I think there’s something to this “retaining water” thing. I’m up by almost four pounds today. Yesterday was an eating day, and I broke the previous day’s fast with the usual yogurt and blueberries. However, I got that strange tortilla chip craving again and consumed more than a few of those (and by “more than a few,” I mean the entire bag) before the day was over. To add insult to injury, I also fell off the “no sugar” wagon for the first time in nearly three weeks. Still, an intake of 3,500 calories is required to gain a pound, and there’s no way I consumed the 14,000 calories necessary to gain four pounds. I’m guessing the culprit is the water retained due to the high sodium intake.

I’m really disappointed that I even bought anything containing refined sugar in it, but HEB (huge Texas grocery store) had a sale on its house-brand chocolate-covered almonds. By a sale, I mean each bag was a dollar off. I don’t know what sort of flawed consumer psychology I succumbed to, but the deal proved too difficult to resist, and I bought two bags. I blame my granddad for this inability to resist: he would always stock up on something that was on sale. I especially remember his penchant for purchasing bags of Circus Peanuts candy when they were on sale. (They’re the worst candy in the world, by the way: orange-colored peanut-shaped gobs of some sort of plastic-like substance that’s only called “candy” for lack of a better descriptor.) Anyway, I’m going to blame my genetics for the decision.

The thing is: I didn’t enjoy the chocolate-covered almonds. I didn’t eat all of them—which is something because I typically can’t stop eating sugar once I start—because they just weren’t that good. I normally love chocolate-covered almonds, but I think my taste buds have become more sensitive since I started this journey, and they were just not impressed with the quality of the chocolate. The candy certainly wasn’t worth falling off the “no sugar” wagon for. It’s just that I got them in my head when I walked by the large display of HEB chocolate-covered nuts, and although I thought about it for a few seconds before grabbing the bags, it was essentially an impulsive decision. What I need to do to avoid such temptation in the future is just follow my grocery list while I wander around the store with my head down.

While I’m sure that a lot of the apparent weight gain from yesterday is water weight, I’m going to fast again today. This will be the third day I’ve fasted this week, and I may do the same next week to accelerate the weight loss. If I can just settle down and not stray from good eating habits, I think I can go back to fasting only twice a week after that. We’ll see.