Tag: banana

Weight Loss

On By Michel McDonaldIn Diet, Exercise, WeightLeave a comment

I have struggled with my weight since I quit smoking and gained 50lbs. I vowed to never get over 200lbs in the late 90’s, but I just couldn’t control the weight gain. I wasn’t eating anything that bad, so I never could understand what I was doing wrong.

Last year in January 2013 I made a New Years resolution to start losing weight. I was 262lbs and I dropped 70lbs and went down to 192lbs. I was so proud of myself, but then both my partner and I decided that we’re both tired of eating nothing but fruits and vegetables and weight watchers frozen dinners every day for the last 6 months, so we decided we could eat restaurant food and regular store-bought food as long as we stayed within a certain amount of calories and portion sizes. Well, try as I might, I couldn’t drop any more weight and I plateaued at 192 for a whole month. Then the weight starting slowly coming back and recently I went right back up to 235. UGH!

So yesterday I decided screw this eating whatever the hell I want crap, I NEED to drop this weight, like right this minute. I started the Noom app all over again from scratch and when I weighed in for the first time I had already lost some weight, so I was 227lbs. For breakfast and my 10am snack I had a banana. For lunch I had a Weight Watchers frozen dinner. For my 3pm snack I had yet another banana and for dinner I had a Weight Watchers frozen dinner.

Most people say not to eat anything after 6 or 7pm. Well here’s my problem, that’s when my appetite really comes to life. It seems as though I’m starving at that time lol. I mean, I can eat a banana for breakfast and snack and then a little meal for lunch and then another banana for my 3pm snack, but around or after dinner time, it’s like I’m famished, like I haven’t eaten in 10 years. That’s when I’m expected to not eat any more food? Yeah, um… good luck with that lol.

Last night around 8pm I started going into the kitchen and I grabbed a slice of bologna and then a slice of salami. I really wanted to make a sandwich, but when I go on my diet, I don’t eat bread. I could have eaten way more food than I did, but I chose to be good. I took a sleeping pill around 10pm and went to bed around 11pm or so.

This morning when I woke up I weighed myself and it said I was 224lbs, so at least I know the lunch meat didn’t affect my weight and the food I ate yesterday was the right amount. The Noom app said I could eat 2000 calories, but I logged around 1300 or so. I did log the lunch meat. The bologna was yellow and the salami was red.

If I can just stick with it, I will lose weight. I have complete faith in my ability to lose weight since it worked last year, I just need to be 100% committed and use the word “NO” when asked if I want to go to KFC or Golden Corral.

I bought some veggies at the store, like I bought 2 things of cauliflower and some broccoli and brussel sprouts and some other things. I didn’t buy any salad stuff because I don’t like salad without either thousand island or ranch, and those are definitely not on the menu for me. Although I did lose 40lbs back in 2003 or 2004 when all I ate were salads and I used ranch dressing, but for some reason it doesn’t work for me anymore. I have to find what works best and do that.

I haven’t been riding my bicycle to lose weight because of the heat. The best time to ride my bike in the summer time is at 5am, but I can’t seem to get to bed until 3am, so that’s out. Last night I wanted to go to bed early because I’m so sick of sleeping in until noon. Now that summer is coming to an end, when the heat starts going away I can start riding around 10am or so. I just can’t stand the heat, not even to go for a 30 minute walk. I feel like a vampire out in the sun about to burst into flames.

I’ve tried to go back on my diet this year, then my partner would buy junk and naturally I would eat that junk and then give up. I’m not going to pass up a bag of potato chips or cookies on the counter. I have an addiction. Potato chips and cookies are like crack cocaine to me. I just need some willpower… like a ton of willpower lol. If willpower came in a can, I would drink it. Unfortunately it does not. So I’m working on myself so that I can be healthy, it just takes time and patience. I know I can do this because it worked before.

I love positive feedback, but everyone is different, so what works for you may not work for me and vice versa. I’m sure people are going to say “Well what you gotta do is eat this and that and then do this exercise and blah blah blah” and that’s awesome advice, but I have to do what my body can handle and what I’m comfortable doing. I really do appreciate the advice, and thank you for thinking of me and caring enough about me to try to help.

I am using Noom which gives lots of wonderful advice and articles and I am in a Noom group so I get to talk to a group of about 10 wonderful people who are all in the same boat. It’s more of a lifeboat, but a boat all the same. This is just something that I have to do for myself.

Weight Gain

On By Michel McDonaldIn Cycling, Diet, Food, Noom, Pain, WeightLeave a comment

WeightGain

We went to the doctor’s office today so I could get my clearance note for surgery to remove my parotid gland.  They had me step on the scale and I was shocked to see that I was 205lbs.  So yeah, I’m a bit verklempt lol.

One of my issues with exercising is that when I walk or ride my bike or do anything that burns calories, the Noom app tells me that I can eat more calories, so I end up eating those extra calories, but then I might even go over those extra calories because I think to myself that I did such a good job that it’s okay.  Well, that’s not how it works.  I should still stick with 1400 calories, 1500 at the most.  Even if it says I can eat 1700, I should draw the line in the sand at 1500.

I’ve been using the Noom app for my cardio, but I decided to download the Noom Cardio Trainer.  I’m sure that it will still show the extra calories in the Noom app, but I just want to see how it goes with the Noom Cardio Trainer.

I’ve been eating those Quinoa and Tofu burgers every day with hamburger buns which is not a good idea; I should be eating them without any bread.  Here is my typical day:

Every morning I will either have a bowl of Malt-O-Meal or a banana for breakfast, which by the way the Malt-O-Meal is a green food (which means healthy) and the banana is obviously a green food.  For my morning snack (second breakfast?) I usually have a banana.  For lunch I normally eat a Weight Watchers Smart Ones frozen dinner, although I’ve been eating the Quinoa and Tofu burgers, both by the way are green, except for the bun of course.  Afternoon snack (linner?) is typically a banana or crackers or sometimes I will have a bowl of broccoli.  That has been consistent.  Dinner is typically a Weight Watchers Smart Ones, but I’ve been eating the Quinoa and Tofu Burgers.  For evening snack I’ve been eating a lot of crackers.  I need to stop doing that, but I get so hungry that it feels like I’m famished.

I’m assuming that my issue here is the bread and the crackers.  I also have to admit that I’ve been eating candy corn, but not daily.  I’m guessing that the amount that I’ve eaten so far is finally catching up to me, so I will stop eating them for the rest of the season.  If I am having this much difficulty from the candy corn, just imagine how it’s going to be when Eggnog is available in stores.  I’m going to go crazy because I just LOVE eggnog lol.

So getting back to the Noom cardio trainer, I have set up 5 days a week to go riding on Mondays, Tuesdays, Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays.  I’m going to go out 5 days a week to do at least 11 miles per day, if I can do more, then great, but I’m not going to push myself that hard.  The app suggests 5 days a week, so I’m giving myself 2 days off, but not 2 consecutive days which is why I chose Sundays and Wednesdays as my days off.

balance ballI am also going to buy that Gaiam Total Body Balance Ball Kit which is sold on Amazon for $20.  It has an exercise DVD with it which I can watch while doing the exercises in my bedroom.  The doctor at Physical Therapy told me I should buy one so I can do exercises for my back since I only have 3 more sessions left.  My insurance only pays for so many sessions, then I’m on my own.  My back isn’t in as much pain as it was, but anyone who has, or anyone who knows anyone with scoliosis knows that the pain is really bad.  The only thing that really helps my pain is the exercises.  Pain meds don’t do anything for my back pain, they help my parotid gland pain, but not my back pain.  $20 is a small price to pay for pain relief.  I wanted to buy one at Target, but they were the same price, but without the DVD.

I really hope I can get back down to my comfortable weight of 192lbs and possibly get back on track with my weight loss so I can get down to my ultimate goal of 170lbs.  Considering I lost 70lbs this year, 35lbs shouldn’t be that difficult to lose, although it’s harder than I thought.

So to recap, my goal is to stay away from Halloween Candy and any other holiday sweets, bread and to exercise more and to try not to eat more than 1500 calories per day, even when the app says I can eat more.

Ready… set…  GO!

Week 33 – Weigh In Day with @Noom

On By Michel McDonaldIn Diet, Doctor, Exercise, Health, Noom, WeightLeave a comment

week 33

I haven’t been doing too well with my diet lately.  I had hit a plateau that I couldn’t get out of, then last week I weighed in at 194, 2lbs more than I was the previous week.  This week after my last weigh in I had actually gone up to 199 and that was my aha moment.  I was gaining too much weight and realized that I wasn’t doing very well and in order to get back on track, I was going to have to go back to my healthy diet.

We went to Food Maxx and I bought 14 Weight Watchers Smart Ones frozen dinners and I also bought some Malt-O Meal Original for my breakfast.  I had been eating Cheerio’s since January with a banana, but I needed a change.  I actually wasn’t sure if Malt-O Meal was going to be good for me, but it shows up as green in the Noom app so I guess it is.

Today was weigh in day and I am happy to say that I am back down to 192.8 which is what I was 2 weeks ago.  I think that I just needed to go off track for a couple of weeks so that I could gain a new perspective and a new momentum and refocus all of my energy again into losing more weight to hopefully get me back on track so I can get down to my ultimate goal weight of 170lbs.

The doctor told me that I didn’t need to lose any more weight, but I still have a fat stomach and I don’t want to have that anymore.  I really want to lose as much fat as I possibly can.  I know I can lose the rest of this weight in only a couple of months if I keep going the same way I did to get to this point.  I just need to have the same determination to get the job done and I will accomplish my goals with complete success.

I haven’t been riding my bicycle because of my back pain, also because of how hot it is.  I am also having issues with not just my back tire going flat, but now my front tire too.  I honestly don’t know what is wrong with my tires, why they keep going flat.  It’s mind boggling to me.  Neither tire have a hole in the tube and there isn’t a thorn or sticker in the tire.  I don’t understand how they can both go from being fully inflated at 60PSI one day, to being around 20PSI the next.  It’s supposed to hold it’s pressure for a long time, especially since my bike hasn’t moved an inch in a month.

When it cools down I will start riding it again.  I would much rather ride my bike before the sun comes out to not only avoid the heat, but also avoid the sun because I burn easily.  Because I broke my arm at night, my partner doesn’t want me to ride when the sun isn’t out because he thinks I will break my arm again.  It was an isolated incident and it had nothing to do with the sun and everything to do with me not paying attention.  I’m sure it would have happened no matter what time of day it was.

At any rate, I am hoping to be at my goal by at least Halloween if not sooner.  That would be awesome.  Not that I have a reason to be at my goal by Halloween, I just want to be that’s all lol.

Anyway, until next weigh in…

I’m Drugged up with Adrenaline

On By Michel McDonaldIn My ChildhoodLeave a comment

It all started out with looking at my AOL buddy list then double clicking a name and saying hi to Chips cousins girlfriend.

We get in this conversation about her girlfriend being in the hospital which turns into me talking about my childhood lol.  I focused the conversation from her girlfriend in the hospital to my childhood trauma lol.

The more we talk about it, the more adrenaline pumps into my body and I start getting angry and then the testosterone starts pumping in and next thing you know, I’m wide awake at 2:30am.

I finally took an ambien which won’t work without food so I had a banana but I have a feeling I’m gonna need some toast.  Ok so I don’t need it, I’m craving it lol.

Why is it that when talking about my childhood my body starts to go through something else?  Most people would cry about it and get over it and it’s done.  But me, I don’t cry, I want to punch someone and since it’s not my style I want to punch something.  But since punching things also isn’t my style (I’m too cheap to damage things I have to replace) then the next best thing is to start growling and just being pissed off lol.

As I’m back in time in my head I’m yelling IN MY HEAD at people who are talking trash to me and I’m punching them in the face lol.  I guess it’s better and less illegal to punch a memory in your mind lol.

This would be a great time to start writing about what happened but I’d rather keep writing in chronological order when I write my book so I’ll wait.  Those memories aren’t gonna go away so I can put them in the back of the closet for a while until I get to them and then watch out lol.

Anyway, off to bed when I get food in me and the ambien kicks in.  Relaxing helps calm me down long enough to go to sleep because it stops my brain from working overtime lol.

Time-Lapse Software

On By Michel McDonaldIn Daily BlogLeave a comment

I was looking at a video on YouTube where they take a banana, put a watch on it then let the camera take a picture every second for a whole week.  The banana had a light over it so naturally it got a really bad tan and you could see the second, minute and hour hands just going and going.

Perios by Martin Slovacek.  It’s totally free and you don’t even have to install anything, just download it and run the exe file (after you unzip it of course).  It finds your webcam and starts taking pictures as soon as you find a directory, choose the amount of time in seconds, minutes or hours then click the Start button.  Once you are finished click the Export button and it combines all of those images into an .avi file.

I did find a program that cost $10 but it only works on the computer you register it on.  Every computer after that costs $5.  I guess it’s a small price to pay but if you reformat your hard drive you might have to buy the upgrade for $5.  I haven’t tested that theory out yet and I don’t plan on it either lol.

It’s called Webcam Flix and I bought it for my laptop.  I think it works a lot better because when you go to make the video it just looks way smoother than the free one I listed above.

I’m going to put it on my laptop and have it do time-lapse on the Scooby Doo Chia Pet.  I have a poor mans version of a time-lapse video on YouTube of my Scooby Doo chia pet so I will redo it lol.  It really is lame lol.  I just gotta find it and I will work on that.

Update: I’ve changed some things in this post so if you notice something is different, it is.  I took out the free part in the subject and I added that I did buy the $10 webcam software, only because it’s superior to the free one.  Here is the new Scooby Doo Chia Pet time lapse video I made with it.

Hunger Pangs

On By Michel McDonaldIn Diet, FoodLeave a comment

Yesterday and today were Chips days off so I didn’t ride the bike the entire weekend.  I thought my body was getting used to the new diet or the new portions, in fact it was doing pretty good.  So I was a little confused today when I had my slim fast shake at 11:45am, I was really getting hungry.  But then at 1:45pm the hunger pangs came back with a vengeance.

For the last couple of weeks that I’ve been on the slim fast and measuring my portions my hunger pangs haven’t been bothering me so I don’t know why today.

I decided that I couldn’t wait until 6pm to eat so I just ate an energy bar, a Tiger’s Milk bar.  But then Darrin said hey let’s go to the store and get some steak for dinner to BBQ.  So we went and even got some salad stuff and a can of beans because what’s a BBQ without beans and salad?

Unfortunately he couldn’t wait for 6pm since he didn’t even eat any lunch so we ate at 3pm lol.  Which was ok for my stomach I guess but then when 6pm came around I started getting hungry again grrrr.  And now, it’s just turning 11pm and guess what?

Well, I gotta take an ambien anyway to get me to sleep, I can’t sleep without it because the BiPap mask keeps me awake so I gotta take a pill to be able to fall asleep with that thing.  The Ambien doesn’t really work without food so I’ll eat a banana, that should work.

I’m out of cereal so tomorrow morning I’m going to just have a slim fast shake.  I wanted to limit myself to 1 shake per day or if I had a very light dinner then just add the shake.  If you haven’t noticed, Slim Fast is expensive lol.  So that’s ok, I can actually have a shake for breakfast and then later tomorrow buy some more Raisin Bran cereal for breakfast the next day.

Will The New Diet Stick?

On By Michel McDonaldIn Cycling, Diet, ExerciseLeave a comment

Yesterday I went to the grocery store and bought about 10 power bars and 4 tigers milk bars for my bike rides so that should last me awhile.  Well, at least 14 rides anyway.  Actually that should last me the whole month since I ride 3 days a week.  Plus I bought 2 cans of Slim Fast Ultima.

I also bought a box of muffins because they were reduced for quick sale.  It had 2 bran muffins and 2 blueberry muffins.  I ate 1 blueberry muffin for breakfast and a slim fast shake for lunch then nothing all day until dinner time and we went to Que Pasa for dinner where I had a 2 item combo, beef Enchilada and beef burrito with rice and beans on the plate.  Then with my ambien I had a banana.  Food helps the ambien kick in faster.

It seems to have done some good for me because I’ve finally noticed some weight loss on the scale.

While I was at the store yesterday I bought 2 bags of the salad mix so when dinner rolls around I can eat some salad instead of the usual pasta or pizzas that we eat.

It’s time for me to start taking responsibility for what I eat and just say no when confronted with certain foods that I like.  I REALLY want to lose this weight but at the same time all this food is coming at me left and right, sometimes I just can’t say no.

I was going to ride today but my thighs are just in so much agony so I’m going to just stay home.  Our new tenant moved in yesterday and I’m going to help them with the rest of the heavy stuff in the U-Haul.  It rained yesterday from about 3pm until late last night but the street seems to be dry as a bone now.  I was going to use that as my excuse for not riding but frankly I can’t lol.  I’m just going to say that my legs are tired, I’ll do it tomorrow.

Recession Weight

On By Michel McDonaldIn HealthLeave a comment

Will Americans put on “recession pounds”? – Link Broken

According to this article, a study has shown that because of the recession we are in people are going to start buying cheaper foods and not paying the extra amount for fruits and veggies and because cheaper foods are higher in sugar and saturated fat, they will gain weight.

It used to be that the only people who were fat were royalty because they were so rich they could eat all the food they want so being obese was a sign of wealth.  Now, being obese is a sign of poverty.

I’ve basically been poor for the last 21 years lol.  Since I turned 17 and was homeless until now.  When I was a smoker I was always thin but when I quit smoking I gained weight because food took the place of the cigarettes.  I gained a huge appetite since then.  When I go to the grocery store for food I buy whatever is on sale like the boxes of shells and white cheddar or Fettuccine Alfredo or I’ll buy the little mini pizzas that are 10 for $10.  And the banquet TV dinners are almost always 10 for $10.

Since people are so busy working (if they didn’t lose their job) they don’t have time to exercise and they use that as an excuse not to exercise but there are always ways to overcome that like riding your bike to work or if you don’t live that far, walk.  And taking the stairs instead of the elevator and you don’t have to pig out on the vending machine food, you can bring some baby carrots with you for a snack or a banana or an apple.  Those aren’t expensive to buy.  I have an orange tree so my oranges are free.