Exercise challenges & a check-in

Tonight I went for my regular walk with my family and since it's snowing and freezing here, the streets were super icy and hard to walk on.  Normally I like to walk fairly briskly and take longer strides, but tonight I had to practically shuffle my feet and went the pace of a snail.

We're supposed to get more snow overnight, up to 6 inches, I secretly have my fingers crossed that my office closes tomorrow, but I'm not sure.  They've been threatening us with snow all week and so far we've only gotten about an inch.  If it does snow though and I'm home tomorrow I'm really looking forward to going hiking in the snow.

On Track
I do feel like I'm getting back on track.  I went over my points today, but that's what they give you the "weekly" points for, right?  The stuff I ate wasn't unhealthy, I just ate more than I normally would because I was hungrier than I normally am.  The only "naughty" things  I had today was a donut hole (Just one! Yay!) and 5 french fries from McDonalds (individual...not orders HAAA!) For dinner I had a Subway Spicy Italian, which used to be my favorite there but after tonight I'm thinking I've lost my taste for it.  It tasted too meaty or something.  I think I'll switch back to the chicken from now on.

Anywho - I'm feeling better and getting my diet in order.

My most important advice to myself...and you

...if "you" are still reading this!

Don't ever ever ever EVER assume that you can do this on your own.  Trust me.  You can't.  You need a support group, you need a plan.  You need motivation and you need focus.  Getting up in the morning and saying, "I can control this without help" is a lie.  And you know it. 

I just had to re-remind myself of this little piece of advice on Friday at my disastrous weigh-in.   I've gained back all but 6 pounds of the 20 I was down.

To say that I'm disgusted is an understatement.  My problem, and I recognize it fully now - is that I started getting cocky and assuming that since I was doing so well on Weight Watchers that I could start managing it on my own without recording my points and my exercise.  Slowly, week by week, I watched the pounds come back.  I stopped blogging, I stopped holding myself accountable.  I kept thinking, "It's only a pound, I'll make it up this week."  A pound a week adds up.  No shit huh?

Thanksgiving

I love Thanksgiving. And I love food. Especially holiday food. My mom makes the best stuffing, and I usually make home made macaroni and cheese for my husband who isn't a big fan of most of the traditional sides. We made cranberry sauce, mashed potatoes, turkey, stuffing, rolls, and pie. Lots of pies. I love all pie, I'm not discriminatory.

However, since I'm on this weight loss kick this year, I have had to make some adjustments to my menu. I'll be making several of my dishes from the Cooking Light recipe index.

I'll be making one of their recipes for Macaroni and Cheese although I haven't picked one specific recipe yet.

The Kid and I want to make an apple pie together.

And.....if she can be persuaded to give up her delicious recipe, I might try and make my own stuffing this year.

We'll also have to make some of the usual desserts too, I always make The Hubs a chocolate pudding cream pie and this year The Kid wants to make chocolate chip cookies.

What's on your menu this year?

I got a pocket, got a pocket full of sunshine

Am I bi-polar? Geesh.

I'm feeling better today. I always feel better when I eat right...I think there might be something to that :-)

This morning I had a peach, chopped up and in a bowl and I poured a Yoplait Harvest Peach yogurt over the top of it and ate that for breakfast.

For lunch I had a turkey sandwich with lettuce and tomato and onion (I normally *hate* lettuce and tomato on food other than salads...but I'm doing it for my waist!) and a two cup serving of strawberries, grapes and cherries.

I didn't get as much water as I normally do...work was extremely busy and before I knew it, it was 5:00 and I'd only had 36 ounces. Not bad...but not what I normally intake either.

For dinner, The Hubs is going to grill hamburgers and he's going to make mac n cheese for him and The Kid, while I eat more fruit.

I'm a little nervous though...I posted on a WW message board asking for some help and when I posted what I eat on an average day I was told.....get this........are you sitting down??? That I don't eat enough...what. the. hell???

After thinking about it though, I suppose they're right. They also suggested changing what I eat (as in...don't eat salads everyday for three months...*sigh*) because eventually your body gets used to that and stops responding (DAMN YOU BODY! WORK WITH ME! I'M DOING THIS FOR YOU!). So I'm going to start working on that.

What makes me nervous though is getting my family on board with new foods...The Hubs and The Kid aren't big on new things, and if I accidentally slip up and use the word "Healthy" ... they may disown me and move out (Oh...but then I'd be alone! That might be a plus! ... I kid, I kid!).

I am going to start out with things that are healthy but aren't blatantly obvious, screaming 'healthy' from the mountaintops. I'll lull them into a false sense of security and then BAM! Fat free sour cream! They'll never know what hit em'.

I feel like if I can take baby steps, this will work. Get my food under control (again....*sigh*) and go from there. Build my exercise plan and eventually find a bootcamp or a gym because I know that walking is wonderful, but I need weights thrown in too.

A secret

I have only shared this with one other person in my "real" life...and he was a therapist. I used to be a terrible binge eater. I used to suffer from severe depression.

I used to fantasize about getting in my car and driving away from my life. Never suicidal thankfully, and never actually got in my car and left, but always thought about it. "I'm a miserable person, and if I'm miserable then all these people in my life must hate me so they'd be better off if I left and never came back." It gives me goosebumps and tears well up in my eyes remembering the darkness I had in my life.

I used to think, "I'm fat. I'm not ever going to be skinny again. Why not eat whatever the f*&k I want and see how fat I can actually get?" When I would go to lunch I'd go through - sometimes - up to three drive-thrus. I'd hit McD's for a #1 and eat that. Then I'd pull across the street into KFC and get a four-piece meal. I'd eat that. Then on my way back to work if I was still "hungry" I'd go to Burger King and get a double Whopper for dessert. It makes me full just remembering it, but at the time I still felt empty when I got back to work and would sometimes eat M&M's all afternoon.

The whole time I was having these thoughts and doing these terrible things, I was lying. To my family, my friends, my coworkers, myself. "What did you do for lunch today?" "Oh, I went to Subway and then I took the sandwich down to the beach and sat on a bench and ate it. Then I went for a walk." I'd always tell myself, "Oh it's just one time, you'll be better tomorrow! Enduldge yourself once in awhile!" ENDULGE MYSELF? WTF?!?!?! Killing myself is more like it.

Getting help for my depression was key. I think if I hadn't gotten through that then I'd still be binging and I'd probably be living in an abandoned rail car somewhere in the rugged outback of Canada so my family wouldn't have to put up with my miserable self anymore.

My doctor helped too. He wasn't a therapist, but when I went to him to get a prescription for anti-depressants, not knowing me at all, he said, "I make all my patients suffering like you make me a promise. If they don't make this promise to me, then I don't give them the prescription and instead I send them to inpatient care. You have to promise me that if you ever feel like doing something bad, even if it's leaving, or if you ever do think about suicide, that you'll call me. I'll give you my home phone number. You call me. Do you understand? If you can't make me that promise, then I'm going to refer you to inpatient treatment."

I don't know why an almost-stranger was my breaking point, but I crumpled in his office. Sobbed hysterically. It was that one moment in his office where it finally hit me. "I'm really worth something. Whether it's to my coworkers, or my husband and child at home. Or to this silly doctor I just met. I'm worth more than this."

That happened 4 years ago. A few weeks after that meeting, I joined a health and wellness program that my health insurance partially paid for. That's where I met my therapist, my nutritionist and my personal trainer. After I got laid off and lost my health insurance I couldn't afford to pay out of pocket for it anymore, but what I took away from it has helped me tremendously.

I still suffer from depression but it's on a more "normal" level now. I get depressed over "regular" things...I'm not saying that I'm 100% cured and well adjusted (Hello? Have you met me?!) but I'm definetly in a much better place, and well on my way to increased mental health, which I firmly believe is going to be key in helping me lose weight.

It's the little things

When you break down your own personal diet and exercise plan, what do you see? Here's mine:

Exercise

• Walking. Walking walking walking. I used to do more, jogging, horseback riding, bicycling, hiking (Which I still love and can do a little here and there), but I broke my ankle 10 years ago and never fully recovered my range of motion and while I haven't had it confirmed yet, I'm fairly certain it's arthritic. Regardless of my limitations on other forms of exercise, walking helps. I gained a pound and a half over two weeks where I only went out for one or two walks. I've been walking every night for a week and I'm pretty confident that I'll see a loss on Friday morning. I have an advantage in the form of a very energetic dog that demands long, meandering walks through my incredibly hilly, challenging neighborhood.
  
• Stairs. Don't underestimate the power of these monsters! My office is on the third floor of a building and you enter on the 2nd floor. I counted. It's 16 stairs to my floor. I used to take the elevator (until people started getting stuck in it...yikes.) and now I take the 16 little stairs up every morning and afternoon. I also take the stairs in my apartment building. I don't climb 10 flights of stairs, but I can feel it in my legs after I've climbed even two or three flights. Those bastards kill but in such a good way it's hard to stay mad at them.
  
• Pushups. OK. This is where I get kind of weird. I do wall push-ups. In the shower. I KNOW! A few years ago I had this really great, totally amazing personal trainer and he kicked my a$$ with push-ups and back extensions. I still hate back extensions, but I like push-ups. I only do about 10-15 a day and it's while I'm in the shower. HEY, it's convenient and the bathtub and wall are perfectly aligned so it's easy. Plus, you know...I can't get sweaty if I'm standing under a shower.
  

Diet

• Food intake. I think it's important to eat healthy, but I don't go overboard. If I want pizza, I eat pizza. If I want a Kidd Valley Cheeseburger and some onion rings, I'll have it. This is where Weight Watchers and I have always disagreed. This is why I stopped going to WW meetings and only doing the plan online. They will tell you, "If you're craving a cheeseburger, eat a rice cake." WTF? Have you eaten a rice cake and a cheeseburger? There's a difference. If I'm craving a cheeseburger and I eat a rice cake, chances are I'm still going to be craving that cheeseburger. So why not eat it? The problem arises when you start "craving" a cheeseburger every day for every meal.
  
• Water. It took me and water a long time to be friendly. I thought water was the most pointless drink ever. It has no flavor. Sometimes it does and it's not a good flavor. I grew up on a farm, with well-fresh water everyday of my life. Moving to the city all of a sudden and I was like, "WOW, water sucks! It tastes funny. Why can I even taste water?!?!?" So I didn't drink it for a long time. Slowly though, I started adding it back into my life. I only drink out of a water cooler or bottled water and only in life or death situations will I drink water straight from the tap. I have to load it up with ice because Hello? Luke warm water is nasty. I have a 26 oz water bottle and I fill it up to 24 oz. Why not the full 26 oz? Because they want you to drink 8-8oz glasses and it's easier for me to track if I do it in 8 oz increments...it's not that I can't do the math or anything but if I'm being completely honest, I have to be exact. There's none of this "I drank 80.79 oz of water today." It has to be a nice fat round number. Yes, you may call the asylum now. Between this and the push-ups in the shower admission, I'm sure I've certified the crazy.
  
• Smoothies. I *heart* smoothies. I make some of the craziest combinations of smoothies and people see it and go, "I'm sorry...you mixed what with what to get that?" I buy frozen fruit, mix it with a half cup OJ and a half cup milk (2%) and throw it in my little smoothie maker that The Husband rocked me with for Christmas (I can't believe I talk like that...) and I eat it. It's an easy way of getting your fruits/veggies for the day if you struggle with that and it's kind of fun to see what different fruits taste like when you combine them (I don't recommend plain yogurt, peaches, blueberries and blackberries being put together...that was something I won't be doing again. Yikes.)
  

Anyway, that's another peek into my crazy how I'm working it off.

I didn't walk tonight

It's so freaking mother-effing cold here that even sitting inside is almost too cold to bear. The Dog hates me for it and I hate that I didn't suck it up and do it but I'll be at it tomorrow.

Triggers

Anyway, I didn't really log in just to 'fess up about not walking tonight. On my horrific drive home tonight (An hour to go 10 miles...HELP!) I found myself craving food. Not a particular food, but f.o.o.d. I wanted to freaking stuff my face. I wasn't hungry. I wasn't even bored...or necessarily all that stressed, I was just sitting in traffic seething through my teeth about how ridiculous it all is, and something washed over me that said, "STUFF FOOD IN YOUR MOUTH! SCREW WEIGHT WATCHERS! LIE! Don't count it on your tracker! JUST DO IT! You know you want to!" ........ and I did ........... which is why I don't keep food in my car.

I didn't eat anything, since I don't have food in the car, but I'm pretty sure that had there been food in the car there wouldn't be any crumbs left by the time I got home.

What are your triggers? Mine is obviously road rage and traffic. I know I also suffer from stress-eating, boredom eating, anger eating...etc. All the normal triggers, but also this weird little random one.