Day 11

Today is Friday, hard to believe how fast this week has flown by.  Next week I start back to school and I just want to say, up front, that I'm not sure if I'll be able to keep up my daily posts once I start back to school.  I promise I will TRY, because this blog is really good for keeping my accountable, but from everything I've heard, this is going to be my hardest semester.  So, my two dear readers, please don't lose faith, I will post as much as I can.  :) 

On to the good stuff.  Guess who has been eating BELOW 1500 calories?? Yep, me! You may be wondering why this is such a big deal, and I will tell you.  See, when I started this process I knew that I could eat up to 1800 calories & still lose my goal of 2 lbs per week.  At first I was eating as close to 1800 calories as possible, just because I knew I could, but lately I just haven't felt the need to continue to eat, JUST BECAUSE I had the calories left over.  Therefore for the last 2 days I have eaten UNDER 1500 calories!! Now for someone who has been eating oh, around 3,000 calories a day for YEARS now, I have to say, that's a big deal! Just the other day I was showing the hubster Katie's blog & I was telling him how she was only eating something like 1200 or so calories & he was like "Why don't you do that?" & I'm sure at that time I looked at him like he'd grown an extra head & said "Are you kidding?  I'd be starving to death if I only ate 1200 or so calories."  Well guess who only ate 1225 calories 2 days ago???  Yep, me again!! You guys are great guessers, lol.  Then yesterday I only ate 1334 calories, and I wasn't even trying to stay low.  It's just that I got to the end of the day & I was like "Hm, I have calories left, I could have a bowl of cereal", my favorite nighttime snack,  but then I was just like "Not really hungry, don't feel the need", so I didn't!!  I am so darn excited!! 

Now, in addition to that, there is one other thing that I am totally excited about.  I don't feel deprived! Not in the least, not even a teensy, tiny bit, and believe me, I have been totally delving into my brain to see if I feel like I am. What I came up with is that I don't feel deprived because I haven't told myself that I "can't" have something.  There is NOTHING that is off limits to me.  This is a lifestyle change, not a diet, therefore I CAN eat anything I want to eat. How cool is that?  But on this journey so far I've also learned that I don't HAVE to eat certain things.  Take for instance today.  I had to go & get my badge for the hospital & I was dragging butt, so we stopped at the gas station & I got one of those yummy French Vanilla cappucinos.  Well, I figured they had quite a few calories in them & so guess what I did?  I drank half and THREW THE OTHER HALF AWAY!  I decided that I didn't want the almost 400 calories & so I just decided not to finish it.  Now, to skinny people this makes PERFECT sense, but to those of us who struggle with our weight, this is a big deal, don't you think??!  I am totally stoked about it!!

Anyhoo, enough about the lessons I am learning, I thought I'd share my lunch with you. I came home & made a English muffin pizza, and this is what it looked like:



This is the english muffin w/mushrooms & pizza sauce
 

I added 1 piece of ham, torn in half & 1 piece of Velveeta Blanco Queso cheese, torn in half
 

Then I put it in the oven on 350 for about 15 minutes & voila!

Here's the actual ingredients & nutritional breakdown:

1 English muffin
1 1/2 T. pizza sauce
1 slice 97% ff cooked ham (torn in half)
1 slice Velveeta Blanco Queso cheese (just b/c it was all I had, I normally would have used mozarella)
Sliced mushrooms from a can (as many as you like)
A few slices of onion on each side (I didn't get a picture of that, but you can see them peeking out from under the ham in the finished product)

After I put on the mushrooms I sprinkled it with a bit of Italian seasoning & a tiny bit of garlic salt.  Added the ham & cheese & baked it on 350 for about 15 minutes.  It was DELISH!!  Seriously. 

Total calories 219 :) 

I also had a tiny salad with that as well. Total lunch w/the salad was only 274 calories.  Pretty good if I do say so myself!!

And lastly, just because I am so excited about it.  Here is my badge from the hospital I will be doing my clinicals at this semester!! :)





Hope everyone has a fantastic weekend!! I'm not sure what I'll be doing yet, probably not too much, but I am definitely going to try to get in some bike rides.  This weather we're having is fantastic.  I'm not in the part of the US that's getting snow, we're getting 70 degree weather! Very uncharacteristic, but I'll take it!