Everyday Systems

nettee wrote:I have been reading about Dr Xand Van Tulleken's diet in the daily mail.

Some good tips - eat cheese - it is filling, avoid 50:50 fat and sugar - it is addictive, avoid alcohol - it makes you eat.

There are so many good tips out there - I recently read about not eating anything with more than a 5:1 ratio of carbs to protein, and not eating anything with more than 10% sugar. I'd agree with the statement that 50:50 fat:sugar combos are addictive - that's my cookie problem!

You're making good progress - my S days have changed gradually over time.

Thanks Rawcookie, I think being more aware of carb:protein ratios would be a good thing.

Success for today. Powering through.

Success

I was quite hungry before lunch today - I think it was because I had smoked salmon instead of cheese at breakfast. We had a cold lunch with fresh chips and lasagne for supper - yummy

Success for yesterday. I cooked another "diet" recipe for supper last night. Sweet potato, salmon, brocolli and tomato roasted in the oven in a bit of Olive oil. I thought it was quite good but my husband thought it was bland. He is also on a bit of a health kick and trying to lose some weight so I don't feel too guilty. Never mind - this morning I am back at my Lowest Weight to Date. LWTD?

I wonder if I can go a little further down for tomorrow - quite often I don't lose anything between Friday and Saturday mornings so I won't get my hopes up too high. Just will enjoy having got the Christmas weight off by 13th January.

success for yesterday! We had chicken with a cream sauce for supper last night and I have a new LWTD! 11st 10lb this morning.

Whoop Whoop.

2 S days to navigate now. We are out to Pizza Hut with our son this evening so that will be enough of an S day treat in itself for today.....

look at you! You're doing it AND you are losing weight...wonderful!

thanks Buns - it is great

I didn't go completely crazy this weekend which is an achievement in itself. Various big dinners out and one small pudding but not much in between. This morning I think I must be at my lowest Monday weight so far, well under 12 st. Back on it for 5 N days this week.....

Success for yesterday 🙂

Success for Tuesday and Wednesday.

I am hung over this morning after quite a dry January so far. It is not fun. The glass ceiling seems very sensible at the moment.

Success for Thursday and Failure for Friday. Just a few extra nibbles on Friday evening but officially not part of the rules.

We had Chinese takeaway on Friday night which I think set me off for a bingy Saturday. Loads of chocolate that had been hanging around since Christmas, left over takeaway and cake from a party that my daughter brought home.

I have been feeling really tired since yesterday afternoon and went to sleep at 8.30 last night. Wondering if it is the sudden sugar rush and rebound. The plan for today is to eat some wholesome meals and maybe one savoury snack this afternoon.

The good news is that I had a new LWTD on Wednesday of 11st 9.5 lb - so close to a stone's loss in total.

Success for Monday. So far so good today. I feel much more awake since I stopped binging.

nettee wrote:Success for Monday. So far so good today. I feel much more awake since I stopped binging.

Yay!

Success for Wednesday and Thursday

Resisted some garlic bread the children were having this afternoon.

ooh, well done - garlic bread is SO tempting!

🎉 this morning I weighed 11 st 9 lb, so have now officially lost a stone 🎉🎉

Thanks Rawcookie, Yes it certainly was tempting so more 🎉🎉🎉

Success 😃

Checking in for my 2 S days ahead - no big plans to eat out and the house is not full of temptations so hopefully they will go smoothly.

Having posted my testimonial I have been doing some calculations on the 10% loss and % loss that I would hope my weight stabilises at. The 10% is 11st 5lb which is now only 4 lb away. Frighteningly I would like to lose 25% of my starting weight to get down to just under 9st 7 lb. I don't know if I will go that low or if I will go lower than that on this diet but it is such a big percentage of my weight that I am not surprised it is going to take a long time to get there.

I have been thinking about measuring success via weight lost. It is a big thing at Slimming World and sometimes I wonder if it is a good thing because the start weight becomes so important and eventually that will be a distant memory and not that significant. However if I didn't have my starting weight to refer to I would only have the stick of having a BMI of 28.8 today and not being happy with my shape and not the carrot of 'wow I have lost a stone'. Once at a healthy weight the weight itself can be the positive carrot and perhaps the total loss is the stick if you need it to remember what can happen if you go back to old habits. Thought for the day 🙂

Well done on losing a stone - that's a huge achievement. I weigh about the same as you and want to get to about 9 stone too. I'm only 5'2 so can't carry a lot of weight. It does seem a long way away so I'm just focusing on one day at a time but I'm looking forward to seeing a big difference in my starting weight and my future weight! (If that makes sense!)
Good luck!

Hello Idontknow, I am 5'3" so we are in quite a similar journey. One day at a time is really all you can do. I am thinking about the big picture as I have hit a milestone but I do think it can be quite dangerous and off putting whether it feels like good or bad news.

I was quite pleased with my S day yesterday. My Ss were as follows:

Cadbury's creme egg (been thinking about it all week - not as good as I imagined)
Satsuma
Grape
Cheese on a cracker
One slice of the children's pizza

My meals were all reasonably healthy. Go again today 🙂

looks like your S day was quite sane. Doesn't it feel so good. Congrats on resisting the garlic bread.

I'm proud of you! You're sticking to it, and you are losing weight. Awesome!

Thank you - yes it does 🙂. Sunday was a bit more nibbly but nothing disastrous and Monday is here again.

Success for yesterday

Success for Tuesday and Wednesday.

I am looking at February on the habitcal - a nice short month. Pancake day is on the last day this year. Not sure whether to celebrate it early, call a nws day, find a savoury pancake recipe or ignore it - choices, choices ...

Pancake day?

Success

Pancake day is Shrove Tuesday, the day before Ash Wednesday which is the start of Lent. Traditionally you use up all your eggs and sugar on pancakes before fasting for lent. I think it also has something to do with unleavened bread. A bit of an excuse to eat pancakes anyway 😋. Do you not have that in America? One less temptation.

Success for Friday, Monday and Tuesday. The weekend was fine - some big meals but not crazy binging so I am pleased (despite the knickerbocker glory!)

(a very large ice cream with tinned fruit and strawberry sauce and usually cream but this one didn't have any)

I've never heard of the pancake tradition here in the U.S. People here, if they celebrate, I think tend to do it with booze ala New Orleans style Mardi Gras style. There may be unofficial pre-Lent overeating, too. But we've got a ways until then.

Pancakes with a LOT of syrup was how I started most of my S days for weeks, maybe months. I still have a crush on them, but don't have them very often anymore. I did have some at Denny's during pumpkin season.

It is interesting that we all have different traditions - I had not associated Mardi Gras with Shrove Tuesday. I love pancakes with lemon and sugar. Is there a relationship between pumpkins and pancakes?

Success for today. February is looking great so far

No, it was just a marketing ploy for Thanksgiving season. It worked on me! But I felt it was smarter than having pancake fixin's around because they were binge foods for me. I think I had 'em twice and was done with it.

Success for Thursday and Friday. The weekend was fairly bad with some baking going on but I have been very good today avoiding lots of temptation so far. It is half term this week so there are going to be more temptations than normal. 😎

Is half term a break or a crunch?

Seven years in and i still rarely bake. The dough or batter is like kryptonite. I gave myself permission not to have t face it down. But I've seen others here get over it beautifully.

Half term is a week off school for the children. I have been at work but have the next 3 days off. Yes baking is dangerous - somehow homemade seems healthier.

Success for yesterday and today - Valentines Day

Success for Wednesday and failure for yesterday. I was out for lunch and polished off some of the children's food. I am pleased though that I didn't give up for the rest of the day and resisted some other temptations.

One more green day for this week to go....

Another failure day - I am annoyed with myself. Prawns and ice cream before dinner today. Not loads but enough. And then I had the odd bite of some other snacks/sweets while I was at it. Never mind - next week is a new week.

Success - feels good after a longer than usual break. I have been thinking about trying to lose weight faster today because I have plateaued a bit but I know that is the road to disaster.

nettee wrote:Success - feels good after a longer than usual break. I have been thinking about trying to lose weight faster today because O have pateaued a bit but I know that is the road to disaster.

Good for you on the success today!

I make myself wait for 3 months of plateauing before I think about how to tweak or change No-S. So far I haven't gotten there. I've had some of those "diet" thoughts creep in this month too though! But...I looked at my habit-cal tonight & realized that so far for the month I'm at 11 green days to 9 yellow/red days. (1 red, 8 yellow). That's almost 50-50--I probably wouldn't see much decrease at this point! Maybe I will see movement by the end of the month, because I'll end up 17 to 11--but I'm more likely to see changes during months where I end up more 2 to 1 green days for yellow days. So I keep reminding myself to just be content to keep up the habits. Some months are better than others!

Good job avoiding the "faster" trap.

I just dropped in to your thread to say that it has really helped me reading the last few posts. I have been reminding myself of the need to take things slowly and to not stress if my weight loss stalls for a while. Merry I like the idea of waiting three months before thinking about any adjustments to NoS. Vanilla has served me well so far, so I think its a case of keeping the faith!

Thanks guys - great to have your support and helpful thoughts.

Another success today. I am feeling more positive again.

Success for today

I had a good weigh in this morning of 11st 8.75lb. I didn't report my 11 8.5 LWTD from a week or two back so hopefully will have a new record by the end of the week.

Good job!

Success for yesterday and today.

Two light lunches and hungry afternoons but I hung on for dinner.

S days ahead.

All in the mix.

I know there is no such thing as a bad S day but I wish today's was better.

Too much grazing rather than enjoying some special treats.

Maybe tomorrow will be better.

One nice thing about keeping your posts here at the NoS site. Next Friday you can go back and read what you just wrote as a reminder to yourself about what you wish.

Having grown up raising beef cattle, I tell myself, "Grazing is for farm animals that need to be fattened up."

TexArk wrote: "Grazing is for farm animals that need to be fattened up."

Love this!! Too funny

That is a great saying to keep me focused

Today was not much better but on the bright side we did Pancake Sunday so I won't be tempted to call a nws day on Tuesday.

Back to N days tomorrow- almost a relief!

TexArk wrote: Having grown up raising beef cattle, I tell myself, "Grazing is for farm animals that need to be fattened up."

LOVE this! Hilarious!

nettee wrote:That is a great saying to keep me focused

Today was not much better but on the bright side we did Pancake Sunday so I won't be tempted to call a nws day on Tuesday.

Back to N days tomorrow- almost a relief!

Good for you, and I hear you about Mondays almost being a relief. There's something comforting about being back in the routine. I do enjoy my days off too though!

Success

February is not looking bad on habitcal. Once the reds have been surrounded by greens I find them less disheartening.

One more green day tomorrow and I will be 5 months in.

I have been in the habit for a month or so of drinking a glass or two of wine most nights. Not the end of the world but I have decided to have 5 days off this week on my n days to break the habit.

Nice!

Success for Tuesday and My son's birthday dinner for this evening

Funny how the decision to go yellow made me nibble after the meal was over....

nettee wrote:Success for Tuesday and My son's birthday dinner for this evening

Funny how the decision to go yellow made me nibble after the meal was over....

Yes, it is like, once we give ourselves 'permission' to deviate from The Habit, our brain takes full advantage of the freedom! It takes a lot of will-power to just have one S event in a day like a birthday.

Success on a long and stressful day - the habit must be going in - not emotional eating.

nettee wrote:Success on a long and stressful day - the habit must be going in - not emotional eating.

Good for you--that's a huge success! but I'm sorry you had a long and stressful day.

Aw thank you. Today should be better! Just work stuff that got sorted fortunately.

I am counting yesterday as a success although supper was tapas which is hard to control washed down with some Coca Cola. No snacks, maybe seconds but no plate to measure with and sweets only in liquid form.

I hit a new LWTD this week of 11st 8lb exactly. So a pound down over the last month. Slow but consistently going in the right direction

nettee wrote: I hit a new LWTD this week of 11st 8lb exactly. So a pound down over the last month. Slow but consistently going in the right direction

WOO HOO!

Yay!

Slow and steady wins the race! Yay for you!

Thanks everyone. I was quite pleased with my Saturday this week but Sunday was another graze fest.

Success for today

Success. I have also stuck to my dry N days plan. It is not hard, not sure what was getting into me in Jan/Feb with the wine o'clock thing. I am considering cutting carbs a bit but not sure how to do it without getting complicated.

No carbs on 2 days per week, no carbs for one meal a day - but which one, small portions of carbs at each meal - would I need to measure? Or is this dangerous talk likely to push me off the plan?

Good new re the dry N days - I am another pound down this morning at 11st 7lb Maybe just thinking about low carb is enough.

I did a rare Waitrose shop this morning - so much temptation! Lots of it looked so healthy and so yummy.

I suggest you don't try at this point to schedule the cutting of carbs. Being more random means you won't necessarily be able to see obvious results in weight or even physical condition, as I believe it's hard to know if the effect of any meal is the result of the most recent meal or a combination. It can also take awhile to figure out what and how much to add to a meal of something else when you cut a macronutrient, or whether you can be happy with no replacement.

So try a few changes at various meals. Normally have two pieces of toast? Try one and a small piece of fruit or more pb or yogurt. Try not to get too caught up in it, and give it several weeks. By that time you might be able to tell if you should just keep going like that or make a new default, but you might not, either. Even if it's not clear, you have the foundation. You don't have to have the house figured out yet.

Thanks Oolala, I think you might be right re cutting down to start with.

Success for today.

Success

I had that miserable experience of not liking one of my 3 meals today. I had high hopes for a Waitrose salad and there was too much mustard in it. Boo!

Better luck for tomorrow when I have the other one 🤞

nettee wrote:Success

I had that miserable experience of not liking one of my 3 meals today. I had high hopes for a Waitrose salad and there was too much mustard in it. Boo!

Better luck for tomorrow when I have the other one 🤞

Boo! That's no fun! I hope you like your meals more tomorrow.

Success for today and the second lunch salad was better - hooray!

A weekend of Birthday celebrations ahead - the first of three in a row. Will try to keep Ss to the parties and not between times.

Wow - a new LWTD this morning of 11st 5.75 lb. it is unusual for me to lose much in the week after Wednesday morning so I wonder if this is an anomaly, good news though.

Maybe I should be more positive and put it down to 5 good S days with no meals out or stretching of the rules. 😇

Also I have had my engagement ring back on since Wednesday with no problems. Hopefully I can do the same with my wedding ring soon which is slightly smaller.

It really takes several weeks of maintaining a weight for it to be a real new weight. The benefits of these new habits go way beyond the scale, and they are what will make this sustainable. I gently recommend you give them LOTS of attention and much less to the scale.

How wonderful to be able to wear your ring again. Of all the disappointments about gaining weight that there are - and there are many - not being able to wear my wedding ring is one of the greatest.

Hugs.

Thanks everyone - I know you are right about giving less attention to the scale but I can't help myself. I am fairly relaxed about temporary gains and big losses that are out of the ordinary though so I don't think it is doing me too much harm. I am very pleased with the week day habits and feeling of control and value that as much as my steady loss.

Success for today after a wild weekend of flapjack eating. Not due to a reaction to the scales but more my sugar addiction and all or nothing mentality.

Success for Tuesday

Failure for yesterday - a few canapés and then some extra chips with my late supper. It was a late supper after an evening event - Not a disaster.

I am working on reducing my lunches which seems to be ok - not no carb but low carb and small portions.

Success for Thursday and Friday.

I think I have to go for an S day mod this weekend. I probably do have to have a slice of cake tomorrow for (another) birthday celebration but perhaps I could go for that being the only sweet S of the weekend.

So far so good avoiding sweet Ss for the weekend. Yesterday I had seconds at lunch and some afternoon snacks but didn't go mad.

Cake today.....

Not a bad Sunday - I did have an extra piece of cake later so didn't quite make it through the weekend as per my plan but no crazy binges which is an improvement.

nettee wrote:Not a bad Sunday - I did have an extra piece of cake later so didn't quite make it through the weekend as per my plan but no crazy binges which is an improvement.

Hey, Great job, Nettee!

Thanks Merry. Success for today 🙂

I have been shopping for my daughter's birthday party food. There is going to be much temptation this weekend. I need a strategy.....

Success for Thursday and failure for Friday due to seconds at dinner time or extra chips and cheese in front of comic relief.

Kids party today over lunch time. It could be worse - I have nibbled lunch but the leftovers are mostly savoury. No more cake for me!

Success for Monday and Tuesday. Some early meal times though and I'm going to bed hungry tonight. Not really the idea of no S I don't think.

Fairly crazy weekend again sadly with the party leftovers - next one will be better.

Success for Wednesday, Thursday and Friday.

No major temptations this weekend I don't think.

I realise that I have been doing this now for 6 months.

Down 1st 4lb in that time

nettee wrote:I realise that I have been doing this now for 6 months.

Down 1st 4lb in that time

Wahoo! Congratulations on your 6 month anniversary, that's great! Keep up the good work, and congrats on your loss too

Thank you Merry. I am just back from a week's holiday of S days and back to my first N day. I am also starting the couch to 5 K running program and did my first run this morning. Feeling positive!

The week before I went I had 3 Successes and two failures. This was the holiday where I was aiming for under 11st 7 - I did get there but am back up above that today. It is a Monday weight though and not as bad as I feared. Will report back on Saturday re the actual gain. After my 9 week running program it would be great to be down to a 1.5 stone loss in total. Should be possible 🙂

Success for today 🙂

Success for Yesterday. I was feeling the gap between lunch and supper yesterday, I will get used to it again but it is quite a change from holiday eating!

success for Friday.

5 straight N days back on the case and, comparing Saturday Weights, it is just a 2lb gain for the holiday.

I have done my first three runs so am on track with the C25K as well.

I am working today and there are no big temptations over this weekend.

Success for Monday and Tuesday.

A good couple of days after a wild weekend of snacking.

Good luck with hump day.

Success for Wednesday, Thursday and Friday.

It is now a bank holiday weekend with two weddings. I think I will keep Monday as an N day. Need a weekend mod - maybe one S event per day?

I have finished week 2 of C25K - feeling good after today's run. I was quite sore earlier in the week. I am quite curious about how I will get on next week with my three minute runs.

The weekend was not bad. Success for bank holiday Monday including a wedding. Quite pleased with that. Also still going strong with the running and considering some races for later in the year.

I'm so envious of your exercise habit. What a great combo with No S.

Thank you - just getting started after a long break - feeling motivated at the moment.

Failure for today though after cheese and crackers after work. Silly of me and only the 2nd of the month. Oh well - tomorrow is a fresh start again.

Oh dear Failure for Wed, Thurs and Fri last week. 5pm munchies each time. On the bright side, the weekend was ok. Also I am keeping up with my running and ran for 5 mins non stop today for the first time.

New week starts today. So far so good, I have had lunch and will now get through till supper.