Plateaus, Set Points and Other Boogeymen

I have said many times that even if I never lost another pound, I would continue to eat a plant-based diet and drink green juice because it has given me back my health.  I would reassure others who hit weight plateaus for a week or two to just keep at it and the weight would start to go down again.  Our bodies sometimes need time to adjust to this new way of being and doing, especially if we have been very overweight for a very long time.  I had been from 280 to 340 for a couple of decades.  So mid-March when I hit a plateau, I had to put my money where my mouth is so to speak.  I hit a plateau.  I hit 265 and my body froze, looked at me in horror and said, "Are you kidding me?  We're melting like the wicked witch after she got watered down by Dorothy! This ain't right!!!  Do you WANT to disappear?  What if there's a famine?  This is dangerous!  You can't just go losing weight willy nilly I tell you!"  
It didn't help that I had several extra-curricular stress activities pop up during this same time frame.  If you don't know or understand what the stress hormone, Cortisol, can do to weight loss efforts, look up Dr. John Bergman on youtube.  He explains it better than anyone else I've seen.  
So for a couple of weeks, I was totally zen about this plateau.  Seriously.  I really didn't let it bother me because I understood what was happening.  I had hit a lower weight than I'd seen in at least 15 years.  When it had been a month, I started to get worried in that scared, secret, small place inside me that has always feared this new found health and energy will be ripped away.  Right at this same time I was getting super busy trying to pack and clean to move out of this house finally.  After several months of planning to move, we are finally actually moving.  We HAVE to be out of this house by the end of the month even if it means camping out at the lake until we can find something else.  Long story....  anyway, I was extremely busy and having to use every coping mechanism I had not to let the stress get to me.  We had a very, very hard winter financially along with some other life stressors so it was no surprise, really, that the weight loss stalled.  Knowing and understanding that and dealing with seeing that number stay the same every day are two different things.  Actually, it didn't stay exactly the same.  My weight, as with most people, can fluctuate 3-5 pounds in any given week which is the main reason I usually weigh daily. So I had hit that 265 for about 2 days when my weight started doing a gentle rollercoaster up and down and up and down from 266 to 269 for weeks.  So I put the scale away.  I didn't want worry over that number to pull my focus away from the main thing which is my health.  I just played Dory and kept on swimming... and eating my plants and making my juice.  As Spring came on strong, I did what I had always planned to do and shifted more to raw fruits and salads and less soups and starches. Not a big shift but just a bit more of this and a bit less of that.  It felt right.  I felt a boost in energy almost immediately.  
I was out of town for over a week and got home last Wednesday night.  Thursday morning I decided to pull out the scale and see where I was at and it said 266.  Okay.  Saturday morning, 264.  Hey!  Monday morning, today, 261!  Yeah!  Bye-bye plateau!  I learned from you.  I let you be and you let me be and now we must part ways.  See ya!
That plateau lasted nearly two months.  I learned that I really do have the power of my convictions within me to put my health first.  I really felt that my body would eventually begin to seek a healthier weight once again.  But I knew that if it didn't or if it took a year or two for that to happen, I would be okay in the meantime as long as I continued to flood my body with real nutrition.  I learned some valuable lessons about myself.  I have said many times that how I feel is far more important than how I look and I proved to myself that this was true.  I've said that I have learned to trust my body.  Now I've proven it.  I've also proved to myself that if the scale becomes a detriment, I can just put it away.  
I recently watched a video shared by my friend, Lori.  It was posted by a bariatric surgeon and explained how our bodies will establish "set points" at a very high weight.  He went into the anthropology of it all.  His point was to make us feel hopeless to lose the weight without surgery.  FALSE.  The problem is that most people hit those points where their body is trying to adjust to the changes you've made, the weight loss slows or stops so they tighten down on the calories even more.  They starve their cells which makes the body freak out even more.  "Starvation!  She's trying to kill us!"  If you hit your plateau - or your new "set point" - and you just keep FLOODING your body with amazing nutrition, your body WILL relax and realize that it is safe to allow more of that weight to go.  Truth.  Doctors selling hopelessness to line their pockets make me sick.  Right up until I drink my green juice or eat my bowl of fruit or salad.  THAT makes me very, very well:)
JUICE ON YA'LL.  WE GOT THIS!!

JANUARY JUICE AND CHEW DAY 8 Or The Best Laid Plans of Mice and Men...

So, not juice fast day 2 and not day 1 again.  I'm postponing my hardcore juice fast for a week or two.  Hubby isn't snowed in anymore but his truck broke down so now they have him put up in a motel in Indiana while he waits his turn for the shop to fix his truck.  Around 200 other guys are waiting for the same thing.  Some new fuel they have made him use in the truck gels up when it gets too cold.  Yup, trucks broke down all over the North half of the country.  Him not moving for a week means my grocery budget will be VERY tight.  Also, when the pipes thawed out, there was a burst pipe in the bathroom.  Long story but it won't be fixed for at least a few days so we have the water to the house shut off.  Not shut-off valve in the bathroom - retarded right?  See why I'm moving?  So clean up will be challenging this week too.  So we'll just go ahead and do what I've already been doing since the 1st.  It's cool.  I'm feeling very zen about it.  The facebook group I LOVE,  Reach4Raw, is doing a 90 day juice and chew challenge so I'm just travelling along with my rawfriends there:)  I'm eating healthy, drinking juice and losing weight so it's all good.

J&C Day 8
Weigh in - 281.8
3 pints juice
3 tangerines
1 LARGE salad with greens, tomatos, mushrooms, green onions, cucumber, sprinkle of sunflower seeds and light balsamic.
I did a 20 minute Sparkpeople resistance band video and discovered that my right leg is still very much weaker than the left.  It wasn't as bad after I finished physical therapy but over the last 3 years being so horrible health wise, it has gotten really weak again.  (I had a massive blood clot in that leg that damaged the veins and also the right knee is the one that is trashed.)  So I have a goal now to rehab my right leg.  I finished the video but was not able to do all reps on the right leg and my form sucked!  So room for improvement:)

On a personal note, I was really excited when Kitten the Juice Pirate joined my group on rebootwithjoe.  She is SUCH a huge inspiration for me and one of the first examples of what you could do with this lifestyle.  I posted on Reach4Raw about this and got lots of great responses but I was so touched I can't even tell you when my friend Taffy said that I was her Kitten the Juice Pirate.  That I was to her what Kitten was to me.  Wow.  I am floored.  The day before, I posted my progress picture and had a few people say that seeing that gave them the inspiration to get on with it and start juicing and eating raw!  Me!!  Inspiring people!!!  On top of all the really stressful stuff that was going on I have to confess I shed a tear or two.  But we'll just say that was emotional detox and keep that between you and me okay?

JUICE ON!!

Progress Pic As Promised

Okay, so this is not exactly earth shattering but there is a difference.  Pic on the left is August 23rd, 2013 at 340.  Pic on the right is January 2nd, 2014 (that's 4 months and 10 days) at 287.

I was going to try to use the same clothes but it was too freaking cold!  It was hard enough to take off my jacket for this one.  and the next one probably won't even be able to be in the same spot since we are moving soon. (Thank God!)  The only measurement I'm going to share right now because I am being lazy, is that my waist went from 52" to 45" so far but trust me, my hips, legs and upper arms are all smaller too.  Now... bring on the next 50!  Now THAT will be a progress pic!!

So for my daily update that really will hopefully become daily:/  Friday and Saturday, I had a couple juices along with a couple pieces of fruit and a big ol' salad.  Today, I'm having more juice, less fruit and a veggie soup that I'm mostly just taking the broth off of.  It has herbs and spices, very little salt, cabbage, mushrooms, squash, green beans and a few stray carrots.  It's yummy:)  I plan to scoop out the veggies and put them in the blender for a cream soup for the girls and I'll set back the broth for me.

Weight this morning 284.
Exercise - 0 (I usually don't exercise on Sunday.)

JUICE WITH ME!!