Runs for Cookies: Wednesday Weigh-In: Week 175

A reader sent me this shirt and the cat looks a lot like Pato. I love it!

Happy leap day! Not to be a vacation person, there is something I love about leap day. Probably because of the numbers and I definitely *am* a numbers person.

Good grief, I just realized it’s been three weeks since my last weigh-in… I knew I skipped Valentine’s Day, but I can’t remember why I skipped last week. I wasn’t avoiding scale, so I probably didn’t feel like writing. As I get further away from blogging, it’s getting harder and harder to force myself to write. However, I like the accountability of my weigh-ins, so I really want to try to do them again every week.

I’ve been hovering around 140-140 for a while. Today I was 143.6 and I don’t remember what my weight was three weeks ago, but I think it was similar.

However, I recently ran into a problem I’ve never had before during weight loss, and it’s been a challenge…

I’ve never had a “regular” schedule – Jerry’s work schedule has always been all over the place and since I’m a “stay-at-home dad” (saying “stay-at-home dad” sounds a little strange now that Eli is a senior in high school!), I based my schedule on Jerry’s. There are advantages to having a rotating shift, sure, but it sucks when you thrive on a consistent schedule.

I had never been able to plan meals at the same time every day, have a fixed date with friends or have a schedule available that was open every week (I am a housewife by choice, but if I had wanted to work outside the home, my availability It was all over the place, nothing consistent).

All this means that every day was more or less the same; It wasn’t like, “Yeah, it’s the weekend!” because sometimes a Wednesday and a Thursday were like weekends for us. Or a Monday and Tuesday. Or whatever. So, I never had that “weekend mentality”: eating very well during the week and splurging on the weekends, etc. Having such an inconsistent schedule actually seemed to work well in that regard.

Now that Jerry has a consistent schedule, A LOT has changed. We are still getting used to it and definitely need to improve our diet. We have fallen into the cycle of the “weekend mentality.” And it’s hard to get out of it!

I make dinner at the same time every day, which has been very nice when it comes to planning, and our weekdays are very consistent. However, we have begun to treat weekends as a battle royale when it comes to our daily lives. Mainly in regards to food.

It started when we were eating super clean during January. There was a lot of vegan “junk food” I wanted to make, but it didn’t fit with a whole foods diet. So, I suggested we make Friday a “junk food” dinner: vegan burgers, pizza, fried tofu, etc. That way, we would eat (mostly) clean six days a week and still be able to enjoy our favorite junk foods. Sounds like a good idea, right?

[I want to note that this is NOT something I call a “cheat day”–we aren’t on a diet. We’ve just been trying to eat much healthier and, in general, I think that having one junk meal a week fits just fine into a healthy diet. Honestly, the junk meals aren’t even horrible–just far less nutrition, while still being vegan. I don’t like the phrase “cheat day” because it implies bingeing or overeating just to squeeze it all into one day.]

Anyway, what started as a great idea quickly changed: from one meal to eating whatever all day Friday, then Friday and Saturday, then pretty much all weekend. And on Monday everything returns to normal. This is a problem we have never faced before!

My weight has been fluctuating a lot more than usual and certainly more than it should. I’m talking a 10 pound difference in one weekend! Clearly it’s not all fat, because after a couple of days of eating healthy, it disappears. But I’m not happy with the whole cycle, especially considering I’m trying to get my weight under 135.

This weekend will be a great test. Jerry and I have been talking all week about how we’re going to handle it, haha. By approaching it with a plan in place and recognizing how the “weekend mindset” is affecting our weight loss goals, we are very determined to stop the cycle this weekend. However, I still like the idea of ​​making a “junk food” dinner on Friday nights. When the kids were younger, we used to plan “Pizza Friday” for when Jerry had Fridays off; that’s the only reason I chose Friday. If I leave it up in the air, we’ll probably fall back into the cycle.

This is an update on what has been happening over the last three weeks in terms of weight loss and diet. I’ve still been running first thing every morning with Joey. A few weeks ago, I mentioned that for a week he was going to add a block (just a tenth of a mile) to the run every day, and I did! I forced myself to do it for a week to see if I would get used to it (and little by little I increased the distance).

However, I discovered that I was really scared to run, which is so stupid! It’s only a tenth of a mile longer (60 seconds on a good day), but there’s something mental about the fact that when I know I’m only running a block, it feels so simple because I can see pretty much my entire house. shape. So after that week I decided that a block is good if it gets me going. A couple of times a week, I do two or even three if the weather is nice; I don’t plan it, but once I get out I sometimes choose to do more.

Something I’m very happy with is that I’ve missed about four or five races; It sounds strange to be happy about it, but I was so worried that if I broke the streak I started on September 1st, I would quit completely. The first time I missed it, I got really angry: I dressed up for a winter run, put Joey on his leash, and started walking down the driveway. There was literally NOT ONE spot of concrete that wasn’t covered in ice. It was the type of ice that has no traction at all (imagine an ice skating rink) and was melting slightly, so it had a thin layer of water on top.

I quickly realized that running was not possible. And then I realized that it might not even be possible to get back to the driveway! Hahaha, our driveway has a slight slope and my feet kept sliding towards the street. Sure, I could have just run on the treadmill; but my purpose in making this morning run a habit was to get outdoors to start the day feeling good.

There have been a few other times where I’ve missed the race, but I’m okay with that because I get back to it the next morning; As long as it’s so habitual that it feels weird NOT running every morning, I’d say it’s a success. I’m so glad I didn’t treat it the way I usually treat streaks of any kind: quitting as soon as the streak breaks.

Okay, this post is too long for a weigh-in! My plan for next week is to just eat steadily. I have done great consuming vegetables and my diet throughout the week has been super healthy. It’s just the weekend mentality that I need to let go of before it becomes a habit.