Working to be Healthier: Week 3

I officially dropped Weight Watchers last week.  After losing 11.2 pounds (!) using their program I stagnated.  After three weeks of not losing weight I have decided that I don't want to spend money on the program anymore and will take what I learned and use that to work towards being healthier.*

I won't use a diet where I will eat very little food for several weeks in order to lose weight and then go back to my normal eating habits.  That will never work for long term weight loss.  This is why fad diets are worthless as well.  You can't lose weight by simply drinking vegetable broth for several weeks or only eating 1000 calories per day and then expect to keep the weight off when you go back to eating McDonalds and ice cream, or whatever else you normally eat, once the weight has been lost.

I used Weight Watchers to help me realize what I was eating and to be accountable for it.  For me the biggest thing I gained was realizing what I was eating, and how many calories but doing it in a way that allows me to continue to breastfeed.  I try to eat healthy, I really do.  but I also have a sweet tooth that I like to indulge.  I was indulging too much as noted by the success of counting my points.  By writing down everything I ate and calculating my points Weight Watchers helped me to realize how much I was eating and that I needed to make better choices.  And I made the better choices.  And I will continue to make better choices.  And if the scale moves up I will start writing everything that I eat down again.  There is nothing worse that seeing that you ate three brownies in one day (not normal for me I swear, but on a bad day chocolate is my comfort I admit).

If I lose more weight I will be thrilled, I really want to get down another 5 pounds.  However I also realize that if I am not willing to make more lifestyle changes at this time then I may not lose that weight.  And I am working through whether I am willing to make more changes to simply see a lower number on the scale.  I am well withing my healthy weight, actually before I started the WW program I was still in my healthy range just on the highest weight allowed, so being a healthy weight is not an issue.  Being able to fit into my clothes, and being comfortable and happy with my body, those are my issues.  Having a healthy lifestyle that I can model for my children (instead of do as I say and not as I do) is what I want as well.  And fitting back into my wedding dress by May 8 would be nice as well.

Which brings me to my updated goals list:

#1- 40 60 crunches a day.
 I have been increasing 10 crunches a week.  My goal is to do 100 crunches a day. 

#2 Exercise 30-40 minutes 3-4 times a week. 
This one I failed miserable at last week.  I managed to exercise 1 time.  I have no reasons, just excuses.  But I will try to do better this week.

New Goal: #3- Drink more water and less soda. 
Confession- I drink WAY to much soda.  I know this.  I don't drink coffee and I use soda to get my caffeine kick.  But I drink too much.  I am thinking about going cold turkey but I don't think that will work well so instead my goal is to simply replace 1 soda a day with water this week.  In two weeks I will replace another soda a day with water.  That will bring me down to 1 soda a day.  And we will see how that goes.

If you are on a weight loss or get healthier journey please share with me.  Reading the stories of others can be very motivating for me!


*Note: I do not blame Weight Watchers in any way for me not losing anymore weight.  I simply feel that I used the program as much as I could.  I have used their program in the past with success.  And I do plan to use what I learned from the past 3 months and use it to continue to maintain my weight.