Week 5 day 5: early weigh-in

A'salaamu alaikum ya'll. I lost 2 pounds so far this week but I had to weigh-in early; who knows what might have happened? Anyway it brings my total loss to 9 lbs yay!

Now for my reason for early weigh-in: my transplanted kidney is experiencing some problems and I have to begin a pretty heavy regimen of steroids for 2 weeks. I will definitely gain weight (hopefully just fluids) so I won't be weighing for a few weeks (at least not for weigh-loss purposes).

I will be updating my other blog until I get back to this new weight (222.2 lbs) insha'Allah. Please bear with me and keep me in your duaat that the medication halts my rejection episode and that it's side effects aren't too severe this time. I know I will get disheartened when I begin to swell and gain weight from the meds but insha'Allah I won't use it as an excuse to just eat and eat. Although prednisone makes you HONGRY! :-) Yes hungry with an "O" is hungrier and very proper southern-ese. :-)

Jazakum Allahu khair....

Week 5 day 1: Sorry!!!

A'salaamu alaikum ya'll and soooo sorry for the lack of posts! I've been super-tired lately and just lacking in initiative. You know, when you start something new, like a hobby or a WEIGHT LOSS EFFORT ;-) it's very easy in the beginning to pick up steam. But then you remember, oh wait, yeah, I have a life and responsibilities and I am B U S Y. So yeah, all of that caught up with me.

Alhamdulillah I lost again!!! I think maybe last week wasn't a true gain, as I had mentioned, but rather my kidney being all weird. Speaking of, my creatnine (which is a by-product of protein breakdown and is used to calculate kidney function) has risen the past two weeks. It's a very sensitive measurement. For example, as a healthy person, most of ya'll reading would have a creatnine level of .8 to 1.1. Not a dot more.

So my creatnine, since transplant, has been steady at 1.2 to 1.3, which is seriously awesome for a transplant patient! For a healthy person, it would definitely raise doctor's concerns. So my was 1.7 two weeks ago and was 1.89 upon retest. Alhamdulillah. I'll be having a biopsy on my kidney in the next week or so insha'Allah and we will see if my kidney is starting to show it's "age". It's been almost 9 years since my transplant.

Anyway, that was a big seque, but only saying it to say that yeah, if my kidney is being cranky I could very easily retain fluid. :-)

OK I have to go, housework and Aaminah calls!!!!! Ma salaama ya'll and insha'allah I'll post more often but probably not every night. It just isn't realistic for my situation. :-)

Week 4 day 1: weigh in woes

A'salaamu alaikum ya'll. I gained 1.4 pounds the past week. WTHeck?!? I know I 'fessed up to some not-so-great choices but I really didn't think I had gained. I have a couple of explanations for this, none of which involve blaming myself! lol

1. My transplanted kidney does not always do a good job of keeping my hydration level on target so I could be retaining fluid from kidney-related issues.

2. I am at the exact time in my monthly cycle when I a) want to eat nonstop and b) seem to retain fluid. Paired with #1 and that could easily equal 1.4 lbs.

3. It's a conspiracy with the people at WW who are afraid of my almost super-human resolve and worry I'll make the others look bad with my awesome weight loss. :-))

Ahhhh scenario #3 not so much but I really think the 1 and 2 did me in. I really told myself it doesn't matter, it's a momentary set-back, I can do this, blah blah blah but inside yeah, I was a little down. Alhamdulillah each day is new and we have the choice to do better.

So did I do better today? That is the question. OK I had 1 egg on 2 pieces of high fiber, high protein bread. BTW don't try it. lol It's Arnold's brand which we love but this really wasn't that palatable. Insha'Allah I'll just get the oatnut next time. :-) Anyway that was breakfast along with my 8 oz of steaming hot milky tea.

Lunch was non-descript... OK I'm trying to cheat a little here. :-) I had to run out for some errands at lunch time and I ended up buying a small sandwich and fries at BK. I didn't stress about it, I got the smallest available and I always drink diet drinks so alhamdulillah minimal damage.

I made maqlouba tonight (a traditional Palestinian dish) which I make in my own manner. :-) It has a healthy mix of veggies but you do fry them first. I fried in them in a very small amount of oil (NOT deep-fried) and ate a reasonable amount. This is the kind of dish you don't just throw together on the spur of the moment so I did eat for enjoyment but didn't over do it. Alhamdulillah my day is ok and I feel back on track.

Make dua' for me sisters that I make positive headway next week! Ma salaama ya'll

Week 3 day 7: I don't wanna weigh in tomorrow!

A'salaamu alaikum ya'll. I feel like a big fat F for failure. Or F for fat, works both ways. :-) I ended my week -5 points. Yep, -5 meaning I used ALL my discretionary points plus 5 I didn't have. Now I have been alot more active this week which technically entitles me to exchange my activity for points for more food if necessary. I didn't exercise but went out in the snow 2 times (seriously it was hard! lol) and had some other projects which typically use more energy than I normally expend.

I really don't want to go to weigh-in tomorrow. I will haaaaate to see a) I lost nothing or b) I gained!!!! Oh the horror! Because... even though I slipped up a bit I still did soooo much better than I was doing before! As I said, at breakfast alone I usually skip 1 turkey sausage and 1 egg, that's 200 calories there. IF I get something out I get the smallest sandwich and a small fry (maybe once a week that happens). I really keep myself from just eating what I want.

Oooooooooh noooooooo! I just remembered I had a lindt chocolate truffle. Arghhhhhhhh! I don't wanna know the points for it! (sigh) 

OK a positive thing is the fact that I am not stressed like a true stressed, I'll just eat exactly as I want, I have size 20 pants, no worries kinda stressed. I still paid attention and limited from what I might have normally done. I have come to the solid conclusion I don't normally eat so much as eat things that individually have alot of needless calories.

I am not giving up sisters. I will persevere and insha'Allah will succeed. I think a huge thing for me will be to set an exercise time and just stick with it. I have a hard time carving out "me" time. Yeah, like most women. :-) Exercise, although as I said before can be done in the gym here RIGHT DOWN THE FLIPPIN' HALL, takes me out of the home. Where I have some unruly stepkids and a cute little 2 yr old who says "mama, mama, you are nice, i love you so much, you are my life". Wallah, she said that. So you can imagine how hard it is for me to say, ok I'm going down the hall, no you can't come, stay here...

Ummmm as I type that I see how silly it is but what can I say? I'm 38 and this is my last baby and by gosh I'll baby her!!!! Actually she is very independent and self-actualized. (That's a snobbish word and I'm kinda sorry I used it. lol. But not sorry enough to erase it cause it's funnier to leave it and type this loooong explanation. :-D) 

Don't remember where I was going with that so I'll just sign off and please sisters, make dua for me that Allah gives me the strength to succeed. Amin!!!!!!! Ma salaama ya'll.....

Week 3 day 6: ouch

Graphic of how my brain feels

A'salaamu alaikum ya'll. I have a really bad headache tonight so I won't be doing a post. I had actually went to bed and got up to get a drink and (get this) I felt guilt for not posting! Silly me.

So this is a post to say I can't post. While I'm here though I might as well share. Today was an ok day; I think I just got it in my head I ruined my week with the oreos and Applebee's and I never really got my groove back. However I have made some changes which have stuck, mainly in the area of portion control.

It's so easy (with the typical American diet) to overeat on your calories while not actually gorging yourself on food. This is a big problem and one the WW combats with their power food choices and free fruits and veggies (getting you to eat more of the healthy stuff). For example, we often have belgian waffles for breakfast on the weekend with turkey sausage, scrambled eggs, and of course pure maple syrup.

I never really stopped to look at what kind of nutrition I was getting. I would eat 2 turkey sausage links (fine), 2 scrambled eggs (1 is sufficient) and I would eat 2 waffles. Nothing major, nothing that a passerby would gawk at, so I felt ok.

Now alhamdulillah I make definite changes. I had 1 sausage, 1 egg, and 1 waffle. I cut my calorie count in half on that! So even though I don't feel I've made the best choices this week, I have definitely learned to be more intelligent in my choices and think before I eat. For the most part.

I am not sure if I will post a loss for this week even though I've been within my points (I only have 16 discretionary left now, I've never used that many of the 49 extras!) . I am a little stressed by that but telling myself, I have next week. I really want to lose the weight, be healthier, and I am committed to it. Insha'Allah. :-)

Hmm not bad for a "this is a post just to say I'm not posting" post. :-)) Ma salaama ya'll!

Week 3 days 4-5: sorry!

1500+ calories...yikes!!!!!!

A'salaamu alaikum ya'll. I was really tired last night and ended up going to bed before I made my post. My sincerest apologies. :-)

I didn't do well the day before. Now again, I say that but I am still within my points, I just know I made poor choices. For example:

I went to Applebee's yesterday. Now they have a WW menu there (not why I went, we live in a small town and I was tired of fish sandwiches from McD's!) but I didn't pick from it. I wanted the Crispy (big warning!) Orange Chicken Bowl. Another bad thing: I didn't check the calories before I went which would have been easy. Now WW doesn't count calories per se but I know if something logs heavy it will be high in points (duh!). So unprepared out I go.

I fully intended to share it with Aaminah (it's pretty big and I can't eat it all myself) but it has a sweet-n-spicy sauce (YUM!). So I ordered sauce on the side to share with her but by the time I ordered her a drink and fries it was cheaper just to buy her a kids' meal and let her graze off my plate as she wanted. So another big mistake: having a huge portion with no built-in failsafe. :-)

I ate more than I normally would (?) but still had about 1/3 leftover. (I also shared some with her but I like to over-project, not under, on my points.) Alhamdulillah! I forgot our box of take-home. I am happy because I would have finished it off that night.

Remember my weekly points target is 31? Well this dish clocks in at 42!!!!! The 2/3 I possible ate put me at 28 points for that dish alone. Oh my goodness! I had no idea! So I did a fair amount of damage with that little meal and pretty well demoralized myself. I tried to watch the rest of my day but of course ended up dipping into my discretionary points. Grrrr! I wanted to wean myself off of them but looks like that won't be this week!

Anyway yesterday was a bit of poo and today wasn't too much better; I went over my target by a few points and am down to about 18 discretionary points. I really wanted to make this my week to shine and lose more than my 1.8 I lost last week. I don't think it will happen.

I've been kind of active with some little things here and there but not real exercise. I realized this is my week to crave food (in relation to where I am in my cycle) so it did help me to quit mentally beating myself up. Insha'allah I can stay on track these next 2 days and then next week is a new chance!

Ma salaama ya'll....

Week 3 day 3: I've done better

Curse you, Oreos!!!!!

A'salaamu alaikum ya'll. So today wasn't my best day. You see, I brought sweets into the house. Yes, I know, silly me. Now don't get me wrong, on a normal day Oreos would NOT be my drug of choice. I love soft yellow cake with milk chocolate icing. Yummmmmmm..... (drooling a little, pardon me!) But as I haven't really had any sweets in a while, those Oreos were looking pretty good.

I had 8 of them. Ohhhh the shame! But it's also the truth so maybe this will embarass me sufficiently so I no longer do this type of thing. Oh I didn't eat them all at once, you know cookies are like the shaitaan; they whisper to you so softly and sweetly. Before you know it, 8 are down the hatch.

I intended to have 3 this morning when I got up for a drink. I was hungry and thought, oh cookies! lol I ended up eating 2 more because I stood there by the open bag. BIG MISTAKE.

Later after dinner I let the kids have some and I took 3 more. Not the end of the world but I am not pleased. I don't want to stop my weight loss or slow it down. I want to continue forward. I have to just set my mind to these types of things being occasional and limited in quantity. I think at this stage you have to really start making some serious changes in your eating habits. The other day I didn't eat breakfast because I wanted a less-than-ideal lunch. OK so A+ for planning but is this intelligent eating? (Remember the phrase I coined? lol). I have to do some behavior modification to help me overcome these obstacles.

Anyway I think I told you (did I?) that my daily points are down to 31 from 32. But I consistently eat more because I have those 49 discretionary points. Dang them! I don't really know how to feel about them. Sometimes I am happy and sometimes I think they are sneaky little saboteurs... time will tell, time will tell. :-)

Today I clocked 38 points, 7 more than my target but still well within my weekly extra points. I guess I have to ask myself what I want more, extra food or faster weight loss? Ahhhh again, time will tell, time will tell. :-)

Ma salaam ya'll!

Week 3 day 2: yup

A'salaamu alaikum ya'll. We have another winter storm here; the kids were out of school today and will be tomorrow as well. :-( Stress-eating anyone? lol

I did good on the plan today. My points target has dropped from 32 to 31 because of my weight loss. Which is a little weird cause I still have 49 discretionary points. I don't think I'll use as many this week as I did the last two because I really want my weight loss to gain momentum, not lose it. We'll see how that works out, insha'Allah. :-)

I was too tired tonight to do my cartoon; I have a bad back and I kinda slipped it out a little. My entire right side hurts from lower back to hip to calf. Insha'allah it'll get better in a few days. It usually does.

Oh I overdid it on breakfast again. Yah, I know, surprise. So I just had a very light supper, tomato soup with a few goldfish crackers. I prefer saltines but obviously so do the kids cause there were none here. lol I made black forset turkey ham sandwiches for lunch; really they are very good but I do like cheese and mayonnaise so that cut into my daily totals a bit. Worth it, though, to not have to choke down a dry sandwich!

Insha'Allah I'll do a better post tomorrow, I'm just too tired right now. Ma salaama ya'll!