Admissions

May 2 2024

Admissions. I finally admitted to myself and to my spouse that I had gained back ten of the twenty pounds I lost over our big push on weight loss over the summer. I did not think it had been that much. He admitted that he had too. I thought we were maintaining once the fall holiday season started but we slooowly let it creep up. One pound at a time. That's what happens isn't it?

What is going wrong? Let's see, we have been eating red meat more than once per week. We dropped the protein shakes for dinner. I thought we could eat soup or salad instead. Apparently not. Evidently the two of us need to replace one meal with a protein shake each day in order to lose weight. Weight loss works differently for different people. So, it's important to figure out what works for you.

We also have been drinking a glass of wine or two maybe twice per week or having a cocktail with dinner. We weren't doing that during our weight loss campaign. Again, I thought when we added that back it would simply mean that we maintain the weight we were. Not so. It meant gaining weight for us.

We have been using the smaller plates and we have been trying to balance the meals with 1/4 protein, 1/4 carbs and 1/2 vegetables. We now need to pay more attention to that and get back to eating chicken and fish. I figure that when I get tired of trying new recipes and cooking, we could do a soup or a salad as our main meal, not as the light meal at night. Back to the shakes.

In terms of conquering my Type II Diabetes, I have found that it's not really the sugar that pushes my glucose levels up, it's the carbs. For some reason wheat is not a good thing for me. I don't think I'm intolerant or allergic, but I gain weight when I eat wheat pasta. One piece of whole grain toast per day is ok but anything else is a weight gainer. I've been experimenting with pasta made from garbanzo beans or peas. Those seem to be acceptable. I simply don't do much with pasta. I make noodles from squash and zucchini in the summer. But those are vegetables, they don't fill the carb requirement. We don't eat white rice or potatoes. I've found that what works best for me are vegetable carbs like corn, peas, squash and pumpkin. I also use legumes and dried beans for my carbs. They are also important sources of fiber. But only one set of carbs per meal. We've been eating a lot of quinoa because it's easy to make. I discovered that there are different colors and therefore flavors of quinoa. I didn't know that. Now I'm experimenting with these different colors and flavors and what I can do with them.

Getting more vegetables in the meals has been a chore. My hubby doesn't mind cauliflower pretending to be rice as long as it has some kind of sauce on it. We get more veggies in that way along with the zucchini noodles. Sometimes I just make a big plate of mixed vegetables and call it done. There's nothing wrong with that.

The challenge is to get back to what it takes to lose the weight. Get back on the wheel. Get used to good nutrition, make that a habit. Now that the cold weather has subsided, we are getting our two mile walk in twice per day. That is a huge help. Exercise and eat right. You know what to do.