accountability update #2

I’m so glad so many of you are digging my plan to post an accountability update every Friday. I feel like I have my own personal group of awesome, intelligent, beautiful, creative, and strong cheerleaders that have my back. You all rock. Last week was off to a rocky start, but I am very happy to say that this week went much, much better.

Food

As I challenged myself to do last week, I tracked every single morsel of food that went into my mouth on MyFitnessPal. My goal for this week wasn’t really to hit any calorie goals, but to more assess where I was at, keep track of my hunger-cues and just be friggin’ accountable for the food that goes into my body. Inherently, by tracking, I cleaned up my eats and paid careful attention to my portions. By the end of the week, I’d even brought back the old school food scale and was weighing my food. Welcome back to 2007, kids!

I did realize this week that my food instincts aren’t totally out of whack. Without even trying to hit a goal, I’m averaging around 1700 calories a day (more on the days I’m working out, less on days I’m not), which is a totally sane and rational number. I don’t need to cut out chocolate or stop drinking beer or give up cheese. I just need to be diligent about portion control. Keep eating what I’m eating, but in rational amounts. And keeping a food diary helps make that happen.

How to improve next week: Keep on keepin’ on. I’m not really trying to hit any calorie goal (especially not the 1300 number that MyFitnessPal keeps telling me I should try for). What I’m figuring out is that the act of tracking my food inherently keeps me in control. So, just keep tracking, and trust my food instincts. And keep up with my fruit and veggie intake! I had over 50 servings of fruit and veggies last week. Woohoo!

Fitness

After not clocking in a single workout last week, this week was a vast, vast improvement. I started off last weekend with an early morning hike with the ‘faces. We did about three miles along the Knobstone Trail. We’d usually do more, but Puppyface is getting up in age and has some arthritis in her hips, so we try to keep our adventures short.

Then I managed to get in a walk during one of my days in the office this week. This might not sound like much of an accomplishment, but I’m pretty guilty of getting to work and not budging for 10 hours. It felt good to get out (even though it was pretty chilly) and get some fresh air.

I also got in one pretty-hardcore workout in our recently rearranged home gym. I’m loving having our new space to work out in! I missed my kettlebells. It felt awesome to get back to something more intense.

How to improve next week: I skipped out on the yoga this week, but I’d love to incorporate it back in. I think I’m my healthiest when I do a wide variety of exercises. This week, I’d like to get in some yoga, some gym work and maybe even a hike.

Hydration

Woohoo! I averaged between 10-12 glasses of water a day this week. And that’s just straight up water (not counting tea). I’m still struggling with drinking water at home, but I’m getting better at carrying my water bottle around with me everywhere. It’s amazing how much better I feel when I’m staying hydrated. Between that and cutting out coffee, I’ve been headache-free all week, which is a crazy improvement over where I’ve been for the past few months.

How to improve next week: I’d still like to start my morning off with a big glass of water. It’s a great way to kickstart your metabolism and get your day started on a healthy note.

Weight

Starting Weight: 272 lbs
Last Week’s Weight: 236.8 lbs
This Week’s Weight: 234.7 lbs
This Week’s Loss: -2.1 lbs

That’ll do! The starting number is different from last week because I’m currently going off the weigh-in for my DietBet game. Usually I weigh-in first thing in the morning without any clothes on, but DietBet has you weigh in with clothes (and I did mine after breakfast), so my starting weight is a big higher. That’s alright. It just means that I get to keep on all my clothes for my future weigh-ins. Less work for me. Awesome.

Speaking of the DietBet, I’ve been hearing some backlash about it, and I totally get it—it’s a lot of focus on the scale. But just as long as folks understand that the scale is just one (and in many cases, an insignificant) indicator of health, I don’t see anything wrong with it. I use the scale as one of many tools to keep track of my health. And I wouldn’t dream of doing anything crazy and unhealthy to scam the system. It’s been working for me. $14,000 is a big motivator for me to keep my hand out of the chocolate chip bag. And that’s all I was looking to get out of it (although some extra cash would be awesome).

How to improve next week: I weigh-in daily (and average the numbers across a week to balance out the fluctuations) and I’ve definitely noticed that I almost always gain weight the morning after I have a super carb-heavy dinner. So I’d like to cut back a little bit on the carbs at dinner. Nothing crazy, but instead of a giant plate of spaghetti, maybe I’ll have a small bowl of spaghetti with a side salad instead. Either that, or the day after I have a lot of carbs I need to hit the gym something fierce to use up all that stored energy! Other than that, I’m doing good. I know how to lose weight, I just have to keep up with it.

How did your week go? Was it healthy? Did you hit your goals?