Okay, well I started this blog last year and then promptly forgot about it because I had little to say on a day to day basis. Well, things have changed so I'm back. This blog is still about my life, but it is also about my new journey I'm undertaking in that life... to be healthy and strong and live long. For those of you who aren't familiar with blogs (hi MOM!) the oldest posts are on the bottom and the newest posts are on the top so if you are going to read them all start at the bottom and read up :)... so here is my blog I recently started on a weight loss site I visit and I'm just posting the two entries I have so far entered and then I'm going to start writing here instead so anybody who is my friend and wants to know can see this. :) I'm baring my soul in these posts so if that is disturbing to you, stop reading here. LOL. I'm brutally honest with myself and sometimes that can be ugly. But warts and all, here's my life.
Well, I thought this a good and safe place to start recording my feelings on this journey. I've got a goal. I almost don't want to put it up. The devil on my shoulder says "what if you fail again? again? again? you've never succeeded, what makes you think you can do it now? Do you want to be made a fool of?"
Well, I've recently told that devil on my shoulder to get down under my heel where he belongs. I'm gonna crush him. I've survived much worse than having to lose weight. I've survived two abusive marriages! I've survived humiliation and defeat. I've survived betrayal and pain. I've survived as a single mom, and now I'm thriving as a happily married mom of 4 beautiful children. I've been saved by the love of God, and I've got nowhere to go but up from here. So why not I say? why not lose 100 pounds? ......oh there, I've said it... 100 pounds. It sounds so freaking daunting. Good lord... lots of diets say you should lose a pound or two a week. Okay, one pound a week, that's 100 weeks. geesh. That's a long time.
So I looked at myself in the mirror on August 12th, 2010. I'm fat. I'm way fat. I'm 240 pounds fat, and only 5'3" tall. Well, technically I'm 5' 3 1/2". I round it up to 5'4". Us short people need a break, after all. I've never been this heavy. My previous high was 235. I had lost a lot of weight right before my divorce in 2007. I'd been married 14 years and felt I finally had a handle on my life. I had lost 65 pounds on weight watchers. It was the first time I had ever lost more than 20. I thought I had made a permanent lifestyle change. I thought I would be able to live that way forever. Then I got the email. It said "I think my wife is cheating on me with your husband". That was the beginning of the end. My life went into a downward spiral - two marriages, four children, abandoned for what? some relationship on the internet? what is wrong with these people? I tried to hold it together, and I didn't gain a pound through the whole divorce proceedings... it was being a single mom that made me fat again. Well, that and Milk Duds. Milk Duds are evil. So much for the lifestyle change. I was so tired all the time. I worked at a preschool teaching two year olds and I was constantly sick with bronchitis or pneumonia. It wasn't for me. My health wasn't strong enough, but I wasn't qualified to do anything else. I had dropped out of college to marry the man who just left me. what a bad bad idea. Hindsight is so 20/20 isn't it?
So here I was. 38 years old and staring at this fat girl in the mirror. Knowing there was more to me than this big hanging gut and this fat face. If I frame my face with my hands I can almost see the "skinny" face inside the fat one. I feel like that's the real me. That's the one that deserves to be facing the world. I just need to let her out. I count the months. I'll be 40 on November 5th, 2011. 40 seems a milestone. I feel if I don't get a grip on my health by then I'll never get a grip. Then it will all come, diabetes, heart disease, joint disease... what else? My asthma will grow worse, my self esteem will drop even more. Worst of all I'd prove to myself that I don't have what it takes to make a change in my life. That I'm just not capable. So I look my fat self in the face and I make her a promise. This time I'm doing what's right for her. What's healthy and what's happy. I'm not going to follow any particular diet. I'm going to research for as long as it takes and I'm going to do this the right way for ME, for my body. I want MY body to have energy, My body to feel good, my lips to smile when I look in the mirror, my mind to say "yeah, you look good girl". As the blue eyed crooner said "I'm gonna do it my way!". I've got little clue where to start but I say this is it. 100 pounds by my 40th birthday. from 240 to 140. I haven't seen 140 for about 20 or 25 years. Can my body even get there anymore? how many pounds is that a week... hmmm.. kind of ambitious.. should I change my goal? Hell no.... if I "fail" and don't reach my goal by 20 pounds, have I really failed? No way! I've won..and won big.
First I went to my doctor. I told her the following. "I'm ALWAYS hungry. I never feel full. It takes massive amounts of food to fill me up. My servings are huge, and if they aren't I am snacking all night. I eat when I'm starving and I eat when I'm bored, and I eat when I'm sad and I eat when I am happy. My life pretty much revolves around my next sweet treat because I'm addicted to sugar. I can't stop. I always want more. I need help, tell me what to do." She gave me a medicine. She said it would help for a while to curb the ravenous appetite. She said my body would get used to it, probably quickly, within a few weeks. She said it would give me time to start some new habits without feeling miserable and starving all the time. I was happy but doubtful. I've been fat for years. why has nobody given me this before? Well, I tried it. It isn't that I wasn't hungry, it was that I felt I didn't NEED it anymore. I felt almost like it was some willpower in a pill. It helped me tremendously that first week. My first week I lost 7 pounds. I ate great, never straying. It was really inspiring and happy. I knew I couldn't keep that up. I also know I tended to lose a lot of weight in the first two weeks of my diet. I was happy but I wasn't fooling myself. I now have 34 more pounds to lose, just to get to that magical ONEderland of under 200 pounds. I'm in this for the long haul. I went to the doctor after one month. I'd lost 13 or 14 pounds by then. She took an EKG, patted me on the back and asked me if I was doing any exercise. Well, some. I did an aqua aerobics class I liked, but haven't been back because I've been on a major housecleaning, shed cleaning kick and spend my free time humping boxes and unloading and sorting and cleaning... oh yeah, and raising four kids. So I'll look into that. Right now I feel I'm active enough FOR NOW. I never sit down it seems until after dinner at 7:30 or 8:00. I'm always exhausted from my day. Right now I'm concentrating on figuring out how to eat for me. I decide I will add FORMAL exercise in slowly. I just vow to keep up and going during the day. She pronounces me fit, wishes me well and sends me home. Okay, now what.
Keep going. It's now September 20th. I'm down about 17.5 pounds. that's about 5 weeks give or take a few days. That's an average of more than 3 pounds a week. Not bad. I know my heavy losses in the first two weeks skew that average, but nonetheless, it gives me a boost mentally and emotionally. Last week I only lost .2 pounds, but I had spent the week kind of slacking as I tried to figure out exactly what would work for me. this week I've lost over 3. So I guess I figured out something good.
Here's what is working for me right now. In the morning I have a quick and easy (and very tasty in my opinion) shake. I add to a cup of skim milk one scoop of designer whey protein powder (vanilla is my favorite), a 1/4 cup of blueberries (or 1/2 a cup if I want it really blueberry-ee ?lol), two teaspoons of benefiber to boost my fiber (no taste, yay!) and two packets of splenda for a little sweetness. I find this really yummy and thick and creamy and it keeps me full until lunch.
For lunch I'll have another shake if I'm really busy, and if not I'll make an omelet with veggies, or some other egg dish that I can whip up in a non stick pan real quick, or I'll whip out the George Foreman grill and grill some chicken or salmon (love salmon... mmmm mmmm good). Throw some wheat rice and/or some veggies and a tall glass of skim milk (I love milk, it is my dairy of choice)..yep.. yum. For dinner I'll make the kids one thing and me another if I can't make what they are eating work for me, but since I'm trying to clean up their diet as well as mine, I usually can eat some of what's on the table. I try to keep it simple. I love greek yogurt, 100 calorie packs of smartfood popcorn, and sugar free jello cubes for snack. sometimes I'll splurge on some low fat icecream but I have trouble controlling myself, so I'd rather go have a real scoop now and then at brusters than bring it into the house. That way my indulgence becomes an intentional outing, not a bored sugar fed craving in the middle of the night. Trying to leave room for treats while being true to my plan. I try to eat between 1200 and 1300 calories a day. I have a great free app for my android phone. It's the spark people app. If you've never been to spark people it is a great site. you can track food, set goals, etc. It's all free. I like to hang out at this more intimate sight, but I love the app for my phone. I put everything I eat in there to make sure I am not eating too little or too much. I can track my protein fiber and carb counts, and of course my calorie counts. It's really handy to stop me from forgetting what I've eaten all day and it makes it easier to plan and to stick to my plan. I highly recommend it if you have a droid!
Well, that's the beginning of my journey. I've gone on for a while. I hope I didn't bore you all, but I want to remember everything and I wanted to start at the beginning. I want to remember my success, because I will succeed. I have to. My life depends on it. literally and figuratively. Next time I'll talk about some of the things I'm looking forward to seeing on the way, not the least of which is my feet!! :) Here's a couple of pics of me before. they are hard to find. I don't have any really recent ones. I keep meaning to take one but I keep forgetting. I've spent so long avoiding the camera that it is hard to find a picture of me, but here's a few from the last six months. My after pictures are going to be a lot better. stick with me. Here I go! This first one is me almost a year ago! I was not at my heaviest then! this is the day we got our puppies! My cheeks are so chipmunk.
This is me this past Christmas with my youngest, Abby. She was Mary in the nativity play at school. Gained some weight from puppy times but still not my heaviest. Got a nice muffin top going... Well, that's the last one I have. I haven't had my picture taken since Christmas. Shows how as the weight topped 210 I started hiding from the world. I'm going to try to get a picture taken of me in the next few days. I'm thinking I'm probably BACK to about this size now after losing the 17 pounds. A long way to go, but compared to the years I have left to live, it won't be too long... and after all, this will put more LIFE in my remaining years.
Well, I've recently told that devil on my shoulder to get down under my heel where he belongs. I'm gonna crush him. I've survived much worse than having to lose weight. I've survived two abusive marriages! I've survived humiliation and defeat. I've survived betrayal and pain. I've survived as a single mom, and now I'm thriving as a happily married mom of 4 beautiful children. I've been saved by the love of God, and I've got nowhere to go but up from here. So why not I say? why not lose 100 pounds? ......oh there, I've said it... 100 pounds. It sounds so freaking daunting. Good lord... lots of diets say you should lose a pound or two a week. Okay, one pound a week, that's 100 weeks. geesh. That's a long time.
So I looked at myself in the mirror on August 12th, 2010. I'm fat. I'm way fat. I'm 240 pounds fat, and only 5'3" tall. Well, technically I'm 5' 3 1/2". I round it up to 5'4". Us short people need a break, after all. I've never been this heavy. My previous high was 235. I had lost a lot of weight right before my divorce in 2007. I'd been married 14 years and felt I finally had a handle on my life. I had lost 65 pounds on weight watchers. It was the first time I had ever lost more than 20. I thought I had made a permanent lifestyle change. I thought I would be able to live that way forever. Then I got the email. It said "I think my wife is cheating on me with your husband". That was the beginning of the end. My life went into a downward spiral - two marriages, four children, abandoned for what? some relationship on the internet? what is wrong with these people? I tried to hold it together, and I didn't gain a pound through the whole divorce proceedings... it was being a single mom that made me fat again. Well, that and Milk Duds. Milk Duds are evil. So much for the lifestyle change. I was so tired all the time. I worked at a preschool teaching two year olds and I was constantly sick with bronchitis or pneumonia. It wasn't for me. My health wasn't strong enough, but I wasn't qualified to do anything else. I had dropped out of college to marry the man who just left me. what a bad bad idea. Hindsight is so 20/20 isn't it?
So here I was. 38 years old and staring at this fat girl in the mirror. Knowing there was more to me than this big hanging gut and this fat face. If I frame my face with my hands I can almost see the "skinny" face inside the fat one. I feel like that's the real me. That's the one that deserves to be facing the world. I just need to let her out. I count the months. I'll be 40 on November 5th, 2011. 40 seems a milestone. I feel if I don't get a grip on my health by then I'll never get a grip. Then it will all come, diabetes, heart disease, joint disease... what else? My asthma will grow worse, my self esteem will drop even more. Worst of all I'd prove to myself that I don't have what it takes to make a change in my life. That I'm just not capable. So I look my fat self in the face and I make her a promise. This time I'm doing what's right for her. What's healthy and what's happy. I'm not going to follow any particular diet. I'm going to research for as long as it takes and I'm going to do this the right way for ME, for my body. I want MY body to have energy, My body to feel good, my lips to smile when I look in the mirror, my mind to say "yeah, you look good girl". As the blue eyed crooner said "I'm gonna do it my way!". I've got little clue where to start but I say this is it. 100 pounds by my 40th birthday. from 240 to 140. I haven't seen 140 for about 20 or 25 years. Can my body even get there anymore? how many pounds is that a week... hmmm.. kind of ambitious.. should I change my goal? Hell no.... if I "fail" and don't reach my goal by 20 pounds, have I really failed? No way! I've won..and won big.
First I went to my doctor. I told her the following. "I'm ALWAYS hungry. I never feel full. It takes massive amounts of food to fill me up. My servings are huge, and if they aren't I am snacking all night. I eat when I'm starving and I eat when I'm bored, and I eat when I'm sad and I eat when I am happy. My life pretty much revolves around my next sweet treat because I'm addicted to sugar. I can't stop. I always want more. I need help, tell me what to do." She gave me a medicine. She said it would help for a while to curb the ravenous appetite. She said my body would get used to it, probably quickly, within a few weeks. She said it would give me time to start some new habits without feeling miserable and starving all the time. I was happy but doubtful. I've been fat for years. why has nobody given me this before? Well, I tried it. It isn't that I wasn't hungry, it was that I felt I didn't NEED it anymore. I felt almost like it was some willpower in a pill. It helped me tremendously that first week. My first week I lost 7 pounds. I ate great, never straying. It was really inspiring and happy. I knew I couldn't keep that up. I also know I tended to lose a lot of weight in the first two weeks of my diet. I was happy but I wasn't fooling myself. I now have 34 more pounds to lose, just to get to that magical ONEderland of under 200 pounds. I'm in this for the long haul. I went to the doctor after one month. I'd lost 13 or 14 pounds by then. She took an EKG, patted me on the back and asked me if I was doing any exercise. Well, some. I did an aqua aerobics class I liked, but haven't been back because I've been on a major housecleaning, shed cleaning kick and spend my free time humping boxes and unloading and sorting and cleaning... oh yeah, and raising four kids. So I'll look into that. Right now I feel I'm active enough FOR NOW. I never sit down it seems until after dinner at 7:30 or 8:00. I'm always exhausted from my day. Right now I'm concentrating on figuring out how to eat for me. I decide I will add FORMAL exercise in slowly. I just vow to keep up and going during the day. She pronounces me fit, wishes me well and sends me home. Okay, now what.
Keep going. It's now September 20th. I'm down about 17.5 pounds. that's about 5 weeks give or take a few days. That's an average of more than 3 pounds a week. Not bad. I know my heavy losses in the first two weeks skew that average, but nonetheless, it gives me a boost mentally and emotionally. Last week I only lost .2 pounds, but I had spent the week kind of slacking as I tried to figure out exactly what would work for me. this week I've lost over 3. So I guess I figured out something good.
Here's what is working for me right now. In the morning I have a quick and easy (and very tasty in my opinion) shake. I add to a cup of skim milk one scoop of designer whey protein powder (vanilla is my favorite), a 1/4 cup of blueberries (or 1/2 a cup if I want it really blueberry-ee ?lol), two teaspoons of benefiber to boost my fiber (no taste, yay!) and two packets of splenda for a little sweetness. I find this really yummy and thick and creamy and it keeps me full until lunch.
For lunch I'll have another shake if I'm really busy, and if not I'll make an omelet with veggies, or some other egg dish that I can whip up in a non stick pan real quick, or I'll whip out the George Foreman grill and grill some chicken or salmon (love salmon... mmmm mmmm good). Throw some wheat rice and/or some veggies and a tall glass of skim milk (I love milk, it is my dairy of choice)..yep.. yum. For dinner I'll make the kids one thing and me another if I can't make what they are eating work for me, but since I'm trying to clean up their diet as well as mine, I usually can eat some of what's on the table. I try to keep it simple. I love greek yogurt, 100 calorie packs of smartfood popcorn, and sugar free jello cubes for snack. sometimes I'll splurge on some low fat icecream but I have trouble controlling myself, so I'd rather go have a real scoop now and then at brusters than bring it into the house. That way my indulgence becomes an intentional outing, not a bored sugar fed craving in the middle of the night. Trying to leave room for treats while being true to my plan. I try to eat between 1200 and 1300 calories a day. I have a great free app for my android phone. It's the spark people app. If you've never been to spark people it is a great site. you can track food, set goals, etc. It's all free. I like to hang out at this more intimate sight, but I love the app for my phone. I put everything I eat in there to make sure I am not eating too little or too much. I can track my protein fiber and carb counts, and of course my calorie counts. It's really handy to stop me from forgetting what I've eaten all day and it makes it easier to plan and to stick to my plan. I highly recommend it if you have a droid!
Well, that's the beginning of my journey. I've gone on for a while. I hope I didn't bore you all, but I want to remember everything and I wanted to start at the beginning. I want to remember my success, because I will succeed. I have to. My life depends on it. literally and figuratively. Next time I'll talk about some of the things I'm looking forward to seeing on the way, not the least of which is my feet!! :) Here's a couple of pics of me before. they are hard to find. I don't have any really recent ones. I keep meaning to take one but I keep forgetting. I've spent so long avoiding the camera that it is hard to find a picture of me, but here's a few from the last six months. My after pictures are going to be a lot better. stick with me. Here I go! This first one is me almost a year ago! I was not at my heaviest then! this is the day we got our puppies! My cheeks are so chipmunk.
This is me this past Christmas with my youngest, Abby. She was Mary in the nativity play at school. Gained some weight from puppy times but still not my heaviest. Got a nice muffin top going... Well, that's the last one I have. I haven't had my picture taken since Christmas. Shows how as the weight topped 210 I started hiding from the world. I'm going to try to get a picture taken of me in the next few days. I'm thinking I'm probably BACK to about this size now after losing the 17 pounds. A long way to go, but compared to the years I have left to live, it won't be too long... and after all, this will put more LIFE in my remaining years. Blessings, Tanya
I can relate to this so much that it made me cry. Many blessings on your journey, Tanya.
ReplyDelete