Week will be a bust no matter what I do....Booooooooooo!
Well, here comes that bloaty pinchy feeling that I get every month right about this time. Oh...and of course a little bit of the huuuungries!
But the one thing that I am come to understand is the way it all works and not to get too frustrated with my scale when it can't help but reflect what my body is doing. The water weight....about 7 days prior....always a fun time in my world.
The scale said an ugly UGLY thing this morning and it is a liar. And I know this. Because I have not eaten badly this week. A little more than normal but not several pounds worth. And I have been exercising. Just like I should.
And so, through this time, I just have to remind myself that as of the day after TOM comes, the scale will drop like an avalanche like it always does. And I have to remind myself that I just need to do what I have been doing and stay on track...no matter what lies the scale tells me....and that in about 10 days, it will all be okay.
Sometimes, we just have to remind ourselves that we are women and, unfortunately, there are some things we just can not control.
This week A's grandfather is in town from Oregon. And so that means southern cooking every night. I know it sounds good....but at best, I am working at a maintain on the scale for Friday. And I am fine with that. There are just some weeks that will naturally have me eating more and this is one of them. We are going to M&M's Soul Food and I will be damned if I am going to miss the Mac and Cheese that would rival anyone's grandmothers home made recipe. So here is to a maintain this week!! I am half way through my exercise week too.
Tonight I was watching Discovery Health Channel and there was a show on about an obesity clinic that has 75 of the most obese patients in the country.
As I looked at the bodies of these people...the people that suffer from the same disease that I do....compulsive overeating....I realize how much of the battle I have won. I am not saying anything negative in any way about the people that I was seeing on the show. I can only imagine what it is like to be in a clinic that is your last hope because there is a tumor on your leg that is life threatening, but you still are ordering take-out that is being sneeked into the clinic. I can only imagine being 750 pounds and not even being able to get out of a bed without basically what looks like a crane.
As I watched this show, it made me realize that although I struggle with this every day...and probably will for the rest of my life.....it made me see how much I am winning this battle. Today, I got on the scale and weighed 204.7...that is exactly 10 pounds that I have lost since July 11th. And although it is the same weight that I have lost before...I am making effort to continue the battle every day. And I am proud of my 5 pounds a month.
I realize that I am ABLE to get up in the morning and get on a treadmill and do a workout where I am jogging whereas there are people that can't even get out of bed. I realize that I don't eat out a lot and I am doing things to make the better choices for my home. I realize that even though this is hard, that I can do it.
Again, I am not saying anything about morbidly obese people. We all struggle with degrees of this issue. Even people who are underweight deal with the same connection to food...either too much, or lack thereof.....it is about control. It is still the same addiction.
I am not sure what the point of this post is other than to be thankful that I am able to get up every morning, put on gym clothes, get on the treadmill, take a shower and go to work. I am winning this battle more than I realize sometimes and I have to remember that always. And it is a good feeling.....but my heart just aches and goes out to the people I saw on this show. I feel their pain so much....
I am SO ready for Friday, it isn't even funny. lol.
Today, I got out of bed and I was so tired. But I got on my treaddy as usual because today is the end of my workout week and WI is tomorrow and it is all just part of the better health stuff. So I got on. My goal is for 40 minutes now but I was running behind but got a good solid 30 in which is what I used to do every day. Funny thing is that 30 minutes feels like so little time now. Even though I only added the 10 minutes to the workouts, I kinda feel jipped when I don't do the whole 40! lol. Who knew I would actually be bummed to not get in my entire workout.
I alternate doing jogging and hills. So 2 days of jogging and 2 days of hills on the treaddy. Today was 1-10 incline 2 times and then 2 to 4 to 6 to 8 incline...and then 4 minutes of cool down. So it was a toughie. Those hills to 10 incline seriously kick my bootay and take names!! lol. But that is all part of the fun of it. I enjoy making up different workouts. And sometimes I do hills AND some jogging. Watch out!! I am tricky....
So tomorro is my WI and I had a superfantastic week but I also know that I lost 3 pounds last week....so I am not expecting too much of this ole body that sometimes likes to hang on to my progress for an extra week. How kind of it.
This eating week was very good.....I was right on track..and the weekend is almost here and time for me to be able to have a little more freedom. LIke I said..I am a nazi during the week but on the weekend I loosen up and have more freedom and I really like the way this works for me.
Well, off to go and talk to a few of my blog buddies!!
....but I went on to my Google Reader and read a few of my girlfriends are back and blogging.
So I thought it was time for a check in.
How am I doing? REALLY WELL!! That is the scary part. I am not here to blog about how I am doing so badly, can't control myself, havn't exercised in god knows how long....I am actually doing WELL. I am actually proud to say that when I logged on today, I had to change my weight to a LOWER number. Who knew that this could be done?!?!? lol. I have lost 17.1 pounds since January 3rd...when I started this leg of the journey. But a majority of that has been since July. Since July I have lost almost 9 pounds. And I am proud.
So, first a catch up on my life. I finally left my job in the mortgage industry and went back to my old occupation, Legal Secretary, after a 10 year gap. I was very lucky to get a shot with this firm and I am glad to be here. I am very very happy with my new job and my new position gives me a lot of discipline with eating, actually....because I am always busy and take a very short lunch. Also, I am loving the fact that there is this thing called 'paid holidays'.... have you heard of such a thing? Well, after being self employed for 10 years, I forgot such amazing things existed. lol.
We finally sold our house and moved and that was a huge strain off of me emotionally. We had to do a short sale because we bought during the worst time and got a bad loan (which I gave to myself thinking that my income would not be changing and that we could get a better loan later)....so one thing leads to another and we were losing the house. But I am overjoyed to say that we moved 9 houses away and are in the same exact neighborhood with all of our favorite conveniences within 4 minutes walking distance. I am very happy and I really love our new home. It has a great layout and we are all settled in after moving in June. Our sale of our house closed last month. It took 3 months but we had amazing buyers and we hope that they are happy in their new home/our old home.
We had to postpone the wedding and don't have a new date yet but we know it will be next year and I am excited about it whenever it happens.
And now to the reason why we are all here...weight. Well, I am doing well in journaling my food for the most part. I am not anal/nazi/psycho about it and do it pretty regularly. But my formula has been to be very very good on the week days and get some slack on the weekends. It has been working really well for me.
Exercise? I get up Monday-Thursday and workout at 6:45am for 40 minutes on the treadmill alternating days of jogging and hill work using incline. Yes. You read it here first ladies. IN THE MORNING!! I have been that girl that always swore up and down that I would never, ever be able to get up in the morning and workout. Silly girl. That is not true!!! I find, now, that with it out of the way in the morning, my day is better, I have more energy and I can not dread having to do it when I get home because it will leave me no time to be with my family, hence sluffing it off to be with them and then regretting that I did not do it. So I am proud to day that I have been consistent with it for some time now and actually *gasp* enjoy it!! lol.
Well, that's pretty much it for now. I will try to make a better habit of checking in here and saying hi to everyone!!
Hi Angela, Donna!!, Linda..and all of you other beautiful ladies!!!
Onward and Downward!!! Onederland, here I come....
Sometimes I look in the mirror and wonder if I am satisfied to just be fat for the rest of my life.
Seriously, if I wanted to be thin, wouldn't I do more to accomplish it?
I have made a commitment to myself that I will not get on the scale until the last Friday of the month.....see what I can do to lose some of this but not focus on the number every day. I am a daily weigher....always have been and always will be.
I have noticed a few things. I usually lose, lose, small gain, small gain, lose a larger number, lose, gain, gain. It has to do with TOM. Most of it. TOM is a hard time for me. For 10 days or so beforehand, I struggle a lot. But the other 20 days of the month, I put in serioius effort. So since the beginning of the year, I have only (I hate that word but that is how it feels) lost 10 pounds. I have a girlfriend who has lost consistantly a pound a week. She exercises 6 days a week (she gets off of work a lot earlier than I do) and eats about 1500 calories a day.
What would it take me to do that? Why can't I get that kind of focus? If I ate only 1500 calories a day and worked out 6 days a week, I would have been done already!! lol. She is so focused. And I am jealous that she can do that.
I keep saying over and over that I want to be thin. But if I wanted it badly enough, wouldn't I be there by now??? I mean, wouldn't I? This part of my journey started 5 years ago in June. 5. Years. Ago. I mean, I should have been to goal and maintained all of this time.
I am just frustrated. Frustrated when I look in the mirror. Frustrated that I can not stay as focused as some others can. Frustrated that I am not 'there' yet....after all this time.
I just want to weigh 150. But I guess I don't want it enough somehow...or I would be there already....
Sometimes on this journey we have 'those moments'. Moments of clarity. Moments when we realize something about ourselves or just plain moments where we 'get' something that we did not get before.
I guess that this journey is filled with these things. Here I sit, almost 5 years from when I started on my WW journey. I started June 3, 2003. A few months after I had my son...who just turned 5 in March. And one of my moments today consists of realizing how long I have been doing this and have yet to get to the end of this part of the road.
I am not on WW any longer. But I am on Calorie King and I county my calories instead of points. So basically the same thing. I have a workout buddy that I exercise with 2 times per week.
I was on strong for about 2 years and got to my lowest weight of 175. But my life took turns and twists. My journey has been long and hard. And I have yet to get to my goal weight of 150. I was so close and then, I let it, over time, slip away from me. And I got back to 223 in January. I can honestly say that I thought I would have been here by now. But this is a journey in every sense of the word. This journey has been full of a baby growing up, getting a divorce, finding a new place to live and a job after not working for 2 years, finding new love in my life, having a major illness that required surgery and recovery, buying a house, my income being cut in half, our financial life going down the tubes...losing a home. That is a lot to go through in just 5 years. And when I type that all out I realize why this is called a journey. Life is a journey with only one final destination. It is what you do in the middle that counts.
The first little while that I have been back on track was hard because of all of the things I could eat over. Money. Stress and more stress. But those are all excuses to not do what I needed to do. And although I have lost quite a bit of weight since I started back to eating better and exercise, I have not fulfilled what my potential is. I have lost 11.3 pounds since January 2nd. And I know I could have done better. But on the flip side of that same coin, I could have done a lot worse.
I have been trying to figure out what has been holding me back. I have a wedding dress to get into...although I bought the right size and it is a corset so I can go down about 3 sizes without alterations. I want to be much thinner by the time I have a baby because being almost 300 pounds at delivery with my last one was no fun so that is not something I want to repeat. So what is holding me back??
The truth is, I don't really know. I don't know how I let all of these pounds creep back on in the first place. 2 gained became 5 gained became 10. And next thing I knew I was back where I said I would *never* be again. Over 200 pounds. But for some reason, in the last 2 weeks, something switched. Last week, I lost 2.8. And this week, I am on track for at least another 2 pounds. I added one more day of exercise a week (making it 3 now) and I modified my lunch time meal to have less calories. That is working. But I think that the other part of it is that I finally got my mind in the game.....if that makes sense.
I am the only one in control of my eating and exercise. I guess another part of it was my honey. He is the most awesome man I know but we have had so much stress lately with everything that has gone on. One of the things he has been doing to try to 'help' me is ask me about what I am eating and if I am going to exercise and when, etc. I felt monitered. I felt like he was watching everything I did and it was making me very conscious and I didn't even realize it. And he was just trying to be helpful because I have told him that I want his support. But I realized that one of the things I didn't want was someone to play food police. I write down what I eat. I get my workouts in. But if I feel I am being constantly scouted, it thwarts my efforts. So this weekend, I finally told him that. I told him that I appreciate what his intention was but it was hurting me. I actually said that. "What you are doing is not helping me. It is hurting me". He was surprised a little bit but told me that he was sorry and that he was just trying to help. I guess he didn't realized that I need SUPPORT not the FP. lol. I felt like he was on my back all the time and he though he was helping. And in a way, I understood what his intention was but it was not what I needed and I spoke up. And since then, it has been easier for me. It is so interesting what triggers us, you know? And we don't even realize it.
I don't really know where all of this is going. I just feel like I have so much to say and I know I can come and share it here.
But my *moment* that I had today was simply this. I will get there. And there is no clock running. I am not in a race. I just have to simply continue to do the things that I am doing right now to get the losses that I have been the last few weeks and I WILL GET THERE. I don't have to be *perfect*. If I am looking for perfection, then I will fail. There is no doubt about that.
So for those of you who are struggling today, let's all say it together. WE WILL GET THERE. We are not on a clock. Persistance, not perfection.
That's it. And I realized something else....I have blogged 3 days in a row. I think that is because I don't feel like hiding anymore. And I know that I will succeed. And I know you are all here for me. And I thank you.
Hello ladies. It has been a little while since I blogged. Things are going well on the weight front. I am down 11.2 pounds since January. Less than 5 pounds a month but still progress nonetheless. I am happy with the changes that I am making. I wish the pace were quicker but I am not the kind to look a gift horse in the mouth. I am happy with my accomplishment.
My life has been hell for the last few months. We are one of 'those' people caught in the mortgage crisis and we are losing our home. Please don't feel badly for us on that front. We made the decision to do the short sale on our house and the bank is working with us...and we are not going to be out in the cold. But to add to that, we racked up a ton in debt trying to save the house. And in doing that, we had credit card bills up to our you know whats. So in the decision to sell the house, we also put ourselves into consumer credit counseling. So for the first time in a long time we are caught up on everything and it is finally turning the right way.
My Fiance and I were dealing with all of this pretty well but it started to take a toll on our relationship. We have been in a few fights that should have been more like nothing but I think that we are so stressed and in our own worlds, that we just forgot the other person was involved too and that we are both feeling the stress. So we have had a few good talks and things are better.
It is odd. Usually in times of struggle, I want to talk talk talk about things...but I have just shut down for a while. But I am glad to say that I finally feel almost normal right now and that is a good thing.
This is a very hard time in my life so please send good thoughts my way. Thanks for listening.
