Oona's Ogham

[OOnaOwl]

Today's meals:
B: 1/2 cup oats, 1 chopped banana, handful of blueberries, cinnamon, almond milk & tbsp. of sunflower seeds.
L: 1 cup brown rice with 1 cup water sautéed broccoli, peas, tofu & shitake mushrooms
D: 1 cup brown rice with 1 1/2 cups water sautéed cauliflower, chickpeas, red onion topped with 1/4 cup of daiya shreds.
Snack: 1 piece of sourdough bread
Went to store & stocked up on veggies, etc. I have enough to last most of the rest of the month now.

[OOnaOwl]

Still sticking with it! No grand changes in health or body to report yet.

[OOnaOwl]

No exciting news to report. Still on plan, upping my raw vegetable intake as I have yet to lose a single pound. Also have appointment with a naturopath next week to have my hormones tested. I am guessing it is a hormonal issue that needs to be addressed before my weight will start dropping. Hoping I start to lose by next week! Since I upped my raw food intake as of yesterday, my energy is increasing.

[OOnaOwl]

It's my birthday today. I had hoped to lose some weight, but I have lost none since I recommitted to this over a month ago.
I am up before the sun, there is some heavy turbulence in my life that I do not care to elaborate about. Suffice it to say that
certain aspects of my personal future looks quite dark & uncertain at this moment. But, I have learned that things can turn around in an eye blink! I am going to apply myself to creating the very best future that I can, from here in the present moment. I have been sticking to the eating plan & also exercising almost every day. I am feeling a bit better, less foggy & groggy, less puffy & stuffy. Dark circles from under my eyes appear to be lightening. I seem to need less sleep & awaken much more refreshed than before. In general, I have much more energy & optimism than before also. This is helping me exercise each day in addition to taking care of more responsibilities. I am so grateful for my life! My health! Giving thanks this day & every day for what I have.

[OOnaOwl]

Wow!
So, I haven't been losing any weight at all this whole time until today. I had to cut my portions of grains back to only about a cup a day and up my intake of raw fruits and veggies. At last the scale moved today! I hope this will be the key to losing the excess weight I have put on these past few years. Today's meals:
B: Green smoothie
L: 3 raw carrots, an apple, a cup of lentils & 1 oat breakfast bite (homemade).
D: Forks over Knives vegan spinach lasagna
D: piece of vegan marionberry pie (a rare Yuletide treat)
My plan is looking more like the eat to live 6 week plan for weight loss. I hope to return more to McDougall style after the weight has been released!

[OOnaOwl]

It's been 2 years since last I posted. So much I could say about my time away, it hasn't been pretty. Grateful to return here, back on the whole food plants, hoping for a return of health & beauty that I radiated before long ago eating this way. Feeling very humble, grateful & hopeful.
CURRENT GOALS:
Weigh in: 115 Lbs. Goal: 100 Lbs or thereabouts. (Fat loss not muscle loss) Improvements of health issues too numerous to list today.
Perhaps soon I will discuss at length.
Today's meals:
B: Oats with apple & cinnamon
L: red lentil vegetable soup with jasmine rice
D: same as lunch
S: pumpkin raisin oatmeal cookies
All food homemade from scratch without oils.

[OOnaOwl]

Finally losing the excess body fat/weight!
I had to reduce the starches to less than half of each meal, reduce the beans/legumes to none (for now) and limiting fruit to 1 or 2 servings at most per day. Increased the non starchy veggies to more than half of each meal. I am down more than 2 pounds in a week-and this is 1/5 of the amount of weight/fat I wish to lose. Excited! Just under 2 weeks until my birthday, hoping to keep this successful momentum going & reach my goal by early next year or before. Felt under the weather today, so made a big pot of fat free from scratch vegetable soup (all non starchy vegetables) and ate with turmeric seasoned short grain brown rice. Might have "dessert" in form of stewed apple in some homemade brown rice porridge. Feeling SO relieved to have seemingly discovered what will work for me at last. This has been a very long experimentation process full of stagnant failures & confusions.

[OOnaOwl]

Finally losing the excess body fat/weight!
I had to reduce the starches to less than half of each meal, reduce the beans/legumes to none (for now) and limiting fruit to 1 or 2 servings at most per day. Increased the non starchy veggies to more than half of each meal. I am down more than 2 pounds in a week-and this is 1/5 of the amount of weight/fat I wish to lose. Excited! Just under 2 weeks until my birthday, hoping to keep this successful momentum going & reach my goal by early next year or before. Felt under the weather today, so made a big pot of fat free from scratch vegetable soup (all non starchy vegetables) and ate with turmeric seasoned short grain brown rice. Might have "dessert" in form of stewed apple in some homemade brown rice porridge. Feeling SO relieved to have seemingly discovered what will work for me at last. This has been a very long experimentation process full of stagnant failures & confusions.

Haha, back here a year later feeling like a failure because I have been "unable to lose weight eating this way" and I see here the post that states I was succeeding-albeit maybe not as fast or as far yet as I wanted to. Schooled by my past self in print, what a funny sensation. Ok, well I am here to start this MWL journey again (started a few days ago but then went out for veggie sushi feast unexpectedly last night). Back on track again today with what I am calling the "Mostly Mary's Mini". I am eating this way for a week or few to kickstart weight loss. I currently weigh 118 which on my tiny 5 foot tall frame appears as excess weight. I am much more comfortable at my usual healthy weight of around 100 pounds give or take 5 or so on either side. Ok here is what I am eating each day:
Breakfast: 1/2 bowl oats, 1/2 bowl or more of fruit.
Lunch: 1/2 bowl rice, 1/2 bowl of water sauteed or steamed or boiled non-starchy vegetables
Dinner: Same as lunch.
Snacks should I need/want them: Fruit or Veggies.
Let's hope I can maintain some clarity on my situation this time! To be fair, I was dealing with a wicked case of adrenal exhaustion for the past year & was in a terrible fog. Started recovering in Spring & firmly on the path to total recovery. This WOE can only help further my success with this also.

[bunsofaluminum]

Hi Owl!

Welcome back! Join the club, of which I also am a member, "The Re-McDougallers" It's been nine years for me, as of Labor Day, and about nine months of "return" since I went away for a few years, and came back in January. I stopped the gain, let's just put it that way, but the mental adjustment has been hard won, and is still not fully "there"...but I'm in the right place to get there, and so are you!

Hope to see many postings from you, with all kinds of progress

[OOnaOwl]

Hi Owl!

Welcome back! Join the club, of which I also am a member, "The Re-McDougallers" It's been nine years for me, as of Labor Day, and about nine months of "return" since I went away for a few years, and came back in January. I stopped the gain, let's just put it that way, but the mental adjustment has been hard won, and is still not fully "there"...but I'm in the right place to get there, and so are you!

Hope to see many postings from you, with all kinds of progress

'

Thank you so much for the warm welcome back! Yes, I suspect there are quite a few of us returning. The food world has been such a clusterf$@#%, so much confusion to navigate. I also regularly mystify myself with my mental gymnastics over this stuff. I was slim, healthy & plant based (mostly whole foods too) for my 20's and 30's, it wasn't confusing then. Then the 40's came with new health concerns & I went diet hopping like a mad bunny rabbit! Now I am over the 50 hill this past year, and circling closer and closer to how I ate for 20 plus years and was slim and healthy (very similiar to McDougall) in a continuing effort to reclaim a current version of the body I had before. I am "only" about 15 pounds overweight, but I am tiny frame & height so it feels like a lot more. Congratulations on your return to the WOE, it is a very good place to be!

[OOnaOwl]

Today's meals thus far:
B: 3/4 cup rolled oats dry & a red apple cooked into it. Cinnamon & salt for spice added at table
L: Basmati rice (about a 1 1/2 cup cooked) 2 cups steamed broccoli & 1/2 cup cooked carrots. Nooch, salt, turmeric, ginger, mustard "sauce" added to taste at table.
D: probably some cabbage concoction with some basmati rice added-I have leftover rice to use up. Last night I had savory oatmeal for dinner.
Weight today still 118.
Digestion was very sluggish from huge starch increase-I didn't "go" yesterday which is rare for me.
Weight was taken before I "went" today, so guessing tomorrow the scale will have moved a bit more south.
I am in the midst of training to be a qigong instructor-so that is my main daily exercise. But since my health is improving I will be returning to running, hiking, yoga and dancing. Well, mostly running & some walking a few times a week. I am aiming for daily yoga practice of at least 15 minutes at home.

******Edited tonight to add my dinner & snacks.
Ended up having savory oats & steamed zucchini for dinner. Also had an afternoon snack of puffed brown rice cereal, banana & unsweetened almond milk. Small bowl. Very hungry today, not sure why? Hoping I start losing soon to keep me motivated. Think I am going to make some vegetable lentil soup tomorrow for lunch & dinner. Also maybe some limited ingredient "oat bites" with canned pumpkin, banana & oats or oat bran.

[OOnaOwl]

Woke up feeling truly terrible. Migraine, stuffy achey ears & sinuses, achey joints. I am going through perimenopause and these symptoms are at least partly due to that. I also have more food sensitivities now than before the Peri, so it could be partly that also. I ate some nutritional yeast yesterday & some mustard, also some vegan kefir. It could be any/all of those. Eating none of those today, took some advil & resting as much as I can. The good news is that I am now skipping periods, so I am closer to being done with the hormonal fluctuations & their affects.

B: 1/2 cup dry rolled gf oats & 1 apple chopped, cooked together. Topped with cinnamon & salt at table.
L: 1/2 cup leftover cooked basmati rice, black beans, broccoli, carrots & peas sauteed in water with garlic & gold onion. Added garlic salt to taste at table. Haven't had beans in a few months due to digestion issues (more perimenopause stuff), trying again now because I have removed animal proteins & need the McD/plant based replacements.
D: same as lunch
S: pumpkin pie oat bites (rolled oats, can of pumpkin puree, 2 mashed bananas, cinnamon & salt.

*Edited to add rest of meals & also comment on my increased appetite and/or metabolism? Yesterday was very hungry all day. Today was not so voracious but am noticing stronger hunger signals as mealtime approaches/my stomach empties out. Hoping it isn't a negative blood sugar thing but instead just faster transit time of plants vs. animals & increasing metabolic rate. I was vegan for 10 years & vegetarian for 10 years before that, but it has been long enough now (a few years since solidly so) that memory is hazy.

I have a history since a teenager of disordered eating issues, & this WOE is helping me have a lot less anxiety about food. Even though I don't have all the answers yet about what works for me now at midlife, it is a real relief to have a portion of it figured out!

[OOnaOwl]

Today's weigh in: 116.8 lbs, down about a pound from where I started a few days ago. Goal weight is 95-105 lbs (where I am most comfortable & energetic).
Today I feel much better, still tired from migraine but pain & other symptoms are gone . I think at least a portion of my symptoms yesterday were also from what I suspect is LRP (like acid reflux but further up) from a small amount of Daiya cheese I added to oatmeal the night before. I threw it out this morning, no more temptation from any overt fats now . I am noticing a general reduction in body inflammatory responses, how very welcome! I am both relieved & excited to be back on this way of eating. So comforting, affordable & familiar! I spent this morning working a bit & studying for my qigong teacher certification through Holden Qigong. Meals today as follows:

B: 3/4 cup dry rolled oats cooked with 1 pear, topped with salt & cinnamon at table.
L: 1 1/2 cup cooked jasmine rice with 2 cups steamed broccoli, green peas & blue kale, added garlic salt to taste.
Snacks: the pumpkin pie oat bites from yesterday & a banana so far.
Will return later today to add the rest of the day's progress.

[Idgie]

Glad you're feeling better! A co-worker believes she has LRP and she's desperate for relief. I've been suggesting McDougalling to her, but now that I know someone who is getting some help from this way of eating, I will suggest it again.

[OOnaOwl]

Glad you're feeling better! A co-worker believes she has LRP and she's desperate for relief. I've been suggesting McDougalling to her, but now that I know someone who is getting some help from this way of eating, I will suggest it again.

Thank you so much Idgie! I hope it helps her also. I've never been diagnosed, just going on symptoms that seem to fit that category. Wishing you good health & happiness