Big and Beautiful

Fixed this today, and really liked it. About 200 calories

 4 ounces chicken breast

1/8 cup mozzerella cheese

Parmesian cheese

green pepper

tomato

1/2 cup tomato sauce

mushrooms (boiled)

I mixed the cheese, pepper, and tomatoes together than stuffed it in a slit I cut in the chicken (easier to do while it’s frozen). I then put a 1/4 cup of tomato sauce in the bottom of a small pan, put the chicken on top of it, then added the other 1/4 cup of tomato sauce. I sprinkled the boiled mushrooms (boiling them I find helps them to retain moisture in the oven) over the top, and added a little more parmesian.  Baked it at 350 for 35 minutes.

Suggestions that I would make is to maybe use a little less tomato sauce (it was a little over powering), and try to stuff it such that the cheese stays inside the chicken.  Otherwise, it was a really good dish. I normally don’t like green peppers, but they helped to add just hte right amount of spice.

Well, weighed-in this morning and I only maintained.  But looking back at what I ate last week, while maybe I didn’t go overboard, I didn’t choose the healthiest foods.

 A good number of my lunches involved eating left-over five can casserole (not really a low fat meal), and then I had a couple of Mexican meals… Wednesday was tacos, and Friday and Saturday was bean burritos smothered in cheese sauce.  I didn’t realize how many calories are in burritos (with the beans and tortilla) until I was figuring it up while everything was warming up.  And I happen to be a cheese-a-hlic, which is great for the calcium, but not hte best for fat and calories.

I did go hiking on Wednesday and have been regretting it ever since… I didn’t use bugspray and went in early evening, and despite my hiking boots and long pants, I ended up with chigger bites all over my ankles and up my legs.  I can hardly walk without itching.

Next week there WILL be a loss!  I have my meals (well, dinner at any rate), planned for this week so I have no excuse!  (other than the chocolate cake I made last night… I’ll take it to work tomorrow. At least it doesn’t have frosting).

So, I was off to a great start on Monday with my loss, but since then it’s kind of been downhill.  

In one of my classes on Monday, I gave the students some wrong instructions, and now I have to get them to redo the problem that was affected.  I know how I would feel if I had to find a time to come in and correc the problem, or come early to the next class, and I feel bad that because of me these students have to do that.

Well, after I finished my office hours, I went out for a walk which didn’t go all that well.  I was ready to quit after only the first mile, and it took me about five minutes longer to finish the three miles than it did the first day I went out there (my GPS verified a dismally low average speed).  I was jello by the end.  I have been managing to go out there about every other day, but I”m considering going hiking instead.  That doesn’t feel as much like exercise to me, and my hiking boots have been feeling a little lonely lately.

Then dinner that night… I waaay over ate. I fixed a meal that I don’t normally (just because it results in a ton of leftovers), and I ended up eating half of it, plus two helpings of salad.  (My mom calls it five can casserole, it’s: Chicken noodle soup, cream of mushroom, condensed milk, chicken breast, and lo mein noodles  all mixed together).

I did better yesterday; it’s my long day so I didn’t get to eat dinner until almost 9 o’clock, which isn’t the greatest thing in the world, but I was reasonable. (Teriyaki chicken and vegetables).  I came really close to either going to Buffalo Wild Wings or ordering nachos from Mazzios, and even dialed Mazzio’s number, but hung up before getting my order placed.

Hopefully today will be ok.

Another loss!  Down another 2.5 pounds - just another 4 to get to my 10%!

The group of us here are fighting against being overweight and being obese.  Sometimes, I forget that there’s a lot of people out there fighting the other problem - those who suffer from anorexia and bulemia.  Being the way I am (100 pounds overweight), I find it hard to imagine someone weighing 70, 80, even 120, and still thinking that their fat.  But last night, I had a reminder of why there are people out there like that, and why those like me have a hard time being accepted in society. 

Last night, I went to go see a movie by myself.  Yes, I went by myself - I have yet to make any friends here, and I didn’t want to spend all weekend in my apartment like last weekend.  I get home, and turn on the TV for noise while I make some hot chocolate (ok, I know that was a no no diet wise, but it was that kind of night). Will & Grace comes on, and the first think I hear is Jack saying, “I’m not going to go to the movies by myself like some fat woman.” Having just come home from a movie bymyself, that struck a very personal nerve with me at that moment. 

Then, I start Ladder 49 (which is a good movie), and there was a line in there where one of the characters holds up some sort of food (didn’t see what kind) and the character says (to this very skinny girl), “What are you doing with this? These are for lonely fat girls who stay in on Friday nights.” (or something along those lines)   Once again, the line described what I was doing.

While at the time I took these jabs very personally, I started thinking about the big picture of attitudes such as these.  They’re passing the message that if you’re fat, you’re going to be lonely.  Society doesn’t like fat women.  And I think that epitamizes why we have girls (and guys, I won’t be sexist and claim it happens to only one gender) who DIE because they are constantly trying to be thinner and thinner. 

It’s influences such as these that makes the wiring in my head go bonkers.  It makes me not want to lose weight, just to show these jackass script writers that, “Hey, look, I’m fat and I’m happy.” Sure, maybe at 24 I’ve never had a boyfriend/significant other (being p.c. here), never been kissed.  But you know what, for the most part, I’m happy with my life.  Yeah, it gets a little lonely going to the movies by myself and spending Friday nights at home watching movies, but that’s what I do.  I can’t stand the large amounts of people and the noise at bars, and am very bad at meeting new people even in small groups.  That is who I am; it has nothing to do with the fact that at one point I weighed 234 pounds!

And even if I do end up with someone on down the line, when I weigh considerably less, I’m always going to wonder if the only reason they decided I was worth approaching was because I didn’t weigh 200 pounds. There will always be that doubt in my mind of if he’ll still love me, even if I gain back every single pound and more.

Ok, so first I have a confession to make about last night… Before I managed to get into bed a friend messaged me asking if I’d picked up Season 2 of Supernatural (one of my favorite shows), and I hadn’t. So, of course, I had to run to Wal-Mart right then and there to get it.  Well… for the past couple of days I’d been hungry for something with peanut butter and chocolate… I was thinking along the liens of a crispy treat or popcorn ball or puppy chow.  Well, I was standing in line waiting to pay, and TADAAAA there it was: A King-Sized Reeses Peanut Butter cup. It was my turn at the cashier, so without even thinking, I snatched it up and paid for it.   I didn’t even wait until I was home to tear into it. I opened it as soon as I got to my car; it was as if I was being possessed!  And I didn’t eat just one of the cups… or even jsut two… I ate ALL four.

Well, after allowing myself to sleep in,  I was feeling really guilty about the cups. So, I decide that after my meeting with my supervisor, I would go walking.

The whole reason why I”m doing walking is that I’ve decided that I’ve decided that my rear-end is probably my worst feature - it’s BIG and it sticks out.  When my brother was getting married almost two years ago, my sister-in-law and I were shopping for bridesmaid dresses and at one point she’d made a comment about the way it stuck out.  She said that it was like a shelf and that we could put little trinkets on it for my walk down the aisle.  She was joking, I know.  But it still hurt a little.   So, the goal is to not only lose wait, but make it such that not as much of the fat is stored there.

So I went walking.  Same place I did on Sunday, only this time I actually had my GPS unit set up right.  It read a distance of not 3 miles, but 3.25 miles. I musth ave walked slower today because it took me alittle longer to complete the loop, and my heart rate didn’t get up as high as before.

Food wise, my day was:

Breakfast: skipped

Lunch: Mashed potatoes, mac and cheese (”lite” prep)

Dinner: 4 oz chicken (lightly breaded, pan fried), 2 dill pickel quarters, cup of steamed rice, and a serving of broccoli and cheese sauce (lite).

I’m feeling a craving for chocolate, so we’ll have to see if I end up with my lite ice cream.

Oh! Also…

I was looking in the mirror after I got home, and I was noticing that I’m actually starting to have somewhat of a shape.  I don’t know if the difference is the weight that I’ve lost, or that my exercise shirt is a little more form fitting than my other t-shirts.  But always before it’s seemed like my fat has hidden any sort of shape that I may have.  That’s kind of exciting for me.

I’m not feeling well, so I’m going to make this brief then head to bed.
Breakfast: bowl of cereal, cup of yogurt -this is more than I usually eat for breakfast, but I didn’ tknow when I’d have a chance to grab lunch, so I tried to eat enough to last.

 Lunch: Chef salad - I swear, the university it out to get me.  By the time I had time to run over for lunch, everything was closed with the exception of an overpriced sandwhich shop, Chik-fil-A, and pizza.  Fortunately, I found some pre-packaged salads that hadn’t been packed up yet and took what I believe was the last light dressing.  The really great part - the cash register screwed up, only charged me six cents, and wouldn’t let the cashier rescan my card to try and put the rest on it.

Dinner: Lasagna TV dinner — I’m blaming this for my not feeling well right now.  I had to eat it pretty quickly because of having to get back to campus, but since about an hour eating it my stomach has been doing gymnastics.

 There it is. Time to go sleep this off.

Weighed in this morning: I was down 4.5 pounds!  Wooee!  That puts me at 6 pounds from my 10%.

I had to go to a Coastie meeting this evening (and I did some work earlier in the day, too), and as I was walking out the door, I caught my reflection in the mirror (I have a full length mirror on my entry-closet door), and for the first time, I actually noticed that my uniform looked big on me. :-)  It makes me want to go buy new shirts, but I know it’d be more money-efficient to wait until it becomes an issue — I can’t afford to buy new uniforms everytime one size is too big.  I did get complimented today… But it was by someone who’d never seen me before and I’m sure he was just complimenting me and being polite because I was actually wearing my uniform, “If all of us should look as good as you do.” (after me saying something about my uniform, don’t remember what though.). But it’s still a feel-good moment.  I don’t get complimented a whole lot.

So, for food today, I ended up splurging a little this evening since I had to eat out (tends to happen when you spend 12:00-10:00 an hour from home).

Breakfast: Oatmeal, hotchocolate

Lunch: Ham and cheese sandwhich (with mustard), salad (with a little bit of lite ranch)

Dinner: A bag of gummy worms (it was an accident… I stopped by Bass Pro, and I wanted to buy a knot tying book, and had points on my card. Well, the book was 9.70, and before you could use points you had to spend $10. So, I bought a 99cent bag of gummy worms.  They didn’t have anything healthy); and some fast food Mexican (something they called a papusa, some beans, and some chips with cheese.)

Breakfast: Slept through it.

Lunch: Left over teriyaki chicken, steamed chicken dumplings

Snack: Popcorn - yeah, I ended up not being able to help myself.  Tried those salts and they’re not that bad.  Not butter, but not bad.

Exercise: Walked 3 miles.  So, we have this lake that has a path around it, and I looked it going, “How far can it be?” So, I stretch, start walking, streth, and continue.  3 miles (the path was marked) later, I was kissing my car hello.  I think that’s the furthest I’ve walked at any one time since I went to visit a friend in Chicago last August. According to my GPS, I averaged about 3.25-3.5 miles an hour.

Dinner: Baked lemon-pepper chicken, mashed potatos, salad (carrots, cucumbers, mushrooms, tablespoon fat free french)

Snack: 1/2 cup Bryer’s slow churned triple chocolate ice cream.

Ok, it not so many words; it was more their attitude that alcohol  is a bad thing.

 Anyway, in the past few years, I’ve thrown that attitude out the window which resulted in last night.

What happened is this: I’m on this medicine that’s not supposed to be mixed with alcohol (ok, so I sorta neglected to tell my doctor that I enjoy a drink now and again, but he knows my dad and I didn’t want anything to slip that would let the cat out of the bag).  Well, I overslept breakfast yesterday, and by the time I got around to eating lunch (a package of ramen noodles) it was too late to take the first dose.  So, I decided, what the hell?  I’ll just plan on skipping the evening dose and treat myself to some wine.  I hadn’t had any since at least June. Well… I ate dinner at about 6:30 (steamed chicken dumplings, teriyaki chicken, steamed rice) then started working on a model of the U.S.S. Eagle.  Perfect time to sip on some wine - I’ll be busy and less likely to just down the wine. Weeeeeelllll…. seven hours later, I had finished gluing all the pieces (with the exception of one that fell off and I couldn’t find) that needed to set up before I could rig the masts and the bottle of wine was finished.  I’m wondering when I’ll see the effects of that little binge.

I may actually go out for a walk today.  We have a little like that they’ve built a walking/biking path around.  I just have to decide whether I’m going to do that before or after homework. 

Thank you to all who gave some suggestions on the popcorn.  I actually bought some of the seasonings that Baggy Pant x2 recommended yesterday with every intention that I was going to eat popcorn and watch another movie last night. Next weekend I’ll have a test taste with all the suggestions.