Kestrel Grey

From everything that I've read, there is usually a struggle week either around week 4 or 7. Things should get smoother again. Don't give up!

If anything I've figured out might help you, I'm happy to share. What seems to work for me: 1. Eating every 4 hours and making sure there is some carb, fibre, and protein in each meal. The carbs and frequent meals seem important for my mood, and the protein and fiber keeps me satisfied. 2. I've used MFP in the past so I know which meals are low calorie. Breakfast especially I can save calories on easily and without getting hungrier later. 3. Finally I have to recognize when I'm snackish for reasons other than hunger and find something else to satisfy that need. The things that can derail me are: 1. Any change to my schedule. Once I get off my 4 hour intervals I end up snacking or hungry for the rest of the day. 2. Being on the road for errands or work. I end up getting calorie dense drinks (habit because I want the treat in exchange for having to be out), snacks, and random cafe meals. 3. Staying up late. It makes me tired in the mornings and I don't do the necessary meal prep. When I'm hungry, food has to be ready or I'll have snack foods.

These weekly mini challenges are too much of a distraction for my fragile food habits. 😆 I am gaining weight because I do silly things like prioritize eating massive amounts of veggies over eating balanced meals then end up ravenously binging at midnight, or spend three days baking healthy versions of treats (and eating all of it) instead of just accepting the one small unhealthy dish. (I am laughing about it now, but there were depressed frustrated tears this morning. As of today I have gained back 100% of what I spent the first 5 weeks losing.) This isn't actually anything to do with the weekly challenges. It's just that my grip on eating for weight loss is so tenuous that any change destroys it and I gain back so quickly that trying seems pointless. Okay, maybe I am still more sad/frustrated than laughing.

Is 100g about a cup of veggies/1 piece of fruit? I don't use a kitchen scale.

@pureleeawesome I have to confess that I also made the grape cake, but not the healthy version. Your post got me interested and then I found a semi sweet one with orange zest... delightful.

I made the mooncakes! Without the duck egg yolk in the middle of a random one (it's a lottery when you eat them) because that's just gross. I made both lotus seed paste and red bean paste from scratch so it could be lower sugar and preservative free and they are fantastic. I may have eaten them for lunch both days...

The torta bertolini looks intriguing.

This Friday is the lunar new year. If we are making healthy celebration treats, I'd really like to try making a healthy red bean cake.

As expected, up 0.9 lbs from last week. I'm too worn out to care though and hopefully by time I start caring again, my weight will be moving downward again. Next week will be mostly back to my work routine and that helps anchor good habits. Outside is blimey-george cold though, so Beat Saber might be the only exercise I get for now.

I know that I've regained this week and I'm hoping that it isn't more than a week's worth of damage. There were a couple days with lots of driving for work, and a change in my waking hours, and that seemed to destroy all healthy eating for a while.

Yes I need some carbs with breakfast and lunch. Dinner doesn't matter as much since I'm going to sleep in a bit anyway. But I actually take dopamine each morning in winter, otherwise I literally don't have the energy to get out of bed. (Welbutrin, a dopamine reuptake inhibitor)

Down 0.7 lbs this week. I am both gratified to be losing at all, and frustrated that it is taking so long. There aren't any noticeable body changes with a total of 2.4 lbs lost.

Nice work! Post away if you like. We usually stick photos in spoilers in cases where they would raise eyebrows if you're reading the thread at work.

Check-in This evening I took measurements of my flexy status. My forward fold is 4.5 inches above the middle of my kneecaps (with straight back/shoulders back). There is no improvement here because I haven't been working on it. The previous measurement of 6 inches was a guess. My toe-to-foot angle is 70 on the left and a smidge over 90 on the right. The left toe is improving a little maybe? I do stretch it throughout most days.

Thank you. That is much more clear than the hour long discourse from my husband with many graphs and equations and words that I didn't understand. (He's a trader and tried to bring me up to his level of understanding...)

It's okay! I understand about the struggle to not make things more important than they really are. You know that if you don't lose weight this week, you can adjust your plan/go back to what you were doing last week. It's not a big deal and most of us have wobble weeks. But when we tell ourselves what success is supposed to look like we panic if we aren't matching that vision. The "pound a week" is just a guideline!

The running sites suggested manually pulling up on it to loosen, then moving in and out of plank position to press on your toes. If that doesn't help, I can ask my osteopath to loosen it up when we are allowed to restart sessions.

Yes up! Though the sideways thing isn't as unlikely as it sounds. I can bend my outer two fingers at 90 degrees sideways, flat against the base of my other fingers. Freaked out quite a few people by making it look like I snapped off my pinkie, and can make some cool looking finger knots. 🤣

Interesting! I'm a biochemistry major but that was a long time ago, if I learned this I'd forgotten.

Most of you have had about two weeks in this challenge. How is it going for you?

Jumping in late! Flexibility is always a goal but something I always forget to work on after about two days. Currently my two targets are 1) to be able to comfortably sit on the ground with my legs and back straight. I have a very bendy lower back that masks my completely inflexible hamstring/calf. With curving my back I can easily put my hands on the floor, without I'm about 6" above my knee. 2) to get my left big toe to 90 degrees. It's pretty stiff, whereas my right one is flexible. It leads to imbalance in my running stride and is an injury risk.

I'm down 0.9 lbs this week, for 1.7 lbs so far. The change this past week was avoiding sugar (cutting out most snacking and upgrading my breakfast from granola with yogurt to fruit/oatmeal with yogurt). I'm surprised and pleased that it made a difference because I'm not specifically calorie restricting. We'll see how next week goes. I had to add my afternoon snack back in to keep my mood from tanking, but keeping it healthy. You know, just between the granola and the Clif bars, that might be most of my weight gain over the past year.

Salty foods like pizza cause me to gain water weight for a day or two. Oddly, so do anti inflammatories. If I take an advil or Tylenol I'll be up by a pound the following day. As @Rurik Harrgathsaid, don't put too much stock in one day's weight.

Starting a no-sugar plan today and probably for the remainder of this challenge, at least. It does seem reasonable that cutting out sugar will help with the depressive episodes... I think... actually I had better not think that through or I will end up convincing myself of the opposite. Either way it is good for me and should help with hitting the weight loss goals. Party pooper.

Down 0.8 lbs this week after losing nothing the first week. I still need to figure out that mid-afternoon crash, but otherwise I'm happy with some progress. And without resorting to calorie counting just yet.