Sweetgreen Passport – Nutrition + Yoga workshop

It’s hard to believe it’s October in MA and I was able to take an outdoor yoga class on Tuesday night – wearing short sleeves & capri pants! There is a unseasonable warm snap happening this week which is awesome – and I’m making the most of it!

I’m on the left in the pink shirt

Julie Starr-Wood from JSW Nutrition lead us both in the yoga class and nutrition discussion post work out.

Both the workout & nutrition discussion felt really needed to me and the timing of this on the same week I’ve starting using Fitbit to track my food & activity was perfect. I joked with Julie that I’m a “recovering Weight Watchers member”. She mentioned limiting fruit as part of a healthy diet (due to the high sugar content) and that runs very counter to WW’s “free fresh fruit” mentality. Julie’s approach to nutrition and exercise seemed very reasonable to me. She’s anti the food fads of “Superfoods” and “Juice Cleanses”. She stressed trying to eat local food as much as possible and that eating “organic” doesn’t mean much so it’s not worth putting local farms out of business that can’t afford to get an “organic” seal for their product.

Here’s the whole group post dinner & nutrition discussion

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Weight Loss Update

I weighed in at Weight Watchers today and was down 0.8 pounds – 24 pounds lost total.

While I’m happy that my weight is going in the right direction again, I’ve made the decision to cancel my membership with Weight Watchers at the end of October.

After my last post about my frustration of gaining & losing the same 25 pounds over the past 2 years with Weight Watchers, many friends reached out to me on Facebook.

I’ve bought a Fit Bit Flex & I’m going to try using the Fit Bit app to track my food and activity. I have other friends trying to lose weight who own Fit Bit so I’ll have a support system there – plus many other friends who’ve offered to support me too.

If that works, I’ll be saving $50 a month and that’s worth it to me.

Weight Watchers Frustration

I’m thinking of quitting Weight Watchers at the end of the month.

I weighed in today and I was up 1.2 pounds instead of seeing the loss I expected a week after walking the marathon. When I weighed in the receptionist said “What’s going on?!” because she knows I’ve been frustrated about the gains I’ve seen when I’m expecting losses instead.

This brings me to 23 pounds lost total. I’m back to feeling like I’m gaining & losing the same 2 pounds all the time.

I’m sick of seeing progress reports like the one below (this is my monthly report from today).

After chatting with friends – I think I could continue my weight loss journey with better success if I got a Fit Bit Flex instead of paying for Weight Watchers. Right now – I pay $50 a month for both Weight Watchers monthly pass (includes etools) and Active Link monthly fee.

Another huge source of my frustration is that to me, meetings were what made Weight Watchers special and work better than other programs.

Today’s meeting topic was all about the community of the meeting room.

I’m very mad at Weight Watchers for canceling the meeting I normally attend.

This week’s topic about how great meetings are just made me sad. I’ve lost the community of members that “knew” me and cared about my journey.

Weight Watchers – Staying the Same This Week

I earned 50 Weight Watchers Activity Points this week. I was expecting to gain weight when I weighed in today – despite having a really good week (food wise too!) – because my muscles tend to retain water after high weeks of activity. This week was my most intense activity wise ever (that whole literally walking a marathon thing).

Much to my surprise – my weight stayed exactly the same as last week – and I consider that a victory.

Hopefully next week will have a weight loss.

Unfortunately, I’m still searching for a Weight Watchers meeting to be my new regularly weekly meeting. I’ve tried the Friday lunch break meeting at the Framingham Center (that the receptionist for the canceled Tuesday meeting suggested) but I am just not jiving with the Leader. She’s a nice woman & she definitely cares about the members. I just don’t do well in meetings where the leaders go rogue and give their own theory on nutrition instead of sticking to explaining the Weight Watchers endorsed program or weekly meeting topic. She was also mean to the Receptionist on staff that day – rudely asking a member who came in late to go find the receptionist in the back storage room to ask her to come out front. (The same woman who recommended this meeting to me!) As a former WW staffer – I notice small things like that and it really bothers me.

Next week I may see if I can take a very early lunch on Tuesday at 10 AM to try out that meeting at the Framingham Center.

Are any of my readers Weight Watchers members in MA that have a suggestion for a meeting to try?

I Did It! 26.2 Miles – Boston Marathon Route – Jimmy Fund Walk

Checking in at the Hopkinton start

Sunday was the Boston Marathon Jimmy Fund Walk.

I completed the whole 26.2 mile route in 10 hours. I walked with my father-in-law and as we crossed the finish line he said “Now you have a personal best for the Boston Marathon course. Who cares how long it took! Not many people can say they’ve done that!” I was ready to cry (tears of joy).

It was an amazing experience & I’m so glad I did it! Hopkinton to Boston – and all the cities & towns in between.

Here I am – a little over 10 miles in – entering Natick (the city my office is located in)

My father-in-law Marcis & I – still smiling at the lunch rest stop

Curing cancer is a cause everyone can get behind. It was inspiring to see all the teams walking – each with their own personal connection that brought them to walk day.

Every mile marker has a picture & story of someone who has fought cancer at Dana-Farber. It’s tradition for walkers to touch every mile marker as they pass it, as a way of passing on hope to the person pictured.

Nearly finished! Just 1.2 miles more to go!

Finish line – woo-hoo!

My husband surprised me at the finish line with a bouquet of flowers. He purposely chose blue & yellow flowers because they’re the colors for the Boston Athletic Association. (BAA manages the Boston Marathon.)

My husband Dave & I

I earned 42 Weight Watchers Activity Points Plus values for the 26.2 mile walk.

I’m still short of my fundraising goal so if anyone is interested in making a donation, my personal fundraising page is http://www.jimmyfundwalk.org/2014/daniellekempe

Weight Watchers – Loss this week

As I suspected in my last post about Weight Watchers – I lost weight when I weighed in today & am down 1.4 pounds. Yippee!

This brings me back to 24.4 pounds lost total.

Quite possibly I’ve lost more – I wasn’t wearing the same dress I normally weigh in wearing & this one is heavier (fall dress vs. summer sleeveless very light dress)

I’ve resolved to not be upset if I weight in next week and the weight is back up from my muscles recovering from the Boston Marathon Jimmy Fund Walk.

Thank you also to Dani, Weight Watchers Leader & the blogger of Weight Off My Shoulders, for offering to look at my tracker for me to offer advice. I didn’t take her up on the offer because I wanted to work on making sure I really was tracking every single thing I ate and not forgetting to track tastes of something. It was my own personal “reset button” and it seemed to work.

I’m still seeking a new Weight Watchers meeting to be the weekly meeting I attend since the Tuesday lunch hour meeting I used to attend was canceled by Weight Watchers for low attendance.

I tried out a Friday lunch hour meeting at the same center but I didn’t like the Leaders meeting style. I may have caught her on a bad day but she seemed to cut off members telling their weight loss journey stories to share her own & that’s not cool in my book.

The only other lunch hour scheduled meetings at this center are on Wednesday & that doesn’t work with my adjusted work schedule on Wednesdays to attend November Project stair climbing. (I work through lunch that day since I’m getting to the office about an hour late.)

There is a meeting on Tuesday at 10 AM so I may try taking a very early lunch hour soon to check that out.

Boston Festival of Indie Games

On Saturday, I spent the day walking around MIT for Boston Festival of Indie Games.

My husband was media covering the event for Gaming Symmetry. I had a fun time acting as his photographer/social media consultant.

I earned 10 Weight Watcher points from all our walking that day. (And stair climbing – ouch!)

Here’s me hanging out with Arthur at the WGBH booth

The event is 2 floors of game demos – digital games on the 2nd floor & tabletop (think board games) on the 1st floor.

There are also presentations throughout the day at another building. I attended 2 sessions – one on player agency in game design and one on improv and game design. Both presenters were great!

Thank you to Yelp Boston for getting me a VIP pass!