For people that want to record what they are eating (to help be strict!)

[atomic sagebrush]

OotB - the biggest trick to skipping breakfast for me is

1) coffee, and
2) keeping busy

I'm usually out and about with my boys in the mornings, so I don't have time to think about food. The few times I've stayed home for the morning with ds3 while my older boys were at school, I SUFFERED. Sitting at my computer gave me oodles of time to think about the food I could be eating if I weren't on this diet.

Good luck with weaning yourself off breakfast. I find it to be the easiest part of this diet - it's the no snacking rule that I have the most trouble with (and I do break the rule and snack in the evening - I suppose I should just call it my 3rd meal since without it I'd be eating only 800 calories a day and would literally waste away).

GREAT ADVICE!!!! I also struggled mightily with skipping breakfast when I was swaying pink (it didn't help that I was the only one doing it then and a lot of people thought I was kinda nuts LOL) and I found sitting at the computer just aggravated it.

PS - Mocha, keep in mind that it's FINE to eat 3 meals, I just don't want people eating every 15 minutes throughout the whole day.

[atomic sagebrush]

Swish - what a yummy sounding meal you had! You deserve a cheat day after all the hell you went through with your late O!

Zanacal - it sounds like weight sways more than time of year. Besides, we all live in different countries with different seasons. I'm sure most of these stats were made for the U.S., and you don't really have the same extreme heat/extreme cold dichotomy we have in many parts of North America (correct me if I'm wrong - I've never lived int he UK, though I've visited many times).

Here's my day:

Breakfast: coffee
Lunch: 1 slice of Weight Watcher's bread with a tiny bit of low fat peanut butter, strawberries
Supper: rice pasta with zucchini, leeks and parmesan, rice milk, low fat vanilla frozen yogurt
Snack: 30g of cheese curd (I was good today and kept to one serving, so stayed within the guidelines!), cranberry & vodka (I needed to have some extra calories anyway, and I'm far enough away from conception that I thought I deserved a little alcohol - I abstained completely for the past 3 weeks), strawberries

Calories: 1396
Protein: 37g
Sodium: 682mg

I went out today to get some new clothes because nothing fits me anymore. Turns out I've gone from a Size 6 to a Size 2! I definitely don't want to lose much more weight. How many calories do you think I should keep to so I don't gain weight but I also don't lose much more. I've been averaging 1200-1300 and thought maybe I should aim for something closer to 1400-1500? Thoughts?

Re seasons - actually the stats are from Italy and I hope that the researchers branch out and do further studies. Chacha was brave and wrote to the researcher and I wish I was brave enough to do that!!!

I ~suspect~ that the seasons may sway MORE strongly in parts of the world with extreme cold and well-defined seasons. Rem that the reasons why seasons may sway are because the more fragile baby boys are more likely to survive when born in the spring when food is plentiful and weather is warm, rather than the winter when food is scarce and temps are bad so it would seem the mechanism would be even stronger in colder climes.

Re calories - Yes I def. think you should be getting more calories but I do also think at some point you're going to stabilize and stop losing.

[zanacal]

I would love to live in a country where the seasons are more defined - we don't really get extremities here, which for this purpose sounds like a good thing!

[Mochagirl]

Where I live it's the land of extremes. We go from complaining all winter about -40 degree Celsius windchills to moaning about summer days with 40 degree humidex. There are only about 10 days a year when Canadians aren't complaining about the weather .

That being said, I love our distinct 4 seasons and love something about each and every one of them!

[Mochagirl]

Re calories - Yes I def. think you should be getting more calories but I do also think at some point you're going to stabilize and stop losing.

Thanks Atomic. I guess my worry is that I know I don't get enough calories to begin with, so I fear I'm doing serious damage to my body now that I'm on my 3rd month on the diet. I'm really, really trying to add calories, but I find it a huge hurdle! I just bought a ton of girl friendly candy yesterday - Jelly Belly jelly beans, Mike & Ikes, Sour Patch Kids - to see if that will help. It seems everything I think of either has too much sodium or protein in it or is such a tiny source of calories (like most of the fruit I eat) that I'd have to eat a ton of it to make a difference (I'm already eating about 3 cups of strawberries a day as it is!). What about cranberry juice? It must have a lot of calories per glass...should I start drinking it or does it have too many nutrients in it?

[atomic sagebrush]

No, that's a good idea, try adding a cup of cran juice (NOT the pure juice, get the "bad" one, the cocktail,with corn syrup in it LOL!!) That's like 150 cals right there if my notes are correct.

Normally I would tell people to try and avoid it due to the Vit. C BUT you have to eat something.

[tweedledeedum]

I find that very interesting about the seasons. I'm a fellow Canadian with extreme weather shifts so hopefully that is in my favour. The days when we TTC this month were some of the hottest of the year so far here.

I spent the day working in the yard doing manual lifting and laying grass so was super hungry by supper time.

MidMorning - yogurt cup
Lunch - 3 rice cakes, glass skim milk, bite of samoosa
Supper - (at restaurant) - 1/4 portion of penne with sauce, ice cream,

[DoulaMama]

Where I live it's the land of extremes. We go from complaining all winter about -40 degree Celsius windchills to moaning about summer days with 40 degree humidex. There are only about 10 days a year when Canadians aren't complaining about the weather .

That being said, I love our distinct 4 seasons and love something about each and every one of them!

HAHAHA! So true! We can get down to around -37C without windchill but our summers suck here! It's not been more than 27C this year. My garden suffers every year I actually hate Alberta winters with a passion. I came from Vancouver originally, lived in the Okanagan for 10 years and then came to Alberta....I've been spoiled and really want to move back to the coast. I really hope to end up in Victoria in the next 5 years. Anyway, I don't think I'm ready for a Winter baby...March was terrible for me with a newborn and I really don't think I could handle it any earlier in the year....I'm just going to hope that the summer heat(the little amount that we get here) kills off those boy sperm

[DoulaMama]

Ok Girls....I started today.

Where's the scared stiff smiley?

[zanacal]

Don't be scared DM, it's only food

So here's me today:

Breakfast/Mid-morning: Coffee
Lunch: Vegeburger (the type with mushed up vegetables and breadcrumbs on the outside) and a few roast potatoes. Fruit crumble and cream for pudding! I took a few frozen raspberries, a couple of nectarines and some strawberries and cooked them with sweetener. I made a crumble topping from flour, sugar and butter but I only made 1/2 the usual quantity so it was sprinkled in it rather than drowned in it. It was really good!
Dinner: Bagel with peanut butter then a couple of boiled sweets.
Snack: 2 white chocolate fingers.