Well, today my child is away at camp for the week, so I am going to use this week – one where I don’t have to run my life around HER schedule, to start figuring out “the rest of my life”, so to speak. In other words, now starts the real work on figuring out how to take off this weight and how to keep it off.

There are a few things of which I am sure, and there are many things about which I have some good thoughts and inklings. Here’s what I have so far:

1) Attempting anything too radical will not work. While I am great at doing just about anything for a short time (6 months or less), I need to work towards changes that I can do for a lifetime. Anything too severe (such as, “I’ll never eat starch again”) won’t work.

2) Eating out is a problem for me, and probably always will be. It is not realistic to think that I will eat out and not eat things that are off of my general plan. This is where I admire people like blogger Suzanne so much. I was, literally, amazed how well she did on her cruise. That would never happen with me. Not at this point, anyway. I would have been all over the deserts, the starches, whatever. I would have NEVER hit the gym. However, she’s been pretty compliant for a long time, and perhaps I CAN see a time, down the road, when I will be able to make better choices for myself when eating out. At this point, however, my goal is to remain complaint when I am eating at home, and to do the best that I can when eating out.

3) I think that the timing of my food and what goes into my mouth first is very, very important to me. This is something that is just starting to show itself right now, as I am really paying attention to what I am eating and how it affects me. This is what I have found so far:

a. My body likes fruit first thing in the morning. Fresh is best, but a smoothy made from frozen is OK, too. I can throw some nuts or seeds in it, but no protein and DEFINITELY NO STARCH. About 30 minutes later or so, my body likes some protein, fat and veggies. The portions do not have to be very big, and while I like to eat the fruit/ nuts right down, I like to eat the protein/fat/veggies slowly. I often take the plate to my computer and eat a bite here and there until it finished. When I follow this plan, I am absolutely satiated and satisfied.

b. I need to avoid starches until the evening. This goes against EVERYTHING that I have ever tried, but this is what keeps me out of the starches and keeps me from binging. I have found this to be completely true. Starches need, for me, to be consumed only at my evening meal. In time, I might be able to eliminate them from many evening meals per week.

c. Some veggies are good starch substitutes and seem to keep me on track. Oddly enough, the ones that I have found that do this so far are okra and fresh artichoke hearts. I added okra to my adaptation of blogger Suzanne’s “trio of bennies” the other day. I did this because I had about 1/3 of a bag of frozen okra sitting in the freezer and wanted to use it up. I didn’t finish it all and the next day I reheated the mixture in a pan. When it was cooked the second time, the okra absolutely felt like a starch to me. I’m going to investigate this further. Other starches, like sweet potatoes and such, do not work for me. They are trigger foods plain and simple. I need to keep trying new, hopefully beneficial, veggies and see which ones seem to satisfy the “starch” tooth.

d. When I eat refined sugar, it, too, needs to be in the evening. I need to cut way down and to perhaps eliminate sugar at home and to severely limit it when eating out. Sugar can be a terrible problem for me. I’m going to look into the blue agave nectar. I have tried veggie glycerin and I hate it. I use honey for most applications at home. Actually, at home, I don’t add sugar to too many things, so perhaps this is just one of those “need to work on when eating out” sort of thing.

4) I like to chew gum. Chewing gum seems to help with some of the compulsion to eat. I chew sugar-free gum, which I know is just junk for the body, but it really seems to help sometimes. I’m going to keep an eye on it and see if it creates problems for me.

5) I need to create a workout schedule that works for me. This is going to be difficult, as I am now riding horses again and I get exhausted from that because I am so out of shape. Regardless, I MUST hit the gym at least 4 days per week. I am an evening workout girl, so once my daughter’s fall evening schedule of swimming and dance gets settled in, I can workout around her stuff as I was doing at the end of the school year last year. In the meantime, I am going to try to get into some sort of modified schedule for the next few weeks.



6) I need to do something, like T-Tapp’s Basic Workout Plus or even just Primary Back Stretch first thing in the morning. I also need to body brush. These things get me going and I have gotten out of the habit of doing them. It would probably be best to eat my fruit, then do these things for the 10-15 minutes that it takes to do them, then go for my veggies and protein. Also, because I work out of the house, doing this makes me feel like I have really started my day. I just plain feel better.

7) I have been somewhat lazy about getting my water it. I need to get back into the habit of drinking more water.

So, these are thing things that I have been thinking about so far. Again, while I am going to start slowly putting this plan into action over the next 3 weeks, the real jump-off time will be the second week in August.

I’ll blog again more, soon!