I love this song by Willie Nelson. I immediately started humming it when I was weighing and measuring for my end of the month reporting on my efforts to lose the lard – except I sang, “Less of me – Why not take less of me?”
I’m finally entering a phase where I can actually see what might be the end of my efforts to LOSE and the beginning of maintenance. I’ve been at this a LONG time and I had honestly begun to doubt my ability to actually achieve my goal.
As of today, I’ve lost almost 67 pounds and 60 inches since my heaviest. Even though Lynn, my much appreciated and much missed massage therapist did what she could to make me taller, it didn’t work. So I’ve continued to eat low carb and exercise more. I’m now finally within sight of my goal to be in the middle to lower end of the healthy range on a BMI chart and to continue my efforts to get more fit and flexible.
I talked to Brian this morning at breakfast. He has been helping and supporting me, but has lately been getting further and further from strict low carb, trying to introduce me to nice food here, plus just pamper me. We have agreed to be stricter about the low carb, and that instead of each of us getting half of whatever we order, I’ll get one-third and he’ll get two-thirds. I would LIKE to get to my goal weight by my next visit to the doctor – in about two months. Brian and I have agreed that I’ll aim to lose 1 kilo a week (or 2.2 pounds.)
I’m walking a mile on the treadmill at the gym each morning and I’m doing yoga stretches (now in the afternoon) as well as 3 new exercises to strengthen my back.
I hope there will be ‘less of me’ at the end of July!
After a year or more of whining/moaning/griping about being in the ‘morbidly obese’ category of the dreaded BMI Chart, I have FINALLY entered a new decade of weight – (this morning) the edge of which is JUST into the “healthy weight” part of the chart.
My goal now is to get into the MIDDLE of the healthy range, or under that enough so that I can walk into a clothing store without worrying if they have ANYTHING large enough for me to wear. I don’t know how much more weight and inches that means, but it feels good to be more within sight of it now.
My combination of mostly eating low carb meals (eating breakfast and dinner with a coffee in-between) and then my exercising with walking a mile on the treadmill at the gym with my son every morning and yoga stretches in the afternoon, plus adventures where we are enjoying walking to and from interesting spots in the city, all seems to be coming together finally.
The clinic doctor, of course, will have the final say. We saw her a month ago for a baseline. She immediately put me on a combination blood pressure drug because I was into stroke territory. She also told me to lose weight (surprise!) and I have lost a bit over 10 lbs (47 kgs) since we saw her. I’m hoping that she will be pleased with my numbers when we see her again Monday afternoon in follow up. I’ll measure at the end of the month to see if I’ve made any progress there.
Brian ordered delivery of some chicken tenders recently to go with the fruit and salad we already had. It came in a box with this message on the lid. I’m not sure if he had ever ordered from this place before. They just take the information from the electronic order and make the experience personal and pleasant.😊
Food is literally everywhere in Thailand. There are small stalls up and down every street, shops everywhere, people cooking on the street, restaurants, etc. Brian is trying to help us get healthier by sticking to a simple low carb diet for us since we are wusses about hot or spicy food, and we’ve had such incredible health problems starting in February when we were still in the states.
We can order almost everything – a whole cut up roasted chicken, slices of pork, salads, eggs and bacon, chicken tenders, soup, and more. Brian orders and pays for it via his phone. A few minutes later, his order has been delivered to the lobby/office/mail area downstairs by Grab (their Uber) and he is notified. He goes down and retrieves it. And the prices are really amazing. My husband and I had chicken, pork, fruit and salad for a total of $6.00 – delivered, within 20 minutes. We created a chef salad recently for the three of us by ordering salad with hard boiled egg and all kinds of other things, plus some chicken strips separately. We cut up the chicken into the salad, divided shares, and dug in. All for a bit over $6 for the three of us.
We are weird here, not liking spicy/hot food, AND we are trying to get healthier, eat low carb, and I’m still trying to lose the lard. We are also walking most days until my husband had his stroke. Now my ‘exercise’ is walking in the hospital to ICU where Harvey is, out to the waiting area when they need us to leave, downstairs for a hot coffee to warm up, as we did for the first time yesterday, etc. We will try for more when life returns to normal.
Happily, just looking on his phone, Brian comes up with a lot of variety for us with different meat, eggs, fruits on the Keto approved list, and salads. We have been delighted with our meals since we came, thanks to him. When we move into our new condo around the end of the month, I will have an extremely small kitchen, augmented by equipment we can get, such as a crockpot, a vous vide (equipment that allows precise cooking on everything known to man, including meat, fish, veggies, etc. in a sealed pouch and water.) I had never heard of this and am eager to try it. We’ll get a hard boiled egg cooker, a hot water pot, and maybe an air fryer. We’ll look at things carefully.
Honestly, as cheap and delicious as whole cooked, cut up chickens, and sliced pork done to perfection are, it’s hard to fight simple continuing to order those. Most people here seem to have one main deep skillet they use to cook lots and lots of things. It’ll be fun.
If you’ve been reading my blog, you know that I whine from time to time that my efforts to lose the lard and get stronger are frustrated.
I’m into a routine now.
I’m eating low carb and monitoring what I’m eating and drinking on MyFitnessPal.com. This is a wonderful site with a free part that allows you to (1) set your goals (2) plan what you’re going to eat and drink ahead of time BEFORE you mess up, and (3) chart your progress with exercising, measurements and weight logs.
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In-between posts on the blog to you, I’m doing short sessions of exercises with 3-pound weights, several reps of lots of different moves – some to the beat of music videos of ladies doing ‘drumming exercises’- and then I go back and write another post. This takes the ‘curse’ off of things for me. I have the weights on my computer counter right next to me, so it’s easy to stop, do a session, and then get back to what I was doing. I end up doing 4 to 5 sessions daily.
The Indian Express
I try to get in a session of “old-lady-yoga-stretches” – 30 to 45 minutes – every afternoon. I do NOT fold myself up into a paper airplane shape and sail across the room. I’m concentrating on relaxing, stretching my poor, aching body as far as I can into each position and breathing into it. I’m making progress because I’m stretching farther and able to relax into it better than I could when I started. I’m getting more flexible, looser, and my balance is improving. I can relax – unless Monster Cat decides to jump onto my feet and bite them.
Getty Images – Health
If the weather permits, I try to take at least a couple of walks around our yard daily. At one point, I decided I would walk down and get our mail every day. Doesn’t sound like much, does it.
Well, we live on top of a ridge line in Arkansas. Our driveway is 650+ feet from the house down to the road that runs in front of our property. It is graveled and STEEP. I tried to do this, but almost fell on my head several times trying to walk down, and then, even stopping several times to bend over and try to catch my breath, it felt like Mt. Everest to this old lady. Once was enough.
Now I walk out to our shop, around it, past our old veggie garden area, back to the house, around it, and do the round again. If the weather is nice, I put my gardening gloves on and carry my pruning shears so I can stop and cut something down while I’m out. (The woods are continually trying to recapture the land we took when we built our home 37 years ago now.)
Deviant Art
Finally, just for giggles, my husband helped me get our old Wii Fit to work again after several years. I stopped using it years ago due to my general laziness and it’s predilection for snark when I got on to measure my weight and when I tried to do the activities. I’m ignoring that and talking back to it now. :0)
I whine because even with watching what I eat like a hawk and pushing myself to move the lard daily, I’m having trouble meeting my current interim goal. I just bobble with 2 to 3 pounds over and over rather than actually meeting my goal and being able to set a new one. It’s aggravating, to say the least.
I guess it’s also character-building, because I AM sticking to my eating and exercise plan and I WILL – EVENTUALLY – reach this interim goal of 45 pounds off from my heaviest. Right now the result is 44 pounds down and almost 44 inches less. I. AM. DETERMINED.
As we get older, we are FINALLY learning how important it is to read the labels on the things we eat and drink. I’m trying to stay low-carb and watch my sodium. My husband is a Type II Diabetic and must watch his sugar (or, more accurately, I’M watching his sugar.)
To this end, I’m embracing products we find that make our lives easier. I’m trying to find substitutes that are healthier as we go.
“Sugar-Free” –
The G. Hughes Smokehouse Sugar-Free BBQ Sauce was a huge find for us. I got two more bottles while we were out today, and discovered that the company also makes sugar-free teriaki sauce, sugar-free stir-fry sauce, and sugar-free honey mustard. I bought all three today to add to our pantry. As we were checking out, the lady at the register told me they also offer Sugar-free Ketchup, so that’s on the list for next time. I also found their website and will go back and see if I’m missing other wonderful things.
Other products we’ve found are Sugar-Free Maple Syrup. My husband is using this in his morning coffee, instead of the two spoonfuls of sugar he has always used. ZERO soft drinks are so much better than the full sugar pop he has always insisted on.
“No Sugar Added” – This is another beautiful phrase, because it allows me to substitute more things my husband has been missing. They are not sugar-free, and you have to read the labels carefully, but there are more and more good products out there. A recent example for us is Marketside No Sugar Added Blueberry Streusel Muffins. These contain 2 grams of sugar per muffin. (The apple fritters my husband was insisting upon were 22 grams per fritter.) I breathed a sigh of relief on the way home from the store today when he told me he had thrown out the last of the fritters today. We bought two containers of the no sugar added muffins today, but I was really trying to keep my lips zipped as much as possible, encouraging, rather than condemning. HOOOORAAAAAAY!
“Low Carb” – this is very important to me. I’m almost to an interim weight loss goal and I’m checking everything I eat and drink, listing all I plan to eat on MyFitnessPal.com before I start the day. You have to be super careful here, though, too. “Low carb” seems to be a relative term. I’ve picked up several things labeled that way, and then read that they’re much too high in carbs for what I’m doing. I also have to really pay attention to the sodium content, as I have blood pressure and water retention considerations.
One place we are really happy with is Stu’s Clean Cookin’. They have a website that lists everything they offer, giving full information on the nutrition content of each frozen meal. They also divide their offerings into categories to make finding things easier, such as low carb. I can go online, read through the offerings, making a list for me, another for my husband before we go to their store. We have our order ready so shopping is quick and easy.
(We made a mistake the last time we were in there. We grabbed some BBQ’d ribs in a big foil package. They were easy to heat up and delicious, but the BBQ sauce obviously wasn’t for us, as our blood sugar numbers were up the next morning. OUR fault, not theirs.)
We’re learning as we go – even though being older than dirt, one would THINK we would have learned before now. We’re tweaking things, learning about new products and new ways to cook things that are healthier and healthier. It feels good that we’re not TOO old to learn how to be as healthy as we can be.
Yes, I’m definitely in celebration mode this morning, “tooting my own horn”, dancing around the room, grinning from ear to ear, dancing with the animals, dancing with my husband (who was very encouraging). I FINALLY REACHED THE 40-POUNDS OFF INTERIM GOAL!!!!!
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WOO HOOOOOO! I’ve been trying to get to this goal for so long that I actually weighed myself several times before I really believed it. :0)
I hauled out my really old NutriSystem weight loss bears so that I could document the GREEN 40-pounds-off bear. (He has “40” embroidered on his chest.) I’ve lost track of how long ago it was that I earned him. The minute I quit eating the prepared NutriSystem meals, though, I began gaining it back. It just wasn’t sustainable for me.
Now I’m eating low carb, plus trying to cut down on salt, plus trying to drink more water, plus trying to exercise on a daily basis. This is something I can stick with and control, tweaking when necessary, reassessing goals as I go.
I’m a little past halfway now, I think to my ultimate goal- again assessing as I go. The overall plan now is to lose another 30 pounds or so and improving my blood work. I have now set my next 5-pound interim goal.
I will set my sights on the next NutriSystem Bear (50-pounds-off) when I reach the next goal.
I’m beginning to feel a bit more confident about my ability to lose some of my lard. This is a BIG thing because I’ve tried lots of different things to no avail. I’m following a low carb eating plan now, cutting WAAAAAY down on salt, as well, plus am trying to move more.
To date, I’ve lost 29.6 pounds and 28 inches since my heaviest.
I’m using MyFitnessPal.com to log what I’m planning to eat and drink each day so that I can make adjustments BEFORE it’s too late. I’m making substitutions, finding alternatives for things I miss the most, like bread. I’ve found Zero Net Carb Mission Tortillas. (Each has 7 carbs, but also 7 grams of fiber, which, since fiber can’t be digested, offsets the carbs, resulting in zero net carbs.) I was used to eating one dinner roll with dinner, we ate sandwiches for lunch, etc. Now I can use these, instead, and not feel guilty. I fixed grilled turkey and cheese sandwiches last night, for example, using bread for my husband and tortillas for me. :0)
I have found that if my total on MyFitnessPal says, “It’s likely you’re not eating enough,” I tend to lose a bit of weight. For me, this works, so I plan to continue. I’m eating so that I’m not hungry. If I am, I eat a snack, so I’m not feeling deprived. I have tried to lose the lard for many years now, so this slow, steady loss is really gratifying.
I’m down 21.6 pounds since my heaviest. One day at a time.
I’m going to get a spaghetti squash today to bake so that I can make the third in my trifecta of substitutes for the ‘white stuff’ I love to serve under sauces – “cauli-rice,” “zoodles,” and “spaghetti squash.” When I finish the prep today, I’ll have a supply of each frozen in individual portions so that I can follow my low carb eating plan while my husband eats whatever pasta and white rice. He has looked quite appalled at my idea that he join me in the change, so this way we can both eat “spaghetti,” for example, with smiles on our faces.
I’ve also discovered Mission Zero Carb Tortillas. They actually have 7 carbs per tortilla, but 7 grams of fiber, so “0” net carbs. I can enjoy one each evening in place of the dinner roll I’ve been eating. Tonight I’m making a large tuna fish salad for our dinner.
I’m happy with progress with my yoga practice. Today is Day 21 of every-afternoon practice. I’m up to 20 reps on my abdominal exercise (started at 5), and 7 reps on each side of my leg lifts (bird dog pose) (started with 3). I’m feeling looser. I won’t say I look forward to my exercise session, but I’m getting ‘used-to-it.’ :0)
I’m hoping I can keep my head on straight with my mouth shut regarding eating or drinking what I shouldn’t so I can continue losing the lard and getting stronger, more flexible, with better balance.
Since not many folks feel as I do about February and I did NOT receive a gazallion signatures on my petition to do away with the month, I’ve decided to quit whining about it. You’re welcome. :0)
I’m seeing signs of spring in our yard and it makes me smile to go outside, though it’s still a bit too brisk to stay out there long. My daffodils are nodding happily, forsythia is starting to shoot forth yellow blooms, my iris are shooting their spears up, and our tulip tree is starting to bloom. NICE!
This is my desk calendar for February. As you can see, I got serious about my yoga practice on the 18th. I finished the month in fine style, earning 12 stars for the month. Hopefully I can earn 31 stars for March, building to a habit of yoga each afternoon.
vladimircech-Freepik.com
On my efforts to lose the lard, I reached my 20 pounds off goal. I’m planning to set new goals in 5-pound-increments, since they seem more attainable than the entire amount of lard I would like to lose. I’m trying to eat low carb. I’m eating cauli-rice instead of rice, zoodles instead of spaghetti, no pasta, a low carb tortilla instead of bread (though I haven’t tried them yet), careful choices on very little fruit, as little sugar as possible, cutting down on salt, lots of low carb veggies.
Cooking for us is a bit of a challenge, but so far, it’s going well. My husband has no interest in low carb. He has no interest in low sugar, either, but I’m adamant about him watching that. I’m hoping that by the end of March, I’ll be making good progress in my diet and exercise, moving more, feeling pretty good for an old broad. :0)
My husband is having trouble with his computer. I’m typing for him as he chats with various Microsoft techs. It’s tedious, but doable. Once this is over, I hope to get up to my art room.
Good morning! It’s sunny outside and 34 degrees F. right now. It was 80 yesterday afternoon. This afternoon’s high is forecast to be 51. What a difference a night makes. We avoided the severe weather threat, and for that I’m very thankful. The wind blew and ‘gusted,’ but that was it. HOORAAAAAY!
Bill Oxford-Getty Images-istockphoto
Our bug spray guy came just as we were getting things together for lunch. He sprayed inside and out, for everything including elephants, so we should be in good shape now. I really don’t like to have scary things crawling around or flying around inside the house, if possible.
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Even though MyFitnessPal said “You are not likely eating enough” and I was careful, apparently I also ate lead or something that made me retain water. I was up almost a pound this morning. I realize that weight can fluctuate for many reasons and that I shouldn’t be upset – and probably shouldn’t be weighing myself every day – but this is working for me and keeping me on track and motivated. I just gnashed my teeth, stuck my tongue out at the scales as it laughed at me, and will do my best to stay on track today.
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I HAVE to train myself to read labels at the grocery store before buying anything. That will drive my husband nuts – but I’ll just tell him it’s necessary, and that he can stay home if he wants to. I pulled out a frozen dinner to eat this evening, since I’ve been cooking a lot lately. It’s ‘high protein’ and I assumed low carb since it’s Lean Cuisine. NOOOOOO! It’s 38 carbs! I’m trying to stick to around 20 carbs per day, so this one meal is almost two days’ worth! ARRRRRRGH! Needless to say, I won’t be eating that tonight.
I will drive down to the bottom of our driveway soon to get our mail and check to see if our trash can is empty. I checked it at 4pm yesterday and it was still full. I’ll call the company either way. When we started with them, the paperwork said they might have someone picking it up at 4am the pickup day, so to have the trash out there and ready. We started putting it out mid day Monday for Tuesday pickup. The last few weeks, we’ve tried to stop, either going or coming back from errands, to put the can away, but it’s still full. I’ll see if I can find out what’s going on, or maybe they just missed us this week. Such a TERRIBLE problem, right? :0)
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I’ll be earning my third sparkly star for the week today for yoga practice. I’m TRYING to make this a habit, but learned last year that I defy the odds on making something become a habit. The sparkly star on the calendar right now is enough to keep me going. Maybe I’ll become more of an adult later…
I’m seeing a bit of progress in my efforts to get my act together. In my yoga yesterday, I was able to do 10 reps of my abdominal exercise (started with 5), and will earn star #6 on my week’s calendar on daily practice. (It felt really good just now to replace the words, “try for” with “EARN”.)
Second, I’m getting a good start on limiting my carbs. I’ve lost 2 lbs since I got serious, using MyFitnessPal.com to work out what I’ll eat for the day. I really like this website. I can type in the name of a frozen dinner, for example, such as Lean Cuisine Herb Roasted Chicken, and it has an extensive data base of foods, added to by their membership, so it’s easy to list and find out where it fits in my plan for the day. They have a place where you can list your own recipes and store them. I can ‘play’ with options for each meal, plus snacks, and see before I screw up how it will work, or if I need to choose something else. Really helpful website if you’re trying to lose weight or just make sure that you’re eating the right foods for a health condition, etc.
I made ‘zoodles’ yesterday. This is a staple for low carb foodies, zucchini taking the place of spaghetti and other pastas.
This is my spiralizer. You cut off one end of the zucchini, put it in the “thick” or “thin” end of the spiralizer, then twist the zucchini. Long ‘ribbons’ of zucchini are formed. The end you see to the right is used when the zucchini is too short to hold, but still has some good ribbons left to make.
I can make my own low carb spaghetti sauce, for example, make some spaghetti for my husband, and heat up a serving of zoodles for me, making both of us happy. One zucchini made three 1-cup servings for me. I froze two of them, eating one last night. Today I’ll make some cauli-rice, a substitute for regular rice. These two things are wonderful for me. They taste fine (although I do miss the real things), allowing my husband and me to eat basically the same dinner, making him happy and taking any guilt away from me, allowing me to stay on my low-carb regimen.
SO – feeling as if I’m making a bit of progress, I will continue ‘onward and downward’ hopefully, with more flexibility and a stronger, flatter abdomen. :0)
I have read and poured over various lists of foods to include in our diet for our various ‘conditions/problems/concerns’ – trying to come up with a master list. I’ve tried and tried and finally officially give up.
The eating regimen that is closest to what my husband and I need is low-carb, so that’s what I’m concentrating on, starting tomorrow. There is only so far my husband is willing to go – and there are definitely two strong personalities and likes and dislikes to consider here.
One of my favorite low-carb recipe books is Simply Keto by Suzanne Ryan. She provides delicious recipes we both like without a lot of hard-to-find ingredients and without a lot of spices we can’t tolerate. I also like the fact that I can cook once and have enough for at least one more meal, if not more. I can freeze the leftovers into individual containers we can nuke, serve with a side veggie, and enjoy.
Tomorrow I’ll cook her “Sausage, Egg, and Cheese Breakfast Bake.” We like it for dinner with a side veggie or salad. I’ll also get supplies for her ‘Keto Chili.’
I’ll intersperse cooked meals with the ones we’ve been buying from Real Food and Stu’s Clean Cookin’.
I’ve lost a couple of pounds in the last few days, so I’m hoping that this further modification will result in scales that quit laughing and smirking at me.
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