Starting up

This fall, our birthday presents to each other are Fitbits.  Josh and I had an opportunity to buy them early at a reduced cost, so we leapt at that as we already knew we wanted them.  We also started using MyFitnessPal more consistently and I made some dietary changes.

I find the Fitbit extremely motivating.  We have taken to going for walks in the evening to get the remainder of our daily steps in.  Instead of sending the kids to fetch something I get up and do it myself if I'm able.  I'm moving more and it feels good to know I am.
I'm tracking my caloric intake with MyFitnessPal.  It's so helpful in terms of not overeating.  It also helps me eat better because when I know I have x number of calories left for the day I don't usually choose to fill them with ice cream.  Or if I want to eat more I recognize that I'll have to walk more to keep things in line.  It's been one week and I've lost about one pound.  Not huge, but I feel better about the choices I'm making to care for my physical body.

And like I mentioned earlier, some of those are dietary.  I've limited my dessert to one night a week - Friday is my splurge day.  I didn't know if I could resist dessert but it's been surprisingly easy.  Cutting myself off forever from my favorite treats was too overwhelming.  Knowing I can have them once in a while makes it seem manageable.  I also am limiting my dairy and meat intake more.  Again, on Fridays I don't worry about it so much.  I eat the pizza I want.

Funnily enough, what I want to eat is changing.  Instead of eating 3-4 slices of pizza (cringe), I'm content with one or two.  I don't feel as hungry as I did at the start of this.  Actually I feel really satisfied most of the time.  Last night, I for instance, because of my exercise I found myself with a potential 600 calories I could still eat.  That is a LOT!  I had a smoothie, which was fairly low carb because non-dairy milk has less calories than dairy, and felt super full so I called it good, even though I could have had two in terms of my calorie allowance.  Not hungry.
Working on adding more veggies into my diet.  They are low cal so really there is no reason not to eat them.  Just need to get used to preparing more options at every meal.

Transitioning out of my regular food patterns in terms of what I cook had been difficult for two reasons. One is that I still have quite a bit of dairy that I'd already purchased.  Two is that it takes more thought energy to figure out what to eat and if we will all like what I'm cooking.  Additionally with the move I am trying to use up what is in my pantry and freezer/fridge.  So the diet will probably to fully transform until some of these transitions are over.

Seasons

It's been such a busy summer and shaping up to be an even busier autumn.  But I can't keep letting that be my excuse.  I've been pretty good lately about taking evening walks.  I love being out after dinner so I've decided to stick with that for now.  I listen to podcasts usually and I like that.

My diet is off the hook.  Time to get back on board with that.  I'm having a really hard time cutting out dessert.  Besides the fact that I just love to eat them, there is also the whole psychological aspect behind having a "treat" that I need to change.  And if the truth were known, I could probably stand to be taking in fewer calories, but I'm not going to worry about that yet.  First exercise and cutting out treats.  I need to be better about monitoring that and I need to decide on some alternate options rather than ice cream or something.  Healthy desserts, snacks, and non food rewards.

It's a new week and the beginning of a new month and time of year.  Time to get back to using MyFitnessPal to track my food and exercise.