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Originally Posted by Blancita  Well you are really good natured in response to our criticism  . .... Thanks again for not taking our comments to heart . |
Absolutely! I came here for advice and help, so who am I to scoff at everyone's suggestions? I've learned a lot from this thread and it made me re-evaluate my diet, which is more than I could have asked for.
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Originally Posted by Blancita Did you ever figure out how many cals you were eating before your diet? That's the number I'd be looking at as that number kept you gaining or maintaining a high weight. So you need to cut from there, not cut out all calories. |
Unfortunately, I did not keep track. I just ate whatever crossed my path that looked good without regard for its healthiness -- "live for the moment", and all that. When I started my diet I knew that 2000 cal/day was a rough estimate (based on the Food Pyramid and nutrition info labels), but since then I've found the BMR calculators and I have a much better feel for it.
To those who've commented on my discipline: it's just part of my personality. I've tried to "eat better" many times in the past, but that always starts out as "I'll have a salad" and degenerates to "I'll have a pile of croutons and dressing with a token lettuce leaf at the bottom." So this time, "the time that I'm really REALLY going to lose weight, I swear!" I had to set strict black-and-white limits. It's easy to judge whether or not you're sticking to the diet when you've got hard and fast rules like "only eat twice a day" and "no fried foods". Either you're within the limits or you're breaking the rules, it's simple. When I got hungry I just thought too bad, it's not time for dinner yet. I took a growling stomach as an indication that I was making progress (my body wants food, but I'm not feeding it, so any moment now it's gonna start burning those reserves of fat!). When I totaled up my calories at SparkPeople I vowed to top myself the next day by eating even fewer.
And yes, I am aware that just about all of the rules I've listed in that last paragraph are false/unhealthy/bad, and I'm not following them anymore. The one good attitude that I developed was that junk food will be there when I'm done losing weight and that this isn't the last time my friends are ever going out to eat. I can eat bacon cheeseburgers and banana splits and meat lover's pizza again, just not right now, not while I'm on my way down. Those things will still be there.
Thanks everyone for the help!
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