A few weeks ago I wrote about the healthy changes I have been making in my life.  You can read about that in this post.  People have asked how it’s going.  I still don’t like it but I’m doing it.  I don’t want this blog to be a weight loss blog.  It’s more about a lot of things in my life that I want to share.  But this healthy lifestyle is also a part of my life now and this is a place where I am committed to honesty with everyone, including myself.  So here is how it’s going.

“It” is actually going well.  As I said before, I’m not sure what to call “it” but I’m sure not going to call it a diet.  Diets are temporary and, because of my age and health, this has to be something I do forever.  I am pretty sure I will never be perfect at it.  Like, that would be crazy.  That’s not my goal.  My goal is to lose weight in a healthy way and to “get healthy”.  And after 3 weeks, I have lost 19 pounds.  My weigh-in date is on Wednesday, which is tomorrow, and I am hoping to pass 20 pounds.  Of course, much of that is water weight and I know it will slow down now but it is certainly motivating to see it working.

So here is what is working:

• Eating mostly plant based meals, lots of veggies, beans and grains, some fish and chicken, and lots of fruit. I’m not hungry and it’s easy to have these foods around the house.  I’m still trying to figure out amounts to buy so I have things on hand but also use them up before they go bad.  I hate wasting food.
• Tracking my food on the MyFitnessPal app and website.  I am not obsessed with the number so some days, I go over by a few calories and some days I am under by a few hundred.  I use it as a guideline but I track EVERYTHING, even the mistakes.  The goal is to know what and how much I am eating so I can learn what works and what doesn’t.  And of course, the accountability.
• Drinking lots of water.  I’m lucky.  I have always preferred water over most any drink.  I rarely have a soda.  I seldom drink juice.  I occasionally enjoy a diet lemonade.  So to stick to pretty much just water all day isn’t hard for me.  I track it on the app and I am averaging 90 ounces per day of just water.  My skin looks better and I just FEEL better.
• Planning ahead.  I’m known for being good with whatever is going on so this has been a wee bit difficult but I’m sticking with it.  When I was traveling last week, I took healthy snacks – some worked and some didn’t – but I had them with me so I wasn’t tempted to buy airport snacks.  There are some healthy things available in the airport but sometimes they are hard to find or you just don’t have time between flights.
• Moving more.  I got an Apple Watch.  It keeps telling me to “stand up” and to move around more, pushy little bugger.  Until last week when I was traveling, I was doing Yoga at least 5 days a week.  I am getting back on track with yoga this week and I am going to add a 30 minute walk at least 3 times a week.  It doesn’t hurt to go up the steep, steep stairs anymore and I don’t dread walking across the parking lot.  I’m really amazed at how quickly it has made a difference.

And here’s what has been hard and I still need to figure out:

• Planning ahead.  Yes, I know I just said it worked but it’s been a struggle for me and I’m still figuring it out.  Last week I made sure my hotel room had a refrigerator, brought snacks, and made a plan to walk to a market close to the office to get fruit, some avocados, and breakfast items as well as other healthy options for the room.  Things happened and I didn’t have the time to go to the market until late in the week.  Lunch was brought in so even the healthiest choice was sometimes high in calories or had a sauce.  I got sick and didn’t eat at all one day.  I didn’t eat hardly any of the snacks since I was helping train and didn’t want to eat while training.  I still made pretty good choices and even had a piece of cheesecake on Thursday night as a treat.  And I have learned what to do for the next trip.
• Eating Out.  I can almost always find at least one option on a menu.  Problem is, I don’t always want that option.  When are restaurants going to add calories and more options to the menu???  So I use that meal as a “cheat meal”.  I know a lot of people have a “cheat day” every week but I don’t really do that.  I save my “cheat” for one meal as needed and then I enjoy the heck out of it.  The rest of the day, I stick to the plan.  I just have to make sure it doesn’t happen very often which can easily get me off track.  Realistically, it’s what I should have been doing all along – eating healthy 90% of the time and enjoying an occasional treat meal where I don’t worry about it.
• Consistency and Structure – I’m not really very structured in any area of my life.  I like variety.  But I know when I am more consistent and add structure to my day, I am more disciplined and accomplish much more than when I fly by the seat of my pants.  I make fewer mistakes in choosing food when I have it prepared.  If I eat out, I can look at the menu ahead of time.  I eat better when I plan out my day and week.  This really goes along with Planning Ahead from above but it’s a little more than that too.  Work in progress.

I will occasionally update my progress here, probably about once per month.  I didn’t want to go on and write about something else until I had posted a follow up.  Now that this update is here, I am excited to share other parts of my life and make this just one part of the bigger story.