Not Losing and Confused

21 days.  21 days is how long I've been counting calories religiously.  In 21 days my weight has barely fluctuated.  What gives?  I checked my history on Calorie Count to make sure I haven't been fooling myself into thinking I've been doing well when I really haven't been.

The green bars are my deficits, the red is when I went over.  The purple line indicates the calories I burned that day, the blue line indicates calories consumed. (The empty green bar on the right is today, and all the check marks across the top are today's numbers so far.)

Okay.... so two days out of 21 have I gone over.  Why am I not losing?  When I had counted calories previously, and didn't lose, I thought maybe I was still eating too many calories and that I don't burn what Calorie Count believes is average.  Hence, my Bugg.  In using my BodyBugg I discovered that I burn around 2100-2300 calories on a day that I don't exercise.  On Calorie Count, I actually had to change my activity level from Sedentary because the daily burned calories didn't match what I actually burned.  On days that I work out, I add the activity to Calorie Count and make sure that my calories burned for that day equal to roughly what my Bugg says that I've burned.  So, this chart should be pretty accurate.  My therapist and NP friend have encouraged me to make my appointment for my physical, so maybe I do need to make that appointment so I can bring this up.  This honestly doesn't make sense to me, and it's frustrating.  What am I missing?

Struggles

I've been weighing myself daily (which I do not advise) and find the scale once again slowly but surely creeping up.  Seems that I hit a peak low a couple of days after the weekend, then the numbers creep up through the rest of the week.  Considering what I know about calories in versus calories out, this doesn't make sense to me.  Theoretically I should be down because I am still having consistent deficits in my calories, so this challenges everything I've found to be true about weight loss.  I've been reflecting on the past week and how I've eaten, and there were some choices I made that had room for improvement.  Usually when I'm binging, I have a little inner voice that says things like "Maybe you don't really need that." "If you keep indulging in impulses like this, you'll never lose the weight."  When she speaks up I know I'm in trouble.  I haven't heard from her much lately.  I think because I still fell under the number of calories I've burned, she hasn't had much of an issue with what I've been eating.  Maybe it's the alcohol.  Maybe this week I won't pick up a bottle (or two) of wine, because when it's open, I'll drink it.  Maybe this week I won't eat out so much.  Thanksgiving is coming up this week and I hope to dear God that I can control myself.  For my goal on DietBet, as of today, I still have 19 days to lose 5.7 pounds.  I can do that.  I just need to be more focused.  Deeeeeep breeeeeeath.......

 

Never Weigh Yourself in the Middle of the Week!

Last night Hubs and I went to the gym, and I swam for about 20 minutes.  Now, I'm not the strongest swimmer, so I acknowledge that this doesn't burn a whole lot of calories for me.  However, since I power-housed through (almost) three classes over the weekend, and plan to go again this weekend, last night's swim was more of a bonus workout than anything.  I feel like I didn't do well on my calories yesterday, but I still had a deficit of 547.  Actually, that could be my lowest deficit since tracking, now that I think about it.  Anyway, this morning I felt like I have been doing fairly well overall so I wanted to weigh myself to see how progress is going.  I never log mid-week weigh ins since they are not "official" but sometimes it's nice to have that encouragement.  Somehow, I just never learn.  Whenever I do this I either see a great number, but a not as great number on my official weigh in day, OR, I weigh in even higher than my last weigh in.  This morning was a SCARY high number.

My friend has this pic on her blog, I think it's hilarious.

Now I am doubting myself.  Are my deficits too low?  Did my body somehow absorb pool water which made the scale lie to me?  Will I ever be able to shed this unwanted weight?  Time will only tell.

A Fantastic Weekend

I had a freaking blast at Zumba last night.  My BFF has a few weeks left of membership at the same gym as me, and she came down from her too far away house to shake it with me.  I went to a class lead by one of the top Zumba instructors in the state.  I loved it.  I'm actually looking forward to going again.  After a weekend of THREE aerobics classes, I am pretty sore today.  My calves and my shoulders are yelling at me.  I can also feel it in my inner thighs when I walk.  PAIN IS GOOD!  Let's keep this up!

I found out about this cool site today - http://dietbet.com/  In a nutshell, you sign up and can either join a game or start your own with friends.  People in the game place bets and have 4 weeks to lose 4% of their weight.  Everyone's money goes into the game's "pot" and at the end, whoever has lost at least 4% wins a slice of the pot.  There are several open games with varied amounts you need to bet, and have a varied amount of players which of course means a bigger pot to win from.  I'm not sure yet if it's something I want to do, because if I'm honest with myself I'm not sure if I can lose 4% in 4 weeks, but I really like the idea of it.  I really, really like the idea of it.  After looking through the website it looks pretty freaking cool!

Yesterday I ate out for lunch, AND had fondue for dinner with Hubs.  Since I burned 665 calories during Zumba, I came out with a deficit of 701 calories.  Not too shabby considering those two meals!  I am looking forward to this week because I am starting to pick up work lunch and snacks in the lower calorie range, helping me out with staying in range of my daily calorie goal.  Last week I tracked, but the snacks I had were still fairly high calorie.  This should be a good week!  I also brought in my gigantor water bottle today, so I'll start drinking from it and peeing a lot.  Back when I lost a bunch of weight several years ago, I had the most success when I drank 60oz water per day.  I can't remember how many ounces this has, but it's massive!

Maybe I should bet on myself.  Hmmm....

Yesterday's totals
Calories consumed - 2018
Calories burned - 2719
Deficit - 701

Finally, some success!

Yesterday actually ended as a good day.  Woohoo!  I was under calories a bit, so I had a pretty good deficit.  Tomorrow will be my first weigh in day after logging and tracking again.  Also, since the class I was going to the other night was canceled, I plan on going to water aerobics at 9am, then Zumba at 10:30am.  Phew!  Wish me luck on that.  To help keep up my motivation, after Zumba I get to sit in the eucalyptus steam room after I'm all done.  Ahhhh, peace.  Feels so good in there.  I'm debating whether I should buy new shoes for Zumba because when I did Zumba before, my shoes were hard to Zumba in.  I couldn't move or turn quickly because my shoes stuck to the floor, and as a result it always hurt my ankles.  I've been googling shoes to wear to Zumba and I could get dance sneakers, but there are also less obvious but still good for dancing sneakers available.  I want something with a low profile and that isn't too bulky.  Something I can move well in.  Something that's not too obvious to me that I'm wearing shoes.  Decisions, decisions.

Yesterdays totals:
Calories consumed - 1361
Calories burned - 2156
Deficit - 795

WTF dude!

Why did I just eat that cupcake?  Why, kid, why?  Damnit.  I skipped the lunchtime Starbucks I meant to have (although I WAS going to walk there) since I wasn't all that hungry after I ate lunch, but then the afternoon started to take it's toll and a chocolate Halloween cupcake *somehow* made it into my mouth.  Plus Caribou is having a BOGO tonight and I was hoping to bring coffee home for Hubs on my way from the gym.  Well on the bright side, I should still have a decent net.  I guess I'm not too far off.

Daily calorie target - 1450
Approximate comsumed (so far) - 1479
Burned during exercise - 378
Approximate deficit - 1004

Yesterday's Results

I ended up eating a 3rd piece of pizza last night, instead of the 2 that I planned on.  I ended with a calorie deficit of approximately 337 calories.  Again, not bad, but will be better going forward.  Tonight I'm going to water aerobics, I have my gym bag packed and ready to go in my car!  I also brought a lunch with fewer calories than I had yesterday, and my dinner will be much lighter than yesterday.  I was trying to finish up leftovers.  Anyway, I think today will be a successful day with no shakiness.  Woo!

Day One - A Shaky Beginning

Today I started diligently tracking what I eat.  I brought my BodyBugg cord to work and it's fully recharged (but not yet back on my arm) so it's ready to go.  I've tracked what I plan on eating for the remainder of the day and I am over by 210 calories.  Not so bad, but not so great.  Tomorrow I'm going to the gym straight from work and going to water aerobics.  Hubs and I went there Sunday to get my membership reinstated, and tomorrow when I'm there I'll add him to the plan.  They had misplaced some spreadsheet so they weren't able to quote us a price to add him at that time.  Just being in the gym gave me an indescribable feeling.  It's so familiar - the way it smells and everything.  Hubs got a tour of the facility since he had never been there, and the pool was so perfect and enticing.  Calm, quiet, peaceful.  I just love the way the water feels.  I'm excited to get into the water and move around!  Maybe I'll start seeing the pounds go down soon.  I've felt this before.  Cautiously optimistic.  The desire to lose weight, the fear of failure.  The excitement of thinking I can do it, the anxiety that I won't.

On a serious note, my thoughts go out to those effected by Hurricane Sandy.  I have a very good friend in New York who I have not heard from, I'm worried and have been scouring news websites on updates from the area.  Be safe everyone!

Daily calorie target - 1450
(Potential) Actual calories consumed - 1660
Approximate calorie deficit - 440