Hi all

It's been a busy several months for me and my new DH! Yet try as we might, we just have not been able to stick to a good diet. He has re-gained 20 lbs and I have stagnated. I just can't seem to stick to anything. He is good about just putting his nose to the grind and getting back to business...I am not Now I am having some issues that are literally going to force me to watch my eating.

My Dr. told me a couple of months ago that I am borderline on my bad cholesterol. And the last two nights, I have been kept up by acid reflux....very painful! I have regular heartburn but nothing like that! I know I have to change my eating habits, but every time I try I fall right back to old habits.

I know that for some people the time has to be right to really focus on weight loss. For me, I know I need to, and I don't have much of a choice! Any recommendations on what to do to get back in the swing of things, especially this time of year?

Robin

Welcome Back!!

Baby Steps is a must..Post if you think you going to go off track and add Lean Protein to your diet as well as healthy fruit and Veggies!!

You may want to check out sparkpeople.com to keep track of what you eat..

Heather

Welcome back Robin!
I agree with most everyone else. Sorry I'm not adding anything new.

Babysteps, especially at this point will make it easier. Don't fall into the "all or nothing" trap.

Incorporate more fruit, vegetables and whole grains into your diet.

Also, if you're like me, all of my holiday parties are dinners. Can you at least make sure to have a GREAT breakfast and a GREAT lunch? At least that's 2/3 of your meals.

If you've heard of KD's "good, better, best." I really strive for good or better around the holiday season. I don't set myself up to try for the best, and I'm ok with that. I am really trying to have very healthy breakfast and lunch choices on days when I have parties, and then eat "good" at the parties. I eat some of what I want, I eat dessert, but I try to cut back elsewhere. If you pick up something at a party and you taste it and it isn't good, then don't eat it. Don't consume calories at parties that aren't REALLY, REALLY worth it.

Watch your alcohol cosumption at parties too. I'm not saying you have to only drink water, but alcoholic beverages can really up your calorie intake in a sneaky way. (I also notice myself noshing a lot more when I drink alcohol.)

Try KD's on delicious bite for every 3 healthy bites.

You can do it, just break it down.

Dawn

robin, i hear you. eating is my toughest challenge. if i could wake up one morning and NOT have eating be such a big deal in my life...oh how much lighter my spirit would be!
what i hear from your messahe is that all this weight loss and exercise thing is hard enough, but in your situation, there are the added difficulties of (1) not feeling like you have a choice at this point, (2) the holiday season, and (3) it is overwhelming right now. that is a lot to process right now so i understand where you are coming from.

can you perhaps try to change your view of things, not see it as one large leap but baby steps? just identify one small thing right now that you can tackle, i.e. get one vegetable side dish onto your lunch. once you have got that down, go for another small change. when i have done that, i was surprised, when i looked back over several weeks how many total changes i actually implemented. for me, going at this thing in small steps is the way to go.

the holiday season is difficult, but i have to say, my eating patterns were SO SO much worse 2 months ago. about 5 weeks ago, my thinking was "why not start today?" even tho we were deep into the holiday season. this forum has helped tremendously. read some of the prior postings about how folks planned their eating for thanksgiving. doing so helped me a great deal. i had intially viewed the holidays with such worry, and now, i am feeling more solid and steadfast. day by day.

take a long breath. you can get on top of this little by little. we are all struggling with you. we all have good and bad days. hang tight robin! stay connected.

I can't eat very late, either. When dinner isn't until 7 or 8...then bedtime isn't until 10 or 11. I also notice more trouble when I don't drink enough water, so I try to down a couple of glasses between dinnertime and bedtime every night.

A simple change might be breakfast...in the good/better/best vein, a good choice might be instant oatmeal in a flavor you'll like and will eat (read that to mean: if you can't stomach the plain stuff, flavored/sugared stuff is still better for your cholesterol than, say, Captain Crunch).

Congrats on your marriage...and in that vein, would it work better (at the beginning) to make the changes for "him" than for you? I have trouble thinking I'm important enough for <insert good habit here>. However, if the boyfriend wants to lose weight or work out more or whatever, I'll pull out all the stops--cooking better, packing his lunch, having something healthy for breakfast ready, doing more for him...which ends up being good for me, too

quote:

Originally posted by RobinBeBe:
Any recommendations on what to do to get back in the swing of things, especially this time of year?

Robin

Welcome back Robin!

My suggestion would be to start posting here regularly to keep your health goals in the fore front of your mind.

I would also go back to the basics and start baby steps again. You may want to take some of Sheri's suggestions about upping your fiber and fruit/veggie intake along with watching what you are eating close to bedtime and make baby steps around those areas.

Robin: I'm sorry that you are struggling--this is an expecially difficult time to try to get back on track. I have been where you are both in terms of acid reflux and cholesterol. In fact, you may recall that it was my doctor hounding me about going on cholesterol meds that motivated me to finally take action to change my lifestyle in 2003. Here are some ideas:

1. Reflux: When I had reflux (about 20 years ago), I was eating dinner late and drinking Coke right up to bedtime. I also ate a lot of spaghetti back then, and the tomato sauce was an especially bad trigger for reflux. I thought I was going to die a couple of times when I awoke in the night with terrible reflux episodes and was unable to catch my breath. Since I live alone, there was no one to call 911 and I could not speak. It was very scary. Once I became more disciplined about eating dinner at dinner time and not eating within 2 hours of bedtime, I improved. Cutting out soda in the evening helped too. If any of those issues apply to you, I would strongly urge you to change your behavior in those areas.

2. Cholesterol: Once I made up my mind to change my lifestyle, I was pretty committed. You just have to decide that your health is more important than the food. My total cholesterol went down 69 points in just the first few months and I also had great improvements in good cholesterol and reduction in bad cholesterol.

I cut out fried foods, dramatically increased my fiber intake, switched from white flour to whole grains, and substantially increased my intake of fresh fruits and vegetables. I also started exercising regularly (I was already a member of a gym, but had had an injury in 2002 that took me a long time to recover from and hadn't gotten back in the swing of exercising regularly since).

I can't tell you, of course, what change made the most impact on my dramatic reduction in cholesterol, but I do believe that all of the changes I made contributed to some extent. If I had to guess, I would say that the increase in fiber and in fruits & vegetables were probably the biggest impacts.

Hope that gives you some ideas for where to start.
Sheri

I am really short on time this morning, but wanted to welcome you back.
How about posting on the What's for Dinner Thread to help you get back into some more postive habits.

Great news that you are back posting and wanting to change.