After a week of diet food, I was so excited about my Friday cheat meal. Was it a bad idea?

Starting weight: 167
Current weight: 161.4 (Last week’s check-in weight was 161.9.)
Goal weight: 130

Exercise: I think about exercising all the time. That counts, right?

The Food: My new favorite NS meal is the Hearty Inspirations Red Pepper Chicken Sauté. It’s really enough for two meals, and it’s delicious as-is. No need to add anything. My favorite dessert is chocolate cheesecake, but I think I read that they are discontinuing their cheesecakes. I hope that’s not true.

My cheat meal this week was at Villa Dianna in Burleson, a lovely family-owned Italian restaurant tucked away in the corner of country roads. I ate less than half of a supreme Stromboli (their Strombolis are h-u-g-e (see photo above) (also, I use parentheses a lot, more than I use the em-dash (which is saying something, because I adore the em-dash))), plus half a roll. When I got home, I indulged in a few pieces of a dark-chocolate orange.

A note about cheat meals: I don’t know if I’m supposed to allow myself a cheat meal on the Nutrisystem program. Probably not, as NS offers many foods that have enough sugar and/or fat to satisfy cravings. So theoretically, I shouldn’t need a cheat meal. Additionally, NS teaches portion control and making good choices when you eat out or when you flex a meal. But look, I’m menopausal, so … let me have this?

A note about menopause: Maybe not every woman’s experience will be the same, but for me, this last stage of life has been fraught with weight gain. I could eat a handful of M&Ms and gain five pounds overnight. However, I could then go four weeks without eating said M&Ms (or anything else) and hardly lose a pound. This is menopause, folks.

Next Steps: I will continue to stick to the program, minus one cheat meal a week, and I will continue to drink more water (and use parentheses).