Dragons to Slay

I've got a lot of dragons out there - huge hurtles that challenge my healthy lifestyle. One of the biggest dragons in my life is the work "food day." I try to plan for the day and bring a healthy option, but when I get in to work, there's a table filled with a glorious assortment of donuts, bagels, brownies, cookies, chips, dip, etc. I usually can't help myself.

Today was one such day. I actually forgot about the food day and didn't bring anything to share. Typical "food day" rules would say that I shouldn't get to partake in the other food since I didn't contribute. Yeah, it didn't go down like that at all.

I returned to the food table time and again. At one point, it seemed almost surreal - I knew I shouldn't be eating more food but I was walking back to my desk with a full plate. Where was my willpower? Where was my shame? Buried under a plate of brownies, evidently.

I regret to say that the dragon most definitely won today. I didn't even put up a fight really. What I did do was write down every last mouthful and add up all of the calories so that I could see exactly what I was doing to myself. During my 8 hour shift, I ingested a whopping 2790 calories! I will have a very light dinner and get some cardio in tonight but it's still more calories than I had wanted/needed to have today.

I am going to really think long and hard about ways to fight this dragon. Asking others to bring healthy food, setting a strict limit on what I can put on my plate, or avoiding the table altogether. I'm going to write all of my ideas down and store them away until the next "food day" is announced. Then I can pull them out so I'm prepared for battle.

The work "food day" is a dragon that I know I can triumph over. Next time I plan to walk away the victor!

Life Gets in the Way

Well true to form, I'm a little over two weeks into a healthy start and life is creeping up on me. There is suddenly an onslaught of work - I'm putting in several hours of overtime this week and that really cuts into the time I use to build healthy meals and to exercise.

I wasn't eating very well during the first half of this week... and getting very little exercise - I was just too exhausted after working such long days. Wah wah wah...

I knew I needed to suck it up because life will ALWAYS get in the way. I decided to just stay up late last night to wash and prepackage all of my fruit and veggies into easy-to-grab portions. That allowed me to get my lunch with ease this morning AND I don't have much to do to make a healthy dinner. It's a step in the right direction.

I have also been trying to get up from my desk more often during the day. I'm sitting at that desk for 10 hours a day sometimes and my poor body is forgetting how to move! I am going to set a reminder tomorrow for every hour or so to remind me to take a break from what I'm doing and just get up and take a quick stroll around the area. Another trick I have is to take the stairs to use the restroom on the first floor. I'm going to drink extra water tomorrow to make those trips on the stairs more frequent.

I know it's probably not enough but every little bit helps.

Right??

Futuristic Me

Week 2 and down 2 more pounds!

It's a loss but it seems like a slow loss. At this rate I'll be thin by 2085!

Ahhh, I look forward to 2085 - I'll be able to buy a smaller hover craft, I'll look svelte in my silver space outfit and I will be able to live off of smaller portions of Soylent Green.

All kidding aside, if I keep up this same rate of weight loss, I'll be to goal in about 2 years. It seems like a lifetime, but really it's not. I just have to keep telling myself that. If I had truly taken weight loss seriously 2 years ago, I'd be thin now. I don't want to look back to this day in 2011 and ask myself why I didn't continue with healthy eating and exercising habits. Future Me is looking back on Present Me right now and she's telling me that slow and steady wins the race.

I don't want to disappoint Future Me... she's been disappointed enough. And if I don't disappoint the near Future Me, then that distant Future Me will be svelte in the silver space outfits of 2085.

Of course, I'll be 117 years old... but that's completely beside the point. =)

Tired Yet Inspired

I'm a sleepy one today. I used up all of my best blogging time reading everyone else's great posts. I was too lazy to leave comments this time but as a group, you are all amazing, funny, honest, wonderful people and you have given me more inspiration in the past couple of weeks than I have found in 10 years of searching!

I just finished watching So You Think You Can Dance. I love that show because I love dancing. I always have - but at my current weight, I never go out and do it. The best I can do is close the shades, plug in my iPod and dance around the living room. Even at that, it feels amazing to move my body to music. I can pretend that I'm the skinny cutie smoking up the dance floor.

It feels great... until I catch myself in the reflection of a mirror or picture glass. Then I realize that the dancing feels good but looks ridiculous. Sometimes I lose my energy and it kills the fun when I see myself... but other times I ignore that reflection and fall back into the fantasy. If I could just do that with other forms of exercise, I would have it made!

There have been a lot of lists on posts lately - what people hate about being overweight and what they look forward to when they've reached their goals. I plan to take some time and create my personal list of these things but for now I'll just say...

I am looking forward to losing weight so I can look as good as I feel when I'm dancing.

Two Pounds Down and I Can't Drive My Car!

I am two pounds lighter after the first week of eating healthier - and I can't drive my car. The two things have nothing to do with each other but it makes for an intriguing blog start, doesn't it?

First, I am so so happy to be down two pounds! I really didn't do much to lose it except to pay attention to what I was eating (I did go overboard a few times but the fact that I was really paying attention made those times less of a "free for all") and to try to get up and move around more than I normally would (which is not at all). I'm going to build on this easing in period and tweak what I'm eating to incorporate some better, fresher foods and I'm hoping to start working out in some sort of regular fashion - even if regular only means one or two times a week.

Second, I am so so happy because I bought a new car! I traded in my old car for a brand spanking new one. :D It's the first time in my life that I've had power windows/locks... a CD player (yes, my old car was rocking the cassette deck) and cruise control. The absolute best part is that the AC works. My old car's AC suffered irreparable damage and I've been sweltering on the commute this summer.

My problem is that the new car is a little larger than my old car and it's higher from the ground. When I'm in it, I have absolutely no idea of the parameters. I had my old car for over 8 years and we'd become thick as thieves. The new car is a stranger and I end up looking like a student driver when I take her out (I've backed into a few curbs and I'm a little jerky with the gas and brakes.)

I also have a very hard time figuring out how to get the car into a parking spot evenly. I've only had it for three days so I know I will get used to it soon but so far I've been parking out in the furthest spots to ensure wide open spaces that I can maneuver into.

I feel like an absolute loon but at least I'm getting more exercise by having to walk the extra distance.

It's Not a Competition!

Like many people, I've had yo-yo periods with my weight. I would go on a diet for a few months, lose a good number of pounds, and then suddenly (or even slowly) go back to my poor eating habits and gain it all back. I came to a realization that this time around I really need to make a lifestyle change. I need to start eating and exercising in a way that I will be able to keep going for the rest of my life. This flies in the face of everything I've ever done or believed in.

Normally, I would cut my calories way down and exercise in inconsistent spurts. The pounds would virtually fall off. Of course, since I was never able to keep this kind of eating/activity going, the pounds would pack back on. By making an entire lifestyle change, I can ensure that I won't freak out my metabolism and I won't "fall of the wagon" so easily. The problem with this approach is that it takes........................ so............................. long!

Three things have happened recently that are making me want to jump back to my previous yo-yo dieting ways:

1. My mother has just lost a ton of weight. This is an excellent thing but every time I see her, she is a size smaller and that makes me feel even bigger. I feel like I'm falling behind and even though I know it's all in my head, I fear that my weight will somehow hold her back. At the same time, I am insanely jealous of her. We've been overweight together for almost my entire life and now it's just me.

2. A friend at work recently got the lap band surgery. She hasn't lost much weight yet but I know that very soon, she will be shedding pounds in a quick way. This brings out the competitive side of me. I want to instantly start starving myself so that I can be the one who suddenly loses a bunch of weight. She's really the only other person in my department that is around my size and if she loses all of her weight, that will make me stick out like a sore thumb.

3. I bought a bathroom scale and stepped on it. I haven't been on a scale in well over a year and as part of the effort to start a new healthy lifestyle, I bought one. The number was sobering. I'm not even ready to type it in this anonymous blog - that's how freaked I am by it.

I know my reaction to these events is very petty but I want to be honest and identify my feelings. Facing all of these events, so close together, gives me a panic attack of sorts and really makes me want to get sloppy and rush to get the pounds off. I know it would be very beneficial to get the weight off quickly but I also know that it won't last. I need to tell myself that this is my life- my weight is my own and I'm not in competition with any other person or circumstance in the world. I need to take the time to lose this weight in a slow, healthy, PERMANENT way.

I'm thankful for all the other blogs out there. Reading your stories really helps keep me motivated and shows me that there are other people out there going through the same thing. :)

Try Try Again

Well... I made my lunch last night so that my Black Bird alter ego couldn't find reasons for me to skip making it in the morning. However, a new nemesis - Dodo Bird - caused me to forget that lunch on the counter as I was walking out of the house. Argh!

The bad news is that I drove through McDonald's at lunch. The good news is that I only had a salad and a coffee.

In my efforts to thwart that Black Bird voice, I think I became much more aware of her. This morning, I noticed she was telling me that I deserved a yummy drive-thru breakfast. That it would help me eat healthy the rest of the day by filling me up. I was able to stop and ask myself "Why do I deserve a drive-thru breakfast? I haven't done anything special and in all reality, drive-thru breakfast rarely ends up being a prize."

Then later, as I was grocery shopping after work, I heard her tell me things I should pick up and buy... in nearly every aisle! If I had let her drive the cart, I would have come home with chips, ice cream and a huge bag of chocolate.

I'm realizing that of the two people in my head - the real me and the toxic, persuasive alter ego - the wrong person is in control. My homework for the rest of this week is to really pay attention to who is talking in my head and when I identify Black Bird (or one of her negative cronies), I will challenge her ideas!

Now, I'm off to make a lunch for tomorrow AND a note to remind me to take it!

No Rules For Success

I've been thinking a lot about the little rules I fool myself with and the fantasies I create to keep me from losing weight. Here's one of my favorites:

The work week is full of schedule changes and stress. There are late nights and working lunches. How could anyone start a diet on a week day? I will start on the weekend!

AND

The weekend has too much time to think. Too much time to talk oneself out of exercise and into a pizza. Not to mention the near constant access to a kitchen for two days - you can eat whenever you want! How could anyone start a diet on the weekend? I will start on a week day!

I do this all of the time. In fact, I told myself that this past weekend was going to be the starting point of good eating and active living. By the time Saturday evening rolled around (and I had shoveled pounds of picnic food into my mouth), I had reasoned that the weekend was a horrible time to start a diet and that I needed to start fresh on Monday. Well, here it is Monday and I didn't bring my lunch like I had planned, I didn't have a sensible dinner (stupid Bit O Honeys! They're like crack!!) and I have yet to do more activity than move from room to room at a snail's pace. My whole week is filled to overflowing with meetings and overtime. I feel myself trying to reason that the work week is a bad place to start and that I should really get going this weekend. And then the cycle has started all over again!

I know a lot of people do this sort of thing. My own mother will decide to quit smoking on the first of the month and then by the second, she has decided that mid-month makes more sense. I've heard countless friends say they are going to start exercising immediately only to change their minds and start after the holidays or after their relatives leave or after the lunar eclipse - whatever is conveniently inconvenient at the time.

I'm going to try to pay special attention to these rules that I've been creating. I know they make no sense - if you can't start a diet on a week day or a weekend, when are you supposed to start?! (and don't say on vacation because you CAN'T start a diet on vacation! :P)

It feels like there is a little alter ego inside my head who is looking for anything to say that will persuade me from doing what is right. I need to figure out how to silence this alter ego - shall we call her Black Bird? - or at least find a way to ignore her. Her reasons are ludicrous and yet so appealing.

I am going to eat well tomorrow and get at least a little exercise in!

Black Bird is telling me that I will be too rushed in the morning to make lunch and too tired after work to exercise...

...But I will be making my lunch before bed tonight so Black Bird can suck it!

How Do I Drive This Thing?!

I must confess - I know very little about blogging. I barely know how to read one, let alone write one. I'm hoping to learn a thing or two here. One good thing about starting something like this is getting my very own page nailed down with all of the little things that make me me. And I must say that I am overly fond of the silly little blue fish that I was able to put on my page. They follow my mouse and eat the food I click for them!

I think I mostly signed up to follow other people's blogs but I do realize that this could be a helpful tool for me too. I find myself being held down by a great many things like my weight, my lack of confidence and my innate ability to turn even the smallest of worries into overwhelming dread. If I could just cut the strings on some of this baggage, I think I could feel a lot more free. I guess I'll be learning to fly in a sense. Or at least I hope I will.

All I can do is try, right?

Anyway, back to staring at my little blue fishies...