Week 2 mini-success; tip for staying on track; other random things

I am happy to report that week 2 finished with a 1-lb loss.  Not spectacular and amazing like week 1's 4 pound loss, but heck--after coming out of the gate with that 4, I'm not going to knock the 1...after all, that's still 5 pounds in 2 weeks.  Only one sorta-iffy eating day last week-several of us had a training class on Friday at work for a new program we're going to be using (not that anyone's interested, but it's going to be for paperless online on-boarding of new hires-can't wait, should be a HUGE timesaver for us), so our boss had us order in lunch, her treat.  The group decided on Italian and I found a spaghetti/salad combo to get.  The portion of pasta I got?  Heaping.  The portion of salad I got?  Teensy-weensy.  And I hadn't had any of my snacks yet-I keep healthy snacks in my desk drawer like carrots, grapes, pretzels and such-so I was really hungry.  Ate almost the whole thing.  But that was my only bad day, and I tried to adjust my dinner but still hit about 2000 calories for the day instead of my recommended range (which tops out in the 1800s).

One tip I use to stay on track is using the nutrition tracker on the Sparkpeople website to track every single thing I eat.  I know it may seem tiresome to have to enter everything, but it really does make a difference.  It's way too easy to just say, "eh, that's about X calories here, another X there, I'll be fine today" and not track, but then if you go back later and enter those same things on the tracker you suddenly see the OMG amount you REALLY ate.  Thankfully they have a mobile app so that makes it even easier for me to track even if I'm not near a computer.  Plus, you can makes groups of food, or copy meals from one day to another....like for me, I often will have a breakfast of cinnamon swirl toast (sprayed with I Can't Believe It's Not Butter), yogurt and orange juice.  I can just copy that whole meal to another day and not have to enter each thing individually.  There's many good food trackers out there in cyberspace, many of them free (like Sparkpeople's), so whether you track online or use paper and pen, try tracking your food-it really can make a difference.

In other news, my work wardrobe has been getting kind of tired so this weekend was a shopping weekend for me (YAY!).  Got some great buys at Sears, plus two extra $10 award cards and 20,000 extra reward points-worth another $10-from their loyalty program from a promotion they were running=successful clothes shopping trip!  Oh, and did you know JCPenney has workout gear?  And in WOMEN'S sizes?  Yup, scored a running tank top on sale for $8.99.  And while the sizes I got this weekend weren't my ideal, I look forward to watching my new stuff get baggy on me by the fall ;-)

One last thing before I sign off for tonight...you may (or may not) know that I have another blog all about Walt Disney World stuff called The Disney World Files.  I've got a giveaway going on over there for a cool Color Block Goofy Vinylmation figure...when you have a moment, head on over to check it out and get yourself entered.  The figure would make a neat addition to any Goofy medal display if you have one, or just a fun thing to decorate with, or even use to trade for other Vinylmations with friends or while you're at WDW.  I'd love it if you'd take a look and share with others!

Success! And the journey begins again...

Last Sunday I did my initial weigh-in to get myself started back on my weight loss plan.  Then on Monday I started off with just the nutrition portion to get myself back on track.  I logged all of my food as well as my water intake (I use Sparkpeople, fantastic free website with trackers for nutrition, exercise, water intake, measurements and so on...plus articles, forums and more).  Oh, and in addition to the initial weigh-in I also did all my measurements this time around.

I was really good all week with my eating.  The ranges I’m supposed to stay in are:

Calories: 1490-1840

Fat: 33-72g

Carbohydrates: 168-299g

Protein: 60-161g

Calcium: 100-150 %RDA

Sodium: 0-2300mg

Fiber (total dietary): 25-35g

Consume at least 8 cups of water per day

Just FYI, these are the recommended ranges for ME based on my current weight, goal weight and amount of time over which I plan on losing weight from the Sparkpeople website.  Just because that’s a range for me and my situation doesn’t necessarily mean that’s what you should do.  If you want to know what your own ranges should be, I’d recommend registering on Sparkpeople, plugging in all your information and you can get your own customized plan.  For me, I’m hoping to lose 85 pounds by the end of the year, though that’s a pretty lofty goal and actually higher than I really should be aiming (but...but...but...I want to be tiny ASAP!  LOL).  If I can get to 65 I’ll be pretty happy with myself and that would have me averaging just over 2 pounds lost per week since there’s 30 weeks from when I started until the end of the year.

I'd love to get this Withings scale, if I could just get over the $149.95 cost!  But I'll take the weight it has showing on it :-)

Calories, fat, carbs and protein were good pretty much all week.  I’ve been under a few days on calcium and fiber...those are the hardest ones for me to hit my numbers.  The other thing that’s hard for me is the water.  Just trying to get to 6 cups a day makes me feel like I’m going to burst.  I think all week I might have had 2 days where I reached 8, all the rest were 6.  Not that I agree with the whole “8 cups a day” thing.  There’s plenty of evidence out there to show that it’s not necessary...and truly, if your urine is coming out a pale lemonade color, you’re hydrated just fine.  And this fall when my training starts to really ramp up while I train for the Disney Full Marathon in January, I’ll be getting plenty to drink with all the water and sports drinks.

Now, one thing you should realize I hadn’t added the exercise component last week.  I wanted to get comfortable back in my good eating habits first.  So when I stepped on the scale yesterday (I weigh in once per week on Sundays), I was totally floored when it showed I had lost 4.2 pounds my first week!  I figured it would be about 1.5 or maybe even 2 if I was lucky so when I saw it was 4.2, I was totally shocked.  And of course, this makes me a bit leery about week 2 since usually that’s a lower week anyway as the body adjusts to the whole weight-loss thing.  BUT-even if this 2nd week isn’t quite as stellar, the first week should make up for it ;-)

So-success for week 1!  Yesterday I added back in strength training with an upper body free weights workout (oh my arms are hollering at me about that!) and tomorrow I go back to my miles...hopefully outside but with the yucky weather we’ve been having lately I’m not going to hold my breath.  I’m actually thinking about joining a gym again.  The 21 Fitness just 2 miles down the street has been changed to a YouFit Health Club and the cost is just $10/month (or I can do $20/month and be able to take a guest every visit if I want, plus discounts on drinks and stuff)...plus there’s no contract.  I’m going to check it out this coming weekend and get DH’s input as well.  Since they just opened as YouFit, they’re running a special with only $29 down instead of their usual $49...and they’re supposed to have tons of machines so you don’t have to wait or limit your time. 

I do have a gym here in my complex, but there’s not much in it (two treadmills, one elliptical, one bike, and maybe 3 or 4 weight machines) and quite often there’s at least one cardio machine down when I go.  Plus the machines here don’t have anyplace for me to put anything, I have to wear my iPod instead of putting it in a holder on the machine (since none of them have one) and my towel, water bottle, etc just get dumped on the floor.  I know, first world problems, right?

All right, gotta go...I still have another 250 calories to consume today so it’s time for an evening snack!

My 1st inspiration board attempt; Week 1 so far

I'm not the creative type.  I'm usually pretty bad at coming up with interesting ideas and I'm certainly not the crafty lady.  The craftiest I've gotten is with my cheering sign, just using markers, sparkle glue and extra sparkles with some letter stencils:

Me and my sparkly cheer sign before the 2011 Princess Half Marathon

So after putting up my last post (from guest post author Michelle Pino) about creating an inspiration board to meet your health goals, I was a little stumped on how to begin.  I knew the central image would be a Mickey medal as that is my goal-to finish the 2014 Walt Disney World Marathon in January...which I'm going to achieve by losing weight, getting fit and training properly.

I've been down this road before-back in late 2008 I got really serious and got back on the Sparkpeople website that I had joined about a year prior (and just never really used) and really focused on losing weight.  Over the next year and few months between diet, exercise and then training for my first half marathon-the 2010 Disney Half Marathon-I wound up losing 45 pounds.  After that first race and several follow-up half marathons, I started to slack off a bit.  And then a bit more...and wound up almost all the way back where I started.  But when I was losing the weight, the things I needed to keep reminding myself of were to drink my water and do my strength training--two things I was very bad at keeping up.  And then once I kind of burned myself out after so many races in a short time period, I took a long (too long) break, after which it was really hard to get motivated again.

So I added pictures of water (my Brita pitcher and some bottled water that I just happened to have left over from my Sanibel trip) and some of my strength and flexibility training accessories (yoga mat, resistance bands, hand weights) to remind myself of their importance.  It's really hard for me to drink a lot of water.  Not just because I find the taste boring and plain-that's what Mio and Crystal Light are for-but also because I'm just not that thirsty.  My body seems to be able to stay hydrated on less water than the "recommended" eight 8-oz glasses a day and no matter how I space out my water consumption throughout the day, 64 ounces just makes me feel like I'm going to burst!  I can handle 48 ounces pretty well every day, so as long as I get to that point I'm happy (and yes, when I go to the bathroom it's always that nice pale lemonade color-if I get to that 64 ounce point it's just about clear...which is not necessarily a good thing).

As for the strength training, I just get bored doing it.  It's very repetitive and is nowhere near as engaging as heading outside to do miles where I can see all the interesting things going on around me.  I do want to get back into doing yoga.  I have a yoga DVD specifically for people who are heavier that I like to use and I always feel good and stretched out afterward.  I know the strength training and exercises to make me more flexible will help me in the long run (figuratively and literally LOL) so that's why I included that picture of some of my accessories.

I also like to have visual representations, being able to visualize what my weight loss will potentially look like is motivational for me.  I love looking at other people's before/after pictures because it inspires me to do the same for myself.  And so I used the virtual weight loss simulator at modelmydiet.com to make a before/after simulation to use on my board.  And yes, I'll be taking pictures to document my weight loss this time...another motivation for me personally as I know I'll push to stay on the wagon so I can have pics that show my progress.

The last picture I have on my board is of some food-a Chicken Caesar Salad specifically (you can find the recipe for the one in the picture here).  This is just to remind me to choose healthy things.  Now granted, a Chicken Caesar Salad could potentially be pretty bad for you depending on how much dressing and how the chicken is cooked, but for me the picture is a representation of healthy eating-not necessarily about the particular entree pictured.  Though just to mention it, I never put dressing on my salads...to me dressing is just yucky-and kind of defeats the purpose of my salad anyway.  Some people say the dressing is for flavor, but I put some cheese and bacon bits on my salads to achieve that (I'm really bad about getting enough protein and fat in my diet, I'm usually a HUGE carb addict-this is just one way to get some other nutrients in there).

Anyway, I added the "NO EXCUSES" since I'm awful about that (too tired, don't feel like it, I'll do it tomorrow instead, etc etc etc).  I'd like to figure out how to fill the empty parts of the background with color fill, but it doesn't seem to be working for me.  I still need to tweak it so it flows better and there's less white space...but, here's what I've got so far.  Let me know what you think:

Oh, and for those who are following along...I restarted my program this week with the nutrition part.  So far this week I've been doing good, staying within my calorie range and doing well with carbs/protein/fat and other nutrients.  My only issue is my calcium.  Most days I'm under, only reaching about 80% of the recommended amounts.  I'd rather get my nutrients from my food and not have to resort to taking a supplement so I'm trying to figure out how to do that.  First week weigh-in is on Sunday...here we go again!

The Dreaded “Starting Over”; Training Calendar update; April Blogger Challenge

You know how it’s easy to become complacent once you’ve lost a bit of weight, and you start to slip a bit..you know, a soda here, some larger portions there?  And how quickly that slippery slope becomes one of those terrifying rides into the dark where when you finally get off, you wonder how the heck you ending up where you did?  That’s what happened to me.  I had lost 45 pounds after I started my initial weight loss journey back in September of 2008.  Then I kind of got stuck where I was and those little slips started happening.  42 pounds later and I’m almost back to where I started.  Well, now 41 since the scale said I lost 1.4 pounds when I got on this morning (yay!).

I had planned on doing the Disney full marathon this past January, but training issues last fall (caused in part by the extra weight gain which gave me problems running more than 30 seconds at a time) caused me to defer my entry to January 2014 instead.  And there’s no way I can do the full without dumping a bunch of this weight again.  And so I started working on my training calendar for the rest of this year (finished it this past Friday, click on the link to take a look)...and started tracking my food again yesterday using Sparkpeople.com (LOVE the site, so much info and several tools like the food and fitness trackers...all for free!). 

So basically, I’m starting over.

Another thing I’m doing is trying to get myself posting more frequently here on my blog.  Not just running stuff, but other stuff as well.  To get myself going, I’ve joined the April Blogger Challenge over at The Dragyn’s Lair.  It’s a fun site that I’ve been following for a while now, and she’s having a blogging challenge-nothing too crazy, it’s not every day of the month, but once every 3 days.  So along the way you’ll learn some stuff about me and see some general posts in addition to my other stuff.  Feel free to join in, either by joining her challenge or you can see my posts as they go up this month and you can do yours off of that.

So that’s what’s up right now...tomorrow will be my first challenge post, so see you then!

Some good news...and back to the training!

Check out my post on my other blog, The Disney World Files, about my winning a contest for a great Disney prize!

And to prep myself to properly enjoy said prize...back to the grindstone!  Took all my measurements yesterday and weighed in.  Did my grocery shopping today to re-stock with the proper foods (not that I hadn't been all along-most of my backsliding had to do with eating out and getting hooked on soda again)...loving Publix right now as they had blueberries on sale for $1.99 a pint!  I bought two pints which I know will be gone by the end of the weekend-even with just me eating them all by myself.  Yum!

I've got my race training schedule on the calendar for the Tower of Terror 10-miler at the end of September and the Disney FULL marathon in January (yup, you read that right, going to do the full again!).  My "official" training doesn't start for another 6 weeks so I might play around with C25K for a bit until then...and work on my yoga.  I want to get the pound-dropping going before the real meat of my training schedule hits since that's when it gets soooo hard to keep dropping those pounds with the sheer volume of miles I'll be doing.

Those are actually the only races on my calendar right now.  Toying with the idea of throwing in a half marathon at the right point during my full marathon training schedule but I haven't made my mind up on that one yet.

Come on peeps...I'm doing this mostly all by myself so would love to have some online buddies to check in with and remain accountable to.  Drop me a line on my contact me page if you're interested.

Looking forward to anniversary bling at Mickey XX!  Time for another picture like this:

I'm back! Someone virtually smack me if I disappear again...

Okay so I know it's been a reeeeeaaaaallllllllllllyyyyyy long time since my last post but I'm back now and determined to be good about posting. I need to keep myself accountable so if you don't see me post at least once a week come by and poke me. I'll be trying for more often than that though, hopefully at least 2-3 times a week or more. Don't let me get lazy people!

I'm going to be posting some VERY overdue race recaps including 2011 Wine & Dine Relay, 2012 Disney Half, 2012 Disney Marathon Relay and 2012 Princess so you might see several pop up one after another...or maybe one a day until I'm all caught up, we'll see how fast I can type LOL. I'm hoping I haven't forgotten too many things from the races but my memory isn't the greatest in the first place so fingers crossed...

Just to catch up, I've gained back a bit of weight. From my highest point, I had lost 45 pounds by the time I did my first half marathon (2010 Disney Half)...now a little over 2 years later I've gained back about 23 of those pounds. I've already berated myself for being stupid and getting lazy again about my eating. I think I was getting frustrated at the fact that even though I was exercising regularly my weight loss had stalled--for many months! It's very discouraging to eat right, exercise and not lose. And so those little indulgences started creeping back in-some soda here, a too-large portion of dessert there-starting that slippery slope.

Then I saw one of the pictures taken by the photographers along the Princess course. The disappointment and embarrassment just flooded in. I don't think I've ever seen a worse picture of myself, even at my highest weight. And I don't want to ever see a picture like that again (and I'm absolutely not brave or confident enough to post it). So back to it I go-and back to the blogging to keep the accountability factor going. Please please please if you see I haven't posted send me a message or comment. With DH on the road most of the time for work, it makes it much harder to stick to eating and exercising plans. Things are so much easier with someone else around to help with accountability and to buddy up with.

I only have one race officially on the schedule right now (meaning only one I've already paid the registration for) which is this year's Expedition Everest Challenge. I'm really looking forward to it-my goal right now is to lose at least 10 pounds before the race which is in 6 weeks...totally do-able, I just need to keep focused. I'm hoping to also sign up for Disney's Tower of Terror 10-miler (end of September) and the 2013 Disney Full Marathon (beginning of January) along with some local races (5K/10K/half marathons--whatever I can find), just need to figure out the $$$ part.

And so I begin again........