Back to What Works

The very day I wrote the last blog post I realized that small changes were not going to be enough.  I needed something bigger to really shake things up.

I contemplated joining Weight Watchers for real, like going to meetings, weighing in and all the trappings that go along with that.  But that felt too disruptive to my life.  I don't want to be busy with running to meetings.  Also, mentally, the weekly weigh-in is anxiety inducing in a way that my private daily weigh-in is not.

I thought about cleaning out my cabinets and going full throttle into Trim Healthy Mama.  I love the IDEA of the plan.  The foods are so healthy and carb cycling is shown to be quite effective.  But that felt super wasteful and I didn't think I'd actually follow through.  

I considered going to a local TOPS meeting, a religiously affiliated weight loss group that meets in churches.  It is supposedly structured like the older weight watchers meetings but you can follow any sensible plan you like.  But I didn't think I would actually do it.  As much as I'd like to feel confident in myself, I feel weird going to a church basement to share with people I've never met.  Maybe that's an area I can grow in.  Not this week, though.

Fortunately I did not consider low carb.  That one is tempting but terrible.  It does something to me physically that I do not like any time that I attempt it.  Many people are successful but I hate it.

Calorie counting was not really something I felt like doing.  The large numbers are cumbersome.  With an app the numbers are doable, but I don't want to be tied to my phone.  Calorie counting works.  It aims at what all weight loss plans actually attempt to achieve: a calorie deficit.  But I just hate counting those large numbers.

So with all these plans out the window where did I land this time?  Which plan did I attempt again?  Because, really, I've tried them all.

Old faithful: The old Weight Watchers Winning Points/Flex Points plan.  My goal was to eat 30 POINTS per day, higher than the recommended and a totally doable thing.  The reason I set the goal higher was because I did not want to fall off the wagon.  I did not want to immediately quit from the intense hunger that is imminent from a drastic cut in food intake.

So far so good!  I kept it simple.  Monday through Friday I kept a food log to track my points. I went over 30 points most days, but barely.  If you even consider 35 points that is still under 1800 calories, a drastic shift from what I was doing before.  Before counting, I was definitely eating over 2200 calories on work days, more on the weekends.

In the past out of curiosity I tracked food without any restriction at all and found that, without trying, I naturally eat around 2200 calories.  That varies day to day but that was close to my average.  It is not very good for weight loss but it also isn't going to land me in the morbidly obese range.  It will just allow for slow creep upwards when sprinkled with some higher calorie weekend or holiday days.  I think that is what landed me back in this spot.

So no new goals this week.  I will just continue to count POINTS and that's it.  I will keep it at 30 per day and re-evaluate after another week.  It's easy, it's doable and it should work.  I just need to focus on this one thing.  

Check out my weight loss charts to see my progress.