Stealthstitcher Goes Tracking

[stealthstitcher]

Starting off the challenge by going straight into show week - and not just a show, but the Big Musical. So I won't be posting anything most of the week. However, rest assured, I am working on an epic plan.

During the last week, I started by tracking food on myfitnesspal, which I had heard of but never used. Quite surprising results. I wasn't shocked at how many calories I was eating on a day when I went out to eat or binged on ice cream. I was, however, quite surprised by how many calories I ate on a "good" day. Seriously, I'd eat what I considered reasonable, healthy meals with no junk food snacking, and I was at like 2600 calories! On a day when I figured I was doing pretty well! The problem foods putting me over the top, unsurprisingly, were cheese, peanut butter, and dark chocolate. It's really easy to start slacking and say "I can have a little cheese, cheese isn't bad for you" and then use two cups of cheese in a day ... Astonishing that even when you know about portion sizes and measuring, you can fool yourself into thinking a cup of something looks like a quarter cup. Or "I only had a little chocolate, like three pieces ... or ten ... one of those numbers ..."

So for the first week, the goals are to:

1. Not die (go to bed when I get home, sleep is not only important but at a premium during show week)

2. Continue tracking food, with a sub goal of keeping it under 1600 calories a day. Shouldn't be hard, as I already have all my meals for the week planned and packed, as long as I avoid junk food snacks. 

And then return next week to expand upon the new plan. 

[Sylvaa]

Oh my goodness, isn't it crazy that when you start tracking, you are eating so much more than you realize?! 

 

Good luck this week! 

[Dagger]

Break a leg!

[Swinging_Jarnbjorn]

Beginning to track is a huge step, and a huge win! Break a leg! See you when you get back to build on this solid foundation.

[stealthstitcher]

Hey, I have a break for a few minutes! 

So far, the week has been quite successful. I've gone straight to bed every night and while I did not stay under 1600 calories every day, I did track what I ate and stayed under 1700 calories every day, which seems pretty good considering I was averaging more like 2800 calories a day or so before this week. So far, it hasn't really been that hard. I have noticed, however, that sometimes I get slightly anxious when I feel hungry. Once I notice it, I can tell myself you should feel hungry; you haven't eaten in four hours, feeling hungry when it's time for a meal is normal and healthy. Then it's fine. But I find it interesting that I have that response at all. It's pretty slight - just a sort of "Oh no, I feel hungry, I need to do something about that right away!" I guess I've just been training my body that it should feel full pretty much all the time. 

I know I'm only four days in - but I feel like this will be sustainable, unlike things I've tried to do in the past. There's also a certain game component in figuring out what to eat in order to feel full, get good nutrition, and stay under the number. I really need to do something sustainable and long term - kind of scared myself when I finally got a new battery for my scale (after three months) and saw where I was.

 

Amusing yet face-palming story - my parents have started carb counting in an effort to get my dad's blood sugar to settle down. It's been working well for them- he's actually managed to get off insulin and go back to just medication for diabetes. However, my parents are not the most veggie-friendly folks. 

Mom: We're trying to eat a vegetable every day, but I just hate wasting my carbs on vegetables. 

Me: 

[Sylvaa]

11 hours ago, stealthstitcher said:

Amusing yet face-palming story - my parents have started carb counting in an effort to get my dad's blood sugar to settle down. It's been working well for them- he's actually managed to get off insulin and go back to just medication for diabetes. However, my parents are not the most veggie-friendly folks. 

Mom: We're trying to eat a vegetable every day, but I just hate wasting my carbs on vegetables. 

Me: 

 

This is the most amazingly wonderful story ever. Thank you! 

[MichiruSedai]

OMG I hear you on cheese. I mean, I live in the land of cheese.  We love cheese so much, we wear hats made of mock cheese on a regular basis.  And now I barely ever eat it, which still makes me sad. But when I look at it as "My burger is already 240 calories, it would be 100 for cheese, 120 for a bun... yeah ok, it's diced burger on a bed of spinach again haha). 

 

My babbling about cheese aside (seriously I could eat it all day every day), I concur, it's super crazy when you start tracking and see how much calories are in things!  I still occasionally get shocked when looking up something that used to be a normal meal or snack for myself and see "Oh, so just what I was eating for dinner once a week was 1500 calories, and it sure wasn't the only thing I ate that day).   Food tracking FTW!

[stealthstitcher]

4 hours ago, MichiruSedai said:

My babbling about cheese aside (seriously I could eat it all day every day), I concur, it's super crazy when you start tracking and see how much calories are in things!  

Right? A friend came to see the show last night and brought fancy donuts. If I have one weakness (I don't, I have lots, but if I had only one) it would be donuts. Like if I was a supervillain and the hero came to defeat me and brought donuts, I'd say "Eh, world conquest sounds like too much work anyway." and would surrender immediately. But 420 calories for ONE donut? I'd have to skip supper entirely and it's just not worth that. Not saying I'll never eat a donut again, but at this point, no. Then my friend felt bad for bringing them when I said no thanks ... 

Still managing to stick to goals for the week. I've gone over 1600 calories twice, but stayed under 1700 both times. Right now I'm not dealing with any intense cravings or bad moods, so it's mostly just a matter of paying attention to what I'm doing.

My plan for the long term right now is to either add, remove, or modify one thing every week and then maintain that thing unless/until I decide to modify it. During extra busy weeks, I'll work on just maintaining. I have a plan laid out for the next 9 weeks of what specifically I want to do, but will try to be mentally flexible enough that if it doesn't quite work I won't say "Failure!" and quit entirely. The goal is to gradually build a routine of diet and exercise and habits that will take me where I want to go, that will still have room to flex and evolve for the long term. 

[Dagger]

5 hours ago, stealthstitcher said:

The goal is to gradually build a routine of diet and exercise and habits that will take me where I want to go, that will still have room to flex and evolve for the long term. 

*like*

[Loveable_Bouncer]

Also like for the gradual goals!

 

And after finally getting to understand what it's like with a busy/chaotic lifestyle I'm impressed by your ability on calorie counting. And awesome for saying no to the "fancy" of donuts. That's impressive. 

 

And understand the cheese dilemma. I personally have gone into the fun of "how much cheese to make whatever I eat edible" (cheese I found out helps keep my meal planning pains down... lovely addictive stuff). In the end though see where all the calories come from can be interesting if able to go into analytic point of view... Give you luck, and hope the show week is ending greatly!

[stealthstitcher]

18 hours ago, Bouncer the Resilient said:

 I personally have gone into the fun of "how much cheese to make whatever I eat edible" 

Truth. Sometimes, cheese is the difference between "nope, can't eat this" and "yeah, I guess I can try it". 

 

Yesterday was interesting ... a friend from church put together a ladies' outing and asked me to come. I was for some reason feeling somewhat social, and also she's been wanting to do this forever. It was actually pretty enjoyable but the food was hands down the most intensely mediocre food I've ever had. Not bad. Definitely not good. Just profoundly, overwhelmingly mediocre. It was wasn't just me and my fajita salad, either - everybody's food was "Well ... that was ... edible." I was almost impressed by the level of mediocrity. Usually food veers down into bad instead of just getting more and more mediocre. Kind of annoying to go to a restaurant and get something I could make 20 times better at home. 

 

I'm adding two goals this week, since they're small. I walk my dog every morning, but sometimes it's a quick walk around a block or two. Goal 1 is to walk for 30 minutes.

Goal 2 is to do a hip/ankle mobility, calf/hamstring flexibility routine every day. And since the theme is tracking, I'll start and end the week by measuring how close I can get to reaching my toes and how deep a squat I can do with my heels on the floor. 

[Loveable_Bouncer]

8 minutes ago, stealthstitcher said:

Goal 2 is to do a hip/ankle mobility, calf/hamstring flexibility routine every day. And since the theme is tracking, I'll start and end the week by measuring how close I can get to reaching my toes and how deep a squat I can do with my heels on the floor. 

 

What routine are you looking into doing? I personally have been making it a goal at my job to try to squat more instead of bend over... I can barely "power curtsey" without my heels in the air it seems. 

 

Ugh mediocre food... At least you have one place you will be suggesting to avoid for now! At least the social was good!

[stealthstitcher]

I've put together my own routine from bits and pieces of others. I wanted to find some kind of "exactly perfect mobility routine that is just right in every way and already assembled by someone else" but I'm not finding that. Every routine seems to have either an exercise I absolutely can't do at this point, or is redundant, or requires equipment I don't have. I wanted a short, simple routine for hips, ankles, calves, and hamstrings so I'm doing standing calf stretches (two kinds, these also work ankle mobility a bit), butterfly stretch, spiderman stretch, staff pose, and then just a squat sit. I feel like I'm missing something ... maybe something more ankle specific? And I'm doing some foam rolling type things with a tennis ball because I don't have a foam roller. 

 

All goals met yesterday - today is still in progress. 

[Loveable_Bouncer]

Ah of course personally finding out of stretches that work. Kind of like I've been doing with my upper body, just need to actually add in the lower body... Thanks sharing, reminds me on why I view exercise the way I do sometimes. 

 

Hope the week is still going strong!

[stealthstitcher]

Not my strongest week so far. I think it's because I had a show on the weekend and also a friend crashing on my couch, so I didn't do any prep or planning for this week. I hate the way that knocks me out so that I can't seem to get back on my feet till the next week. I also had to work some evenings, which doesn't help with the staggering downhill trying not to fall feeling.

Walking a half hour, 5/5. Amusingly, the princess puppy is not pleased. She likes her walk, yes, but she wants a sedate jaunt around the block. She is not excited for a longer walk. She's not limping or panting or worn out or anything. She just doesn't like it. Maybe it's the fact that we're not doing our usual route and she's a creature of habit.

 Mobility exercises, 3/5. Not great but not terrible.

Under calories, 1/5 (but it will be 2/5 if I do well today). I'm going over 1600 but still staying under 1700. So it's not like I'm doing terribly, just not hitting my goal. Part of that this week is that since I didn't prep or plan, I've been eating lunches out. It's fairly difficult to find a quick, low calorie lunch that isn't going to leave you starving  by mid-afternoon. The only things close to work are fast food. 

The moral of the story is, I absolutely must plan and prep meals and plan when I'm going to do workouts on busy days ahead of time. It just doesn't work for me to try to figure things out during the week. 

[stealthstitcher]

Ugh, okay, do you ever do a thing and think, "Why did I do the thing?"

Had a work call this morning at 9 and didn't get off until 5:30, with no breaks and no food. I'd had breakfast, so I was okay but nonetheless pretty darn hungry by the time I got off. I had a coupon for a free pizza so I thought, this is the perfect time for free pizza. And of course by this point I was hungry enough to just shove food in fast to make the hungry feeling stop. So many calories ... so little protein. Now my head and my gut feel like sacks of wet concrete and I've had a day and a half worth of calories. I mean, it's far from the worst meal I've ever eaten, but I just feel so bloated and lethargic. If I'd known I was going to be at work that late, I'd have brought an emergency granola bar to tide me over, but I didn't. 

However, I am 6/6 on walking and 4/6 on mobility exercises, so doing okay there. Definitely need tomorrow to be a meat and veggies day, though. And some painkillers for the overcarbed headache and ALL THE WATER. I haven't eaten anything like this in two weeks, so my body is going "What did you do to me?!?" Sorry, body. 

[stealthstitcher]

For this week, I'm maintaining the half hour walk, hip/leg mobility/flexibility routine, and eating under 1600 calories a day.

And I'm adding wrist and ankle mobility: http://www.marksdailyapple.com/how-to-improve-wrist-and-ankle-mobility/

Honestly, my wrists and ankles have such poor mobility that some of these exercises are beyond me, so I'm starting with the ones I can do and hopefully will be able to add the others eventually. Also, I have a foam roller on my shopping list for next payday. The tennis balls work, but they're a little difficult to use - they like to roll away if they can escape - and they don't cover much ground so it takes quite a while. Anybody with foam roller advice, please feel free to advise on the best one, or a better idea if you've got one.

In other excitements, the opera is on hold while they work out casting issues ... but I got a last minute call to work a dance show so my evenings are still booked. Never a dull moment, I'm telling you! Sweaty, sweaty dancer tights!  

[MichiruSedai]

Yay for being busy!  And yay for meeting the walk/mobility/calorie goals!

[Loveable_Bouncer]

On 4/3/2017 at 9:10 PM, stealthstitcher said:

Sweaty, sweaty dancer tights!  

I have a feeling that this quote will pop in my head the next time I watch a dancing video/show of some sorts,... Never thought of it. 

 

 

Your mobility goals have influenced my own, been able to come up with a few stretches that I can do the most passive way possible (stopping at a step to stretch out my legs, or a long upper body stretch when I'm in a casual setting). 

[stealthstitcher]

So I'm going to complain here for a bit, because going on a murderous rampage is illegal.

I took off work at my regular job to work Riverdance, which involved standing on a cement floor for literally and truthfully 16 hours the first day. (Other things, too, but all of it while standing on cement ... feet so sore). Finished with that show, attended a student directed show at my regular workplace on Saturday to find out that during the three days I was gone, 12 jobs had been eliminated, including one in my department (not mine, but still) AND my supervisor told me there was "One more thing, but I can't talk about it here. I'll tell you on Monday." And he hasn't been in yet so I still don't know what it is. I feel like if it was that my job was also eliminated, he would have just said so, or asked me if I had time to talk after the show, or at least hinted at it. But still, the suspense ... 

This morning I had a meeting for an opera I'm co-designing, at 8:30. I show up, I walk a million miles from the parking lot to the building (1.25 miles, to be exact) to find that no one is there. I wait until after nine, figuring they probably changed the meeting time or something. No emails, no information, no anything but they're notoriously disorganized. Nobody was there by 9:05 so I gave up and headed back to my car. Halfway there, there was a cloudburst followed by a hailstorm. In a matter of seconds I'm soaked to the skin, and being pelted by hail (small hail; it was like being hit by frozen peas). 

I decided to go home, change clothes, and go into work at my regular job late. And on the way in, I got myself a donut. Maybe one shouldn't use food for comfort but sometimes, gosh darn it, you need a donut! Or something! 

So now I'm on Monday 2.0, and still waiting to hear what the "one more thing" that happened while I was gone, that couldn't be discussed in public, is.

On the plus side, I've already walked 2.5 miles today.

 

Goals were not good last week, so I'm keeping them the same for this week. Kind of looks like the theme for this week is going to be "get up, try again, try not to have hysterics while doing so".

 

[stealthstitcher]

The Big Thing at work turned out not to be a big thing - at least for me - just something I needed to know about that isn't public knowledge yet. My job is safe! For now ... 

[Loveable_Bouncer]

Glad to hear that the job thing was nothing, I personally can't stand when they wait to hold information that may get to you the wrong way... (or not in this case). May the coming weeks be low stress in the "questionable department!" 

[stealthstitcher]

9 hours ago, Bouncer the Resilient said:

Glad to hear that the job thing was nothing, I personally can't stand when they wait to hold information that may get to you the wrong way...

Ugh, yes! Just tell me already! 

 

It's been a pretty rough week on all fronts. I just realized it's only Wednesday morning ... so a rough two days? All the upheaval at work has made everyone angry and upset and nervous, which is not surprising, but it makes for a very emotionally charged workplace. 

I think it's probably related that I'm 0/2 on all my goals. That and the extra things scheduled in the evening. I could totally have done a walk and mobility work this morning - I woke up in time - but I laid in bed and stared at the ceiling for 40 minutes because I just didn't want to get up.

I feel like it's been a very bad week, but let me actually put it in perspective for myself:

Walking - 1/2

Mobility - 0/2

Calories - 0/2

 

So I have only missed two days on mobility and eating under calories, and only one day of walking. Missing one or two days is not that big a deal. 

[MichiruSedai]

Sorry it's been such a rough week.  Hugs!

[Loveable_Bouncer]

Hope the end of the week has been a tad better, or a light at the tunnel. Or at least a lazy day to come around soon.