The Diet/Self-Improvement Thread

[egerandi]

With all that moving I'm sure you got plenty of exercise

BTW, noodles. Have you heard of the shirataki noodles? They look and for the most part taste like real noodles (but you have to carefully rinse and prepare), and they have 0 or very low calories!
Here is one site that sells them: http://www.miraclenoodle.com/index-2.html
I only use them for asian-inspired cooking, but one day I may try mixing with other sauces. Anyone else?

[karen]

I tried them once! What's better than calorie-free pasta? But I think I may have done something wrong. I remember rinsing and rinsing and then I dunked them in boiling water to heat them up, but they smelled the same as when they came out of the package (not good). Maybe it was the brand? Mine came from the Asian grocery store, and the package was pretty much all in Japanese.

[tizzylou]

I tried them too, and Karen my experience was the same as yours, bad smell when out of package and no better after they had been rinsed and cooked. Let's just say that they
didn't impress me calorie free or not. I think I'll just make my carb choice's wisely and limit the amount I consume. By the way I love Soba noodles.

[Ghost]

Hi all

It's been three weeks so I got weighed today and I've lost a whopping 3kg (6.61lb - almost half a stone) I'm soooooooo chuffed with myself.

I haven't had a chance to check out curves yet but when I do I'll let you know what its like.

[Rhys]

Ghost, that's great! So happy to see everyone doing so well in this thread, especially you cos you've been doing this for so long. You've come so far, and that's just...marvellous!

[egerandi]

Oh, wow, 3ks! Good job, looks like whatever you're doing is working great

[karen]

Wow! That's wonderful!!! I think I'm down a little bit more- but nothing like your impressive results. Honestly, it's been what 4 months since DH and I started- it comes and goes- good one day, eating greasy Chinese the next. I don't know how you manage to keep it up- you really are an inspiration.

[egerandi]

Oh, the dreaded plateau! After marching on and loosing about 8lbs AND going under 130, even just a little but (woohoo, I didn't think it would ever happen), I'm afraid I reached the wall

I'm already doing most of what I'm seeing as advice: eating smaller snacks throughout the day, drink a ton of water (and caffeine to get rid of it), eating a bit more one day and a little less the other, but after steady losing at least a pound a week, I only weighed in half a pound less last time, with the same calorie intake as before. Bummer. I guess my body is getting used to reduced diet, even though I'm not starving myself at all, and I do pig out from time to time (Japanese BBQ with 11 rounds of sake shots, anyone? ).

I wanted to wait a bit with the toning and weight exercises until I get to my target number, which was 10% of my starting weight, because I know muscles mean more weight. I guess I'll have to start building those muscles in order to speed up the metabolism again. Meh.

Any suggestions, ladies?

[karen]

Maybe take your measurements. The scale isn't going to fall, but you'll get thinner- so you can still see progress. As for building muscle?? For ab muscles I do this one exercise where you lay down flat, and pick your feet 2 inches off the floor then hold for a few seconds. It hurts but tones the area below your belly button, and it's good for the lower back. My skinny friends do yoga and that really seems to be working for them. I do squats for my legs, but I'm a weakling when it comes to arm exercises.

[Ghost]

thanks all for your comments - really put a smile on my face.

Defiantly take measurements egerandi. When I first started to diet the weight just dropped off, then 3 months later I started to exercise. For the first month it was great then I'd get on the scale and they showed that I either hadn't lost or worst gain!!!!! But you could see I was losing so I started to measure, but unfortunately I haven’t done that in a while – must start again as the scale are going up and down again lol.

A great ab exercise is to lie down, do a sit up (only go up as far as you can go), hole while you take one arm and reach for one knee, then do the other arm, then put the first arm behind your head again, then the other, then lie back down. I only do six of these on my exercising DVD and it's one is my favs of all the sit-ups, it really makes you work your tummy muscle.

I do recommend that with any diet you exercise as well. I do 30 mins after work three times a week, then the whole DVD (1hr and 10min) on sat and Sun. Granted I don't do this every weekend, once every 3 weeks I'll take one of those days off (usually when I go shopping in town).

But the next 3 weeks won't be as good as this time. I'm shopping this sat at my local town centre with mum and little sis (and I won't listen to her again when buying make up!!!), then shopping the weekend after that with mum, sis and aunty in Cheltenham, then the week after that it's off to Cardiff for a BIG shopping trip with a friend of mine. I’ve been saving for months and I’ll be going to a MAC shop for the first time (hope I don’t spend too much). So my weekend exercises will be down to just one day, but traipsing all over shopping centres for 3 or more hours is not only good exercising but therapeutic too!!! Then next Sat (after shopping of course) it's my two-month pizza treat. One large pizza with prawns, chicken, pineapple and ham (yummers) and of course we're be watching Twilight which comes out on DVD on Monday - YAY. Hope I can wait till next Sat to watch it

So my weigh in won't be great next time, but I'll have a good time in between