Weekly Results: We are on the same team now...

Results:

• Loss -5.4 (Total lost 28.4 pounds - There was something wrong with my spreadsheet. The loss numbers have been wrong the last few weeks. This is corrected.) YEAH!!! All the gluten is gone, plus more!
• 105,033 steps = 50.74 miles
• Gluten free again, still vegetarian, ate chocolate this week so not sugar free
• Week 13 of working out.
• Week 8 of working out and eating right

Thoughts:

I spent some time serious time looking in the mirror this week. I took the time to notice changes. I took the time to really see and appreciate the strength and the beauty. I tried really hard not to let any of the negative thoughts creep in that are so typical of women in general. I just wanted to love what was there right then in front of the mirror.

I really started to hate TV as stood there looking at myself. I googled it. The average woman celebrety is something like a size 2 while the real average American woman is a size 14 and I would guess in reality that down here in the South average is more like a 16 or maybe even an 18. If beauty is always portrayed as this wafish, anorexic, stick person and that is the only message that is sent to us no wonder we are so critical. Size 2 certainly seems to be what many of the women in my life are shooting for...

As I stared at in the mirror I realized that no amount of working out is going to change my actual shape. I'm sooooo pear shaped. I am one size on top and another size on the bottom. Its a good shape to be and while I did not always love it in the past I am learnign to appreciate it more and more. The pear shape is so womanly. It feels strong. I like having hips. I am starting to own my feminenity more. (Down here in the South the pear shape is an asset. The J-Lo booty is HAWT and I get picked up on a lot by guys which always makes me laugh.)

This week I gained an overwhelming sense of gratitude for my body. I love how strong it is becoming. I love the things that it can do. I am starting to feel like my body and I are on the same team these days. We both want to climb Timpanogos even if there is a ton of snow...

Chocolate... Its really the only candy...

Blogger is a mess right now... I am missing at least one post to this blog now. I hope it comes back? I may have to go cut and paste it from Google Reader if Blogger can't get it back... Oh, well...

This week has been awful…

Unusual job stress, combined with major family stress resulted in me eating chocolate this week. Not a ridiculous amount by any stretch (chocolate on Sunday… chocolate on Monday). Two chocolate bars in a week do not equal pounds and pounds of unhealthy but I am still a little bit mad at myself. One of the things that I have really attempted to do in my recent fitness attempts is to deal with emotions in healthy ways. I have actually been super successful in this endeavor until this week.  

Let me say, the chocolate tasted incredible. I don’t remember chocolate ever tasting as good as this chocolate and it was crappy cheap Hershey’s chocolate. Maybe it was the complete absence of milk chocolate for two months that made it soooo good… The aftereffects of the chocolate however were not so great.

I repented of the chocolate bars by burning them off on the elliptical machine and paid in other ways too. The sugar killed me. I felt cranky and tired after eating it. Maybe smaller amounts in the future would be alright or I should just stick with the dark stuff that is a bit more healthy and  has a lot less sugar…

We so easily fall back into old patterns…  

What?! Jillian can't leave Biggest Loser!

The only TV I watch these days besides crappy LGBT movies on Netflix is Biggest Loser. Jillian announced this week that she is leaving Biggest Loser. Why does the hot lesbian have to leave the show? I may have to quit watching now...

Really, the show has a lot of critics, but I have found it motivational. This season especially has been motivational because I feel like I have been progressing right along side the contestants. I was not really big enough to even qualify for the show. Yet I relate to the people on it the show in many ways. Just like many of the contestants, I have allowed my weight to determine my confidence level. I have allowed my weight to limit me. The weight was an excuse to not to do things... Now even with the few pounds that I have lost I feel more confident.

I find myself engaging more actively with the world now that I have lost weight, where as before I was definitely holding back.

I still find myself looking at really big girls and wondering if I look like that. My mental image of myself does not match reality. My mental image is that of an enormous fat girl. I know on some level that I am not an enormous fat girl but it is still a fear... I was never an enormous fat girl so why do I think that I am? What part of me needs to imagine this "reality"?

Weekly Results: Gluten...

Results:

+3 pounds... Total lost 25...
93,800 steps = 44.38 miles
Not gluten free yet, vegetarian still, sugar free

Thoughts:
I unknowingly ate gluten all week long! Clearing it out of my system is going to take awhile... Anytime I eat gluten my body responds by retaining crazy amounts of water, I get super tired, and I will avoid sharing the long and detailed list of the other gluten signs...

Last week was a busy week so I did not cook. I went to Whole Foods and bought various salads. They had basalmic quinoa salad, marinated tofu and vegan borracho beans... Half-way through the week I started freaking out because the number on the scale jumped like five pounds in a day. I knew I had not eaten five pounds worth of food... The next day three more pounds... In two days the number on the scale jumped 8 pounds and I was super tired.

Yeah, Whole Foods borracho beans have fakin bacon in them which has wheat in it... So annoying. It will probably take another week or two to recover from this. I can't believe I did not figure it out sooner. Ridiculous.

Alcohol, caffeine and Benedryl really get to me now...

I am sitting in the Barnes and Noble right now. I got a tall Cinnamon Dolce Latte and I am shaking from the caffeine. I used to get the grande with an extra shot of espresso and had no problem at all going to bed a hour later... I have only lost about 30 pounds but caffeine is killing me now...

I also took some Benedryl last week and the normal dose knocked me out. I got a great night's sleep but I seriously could not keep my eyes open. 

I am careful when I drink to not actually get drunk. I don't like getting wasted. I can usually drink three or four drinks and be more or less fine. Last night I had two and it was too much... I got a little loud and rowdy!

All of this was a more or less unexpected effect of weight-loss. Not sure why it did not occur to me sooner that this would happen. 

Sports...

I spent a lot of time last week staring at Mount Timpanogos completely covered in a super-thick layer of snow. It has been a bad winter in Utah and it has stayed cold pretty late into the year this year. I had a horrible thought pop into my head a few days ago... My window for climbing it is June/July. The snow will definitely not be melted by June and it is possible that a lot will still be there in July. Hiking the mountain in snowy conditions may require more mountaineering expertise than I currently posses and things like snowshoes... DAMN global warming. 

Trudging through snow will require an even greater level of fitness so maybe that makes the goal all the more worthy! (I need to find out if they even allow the general public up on the mountain when there is a lot of snow.) 

The whole thing got me thinking about sports. After this summer and after hiking the mountain I am going to need other interests and goals to get me through to the next summer. 

1. I want to get into roller derby. There are two teams in Baton Rouge. Another possible goal would be learning to skate well enough to make the team. 

2. I really want to get a mountain bike. There are lots of country roads out here. 

3. I want to learn how to swim. 

4. My sisters wants to do marathons with me. She wants to start out doing some 5Ks this summer. I'm going to start running. I think my back can handle it.

Weekly Results (Late again! I was traveling)

Results:
Lost 4.4 pounds this week. Total lost so far 28.0 pounds
85,548 total steps = 40.47 miles
Gluten free, vegetarian, sugar free

Thoughts:
My steps total leaves a lot to be desired this week! I knew it would be low though because I was on vacation and did some serious socializing instead of my normal three hours of working out each day. About 25 of those 40 miles were super intense hiking in Moab, Utah. Every muscle in my body had been sore for about three days now.

Living on sea-level and than going on vacation to Utah was interesting. I was working out at about 5000 feet above sea-level. It was such a strange thing to know that my muscles had the potential to work a lot harder than they were. I knew that I could walk faster and yet I could not get enough oxygen to make that happen. As the week progressed working out in the high altitude environment got easier and with my expanded lung capacity I am curious to see what I can do today back at sea-level again.

Despite the altitude if Timpanogos was not totally and completely covered with snow right now I think I could I hike it. (I have seriously no memory of the snow being this thick on that mountain before. This winter has been brutal in Utah.) I am basing this on how I did on the Moab hikes. So now the goal is not really to be able to hike Timpanogos. The goal changes to be more about how easy I can make it to hike Timpanogos.

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I am happy with this weight loss for this week. I ate out with friends six times on this trip and still managed to eat healthy. YEAH!!!!