Every day, I write down what I ate and total calories in my food journal. My aim is to be in control of my weight. You can’t control it if you don’t know what’s going on. The food journal is a lifestyle change, and a high-priority one. I have committed to doing it for the rest of my life. I also commit to weighing myself every week. I am glad I didn’t weight myself today, though. Yesterday, I had a big meal and followed it up with a lot of cake! I woke up with no appetite at all. It took all morning before I was hungry again, and just in time for lunch. It’s Wednesday, and that means…
My daily food intake and calorie count:
Breakfast – tea with half and half. Not hungry at all.
- 80 calories
Lunch – Big Greek Cafe $5 Gyro on Wednesdays! (600)
- 600 calories
Dinner – 2 x Costco pepperoni pizza slices (355).
- 710 calories
Snacking – none
- 0 calories
Total for the day: 1390 calories (limit 1800)
Observing thin people eat
Today, I had a great opportunity to watch the behavior of thin people around delicious dessert food. I brought my leftover, homemade birthday cake to my team at work, thinking they would eat it up quickly (and I wouldn’t get snowed under with all the calories!). I’ve never really watched thin people’s behavior until recently. All the people I watched today were thin, some very thin. Those who ate it agreed the cake was very, very tasty. I had already pre-cut the cake into 300-calorie pieces. What I saw (in no particular order):
- Fitness guy (he exercises every day) ate a full piece. Then he went to the gym, as usual.
- Very thin guy cut a piece in half and ate it quite slowly while talking to the group standing around the cake.
- Joker guy ate a full piece, reasonably quickly, while talking to the group standing around the cake.
- Beard guy politely refused cake, because he had had cake at home over the weekend.
- Cello playing girl hesitated to take any cake. When I told her how many calories per slice (300), she cut a piece in half and ate that, fairly slowly. She told everyone else who approached the cake how many calories were in a slice (she was meaning to be helpful – she clearly thought that was important information).
- Egyptian guy took a full piece and ate it slowly at his desk.
- Pregnant girl (quite thin) took a half piece and ate it slowly, while talking to the group standing around the cake. First she asked if the cake was safe for pregnant women. (I think she just wanted everyone to know she was pregnant – just passed the first trimester.)
Two other people refused any cake. There were three half pieces left at the end of the day. I gave them to the people at my mechanic’s front office (some car work today). Back when I was gaining weight and out of control, I would have waited until no one was there, then taken a big piece and eaten it in my office. I wouldn’t have thought about calories. What a difference changing your mind makes. As wonderful as the cake was, since I didn’t think I could freeze pieces and eat it slowly, I couldn’t wait to get rid of it.
It was very interesting to watch the thin people use social approval as a tool to regulate their cake eating. Once they were told how many calories in the cake, almost everyone opted for a half slice of 150 calories. Most of them ate it in front of each other and were slow about it. There’s a lot to learn, there.
-The Doctor