Bah humbug. It's unfortunate that six days at home can be so detrimental to my weight loss! I weighed in last night at 185.4 (thankfully this morning I was down to 183.8). I tried to be good while I was home. I didn't really get any "home-cooked meals" as the primary cooking was always done by my mom. Dad is more apt, especially now, to go pick up some take-out Mexican or Chinese and eat off it for a couple of meals. The day I flew back to CA I didn't eat great, simply because I was relying on airport food--a bagel and cream cheese at Einstein's, a personal pan pizza at Pizza Hut. Then Dad and I got Chinese for dinner. So that day wasn't very good. The next day I did OK--ran/walked a couple miles in the morning, had a small bowl of cereal for breakfast, didn't have lunch because we went to the movies (and had popcorn, although I didn't put butter on mine), and had leftover Chinese for dinner. The next day wasn't too bad; after the small bowl of cereal for breakfast we went to a wedding and had a meal at the reception. I didn't have any dinner that night because I felt like I had probably eaten enough at the reception, and I really wasn't that hungry. The next day was Mom and Dad's 40th anniversary, and I took my dad out to lunch at a salad buffet (after the obligatory bowl of cereal for breakfast). I tried to be good at the buffet--I didn't put dressing on my salad, just dipping my fork in the dressing instead, and not getting any other items than a small bowl of chili and piece of bread. Buffets are the kiss of death as far as diets are concerned, but I felt like I had really done a good job of restraining myself. Again I did not have dinner, but I did have a pretzel (one of the big soft ones) at the movie theatre with a friend. The last day I was home I went running again, and it was the only day I ate three meals while I was there--the usual breakfast, lunch with some of my mom's friends (and the only bad thing I did was the French fries), and then dinner with my brother (didn't even eat everything on my plate, but I'm pretty sure the two monster margaritas I drank were probably pretty bad). No breakfast yesterday until I got to the Phoenix airport, where I repeated my personal pan pizza, and then nothing until I got home and went out with my husband to Chili's. So I had hoped that my multiple days of only two meals might offset the fact that so many meals were restaurant food, but apparently not. I'm pleased that the 185 dropped this morning to 183, but it still is three pounds more than it should be.

So here's the deal: I have 37 days until school starts, just over five weeks. Realistically, I can probably only lose about ten pounds by then, since they (whoever "they" are) recommend losing no more than two pounds each week. So that's my goal, ten pounds from today's weight. So that would be 173.8 by August 16th (the day school starts). That would only put me equal to my lightest weight (which I think I hit either spring last year or last July). Definitely not the 160 I was originally hoping for.

Here's how I'm apparently going to have to do it. I am going to have to keep track of my calories, as much I as absolutely despise keeping a journal. I briefly considered relying on either packaged meals (like Lean Cuisine or Healthy Choice) or an actual program (like Jenny Craig or Nutrisystem), but it's less expensive to just eat regular food and try to keep track of it. So I'm shooting for approximately 1200 calories a day, really the minimum they (again, "they") suggest for weight loss. To balance that out, I need to be burning at least 1000 calories each day. I am going to only count the calories I burn on a cardio machine, like a treadmill or elliptical machine, simply because those machines are calibrated and consistent. I know I might not be burning exactly the number the machine says I am, but I can rely on the machine to give me the same kind of reading each time. It's hard to calculate your own calories being burned in an exercise because you can never be sure you are putting in the same kind of effort or resistance as the calculation, and the numbers for exercises are never the same depending on the website you look at (one might say you burn 250 calories swimming at a medium pace for a half hour, while another might say you are burning 300 calories, and are you really sure you are swimming at what "they" think is a medium pace?). Now, I will still lift weights and swim and things like that, but I'm only going to count the calories burned on the cardio machines. Hopefully I can get back on track and get some weight off before school starts again.

Why is this so darn hard?