I SHOULD be happy

I lost 3 pounds this week. I should be happy about this, because it's a loss, not a gain, and I need to remember that 2 pounds a week is "normal." There are a few reasons I'm not happy, though. I lost 6 pounds in one week last time I did the no snacks/sweets thing, and I wasn't even working out then. I was drinking more water this week, too. I thought I was doing things better this time. I don't know how much the Pringles last weekend sabotaged this (it wasn't just a few Pringles, it was possibly as much as 1600 calories within two days). I had two cookies this entire week. Though, I don't know how many calories they were. I'm also mad because I'm 400 pounds and I should be able to lose more than 3 pounds in a week by watching what I eat and exercising. What went wrong?

I did make it to the gym again, and the same thing happened--I was on the bike and the same two girls came in and took the ellipticals RIGHT before I was about to get on it. I'm still debating if I'll work out again tonight. I have chicken and rice casserole in the oven that won't be done until about 9 PM, and I don't feel like working out at this moment. I already worked out though, and I stepped up my biking a bit--7.5 minutes at level 4, 7.5 minutes at level 5 and making sure to stay around 60 RPM. Today my muscles didn't even get sore until the last 5 minutes and my feet were okay for just a little longer than usual. I'm getting there!

I didn't *go to the bathroom* fully before I weighed in tonight, so maybe that had something to do with it? I don't know. I'm back down to 408 again, so I can't even change my ticker yet. I think there may be something wrong with my scale though, not to make excuses (because it could just as easily be telling me I lost more weight than I did), but the second time I got on it tonight (I do it in two different rooms because the floors aren't quite even in my bedroom), it didn't even stabilize at a number before turning off--while I was still standing on it. Normally it stabilizes, stays at that number for 10 seconds while I get off, then goes back to zero, then shuts off. Hmm. I think I might see if I can pop into my doctor's office just to get weighed every few weeks to keep a more solid record.

That Was An Interesting Day

It is REALLY hard for me to drink a lot of water at work. Around 3 I start to chug gulps here and there--usually 30 of my 40 "work" oz come between 2:30 and 5.

I had a nice chat with a coworker who works from home in Colorado about diet and exercise. I just mentioned that I have the Lap-Band, but it's not really working for me right now, so if I want the results, I have to do it myself. I don't know why, but just saying it this way, admitting that my Lap-Band is not helping me at all right now, just sent me on a roller coaster of emotions:

I'm very proud of myself for taking it into my own hands and eating better and exercising every single day. It's getting easier not to see it as a "diet" but as something I can live with.

I'm angry. I'm so angry that I had surgery and took a huge step to improve my health, and it's not working. IT'S NOT WORKING. Yes, yes, you have to work "with" your band, you still have to make healthy choices, yadda yadda yadda. Honestly, I didn't get to be this big by eating fast food and junk food and drinking soda all the time. It's because I just ate HUGE amounts of "regular" food. I NEED the portion control. If I don't feel full after a meal, I will absolutely be picking and snacking between meals. My body just doesn't understand that just because I'm not "full" doesn't mean that I have to keep eating until I am. Yes, it's also mental. But I want to be full off less food. If I could do this by myself, I wouldn't have gotten the Lap-Band. I'm also mad at myself that I'm stuck in a program that I'm starting to think is more at home with bypass than the Lap-Band. It's easy to just tell bypass patients that after their surgery, it really is about what you eat. With the Lap-Band though, it takes FILLS to get to the same state that a bypass patient is in! SO GIVE ME MY DAMN FILLS!

I'm scared. I'm scared shitless that my Lap-Band will never work. It happens. I've seen a few people on LBT that it just never works for them and they end up having RNY instead. I don't want to be one of those people.

I'm jealous of people who the Lap-Band works for from Day 1. I know many people from LBT that never exercised and 100 pounds just came off. It's definitely not the norm, but it happens. Just in my June surgery group, a lot of people have lost 100 pounds already, or close to it. I'm 400 pounds, I should have lost weight faster than any of them.

I feel useless. I know all of these things that I'm supposed to have to do with my Lap-Band: eat slowly, chew chew chew, eat protein first in case you get full before you get to the rest of the food, take a multi-vitamin because you aren't getting all the nutrients from your small amount of food. I don't need to do any of those. I haven't had a PB since about the first month of my surgery. Is it weird that now I wish I would have one, just to know my band is working?

In other news, the gym was strange tonight. I was on the bike and I did a little harder routine on the bike (one of the programmed ones, where it changes the resistance at certain points) and I also noticed I was going a lot faster without realizing it! I normally go about 50 RPM, today was anywhere between 60-70, and the 70 was closer to the end when I was sore! Two girls came in and took both of the ellipticals, so I couldn't do that tonight. My feet were really sore from my shoes, so I knew I couldn't go another 5 minutes on the bike. Instead, I cranked the resistance up a few more notches and went all out for a full minute. I was really proud of myself.

When I went back to the locker room and sat down, after a few minutes, I didn't even feel like I worked out. No soreness, I wasn't waddling like most nights, and I wasn't sweating as bad. The elliptical really makes me work harder than I realized and it makes me feel like I actually accomplished something.

I was a little perturbed about the elliptical when I got home, so I did a mile of Walk Away The Pounds while my dinner was in the oven. Yep! I earned two stickers in one day :)

Tomorrow is my weigh-in day...wish me luck!

Boooo on Chocolate-dipped Chocolate Chip Cookies

I did good today, no snacks, worked out, tried to drink a lot of water... (I think I'm at about 35-40 oz, going to try to make up the rest before bed). Then we stopped at the grocery store after I picked up DH from work. Again, I was doing really well, got some veggies, calorie free/fat free Ranch dressing (! - even the lowest fat-free Ranch I've seen had 30 calories). Then, we went past the bakery, I saw my strawberry shortcake, only stared for a minute, the moved on. On the way out of the bakery section, I saw a big tub of 20 chocolate chip cookies...that were half-dipped in chocolate. I showed DH, just because I had never seen them before, and then I was ready to move on. He flipped a coin and put them in the cart. He said he's going to count them to make sure I don't binge, but I won't anyway, I KNOW I have enough willpower now. I did have one, and just one. It wasn't as great as I was hoping, so now I really know I won't be eating more than one a day, if even that.

The week is going so slooow, I want Friday to come so I can weigh in and see if my no-snack, no-sweet week is paying off as much as it did last time (I lost 6 pounds about 3 weeks ago when I tried this).

Uggggh...Sore

I'm definitely not feeling any restriction. Now that I'm consciously not snacking, I'm hungry a lot more. I was starving by lunchtime today, I had oatmeal for breakfast. I was hungry last night around 10 PM, after I had a pretty big dinner. I think some of it is mental, that I just WANT to eat something, not that my body is really hungry (but it was hunger at lunch today).

I got stuck doing some extra stuff at work before I had to leave so I was afraid I wouldn't get to the gym. I hauled ass though and got out in time to get in before the door locked. About 5 minutes into the bike, my thighs were killing me and I seriously thought about stopping early and going home. I kept saying "okay, 5 more minutes and I'll stop" and I just kept saying that until I got through the 15 minutes. The elliptical seems like it's getting a LITTLE easier, but I'm still exhausted by the end of my 5 minutes. I want to try doing it before the bike so I'm not so tired and sore already, but then I don't think I'd have any energy left for the bike at all.

I'm proud of myself though--a few months ago, I would have made excuses to either skip the gym or purposely stay late at work to miss it, now I really push myself to get out on time so I can make it down there.

Well, That's Depressing

Today, while I was just watching stuff run at work, I decided to look up calorie burn for the exercise equipment. See, I didn't think the machines were right, that maybe they just don't have the right information when someone weighs 400 pounds. How could I be busting my ass and burning so few calories? The answers I found were even more depressing. Turns out that most exercise machines overestimate calorie burn by up to 30%. Turns out that my 15 minutes on the bike at a medium-ish level only burns about 190 calories.

Hmm.

I had to estimate what I burn with Walk Away The Pounds--I do a mile at a time, and a mile is generally 15 minutes of the workout. So I just looked up 15 minutes of walking at 4 MPH. This is also somewhere between 150-190, I don't remember what the actual count was.

I couldn't find the elliptical, but since I only do it for 5 minutes, it doesn't matter too much (and it STILL kicks my ass).

So now I have some serious thinking to do. What is the point of rushing to get to the gym, have to change, worry about getting locked in the gym, and getting home late when I'm only burning let's say 250 total at the gym? Is it worth it? A pound is 3500 calories, so it doesn't seem like it. Would I be better off just doing Walk Away The Pounds at home instead of going down to the gym?

Let me know if you have any thoughts on this, I really need some guidance right about now, and this isn't the type of help I could get from my nutritionist.

Of course, now that I'm back on my "diet," there's a ton of new snack foods and cookies in the office. Temptation is a bitch. I did eat 2 granola bars today, but mostly just to get them out of my desk and be rid of them (yes, I should have given them away instead of eating them myself). I also drank 40 oz. of Crystal Light in the office, really going to try to make it to 64 by the end of the night. I realized that it's REALLY hard for me to drink that much during the day, I'm usually focused on other things, and when I put the cap on my bottle for lunch (no drinking before and after meals--at least one Lap-Band rule I try to follow pretty well) I usually forget to drink again until maybe 2 hours afterward.

The bike is getting easier and easier for me. I put my new gym shoes on today (I only wore them the first day and my feet hurt too much to wear them again last week), my feet still hurt, but I made myself finish my routine. The elliptical isn't getting easier though. I find myself dreading it, and I don't know what to do. My heartrate goes up a LOT more than it is during the bike, so I don't know if I should just go longer on the bike or stick out the 5 mins on the elliptical.

I did borrow an idea from Gloucester and bought some stickers for my calender for the days I work out. I got 2 different kinds: one for days I go to the gym, and one for days I do Walk Away The Pounds. I need an incentive of some sort, or it'll be too easy to skip a day here and there.

Not A Great Weekend

I DID work out both Saturday and today, so at least I did something right this weekend. On the other hand, though, I ate like crap. I had LOTS of Pringles...I got them for my husband but it is true--once you pop, you can't stop. Well okay, I didn't have too bad of a weekend besides the Pringles, but I still feel cruddy about it.

Plus, I was good at the grocery store. They had Oreos on sale REALLY cheap, and I put a pack of the Double Stuf Mint in my cart. About halfway through the store, I put them back. Resisting temptation at the grocery store has been my biggest success so far, I've been pretty good about it the last few months.

I figured out a way to satisfy my never-ending addiction to Strawberry Shortcake. I got a bag of frozen strawberries (no sugar added, 50 calories a serving) and some fat-free Cool Whip (20 calories a serving). The Cool Whip makes up for no sugar on the strawberries, and it's actually pretty filling. I can live with that instead of the cake!

Tomorrow absolutely starts my "Cut the Crap" week. No snacks, no sweets, no caloric beverages, and another big change I have to make--no breakfast burritos from the cafeteria at work. I HAVE to stick to oatmeal. It's the difference between 150-250 calories for the oatmeal and the 800+ for the burrito. That's GOTTA go.

Friday had better yield better results this week!

Yep! Did it again!

Yes indeed, I still made it to the gym again tonight. I had an interruption though...all of the women's restrooms were covered up and taped off because they were going to repaint them tonight or this weekend. I tried holding it when I started to ride the bike. About 4 minutes into it, I realized the leg movements + full bladder just wasn't going to work! I asked the guys who were in the gym and the men's rooms were covered too. So I went back into the locker room and uncovered one of the toilets. Sorry guys, you really shouldn't block access to every bathroom in the building when people are still in it!

I'm really really frustrated though. I weighed myself tonight and I'm still 411.6. I was 410.8 last Wednesday. I've been working out every day since Monday and (mostly) watching what I eat. So why did I gain a pound this week? Well, 1 pound net gain, I was up to 414 Tuesday and back down to 411 Wednesday. I know I'm not working out MUCH, but come on, I'm over 400 pounds and even that little bit should have shed some weight.

I'm not going to weigh myself again until next Friday. I'm going to, as the "Shrinking Violets" on LBT say, CUT THE CRAP!, keep working out, and see what happens in another week. I'm seriously disheartened though. I've been working so hard and I don't think I'm going to make my goal by my birthday.