Power 90 – After 30 Days

Today's the 30-day mark for my Power 90 commitment started 1/1/2012.  Just a reminder about where I was before starting:

I lost 62 pounds last year on Weight Watchers.
I was only exercising minimally – an occasional walk, etc.
I tried Power 90 two years ago but quit when I'd only lost 3 pounds in 45 days.
I'm still on Weight Watchers.
I'm doing Phase 1/2 of Power 90 and probably will do so for another 30 days before trying to move up to level 3/4.
I'm using 5 lb dumbbells.

So I admit I was pretty discouraged by the scales news this morning.  I'm beginning to suspect I'm the only person who has this much to lose, exercises, and GAINS weight.

I'm up again for absolutely no reason.  Yesterday I was up 3 pounds (TMI, it's not related to my monthly cycle).  Today I'm only up 1.6 pounds.  But that wipes out this entire month's loss to only .4 according to my WW tracker (although my official WI day isn't until tomorow).

Woo.  See me losing like a turtle.

(That's the bad thing about only losing .4 a week – it gets wiped out really quickly.)

Trying to think positively here, I know it's not a "real" gain.  I've eaten on plan the entire month.  By that, I mean I've eaten within my Daily Points (DPs) or only gone over slightly into Activity Points (APs) or Weekly Points (WPs), all there for me to eat if I need to.  A few days I did dip into my APs but not significantly.  I only rarely ever eat my WPs (anniversary dinner at Mythos, for example) anyway.  I tracked every single day.

Other than an occasional Dove dark chocolate and Princess's homemade oatmeal cookies yesterday, I haven't had ANY sugar.  I've also been cutting artifical sugars out and switching to either honey, pure maple syrup, or none at all.  (Except my WW smoothies – they're artifically sweetened.  I'm still looking for a natural protein/meal replacement.)  I haven't had a Diet Coke or Cherry Dr. Pepper in over a week.  I've been drinking my hot green tea plain.

Last week, I even started adding a bit more cardio (via Walk It Out on the Wii) to my strength-only days.

I went from earning 0 APs to 104 this month (not counting today!).

While I've still got two pairs of jeans in this size that stubbornly refuse to fit, I've lost the following inches:

Waist:  -2
Bust:  -2
Hips:  -2
Arms: -.5 each
Thighs: -2 each

So I *am* losing, even if the scale is lying to me.  I won't let the unreasonable increase in poundage derail me this time.  Here's to another 30 days of Power 90 and I'll hope for better news next month!