Saturday, October 20, 2012

True Emotions

There are some days when I feel incredible.  I look in the mirror and think, "Wow!  Look at how great you are doing."  I get dressed in the morning and am impressed with how thin I feel.  I feel confident, I feel beautiful. 

Then there are those days when I think, "I still have so much further to go!"  I still have a big butt, my thighs are still big and rub together at the top, my arms are still relatively large, my face is still slightly chubby.. and my stomach.  Well, what should I expect after having 2 kids and going from 217 pounds to pregnant and 217 pounds, to 195 pounds, back up to 217, back down to 195, back up to 217, down to 174, back up to 205, then pregnant and up to 228, and then five months later, back down to 174!  My poor stomach is gross.  To say the least. 

I often wonder how long it will be before I feel comfortable in almost anything I wear.  I still find that, too often, I put shirts on in the morning and find myself uncomfortable and not enjoying what I'm seeing.  Too often, I look in the mirror and am grossed out. 

I have so much more to lose.  I'm really contemplating getting "Don't give up" tattooed on me.  Somewhere.  I need a constant reminder, for the rest of my life, to never, ever give up.  This is a hard fight.  A long fight.  One that I will be fighting for the rest of my life.  One that I will want to give up on.  I need to remember that having a bad day, doesn't mean I need to have two bad days, or a bad week, or a bad month.  It doesn't mean that my life is ruined, or my week is shot.  It just means that I need to pick up and keep going.

A friend of mine posted a picture on Instagram that said, "If you don't want to start over, never give up."  That's what I need to remember every day.  I wouldn't feel the way I feel about myself most days if I never gave up last year. 

I'll admit, that many of the pictures that I have had taken of me lately I feel wonderful when I look at them.  I can't believe how thin I look.  But that is in comparison to before.  I wonder what I will look like at my goal weight.  I wonder if my goal weight is realistic, or if I'm pushing it.  I'm wondering if I'll ever feel good about myself the majority of the time (because, let's face it, you cannot feel good about yourself 100% of the time). 

I want to feel beautiful.  That's my ultimate goal. 

Here's to hoping I can reach that one day.

Wednesday, October 17, 2012

An image I should have added with the last entry

          (on the left) My 26th birthday.  I was 217 lbs in this picture.  By my 27th birthday, I had lost some weight (see below - purposely wore the same shirt as my 26th bday to see the weight difference... there wasn't any LOL), but by my 28th birthday I was pregnant and back up to 205 lbs.  THIS past birthday (pictured to the right) I weighed in around 180 lbs. 

Been too long

Don't think that you have heard the last of me!!  I fell off the wagon a bit here and there.  Got myself up to just over 183 a little over two weeks ago.  But as of this morning I am 174.  I am almost at the lowest weight I've ever been as an adult!  YAY!!!

Work has been keeping me exceptionally busy.  I struggled a lot the first month of the new school year, trying to eat right, but basically stress eating.  I was also struggling with my running.  Around the start of September, I worked myself up to a 2.0 mile run in 20 minutes.  I felt unstoppable.  I was okay with the fact that my weight had been basically stagnant for two months.  Then, after running those two miles, I must have injured myself (let me follow this up by letting you know that I didn't stop at the 2 miles, I then carried two massive laundry bags up and down flights of stairs, and then did a one hour intense workout with weights and cardio combined - circuit training).  Since then, I have had a massive pain when I run.  I have tried everything - changing what I eat before I run, running on an empty stomach, running slowly, changing my breathing, changing my stretching, taking breaks while I run... nothing has worked.  Only when it started hurting while I was doing Zumba did I realize that this might actually be an injury (I was thinking I had a side stitch... apparently not). 

The 5K was this past Saturday, and sure enough, I walked almost the entire thing.  That's okay though, my father and sister were there with me - and we had an awesome time.  My other sister (the tiny lil nothing of a thing - grr *jealous!*) took off running and beat her *already incredible* personal record for running a 5k.  We all had a great time, and that's what matters most.

I have been having many, many cheat days.  Well, I HAD been having many cheat days.  I was literally eating chocolate every single day.  Not sure why.  Not sure what I was thinking, I just ate.  I indulged a bit too much and put on about 7 pounds.  Thankfully, I took it all off (and a few extra pounds) within a week and a half.  :) 

Now I am taking a break from working out.  It bothers me.  Alot!  I don't like the idea that I won't be able to run or kickbox or do zumba for a month or so, but if I want to see improvements in my athletic ability, I know that working out while I'm injured is not a good idea.  As long as I'm eating right, then I should still see some sort of a drop in weight. 

I am CRAZY excited to (hopefully) soon be seeing the 160's on the scale.  I've said it before, and I'll say it again, to many of you out there, 160s is HEAVY, but for me, it's incredible.  I think I may have been in the 160's in high school.  I honestly can't remember what I weighed in high school.  I can tell you that I was extremely out of shape, especially considering I played basketball.  I should have been in incredible shape.  I remember games where I just didn't have the energy to run anymore.  Games where the ball would literally bounce past me as I staggered to the floor to try to get it.  Games where I would sit on the sidelines and cry because I didn't have the strength to make it through, despite my desperate desire to be in the game.

I remember gaining a lot of weight immediately out of high school.  I was dating a boy from high school, we dated for two years.  Just before we broke up, in April 2003, I had worked my way up to the 190s.  I started to lose weight at the end of our relationship; probably for no reason other than to start grabbing the attention of boys around college.  My next relationship my weight fluctuated, but never drastically.  By the end of that relationship in 2005, I was around 200's.  I quickly lost a ton of weight (being called a "fat cow" by the person you love most [at that time] can really get one motivated), getting down to 175, and by the time I met my husband, in August 2006, I was 177.  It's amazing how I am 3 lbs lighter than I was 6 years ago when we met, but how different my body is now.  I feel (and look) much heavier than when we met.  I know, I know, I've had two kids, but still!  177 was my "skinny" 6 years ago.  Now... it's my "not-so-bad-but-you-have-ways-to-go" 

When Adam and I got married I weighed 211 lbs.  By the time I was pregnant with Joshua, only two short months later, I got up to 217.  Which is where I basically hung out for the next year before losing all that weight (the start of this blog back in 2010). 

In short - 160s excites me.  150s seems like it can't happen (at least not right now.  Maybe as I get lower in 160s). 

For now, I'm enjoying the journey.  I need constant motivation, but at the same time, I'm here to motivate YOU.  For those of you taking this journey, don't give up.  You can do this!  WE can do this!

Tuesday, August 7, 2012

Run, Run, Run, as fast as you can...

Hey everyone!  Here is what this past week brought me:

I lost .8 lbs despite the fact that I ate like a pig and didn't follow the WW plan precisely for most of the week.  I was shocked when I stepped on the scale and saw that my weight had gone down; and, as always, I reweighed myself just to make sure.

Sunday was a disaster for me.  We went to my husband's family's house and ate lasagna, meatballs, bread, cakes, pastries... and I dove right in.  I felt absolutely disgusting afterwards.

Yesterday wasn't terrible, but today I did so much better.  I also walked over 3 miles today, rollerbladed with my students for about 40 minutes, and finished day 3 of week 2 in C25k.  I kept my body moving for over 2 hours today. 

I'm only 6 pounds away from my second goal of 174 lbs.  That's what I weighed after being 217 lbs last February.  It was my weight before I started to climb again - all the way back to 205 lbs.  Once I hit that mark, I'll make my next goal.

There has been so much on my mind lately.  I have been having a difficult time focusing.  I have really found that running is helping me relieve a lot of the stress that is building in my mind.  I have a horrible time talking about what is bothering me, especially since it often is followed by a never-ending flow of tears.  This is a great way for me to just get it out.  I love listening to my music and just letting myself move.

I hope you are all doing great!  If you are finding this blog to be motivating, please feel free to share it with your friends.  The more the merrier!

~ Cindy ~

Tuesday, July 31, 2012

October 13th

I did it!  I signed up for a 5k!  I'm really excited, especially since my sisters will be joining me.  It's great to feel like I am getting support from them.  Support, especially when it comes to weight loss, can be very difficult to find.

My goal is to be trained by mid September, so that by the time October 13th rolls around, it'll be a breeze.  Once I am done with that, I intend on signing up for a 10k and begin working towards that.  By the end of March, I'd like to be able to run a half marathon, and by the end of 2013, I'd LOVE if I could run a complete marathon. 

I've never been able to see myself actually doing any of those things.  But, just as I am setting weight loss goals for myself each month, I must also strive for other goals as well.  These are great fitness goals, and I am sure that I will stay motivated to continue doing it, especially after I complete the 5k. 

I've seen several people do tough mudder races (don't laugh at me if that's not what it's called - this is pretty late for me to be writing), and it's something that I thought was kind of gross, but after some thought, I think that is something that I am going to try to do one day as well!  Why not go for it all, right?

When thinking about what I want to do to reward myself for reaching my final goal (I'll get there this time, yessirreebob I will!) and I think when I lose all my weight, I am going to go sky diving.  It's something that I have always wanted to do.  I want to experience the adventure, the thrill, the need to pee my pants but the ability to not do so... I want to scream and laugh and watch the world beneath me.  I have never looked into it before because, well, a 200+ lb. woman flying from the sky would pretty much scare the crap out of anyone!  Especially the person strapped to that 200+ lb woman.  I'm sure he/she would be pre-tty afraid that the parachute wouldn't hold such a load. 

Anyway, goals!  Goals, goals, goals.  If I have none, I'll fail.  That's my new philosophy!  (I'm borrowing that philosophy, but let's just say that I came up with it.  For arguments sake).  One of my MAJOR goals is to get this flabby belly under control!  47 lbs gone in under 3 months - it's no wonder my stomach is moving side to side when I'm at a standstill!  Yuck.

It's way past my bedtime (it's not even 10:30 pm, but I have two kids and a crazy job.  I.  Am.  Tired.). 

Goodnight all!

~Cindy~

Sunday, July 29, 2012

C25K, ok!

Another 4 lbs loss this week.  That's 12 lbs in just three weeks (holy moly guacamole....yum, I could SO go for some!)  I am just a few pounds away from my lowest weight in Feb 2011!  So exciting.

Today I started training for a 5k using the C25K app (it's free!  Go get it and start training!)  It was easier than I expected it to be.  Let me rephrase that - I did better than I expected myself to.  Week 1 Day 1 begins with a 5 minutes walking warm-up, followed by 20 minutes of 60 seconds of running/90 seconds of walking, and at 25 minutes a 5 minute cool-down walk.  I did 2.38 miles in 30 minutes.  Not bad.  I need to commit to 3 times a week.  I really want to run (not walk) 5k!  Next year I want to participate in the Color Run!  I've seen a few people post on FB about it, and it looks SO much fun!!!  Plus, I would be SO proud of myself if I could run the whole thing!  Today, I was barely able to run .125 miles!  Once around the track is .25 miles, and I don't even think I ran half the track at a time.  Hopefully by next week I'll be able to run at least one full lap.

I'm going to keep it short today.  I have soo much to do and not enough time to do it!

Enjoy your day!!

~Cindy~

Sunday, July 22, 2012

Flying off, moving, moving, and competition

Holy, holy cow!  I cannot believe the scale.  I stepped on it this morning and couldn't believe my eyes.  I actually stepped on it twice to ensure that my weight was correct. 

185.2

I am only 11 lbs away from where I was in April 2011!  8 lbs in two weeks is crazy!!  It's probably because these last two weeks I have moved so much!  I am being activity literally every single day.  Today, I decided that I wanted to get one of the Jillian Michaels Wii games for working out.  I walked a mile to get the game and a mile back home.  My goal is to try to be active for an hour each day. 

We started a weight loss challenge at work this week.  I am using it as even more motivation to eat right and be active.  The competition is fierce, plus I am at a bit of a disadvantage because I'm already 23 lbs into this journey.  I doubt that I'll have a third week with a 4 lbs loss.  The people I work with are starting fresh.  So it could really go either way.  The competition ends at the end of August.  The person with the highest percentage of weight loss gets $140.  I could really use that money to buy myself some new clothes :)  I anticipate that I'll have lost my other 13 lbs by then!

So, I've lost just over 10% of my initial weight so far.  That was my first goal.  My second goal is 173 - to get me past the weight I was at in April 2011.  My third goal will be 160 lbs.  And from their I'll try for 150, but I don't know if my body will let me get there.  But hey, I'll try!  :)

What's a bit sad for me is that when I was at this weight a year and a half ago, I felt incredible!  Now, I look at myself and feel flabby and gross.  I'm sure having a second baby caused my stomach to be much more flabby this time around.  I also waited over a year from having Joshua to lose weight, whereas now I am losing it quickly and immediately after having Sofia.  I'm sure there are many contributing factors to the flabby, grossness of my stomach.  Weight gain from pregnancy, a second child, rapid weightloss, etc.

I'm gonna wrap up here, but we'll see what the week brings! 

Thanks for reading!

~ Cindy ~

Sunday, July 15, 2012

Down, down, baby, down, down this roller coaster

Sweet, sweet baby, I'll never let ya go!  I am a very excited chicky this morning!!  I am down to 189.4!  That is a total loss of 19.4 lbs in just TWO MONTHS!  I often wonder where I would be if I never had a cheat day, but at the same time, I have to remind myself that the body, every once in a while, needs a boost in order to do what you would like it to do.  I love my cheat days.  I hate how I feel after them, but I know that they help keep me going.  A cheat day for me means that I work harder and do better the next few days.  And look - even after a small gain last week (1.4 lbs), I had a massive gain this week (3.8 lbs).

I have been finding some great motivational sayings on Pinterest (my new hobby when I remember that I actually use it LOL).  Saying like, "You're not hungry, you're bored.  Drink water and learn the difference" and "Remember: Fat lasts longer than flavor"  I'm referring to these daily to keep me going.

Yesterday I worked out a LOT. I did an hour of kickboxing - so intense!  About fifteen minutes of Wii Yoga and Strength.  About ten minutes of swimming in my parents pool.  And at the end of the night I ended it with twenty five minutes of Wii Zumba.  <3

What is really helping me this summer is that I am working with the older kids, so our group does a LOT of walking and playing.  And being that I'm the only teacher that actually gets involved in what the kids are doing and gets active with them, my loss this week was tremendous partly because of this activity.  Whereas, last summer, I gained a ton of weight because I was stuck inside with the pre-k kids, bored, annoyed, and hot... this year, I am walking several miles a week (at least seven or eight, if not ten or twelve), swimming every Monday, and playing basketball for an hour or more a few times a week.  I am going to use these next six weeks with these kids to push me to my limits.  Not only do I intend on being active during the day with the kids, but then I want to come home and do kickboxing, or zumba, or whatever!

I am really hoping to become a motivation to others around me.  I am sacrificing my time and the foods I crave to try and reach my goals.  I am hoping this time around, however, to maintain whatever loss I have.  I feel like this time around I may have a better chance of that, simply because I jumped into it willingly immediately after Sofia was born.  It didn't take me looking in the mirror or seeing photos of me.  It took me remembering how I felt at 174 lbs and telling myself that I would not only get back to THAT, but I would surpass it and get as fit as I possibly can.  Immediately after having Sofia I began making healthier choices in my food.  In the hospital, I decided to eat salads and chicken and fruits and vegatables, as opposed to getting chicken nuggets and french fries or having cake for dessert. 

The battery on my computer is dying quickly so I'll end my chatter here. 

~ Cindy ~

Thursday, June 14, 2012

Thoughts

I look in the mirror lately and I think to myself, "How did I let myself get back to this?"

People say to me, "Oh but you just had a baby!  Give yourself time!"  But I have lost all the baby weight and a few pounds extra.  This isn't "baby weight"  Sure, I'm a bit looser in places I wasn't as loose before getting pregnant, but the pounds aren't from the pregnancy.  They are from ME, overeating last summer and gaining back nearly every pound.

I think that what disappoints me more than anything, is that when I lost all that weight, I told myself I would never go back to being fat again.  I had become an encouragment to so many people.  I had people messaging me on fb and telling me in person that I was the reason they joined weight watchers.  They had seen how well I had done and decided to change their lives with weight watchers as well.  It felt so good to know that I had become that inspiration that I had always wanted to be.  Now I look at where I am at, 199 pounds, and wonder where I went wrong.  Correction, I know *exactly* where I went wrong - I ate! And ate, and ate, and ate some more.  Then I stopped working out.  And continued to eat.  I ate everything and anything I wanted to.  And as quickly as I had lost all those glorious pounds, they came back just as fast.

Now I have gotten myself into a groove over this last month, measuring out my foods, cooking dinner every night, food shopping once a week for healthy choices... and in two weeks I go back to the stress that initially brought me to my breaking point - my job.  I will be working all summer (thankfully a few less hours than I did last summer, but still working 40 hours a week).  I need to remember how I felt wearing a size 10 (which is mighty small for me) and enjoying clothes shopping and getting dressed in the morning.  I need to not allow the stresses from my job to become an excuse for bad habits. 

What might make this a little easier is that Adam is finally "doing weight watchers."  I put it in quotes because, is he REALLY doing it?  He didn't join because we can't afford two memberships.  Plus, I have all the tools he needs.  He is "counting points" and eating much better, however, he doesn't measure anything out or write anything down.  I'm forced to help him remember the point value of everything he eats, and try to figure out the point value for the bowls of cereal he hasn't measured or the yogurt he has just plopped into a bowl with granola.  I am going to have to train him to measure everything out the night before for his breakfast, so that he can accurately keep track of his own points.  Plus he needs to write it all down so that I am not going through what he ate five times a day in order to see if he has enough points to eat something else.  Hopefully, if he gets himself organized and does it accurately, it will be easier on both of us. 

The kiddies need my attention, so I'll wrap it up here.

Until next time

~

Sunday, June 3, 2012

Losing, Losing, Losing, but needing better motivation at home

When I set my mind to it, I can be great at this.  I can lose my weight in just a matter of a few short months.  However, when I'm not getting the support I need at home, that progress is much slower.

Let me start off by saying that I lost 3 lbs this week.  I'm down 7.4 lbs in a week and a half.  That's great.  Not bad at all.  My problem right now is with my husband.  I don't feel like he fully supports me in what I'm doing.  He encourages me to do what makes me happy, but he also seems indifferent at times.  It's when I am trying to do my best that sometimes he tries to bring me down.

For example: the other day he asked me if I wanted a cupcake from the deli around the block.  I told him no.  He continued to tell me how good they looked and how badly he wanted one.  I told him that it was okay if he went to get one, but that I wasn't going to have one.  He followed that with, "well if you aren't going to get one, I"m not going to go there for just myself."  I stood my ground and told him that I wasn't getting one. 

He then waited a bit and then asked me again.  I repeated what I told him before.  He continued to tell me how he really wanted one but he wasn't going to walk there for just himself.  Eventually I caved.  The worst part is that I ate the whole thing (they were pretty big).  Now, I can't blame him for ME eating the cupcake, however, I get highly annoyed when I am trying to lose weight and he is hounding me to eat something I dont want to eat or know isn't good for me/within my points. 

I explained this to him yesterday.  So now let's see where that goes. 

It would be so much easier if he did this with me.  While he says he is going to do it with me, I know he wont. 

Anyway, I've started doing Wii workouts and I find that it's helping me get some sort of physical activity in my day.  I really want to do MORE, like Zumba or the biggest loser workout DVDs I have, but I can't do anything too active until I have my 6 week check up.  That's in 12 days!  Still so far away. 

For now I'm going to have to work on working on me and ignoring my husband ( LOL) and doing small workouts for the time being. 

I'm looking forward to a healthier, prettier, more confident me :)

Thursday, May 17, 2012

Restarting the journey.. yet again.

Well, I knew it was going to be a long road.  I knew I was going to have a lifetime of working out and watching what I eat in order to "maintain" a healthy body.  Unfortunately, I am the Queen of excuses and found myself no longer going to the gym or eating right when I became overwhelmed with work yet again.  Last summer my job required me to work 46 hours a week.  Now that might not seem like a huge ordeal since so many others out there work just as many, if not more, hours.  However, I was working with two separate groups of kids - 4th - 8th grade six hours a week doing an enrichment program and 40 hours working with pre-k children - going on trips and to the pool every week.  Some days I didn't even get a decent lunch break (if I got one at all).  I did a lot of ordering out with my coworkers, and I completely stopped all physical activity.  As summer started approaching, I had been gaining some of the weight back.  But by the end of the summer, I was so drained that I had given up completely.

By the time I found out I was pregnant on August 19th, I had discovered that I had worked myself all the way back up to 205 lbs.  At that point, my hopes of "eating right" during the pregnancy vanished.  I was so thankful that I was hungry at all during the pregnancy that I used it as an excuse to eat whatever I wanted.  And believe me when I tell you, I ate WHATEVER I wanted. 

In just a few short months I had gone from 174 lbs to 205 lbs.  I went from a size 10 jeans back to a size 18 jeans.  I felt myself gaining weight, but was still in complete denial.  In my eyes, I had still lost over 50 lbs.  It took me getting pregnant and really weighing myself to see that I had strayed so far from where I wanted to be that I allowed myself to gain back 41 pounds in just a matter of months.

During the pregnancy, I gained 23 lbs over the course of four months.  Like I said, I ate EVERYTHING and ANYTHING.  Thankfully, somewhere around the fifth month, my body decided to stop gaining weight.  I still ate whatever I wanted, but I was fortunate enough that I didn't gain anything no matter how much or how little I ate.

So here I am again, 13 days after having the baby (she is beautiful by the way), I rejoined Weight Watchers yesterday - online only (ironically enough, I found that once I started meetings - I stopped doing weight watchers all together).  I am currently weighing in at 208 lbs - only 3 lbs heavier than when I got pregnant.  Thankfully, I don't have a ton of pregnancy weight to lose - those 3 lbs *should* come off pretty fast (like this week) as long as I do what I'm supposed to do.

Why am I blogging about it again?  I honestly felt that if I am going to find success in this again, that I needed to go back to what I did last year - keeping track of everything I eat/drink by joining weight watchers online, and blogging about my journey (as much as I can) along the way.  Hopefully the determination I have been feeling these last several days will be a lasting feeling. 

Here's hoping!