Piggin' Out

In a previous post, Losing Weight Without a Diet, I wrote about losing weight while eating whatever you want. In following this lifestyle, I have reached my goal weight and maintain it. I will sometimes test out the waters to see what causes me to gain weight and how much.

When we first started, we walked maybe two weeks in a row every day for about fifteen minutes. We even used a walking video to exercise early on, but for most of the 20 weeks I lost weight I did not exercise. It was just from learning to eat until I was comfortably full and eating much less sugar. At work Amy goes up and down stairs all day going from one office to another. She gets a good amount of exercise each work day. In 20 weeks I went from 185 lbs. to 150 lbs.

It's an easy thing to gain weight. Eat sugar and you will find you will gain about 2 to 3 pounds in a day depending on how much you eat. We buy Kashi cookies that have been sweetened with natural sugars such as honey, cane juice, etc., ice cream made with Splenda, dark chocolate bars and bite sized Hershey's dark chocolate candy. We do not eat the entire candy bar which is usually measured as one serving. That serving has a lot of sugar and you do not want to eat that in one sitting. We break it up into 4 grams of sugar bites (remember 4 grams of sugar is 1 teaspoon of sugar). We usually eat this with dinner so that the protein counteracts the sugar. When I eat these items correctly I do not gain weight. If I pig out on them, I will gain weight easily.

Each Friday, at work, a guy will bring a load of donuts that we eat during the day. Last Friday, I pigged out and had two glazed donuts, a six inch tuna fish sandwich from Subway for lunch and two more glazed donuts after lunch. When I got home, I pigged out on ice cream (a little less than half the container) and when Amy came home, she cooked us some beans. I crumbled crackers up in the beans and added ketchup. For those that don't know it, I eat ketchup on most any food :) I have no idea how many calories I ate last Friday but it was way more than I should have eaten. The next morning around 9 am, I weighed myself and had actually lost weight! How is that possible?? I did not exercise. I did not do anything different except eat more. If I kept it up I surely would gain weight but I actually lost weight. It still baffles my mind.

A day or two before last Friday, I had a Hostess cherry pie (tons of sugar) and ate normally the whole day. When I got on the scale the next morning I had gained nearly 3 pounds! The human body is very confusing. How can I gain weight one day eating somewhat good and pig out another day and lose weight??

Although I am at my goal weight, I still have a small fat belly. Although I have lost weight without exercising, exercise is very important. Without it, you become a lump of flab. I haven't started yet but I would like to get a pull up bar and a bicycle. I think with those two things I would have all I needed to stay fit. Amy wants to get a Zumba Wii game and start dancing. I love to dance and it is a great way to exercise and have fun at the same time. I think I might go try to get that game today :)

When you reach your goal weight, play around with eating poorly and see if you get odd weight fluctuations. Make sure you bounce back to the right way to eat though, or you will find yourself 10 lbs. heavier because good habits are easy to form, and bad habits are even easier to fall back into...