Spousal Sabotage Survey

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Last week, I received an interesting email. Amanda, a PhD candidate at Clark University trained in Integrative Behavioral Couples Therapy, is seeking volunteers to participate in her survey on spousal interference/spousal undermining with weight loss.

Amanda needs volunteers to complete an anonymous online survey as part of her research for her dissertation. Amanda is offering to donate $1 to charity for each survey completed (the 5 charities she’s selected are: Playworks, The Carter Center, Teach for America, Susan G. Komen for the Cure, or MAP International) Additionally, Amanda is offering a total of $325 in gift cards to participants, via drawing.

In order to participate in the survey, you have to answer ‘yes’ to the following questions:

1) Are you at least 18 years of age?

2) Have you been participating in a weight loss program for the past consecutive 5 weeks?

3) Have you been in a committed, cohabitating relationship for the past two years?

4) Do you ever feel like your partner/spouse gets in the way of your weight loss?

So, if you’re eligible and willing to doing so, please take the anonymous survey here. It should take approximately 30-45 minutes to complete and responses cannot be traced back to you. Any question may be left unanswered. Participation is voluntary and may be withdrawn at any time. Upon survey completion, you will be provided with an email address and subject line to enter a drawing for 1 of 10 gift cards (one $100 card and nine $25 cards). Each participant who completes the survey may also select to have $1 donated to one of the charities mentioned above.

More on Amanda’s research: her advisor is James Cordova who has been on the Rachael Ray Show to discuss “The Marriage Checkup,” on which she was a founding student-therapist. She completed her pre-doctoral internship in health psychology at Duke University Medical Center.

From Amanda: “This dissertation brings my interests in couples and health psychology together in order to develop a measure of partner undermining. My aim is to help individuals and weight management professionals better understand the barriers to weight loss introduced specifically within the couples context.”

We all know that the people around use have a huge impact on our weight loss efforts! I am excited to see what comes out of Amanda's research!

My Top 5 Birthday Memories

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It always feels weird to write a blog post about myself on my birthday. I do not want it to seem like I am fishing for compliments and birthday wishes. Today, I was just going to take a pass at blogging altogether, but I came up with another great idea instead. I would like to share with you one of my favorite birthday memories! I know that it's not Friday, but I still think that writing a flashback blog post would be a fun way to celebrate my birthday today!

Now, I just have to decide what birthday memory I want to share with you! I could not do just one, so here are my top 5 birthday memories.

Top 5 Birthday Memories

5. My Rollerskating Birthday Party

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When I was in 3rd or 4th grade, my Mom organized a rollerskating birthday party for me. It was so much fun!! We invited my entire class to my birthday party, which didn't seem like the best idea at first. However, it turned out to be one of my most memorial birthdays!


4. My Spring Break Birthday

In March 2008, Jon and I were able to travel to Hollywood, CA to visit Jon's family. On our trip I ate at In-N-Out Burger for the first time, visited Santa Monica Pier (where we saw Adam Sandler), went to Disneyland, and spent time having fun with Jon's family. Jon's Mom, Lisa, makes amazing cakes and I was excited that she was going to make a birthday cake for me! She made me an elephant birthday cake!! This is the first and only elephant birthday cake that I have ever had and I loved it. We had such an awesome time on our trip and this really was one of my favorite birthdays!


3. My YMCA Birthday Party

I love to swim (I get that from my Mom)!! As a child I was on a swim team and traveled to compete in competitions. In either 2nd or 3rd grade my Mom let me have my birthday party at the YMCA. We reserved the pool so that me and my friends could go swimming!! I never thought that I pool party for my birthday would be possible, because my birthday is in March and it's always too cold for swimming this time of year. I am so thankful that this didn't stop my Mom from planning such an awesome birthday party for me!


2. My Scavenger Hunt Birthday

When my 20th birthday came along I was away at college and I wasn't expecting much on this birthday other than the standard birthday wishes. To my surprise, my friends had planned an entire birthday scavenger hunt for me that took us all over Portland, OR!! My friends even managed to find me a sub on the evening of my birthday, so that I didn't have to work that night. I had such an amazing time trying to solve the clues that I was given. It all ended with an amazing birthday dinner at Red Robin (one of my favorite restaurants)!!


1. My First Birthday with Jon

My favorite birthday is the first one that I ever spent with Jon!! Jon and I had just started to become friends when my 21st birthday came around. We had been playing a game of Tag with some friends of ours. We would all go to great/silly lengths to communicate to the other person that we had tagged them. Jon thought it would be funny if he filled my dorm room with balloons that said, "Tag you are it" on them. He had my entire dorm section in on his plan too!

When I opened my door balloons spilled out letting me know that I had been tagged and wishing me a happy birthday. This birthday was also special, because Jon made real Chinese food for me on my birthday. It's been my meal of choice ever since! I love Jon so much!!

Visit Jen for more flashbacks.

Quaker Life Soft Baked Cereal Bars

Sorry for the poor quality I took this with me phone.

This morning I was in a hurry and needed something quick for breakfast. I remembered that my Weight Watchers coworker had given me a new bar to try out. Up until this morning I had forgotten about it, but being that I was short on time I knew that this would be the perfect morning to try out this new bar.

{Quaker Life Soft Baked Cereal Bars}

Serving Size: 1 bar
  4 pointsplus+

This morning, I ate a Banana Nut Bread Quaker Life Soft Baked Cereal Bar. I heated up the bar for 15 seconds in the microwave. I also cut up some strawberries to eat along with my cereal bar. This new cereal bar was delicious!! It was soft and tasted just like banana bread. It has 5g of fiber and so I am interested to see how long this cereal bar keeps me satisfied. If you have not tried these I would highly recommend them!!

Becoming a Portion Pro

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This morning, I want to give you the meeting summary from my Weight Watchers meeting on Saturday, March 10, 2012.

Practicing Portion Control
Easy ways to size up healthy servings.
Article By: Leslie Fink, M.S., R.D.

You go out for dinner and order whole wheat spaghetti with marinara sauce and a side of grilled veggies. The pasta is so plentiful that it's falling off the plate. Yes, your meal is nutritious. But can too much of a good thing be not so good? Absolutely.

How super is super size?

In the era of the super sized meal it's often hard to recognize normal portion sizes. Giant bottles of soda, extra-large bags of chips and king-size candy bars are part of our everyday eating landscape. But unfortunately, as our portion sizes get larger, so do our waistlines. And bigger packages can also sabotage portion control.

Research from the University of Illinois shows that people may tend to eat more food when it's served in larger containers. When movie-goers were given the same amount of popcorn in containers of two different sizes, the people given the larger tubs ate 44 percent more. The lesson here is to use a smaller plate at dinner!

Sizing things up
To keep portions in perspective, you need tools to help you navigate through bulked-up servings. It's wise to weigh things to get an accurate idea of how big portions should be, but that's not feasible when you're on the go. Relating measurements to common objects and teaching yourself to recognize appropriate serving sizes will be a great step toward achieving your weight-loss goals. For example, you can use your hand to gauge healthy portions.

• Your fist is about the same size as one cup of fruit or pasta
• Your thumb (tip to base) is the size of one ounce of meat or cheese
• Your palm (minus fingers) equals three ounces of meat, fish, or poultry
• Your cupped hand equals one to two ounces of nuts or pretzels

Putting it into action
Once you have serving sizes committed to memory, you'll be ready to fit them into your eating plan.

• Limit servings of high-fat foods such as fatty meats and fried foods
• Buy single-servings of some foods, such as 1-ounce bags of chips or 1/2-cup servings of ice cream
• Remember that servings of most vegetables are extremely low in fat and calories. Bell peppers and button mushrooms just might become your new best buddies!

Try these other portion-control tips:
1. Don't leave a half-eaten birthday cake sitting on your kitchen counter. Wrap up cake and cookies and send them home with your guests.

2. Doggie-bag it at restaurants. Their portions can sometimes be extra large. Ask that half of your meal be wrapped up to take home.

3. Consider ordering kiddie-sized meals at fast-food restaurants. You may have to make up a lie about a child waiting for you in the car but it's a small price to pay for "built-in" portion control.

4. Seek out appetizers and side dishes at restaurants that serve gargantuan entrees. Order two of the smaller dishes for a more reasonably sized meal.

5. Minimize bargain temptations. If you buy big tubs or bags of snack foods to save money, store them on a high shelf so they're not within arm's reach. Or, immediately divide them into single serve portions and stash them away in a hard-to-reach place.

6. Learn to eyeball portion sizes, so it becomes second nature. Three ounces of chicken, for instance, equals the size of a deck of cards or your palm.

7. Make your own "frozen" dinners. When recipes yield extra servings, store the leftovers in single serve containers for portion-controlled meals later on, or lunch at work.

8. Retire your serving platters. If half a tray of lasagna stares you in the face while you eat dinner, you may be more likely to reach for seconds. Instead, serve yourself a portion and put the rest away. You can always go back for more, but this way, you may be less likely to.

9. Stock up on smaller plates. A half-empty 10-inch dinner plate spells deprivation; a salad plate filled to the edge seems like a huge meal.

10. Eat slowly! Research suggests that it takes approximately 20 minutes for your body to know that it's full. If you gobble down your food, seconds will be much more tempting.

To read more blog post about Portion Control, please click here.

Pictures from Our Weekend

Recently, Jon has been very busy flying. We are so thankful for all the trips that he has been able to go on. However, it was so nice to have Jon home this weekend!! Whenever Jon is home I try to hangout with him as much as possible, because I don't know the next time that his schedule will allow for him to be home. That being said, Jon decided that this past weekend would be the perfect time to start celebrating my birthday, which is coming up this next week!!

{Saturday}

Saturday morning, Jon and I both had to work, but after that our schedule was free for us to hangout together! Jon took me to a neighboring town, so that we could do some shopping.

I have been dying to go to Fresh. It's the most amazing grocery store, but we do not have one in our town. Jon took me to the closest Fresh around, so that we could check it out! It was amazing and we had so much fun walking up and down all the isles to see what types of food we could find.

We even found Okinawa Sweet Potatoes!!

Me with the Okinawa Sweet Potato. (Michelle, these pictures were for you!)

We also found some of the most amazing four cheese bread. It's not Weight Watchers friendly, but that's okay!

After some shopping, I was starving so we went and ate at Chipotle!

Jon wanted a picture of his Chipotle burrito. It was so big that they needed two pieces of tinfoil when they wrapped it up!

After dinner we made a quick stop by Barnes & Noble, because we love bookstores!!

Of course, Jon was able to find the only Legos in the whole store! They were actually really cool!

On our way home, Jon gave me one of my birthday presents. Don't you love the bag!?

Jon knows me so well! He bought me Elephant & Piggie books!! I read them aloud to Jon and the baby on our way home. These books were so funny that I could not help but laugh out loud!

{Sunday}

Sunday was awesome, because after church we came home and didn't go anywhere the rest of the day! We watched movies, played games, read books, made pancakes and cookies!! It was just the restful kind of day that we needed before starting another week.

Jon said it's my birthday week, so I got to choose what we had for dinner. I picked pancakes!! Jon made very thick pancakes and they were so good!

I was craving cookies so I made Chocolate Chip.

It was such an amazing weekend! I am so thankful to Jon for making my pre-birthday weekend so special!!

Hungry Girl Supermarket List 2012

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If you have ever started a weight loss program you know how overwhelming it can be to make your very first trip to the grocery store. Many of my Weight Watchers members ask me for food ideas, so that they know which items are "safe" to buy when shopping. To keep from being overwhelmed when grocery shopping I use the Supermarket List from Hungry Girl, which I have found to be the solution to my problem.

I am happy to announce that today Hungry Girl released their 2012 Supermarket List! This yearly list from Hungry Girl is so helpful. Each year I print off this list and keep it with me while I am grocery shopping. It helps me to navigate the store successfully without spending hours calculating the PointsPlus values of every food item I walk past.

If you are new to healthy eating, I would recommend that you print this list and keep it with you.

This supermarket list is extremely long, so please visit Hungry Girl for the complete Hungry Girl Supermarket List 2012. To download the PDF version of this list, please click here.

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Wordless Wednesday: Sore or Sorry

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