1500 calories a day and counting….

1500 calories a day and counting….

1480 calories a day to be exact.  That is what it comes down to, my plan to get back to my pre-baby weight (or at least within ten pounds).  It’s been 10 years since I had my first born, and my youngest is now 2 ½, so I think it’s time.  Over the years I have tried South Beach, Paleo, and then two years ago, counting calories.  It worked great.  My husband and I did it together, before we went on our Ten year anniversary cruise.  The baby was a few months old, and we both lost about 30 pounds.  We knew we would take a week off the diet for the cruise.   After all that dieting, we indulged. We ate at the buffets, we ate dessert and we went to the Chocoholics Buffet.  When we got home we had both gained 5 pounds. I don’t know what happened after that; we forgot about the diet.  He stopped and I couldn’t do it alone.  Life happened.  And summer BBQs, with hamburgers, and hot dogs, and potato salad….  I could go on.  Two years went by and I was still fat.  The place where the babies grew (all five of them) was still sticking out; it didn’t seem to get the message that there is no longer somebody in there.  It was time to do something!  

After thinking about joining weight watchers for a couple weeks, I looked and saw the prices.  $40 a month.  $40 that I could use to buy reward clothes when I lose the weight.  I thought about it and decided to try counting calories again, so I downloaded myfitnesspal for free to my phone.  Much to my delight, they now have a barcode scanner which makes it easy.  I don’t even have to type every food in, most are already there. 

So far it has been a week.  I don’t know exactly how much weight I have lost, because for the past month I have been avoiding the scale.  I only know that it had gotten to 4 pounds above my alarm weight (when the first number on the scale was the same as the one for my husband and he is 6’ 2” and I am only 5’ 8”).   And now the number is under.  0.8 of a pound under, but still under.  Now, I actually like stepping on the scale, because every day it is less than before, maybe a fraction of a pound less, but still less.  

So every day, I think before I eat.  I don’t taste food when I am cooking it.  I don’t eat the last square of sandwich that my daughter leaves behind.  I measure everything by a cup, or half a cup, or teaspoon, and I record it.  I can envision myself looking good in a bathing suit.  Not a skimpy bikini (because I don’t know if the stretch marks will every go away) but a nice tankini, in something much smaller than an x-large.  I have hope, and I am smiling.  I will get there.  


Amanda Conlan