Sarah's Target & 10K Mission

Hello everyone!

I've just joined SW (online) for the first time and, following a huge supermarket trolley dash for the world's supply of fruit and veg yesterday, I've kicked off my regime today!

I've dabbled in WW before and tried other calorie counting diets etc, but apart from SlimFast (on which I lost 2 1/2st in 3 months back when I was at uni), nothing has really worked for me. My lovely boyfriend and I are going to Cuba on holiday at the end of September and by then I would love to shift 2 stone, which I have worked out to be 1.5lbs a week. I'm really hoping that SW, combined with some exercise, can deliver that.

I'm currently 12st 5lbs and I desperately want to get to around the 10st mark, which is about right for my height (5' 4") and would make me a very happy small size 12.

I've never really posted on a forum before, but I'm hoping that keeping a food diary will help to keep me on the straight and narrow and not succumb to the evil temptation of red wine!

What I'm finding a bit confusing is this green day/red day malarkey (this is fundamental to the plan, I know!) - perhaps I'm just being a bit blonde about it all, or overcomplicating!

Anyway, so far today I've had/am planning:

Breakfast - raspberries, blueberries and 0.1% yoghurt (2syns)
Lunch - salmon salad with fat free dressing
Dinner - turkey breast with ratatouille
Snacks - banana and I might treat myself to 2 pink wafers (4syns)!

As a newbie, I'm still trying to get my head around when I can have what (e.g. today is a red day so could I have had cereal for breakfast?). I've heard mixed reviews of ExtraEasy so I'm hoping to stick to Red/Green for a while and see how I get on with that. I'd also love to hear from anyone about what the best snacks are - fruit, of course, and I've got plenty of that in the house but I travel with work quite a lot and fruit tends to get squashed so something easy I could chuck in my bag would be ideal!

Anyway, thanks for taking the time to read my random waffle! And please wish me luck!

Best wishes
Sarah x

So yesterday was a good day! I went out and brought myself some shiny new electronic scales so there's no peering down at the old ones trying to work out where the needle is sitting!

I must admit I was peckish in the evening - I don't think I ate enough as I didn't get 'round to my pink wafers so only had 2 of my syns. I need to do a better shop this weekend so I've got plenty of bits and bobs to snack on throughout the day. I'm working really hard on drinking more water too. Once I get in the habit, drinking 1.5 litres a day is fine, but I've got to get back into the habit first!

My boyfriend is away for a lad's night on Saturday so I'm hoping to get lots of healthy food shopping done and then get some serious exercise in! I've just brought The Biggest Loser for the XBox Kinect which is supposed to be really good. It will be interesting to see! I'd go out for a jog but if the weather this week is anything to go by, I don't think I'm going to want to do that! With my last job, the office was opposite a gym, which was amazing! But I left for a new job in October which is really busy and stressful and in the middle of nowhere! I'm getting to the office at 7.30am, working through lunch and then leaving at 5.30, by which point I'm shattered! I'm hoping it will calm down soon so I can do some exercise in the evenings. I know lack of time is a rubbish excuse, but I'm really struggling at the moment!

Having said that, today I've got a day of very few meetings and my boss is away so I'm having a bit of sneaky time on the forum and doing some goal planning! I haven't got enough posts to put this in my signature, but I think I need to print it out and pin it in a few places around the house to remind me of where I want to get to!

Goal 1 - Into 11s!
Goal 2 - Lose 1/2st
Goal 3 - Lose 1st
Goal 4 - Club 10
Goal 5 - Into 10s!
Goal 6 - Healthy BMI
Goal 7 - Lose 2st
Goal 8 - 10st!!

I've got a few things coming up which I'm hoping to use to motivate me on my quest to be a skinny minnie! I'm wondering how much I can lose by:
My friend Sara's birthday weekend in 2 weeks?
A work trip to South Africa trip in 6 weeks?
Our amazing Cuba holiday in 18 weeks? I'm really hoping I can get to my 2 stone lost target by Cuba - I would feel amazing with a tan and some lovely new swimwear if I can shift the weight! MUST. STICK. AT. IT!

Anyway, today's food is looking like this:

B - Fat free yoghurt with raspberries
L - salmon salad with fat free dressing and an Alpen Light bar (1/2 HEXB)
D - pork fillet with sweet potato wedges and lots of green veg
HEXA - milk in tea
Snacks - banana, blueberries, Alpen Light bar (1/2 HEXB)

I should probably get back to work now!

S x

Hi. To answer your question about cereal you can have that on any day as you have to use it as a HEb or syns. On todays you only have 1 HEb and 1 HEa, make sure you have 2 b's on red and green and either 1 or 2 a's as well. And make sure you have at least 5 syns, with you just starting I would say aim for at least 10 a day, then if you start to struggle nearer to target you have something to reduce down I do it online too, its annoying sometimes as it doesn't always tell you everything, but you'll get your head around it in the end

Hi Ally,

Thanks for the advice - that's really helpful.

I was rather hoping if I kept the syns low for the first couple of weeks, it would give me a real kickstart in terms of pounds lost. But the more I read of the forum, it seems that you're definitely right and I should have more. It's a weird thing to get your head around - that you can eat more than you ever have done and lose weight! I think it's going to take my brain a while to understand that!!

It takes everyone a while to start with But with the syns most people find if they are on low syns they won't lose as much as when they have the full amount. I think most people are baffled as to how you manage to lose weight with the amount you eat, but in reality you are eating the right amount of calories but on good food, the HE's provide balance with calcium and fibre and then your body still needs some fat and "bad stuff" and you also need treats so then the syns come in. it does all fit together when you think about it

Yeah, when you think of it that way, it does all make sense! I'm glad it's nearly lunchtime as I'm getting peckish!

Any tips for the best low-syn treats? What are your favourites?

I'm a nightmare for red wine so it'll be good if I can treat myself with a small glass of that. I'm trying not to drink during the week, but that hopefully means I can have a couple of glasses at the weekend. x

I'm hungry constantly at the moment, i'm always glad when 1pm comes round and I can eat lunch.

Anything that involves chocolate at the moment. Curly Wurly 6, Chomp 5.5, freddo 5. Depends what you prefer, french fries crisps are 4.5 so they're good. I've got a think for eating humbugs during the day too, 1.5 each.

If you wanted you could save your syns from in the week so you can have more wine at the weekend, so you could maybe use 5 a day in the week then use your other 80 at the weekend, if you wanted to drink more. Its up to you if you want to use 15 syns a day or work them weekly. A lot of people save there syns from in the week so they can go for a meal at weekend, I prefer to use 15 a day though.

Fab advice, thank you Ally!

I'm definitely a bit of a chocoholic too! I read about someone who puts a square or two of dark chocolate into a mug of hot milk with some low calorie sweetener to help get that chocolate fix - that's definitely something I'm going to try!

I've not tried that but I have heard its nice. Options hot chocolate is good for a quick chocolate fix too

Grr...really cross with myself! Biscuits just got passed around in the office and I had one. Admittedly they were little ginger ones which were only 24 calories - I'm hoping that's about 1.5syns so won't mess anything up too much!

I really need to practice a "no thank you" mantra in the office or this is not going to work!

They will be 1 or definitely 1.5 at most, they won't be any more

Feeling very proud of myself! Just made 24 vanilla cupcakes, 750g of buttercream and 50 sugar paste butterflies and I managed to resist it all! I tried the tiniest smidgen to check taste and consistency but wasn't in the least bit tempted to lick the bowl like I usually would have done!

I feel like I've passed a mini test!

What a gorgeous day! Really looking forward to catching up with an old friend I haven't seem for 8 years over lunch! Have warned her I'm on SW so she's promised to pick a suitable venue! Haven't used many syns yet this week so hopefully I can make it through the weekend on track.

I'm planning smoked salmon and scrambled eggs and mushrooms for breakfast. Then a banana mid morning so I'm not starving when I see Julie!

Love weekends!!

Lovely day today! Think I maxed out the syns for the first time, but catching up with a friend after 8 years was worth it I think.

B - smoked salmon, scrambled eggs, mushrooms in fry light and a banana.
L - grilled chicken breast with Serrano ham and mozerella but I didn't eat most of the toppings! With salad, grilled tomatoes and about 7 chips! Guessing that's my 15 syns! Followed by Starbucks skinny caramel macchiato (milk = HEXA)
D - chicken breast and salad followed by weetabix mini choc (HEXB)
Snacks - fat free yoghurt with raspberries, blackberries and blueberries

Lots of brisk walking today too so hopefully that counteracted it a bit and I'm planning a Wii Zumba workout in the morning too! Sunday lunch out for my parents' wedding anniversary tomorrow so need to counteract the challenge ahead!

Argh! Fallen off the wagon today! Lovely lunch out for parents anniversary/Nan's 91st birthday!

So here goes:

B- fat free yoghurt, fruit, all bran golden crunch (hexb). Coffee (milk = hexa)
L - poached and smoked salmon with salad. Roast beef, 3 roast spuds and loads of veg. Mini apple crumble.
Snacks - 1 choc truffle and a cupcake.

Naughty I know but the whole family hardly ever get together so I didn't want to be left out!

Back on it like sonic tomorrow!

Feeling motivated today - especially because it's sunny again! Drawing a line in the sand after my weekend of slight excess and today is all about the plan! I had a cheeky mid-week weigh in on Saturday morning and was pleased with what the scales said so I'm going to do everything I can today and tomorrow to ensure I can keep at that point!

Green day today, so:

B - low fat yoghurt with raspberries and blackberries plus Alpen light bar (1/2 HEXB)
L - couscous with 1 mini tub of extra light Philly stirred through plus tomatoes, cucumber, celery, radishes, beetroot and spring onions (1/2 HEXA)
D - pasta bake with tonnes of veg (yet to be bought but will be aubergine, courgette, peppers, tomatoes, spinach, tomatoes and mushrooms) with a bit of cheese on the top (1/2 HEXA plus Syns TBC once I've brought the cheese - probably light mozerella)
S - banana, Alpen light bar (1/2 HEXB)
Aiming to minimise Syns today to balance out yesterday!

Here goes...!

Another thing I need to focus on is drinking more water. Normally I drink about a litre a day and have been trying to have 1.5 per day since I kicked off my SW adventure last week. Although one of my wisom teeth seems to be moving at the moment, which is really painful, so I'm struggling with cold drinks as they seem to make it worse. Must get some fruit tea bags at lunchtime so I can drink more hot drinks instead. Black Earl Grey until then...

Note to self: stirring extra light Philly through couscous makes the couscous all soft and clumpy and not very nice! Yuck!

Not sure what to do about lunch now - could pop to Waitrose near my office but need to plan what to buy first so I'm not tempted by anything silly!

It's hammering down with rain and I'm about to go into yet another meeting so I couldn't escape the office for alternative lunch. Instead I've got a banana, some raspberries and a pink wafer (2 syns). Not quite what I had planned, but sometimes you just have to roll with it!