Happy November

My view for my walk the other day.....when it actually wasn't raining!

How is it already NOVEMBER?!?!

I hope everyone had a great Halloween and didn't go too crazy on candy. I was actually very proud of myself yesterday because it wasn't even a challenge. My daughter went to a friends house to help pass out candy and my son went trick or treating with some friends. The night wasn't any different for me than any other night.

I saved some points for the end of the day so that I could steal a piece (or 2) of candy and that's exactly what I did. I had half a serving of Chewy Lemonheads (3 points) and one of the mini size Reese's Pumpkins (4 points). As you know, I'm entering my calories in My Fitness Pal as well as tracking on the WW app. My calories yesterday were 1369....on Halloween! Needless to say I am feeling very proud of myself today.

I decided to re-do my weight loss calendar. You may remember I posted a different looking calendar a couple times this year and my weight loss looks slightly different on that one. When I first made the calendar I would count the loss for that month from the 1st to the 31st; but I decided that doesn't give the most accurate measure of where my weight is at. So, these are the dates I used to figure out the above calendar:

January = 1/1/18 - 2/1/8

February = 2/1/18 - 3/1/18

March = 3/1/18 - 4/1/18

April = 4/1/18 - 5/1/18

May = 5/1/18 - 6/8/18 

June = 6/8/18 - 7/1/18

July = 7/1/18 - 8/1/18

August = 8/1/18 - 9/1/18

September = 9/1/18 - 10/8/18

October = 10/8/18 - 11/1/8

You'll see that May is actually all of May plus the start of June which means it incorporates our vacation. You'll also see that it has taken me quite a while to get back on the losing train since getting back from vacation in June. September also incorporates the start of October because I was struggling at that point and really didn't want to get on the scale on October 1st. I think I was scared that the scale might show me a number I didn't want to see. 

But, what I want to focus on is the loss for the month of October! I am absolutely STOKED to see 4.6 pounds on that calendar. You might think I'd be disappointed because "that's not much weight", but you'd be wrong. You'll remember that on September 4th I blogged about wanting to lose 5 pounds in September. And, you'll remember that in my first October post I talked about how I did not meet that goal. Interestingly, for October I didn't denote any specific goal for the month. 2 weeks ago I simply stated that I wanted to get back to being more consistent again with my tracking. I also re-joined WW. 4.4 of those 4.6 pounds have come since that post on 10/16/18. 

Perhaps this has something to do with my loss this month. 😉
I have PR'd on so many things in the gym this month.
This was just one exercise where I did PR'd.
This is 240# and I deadlifted that 6 times! 

On Monday I talked about how I didn't track my food on Sunday and had used almost all my points by the time Saturday was done. What's interesting is that on Monday this week I was easily able to get right back to it. I tracked what I ate and kept my points/calories low. My calories have been pretty low all week and, although not easy, I would say it hasn't been hard because I am allowing myself to have my weekends. I've decided that's where I'm going to stay for a while. If I can be more strict with myself during the week I should still be able to lose weight even with not tracking on the weekends. And, I remember what happened last time I did this; I felt so good when I was tracking during the week that I would start to track on the weekends "just to see" where I was. Or, I enjoyed seeing the scale drastically drop during the week when I kept my calories nice and low that I maybe didn't want to eat as much on the weekends because I didn't want to see that huge jump on the scale on Monday. Also, the more consistent I am with eating reasonably, the more natural it becomes. My "free" weekends naturally won't be as "bad" (I hate using that word but don't know how else to really explain it) because my body has gotten used to less food. But just knowing that if there is something I really want, I can  have it as long as I just wait for the weekend makes all the difference for me right now. 

If I can do all these things and lose 4-5 pounds a month I will still be down another 8-10 pounds before January 1, 2019. That will put me at my lowest weight since before Robbie was born (he's 12) and would be my most successful weight loss in one year ever! And, since I just looked that up, I realize I actually only have to lose another 4 pounds (and keep it off until January 1st) in order to have my most successful weight loss year. 😁I can do this. It doesn't have to be that hard....even if we are starting the most difficult 2 months of the year for weight loss!