Down 2 lbs

So why am I not thrilled???  Because I'm an impatient dufus and even though I know the whole "the healthy and long term way to lose weight is 1-2 lbs a week...."  BLAH!!!  I want it faster!!!  I have so much weight to lose and I dont't want to be struggling with these pounds for the rest of my life.  And I feel like I have started taking Alli and they say you'll lose 50% more weight than through diet alone....so naturally that, in my mind, makes me feel like I should get to lose 2-4 lbs a week and I should certainly be at the 4 lb mark because I'm working so freaking hard. 

This is the kind of thinking that makes me crash and burn.  I AM working hard.  I'm staying with my diet.  I'm under (not by enough to make it slow down weight loss) my calorie and fat goals every single day.  I'm working out every single day.  And I just want results faster.  Sigh  I've GOT to get over this kind of thinking because I can't allow myself to get down again being an emotional eater.  I just can't. 

So......whoohoo!!!  I lost 2 lbs!!! 

8:30 am, workout done!!!

Got my workout in already this morning.  Did a 2 mile WATP.  Off to shower and get DD ready to go for her kindergarten assessments.  Great way to start the day knowing my workout is already done.  Who knows....maybe I'll feel up to riding the bike or something later :)

Big thank you to a friend from the past

Hokey smokes, it's amazing what increasing the weight your are lifting by 5 little pounds can do!!!  It's been a while since I've done any "real" weight lifting.  I was uh, er, trained for lack of a better word LOL by a wonderful woman years ago.  We worked together in a law office.  She had been stationed overseas in the military for over 5 years before returning to her hometown.  While in Germany she met and married a guy also in the Army who was really into body building.  Competeing and the whole 9 yards.  He got her into it and she won several competitions.  So she really knew what she was doing and offered to teach me the ropes.  I was a little nervous because in the town where we worked the only place that had a weight room was the YMCA and all you ever saw in said weight room were men.  Big, huge, Schwarzenegger type men LOL  She was fit.  I was unfit.  I was a blob.   I'm a much bigger blob today than I was at that time though.  But she taught me well.  That was over 17 years ago and I can still remember everything she taught me :)  I can still hear her telling me to watch my form as I'm lifting.  I'm really grateful for that because although I have a long, loooooong way to go weight loss wise, I want to tone up along the way as well so that hopefully I won't be floppy when I finally get thin   I've been starting out slow with the weights.  I want results, but I don't want to hurt myself either.  I started my 1000th weight loss journey (ok, overexaggeration probably, but it feels that way), on 4/7.  I started lifting again on 4/9 using only free weights this time around.  I had also forgotten how much more you feel the workout with free weights than with machines.  Nothing at all against machines, I have a weight machine in my basement which I fully intend to start using again down the road.  But I fully believe that right now free weights are the best thing for me.  I can really feel that I've worked my muscles today even though I'm not lifting large amounts of weight.  Hopefully my muscles will return the favor soon and start showing me some resulting definition as I continue to lose weight. 

I wonder where Arlene is these days......it would be kind of nice to thank her all these years later for having patience with me and teaching me something I would have never gone out and tried on my own. 

Update to the BLAHS post

I am very happy to say that I found it within myself to put in another workout session.  The fact that I really had to force myself through that WATP workout.  I've never had that happen before, but I honestly just couldn't do it.  My legs felt like lead, I felt as if I were in some kind of time warp moving at super slow motion accomplishing nothing.  But then something happened.  Nothing major, just a little teeny thing that kind of ticked me off.  And a "friend" of mine came to visit.  Someone I call CCBG.  Also known as Crazy, Cynical, Bitchy Girl   I can definitely be on the cynical side.  Crazy - eh, that's a given.  Bitchy, not so much.  Sure I have my moments, but I don't think anyone could ever with a straight face refer to me as a bitch - which is a nice thing LOL  But, this little something just got under my skin and CCBG was just trying to bust out in all her amazingly huge cynicism.  And CCBG made me do something.  She made me walk over and hop on my recumbent exercise bike.  And then I turned on my MP3 player and John Mellencamp was first in line on my playlist and away CCBG and I rode.  For 9 miles.  I think she fell off somewhere around mile 5, but I kept going to make sure she couldn't try to hitch another ride me with.  So I'm happy to say that CCBG is gone and I got a really good workout in.  Sometimes CCBG uses her superpowers for good and not evil

I've got the blahs

And I'm not sure why :(  I'm doing alright with my eating so far (I've only had breakfast, but that turned out good LOL) but I just have no umph whatsoever today and that is so unlike me.  I have so many things I really need to do and I couldn't even force my way through a complete workout!   I keep reminding myself I did do one mile of my WATP video, but that's NOTHING!  And it was an old workout that was really slow to boot.  I just felt like my legs were not wanting to cooperate and that they were so heavy it was just making me feel like I was moving so slow and awkwardly.  My kids all have colds and I'm feeling that scrtachy feeling in my throat and feel a tiny bit congested so I don't know if I'm coming down with something or what.  But I hope it moves on it's merry way quickly because I do not like feeling like this and I don't have time to feel like this!  I need to be able to get my full workouts in to make sure I get this weight off and firm this flabby body of mine.

A little about me

Thought I should jump in with both feet and tell a little about me and my weight gain/loss history :)

My name is Karen, born and raised in Northeast Indiana.  I'm 40 yo, married almost 20 years to an amazing, supportive man, I have 3 children (ds 14, ds 9 and dd 4), a dog and a cat :)  (can't leave them out, they're part of the family too)

I was never really overweight growing up.  My mom would have told you otherwise.  She sure let me know often enough she thought I needed to lose weight.  And that was at a time that I was a size 9 weighing maybe 140 lbs.  I wish I could be anywhere NEAR that size/weight now, how she ever thought that was heavy I'll never understand.  Can't help but wonder sometimes what she thinks now in comparison, kwim?  Her favorite comment to me was "you'd be so pretty if you lost weight".  Oh that was such a helpful comment.  Just made me think that all of my teenage thoughts that I wasn't pretty enough or good enough were right on and really helped with my issue of low selfesteem.  When I was dating my DH she tried to pull him into all of this and he wouldn't bite.  He never told me about her saying these things to him, until one day when she put he and I in probably the most uncomfortably ackward position of our relationship.  But little did she know it backfired and made me realize what a wonderful man he is and that he loves ME.  We were engaged and she'd been harping on my weight wanting me to lose, now by this time I was probably in the 160 range.  I was away at college and not eating great (although mom didn't teach us how to eat well at all so I'm trying to reteach myself the proper way to eat).  My dh had come to pick me up for a date and I had to go back upstairs to my room for something and mom cornered him in the kitchen and told him she wanted him to demand that I lose weight or he was going to call off the wedding.  He told her no way, that it didn't matter to him and told her to drop it.  Of course, she didn't.  As soon as I hit the kitchen she said "R doesn't want to marry you.  You're too fat.  If you don't lose weight he's calling off the wedding."  OMG I was mortified and more pissed off than I've ever been in my life up to that point.  I ran out of the house and DH came after me.  We left with me crying and we went and found a place to park and talk.  Naturally, having absolutely no selfesteem and always in the back of my mind wondering when I was going to lose this great guy I thought at least some of it had to be true.  Who would want me???  He talked and I didn't listen.  Until he grabbed me and turned me toward him and MADE me look at him and listen and he explained what my mom had said while I was upstairs and that he told her that she had better not say the first thing to me about my weight and I could see in his eyes he was so hurt and horrified that she'd actually done this to me.  That day, even though I knew I loved him with all my heart and he was the one I was meant to be with, that day I finally found out what it felt like to truly trust someone and know he would never hurt me. 

Unfortunately things continued on the same with my mom with regard to my weight for years.  My dh hated that he had no control over her continually hurting me.  And she has no clue to this day that her words have been at least a small part of why my weight continued to climb and climb and climb over the years.  Any little bit of me that my DH could help me build up, she could tear down with one sentence.  After I had our first DS, mom became pretty relentless again and just ripped on my weight any time she could.  And she'd become good.  She knew after that day when he wouldn't come over to her side she could never speak up about my weight in front of him.  She knew he'd never be her ally in that battle.  After visiting with my parents one afternoon I came home more upset than ever telling him I couldn't understand how he could love me since I was so fat and ugly just regurgitating everything my mom had spewed at me all that day.  He did not tell me this until a couple of years later, but the next time we saw my parents, he pulled my mom aside and told her she was to never, EVER mention my weight to me again.  And if he had to pick me back up and try to put me together again after another visit with her like our last one she wouldn't see me anymore because she was doing nothing but destroying me a little at a time.  To this day, she's not made another comment about my weight that was disrespectful. 

In her defense, I've made her sound like a monster and she isn't.  I love my mom and she and my dad would do anything for me.  I realize now that in her own warped way this is what she thought she needed to do to "help" me.  And I think in some way she's maybe finally realized all the damage she's done.  My brother is even more obese than I am.  I am forever grateful that my DH is the one I was drawn to and that he's stood right beside me loving me for me no matter what all these years.

Up and down my weight would go over the years.  But any down it went, it always came up as much and then more.  I tried everything.  Weight Watchers - more times than I could count.  Another bone of contention with my mom because she used WW several times as I was growing up and she became a lifer after meeting and staying at her goal.  I went to paid weight loss clinics, a local one called Summit Weight Loss, one that is national, I don't remember what it went by at the time but it's basically an LA Weight Loss type deal, carb addicts diets, south beach diet, atkins, the rotation diet....you mention a diet and more than likely I've done it.  Some of them would work for a while, but then I'd hit a point where I just couldn't do it anymore.  The diet was either too strict or as is the case with the WW points for me personally, it would make me think of nothing but food constantly trying to figure out what I could eat to stay within my points yet still be satisifed and then I'd just go on a binge.  So up and down and up and up and up my weight would go. 

Finally in 2006 I started exercising regularly, doing WATP videos and I loved them.  And they worked.  I started losing weight again for the first time in years.  I lost 30 lbs and then I hit a plateau.  I didn't get too discouraged and continued with what I was doing.  And then that November my husband's brother died unexpectedly.  He was only 42 years old and had a heart attack.  We just had dinner with him that night and at midnight a police officer came to our door to tell us he was dead.  That sent me into a whirlwind of emotions and set off my eating again.  And I couldn't exercise.  I just couldn't make myself do it at first.  I wasn't sleeping and I just flat out didn't have the energy.  And then in the days after his death there were so many things to help MIL and DH and SILs take care of, getting his house cleaned and fixed up and ready to put on the market, going through all of his things, we took in one of his dogs and she's a part of our family now and that was an adjustment.  She'd been to our home 100s of times, so she knew us and was fine here.  But she also, I believe, saw my BIL die.  She was with him when he was found and for weeks afterward she would just shake uncontrolably so much of my time and attention was focused on making sure she was alright (she was going on 13 at the time and I was so worried we were going to lose her too)  So in the beginning of 2007 I finally pulled myself up and made myself start exercising again.  And then I dislocated my knee.  Had to baby it and get it back into shape.  Began again with the workouts and then I hurt my foot.  Tore tendons.  This time the workouts had to completely stop as I went through physical therapy to try to mend things a bit. 

And so came 2008.  After our first ever family vacation to Disney in January I decided I had to get to work getting this weight off again.  I had managed to keep the 30 lbs off give or take a few at any given time, but I need to lose over 100 lbs to be in a healthy range.  So I started back with the diet and exercise.  But nothing worked.  Nothing.  It just didn't matter what I did or didn't do the weight wouldn't budge.  And I was seeing people around me losing weight.  It seemed so easy for them.  I know it wasn't/isn't.  I know they worked as hard as I was working and they deserved their losses, but it hurt seeing others lose and me just stuck.  And things just kept getting darker and darker until I finally hit the bottom and decided I had to do something, anything to make this weight go away. 

I turned to Alli.  I have been taking Alli since April 7th and to date I have lost 10 lbs.  I'm tracking my food on the Alli site daily to make sure I stay w/i my fat and calorie guidelines and it's going really well.  I don't know what has changed, but for the first time in as long as I can remember food isn't the first and last thing on my mind every day.  I'm not trying to think of ways to get red licorice if I have to make a stop somewhere.  I'm not trying to keep myself from thinking about what we'll eat for our next meal when I've not even finished breakfast yet.  Food isn't the constant in my life it once was.  I hope whatever has switched that off for me stays switched off!!!!

And I stumbled upon this site yesterday.  How I hadn't found it in all my years of searching the web for diet tips I have no idea LOL  But I love the site so far and I am hoping that I can build a wonderful support group here and offer and receive support on this long journey I have ahead of me.  I want this weight to become a part of my past.  Not remain a part of who I am not only in my eyes but in others eyes as well. 

#1 post

Just found this site today and I love it already :)  I'm really looking forward to finding my way around and having a great support system in place for my journey through weight loss!!