The One That Got Away

As I write this, I am at 187 pounds. I'm in my first semester of xray school, and have undergone many positive life changes since I last wrote in this blog. I'm really really happy. At peace. For the first time in a long time.  I actually hadn't thought to write again- I have basically quit running and put that chapter of my life behind me. Sometimes you don't know when you're going to have to write again though.

Yesterday was the inaugural Rock N Roll Savannah Marathon. Up until earlier this week, I'd still planned to do the race. I was going to walk it with a friend of mine from high school--training be damned, I was going to laugh in the face of training and collect me another half marathon medal. The plan was to go spend the night at my parents' house with the kids and visit with them, do the race, and come home later that night or the next day, depending on how I felt. I was also going to get to meet Ann Marie....who was traveling here all the way from Wisconsin to do the race. We'd had this planned for months...she is one of my dearest friends that I've met through running and blogging.

I just couldn't feel doing this race. My knee has been giving me absolute fits lately...the knee that I injured when I first started running. It still swells up and becomes immovable and very painful all the time. I am in my clinical rotations for school right now. Ten hour days lifting heavy patients and doing very physical work. I love it, every minute of it, but I started feeling scared that doing the race, especially untrained, might screw up my knee more and make me have to miss clinic. There were other, logistical reasons. I didn't want to have to get my kids out of school early, which I would've had to do in order to pick up my packet. I didn't want to have to fight crowds. I have a major research paper due in a week that I've yet to get started on, and really couldn't afford to stay in town an extra night. Blah blah blah.

So I decided not to do the race, but to go to Savannah anyway. I still wanted to see my family, and at least watch part of the race. Figured maybe I could still meet up with Becca and Ann Marie somehow...though I didn't really see how that could be possible, but maybe.  And I had a great time with my family. We watched and cheered runners for an hour or so. It was so exciting! My sister and I walked down to Forsythe Park after the race and just kind of experienced the atmosphere.

And I got sad. I wanted to be a part of that and I could have been. I had PAID to be...but I didn't follow through. I didn't get to meet Ann Marie, or see Becca, or meet John Bingham and have him sign my running books either. And all of that sucked. But it was watching the runners, who at my vantage point were at Mile 15, and seeing that slow, steady, plodding determination in their eyes that really prickled at me. I saw the way they were breathing and I remembered it. Everything came back to me, and I remembered why I ever loved to run in the first place. And I was sad.

All in all, I can't say that I necessarily made the right or wrong decision. I don't regret being able to walk, being well rested for clinic, and having an extra day to work on my paper. I don't regret the weight that I've lost and the peace that I have found with food since I have STOPPED running. I know I'm not ready to throw something else into the mix and disturb that right now. I don't regret not getting caught in standstill traffic, waiting two hours to get over the bridge to get my packet when it should have been 15 minutes max. And I certainly don't regret not torturing myself over the hot summer to train.  I have made my decision, and I am willing to accept the consequences for it, positive and negative.

That being said, I sure didn't expect to experience some of the feelings that I've had this weekend. I didn't expect to long for running so much, and to feel such a ....loss....about it.

I'm a busy person right now.  A busy, fufilled person who doesn't have time for much else. So this whole weekend may have inspired a blog post and nothing else. And that will be fine. I don't need to be a runner right now, and I really don't even want to be.

But maybe just one jog, this afternoon....

It feels good....

To be under 200 pounds. Finally! Actually, my last official weigh in put me at 194.6, so I have a good 5 lb safety barrier between me and 200. 
I wish I could be more inspirational, but here is the cold hard truth: I am not working out, I am not counting calories, I am eating whatever I want, and I am losing weight anyway. The key? I just don't eat as much as I used to. Period. It works.
All this time...all that hard work...I over complicated everything. It's just about not eating everything in sight and not getting so damn excited about food. And now the weight is finally dropping. And people are finally noticing.
I'm not going to do the half marathon in the fall, for a lot of reasons, but the main one being that I'm actually afraid training will screw up my weight loss. I mean...it didn't really do anything for me last year, as far as weight loss went. I lost two freaking pounds. I'm afraid that all that calorie burning will make my appetite surge again.
Call me a quitter, or whatever. I miss running, and as soon as the heat index drops to below 110 every day I'm going to run again.
But for now? I'm finally happy with myself. I feel like there is a huge monkey off my back because I've finally lost my fear of food. I feel 17 again in a way. I can drink a regular soda and not think about it. I can have cake and not eat the whole thing. It's just not an issue.
And I'm looking pretty damn good too...if I do say so myself.

Some Good News

First of all, thank you Jennifer and Crystal for commenting on my last post. It meant a lot to me, and helped lift my spirits.

I'm slowly coming out of this latest funk. I know that depression is something that I will always have to deal with, and that's fine. But there are times when I can feel myself giving in...embracing the sick part of me because in some twisted way I am comforted by being able to label myself as Depressed. Those are the moments when things get scary....and when I find myself at a crossroads, knowing that the next small decision that I make could have a profound effect on the next few years of my life. I choose not to give in this go round, so we shall see what happens.

Anyway, this has been a pretty great week in my household. My husband got a much needed and well deserved promotion at work! I am so very proud of him. His new position is going to be a lot more challenging and hopefully very rewarding for him. The money is definitely going to help too especially as....I got my official acceptance into the Radiology program and will definitely be a student for the next two years! So things definitely seem to be falling into place for us...and I'm so happy about it.

So this last week I've made more of an effort to be alive. Less laying around, more participating in life. I've even gotten a little bit of exercise in, although no running yet. But we'll get there. I shall keep chugging along.

I don't feel great lately. It's hard to sleep, or to be awake. I have no motivation to run at all. It's hot. I don't wanna. I'm thinking of dropping out of the half marathon in November. I have no motivation to eat right either. It's expensive. I don't wanna. I'm pretty comfortable just staying curled up in the fetal position until an undetermined date in the future.

I really don't know why I'm even giving this update right now. Gotta keep it real, I guess. Ha.

On the plus side, I have no appetite at all and so am continuing to lose weight. 203.2 this morning. So apparently being lifeless and depressed works just as well, if not better than working your ass off. Good to know.

Later...maybe. Oh who cares. Why should you if I don't, right?

Lessons Learned From The Other Side

I've wanted so badly to blog lately, but the longer I go without doing it, the harder it becomes to sit down and write. So this is my attempt to return to Blogville, and maybe I'll get through an entire post and hit publish before I give up and go do something else.
A lot of things have happened in the past few months, most of them internal. Because this isn't an anonymous blog, and there are things that I just don't want to get out to certain people in my real life on the off chance that they read this, what I can tell you is limited. But I can sum up by saying that I've been bothered by a lot of personal demons, and the end result of it all was that my weight got back up to 212 lbs. Now, before my cruise I weighed about 204, which was still up from my lowest weight of 201 in December. I really started struggling after Christmas. By the time I got back from the cruise, I weighed 208--not totally unexpected, but instead of working to take it off, I let it get worse and worse until I was back up to 212. You probably don't have to guess that I was devastated and felt very hopeless. A lot of hard work for nothing.  I was talking about all of this with Heather one day (which was kind of a rare occasion because increasingly I would go to extensive lengths to NOT discuss anything that was going on with me), and she told me that I amazed her because I worked very hard to accomplish my goals and then I turned around and worked equally hard to undo all the hard work I put in! She said it was like I would spend hours shampooing my sofa to make it look fantastic, and then I would go outside and spend hours digging up dirt and dragging it inside and rubbing it all over my wet sofa.  I realized that she was exactly right, and that cleared up a lot of my frustration. I would go on a really long run, burn tons of calories, and come home and drink a milkshake that I had "earned". Man, I really have "earned" myself a lot of food over the past few months! But the good news is, I'm back in the saddle now and I'm much wiser for my experiences. I'm now back down to 206 and going strong. I'm running regularly and even completed a 10k over Mother's Day Weekend. I've learned some valuable lessons and I'm putting them into practice. And I will now write them down in the hopes of maybe sparing somebody a lot of the heartache that I've had to go through.
Lesson #1: Eating in moderation can really be a crock of shit with the wrong outlook. Just because you aren't binging and pigging out on everything that you see does not mean that you can have anything that you want and still expect to lose weight. While "eating in moderation", I would often have at least one piece of cake a day (all the while being super proud of myself for limiting it to one piece or leaving one bite of it), one serving of cookies, or ice cream, or something fatty and delicious like a cheese wonton from the Chinese restaurant. I would have all of these things every day, just not a whole lot of them. And sometimes eating one thing in "moderation" WOULD lead to a binge. Which leads me to the second lesson that I have learned....
Lesson #2: Trigger foods are called trigger foods for a reason. STAY AWAY from them. This was the major thing about moderation that I could never grasp. Cake is my favorite food, and I tried over and over again to keep it in my diet and still lose weight. Won't work, not for me, not right now. Every delicious slice made me want to eat another one. If I somehow managed to avoid doing that, I was left hungry and wanting all day long, causing me to overeat other things trying to fill the void that cake left. But I refused to give it up, determined to find a way to eat it in peace and moderation. I don't know why I was so stubborn about it, or what I felt my life would be without it. But I felt like giving it up would be giving up control...and in fact I've learned that gaining control is about learning my limits. Right now, I can't have cake or any other type of baked goods. I don't buy them, and I won't be pressured by others into eating them. And ironically, now that these food items are off limits, I feel a sense of peace that I never had before. No more pressure, no more trying something out "just this once" to see if I can eat it like a skinny person would.
Lesson #3: "Just this once" really means "I don't feel like fighting right now and I'm giving up". I can't begin to elaborate on how close this one has come to destroying me forever. Allowing myself to eat something "for a treat" or not tracking my calories "just this once" always always ALWAYS leads to bad things for me. When I begin the justification cycle, I have a hard time breaking out of it. When I eat something that I know I shouldn't, it just makes it easier to eat the next thing that I shouldn't, and so on. The more I eat, the more weight I gain, the more helpless I feel, the more I eat. I've learned that the easiest place to break the cycle is right after I have the "just this once" thought. It's my new warning sign. It's my cue to stop and pay attention to what I'm doing. It just works better this way.
Lesson #4 It's just food. Realizing that my life is not going to be made any better by giving into cravings has been a huge step. It's all about taking the power out of food. Who cares? No matter how delicious something is, the experience is over in 15 minutes max (more like 3 minutes for me). Then I'm just left feeling empty and dirty! Better to just skip it and focus my thrills for something else. Cravings will dissipate, and funny enough, they go away quicker when I know that I won't give into them. Last but most importantly......
Lesson #5: I'm not a failure until I stop trying. When I was at my very worst, this thought came to me and wouldn't go away. I felt like all of my efforts had been for nothing. I thought that the entire past year went wrong....I tried so hard to make it go one way and it took a completely different direction. When I ran my half marathon, I was supposed to be able to have these amazing "after" photos that I could put up on this blog and share with the world. I was supposed to be a faster runner, I was supposed to be at my goal weight, I was supposed to have a large following of adoring fans telling me how great I am. None of that happened. I am still as slow as molasses, and I have lost a negligible amount of weight compared to what I should have lost. I stopped blogging because I got tired of having to say the same things over again....giving up and disappearing would just be much easier. And it was easy, and I was almost totally gone. But then what? If I end it, then I end it as a failure. If I give up, then everything really was for nothing. If I stop trying, then in a couple of years I will wish I was still only 212 pounds. Better to do just one thing right. Better to make just one good decision today and hope that it triggers another one. Better to claw my way up, even if I never get anywhere,  because as long as I'm TRYING then I'm not FINISHED.

And I am here to tell you that I am NOT finished, not by a long shot.

Cruisin'

Back from the Bahamas! I had SUCH a wonderful time on this cruise. The ship was beautiful, the food was delicious, the water was stunning gorgeous, and the alchohol was plentiful. What more can a girl ask for?

Here are a few random shots from the trip.

Right after getting on the ship

My love and me

I still can't get over how beautiful the water was. Pictures just cannot do it justiice.

Add caption

At the beach

I LOVED this sign!

I gained 4 pounds on this trip...I don't know how much was from food and how much was from fruity tropical drinks. Oh well.

No Time

Where is time going? Why is there never any available to me? There are so many things that I want to do. I want to keep up with this blog better, for one. Spend more time with my: husband, children, friends, parents, sister, you name it and I probably would like to have more time with them. I would like to be able to actually blow dry my hair and throw on some makeup before rushing out the door...that hasn't happened in a while.
I would like to, no I NEED, to have more downtime just for me. I'm not a social person at heart. Although I love my friends and family, I need time to just flat out be alone and read, write, do rithmatic, I don't know just decompress and regroup. I need that, haven't gotten it lately, but need it. And the worse part is that at the end of the day, I feel like I got NOTHING accomplished. So where did my damn day go, huh? What was I even doing when I was having to say no to all the things that I really wanted to do?
I'm seriously on the verge of losing it here...it's gotten to where I want to cry myself to sleep at night because I feel like I'm losing my identity. Luckily for me, this coming week is my last week of school for the quarter, after which I leave for my Bahamas cruise. It will be sorely appreciated and I think of nothing more lately than spending four tropical days in a fuity alcohol-induced daze. I will not even look at my cell phone after I get on the boat!!
Exercise and diet? I'm trying. I am getting my exercise in, for sure. I think its the only thing that keeps me sane. I'm doing fairly good on my diet, but I have been around some major food pushers lately and I need to learn how to resist pushy food pushers better. My weight keeps fluctuating from 208 to 203...I'm getting pretty frustrated and discouraged, and while I know that I need to do better--- I'm not deluding myself when I tell you that I try every day to feed myself the best diet possible. The inches are disappearing, though. I'm going to try to drink more water and eat less salt...two of my eternal crosses that I bear. Love salt. LOVE salt.
Anyway, going for a run this afternoon in between paper writing and test studying. Did Level 3 of the Shred for the first time yesterday...all I can say is wow.

The "I Just Felt Like Running" Virtual 5k Race Report

This was a fun race for me.  Heather graciously accepted my offer to run this with me, and what is better than starting your day off with your best friend AND a nice run?? Well, I just can't think of anything so how bout dat! Anyway, I haven't run in a few weeks but I was determined to be a warrior and power through. Here is a picture of us before the race being very fierce and athletic:

I was surprised at my endurance, actually. It's definitely taken a hit, but not as big of one as I'd imagined. For the first 2 miles, I was good and keeping a steady 12 minute pace. My breathing wasn't too eractic. The last 1.1 mile kicked both of our asses though! I think doing the 30 Day Shred every day has basically conditioned my body not to exert itself for more than about 25 minutes at a time. My legs never hurt, but they did get sort of weak and I couldn't catch my breath a couple of times so we had to slow down and take a few walk breaks. BUT we finished and let me just tell you, I have MISSED that running afterglow. Here is a picture of our afterglow:

Thank you, Jeff, for putting on this race and getting me back outside! This has totally whet my appetite for more running. I can't wait to get out there and start training for my upcoming 10k.

Quick Update

Sorry for all the test posts. New phone, and I'm trying to figure out how to do everything from it! Everything is CRAZY. Between my school, kids' schools, getting everything ready to start clinic next quarter, husband's work schedule going all wonky, and about fifty million other things, I have NOT had much time to blog. HOWEVER, just because I haven't been blogging doesn't mean that I haven't been working. I didn't post a weigh in last week because I had an exact maintain on the scale--steady at 206.6. I wasn't overly crushed, though, because I'd lost about 4 inches from my waist, arms, and thighs. (Doing that wretched 30 Day Shred, you know). This week, I haven't measured yet (because I lost the sheet of paper with my old measurements) but I'm down 2 pounds to 204.6. So I'll take it. I'm starting to feel smaller again, and I've progressed to doing Level 2 on the Shred without too much modification. Jillian Michaels is an unforgiving spawn of Satan.
Food is less of an issue right now, mostly because I haven't had time to obsess about it.  Making healthy choices is easy right now...maybe its just because my trip is getting closer. 19 days!
Also, I'm signed up for two races coming up shortly. The first one is Detroit Runner's "I Just Felt Like Running Virtual 5k." coming up this Saturday. I haven't been doing much running lately, so this will probably be ugly. The other race is the Crimestoppers' Azalea Run in Savannah on Mothers Day Weekend. That one is a10k. The coolest thing about that race is that my mom is going to be working it, and I'm going to bring the kids down and spend the whole weekend with my parents. I don't get to do that often enough, and I'm really looking forward to some quality family time. My mom even paid my registration fee, that made me feel really special. So, I'm going to be following the Hal Higdon 10k training plan...probably the beginner one because, honestly, I've not been a runner lately. I'm so excited about getting back out there though! I've been dying to run lately, and I've let some external issues scare me out of doing it. Seriously, you wouldn't even believe me if I told you...Suffice it to say that I've been sticking to exercises that I can do indoors. Anyway, I've missed blogging and I've missed everyone in Bloggity Land. I'm going to make this more of a priority. I do better when I blog often. I wrote this entire post from my new phone using this thing called Swype, so any weird typos or misplaced words are because of that. I'm trying to learn. Layer, taters.

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You Guys Have Got To Read This!

Ok, so I fell in love with Jack Sh*t Getting Fit a few months ago, but the man has just outdone himself this time. I am a HUGE Dr. Suess fan, and The Sneetches was my favorite book when I was a child. I just loved those silly little sneetches and the lengths they would go to be the best Sneetch on the Beach!! If you've never read the originial story, you can go here. In fact, here's a reading of the book on YouTube. Watch it. Right now. It's got a great message and you need to hear it! NOW!!!! Ok, well, just whenever you have time. ;)



Anyway, the POINT of all of this Sneetch ranting is that I woke up this morning and found that Mr. Sh*t had posted his own version of the Sneetch poem. With an awesome weight loss message! You should go read it, he did a great job.

I printed it out and it's going on my fridge so that I have to look at it everytime I open it. Because I am going to be a Fit-Bellied Beetch!!

Monday Weigh In

Well, the new scale hasn't changed in the few days since I bought it. I'm staying steady at 206.6. But that's okay. It hasn't been a whole week yet. I'm just doing the weigh in today to get back on track with my official weigh in days. But the real reason that I'm not upset is because I KNOW that I'm doing everything right, at least for the past 3 days. Green smoothies? Check. Lots of water? Check. Staying within my calorie range? Check. 30 Day Shred? Check check check check check.  Also have NOT binged at night, haven't eaten anything after dinner as a matter of fact.
I had a major victory last night when my next door neighbor (major food pusher....she is all the time cooking and baking delicious things that don't have a lick of nutrition in them) asked me to come over and when I got there, she had an entire plate of mini cupcakes waiting just for me. Her cupcakes are my favorite in the entire world---and ya'll know how I feel about cake anyway! But I just had 2 little bite size pieces to be polite. The real victory is that I stayed at her house for well over an hour after that and they were right there the entire time and I didn't eat them, wasn't even tempted.
Also Jeremy offered me a Valentine's breakfast at our local doughnut shop and somehow I turned it down. Green smoothie it is. Yummy. Oh!! I upgraded my handweights for the Shred from 3 lbs to 5 lbs. Yesterday was my first day with the heavier weights.  I managed not to commit suicide.
I hope all of you have a great Valentine's Day!

I'm back!

Hi. I don't know what my problem has been with blogging lately! I start to, and then decide not to. In reading some blogs lately, I've just noticed kind of a trend of calling people out. I don't agree or disagree with that, but it really has made me more hesitant to post anything on this blog that could...I don't know...make people roll their eyes at me? If that makes any sense? I just don't want to be one of those people who have all of these grand plans and no follow through. I don't want to waste anyone's time.
It's no secret that I've been struggling since Christmas. I was doing really well, had completed a half marathon and lost about 15 pounds and then I just...stopped. It didn't happen all at once, and I fought against myself every day to try to make the right decisions and stop making the wrong ones. I had less success as time went on, and then I went into a week long binge. That just sort of set the tone, and mentally I felt as if the past year hadn't even happened.
It is so easy, when you're losing weight, to look back and say, "How did I ever eat like that before? I was poisoning myself! I love the way my body feels now that I'm treating it right, and I'm never going back!" And then, when you do revert back to your old behaviors it is equally easy to look back and say, "How was I ever able to control myself with food? That seems so far away right now, even though it was only two weeks ago. I feel so helpless, and I just can't see out of this place." Whatever phase that I'm in, its just so easy for me to forget about how I felt BEFORE.
Feeling like a failure is natural to me. I would go so far as to say...comfortable. Feeling like a failure is comfortable for me. I use failing as a crutch so that I don't have to make the effort to make the effort, if that makes any sense. At heart, I'm a lazy person who just likes to be comfortable.  Hence, failure.
The thing with that, though, is that over the past 10 months enough change has happened within me that I just can't let myself STAY in that place. I keep going back to visit, but I can't bring myself to throw in the towel once and for all.
I've stayed away from the blog and have just done a lot of thinking. This process isn't linear. There is never going to be a moment when the path just lights itself up and from then on out, struggling is over. But that's what I always expect, over and over again. That there will be a lot of struggling in the beginning, but if I can just "get through it", things will get easier and easier until this new healthy lifestyle just comes naturally. Bull shit!!! I have good days and bad days. And now I see that the bad days are to be expected just as much as the good ones. The trick is to not let them derail me. Just because I have a day where all I crave is sugar and fat doesn't mean that the process isn't working. I'm not doing anything wrong. And it doesn't mean that I have to give in. And I will continue to blog about it---good, bad, and ugly because blogging helps me, and I don't want to give it up. That's all part of the strange self sabotage that I am so good at!
With all this great thinking I have been doing has also come some action. I'm now on Day 5 of the 30 Day Shred and loving it so far. If nothing else, I can give all that I have for 20 minutes.  That much I can handle! I'm drinking my smoothies again daily, which is imperative for me. They really help me to regulate my food intake and control my sugar cravings. I bought another scale last week and weighed myself - 206.6. I'm not happy about it, because now I've gained back 5 full pounds I'd lost. BUT I'm on my way to losing it, and much more. I do believe this. After all, I have a cruise coming up. :)

Help

I know I haven't blogged in a while. I've been hiding from life. There was no weigh in this Monday because my downstairs flooded on Saturday night and my digital scale was one of the victims. I guess the batteries fried...which sucks because it was a really expensive scale that measured your body fat percentage and all that fancy stuff....so anyway, I have no idea what I weigh.

I need help. I've been struggling a lot, and while I could sit here and analyze all of the reasons to death, I'm going to spare you. They would all come across as excuses...they are all excuses. I have noticed that its actually much harder, in a way, to eat unhealthily and avoid exercise. Because then I have all this self-loathing and guilt to constantly deal with, and I am drained. But whatever.

The thing is, I have a Bahamas cruise coming up at the end of March. There are 6 weeks and 6 days before this trip, to be exact. This is a very important trip for me. First, I've never been on a cruise before. In fact, I've never been off the East Coast my whole life. Second, this is my husband's and my 10 year wedding anniversary. We never got to go on a honeymoon, so in a way this is a really really late honeymoon too.  I want this to be a perfect trip. I don't want to spend the entire time worried about how I look in a bathing suit, and feeling bad that I don't have the body of all the beautiful girls that I am sure to see. I know that I don't have enough time to get even close to goal weight, and I'm okay with that. But I would like to lose 15 pounds...I think that would at least allow me to feel good enough about my progress that I can get on the boat proud of myself and my body instead of ashamed.

15 pounds is a lot to lose in 6 weeks, and I need a plan. Please help me figure out what to do. I know that the way to lose weight for life is to "eat a little less and move a little more." But what I'm interested in right now is a plan that will allow me to lose weight safely, but rapidly. What should I eat? How many calories should I take in? What kind? What about exercise?  I wish I could afford Medifast or something like that, but that isn't in the budget right now. So what I need is a plan that has a similar calorie intake that I can just do at home. I really need some good advice here. I'm directionless, and (I'm starting to believe this) clueless about the right way to lose weight. So, help, help, help!!

Grumble Grumble Grrrrr

Haven't blogged in a few days because I didn't know what to say. I'm pissy today, have been most of this week. It's just stress. I'm not handling it well. I feel like there's too much. I'm overwhelmed and I feel like I'm almost to the point at being paralyzed with it all, but I'm still struggling to stay above water here. Not going to give up and drown quite yet.
It's nothing new that I'm not good at balancing acts. I'm really really good at concentrating at one thing at a time, but that's about all that's in my repertoire. I can focus on running but then my eating gets out of control. I can focus on dieting, and then I lose weight, but I lose steam for running. I can focus on my schoolwork and get straight A's but then exercise and weight loss don't seem so important anymore.
I've been trying to focus on all three, and all three are suffering. This is in addition to everything else that's stressing me out lately. My kids are especially needy. They're all having birthdays right around now, and I just came off of one party and now I'm having to plan another. We just got through Christmas, and our budget is severely suffering, and now I have to pull off a financial miracle for my oldest daughter's 13th birthday. My husband is stressed out about work.  I have really stupid neighbors whose children are always causing problems with my children, and I've been letting that get to me too much. There is never enough time to do everything that I want to do. I think I may have just gotten my first B or C on my test yesterday. I can't concentrate on anything.
I just feel like everything is swirling around me, and I'm standing still with my eyes clamped shut and my hands over my ears screaming at the top of my lungs...and nobody hears me. It's really not as bad as all that...I know this. It's LIFE and I LOVE life. But everything is really getting to me lately, and I'm just going through my days with a huge knot in my stomach. And quite honestly, I just want to hit somebody something repeatedly until everything goes away. I'm....I'm ANGRY. And I don't know who I'm even angry at.
This is not an excuse post. I realize that a lot of you out there put up with much more on a daily basis, all while completing weekly Ironmans and eating nothing but organic broccoli and flaxseed oil.I want to be more like you. I am working on being more like you. But I just had to vent.

Hodge Podge; "Moderation?"

Had an exact maintain on the scale this morning - 204.8. I'm a little crushed, but what can you do? Binges have consequences. I guess its taking my body a little bit longer to jump back than I would've hoped. But what I CAN say is that I'm very proud of my behavior this last week. It wasn't a perfect week, for sure. We had my daughter's birthday party and I caved in to the cupcakes. I also had a day where I didn't track my calories on MFP like I was supposed to. I did track them in my head, but that has never gotten me very far in the past. However, those slip ups were the only significant ones that I had. The rest of the week, I drank my green smoothies and ate what I was supposed to, drank lots of water, and for the most part felt like I was glowing. Also there were times when I could FEEL myself start to slip up, and I was able to mentally turn around and do the right thing.

My activity for the week? Was awesome. I got in THREE runs (had been down to running once a week), including yesterday's planned 5 miler. My pace was consistent at under 12 minutes a mile even for the long run. During the two short runs, I did no walking at all. During the 5 miler, I only stopped twice to walk for a minute or so. Actually, all of this is pretty mindblowing to me. I mean, I basically took two and a half months off from any real running, and when I completed the half marathon I was running 13 to 14 minute miles, having to walk at least once per mile if not more. Now all of a sudden, definitely without training, I'm over a minute faster than I was before and the distance I can go without having to walk has tripled. Weird, but I'll take it.

I actually think that this 100 day challenge is helping my running. I've never cross-trained before, but what with all of the stairclimbing, walking, and rollerblading that I've been doing, I suppose that I am now. And I think its really helping me run! I know that I'm definitely getting in more activity now than I was when I was training for my half, and running is just easier than it was back then. Now watch, I've gone and jinxed myself and this week I'm going to have the worst runs of my life!

Let's see, what else? I've decreased my calorie intake on MFP from 1720 to 1530, so I'm trying to adjust to that. I don't need 1700 calories a day.  Also, I discovered a Allan's blog, and it's had me captivated for the past few days. I've never met anyone who didn't believe in "all things in moderation", and he seems to be a little bit of a weight loss nazi when it comes to moderation. His philosphy? No cookie. NO. Just one? Not even one. Not even ONCE!! If you were an alcoholic, would just one drink be all right? Same deal, bucko!! Are the five minutes of pleasure you'll get from that cookie worth the consequences on the scale? Suck it up and be strong, and you will reap the rewards. But speaking of rewards...they won't be food related!!! Because your days of eating junk are over FOREVER, and pretty soon you won't even want it anymore. This goes against everything that I've stood for in my life (when it comes to eating). I've always believed that eating SHOULD be a pleasure. We only have this one time on this earth...why should I give up my beloved chocolate? My holiday gorge of turkey and stuffing? Fried chicken???? My occasional breakfast muffin or fast food cheeseburger or...gasp...my Oreos and milk?? Because honestly, what kind of world would this be without them? So many of my favorite childhood memories are tied into a certain food, or aroma. Never smelling cookies bake again? Is this not a little bit harsh and unneccessary? We only live once, and why should we travel through life with the knowledge that we can never again taste our favorite treats?

Of course, if I'm being truthful with myself (which sucks), these things aren't exactly things that I eat strictly in moderation. In fact, ingesting any one of these items usually never fails to set me up for a huge overeating session. In fact, I usually set out to eat one of the above items in moderation just to prove to myself that I can, and without fail I cannot. So is "moderation" just a mind trick that I play on myself? Similar to "just one cigarette won't make me become a smoker again"? On the other hand, living out the rest of my life and never allowing myself to have one moment's pleasure from a decadent food? That just seems so harsh. I don't know, I really don't. What I DO know is that this Allan guy has lost over 200 pounds whereas I have lost 12, so his opinions should not easily discarded.

So I'm opening the floor. What is your opinion on the "everything is fine in moderation" issue? For me, I can say that right now I really don't know. Almost everything inside of me rejects what this guy is saying, but there's a teensy little part that has been gnawing at my brain ever since I started reading his blog that's saying, "He's right, he's right, he's riiiiiiight".

Plus side! My husband offered me a cookie last night before bed. I thought of Allan and ran away screaming!!! Haha....no, really. :)

The Scale Broke My Heart

So I decided this morning that it would be a good day for a midweek weigh in, just to check my progress and see if there's anything I need to tweak before Monday. So I get all my little ducklings off to school, come inside, lock the doors, and strip down. I step on the scale, praying for at least a maintain.

It said 195.

WHAT?? I knew that had to be a mistake, so I weighed myself again. And again. And again. It still said 195!

At this point, I was trying to calculate in my head how it is possible to lose 9 pounds in 5 days. Maybe I was just holding onto water weight? Maybe I was ingesting too much sodium, which was making me bloat? Maybe a miracle has just happened?? I came so close to believing that I really weighed what the scale said. I decided before I started to jump up and down in jubilation, I would try just one more thing. I took the batteries out and put them back in.

So I step back on, overly confident by this point. Oh, yeah, I'm totally on track! Ahead of schedule! Why was I worried about last week's binge? I'm quite obviously the absolute queen of weight loss! I'm about to look down at this scale and it's going to say...

205.

Sigh. Sob. Dagger in my gut. Piffle.

The damn thing was off kilter! Oh, well. I knew there was no way that I'd actually lost 9 pounds, but it sure did feel good to be under 200 lbs for just a moment! Now I'm totally on fire to see that number for real. No. More. Setbacks!

On the plus side, I've gotten in a couple of great runs this week!! I did 2.11 miles this morning at an 11.5 pace. No walking!! I am totally coming back. I plan to do a 5 miler on Sunday, and I'm really excited about it!

Have a great weekend, everyone!! Hope the scales are kinder to you than mine was to me this morning!!!

Awards!

Over the past week, I've gotten two awards from three different people. I didn't have a chance to post about it until now what with sick demanding child wanting constant cuddle time (she is getting much better, by the way), but I'm beyond honored that anybody thought of me!

First, Polar's Mom and Michele gave me the Stylish Blogger Award.

 This really tickled me, because I've never been accused of having a stylish ANYTHING before! Please go check out both of these blogs because they're definitely worth a read (and you might be like me and just get lost in the archiving.)

The rules are to list and link back to who gave you the award, and to list seven things about yourself. So here we go:
1. My favorite color depends on my mood, but has been leaning toward purple lately.
2. My favorite place on earth is New York City, and I hope to be able to live there one day even if just for a year or so.
3. I love musicals, and have more musical soundtracks on my Zune than regular music.
4. That being said, I never run to music. I like to hear my breath and footfalls, no matter the distance.
5. I love my cats almost as much as my children.
6. Driving in big cities terrifies me, and prevents me from traveling most of the time.
7. I think Sarah Michelle Gellar is the most gorgeous woman in Hollywood, and I'm sorely upset that I don't look like her.

OK, now I'm supposed to pass this award onto some peeps, but I've decided to just pick one person for both of my awards because I'm lazy I feel that makes it more special. So, without further ado, I give my Stylish Blogger Award to: Blubeari!! I really love her blog, and she puts a great deal of effort into it, and even makes monthly videos from her exercising and stuff. She's fun to read, and very relate able, and her blog was the first one that popped into my head when I thought Stylish.

The second award I received was The Honest Scrap from Polar's Mom and Bethanny.

I was really honored here, because these two women are probably the ones that I would have given this award to had they not given it to me first. They're two of the most honest bloggers I know (which is probably why they received the award in the first place, duh) and sometimes it makes me uncomfortable to even read them because they call out emotions in themselves that I don't even want to admit that I have.

So now for 10 honest things about me.

1. I feel like an incompetent mother most of the time, to the point where I don't really like to discuss my children with people for fear they will think poorly of my mothering skills also.
2. I didn't go to my 10 year high school reunion because I was afraid that nobody there would remember me.

3. I'm extremely shy, especially in group situations. For a long time I never accepted party invitations and things like that because I was scared to be around a group of people that I didn't know. I am working on this, though.

4. I lost my mom when I was four, but I feel like I didn't really start to grieve her until my own daughter was four.

5. I experience extreme anxiety when looking at things that aren't smooth, like tree bark and ivy, and cracks in the desert. I could literally spend hours peeling bark off of a tree to "fix it!"

6. I always cry at very well organized events. Parades, musicals, even the American Idol season finale tribute to Simon last year--I sob at every single one. I think its something about so many people working together on something for so long that does it to me. I dunno.

8. No matter how much makeup I put on or how I style my hair, I always look exactly the same. This is discouraging when I want to dress up, but an advantage because I don't have to wear makeup very much.

9. I've always felt that I was really good at a lot of things, but have been afraid to admit it because I didn't want to sound conceited.

10. I still amazed every day about how great my marriage is even after 10 years and marrying so young. My husband and I are still crazy about each other and best friends and we have all these stupid inside jokes that nobody else thinks is funny. I'm still just as attracted to him as I was a decade ago. I keep waiting for this to get old (as so many people seem to think is inevitable), but I gotta say--I don't think its going to. I think I was just one of the rare lucky people who got to find their mate early in life.

And now, to pass on this award. Once again, I'm only going to nominate one other blogger. I nominate The Fat Mom. If you happen to read her blog, then you probably won't have any trouble understanding why I picked her. She is also one of those bloggers who, when talking about herself, brings emotions up inside of me because she's getting way too close to something I don't want to deal with inside myself. Which is why I love her blog so much, actually. Go check it out!!

Thanks again so much everyone for the awards. They really put a bright spot in an otherwise dismal week!!

Post-Binge Weigh In; Seeking Training Advice

I gained 2.2 lbs this week from the binge, bringing me back up to 204.8. I told myself that I would be good with anything under 207, since that would keep me at 10 lbs lost. But then I realized how stupid it was to be "ok" with gaining any amount of weight through my own fault. I mean, I guess it would be different if I'd known that I'd done everything right this week. The scale can go wonky on anyone occasionally. But I think my scale knew just what it was talking about. Oh well, no matter. I'm not going to sabotage myself anymore, and I do think that's exactly what happened. I used all the stresses last week as an excuse. And also...those foods are addictive. I believe that. One giant muffin just spikes your blood sugar and makes you hungrier and hungrier. Its a vicious cycle that I let myself become caught up in even though I know what my trigger foods are. Cakes, muffins, cookies---baked goods in general---I cannot practice moderation with, not yet. Maybe not ever. Who knows?

I'm still feeling the after effects of my food hangover, BUT I did manage to go on a GREAT run yesterday with Heather. There were 4 blissful miles of feeling strong and back in control. My easy pace is just so much faster than it used to be, and during the second mile I literally felt like I was flying. We did the second mile in 10 minutes!! This was a really easy, chatty run and we stopped and walked a few times and even so managed to maintain a 12 minute average pace. That used to be the pace at which I would do speed training! And now its nothing for me to run a mile in 11 minutes.

I've been feeling it coming on for a while now, and I'm definitely ready to start training for something again. The only problem is, there is nothing within 100 miles to train for in the next few months. We are having a 10k here at the end of April which I plan on doing, and I've looked at some 10k training plans. The problem is, they are only 8 weeks long, which gives me about a month before I can start one. This is the only race there is to train for. I have searched Active very thoroughly because I really wanted a half marathon, but this is it. So, my question is -- what do I do in the meantime? Can I stretch this thing out over 12 weeks? Should I just start it early and...but then what would I do for the last month? I mean, honestly, I don't even need a training plan for a 10k just to be able to complete it. I'm confident that I could go run one right now. But I'm not doing so well right now with getting out the door, and I am just craving the structure of a training plan, any training plan! But I don't want to train for a nonexistent race, I want a goal. I'm feeling pretty frustrated right now with my lack of race options. I'm ready to DO SOMETHING!! So...any advice? Does anyone else ever have this problem with lack of races? Or do I just live in the most remote spot on Earth?

What a Week

It's not been a good week around here. Winter weather kicked in with a vengeance and we had an ice storm on Sunday night that cancelled local schools Monday and Tuesday. Plus made it very unpleasant to be outside at all--we just aren't equipped for that stuff down here. Everything stops! My little girl has been sick since Wednesday, coughing and burning up with fever. Turns out she has bronchitis, poor little thing. She's been out of school all week long.
Between the weather and Josie's bronchitis and all the ensuing chaos, I totally let myself go this week. I binged for 5 days straight. Muffins for breakfast every day, comfort foods like fried chicken and mac n cheese for lunch. Cookies, candy bars, donuts, you name it. They all were stuffed down my throat. A couple of the days I actually ate four entire meals plus too many snacks...we are talking thousands of calories here. I didn't drink any water, and vegetables were nonexistent scarce.
As you can probably imagine, eating this way made me feel like shit. I had no energy whatsoever and spent the majority of my time laying down. All I wanted to do was sleep. I also felt pretty crappy mentally and knew I needed to turn things around but I never did. I did (somehow) manage to get in my 30 minutes of movement in each day, but the majority of the time it wasn't really exercise. I got in one stair climbing session on Wednesday, and that was the only time I raised my heart rate.
Yesterday and today, I am slowly crawling out of my funk. Moving more, eating less, drinking water. I'm trying to flush out my system. I really don't want anymore grease and sugar...I've been craving green smoothies this weekend, and I've been drinking them. I'm trying to be kinder to my body now after a week of abuse. This afternoon, I'm planning to go on a 4 mile run and I'm really looking forward to it.
I'm not excited about weighing in tomorrow, but I'm just going to look the number in the eye and deal with it. It doesn't define me, and it doesn't make me a bad person.
Part of me is wondering if I am sabotaging myself because I was so close to being under 200 lbs?? I think I'm just crazy enough to do that.
No matter, life goes on. Hopefully this week will be better than last week, and more importantly I hope my daughter gets better. I can handle the food battle, but seeing my baby sick is making me crazy!

I Want A Garmin

It's true, I really do. I can't afford one right now (what with raising a zoo full of children and trying to put myself through school while surviving solely on the hubby's income), but I read The Secret. And The Secret says that you are not supposed to worry about how to afford things, you are only supposed to put your request out there to The Universe and believe with all your heart that the object of your desire is on its way to you. SO! I thought perhaps The Universe would appreciate my request in writing! And, Universe, I would like this one because it has a heart rate monitor built in and it's also priced pretty reasonably.

I hope the Powers That Be are listening, because this watch sure would come in handy before I start marathon training!

Monday Weigh In

I'm down 1.6 pounds this week and I'm at 202.6. Still haven't lost all the weight that I've gained over the holidays, but I'm going in the right direction. I think if I hadn't lost weight this week, I would have done something really stupid to sabotage myself. Thank goodness I don't have to pick up the pieces from THAT potential mess!

One step at a time! I'm going to be out of these 200's soon.

Freeze Your Thorns Off Virtual 5k Race Recap ----- Warning: Cringe-worthy

Spoiler alert: The following post is pitiful. Pa-thetic. Embarrassing. Ridiculous. Slightly amusing. And very long-winded. Not your typical race recap. Feel free to run and hide if you must.

A couple of weeks ago, I signed up for this 5k on Adam's blog, I Am Boring.  BUT I didn't tell anybody and I didn't announce that I was participating on my blog. I "planned" to do it, and even went so far as to get dressed to run yesterday. (It was supposed to be done yesterday). Things just kept...coming up. I'm still going strong on the 100 Days Challenge, but I ended up rollerblading instead of running. (big surprise). I basically put it out of my head and chalked it up to life happening (I totally could have done it) and comforted myself with the thought that at least I didn't tell anyone I was going to do it.

This morning, I woke up and straightened up the house a little bit and did some studying in the morning while the kids were outside playing and the husband was at work. This afternoon my best friend came over and we watched Julia Roberts movies and gossiped. I was wondering how I was going to get my 30 minutes in today because it has been COLD. My friend didn't end up leaving until a little after 5, and I still didn't know what I was going to do for exercise. One thing was for sure, it would be completed indoors. The missed 5k was still niggling in the back of my mind. I felt rotten for not doing it. I've just been having issues with running lately. I feel like I can't compare to the bloggers I admire most. They're real, and they deserve to have a running blog. I'm a fraud, and I do NOT deserve to have a running blog. But what kind of thinking is that? It's nothing but a cop out. WHY am I trying to cop out???

Anyway, so then I got on the computer and decided to check Blogger, and you'll never believe it. Adam commented on my last post! You know, the guy who hosted the virtual 5k? While I follow his blog, the only time I have ever commented on it was to sign up for the race and because he had so many people sign up I figured I had (rightfully so) gotten lost in the mix. I had NO idea this guy even knew I existed, and here he is leaving a supportive comment about my cheeseburger craving. I felt like a weasel.

At that point, I finally told the universe, "Fine! I will run the damn 5k!!!" I laced up my shoes and threw on a hoodie and trudged out the door, pouting all the way. It was almost dark by this point and I had dinner in the oven. I do not run in the dark as a rule--I've read way too many Ann Rule books to feel comfortable with that. Also I do not feel that anyone has ever presented a valid enough argument AGAINST the existence of vampires. So instead of doing my usual 5k route, I decided to run around my block for 3.1 miles.

Have I ever told you about my block? It's no ideal running surface. It's a loop that is slightly longer than a quarter of a mile in circumfrence. The road is bowed up in the middle, so no matter where you decide to run you are almost always at a slant. There is also a nasty little hill that is just steep enough to be annoying. The most times I have ever made it around the block is 3. After that, my brain starts to turn to jelly. (I really don't see how people do track work--it is BORING). The upside to running this little loop is that my house is always in view and I feel relatively certain that I won't be murdered while running it.

You have to work with what you've got, and by then I didn't have a lot to work with, so I ran around the block 12 times until my little Blackberry running app hit 3.1. I started out sheepishly, fully aware of how ridiculous the situation was. Here it is, Sunday night. Its cold and dark, I am in the middle of cooking dinner, my children have to get ready for school tomorrow, and I have about a million things I should be doing besides running. I didn't even WANT to run, but there I was plodding diligently around the block, drawing curious stares from my neighbors. I had to see the humor in the situation, and I totally laughed out loud at myself a few times! At about 1.5 miles (6 times around) I was thoroughly convinced that I was stuck in an evil time warp and forever doomed to be running around my block. That only lasted for 2 or 3 laps, though, and I began to see the light at the end of the tunnel. 4 more laps....3....2...1...I did it! I did it! My time sucked but I did it! As I always do after I run, I felt great.  I'm not a quitter dammit...I TRIED to be a quitter but I just couldn't.

I have felt really inadequate in my running lately. I read blogs like Detroit Runner and Bookworm Runs (my two favorites) and I think to myself, "These people are runners. Not you." They get out there every day, they have GARMINS and they talk about things like mile splits and race schedules. They take pictures of their runs. They DO it. Me? I can't afford a Garmin, so I have no idea what my mile splits are. My running routes are not picture worthy. I live in the middle of nowhere, and not a lot of races come to my area. Who wants to read a running blog about someone that is barely a runner?I don't know why all of this has been affecting me lately, but it has gotten harder and harder to get out the door and run. When I had a race to train for, it was easier, but now...

Going around and around in a circle tonight, I finally just told myself to stop it. All of this...is an excuse. Every bit of it is an excuse to give up on myself, to not push myself to be better than I am, to let myself off the hook before I really mess around and accomplish something big. It never gets any easier, this mental game. I think that for the rest of my life I will have to fight against the part of me that doesn't want to be healthy. That part of me is cunning and creative, and as soon as I let my guard down --I am toast.

 I have no one to compare myself to but me. I run, not because I am trying to be as good as somebody else, but because it is part of who I am now. I blog because I love blogging and being a part of the blogging community. I'm not going to let myself ruin either one of these activities for me. My blog may not be a running blog in the strictest sense...but I do come to it from a place of honesty. I'm real. I'm a total spazz, running around in circles in the dark just so I do not have to live with the fact that I didn't run a virtual race that I wasn't certain I was going to do in the first place, but I'm honest about it! And people seem to be okay with this--it's me that's the problem. And it all boils down to excuses, excuses, excuses!

So the moral of the story is just do what you say you're going to do when you're supposed to do it, would you? Then you won't have to give a race recap of this caliber! But thanks to Adam for commenting on my last post! You made all the difference. ;) Tonight's run was a total mental workout that was much needed.

Oh, yeah. My time: 43:05. Not even close to my best, but I don't care.  I needed all that time to work a few things out. ;)

9:23 p.m.

It's 9:23 on a Saturday night and I just stopped myself in the middle of begging my husband to go buy me the biggest, greasiest cheeseburger he could find. I've already had all of my calories today, but for some reason I'm not caring so much right now. I'm STARVING. I want GREASE. I want a fatty, drippy, cheesy, meaty, heart attack inducing cheeseburger and THEN I want to have a cigarette.

Ahhh...the old days.

These past few days my cravings for all old vices have been bad. I'm not in the best place mentally. I've gained weight the past two weeks in a row and I'm terrified of that number on Monday. The old "screw it" side of me keeps trying to pop up and tell me its hopeless anyway, I've lost all the weight I'm going to lose. Just eat some grease.

No burger for me. No food of any kind. I will get through this craving, but I'm still scared that it won't matter in the long run. I'm still scared that I can't lose weight. Weird.

The Day The Panic Died

Today was supposed to be a run day, but I bent over to pick up my 6 year old this morning and pulled something in my back. It took my breath away!! It's okay when I'm standing straight up but any kind of leaning over really just doesn't feel good. I don't think its that serious because I can function normally and all that, but I was afraid of jarring it while running. Good thing that I'm doing the 100 Days Challenge, because that at least got me out the door for a walk after dinner. This would have definitely been one of those days where no intentional movement occured if I didn't "have" to.

Today was also my first day back at school. This is a significant quarter for me, because I am taking my first radiology class! (In case you didn't know, I'm in school to become a Rad Tech). But this is still the pre-radiology program so this quarter and next quarter will determine whether or not I get admitted into the radiology program in the fall. I had a mini panic attack this morning when I walked into class. For the first time all of the pre-rad students are together in the same class. There are 40 of us...and only 12 will get into the program this fall. To top that off, if we don't get in this fall then we lose ALL of our credits and have to take everything over again! (Long story!) Which means basically I lose a year of my life and a 4.0 average too. So there is a lot of pressure, and seeing all 39 smug evil faces of my competition really brought it home for me! Then my teacher started lecturing and using all of these terms I'd never heard before..fluoroscopy...cathode....tungsten...and I just flipped out! How am I supposed to keep my head above water and beat all of these people for a spot into a program that I don't even know if I'm going to be any good at anyway? What if all I've done is wasted my time and cost my family money that I SHOULD have been out there in the workforce earning? Hopeless...stupid...give up...moron....all these sort of words were spinning through my head.

And then I remembered something. I ran a half marathon. I never thought that I would be able to conquer that distance, but I did. I ran, I ached, I sweat, I almost fainted from the heat a few times, I hobbled through blisters, I even threw up on the side of the road once but I did it. And if I can do all of that, then surely I can crack a book and figure out what the hell a cathode is! Panic attack over, back to driven, focused, ass kicking Jennifer back in the saddle. I will make these people cry...they are NOT getting my spot! 

It's amazing the things that running does for a girl's self esteem.

Stair Climbing

Today was day 5 of the 100 days challenge. It is raining. I couldn't convince myself to get out and run in the rain...I mean, its freaking COLD out! And rollerblading was obviously out...I don't have a treadmill or any fancy exercise equipment....and Wii Fit just kinda sucks now. It doesn't offer a challenge at all. So MY brilliant idea??

Climb the stairs in my apartment for 30 minutes! It'll simulate hill work, right? Give a good burn??

OH YEAH!!! Man, I am now pouring sweat like I haven't since... a long frigging time.  My legs are weak and shaky too! But guess what?? I don't want to die! I actually handled that workout like a champ and felt powerful and strong throughout the whole thing. (It helped to have the soundtrack from the musical episode of Buffy: The Vampire Slayer blasting in the background!) I'm all "Eye of the Tiger"y right now. I'm a bloody superhero. Don't you want my autograph?

Ok, I know stairclimbing is no 10 miler or anything, but its nothing to sneeze at either!! Try it sometime.

On the food front...I'm holding my head above water. Canteloupe and one slice of peanut butter toast for breakfast. Jeremy and I went out to lunch today at our local mexican restaurant. I was CRAVING a taco. I ordered a kids meal of one taco, rice and beans. I ate the taco and half the rice and beans. You know how they give out the tortilla chips and salsa at those places? Well, I've gotten into the habit of taking a chip and breaking it up into a million pieces and dipping each piece in the salsa. That way, I can munch on chips until the food comes, but in reality I only had about 3 chips.  So I definitely minimized lunch damage, but the meal was still high in calories. Can't hide from life, though.  After lunch, we stopped at the grocery store to pick up some various staples, and GUESS what the bakery was selling? Individually. Packaged. Chocolate. Cupcakes!! I had to have one...but at least I didn't have to buy the usual 6 pack, right? Right? And I "split it" with Jeremy...by splitting it, I mean that I let him have a bite. BUT that still counts as not eating the whole thing, so HA!!

Good thing I came home and burned off all those calories climbing stairs, huh! But I'm still going easy on dinner tonight.

Hope everyone is having a great week!! Tootaloo!!

Monday Weigh In

I'm back up to 204.2. Two pound weight gain!! NOT HAPPY. I really want to feel martyred and victimized right now. I want to be self-righteous and stick my nose up at the scale. I didn't make either my Christmas goal or my New Year's goal, and its definitely time to feel sorry for myself!

I want to tell myself that I've done everything I should be doing. This was unavoidable. I've been logging in my calories and I got lots of exercising in last week! Which is true...but I can't stop thinking about a lot of other things that are also true:

I've eaten too many of my exercise calories.

I haven't measured my food out-I've been guesstimating in my head.

I stopped drinking my green smoothies every day.

I've let myself eat junk late at night and not recorded it into MFP.

I've eaten more and more processed foods and less and less natural ones.

I knew, in the back of my mind, what the scale would say today. I've noticed that I've stopped FEELING smaller. I knew things were at a halt, but I guess I just had to see the confirmation on the scale.

I'm not going to beat myself up too much. This is a process, and I know what I have to do. All in all, I've still lost 13 pounds over the holiday season. BUT its time to recommit. So here I go. Wish me lots of shrinkage.

So Glad I Went

Today was Day 2 of the 100 Days Challenge. I went running. I REALLY didn't want to. My rollerblades were calling my name...lately that's all I've wanted to do. But I knew I needed to go for a run, so I sucked it up and went. Yay for me.
I did the first 2.2 miles without stopping at all. This hasn't happened in...uh....well....a while. And I did the 2.2 in 25 minutes flat, which is a little over 11 minutes a mile. So I think my pace is really improving! Although I haven't done any speed training?
I ended up doing a 5k in 38.16 which is over a minute faster than my official 5k back in September.
Most importantly...I felt strong! I felt like a runner again! I have been feeling more like a not-so-much-of-a-runner lately. But screw that, I'm totally a runner. :-D

New Year, New Challenge!!

Happy New Year, everybody!! I hope 2011 is treating you well so far. I had a wonderful New Year's Eve- we had a bonfire with several of our neighbors. We roasted marshmallows, made smores, the neighborhood teenage boys set off a million fireworks...it was great!! My kids made it all the way to midnight this year--first year ever! Oh, and my husband (who has had long hair since we met) gave himself a buzz cut!! What a drastic change, but he looks amazing!

Poor picture quality, but my baby looks GOOD.

Anyway, I am participating in John Bingham's 100 Day Challenge. The challenge is so simplistic that its genius-- move for 30 minutes a day EVERY DAY for the first 100 days of 2011. It doesn't matter what kind of exercise you do, as long as it is intentional movement for 30 minutes. This is going to be a great challenge for me, because while on the days that I run I usually get well over 30 minutes of exercise, but on my rest days I don't exercise AT ALL.  So from now until April 11, 2011 I will at the very least be going for a brisk 30 minute walk every day! I also have my roller blades now, so this gives me even more of a reason to use them.  I'm sure that a lot of people who read this blog get well over 30 minutes of exercise a day, but if by chance you also want to participate in this challenge you can go here to do so. Just become a fan of John Bingham on Facebook, and go to his Events tab to sign up. You can also friend request him on Facebook, and he will accept you. (Which, let me just tell you, made me feel UBER important--yeah, I'm friends with The Penguin--my HERO--on Facebook! We're buddies!!)I think today I'm just going to go for a walk with my children

 I hope that wherever you are, you're having a wonderful New Year's Day!!