As I was walking around the mall today, finishing up my Christmas shopping, I can't help wonder and it sounded something like this:
Self: What happened to the true Christmas spirit? I'm blown away by how rude people are here!
Self 1: Yes it's a shame.
Enough said. Ugh!
I am just truly blown away by the way people act around this time of year! I had "incidents" with at least two strollers today, none of whom said excuse me or I'm sorry!
It's amazing how those two phrases can really make a difference and how little people use them!
People are all about memememememememe and it absolutely kills me! Have a little courtesy will you? I promise you that I'm not out to steal your end-all-be-all present for your loved one. I'm just here trying to get this done so I can enjoy the rest of my season.
Don't get me wrong, I really do like Christmas. A lot. I just wish that people would remember what the season really is all about.
While we are all out there shopping for our presents, there are people who can't afford to do that. And what about the people who have trouble affording their food or their life-saving medication?
Why can't we, for just one day, drop our mememememememe status and think about someone else? Someone less fortunate that we could help!
It's such a simple thing to do!
Donate a dollar here and a dollar there. Go volunteer somewhere that could really use the help. Or better yet, go volunteer where you can make a difference in someone's life by serving them a dinner, or handing out a much needed box of necessities such as food and clothing. Go to a nursing home and hand out little dollar presents to the residents living there. To them it's not the present that matters, it's the fact that you took time out of your schedule to see them that matters.
The smiles and thanks you get back from doing things like that is absolutely priceless and THAT IS WHAT THE SEASON REALLY IS ABOUT!
I challenge you that for one day you stop giving out your money to retail stores and isntead, give out your heart. The rewards are much to be had!
Merry Christmas everyone.
Well hopefully I'm over my platau/hump of weight loss. Week one of the challenge, I lost 0.6 of a pound, then gained it back in week two, now in week three I'm down 2.2 pounds to be 171.0. Woot!
I sure hope I can keep this up. I've been getting tighter and tighter on my diet. It's been a series of small changes along the way and after seeing my weight loss this week, it gives me even more desire to stick with it and reach my goal.
My very short term goal is to break 170 and my medium term goal is 160 and then I reevaluate from there.
I did some Christmas shopping yesterday. Not quite done but got most of it out of the way. I'm hoping to finish today before I go to a party tonight with some friends from school.
This is going to be the tough one. When we hang out there is always a bunch of unhealthy food available. I'm thinking I may make a salad to bring just so there is something good to eat that won't totally ruin the progress I've made so far. That is if I have the time to stop by the store to pick up the stuff I need. I may be shopped out again.
Last night I finished shopping right when rush hour hit and I just didn't feel like dealing with it so I dropped in to the local book store (Hastings) and looked at books and sat and drank a tea while I read for about 45 minutes or so. It was nice.
I bought a book called Stitch and Bitch Nation. It's a knitting book. I just picked up knitting not too long ago and am hoping this book inspires me to stick with it. I think it would be really cool to make some of my own stuff to wear. Especially if it looks cute.
There are some really neat things to make in the book. I'm going to start simple with a cool pattern for a scarf, some cat toys, and the work up to a doggie sweater for a friend (I don't have a dog yet) and then on to these reall awesome leg warmer type things and fingerless gloves.
But before I do all of this, I need to finish the scarf I started. I'm just about there. I'm a slow knitter. I was hoping to have it done by Christmas but we'll see. It takes me a while but I'm about halfway through this ball of yarn and I may do one more depending on the length of it. We'll see.
I'm so aggravated right now! It seems like I keep losing and then gaining the same half pound.
What really confuses me though is that I'm losing inches. So far, since the begining of november, I've lost an inch off my waist, upper arms, and thighs so that's a good thing.
I'm thinking this weeks weigh-in is due to one of two things and I'm leaning heavily on the first.
1.) I ate a very not so good for you meal last night that was pretty high in sodium and of course I eat it right before bed without drinking a whole lot of water so I'm wondering if I'm retaining some water.
Solution: Going to reweigh myself tomorrow morning to see if that's the case. If there's a difference of at least a half pound, then I'll know.
2.) And I like this option as well. I've recently upped the pounds on my weights that I'm lifing and I'm gainig muscle and since muscle is more dense than fat, that would explain why I'm losing inches and not weight.
We'll see. Tomorrow will tell which theory is really at work here.
I will survive. No matter how many times I try I know I'll stay alive!
I was released to go back to work as of Thursday and unexpectedly put myself on the schedule for Friday. Like I said, unexpectedly. It was open and I really wanted to go back after being off for 2 months (OK, I worked two short shifts during this time but I don't really count them).
As soon as I got my schedule done, I headed straight to the grocery store to get some shopping for some easy work friendly and healthy foods. I will be making another trip soon to stock up even more but this was a scramble so I went for what I knew worked.
I packed my food for the day the night before and even entered it into my nutrition tracker on www.sparkpeople.com to give myself some accountability (basically to make me stay on track).
I was 99% successful in sticking with my diet and I'm so proud of myself! Work is where I seemed to really fall off the wagon because so many unhealthy/un-nutritious foods are freely available (not to mention free).
For example, yesterday when I came in to the unit they assigned me to, there was a butload of cake out on the table where we gave report. I managed to dodge that bullet almost completely. I can't really deprive myself so what I did was took a knife and cut a bite sized piece out so I could have just a little and that was it. I managed to stop at that.
I know down the road when the stress gets worse I'm really going to have to pull on my willpower but because my stress level was 0, I was able to keep in contril of stuff like that.
I did go over on my daily calorie alottment but I'm telling myself that I'm OK with that because I work 12.5 hour shifts and am on my feet for at least 11 of that doing patient care which I call my weight lifting for the day although I was on a general medical floor yesterday so it wasn't as bad as usual so I'm planning on hitting the gym today to do some weights.
So due to going back to work yesterday, I obviously didn't run so I am going to go out later this morning after it warms up a bit to do my first run! I'm so excited! I have everything all planned out, all I have to do is put on my clothes and go. Yay!!!!!! I'm getting butterflies in my tummy just thinking about it!
School is over too which is another reason I say that I'm a surviver!
I have officially survived my level 3 (3rd semester) nursing class and came out with a grade I totally didn't expect! I GOT A 90%!!!!!!!!!!!! In nursing school it's not an A, a 91 is an A, but I'm so freaking excited!
I was worried about this semester because I came into it so burnt out that I thought I was going to let my grade slip but I managed to keep it up! Woot!
With this grade, it should keep me in the top three in my class which is where I've been since the start of all of this back in January. I'd like to graduate top of my class, that would be really awesome for when I go for my masters, but I'll take the top 3 out of 80! That's still pretty darn good!
I'm so happy this semester is over. I took my tests all early so I'll get a full 5 week break. I feel like I can finally breathe for the first time since the first of September when I started.
For the break I'm planning on having a lot of fun by not studying and hanging out with my friends more.
Of course it can't all be fun and games so I'm going to be working 2 days a week to help make up for what I wasn't able to work previously.
Can I run now? Please? Pretty pretty please?
It got me bad yesterday. I think I'm pretty much over the muscle soreness from not using my left ankle for a month. I'm feeling very high in energy and SO READY TO RUN!!! It's killing me! Pretty soon I'm going to start counting down the hours until Friday when I can run again.
Yesterday I had to take two tests at school, got registered for classes next semester, bought my parking pass, got my clearance note from the doc for work, and then went to the gym.
It was so hard to not crank up the speed on the treadmill yesterday but I resisted. I traded in increased speed for killer hills! I did the program on the treadmill called cross country 1 which went from a 0% incline up to a 9% incline. I actually got my heart rate up in the low 180's when I was at the 9% incline just walking! It was a great tough workout that I wouldn't mind doing again. I did that for 40 minutes and then did my weight workout which lasted another 35-40 minutes.
While I was at the gym, I got my body fat percentage tested and it came out to 28% which puts me in the overweight category. I'm not too sure that it was accurate because when the guy tested me, he didn't test any part of my lower body at all and you can't possibly get an overall body fat percentage without checking all over. He checked my arms front and back, my upper back, and my hip and that was all.
If anything, I figure that I can use this just as a gauge. I'm planning on having it done again in a month to see where I am. Even though it probably isn't accurate, I can still use it.
I did good things diet wise this week too! My aunt is in town, she came in Sunday and we met for dinner at Chili's. Since I knew that was where we were going to go, I hopped online to check the nutrition values of the meals and planned out my whole meal and pretty much stuck to it! I got the margarita grilled chicken but instead of the rice and beans, I substituted the seasonal veggies which saved me a lot of calories, enough that I could have a margarita and still stay within my calorie budget!
Every day this gets easier and easier. I'm so glad that I've made the changes that I have. Maybe I will reach my goal weight before having a kid. That's the whole point of all of this. I figure if I lose the weight before, I have a better chance of having a healthy baby and the weight should come off a little easier since I will have a system down already.
Today is my final day of school. I have to drive downtown and take a few tests and then I'm done and I'll register for my classes next semester.
I'm so glad this semester is over. Although this wasn't the hardest semester academically, it was frustrating organizational wise.
The first half actually was great but it was the second half that was a nightmare! The secion director person had so much going on and her lectures were so all over the place it was rediculous! We wouldn't find out about things until the very last minute which makes it really hard to plan your time well.
So that's that.
After I finish my tests, I'm going to go to the gym and lift some weights and walk on the treadmill.
I'd walk outside today but it's so windy I'm dreading it, plus I need to get into the gym to lift. I didn't lift at all last week, I just walked outside. Last week was rough and I take a week off of weight lifting every 4-6 weeks and I was due anyway so it worked out in the end.
Today I'm going to resume my regular wight lifting schedule of twice a week doing a push/pull split. Push muscles on one day, pull muscles on another. I can get back to doing lower body work now that I'm out of the cast.
Had an eff it meal for dinner. Was just so incredibly hungry so I ate a lot of pizza. It was OK. I feel alright today. Gotta keep it in check though. I like to save at least one eff it meal for Saturday morning when we go out to breakfast after we all meet to run. It's a tradition that I've had for years and don't want to break. I do still try to keep it as healthy as possible by ordering eggwhites dry instead of scrambled eggs, and I only eat half of what I order and save the other half for lunch (this happens if we go to Weck's where the portions are enough for 2-3 people in one plate!)
I'd be really happy if I lost a pound this week. Still waiting to get out of the 170's. I'm so close!!!!
It's turned out pretty well. I started at 173.2 and am down to 172.6 so I lost 0.6 pounds this week which seems realistic for me to keep up. Would have liked to lose a pound but yesterday was a gift exchange where I let it go a little and ate several small helpings of deserts and some really yummy appetizers. Tried to balance it with fruit and beer. Yes I said beer. Yum!
I think I've finally found out where my calorie range should be. Before, I was trying to keep my calories too low and I felt low on energy and my mood changed but now that I have a better grasp on my range, I feel normal, if not really good when I eat in that range. I added 300 calories-ish per day. It's amazing what that little amount can do for you.
So this was my first week out of the boot as well. I'm not allowed to run until December 11. Doc said to just walk for 10 days to build up my muscles which didn't have to work while I was in the boot.
I've been walking quite a bit. I walked 4 miles yesterday with the group and have walked several other times during the week.
The only part that is sore are those muscles that I have to build back up again so if I have a particularly busy day on my feet, I try to rest the next day until the soreness goes away and then I go for a nice long walk again adding on a few minutes each time to get my muscles to where I need them to be to be able to run.
I talked to the doc about the C25k plan and he thinks it's a good way to get back and so do I.
When I get back to it, I may start somewhere in the middle of the plan and work up from there but we'll see. That first day is really going to be an experiment and I'm not sure what my body will do.
I know I've lost fitness while I was out but I don't know exactly how much.
The good news is that with all the years behind me of working out and stuff, it shouldn't take me too long to build myself back up. I'm guessing a couple of months before I get to my regular long run routine.
We'll see.
Merry Christmas all!
It's nice to know that I have control over two things today. My nutrition and my fitness. Do I eat well and exercise or do I sloth? Hmmmmmmmm........
Today I took two "practice" tests that are supposed to predict how well a person will do on the NCLEX exam. I've taken two previous tests in med-surg and totally rocked them, ranking in the 93-97th percentile.
Not so much anymore. Today the two tests I took were psych and maternal/baby nursing. My two weakest subjects.
It totally showed on my test results too. I totally bombed them. Not just a little bomb but I'm talking atomic size bombed them!!!! I didn't even meet the standard on them and I'm totally bummed about it!
I know I've been slacking but I'm still doing well, close to the top of my class, but this was all foreign to me today!
I'm sure the migraine doesn't help at all. It started last night and has gotten worse through today. I did take some Tylenol before the test but it wasn't enough. When I get these I can't concentrate on anything for the life of me. Grrrrrrrrr....
So I will regain control by going for a walk without the boot! Yay!!!!!! And I will keep my nutrition in check.
