Finding my Groove

Share your daily McDougall menus and/or keep a journal describing your personal progress.

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Finding my Groove

Postby Marla » Wed Nov 11, 2020 12:11 am

Hi McDougall friends!

I recently started a journal to help me stay compliant during the holiday months of November and December. A few days into the project, I realized that my deeper need was not just to get through the holidays, but to work on permanent lifestyle changes, however long that process may take. My ultimate goal is to get into that "deep groove" that Dr. Doug Lisle talks about, where the habits and routines that support healthy living have become automatic, and making the right choices feels effortless. With that object in mind, I decided to start a new journal dedicated to finding my groove.

I'm not new to the McDougall program. I discovered Dr. McDougall and these message boards (which back then were hosted by VegSource) in 2003. I learned how to cook and eat whole plant foods without oil, and I lost about 70 pounds, which took me from the obese BMI range into the normal BMI range. I remained on the program for 11 years and kept the weight off, with minor fluctuations. Then in 2014, I went through some very difficult events that turned my whole world upside down. My routines were disrupted, my priorities shifted, and my motivation to follow a healthy lifestyle evaporated. Dr. Doug Lisle would say my cost-benefit analysis changed. It requires time and energy to maintain a routine of planning, shopping, and food preparation, and I was so preoccupied with the anvils falling from the sky (the best metaphor I can think of to describe what my life felt like at that time), I didn't have any time or energy to spare. Without care and attention to my diet, I fell back into the Pleasure Trap and regained 50 pounds within a year. I tried many times to clean up my diet and start exercising again, but my heart wasn't in it, and I didn't succeed. I gained another 25 pounds over the next year, and another 25 the year after that. By the summer of 2019 I reached my highest weight ever, 230 pounds.

Finally in 2020, with my umpteenth attempt to get back on track, I was successful. As of today I'm down 70 pounds from my highest, and have about 40 more pounds to lose. My weight loss has been very consistent, averaging 1.8 pounds per week.

I would like to maintain my momentum during the holidays, with all of the challenges that the festive season can bring. To that end, I've decided to join the MWLP weigh-in group as well as journalling here. I'll follow the MWL 10-point checklist as closely as I can, and focus on improving my adherence to the program principles. There are a few things I've been eating, in small amounts, that I'll have to give up in order to be MWL-compliant: nuts in salad dressing, soy yogurt as a condiment, corn tortillas, whole wheat pita bread or lavash once in a while. It isn't a long list, and these things already make up such a small part of my diet that I don't think it will be too hard to omit them.

I use an app called Ate to keep a visual log of the food I consume, and I plan to use annotated screenshots from the app in my journal. I think that will be helpful to me as I try to reinforce good habits, build solid routines, and hopefully, find my groove.
Last edited by Marla on Thu Nov 12, 2020 6:59 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Finding my Groove

Postby Marla » Wed Nov 11, 2020 12:34 am

My intention is to post my food diary every day (or as often as I can) and to assess how I did at following the MWL guidelines and the 10-point checklist. I know from reading the weigh-in thread that it is ok not to be perfect. I expect some days to be better than others. I think today was a good day!

Image

1. Start each meal with a soup and/or salad and/or fruit. My fruit at breakfast was on top of my oats and I didn't eat it by itself, so I'm not sure if that counts. And my lunch was a big salad and starch, so I'm not sure if I'm supposed to eat a separate salad before the big salad? I did have a pre-dinner salad of beets.

2. Follow the 50/50 plate method for your meals, filling half your plate (by visual volume) with non-starchy vegetables and 50% (by visual volume) with minimally processed starches. Choose fruit for dessert.Yes

3. Greatly reduce or eliminate added sugars and added salts. This includes gourmet sugars and salts, too. If either is troublesome for you, you can eliminate them. Yes

4. Eliminate all animal foods (dairy, meat, eggs, fish, seafood). Yes

5. Eliminate all higher fat plant foods (i.e., nuts, seeds, avocados, tofu, soy). Yes

6. Eliminate any added oil. Yes

7. Eliminate all higher calorie-dense foods including flour products (i.e., bread, bagels, muffins, crackers, dry cereals, cookies, cakes), puffed cereals, air-popped popcorn and dried fruit. Yes

8. Don't drink your calories (especially from juices & sugar-sweetened beverages). Yes, drank water, sparkling water, and unsweetened herbal tea

9. Follow these principles, eating whenever you are hungry until you are comfortably full. Don't starve yourself and don't stuff yourself.Yes

10. Avoid being sedentary and aim for at least 30 minutes or more of moderate exercise daily (i.e., brisk walking). Yes, did about an hour of exercise
Last edited by Marla on Thu Nov 12, 2020 4:46 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Finding my Groove

Postby bunsofaluminum » Wed Nov 11, 2020 7:58 am

ack! isn't it something when life hits and we dash back into the Pleasure Trap for comfort. So glad the lbs are coming off for you! well done :)
JUST DON'T EAT IT

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Re: Finding my Groove

Postby Marla » Thu Nov 12, 2020 4:55 pm

Thanks Buns. It took a cataclysmic series of events to get me off course, and I don't really blame the stress of the events for driving me to eat rich foods. It was more a situation where, for a time, I stopped believing it was worth the effort to take care of my health. Intellectually I still thought it was worth it and would have told you so, but the calculator in my subconscious deemed otherwise.
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Re: Finding my Groove

Postby Marla » Thu Nov 12, 2020 5:51 pm

Image

1. Start each meal with a soup and/or salad and/or fruit.

I have some questions about this checklist item. For breakfast I usually eat about a cup of vegetables, a cup of fruit, and a cup of oat groats, and I am wondering if it counts as effective preloading if I eat the vegetables first, then the oats and fruit together, or do I really have to eat the fruit first? For lunch I had a large bowl (about a quart) of non-starchy vegetable soup, followed by my starch. I would like to know if that amount of soup can count as both a preload (checklist item #1) and the vegetable portion of my 50/50 (checklist item #2). I don't lack understanding of the principles of preloading and dilution, but due to the way the checklist is worded, I am having trouble understanding whether I should answer yes or no to checklist items #1 and # 2 when I eat in the manner I described.

2. Follow the 50/50 plate method for your meals, filling half your plate (by visual volume) with non-starchy vegetables and 50% (by visual volume) with minimally processed starches. Choose fruit for dessert.
I think so, but see above.


3. Greatly reduce or eliminate added sugars and added salts. This includes gourmet sugars and salts, too. If either is troublesome for you, you can eliminate them.
Yes

4. Eliminate all animal foods (dairy, meat, eggs, fish, seafood).
Yes

5. Eliminate all higher fat plant foods (i.e., nuts, seeds, avocados, tofu, soy).
Yes

6. Eliminate any added oil.
Yes

7. Eliminate all higher calorie-dense foods including flour products (i.e., bread, bagels, muffins, crackers, dry cereals, cookies, cakes), puffed cereals, air-popped popcorn and dried fruit.
Yes

8. Don't drink your calories (especially from juices & sugar-sweetened beverages).
Yes

9. Follow these principles, eating whenever you are hungry until you are comfortably full. Don't starve yourself and don't stuff yourself.
Yes

10. Avoid being sedentary and aim for at least 30 minutes or more of moderate exercise daily (i.e., brisk walking).
Yes, exercised for 50 minutes on treadmill plus 10 on stationary bike.

Thoughts:

In the afternoon I went to visit my dad and stayed overnight, so my dinner and dessert, and next day's breakfast, had to be brought with me. I am very used to bringing my own food everywhere, so that was fine. In recent months I've also found it easy to ignore the candy and cookies at his house, though that wasn't always the case.

Eating soup or salad as a first course for dinner was a new behavior for me, as I hadn't been doing that. I plan to continue and see if I find it helpful.
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Re: Finding my Groove

Postby Marla » Thu Nov 12, 2020 10:32 pm

Image

1. Start each meal with a soup and/or salad and/or fruit.
I still plan to ask for clarification about this item when I post in the weekly weigh-in thread. I had a pre-dinner salad. At breakfast I ate my kale first, then at my groats and pear together. At lunch I had a large amount of vegetable soup that I feel worked as both a preload and half of my 50/50, if I am allowed to count part of it for each,

2. Follow the 50/50 plate method for your meals, filling half your plate (by visual volume) with non-starchy vegetables and 50% (by visual volume) with minimally processed starches. Choose fruit for dessert.
Yes, if my lunch soup counts.


3. Greatly reduce or eliminate added sugars and added salts. This includes gourmet sugars and salts, too. If either is troublesome for you, you can eliminate them.
Yes

4. Eliminate all animal foods (dairy, meat, eggs, fish, seafood).
Yes

5. Eliminate all higher fat plant foods (i.e., nuts, seeds, avocados, tofu, soy).
Yes - cheez sauce did not have any nuts/plant milk.

6. Eliminate any added oil.
Yes

7. Eliminate all higher calorie-dense foods including flour products (i.e., bread, bagels, muffins, crackers, dry cereals, cookies, cakes), puffed cereals, air-popped popcorn and dried fruit.
Yes

8. Don't drink your calories (especially from juices & sugar-sweetened beverages).
Yes

9. Follow these principles, eating whenever you are hungry until you are comfortably full. Don't starve yourself and don't stuff yourself.
I was fuller than I liked after dinner. That means the salad preload helped fill me up more, but for it to make a difference I will have to perhaps leave some of my other dinner uneaten. Just adding salad won't help reduce total calories unless it displaces something else. Not sure if I could have felt good about leaving a half-eaten potato waffle or delicata squash!

10. Avoid being sedentary and aim for at least 30 minutes or more of moderate exercise daily (i.e., brisk walking).
Yes, exercised on elliptical for 45 minutes.

Thoughts:

I felt like I ate a lot of food today. Maybe more than I really wanted. I'm not a volume eater; when I've tracked volumes in the past, I was very satisfied on about 4 pounds of food a day and could be comfortable enough on less than that. I've read that the average human prefers to eat 3-5 pounds per day, so I figure I'm about average in terms of how much volume I need for satiety.

I've never had delicata squash before! I love kabocha squash and hoped it would be similar (and it was, ish).I cut into slices and roasted on a parchment-lined baking sheet for 20 minutes, turned over and roasted for another 20 minutes. When I turned it over I also basted it with a little aquafaba for moisture. Really yummy.

Tomorrow I'll weigh in.
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Re: Finding my Groove

Postby squealcat » Fri Nov 13, 2020 8:02 am

I LOVE delacata squash ! You can eat it skin and all and I do if it is organic !

I have the same questions as you regarding the pre-loading thing. I have a very large salad at lunch so don't have any more veggies than that and then have my potato . Dinner is usually soup then steamed veggies and starch so pretty sure I am good there. Others have asked Mark before but I didn't fully understand his answer. Maybe you can ask again to clarify ?
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Re: Finding my Groove

Postby bunsofaluminum » Fri Nov 13, 2020 8:17 am

1. Start each meal with a soup and/or salad and/or fruit.
I still plan to ask for clarification about this item when I post in the weekly weigh-in thread. I had a pre-dinner salad. At breakfast I ate my kale first, then at my groats and pear together. At lunch I had a large amount of vegetable soup that I feel worked as both a preload and half of my 50/50, if I am allowed to count part of it for each,


1. Start each meal with a soup and/or salad and/or fruit.

I have some questions about this checklist item. For breakfast I usually eat about a cup of vegetables, a cup of fruit, and a cup of oat groats, and I am wondering if it counts as effective preloading if I eat the vegetables first, then the oats and fruit together, or do I really have to eat the fruit first? For lunch I had a large bowl (about a quart) of non-starchy vegetable soup, followed by my starch. I would like to know if that amount of soup can count as both a preload (checklist item #1) and the vegetable portion of my 50/50 (checklist item #2). I don't lack understanding of the principles of preloading and dilution, but due to the way the checklist is worded, I am having trouble understanding whether I should answer yes or no to checklist items #1 and # 2 when I eat in the manner I described.


This was a sticky point for me, too, because soup IS a meal. when I have soup, it satiates right on the spot and I don't need the entree at all. It's smart to front load with very light density foods such as the green vegs or soup. As for whether a vegetable soup would count as the 50% veggies...absolutely! In fact, I've eaten lentil/split pea soup as my 50% starch, so why shouldn't a veggie soup count as the veggies in a meal? You tick off two with one dish! :)
JUST DON'T EAT IT

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by red squirrel

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The rest is an industry looking to make a buck off my poor health
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Re: Finding my Groove

Postby Marla » Sat Nov 14, 2020 12:07 am

Image

1. Start each meal with a soup and/or salad and/or fruit.
I got great answers to my questions about this item and the 50/50 plate over on the weekly weigh-in thread. I've decided that if the vegetable soup/salad/non-starchy vegetables/fruit in a meal is a large enough volume that if combined, it would fill a soup or salad bowl AND the remainder would still fill half my plate, I will count it as fulfilling checklist items 1 & 2. If the volume is less than that, then I will count it for either 1 or 2, but not both. So today, my answer is yes for breakfast, yes for lunch, and no for dinner because I completely forgot to eat soup or salad first!

2. Follow the 50/50 plate method for your meals, filling half your plate (by visual volume) with non-starchy vegetables and 50% (by visual volume) with minimally processed starches. Choose fruit for dessert.
Yes, yes, and yes :)

3. Greatly reduce or eliminate added sugars and added salts. This includes gourmet sugars and salts, too. If either is troublesome for you, you can eliminate them.
Yes

4. Eliminate all animal foods (dairy, meat, eggs, fish, seafood).
Yes

5. Eliminate all higher fat plant foods (i.e., nuts, seeds, avocados, tofu, soy).
Yes. I would have normally had raita (made with homemade soy yogurt) as a condiment with this dinner, but I made MWL-compliant cilantro chutney instead. I missed the yogurt sauce but it was okay.

6. Eliminate any added oil.
Yes

7. Eliminate all higher calorie-dense foods including flour products (i.e., bread, bagels, muffins, crackers, dry cereals, cookies, cakes), puffed cereals, air-popped popcorn and dried fruit.
Yes

8. Don't drink your calories (especially from juices & sugar-sweetened beverages).
Yes

9. Follow these principles, eating whenever you are hungry until you are comfortably full. Don't starve yourself and don't stuff yourself.
Yes

10. Avoid being sedentary and aim for at least 30 minutes or more of moderate exercise daily (i.e., brisk walking).
No, didn't exercise today

Thoughts:
My weigh-in day used to be Monday, but I've changed it to Friday so that I can report on the weekly thread. I was 160.4 today, Looking forward to being in the 150s soon.
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Re: Finding my Groove

Postby Mark Cooper » Sat Nov 14, 2020 4:27 am

Marla wrote:I've decided that if the vegetable soup/salad/non-starchy vegetables/fruit in a meal is a large enough volume that if combined, it would fill a soup or salad bowl AND the remainder would still fill half my plate, I will count it as fulfilling checklist items 1 & 2. If the volume is less than that, then I will count it for either 1 or 2, but not both. So today, my answer is yes for breakfast, yes for lunch, and no for dinner because I completely forgot to eat soup or salad first!
:thumbsup: I think this criterion is spot-on.
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Re: Finding my Groove

Postby Marla » Sun Nov 15, 2020 10:48 am

I think this criterion is spot-on.


Thanks so much for your help with this concept, Mark. I feel completely confident and empowered now :nod:

Here's yesterday's food:

Image

1. Start each meal with a soup and/or salad and/or fruit.
For breakfast I'll say no, because the volume of berries I had today wasn't enough to function as a preload. Yes at lunch, and yes at dinner.

2. Follow the 50/50 plate method for your meals, filling half your plate (by visual volume) with non-starchy vegetables and 50% (by visual volume) with minimally processed starches. Choose fruit for dessert.
Yes

3. Greatly reduce or eliminate added sugars and added salts. This includes gourmet sugars and salts, too. If either is troublesome for you, you can eliminate them.
Yes

4. Eliminate all animal foods (dairy, meat, eggs, fish, seafood).
Yes

5. Eliminate all higher fat plant foods (i.e., nuts, seeds, avocados, tofu, soy).
Yes

6. Eliminate any added oil.
Yes

7. Eliminate all higher calorie-dense foods including flour products (i.e., bread, bagels, muffins, crackers, dry cereals, cookies, cakes), puffed cereals, air-popped popcorn and dried fruit.
Yes

8. Don't drink your calories (especially from juices & sugar-sweetened beverages).
Yes

9. Follow these principles, eating whenever you are hungry until you are comfortably full. Don't starve yourself and don't stuff yourself.
Yes. Tonight I left some curry and rice on my plate because I got full after eating about 3/4 of my meal. That required really paying attention to how full I was getting as I ate.

10. Avoid being sedentary and aim for at least 30 minutes or more of moderate exercise daily (i.e., brisk walking).
Was an active day (doing DIY), but no formal exercise.

Thoughts:
Today is going to be another busy day trying to get some projects done around the house (we just installed two new exterior doors and I have a lot of work still to do to finish those up).

I do need to do some batch cooking because my freezer stock is getting pretty low. I like to have a few freezer bags full of prepared foods like chili, curry, marinara sauce, and seasoned beans that I can thaw and eat with rice or potatoes for a quick meal when life gets busy. I am also running out of vegetable soup for lunch, and I like to alternate between soup and salad, so I need to prep a big batch of salad soon.

It feels like I am constantly shopping for vegetables! I have a standard sized refrigerator (in other words, not very big) and the produce bins and bottom shelf are always crammed with vegetables after I shop, but they are gone in a couple of days. It's not a bad problem to have I guess. :)
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Re: Finding my Groove

Postby Marla » Sun Nov 15, 2020 11:48 pm

Today's food:

Image

1. Start each meal with a soup and/or salad and/or fruit.
Yes

2. Follow the 50/50 plate method for your meals, filling half your plate (by visual volume) with non-starchy vegetables and 50% (by visual volume) with minimally processed starches. Choose fruit for dessert.
Yes

3. Greatly reduce or eliminate added sugars and added salts. This includes gourmet sugars and salts, too. If either is troublesome for you, you can eliminate them.
Yes

4. Eliminate all animal foods (dairy, meat, eggs, fish, seafood).
Yes

5. Eliminate all higher fat plant foods (i.e., nuts, seeds, avocados, tofu, soy).
Yes

6. Eliminate any added oil.
Yes

7. Eliminate all higher calorie-dense foods including flour products (i.e., bread, bagels, muffins, crackers, dry cereals, cookies, cakes), puffed cereals, air-popped popcorn and dried fruit.
Yes

8. Don't drink your calories (especially from juices & sugar-sweetened beverages).
Yes

9. Follow these principles, eating whenever you are hungry until you are comfortably full. Don't starve yourself and don't stuff yourself.
Yes...didn't finish all of my chili and rice at dinner because I had reached comfortable fullness. But I did have room for dessert. ;-)

10. Avoid being sedentary and aim for at least 30 minutes or more of moderate exercise daily (i.e., brisk walking).
Yes, did an hour combined total on treadmill and exercise bike. Some of that was higher intensity intervals.

Thoughts:
I've been eating more or less the same way for most of this year, and I am still amazed and thankful that I can eat to satiety and lose weight. Especially because I'm now in menopause, I have "curvy" genes, and I have a personal (and family) history of obesity. All of those things stack the odds against me, but when I follow the MWLP with good compliance, I get good results. If I'm not getting good results, it's probably because something I shouldn't be eating or drinking has snuck back into my diet.

I remembered to preload with a salad before dinner today, and I do think it reduces my caloric intake by at least a little bit, provided I put down my fork when I start to feel full.

I didn't get any batch cooking at all done today, as I was busy with DIY projects. For dinner I thawed the last thing I had left in the freezer, some red lentil chili. I really do need to replenish my freezer meals in the next couple of days.
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Re: Finding my Groove

Postby Marla » Mon Nov 16, 2020 11:13 pm

Today's food:

Image

1. Start each meal with a soup and/or salad and/or fruit.
Yes

2. Follow the 50/50 plate method for your meals, filling half your plate (by visual volume) with non-starchy vegetables and 50% (by visual volume) with minimally processed starches. Choose fruit for dessert.
Yes for breakfast and lunch, no for dinner. My lunch soup was not quite as much I usually have (it was the last of the batch), so I made some cabbage to help meet my preload and 50/50 goals for that meal. For dinner, the amount of greens and fresh salsa in my bowl didn't quite make up 50% of the volume -- more like 33%. I thought about making an extra steamed vegetable but ultimately didn't.


3. Greatly reduce or eliminate added sugars and added salts. This includes gourmet sugars and salts, too. If either is troublesome for you, you can eliminate them.
Yes

4. Eliminate all animal foods (dairy, meat, eggs, fish, seafood).
Yes

5. Eliminate all higher fat plant foods (i.e., nuts, seeds, avocados, tofu, soy).
Yes

6. Eliminate any added oil.
Yes

7. Eliminate all higher calorie-dense foods including flour products (i.e., bread, bagels, muffins, crackers, dry cereals, cookies, cakes), puffed cereals, air-popped popcorn and dried fruit.
Yes

8. Don't drink your calories (especially from juices & sugar-sweetened beverages).
Yes

9. Follow these principles, eating whenever you are hungry until you are comfortably full. Don't starve yourself and don't stuff yourself.
Yes

10. Avoid being sedentary and aim for at least 30 minutes or more of moderate exercise daily (i.e., brisk walking).
Yes, did about an hour of exercise, mostly treadmill with a little bit of stationary bike.

Thoughts:
Tonight's dinner is one of our favorites that has been in our rotation for a long time. Those layers of rice, seasoned beans, sweet potato and greens, topped with pineapple salsa, really taste amazing. I've settled into a routine where I really don't mind eating the same thing for breakfast and lunch every day, as long as I have variety at dinner. I admire the folks who eat very plain, simple, food at every meal. My food now is the simplest it's ever been, but I think I'll always want to include some more complex recipes with layers of flavor. Or to put it another way, I can enjoy plain and simple meals, but not on repeat.
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Re: Finding my Groove

Postby Marla » Wed Nov 18, 2020 12:24 am

Today's food:

Image

1. Start each meal with a soup and/or salad and/or fruit.
Yes

2. Follow the 50/50 plate method for your meals, filling half your plate (by visual volume) with non-starchy vegetables and 50% (by visual volume) with minimally processed starches. Choose fruit for dessert.
Yes

3. Greatly reduce or eliminate added sugars and added salts. This includes gourmet sugars and salts, too. If either is troublesome for you, you can eliminate them.
Yes

4. Eliminate all animal foods (dairy, meat, eggs, fish, seafood).
Yes

5. Eliminate all higher fat plant foods (i.e., nuts, seeds, avocados, tofu, soy).
Yes. I modified my tomato soup recipe which calls for some plant milk to make it a little creamy. I left it out and it was acceptable.

6. Eliminate any added oil.
Yes

7. Eliminate all higher calorie-dense foods including flour products (i.e., bread, bagels, muffins, crackers, dry cereals, cookies, cakes), puffed cereals, air-popped popcorn and dried fruit.
Yes. I made a batch of muffins for my husband (bananas, whole oats, applesauce, apples, carrots, small amount of ground millet, spices) but I didn't eat any and put them straight into the freezer. Dealing with the smell of them baking was challenging.

8. Don't drink your calories (especially from juices & sugar-sweetened beverages).
Yes

9. Follow these principles, eating whenever you are hungry until you are comfortably full. Don't starve yourself and don't stuff yourself.
Yes. Tonight I made up a smaller portion of my rice-beans-sweet potato-spinach-salsa bowl because I knew I'd be filling up on soup and steamed vegetables first. It felt like the right amount and I was satisfied when I finished eating.

10. Avoid being sedentary and aim for at least 30 minutes or more of moderate exercise daily (i.e., brisk walking).
Yes, did 30 minutes on treadmill.

Thoughts:

I probably shouldn't do these reports last thing at night; my "thoughts" aren't very interesting by this time in the evening! :lol:

I created a weight loss ticker and initially set my target weight at 120, then thought better of that idea and changed it to 128 (a BMI of 22). I have only been in the 120s a couple of times before, and never as low as 120, so I honestly don't know where my weight will settle. Maybe I'll be one of those folks who reaches their goal weight, continues to eat the same way, and ends up below goal weight after some time.

Can I see myself eating exactly this way long term? Well, the weight I have lost so far, I have lost while continuing to eat small amounts of nuts (less than an ounce a day, only in salad dressing), occasional whole grain flour products (1-2 servings a week), corn tortillas, homemade soy yogurt as a condiment (a couple tablespoons on a meal once or twice a week), occasional dried fruit in a recipe, etc. I didn't have trouble moderating these items, they didn't cause issues with overeating, and I had good weight loss results while consuming them. I have stopped eating them temporarily, to keep a tighter rein on my diet over the holidays, and because I joined the MWL weigh-in group. Long term, I'd like to add them back in if I discover that I am able to. For now though, this is an interesting experiment.
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Re: Finding my Groove

Postby Marla » Wed Nov 18, 2020 11:50 pm

Today's food:

Image

1. Start each meal with a soup and/or salad and/or fruit.
Yes

2. Follow the 50/50 plate method for your meals, filling half your plate (by visual volume) with non-starchy vegetables and 50% (by visual volume) with minimally processed starches. Choose fruit for dessert.
Yes

3. Greatly reduce or eliminate added sugars and added salts. This includes gourmet sugars and salts, too. If either is troublesome for you, you can eliminate them.
Yes

4. Eliminate all animal foods (dairy, meat, eggs, fish, seafood).
Yes

5. Eliminate all higher fat plant foods (i.e., nuts, seeds, avocados, tofu, soy).
Yes.

6. Eliminate any added oil.
Yes

7. Eliminate all higher calorie-dense foods including flour products (i.e., bread, bagels, muffins, crackers, dry cereals, cookies, cakes), puffed cereals, air-popped popcorn and dried fruit.
Yes. I really wanted to make some McDougall-compliant cornbread to go with the taco soup, but resisted.

8. Don't drink your calories (especially from juices & sugar-sweetened beverages).
Yes

9. Follow these principles, eating whenever you are hungry until you are comfortably full. Don't starve yourself and don't stuff yourself.
Yes

10. Avoid being sedentary and aim for at least 30 minutes or more of moderate exercise daily (i.e., brisk walking).
Yes, exercised for an hour (combined time) on treadmill and exercise bike.

Thoughts:
I wonder what the calorie density of my meals was today. Several years ago I did an experiment where I tracked everything I ate in Cronometer, and I on days when I ate similarly to this, my overall calorie density was around 275-325 calories/pound.

In one of Jeff's classic posts, he explains that following the Healthy Eating Placemat will yield meals with a calorie density of under 400 calories/pound: https://www.drmcdougall.com/forums/viewtopic.php?p=429308#p429308 I think that in order to reach and maintain my ideal weight, I'll need to keep the calorie density of my diet around that threshold. I already know that I like to eat about 4 pounds of food per day, and at my ideal weight, I'll only be burning somewhere around 1200 calories a day at rest. I exercise most days, but the rest of my life is pretty sedentary. If I follow the Healthy Eating Placemat and keep my calorie density under 400 calories/pound, while consuming about 4 pounds of food, with my current activity level, I should hopefully be able to reach and maintain a healthy BMI. I just can't kid myself that I can go back to eating calorie-rich foods on any regular basis, unless I want to see the scale move up again.
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Marla
 
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Joined: Sat Oct 21, 2006 8:58 am
Location: Sacramento, CA

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