About My Plan

I know I only touched on the plan I follow yesterday. Today I'll go more in depth, since well, that's the whole point of this blog!

As I mentioned yesterday, I follow Weight Watchers Flex Points plan. I won't go too in depth on the plan since I have no clue where the copyright infringement line is. Basically, based on your weight you get a set number of points you can eat a day. (Yes, I know the current plan goes off weight, height, activity level, etc.) If you convert points to calories, one point equals 50 calories. I get 24 points in a day or 1200 calories. In addition to that, I get an extra 35 points or 1750 a week to use as I want. To get points out of your food, you have to take the calories, fat, and fiber and plug it into a special formula. (I won't divulge it here, again, fearing copyright stuff, but if I have a big enough following and request, I'll go further into the plan at a later date!) For example, a medium apple is 1 point. A Snickers candy bar is 7. See where I'm going with this?!

You may be thinking, "That's not a lot of calories to eat." I plan to show you just how you can stretch that amount of calories/points out and still feel satisfied. Whats more, I want to show you how to do it with your current lifestyle. I don't want you to think you have to change your life completely around. Granted, you will have to make a few changes and maybe buy a few new to you products. But you won't have to switch to a diet of 1 egg for breakfast, a tofurkey dog for lunch, soy nuts for a snack, and a small bean burrito for dinner. (Note: This is not a real diet menu. I just threw these off the top of my head because this is what a diet looks like to me.)

A big key to having success with the new plan is Don't beat yourself up if you screw up. I once heard it compared to a GPS in your car. What does it do when you make a wrong turn? It doesn't beat you up, belittle you, make you feel bad. If it does, you need a new GPS. It simply says "Turn around at your next available convenience." The same holds true with trying to lose weight. Say you have an off day and decide to eat that piece of cake with ice cream on top. Don't gorge it down then feel ashamed. Enjoy it! Savor it! Try again tomorrow at getting it right! Granted you don't want to slip up every day or you won't get anywhere. Like in a car, if you make a wrong left turn and then keep making left turns, you'll just go in a circle (or square if you want to be technical).

Another thing, I've recently found to help keep success up is Purposely cheat! Now I don't mean every day or all the time, but some cheating is ok. I find when I've been following my plan for a while, I start to get bored. Then I slip and screw up, next thing I know I've gained a pound or two. Every couple of months, my husband and I plan a get away together. On this get away, I get away from everything, literally! Kids, work, chores, and yes, "diet" plan. I enjoy the weekend, eat what I want, and just let go. Granted I know the following weigh in will probably not show a loss. But mentally I feel like I've lost some baggage and can start anew!

I mentioned about the extra 1750 calories a week I get. I find I end up using them on the weekends. But that's just our lifestyle. You can use them how you want. During the week I try to stay on the strict 24 points/1200 calories, maybe going over by 100 calories (2 points) at the most. The thing I do make sure to do is Always have a high calorie day. Every week! Take one day and make sure you eat more calories than normal. And I'm talking like 1700 to 2000 calories, enjoy your splurges on this day. Doing this ensure you get enough calories within the week so your body does think it's being deprived and go into starvation mode. Starvation mode is a very bad thing. Your body will basically hold on to any and everything you eat, the result being no weight lost. Then you look back at your week and can't figure out how you didn't lose anything when you followed plan to T. It's because you followed it too well. But make sure, the extra calories you consume on your high calorie day come out of your extra 1750, that's part of the plan.

I think I've give enough information for you to digest for one day. I don't want to overwhelm and fry your brain! I plan to try to post more tidbits and info daily, but I don't intend every post to be this long. Today's just happened to be so long so I could get a lot of the basics in! Hope that was enough food for thought for one day! Good luck to everyone trying to lose weight along with me!