Progress is a bit Sketchy these days, but...

My weight is up, but so is my enthusiasm. I have had a rough summer, admittedly. I was hoping to be out of the red by the end of August, but actually I climbed the numbers scale. I'm back to my March weight. I've lost a few battles but the war is still on.

Hating to count calories, I quit doing it AGAIN, and that truly was my downfall, AGAIN. So I'm back to counting, starting yesterday.

Stress has played a big role in my struggle. Also fatigue. When I'm tired, my enthusiasm and will-power go out the window. I usually do very well in the mornings with limiting my calories and staying with my basic plan. I usually can keep myself from cheating. Sometimes I'm okay until noon. If I've planned ahead there's more chance that I'll stay with it, but to not plan, for me, is to plan to fail. I'm trying to eat more low-cal vegetables, ghastly as they are for me. But they do fill me up, and I know they are good for me. 

I came across a "NO-NO" list the other day, and potato chips were of course listed. Chips are a great temptation to me. I've tried making substitutions but no matter what, I can't convince myself a slice of celery or carrot stick or cucumber is as satisfying as a potato chip. I've got to find some other way to resist them when they call out to me.

Second helpings are on my own personal NO-NO list, but that's pretty hard, especially when faced with items like pizza. We brought home pizza last night, just an ordinary pepperoni. I stir-fried some goodies that I like and decorated my slice. Pizza is just heavenly with a mix of onions, mushrooms and bell peppers. Oh, and sliced cherry tomatoes. Knowing that I'm not that fond of plain pepperoni pizza, I thought if I only made enough goodies topping for one slice, that would keep me away from having seconds. I did fine for a whole hour. But when I walked past the pizza box and there laid a slice that no one else had claimed, I cut it into four pieces. At least eating just a quarter of it wouldn't be so bad. But no one else continued to show any interest and I kept going back to the box until I'd nibbled away the whole second slice. By the end of the day, reviewing my calories, I was a little dismayed that I was over my limit. But not terribly so, since I'd done pretty well the rest of the day. A real killer is to face both pizza and potato chips in the same day.

All of this is to say, I think I'm back on track. I simply cannot give up, even though at times it looks pretty hopeless that I'll be able to lose any significant amount of weight. I'll check in again next month. My goal is to stay between 1500 and 1700 calories. My fingers are crossed that I will be out of the red, and those little dots will be on a downward trend.