Tonight is a wonderful rainy night breaking up a string of sunny summer days. Yes, I do belong in Seattle. Sunny days make me so happy, but then a rainy day comes along... and its so very nice to cozy up with a book or movie and don't forget the kitty! What makes this relaxation even sweeter is that I went to spin class this morning. It felt great. I love how my legs buzz after its done and then when I relax I feel so much more relaxed than had I not worked out.
Tonight as I sit here enjoying the rain, I'm rereading "Your Money or Your Life". I went to a mini-seminar in February by the author, and it made so much sense. I was gung-ho for awhile and then I forgot and went back to my old habits which has resulted in me being very unhappy recently. The book does address how to make yourself more financially stable, but more than that it challenges you to rethink consumerism and what you personally get (or give up) by being a consumer.
The thing that really strikes me is the concept of "enough". My inability to recognize when I have enough is what causes my problems with food and money. I seek satisfaction through external means. Frustrated? Bag of chips. Long day? Dinner and drinks at a restaurant. Bored? A shiny new magazine with recipes I'll probably never make. These things make me happy for a short period of time but are destroying me long-term. And the real kicker is that I get so much enjoyment from taking walks and making dinner at home!
Anyway, I better get back to reading. Sunday nights are so short.
Looking back at my blogs, it's been quite a while since I've written consistently. I'm going to try to give it a go again. This morning I did Jillian's 30-Day Shred on my cable on-demand. She kicks my butt every time, but it feels so good! When I'm in the middle of the workout I think "I need to write about this so I remember how good this feels!" So here I am again.
I'd love to write a bunch this morning, but I need to get to work. So I'll get to the most pressing things on my mind at the moment. Are there any vegetarians out there? I've been experimenting with vegetarianism this week. Starting Monday, the only meat I've had was one slice of bacon. Really, I think it would be easy for me on my own. I love vegetables and love the variety of flavors vegetarian dishes generally use. But just like many women I have a meat-loving husband. And he's just been diagnosed with diabetes, so he has enough diet changes to worry about at the moment. So I made him one vegetarian meal this week and I skipped out on the meat part of 2 other dinners. So I guess I don't have any vegetarian-specific questions. Just wondering if you're on this blog site.
Yep, I had another hell week at work. I've been working so hard that I made myself sick. On Monday night I worked from 8pm to 3am after working an entire day in the office. And then got up for an 8:30am call on Tuesday! The result was a horrible cold and got a big ol' stress zit on my chin. I haven't had one of those in months. On Friday I worked in bed with my laptop. Finally, I finished what I needed to finish on Saturday morning. When I sent off my fabulous spreadsheet, I told them I won't be checking my e-mail until Tuesday. So that's that, and the weekend is absolutely wonderful. It's so sunny here. Yesterday, my husband and I sat on a bench in the Seattle Center listening to bluegrass music at the Folklife festival. Very nice. In about 10 minutes, my friend is picking me up for our first kayak outing of the summer. Hurray!
This morning, I went back to last summer's blog entries. I'm so happy to be 20 pounds thinner this year. Right now, I'm wearing shorts that I could barely close last May. Thank you, 2008 Rachel, for giving 2009 Rachel this gift. I've been hanging around the upper 170's steadily for a while now. I think I will do a big push over the next few weeks to bring it down to the lower 170's. Fortunately or unfortunately, my husband's diabetes diagnosis should help with that. I don't want to put any unnecessary temptation in his way. Last night I suppressed my popcorn craving and today I'm glad I did.
Off to kayak! Hope everyone is having a fabulous long weekend!
I'm so mentally fragile lately, weight is not the issue for me right now, but taking care of myself is. It's Monday morning, I'm sitting at my desk at work and its so nice and quiet. I feel so peaceful right now and I'm truly afraid what the next few hours will bring. I don't really want to rehash all the problems, so I'll just list them.
1. My job has become unreasonable and has driven my up stress level so high. All my energy is drained by my job and I have no time or energy to do any that is enjoyable or necessary like working out, making a healthy dinner, or household tasks. I've been here before and thought I had escaped it.
2. My husband found out last week that he has diabetes. I don't think he's taking it seriously enough.
3. My debt is still going up instead of down even after all these years. This means I'm trapped in my current job for the foreseeable future.
Last night I finally ran 3 miles without stopping. I've been trying to get there since.... gosh, I'm not even sure how long. Do I count the time since I started running consistently again in August? Or do I count all the way back to 2004, the year of my first triathlon? It's too bad that I forgot to notice my time. I started with .25 miles of walking and actually I went a bit further than 3 miles. When I hit 3.25 I kept going to finish up the 45 minutes, ending with 3.33 miles.
I noticed that when I signed in today, I hadn't written since 1/29 and on that day my weight was exactly the same as it is today. Since the 29th, I hadn't been that low until today. I had a weekend to Portland, a couple happy hours, Valentine's Day.... all days when the diet went out the window. But overall, I balanced those days with healthy days. Since the beginning of the year, I've been steadily losing 1 pound per week.
Sorry this is such a boring post, but I thought I ought to mark my 3 mile accomplishment.
Like a swinging pendulum, my attitude has gone back and forth since my last post.
Attitude: "It's all good." On Monday morning, I weighed myself and logged it in my spreadsheet like I do every Monday morning. I realized that I have been losing a steady 1.4 pounds per week for the last 3 weeks. So nothing to panic about. I've seen 177 on the scale and been back up to 180 after that, but the overall trend is down. Could I have stayed at 177 if I hadn't eaten too much between Thursday and Sunday? It's certainly a possibility and a habit to try to change in the coming weeks.
Attitude: "I can do better!" Good ol' Biggest Loser. I feel silly relying on a television show so much for encouragement - especially a reality show! But Bob and Jillian are fantastic. This week, one of the contestants from home lost 2 pounds in her 30 days away from the ranch, and she said something about not worrying because she had gained muscle. Gosh, isn't that such a common idea? But Bob and Jillian struck it down immediately as being just another poor excuse. I and others have talked a lot in our blogs about excuses. There are so many that sound perfectly reasonable. "I'm tall and big-boned", "something is better than nothing", "I should start small to get my body used to working out"... This morning, I did Jillian's 30-Day Shred workout #1. I've done this workout about 4 times now, but didn't notice until today something she said. She said something to the effect of "People tell you to just take the stairs. You're capable of so much more!" I'm all for squeezing activity into my day, but she's so right! People expect so little from overweight people. If nothing else, The Biggest Loser shows that none of those excuses are valid. Most of us are capable of amazing physical feats if we just challenge ourselves to do it. I wish someone would have pushed me to try more physical challenges when I was younger. I always had the mindset that I just wasn't the athletic type. I wasn't the athletic type, because I never tried to be!
On another note, today I'm wearing my size 12 cords that I bought on sale from Ann Taylor Loft for $4.48! And I'm wearing my 180lb necklace - my reward to myself for reaching 180lbs. I'm so happy in my outfit today!
I'm disappointed in myself this morning. On Tuesday and Wednesday, I reached new low weights with Wednesday being 177.4! I was thrilled. Then I did the weekend gain again. WTF? Today I'm back up to 180.8. I know that I will again take it off and probably go even a little lower, but why can't I manage to continue my good habits into the weekend?
Can I play the blame game now? On Friday night, my husband said he wanted hamburgers. Ok, I can have a hamburger without trouble. And he said he wanted Pringles with French Onion dip to go with. So I got both those things and decided to take it easy on the chips. I didn't. I had a large glass with red wine with it all since it was Friday. And then I later we had ice cream with dorayaki (a Japanese treat consisting of 2 little pancakes with sweet bean paste in the middle). Last night, I said I wanted to watch a movie rather than sitcom after sitcom like we normally do. So while we were out, he picked up butter microwave popcorn, something I haven't had in years. I like regular made-on-the-stove popcorn, but he really wanted butter popcorn to go with the movie. As I'm making it, he yells into the kitchen "make 2 bags! I want a big bowl for our movie." I did and ate too much of it along with him. Here's the thing: both of us equate food with fun. If I insisted on making one bag and then measured out a cup or two? Not fun. If I skipped the Pringles and dip on Friday? Well, then I just feel deprived. I love Pringles and dip. But you know what, I didn't even enjoy either of those things. I went through the motions and felt bad that I was eating poorly. It didn't even taste that good. I know I can't blame it on my husband. I did just as much damage last weekend when he was out of town.
But he did make a comment yesterday. There's another common interest (besides eating too much) we used to share that now I'm not as into it anymore. He said that he doesn't even know what I'm into now besides losing weight. And its kinda true. This has been making me happy. But it is very time-consuming. The other thing that makes this a touchy topic is that he needs to lose weight - way more weight than I ever needed to lose. Half the time he says he's glad I'm making healthier meals because he likes them and knows its good for him. But then other times, I think he feels like I'm trying to push him to lose weight like I am. I love him just the way he is. Its how he was when I met him, its how he was when I married him, but I would really like him to be healthy so that he sticks around. And I tell him this. But weight is a touchy subject no matter what, isn't it. I think I've changed a lot in many ways and he's afraid we'll have nothing in common anymore. I don't want eating too much to be our fun thing anymore.
I've been losing pretty steadily for the past few weeks, but suddenly its just falling off of me! I think it's because I'm logging everything. Before if I had a bad day, I'd just stop logging calories, figuring that I had already blown it. Now even when I go past my goal calories for the day I just keep logging. I think it stops me from doing too much damage and also helps me stay in the mindset of this being my new lifestyle. I'm bound to have better days and worse days. No more thinking that the diet is either on or off (we call it boolean in my world). All of nothing attitude: bye bye! Oh, and 180's: bye bye to you too - forever!
I've also been pushing my limits working out. The Biggest Loser really helped me with that one. There is absolutely no reason that I can't push myself beyond my confort zone when they have 400lb people on there doing it!
Yar! Sorry for the lame pirate jokes. I ordered swimsuit pieces, 3 tops and 2 bottoms from LandsEnd.com and they arrived yesterday. You should check out the sale! The ONLY reason I felt comfortable buying swimsuits online is that they have a virtual model. You put in your measurements and even pick your face and hairstyle. And you can try on outfits virtually. Fantastic! No glaring lights or 3-way mirrors involved. (The virtual me has no cellulite!)
As I was saying, my box of inspiration arrived yesterday. Fortunately everything did fit very nicely. But I made a rather disappointing discovery. I think the last 5 pounds I lost were all in my chest! The tops I ordered were size 12-B cup and I didn't even fill it out! Now, I know that when I was a C-cup, I was also much, much bigger everywhere else, but I certainly thought I could fill out a B. Now if only my bottom half could catch up!
