My son was gone this evening and when we asked, my daughter was up for a night run! I chased these two round the hood after dinner tonight. My muscles hurt all day so I let the weights go for the evening and instead am hunkering down to watch very important things on Netflix.
🙂
Five days till the last day- school days, that is. There’s a weekend in there too. Have I finished report cards? Nope. Is my classroom summer ready? Getting there. Am I having a blast with my student- the sweetest class evah? YES! I’m in denial. The last day? what is “last day”? I’m going to miss these kiddos. It’s been a good year.
That said… I’m clean tuckered. So tired.
It is warrior week and I seem to be gaining. Not gaining for real- just 2-3 pounds of water just chilling on my frame. Bradley has the same thing going on. So irritating. When I look at our diet it is not a calorie issue. It is a salt issue. I think that I need to lay off the soda again, be more mindful of eating crackers and stuff like that. I start to get lazy sometimes and start substituting empty carbs for solid, healthy fruits and veggies that have the same caloric value. I need to be thinking about more than calories- this is how I start slipping into bad choices and plus sized clothing. I know I feel good when I’m eating as clean as possible. I’m recommitting to that right NOW.
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Despite the tiredness and salty choices, I’m still keeping moving. I really didn’t want to run tonight, but I did. Not far, just a mile and a half to show my body who is boss (that would be my brain, if you were wondering). So far this week I’m at 4 miles, not bad. Plus I’ve done one round of weights, and guess what I’m about to do as soon as I post this? Yup.
Last night I was so pleased with myself after I did the weights routine. When I’m a good kid and control myself I end the day with such a complete sense of satisfaction. That’s what exercise does for me lately. I just need to remember that when I’m making my healthy food choices as well.
Cheers for a successful day tomorrow!
Remember yesterday when I did that cross training thing like they do on The Biggest Loser? A small reminder:
I did it over and over yesterday. It didn’t seem like a big deal – at all. Like, I kept doing it over and over and over for the purpose of pictures while Bradley kept asking if I was feeling it. Feeling what? Nothing. That’s what.
Arrogance.
Silly, arrogant woman! I tell you what- I felt it today. All. Day. Long.
My ribs hurt, my back hurt, my thighs hurt. I kept stretching my arms wide and far trying to alleviate the tightness. It feels good though.
Tonight I didn’t run. I decided yesterday to get all fancy schmancy with some super fabulous dance moves and threw out my hip. I was a little sore and needed a rest, but this sealed the deal. I’m taking a day or two off of running.
This event prompted some super motivating weight work tonight! I tightened, lifted, crunched and even tried to lunge this evening. Lunging was a bad idea. My knees sounded like they were actively exploding popcorn from them. I stopped lunging and focused instead on positioning myself like a seal with my belly on the floor and my legs and head raised, clenching my butt over and over in a small variety of variances with my legs bouncing in the air. About halfway through my body started to ache a little. 25 minutes into the workout I was burning. But the end of my workout I crawled into bed like a limp rag. You ever have one of those workouts where you by the end of it you’re already sore? (Me either, I’m new to this). This was one of those workouts. I’ll be feeling it tomorrow. I’m feeling it now! I will attempt to relish it!
We headed to the track this morning. My daughter has made a goal to run at least two miles every week through the summer. Right now that means she runs once a week down at the track where she also plays parkour and practices her award winning jumps. Today we had the added bonuses of:
A. My son ran a half mile! That is two times around the track for my five year old! I was so proud of his active little body and his positive attitude.
B. The track equipment was left out on the field. We took advantage of the opportunity to jump around on the big mats and do the knee lifting running thing that is in the picture. Clearly I am new to track and field, and truly, to exercise in general, since I have no idea what those things are called. Anyhow, if you want to work out your hips and abs, you have your exercise. Wow! I did it several times and have many many hilarious pictures and the sore muscles to prove it! Ha ha!
I’m going to direct your attention to my thighs. I know, weird, right? Look at my thighs! How often have I EVER asked for people to check out my thighs?! Anyhow, do you see that white line? That’s light, my babies. Light shines betwixt my thighs! I can’t even remember when that has ever happened in my entire life. Maybe when I was nine… Pre-puberty, if ever. Anyhow, you should be happy that I figured out spandex covered thighs would show the progress. I seriously look pictures of myself in my underwear and considered sharing those. Somehow that just seemed… Wrong? Ha ha!
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Lastly, like I said, I’m obsessed with the before and after picture sets… Yesterday when the hubs took that picture of my rear end I just had to make one of my before-during-present comparisons. At first I thought I was never ever going to post it, but then I realized from the get-go my mission on this website has been to track the whole project. It was to journal and talk about all of my celebrations and struggles. This is a place where I get to be self centered and booty dance whenever I want. So here is my backside- through the years. Woot!
2008- 10/2012- 6/2013
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Now I’m off to get my weight work on! Consistency!
(Ran 2.25 miles this morning)
Today was a summer test. How will it go if I wait until the evening to run in the summer? The answer? Not good. It will go sloooowww. It will be sweaty. It will make me want to dry heave. It will make me want to run very early in the morning. Good to know. Now I have a plan for the summer heat!
Not that I’m complaining AT ALL. we are having splendid weather. I noticed today at my school’s musical all of our kids look healthy and like they’ve recently vacationed in Mexico or Hawaii. A testament to spending lots of time outside. It has been wonderful!
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In other news, it is officially the weightloss warrior weeks (WW Weeks are the 2.5 weeks from day one of my cycle. I seem to lose really well during this time and not so well at others). I’m shedding poundage again. My last lowest was 234.8 and that’s what I weighed in at today! Woohoo! That means the PMS water weight is receding and I can get some serious work done now. 220’s, here I come. AMAZEBALLS.
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Check this craziness out:
Yup, that’s my arm serving up some yummy indian food last night. I get all weirded out about jiggly arm fat and have been proud of how I’ve been working through this ‘issue’ of dangling skin. Then I saw this picture and had to reassess my body image. That arm looks plenty small. In fact, it looks like it might be on the side of stick arms coming out of big body look… I decided to fill them up a bit with muscle. So that’s a goal now- better toned arms. But seriously- those arms! 🙂
Today marks 14 years of the best life I could ever imagine. Here’s to many many more healthy and happy years ahead!
My true love marked the day with the prettiest handmade card. He made me a mermaid princess! Love love love him.
***Incidentally, my husband is also the man behind my banner art. It’s nice to see myself the way he sees me. 🙂
I guess by now I should know that these final weeks of school are, at best, insane for the average girl like me. Add to that huge projects like a class museum, making giant set pieces for our musical, taking down my classroom for summer while teaching and parenting and living life…
Yeah.
Phew.
Breathe… The scenery for the musical got finished tonight and a huge part of the insanity is eradicated!
I built that with five students. Now that it is all put together I’m not surprised that it seemed like such a big job. It WAS a big job! Ha!
***
Despite the crazy week, I can’t let weightloss warrior week slip by without running my tail off. This week so far I’ve run 7.5 miles. Each day I think I’m going to take it off and just do strength, then I tuck the kids in bed and get really restless and antsy. My brain encourages me to go look in the pantry for a delicious thing, and I barter with the brain and offer a trade- running for a treat after I get back. So off I go, on a trek to earn dessert. The funny thing is each night I’ve come home and skipped the treat. I’m wondering if really I just want to run.
Until tonight, my running times have been improving quite a lot. Tonight I was abysmally slow- 13 minute miles on average! Yesterday I ran just under ten minute miles and the day before I was at 10:30 miles. I pleased. If this is the kind of improvement I’m showing in this short period of time, my times should get better as I keep chugging along. Why do I care? I want the burn and as I lose more weight I burn fewer calories because, as Bradley says, my chassis won’t be quite as heavy.
***
I realized that I haven’t posted any weights lately. There has been nothing significant… I’ll let you know when things change. Right now I’m vacillating between 235-238. My great desire is to be in the 220’s very soon. 🙂
I did it!
This morning I rose and shone, made breakfast, tied my sneakers and took off! My big goal was to simply run for a bit. To get my legs back under me. My ultra goal was to finally do a real five mile run. For some reason I feel the need to keep pushing more mileage on myself. I not sure why I want more and more distance under me, but I do. I think it’s just to prove to myself that I CAN. I’m not that person who can barely run twenty steps and then lose her balance and breath all at once anymore. I’m the person who can run for 50 minutes without stopping. I can do it now. AMAZEBALLS.
Today I decided to explore my neighborhood a little farther. I have the little loop- that is a hair under one mile. Big loop is about 1.4 miles. This newest loop was about 3.6. I call it ‘Huge Loop’ since I’m so official with everything… Anyhow, it was really fun just to go explore my neighborhood at my little trot. A few things I noticed:
1. Hills- Hills are a non issue for me now. When I first started running I would gear all of my runs to be as much downhill as possible. Over time I have discovered that I hate going down hills. It hurts my joints! I much prefer running up. I have never ever allowed myself to stop or walk on a hill, so it seems I’m just getting used to them. Today I encountered three new hills – one was long and steeper than I’m used to enduring. I just chugged right up that thing and then kept going. I was pretty amazed by the whole thing.
2. Pacing- today I was alone so I decided to throw speed out the window and just focus on enjoying myself. I listened to my podcast and just cruised. I assumed my miles were in the 11-12 range but when I arrived home my mileage averaged just over 10 minute miles. Unbelievable. Without trying I improved my pace – and I thought I was going slow! Ha ha! Joke’s on me, I suppose.
As I was making my final few blocks home I knew my goal was to hit five miles today. I was so excited! About a block and a half before I got home I checked my Strava and it said I was at five miles. I hooted with happy and kept on. If I wasn’t close enough to five or over a little I was going to continue around the block and shortcut through a park- just to make SURE I got the credit of a five mile run. I assumed I’d be ok… See, the Strava has a tendency to count ahead, I think, then when you save your run it does an official calculation and the mileage can change. Guess what? When I saved my run I got downgraded to a 4.9!!!! Argh! I wish I had kept on one more time around, just to be sure. Now I know. Two weeks in a row, now, this has happened. Booo!
However, I thoroughly enjoyed eating a big bowl of peanut butter smash with blueberries upon my return! Eating with impunity… I love running.
***
Tomorrow I’m going to do two miles and you won’t believe the milestone that will make me hit!
***
Goals:
Run: 10 miles
Actual: 8 miles (not bad with the sick ear)
Abs: meh
Actual: once
My ear kicked my booty. It morphed into bizarro ear- like, I couldn’t smile, laugh, or eat (not that it stopped me) because it hurt so much. I couldn’t hear, my ear swelled so much. Yeah…. I went to the doctors, got my antibiotics on. I went back to work today. Without really thinking about it, of course I took my meds. Without thinking about it, I also had the surprisingly woozy side effect that makes me briefly feel like I just had a glass of wine. I’ll time my meds tomorrow to coincide with my lunch a little better.
Today the ear opened up. It’s not pretty. I won’t describe anything, but I will say that OH MY GOSH it feels soooooo much better. Insanely better. I’m starting to be able to hear again, laugh again, smile… Yup. Eat too. (Damn!)
I was going to go for a run today. I thought I’d just force a mile or two out of my body, but Bradley looked at me like I was cuh-ray-zay. He informed me that people who have infections definitely aren’t supposed to add the additional stress of healing muscles from a workout. Duh. How to make the infection last longer. Hopefully tomorrow? The day after? I’m getting paranoid that I’m spending too much time away from my running shoes.
I instead went and watched my girl take first place in her triple jump and third in both her relay and 440. There’s not much more she could do to make me feel proud. What a blessing, that kid is.
Ear With Bandage
(What a gripping life I do lead, eh, Bridget?)
***
I was just informed that as my husband and son were walking out onto the track field today my son just started talking to no one in particular in a loud voice…
“Hey, my mom’s losing weight.”
“My mom is a runner now.”
No one was listening except Bradley and one guy who looked sideways at our funny boy and laughed. Clearly, Bradley said, this information was meant for the masses in the casual, off-the-cuff way it was delivered. Bradley wanted to announce as well that, “It’s true. She’s lost over a hundred pounds. It’s kind of a big deal.” But of course, he didn’t. He instead just told Jude that Mama will decide when and where to celebrate her news. I don’t care, but it is a bit of a strange thing to just randomly shout out! Ha!
While it was funny in one of those ‘the kids say the darndest things’ kind of way, it also really made me understand the pride that my son sees inour family and me. He understands the importance of our project and he is proud to be a part of it. I love that kid, too. Love-fest at the Lj’s!
Yesterday I mentioned an interest in sharing my thinking about some of my strategies and thoughts on this whole weightloss project I’ve embarked on.
From the beginning of my project (sorry, I just hate the word ‘journey’ for some reason) I decided that I wasn’t going to deny myself things. If I wanted a donut, I would have a donut. Or at least a taste of it. My thinking was that if I had a ‘diet’ of denial yet full of foods that are tasty but not personally fulfilling that need for something special, then I was going to go bonkers.
I relate to food in an intimate way – I think we all do- but over the years with my husband I’ve observed that food has a stronger hold over me than it does him. Food calls to me, even when I’m not hungry. I get the munchies so incredibly easy- it’s ridiculous. If there is anything delicious in the house- ice cream is my greatest down falling- it talks to me. I can’t leave it alone. My husband, on the other hand, goes through life with very few cravings, very few treats. He needs to be reminded to eat. Food is mostly just fuel to him. For a long time I felt shame about this issue, as though my genetic or psychological predisposition for elevating food to a higher level of need and desire made me less evolved, or worthy, or justified or… whatever! More recently, though, I’ve started to realize that I just need to have an action plan for dealing with food. Denying that these food cravings exist does me no favors. In fact, it makes me long more for some creamy, delicious thing… Instead, I realized that I love sour cream- the real full fat kind. Ice cream + me= true love. Chocolate is an old friend of mine. Chips are the perfect accompaniment to most sandwiches. I’m nuts about nuts and nut butters. I’m never not going to feel this way. I will always crave fat (I’m a fat eater, Bradley is a sugar eater- example- my favorite candy is always peanut butter plus chocolate something, his is sour or hot tamale sugar something). It’s where my mouth guides me. So I have to do things to insure my success with these kinds of foods.
1. I never say no. If I want ice cream, I’m having some ice cream. We only buy it in single sized servings. Right now our local bargain grocery outlet (we call it the ‘Gross Out’) is carrying these 150 calorie skinny cow ice cream individual serving cups. I keep them in the freezer and when I want ice cream, I don’t even have to measure. I just eat the whole thing and don’t worry about it. And I’m only allowed one a day- they are too expensive at .50 per serving otherwise.
2. I have one tablespoon of sour cream now. Not half a cup.
3. We buy all of our chips at Costco in single sized serving bags. I’m addicted to BBQ flavored pop chips right now. They are 100 calories per bag, so not a bad trade for a craving. Again, I never eat more than one a day. The expense is high, at about .50 per bag, so I’m judicial with them. They also carry the baked lays and sun chips at our local business Costco. Those run between 180-240 calories per bag though so I tend to stay with the pop chips. I’m glad my family had a healthier alternative though.
4. I don’t keep any candy around. If we want it, we explicitly go out and get it. And I’ll tell you what, you have to really be having a strong craving to get off the couch to drive to the store to buy a candy bar. I’m not saying it has never happened, but not keeping it in the house is a great deterrent.
5. I will trade exercise for food. The best thing about being a runner is the calories you burn. I’m dieting, right? But when I burn 2200 calories on a 55 minute run I have every right to devour an awesome and delicious sub sandwich. The coolest part is even after the sandwich I still usually fall way short of my calorie allowances. I have no problem paying extra minutes in exchange for a particularly high calorie food. Usually I get a super yummy meal on those days, but, yes, once it was a trip to Ben and Jerry’s!
Anything I do while losing weight should be a habit towards maintaining my weight once I get there. I plan to continue to enjoy all of these foods for the rest of my life. I love to bake. I love to eat. I love desserts!!! Cutting them out would take away a lovely sensory experience in my life. So I integrate them. You can ask my husband how whenever I do eat a piece of cake or something how I discuss it over an over with him, insuring that I won’t go into a frosting fueled cake eating frenzy if I do decide to have a slice (actually not a cake fan, FYI). I worry about it, that the treat will start me down a path that will degrade this project. So far so good.
*There are seeds of thought here from my head and all over the Internet, but if i borrowed anything it is from Katie at runsforcookies.com.
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WARNING: gross description coming up…
I have this weird thing on my ear. It felt like a pocket of fluid and it just built, like a tiny, enclosed bubble that was attached to the inner part of the ear- that part where you have to swirl a q-tip inside to clean it. So the last time it happened, it grew to the size of a BB gun pellet and then one day it just drained. It was gross, yeah, but I didn’t think much of it. It didn’t hurt or seem infected, just one of those weird body things that happened.
Then it started refilling. Faster. This time it seemed bigger after just a few weeks, and the day before yesterday I decided to help things along by giving it a good squeeze. Well, it popped- backwards. Instead of expelling the fluid outside of my ear it did it backwards, creating a new pocket among the cartelidge. It hurt a little. Then it hurt a little more. And then it hurt so much that moving my jaw to talk or chew hurt.
Today, this is me:
There will be no running today. Or much of any movement. I’ll watch The Biggest Loser, heat my ear and boss people around from the couch. LOL!