Shelly Does Life

So I didn’t want to write this post yesterday, because all I could think of to type was whining, self-defeating words. But thanks to a refocus of my thoughts yesterday afternoon and evening, I’m feeling a lot better and a lot more able to write this post from a more positive point of view. 

I weighed 1.2# more than I did last week. Like I said, I really beat myself up over it for a large part of my day. But then, I got to talking to a friend on a weight loss group I’m in on Facebook. She pointed out that we need to focus on today. Don’t be upset about yesterday and don’t worry about tomorrow. Which brought me back around to the motto “Win today and repeat!” That’s going to be where I force myself to go every time I start thinking negatively about myself.

I thought up a plan yesterday afternoon to get my exercise in earlier and not sacrifice time with my daughter. It’s been tough to figure out how to do both, and as soon as I thought of this, I felt a little silly. I will go downstairs with her after dinner and she will play while I exercise. I’m still there with her, we’re still interacting, I’m just doing my thing and she’s doing hers. Which actually benefits her a lot, because she’s old enough she needs to embrace independent play skills. 

I tried this out last night, and it worked pretty well considering this was the first time and Gwen didn’t quite know what was going on. I did an interval workout. 5 min warm up, 4 reps of 3 minutes high intensity and 1 minute lower intensity, and 4 min cool down. 25 minutes. Well, it would have been a 25 minute workout, if the display panel on my recumbent bike had cooperated!

Just after my inlaws left us in mid-January, I went down stairs and found the display snapped off the base… I don’t know what happened, I don’t care to know what happened, I’m not even really all that mad that it happened. I’m upset that whoever did it didn’t attempt to make it better, and didn’t tell me about it so I could make it better. But that’s all. It’s been resting against the frame of the bike, and doing alright when all I’ve been doing is a steady, consistent speed for my workout. But increasing the intensity was too much for it, and it kept flopping over into the way of my pedals, which caused it to ricochet around and pull out at least one of the two wires.

It happened as I started my first interval last night, so I solved the problem - super glue! I had to start my workout over because the display had been unplugged and erased the data from the warm-up. But I didn’t feel like doing the warm-up again, so I just started at the first interval. Which meant the data from the warm-up isn’t included in my stats on DailyMile. Oh well. It wasn’t THAT many calories :)

Oh, the other thing that cheered me up? I was talking with my friend on messenger while I was exercising and he told me I needed to go take my measurements again instead of just fretting about the (lack of) weight loss. The last time I took my measurements was 4/16/2011. From then until last night, I lost a combined 14.5 inches from my chest, upper arms, thighs, waist and hips!!! 

I’m considering doing a 7-day cleanse I read about yesterday - thanks to someone posting it on Pinterest. It’s called the GM diet, and it’s a very structured 7-day plan of mostly fruits and veggies. I really don’t care about the weight loss claims (10-17# or something like that) nearly as much as I care about flushing my system so I can feel better. Who knows? Maybe it’ll help with my endometriosis somehow. It’s worth a shot. I haven’t talked to Bary about it yet, but I’m thinking about starting it next Monday (since that’s weigh day) and running through next Sunday so I’ll see full results the following Monday. Has anyone ever heard about or tried the GM diet?

Alright, folks! I found the TRUE secret! It’s diet, exercise, and getting sick! Ba-da-ba But seriously. I’m blaming lady problems (ie bloating) for last week’s gain. Thanks to my increase in exercising this past week, focus on eating better, and being sick from Thursday through Sunday, I managed to lose 4 pounds! (I was back to the land of the living yesterday, but still definitely ill.) 

Four pounds! That’s great! I had a challenge from a friend to lose 3# to make up for the gain from last week. I showed him! HA! That puts me back on track for my 20# in 10 weeks goal. I’m now 5.8# down, on week 3. That’s just 0.2# shy of the 6# place I should be to stay on track. Victory is mine! Mwahaha! 

I’m looking forward to feeding off this energy to push myself to succeed well again next Monday. 

I was given a bag of shirts that a friend of mine had no use for, as she’s losing weight, too. There were a lot of XL and L things, and so I figured, thanks to my bosom of plenty, that I would probably be able to use a lot of them. There are a lot of nice work clothes in there. I was amazed when I started trying things on. Not only is the XL stuff too big, it’s so big that I was swimming in all the excess fabric! I’ve never been so happy to be able to put aside clothes that don’t fit. 

Also, you know how you don’t always notice the results of your actions, because you’re with yourself day in and day out? Kind of like how I’m not as acutely aware of how my 3-year-old is growing, because she’s always around, but then someone who hasn’t seen her in a while points out how articulate she’s gotten, or how tall, or whatnot? I had one of those moments with myself last week:

I have a portable dish washer. I have to push it in to the kitchen and hook it up to the sink when it’s time to do dishes. Quite a while ago, I’m going to guess a year or so, I needed to get past the dish washer to get something out of the laundry room. I had to squeeeeeeeeze through the opening between the dishwasher and the counter opposite the sink. Since then, I’d always made sure I had everything I needed from the laundry room before rolling the dishwasher into the kitchen, or I’d wait it out until the dishwasher was done and safely rolled back away. However, last week, I don’t remember what day, I needed to get into the laundry room. I didn’t want to wait til the next day (I started the dishwasher as I was headed to bed so it wouldn’t be in my way), so I decided to squeeeeeeeeeze through and grab it. I DIDN’T HAVE TO SQUEEZE! It wasn’t a comfortable situation to be in, by any means, but I didn’t have bits of myself hanging over onto the countertop behind me and the dishwasher in front of me. I fit! YAY ME!

So here’s to hoping my attitude stays positive, and I get a lot of work done this week! Looking forward to next Monday! :) 

The recipe for weight loss is pretty simple: eat less, eat healthier, exercise. So why is it that I am doing all of the above and GAINED a pound this week?

How am I supposed to stay positive with all these negative things weighing me down?

Maybe I just woke up on the wrong side of the bed, but between my infertility problems and failure to lose weight, I hate myself today. I was looking forward to this morning’s weigh-in to see the true results of my hard work last week and this is what I was greeted with: 186.2. A gain of 0.8# over last week. Back to pretty much losing nothing this year.

I don’t really know what to change. Do I ignore all my responsibilities at home after work and exercise for 2 or more hours every night? Do I get on the hcg diet? I don’t want to go extreme; but I don’t want to stay where I am.

Starting tonight, I’m completely eliminating carbs from dinner. Not sure what I will do on spaghetti night. Or taco night. Or sloppy joe night. Maybe I should just thaw several tilapia filets and eat fish and veggies every night. I just don’t know.

So last week was my first conscious effort to get more active. I walked Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday around the mall near my office. It averaged out to 1.4 miles and 22min15sec each day; totaling 4.21 miles and 1hr8min15sec. I can only go up from here, and look forward to it :)

Also, I didn’t start downtownn’s Level 1 plan last week like I had planned. So I’m starting it today. 20 jumping jacks and 10 crunches. ¡No problemo!

Today’s weigh-in was a happy one!! Please note that last week, I gained weight from the week before. But this week, I lost what I gained plus a bit, just over 2#. I weighed in at 185.4. It feels so good to be down to 185. Half-way through the 180’s! And right on track to lose 2# each week for my 10-week challenge to lose 20#. Hooray!

Now I just need to keep building on what I accomplished last week. My exercise goal this week is to walk 4 days on my lunch break.

And my eating goal is to make better dinner choices. I’m trying to do a pantry challenge this week (and possibly next) to empty our shelves of some of the stuff that’s been sitting around for a while. The real challenge is going to be making things that Bary will eat. I should have made the meal plan last night, but I didn’t. I plan to think about it as I’m walking on my lunch break, and put some ideas down, based on some of the stuff I know that I have on hand. Then when I get home tonight I’ll brainstorm while the pantry is right in front of me.

In order to get my weight down, get healthy, and do everything I want to do, I have to make changes. The only person that can hold me accountable for following through with these changes is myself. Self-discipline is hard. tough. very difficult. But I’ve got to reprogram the way I think and act, so I have to put on my big girl panties and get to it. 

1. My alarm goes off at 0530 every morning. I snooze it at least once, and more often than I should I snooze it for 30-60 minutes. I’ve got to get up when my alarm goes off. I want that extra half-hour in the morning to get things done around the house, and possibly soon use it for exercise time.
2. Snacking is going to be my downfall. This is a point where I have to reprogram my thoughts. “It’s just one cookie.” “It’s just one piece of candy.” “It’s just one Coke.” For starters,  it’s not JUST one of these things because I rarely stop at one. And for another thing, just ONE still has calories in it. And they add up!

Another thing on my mind right now is how long of a limbo period should I have between jean sizes? I have two identical pairs of jeans, purchased at the same time on clearance, the only difference is one is a 13, and the other is a 15. The 15s fall off me, I can put them on and take them off without unbuttoning them. But the 13s are small enough that I have a big muffin top bulge. /sigh/ I guess it’s just an incentive to hurry up and shed some more pounds so the tummy gets smaller!

Doing this. Starting today!

downtownn:

Are you ready? :)

This plan has 3 levels! Let me know when you complete level 3, I’ll probably congratulate you by posting it to my blog. DON’T CHEAT AND DON’T POST TO YOUR OWN BLOG! (You may re-blog, just don’t take this and post it as your own please!)

So it only took me 24 days of 2012 to finally get my butt moving. But that’s OK. That still leaves me 342 days of 2012 to win. (It’s a leap year, lucky me :)

For those of you who are interested, I lost 21# from Jan. 31, 2011, to Dec. 31, 2011. This was almost completely due to changing my eating habits. I eat a smaller portion at dinner, I’ve completely revamped what I’m eating for lunch, and I’m working on making changes to my breakfast. 

I’ve been watching what I eat for quite a while. I haven’t done the greatest job, but I’ve definitely done better than before I decided to lose weight.

I made a batch of bran muffins for breakfast. One batch of batter made 36 muffins. I plugged my recipe into caloriecount.about.com and it says there are 140 calories in each muffin. I’ve been eating two a day. So 280 calories for breakfast.

I’ve been eating turkey sandwiches for lunch during the week when I’m at work. Two slices of bread = 140 calories. One slice of cheese = 70 calories. Two slices of turkey = 70 calories. One Tablespoon Kraft Mayo w/ Olive Oil = 45 calories. So 325 calories for lunch. 605 calories for breakfast & lunch combined.

For dinner, I’ve just been focusing on not eating as much. I’m still eating the same things as everyone else - spaghetti, tacos, chili, smoked sausages, pancakes, etc - I’m just trying to eat less of it. Since I’ve got 600 calories to play with for dinner, and still hit 1200 calories per day, I haven’t given this much thought yet. 

I’ve been drinking a 74.4 oz bottle of water at work each day, plus whatever I drink at home on the side. I’ve been trying very hard not to steal sips of pop. I use iced tea as a treat instead of the go-to at restaurants. 

Today I (finally) added in the next step: exercise! It wasn’t much, 1.35 miles in 22:27 around the mall near where I work; but it’s SO. MUCH. MORE than I’ve been doing. I’ve been on a plateau in the mid-180s since October, and I’m tired of it. I want to get down another 30# to my goal weight of 155.

So I’m going to put myself out here more than I did in the past. I weigh in on Mondays. Yesterday I weighed in at 186.8. I’m d.o.n.e. hiding where I am at weight-wise. Maybe if I tell the world what I’m doing, I’ll be more motivated to make that number plummet. I’m going to take “before” pics tonight. I won’t post them, at least not until the “after” pics can be put up next to them. This might be too big of a goal, but I want to be 20# lighter in 10 weeks. That might be pushing it a bit, but it’s in the healthy range for weight loss. That’ll put me within 10# of my goal weight. And hopefully by May 1, I will be around 155#. /fingers crossed/

So now, I’m serious. And I’m back :)

I just realized I have neglected this blog since… two weeks ago?

Anywho… Here’s today’s Monday weigh day results:

Week 1: [Starting weight]
Week 2: -4.0 lbs
Week 3: -1.4 lbs
Week 4: -0.2 lbs
Week 5: -1.0 lbs

Total lost: 6.6 lbs.

I am at LEAST on target to hit the low end of my goal (12#) but I really hope to get closer to the high end. I know I’m almost at the half-way point. But I also know something you don’t…

Hubs brought home a never-been-used-still-in-the-banded-shut-box recumbent bike for me from his parents’ house (whom he had just helped move). I’m going to set it up in the basement and do at least 15 minutes each night. My goal is to set it up tonight.

Last night, my support group on Facebook decided we need to light a fire under our behinds and get going again. We all slumped a bit over the summer. (How could we not, with so much unending record-breaking heat?!) I told everyone to make one small goal to accomplish this week. We’ll check in again on Thursday to see how we’re doing. My goal was to set up my bike & get at least one day’s exercise on it.

I really believe once I start throwing exercise in the mix, I’m going to have a LOT more weight loss! I cannot WAIT to get to go on vacation!

Y’all have no idea how excited I was yesterday to step up on the scale and see the magic number that tells me I’ve lost a full 20 pounds since starting this trek at the very end of January. That’s about 3 pounds a month average, which isn’t too bad considering healthy weight loss is supposed to be 1 to 2 pounds a week. Especially when you account for the major lack of exercise. I guess this is proof that diet means a LOT when you’re trying to lose weight.

I’m still very much on schedule to complete my goal of 12-24 by vacation time. see:

Week 1: [Starting weight]
Week 2: -4.0 lbs
Week 3: -1.4 lbs 

Total lost: 5.4 lbs.

How are you doing this week?

Ben posted on his Facebook page earlier today asking followers to throw our blog URL up. As I’m writing this, there are 113(!) or so different blogs listed! We. Are. Awesome. 

This has been a really inspiring thing to see. I feel so alone out here in the real world. Hopefully someone comes along and starts following me, so I feel more obligated to post. I feel like I’m just posting for myself right now, and since I’m typically the last person I’m worried about, I blow this thing off. 

The weather in Kansas has shifted for the good. As I write this, I’m sitting on the hood of my truck staring up at the prettiest moon I’ve seen in a while, enjoying the sounds of the crickets and the distant dog barking. I hope to jump back on the running - or at least walking - wagon soon! c25k, I’m coming at you for the third time. They say third time’s a charm, right?

Also, stay tuned for tomorrow’s weigh in. I made a pledge three weeks ago that I wanted to lose 12-24 lbs by the first week of November, when my family goes on vacation to Galveston Island. We’ll find out together if I’m still on track!