Wednesday, March 31, 2010

I'm not defeated; it's just a hill.

Well, it’s that time again. I had my weight watchers meeting last night, and I was pretty sure I had probably gained, although I knew it wouldn’t be a huge amount. I went back up 1.6 pounds to 290.2 pounds. In the last week, I only exercised 1 time. I really need to kick that up a notch, mostly because when I exercise a couple times a week, there’s an obvious difference. About a month ago, I exercised for 7 days straight (and only about a half hour each time) and at my weigh-in, I found I’d lost 4 pounds.

Knowing that I had been so successful once, why is it that I can’t seem to do it again? I really struggle with the exercising part of this and it’s driving me nuts. I will be sitting there on the couch watching tv, knowing I should be exercising, and just lacking the motivation to actually get up and do it. So after I got home last night, I rode on my bike for 15 minutes, while watching Biggest Loser, which was something.

I set a new mini goal for myself. I’ve noticed that I have barely used any of my activity points every week; this last week, I only used 3 out of 28! So my goal is to use up all of my activity points by next Tuesday and to be able to cross them ALL off. That would be pretty darn cool. And I want to get into the 280’s and stay there. I’ve been hovering in the high 280’s- low 290’s (although maintaining), but I really want to see a seven somewhere in the middle of the number. Not to mention reaching my 10% weight lost since joining SP and 5% since joining WW.

I am going to do this.

Monday, March 29, 2010

My weekends can use some work

This weekend, I didn’t do the greatest, though I was definitely aware of what I was eating. I didn’t track my points; not an excuse, but I was really busy and kept forgetting to. I had birthday cake both days because of Jeff’s birthday. Though if I compared the amount now to the amount a year and a half ago, I’d say it was less than half what I used to eat which is such a huge change for me. Then on Saturday at Jeff’s birthday party, I had a carb smart tortilla with the works, but I put a lot less meat and beans, and a lot more lettuce and tomatoes. The sour cream was light, so that helped too. I ended up putting too much on the small tortilla, so I scraped off half of it and put it into a crunchy taco, and when I finished both, I was pretty stuffed. So I think that was a pretty successful dinner.

On Saturday, the only exercise I got was walking around a lot at a couple of garage sales I went to with my sister. We brought her 3 kids, so I helped keep track of them, which was probably a little more walking than I’d have normally done.

Unfortunately then, on Sunday, my Mom had a dinner for Jeff’s birthday, and we had baked chicken, and pasta salad, and rolls, and salad with dressing, and beans in gravy, and cake. And I did only have one serving of everything but the rolls (thankfully they were small), and was full by the time I finished.

Then on Sunday, Jeff had to go to bed by 8 because he has to be up at 4:30 on Monday for school, so I watched a great movie on the laptop and biked for 4 miles. I’ve decided I need to get a more comfortable seat for it, as when I pried myself off of it, there was pain in places there should not have been pain. But I have to say that watching the movie instead of the odometer did make the time go faster on the bike. I started out planning to go 1 mile. Then, since that one was really easy and I wasn’t tired, I decided to go 2 miles. When I got to that one, I decided to challenge myself and go for 3. So I did. Then I felt like three isn’t a round number, and it really should be four, so I went another mile to even it up. Can we say obsessive-compulsive? Sometimes, I tend to border on that. However, in this instance, I think it didn’t do anything but help.

Friday, March 26, 2010

Planning for a birthday party

Today is my husband’s 33rd birthday. We’re having a small party tomorrow with a few of our friends, and I’ve been devising ways to provide a fun meal, but to eat a little healthier at the same time. I decided to make the makings for plate tacos; ground beef, refried beans, lettuce, tomatoes, cheese, sour cream, etc. I’ll make the ground beef mixture half ground turkey (because Jeff doesn’t like ground turkey very much) and the refried beans will be half canned pumpkin, which cuts down on calories big time. And I’ll have low-fat sour cream. For me, I may use baked chips, OR high-fiber tortillas and make mine into a burrito instead. The options are endless!

The best part of these switches is that everything tastes the same, so no one notices, but it is healthier, and I can eat comfortably without worrying so much about my points. The thing that may stop me up is the chocolate ganache cake he wanted. Although, it may be helpful that I’m not that big of a fan of desserts in general so I’ll probably have a small piece and be happy.

He wanted peanut butter cookies, so last night, I made a batch, but I changed the recipe a bit. It said to make 1-inch balls of dough, but I used a mini scooper and the balls were quite a bit smaller. Original recipe said it makes 48 cookies, but the way I did it, it made 78. Which is great because since I’m not really into cookies, if I have one, it’s only 77.4 calories, or 2 points.

In my life, I haven’t liked peanut butter cookies since I remember having my first one at my Grandma’s house when I was about 6 years old. I haven’t eaten one since that first one, 21 years ago. I simply love peanut butter, and could possibly live on it, but I don’t think it belongs in a cookie (since I don’t like cookies). I really feel like whoever came up with that was sadly mistaken.

However, last night, one of them flipped over when I was putting them out to cool, and it kind of folded in half, revealing the inner almost-cooked-but-not-quite goodness. And all of a sudden, I had to give peanut butter cookies another try. After all, taste buds do change. And. It. Was. Delicious. Seriously. It was perfectly soft and moist, wow. So while I am enamored of MY peanut butter cookies, it’s apparent that it’s the store-bought ones I can’t stand. Even better for me! After all, I can figure out the nutritional value (or lack-of) with my recipe. So I had extra points left last night, and ended up eating three cookies for 6 points which brought me cleanly to zero. And best for me, I really only liked them when they were still warm and gooey from the oven, so now that they’ve been sitting on the kitchen table to cool, I don’t want them. They’re too hard and crunchy. But perhaps, I’ve found a recipe I can make a couple of times a year to impress (and have a couple of nice warm ones myself).

Wednesday, March 24, 2010

Finding what works for me

I had my official weigh-in last night at my weight watchers meeting, where I found out I had gotten rid of another 1.8 pounds! I am below my lowest weight finally, that I reached before I went on vacation at the end of the month. Damage repaired! In another 5 pounds, I will have lost 10% of my original starting weight which is fantastic! I will have reached my 5% weight watchers goal (I'll get something cool!). And I am a total of 26 pounds down now. I really love reaching these numbers. There are so many things to celebrate reaching!

I had kind of felt myself fall off the wagon for awhile there, and discovered one thing that motivates me, even if I don’t bring it home and stick it on the fridge; looking at people’s success stories. Getting more interactive on other people's weight loss blogs and SparkPeople really helps me. I gave myself a jump start by looking at all my friends’ pages, and commenting (where I hadn’t been because I was slipping) on their blogs and achievements, and reading the blogs. The effect was instantly uplifting! It reminded me of my own goals and dreams to be healthy and thin. It gave me a much needed kick in the pants, which got me moving again.

I had been doing pretty well; making my lunches every day, exercising a couple times a week, but it wasn’t quite enough. After my hypothetical kick in the butt, I reset my goals. I didn’t eat any foods off plan (by off plan, I mean foods I had not planned to eat), I wrote my foods down in my tracking book the night before when I made my lunch, so that I have my day until dinner planned out. Let me just say, avoiding the tamale on the table yesterday was only possible because I reminded myself that it was not on my plan, and would completely mess up my points for the day.

And because of all this, last week was the first week in my entire journey where I tracked EVERY SINGLE THING I PUT INTO MY MOUTH for an entire week. Including the weekend! This for me is a huge deal! Weekends have been something of a problem and being successful through them has been on my short-term goal list for ages, and no matter what I did, I hadn’t quite been able to reach it. Until yesterday. This gives me an amazing feeling of empowerment. That no matter how hard something is, if I keep trying to reach it, and keep pushing on towards it, I’ll get there. It will just take time and action.

When I started weight watchers, I had to adjust my points so that I didn’t go over, and since my dinner was my largest meal of the day, I would use only 5 points on breakfast, 5 points on lunch and leave myself 26-ish points for dinner, just so that I would reach my points target without going over, since we ate a way bigger meal at dinner. It did work ok, but over the last couple of months, I’ve been working on evening out my points used during the day, so that now, my breakfast is about 8-10, lunch is 9-12 and dinner is approximately 16 points. Lately, I have been doing really well with this. I’ve been getting several of the food groups that I need during each meal and find that it keeps me fuller longer, which is what I want. I also eat more normally, instead of banking my points for dinner and being so hungry, I go over anyways, or Jeff and I go out to eat and I get too much, even though it fits into my points.

It’s really working for me! I need to remember that when I feel my motivation flagging, I am slacking on keeping in touch with my friends blogs and need to become more interactive again. It’s the success that others are celebrating and the support I give and receive that makes it work!

Sunday, March 21, 2010

So totally awesome!

This weekend I did really well eating-wise. Yes, I did eat out but I kept pretty close track of my points and did really well!

Yesterday, I spent about 3 hours cleaning around the house. I cleaned the inside and outsides of the windows (must have some kind of spring-cleaning bug), cleaned out an entire! closet and most of the garage. Then we had a delightful bonfire, which was so fun! The weather was perfect.

And while I was cleaning out the closet, I found a book that I found last year where I took the measurements before starting Barry's Bootcamp, and compared with my measurements that I took yesterday for fun. In the last 14 months, I have lost a total of 26 inches!!! 2 1/2 in my bust, 1 in my hips, 12 in my right thigh, and 11 1/4 in my left thigh. Isn't that amazing?!!?!? I haven't kept track of my measurements at all for the year, which I'm thinking I may keep closer track of now, since there's an obvious difference!

So I'm feeling pretty stoked. I found our Barry's Bootcamp again, and I decided I'm going to follow their 30 day program for working out, and then I'll measure again and see where I'm at. There's bound to be a difference, which would be fantastic to see. So we'll see what happens with it!

Thursday, March 18, 2010

Really successful day yesterday!

I had a really good day yesterday. I ate more points for breakfast and lunch, kind of trying to even out my intake throughout the day. I made lasagna rolls, which, while I did stay in my limits, were waaay higher in points and calories than I’d intended, and I even used cottage cheese and turkey. Weird, but they were delicious! I had them with a large side of cauliflower which I ate first so I’d be more full by the time I got to the good stuff. LOL. By the end of the day, I had reached 32 points and a little less than 1,500 calories. I feel really successful with this. And I exercised on the wii for a half hour while watching a Friends.

I used to love watching Friends, and kind of miss it not being on tv regularly, so I’ve started out with the whole series from the library. I got season one the first week and am up to season six so far. I’m really enjoying seeing all these episodes that I’ve never seen before. When Friends was on originally, I was too young to watch the first several seasons, so when I started watching, I only caught the last 2 or so. So I’m seeing a lot of new stuff, and loving it! Once I finish it, I don’t know what I’m going to do! LOL, I’m not really into TV shows that much, so I’ll have to look for something that’ll keep me interested as Friends has.

I’m looking up recipes to make for dinner tonight. We’re limited by what we have in the house, so it’s somewhat tough to find recipes that work, but usually I can make some wiggle room. I also have to make frosting for my nieces birthday cake for tomorrow. I’m not a big fan of sweets, so it’s good that I won’t be snacking on it. But I’m going to have a busy night tonight. After I make the frosting in several different colors, I am going to decorate the cake. Luckily, I wrote out the wording in royal icing to dry on Sunday, so all I have to do is peel them off and put them on the cake. It’s just frosting and borders. I’m really looking forward to how this one turns out. It should look fantastic!

Wednesday, March 17, 2010

And.....

Despite my lack of progress over the weekend, I weighed in at 290.4 pounds last night! It's a loss of 1.8 pounds! And I wanted to see what my scale says so I know how close it is, and it's almost exactly 2 pounds less. Consistently. Which means I actually started this journey at 315 pounds, not 313. No biggie, but it's good to know how far I've come. I'm back down to the 25 pound loss, which is pretty cool. And only 6 pounds away from 10% weight loss! So cool!

Yesterday, after I blogged, I decided to spend some time and thought on ways to remind myself to continually eat better. I came up with a list of short-term goals, and long term goals. Here's my list.

SHORT-TERM GOALS
Exercise today
Make dinner tonight
Pack my lunch for tomorrow
Track my points today
Track my points this weekend
Lose 5 pounds

LONG-TERM GOALS
Run in a 5k
Lose 158 pounds & get to the weight of 155 pounds
Become a Lifetime Member of Weight Watchers

And I stuck 3 of them around the house in places that I think I should see them. Like one's on the fridge, one's in the living room, and one is in our bedroom right by the door, so that I will look at it on my way out of our room. It worked this morning, so hopefully that'll be a good idea.

Last night, we watched Biggest Loser and I realized I'm still pretty perturbed at the way John split up the teams and stacked them for him. The poor black team really doesn't stand much of a chance because they have alot less weight left to lose as opposed to the blue team. The part that bothers me, is that while yes, it is a game, ALL of those people are there to change their lives. They want to lose weight and be healthy. That is their primary reason. But then you put someone like John there, who decides that he doesn't care about giving the others a chance to lose weight; he just wants to win the game. Ugh!

And speaking of Biggest Loser, they're doing auditions in Portland at the end of the month. My sisters mentioned it to me, and kind of talked me into it, and so I said I'd go, and then my wonderful husband said on his own (no hinting or anything from me) that he'd go with me and try-out too. I'm still not entirely sure how I feel about it. I really REALLY don't like Jillian. Even Jeff said he could see me punch her in the face for getting in my face. LOL. I like the premise of the show, but they're definitely leaning towards the drama (gotta keep their viewers somehow), and drama really annoys me.

It also seems to me that the people have been more and more laden with medical issues due to obesity, which I don't struggle with. Jeff does, more with fertility issues, but for the most part, I'm just fat. The other thing I question; if they do want me, are they going to tell me to not lose any more weight before the show? Because that's not something I'm willing to stop doing. I'm living a healthier lifestyle now, than I ever was, and I'm not going to go back to where I was for a TV show.

I'm probably over thinking it, but I want to have all of these questions now so I can ask them later. I don't quite know what to think about it yet. I'm thinking I'll go to the audition, and if they actually call me to do it, then I'll decide if I actually want to do it. In the meantime, I'm going to continue to work on my weight and getting healthier.

My grandpa passed away on Monday morning. The thing is, I barely knew him. He's my Dad's dad, and lived in Puerto Rico and New York all his life, while I always lived in Oregon. I met him, about 4 times total. He was such a sweet man, but I don't remember hardly anything about him from when he came to visit. What memories I do have are tempered by stories I've heard from others. I want to imagine he sang a song to me, but he sang it to my aunt, and I can only picture it. From what I know, he had a great sense of humor too.

What makes me especially sad now is that I'll never have the chance to get to know him. I'll never have a chance to hear the stories from his past, and to learn my history from him, and now, it's gone. That side of our family never (as far as I know) talked about their past, and so nothing has been passed on.

Tuesday, March 16, 2010

Update

Tonight I have my weekly weight-watchers meeting. I've been eyeing the scale to see kind of where I'm at, and I think I've gained since last week. I was doing pretty good up until Friday evening, and it all went down hill from there. If I could just gain control of my weekends, I think I'd be losing alot more weight, because it really comes right off on the days that I put forth even a little effort. Anfd then I lose that effort come Saturday and Sunday, and by Monday, I have to work really hard to get back into the swing of things.

I lost 0 pounds last month, and actually gained 0.4. I'm finding myself annoyed, because as much as I want to be thin and healthy and lose weight, I know I'm not giving 100%.

It seems to me that what I struggle with is when the weekend comes, I almost forget that I'm trying to lose weight, so I slip back into old habits. I need to do something that reminds me at home daily what I'm trying to do. I'm thinking visual aids; Like what?!? I suppose sticky notes could be one. But then again, I have a couple up already, and don't pay attention to them. I need something more obvious. I'm going to have to do some serious thinking about this. I need to get back on track. It'll take me 5 years to reach my goal if I keep wavering like I have been.

Thursday, March 11, 2010

Barbeque Chicken Pizza

Yesterday, I was dreaming about bbq. Unfortunately, since I live in Oregon, and the weather can't make up it's mind to rain, wind blow, hail, snow, or show us the sun, we can't really bbq until May-ish.

So instead, when I got home, I pulled out two Oroweat sandwich thins, and turned each one into a bbq chicken pizza. First I pulled out my 3 oz. portions of chicken out of the freezer to thaw in the microwave, and put 1 1/2 Tablespoons of bbq sauce over them. Then I toasted the sandwich thins (didn't separate them, as I wanted a more solid crust). I warmed up an ounce of Neufchatel cheese and used that as the base instead of mayonnaise. Less fat and a serving of dairy. Put the chicken on top of that and topped them with 1 ounce of cheddar cheese. Then I broiled them to melt the cheese.

I believe they cost me 9 points, but I got two pizzas for it. I got protein, whole grain and dairy. And it was totally delicious and filling! I wasn't hungry for the rest of the evening.

I also tried the 15 minute kettlebell work-out last night. I must've drank enough water though, because my muscles aren't sore today. They feel a little worked, but definitely not sore, which I can appreciate. Jeff was sitting in his chair watching me exercise and at one point said, "watching you is kind of erotic". LOL, I personally didn't see it; I was sweaty and I'm big, and I think it looked funny, but apparently not. :)

Wednesday, March 10, 2010

Official weight

Well, I had my official weigh-in last night, and the damage isn’t as bad as I thought it would be. Remember, two weeks ago I weighed 289 pounds. I was worried that I’d be 297-ish this week, because while I did exercise on vacation, I definitely didn’t eat well. When I got back and weighed myself, it was up about 8 pounds, so I ate better and exercised more through Tuesday and my weigh-in weight was 292 pounds. 3 pounds is not bad for having gone on vacation.

Overall, in my first month of weight watchers, I lost 8.6 pounds. The second month I gained 0.4 pounds. Again, not bad because I’m kind of maintaining. The lousy part is hindsight; if I had stayed on plan through the second month, I’d almost be seeing the 270’s now. Ugh.

Due to all of the above :), I wrote out a simple menu for myself which incorporates a lot of vegetables, whole grains and lean meats. This particular menu also should help me to get the nutrients I need to be healthier. I’m hoping to get my sister to go shopping with me this weekend, as I’m running out of the good foods. LOL, I really should shop more, but I don’t like going to crowded stores.

I also got a 10 pound kettle bell to exercise with. I really like it; the shape and handle make it easy to hold, and it came with 3 work-outs on a dvd. One is 10 minutes, one is 15 and one is 20. I did the 10 minute work-out the first night and the next day discovered I have muscles on my inner thighs. I love that working with a kettle bell uses a lot of momentum and using your body to add momentum. It’s very comfortable. The music’s a little funky, but the instructor on the dvd is awesome! She explains every movement very well, and takes it easy which makes the time go by faster. I’m really liking it.

Monday, March 8, 2010

Vacations go by so quickly.

I’m back from my vacation, and back at work. I so enjoyed being with Jeff. I love that man so much.

On The 28th, we arrived at our hotel room which was beach front, we just didn’t have a beach view. It was really pretty nice for only $45 a night. They also had a swimming pool, so we went swimming on Sunday and Monday, which I counted for a half hour of exercise on my calendar, since I’m never really sitting still when I’m in water. There is almost nothing I enjoy more than being in the water. That feeling of weightlessness is so appealing to me. Not to mention that I actually feel graceful when I’m floating. You can’t trip in a swimming pool.

Unfortunately, you can cause injuries on the concrete. My feet get dried out when I’m in the water a lot, and two of my toes now have cuts at the base where the skin split. It makes working out a little less fun.

Then on Tuesday, we left the coast and drove up to Welches, which is about 10 miles from Mt. Hood. We got to stay in a condo that my FIL reserved through his time share. It was so relaxing and nice to be with Jeff. On Wednesday, I worked out in their gym for an hour, which was a lot of fun. The treadmill was so quiet; nothing I’m used to, since mine makes such a racket, you’d think a washing machine is walking around the room. It’s THAT bad. Anyways, after a half hour on the treadmill at an incline, I got onto the recumbent bike and pedaled for 10 minutes straight. I was struggling to get my rhythm, and then struggled with making t the 10 minutes I kept pushing for. It didn’t hurt, it was just a push to do it that much, but I did! And then on Thursday, I couldn’t get Jeff to go to the gym with me, but he was willing to go swimming, so we did that instead.

All in all, while I did pretty well at keeping active during the week, my eating did suffer. We went out a couple of times and I didn’t stick to healthy choices. I hate to say it, but I did use the excuse that I was on vacation and we rarely get to the places we ate at. Worse off is that we ended up going to the same place 2 nights in a row because the restaurant I had planned for (and was going to eat healthy at) closed early. So off my plan I went, and got the fish and baked potato again. Not good, but a slightly better choice than french fries. I need to remind myself that better is good enough for me.

I’m working this week on getting myself back on plan, because I’m back up to 296. On Saturday, I mowed the lawn for 1 hour, and did a 10 minute workout with my kettle bell, which I felt on my inner thighs today. Kinda cool. My work-out calendar is looking pretty colorful now. I haven’t used any green or yellow, which I’m working on figuring in, but it’s got a lot of red, white and blue on it. While I haven’t exercised as well as I should with my 30 days of exercising in 40 days, I am only a little behind, and can keep on track if I pay attention.