Quick Weekend Recap

Friday

Weighed in at 204.4, the lowest weight I've seen in over a year, possibly in up to two years!  I had friends coming over in the evening so my day was spent cleaning and preparing.  Which meant I didn't get my 30DS workout in :(  And then I definitely over indulged that evening.  So many good snacks were brought.

Saturday

Weighed in at 208 :(  I was a little shocked but figured it was from the salty chip/dip combination.  Got right back to it and ate mostly plant based all day.

Sunday

Weighed in at 208.   Double bummed.  Went for a very wet and windy run.  And ate well until the Harvey's for dinner tonight.  Not looking forward to tomorrow morning's weigh in.

It really is getting extraordinarily frustrating to have my progress destroyed by one evening of indulgence.  The knowledge that one evening could take weeks to undo is really a downer.

First Day of School!

Yesterday it poured buckets.  Literally buckets of water.  Roads were unpassable and closed.  So when noone from my clinic showed up for last nights run I took myself to the mall for some shopping :)  And learned that I still can't find a pair of knee high boots that will zip up :(  I think this will be something that I deal with for the rest of my life. 

But I deperately don't want to spend another winter wearing my sneakers in the snow.  I want something that is flat, fashionable but not fancy.  As much as I want to be, I just am not.  So I want something a little more hiking but that can be worn with a dress/skirt.  I'm not asking too much, am I?

I was also tempted by a pair of jeans.  I have never spent more than $50 on a pair of jeans but I'm committed to building a good wardrobe.  It's a hard thing for me to do.  I don't think there has been a time in my adult life where I have entered a season and been able to wear all of my clothes from the last year.  I'm not interested in being that girl anymore.  I want to reach a size and stay there.  So I tried on a $100 pair of jeans.  And they buttoned but it wasn't pretty LOL.  Thankfully so.  My husband was kind enough to point out that I probably shouldn't spend $100 on a pair of jeans that I'm working towards being too big in 3 or 4 months.  Smart man, he is :)

Today was the first day of school for my oldest.  I'm so happy to start building routines for my business, my fitness and house.  Since I missed my run last night I went out at lunch time today.  It was still raining but more of a mist which was nice and cooling.  I ran a little beyond my comfortable zone and cut over a minute off my 5K time from last week WOOHOO!!  As soon as I got home I grabbed some energy chews and pressed play on 30 day shred. I could definitely feel the effect of running on my energy level.  And even after eating lunch I was starving.

I tracked and kept to mostly natural foods and ended up with a decent defecit for the day.  I changed my calorie goal to 1500 this morning.  If I am going to hit my 53 pounds I need to keep to that instead of thinking 1700 is good.  Crossing my fingers that I see 204 tomorrow morning!

The Numbers in My Head

223 - my starting weight this year
204 - my weight the day I delivered my oldest daughter
194 - my lowest weight since delivering my youngest daughter (2 years and 5 months ago)
191 - my starting weight in 2003, a number I swore I would never see again
187 - the weight I hovered at for the two years before conceiving DD2
174 - when I bought a new wardrobe during a weight loss stint (all of these clothes remain in my closet as they have been worn only a handful of times)
165 - my wedding day weight (2 months post partum)
157 - my feel good maintenance weight from 2004/2005
145 - the highest healthy weight for my height according to BMI (I'm not sure this is even possible in a healthy manner for me)

I carry these numbers around with me always.  And I've often wondered if other women have the same idea floating around in their head.

I completed 30DS today and as I grunted through one of the ab workouts my oldest said "you're doing great Mommy!"  :)

Jillian Michaels and Fresh Inspiration

I own the infamous 30 day shred and have even done it a fair share of times.  In fact, in March I did it nearly all the way through, missing only a handful of days.  And I noticed a significant difference in the way my clothing fit.  But then I fell completely apart in April/May and haven't really done any strength training since.

For a while I've been planning on integrating it  back into my week once school started and I was feeling good about my running progress.  My plan was to do it M-F and take the weekends off, starting this Thursday (first day of school).  Well, today we went to the beach as it's a holiday and I ended up not going for my scheduled clinic run.  I was going to just count it as a rest day but after eating ice cream and popcorn and brownies (albeit healthy ones) I decided that I needed to flick the switch in my brain.  So I popped in the DVD and did level 1.  And halfway through, I decided to start today instead of Thursday.  Surely I can manage to fit in a 30 minute workout in the next two days.  Even if Ella needs to do it next to me :)

And I'm pulling out the prepregnancy jeans.  The last time I pulled them out was probably in March and although I could button them up, there was no way I was going anywhere in them.  Or sitting down for that matter LOL.  Prepregnancy weight is still 19 pounds away but I was fairly unfit back then and part of me is thinking I may be able to fit into them at a higher weight.

So Mondays will be my progress testing photo day.  Not sure if I will show the photos or not but I want to have them for me, at the very least.

Pour Some Sugar..

UGH  I went to a BBQ tonight and went a little overboard on the desserts.  They were all so seriously delicious and I enjoyed every one.  But I think I have some major sensitivities to sugar.  About an hour after eating the desserts I started to itch.  And now that I am home, I'm tired, my eyes are watering, my nose is runny and the bloating/gas is ridiculous.

I guess these days are important to remind me why I am trying to remove the majority of processed food from my diet.  Tomorrow's run just moved from optional to required!

I ran 5km today!

I know for most runners that is not anything to jump up and down about but after 4 months of not running at all I am celebrating every milestone.  It was not my fastest time, not even close but it felt good.  And it game me hope that I can see improvements and fast.

Weigh In Friday

I weigh in on Friday.  No good reason really, just what we have been doing.  This morning I weighed in at 206 even.  That means I am down 17 pounds since Christmas.  Well, technically since March 1st since I did little to nothing in January and February.  And don't get me wrong, I am thrilled that it is moving downwards mostly consistently.  But if I want to reach 53 pounds by Christmas of this year it needs to move a little faster than that.

So I set a goal through The Line Diet and it seemed to be reasonable.  I'm planning to use the graph as my guideline.  On days I'm below the line I will eat healthy, and aim to keep my calories under 1800.  On days I am above the line I will aim to come in at 1500 net calories for the day.

Becoming a Runner

I was never the sporty type growing up.  Picked last for intramurals, crossing the finish line long after the others in the gym class fit tests.  Very stereotypical nerd :)  But I have always wanted to run.  I would try for a week or two but it was always really hard.  Hard to breathe, sore legs and I wasn't very fast.  So I would give up shortly after starting.  But oddly enough I was into fitness.  I loved to swim and joined the gym of the local hotel where I would do some minor weights, use the machines and swim.

In University I joined the triathlon club after doing a sprint race with a coworker during the summer.  It was definitely not competitive and practices were often followed by nachos and beer :)  But I improved a lot over that year and ran a 5K race in 27 minutes.  As always I was one of the last to cross the line and I was working hard!  I didn't realize at the time that I was running in a FAST race LOL. 

I decided that I wanted to run a marathon.  I even signed up with a private coach.  But it was hard and the coach wasn't interested in making it fun :)  He wanted to get me super fit and running the best marathon I possibly could.  I stopped training, using finances as an excuse.  And for the next 10 years yo-yo ran.  I tried it out for a few weeks or months and then found whatever excuse was handy to stop.

In April of 2011, I was coming out of the fog of undiagnosed post partum anxiety. I had a rough pregnancy and a rough year after delivering my second daughter.  So I had two years of binge eating and the least amount of movement I could get away with.  I couldn't run 3K without multiple walk breaks and it was HARD!  But my sister had asked me to run a marathon with her in October to celebrate her 30th birthday.  I walked into the brand new Running Room that just opened in my city and signed up for the marathon clinic starting the end of June.

The manager, Courtney, was so sweet and encouraging.  She probably should have told me to sign up for the 5K clinic instead but she explained that the first long run would be 13km and I should be able to run 10 km before that week. EEEEK!  I signed up to run a 10K in late May to hopefully keep me on track.  When the day came I ran with my sister (with plentiful walk breaks) and was thrilled to cross the finish line in 1 hour and 33 minutes.  But I was tired and had no idea how I would ever complete that 3 more times :(

I showed up for the first clinic night and learned very quickly that I was the least prepared of the whole group LOL.  Some had run marathons before.  All but two of us had run a half marathon before.  That night we were running 6km and would run the same route every Tuesday for the length of the clinic.  The instructor, Courtney, ran with me the whole way, including the many walk breaks I had to take.  But by week 4 I could run the whole 6km without walking!  And although I was using generous intervals for my long run (10 min run: 3 min walk) I was completing the distance.

I was slow but for some reason it didn't matter to me.  Maybe because I was sooooo much slower than everyone else there was little pressure to try and keep up.  I started leaving for my long runs an hour before the rest of the group started.  They would pass me along the route, giving me a thumbs up and I would finish while they were stretching. Everyone was so encouraging and I could feel myself getting better each week.

Sometime during a three hour run I came to the realization that I was enjoying myself!  I really enjoyed running, being on my own and plodding along in my own world.  I was excited to run and really excited to cross such a monumental event from my bucket list.  Three weeks from race day we started out on our final 32km training run.  My husband dropped me off and I started.  About 2 or 3 kms in I rolled my right ankle.  I still have no idea what happened but it hurt and bad.  I called my husband to pick me up and did a little test walk while I waited.  It felt ok, so I tried some running.  When he arrived, there was no swelling or bruising so I decided to keep running until it hurt.

At the 21 km mark I called him to pick me up. And by the time we arrived home I couldn't bear weight on my right foot and it was extremely swollen.  And it wasn't better the next morning or the next.  And by a week later I knew that the marathon was out of the question.  I cried.  A lot.  But when race day rolled around I was surprisingly calm about it.  I volunteered at the 36km water station and screamed for each and every one of my teammates in training until I was hoarse. 

And I realized that it really was about the journey this time.  I still haven't crossed run a marathon off my bucket list but I have discovered a run of loving that must have been buried away for 33 years.  And that makes everything worthwhile.

The Gradual Change

I wish I could say that my diabetes diagnosis was enough to propel me immediately into an angelically healthy lifestyle.  I certainly made the vow that everything was going to be different.  And for several weeks it was.  I cut refined sugar out of my diet completely.  I started swimming a few times a week.  And I reached the conclusion that I wasn't REALLY diabetic because my sugars remained normal when I didn't eat crap.  So it would probably be ok to have a treat once in a while.  But then the treats became weekly, then several times weekly, then daily....well you can see where this is going.

During the last week of July my husband came to me with a proposal.  We both wanted to lose weight and we were both struggling hard to stay committed.  But what if there was some external motivation, in the form of $5 per pound (payable every 4 pounds).  Neither of us had taken spending money from the budget in quite some time and it would be nice to have some blow money.  So away we went.

That Friday (our chosen weigh in day) I weighed in at 212 pounds.  Two months later I am at 205.4 pounds.  It definitely has not been a fast or perfect journey thus far.  There has been travel, weddings, bar-b-ques.  There has been stress eating (a week at my parents' house for my sister's wedding!), too many trips to the ice cream store and some enabling of each other.  But there has also been a return to running (very short distances), more days without diet pepsi than with and an overall healthier attitude towards my diet.

My aim is to cut almost all processed food out of my day to day diet.  Everything but yogurt, cheese, salad dressing and bacon :)  I have removed the pressure to be perfect.  I won't be.  I know that.  There will be days I take Ella to McDonald's and choose the burger/fries over the salad (hello today!).  But if those days are the minority my body can handle it.  And eventually, I know I will start to want the salad over the burger/fries.  Eventually...

Here I Go Again On My Own...

Well, hopefully not completely on my own.  But realistically, mostly on my own.  Blogging consistently is something I struggle with.  I have started and stopped dozens upon dozens of times through numerous blogs. And yet I keep coming back.  Almost daily I compose blog posts in my head but never seem to sit and put my fingers to the keys.  I'm not going to promise myself that THIS TIME I will do it on a regular basis because I really have no clue.  But it is something I would like to do.

I took a few minutes to read over my last few posts.  That was a rough period of 2012.  Shortly after my last post I got the results of the bloodwork I mentioned a few posts before that.  Diabetes.  Not a happy word.  But not a shocking word.  I was feeling the highs and lows through my mood and energy.  I knew the test was coming and yet I continued to eat donuts, chips, chocolate bars. Often all three in a day.  I knew that my diet seriously lacked in real food.  I knew that I was doing zero exercise and blaming it on my running injury. And I still chose to drink 3 (!!!) coconut cream frappucinos the weekend before I had my blood drawn.

I honestly was just really disappointed in myself.  The label of diabetes was one I knew I was at risk for.  I didn't want it but I chose to pretend I am invincible.  It's not going to happen to me, I told myself.  WRONG!

My doctor informed me that my levels were considered controlled through diet.  Insulin was not required, nor was daily testing.  I was given instructions to exercise when my foot healed enough to allow it, work on my diet and lose 12 pounds (5% of my bodyweight).  Then come back in three months to be retested.

I chose to do some testing of my levels anyway.  I cut the crap from my diet completely and tested after every meal for the first week.  And every meal had me perfectly within acceptable levels.  Basically, my sugary junk food snacks (and most likely the quantity of them) pushed me into diabetes.

It was time to change.

Musings

It was not a great day food wise.  I did not track but didn't eat a lot so have a pretty good idea of what I came out at.

Breakfast was my regular oatmeal with blueberries and yogurt.  After which the baby (who is 2) had a full blown all out tantrum which only ended when J gave her is egg on toast breakfast.  Which meant on the way to work we stopped at Tim's to get him a muffin.  I got a doughnut (stress eating).

I had physio mid morning and I knew that meant lunch would be late so I brought a banana.  But physio did not go well and I ended up buying a chocolate bar on my way to pick up Alexis from daycare.  I ended up not feeling hungry all afternoon and it was supper before I realized I hadn't eaten anything else. 

Goulash for dinner and then I made up a tasty snack for Ella and I of cut up banana topped with crushed pecans, coconut and whipped coconut milk.  Very tasty.

And along the way I realized that if I threw all the 'shoulds' out the window and listened to my body I would probably end up right where I want to be.  Meaning if I'm not hungry at 10am I don't need to have a snack.  If I have a snack at 11 instead and then don't want a full lunch, that's ok.  If I only want a little dish of dinner and a bigger snack at 7pm that's ok as well.

Of course this only really works if what I'm choosing to eat is mostly healthy choices.  I'm thinking I might give it a shot for a few days.  And tracking my calories just to see where I end up.

Feeling the Hunger

I was hungry all day today.  Stomach growling hunger too.  And there wasn't really any reason.  I ate 3 meals and 3 snacks.  Total for the day was 1865 calories which is a perfect zone for me.  But I'm sitting here with a growling belly.  "Hunger is not an emergency" was repeated in my head more than once :)  I know it's just the adjustment period and I need to suck it up for a little bit but it really does suck!

I also increased my water today.  Which means my weight will be up for a few days as I rehydrate after a few weeks of drinking pretty much zero water.  And I'm again noticing that the more water I drink the thirstier I become.

Weight: 214

Slightly better

Breakfast
Tim Hortons (Canada) - Sour Cream Glazed Donut, 1 donut	340	46g	17g	3g	10mg	230mg	29g	1g
Lunch
Cereals - Oats, regular and quick and instant, unenriched, cooked with water, without salt (oatmeal), 1 cup	147	25g	2g	6g	0mg	2mg	3g	4g
Blueberries - Frozen, unsweetened, 0.5 cup, unthawed	40	9g	0g	0g	0mg	1mg	7g	2g
Danone - Oikos Greek Yogurt - Honey, 180 g	156	17g	2g	10g	6mg	60mg	16g	0g
Dinner
Potatoes - Mashed, home-prepared, whole milk and margarine added, 0.5 cup	119	18g	4g	2g	1mg	350mg	2g	2g
Beans (S) - Green Beans Fresh , 1 cup	60	2g	0g	4g	0mg	0mg	2g	7g
Chicken - Breast, meat only, cooked, roasted, 1 cup, chopped or diced	231	0g	5g	43g	119mg	104mg	0g	0g
Snacks
Doritos - Nacho Chips, 100 g	500	60g	26g	8g	0mg	620mg	4g	4g
TOTAL:	1,593	177g	56g	76g	136mg	1,367mg	63g	20g

It has been an extraordinarily long day so I apologize for the crappy formatting but I just don't have it in me to figure out how to fix it. The important parts (for right now) are visible.

It was not the greatest of days. I had bloodwork at 8:30 which meant I couldn't have breakfast. By the time I was finished I was absolutely starving and grabbed a doughnut. But having the tracker going meant that I didn't eat my way through the tantrum my oldest had tonight.

I am still hungry and plan on having a bedtime snack of some chocolate covered strawberries. So fruits and veggies are definitely better than yesterday. I'm seeing it as lots of room to improve :) More MFP tomorrow.

Today's eats

Breakfast: Oatmeal with blueberries and greek yogurt
Snack: Rice Krispie square
Lunch: Chicken pizza with cheese (homemade and low cal) with cake for dessert
Snack: ice cream and another piece of cake
Dinner: noodles with meat sauce

I am less disappointed with what I ate today that with what I didn't eat.  1.5 servings of fruits/veggies all day?  Not good. 

Tomorrow I track on MFP to get an idea of calories.
Weight: 216

I commit

To keeping a food journal for all of next week (going out of town for the weekend)

To not purchasing any food or drinks aside from groceries.

In Limbo

I am in a very crappy no running limbo.  By early March my heel pain had escalated to the point I couldn't walk for days after a long run and I wasn't pain free by the time my next run came around.  I started doing some research and came to the conclusion that it was plantar fasciitis.  My doctor soon confirmed.  UGH!

I had been having the pain since late December so it was pretty bad by this point.  I managed to determine that the cause was tight calves (probably initiated by my 5K clinic pace) and moving to a house with ceramic floors in the kitchen.

The prescription: no running or walking, stretching daily, icing and a special sock to keep my foot flexed at night.  And orthotics.  I added gel cups to shoes and began wearing my sneakers daily.  6 weeks later, the pain was still there and although it was improving, something as simple as groceries or running errands caused the pain to flare up. 

I saw another doctor to get a cortisone shot and once again heard the orthotic suggestion.  The cortisone helped slightly but not as much as I've heard it can. Boo! 

I'm not sure why, but I'm seriously resisting orthotics.  I feel like I managed to train for a marathon without them and without encountering any problems, so if I can just heal up I should be able to deal with the causes and run again without them.  It doesn't help that they are not covered by our insurance, they are super expensive and I have heard many stories where they didn't help at all.   So I'm meeting with a physiotherapist next week to discuss a plan of attack.  If she strongly recommends orthotics I will bite the bullet and do it.

Surprisingly enough, my weight has remained pretty stable through all of this. Even more surprising, given that I am back on sugar and self medicating through food :(  I gained 5 pounds in the first month but have lost it again through very little effort.  I need to find the effort...

March 5th update

January - I really did nothing different this whole month.  I ran with my training group but ate the same and didn't add any strength training.  Not surprisingly I ended the month pretty much where I started.

February
During the first week of February I found this website I started reading about sugar and people who have cut it out of their diet. I was intrigued. Especially when I heard about the changes people saw in their moods, energy level and focus. So I figured I would give it a shot.

It was surprisingly easy to do. I have very few cravings and the few times I indulged it immediately resulted in a headache and extreme bitchiness. So I kept at it with little to no thought.

Even though I was still only running 3 times a week with my clinic I managed to lose 9 pounds by the end of the month. YAY!!!

March
My plans for March are to take it one step further. I've committed to doing Jillian Michael's 30 day shred every day in March. I'm also tracking my calories in and burned to try and find a balance of losing weight and staying fueled for my workout. I would love to see 5 pounds gone by the end of the month.

Weigh In Jan 8

223.4 UGH
I was on track and feeling good until the Kentucky Fried Chicken on Friday.  One more week of not tracking and if I have poor results I will be going to tracking immediately.

Keeping it Real

I'm throwing it all out there.  The good, the bad and the ugly.  Although there is not much good about my starting point.

The Starting Point

 

Weight: 223 pounds
Chest: 43"
Abs: 42 3/4 "
Hips: 41"
Thigh: 28"
Arm: 13"
These were taken on December 26th, 2011 and I weighed in the same on Jan 1, 2012.  I will do measurements once a month only.

The Goals

1. Lose 53 pounds.  Averaging a pound a week seems reasonable and doable with any craziness
2. Run a 10K, a half marathon and a full marathon.
3. Wear my wedding rings and my prepregnancy jeans (my "baby" is turning 2 in April)

The Plan  

1. Running 3 times a week with my half marathon training group (maybe once more if I feel like it)
2. Strength train 2 times a week
3. Yoga once a week.
4. My food plan is a little looser at the moment.  I'm focusing on cutting out all day eating to start.  3 healthy meals and two healthy snacks.  8 glasses of water daily.  If I need to tighten things up down the road and track calories I am willing to do that as well.
5. Post a weekly weigh-in, once a month measurement and during photos every 2 months or 10 pounds (whichever happens first).

And even though I'm the only one reading this, it was still really really scary to put out there :/