Weigh-in Wednesday: 1-14-15

I record my weight on Wednesdays, but I usually weigh myself two or three times during the week.  As a result, I usually know where I stand before my Wednesday weigh-in.  Today was the first time I weighed in all week, but I still knew it wasn’t going to be good news.  I could tell in other ways.

My first workout after getting home from Mobile was a core workout.  It’s only a 10 minute workout, and it’s not particularly difficult.  Nevertheless, I felt sluggish.  Yesterday, I did weight training for my afternoon workout.  For one exercise, I wore a weight belt to support my lower back.  The belt felt snug.  While I knew I wasn’t making progress on my weight, it was still disheartening when I weighed in this morning at 121.2.  That’s another small step backwards.  I’m three pounds above my goal and moving in the wrong direction.

I could blame my cold for reducing my activity level, but I still managed to run 50 miles last week.  That’s enough miles that I should be able to at least maintain my weight.  The problem is my eating habits.

I have a tendency to snack.  Actually I graze.  One small snack doesn’t do much damage, but if you keep eating another and another, it adds up.  Most of the damage was done Monday evening when I got home from Mobile.  That’s probably why I felt most sluggish Tuesday morning.

I maintain discipline when I’m home by keeping track of what I eat.  If I start eating too much, I realize it when I record the numbers in my spreadsheet.  That’s the wake-up call I need to remind me that I can’t afford to keep snacking.

When I’m traveling, I don’t keep track.  I may eat some big restaurant meals, but I don’t generally have food available the rest of the time.  That limits the damage.

The day I come home is a “travel day,” so I’m not keeping track.  As soon as I get home, I have the perfect storm.  There’s food in the house, and I don’t realize how much I’m eating.

That’s what happened on Monday.  I had some travel delays, so I didn’t get home until evening.  So far, I hadn’t eaten too much, but I had enough food to satisfy me.  After getting a few things done, I was craving a sweet snack.  We don’t usually have many sweets in the house, but I noticed that Deb had bought some cookies.  They were whole grain peanut butter crème cookies.  As cookies go, they were healthier than most, but it’s still something I didn’t really need.

Two cookies have 130 calories.  I think I started with three.  A while later I had two more ... then two more … I think you can see where this is going.  I probably ate about 15 by the time I went to bed.  I only had two at a time, so it never seemed over the top, but I was basically binging.  Eventually I noticed she also bought some lemon crème Oreo cookies.  I also had a few of those … and a few more.

I really need to control my binge snacking.  The only time I do that is on the day I get home from a trip.  This is why I usually keep track of my eating.  It only takes one evening to undo a week of watching my diet.