Just. Breathe.

I woke up in the mood to write today. It's been a while since I've even wanted to start a new post, and I wouldn't let myself consider why. But, here it is: I've got 7-9 pounds that have come back on since Christmas and they will. not. leave. I don't want to make changes, therefore, I don't want to write about it. If I write about it, I have to admit it out loud, and then I'm committed. When I look back at my weight loss chart, I was this weight back in July. It's like a 9-month maintenance plan, but I don't want to maintain this weight! When I consider what I've done (and not done) in those months, it's somewhat easy to see why I'm not losing, and why, for a long time, I didn't gain. Paleo is not a weight loss method. That's right out there on any reputable Paleo expert's front door. It's clean eating, it's staying away from sugar and unnecessary foods, but it's not designed for weight loss - our ancestors we...

I totally love cheese. On stuff. By itself. Any kind (except Limburger, of course). Melted, cubed, sliced, crumbled. If it weren't for cheese (oh, and bacon) I could probably be vegan. But anyway... If you've been on many diets, and especially if you've done Weight Watchers, you already know that cheese is not exactly friendly to most point-counting or calorie-watching plans. It does have an offset with protein and calcium, but I realized it's probably worth a little research.  First, a visual. This is one ounce of each of these cheeses. Generally, an ounce is a serving size - a sandwich slice, a string cheese stick, those single serve snacks in a bag -- most of those are one ounce. It's a little hard to tell in a picture, but the "bars" like Gouda and Havarti look like about the same amount in an ounce, but parmesan looks like a much more when it's piled up like this. Lesson #1 : All cheese is not created equal. It's hard to tell by ...

What I've never understand about the Weight Watchers program (in any version, and I've done them all) is that it does not count calories. Anyone who has ever dieted has memorized the "calories in/calories out" mantra, but here's a hugely popular and successful program that completely ignores the calorie count of food. How can that even work? [For anyone who has not tried or read about WW, the current system counts fat, carbs, fiber, and protein, and assigns a point value to the serving of food. You're given a set number of points to use per day, with additional ones for activity minutes, and a bonus bank for the week. Stay within your points, and you'll lose weight.] So I tried an experiment. For about a week, I tracked my food on WW and on sparkpeople (dot) com -- an awesome FREE site that I highly recommend. I entered the same foods, the same quantities in order to see what, if any, correlation there might be. WW gives 26 points a day. Sparkpeople ...