Annette's Journal

[keithswife]

Hi Annette. I loved reading about how your joint pain is disappearing. This gives me hope. For years my ankles have ached and throbbed most nights without any heat in them or minor swelling. My doctor, like yours, summed it up as arthritis. I have noticed that the pain is lessening, but it's still there. But it hasn't kept me awake at night for quite a while so this diet does work as long as we stick to it.

[bunsofaluminum]

That is wonderful, about the reduction in joint pain! It's just so cool how with eating this way, losing weight is like...a bonus on top of all the health benefits. If you never lose an ounce, you still have so much good going in your body. And then TA DAAA pounds off! woot!

[AnnetteW]

Hi keithswife and bunsofaluminum. Yes, the joint pain reduction alone is so marvelous, and I have to remember that when I feel like faltering. Now if my eczema and psoriasis would just clear up, I would be in heaven. I've told myself not to worry too much about it until my excess weight is gone. Perhaps at that time I would be ready to try an actual elimination diet, but not till then. I've tried before with no success. I often think this or that triggers it, but I truly can't be certain, as the next time it appears to be something else.

I need to get back to 100% compliance, I can feel the excuses sneaking in....the little treats popping in my mouth.

Yesterday I made a yummy "fake guacamole" recipe that was running around Facebook, and it was divine. Tastes nothing like guacamole, but more of a great Mexican based sauce. This is the recipe, minus the oil.

https://www.lataco.com/fake-guacamole-is-here/

So of course once I made it, I had to try it out. And we do have tortilla chips in the house. Now honestly, I haven't been tempted by my husband's foods, the chips or cheeses or meats. But it was the "fake guac" I wanted to eat. So I tried it with one chip....AWESOME! And then a few more. Then I got smart and cooked up 3 corn tortilla into chip sizes in the Air Fryer and then ate some more. Delicious, but not as delicious as the regular fried and salted chips.

Boom!!! The lightbulb went off in my head, and the flavor explosion in my mouth told me I have to avoid those chips...which like I said really hasn't been any issue. So then the thought was that I can buy a bag of baked chips. Yes, I can do that, but they too aren't compliant. Heck, even the corn tortillas are skirting the issue.

I'm not supposed to be eating chips. I'm not denying myself the chips, I'm choosing not to eat them at this time. Total pisser

Then later in the afternoon I was feeling hungry again. Feeling hungry isn't good. I made up a snack of cucumbers and little tomatoes and some of my yummy whole grain bread, which toasted and put a bit of cherry jam on. I really miss almond butter on bread. I don't eat a lot of bread, but I can bake the best sourdough, and enjoy having it now and then. And at the same time my husband was making pesto. I can ignore pesto, I don't really like it much, and now that I see the parmasan going into it and the olive oil, I can just avoid it totally. All fine and dandy, but then a small handful of walnuts jumped into my mouth.

Um What? I put those in the freezer so I wouldn't eat them, and I haven't eaten them. Till they were right there in front of me. Then I ate a few more. I don't think I had more than 1 ounce total, but I'm not supposed to be eating them at all right now.

Then we went out for dinner. Heck, why not just top it off with a glass of wine (my vice) and my giant salad, which also was not compliant at all, not with the dressing, olives, marinated mushrooms and marinated artichoke hearts.

At least I ate VEGAN all day.

Yesterday was a first for me, for being that much off track, yet truly not eating horribly. What a crazy thought. I still ate better than 99% of the US population. I had my oats and fruit for breakfast, lunch was millet, garbanzos, veggies, kale, curry...seriously good healthy foods.

Not sure what made me go off track.

It's amazing how then you want to just say "to h*ll with it all."

But no, I went to bed reading Ornish. I woke up and ordered a subscription to a WFPB magazine, and I printed out a few recipes. I am printing out the MWL list again, and sticking it on my fridge. I will make myself a checklist and try harder.

The few areas I'm having issues with are:

- No flours or caloric dense items (like the occasional bread)
- No oils (I'm fine without oils until I'm out)
- No nuts (I do miss those a lot, and keep telling myself I can have them later)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Plan for today:

Breakfast - Oats, blueberries, soymilk, ground flax

Lunch - rice, lentils, lots of veggies

Snack - fruit

Dinner - potatoes, mushroom gravy, green tossed salad

Exercise - class at the gym

[AnnetteW]

Just ate my breakfast and had a thought. I'm leaving for a 5 day training session next week, and until then will skip the ground flax seeds in my oats.

I will work on 6 days of doing my absolute best, following the guidelines.

~~~~~~~~~~
Dang, which also means no soy milk in my oats. I need to work on that one, and find an alternative.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Jeez, just thought of another one. I have tofu in the fridge. Guess later today I'll press it and freeze it for a later date.

Hopefully nothing more pops into my head.

[AnnetteW]

The heart to heart I had with myself yesterday was pretty good and quite helpful. It got me thinking about the items that are far from the MWL plan.

This morning I chose to make something totally different than the oats, which I've been having consistently with 2T ground flax, soymilk, and stevia (all of which are not on the MWL plan) and instead I ate a large apple sliced and made my first hashbrowns, frozen ones and added the "faux guac" I made the other day.

Quite yummy I must say. I'm going to see if I can add a photo.





~~~~~~~~~~~~
Plan for today:

Breakfast - apple, hash browns, squash/tomatillo sauce

Lunch - time for a large salad, beans, more potato or sweet potato perhaps

Snack - fruit

Dinner - rice, dal, veggies

[AnnetteW]

Yesterday was interesting with my giant quantity of yams at lunch. In the morning I weighed 2 yams before cooking and they came out at 1 lb 6oz. I cooked them in the microwave to later airfry.

For lunch I made a large salad, veggies only and vinegar, so basically barely any calories. I peeled the yams and airfried them and ate them all up with some mustard. I was so stuffed....and I'll admit I ate much more than I needed.

But I was not hungry all afternoon, and I'm an afternoon snacker. That was a total first for me. If I'm busy and out of the house I can skip snacking.

No weight change from yesterday, in fact my weight is being very stable right now. I know my calories are in the 1300-1500 range, so I feel slightly stumped that weight isn't dropping. I tend to burn in the 2000-2300 range, as per my fitbit. Obviously they are just numbers and no, I'm not actually tracking calories, I'll do a rough count in my head though, and round up. I've worn my fitbit for the past few days, just to check, but I don't wear it regularly anymore. If my eating is a bit higher and my burn a bit lower, well, then that accounts for less loss.

Plus it really took awhile for my body to settle after the colonoscopy. I thought it was "settled earlier than it really was.

The month isn't quite over yet, I just hate trying to lose weight. I keep telling myself I should just stay off the scale, but I don't as the small drops and even stable numbers are more motivating to me than staying off. I tend to go off plan when I stop weighing, that's something I've noticed in the past.

It doesn't mess with my head too much, it just frustrates me somewhat.

Oh, I had the best compliment yesterday from one of the exercise instructors at the gym. She told me I was looking really fit. Now, I take that compliment over "losing weight" any day. When someone mentions that I'm losing weight I feel bad knowing that I was fatter. Plus then often they ask what you are doing. No one wants to hear about what I'm really doing, then I just get "the talk" about protein and crap. I hate it! So I try to talk less about it. Perhaps later, or if I think someone is truly interested.

I'm already getting the "you're not eating meat?" comments, as people have noticed at our group parties. Someone commented that I wasn't eating the ribs recently, and I just said I don't like them, and left it at that.

I kind of want to wait to talk about my diet till I've lost more weight, when I feel stronger and more confident about it.

Also to add, my husband is commenting that his shorts are getting loose. Personally I can't tell, as he has a very large belly, and I know men with a large belly tend to wear the shorts under the belly. So I was thinking maybe his belly was getting bigger so his shorts were sitting lower. Perhaps a man who's gone through that can tell me I'm wrong. I don't know.

But I kept it positive and made a comment like "doesn't that encourage you to try a little harder"...and he actually agreed. He's eating what I cook, and will cook a bit of something else to go with it like fish or chicken. Or stir fry up his veggies with oil. I just keep saying, no oil, on anything of mine. Like last night we roasted two separate pans on brussel sprouts. Mine had only a bit of balsamic on them, his had olive oil and balsamic. Now I will admit, I prefer a bit of oil on them too, but I'm not eating the oil. But the dal, cauliflower dish, and potatoes or rice all had no oil, so the amount he had was much less. And he does eat his veggies, and he does exercise. He's been heavy his entire life, I've seen his kid photos and he was the "hefty" child.

Tonight we go to a party, dang, we sure go to lots of parties. I'm making a hummus as the hummus at the last party was nasty crap (store bought but gross). I will use a small amount of tahini and also eat some...I won't fret. Cut up veggies too. My goal will be not to drink wine. And I will eat a full dinner before going and try my best not to eat.

Lunch is out today with friends at the Cheesecake Factory. We eat there regularly, and they have the worst menu for any sort of diet. Have you ever gone to the website and looked at their nutrition data? I don't know how it's even possible to put that many calories into a recipe. They must inject fat and sugar into everything.

My plan is set, I just ask for a large salad, veggies only. They do have edamame, so perhaps I'll have that too... I really hate eating out and paying for lettuce, but I guess when I think of what I'm not paying to eat, a big greasy burger and fries, which is what I would have had before, I should think of the positive aspect of it vs. the negative. I'm paying to eat healthy and be with my friends.

And not having a glass of wine is also on my plan...ugh. I rather have wine (see, now I think I deserve it). I would feel less deprived.

okay, so the plan for today is as follows, maybe try to keep quantities on the smaller side, since I'm normally a quantity eater

Breakfast - oats, banana or blueberries, soymilk (use up what I have in the fridge), stevia (I still can't believe a tiny dash is an issue)

Lunch - salad and probably wine because I'm a weak wimp

Snack - sure I'll need something after that lousy lunch, fruit

Dinner - potatoes, dal, mushrooms, cauliflower (leftovers from last night or whatever is in the fridge)

Party snacks - hopefully very little, stay away from the food and drink, hummus and veggies (so I feel like a normal person)

Exercise - none today, let sore body rest

[AnnetteW]

Ah ha, now that I know how to post a photo, this is my Weight Trend for the past 3 months. That low dip at 150 was the day of my colonoscopy. You can see where shortly before I was leveling out, that's where I first started to transition to the starches in this diet. Then I had the days of low fiber, the day of fluids, the colonoscopy, then it went back up and has leveled out again.

So I'm not 100% sure where I am right now, I'm not trying to worry about it, just follow the plan. I'm going to be gone next week, out of town, and don't want to stress too much over that. But when I'm back, I want to tighten things up a bit, because then I have till October 1 when I'll be gone again for a week. I like having dates I can work with. I would really love to lose 8-10 lbs during August and September.

Then my next focus will be another 10 pounds, which will put me in a good slim state physically, down around 135. My birthday is in May, so I hope to see the final pounds slowly, very slowly (as I know) drop down. The last time I lost weight the lowest I got was 126 and I thought I looked super skinny. I'll have to hunt down a photo. I don't want to look super skinny, but I also didn't allow myself time for my weight to settle and adjust. I'm also older and I know how weightloss looks when someone ages.

We'll see. I just wanted to share my graph, and then I started to ramble more.

[AnnetteW]

I was a bit lax yesterday as I enjoyed a bowl of sunflower seeds (raw in the shell) and also a large portion of homemade hummus (which included tahini). So basically a bit lax on the fat. I also bought some whole wheat pita bread to eat with the hummus, and missed that it had a bit of oil in it. Dang, I did goof on that one, I tried so hard. I guess I will just have to make my own pitas on occasion. I'm totally capable of doing that.

Plus the only reason I had added the tahini to the hummus was that I brought it the night before to a party. Recently we went to a party and the storebought hummus someone brought was nasty tasting, and I had told someone that I make great hummus and how I do it, so I decided to make some and bring it along.

Very few people even tasted it, I honestly don't think people know what it is. I had a giant platter of cut up veggies with the bowl of hummus in the middle. I ate some and I know my husband did too. For all I know, no one else even tried it.

Everyone just wants to eat the crap garbage food that is brought to a party.

I honestly felt a bit sad by that, as veggies/hummus is something I've brought for years to parties.

~~~~~~~~~~~

Weight is in the 153 range, and if it stays there for the next week+ I'll be happy.

I'm heading out of town on Wednesday for 6 full days, which means eating out of my own house all those days. And no, I don't plan on baking potatoes and eating my own food. I play on kicking back and enjoying the group I'm with, and we'll be going out for meals and having so much fun. But I do plan on eating Vegan (to the best of my ability) and keeping the fat as low as possible.

I know that flour will be in quite a few of my meals, it might be a bagel for breakfast with fruit, unless there are oats. I do plan on bringing baggies of oats with me since hotels all have microwaves these days in the breakfast area, so I should bring a big bowl. I can hopefully do oats and fruit. It might also be smart for me to bring my ground flax seeds...or I can just skip it that week.

I've gotten good at just ordering giant salads at restaurants. I don't even try to have them adjust a salad on the menu, I just say giant salad, all raw, etc. At a Mexican restaurant I've ordered that and had them plop beans on top. The beans might not be 100% compliant, and probably aren't, but it's a decent option.

I will bring fruit along, and also some nuts and dates (in case of hunger emergencies.) I'm not concerned with eating cookies and chips, though I do like chips/salsa.

So basically I'm planning on trying my best to make decent choices. I'm not ready mentally or emotionally to do this 100%. I don't like to be "different" from others, and I do not like sticking out, and I don't like people talking about me. Maybe in the future I'll be there, but at this time I'm not.

But I have full days of food at home until then, so it's good and yummy and healthy until I leave. And perhaps I'll see 152 before I leave.

Plan for today (I obviously haven't thought this out yet):

Breakfast - Oats with banana, oatmilk, stevia

Lunch - I really need a giant salad, beans, potatoes in Air Fryer

Snack - grapes

Dinner - veggie burger, watermelon, no clue what else

[AnnetteW]

I'm maintaining really well right now.

I have a few too many things sneaking in that shouldn't be there (have had sunflower seeds the past few days, raw in the shell, and a few beers...not safe with booze in my fridge.)

Today I will prepare a few things to bring on my trip. Basically I'm bringing baggies of oats and ground flax. The hotel should have fruit to add. I will also bring a box of soymilk to keep in the fridge in the hotel and it might have more fat than I'd like, but I'm going to use it.

BTW, I bought Oatly oat milk at Sprouts the other day and will plan on buying that more regularly. I had to freeze much of the carton up, so we'll see how it freezes. I have it in Kombucha bottles, so I hope they don't burst. If it freezes well, it will be a great product for me to use in small quantities. I also recommended it to my daughter. She's never been a milk drinker, but her 2 year old drinks some milk. He always wants a cup of milk when he visits, and has had soymilk here and was fine with it.

As far as lunches/dinners go, I hope to be able to focus on the starches, obviously salads are an option, but I need my starches. One good thing will be not being around so much fruit. I've become a bit of a fruit binger, so I hope to be eating less of it.

No clue what to expect. Last time I visited my parents for 3 weeks I lost 7 lbs. I was just venturing in to the WFPB diet at that time and had still quite a bit of fats in nuts/seeds and avocados, though I was skipping the oil on my salads. I was reading Dr. Fuhrman at that time, so eating tons of veggies.

Since my food options might be less than perfect, it will be a good opportunity to actually just eat less quantity wise.

[bunsofaluminum]

I hope your visit goes well. One thing about staying in someone's home, you can buy a bag of potatoes and bake them. Have some salsa in the fridge. Etc. It's easier to stay on plan that way, than going out for food all the time. Eating out is nearly impossible to keep compliant.

Keep us posted. I want to hear how things go!

[moonlight]

Hi Annette,

Good luck with your trip. My advice is to avoid as much oil and fatty foods as possible, eat as many veggies and whole grains as you can, and have fun! Once you get back you can get back to striving for that 100% MWL way of life.

[AnnetteW]

Hi Annette,

Good luck with your trip. My advice is to avoid as much oil and fatty foods as possible, eat as many veggies and whole grains as you can, and have fun! Once you get back you can get back to striving for that 100% MWL way of life.

That is the wise way of doing things, isn't it. Didn't happen, and not for lack of trying. There was no food. I would order the salad, talk to them about making sure it had no animal products on it, they would have no beans or tofu....promise me it would be bulked up, and I'd have the tiniest salad, smaller than a side salad. I was in a large group, we were bused to eat lunches, there was no time to argue. I was starving the first few days. Then I just ate, and did my best to avoid obvious animal products. Yesterday I caved in and ate a turkey sandwich.

I didn't consider it giving up, yet in a way I did. But I knew I'd be home to my own kitchen today. I got home last night and made a salad. I've had barely any salad in the past week. I had more lettuce last night than in 6 days total.

If I had a choice of where I was eating it might have been easier. And you know how we always say other people don't care what you are eating. Um. YES THEY DO! Pissed me off to be honest. Other people scouring a menu for me, no no no....just leave me alone.

I even had an extreme allergic reaction one evening. We were at a mexican restaurant (I made do with veggie fajitas which I barely ate.) I ate the rice and beans and corn tortillas and some of the veggies. But I started to get hives. By the time we were back at the hotel I had welts, giant welts. I bought a claritan tablet, that's all the hotel had. And I was definitely a bit concerned, but my breathing was fine. I was just covered in hives from my belly up. So some people did see that I was sensitive to foods and that my wanting to eat a certain way for a true reason. Ha ha...that was just to my benefit (well, kind of sort of.) Luckily that only happens rarely. I think it was more that my "bucket was full" from the stresses of the class/workshop, allergies in Dallas, food, etc. It just overflowed. I was fine by morning.

It's over and was a good learning experience. I will have to be better prepared in the future, if I care and choose to be.

I'm not looking for anyone to say how I could have done it differently. I really couldn't, not in the time restraints we had. And vegetarian options are not the answer, it's totally irrelevent at that point. I was more concerned with my stomach and gut rebelling, from oils and animal, but it didn't. My bowels were fine, my stomach only hurt a tiny bit at one time. I didn't over indulge. But I'm up 4 lbs.

Back on plan now. I just had a bowl of oatmeal, and I'm still hungry. I'm going to eat all the healthy food I need to satisfy myself. I think I'll have another bowl of oatmeal. Later I will shop for potatoes and sweet potatoes and I want some corn on the cob. I just want my own food.

Glad to be home.

[sirdle]

Welcome back!

[AnnetteW]

So nice to be back on plan, but dang, I've had the munchies. Hopefully a day or two more will put me back to normal.

I made wheat berries in the instant pot, someone on this board was talking about them, and then I ate them all up. Um, not good. But quite yummy and a pleasant change from oat. Then I had afternoon munchies hard yesterday and really was craving nuts, so I ate some with some dates. Well, if that's the worst thing I ate all day, I'll run with it.

So today no nuts/dates. That should be fine.

Weight is down a pound from yesterday, the water weight should be starting to drop. All good and dandy. Tomorrow is lunch out with friends, I don't have any worries at this time. I'll plan a nice salad or baked potato and enjoy.

I've been physically worn out from my trip, and trying to jump back into my schedule kind of beat me down. So today I'll stay home (no gym for me) and relax and work on projects.

Plan for today -

Breakfast - Barley, oat milk, sweetener of some sort (I have date syrup), canteloupe

Lunch - salad with pototoes cooked in IP (my new favorite lunch)

Snack - fruit

Dinner - not sure yet

[AnnetteW]

I'm definitely not in a quick weight loss stage. I can't believe how hungry I'm feeling, and I'm eating too. I've never been good at deny myself when I'm hungry, regular diets basically suck. I still feel like I'm eating too much to lose weight, but I'm following the plan better all the time.

I just wish I'd stop thinking about it all the time.

There is a little of the mental stuff going on in my head right now. I've started watching some of the videos with Dr. Lisle (with Chef AJ) and he's good at making me feel normal, and not abnormal. Everyone thinks they are different, and that foods work differently for them, and that their bodies are different from everyone elses.

It's important that I don't listen/view too many different "experts" in this field. I'm doing my best to stick to Dr. McDougall, but of course, others sneak in at times. I spend a lot of my time sewing and having a YouTube on in the background is great for listening to the experts talk. Or I'll watch while meal prepping.

Yesterday I did a first, and I struggled a bit to do it. I had the afternoon munchies, and this was after eating a bunch of frozen mango. I really wanted to eat that small bowl of nuts and dates I had eaten the day before (was my body remembering how awesome they were?) But I popped two medium potatoes into the microwave, and smooshed them up with salt and pepper. It was definitely satisfying. I might try to make some sort of gravy to have prepared to to it again. I definitely wanted savory with my potatoes.

Then I ate a large portion of whole wheat pasta (4 oz uncooked) with a tomato and veggie sauce. I was full and satisfied.

I just don't know why it takes such large quantities to make me feel satisfied. But Dr. Lisle does talk about it, the stretch receptors and the nutrient receptors. I've always feel satisfied by fat (nuts have always been my friend) but now with no nuts/oil I feel less satisfied. That must be considered a nutrient receptor, I don't remember if there is one that's for calories specifically.

But I don't think my stretch receptors work properly.

No, I'm not really worrying about this, not like it looks like I am, I'm just talking to myself and trying to understand, that's all. I will research some more. Plus it also means I need to continue to find foods that do fill me up, that satisfy me.

It's such an interesting concept from a dieting point of view. When dieting the traditional way we are told to eat some carrot or celery sticks, and apple. Eek, those always made my stomach feel horrible. Raw veggies like that, when I was actually hungry, made me feel like I had a hole (or a pit) in my stomach. And afternoons are the worst, even now. I have this need to fill my stomach in the afternoon.

And I don't feel like I'm doing it for an emotional reason, but who knows.

Now of course it sounds like I'm a major binger, and I don't think I am. Feel free to tell me what you think. This is what I ate yesterday:

Breakfast - cooked barley ( 1/2 raw is about 1.5 cups cooked), date syrup, oat milk, 1/3 canteloupe

Lunch - Large salad (mixed greens, a few other veggies), dressing of vinegar/mustard/maple syrup, brown rice and dal (perhaps 1 cup rice, 3/4 cup dal)

Snack - 1 lb bag of frozen mango

Snack - 2 medium cooked potatoes

Dinner - whole wheat pasta (4 oz uncooked), tomato sauce with onions/mushrooms/zucchini/cabbage

Hmmm...actually, that doesn't look too bad all written out. Maybe I'll go pop it into cronometer and get an idea of the cals and nutrients. I'm guessing (off the top of my head) about 1700 cals, which is fine for a very slow weight loss for me.

Enough contemplation for now. No clue what my plan is for today, minus the barley for breakfast, lunch out (so it will be a green salad) and I was thinking a pasta salad for dinner perhaps.