I have at least another 35 lbs. to lose, but I want to take a moment to give thanks for how much "less" I have this year. I don't have the words (or Kleenex) for how happy I am to be so much smaller and stronger and prouder of myself. But I am so thankful.
I also am mindful of how easy it would be to undo all the hard work I've done. With Thanksgiving at T-3 days, the risks are even greater, so I've come up with a plan to remain in the 160s for next week's weigh-in (which is also a contest weigh-in!).
The first step in my plan is controlling my eating at the Thanksgiving table. I'm hosting this year, so I got to set the menu (which seemed smart for my first "thin" Thanksgiving, but I'm already regretting the extra work). This being my favorite holiday, I'm allowing myself to splurge a little, while trying to keep it from getting out of control.
My original plan was to limit myself to a single serving of everything on the table. Then I figured out the calorie count:
- turkey breast, 240 calories
- stuffing, 213 calories
- cranberry sauce, 110 calories
- mashed potatoes, 153 calories
- maple butternut squash, 224 calories
- steamed snap peas, 40 calories
- spinach salad with dried cranberries, feta cheese, and raspberry vinaigrette, 224 calories
- whole wheat dinner roll with butter, 225
- sweet potato biscuit with butter, 310
- slice of French silk chocolate pie, 476
- slice of apple pie, 359
- slice of pumpkin-raisin cake with cream cheese frosting, 186 calories
The grand total? 2,760 calories. Two-thousand-seven-hundred-and-sixty! That's more than 2-days' worth of calories. Even if I eat nothing else all day, I'm still doubling my daily allowance of calories!
I tried rationalizing that I deserved such a special day after all my hard work, and it was a close thing, but reason prevailed. Because realistically? I doubt I could put away that much food in one sitting anymore, even if a French chef had a funnel shoved down my throat.
So the revised plan is to limit myself to 1 plateful of food. I'll still have turkey and all the fixings, but just reasonable tastes. And I may skip dessert altogether. Well, realistically again, if it meant instant death by explosion, I would probably still force down a slice of my fabulous pumpkin-raisin cake with cream cheese frosting. So I'll limit myself to a small slice of cake.
Here's hoping this compromise will keep my diet on track while allowing me some pleasure on this festive occasion. In addition, I'll be working to keep my diet on track the other 6 days this week by continuing to read my ARC and Response Cards.
But diet is only half the battle; I'll also be defending on the exercise front. The second step in my plan is to exercise every day this week, except for Thursday*. That means working out on Saturday and Sunday, which are sometimes optional for me. But not this time! I'm dedicated to not gaining any weight this week!
*I'm not scheduling exercise on Thanksgiving because I don't want to set myself up for failure. However, I have a feeble dream that I can convince a few people to go for an amble around the neighborhood after (maybe way after) dinner.
I already know I'll be missing one class (for dinner with friends in town for the holiday), so I'm going to replace it with a long walk that afternoon. I'm also adding a free-weights seminar (which is specifically targeted at remedying holiday overeating and stress). With the addition of the Saturday step aerobics class and a Sunday walk, that will be 9 opportunities to work off my Thanksgiving excesses.
In a nutshell then, the plan is:
- Control my eating by:
- Following my Thanksgiving food plan of 1 plate with little tastes of everything and no more than 1 slice of cake for dessert
- Reading my ARC and Response Cards every day
- Exercise every day but Thursday
And if the plan is successful, next week I should see more beautiful, awe-inspiring, wonderful, joyful-tears-inducing, fantabulous results like this:
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