Sunday, January 1, 2012

Halfway there...

This is my Jenny check in. Yeah, I know I pretty much skipped posting about the holidays but I don't have much to tell. I can do that in a paragraph or two and segue into Jenny because most often people associate holidays/December with over-eating and for us it isn't a gorge-fest. We don't really do anything. For whatever reason, no one is inviting us to holiday parties if they're having them, B's family doesn't really do anything, and neither do we. We also don't have a "corporate holiday party" for either of us to attend.

For Hanukkah, of course there are latkes. We went to a Hanukkah thing the pre-school did at the synagogue, but the latkes there kind of left something to be desired for me. They were the shreddy (I don't know what else to call them) kind. I ate it, because it was there, and it wasn't Jenny food. But, I did stick to one and a bite of the one E didn't eat. I don't like applesauce so I didn't eat that. A very close family friend, Barbara, makes kick-ass latkes that are to die over, and I couldn't resist letting her bring some over. I only ate two. One per day. I let B eat the rest. It was sad, but I was able to do it.

Other than that, on Christmas, B is really adamant about a strict "Jewish Xmas" (I think it looks weird to keep the "Christ in Christmas" when I put Jewish in front of it, so excuse the "X" but it seems right to me) of Chinese food and going to the movies. Instead of doing both on Christmas and maximizing on calories, B was cool with doing Chinese on Christmas Eve and the movies on Christmas day. I ordered the Combo plate, but got steamed chicken, shrimp & snow peas with my pork fried rice and egg roll. I skipped my snack that day too. I knew going into Jenny: Week 3 that going to the movies, I was having my movie theatre popcorn with extreme "butter" (whatever that goop really is, I don't want to know, but I LOVE it), come hell or high water. And I did. But, I ordered a small and I didn't eat the whole thing. Because I was also nauseous from the amount of butter. When I say, a lot, I mean, I sometimes choke on it. Yeah. We got no candy and usually I'd get (ok, I'd bring...) a box of Raisinets so I felt like I was making a better choice than usual.

So, that was food. As far as exercise, I've been going on the treadmill around 5-6x a week. Listen, I'm no runner, I'm not going to end up telling you that I'm doing any 5k or "dirty marathon" (you know, whatever those mud things where you go through barbed wire and shit) at the end of this. I go on my treadmill. I walk fast. Or as fast as I can go while still being able to hear the TV and check the Nest or Facebook at the same time. That's roughly going up and down between 3.2-4.2 the whole time. Here and there I burst into a little jog for like a minute. But, it's exercise. 30 min. It's better than nothing I assume.

The kicker- I had TWO F'ING YEARS of Desperate Housewives I was watching in the 30 minute increments on there. Last week, I went to go see if Orson and Bree were going to make it as a couple and my DVR DIED. It DIED. I don't know if you fully know devastation until your DVR kicks the bucket. I am a fully admitted TV addict that doesn't plan to change. And this was PERFECT for being able to hold my attention on the treadmill because I loathe exercise. Had to get a new box, and by the way, they gave me an HD box which we never had before. Yes, I realize we're late in the game but when you have 2 years of TV saved up, you can't just go get a new box. Well, until you HAVE to do it in an unfortunate box death. HD is WEIRD. Actors you think are hot? Not-so-much when you see every mark on their face. It's very disconcerting. Ok. A friend from Rider, James Mount, tells all his FB friends he's in this movie- Lebanon, PA: http://lebanonpamovie.com/ and it's on Showtime. I christened my new DVR with it. So, yay, I had something to watch. Just FYI, if you can catch it on cable or stream it on Netflix or Amazon it's worth it. GOOD MOVIE. I got three treadmill days out of that one. I got B to watch part of it today and he is really digging it too.

I went to Jenny on Wednesday morning to weigh in and get my food. I was concerned because of the Chinese food, the latkes, and the popcorn. DOWN TWO POUNDS. Yup. I don't know why I was so surprised. That's the cool thing about Jenny- it helps you re-train yourself to normal portions but you CAN have "cheat nights" here and there and still manage to lose. Because the bottom line is, it's all about calories in and out. Jenny just helps you manage it easier if you're not into measuring and cooking. And I'm really liking my food. I'm eating the beef slider for lunch like 3x a week and loving it. I think my weight was 154 and change (ounces, but not sure the exact weight). Whatever it was, I reached my halfway goal so I got $50 off my food that day per whatever plan I signed up on. Awesome deal if you ask me. Very motivating.

I gave them a goal of 148. Ideally, I'd really like to get between 140-145, but like I said in my earlier Jenny post, that's a bit harder to maintain, and while still realistic, I can live with 148. When I get there, I presume, hopefully in the next 4 weeks, I'll just keep buying the Jenny food. But, instead of buying the hot breakfasts which are more expensive, I think I'll just stick to the cereals which are like $2 less per item. Eventually, once I get past the goal, I'd like to find out approximately how many calories my favorite cupcakes are at A la Cupcake and instead of buying Jenny desserts, I'd like to eat those! I'm never giving up dessert. I don't do the Jenny "snacks" as snacks- for instance, I don't switch it up and ever get chips, popcorn, or anything like that. I always get 7 Cookies & Cream cheesecakes and eat them as my after dinner dessert. I'd like to be able to at least substitute my strawberry preserve cupcake from Pam a few times a week instead! I know I can't go back to my jelly bean addiction, but what I can do is buy some jelly beans, find out what the real serving size is, and eat them here and there as a treat, in a controlled portion. I think I'm going to have to give up my candy dispenser. So sad.

New Years Eve was going to be another pitfall though. I don't know how this weeks weigh-in is going to go. I weighed in Wednesday and went to Grand Lux Cafe with my friend Amy on Thursday for dinner. I did really well. I had two small pieces of bread with butter, but got steamed edemame, grilled salmon, sweet mashed potatoes and steamed green beans for dinner. I only had half (pretty much exactly) for dinner there and took the rest home. I ate the second half Friday night. We were having friends over for New Years Eve and I'd bought all hors d'oevers, including my weakness- Hebrew National pigs in a blanket. The others I could give or take.

My friend C brought some cool stuff from Trader Joes, including that awesome microwave spinach dip thing. And M brought brownies from Kings. But, for some reason, I guess from all my running around preparing, trying to get all the food made and warm at the same time, I wasn't super hungry. I know you're probably not supposed to do this, but I saved some 800 calories for the evening by not eating my Jenny lunch or really anything else besides breakfast so that I could indulge a little. But, all I ended up eating really was about 10 blanketed pigs and about 10 of those amazing cream puff things you buy frozen in the box from the supermarket! I also had two Mike's Hard Lemonade which I think was responsible for the absolutely splitting headache I had all day today.

I started out the day on 12/31/11 at 154.5. I bought a new scale- the Weight Watchers one, at Target, which gives you your weight in increments of one ounce, exactly like the Jenny scale at the center. I've been getting on it like every other day. I got on it today and my weight was 154.2. Hey, I'm not going to argue. Like I said, once you've retrained your body with Jenny, it becomes easier to be full on less so even if I cheat, it's not like I'm back at eating 2lbs of jelly beans and a daily cupcake.

All in all, Jenny has been a success. It definitely helps keep me in line and that's what I need. I honestly don't understand the waiting for January 1 to get back in line. If anything, it helps retrain your mind too. If you start it BEFORE you know you're going to want to over-indulge, it helps motivate you not to sabotage yourself like that. It helps give the discipline I can't just give my myself without a little help. Hopefully my weigh-in won't be messed up this week but having the scale with the most accurate weight also helps in not having any surprises. We have another scale that just goes in increments of half pounds. So, it would be either 154.5 or 154/155. I NEED to see that little ounce number. For some reason, it helps.

For anyone who is starting their weight loss journey this week as their New Years Resolution, good luck and feel free to be like a weight loss buddy here- leave comments, inspiration, funny anecdotes, whatever you need to stay motivated and on track!!

2 comments:

  1. Congrats! I was sick over Christmas so I did lose last week when I weighed in at WW and am down 26.5 pounds. However, I got off the wagon the past two nights and am considering not weighing in on Wednesday. I don't want to be discouraged. Today I am doing well and plan on starting my Tae bo full force today. I haven't exercised much over the holidays due to illness and just being on a different schedule but need to get back on track.

    Glad you are doing well on Jenny! Keep it up.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Yay! I made it in the blog :)

    Congrats again on the 2 pounds! And remember, if you want to run a 5k, you know who to call (me) :)

    ReplyDelete