Mar 18, 2007

March 18 diet thoughts

I keep telling my wife that I wish I could just fast-forward to July. But that's not happening.

It's interesting to see how much my weight fluctuates during the day. Right now, I'm over 10 lbs heavier than I was when I woke up this morning. Yet, I've only eaten 1037 calories today. I drink a lot of water and other zero-calorie liquids, that accounts for most of the weight gain.

Today might have been the most balanced day I've had as far as nutrition. check this out:
22% of my calories were fat. Right on! only 3% was saturated fat. Awesome!
36% carbs, 42% protein. I had 27 grams of fiber today, in just 1037 calories.

I indulged in some sushi today, had twelve pieces. eleven pieces and I would have been under 1000 calories.

Speaking of calories, I once again went over my goal of 1000 calories a day - I had 1037! What a pig I am! (:

The gimme lean sausage turned out to be meh. It would have been better with maple syrup!
That's ok, I hit a grand slam with the shirataki noodles, which I was sure to eat today. With tomato sauce. Yum.
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What is amazing to me is how slow the fat loss is, when compared to the overall weight fluctuations due to consumed solids and liquids, as well as water weight and other fun things going on in a body. I am probably losing about a pound of fat a day at this point, and when I think about how I can easily drink enough water to exceed my starting weight right now, it really makes it obvious that the daily scale routine is worthless unless seen in the big picture. I always knew that, of course, and I even knew why - but I don't think I "got" why - if you see the difference. I will continue to weigh myself daily because I think it'll be an interesting graph to see. But I won't worry to much if tomorrow morning I weigh 2 lbs more than i did this morning - I know that extra 2 lbs isn't fat, so whatever. Same goes true for bodyfat % measurements - there are so many factors that go into that, the accuracy of it is nowhere near where it needs to be if I was to accurately take day-to-day measurements.

Bottom line: I just have to sit back and look at the trends rather than the miniature peaks and valleys.
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Right now, as I haven't had a piece of red meat or wheat in three weeks, time really seems to be going by slowly. I can't imagine keeping this up for four more months! So as a motivating thought for myself, I reflect back to times when I had a definite goal date for other projects in my life - projects that I let fizzle out. Example: Lets say it's memorial day and that I make a goal to read 20 books by labor day. I figure out how many books I need to read every week, set up a checklist, and for the first couple of weeks I come out of the gates really strong. But as the weeks go by, I start to lose interest. By the end of June, I am forcing myself to read, wondering why I set this goal. And long before mid-july, I've forgotten about it. Fast forward to Labor Day. At the BBQ, It occurs to me that there wasn't that much time in the interval, and I could have completed that goal easily.. and I wonder why I didn't.

I've had enough of those experiences in the past that it's been motivating me past the cravings for the last week. And I kept going for a week - and right now, I feel pretty satisfied, even though I've had very few calories today. Of course, I could go for a cheeseburger right now, but the cravings aren't what they used to be.

Less than four months to go. Once again, I've got to look past the day-to-day and instead at the big picture - that four months won't seem that long at the end of the period.

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