That Cost Me How Many Points????

Note (December 19, 2009): I started to write this entry last week but never finished, so I'll do that and immediately following, I'll do the entry for this week...

Today's Weight: 182.6
(Sunday, December 13, 2009)

Total Weight Gain: .2 Pounds

Here I am a week later and .2 pounds heavier, which to my estimation is nothing and I could lose it simply by going to the bathroom and giving it the old college try. The problem with that, is I would like do some serious damage to my insides - not a very good idea since that hurts and if there's anything I hate more than a very minor weight gain is major pain!

This past week was not without major challenges. First, the weather did not cooperate in the slightest. It was freezing cold, windy, snowy and/or raining, making going out for a major walk, impossible. Then, despite my best efforts (packing my sweats, and t-shirt), I forgot to pack my running shoes for my Thursday exercise class. This was disastrous for me since I had a holiday lunch at my boss's home the following day.

The holiday lunch was a huge challenge for me since the planned menu was only finger foods. When I found out that it was going to be finger foods this sent me into huge panic mode. It made me wish that my boss had repeated her menu from several years ago, where she served a full turkey dinner with all the trimmings. That's far more manageable than unknown finger food. At least I can calculate the value of turkey, stuffing, etc. Not something I could do with mushroom in a puff pastry cup!

Anyway, I made mental notes on what I ate and then went home and wrote it all down...what an eye-opening exercise that was!!!! And because I really had no idea what the point values were I had to guestimate. Here's what I ate and the point totals I assigned:

4 Triscuit triangles - 1 Point
Melted Brie Cheese on 2 very small slices of french bread - 3 Points
3 Grilled Shrimp - 2 Points
1 Piece of Salmon on a Skewer - 2 Points
3 Gingered Slivered Carrots in Rice Paper - 3 Points
2 Stuffed Mushroom Appetizers - 4 Points
1 Mini Roast Beef Sandwich - 4 Points
1 Cheesecake Lolipop - 2 Points

For a total consumption of 20 points!!! Unbelievable, considering that my daily allowance is 22 points! What's worse is that in a matter of 2 hours, I blew through my daily allotment (save 2 points)! I was completely dumbfounded after the fact, but I learned a very valuable lesson - be very, very careful about what goes into your mouth and think about what it may cost you in the end.

The sad thing was that in the end, in spite of my vigilance, I ended up putting on the .2 pounds mentioned above. On the up-side, the topic for discussion at my WW meeting for the week was "Stress". When the leader introduced the topic, I was the first to pipe up that I had a very stressful week, and went on to tell my story. She commended me for my vigilance and said that it was great that I was mindful of everything that went into my mouth and that I documented it. I imagine that had I not written it down, I could've gone down an extremely slippery slope and who knows what further damage I could've done to myself.

Challenge for the Coming Week:

Departmental Lunch at an Italian cafe with few selections;
Hospital Doctor Holiday Party;