I mentioned last week that this week I would be watching what I ate, but taking it easy since I would be in between 21-day challenges. I was unsure how the week was gonna go, to be honest. I wanted it to go well, but I was a little worried that old habits would rear their ugly heads and cause me to make poor decisions. I'd say it was a little of both.
I realized that when I'm not actually counting the things I eat all day every day it's really easy to skip the good and go with the bad. Having said that, I didn't let myself get that bad. I definitely ate more carbs than I was supposed to, but I didn't go crazy. I allowed myself to eat pretty much what I wanted, but I often found that after I ate it, it didn't taste as good as the idea of it had been. During the fix challenge, I ate a lot of quinoa and a little bit of brown rice. On occasion when I ate them with baked chicken, I would put some of the chicken juice/gravy over it but it was often left plain. Sometimes I would see that box of white rice in my cabinet and really just want some white rice with butter and I was tired of the plain better-for-you stuff. This week I allowed myself to eat some white rice with butter....and it didn't taste very good. I actually ate it with baked chicken and wished that I had put some of the juice over it instead of the butter.
I allowed myself to eat one mini-sized Kit Kat....I LOVE Kit Kats....but I didn't like this one. I took one bite and thought "holy cow that is so sweet!!" There was nothing wrong with the candy bar - I just realized that my taste buds had already changed so much. I've been drinking pretty much just water since I started the fix (other than the Shakeology drinks), with just the rare exception of some tea with honey. I started getting a migraine at work the other day so I broke down and bought a diet Pepsi with the hope that the caffeine would help my headache go away. And the drink was disgusting. I could actually taste the sweetener in it and I certainly didn't like it.
While doing Weight Watchers I had essentially cut out all pop-like drinks, but when I would go back to one it never was quite as bad as this time. I think the difference is that while I may not have been drinking the diet drinks, I was still using artificial sweeteners in my food and other drinks. I'd put them in my tea, use them to sweeten my plain greek yogurt, etc. But the fix doesn't allow you to have them at all. I sweeten my tea and yogurt with honey, I eat my oatmeal plain or with peanut butter, and everything is natural. So I didn't just cut out pop this time - I cut out the sweetener altogether and it's made a huge difference.
I'm finding that I don't need to add as much to sweeten things, I don't use as much salt (not that I really used a whole lot to begin with), and several things just aren't tasting the same as they used to. Microwave popcorn...I didn't enjoy it as much as I thought I would.
So, while my week obviously wasn't as good as the past few have been, it was still pretty successful. I still lost a little weight, but more importantly, this was a great opportunity for me to see these changes and realize that during those 21 days when I'm craving something not-so-healthy and wishing I could just eat whatever I want, I can remember this week and remind myself that if I ate that thing I wanted when I wanted it, there's a really good chance it's not going to actually taste as good as I think it will.
A lot of people say things like "nothing tastes as good as skinny feels" and I've pretty much always thought that was bogus because I've tasted some pretty amazing things. But after this week I understand it a little more. I won't live my life depriving myself of things in an effort to be skinny, but when you spend more time eating natural foods that are good for you, your tastes themselves change. And maybe that amazing cheesecake or chocolate ice cream or whatever floats my boat right now, isn't going to float my boat as much when I get myself even healthier. And healthy is the goal...not skinny.
Initial weight: 254.4
Week 4: -0.4
Total weight loss: -6.2
Current weight: 248.2
I'm a little behind where I was at this point on Weight Watchers, but I also haven't been working out like I was then and I'm eating better quality food. I didn't eat "bad" stuff on WW, but it gives much more room for including processed foods than the fix does. And, our new challenge got pushed back another week so this week I'm not being super strict, but much more so than I was this past week.
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