The blog in which I am boring.

Okay, so we all know I'm doing this losing weight thing.


I like to think it's not a diet, particularly since I'm now eating more than I have in years (though my grocery bill does not care for that at all).  But, the weight is coming off all the same.  I have, however, found a nemesis in this weight loss game.  It's not even a "real" nemesis, but a temporary irritant in my way, but I suspect that if I'm EVER going to get down to the weight I like, it will be a perpetual thorn in my side, and I'll have to deal with it.  This stupid little thing makes the scale lie.  There is a certain amount of it that's acceptable, of course, but any much more than that and the scale reacts like you're ballooning.  It's crazymaking.  And it's not like you can avoid it.  It's everywhere.  Oddly, this thorn?  Not fat.  I don't have too much trouble with fat.  It's sodium.  Let me illustrate for you two things.  1) how overweight I am, and 2) how much of an impact sodium has on the scale.


I weigh in daily.  My "real" weight, which is to say, the weight I am if I'm within my sodium goals, will become fairly apparent in the next moment.  I use the measurement of a daily weigh in to get a trend, so I know roughly whether I'm losing or gaining over time (instead of the daily/weekly fluctuations that are pretty normal). 


Anyhow.


In this example, I had my sodium (versus RDA) look like this:

Sunday: over by 200
Monday: over by 1900 
Tuesday: under by 130
Wednesday: over by 2100
Thursday: over by 770

Correspondingly, my weight did this:
Monday: 209.8
Tuesday: 211.0
Wednesday: 209.4
Thursday: 210.6
Friday: 208.6


Apparently, there is a set threshold for how "over" in sodium I can be before I start massively retaining water.  I'm not sure how to combat that retention save for cutting sodium, but that's not a simple proposition.  In theory, it is - just don't put so much salt on things, right?  I haven't used my salt shaker (in cooking OR in serving myself) in very nearly a month.  And I'm STILL battling sodium intake.  I found out yesterday, while trying to plan a snack that would be filling, keep my calories up, AND keep me low in sodium that CELERY is chock full of it.  One stalk of celery has eight calories.  But it also has FIFTY mg of sodium in it.  How is this POSSIBLE?  How can what is effectively solid, greenish water have THAT MUCH sodium in it?!?  I mean, really!  This is insanity!  Today, I'm through my first two (really, likely three) meals of the day, and I'm already well ahead of what my sodium intake should be.  But, I didn't count on the tortilla my taco went in having more sodium than the SPICY MEAT did.  And not by a small margin, either.  WHAT IS UP WITH THIS?!?!  I will, eventually, find a way to make the foods I like at home so that I won't have to worry about this, but even still.  THE CELERY!  This is craziness, and it just keeps getting more and more insane the more I look at it.  


Even more, I wonder about the low income folks.  People are all about cutting assistance benefits left, right and center.  If there's a problem, social assistance is usually one of the first things on the table to cut.  It costs a fair bit of money to make bread in the house, not to mention time.  I'd imagine that other things are pretty much the same.  Anything truly healthy in the store costs a pretty penny, and making it at home, while cheaper, is not so significantly cheaper as to make it worthwhile if you're on a very limited budget.  However, if you go to the store, what IS cheap?  Macaroni and cheese.  Ramen noodles.  Billions of things that are high fat, low nutrient, and chock full of sodium.  The people who're living this diet gain weight.  How can you not when you're eating like this?  But then people look at it and think, 'obviously they're not starving, look how fat they are!  They obviously have too much in benefits if they're eating that much.'  And so the benefits get cut again.  And the problem gets worse.  And then we add in the fat shaming, and the direction that society is taking for charging the overweight for double simply because of their weight (see airline seats), and...  The poor get poorer, and the less they have, the more they have to make do with the very foods making them fat, which makes society in general convinced they're getting HUGE benefits, which are summarily cut again, and...  It's a horrifying proposition.  I knew there was a big connection.  I didn't realize that my own nemesis in all this played such a large part.


And bringing sodium down to 2500mg/day?  Not as easy as it sounds.  Nothing ever is, is it?

Ups and Downs

The good news is, I'm now down 11 pounds - which means I made my first mini-goal of a 10 pound loss by 3/31.  Since I had my period at the time (and still do, but I'm losing the water weight by the second), and was .2 pounds from goal when silly ol' AF decided to drop in with three pounds of water baggage...  I'm counting it.  HOORAY!!  The 'reward' for my mini-goal?  I'm going to dye my hair.  BLUE.  Because I can, and before I hit the age bracket where it's constant blue-haired-old-lady jokes.  It's going to wait until I can find a decent kool-aid dyeing tutorial, though.  I don't want to permanently dye it, as that would require bleaching the hell out of my hair, and I do what I can to keep my hair chemical-free.  I use a henna dye, I don't bleach.. I want my hair to be strong and healthy.  Of course, it's also gray and horrifyingly end-split, but hey.  Only so much that can be handled at a time.

The bad news is that we're eating for crap today.  Probably tomorrow too.  Possibly longer than that.  Why?  I don't have the energy to get up and cook, or to put together healthy snacks every two hours.  Obviously, the frequent eating thing is working for me, but today...  I am SICK.  I have a stuffed head, sore throat, the aches, the pains, the dizziness...  Today is sucking hard core.  Yesterday, I had the energy to vacuum under the furniture in preparation for a visit from some foreign folks.  Today, I'm going to be lucky to get off the couch more often than to pee.  I'm trying to hold it together, as Skeeve is... unfocused... at best, and LP does need someone to pay attention to him and play with him, but...  It's not exactly pretty.

The wonderful news?  My first-stage approval has come through, so we're going to visit home for Easter!  We're very excited!  A little nervous about getting home, but we're going.  And we're very excited about it.  It's just LP and I, so it's a little nervous-making, but...  We're really looking forward to it.  So many plans and people we want to see... and while a week and a half is a long time, it sure doesn't seem like it while we're planning.  o.o;;

So many things going on, I'm hoping we'll make the best of it.  ^_^