Knowing is not everything.....

Morning: 1 cup of coffee without sugar and 3-4 grapes

Breakfast: 4 pathiris and ½ cup chicken curry
Handful of grapes, 1 cup of coffee without sugar

Lunch:  2 chapathis with stir fried vegetables in 2 tsp oil, 2 oranges, 10-12 grapes,  2 njali poovan (plantain)
20 peanuts with 10 raisins, 3 tsp mango mousse

Tea:  5 small ullivadas and 1 small cupcake

dinner: 2 pathiris, 2 pieces of chicken and 1 uzhunnu vada, 1/4 piece of a cake (cut in biscotti style), 2 tbsp veg noodles

 Lessons learnt: (1) No more dessert making until the scale makes a substantial change (maybe 5 kilos). I made the mango mousse because there was an over-ripe mango that was on the verge of rotting. I think I would not have had the mango on its own, but when I I was the one making mango mousse I wanted to taste it before 'inflicting' it on others, but yes, I restricted my intake <GOOD JOB>

 I made the ullivadas in the evening when some guests came over. After eating the ullivadas and the cupcake I even opened the fridge to eat the rest of the mango mousse but thankfully good sense prevailed. <GOOD JOB>

 (2)  I should not let trivialities affect me and upset my regimen  I was a little stressed. We had guests in the evening and in between I went to the kitchen to make ullivadas and it took me a while to incorporate the ingredients and get the batter ready, then I stepped out of hte kitchen and asked the guests if they wanted coffee or tea. The aunty who was visiting half-jokingly said "Oh you mean, it is not ready yet..." and that made me a bit stressed though I am sure she did not mean it maliciously (she is like that, pulls her husband's leg all the time). I wonder if the pressure to perform made me eat those five ullivadas and the cupcake.  On a positive note, I was looking for calories in ullivada and came across this recipe for baked ullivadas - a recipe for iftaars during Ramadan, perhaps? I see that apart from the frying aspect, the ingredients of ulli vada, good ole' rice flour, besan flour and onion and other spices are quite healthy for you.  It does not require my former BFF maida.

(3) If you fail to plan, you plan to fail: I should plan my meals. If I had planned my dinner in advance and had eaten it at the right time, I would not have ended up having what I did.  But I was so busy with guests that I did not have the time to even consider what my options were. Better luck next time.


Exercise: Today is my rest day. I felt relieved today morning when I realised that I did not have to exercise today. I don't think I have reached the stage where I like exercise. I was never a sporty person. So, this is something I have to work on.
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So yesterday, I wrote about education about food and listening to your body. But education is not everything. As my experience today testifies, 'knowing is rarely enough.. it is the doing (or not doing) that matters".  I knew even as a kid that fried stuff and sweets are not good for someone working towards losing weight. But I had exactly that -- fried ullivada and sweet cupcake and sweet mango mousse. I also did not listen to my body, I was not hungry when I ate these items.

I also find that when I cook tasty (read unhealthy) food, it is very difficult for me to resist. Last night, as I mentioned before we had guests and dinner was pathiri, chicken curry and chicken noodles. The chicken was deep fried and I managed to eat 2 tbsps before the fried chicken was added to the noodles.I then went on to have 2 pathiris and 2 pieces of chicken along with an uzhunnu vada (it was in the fridge and without thinking, I grabbed it and ate it) . I just don't know what to do about that. Over at fat chic goes slim, Shiva has published an interview with Pman16, who advises women not to depend on their husbands for weight loss. I would tweak that to say, do not depend on anyone else for your health goals. If others help well and good, if not, work your way around it. In my case, I have not yet figured out a fool-proof plan to resist when I cook unhealthy food. The easy answer might be, "oh do not cook unhealthy food. period". That might work, if I lived on my own and cooked  meals only for myself. It is not as if I fry stuff on a daily basis, but how can I resist when I do?

I have come to realize that my family is not big on desserts because of a history of diabetics among older generations, in fact, I am the one who gets motivated to try out new desserts. Now that I have incorporated this new rule of no dessert making, at least some of the havoc can be avoided.

 I think I will incorporate a few more rules in my weight loss strategies. They have not worked all the time. But no harm in trying, right? Count till sixty when I am tempted to eat unhealthy food. As I count till sixty, I will try to visualise myself at a healthy weight without spilling out of blouses and shirts. The other thing is to remind myself of this saying "A moment on the lips, a lifetime on the hips".