Sometimes I flipping hate the scale.
I'm almost done with week two of my cutting calories as well as carbs effort. Week one ended well; once all the carbs were out of my system I weighed in at 153.4, and by the end of week one I was at 151.8. A decent result for 5 days of very low cal eating. Then I went away for the weekend; always dangerous BUT I was angelic. I ate only what I should have eaten; when I got home and fitdayed my stuff I'd stayed well under maintenance calories both days. But on Sunday the scale was up to 155. For no reason whatsoever. I expect a jump like that if I'm carbed up, but I wasn't. TOM was not on the way. No bloody reason at all. And I've spent the last few days trying to get back to where I was last friday, even though I'm *not* needing to buckle under after a splurge. There was no splurge. This morning I'm still half a pound up from where I was six days ago, despite the fact I've continued to eat at around 1200/1300 cals a day. I should be rights be down to 151 now, not at 152.4
I know that I shouldn't pay attention on a day to day basis; that it's week to week and month to month that matter, and the scale will fluctuate in annoying ways for no apparent reason. It still pisses me off. It's not a hardship for me to eat low carb, generally. But I do resent having to count calories too, if I don't see the results. Tonight I'm going out for dinner, and I just started trying to work out what the calories could be in the roquefort salad I usually get as a virtuous meal in that particular restaurant. Too high, is what they'd be. So I'll probably go for something else; or actually eat dinner before I go, and just get a soup or something.
I just don't believe in the 'purity' of that calories in/calories out equation - not after five years of low-carb, and other experiences of dieting before that. Example. When I was 22, I stuck to Weightwatchers for about a year. I managed to struggle down from about 210 to 175 in that time, eating what must have been around 1400/1500 calories a day. Then my mum introduced me to a book called 'The Carbohydrate Addicts Diet'. I read it with interest, since it was so obvious to me that I was a carb addict. I figured I'd give it a try. I was sooo sick of starving myself, and the carb addict diet said I could have a meal of whatever I wanted once a day! I set to with relish. And although I managed to be moderate for the first few days, I was quickly bingeing for that one hour 'reward' meal. I ate everything I'd been denying myself for a year, everything that I'd been craving. In one meal, I could eat a burger and chips, chocolate, ice cream, crisps... or a huge bowl of pasta, also accompanied by crisps, chocolate, etc.
I must have upped my calories - no exaggeration - by at least 2,000 a day. Possibly more.
What happened? During the two or three months I stuck to the diet, I didn't lose any weight. But I didn't gain any either. I probably tripled, even quadrupled my daily calorie intake, having been in almost starvation mode for a year, and I didn't put on weight. That's as pure a refutation as calories in/calories out that I've ever seen.
I gave up on the diet after a while because I wasn't losing weight. And because it was difficult to do at the time, with my particular lifestyle (and I was less skilled at cooking then, too). Tried all kinds of other things that didn't work either, and that just had me putting on weight until I was up to 250lbs about two years later. I always thought of that diet as a good way to maintain, since I hadn't put on weight, but since I needed to lose, I didn't think of doing it again for a long, long time. Why I went back to it is the subject of another post.
This post was just about the bloody scale. And that calorie intake vs expenditure just not working as *simply* as it is rumoured to. If it did, I'd have been at goal years ago. I've been doing this for five years now, and I'm still in the 'overweight' category according to my BMI. Only by a few pounds, but still. I could reconcile myself, almost easily, to having to stay low-carb for life. To being ever-vigilant, ever-different to other people. If only I was AT my goal weight. To struggle just to stay 20 pounds *heavier* than I want to be, after five years of sustained effort, well that's just not fair.
But then, life's just not fair, is it?
And I can't let this stop my efforts in calorie cutting or strictness. Because giving up certainly won't help either, will it? So I'm staying vigilant, and I'm staying low-cal, low-carb. I'm going away to friends for shabbat this week, and I've already spoken to them about the menu so I know there should be food that's good for me, even if I can't control calories one hundred percent.
Maybe on sunday there won't be another unexplained weight spike, and then I'll feel better.
I'm still thinner than I've ever been since I was 13 years old. I need to focus on that.
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4 comments:
I too had a weight spike a week or two ago. After being away from home a little less than 48 hours, I came home to find I'd gained 3-1/2 lbs.
It wasn't like I went nuts and scarfed down carbs like no tomorrow.
No, I ate the exact same kinds of things that I would have eaten at home: meat, cheese, salad, low carb veggies, a couple sugar-free high-protein bars (Atkins, so there weren't excessive hidden carbs in them). I kept count of all my carbs, and by all indications, I didn't eat any more than normal. As far as fats were concerned, I probably ate *fewer* grams of fat when eating out, because ordering your meat and veggies without things that are likely to add (obvious) carbs very likely means that they're low-fat too. So that means the calories were very likely also lower, although I have no idea to what extent.
So what happened?
My theory is that not only does restaurant food have more salt in it (causing water bloat), they also hide sugars and starches in the most unlikely things.
There are a few things that I most suspect: The meal at a Mexican restaurant had the chicken cooked with onions and multicolor peppers, and seasoned with what should have been the usual mexican spices: chili, cumin, etc., just like I use at home when I prepare a mexican meal. I *suspect* that the mixture probably also had some sugar and/or starch in it to "perk up the flavor" or "improve the texture". The guacamole looked like it was very similar to my homemade guacamole, as it even had some chunks of avocado in it that didn't get completely mashed. But again, in an effort to prevent browning of the avocados, or to improve the flavor and texture of the guacamole, it's very possible they added some kind of color protector that contained sugars and starches.
I always take my breakfast with me (cheese omelet) and heat it in the microwave in my room, so that I know was no problem, since it was prepared at home by me.
Then for lunch I stopped at a steak house, thinking that surely a steak meal (without potato) would be just as close as possible to real unadulterated, low carb food as I'd be likely to find.
The salad was a little on the small side, but using caesar dressing, there really shouldn't have been enough sugar or starch in it to cause a problem, especially since there wasn't all that much dressing on it to begin with. The steak seemed fine, although it's very possible that it was treated with something containing certain starches and sugars to tenderize it. But that's not what I really suspect.
What I really suspect was the broccoli. It wasn't some kind of fancy broccoli casserole or broccoli salad. No, it was supposedly just plain broccoli. It was a good texture, and still beautifully bright green, as if it had been cooked just right.
But one bite of it and I realized something wasn't quite right - something about it tasted downright sweet. Not sweet enough that most people would ever notice it, but to those of us who have been off sugar for years, it was pretty obvious something had been done in some way to sweeten this otherwise perfect broccoli. As I ate it, I noticed that the floret buds were a lot sweeter than the stalk portion of the florets, so perhaps the florets were soaked in some kind of sugar-water solution before cooking.
Next time I'll know better than to continue eating a vegetable that tastes that sweet, but this time I naively went along eating it, thinking that surely it must just be me imagining that it was sweet.
So to end a story that's gone on far too long, almost 2 weeks later and I'm still fighting off the cravings from whatever sugars and starches were sneaked into my food, plus I've only managed to drop 1 lb from the 3-1/2 lbs I gained in that short weekend!
I think you're doing pretty well to have dropped nearly all of what you gained.
But nevertheless, I leave you with a warning that even if you think what you're eating is "safe", it may not be - the food industry sneaks those carbs in everywhere, even when you least suspect it.
hi calianna,
thanks for sharing! the thing is, i may have been away from home, but iw as at my sister's house! and she not only knows how to cook for me, she's following atkins herself at the moment! so there were no hidden sugars or starches in the food...
it could have been extra salt, or just the extra bulk of more vegetables. it's just hard to reconcile staying under 1500 calories a day with a 3lb spike!
Yes, it's possible that it was salt - I know I'm very sensitive to it, and a lot of other people are too.
The whole calories in/calories out thing really is hogwash. When I starved myself several years ago eating very low calorie, very low fat, it took me about 10 months to lose a lousey 18 lbs or so. And only a few weeks to gain back those same 18 lbs when I finally couldn't stand being so hungry and the constant blood sugar roller coaster, and went back to eating somewhat more "normally".
I've been so messed up by my weekend away that I finally gave up counting carb grams for the last day or two. Big mistake, I can feel myself becoming more bloated all the time.
Again, I have to admit that I genuinely admire your ability to get right back on low carb after every time you have a weekend where you can't avoid the starches and sugars you're served. I have no willpower at all, even the hidden starches and sugars have had me ridiculously messed up, for far too long. Even if I'm not seeking carby stuff, I'm eating the low carb treats with far too much wild abandon.
I gotta get back on the wagon! Now!
Hello
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