What's on your Monday Menu, RNYers?

Hahaha, I am still off from work, and loving every minute of it! My start date back with my new job is not until August 12th, so I still have lots of time to relax!

I don't have a ton of plans for this week, but I am sure I will keep busy. I have been doing fun summer/beachy activitie****ting the gym, doing some woodworking projects with Grim, and generally getting organized. I have also jumped down the Keto rabbit hole with AmyLiz and I have been doing a lot of reading, menu planning, and shopping!

Grim's brother is in town for just a day or so. We don't have any plans yet, but it should be fun. He flew into Boston and is staying with us for a bit until he drives down to VA for a meeting. Yay! He's a lot of fun to have around. They are so much alike, it's scary!

Accountability: I haven't come close to my calorie goal all week--I am staying very low and skipping a lot from my planned menu. Not sure if it a just a small pouch week or if I have the high fat content from Keto to thank? Probably a little of both. I've been great about the gym, too :) I am down a few pounds already!

QOTD: Let's do an NSV round up! Recently I have spent so much time focused on my slight weight gain that I haven't spent time remembering that I am still so much better off than I used to be. So, this week, I am focused and happy on my gym victories and realizing that job hunting has been so much easier without worrying about my weight being a factor.

Exercise: Not sure, actually... I might try to sneak out to the gym now before everyone wakes up.

i was wondering why such an early post on vacation?

I was up at 3:30- my alarm was going to go off at 4:45 but I just couldn't sleep any more so I ended up earlier than I intended at work

I am unhappy abt my weight gain and am working hard on it but it will mean reducing calories which is hard for me as I tend to have a binge episode if I restrict too much.

also decided to up the cardio so that is what I will do at lunch- go walk and brought my tennis shoes. also going to divert to the gym on the way home which will make for a late night but I should sleep really well tonight due to exhaustion.

I planned out my food, going to see how close to it I can get. have about 90 calories unplanned...

I'm the same way - getting back below 150 is going to mean cutting calories, and that's really hard for me to do. My body is used to 1700 calories and rebels if I try to lower it too much. UGH! Like you, I'm going to increase my exercise to see if that helps. Maybe burning up an extra 100 kcal/day will get things going in the right direction. I think part of the issue is that I haven't been able to do much in the way of exercise since my plastic surgery three months ago (it's taking longer this time because of some issues I've had with it). I've been pretty much restricted to walking - and I've gone back to gentle yoga within the last month, too. Neither of which burn up a crap ton of calories. Yesterday I went to Jazzercise with a friend -- previously the maximum-support sports bra I'm supposed to wear doing higher-impact activity dug into the sore areas along my incisions, so it wasn't really do-able. But it seemed OK last night - so I'm planning to start up with that - and similar activities like Zumba - again. Pool-based stuff is still out. Weights might be OK - I'll give it a try this week and see. Anyway, hoping this will work. I weighed 149 just before PS and have been bouncing around between 152-155 pretty much since then, so I don't have TOO far to go - so I'm hoping this might help.

such a fine line for me for balance. I do want to lose and weigh less but also can't sabotage myself.

I feel your pain. I had plastics in February and my surgeon still has me restricted to elliptical and walking. I am so bored with it I do a half hour of elliptical and leave the gym. And I am also not aloud in the pool yet. My wound finally closed and I see the Doctor July 29 so with fingers crossed He will allow me to increase activity. I hope your doctor will approve more activity soon.

I am just an early riser... not much I can do about it, apparently! Its sad that it still feels like sleeping in to wake up at 5!

Same here! I did finally realize a few years ago that trying to force myself to sleep in just made me annoyed. Now, once I know I'm awake, I just get up. It's really increases the amount of books I get through a year, lol.

I'm the same way too but only since surgery. When I weighed 275 I was always tired no matter how much sleep I got. Now I do volunteer work and get 10,000 plus steps in a day and still have tons of energy. I just don't seem to need the sleep I did before and wake about 5ish every day even on the weekend. And once I wake I just toss and turn if I try to stay in bed so I might as well just get up!

I'm the same way - I've been retired for a year, and I still get up between 5:00 and 6:00. Part of it might be age, too - it seems a lot of people get up earlier the older they get (well, except for our 80-year-old next door neighbor who goes to bed around 5:00 and gets up at noon! Those sound like college kid hours to me!)

I try to go to bed before 5 AM and it's too light. I sleep 7.5 hours religiously.