Breezy's Journey - Starting April 5, 2011

[breezy7]

Hi all!

I'm starting the South Beach Diet today, after a week of hell attempting the Dukan Diet, which really ended up harming my body despite my losing weight. I'm a 22-year-old student living in Atlanta, and I work full time as a bartender/server as well.

I know myself well enough to know that weighing mid-day is a bad call, so I'll weigh myself in the morning and post my starting weight then. I assume, though, that I'm around 140-145ish, and my goal is to be 118. At 5'4", this was my most comfortable weight during my freshman year of college.

I'm stoked to find this forum, because I signed up on the South Beach website and honestly can't afford the weekly payment right now! Am about to call and cancel

Breakfast: 3 romaine lettuce cups with turkey slices, 1 low fat string cheese, yellow peppers, and mustard, cup of V8
Snack: 30 pistachios
Lunch: 1 can of tuna mixed with nonfat Greek yogurt, mustard, and seasonings with 5 stalks of celery
Snack: Low fat mozzarella cheese stick
Dinner: 4 slices extra lean turkey bacon, hard-boiled egg, yellow pepper strips, and a couple of stuffed mushrooms! Yum!
Dessert: No-sugar-added fudgsicle

For you seasoned SB-ers, how is my food intake looking? I'm so used to counting calories that I'm not certain how to approach this diet.

[Chris55]

You might need some more veggies in there - 1/2 cup with breakfast, 2 cups at lunch and at dinner. Make sure you're having healthy fats. Also, you're allowed up to 2 cups a day of dairy (milk/yogurt). Maximizing that will help your energy level. Beans also help with adding good carbs and help keep you full. You might want to check out the meal planning info here:

viewtopic.php?f=2&t=24136&start=0

All of the info accessed by the blue tabs along the top of the page is out of date, so read only the "sticky" posts - the first ones on each thread.

[breezy7]

Thanks, Chris! I just made a batch of stuffed mushrooms (stuffed with mushrooms, chickpeas, cheese, and onions), so I should be good in the veggie dept for dinner. Might wash it down with a cup of milk. And thanks for the link, I'll check it out!

[amalfi_girl]

I adore mushrooms. Although mushrooms stuffed with mushrooms somehow feels like feeding a cow hamburgers, I'm on board 100%. I hope you post the recipe!

[ladybugmom]

Good morning and welcome!!

I know how you feel about the calorie counting thing. I still do. I have found it can be very easy to slip into diet mode and consume too few calories to sustain a healthy lifestyle. Also, I am less likely to go too long without eating and my day has a better balance of all the food groups when I plan ahead. So, every morning I plan my food out, count my calories, make sure I am eating enough, and that my daily menu is balanced. Just find what works for you and what makes you feel good about this. Have fun, lean on the support here, and just enjoy the ride!

[breezy7]

Good morning, SBers!

Just weighed myself on my new scale so I could get an accurate starting point, and it's 138.4 pounds. I guess that means I lost about 5.6 pounds on my one week attempt at the Dukan diet... still, I feel much, much healthier already on the South Beach. My goal, again, is to reach 118, which is the lowest "acceptable" weight for my 5'4" frame. That being said, I felt incredibly comfortable at that weight in the past, and my frame is small-medium, so I think it's a good goal to have. My short term goal is to lose 10 pounds this month, so that I can be in the 120s for my trip to Los Angeles in May!

amalfi_girl: I will definitely post the recipe when I get home from classes. Mushrooms are pretty much made of epic awesomeness.

ladybugmom: Thanks so much for the suggestion! I'm finding that the support alone here is making this so much easier. You guys are all rockstars

[breezy7]

Day 2:

Breakfast:
1 cup v8 low sodium
4 slices extra lean turkey bacon
1 hard boiled egg
1 lf cheese stick

Morning snack:
1 cinnamon bean-cake muffin, homemade (not a fan... tasted way too bean-y. That being said, I omitted the olive oil, so maybe it was a necessary ingredient!)

Lunch:
2 romaine cups with chicken slices, yellow pepper, 1 lf cheese stick, mustard
A few homemade stuffed mushrooms

Afternoon snack:
Attempted to make a milkshake with nf Greek yogurt, almond butter, unsweetened cocoa, and skim milk, but the taste was too bitter. Instead, I had 20 pistachios and half a bean muffin

Dinner: (haven't eaten yet)
Mashed cauliflower - will probably incorporate skim milk into the recipe so I get enough dairy
Tuna mixed with Greek yogurt and mustard with chopped up celery in romaine lettuce cups

Dessert: (haven't eaten yet)
1 fudgesicle

Mood: Still really excited about the weight loss I had last week! My clothes don't feel any looser, though. Also, I've been having trouble motivating myself to exercise. I think a lot of it has to do with it being the last month of classes. I have 2 papers due Monday, another due the following week, and 2 more papers (one 6 pages and the other due the next week. In addition to a massive presentation. Needless to say, I'm a little bit stressed! Hope you all are fairing a bit better.

[grace2]

Hey Breezy,

Welcome - good to have you joining us! I want to wish you the best on all those papers and the presentation you have due. I'm sure you'll take it step-by-step and will accomplish all of them - well Plus, with the good eating habits you are establishing, you'll have the energy to get through.

Have a good one!
Lauren

[breezy7]

Thanks so much, Lauren! I already feel fantastic and motivated, it's amazing. Hope you have a great one as well!!!

Day 3 (thus far)

Breakfast: Cup of low-sodium V8 juice, 3 strips extra lean turkey bacon, 1 hard boiled egg
Morning snack: Side salad (lettuce, cucumbers, mushrooms, tomatoes) with grilled chicken strips and salsa as dressing at work
Lunch: Romaine lettuce cups filled with turkey, 1 lf string cheese, and mustard, one cup of mashed cauliflower (cauliflower, sauteed onions, garlic, skim milk, dash of parmesan
Afternoon snack: (I have some almond butter cookies in the oven - made with almond butter, splenda, and egg whites! Will have 2 tbls worth and a cup of skim milk)
Dinner: (Probably a tofu scramble with leftover stuffed mushrooms or possible a stuffed pepper)

Tonight, I'm going to try the black bean brownie recipe! Tomorrow night the boy and I are going to the first home Braves game of the season! I'm packing pepper strips, cherry tomatoes, pistachios, and possibly some of the brownies, if they turn out to be yummy. Still feeling kind of bleh when it comes to exercising - I'm hoping this will fade away as my body continues to get used to this new diet. Also been feeling the urge to go out drinking with friends, but I know that if I wait, the glass of red wine in 2 weeks will taste even better. It's sunny and gorgeous here in Atlanta... hope today is going great for all of you, as well!

[breezy7]

Black bean brownies BLEW MY MIND. Had one alone with dinner, which ended up being tuna with Greek yogurt, lf string cheese, and half a cucumber. Might indulge in another later if I don't have my nightly fudgsicle! Seriously, though, this recipe is amazing, and only 40 cals and 5 carbs a brownie.

[grace2]

Thanks for the tip on the BB brownies. They sound kind of "too good to be true" and I haven't tried them yet. I'd better give them a try

[ladybugmom]

Just dropping in to say hi and welcome!! It looks like you are having a lot of fun with your food. Isn't it amazing the desserts and such we could have been eating all along?

[breezy7]

Definitely do! They're even more amazing heated up a bit with a small dollop of ff cool whip on top!

Thank you! And agreed - it's wonderful how eating at home can allow for such exciting creations. I haven't had any desire to eat out since I started!

[breezy7]

Just made the mistake of weighing myself, and I'm baffled. According to the scale, I'm up 1.6 pounds! I'm worried about scale accurateness, because I just purchased this one for the purpose of doing SB. I'm wondering if this has to do with my needing to move the scale out of the small closet it's in in order to weigh myself, or if I really have gained on the diet. If it's the latter... am I eating too much? Slightly confused...

[breezy7]

Goodness, I'm updating this thing a lot. I can pretty much guarantee that this won't be true late on down the line, but it's fantastic to have a place to spill this all that isn't my boyfriend. He's already pretty tired of hearing about my issues with food/new love for cooking (keep in mind, I was diagnosed with Celiac fairly recently, so there's been that journey as well), despite his love for all the food he ultimately ends up getting to consume.

Here's the deal with today thus far:

Breakfast: cup of coffee, cup of low-sodium V8, two veggie quiches (made with egg whites, 1 egg, 1 slice turkey bacon, 2 lf cheese sticks, 1/3 yellow pepper, and some chopped up leftover stuffed mushrooms. This is for the whole recipe, so each quiche came out to about 50 cals. The boy ate the other 4)

Lunch: Probably tofu-related with some Greek yogurt and veggies

I'm going to the game from 4PM to 11PM, and I've packed:
- the other 2/3 of the yellow pepper
- a baggie of cherry tomatoes
- 30 pistachios
- 1/2 cup of roasted garbanzos
- 1 lf cheese stick
- 1 bean brownie

Hopefully this'll be alright for an afternoon snack and dinner, because there's no way I can eat ANYTHING at the park or the tail-gate before. Kind of nervous, especially since I sneak-weighed myself this morning and had such horrifying results. I thought I was following this perfectly! And the no drinking alcohol in and of itself should've make me drop a few already... Trying to stay positive, but pretty upset thus far today.