Weekly Update, and Surviving Sabotage Situations

Mondays are my weigh-in days. So, for better or for worse, I will give you all a weekly update.


Today I am happy to report a little over a pound lost! I often don't think this means much, but...

One pound of fat.

... it really does. See? So gross, but also encouraging! I can also report that I did in fact work out last week as I had planned. The exercise wasn't as intense as I had hoped, but it still happened, and I'm trying to see that as a success.


I would like to be losing closer to two pounds a week - which would require working out more intensely and cutting a few of those extra calories. Hmm. It is so much harder to do than talk about doing.


So about my weekend. [Weekends are SO HARD for me anyway. Usually, my husband and I get time to rest and veg over the weekend. We get tasks done, too, but mainly we chill. All week long we work and grow increasingly more tired, so we enjoy the weekends of next to nothingness. When I am relaxing like this, it makes me want to eat junk food! Why does lounging around doing nothing somehow mean that I need to add worthless, empty calories to my lethargy??? Boredom, I suppose. That is one of my junk food triggers.] This weekend we had some extra time off to run errands, some of which were up where my husband grew up; a.k.a. we stayed the night with my in-laws.


Don't get me wrong, I love these people dearly, but that kitchen has a Stash of its own. It knows I'm there. It hears me coming. It shows now mercy. Chocolate dipped cookies, tubs of caramel and toffee chocolates from Costco, delicious (and certainly not low fat or sugar free) coffee creamers, and CHOCOLATE CAKE to boot!


SPOILER ALERT: Chocolate is one of my main TRIGGERS! Especially when it is put in the form of moist, gooey, several-layer cake. Muffins, cupcakes, cake pops, chewy cookies - this taste/texture combo almost always gets the better of me. And I can't have just one! That's simply not how The Stash works!


Eggs and sausage for breakfast. I drank three glasses of water in an attempt to fill myself up and thereby eat less food. It sort of worked. (This is a tip I picked up long ago: drink 8 oz of water before a meal, wait 15 minutes, and you'll be more filled and less likely to binge on the meal itself. I didn't wait the 15 minutes.) I also ate an orange and a banana to slow down the oncoming binge. Again, it sort of worked. I ended up eating one each of the Costco goodies, one chocolate covered cookie, too many little smokies (probably 5-7), about two eggs (so hard to measure when there are 20 scrambled eggs in the pan), 2 Morningstar sausage links, and a decadent and deadly slice of chocolate cake. Chocolate is a vegetable, right?


My mother-in-law is one of those women who keeps lots of food stocked up so she can feed the armies that inevitably show up at her house unexpectedly. This is the kind of kitchen/home I hope to have someday. But for now, I need strategies to survive a situation like this that can sabotage my weekly weight loss.


I did track everything I ate (at least what I could remember, i.e. mindless snacking), and I was able to finish out the week without going over my allotted food points. And I did my planned workouts. AND one more little marble went into the Pounds Lost glass this morning (which makes the mirror more bearable). But I need to plan ahead for sabotage situations. And I need to really think hard before I eat a food I know to be a trigger.


Here are some things I've picked up over the years, even if I haven't often used or perfected them (not to mention, I do not have any data or stats to show you, only common experiences and wisdom from others):

• Don't eat yellow snow. You're right, I'm sorry, that was immature. :)
• Drink as much water as you can throughout the day. (I love Sobe Lifewater Zeros and always keep some stocked in the fridge - unless they aren't on sale, so I go with a cheaper, similar brand.)
• Talk through (out loud, and with someone you trust) your plan to get through a sabotage situation.
• Take snacks with you! (I love baby carrots, bananas, grapes, high-protein snack bars, and even Snapea Crisps.)
• When you feel a craving coming on, take the time to figure out if it is emotional or physical. If your body is hungry, drink some water, wait, and if you're still hungry - grab a snack. If your craving is emotional, also drink some water, and maybe send someone a text or call a friend. Even if you don't tell them why, it might distract you long enough to forgo the potential binge.
• Keep small, pre-portioned amounts of your favorite "naughty" foods somewhere in the pantry. Maybe two or three Hershey's Kisses will tide you over. Or perhaps a serving of the salty Snapea Crisps. I personally enjoy Jelly Belly jelly beans (10 for 1 point) and Lindor Truffles (1 for 2 points). Sometimes you need to indulge a little to keep you from indulging a LOT!
• Keep words of encouragement and inspirational images in your bathroom and maybe even in your pantry or on the fridge. Remind yourself regularly why you are doing what you're doing.
• Forgive yourself when you mess up. It's going to happen. Let yourself feel the pain of it for a bit, and then move on! (This is when I tell my husband to just pipe down. :-) I am learning to move on! Okay... not my greatest skill. But I'm working on it!)

So tell me: What are your sabotage situations? What are your triggers? What do you do to battle these?