Last weekend had the coldest weather on record hereabouts for October, with snow and ice galore. Nothing as bad as hurricane Sandy, of course, but enough to keep us from attempting the journey to visit MIL on Saturday as planned- we didn´t have our winter tyres on yet as we weren´t counting on snow before November. Which means DH has driven down there on Sunday alone so he could take care of the appointments this week he was going down there for, while I am staying here on my own.
Which means I have plenty of time for catching up with the things that need doing in the household. Add to that the fact that Wednesday is a legal holiday hereabouts, and thus not an office bound day, and what you get is one big decluttering action. The first thing I did today was deal with the mess on the balcony. The geraniums, which had until Friday been blooming beautifully, didn´t take too kindly to being frozen stiff and snowed in. So I emptied out the balcony flower boxes today, and then took everything down to the cellar including some empty flower pots I had kept under the balcony table. The rosmary and lavender bushes now reside in the bathroom, as that is the only window sill that doesn´t have a radiator underneath.
Taking that stuff down, plus putting the recycling stuff down into the bins, too, actually meant several trips up and down four flights of stairs, so I got my exercise, too.
The balcony looks tidy now, but also quite empty. It´s always a strange feeling to take down the remnants of summer, knowing it will be six months at least before I´ll be able to replant my balcony. The trees, too, have been dropping their leaves after the frost, so, it´s definitely autumn going on winter.
Time to break out the hot tea and some cookies. I think after running up and down stairs all afternoon I can afford to.
Julia
2012/10/31
2012/10/25
Less luggage
There it sits on my desk. The tablet I wrote about yesterday, after carrying it here.
I have found it a lot easier to carry and handle, because of the smaller weight and size when compared to the netbook I used to lug around.
Still, the difference between both gadgets is less than three pounds.
Only three pounds. How often have I consoled myself over a gain with these words. Only three pounds, barely noticeable.Especially if one has ten times as much to lose.
That tablet tells me a different story.
Three pounds can make a difference, one that is noticeable, one that I really can feel.
So I should not take those regains lightly, because they are not unnoticeable.
As it is, my weight is slowly creeping back down, but still about a pound above that pesky limit of obesity.
I'll have to stay on plan.
Owning a tablet means having access to lots of apps. The first one I installed was Sparkpeople, so I can journal my food intake on the go. Perhaps that will help me stay on track.
Limits and accountability. The only thing that works in the long run.
Julia
I have found it a lot easier to carry and handle, because of the smaller weight and size when compared to the netbook I used to lug around.
Still, the difference between both gadgets is less than three pounds.
Only three pounds. How often have I consoled myself over a gain with these words. Only three pounds, barely noticeable.Especially if one has ten times as much to lose.
That tablet tells me a different story.
Three pounds can make a difference, one that is noticeable, one that I really can feel.
So I should not take those regains lightly, because they are not unnoticeable.
As it is, my weight is slowly creeping back down, but still about a pound above that pesky limit of obesity.
I'll have to stay on plan.
Owning a tablet means having access to lots of apps. The first one I installed was Sparkpeople, so I can journal my food intake on the go. Perhaps that will help me stay on track.
Limits and accountability. The only thing that works in the long run.
Julia
2012/10/24
Shopping my closet
As I've mentioned before, I used to be an avid collector of handbags. During one of my latest decluttering marathons, I got rid of a number of specimens that just did not fit my needs any more, and I'm happy to report that not a single one of them has been missed. The drawer in my handbag storage chest that used to hold them now contains winter hats and scarves,which have ceased to clutter my entrance area.
Still, there were a few specimens left which saw relatively little use, but were too good to toss.
One of them is a sturdy leather shoulder bag which I had originally intended to hold my netbook, but it turned out that the opening was just a tad too tight to comfortably put it in or remove it. Thus, said bag went into hibernation in my closet.
Last week, I decided to take the plunge and acquire a tablet computer. I had actually vacillated between a tablet and an ebook reader for quite a while, since I had discovered that Amazon has reading apps for tablets, too. As I am not exactly a teenager any more, the size of the letters in what I read has become increasingly important, so, any device with too small a screen would be out of the question because of eyestrain. Then again, the netbook, while rather sturdy, weighs in at more than four pounds if I take along the cables for loading it, too, which meant that I would need to use a backpack to carry it or have my back hurt from carrying it on one side.
What kept me from exchanging it for a tablet was the prohibitively high prices those things usually are sold for.
Enter my friendly phone provider and an inductory offer on a tablet with cell phone connection that meant that I could swap my existing contract for one at the same monthly cost but with higher speed and receive a tablet for half what a 3G-capable Kindle would have cost me. So, my tech equipment got a new addition. I was, of course, lucky in that my old contract was running out right now, so I could go for that offer without penalties to pay. It really pays to keep the expiration dates for a contract in mind sometimes.
The new tablet, of course, needs something I can carry it in, which also must protect the screen from damages. After seeing the prices they demand for made-for-this-tablet sleeves, and seeing that they are mostly too soft to really protect the screen from damage by accidental pressure, I decided to go shop my closet instead. An old netbook sleeve was soon found, but the neoprene was only good against scratches, not for screen protection. What item could I use for that? It had to be flat, stiff and about the size of the tablet. What I settled on for the time being is the backside of an old picture frame. I put the tablet into the sleeve and then into a bag with the screen side facing the particle board piece. Thus, it's safe from damage. This works only with a bag that is small enough so the whole thing cannot slide around and stays together.
And that meant the reactivation of the aforementioned shoulder bag. While it was too small for the netbbok, it fits the tablet as if it were made for it.
I might upgrade the whole thing to a proper case someday, but for now I have what I need to carry that tablet without spending a dime on it, everything coming from my closet.
Including the shoulder bag.
There used to be a time when I would have gone out to buy a new bag for a new gizmo. I'm glad I don't need to do that any more.
Shopping my closet is something that did, at first, not come naturally. But with more experiences like this, it keeps getting easier.
Julia
Still, there were a few specimens left which saw relatively little use, but were too good to toss.
One of them is a sturdy leather shoulder bag which I had originally intended to hold my netbook, but it turned out that the opening was just a tad too tight to comfortably put it in or remove it. Thus, said bag went into hibernation in my closet.
Last week, I decided to take the plunge and acquire a tablet computer. I had actually vacillated between a tablet and an ebook reader for quite a while, since I had discovered that Amazon has reading apps for tablets, too. As I am not exactly a teenager any more, the size of the letters in what I read has become increasingly important, so, any device with too small a screen would be out of the question because of eyestrain. Then again, the netbook, while rather sturdy, weighs in at more than four pounds if I take along the cables for loading it, too, which meant that I would need to use a backpack to carry it or have my back hurt from carrying it on one side.
What kept me from exchanging it for a tablet was the prohibitively high prices those things usually are sold for.
Enter my friendly phone provider and an inductory offer on a tablet with cell phone connection that meant that I could swap my existing contract for one at the same monthly cost but with higher speed and receive a tablet for half what a 3G-capable Kindle would have cost me. So, my tech equipment got a new addition. I was, of course, lucky in that my old contract was running out right now, so I could go for that offer without penalties to pay. It really pays to keep the expiration dates for a contract in mind sometimes.
The new tablet, of course, needs something I can carry it in, which also must protect the screen from damages. After seeing the prices they demand for made-for-this-tablet sleeves, and seeing that they are mostly too soft to really protect the screen from damage by accidental pressure, I decided to go shop my closet instead. An old netbook sleeve was soon found, but the neoprene was only good against scratches, not for screen protection. What item could I use for that? It had to be flat, stiff and about the size of the tablet. What I settled on for the time being is the backside of an old picture frame. I put the tablet into the sleeve and then into a bag with the screen side facing the particle board piece. Thus, it's safe from damage. This works only with a bag that is small enough so the whole thing cannot slide around and stays together.
And that meant the reactivation of the aforementioned shoulder bag. While it was too small for the netbbok, it fits the tablet as if it were made for it.
I might upgrade the whole thing to a proper case someday, but for now I have what I need to carry that tablet without spending a dime on it, everything coming from my closet.
Including the shoulder bag.
There used to be a time when I would have gone out to buy a new bag for a new gizmo. I'm glad I don't need to do that any more.
Shopping my closet is something that did, at first, not come naturally. But with more experiences like this, it keeps getting easier.
Julia
2012/10/23
The opposite of falling
Ever noticed that weight acts just the opposite of other physical bodies? Not on your scales, of course, but whenever my weight vacillates, it's going up real fast, like, two pounds in a single day, and it regularly takes several days to get rid of these again. Which is exactly what happened to me again. I've managed to stop that upwardly mobile elevator, but climbing down again...takes time.
Some weight loss bloggers are, right now, pouring vitriol on those of us who are not, in their opinion, eating as perfectly as they are, or not exercising as much as they are.
Shouldn't everybody remember that everybody is different?
If I remember correctly, there are studies that prove that willpower is by no means an inexhaustible resource. So, if your resistance to certain foods depends on willpower alone, you're quite likely doomed to break down whenever you had to use up your willpower on something else that day.
Which means one thing. You have to replace willpower with something else. One possible replacement is called habit. Once something becomes a habit, you won't need any willpower to keep it up.
The other replacement is planning. You cannot eat what you do not keep where you can eat it, so, not bringing certain foods into your house is the best insurance against gorging on them, if you can keep yourself from going out to get them. That way, the time you have to exert willpower is limited to the time you spend at the supermarket- if the chips stay there you cannot eat them at home.
Or- and that is one thing that some weight loss bloggers are damning vehemently- you can plan in advance what you will do in a certain situation. If you have kids, or a DH who likes to nosh, it's not always feasible to have no sweets at all in the house, unless you want to waste your willpower on contending with their demands. What you can do instead is plan what you yourself can and will eat of that stuff and work that into your plan.
For me, for example, that means hands off DH's chocolate bars, but in case of extreme chocolate cravings, I allow myself two or three squares of dark chocolate which are sold individually wrapped, so I take out what I allow myself to eat and put the rest out of sight.
Or, it may mean having to partake in traditional foods so as not to hurt the feelings of my relatives. If I don't go completely overboard, the damage to my weight loss is minor, which I, for one, prefer to major fallouts in the family.
It's not about excuses, it's about decisions.
The more decisions I make before I get into a situation, the less willpower will I use up when the situation is there.
So, it's actually good policy to start thinking about what I will have at the family christmas dinner today.
Julia
Some weight loss bloggers are, right now, pouring vitriol on those of us who are not, in their opinion, eating as perfectly as they are, or not exercising as much as they are.
Shouldn't everybody remember that everybody is different?
If I remember correctly, there are studies that prove that willpower is by no means an inexhaustible resource. So, if your resistance to certain foods depends on willpower alone, you're quite likely doomed to break down whenever you had to use up your willpower on something else that day.
Which means one thing. You have to replace willpower with something else. One possible replacement is called habit. Once something becomes a habit, you won't need any willpower to keep it up.
The other replacement is planning. You cannot eat what you do not keep where you can eat it, so, not bringing certain foods into your house is the best insurance against gorging on them, if you can keep yourself from going out to get them. That way, the time you have to exert willpower is limited to the time you spend at the supermarket- if the chips stay there you cannot eat them at home.
Or- and that is one thing that some weight loss bloggers are damning vehemently- you can plan in advance what you will do in a certain situation. If you have kids, or a DH who likes to nosh, it's not always feasible to have no sweets at all in the house, unless you want to waste your willpower on contending with their demands. What you can do instead is plan what you yourself can and will eat of that stuff and work that into your plan.
For me, for example, that means hands off DH's chocolate bars, but in case of extreme chocolate cravings, I allow myself two or three squares of dark chocolate which are sold individually wrapped, so I take out what I allow myself to eat and put the rest out of sight.
Or, it may mean having to partake in traditional foods so as not to hurt the feelings of my relatives. If I don't go completely overboard, the damage to my weight loss is minor, which I, for one, prefer to major fallouts in the family.
It's not about excuses, it's about decisions.
The more decisions I make before I get into a situation, the less willpower will I use up when the situation is there.
So, it's actually good policy to start thinking about what I will have at the family christmas dinner today.
Julia
2012/10/15
The fruits of uncluttering
This weekend was, once more, wardrobe rollover time, meaning that my summer clothes went into storage until next spring, and the warm sweaters and fake fur hats and the other cold-season stuff went to take their places in the readily accessible part of my wardrobe.
In years past, before my weight loss, that used to mean wrestling with at least four of those zippered things I use to store my out-of-season clothes in, digging through them, and spending at least two hours doing so.
Not so this year. Having gotten rid of every piece that had become too big for me when I packed the winter stuff away last spring, I just took out the remaining stash, replaced the summer t-shirts and such where the sweaters had been, and put the (one) zippered box needed for that back on top of my closet. Total time spent- ten minutes. Then I took my warm jackets out and the thin ones back in (five minutes) and I was done. There wasn´t any garment I needed to toss, and the fact that my formerly overcrowded closet rods hold, by now, only the clothes that right now fit me also means that the things I store on hangers don´t have to go into storage any more- I just push the out-of-season stuff to the less accessible side of the closet.
What used to be an endeavour taking up the better part of an afternoon has thus become a fifteen-minute project.
What´s more, having gotten through one winter already on what I have in my wardrobe right now, I know that I won´t have to buy anything new this winter. Which suits me just fine.
There must be some "up" side to that weight plateau and slight regain, mustn´t there?
Julia
In years past, before my weight loss, that used to mean wrestling with at least four of those zippered things I use to store my out-of-season clothes in, digging through them, and spending at least two hours doing so.
Not so this year. Having gotten rid of every piece that had become too big for me when I packed the winter stuff away last spring, I just took out the remaining stash, replaced the summer t-shirts and such where the sweaters had been, and put the (one) zippered box needed for that back on top of my closet. Total time spent- ten minutes. Then I took my warm jackets out and the thin ones back in (five minutes) and I was done. There wasn´t any garment I needed to toss, and the fact that my formerly overcrowded closet rods hold, by now, only the clothes that right now fit me also means that the things I store on hangers don´t have to go into storage any more- I just push the out-of-season stuff to the less accessible side of the closet.
What used to be an endeavour taking up the better part of an afternoon has thus become a fifteen-minute project.
What´s more, having gotten through one winter already on what I have in my wardrobe right now, I know that I won´t have to buy anything new this winter. Which suits me just fine.
There must be some "up" side to that weight plateau and slight regain, mustn´t there?
Julia
2012/10/11
Recondensing FAIL
We´ve just had the first night of below-freezing temperatures, so this weekend will be wardrobe rollover time.
The frugal part of it is that last winter´s clothes still fit me.
The annoying part is that last winter´s clothes still fit me.
I must not even think of how much further I had hoped I´d have recondensed by today. Weight-wise I´m back to about what I weighed in February, and once again, I see little connection between what I have eaten on a given day and what stares me in the face the next morning on the scales. Like in, eat about 1700 calories total on a given day and gain two pounds overnight which then proceed to refuse to come off again. Don´t anybody tell me that isn´t possible, because it´s exactly what happened to me this week. Seems like that obstinate body of mine is determined to show me once again that it refuses to follow any rules about how a body should behave.
And probably all because I had been going off-plan for less than a month due to serious work overload that left me, evening after evening, too exhausted to cook. I mean, I couldn´t even finish watching the evening news with DH at seven PM to seven fifteen PM without falling asleep in my easy chair. DH´s cooking abilities are mostly restricted to popping something in the microwave, so, no help from that quarter, either.
The overload situation seems to be going down a bit, but the fatigue it engendered is still there.
I´m fighting it with coffee, black, no sweetener. Breakfast is two eggs on two strips of bacon, fried. About 300 calories. The nuts that I had been crunching on at peak workload don´t even enter my office any more. Instad, lunch is a very-low-carb protein shake (sets me back about by 200 calories). In the evening, some vegetable-heavy stir fry, some greek yoghourt mixed with cocoa powder (the sugarfree kind you use for baking) and a glass of good German beer to unwind. All in all well below 2000 calories for the whole day´s intake. And still my weight is climbing. Heck, I ate exactly the same things in the same amounts when I was losing!
I don´t know what´s going on here, and that scares me.
As does the possibility that this might not stop before I haven´t gained everything back.
I must not try to drown the panic I feel at that thought in a sea of cookies, lest I end up like one of those Greek heroes who gets a prophecy, tries everything he can to avoid it becoming real, and then it turns out that the very things he did to avoid it were what made it possible to happen.
What I must do instead is watch things very closely. Maybe I´ll find out what started this regain, and maybe I´ll be able to stop it yet.
As long as I breathe there´s hope.
Julia
The frugal part of it is that last winter´s clothes still fit me.
The annoying part is that last winter´s clothes still fit me.
I must not even think of how much further I had hoped I´d have recondensed by today. Weight-wise I´m back to about what I weighed in February, and once again, I see little connection between what I have eaten on a given day and what stares me in the face the next morning on the scales. Like in, eat about 1700 calories total on a given day and gain two pounds overnight which then proceed to refuse to come off again. Don´t anybody tell me that isn´t possible, because it´s exactly what happened to me this week. Seems like that obstinate body of mine is determined to show me once again that it refuses to follow any rules about how a body should behave.
And probably all because I had been going off-plan for less than a month due to serious work overload that left me, evening after evening, too exhausted to cook. I mean, I couldn´t even finish watching the evening news with DH at seven PM to seven fifteen PM without falling asleep in my easy chair. DH´s cooking abilities are mostly restricted to popping something in the microwave, so, no help from that quarter, either.
The overload situation seems to be going down a bit, but the fatigue it engendered is still there.
I´m fighting it with coffee, black, no sweetener. Breakfast is two eggs on two strips of bacon, fried. About 300 calories. The nuts that I had been crunching on at peak workload don´t even enter my office any more. Instad, lunch is a very-low-carb protein shake (sets me back about by 200 calories). In the evening, some vegetable-heavy stir fry, some greek yoghourt mixed with cocoa powder (the sugarfree kind you use for baking) and a glass of good German beer to unwind. All in all well below 2000 calories for the whole day´s intake. And still my weight is climbing. Heck, I ate exactly the same things in the same amounts when I was losing!
I don´t know what´s going on here, and that scares me.
As does the possibility that this might not stop before I haven´t gained everything back.
I must not try to drown the panic I feel at that thought in a sea of cookies, lest I end up like one of those Greek heroes who gets a prophecy, tries everything he can to avoid it becoming real, and then it turns out that the very things he did to avoid it were what made it possible to happen.
What I must do instead is watch things very closely. Maybe I´ll find out what started this regain, and maybe I´ll be able to stop it yet.
As long as I breathe there´s hope.
Julia
2012/10/09
Shaking things up
Once again, I spent the weekend after a stressful work week at MIL´s place. As usual, that meant eating stuff I shouldn´t eat, such as potatoes and bread. Even though I managed to keep the portions small, on Monday morning, back on my trusty scales, it meant yet another uptick in my weight, back to square 64 and a total of nine pounds regained. Not good.
So, I decided to shake things up a bit, namely, by going back on a strictly low-carb regimen of bacon and eggs for breakfast and protein shakes for everything else. I know, not sustainable in the long run, but I have to get my body back into recondensing mode, and those pure protein shakes are the quickest way I know of doing just that.
I´m rather glad that they come in a variety of flavours so I can alternate between different tastes. I have been trying out a different brand, too, which was on sale lately, and which doesn´t have any added carbohydrates either. Right now, I´m sipping on a straciatella flavored shake which also satisfies any sweet tooth I might have.
Another thing I have to work on is the sleep deficit I accumulated last week. It´s a bit of a senior moment realizing that I can´t pull an all-nighter any more and be back to functioning normally the day after the next day on just one night of regular sleep. So, early to bed and early to rise. If anybody had told me that when I was a student I´d have declared them crazy, being a confirmed night owl who only came into my own several hours into the afternoon and then worked until well after midnight. I just hope there won´t be any more emergencies like last week´s in the near future.
And, of course, I hope the protein shake thing will get me below that threshold of obesity again, fast. Because if it doesn´t, fasting seems to be the only alternative left, and that´s out of the question if I want to stay functioning.
Keeping my fingers crossed and trying to ignore the increasing growls of my stomach,
Julia
So, I decided to shake things up a bit, namely, by going back on a strictly low-carb regimen of bacon and eggs for breakfast and protein shakes for everything else. I know, not sustainable in the long run, but I have to get my body back into recondensing mode, and those pure protein shakes are the quickest way I know of doing just that.
I´m rather glad that they come in a variety of flavours so I can alternate between different tastes. I have been trying out a different brand, too, which was on sale lately, and which doesn´t have any added carbohydrates either. Right now, I´m sipping on a straciatella flavored shake which also satisfies any sweet tooth I might have.
Another thing I have to work on is the sleep deficit I accumulated last week. It´s a bit of a senior moment realizing that I can´t pull an all-nighter any more and be back to functioning normally the day after the next day on just one night of regular sleep. So, early to bed and early to rise. If anybody had told me that when I was a student I´d have declared them crazy, being a confirmed night owl who only came into my own several hours into the afternoon and then worked until well after midnight. I just hope there won´t be any more emergencies like last week´s in the near future.
And, of course, I hope the protein shake thing will get me below that threshold of obesity again, fast. Because if it doesn´t, fasting seems to be the only alternative left, and that´s out of the question if I want to stay functioning.
Keeping my fingers crossed and trying to ignore the increasing growls of my stomach,
Julia
2012/10/01
Back To Square 61
As you might have guessed from my prologed absence, I´ve been extremely busy during the last two weeks.
Unfortunately, this also meant being careless about what I ate. Either I had no time left to cook after coming home from an exhausting day of work, so I went for whatever was around to eat that didn´t require preparation (which usually meant bread), or I resorted to convenience stuff like frozen pizza. Add to that the fact that my job involves a lot of mental work but very little physical exertion, and my sadly deep-ingrained pattern of reacting to extreme stress by eating sweet and crunchy food like chocolate and nuts, and several consecutive nights of almost no sleep (don´t ask...) and what you get is a recipe for desaster.
Which did hit me hard this morning when I set foot on my scales again.
I have, during just two weeks of not watching what I ate, gained back a whopping seven pounds. From the lowest point I had reached this year, that means up a total of more than eleven pounds. It also means I am, once again, above that limit of morbid obesity that took me so long to break in the first place.
But I don´t intend to stay there any longer than absolutely unavoidable.
So, it´s back to square 61 (the distance to my top weight this morning in pounds).
Which means cut out the sugar and bread, no snacking on nuts while working, and if possible, get a decent night´s sleep, plus keep portions small again and stop eating mindlessly to get rid of stress.
The scary part isn´t only how fast I´ve slipped back into my old habits, but also how fast the weight went up again as soon as I did.
Besides, just two weeks of eating crap again have been enough to make the cravings return in full force. The same ones that I thought I had left behind when I started my weight loss journey. It´s almost as if the mere idea of ceasing to be vigilant were blowing everything I had reached out of the window.
Or perhaps there really is truth to the claims about wheat and sugar being physically addictive.
Either way, this has to stop, fast. Before I end up, not on square 61, but still further back in Area 51, or worse.
Keep calm and carry on.
Julia
Unfortunately, this also meant being careless about what I ate. Either I had no time left to cook after coming home from an exhausting day of work, so I went for whatever was around to eat that didn´t require preparation (which usually meant bread), or I resorted to convenience stuff like frozen pizza. Add to that the fact that my job involves a lot of mental work but very little physical exertion, and my sadly deep-ingrained pattern of reacting to extreme stress by eating sweet and crunchy food like chocolate and nuts, and several consecutive nights of almost no sleep (don´t ask...) and what you get is a recipe for desaster.
Which did hit me hard this morning when I set foot on my scales again.
I have, during just two weeks of not watching what I ate, gained back a whopping seven pounds. From the lowest point I had reached this year, that means up a total of more than eleven pounds. It also means I am, once again, above that limit of morbid obesity that took me so long to break in the first place.
But I don´t intend to stay there any longer than absolutely unavoidable.
So, it´s back to square 61 (the distance to my top weight this morning in pounds).
Which means cut out the sugar and bread, no snacking on nuts while working, and if possible, get a decent night´s sleep, plus keep portions small again and stop eating mindlessly to get rid of stress.
The scary part isn´t only how fast I´ve slipped back into my old habits, but also how fast the weight went up again as soon as I did.
Besides, just two weeks of eating crap again have been enough to make the cravings return in full force. The same ones that I thought I had left behind when I started my weight loss journey. It´s almost as if the mere idea of ceasing to be vigilant were blowing everything I had reached out of the window.
Or perhaps there really is truth to the claims about wheat and sugar being physically addictive.
Either way, this has to stop, fast. Before I end up, not on square 61, but still further back in Area 51, or worse.
Keep calm and carry on.
Julia
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