Post-Thanksgiving Freak Out!

     Anyone else still feeling sluggish and bloated after the festivities two days ago? I ate pretty healthy on Thanksgiving and was under my calories but I still gained weight. I woke up yesterday morning ready to see a good number on the scale, and was shocked to see almost 3 lbs more than before! The day before Thanksgiving I was 243.8, and yesterday I was 246.6...and that's not even the worst part, today when I weighed in I was 247.0!!!!!!! How is that even feasible? I did so good on Thanksgiving and yesterday, and I am really frustrated to see that number! However, I am convinced that the culprit is sodium. That's right Sodium! No, I'm not making excuses, I promise. While I watched my calories the last two days, I did not watch how much sodium I was eating. 


Here is a break down of how much sodium is in a lot of the foods we normally eat on Thanksgiving:

Green Bean Casserole: 600 milligrams of sodium (add 350 calories if the beans are canned) 

Stuffing: 600 milligrams of sodium

Turkey: 320 milligrams of sodium

Pumpkin pie: 350 milligrams of sodium

Gravy: 270 milligrams of sodium

Mashed Potatoes: 400 milligrams of sodium (more if you add butter)

Dinner Roll: 130 milligrams of sodium

     We are only supposed to consume a max of 2,300 mg of sodium per day and one meal can easily have more than that...and I had two family dinners to go to! That means that while I was under my calories, I was more than likely WAY over on my sodium. Now sodium will not make you have more fat, but it will make you retain water which will make the numbers on the scale go up. I believe that is my problem because nothing else makes any sense.

     I have gone back to the eating plan from my November 24th post and will be adding something in that I neglected last time...I will be watching my sodium and drinking a lot of water! You would think that if you are retaining water, you shouldn't drink so much but the opposite is true. We should be drinking a minimum 64 ounces of water per day and some people say it should be even more. I can guarantee that over the last two days I haven't even had half of that!

     I will follow that plan today and see if it has any effect on the scale. I also will be moving, instead of sitting on the couch all day which is what I did yesterday. I will write more tomorrow and we'll see what the scale has to say! :-)

Until tomorrow,

Summer