Good morning!
Well, I am basically back to goal weight. I'm at 77.3 kilos today, and it's only Wednesday. :) I was hoping to reach this point by Saturday, so I'm a happy guy this morning.
Of course, huge drops in weight like this often results in gain the following day, so let's see where we end up. Regardless of where that is, I'm very satisfied.
It seems that my system and my maintenance approach works.
I have actually lowered my goal weight on the calorie counter to 76, just to keep myself in a relatively short leash. It's not hard at all - I have an allowance of 2100 calories. It's a walk in the park.
Yesterday, I used ALL my allowed calories. Every single one. I'm not sure I can conclude anything about what happened, but it went perfectly hand in hand with the theory that me eating breakfast results in me wanting to eat all day.
I did good though. I stayed within the RDI, and the "snacks" that I filled the RDI with was all protein rich treats. Protein bars, and a protein rich chocolate milk. No cake. No candy. No ice cream. Just real food and protein rich snacks. I think I did good.
I woke up after very little sleep today, so I am really tired. I had a good old friend call me just as I was on my way to bed last night. He sounded like he had a lot on his mind, so we talked, talked and talked some more. We ended up being on the phone for about 90 minutes - and boy do I need that sleep time now. :) It was great though, and I would have hated to miss it. I'll sleep when I get old.
This morning, I have absolutely no hunger. I will jump right back into the "8 hour window" eating approach today, and see how it goes. I've had water and coffee, but I won't eat any actual food until lunch at 11 am. I can easily do this, I think.
I really felt that urge for MORE food yesterday, it was almost freaky. I know that a lot of it was emotional hunger. It was not the slowly growing hunger, but much more the hunger that just pops up.
I had a busy day at work, and I am sure that affected me in many ways. I had several meetings, had MANY curve balls thrown at me, and it was just a wild day. But boy, did it affect how I wanted to eat.
We're all gonna have those days, I think. And I think it's okay - as long as we don't go nuts and overboard every single day. For me, I'm happy that I managed to stay within RDI nicely, and I didn't feel that there was any kind of failure in it. If anything, I feel that I learned something new.
It's still very early on the whole "8 hour window" eating. Basically, I'm trying to ONLY eat through an 8 hour period, from 11 AM to 7 PM. The days where I have done it has been really easy, and absolutely no issues have occurred. It's just a matter of doing it.
Really the hardest part has to been to explain to Wife why I don't want breakfast. LOL.
So, today I am back to this approach. I think I like it so far. Let's do it, and see what happens. If I get overly hungry, I have a massive protein bar in my backpack, and a couple of protein shakes at work. It's no biggie - I won't go overly hungry. Besides, lunch is in 5 hours. Just how hungry can I get? :) It's not like I'm gonna die of starvation, or simply implode.
...
Dinner tonight is interesting. Wife and I have been craving clam chowder. Good old fashioned clam chowder.
This is a challenge to do here in Denmark though. All the recipes I see online asks for cans of this, cans of that. Cream of mushrooms and what have you. In Denmark, we don't have these cans, but maybe similar things. However, experience tells me that if we want to have a meal like this, we'll more or less need to make it completely from scratch instead. That's the way to go here. So today, I'm gonna be spending a little time googling it, and seeing if I can come up with a recipe. Wish me luck! :)
...
I did great on my exercise yesterday. I did my one hour walk in the morning, and Wife joined me at the gym after work.
Here are my
stats from yesterday - I did great, I think. My only regret is that I didn't check my stats before bedtime and took another 500 steps to reach 20000! :)
It's really great to have the Fitbit website to follow my activity. I love it. I really feel that I am connecting with my exercise in a way that I never thought possible. It truly gives me a drive to move and do more. It really gives me a feeling of control. And you know me - I need control.
The website has a "calorie plan" too. Just like Fatsecret. I don't use it to register my food, as I prefer my Danish version called Madlog, but I love the way it tells me how much I should eat.
Basically, it starts out by giving me an RDI that is relatively low in the morning. This one is based on BMR and a few other factors, such as whether I am in a weight-loss or maintenance mode, and tells me what I can eat today to reach my goal, based on the exercise I have done so far today. Then, as I move around more, the number increases. It's basically an ever changing RDI, that promotes moving around. Running out of calories for your foods today? Move more, earn more! I love that idea! It helps us not starving ourselves, but gives us a chance to have our caloric intake in the "sweet spot", where our bodies burn calories most efficiently, and we still lose weight - if that is what we want.
For me, once I reach maintenance at 76 kilos (I changed this setting here too, from 77 to 76 kgs), I will be given a much higher number. It will fluctuate from day to day based on my movement, but it would be a GREAT indicator for my future of what I can do on the specific day. I like this a lot!
This way I can basically set my RDI of the day according to the Fitbit, and just go with it. Obviously, I need to see that the numbers DO work, and that it doesn't miscalculate things. I don't know this part of the system very well just yet - but I see a LOT of potential.
...
It's almost time for my walk.
Today, I'm thankful for:
- Hearing from a dear old friend.
- Being asked if I was interested in a potentially VERY interesting job opportunity. Can't say more. It will be in the future, anyways, not now. If anything develops, I will let you know. :)
- Morning coffee and water. Great substitutes for breakfast. LOL.
- Reaching 77.3 kilos this morning. I feel accomplished.
- Having the courage to lower my goal weight to 76 on my calorie counter. This way I should be even more certain to (virtually) never go higher than 80 again. I really want this.
Happy hump day! Life is good!
EDIT:
No morning walk. :( It's raining. Hard. I'll have to get my steps in other ways today - I'll do my best to reach goal. :)
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2nd EDIT:
It's interesting. No breakfast today, as dictated by "8 hour Window", it's been 3½ hours since I'd normally have breakfast, and I have no hunger at all. I will have lunch in 2½ hours, and doubt that I will have any issues waiting for that time to come. How about that?!? :)
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