My little LoseIt program for my ipod touch is teaching me a few things. I've never really counted calories before, and I see this as being of more value for food journaling, but the calorie thing is teaching me a few things.

1. Craving battles. Empty calories just leave me hungry for more and fill up my calorie allotment for the day without being at all satisfying. Even though they are what I crave when I'm having one of those days, they aren't what I NEED when I'm having one of those days. I can nosh down a whole plateful of veggies, with olive oil or ghee, sea salt, etc., for fewer calories than most junk and packaged foods. I have now learned to pig out on healthy foods when I'm stressed, it leaves me satisfied and doesn't mean I have to skip a meal in order to stay within my calorie goal.

2. The program greatly underestimates the power of the BTD/GTD way of eating. I've had to increase my calorie goal by about 200, and I still go over some days, but lose weight faster than what it says I will (even taking exercise calories into consideration, which it does).

3. Someone can eat just one. If I find myself cheating, I can and do stop after one bite. I have to track it in my log, whatever I eat, and how much. Then I hold myself accountable for it.

3. Rewards are no longer edible. I reward myself with a new mp3 each day that I am BTD/GTD compliant. It costs less than most junk food rewards, but I can enjoy it for as long as I want without bad health consequences. The program tells me if I've eaten too much, the log tells me if I've eaten the wrong things, and if so, I don't get the reward.

4. Taekwondo burns a whole lot of calories! On days when I work out I'm often very hungry. Now I know why and how hungry I should be...so I can plan to eat a bit more rather than sticking with the low calorie goal, starving and ending up cheating.

5. Know when I'm full. It's nice to have a visual reminder of when I've had enough food for the day, which isn't usually until after dinner when everybody else is looking for dessert...the program tells me that I'm full and helps me to say no to empty calorie desserts. I give myself some leeway of course, if I do feel hungy at that point or need something sweet I can eat some compliant fruit, and as long as it's compliant, I can still get my reward. (Compliance outweights calories)

I'm still sticking to no food after dinner is over, that's not a new key, but it's a keeper. Leeway goes to raw veggies if it's been a crazy day or I haven't gotten enough calories.

I haven't blogged in a few weeks because I haven't felt all that successful or compliant. The truth is otherwise however, as I just realized I've lost nine pounds since starting my SWAMI diet on August 1st. Why haven't I felt successful? Well, for one thing, the diet itself has been a bit easier, as SWAMI gave me back more than it took away. What it took away was important, like most dairy, because that just didn't work out for me when it comes to weight loss. And yes, I have cheated a bit, but in much smaller increments than I was formerly known to do. They say "no one can eat just one", but lately I have been able to (as long as it's not something that causes awful cravings, and I've avoided cheating on those things, one of which being the things that they made up that ad slogan for...was it potato chips?).

It has felt like I wasn't losing weight fast enough, some days and weeks the scales didn't seem to budge. There are plenty of argument for not weighing every day, but I have been because it helps me track myself better and assess any damage from cheating or just plain overeating. I've also been journaling my foods. At first this was just with a digital voice recorder, but then I won an iPod touch a a raffle and have been trying a free program on it called LoseIt! It's easy to enter in my foods as I go, and my weight each day, with that. Some of my foods are not in their lists so I just pick the closest thing I can find calorie-wise.

It keeps track of the calories through the day and I can also check out my nutrient levels. It recommended 1700 calories a day, but I upped that to 1900, and on days when I enter in lots of exercise, it allows for more, so I've only been over the limit once in the last week...and I realized the "cheat" that took me over the limit wasn't worth it. I've also realized that you can really fill up on fruits and vegetables without coming anywhere near the calorie limit. Cheating on some empty calories just wrecks it, and it's so not worth it.

Anyway, that's where it stands right now. Considering how stressful this month has been, I'm proud as a peacock to have lost 9 pounds despite being under much more pressure than usual. Others in my house have been sick, and I was a little sick myself, but that didn't derail me, which is a unique thing for me. In the past I tended to crave those things that did damage when I most needed the beneficial foods, but this month I have made much better choices and upped the beneficials instead of the toxins.