I'm back! Monday W40

Hey everyone! I'm glad to be back and tracking! Today was a busy day. Work in the morning and then working on my thesis all day. I posted last night about (check it out here) how awful I've done on my time off and said that I would get back on it. Well, I went to the grocery to get some Smart Ones and stock up. Weeeellll, I was so tired when I got back, I completely forgot to put them all away after dinner and before bed! I don't know where my brain was! So all of my Smart Ones went bad! I made a pb&j 4pts for breakfast since the food I had planned went bad.

At lab, I had another pb&j for lunch 4pts and some pretzels 2pts.

I was exhausted at work all day! I couldn't wait until it was time to go. After work, I went to my WW meeting. Down .6 lbs. I didn't track last week and today is my first day tracking in almost a month! Not great, but I'll take it. 

We talked about demystifying myths about weight loss, such as "Its too hard because I'm older," "I have a slow metabolism," or "my body is just in starvation mode." First, So there is some new nutrition info out there for the first time supporting the fact that starvation mode doesn't exist- your metabolism doesn't slow down if you don't eat. If anything- if you lower your carb intake too low- you will go into kertosis and actually burn more calories. This isn't healthy and hurts your kidneys. Second, (unless you have a disease like hypo/hyper- thyroidism [not PCOS]) you have little control over your metabolism and everyone's are mostly the same. Your metabolism is the rate at which you burn calories. What affects it?

• Involuntary body regulation/functions: heart rate, breathing, respiration, circulation. This constitutes 65-75% of overall energy expenditure. (you have no control over it)
• Digestion: merely digesting your food takes energy. This accounts for another 10% of your calorie burn.
• Movement: getting out of bed, blinking, running a 5k, typing on a keyboard, lifting weights. All of this accounts for about 15% of your caloric expenditure. 

Those are what we went over in the meeting. To a small extent there are over-general. (You can build lean muscle and change your metabolism- a little), it is a little harder to loose weight since your metabolism slows as you age (but the reason is because you loose lean body tissue and have a greater fat % as you age, ect. Overall, we get back to the fact that if calories in < calories out, you will loose weight.  While a lot of people in the meeting weren't excited about these facts because it means that we can't wave a magic wand, take a diet pill, or put the blame on our slow metabolisms; it made me happy. Its a formula that I can watch and understand and be responsible for. Our bodies work in predictable ways. 

After the meeting, I went grocery shopping again and re-bought Smart Ones and other healthful meals to help me stay on track. After that, I came home and made chicken veggie orzo for dinner. I had a little over a serving for 10pts. I was pretty hungry!

I really want to work on losing weight over the next few weeks and staying on plan. So- here is my game plan, 30 days completely OP. That will take me through all of Nov- meaning even Thanksgiving! I think this will be a good way to keep me focused and accountable. I'm also thinking of joining the 10 week challenge to the new year over at A Daunting Tale of Scale Warfare. I'm still brainstorming on how I want to commit to it. I'll keep you posted.

I'll leave you with my picture of my halloween costume. I was D-Mac from when he played for the razorbacks. Did you dress up for Halloween? If so, who were you?

He has a tattoo of the Little Rock area code (501) on his bicep!

MONDAY STATS:
Points: 20/23
Weekly Allowance Points: 0 used / 35 remaining
Exercise: none
Weekly Activity Points: 0/0
Weekly Weight Loss: -.6 lbs / -30.4 total