Thanksgiving

Current weight: 222.4
Total weight change: -2.6


Not a lot of weight loss over the past month, but I had a couple of rough weeks were I wasn't working very hard.  Last week I made it to the gym three times and did some pretty intense (for me) jogging, biking, and weight lifting.  


I'm noticing more changes in the way my clothes fit; namely more room around my waist.  I have been working veggies into lunch and dinner portions regularly and need to up those, likely.  


My Fitness Pal is still working out well, as long as I use it consistently.  


The holidays are a tough time for me, since I happen to LOVE holiday food.  I literally dreamed about fudge the other day.  Dreamed about making it and eating it.  I also have regular dreams set in restaurants and at the dinner table.  Typically I'm eating roast chicken.  So there you go, now you know how deep my food pathology goes. 


So, here's the plan.  For the rest of this week, I'm going to work out, eat well, and be sensible.  Then, on Thursday, I'm going crazy.  Be warned. 

Weekly Check In: Week Seven

Current weight: 222.6
Weight change since last week: -5
Total weight change: -2.4

Woo hoo!  Weight changes! In the right direction!  Yay!

So what did I do this week?  I started using My Fitness Pal.  The website is a little clunky and awkward looking, but the app is a lifesaver.

So what do I like about it?

• It's easy to use (and free).  Unlike the Weight Watchers app (which I paid 17 dollars a month to use), the food selections are huge, since it's information compiled from the users.  Pretty much any food you could ever want to eat has been input by someone, sometime.  If it hasn't, you can enter it yourself.
• The progress page shows me drops in my weight in a pretty little graph.  I like being able to see that line go down, and hate to see it go up.  I weighed myself every day this week, and it was awesome to see a pound drop here, two pounds there.  Additionally, if you have a ken to measure yourself in a specific area, you can do that.  The app has tracking of weight, neck, waist, and hips. 
• I can enter recipes.  I cook at home.  A lot.  It's cheap.  And with this app, you can choose the ingredients you added, tell how much of it you used, how many the recipe feeds, and save it for future use.  This is a great feature for me, because I circulate some of my favorite recipes into my meal plan over and over. 
• I love the friends function. My brother uses this app too.  I can see how much exercise he's doing, how much he's lost, and we can comment on each other's progress.  It's good to have him showing me up and challenging me to do well. 
• The Home page shows me how well I'm meeting my Recommended Daily Values.  This is one place where Weight Watchers was seriously lacking.  It ignores things like vitamin and mineral intake, figuring that if you meet the healthy checks, then you're good.  That may be true, but looking at the fact that I only got 20% of my Vitamin A for the day makes me wonder what foods have it and how to improve that area.  This curiosity leads me to learn more about nutrition and knowledge is power, if you weren't apprised of that already.
• Last but not least, the weight predictor.  The app has a button at the bottom of the page that says "Complete this Entry."  When you click it at night, it tells you "If every day were like today...  You'd weigh ______ lbs. in 5 weeks."  Man is this great motivation to use it the next day!  When my weight jumps up two or three pounds in water weight and I think I overate or I suck at life, clicking "Complete this Entry" keeps me going and reminds me that I'm still on the right track.  

And thus concludes my fangirl love of this app.  What weight loss tools and tricks have you guys found so far?  Julie's comment on "What week is this again?"  had some great motivational tips, so give them a look-see. 

JK Rowling's thoughts on thinness

I stumbled across this quote today: "Is 'fat' worse than 'vindictive', 'jealous', 'shallow', 'vain', 'boring' or 'cruel'? Not to me"  and did some research (read: googled it) to find out where it came from.

And all I have to say is, "Three cheers.  Let's remember how many good things we are before we label ourselves as 'fat.'"

What week is this again?

Whoo, awesome.  I'm at 227.6, which is a weight gain of like four pounds or something?   Guess how many times I've worked out since last post.  Just guess.

0

A big whopping 0 times.  I need motivation again.  I need constant motivation.

Weekly Check-In: Week Three

Current Weight: 224.8
Weight change since last week: -3
Total weight change: 0


Back to zero, but at least I didn't gain this week!  


This week has been pretty stressful with my workload exploding, but I have eaten pretty healthily with a treat thrown in here or there.   Matthew and I decided (for the second or third time) to eat at least one vegetarian meal a week.  


Here's why: 

• Meat is expensive (this might be the only reason that Matthew went along with this). 
• A light vegetarian meal can still be filling (for example, veggie spaghetti on whole wheat pasta). 
• I love Black Bean Soup. 

Panera's Black Bean Soup is DELICIOUS, vegetarian, 240 calories for a 1 1/2 cup serving, and filling. It's a winner in my book, and justifies eating a slice of baguette rather than the healthier option of an apple.  And man do I love Panera baguettes. 

This week's vegetarian meal was oven roasted root vegetables with a green salad.  The vegetables were served hot, to simulate roasted meat.  This didn't work.  I missed my meats!  However, I'm told there are some good ways to make a veggie meal feel like a meat meal, like Eggplant Parmesan, Basil Pesto Fafalle, etc.  

Plus, sometimes there's nothing better than beans and cornbread. :) 

P. S. -- Sorry for the late check-in.  I'm shooting for Monday next week.  

Weekly Check-In: Week Two

Current Weight: 227.8
Weight change since last week: +2
Total weight change: +3

Hmm...It seems these numbers are going in the wrong direction...

It's been an Epic Fail week.  I have been not tracking what I'm eating, didn't make a single workout all week, and had greasy, unhealthy Mexican food a number of times.  True dat.  The proof is in the pudding, I suppose, as you see my weight gain of another two pounds.

However!  On Saturday, we went to the new OKC outlets at I-40 and Council and a magical thing happened. A size 20 was too big.  Let me repeat that for you...TOO BIG.  Nice, right?  I was pleasantly surprised to be seeing some body shape changes from my changing eating and workout habits. My tummy seems a little flatter, my dimples showing a little more...it's barely there, but it's there.  I like it.

For this week the goals are:
1.) Have fun with Ashley at the yarn tasting on Friday (not fitness related, but a goal nonetheless)
2.) Eat at least four servings of fruits and vegetables a day.
3.) Make at least two workouts this week.
4.) Find some rockin' out, pumped up workout music to download on the iPod.

Weekly Weigh In: Week One

Current weight: 226
Weight change since last week: +1
Overall weight change: +1

Woo, what an unsuccessful week it's been for weight loss!  I did pretty well as far as working out goes, with two good work outs since I started this ball rolling.  (Small steps.)

This weekend we were down in Davis working on Grandpa's house--dusting, vacuuming, planting bulbs, cleaning fixtures--and I'd say I worked for a good four hours or so.  At the end of the four hours, I still felt like I could do more work, which is new.

As far as eating this week, there were some pretty bad decisions made.  For example, Saturday's food intake consisted of a sausage, egg, and cheese McGriddle, a Bisteck Especial (steak covered in cheese), rice and refried beans, a sopapilla, and a slice of pizza.  Nary a vegetable around (except pico de gallo and guacamole).  Overall, though, I'm glad that my energy seems to be up already, and that's enough to keep me working on healthy choices and hitting the gym regularly.

Over the next week, my goals are three solid workouts of about an hour (typically broken into twenty minute increments doing different things) and four servings of fruits and vegetables every day.  'Til then, keep on trucking and let me know how your weight loss week has gone.

This just in...

On KLG and Hoda this morning, they references this study which said Weight Watchers was twice as effective as the generally doctor prescribed diet and exercise. Those in Weight Watchers lost twice as much weight over the long haul.

I might need to sign up again! 

The Backstory

There I was, sitting at my desk, waiting for students to come and chat with me while scanning Pinterest and I saw it.

Wait, you're shitting me, I thought.  People think the most beautiful size woman is the size I was in high school?  That is so unfair!   You see, I spent my high school days hating my body.  I believed I was too fat for anyone to like me, when really, I looked like this: 

So after high school I went off to college and gained the the freshman fifteen.  Then I met my husband and gained another ten pounds from happiness.  Then we got married, and I didn't work out any more.   Add to that a steady diet of grilled cheese (since bread and cheese slices were about all we could afford) and I soon packed on another 20 pounds.  Around the time I met Matthew, I was right around 150 pounds.  Now I weigh about 225, am a size 20, and look like this: 

I miss the younger, less doughy version of myself.  I miss being able to work out for an hour and leave the gym not feeling exhausted.  

So what do I plan to do?  I am implementing an exercise regimen and holding myself accountable to you all through the blogosphere. I don't intend to change my diet other than to try to eat more fruits and vegetables and cut back on junk food.  Basically, I love food, and any change where I cut foods out of my diet is only going to be temporary, because I will never completely cut anything out.  But I can devote time to exercise, I can make healthier choices as I'm eating each day, and I can lose weight.  

Don't expect a quick transformation from me.  I gained the weight slowly, through the years, and I plan to lose it slowly too, but I'm sure that I can.  

The Invitation:  So, fellow weight loss champions, here's my proposal.  Since so many women are constantly trying to lose weight during their busy lives, let's do it together.  Let's write about our stories of trial and temptation, our successes and joys.  Let's share healthy steps, exercises, and recipes.  If this is something you're up for, start up a blog and let me know about it.  I'll link to it, and we can support each other's journeys and inspire ourselves to continue on our own.