Saturday, August 31, 2013

August Results!

Hey friends! Another week behind me, week 2 of T25 Beta phase complete! That's 7 weeks completing EVERY workout prescribed in the program.  If you've been blog-stalking me for any amount of time you realize what a HUGE deal this is.

It's tough for me to stick to any schedule I make for myself, no matter how hard I try.  I just enjoy variety and shiny objects too much to be a routine person.  Now, you are probably shaking your head and reminding me that I eat the same foods alot.  But I feel I get a TON of variety in the way I eat, and I truly love all the food.  So I'm not bored. 

This week I learned some important things about my body that affected my overall results for the month.

I was hoping to lose 2.6 pounds this week...which is ALOT.  During the entire 102 pound weight loss, I've never lost more than 1.5-2lbs a week with the exception of my cycle week (moon week, girls) in which I have dropped 3-4 lbs.  In fact, my most constant pattern has always been, in a 4 week period as follows:

Week 1: -.5-.8lb
Week 2: -.5-1lb
Week 3: +1-2lbs (bloat week)
Week 4: -2.5-4lb (cycle week)

So my results are that I gained .8 this week.  What the heck, I thought.  But then I remembered my moon calendar and it made sense.  I also made a few choices food-wise this week that I know contributed.

Here are my food pics for the week and then I'll recap what I will change for the next week.

B - eggs, brussel sprouts salad, sweet potatoes, L - leftover pork, carrots, snap peas, D - huge salad with grilled chicken and fruit, olive oil. (my meal planning template also pictured)

B - eggs, snap peas, and sweet potatoes, L - taco salad and a whole mango, D - salmon with cucumber dill sauce, cole slaw and sweet potatoes.

B - eggs, snap peas and sweet potatoes, L - salmon salad boats and cole slaw, D - 3 egg/sausage muffins (literally just eggs, homemade sausage and seasoning) and also pictured is my new purse/laptop bag!

B - eggs, snap peas, L - grilled chicken salad from Soho South in Savannah, D - at the Green Truck, the "whole farm" burger (minus cheese) with an egg and bacon on top of grass fed beef.  Also pictured my awesome friend Wendy who I get to see when I have to head to Savannah for work! We always have awesome conversation and shopping!  But we take terrible selfies. In fact, I ended up having to cover my neck muscles as they kept looking weird in the pictures!  lol

B - Hard boiled eggs, sausage, fruit.  L - green truck again - same thing as last night.  D - chicken salad and leftover cole slaw.  Other picture - brought my clothes this week!  lol!

B - eggs, snap peas and avocado, L - some leftover chicken salad (not pictured) and almond/hazelnut/chocolate butter (no sugar) and apple and D - Aidell's chicken sausage, cole slaw, carrots and avocado.  Also pictured is one of those daily challenges I have yet to start (haha - there we go again, not good with a plan!).

B - eggs (already eaten), snap peas and avocado.  L - taco salad and D - The Rancher at Longhorn, (sirloin with bacon and egg on top) and steamed veggies.  Also the newest temporary member of our family, a beautiful kitty my husband found half starved crawling across the road.  She's perked up amazingly in just 24 hours of a bath, de-fleaing, food and lots of love.  Even purred today.  Hoping we find her a good home once we get her strength up.  I'm guessing she's around 4 weeks old.

So...looking at my food do you see any trends that might have contributed to the gain?  I do!  First, I ate sweet potatoes 4 times in 3 days.  Now, sweet potatoes are W30 approved, however, I have had maybe two this entire YEAR.  So technically even though they are good for some people's regular consumption, they are not for me.  While they are approved, they are too starchy for me and slow down my digestion. Some athletes SWEAR by them as necessary to fuel workouts, runs, etc.  I, um, don't need them! Maybe all the fat left to burn?  I was stressing over the gain then read an article on the fact that if you eat "low carb" (which I don't do, really, I just don't eat crap - lol) that adding carbs back in (and sweet potatoes are a form of that) too quickly and often will cause issues.  Aha! Now that article was trying to convince people NOT to eat like I do.  Sorry folks, I already have figured out what works for me.

And this week I figured out me and sweet potatoes need to break up again.  I'm ok with that! Good thing I don't really love them! Just got on a kick last weekend with them.  Not kicking anymore. Haha.  Going to make some tonight for my family and our guests but not planning to partake.

I also made my own sausage for the first time.  1lb ground turkey and 1lb ground pork along with the Italian sausage seasoning mix recipe from Well Fed.  (BUY this cookbook if you eat like me!  Well Fed 2 is coming out very soon too - can't wait!).  This was wonderful, and I cooked my own egg muffins with sausage as well.  Some of the sausage I made into patties, the rest I ground and cooked to add to the egg muffins, etc.  It was AMAZING.  Fennel seed is my new favorite.  THAT is what makes sausage taste like sausage to me!

But.  Sausage is "food without brakes" for me I think.  Food without brakes, as described in "It Starts with Food" by Dallas & Melissa Hartwig, is ANY food in which you cannot control yourself around.  Meaning you just keep grabbing some here and there, and find yourself snacking, etc.  And yeah, I snacked on sausage.  Alot.  Oops!  Lesson learned.

Here are a few more pics for you of things I learned/realized this week.


Today started football season!  And yes, I have NO shame in wearing my Gator garb around this GA town.  I did get a few looks but who cares?  Not me!  Sorry for the Dixie photo bomb. 

Tried these this week.  The bag is still full.  I do not like them.  $6.99 a bag I'm kinda glad I don't like them plus they aren't technically approved as they have organic evaporated cane juice in them.  Note that is only 2 oz of food for $6.99! And they are gross, to me.  Sorry...have to be honest on here.  lol.

Day 3 of no concealer/foundation.  My skin is simply glowing right now.  It is awesome not to have to put anything but a lil powder on my skin, do my eyes and head out!  Awesome result from eating clean.
So, not super jumping up and down ecstatic about not hitting 179 this week, but I'll take 183.2.  I'm so so close to my goal, and given next week is a cycle week, I just might be hitting that goal in the next few weeks anyway! 

When this happens, you have one of two choices.

1) Give up.  This is too hard and I keep failing or
2) KEEP GOING.  Learn from the signals your own body sends you and KEEP FIGHTING!

Door number 2 for me please!

Overall, I'm happy.  And still motivated.  And so blessed.  Here's to another great week!

~Clara

1 comment:

Brit said...

I've never had the mango habanero flavor but I have had "taco" flavor of those kale chips...the taco flavor was actually pretty good but I didn't really eat them alone -- I put them on taco salad for some crunch. I also bought them on sale so while they were still toooooo expensive ($3.99, I think) for what little you get, they weren't RIDICULOUSLY expensive. $6.99?? Yikes! Good thing you don't love them :D