I'm at only 1/2 pound less than I was two weeks ago. This is frustrating. I do know I feel better and the scale says my percentage of body fat is going down - 3% from when I started. I feel like I'm eating much better, however, and isn't that a start in the right direction?
Yesterday, as I was making lunch, I got a call from my medical insurance company. They have a new program where, free of charge, they coach you through lifestyle changes. I signed up. I don't get any "counseling" until next week. My coach will call me to establish goals and then give me some help with ways to achieve them. My goals have already been set:
1) continue to lose weight
2) reach a BMI of below 30 ( not obese ) by Christmas
3) reach my goal weight by my husband's birthday in April
4) keep the weight off
5) Don't believe I'm actually going to publish this, but I would like to try to run a 5k before I turn 45.
I also want to get my family back on a better track. Pregnancy fatigue and postpartum weakness have led to bad eating habits here. Since I've been pregnant or post partum for much of the last 12 years, that's lead to bad eating habits for ALL of my children's lives. So, I'll add that as a goal:
6) provide better food choices for EVERYONE
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See, I told you not to worry about losing too fast in the beginning. :-) This is pretty normal -- a really quick drop, probably largely from water, when first you begin to control intake, and then it levels off. If you increased your intake because you were worried about going "too fast," then the leveling off can be quite abrupt!
ReplyDeleteBecause I don't think the rapid weight loss at the beginning actually represents fat loss, I don't think this is really a plateau. You are still establishing a basic rate of loss. Your body composition changed in those first couple of weeks, and you have a new body now. You don't yet know what firm adherence to those habits will produce - it simply hasn't been long enough.
Erin, I've had a couple of anomalies I hadn't mentioned here that might have had an effect, too...2 medtrol dose packs: one for arthritis pain another for a serious allergic reaction last Friday. Both have been in the last month. I hate what prednisone does to me (makes me VERY hungry).
ReplyDeleteIt occurred to me, too, as I re-read your goals, that you might do well to de-emphasize the long term, outcome-based ones (reach such-and-such a weight by such-and-such a date; continue to lose; keep the weight off) and instead emphasize short-term, specific, and behavior-based goals.
ReplyDeleteYou only have indirect control, if any, over outcome-based goals -- see, the prednisone has done something to yours, you don't have complete control over that. But you have DIRECT control over behavior-based goals. "Try to run a 5k before age 45" is behavior-based -- ultimately, you decide whether you meet that goal, in a very definite decision to sign up for a 5k and show up for it and take the first steps when the gun goes off. "Provide better food choices for everyone" is behavior-based -- you decide whether to do it, you act, you control it.
You could still get more short-term and more specific with both of them. The nice thing about a specific goal is that you know exactly what you need to do to achieve it. The nice thing about a short-term goal is that you can have more successes right away.
So...