Weigh In and Back to the Land of the Living

Weigh in Day - Feb. 24
Previous weight - 198.4
Current weight - 197.2
Difference - lost 1.2 pound

Total weight lost - 47.8 pounds

As you saw in my last post, I was sick all last week with the flu. I'm glad it wasn't the vomiting kind of flu, but I was still miserable with the fever, headache, sinus pressure and drainage. I'm still recovering from the fatigue. I did have my appetite while I was sick so my 1.2 pound loss wasn't from not eating or drinking.

The only bright side of being sick last week was watching both seasons of Downton Abbey.

Source

And I got to spend a lot of quality time with my puppies. They never left my side.

I'm the one in the fancy puppy jammy pants.
Peyton is asleep on my leg and Tanner is asleep on my ankle.

So now I feel like I'm starting over again. I'm still too weak to work out and I didn't track at all last week. I'll get it back though. Never give up.

In case you were wondering, I decided to give up chocolate for Lent and it has been a struggle. I'm sure it's just because I've decided that I'm not going to have it, but it's all I've been craving since Wednesday. 

Out sick

I have the flu and have been down all week. I'll be back once I'm feeling better.

Weigh In and New Workout Clothes?

Weigh in Day - Feb. 17
Previous weight - 198.6
Current weight - 198.4
Difference - lost .2 pound

Total weight lost - 46.6 pounds

Just a little loss this week. I expect the numbers on the scale to continue to go down over the weekend considering the amount of exercise I did this week.

I'm feeling stronger mentally with my wellness goals. It's all starting to come together for me. I'm excited about what the future holds. I'm really excited to get out of the 190s because I know what a difference it will make in my appearance and clothes since I've been there before. I especially want to look better in my workout clothes. I'm not loving looking at my reflection in the mirror right now. Speaking of which, I really need some new workout clothes. I'm proud to say that I've worn them so much over the last couple of years that they are getting pretty faded. Maybe that's a goal I can give myself. Once I get down to the 189 I buy myself some new gear :)

Have a great weekend everyone.

Numbers and Why I HAVE to Track

Yesterday I had a 7 point breakfast and a 12 point lunch. Throw in an after-lunch treat of six Hersey kisses for 4 pts and that left me with 8 pts left for dinner.

Usually on Tuesdays I've been going to a church group but it was cancelled for Valentine's Day so Jim and I decided to take the kids out for dinner. I had an e-mail from Qdoba about a buy one get one free deal for Valentine's Day so we went there. I got the chicken gumbo. While we were in line to pay Gracie asked if she could get a brownie and Jim gave me a little head nod to let me know he wanted to take the kids next door to Coldstone Creamery after dinner.

I ate about 3/4 of the gumbo, shared with Jacob and threw the rest away. We went next door and I knew I was going to get the apple pie ice cream mix in. I looked at the prices and saw the medium was only a few cents more than the small, but I still went with the small.

I didn't feel any anxiety about what I ate. I was aware of my choices, but I wasn't beating myself up about them. I knew that I would track it later and figure out a game plan if I needed to. 

When I had talked to Jim during the day he asked if I was working out that night. I told him I would probably go to the 8 p.m. Zumba class since I didn't have my church group. I was on the fence though, I could have easily talked myself out of it.

As I was eating my ice cream I told my family that I was definitely going to Zumba.

I was worried about all the food in my stomach as I headed to Zumba, but at that point I didn't care. I had to get some exercise in. My body was craving it.

I ended up getting to class around 7:20 and stayed for the second class which ended at 9 p.m.

I got home, watched New Girl (love that show), showered and went to bed without even thinking about eating anything else.

When I sat down with my tracker this morning, I was shocked by the numbers. I shouldn't have been, but it's always a gut punch when you type in the numbers and see what the calculator spews back at you. The 3/4 of gumbo was 15 pts. The small ice cream was 17 pts. That small ice cream was over half of my daily point allowance.

Just as I was starting to feel the panic set in I typed in my numbers to calculate my activity from last night. I put in 90 minutes at high intensity and the calculator showed that I earned 21 points. Well my panic switched immediately to relief. (activity points are different for everyone, but I've learned what to calculate for myself that actually is confirmed on the scale week-to-week.)

That simple exercise of entering my points made something perfectly clear to me. I'm not getting enough exercise. I can not stress that enough. I'm not getting enough exercise emotionally or physically. I've been really frustrated at how hungry I've been lately and how I feel 31 points is not enough to survive every day (while not admitting that I shouldn't blow all my weekly points on the weekend). And seeing those activity points show up on my tracker helped me to remember that that is how I did it before. When I exercise I can eat more. Seriously, when I type it out it seems so simple.

The moral of the story isn't that it's ok to eat chicken gumbo and Coldstone Creamery all the time and then go and workout for an hour and half to work it off. Quite the contrary. Last night I learned what a bad idea it was to have made those choices and how much work I had to put into fixing them. If I would just workout consistently and make healthy food choices I would be losing so much more than I have been the last few weeks.

I'm still learning everyday. I just need to put it all together.

One thing I've learned is that blogging is hard when I'm not losing. I don't like typing the story above. I would much rather type out all the wonderful food choices I made for myself AND my family while getting in exercise, but I'm not there yet. At least admitting it here is helping me, I just hope that it's not hurting you guys that are reading. I want to be motivating for you and I feel like such a failure at that lately.

I have to keep going though. For me. I have to keep striving to figure this all out. I feel like I'm right there at the starting line and I'm just ready to take off and win this race.

Poor Me (aka: this post is silly and if I had time, I'd delete it and write about something else)

If you've followed along with me since the beginning of my blog you know that Zumba is a large part of my life. It has taken on different degrees of importance throughout the years and has recently circled back around.

When I first started going to Zumba, I went with the full intention of going to exercise. It was a pleasant surprise when over the months, I became friends with a group of girls that consistently went to Zumba. Over the past year many of those girls have gotten Zumba certified and no longer belong to the Y and/or are teaching their own classes outside of the Y.

But I kept going and last year my friend from work Stacey started going with me to Zumba and it was so fun to have her there. I just smiled the whole time and enjoy talking to her in between songs. But Stacey now belongs to another gym.

And this past fall I took three months off of Zumba to train for my half marathon and when I did make it back to Zumba in November, I didn't know any of the songs or any of the new faces in class. 

So now I'm back where I started. Although I've been going to Zumba at the YMCA for nearly three years I don't really no anyone in class. There are new regulars who stand in the front row and all laugh and chat between songs and I really miss that. It's selfish, but I miss being one of the regulars. Having a spot reserved for me in the front row. Having everyone wave to me and know who I am.

So now I stand in my spot in the back of class, shuffling my feet waiting for class to begin and stare blanking ahead of me in between songs.

It makes me sad.

But it has forced me to get back to the reason I started going to Zumba in the first place. For exercise. I've really been focusing on getting the best workout possible when I'm able to go to class. There is a song, Shawty Got Moves, that Geraldine does usually towards the end of class and let me tell you I'm on fire when that song comes on. It gets my endorphins going for sure. And that is what is really important.

I know this is a downer of a post, especially for Valentine's Day, but it does make me feel better to get it out. Reading this post back makes me feel silly. It's such a silly thing to be sad about and maybe that will help me not obsess about what I don't have and maybe make the effort to turn to my neighbor at my next class and introduce myself. No more pitty parties - If I don't like something and I have the power to change it than I will change it.

(I really don't want to hit publish because I think this post is stupid, but I will anyway).

Lent

Next Wednesday will begin the Lenten season with the observance of Ash Wednesday. The family and I were talking about Lent on the way to the library yesterday and Gracie asked what a sacrifice was. I talked to her about Jesus dieing on the cross as a sacrifice for all of us and she began to wrap her ahead around the concept.

Last year I gave up checking Facebook while I was with the kids. It was difficult for me because I'm admittedly addicted to social media. Last year was the first time in a long time that I gave up anything at Lent. Jacob gave up waffles. He eats waffles everyday so it was quite a sacrifice for him but I never heard him complain about it once. He resolved to not eat waffles and so that's just how it was.

I'm curious to see what the kids give up this year. I have a feeling Jacob's sacrifice will have something to do with staying organized at school which he has really struggled with lately.

I want my sacrifice to be a real sacrifice this year. To really make me aware everyday as to why I made the sacrifice. Mine will either be wellness or like Jacob, organization focused - the two areas of my life that need the most help at the moment.

It will either be something about doing some sort of chores every night - maybe getting the kids involved with that. Or maybe not eating after dinner. Maybe no chocolate or ice cream. No soda (could I really do that?)What else? Any ideas out there in blog land?

Weigh In and My Dream

Weigh in Day - Feb. 10
Previous weight - 199
Current weight - 198.6
Difference - lost .4 pound

Total weight lost - 46.4 pounds

Early this morning I had a dream that I was morbidly obese. The dream didn't last very long. I do remember that I was looking at myself in a full length mirror from the side and I was shocked at what I saw, especially my face. When I think back on the dream I remember the feeling of - there is nothing I can do right now to change how I look.

And you know, that is true and maybe that's why so many of us have given up in the past. There was nothing I could do in that moment, looking in the mirror and not liking what I was seeing, to change how I looked.

Any effort that I put into losing weight won't show up physically for awhile. There is no instant gratification when it comes to saying no to a piece of cake and then physically seeing your double chin get smaller at the same time.

Although it would be nice to have instant results I think part of the whole journey of losing weight should be that it's hard. That way you learn about yourself along the way. Plus, when you've worked so hard you don't want to put the weight back on and make all that hard work be for nothing.

I was thinking this morning about my .4 lb loss this week. I am happy with any loss but in my head I knew I could have done better. This week was pretty easy for me. I only worked out once, I went over in points again this week, I had several days where I ate what I wanted (but still tracked). It was pretty easy and I lost. But you know what? I don't want it to be easy. I want it to be challenging. And that's because I remember what it was like before when I was losing every week. It was hard, but so rewarding. Planning out my points so that I could have a burger at the end of the week is different than eating a burger and then manipulating my points the rest of the week to make it work. It goes back to being in control.

Like I've said the last two weeks, I'm taking teeny tiny baby steps right now but with each step I'm gaining my confidence and belief in myself. It's working for me.

Tanner & Peyton

I don't think I've told you all about Peyton have I?

If you remember, I lost my black lab, Maggie, back in. Pause. I had to go back to my blog to see when Maggie died and it was Feb. 10, 2011. I can't believe it's already been a year. I saw this photo of her pop up on my screen and it hit me in the chest. I still miss her so much. I'm fighting back tears as I type.

Maggie was my wedding present from Jim. She was 11 when she died. In April I was finally able to write my goodbye to Maggie on my blog. Please read it if you haven't already. (ok, now I am crying)

It was in that post that I introduced you to our crazy dog Tanner that we had just adopted from Indiana Bulldog Rescue.

Over the spring and summer we got to know Tanner. He was about six months old when we got him and we were his third owner. We could tell it was his behavior that made him end up in the rescue. We're not sure about Tanner's history, but we could tell he didn't respond to positive or negative reactions from us. We would walk in the door and he would immediately start biting on us, wanting to play. He was full of energy and even long walks didn't tire him out.

We traveled a bit over the summer and we found an awesome lady to watch Tanner at her house. She has two dogs and a huge backyard and whenever Tanner would come home from doggie day camp he would be tired and lay around for two days straight. It happened every time. We knew that he was lonely and needed a playmate, but were we really considering getting another dog?

I thought it would be out of the question.

When Maggie and Cicely were still alive I used to look at the Human Society of Indianapolis' web site all the time and send Jim photos of the cute puppies I would see up for adoption. Well, one day in late October I happened to go out to that site for the first time in years. I browsed the different dogs stories, looking to see if any of them jumped out at me and then I found this little guy. Peyton.

I sent Jim an e-mail titled "humor me; i'm at it again ..." and the e-mail included this sentence from Peyton's bio “I also enjoy playing with big dogs who enjoy wrestling.” along with this photo.

Later that day I sent Jim a text about the dog and he replied "get that dog."

So we coordinated a date to meet Peyton and brought the whole family, including Tanner, to meet him. As soon as Tanner locked eyes on Peyton in the little garden area of the human society we knew it was over. They immediately took to each other and were having so much fun playing. They both loved wrestling, but never got mad at each other.

We talked to the volunteer for a long time about Peyton. Again, we don't know his history. He's the same age as Tanner (about a year at the time we adopted him). She said when he came into the shelter and was put in a crate he freaked out after a few days and she volunteered to keep him at her house until he was adopted. She said he was going insane in the crate with all the other dogs and noise.

It took him a little while to warm up to Jim. We can tell he's afraid of the garage and he jumps at sudden movements. It just breaks my heart to think about what may have happened to either of our dogs before they came to us.

I could go on forever about Peyton and Tanner, but the main point is that they are a match made in heaven. We knew right away we made the right decision and these two boys were meant to be together. They even have the same coloring and they have the same markings on their head.

They need each other. They played nonstop for three months. If they weren't asleep they were playing and wrestling with each other. Tanner became a perfect angel once Peyton came home with us. He never nibbles on us anymore. Peyton loves to cuddle, which I love. He will snuggle up with me and just be happy to be near me.

Ok, enough with the words, here are some photos.

 

Yep, Tanner still sucks on blankets :)

My big sweetie sleeping on me.

Tanner likes to lick Peyton's ears and face for some reason.

It took them awhile to get to this point, but they love each other so much now that they often "spoon" together.

Cake and Pickles

One thing I've noticed the last two weeks is that I'm so hungry. Oh my gosh, I'm hungry all the time. It's so frustrating. It's usually a few hours after dinner that I notice it the most and that is one of my most vulnerable times. It would be so easy for me to grab a full meal's worth of points from the fridge or pantry if I'm not paying attention.

The two things that have been working for me are first (which I mention last night) I just go to bed. I fall asleep really fast and sleep soundly so I know if I just go to bed I'll be up before I know it and can eat breakfast. And secondly, I'm trying to fill up on zero or low point items. The last two nights I have been so tempted to get into the cake that the boys made for the Scout auction on Sunday. It would have been so easy to just take a forkful here and there (btw, the rest of the cake went in the trash last night).

Jacob and Jim's "CAKE" they made for the Cub Scout Cake Auction. So creative!
(I'm not allowed to help. Obviously.)

But instead I've gone through half a jar of pickles. They are zero points and actually somewhat filling. Plus, once you eat a pickle, nothing else really sounds good.  My favorite are Claussen Dill Halves (thanks for the recommend Kim!)

Source

P.S.

You know your successfully back on Weight Watchers when you're happy to go to bed because it means you can eat again in the morning.

Best Effort

Zumba was great tonight. I knew going into it that the Monday night class would be the only one I would be able to make it to this week so I knew I wanted to make it count. I even made "put your best effort into Zumba tonight" as one of my three daily tasks. I left feeling awesome so that gets a big fat check mark.

Hey, did you guys notice that I blogged Monday through Friday last week? And I wasn't even trying! I definitely see benefits from blogging regularly so I'm really going to give it my best effort, even if it's just short posts like this one.

Weigh In and Girl Scout Cookies

Weigh in Day - Feb. 3
Previous weight - 200 (Jan. 27)
Current weight - 199
Difference - lost 1 pound

Total weight lost - 46 pounds

First of all, I haven't done a weigh in post since Sept. 9 (I was 197.8 on that day). Nearly five months - ridiculous. I'm really glad I'm bringing these back.

Second of all, I felt really strange taking my weekly weigh-in photo. It had been awhile for one of those as well (July).

Thirdly, I'm thrilled with my one pound loss because according to my tracker I was wayyyy over in points this week. Which means one of three things 1.) it will show up on the scale this week, 2.) I overestimate points for the foods I didn't know nutritional information for or 3.) I've been eating so poorly before this week that even though I was over, I still made better choices than I have been and it showed with a loss.

I'm really hoping for number three because that will mean I will have a killer loss next week because I'm going to rock the point counting this week.

Fourthly, this has been a truly stressful week for me personally. There have been so many ups and downs this week that have happened so quickly that I'm proud that I still have my head in the game. There is nothing I would like more than to crack open five different boxes of Girl Scout cookies and eat them all right now. Thankful I wrote this down this morning.

Have a great weekend everyone!

Parallels

I talked about my headaches once before on my blog. I was seeing a neurologist at the time that diagnosed me with cluster headaches. I stayed with him for a year and tried one prescription after another. The only thing that seemed to work were steroids but he kept taking me off of them once the headaches were gone and then they would promptly come back. I finally realized I really did not like this doctor so I decided to try another doctor in early November. (Sidenote - I was very annoyed when I called my physician for another referral and through our conversation the nurse told me she had heard similar complaints about the first doctor I had seen. Then why did you refer him to me???)

So anyway I went to my new doctor and immediately liked her. I told her about my history and treatment up until that point. She asked me why the other doctor hadn't had me try oxygen. I had wondered the same thing and I was already feeling more comfortable with her as my doctor. As I went into more detail about my pain she said she thought they weren't actually cluster headaches but I had what was called neuralgia. Neuralgia is nerve pain that occurs when a nerve is irritated. She schedule a bunch of tests and scans to rule out anything scary and she tried me on new medications. As my previous doctor had done, she started me off with a medication plus a steroid and so I wasn't surprised when my headaches went away after a few days.

... Just to remind you, I'm talking at least three headaches a day, every day without a break. I've had this for at least five years. They could be so painful that I would lay down because of the pain and wake up nearly two hours later and feel like I had passed out. I tried not to talk about them too much with my family because I didn't want to worry them about how painful they were. Most nights I would wake up in the middle of the night because of the pain and not be able to fall back asleep for at least an hour. I was taking Alieve every day and was worried about becoming addicted to it. It was a pretty miserable time. One of the worst parts is that I would be just going about my day just fine and then the pain would start under my eye and I would know the next 60 minutes would be miserable. The headaches happened around the same time of the day give or take an hour so I had to avoid scheduling work meetings during times I would be afraid I would get one. It was just awful. It hurts my stomach just to think about it ...

So back to my treatment, I took the steroid and the anti-inflammatory drug she prescribed and relished the few pain-free days I knew I would have while on the steroid. And as I tapered off the steroid to see if the anti-inflammatory drug held the headaches off I held my breath. I held my breath for 10 days and then finally felt comfortable enough to admit to myself that the drugs were working. It was amazing. I was still having some breakthrough pain in the middle of the day, but nothing like what I experienced before. My doctor was so thrilled at my follow up appointment. She prescribe another daily dose of the anti-inflammatory drug which eliminated the pain completely.

So now I take my medicine three times a day. I don't have any headaches. I haven't taken an Alieve in weeks. I feel wonderful. It's almost to the point now that I forget how much the pain used to effect my daily life. It's hard for me to remember the fear I carried around just waiting for the next attack. Afraid to go to sleep knowing I would wake up in so much pain. Feeling like I was missing out precious time with the family when I had to lay down because of "one of Mommy's headaches."

I have alarms set on my phone to help me remember to take my meds. Every once in awhile I'll forget to take a dose at the normal time and I will begin to feel a little bit of pain breaking through and it's then that it all comes rushing back to me and I'm so thankful I don't have to deal with the pain anymore.

I was thinking about all this last night and I realized you can draw similar parallels to losing weight. When I was 50 pounds heavier that weight would make me feel miserable on a daily bases. I never knew exactly when it would bring me down - whether it be seeing my reflection in a window, seeing a friend look great in clothes I wished I could wear, trying on bathing suits - but it happened daily.

I tried different diets and different theories. Sometimes they would work for a little while, but eventually the old feelings would come back. I stuck with the same plan of trying over every Jan. 1 even though I knew in the back of my mind that it wasn't right for me.

And once the weight was gone I was so excited. I could hardly believe it. I had no idea what it would be like to be thinner and it was a wonderful feeling. But as the days went on I got more and more used to my new body and healthy lifestyle that I didn't appreciate how far I had come. It wouldn't be until I fell of the wagon that it would all come back to me how unhappy I had been with the extra weight. Never again will I miss out on precious time with my family because I'm too overweight to participate!

I Can Relate to This Dog