And....I'm back.

So I was really starting to feel guilty beacause I quit the gym back in the middle of July.  Honestly, I was so annoyed with the other people that went in the morning that they would seriously ruin my morning.  Not to mention some guy was hitting on me every morning and I'd finally had enough. I packed up my mental 'luggage' and left that place.  In place of my work outs, I started hula hooping.  I got pretty good too. It's a really fun hobby to pick up and Youtube is an awesome place to see tutorials on tricks and what not.  I also decided to cut back on red meat (hamburger mainly) and diet pop.  I never believed the myth about drinking diet pop until I actually cut back on it.  I have a friend that works at the gym, so I got a hold of her and asked her about rejoining the gym.  It'd been about 2 months and I was starting to feel really bad about my lack of exercise.  I was worried that I was packing on all these pounds again and whenever I ate something fattening or 'carby' I'd be sitting there imagining the fat just placing itself back into the places it had dissapeared from. She told me that I wouldn't have to pay another enrollment fee since I had just recently quit, so I jumped on it. I was back in there the next day, pedaling away on the stationary bike.  I decided that weighing myself needed to happen because I was anxious to see how much weight I gained or didn't gain since I'd quit the gym. Much to my disbelief, I'd actually LOST 12 pounds in that two months. I guess the mix of hula hooping, no hamburger and diet pop actually did work.  So that now puts me up at a grand total of 35 pounds lost. (Pat on the back). I'm making it a point to work harder at the gym. Over this past weekend, I rode 10 miles on the bike, and over the past few days, I've run a total of 3 miles. Psh, 3 miles, I know, but for a person who despises running at much as I do, that's quite the accomplishment to me.

Aside from the 'no hamburger/no diet pop' policy, I've been trying to train myself to portion control.  Let me break down the Weightwatchers diet for you:

Portion control - Take smaller bites and eat less of something. If you have a giant steak, only eat until you are full and take the rest home for later.  That's why they always say that you don't have to deprive yourself of eating foods you love. You can still eat them, just STOP eating when you feel full.  Something I try to do when we go out now is if I want to get something on the menu (pizza - because I love pizza), I get a dinner salad before hand, or a cup of soup (a vegetable, broth based soup, creamy soups do not work for this idea because they are loaded with fat and sodium). By the time you get your actual dinner (or the pizza in my case) you are somewhat full, and won't devour the entirety of the entree (25 peices of pizza). If you like cheeseburgers as much as I did (remember, I'm cutting back on eating hamburger meat), cut the cheeseburger in half before starting to eat and set it aside. I bet by the time you eat that half, you're full. Then you don't feel as guilty about eating it, and you have some for later.

Dietary fiber - Dietary fiber absorbs water as it passes through the digestive system. In other words, this helps you poop.  Start checking labels, the more dietary fiber that is in food, the better it is. It's easily digested.

That's pretty much it. Portion control, and foods with dietary fiber. The higher the dietary fiber, the lower the point on the system.

By no means am I any kind of expert, but it's just little everyday tactics that get easier after awhile. I do things now and I don't even notice. I got a cheeseburger from McDonalds a few weeks ago for the first time in 2 months out of desperation for the taste of fast food and I actually found myself cutting it in half and saving the rest. Once I put the other half in the fridge, I felt silly. I feel silly even typing it. I also found a new love for fish. Once I got a taste of a good slab of grilled salmon, it's all I want to eat. There are so many ways to experiment with chicken and fish, with different seasonings and breadings. I also switched from regular Yoplait yogurt to Greek yogurt.  Greek yogurt is always recommended by whoever, Jillian Michaels and whatever, but I tried it and I never want to go back to the Yoplait crap. They have such different textures. Greek is thick and pasty (and awesome with fruit or honey I might add), and Yopliat is runny and gloopy.  The only problem I ran into is that Greek yogurt is really expensive. I was pretty bummed about it actually. $1.50 a cup? Gawd.  So I tried Aldis one day and was extremely happy with the outcome. $.89 a cup, and taste just as good as the expensive ones. I will warn you though, you really have to have a taste for it because I tried to get all the girls at work on the Greek yogurt horse and they weren't having it. There were a lot of crushed faces in the room and a lot of wasted yogurt.

Oikos - good
Yoplait greek - shit
Dannon - good 
Aldis brand (Friendly Farms) - awesome

And that's my lesson for the day.

By the way, if you want to watch something that will really change your mind about eating fast food, watch the documentary 'Supersize me'.