March 17, 2011

AM Supplements:
Fish Oil 2000 mg
Lecithin

Lunch Supplements:
Flaxseed Oil 2000 mg
Cayenne

Daily Health and Food Log
Bed	Up	Hrs	AM Pain	AM BP	PM Pain	PM BP	Weight
1130p	7a	7.5	4		5		295
	Calories	Fat	Chol	Sodium	Carbs	Fiber	Protein
Goal	1396	45g	211mg	1688mg	211g	18g	35g
Actual	1019	58g	106mg	1194mg	57g	7g	41g

AM Supplements:
Fish Oil 2000 mg
Lecithin

Daily Health and Food Log
Bed	Up	Hrs	AM Pain	AM BP	PM Pain	PM BP	Weight
1130p	7a	7.5	4		7		295
	Calories	Fat	Chol	Sodium	Carbs	Fiber	Protein
Goal	1396	45g	211mg	1688mg	211g	18g	35g
Actual	1387	84g	438mg	1498	178g	14g	22g

AM Supplements:
Fish Oil 2000 mg
Potassium
Midday Supplements:
Flaxseed Oil 2000 mg
Cayenne

Daily Health and Food Log
Bed	Up	Hrs	AM Pain	AM BP	PM Pain	PM BP	Weight
1130p	7a	7.5	6		6		297
	Calories	Fat	Chol	Sodium	Carbs	Fiber	Protein
Goal	1396	45g	211mg	1688mg	211g	18g	35g
Actual	751	37g	438mg	1251	46g	6g	47g

I'm really liking LiveStrong. It's easy to use.  The ads are low key.  No one bothers you.  Although I wouldn't mind a few friends.

AM Supplements:
Fish Oil 2000 mg
Potassium
Midday Supplements:
Flaxseed Oil 2000 mg
Cayenne

Daily Health and Food Log
Bed	Up	Hrs	AM Pain	AM BP	PM Pain	PM BP	Weight
1130p	7a	7.5	6		6		297
	Calories	Fat	Chol	Sodium	Carbs	Fiber	Protein
Goal	1403	45g	211mg	1688mg	211g	18g	35g
Actual	1584	69g	179mg	1503mg	166g	19g	77g

Writing Everything Down Sucks!

Actually, the writing down is okay.  It's the totaling.  But today I found a great website with very little advertising.  That was what I disliked about SparkPeople.  Tons of ads.  So now I'm using LiveStrong, sponsored by the Lance Armstrong Foundation.  Easy to use.  No annoying ads, or popups.  So I will be using it instead of my cute food diary.

Here are my totals for today.

Daily Health and Food Log
Bed	Up	Hrs	AM Pain	AM BP	PM Pain	PM BP	Weight
1130p	7a	7.5	6		7		303
	Fat	Cal	Carbs	Protein	Chol	Fiber	S Fat
Total	79	1830	153	92	603g	20
Goal	53g	2000	300	65g	300mg	17g	18g

Totals 2/1/11

Happy Imbolc.  I'm feeling the Spring.  All antsy and wanting to organize stuff.  Had an egg today, which totally blew my cholesterol out of the water.  But stuff like that is gonna happen, I guess.

Daily Health and Food Log
Bed	Up	Hrs	AM Pain	AM BP	PM Pain	PM BP	Weight
11p	7a	8	4		4		303
	Fat	Cal	Carbs	Protein	Chol	Fiber	S Fat
Total	57	1934	291.8	119.6	453g	67.2	17.8
Goal	53g	2000	300	65g	300mg	17g	18g

Here's my stats from blood letting last weekend:
Total Cholesterol: 170
Pulse: 65
BP: 146/84
Hemoglobin: 13.7

Totals 1/31/11

Better today.  I'm quite please.  I was also surprised that an half sandwich and soup had less fat.  I'm guessing the salad would have been better without the dressing but I wasn't in the mood for a naked salad. 

Daily Health and Food Log
Bed	Up	Hrs	AM Pain	AM BP	PM Pain	PM BP	Weight
1130p	7a	7.5	4		6		303
Total	Fat	Cal	Carbs	Protein	Chol	Fiber	S Fat
.	57	1828	251	62.2	252	28	13.5
Goal	53g	2000	300	65g	300mg	17g	18g

Totals 1/30/11

Another not motivated to really comment. 

Daily Health and Food Log
Bed	Up	Hrs	AM Pain	AM BP	PM Pain	PM BP	Weight
1130p	8a	7.5	5		5		302
Total	Fat	Cal	Carbs	Protein	Chol	Fiber	S Fat
.	60	1400	45.5	103	198	6	15.5
Goal	53g	2000	300	65g	300mg	17g	18g

Totals for 1/28/11

Not as good a day as I might have hoped.  I was right on track all day, but then we got take out for dinner and . . .well, it's not pretty.  Here we go:

Daily Health and Food Log
Bed	Up	Hrs	AM Pain	AM BP	PM Pain	PM BP	Weight
11p	7a	8	4		6	`146/84
	Fat	Cal	Carbs	Protein	Chol	Fiber	S Fat
Total .	110g	2440	391	93g	236mg	10	23.5
Goal	53g	2000	300	65g	300mg	17g	18g

So, the only place I succeeded was with saturated fats.  A start I guess.  Tomorrow is another day.  Perhaps I can do better now that I'm tracking it better.

Totals for 1/27/11

I'm going to try to list the totals from my food diary every day . . .as well as some other data.

Daily Health and Food Log
Bed	Up	Hrs	Pain
1030p	650a	8:20	6
Total	Fat	Cal	Carbs	Protein	Chol	Fiber	S Fat
.	85g	2055	232.1	91.4	236	17	62.5

This is actually pretty good for not trying.  I've been doing a bit of research and my goals should be as follows:

Total Calories: 2000   Total Carbs: 300g Total Protein: 65g Total Cholesterol: 300 mg Total Fat: 53 Saturated Fat: 18


Kind of a mixed day.  Felt motivated for part of it, but also had a bit of a manic episode.

The Holidays are OVER!

Thanks to an article in Slate, Kafka's Calisthenics, I started remembering to breathe more again and am starting to stabilize early this year.  As I go through this part of my cycle again, I will be trying to figure out how to keep from losing track of so much.  Although, honestly, I did pretty well.  I even managed to my food journal until about Christmas.  So only about a month of not keeping it this time.  And, I wasn't happy with the one I had made.  It was ugly and did not track all the stuff I wanted to track.  So I designed a new one yesterday.

This isn't a very clear shot, I'll print it later as a pdf.  (Really need to get a usb hub for home.)  I added weekly and daily goals and also space for tracking fats and carbs, which the other one did not have.  And more space for listing food, the old one didn't have enough. 

So I'm back on track to keep track of my food again.  I'd say it doesn't really change how I eat much, but I think it will help me identify nutrients I might be missing out on.  I have a list of potassium and calcium rich foods, as I don't seem to get a huge benefit from supplements, as well as list of minimum dailies for a person of the weight I wish to be.  

Today I am going to try to work up some sort of "totals" for the day table that I can insert into this blog.  I know no one reads this, but I would like to be able to see changes online.  Probably going to put my "before" pic back up.  Took it down for some reason a few months ago.  Yes, possibly shame.  It was taken when I was over 320 pounds and . . it ain't pretty. 


I'm also working on a very comprehensive calorie counter book.  Found a text only database of foods with calories, fat, pro, etc and made it almost spreadsheet ready, just going through and tweaking some places where "find and replace" failed.  As soon as I sort out how to print it nicely, I'll offer it for download.  It's got a LOT of foods.  That is where I run into trouble food journaling, as I hate to look everything up at some of the food/diet sites.  There's good ones.  But it gets sooooo tiresome.

This morning I found an old . . .notebook . . it's sort of a cross between just a notebook I carried around to plan menus and shopping lists and a diary.  It's from 2001.  The first entry, if only I would remember what I learn, was in July, less than 2 weeks before I agreed to marry Mike.  I was having doubts.  I wanted to wait and sort out the Michie thing.  And then ten days later he found out he had gotten the job in CA and in the excitement I forgot my own wisdom.  I let myself get caught up because I had a limited time to choose.  Ah well, who's to say it would have turned out better if I had stayed in CO . . would probably never had a tv show for half a decade.  Although I'm so lonely it doesn't really matter a lot of the time.

Okay, that way lies crawling back in bed and crying.  Need to do some research and then off to work.

Current Regimen

As I'm sure I've commented somewhere, I tend to be a person of extremes.  When I decide to bring change into my life, I go overboard.  A couple of months ago I did that.  It did not turn out well.  Going forward I am trying to be more reasonable about it.  I'd already established that I can tolerate fish oil and about a third of the recommended dosage of calcium.  (I'll write about my experience with taking the full dose sometime)  So on 9/20/10 (my mom's birthday . . .not sure if that had anything to do with it) I started keeping a food journal again.  And I added cayenne to my regimen. One of the things I've found is that I tolerate all supplements better with lunch rather than breakfast.  Especially the cayenne, which gave me some problems at first. 

So now I have my alarm set to remind me to go to bed at 10p.  I usually don't make it until 11p but it's way better than the 1a I was staying up until a couple of months ago.  I am also pretty consistently getting up and walking just a little bit every morning.

I will try to create a digital version of my food/activity diary to use here, so I can track my progress online.

Getting Serious

It's time to get serious again. Those of you who struggle with weight and depression know what I mean. One day you wake up and you know you have the energy to take a shot at getting your body and mood under control. And you feel confident that this time, you will be triumphant.

I woke up feeling that way this morning. I actually got out and walked, not just lay in bed or puttered around the house thinking I'd like to. Didn't go far, just around our complex. But it was a start, and part of the reason we fail so often is we try to take too big a bite . . . try to change too much too fast.

From Calories Per Hour:

Unless you are excited to be following a very specific diet and exercise plan, do not try and change too much too fast. If you have been eating poorly and not exercising, both your body and your mind will have a lot of adjusting to do.

All the sugar and fat were actually quite enjoyable, and sitting on the couch didn't feel too bad, either. If you try and change everything too quickly the odds are greater that you will feel bad, get discouraged, and give up. So be patient.

A time will come when a healthy snack will taste as good as the junk food you felt bad about eating, and you will look forward to your regular exercise.

This is what I do. I jump in and try to change all the bad habits at once . . overcome enui that has ruled my life for months or years. But I often fail quickly because, honestly, I'm a creature of habit and the habits I have developed have stood me in good stead in surviving depression and mania. So trying to change everything at once often leaves me feeling lost . . .adrift without any anchor.

With that in mind, I've actually already started. Over a year ago I signed up for a Twitter based app called Your Flowing Data. I didn't use it very much for a year. Then a couple of weeks ago I felt my spring surge building and started recording some things. I have successfully kept track of my getting up and going to bed, blood pressure twice a day and my weight daily for over a week. As I progress I will add other things . . .not only what I eat, but vitamins and meds. This may seem onerous, but I can do most of this via my Blackberry Twitter login.

So I will be keeping a food log, something almost every weight loss expert agrees is the one thing that will guarantee success. If you are like me you have done this time and again. I've even designed my own food log, really cute little pocket sized number. And sometimes I could manage to keep tracks for a month . .before I lost it. The value of the BB based one is, I'm not likely to lose my BB. So we will see how this goes.

I'm still working on a plan. Which things to change, when. For the short term, I will continue to monitor my default behavior, tracking various activities that might impact mood and health. I'm hoping to add pain tracking today, because I have been in a lot of pain the past few days. I may start going to TOPS again, that's difficult with my schedule.

So here we . . .an adventure not so new but hopefully more successful!

Interesting article about food diaries

Double Your Weight Loss: the Write Idea

Wouldn't it be nice if there was something you could do to double your weight loss efforts?

According to one of the largest and longest running weight-loss trials ever conducted, there is.

What's this new weight-loss miracle? Is it a drug? A new machine for blasting your abs? A crazy diet where you eat nothing but broccoli?

Double Weight LossNo. It's simply your keyboard. Keeping a food diary -- recording what you eat throughout the day -- can double a person's weight loss efforts, according to a study conducted by Kaiser Permanente's Center for Health Research. Read more . . .