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<p>64.4 pounds, as of this morning. Down four pants sizes – eight inches off the waist size.</p>
<p>For cravings, generally I get a lot of satisfaction from nuts, particularly pistachios and cashews. Peanuts too, but I have a hard time putting roasted peanuts down. LOL. I tend to crave sweets after dinner, so I satisfy that lust with chilled canned pineapple or chilled red grapes. Also oddly enough, a juicy whole tomato works well for me as a snack if it’s chilled.</p>
<p>I don’t really get cravings- except for sugar or salt around my period ( which will stop at some point I assume)
I think to keep blood sugar level- protein helps or if you are trying to short circuit an acute sugar craving- eat a dill pickle.</p>
<p>emeraldkity- that is also the only time I get cravings.</p>
<p>I can’t believe I neglected to mention my favorite way to stop sugar cravings. A nice hoppy beer! A good friend and I started this tradition when our kids were small-- The dads would take all the boys for the day and the moms would spend it baking Xmas cookies. (The dads also cooked dinner!) We found ourselves “sampling” cookies somewhat excessively and decided to pop a couple beers to quash the desire. It did the trick.</p>
<p>Yay! for you, interesteddad. I think we have similar diets, though I skip the half and half.</p>
<p>I’ve always held the coffee half n’ half in reserve as my “drastic action” if I had hit the wall and needed to further reduce calories. But, from the get go, I was losing weight at 1.8 pounds a week, which is about as much as you want to lose if you are thinking about a sustained program. I’ve finally hit a plateau – the first one that’s lasted more than a week or two since February, but I’m also within six pounds of my “only in my wildest dreams” weight. It would be unrealistic to expect that rate of weigth loss to continue.</p>
<p>Frankly, with the amount and intensity of my exercise, it would be counter-productive to cut my calories below 1800 a day. I would just end up wearing down muscle and fitness. So, if I cut the half n’ half, I would need to replace it with something else. I think being able to enjoy a really good cup of coffee with fresh ground beans and half n’ half has been a way for me to feel like I’m getting a nice tasty snack. Not bad for 40 calories. Beats drinking a coke or eating red twizzlers. It’s one of those cases where 40 calories of fat goes a long way towards preventing crave binging on far more calories of sugars and carbs.</p>
<p>We all need a few guilty pleasures. Maybe you should be happy with maintenance through the holidays, then start with new resolve at the new year.</p>
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<p>Idad: There is a woman who was on weight watchers for a long time, lost a lot and then hit a plateau. She kept very detailed logs of everything she ate, so she went back and reviewed her records. She identified a pattern whereby some weeks when she varied the amount of calories, she actually lost the most weight. She came up with this theory that the way to ‘trick’ your body into giving up those last few pounds is to eat more than your calorie limit one day and then less the next (she refers to them as ‘points’ since that the basis of weight watchers but in reality every ‘point’ in weight watchers is roughly 70-80 calories depending upon the fat content) and occasionally eat a super-high number of calories.</p>
<p>Anyway, thought it was an interesting theory - a lot of people subscribe to it and claim it works well when you hit a plateau. Here’s the link to her story:</p>
<p>[The</a> Wendie Plan](<a href=“http://www.stormpc.com/ww/wendie_plan.htm]The”>http://www.stormpc.com/ww/wendie_plan.htm)</p>
<p>Also, you can google The Wendie Plan and get other information on it.</p>
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<p>Oh, trust me. I would be happy with maintenance where I am today for the rest of my life. I have been shifting gears for about a month now. I now have the opportunity to actually get fit (for an old guy), so my workouts have taken a turn in that direction. It’s a challenge, but I’m seeing some results.</p>
<p>I’m focused pretty much on becoming stronger and more fit. I figure the weight, from here on out, will simply follow the body changes from becoming more fit – lifting heavier weights, doing more challenging exercises, and so forth. I thought it was all about losing weight, but I’ve slowly come to appreciate that losing some weight opens up doors and may not even be the biggest reward. Weight really isn’t the ultimate goal, there’s an element of reshaping your body that ideally involves jettisoning fat and replacing it with lean muscle. Crash diets that result in loss of both fat and muscle are self-defeating because, without muscle and fitness, metabolism drops and the yo-yo syndrome weight gain is inevitable.</p>
<p>If I keep up my workouts, I am confident that I will like the results, even though I really don’t know exactly what they will be, never having been this weight or exercised like this at this age.</p>
<p>MomLive:</p>
<p>There is a very strong belief in the fat loss fitness community that you have to jolt your body with a shot of carbs once a week to prevent going into metabolism slow-down mode. As a result, you see elaborate calorie cycling routines, consuming large amounts of carbs on heavy workout days, followed by carb restricted days.</p>
<p>I kind of do that without thinking about it. I’ve always had a carb-day meal once a week – pizza, pasta, or a sub sandwich – throughout my entire “diet”. Whether that has been a factor in my steady weight loss, I don’t know. Whatever the case, I’m sure I’ll get a nice carb shot on Thursday!</p>
<p>At this point, I’m not too worried one way or the other. The curve of my weight loss looks exactly like you would expect: steep during the early phases when I had a lot of fat to lose and slowly becoming more shallow in the last couple of month as I have gotten closer to my target – really once I had lost about 50 pounds. That’s inevitable. If you have 10 pounds to lose, you are going to lose fat slower than someone who has 50 pounds to lose.</p>
<p>^Also you have probably put on a lot of muscle. I think you are wise to not worry about the actual weight in terms of pounds and work on just become fitter.</p>
<p>Can I ask how old you are? I am 48 and am just now starting to feel the effects of not being very fit and overweight. I have been steadily increasing my exercise (to the point that when I haven’t exercised in a few days, I miss it!) and have crafted an eating plan that is keeping me off sugar, junk food and other items that can cause me to over-eat. The weight is coming off at a rate of about 1.5 pounds a week. However, I’m a little intimidated about taking it to the next level (in terms of workout). I can hire a private trainer but I’m afraid they will work me to the point that I will get scared off - if that makes sense. OTOH, I’m not likely to push myself too hard without it. Would love to hear how someone very out of shape and close to 50 did it. Did you jump in with both feet or gradually work your way up to it? :)</p>
<p>I’ll be 57 in January.</p>
<p>I was a 38 year smoker (at least a pack a day, every day, since Nixon was President) until I quit cold turkey in February 2008. That, of course, meant that I pretty much didn’t/couldn’t exercise from about age 35 on. I started this eat less/move more kick last February, on my two-year anniversary of my last use of nicotine. So, believe me, I started from absolute ground zero. I couldn’t do a push up. One of my goals was just to walk a mile without getting winded, etc.</p>
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<p>You must be doing something right because 1.5 pounds a week is a fantastic rate of weight loss. I’d keep doing what you are doing.</p>
<p>The exercise thing is a long process. I’ve done it with self-directed exercise – an iPod based program I bought and using simple equipment: exercise bike, stability ball, dumbbells. Two things have to happen. First, your fitness curve has to increase over time. In other words, assuming I never lost the first pound, I would get more fit and stronger purely from working out. Then, the weight loss curve is steadily shedding pounds, which makes all forms of exercise easier. I got a graphic demonstration of that when I bought two 28 pound boxes of cat litter on sale at the grocery store a few weeks ago. As I carried them out to the car by their handles, one in each hand, I realized that’s the extra weight I carried 24/7 back in February. I would get winded today walking a mile with those boxes. I wouldn’t be able to do a pushup today with 56 pounds on my back. Forget doing a burpee or a t-pushup with that kind of extra load. No wonder those first workouts were so ridiculously hard. I think shedding the weight is a bigger component than getting stronger in my workout progress – although how do separate the two?</p>
<p>So it is very, very rewarding when those two changing curves intersect and you can start doing workouts that you couldn’t imagine just a few months earlier. I’m just wrapping up what was nominally a 12 week iPod workout plan – repeating weeks two or three times until my fitness caught up and then moving on to the next stage. I’ve also mixed in some different stuff – like [Rachel</a> Cosgrove’s Spartacus Workout](<a href=“http://www.menshealth.com/mhlists/high-intensity-circuit-routine/printer.php]Rachel”>http://www.menshealth.com/mhlists/high-intensity-circuit-routine/printer.php) – for variety. It’s similar to what I’ve been doing – a bunch of whole body exercises – so it’s been a nice complement and very challenging. I had sent it as a joke to my wife and daughter, issuing a family challenge on who could do it first. Then, I started working on each exercise. For example, I could see that I needed to crank up my pushups to get ready. Then, one I day I figured that I could probably do it, so I picked a day and dove in. First just one set. Then, two sets at a time. I’ve been working on that on and off for a couple months. </p>
<p>I’m not in any hurry. I just keep plugging away. When I start to get good at a workout, I move on to the next level of difficulty. Sometimes that means breaking it down and just working on the individual exercises. Sometimes it means doing fewer reps or fewer sets in a workout and building up. Sometimes it means throwing in extra breaks during a workout and building up. For example, I can’t do 60 seconds on each exercise with 15 seconds rest on the Spartacus workout. So I do 45 seconds with 30 seconds rest - still a big mental “win”. I try to walk a fine line between giving myself the time to really get solid with a workout (I don’t think sloppy exericise is smart, that’s how you get hurt) and always trying to push myself so the intensity level is high. Basically, if my heart rate isn’t hitting at least 85% to 90% of my maximum during a workout, it’s time to kick it up a notch. Sweating and panting should be part of any good workout – which has not been hard for me to achieve! It comes naturally for me…</p>
<p>When I’m having a sugar craving I have a chocolate calcium chew (or two). I buy the Target brand and they’re very tasty and satisfying, plus I’m getting some calcium and Vit D. The other thing I do is make a fruit smoothy with fiber powder and yogurt. </p>
<p>When I’m having a carb craving I’ll get a handful of mixed nuts, leaving the can in the pantry. Keeps me from eating the whole can.</p>
<p>Idad - thanks for the information. I will think of you whenever I feel like giving up.</p>
<p>I noticed earlier this year that I was getting winded when walking with friends or co-workers (regular walking - not for exercise). I also found myself avoiding hills, stairs and anything the least bit strenuous. That’s when I started to get scared about my health. Since I have been working out regularly, I don’t winded at that level anymore and am not afraid of stairs and hills. I still have a long, long way to go but I do see the positive effects of exercising and losing weight. I just need to kick it up a notch.</p>
<p>I read the diet and exercise thread and think your posts are always inspiring. Please keep it up - you never know how much your story will inspire others to find the courage to do what you’re doing but I bet it does pretty frequently.</p>
<p>MomLive:</p>
<p>The hardest part is getting started. Once you are underway, the “wins” along the way provide self-sustaining motivation. Rachel Cosgrove tells people to start thinking of themselves as “fit” even before they’ve lost a pound. That’s where I think the exercise part is so important – it makes you feel like you are are more fit than you were the day before (even if you are bent over panting like a dog!)</p>
<p>Tonight when I really wanted a hunk of cheddar cheese, I did settle for a Cuties (little orange). It reminded me to add a hint about taking a good whiff from the orange peels. It’s a good pick-me-up.</p>
<p>Oranges and nectarines have satisfied my sweet tooth on many a night. I know it’s possible to overdo the fruit, but it is so much better than the other options. I look at eating an orange as a “win” compared to noshing on cheese or peanuts or ice cream. </p>
<p>I hear ya on the cheese. We used to buy two pound bricks of extra charp or seriously sharp Cabot cheddar. I could plow through one of those in a week. That’s 3500 calories. One pound of body fat. Eat it and gain a pound. Stop eating it and lose a pound.</p>
<p>Hey, easy on the peanuts, fella!!!. Some of us just have to have them.</p>
<p>A one pound bottle of dry roasted peanuts is 2500 calories. That is 3/4 of a pound of body fat. It’s hard to imagine a food that is more calorie dense. That’s probably twice as “fattening” as a one-pound rib eye steak. By comparison, a pound of red twizzlers candy is only 1600 calories, just under 1/2 pound of belly fat.</p>
<p>The Atkins diet a few years ago killed me with the peanuts. They were “ok” because they are fairly lo-carb. So I got the impression that eating mass quantities was a “healthy” snack. It is fairly healthy food, but nuts will flat pack the pounds on, just one handful at a time.</p>
<p>I heard folks talking about the Atkins diet. Yikes, no breadcrumbs allowed in meatloaf… but chitlngs could be use. And it seemed like way too much bacon was encouraged.</p>