Everyday Systems

Mander

Yesterday I had to go to the dentist to get a cracked filling replaced so my day was a bit wonky. I had a big breakfast (3 egg omelette with ham) and didn't have anything to eat all day until 5:30, at which point I was starving so I had my lunch then. Dinner wasn't until 9:30.

Mander

That sounds like a good strategy. I think I need to try something like that with lunch especially. The late afternoon/early evening period, when it's not quite time for dinner, is when I get ravenously hungry and reach for a snack.

I didn't fill out my habitcal last week and I think that, rather ...

Mander

Sigh. I got off-track again, not only with tracking myself but also with snacking.

I'll try again next week.

Mander

Well, so far this week has not been all that great in terms of snacking. I have once again found myself getting very hungry in the late afternoon/early evening and dinner has been rather late for various reasons, so I've ended up having a snack. On the plus side these have been limited to just one ...

Mander

The label on mine said 30g was the right serving, which just happens to be exactly one little ramekin full -- that was about the amount I was eating anyway. This particular kind seems to be less dense than some of the others I've had (maybe because it has no added sugar?) but I think it is more ...

Mander

Well, the end of last week didn't go so well. Friday night we didn't have dinner until very late and I got hungry and started snacking (cheese, oatcakes, almonds, and a little bowl of muesli). I snacked a bunch on Thursday, too, with similar stuff. Part of the problem is that I have a cold, which ...

Mander

Don't be too quick to congratulate me for getting back on track! I ended up snacking quite a bit over the course of the day, not a huge amount but it was still a fail in that respect. :oops:

But so far today I have done much better. Perhaps the key for me is having a reliable breakfast at the ...

Mander

I went on an overnight trip with the other half Monday and Tuesday, so things were a little off-kilter. Monday we had breakfast on an early train, no lunch, a big fancy dinner and some even fancier beers (and cake) afterwards. Tuesday we didn't really have breakfast, just a handful of nuts, and we ...

Mander

Well, I have done relatively well this week. I had a few hard candies one day as a snack, and this evening I have fallen off the snack wagon with a bowl of cereal and a granola bar, but the rest of this week I did fine. So, that's encouraging.

Mander

Yesterday was ok, though red on snacks/sweets (I ate 3 pieces of hard candy in the afternoon). But I didn't snack all afternoon and I had three regular meals.

So far today has been ok although I had another hard candy earlier. I'm not going to beat myself up too much with these, as long as I am ...

Mander

Wow, it's been a while since I did this. I decided to start again and today was the first regular day. And I managed to keep it green!

Mander

I have not been very consistent about this at all in the last few months. In fact I have hardly even paid attention to what I am stuffing into my mouth. Perhaps it's just a disrupted routine, what with vacations, holidays, and family visits. So far I have managed to more or less eat proper meals ...

Mander

They don't call it the what the hell effect, but it's a similar idea:

http://lifehacker.com/5928698/how-our-b ... pular=true[/list]

Mander

Ah, right, I misread their description of what the results meant.

IIRC, BMI was originally intended to be used like this, that is, as a statistic for characterising populations. Its limitations as an indicator of personal health have been discussed at length by many others, though.

It's ...

Mander

Having tried it out, I think I doubt the veracity of the figures. I mean, I'm obese. That's a fact. But I doubt that I am heavier than 100% of the entire world, which is what my result was.

Mander

Sigh. I got off track with the long Jubilee weekend, did ok for a couple of days and then fell off the wagon again last Friday. I have been hitting the sweets really hard the last few days and I feel pretty gross as a result. I've also been struggling with the negative self-talk again.

Not much for ...

Mander

Having watched my cousins' toddlers, I think the toddler is by far the scarier proposition!

This is a very vivid analogy, though, Reinhard -- thanks!

Mander

I haven't been updating this as religiously as I should, but I've been doing pretty well. We have just had a 4-day weekend and extended party for the Queen's Jubilee in the UK, so things have been a little off schedule the last few days. The "violations", so to speak, have been:

-- Friday afternoon ...

Mander

Wow, I actually made it through the first week! I'm going to reward myself by going to the beach later on today, before the weather changes.

Here's to week 2! Only 13 days till I get to join the 21 day club!

Mander

Ok, I started again with this on Monday, and today marks three days in a row of following the rules! Yay! And if I count Saturday and Sunday, too, then I am five days in! That is the best record yet!

Mander

Ok, so I took your advice and decided to count Saturday as the first day. So now I have just updated my habit cal and ta-da, I've already done three days!

Mander

Hello again all! I think the last time I posted here I was all full of positive, wise-sounding thinking on the goals I want to set and how to set them, sticking to the plan, focusing on behavior, etc etc. And then the next day I seemed to just forget that the whole idea even existed and did not even ...

Mander

I'm not at all qualified to comment, really, but I have heard so many stories of pain and regret after WLS that I don't think I will ever chose to have it myself. It seems that so many people are able to lose weight but not keep it off because they haven't learned to eat in the very restricted and ...

Mander

Right, dove off the wagon yet again but I'm trying to get started in earnest again as of today. Let's see if I can make it to 21 days this time!

I have also added doing a daily meditation exercise thing. Might help with my general state of mind.

Mander

I thought about this article this morning, and I definitely agree with Reinhard's focus on behavior rather than results. Much like my writing goals when I was working on my thesis, I found that I was more successful when my goal was to work on writing a particular section for a set amount of time ...

Mander

Thanks for that article! I actually sat down to think about it and the overall ideas make sense. I do wish they had provided a reference to the weight loss study, though.

In the last few weeks I have not been keeping track of anything, but I have been doing generally ok with eating actual meals ...

Mander

I feel like it's been months since I updated this but I guess it hasn't really. Although I said I was going to start again on Monday I have not really stuck to the rules. Right now I am feeling unpleasantly stuffed after seconds of dinner. I had two colors and a chocolate with lunch, and oatcakes ...

Mander

I was doing ok at keeping track of what I was doing, then I had a bad week and fell off the wagon completely. Well, I have been more-or-less managing to eat real meals at the table instead of snacking in front of the computer, but I have been snacking and eating sweets far too often.

So, I am going ...

Mander

Hmm. Interesting, but I'd want to know what happens if both groups have a similar amount of breakfast, or substantially the same breakfast but with the addition of the chocolate cake in one group. It seems that the low carb group had half as much breakfast as the other group (300 vs 600 calories) as ...

Mander

Well, I kind of fell off the wagon last week. I don't think I pigged out too much, except on Thursday and Friday, but I didn't even really pay much attention to what I was eating. I did have a bit of a relapse in terms of depression and anxiety this week which I'm sure both contributed to and was ...

Mander

Sigh... I broke my streak. I had a big handful of carrot and celery sticks on Thursday afternoon, and I had a flapjack (the British kind) with a cup of tea yesterday evening with my husband after he got home from work. Not too terrible in the grand scheme of things but a bit self-sabotaging, really.

Mander

The "garbage disposal" method sounds like my lunches. Add broth and anything can become soup!

I'm just not a very organized person, or rather, I find that I unconsciously rebel against anything that threatens to impose order or issue commands. So I find it hard to plan meals, even though I actually ...

Mander

All right, three in a row!!

Mander

Double woot! I managed to make today all green as well!

Mander

I find it curious that my husband, who is British, claims to have never heard any of the ultra low-fat diet advice. When my father (American) was first diagnosed with heart disease in the early 90s, his cardiologist had the whole family eating low-fat everything. The doctor taught us that as long as ...

Mander

Woot!! Yesterday I managed an all-green day!! :D

I was pretty hungry in the afternoon and early evening but I managed to keep telling myself "no, not yet". I had a cup of bovril with a bit of ginger in the afternoon, which I'm not really counting as a snack since it only has 35 calories or ...

Mander

Ah, well, I haven't actually been keeping a journal -- I don't want to mess it up with less-than-perfect pages! :wink: :oops:

Sunday wasn't too excessive although I did graze on snacks for breakfast and we didn't get around to eating "lunch" until about 4pm. So far today it's been ok. Breakfast ...

Mander

Just wondering if anyone does this and whether they find it helpful. I tend to decide what's for dinner that day, and I often realize at the last minute that I don't really have anything appropriate in the house for lunch. Hence I end up eating a lot of haphazard lunches that are just thrown ...

Mander

I think I am already suffering from the burn-out I feel when I try to establish a new habit but fail repeatedly. This all requires a lot more soul-searching, perhaps -- or maybe it needs less analysis and more adherence to rules?

Anyway, Thursday and Friday were also snack attack days. I did a ...

Mander

So far today has been better, but then I usually have the snack issue after lunch. Today my lunch was very late, but I made a proper meal including soup from scratch. Hopefully I'll be able to avoid the afternoon snack attack.

Mander

Arrgh, snacks snacks snacks!!! I've been doing pretty well with actually sitting down with a plate and eating a proper meal, but it seems that every afternoon I am just too hungry and I wind up eating snacks.

Perhaps I need more substantial meals? More fiber? Soup every day? Probably the biggest ...

Mander

Well, let's see. I don't really recall what happened on Thursday, but I'm sure I broke down and had snacks. Friday was another day where I went to class in the morning and then ran errands without stopping for lunch, so by the time I got home I was starving and had an extra-large lunch/snack. I ...

Mander

A strategy that I'm using from Judith Beck is to keep a notebook where I write down the things that I do each day that help me towards my goal of habit building with NoS and keeping my day green. In this way you (according to Beck) are building your confidence in what you're doing.

This sounds ...

Mander

I'm not actually sure what I am saying to myself at these times. Classic emotional eating behavior, no? I will make an effort to pay more attention to what I am thinking.

Yesterday was a bit chaotic. I had a real breakfast (yogurt with muesli) and then had to travel to a nearby city for a research ...

Mander

Oddly, though, I managed to get it to work the other day, but only once. Perhaps it's something to do with the size of the area that you touch to activate the drop-down list?

Mander

Well, yesterday being an "s" day, I guess everything went as expected. I did the usual thing of snacking until DH got up, but we had a friend coming over so never really ate a proper breakfast or lunch. We had snacks with said friend and then a normal dinner (followed by a couple of mini-florentines ...

Mander

Right. This last week did not go well in terms of avoiding snacks. I think I had a late afternoon or evening snack every day this week. Friday I didn't really have a proper breakfast as I was running late for class, and afterwards I went shopping and didn't eat anything until nearly 6pm. And even ...

Mander

Right, well, I guess I had a bit of a "snack hangover" after the weekend. The past two days I ended up snacking, even though yesterday I had a big lunch and felt stuffed for much of the afternoon. I think part of the problem was that I didn't eat until late, which kind of threw me off. It's also ...

Mander

Right, well, the weekend ended up being kinda snack filled, although I didn't go too insane. I usually get up earlier than my husband on weekends and wind up snacking while I wait for him to be ready for breakfast. Maybe this week I'll make something in advance so I don't have the same problem.

Ok ...

Mander

Indeed! Soup and salad in the same bowl would be a bit, um, interesting.

Anyway, Thursday was mostly green as well but I was up late helping my husband with something and we had hot chocolate. Today was an S day (yes, I know Friday doesn't start with S, but I am much more likely to want to go to ...

Mander

That's encouraging to hear, oolala. My biggest problem, really, is that I would wake up and go straight to the computer. I'd get a cup of coffee but not eat anything until I was starving, at which point I would type with one hand and scarf whatever was available with the other! But now that I'm done ...

Mander

As an archaeologist, I'm always suspicious of diets that claim to have discovered some true ancient way of eating. Even the so-called Palaeo diet, which at least has the advantage of being plausible.

I mean, we've had decades of research and debate over what our ancestors ate, and how they obtained ...

Mander

Woot, an all-green day!

I had slightly larger meals today in an attempt to stave off the desire to snack. Breakfast was more fritatta, as well as an oatcake. Lunch was leftover pasta weirdness plus an apple with peanut butter. Dinner was a sort of southwestern chicken chowder thing, plus salad and ...

Mander

Just thought I'd let you know that I tried out the webapp yesterday, and it doesn't seem to quite work on my phone (Android 2.3.3). I can't seem to get the drop-down box to change tags to work.

Mander

Ok, I'm going to try and do this properly for a while and actually check in!

Day 1 (January 24) went mostly ok, but it was still a fail overall in vanilla no-s terms. I had an extra snack (one oatcake) while waiting for dinner, which ended up being later than planned, and a cookie as dessert with ...

Mander

I posted here a while ago and got many helpful responses, then I just kind of lost track of the whole idea. Partly this was due to the time-sucking madness surrounding the end of my degree, when I spent all of my time writing and got very little sleep. Anyway, I have finished that now, and I am ...

Mander

Thanks for the advice so far!

We're usually up at 8 or 9. He eats breakfast before he leaves but I'm generally not interested in anything other than coffee at that time. Then I get wrapped up in whatever I am working on and usually don't want to stop to fix a real meal, so I snack.

Most days he ...

Mander

Hello, I'm new to this whole thing, but it seems like it might be a useful approach. I've been thinking about "doing" No S for a while now but I'm having a tough time with it. I just can't seem to stick to a plan or a routine in general, but especially with meals.

I work at home, and my days are ...

Everyday Systems

Search found 58 matches

Interesting article on Lifehacker: WTH effect

Fell so far off the wagon that I forgot there even was one

Sigh... fell off the wagon

Do you plan your meals for the week?

Mander's daily check-in attempt

Hello again -- working up to trying this again

Trouble getting started--establishing a routine