I’m on Weight Watchers, following the Core plan this time. In the Core plan, you only have to count “points” that are outside the Core food list. Most of the things on the Core list are: whole fruits and veggies (not dried or juice), fat-free dairy products, soy dairy, lean meats, and whole grains. And by whole grains, I mean I have bags of barley in my cupboard now. Whole wheat pasta once a day (maximum), and brown rice once a day (no white rice). No added sugar on anything. I get 35 “Flex” points each week, which I can use on whatever foods I want to eat.
No bread. I love bread. No real cheese, either. Those who know me know my preferred diet is cheese melted onto bread in some combination or another.
I’ve been on this kind of diet before and I know it’s not sustainable in the long-term, at least not for me, but it does help me lose weight, and with Weight Watchers I can switch to the other plan when I get fatigued with this one.
The only thing that helps on the Core plan is that John is also on a health food kick, so while there are things on my Core diet that aren’t on his (he counts artificial additives and “bad foods” like high fructose corn syrup for his “points”), and there are things on his plan that aren’t on mine (like regular mayonnaise), we overlap enough to eat three square meals a day.
Breakfasts are actually the easiest meal of the day. We have many choices, between eggs, organic cereal, bananas or other fruit, yogurt, fat free milk, and oatmeal. And coffee. I would be devastated without coffee. It helps that my coffee preferences are either black coffee with nothing in it but coffee, and non-fat lattes, both of which are on Core.
This morning, I chose to mix things up a bit. We have some new bread in the house– super-dense whole grain bread from Germany. We got it at Cost Plus World Market. It’s one point per slice, and each slice is about the same dimensions as a normal, albeit small, piece of other bread. Most bread is 1-2 points per slice, so when you make a sandwich, you’re eating 4 points, right there, without anything extra in the mix. If I spread out my points evenly throughout the week, I get 5 points a day, so a sandwich is a big deal.
This morning, John had his healthy 9-grain bread with non-hydrogenated organic margerine, organic blackberry jam, orange juice, and a scrambled (organic) egg. His points: 0. If I had eaten that, it would have cost me 6 or 7 points. I have 35 each week, and I’ve used 33 for this week (my week re-starts at 6 tonight).
I, on the other hand, had a “Healthy McMuffin” with the whole grain bread, scrambled eggs, soy cheese (“American cheese flavored slices”), and Canadian bacon. To drink, I had fat free milk and coffee. My Core points cost: 1 point.
My breakfast would have been better without the cheese, in my opinion. On the other hand, I have now discovered where McDonald’s gets theirs, because it had the same stale-plastic flavor as a McDonald’s Egg McMuffin. If John had eaten my breakfast, it would have also cost him 0 points.
Breakfasts are easy. Lunches are really hard– I often want a sandwich, and spending 35 minutes boiling bulgar over the stove is not my favorite activity. Nonetheless, I do it if I must, because in two weeks I think I’ve lost a little over 5 lbs. (I weigh in today and will know then the precise amount).
Incidentally, I’ve been on this diet for 2 weeks. Last night, I dreamed I was eating a pizza. And I didn’t even realize it. I kept thinking that I was doing well on the diet, but my brain was blocking out the fact that I was munching on this big, greasy pizza the whole time. I didn’t even understand when people said I should count the points, because I didn’t think I’d eaten anything off Core.
That’s one of my biggest fears in dieting. I’m an unconscious eater. I’ll eat without thinking about it, without hardly tasting my food. I can’t help it– I even go on “benders” where I’ll spend 3 or 4 months eating very rich and fatty foods. I have no balance when it comes to food, taste, and nutrition. I am trying– it’s a lifelong struggle at this point. But the fact is, I’m genetically predisposed to being fat, and my whole life I have used food as a means for comfort. It’s not even that I’m particularly unhappy in my life or unfulfilled. People always say “look and see what you’re really hungry for.” Well, that’s not really the case, here. You wouldn’t tell an alcoholic to “just go figure out what makes you drink.” Addicts don’t need a reason– they’re addicts.
I hate being a food addict. I hate being fat, but I hate even more the fact that, when I’m thin, I censure fat people, something I despise in myself.
Here is what I would love to do, but can’t do for a living: I would love to make camping clothes and equipment for fat people. I don’t know what I’d call it, but we short fat chicks need good sleeping bags that don’t make us feel like sausages. We need camping pants that are lightweight but fit. We need backpacks with hip belts that actually go all the way around comfortably. We tend to have bad backs, so we need to have everything be ultra-lightweight so we can carry it all. We need camping and backpacking food that is healthy and not super-caloric, because on an overnight camping trip, we don’t actually need an extra 600 calories to make up for the calories we’ve burned while hiking. We need hiking poles that can withstand over 220 lbs. of weight put on them. Hammocks that can hold our weight without collapsing. We need hiking shoes that fit and can hold up to the extra 20-100 lbs. that we’re carrying around. Basically, we need a system that fits into the “hiking for weight loss” philosophy.
17 Comments
I’m bad enough about counting points.
I totally understand what you mean about being a food addict. As soon as I’m in pain or depressed, I reach for comfort food. Anything with fat or sugar in it. Especially chocolate. I’ve read books that compare it to alcoholism, just like you do. It’s a brain chemistry thing. And my brain chemistry is very screwed up.
So I identify with your battle. Good luck.
Been paying a lot of attention recently to my eating habits. They suck. MAJORLY. I’m thinking that when I move out I’m either going to do something like Seattle Sutton (which maybe you suggested?) or stock my kitchen with very little other than Weight Watchers or South Beach Diet prepackaged foods. The less I have temptation around the better off I am.
Anyway, I congratulate you on the job you are doing keeping yourself healthy.
I think you have a business plan. And very good luck with the diet.
Sounds like you have a potentially second business brewing.
Wow, I could totally have written this myself. I do the fatty-food months-long binge too, and it IS a form of addiction. I quit smoking after 13 years but I just can’t quit my eating habits. Still doesn’t keep me from trying though.
I’m on Core right now too – just got back on actually, after a few months of doing nothing and watching 10 pounds creep back on. I actually find that Core is a lot easier to stick with long-term than counting points for every single thing, and also that I can slip up now and then and still see decent results. One thing I also noticed, when I was on last time, was that it gave me a ton more energy and directly contributed to my two blazing (for me) half-marathon finishes last fall….
Good luck. Hope you find the “tweaks” to the program that make it liveable for you. And I’m with you, on the need for hiking/camping/general athletic equipment for bigger girls!!!
And I was just thinking in the shower the other day that I want to start a league of sports teams just for fat chicks. We’d play just as hard as any other kind of team, but you would rotate your players a little more often so that nobody’s on the playing field as long. And training would look a little different too.
I just think it would be fun.
Just out of curiousity, what do you mean when you say you “censure fat people” when you’re thin?
For myself, my biggest struggle is just getting exercise. I am the kind of person who eats just a little more than I need every day, but it slowly adds up. If I could just get myself back into the habit of daily exercise, I could get back down to a weight at which I am happy (when I was in the Army, I was around 175, which was fat by Army standards, but was perfectly fine by my own). The irony is that I now live walking distance to work, but it has primarily translated into more sleeptime and more hanging around the house time with Laura instead of making the 20 minute commute.
Curious, how much exercise do you regularly get? I remember a story about a guy who wanted to donate his kidney to his daughter, but he had to lose weight first. He started by walking around his block daily (which wiped him out), and slowly got to the point where he was walking 3-4 miles a day. He was able to donate the kidney, and realized that his exercising had helped him more than any diet ever had.
When I’m thin and I see someone who is fat, I get awfully high and mighty about it, and have exactly the same reaction to them that I know people have to me– to view them somehow as inferior in moral fiber somehow, because they’re fat. I even do it now, with people who are fatter than I am. It’s wrong, because I know there are tons of reasons for fat, but I do it anyway, and I hate that about myself.
Exercise: I don’t much. It’s very hard at my weight to exercise in a healthy way without injury or pain. We had to call off our backpacking trip last weekend because my hip started hurting and my knee spasmed. John and I take a walk about once a week– not enough, but it’s something. When I drop about 15-20 lbs., it becomes a whole lot easier and more comfortable to workout. Getting those first 15-20 lbs. off, however, is a challenge, especially when I’m not really getting much exercise.
Hahahaha– that would be great!
And the hiking clothes should be affordable, because a lot of the people who buy them will be planning on changing sizes. Maybe there could be a secondhand or trade-in market.
The clothing selection in running stores seems to go up to about size 10, and that’s it. They’re missing out on business from LOTS of the runners and walkers who go there for shoes.
Maybe it could be a rental/rent-to-buy program, where you can rent the clothes for 2-3 months at a time and, if you changed sizes, exchange them for the next size down. You’d always get “hand me downs” but there’d be no penalty for returning clothes that were worn out, and the cost of the clothes would be spread out over several users.
The big thing with that would be the cleaning process in between users; sometimes there’s no amount of washing that can get out sweat stains/smell.
The problem with the pre-packaged foods is that they’ve replaced calories with chemicals. Here are the big bad things that are in nearly every processed food:
Partially hydrogenated oils – hugely bad for those with sensitive cholesterol
High fructose corn syrup -A cheap supersugar that hits your glycemic index hard but doesn’t make you feel full. In order to reduce the amount of fat shown on the label, companies use HFCS to boost flavor.
MSG – almost never explicitly named in the label, this is found in “natural flavoring” as well as “artificial flavoring” and is an “excitotoxin.” It does what salt does, but without adding sodium to the label. Unfortunately, it’s also a poison that slowly destroys the nervous system.
The problem with these is not that they’re bad for you, but also that they’re so common, they’ve led to addiction. Chances are if you have a food craving for a very specific food (like a particular brand of cookie or salty snack), it has MSG or HFCS in it. They’re also various ways to make food not really food.
Aspartame (Nutrasweet) and Stevia (which are basically the same thing, no matter what Stevia brand wants to say) are artificial sugar replacements. They are also toxins. Aspartame has been loosely linked to an increase in diabetes.
John and I have been avoiding these items in our food for about 3 weeks now. I still have a few of them sometimes, but for the most part we’re eating healthier, mostly organic foods, especially a lot of whole grains and fruits/veggies. Even our camping food is organic, from Mary Jane’s farm. I can’t say I’ve noticed a big difference in taste yet, but I feel a bit healthier overall, which is an improvement.
Man, eating healthfully is complicated. Is organic food more expensive?
MUCH. On the other hand, you don’t need to eat as much of it, bulk-wise, because it has more nutrition, and it often has a “heartier” feelin to it (fuller feeling, less food).
I think I will have to look into this. I think I eat more partially because I’m not as satisfied with the eating experience as a whole, rather than anything else; I eat and then I go, did I eat that? I didn’t taste it. I also need to eat more slowly.
I think that you have a great idea for a business there! That would RULE. How are heavy folks supposed to get into these activities if they can’t get into the clothes or use the equipment? AWESOME idea. You could make a jillion bucks, I bet.
And I hear you about hating to diet long term and struggling to lose weight. I dieted off and on from junior high (when I first joined weight watchers) up through … college or so. It took getting a huge-ass cyst in my gut (which pressed on my stomach) and major stress (grad school nearly gave me an ulcer) to get me down to a “normal” weight. Somehow dieting just doesn’t work – I lose the weight so slowly no matter how hard I try that eventually I just give up.
Interesting note on the views of other people. I’ll admit, when I see someone who is morbidly obese, I do feel some disgust, though for the most part I just pity them. It also tends to steel my own determination never to look like that.
As for the exercise, it is a matter of degrees. To be perfectly honest, I was surprised when you said you were going for a backpacking weekend. That is not an inconsequential amount of exercise, and a two hour hike with a pack will wear you out pretty darn quick (as you discovered). With your experience with TNT, you’ve done serious endurance stuff in the past, but when talking about regular exercise, start small. Walk to the end of the road (to the fire station, for example) and back one day, then the next day go a little farther, so you gradually increase your level of exercise. Binge exercising can screw you up just as much as binge eating.
I truly wish you the best of luck with this endevour. I’d love to see you happy with your whole self.
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