Fat as Hell…

Despite the fact that I *was* up on Saturday (by a pound and a half) I’m having a great week. Taking a cue from Cammy, I’ve decided that my recent gain is just a “weird bounce” and that rather than dwelling on it, I’m just moving on. (Oh, and yes, Cammy, you are more than welcome to blame my mother in law for anything you want, dear. Trust me. She’s probably to blame. *wink*) Even though I didn’t get a chance to post them, I did set some goals for this week and, so far, I’ve been keeping them. Here they be:

Exercise Goals:
Sunday: 30 minutes cardio -or- 30 minutes strength training
(Accomplished: 30 minutes of both!)
Monday: 30 minutes cardio + 30 minutes strength training
(Accomplished 20 minutes cardio on bike plus 2 mile/40 minute walk later in day + 40 minutes of ST)
Tuesday: 30 minutes cardio + 30 minutes strength training
Wednesday: rest day
Thursday: 30 minutes cardio -or- 30 minutes strength training
Friday: rest day
Saturday: 30 minutes cardio + 30 minutes strength training

Food/Calorie Goals:
1. I’m still working trying to stick somewhere between 1300 - 1500 calories per day.
2. I’m trying to work fruit and whole grains into my diet on a daily basis.

Honestly, I’m a bit sore today, but I’m chalking it off to the new pillows I bought yesterday. I bought some “extra firm” quilted pillows to replace the flattened pancakes we’ve been sleeping on for awhile. I love the new ones, but they may take a bit of getting used to. (An aside: I remember having the same pillow for just about my entire childhood… but as an adult, it seems as though pillows go flat so quickly. Is it just me, or are pillows becoming somewhat “disposable?” Note: not disposable in the waste/green/environmental sense, I’m just talking about pillow quality here.)

Anyway, as I was out and about yesterday I saw several little goodies that I thought I wanted and that, moreover, I tried to justify buying by telling myself that I had “earned” them. In the end, I kept my spending in check, but it did get me thinking about getting in the habit of rewarding myself for meeting certain goals. Other bloggers that I read are really adept at this, but up till now, I’ve had a hard time pin pointing longer term goals that I could set, hopefully accomplish, and thus reward myself for.

My husband and I talked about this over dinner last night (grilled chicken and feta crumbles over mixed greens with a sprinkling of homemade croûtons and a lovely olive oil vinaigrette) and he agreed that dangling some carrots in front of me as rewards for reaching specific benchmarks was a good plan.

I told him that I’d already sort of set the following goals/rewards in my head. But now that I’m put them in writing here, it looks like they’re official:
1. When I lose 100lbs (37lbs away) I’m going to buy myself a bike (a real one, not one that stays put in a corner of my house).
2. When my weight drops below 200lbs (58lbs away) I’m going to order *this.* I’ve had my eye on it for a long, long time.
3. If WHEN I succeed in completing the goals for April that I outlined at the beginning of the month, I’m going to buy myself one of *these* (though I flat refuse to pay that much for one).

When I told my husband he nodded and said that those sounded like perfect incentives. But then he added that he thought I needed a reward for losing 75lbs (a goal that is only 12lbs away).

“Like what?” I asked.

He thought for a minute. “Hmmm. How about a new miniskirt?” he offered sheepishly.

I had to smile. Clearly this would be a reward for HIM and not so much for me. But I agreed. When I’ve lost 75lbs, I’m going to try to find myself a “mini-skirt” of some kind. Honestly, it just made me feel good to know that HE thinks I’m getting to the point where I could pull something like that off. What he doesn’t know is that I’ll likely buy one that is a few sizes smaller than what I can actually fit into having lost 75lbs, but that way, it will continue to be motivator long after I’ve said goodbye to 75lbs. (Gosh, I can’t wait to say goodbye to 75lbs).

Anyway… as bikinime says, I’m having a kick-ass April.
I hope you are too!

Goodbye, March.
Hello, April.

Let’s start things off on the right foot, shall we?

Goals:
1. To restart (and keep up with) my stats calendar.
2. To make (and keep) weekly exercise goals.
3. To make (and keep) weekly caloric goals.
3a. To keep track of and record (if not publically) my calorie intake each day.
(I think I may start using thedailyplate.com — I’ll keep you posted).
4. To keep track of and record my blood pressure (if not daily) than at least 4 times a week until my Doc’s appt at the end of the month.

(April) Week 1 Exercise Goals:
Monday: 30 minutes cardio
Tuesday: 30 minutes strength training
Wednesday: rest
Thursday: 30 minutes cardio + 30 minutes strength training
Friday: rest
Saturday: 30 minutes cardio + 30 minutes strength training
Saturday: 30 minutes of either (depending on my mood)

Note: These are all minimums and, I think, based on my previous exercising regiment, entirely doable. In fact, I think I am capable of more, but I want to see how this first week goes before raising the stakes.

Gosh… just setting these goals feels so productive.

The truth is, I think I am constantly setting and renegotiating goals in my mind. Each morning (especially in the shower) I make deals with myself about what I will and won’t do that day. Many times the goals I sent in the morning while trying to ready myself for the day are unrealistic… and because they only exist in my mind, it’s easy to toss them aside when the going gets rough. This is different. Not only does writing them down make them feel more official, but you know, it’s that whole accountability thing. Knowing that all of you *know* about them and that you will (ever so gently) hold my feet to the fire if I don’t follow through, makes it more difficult for me to just throw in the towel.

Knowing that I have a doctor’s appointment at the end of the month helps too. For some reason, I am always so motivated to take off as much weight as possible in the weeks before going to the doctor. I can remember when I first started seeing this doctor and how I could tell, even though he was encouraging, that he didn’t really believe me when I said that I was going to lose weight. And, after all, who could blame him? I mean, I’m sure he’s seen hundreds of patients who need to take off the pounds and who claim they are going to, but who just aren’t able to make it happen. I’ve been there. And, believe me, I failed dozens and dozens of times before I ever experienced any kind of success. What’s more, I’m sure that my vow, albeit good intentioned, probably seemed like a long shot… after all, all told, I probably had a good 180lbs to lose — and that’s no small feat.

Little did he know how stubborn I am. What he didn’t realize (or maybe he did) is that I would find his well founded skepticism regarding my ability to shed over half my bodyweight to be something of a challenge. As ridiculous as it sounds, when it comes to my doctor, I’ve got a definite case of the “hmmpft! I’ll show him!’s” I realize, of course, that this isn’t the healthiest motivation, but at this point, I’ll take whatever motivation I can get.

Anyway… tonight I’m gonna party like it’s my birthday — because it *is* my birthday!

And then I’m gonna grab April by the balls.
This is going to be my best month yet.

Happy Monday, everyone!

PS: I’m counting this post as my HYC update for this week! :)

*drumroll please*

258.3lbs - 254.0lbs = -4.3lbs

4.3lbs in a week is a *huge* loss for me. 2lbs a week, *if* I do what I’m supposed to all week, is usually the most I can hope for and is what I’ve come to “shoot” for as a result. Anything else is gratis.

I guess getting “back on track” after a few weeks of only half-heartedly doing this has made a difference. Plus, and I’m sure you’ll agree… marking a loss is always a great motivator. For me, seeing a loss on the scale is *always* so much more motivating than seeing a gain. I read some bloggers who say that they need the occasional “kick in the ass” of a gain to get them back in the game… but not me. A gain only serves to make me feel more defeated. I find that, for me, one loss begets another loss and so on. That said, I hope this marks the beginning of a roll.

It was a lovely weekend here, and we took full advantage of the good weather by moving our exercising outdoors. On Saturday, I did a 3 mile walk around an area that the locals call “the loop.” I live right across the bridge from a set of barrier islands that are nestled between the mainland and the Atlantic ocean. “The loop” is a public footpath that starts on one side of the islands, travels across one bridge and over the intracoastal waterway, runs parallel to the ocean, then back across another bridge and then back around. It’s really quite lovely, and although I was really more focused on my walk then the view, I did snap this picture along the way, so I’d have something to show you guys. At this point, I was just about to cross one bridge, and if you click on the picture to make it larger, you’ll see the *other* bridge that would bring me back around, far off in the distance.

Then, on Sunday, my husband and I took a walk through a park that’s right in our neighborhood, but that we’d never been to. It was beautiful, overlooks a marshy area and then a different part of the intracoastal waterway that I got to traverse the day before. In the end, we surely marked that spot as a good “picnic place” when the weather is really nice, but it wasn’t much of a “walk” so we decided to walk the same “nature trail” that we did last week. By the time we reached the last mile of the trail, I’d walked *at least* 6 miles in two days, and I have to admit I was feeling it. I wasn’t *nearly* as out of breath as my two dogs though who, in the main, seemed to be as glad to be outside as I was.

Anyway, it felt so good to be outside and I couldn’t help but feel that all this walking was doing more for me than the exercise I’ve been able to do while cooped up in the house all winter. My husband and I are “talking about” buying tennis rackets and then trying our hand at that once the weather really settles into spring and then summer… but we’ll see. Neither one of us is particularly “sporty” so I imagine such an effort would be good for a laugh, if nothing else.

One last thing. I’m really having trouble keeping up with my food and exercise journals. I’m still, absolutely, counting calories and sticking within my limits (as evidenced by my loss last week) I just haven’t had time to record them. For some reason, I feel racked with guilt over this. Part of me feels like I’m “cheating” by not writing all this stuff down — while another part of me feels like that’s ridiculous because, prior to starting this blog, I *never* kept a food or exercise journal. The thing is, I don’t want to get so bogged down in the administrative details of this that the pressure of having to write everything down knocks me off course. On the other hand, I don’t want to start slacking and sliding *because* I haven’t held myself to account by writing everything down.

It makes me wonder, because I read a lot of weight loss/health related blogs and I don’t really see *that* many food/exercise journals. Do you guys find them necessary or even helpful?

Anyway… I’m off to face Monday.
Happy new week everybody!