W.O.W. #2- Week 2

This week has been so much better, things are getting to a point of normal. My total loss at this point is 7.8 pounds in 2 weeks, which is pretty awesome. I am definitely feeling the difference of having the protein added in and making sure that it stays there is sometimes the challenge because it is the biggest thing that you can eliminate to save time, which is something that just can't happen.

My breakfast this morning comprised of 1 whole hard boiled egg, 2 hard boiled egg whites, 1/2 Cup of oatmeal (dry with 1 cup of water added, 2 tsp brown sugar, and 9 almonds. Yes you read that correctly and I am LOSING WEIGHT with all that food. It is crazy, and the tone in my muscles is getting much more defined.

well here comes another week!!

W.O.W. #2- Week 1-WOW as an adjective

Well with one week of the second wow underway, all i can think about is all the ways the WOW has become an adjective in my life. Such as, wow my body is soooo happy that i am working out again at this intensity level, wow my body was exhausted all week, wow zone dieting is hard if you ever leave the house, and wow i have lost a ton of weight.

It is so hard to do this zone diet, because that is exactly what it feels like...a diet. Knowing my track record I don't stick with diets, and I don't want to feel like I am on one. I am trying to make a lot of healthy changes, or eating better foods, but I also got into the habit of eating the same thing over and over and over this week. This attitude I am feeling is hard to deal with because I NEVER felt that way in the last wow, but I just have to keep telling myself that I know Kristan would never give me a task I couldn't accomplish or set me up for failure.

The positive side of the Zone diet is the amount of food I can eat, and my level of satisfaction that I have after meals, as well as how long that satisfaction lasts. I can make it easily between meals instead of struggling to get to the next one. The down side is that I spend FOREVER planning and preparing. Also, I feel like there are so many things I can't have.

The positive side of the week is that I started at 194.4 Monday (which is the result of a few bad weekend choices) and today am at 188.4....which is a 6 pound loss this week!!

Here goes week two...i hope it gets a little easier.

Please help...

I know money is tight everywhere, but I don't know anyone who can't sacrifice $10 to help aid those in Haiti right now whose lives have been shattered in the earthquake.

I know if I were there, I would be on my knees begging God, praying for help from people like you and me. We are all so blessed people!!! We can't sit here and allow those people to suffer without offering the slightest bit of help.

Right now is the time to help.

Read this article.

Really, just take the 5 minutes and read it please.

Did you read the part that states there could be as many as 100,000 dead? Or maybe even up to 500,000 dead?? Or more???? I can't even imagine the heartache involved in such a disaster.

For those interested in helping immediately (YOU AND ME!), simply text "HAITI" to "90999" and a donation of $10 will be given automatically to the Red Cross to help with relief efforts, charged to your cell phone bill (I checked it out and it's 100% legit. It's sponsored by the mGive Foundation and Every penny of that $10 goes straight to the Red Cross).Once you text, they will text you back asking to confirm. Reply "YES". They will send you 2 more texts and you just reply "STOP" to never hear from them again. Simple as can be.

Or you can go online to organizations like the Red Cross and Mercy Corps to make a contribution to the disaster relief efforts.

Time to get moving!

I just recieved a phone call from my dear SIL (who accompanied me in the 2 mile fun run last August) who was calling to notify me that she had heard of a Valentine's Day 5k on February 13 that she wants to do, and asked if I would do it with her!

Look to the left -----> and you will see a precious little widget that I just added to our blog. It's official. I was extremely hesitant but I just paid the registration fees for my husband and I and we are ON! No turning back now!! And my SIL is currently in the process of talking her hubby into it as well.

I also called my Dr. today to see when exactly I could start jogging again and they said TODAY. A week ago, actually! It turns out that I only HAD to wait 4 weeks rather than 6 like I thought. Both with upper body strength training, and jogging. This Friday will be my 6 week mark, so I am going to start up jogging tonight at my cardio class! I'm super nervous about this 5k considering it is IN A MONTH, but I think this is just the kick in the pants I needed to get going again!

Needing to talk...

I don't really know where this post is heading, but I just feel like I need to write.

The past 2 days have been rough. I spent the weekend binging, feeling like crap and having major cramps, and allowing myself to have a bad attitude. I started my period last week and Saturday the binging began. I ALWAYS feel horrible when I binge and I don't understand why I let it happen in the first place. Lately I've been finding myself doing negative self talk. I find myself thinking "Yeah... I'm way too lazy to lose any more weight." "Yeah, I ate something bad for breakfast so there is no turning this day around now and I may as well not even exercise." THESE STATEMENTS ARE WRONG. It's like a form of self abuse and when I look at it that way, I can't believe that I just sit here and allow myself to be abused (by myself...). I guess I have just lost my momentum and am allowing that to make me feel like a failure?? I really don't know. Then I find myself on certain days feeling really great and motivated and have a really awesome and healthy day, and then the next day I feel careless again.

There is a person in my life who is overweight and she is CONSTANTLY telling me "I HAVE GOT to lose this weight. I'm so miserable and fat and I hate it. I'm changing this right now. I AM GOING TO LOSE THIS WEIGHT..." Then she will diet and exercise for one day, and then go right back to her same bad habits, and then the next week she is back telling me how miserable she is and how she HAS GOT to lose this weight... It is a vicious cycle that she lets herself be stuck in and I really really fear becoming exactly like that person.

Now writing all this down and reading it I feel like I'm being way hard on myself and I'm thinking perhaps my hormones (yes, it's that lovely time again!) are to blame? Because I'm normally a very positive person. I think (know) that not being able to run is really affecting my outlook on things as well as the way I feel about myself. I will be able to start jogging again next week and OMG I can't wait. I know it's going to be hard starting over, but I really can't wait. After every jog, no matter if I only ran .25 miles at a time or 2 miles at a time, I always feel a huge sense of accomplishment and like I am truly making progress in my overall fitness, as well as my goal of losing weight. So I am really looking forward to jogging again and getting back into that routine of progression.

Anyway, today my thoughts good. I at a Zone perfect bar for breakfast, I brought some DELICIOUS homemade ham and chicken pot pie for lunch (hubby made it and it's a relatively healthy recipe and oh-so yummy!) and am having homemade minestrone soup and roasted veggies for supper. I feel so good about things when my day is planned out like that. I am also taking my lunch time walk today, and John and I are walking to the little vegetable stand after work today to buy some veggies for roasting, and I will do my 45 minutes on the elliptical tonight.

I want to say that I am so thankful for having Stephanie as a partner in this journey. Reading her blogs ALWAYS ALWAYS ALWAYS encourages me and gives me the little bits of inspiration that I need, and I want SO BADLY to be that person for her again. She has made her long term goal 140 lbs, and I've never told her or anybody else this but my *dream* goal has always been 150 lbs. I have just never put it on paper or told a single soul because I thought it would be too hard for me and unrealistic so I settled for 160 as my long term goal. Well guess what Stef? I'm changing my goal to 150 because you gave me the courage to be true to myself. Thank you!!

So: how have I been doing on my January goals?
#1- Get back to the track in 2 weeks because that's when the Dr. said I will be good to go with running. Still waiting for this one, but it's gonna happen!
#2- Cook at least 3 dinners at home per week and eat the leftovers! Doing really well here. John has been cooking some too, but we are both very much more aware about eating at home AND eating the leftovers rather than letting things go to waste
#3- Exercise at least 45 minutes, 4 times a week. Didn't completely accomplish this one last week, as I only did 3 days. But this week is a new week and I plan to make it to 4 days.
#4- Read the daily sparkblog EVERY DAY. I've done just great here too. Even days when I wasn't exactly feeling motivated, I would read the blog because I knew it was part of my goals and that I needed to do it.
#5- BRING LUNCH TO WORK. Doing great here as well. Bringing lunch to work is SUCH AN IMPORTANT THING for me or else I find myself getting into trouble in the middle of the day and heading to the cafe. Having a lunch AND snacks at work helps me in achieving my goals.

I have these goals posted on my wall in my office, and in the kitchen at home right next to my calender. I have also told John about these goals and of course he can see them hanging on the wall in the kitchen. I know having them in sight as well as having John know about them helps me keep them in my mind.

So there we are. Overall not too bad with my January goals, I just needed a serious attitude adjustment and I think blogging gave me just that. Proof that I need to blog more often...

I have also been researching 5ks in my area for this spring and summer, and there is one on April 10 that John and I are going to sign up for! I am so excited and I know that signing up and paying for it will help in my motivation. We can't officially sign up until February 1st, but I am definitely going to do it that day.

John has started working out again and wants to try P90X (his bro said he would burn the discs for him) and I'm really proud of him for wanting that. He hasn't worked out much since winter hit but things work out so much better when we are both trying to achieve healthy goals and being a support for one another. I'm so thankful for him!

Anyway, there it all is. What a blog! I'm looking forward to making this week a success in my path of enjoying a healthy lifestyle

The eve before W.O.W. #2 and my goals

Tonight I am sitting here awaiting the morning when wow gets under way. There are a lot of changes this time because we are going to be with a partner, and then with a team. I don't know how this will work, it will motivate me so I hope that it motivates others so that the team dynamic will work.

As for our eating, we are going more into what Kristan calls "zone eating" so we have to have 3 blocks of protein, 3 blocks of carb, and 3 blocks of fat at breakfast/lunch/supper, and then 1 block of each at the two snacks. I spent a large portion of the entire weekend trying to plan and well i came to a few conclusions: 1) i am a perfectionist, 2)that i relied too heavily on carbohydrates, and 3)this is going to be very hard to do long-term unless i get this figured out. I am just worried that my perfectionist tendencies may lead me to not eat if i don't know that i am doing it right for fear of doing it wrong. see how scatterbrained this paragraph sounds, well that is how successful i was at meal planning, i think i got about three days completed. Then we have the problem of tuesdays and wednesdays when i have nights classes...ugh...so i will have to eat on the run which this diet doesn't appear to lend itself to AT ALL. I have a lot to learn but wow here we go.

My measurements were very close to my ending ones, I can feel that i lost some muscle tone but I expected that because I did more yoga than strength training during our break. Although i did do my pictures in a bikini...yes a bikini...and will post them at the end with my final pictures.

I have a lot of goals for this wow because I could get almost to my goal of 140 pounds by the end. I don't even know what that looks like or how it will feel because I haven't ever been there and been able to maintain it. However, my first goal is to plan all of my meals in advance because it really does help, then I want to have perfect attendance again (even though it doesn't count, it counts for me), and I want to finish this wow with SERIOUS definition in my arms and legs so that that bikini may actually get worn, and I want to be able to do 40 push-ups.

Well I am going to blog at least each week, maybe more if I can.

It's been way too long...

OK I'm not going to dwell on how long it's been since I've blogged. Bottom line is: Stephanie suggested that I need to blog, and she is right. So here I am.

I am anti new year's resolution, but this year I do plan on taking up running again (I should be able to get back on the track in 2 weeks, I obviously haven't run or exercised much since the beginning of December). My big plan for the year is to sign up for, and RUN lots and lots of 5k's. Maybe even 10k's! But 5k's for sure. I was finally to the point of being able to run 1 mile without stopping (it took me 12 minutes, but still!) So I am excited to get back to that, as well as get to running 3.1 miles without stopping. I know I can do it!! Little by little I can do it.

I really need to start focusing more on my intake as well. December was just a disaster for me as far as eating well and exercising. I really want to start cooking a lot again, and with my husband being graduated from college finally, he will be home to eat dinner with me every night.

So let me take this time to write out my goals for this MONTH:
#1- Get back to the track in 2 weeks because that's when the Dr. said I will be good to go with running.
#2- Cook at least 3 dinners at home per week and eat the leftovers! I've been going out too much and wasting food, and being lazy with cooking.
#3- Exercise at least 45 minutes, 4 times a week. I've been so lazy for a month, and it's time to get my head back into the game.
#4- Read the daily sparkblog EVERY DAY. As much as I do get burned out on Sparkpeople.com sometimes, it really helps me to read the daily blog.
#5- BRING LUNCH TO WORK.

So those are my 5 goals for this month. I am going to type them up on a word document and print them off and hang them on my fridge, and my wall at work, and write them on my calender. I have a tendency to make goals and forget all about them, but not this time! I will post my progress on this blog throughout the month.