So today is a new day right? I sure hope so because if it isn't, I'm screwed!
Thanksgiving was good. I'm feeling 100% better now. I really wonder if all my yucky-ness came from overeating. I didn't intend to overeat. I even served my dinner on a smaller salad plate while everyone else used the bigger plates. I got some wierd looks but I don't really care.
I filled my plate with a serving of meat, a good heaping serving spoon full of sweet potato banana stuff, a small spoonful of homemade cranberry sauce, a small serving of mashed potatoes and a very very small serving of stuffing. No gravy! The sweet potato banana stuff was so good that I had another smaller spoonful of that on round two. After dinner we played games and I ate a lot of fudge. My friend made fudge and I couldn't resist, taking two small pieces at one time. Must have eaten like 10 pieces of the stuff! Then we had pumpkin pie. I had one piece, told the husband to give me a small one and he gave me a normal sized one and of course I ate it all which is why I asked for the smaller sized piece in the first place. Then I topped it all off with two glasses of red wine (pinot noir).
After that, I spent the next 24 hours in misery. Nothing settled right and I was always afraid I was going to throw it all back up again. I was convinced that by the time I woke up the next morning, the previous night's dinner was already gone from all the trips I had to make to the bathroom. It was plain miserable.
At least it's done and out of the way. Eating on Christmas has never been a big focus for me so I'm not as worried about overeating then as I was for Thanksgiving.
I have to admit though, I've gotten better about my choices such as not taking the gravy and getting small portions of stuffing.
I also did something a little different this year. I always make my potatoes butter and margarine free and use light sour cream and milk instead. This year I used a small amount of light sour cream, finished it off with light yogurt and a splash of milk. I couldn't tell the difference! They came out so good that I'm going to start doing this more often!
So today is a new day. I'm feeling better and will be able to get back on track.
Today is also the start of the 5% winter weight loss challenge. It goes from today until February and the point is to lose 5% of your weight in that time.
This comes out to a little more than 8 pounds for me. Seems very reasonable.
Wish me luck! I'm gonna need it!
Ugh. That's all I can really say for how I feel right now.
Yesterday for Thanksgiving, we had some friends over and we had a lot of good food plus we played games. It was so much fun! Everything worked out so well I couldn't have asked for much better.
Until the wee hours this morning when I got sick. I felt so terrible. I was up and down, up and down, from 1:30 to about 5 this morning. I don't know if it was because I overate or what but I had it coming out all over.
The husband didn't get sick so that's why I'm wondering if it's because I ate too much or my body didn't like the wine I was drinking (only had 2 glasses so hangover isn't an option).
Either way, I learned my lesson and have absolutely no desire to eat much at all right now.
It's 1pm, I got out of bed at 9am and my stomach is still protesting although at least it's not lurching anything out.
Here it is, the eve of Thanksgiving and I have so much to be thankful for. The first thing is life. I thank my mom and dad for giving that to me. It's been a good one!
I'm also thankful for all of the friends I've made here in Albuquerque! You guys are what makes this place feel like home and that is priceless!!!
I'm thankful for my husband and all of the support he's given me in this past year that I've been in nursing school. It's been a rough one but I know I can count on him!
I'm thankful for my 2 kitties because they are the best stress busters ever!!! There's nothing better than sitting down and being surrounded by these two lumps of purring fur. Beautiful!
I'm thankful for beer, oh beer! Light of course! It seems to really take the edge off a rough day sometimes. Oh yeah, can't forget wine either! My favorite!
I could go on and on but I'm tired and need a nap (I'm thankful for those too!).
Watch out! A woman with a plan could potentially be dangerous! :)
As the day of my next doctor's appointment with the podiatrist comes up I think more and more about planning my comeback and it's so exciting!
I have a feeling I will be released to cycling first which is A-OK with me! I actually get butterflies in my stomach thinking about it I'm so excited!
The main purpose for thinking of my comeback plan has to do with running since the injury I have is running related.
I've been thinking about it for a few days and then today as I'm checking my www.sparkpeople.com page, I had my ah ha moment! C25K!!!
For those of you who aren't familiar with the C25K, it stands for Couch 2 5k. This is a plan for people coming straight from the couch to get them up and running (pun intenteded). So today I go to www.coolrunning.com and print out a copy of the plan to bring to the podiatrist a week from Tuesday.
If I get his OK for it, then I'm going to follow this plan and then work my way back up.
If I get his blessings, my tentative plans are to do a sprint tri in April and then a 10k in May. From there, it's hard to tell. I'd really like to get into half marathon shape again before I get pregnant but I'll just have to see how things work out.
After I finish the C25k plan, In Motion will be starting so that will work out perfect for me as a transition to Albuquerque Fit which starts in April.
I'm so excited! I'm crossing my fingers that it all works out!
Yep! I survived one more week of relearning how to live with a new lifestyle.
My biggest challenge this past week was when I went out with a few people after school on Friday.
To start off the day, someone brought in a lot of junk food for us to eat so I indulged in some chips and queso (sp?) and a powdered donut. The donut actually didn't taste so good so next time it comes up, I'll know I can pass on that and not feel like I'm missing anything. The food was brought in because we were watching some movies for part of our psych rotation in school.
After class we went to the bar for some drinks. I got my usual Corona Light with a lime. I always order light beer so that when I drink it, and I only had one, I don't feel like I'm ruining the whole day.
The three of us ordered appetizers to share for lunch since it was that time. We ordered this combination type appetizer that ended up being enough to feed like 6 people or so and it was all fried food. Fried okra, mushrooms (yum!), zuccini (yum), and cheese sticks. Suffice to say it was basically a heart attack on a plate. I figured I could have some though since I'd done pretty well throughout the week so I did. I tried to eat more of the mushrooms and zuccini and had 2 of the cheese sticks. I was so full from lunch that when I got home I had a super light dinner.
That's the thing with all of this is that every time I encounter something like this, I try to learn from it. What I learned this week is that I can pass on the storebought donuts. They did nothing for me other than taste processed.
Every week I'm learning how to balance things and that is another principle that I put into play on Friday.
Another valuable thing I learned is to pack my food and bring it with me! I was saved by packing my food on Thursday. I had planned on eating my lunch at school but we got out early enough that it didn't happen so I went and took care of some things that needed to be done. While taking care of what I needed to do, it was so tempting to stop in the cafeteria and pick something quick up. But I kept reminding myself that I took time this morning to pack some healthy food and that I really should eat that and I did! I totally passed on the cafeteria and I'M SO PROUD OF MYSELF FOR THAT!!!!!!!!!!
Last night was kind of a challenge for me too but I'm so happy at how well I did! It was another potluck type of situation with some unhealthy food avaialble. Luckily it was with the group that I coach and we're all generally good about brining healthy stuff to eat for main/side dishes so what I did was I filled half of my plate with salad and just a little bit of dressing and then filled the other half of my plate with a portion of protein and then left a little space for some not-so-good but good for the soul food. I know it wasn't perfect but I'm getting better at navigating these types of things which is one of my biggest pitfalls.
So, lessons learned this week: still working on balancing meals (getting better at it), I can pass on the store bought donuts and not miss a thing other than guilt and who wants that and, the most valuable lesson I learned this week was that always having healthy food around and ready to go makes it so much easier to resist temptations such as convenience foods/unhealthy stuff.
Tuesday is the weigh in. We'll see how it goes. I'm a little nervous because of how Friday went.
Let's start off with the good because I like good. Good is happy and fun.
I weighed in this morning and saw that I lost another 2 pounds much to my surprise. I didn't have time to measure so I don't know how everything else turned out. My next small/big goal is to get below 170. That would be awesome and I'm so close!!!!!
Last week was rough as far as the diet goes. I ate out 3 times and tried my best to do the balancing game. Apparently it worked but it was really hard. The most difficult day was Friday when we ate out for lunch (it was the end of clinicals) and then Scott and I went out for dinner that night to a pizza place (Il Vicino) with friends we hadn't seen in a while. I ordered a healthy sounding sandwich, not pizza, had them hold the dressings and add extra good stuff like tomatoes. Did I mention lunch on Friday was at a bar? Bars do not equal healthy food but I did my best with a ham and cheese sandwich, hold the mayo. I did splurge on fries and a Corona Light (with a lime of course!) and they were sooooo good!
This whole injury thing is really starting to take it's toll on me mentally. I had been doing very well in holding it all off but something changed over the weekend and now I'm totally down in the dumps about it.
It seems that everywhere I go I see people running and I want so badly to be one of those people! I remember what it was like to be one of those people! It was fantastic! It's hard though because every time I see someone running, I feel like I'm being slapped in the face with reality.
My mind is really starting to get the best of me. It seems silly to me that I would feel like this but I do and it's very real. I try as hard as I can to get my fix but nothing seems to really help. Swimming doesn't get my heartrate up, plus it hurts my ankle if I do it too long and I can only do the eliptical for 20 minutes which is enough to get the heart rate up if I put the resistence up high (which I do) but it's not long enough for all the "make me feel good" chemicals in my brain to get going and that is what I'm really missing out on. I know this is wrong on every level but I'm so tempted to go into the gym and hit the elliptical for a good 45 minutes at a good pace with the resistance up there (8-9/10). I think that may start to trigger the feel good stuff again.
I miss me and I'm sure everyone else around me misses the old me too. I'd like to apologize now for how I've changed over the past few weeks. I just want you to know that I really am trying my best and I'm doing everything possible to be in a good mood.
I never really believed in being addicted to running until now. When someone says they are addicted, I totally understand and can relate! There's nothing like moving your feet over the ground (especially the trails!), feeling your heart beat and your breath coming evenly, in, out, in, out, thump, thump, thump, thump. Then the only sounds you hear are those of your footsteps, your light breathing, and those of the world happening around you while you are on your morning communte as well.
I always get a kick out of running the paseo trail/north diversion channel during rush hour in the morning. I love to think how everyone is going through their morning communte to their offices all stressed out about what their day is going to bring them and here I am, "commuting" in the only way a runner really can. Totally free of stress and care and worry. It really is a great and beautiful feeling. I also know I can go home and have some more coffee. That makes it all the more sweet.
More good news is that the pain in my foot is greatly reduced. I tried yoga last night. I did yoga fit's Powerful Yoga. It's a great DVD and I really enjoyed it but I'm feeling it today. My whole upper body is sore and my ankle is a little sore as well.
Seeing as I was working a flu clinic yesterday and it was dead and I had a lot of time on my hands, I did a little more research on what's going on with my ankle. The best description that I found from the mayoclinic.com and medscape.com is that my bone isn't broken but my cartilage is.
So yes, I am officially broken.
Today is a real tough mental day for me because I want to go work out but with the way my body reacted to doing the yoga last night, I know it would not be a smart thing to do. I'm craving my fix so bad that it's killing me though! I wish I could just put on my running shoes and go run my 3 mile loop (that is now partially torn up due to a road being built but it's still there!) right out my door.
To add a little sting to this, Scott comes home yesterday with mint chocolate ice cream. Now if you know me well, and I'm sure you do now, you know that mint chocolate ANYTHING is right up there with chocolate and peanutbutter. I just can't resist it and when you put it in ice cream, it's toast. Come to my tummy!
What I'm saying is that Scott comes home with one of the worst possible foods for me to have in the house right now because ice cream is a comfort food for me.
Scott is also working nights this week and then is going to Tuscon for the bike race on Thrusday and won't be home until Sunday. I'm really wondering how I'm going to deal with this. I have a feeling I'm going to be at the gym a lot.
Today was the day. The day to weigh in. I missed it on Monday so I made up for it today.
Here are the stats
Week one
Weight: 175
Waist: 33"
Hips: 40"
Week two (today)
Weight: 174
Waist: 32.75
Hips: 39.5
All of that in one week! Plus my diet wasn't quite where it needed to be the past few days. I didn't blow the whole days completely but I did make some not so good choices but I would make up for it with healthy choices.
I struggle everyday to keep my balance and every day that I keep striving for that balance, it gets easier and easier.
Making change in life is tough. I had to actually convince myself that I wanted to do this. I knew that I NEEDED to because I really want to be in great shape. I knew I wanted it but the problem was wanting the changes that were going to have to be made. I've done a lot of reading and arguing with myself (the arguments were interesting to say the least) and finally things are sinking in and my motivation is there.
I would say it's still a lukewarm motivation though becasue I find it quite easy to go for those not so healthy foods. What I like to do to keep up my motivation is to look at my Oxygen magazines of these women who are lean with good muscle tone. I don't necisarily want to be as lean as they are. Add 5-10 pounds onto their frames and I think that would be a reasonable amount of body fat to maintain and then if I needed to, I could lean up for vacations or whatever comes up that I want to look extra hot for. :-)
I think my challenge this week is going to be to stay on track with the healthy foods and not overeating.
We went grocery shopping last night and we got a lot of good healthy food. The only junk food I bought are these mint truffle hersey's kisses. I bought these becasue I don't want to totally depreive and I know I can eat two or three of these and not blow it while taking the edge off.
It's little things like that that I have to rediscover to keep myself going.
So tomorrow is the big "date" with the scale. We'll see how it goes. What's funny is that I realize that I really shouldn't go by weight but it's good motivation for me to see those numbers go down.
All in all, the really important factor is going to be when I "undergrow" my clothes and I have to start buying new ones but without taking measurements and whatnot, how do I know I'm making progress?
I could go by how I feel but I'm such a numbers dork that I'm more motivated by numbers than that. Number of pounds I weigh, the number (size) of my clothes, the size of my waist, thighs, upper arms, hips, and the list goes on. If I really wanted to, I could totally surround myself in numbers but then I may end up in a corner in the fetal position from too much stimulation.
So what is the point of all of this you ask? MODERATION! Moderation in everything!
Today I broke down and just couldn't take it anymore. The husband and I went to breakfast this morning and talked over the morning paper. It was so nice. We used to do this quite regularly before I started running so it was like old times. Because of this, I allwed myself to have a little more than usual (aka "cheat" btw, I loathe that word). Sometimes you just need to but I don't always do this (think moderation).
After breakfast he went to work and went to work out at the gym. It was so nice. I've been going absolutely insane not being able to run. It's really had an effect on all aspects of my life because I'm not getting my usual endorphin rush. I'm missing my rush so much that I gave in and did the eliptical today for 20 minutes after my weight workout.
Now don't go freaking out on me. I got the OK from the doctor to do this! He said I can cycle for 20 minutes, use the eliptical for 20 minutes, or swim all I want (I don't think he realized when he said I could swim all I want that it meant a minimum of an hour at a time but anyhow...... :) )
After doing this I feel almost human. I hit the eliptical at a moderate level of intensity. I have to say that it was quite ackward to do the eliptical in the boot. Not being able to move my ankle through it's full range of motion really put my balance off so I had to hold on to the bars the whole time but I managed. While I was on the eliptical I acutally felt human for the first time in two weeks. It was wonderful!!!!!
Today I also started my Learn To Chin program where the eventual goal is to be able to do wide grip, real pull ups or chins. Let's just say I have quite a ways to go. I got the program out of one of my Oxygen magazines. It says to use a Smith machine to start and you put the bar so that when your hands are on it with your arms extended, your butt is a few inches off the ground and then you pull yourself up. Much easier said than done.
I did my upper body routine with free weights and then went to this so I was already tired. I hit the weights pretty good today. The first set of these went great! I was able to knock out 6 in a row! Woot! The second set was a bit harder and I barely squeaked that 6th rep out. Come the third set, I was toast! I barely made 3 reps before I just couldn't anymore.
Yes, I am definately a work in progress but I'd really like to be able to do a pull up. I've only ever done one real one in my whole life and that is when I was 15 and was very lean.
I think for the first time ever I kept an accurate record of the food that I ate and it came out to 1585 and I'M NOT HUNGRY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I know my meals aren't perfect but I'm so happy that I was able to eat like that and not be hungry. I was convinced when I loaded it all in that I would easily be over 2000 calories!!!
That was yesterday. Today with my planned dinner I am at 1768 so a bit high but then again, I gave in to the sour cream that I had in the fridge so I had the oh-so-nutritious lunch of sour cream (low fat) and multi grain tostitos. OOPS!!
This is definately a weigh loss in progress.
I did weigh myself the other day and am down to 173. I have a feeling that I got up to 173 after my "halloween candy/food binge" over the weekend. My official weigh in day is going to be Monday so that will be the true measure of where I am.
It's kind of nice to know that I have a date with my scale on Monday. It's really going to make me rethink my choices on Sunday. Sunday's are historically my worst eating days because that is the day I go to church and have study group. I try to bring healthy food to study group but sometimes I give in to temptation and then feel guilty about it. This week the plan is to go to the store and buy some strawberries and grapes so I can snack on those instead of junk. I don't feel guilty when I eat fresh fruit like that.
OK, so I have only one gripe for the week and that is the husband (sorry hun!). I come home one night and he has bought a thing of 7 layer dip and two bags of those Totino's Pizza rolls. I feel like he's secretly trying to sabatoge me and it irks me to no end!
Exercise has been tough lately with my foot and all. I was able to water run on Monday night for 25 minutes and I finished the rest of my workout in the pool off with swimming laps. All in all I exercised for 1 hour 10 minutes which is about right. I aim for 1 hour during the week (three days a week) and then 2 hours on Saturday and 2-3 hours on Sunday. That was the pre-injury training schedule which included running (the majority of my time), lifting weights (can't wait to get back to this, I'm hoping next week!), swimming (about an hour), and biking.
So far this week I've just done the one workout because my foot has been swollen still and painful. It's not worth it to push it so I'm going to go swim some gentle laps tomorrow and bring my water wieghts so I can get some muscle toning exercise in and the go swim on Friday.
Saturday is still up in the air. I'm thinking of going to the pool Saturday morning but we'll see how things work out.
I have to play it all by ear right now and let my injury guide my duration and frequency of exercise.
Yep. Injured and it sucks. The good part is that it gives me more time to study, sit around thinking about running and cycling (can swim all I want), and lose weight.
That's why I'm writing this today. I figure if I get it all out there then maybe it will help me be accountable for my actions meaning, holding myself accountable for what I'm going to be putting into my mouth.
I started up my sparkpeople.com page again and put in measurements. Here they are
Weight: 175 (this is after two halloween parties and too much candy...was 173 before)
Waist: 33in
Hips: 40in
Thigh: 24.5in
Upper arm: 14.25in
I don't really have a size goal right now. Ideally I'd like to get down to a 6 but shorter term I'm thinking 8 or 10. I'm a 12 right now.
The main goal is to lose 10 pounds in the next two months which means 5 pounds a month or an average of 1.25 pounds per week which seems very reasonable to me.
The trick is going to be Thanksgiving and Christmas on top of being in nursing school (think: added stress) and being injured.
Because of that, I'm really going to have to concentrate on what I eat.
I'm in some sick way, looking forward to this. I've lost weight before. Used to weigh in at a heafty 235 at my highest and have kept the weight off for about 7 years now. I know I can do it.
Since it's the begining of November, I figured that now would be a good time to start.
I'm running into challenges already. Last night the husband and I went out to eat and I didn't really want to but it was nice to get out of the house. I'd been studying all afternoon and evening. The challenge is that it was hard for me to find a place that was healthy to eat at so we went to Wendy's. I ordered a grilled chicken (no lettuce. yuck!) and a chili with a caffiene free diet coke. I probably could have done better on the chicken and told them to hold the sauce but all in all I'm fairly happy with the decisions I've made.
Today I'm going gorcery shopping and I'm going to stock up on chicken and healthy easy stuff to make. The biggest hurdle for me is eating a healthy breakfast. I'm afraid it's going to come down to having to set the alarm clock earlier so I can get up and cook. If I have to I will though. It will be worth it in the end.
