Weekends are disasters for me

Yeah. I've been slacking with the blogging. Partially because I'm embarrassed of my complete lack of willpower on the weekends. Partially because I gained .6 pounds last Friday at my weigh-in (pretty much expected, which I'll get into later). Partially because I can't figure out how to eat healthy while maintaining the lifestyle I had before. It's really difficult, to be honest.

So, last Friday, as I mentioned, I gained .6 pounds. I expected this. I had lost 5.6 pounds the week before, and anyone who watches The Biggest Loser knows that there is a Week 2 curse. This essentially states that if you lost a lot of weight in the first week, you'll probably stay the same or gain the next week. I also had been really, really slacking with my water consumption. Really, though, I was just glad that I only gained .6. It could have been A LOT worse.

Weekends are tough. I don't have the structure of a workday to base myself on. I have a fridge full of food that I can munch on at any given time. If I'm away for the weekend (like I was this past weekend), I always end up going out to dinner.

But I'm trying to make better decisions at restaurants, too. Let's review last weekend, shall we? The lady and I were going to West Long Branch to spend the entire day looking at apartment complexes. We stopped at Starbucks to get some coffee and breakfast, where I had a tall one-pump skinny vanilla latte. Points? 2. Breakfast was the Perfect Oatmeal with brown sugar and dried fruit. Points? 5. A 7-point breakfast, but not bad for 10AM. Later in the day, while walking down the boardwalk, we stopped for a cappuchino. I got both made with skim milk and no sugar. Again, not bad. And then....

And then...

There was gelato. And it looked delicious. We both wanted some. Normal me would have bought two smalls, one for each of us. I looked at her and said, "we can get it, but we have to share the kiddie size.". It was PERFECT.

She had surprised me earlier in the day with a night away from life at a local hotel. It was great. We really needed some time to ourselves, with no family or roommates or friends to bother us. We needed to recharge our relationship batteries. But of course...That meant that we would have to go out to eat for dinner.

We shared an order of wings, because we're both addicted to wings.
She got a crock of french onion soup, of which I had a spoonful.
For dinner, she had crabcakes and I had a grilled chicken sandwich. Grilled chicken, mozzarella, roasted red peppers, onions, an a balsamic vinagrette. Delicious. I cut it in half, took half the chicken off of one half, and ate only one half. I was pretty proud of myself! I also had two Michelob Ultras with dinner, but at only 2 points apiece I treated myself.

It's not about limiting yourself, I'm realizing. It's about allowing yourself to have what you want, but being conscious of how much you're having. Past-me would have eaten the entire sandwich and not thought about it. Healthy-me knows better.

The other night, I went out for karaoke with the lady, her best friend, his husband, and two of their friends. Apparently karaoke also includes dinner now. I had a chipotle ranch chicken salad, and got grilled chicken instead of chicket cutlet, and kept the dressing on the side instead of pouring it all over the salad. I ended up using only half the dressing they gave.

It's the small changes that can really make or break a meal. I probably saved a few hundred calories on that chicken salad by switching out for grilled chicken, and dipping the salad into the dressing.

So what did all those small changes add up to this week?

A 2-pound weight loss :-D I'm down 7 pounds in three weeks. My goal is to lose 3 lbs next week, so that I can hit an even 10 in one month.

Coming up this weekend - a behind the scenes tour of Yankee Stadium, lunch at the Hard Rock Cafe in the Stadium, and a St. Paddy's Day pub crawl. Let's see what small changes I can make to my antics to save some calories.