I am at 152 now.  I am so close to my goal weight of 149...  I feel like I don't know what to do when I get there?  Just maintain for a while?  I'm not there yet so I guess I don't need to worry yet.  But maybe when I get there I will just try and maintain for about a month. 

I have read that you can lose about 10% of your body weight at a time and then you hit a plateau for a while...  but i think it is good to lose weight, as long as you are doing it slowly.  I have been losing about one pound a week on average.  that is what is recommended.

it's weird...  I grew up eating a lot of dessert food, like ice cream, and a lot of refined bread and pasta...  and now I have cut those foods out of my diet/repreretoire completely.  It's such a change from how I ate growing up.

But I feel like it's something I have to do to be at a healthy weight.

I feel like I need to eat a somewhat large amount to be satieted.  A small serving of, for example, refined pasta (white pasta) will definitely not satisfy me.

or a small cupcake.  even if it has a lot of calories, I know it won't fill me up and keep me full.  I have to take these things out of my diet because they just don't fill me up. 

I understand the words "junk food" now much better than I ever did.  I am noticing the effects of food on my body more than I used to, too. 

So, it's weird to think about not losing weight.  I want to just keep doing it.  Maybe instead of thinking of stopping losing weight...  I could think about what reward I want to give myself when I get to 149.  It should be a really good one, because that is my goal weight and I would have lost a LOT of weight to get there:  13 pounds.  and I think I was actually at 165 when I started... so maybe more like 16 pounds. 

anyways...  I don't want to build it up too much with expectations but it's nice to think about what i could do for myself when i get there so i'm not rewarding myself with food in the meantime.

ideas:

1) a small day trip somewhere... like a hike with a friend to garapata.
2) a trip to San Francisco to go to a museum like the science museum
3) a spa day with hot tub and massage (and facial?)
4) a cleaning lady to come over and clean the whole house & windows
5) buy a bunch of new plants for the yard
6) trip to visit Neola

I keep thinking of ideas relating to food... it's always interesting to remind myself "don't use food as a reward...  it's fascinating how often the mind jumps to food as a reward mechinism.

7) mani/pedi
8) shopping spree!
9) backpacking trip
10) re-paint the house (interior walls)