Stabilization CONSOSTAB (shared diary)

[dukandebut]

Well done on STS, Anja. Always a relief, isn't it!

It does sound as though the belly might have been due to bloating. I do get that sometimes - but hardly noticeable since being on the diet. Of course, that may change once I hit Stab - although it is a very good motivation for me not to go overboard on carbs like I used to.

Stop the snacking on leftovers. Done I think. The crusts went in the bin today! If I am going to have something like that I need to make it part of a meal - Ie have a slice of bread OR a bowl of rice pudding and account for it!

You don't have to finish your packed lunch / what's on your plate! Sometimes I still end up with largish portions (of dukan friendly food I have to add), yesterday I actually took a yoghurt and some cottage cheese back home as I was not hungry and had it at dinnertime instead.

These are both points with which I very strongly agree. They've definitely been brought home to me since I've been on Dukan. The great thing is that we're identifying our weaknesses and coming up with plans to combat them. That's a big and very helpful step forward.

 

[anjuschka]

Well done on STS, Anja. Always a relief, isn't it!

It does sound as though the belly might have been due to bloating. I do get that sometimes - but hardly noticeable since being on the diet.

thanks DD, yes definitely bloating / transition issues there, in my case so much more noticeable since slimming down. I drink a few glasses of water and I look pregnant

These are both points with which I very strongly agree. They've definitely been brought home to me since I've been on Dukan. The great thing is that we're identifying our weaknesses and coming up with plans to combat them. That's a big and very helpful step forward.

Yes I think now I'm finally at the 'sort out your life' part!! Dieting was easy compared to this! My mum has just started the diet a few weeks ago (lost 5kg so far) and now she keeps asking me 'ohh are you allowed to eat this and that now' and of course the answer is always 'yes' - in THEORY and in MODERATION!!

Have a nice evening I have to tidy up the kids mostly uneaten Pizzas (yes, it's Friday - I don't always feed them on junk ). Mmh a tiny piece of mini-pizza ..... Aaarrgh !

 

[dukandebut]

Step away from the pizza, Anja! ;-)

 

[anjuschka]

Thanks DD, in the end I had 1/8 of a mini pizza - ie a bite to check the taste and quality (different brand than usual) and felt no ill-effects

The rest of the weekend was good, I did no snacking and no nipping from Kid's plates or bowls. Days were normal conso-style and evening or extras were

Friday evening: venison stew with a glass of red wine. Couple of gingerbread hearts.
Sat: Low-fat healthy Cottage pie but very carby with lentils in the meat and a potato&sweet poatao mash. Yum but the kids yet again rejected my efforts... this is so frustrating. For dessert I allowed myself a Mini Magnum ice-cream.
Sunday again no straying all day, BUT: I did have a nice slice of fresh home made bread: spiced pumpkin with pumkin seeds, and spread it with a scraping of butter and a teaspoon of Honey. Bliss
Evening: Cauliflower and chicken curry (actually 'creamy vegetable Korma')with mini-naans (none for me).
Today: after school, with the girls, a home made blueberry flapjack (about the size and thickness of a 'Nice' biscuit). This evening home made 'baked beans': haricot beans with tomatoes and veg, sprinkled with cheese, some WM pasta, and one proper pork&caramelised onion sausage.
Coming home from choir tonight, a glass of Gluehwein (mulled wine), and two Gingerbread hearts.

I think as things go I've not done too badly. I am consciously blurring the gala > non-gala boundaries, as I need to get back to an everyday situation where my mind in not thinking 'diet' but 'normal week'. as soon as I think 'diet' - certain foods become so much more attractive, shouting for attention as they're 'forbidden'. So I'm having more carbs, or no carbs, and some 'full-fat' foods in moderation...

Tomorrow I am planning to have some pate on my sandwich instead of cheese, as I need to figure out how to allow small amounts of fatty 'deli meats' back into my routine!

 

[Maintainer]

I love it Anja! The whole feast or famine mentality we all had prior to dieting just had to go if we had a hope of stabilising properly. Taking out the gala meals yet having a regular "treat" (albeit pretty limited where a nice size biscuit flapjack is concerned) is an excellent way round this. Far too often did I count down the days/hours to my next gala, planning to the letter each thing I'd eat!

It's a shame your kids aren't enjoying what you're proposing always but, as a kid, nor would I have so I'm sure you're used to adapting family meals to suit the younger palate! Shame though I agree!

As for homemade baked beans, I've tried before but found them hopelessly bland (because of course the tinned ones I love are so sweet and artificially flavoured!!).

Do you weigh yourself at all midweek? Are you having a Thursday PP which will be whiter than white? (If so, to latter, might you weigh yourself Thurs am and Fri am to see the "loss"?).
x

 

[robinhood]

Just to add my ramblings for my first week of stab!

I had a 'normal' week, conso-type with a few extras. We spent the weekend with friends, so no cooking for me. However, Friday night was salad, pork chops and cauli, bread/cheese, so despite some butter being used (in the cooking), that was good. Saturday - Dukan breakfast - had taken brans with us, lunch - tomato salad, sausages (good ones!) with courgettes, bread and cheese, Saturday evening, chicken leg on the run (went and played bingo - a first for me apart from the school obligatory one, didn't win anything!) and a slice of cake while at the bingo with a cup of tea.

Sunday - pancakes for breakfast, lunch more chicken, with 1 small tbs rice and curry sauce (husband's making so Dukan-friendly), more bread and cheese and a small slice of galette des rois, evening had our OB porridge as it needed to be eaten and we weren't hungry for anything else.

So, lesson for us - friends seem to automatically eat much less carbs than we used to pre-diet (although they eat more bread than we do/did), salad/veg starter always (we do this too mainly) and usually veg with the main (although they have meat at both main meals which is too much for me each day).

All the excesses were walked/played off, I think, we were outside the whole weekend, had a couple of long walks and played with the kids (football and the like) too.

So today should be PV day but it's not happening. I've been coughing like an old person with a lifelong 60 a day habit, so have been guzzling down honey, thyme and lemon concoction. I will do PP day on Thursday though:sigh:.

 

[BREN]

Looking good Laura. Cannot wait to be where you are. Seems I loose and then lapse and gain some/all back.

Bren
X

 

[dukandebut]

Seems to be going well, Laura, with some lovely meals there (especially the sausages!)

Sorry to hear about your cough, though. I hadn't heard of using thyme, so might try that next time either of us is similarly afflicted.

Get better soon!

 

[Maintainer]

Sounding good Robin... except for the cough. So many of us are having a second round of whatever we had at the end of last year/beginning of this. Take care of you!

 

[robinhood]

It's awful all these illnesses, we're never (as a family) usually so badly affected. The odd 'well-meant' comment "it's probably because you were on a diet" goes over my head though (as I think it would have the opposite effect, less weight to carry around, better general fitness and I introduced carbs/cheese/daily veg/fruit before winter started and long before all these colds/coughs/bugs started). I do think the strange weather we've had for the last couple of months (very hot for the season, then very cold, repeat...) has to take the main part of responsibility, the classrooms are quite empty too, so definitely not just me getting more colds/coughs than usual. However, coughing less this morning (thankfully), but my insides feel raw after yesterday, another day and I'll be fighting fit again. Just hope that's the end of it for us all.

On another stabilisation note, don't want cheese - didn't have any yesterday and probably won't today. Just want cold, liquidy-type things or soup. So, have decided that cheese can be replaced by a 'normal' yogurt (ie with some fat, fruit and sugar) and that if I want custard from now on, it will be as the children have it (with ss milk and sugar). I'll stick to sweetner/skimmed milk in porridge and will also have sweetner and 0% yogurt if I'm having cheese that day (not having cheese every day is a good habit for me long-term, I think and I'll have sugary yogurt instead).

Once I've properly stabilised (in a couple of months maybe), I will ditch the sweetners, don't mind keeping skimmed milk/0% dairy most of the time though, it tastes less creamy so I actually prefer it!

 

[Maintainer]

I'm with you on that Robin. I've not caught a cold in years, so to have two in a month is ridiculous and far more likely to be linked to the sharp temperature swings we are experiencing.

Even now it feels warm, and I'm in a tshirt! Ridiculous!

Mind you don't start losing weight again though Robin... how about some grated cheese on/in your soup... and some bread floating around in it. Yum!

 

[anjuschka]

Robin, hope you get better soon! You can probably pack some good nutritious things into the soup - as Jo suggested!

Now I'm rarely ill and I have to say it's been no different this year. the only thing I have noticed is that my joints are much much better (rheumatoid arthritis, congenital in the fingers, so not weight-related stress) , I've forgotten that I usually have a problem with them in the winter! Now this could have a number of explanations: the additional multivits, the additional protein (going down now though) or 'good' fats, I do eat more fatty/smoked fish than I used to.

 

[anjuschka]

Right now to the food this week. Jo invited lots more comments

I love it Anja! The whole feast or famine mentality we all had prior to dieting just had to go if we had a hope of stabilising properly. Taking out the gala meals yet having a regular "treat" (albeit pretty limited where a nice size biscuit flapjack is concerned) is an excellent way round this. Far too often did I count down the days/hours to my next gala, planning to the letter each thing I'd eat!

Yes it seems to be working for now, I am still, as well as I can, tracking the cals and yesterday, despite having several chocolates and a couple of biscuits, I managed to clock up in the region of 2000 cals which is what I've stayed on/just under all week since starting the counting (and I intend to stop soon). Unless I missed something major off yesterday. I didn't even try to piece together what I ate on Monday, have clean forgotten the details...
These are NOT net cals but total consumption, any activity I might do comes off that figure again.

It's a shame your kids aren't enjoying what you're proposing always but, as a kid, nor would I have so I'm sure you're used to adapting family meals to suit the younger palate! Shame though I agree!

As for homemade baked beans, I've tried before but found them hopelessly bland (because of course the tinned ones I love are so sweet and artificially flavoured!!).

Yes the kids: what frustrates me is they will clean their plates of whatever it is one day and then refuse to eat it the next time. Anything: rice, chilli (mild and usually a favourite), milk curry, pasta sauce. I do consider their tastes and there are things I won't even challenge them with if they have at least tried it once - they just get an alternative Veg (peas etc) if we're having red cabbage or kale for example ;-). And of course DD2 always eats EVERYTHING at nursery, I've seen the food, it's not babyish either.

I am just trying NOT to always resort to the tried and tested favourites when it comes to feed then as that would be a recipe for disaster in the long term! But they've also rejected Pizza and chicken nuggets in the past.

Baked beans: used the wrong name: 'cowboy beans': haricot beans, tomatoes, celery, carrots, seasoning (inc Worcestershire sauce). Yes not comparable to the sweet sauce of baked beans from a tin.

Do you weigh yourself at all midweek? Are you having a Thursday PP which will be whiter than white? (If so, to latter, might you weigh yourself Thurs am and Fri am to see the "loss"?).
x

Definitely no interim weighing at the moment!
Jo are you asking me to do so? I think I'd prefer not to but might try it once - just for you !

Thursdays: I try, but not too hard. Last week I had some toffee muffins already made so stuck with them but must keep my egg yolks down a bit! For tomorrow I have a portion of hot-smoked salmon lined up, I think that adds a bit of colour into my white day! Last week was pretty white (herring, chicken) and 'only' clocked up 1200 cal, but with a fair amount of dairy and several eggs and 1/2 a muller light (in the muffins)

Anyway food coming up today: home made fish cakes! They are to die for, I made a huge batch at the weekend and they are in the freezer. They are not exactly dukan-friendly but healthy low-fat. I'll bake them in the oven I think, and not brush then with oil but give them a squirt or two of fry-lite spray.
With those I will have to root around the fridge to find some veg, it's shopping day and we've nearly run out - at least 'lunchable' veg. Plus potatoes for everyone else, I'm already having enough in the fish cake! It was a potato-heavy week this week...

Coming up next week: Valentines meal and my birthday. One 'grown up meal for two': I have planned a gooey chocolate pud to make (with Green&Black chocolate), need to decide on the main, it might be some cut of meat I haven't had yet like pork or lamb chops. My birthday: a family meal for all with a nice Quiche, and of course I'll have to bake a cake for them to decorate for me... and I think as far as the kids are concerned it will have to be a chocolate cake...

And definitely no Thursday weigh-in next week - Friday might be bad enough!

 

[robinhood]

I have scotch broth for tonight with extra barley. Due to the amount of sugar-free sweets and mugs of honey/lemon I've got through in the last couple of days, I would be surprised to have lost (but am PPing tomorrow after a food-laden weekend, so we'll see - am not bothered either way on weight, but want to keep good habits going as it would be too easy to let the PP/PV day slide - had promised myself I would 'PV-with-low-carb-veg-Thursday' on weeks without excesses and PP Thursday if away for the weekend, so this week it is the latter).

Oh, can identify with children who go off things overnight. So annoying - my daughter seems fussiest whereas she used to eat anything and everything in huge quantities - now her appetite is sparrow-like unless it's cake/biscuits/sweets/chocolate on offer - not good.

 

[Maintainer]

Anja - I wouldn't ask you to do that if you thought for a second that it might mess with your head... so please only do it if you're feeling particularly zen!

oooh a birthday... which day Anja? how few candles?

 

[dukandebut]

Laura - I got so sick of people telling me that the reason why I caught 3 colds within such a short space of time was because of my diet. (Two of the colds actually started before I began Dukanning!)

Take care of yourself. Hope you're feeling very much better soon.

Anja - Your planned Valentine and birthday meals sound lovely, particularly the G&B choc pud! And I also just wanted to wish you happy birthday in advance!

 

[anjuschka]

Right, time to check into the STAB diary. I have indeed STS - SORT OF, but with a definite up trend. but I feel really slim today and my belt confirms this so I'm not bothered. especially for Jo:
yesterday: 63.6 kg
today: 63.1 kg
which really is just water loss I think, and clearly up on the 62.7 last week (or was it 62.9?). I was strict and clocked up under 1000 cal, and drank over 2l of water plus about 4 cups of coffee (decaf) and tea / green tea:
Yesterday's PP Thursday:
B: Pancake: 1 egg, egg white, 1.5Tb oatbran, some yoghurt. With 3 TB sweetened vanilla fromfrais YUM
S: muffins made with (total) 1tb each oat and wheat bran, 2 egg white, 1tb yoghurt.
L: 125gr hot smoked Salmon, 150gr cottage cheese with coarse mustard. diet jelly (FF/SF, 10cal)
S: WW toffee yoghurt
D: Omelette: 1 egg 1 egg white, 150gr peeled prawns, 150gr cottage cheese. Yoghurt with cinnamon.
S: diet lemonade

No hunger pangs, except just before dinner. Obviously I could have gone much lower had I not had the Salmon, but there needs to be a bit of enjoyment in the food still...

I think the PP does not exactly pull down the weight ON THE DAY, except the water weight, but in general it balances out the nutrition of the day before or after...

Now my Wednesday before was good in general, but I did have a slice of blueberry Tart with custard. And the chocolates the day before so I know where the 'gain' comes from!

This week is going to be a bit more feast/famine: Tonight definitely a non-dukan meal with pork loins, I marinated the meat this morning and some of it had gentle fat marbling that I could not trim off without throwing away half the meat...
Tomorrow I should manage quite light (crusted Salmon), if I can stay off the snacks. (note to self - bake another batch of oatbran biscuits!!)
Sunday a nice meal of stuffed chicken breasts (dukan friendly) with Veg and an indulgent home made chocolate pud ('Valetines meal)
then back on normal healthy eating regime with small carbs (though I could drop some depending on how I feel), till Wed, my birthday when I'm having a nice quiche with the whole family. And chocolate cake of course. My kids would not accept anything else as a birthday cake, I was looking as some nice fruit or cheese cakes (non-diet though) but DH reminded me they would not 'look' like birthday cakes to the kids.

My birthday last year was a 'biggie' so of course now we start counting down again so I'm 39 (forever). It kind of was reaching the 40 last year that finally tightened my resolve to diet and lose those extra 2 stone I had been carrying round with me since about teenage! A case of 'now or never'.

Oh and I have dug out and inflated my exercise ball, the kids love it, shame it's so big. I am now doing my core exercises in the evening - not huge amounts yet, especially the abdominal crunches I can only manage about 10 in one go! See here:
YouTube - 3 Core Stability Ball Exercises
But at least I've started! The strength (and tone) in my arms and legs is better because of the Yoga.

Right, better get some work done now, have a nice weekend everyone!

 

[jaqys]

Good to hear its going well Anja, if you're feeling slim thats most the battle.

 

[anjuschka]

Oh PS forgot to mention:

I am stopping the food/calorie logging again. I just wanted to do it for a week as a reference point and what it has shown:
'Healthy eating' with conso-size portions of carbs every day results in a balanced nutritional intake with scope for extras every day, but only little ones. Or one to two big extras a week - things like 'full fat' meals etc. Protein and fibre are above RDA (as is cholesterol as soon as you eat more than one egg yolk, or oily fish), fat, sugar and sodium are below.
PP day can be very low calorie wise, and 50% of calories comes from protein.

And I guess you users of myfitnesspal know all this to a T! I don't even know the average calories etc of most food stuffs but I do know what's 'allowed' under dukan = reasonably safe to eat / eat in allocated portions!

 

[dukandebut]

This is so interesting, Anja. I'm so scared of STAB that I'm relying on you and Laura to scout it out for me!

When you say "conso-sized portions of carbs", do you mean the 8oz cooked version, please?