Frustration!

A friend told me that according to scientists yesterday (January 24) is considered the worst day of the year. Some of the reasons being financial stress after the holidays, hype of holidays done, blowing off the new year’s resolutions, less sunlight, etc.

I’m feeling the frustration. It’s not financial or holiday letdown related, it’s just – WINTER. We have 6, yes SIX, months of winter here. It gets long. And it’s cold. And even when the sun does come out, I work in a windowless office and don’t get to see it. The roads suck to drive on.

Then there’s the scale. I’m frustrated with trying—eating well, trying to get some form of cardio in, in hopes of not aggravating my plantar fasciitis more (biking is out)—only to have the scale just fluctuate in a 3 pound range. Up down up down. I look at the standings for my work weight loss challenge and see everyone losing, and I gained. Real booster there, not.

I broke down today and ordered Fahrenheit Nutrition Lean EFX. I’m not looking for it to be a miracle cure, but I’m hoping it will help jump start metabolism, so I don’t feel that my efforts are for nothing. I’ll be sure to let you know if it helps, or if it was a waste of $.

thinking vs doing

I'm really bummed I can't get to the gym anymore.  First it got down to once a week, and now it's about twice a month only.  Why? I have a 7 year old who is too old for the children's room there, but too young to stay home. We do not have any babysitters (we rarely go out).  My spouse has been working so much lately we barely see him.

Now I do realize this doesn't mean I can't work out.  I just like the gym because I can focus there. I don't look to my left and think "oh i need to clean that" etc. I don't have a child bothering me every 5 minutes for something (not that they need anything, but just want to tell me something, thus taking my focus off exercise).

In my head I think a lot of about exercises.  Do 10 pushups, 10 situps, 60 second plank. How hard would it be to do those a couple times a day, anywhere? Well at work it's awkward. I don't have a private office, I'm the front desk, and most every other office is occupied.   At home, clutter is my excuse.  To have a clean floor is a wonderful thing--but it doesn't last long.  A clean floor = space for my boy to drag every toy in the house to.

Excuses excuses.  I just need to stop thinking and start doing.  Something is better than nothing.

Power of One Check In

Why oh why couldn't yesterday be weigh in day for the Power of One? It was for my work challenge however, and I got a nice percertage drop.  I kept on track yesterday, and even got to go to the gym--which I think was my downfall today actually.  I'm guessing my body said 'hang on, here' in anticipation of increased activity. At least that's what I'm telling myself :-P  I do anticipate the the scale going back down to yesterday's weight and lower. 

So, here's my official weigh in for the Power of One challenge today:

Still officially down .2, but it could have been 1.2.  Oh well, progress!

Cholesterol Update!

The letter from my dr. came yesterday.  There was a sense of anticipation and dread all at the same time while opening it.  Would the numbers be down? Well, here's a breakdown:

Type     Start     Current     Should Be
Total     280       252          Under 200
LDL      197       169          Under 130
HDL      46         49           Over 40
Trig       208       172          Under 150

The numbers are dropping! It was enough of an improvement for him to tell me to just keep doing what I'm doing, and recheck again in another six months.  Besides exercise and losing weight, his recommendation was to eat 200mg or less of cholesterol per day.  I've also been taking Schiff MegaRed Krill Oil. I'd read krill oil is supposed to be better than typical the omega fish oil for lowering cholesterol.  IDK how much it has helped in my lowering, but its 1 simple little (yes! little, not horsepill) pill a day.

eek

Ok, after fasting 12+ hours so I could have blood drawn for a cholesterol test today, I decided today would be a cheat day.  Starbucks used up almost half my calories for the day, for a mid-morning breakfast.  For lunch, I hadn't packed anything, and since I was 10 minutes late I took only a 20 minute lunch and therefore grabbed the easy but not great fried special--grilled ham & swiss on rye, and french fries.  I didn't finish either, omg the grease & unhealthiness.  Gut Bomb.  I shouldn't have eaten when I got home after work, but I did.  And tomorrow will probably be a scary scale pic.  You've been warned. :P

Wednesday Check In: The Power of One!

Well, a whole week has gone by and I’ve blogged nothing. Guess I haven’t had much to say! Yesterday I was feeling a bit down. It was weigh-in/points logging day at work and I wasn’t impressed with my check in.

As for the Power of One check in?

Not as much as I hoped, but still a loss!

As for the January project? I didn’t do last weeks. I have a hard time imagining the goals I’d like to achieve this year much less realizing them as the year goes on. I could say “I ran my first half marathon” but honestly, I don’t see that happening. I tend to not plan further out than a week, I can’t plan 9 months from now. I could write “I lowered my cholesterol 50 points by losing weight”…but if I have a hereditary problem losing weight may not dent it even. I can’t say that this week’s project is much different. I’m like several others I’ve read—I hate seeing these goals I’ve written down, and I’ve accomplished nothing of them when I look back.
I have an appointment tomorrow morning to see my dr. and have my cholesterol levels checked. I’ve lost about 8 pounds since the end of July 2010. It’s not much, but we’ll see if it’s helped. I’ve printed out reports from the last 90 days from my tracking at My Fitness Pal (since that’s as far back as it goes) to show him that I’ve tried. I’m excited and nervous to see what happens.

Wednesday Check-In: The Power of One

Officially a half pound down. It’s not much, it’s not enough, but it’s better than a gain. Part of this is from eating too much a couple times, and much too little exercise. I really miss my gym time. I am so much better focused there, I don’t have the distraction of children or pets, the air movement better compared to my dungeon basement with a hot wood stove in the same room as my equipment.

Another new challange starting

Not only am I doing the Shrinking Jeans Power of One challenge, they have started a weight loss challenge at work that I figured I'd jump in on.  The biggest difference being the one at work is a $35 buy in.  They have 4 winners--most weight loss, 2nd weight loss, most points, 2nd points, with each winning a certain percentage of the pot.  As of last night there was only like 6 of us joined.  In the past the guys have joined and I figured they could smoke our ladies asses, but I was told they were the opposite. They checked in at the beginning and rarely or never afterward lol.

I figured all I have to lose is $35, hell I've blown money on stupider things lol. The challenge goes till April, so I'm hoping that will keep me motivated during this cold hell winter.  It's -10* F here this morning.  Just lovely. :P

The weigh ins for work are on Tuesdays. Considering I weigh everyday anyway it doesn't matter that I have 2 different weigh in days.  I'm not going to do a weigh in post for the work challenge--none of them read this.  My weigh in posts will remain for the SJPOW on Wednesdays.  I've also added in the upper left, a feed to my tumblr Daily Weigh blog.  I'm posting a pic of the scale every day (that's possible to do so).  I think it will be interesting over the course of the year to see the trends.

thinspo?

With the death of Isabelle Caro I got to looking at some thinspo material just out of curiosity.  What I see is a lot of extremely underweight girls. Girls. Most being teenagers, some in early 20s.  Kids.  I think back to when I was that age, when I was thin. I weighed 115 pounds, a BMI of 19.1--still in the healthy range but at the bottom.  5 pounds less and I would have been "underweight".  And as a teenager, I had some almost anorexic habits, except now days they have the buzzword "drunkorexia" for it.  I literally would refuse to eat all day so that when we went out drinking I could get drunk faster.  (Hence part of why I no longer drink.)  After I sobered up and went off to college I started the typical weight gain "freshman 15" etc.  I remember there being a girl in the dorm who was anorexic--skeletal and had that fine downy hair all over her.  Not something you aspire to when you see it in person.

Fast forward approx 20 years and lots of additional pounds later.  I now look at these "thinspo" photos and can't imagine ever being that thin again.  Do I want it? Honestly, Yes.  Am I willing to starve myself for it? No. I know enough about nutrition and I've read enough about the damage anorexia does.  I don't need to read about the damage bulimia does and its never been an option for me, my mother was one.  I see the damage first hand. I know in order to successfully lose weight, and keep it off, I need to eat.  Not overeat, not under eat.

I look in the mirror, I see a jelly belly, thunder thighs, big butt. In some thinspo pics, the girls hip bones stick out so far that their panties actually don't touch their abdomen.   I tried to find my hip bones last night, they are buried deep lol.

GAH!

Thursday night was a binge....NYE wasn't but I didn't eat the best.  And the scale shows it this morning.  Must crack down.