Week 2

Week 2

Lost another 3 lbs this week! Most days my carbs were 70-90g. Still feeling good. Have gotten more compliments at work; people are noticing my weight loss finally! Next week I will report back on Friday after a week of NOT counting calories or macros, just eating low carb foods and exercising. 



Going full on keto last week and then learning more about paleo/primal/lowcarb this week taught me a few things.

1. I can lose weight great on <50g carbs. 
2. Staying under 50g of carbs is tricky but doable.
3. Keto is not a lifelong diet change; I need to have veggies and fruits for a diet shift to be sustainable.
4.  If I get all of my carbs from veggies it's easy to keep the carb count low.
5. Dark chocolate is a wonderful treat.
6. Halo top is a sometimes food. 
7. Grain free chips are delicious but still have lots of carbs.

Sunday thoughts:

Friday night we went out for sushi and I ate a bit of rice along with sashimi. Then I had my halo top treat. Yesterday's 10K went GREAT. I did not feel like my legs were going to fall off the whole time, and I didn't have to take a ton of walking breaks. In fact, my pace was 11:52, and I looked back and in 2017 on the same race my pace was 13:31. Holy crap! Despite having more carbs that night, I was still able to fast yesterday morning, through the race and beyond. I would have eaten at 12 but we had to go out grocery shopping so lunch didn't happen until after 2. I did get pretty hungry toward the end but made it through. Last night I had more halo top because 1. psychologically that evening treat is a big deal to me and 2. I've been reading more about how you don't have to go full on very low carb to get the weight loss benefits. My goals for this week are to keep total carbs below 100g, increase protein while decreasing fat, and to eat 2 meals per day. The 16:8 or so intermittent fasting is probably just as beneficial as the low carb diet.

Tuesday thoughts:

I have read about 1/2 of the new Atkins book. There is a lot of good info in there, and a lot of things I don't agree with, like eating 3 meals a day. I'm doing really well on just 2 meals. Despite increasing my carbs I am not starving all morning. The nightly halo top treat is keeping me quite happy. I've also started reading Primal Endurance and so far my favorite part is where it says <100g carbs a day = fat burning and <150 = maintenance. Of course they are encouraging getting carbs from healthy sources like whole grains, legumes, and berries. I would be sad if I could never eat lentils again! Definitely going to put that back in my regimen. It will be great to have some quinoa and fruits again too. Weight was up a little bit today, which is only the second time I have trended up a day. I'm consistently under my calories though, so I feel certain I am burning fat like I'm supposed to. I haven't worked out in 2 days, feeling very ready to go to kickboxing this evening.

Thursday thoughts:

It looks like my carb threshold for losing weight is somewhere between 50 and 80. Sadly, eating 30g of carbs in the evening with my halo top snack is not helping me lose right now. I've been stalled at 157 all week. I also think that extra sugar is making the mornings harder to fast - yesterday and today I was starving by 10am and had to have a snack while waiting for lunch. I'm trying to allow myself to eat more intuitively and then go back and log stuff in the evenings, but I just love the data so much it's hard to stop myself. Plus I haven't really grasped the feel of a certain # of carbs yet so maybe keeping up with the data is helping. Tonight I will forego halo top. Sigh. It really should be just a treat, not an every evening occurrence. Even thought it's low in sugar, it still does have sugar, and that's not helping me. I'll stick to having it the evenings before a long run. Oh good - that means I can have it again tomorrow. LOL

The data:

Saturday: weight 158.9

                calories 1418 (burned 2779)

                carbs 62 (net 46.8)

                protein 93

                fat 99

Sunday: weight 157

              calories 1310 (burned 2012)

              carbs 71.8 (net 58.4)

              protein 86

              fat 80

Monday: weight 157
              calories 1457 (burned 2284)
              carbs 90 (net 63)
              protein 98
              fat 87

Tuesday: weight 157.9
              calories 1508 (burned 2579)
              carbs 83
              protein 81
              fat 94

Wednesday: weight 157
              calories 1408 (burned 2579)
              carbs 90
              protein 96
              fat 81

Thursday: weight 157

Friday: weight 156