A week in the life…

This week I started training for a marathon.  Those who know me understand how strange of an idea this is.  I have always said that if you see me running, I’m being chased so please stop and help out.  But I’m actually really excited about it.  First of all, I want to get in shape.  Second, I feel like running a marathon is so far from anything I ever thought I could do that doing it will just prove to me that I can do anything I put my mind to.  I mean, for me – the girl who ran a 12 minute mile in high school – to actually finish a marathon!?  It would be a huge accomplishment.  Correction – it will be a huge accomplishment.

The training plan I’m using can be found at http://www.c25k.com/   I know that this program is just for a 5k, and not a full marathon, but it’s a start that I feel comfortable with.  So far, I’ve only gone one day, but I’ll go again tomorrow.  The program is a mix of walking and running.  I walk for 5 minutes and run for 1 minute, alternating that for 30 minutes.  And I’ll tell you this, running for 1 minute sounds easy, but it’s not.  I am so proud of myself that I completed each running section, because believe me, I felt like falling out a few times.  When I got back home, my face was soooo red!  I had to take a pic.

In other news – we once again had Tuesday grill-o-rama.  Tuesdays are my husband’s only night off, so we grill a bunch of food.  The food lasts me all week, so I don’t have to cook again except for some sides, and those only take a few minutes.  I cooked boneless beef ribs, pork loin steaks, chicken breasts and some sausage.  We’ve been eating on that food all week and it’s been so easy.  I love it when I don’t have to worry about cooking.  Check out some of my recipes to find out what kind of dishes I made!

Weight loss is easy

I am starting my own little diet revolution – and we’ll see if this one works.

Just Say NO!!

First of all, you just can’t diet.  Or at least I can’t.  Dieting sucks, I hate not being able to eat what I want, and they fail all the time.  So I’m doing it different this time.  No dieting, no weigh ins, no guilt.  I’m eating healthy foods and exercising moderation.  For instance, my breakfast today was a fried egg on a sandwich thin with a slice of cheese.  I can calculate how many calories are in it, but I know that I had a healthy, delicious, protein packed breakfast without too many calories.  And that’s all I need to know.

I’m sick of counting every calorie and stressing over every pound.  I’m not going to do it anymore, I refuse.  For one, I get too caught up in the numbers.  I tend to worry over every little pound, and when I have a week where I’ve gained weight or only lost a half a pound, I just want to give up.  I hate denying myself foods, that makes me want to give up too.  So I’m not doing it.  I refuse.

Alright – so here’s my outlook on weight loss and dieting – It’s easy.  Weight loss is not difficult.  Move more, eat less.  It truly is that simple.  Weight loss has been overly complicated by diet programs and companies that want to sell you something.  They want you to believe that it’s hard.  That is pounded into our heads time and time again.  It’s difficult to lose weight, so pay us to show you how.  When the truth is, weight loss is simple!

Anybody got a time machine so I can go back four years?

Now, along with that thought process comes another.  I’m not weighing myself anymore.  I’m done with that.  There are a lot of ways to measure your health and I don’t need a scale to tell me if I’m losing or not.  I will weigh myself from time to time, but I’m not stepping on that scale unless I know I’ve lost some weight.  When I start to see a difference in my clothes, then I might go ahead and weigh myself.  But I’m not going to worry about the numbers on the scale every week and make that be a measurement that determines my whole outlook.  I know I’m eating healthy.  I know I’m moving more.  I know that in time all of that will pay off.

Like I said, I’m not counting every calorie.  I do still weigh some of my foods to make sure I don’t get too much, but generally speaking I take a moderate portion and that’s it.  I’m still eating all the foods I love.  My husband works at Papa Johns and brings home pizzas all the time.  Occasionally, I’ll eat one piece of pizza.  I try to keep it to about one per every two weeks.  I never feel guilty about it, and since one piece of pizza really isn’t a meal to me, I might have some salad or cucumbers in vinaigrette on the side.  The same is true for burgers and fries.  For a long time I was a junk food junkie.  I love fast food, but I am fully aware of how bad it is for me.  So the other day I was doing some work at McDonalds (they are the only place in town where I can sit and logon to high speed Wifi) and I wanted a burger and fries.  I ordered a happy meal that came with a cheeseburger, small fries, small drink and some apple slices.  I got to have some of the fast food I was craving, but just didn’t go crazy with it.  Totally worth it.

Anyways, this is going to take a long time.  I weighed myself at the beginning of this and I am at 225.  I have about 100 lbs to lose total and I expect it will take me at least a year.  It took 32 years and a lot of diet ups and downs to get me here.  I will be patient and know that making the right choices will get me where I need to be.  It’s easy.

The Results Are In

After one week, I have officially lost 3.5 pounds!

Pizza is not my butt's friend

It was an… interesting week.  Look, this isn’t my first time on this diet train.  I’ve tried this so many times only to find myself stuck with a late night craving that I just couldn’t shake.  I’ve been so desperate for something sweet to eat that I’ve sat on my couch with a tub of peanut butter, some chocolate syrup, and a spoon.  If it’s cheesy, I’m done for.  And after a few days of staring down temptation I start feeling sorry for myself.  Why can’t I eat what I want?  What’s the big deal if I’m fat?  Maybe I’m just meant to be fat.  And then the tears and self pity come.  But this week, I was really damn good, and I am so proud of myself for it.

My husband works at a major pizza chain.  One that has better ingredients, and therefore, better pizza.  The pizza also comes with some amazing garlic butter dipping sauce to ensure that the last bite is as delicious as the first.  On top of that, he’s able to make his own combinations and bring them home for free.  Considering we’re in the bottom 0.5% on the income scale, free pizzas simply can’t be passed up.  So several times this week, he’s come home with these friggin AWESOME looking pizzas with things like chicken and bacon and green peppers and 6 different cheeses on them.  Oh, and garlic butter baked right into the crust.  One night, I had to pick him up from work and come home with two pizzas on my lap.  Torture.

Oh, and he also bought this new Kellogg’s cereal, Krave.  It’s meant to be a new kind of chocolate cereal.  It’s crispy rice on the outside and actual chocolate on the inside.  Yeah, it’s the devil.

The devil in disguise

Yes, through all this temptation – I stood strong.  It took all of my willpower, but  I resisted like a silent monk who stubbed his toe.  Or maybe simply, I resisted like a woman with a mission.

Here’s the rub though, this is always going to happen.  In the first week of my diet and every week thereafter, I’m going to be faced with temptation.  No matter how much I try to keep the tempting things out of my house, if the craving is big enough, I’ll always find something.  It’s a matter of having the willpower to resist and giving myself small rewards when I do.  Since I didn’t have any pizza, I had a Lean Cuisine french bread pizza for lunch one day.  I couldn’t have a big bowl of that cereal, but I did let myself have a few pieces, and I stopped there.  Amazingly enough, I didn’t even want to cry once.  Except maybe a couple tears of joy when I got on the scale this morning.

**On a side note, I’d like to mention a great new blog I started reading last week – The Mother Freaking Princess.  Not only is her blog both funny and interesting, she gave me some great words of support last week that really meant the world to me!  Thanks MFP!**