All In…

This morning, I was thinking about my weight loss journey and drew an interesting parallel to my journey with Christ.

If I do the WW thing half way, I’m not going to realize true success. I’ll get tired. I lose interest. I will set a bad example for my children and people around me.

If I don’t go all in for Christ, I’m not going to find true peace. I’ll get tired, as there is no way I can do this by myself. I will definitely be a poor example for my children and the people around.

Starting today, I don’t want to be a halfway person. When I start something, I’m going all in.

Thank you, Christ, for your patience and forgiveness as I swing between giving you my all and holding something back.

The Weight Loss Pact

Early September, my boss was thrown from a horse and fractured his hip and pelvis in three places. YIKES! He’s recovering nicely, despite the fact that he doesn’t listen to any doctors when it comes to resting. But seriously, who does?

He, like most of us, gained some weight because of all the inactivity. He’s gotten back to work. He travels a lot (A LOT) and, as you know, when you travel, you don’t have as many opportunities to eat healthy. And with his trying to recover from the accident, he couldn’t exercise.

Now I am NOT SAYING that he needed to lose weight. Those were HIS WORDS! He’s been trying to get himself back on track, but has found it difficult.

He said that what he needed was to be held publicly accountable. He was going to write a letter to everyone at work, describing his plight and asking that everyone hold him to his commitment. That may still come. We’ll see.

But for now, he and I have set a goal of trying to lose two pounds a week until the end of the year.

I told him I was going to write about our pact so that anyone who knows him can ask out his progress and call him out on it if he’s not giving it his all.

And me? I’m a little bit competitive. Here’s an opportunity to KICK HIS BUTT! (but all in good fun, of course.)

I’ll let you know how things progress. No matter what happens, we will BOTH be healthier come the end of the year.

In a funk

I’m in a funk. I’ve been in a funk for a couple of months. It started with my being sick for several weeks, and then kept on as I tried to get myself back on track.

This time last year, I was just gaining some momentum, posting losses each week. Now, I feel like I’m just going through the motions.

I’m tracking my points – for the most part. Well, at least until I get home from work. Then I lose interest.

I’m going to the gym, but it feels like absolute drudgery. Before I was sick, I loved going to exercise. Whether I was walking on the treadmill or pushing myself on the elliptical, I always felt great (though exhausted) when I was done. Now, I just go, tick off the minutes, and leave.

Like I said, I’m in a funk.

On the bright side, the one thing I do know is that – even though I feel like I’m hanging by a thread – I am not going to quit.

That’s gotta count for something.

The Downside of Weight Loss

There is a downside to significant weight loss. And it is going to cause me to have to eat my words, or even worse, apologize to my friend Leanne for all the grief I gave her about always being cold.  =)

After losing 85 pounds of insulation, I am cold all the time. There. I’ve said it.

Leanne, stop laughing. I still prefer the colder weather. But I’m COLD!

Oh well, I’ll just have to get another couple of sweaters and sweatshirts, because I’m going to lose even more. Stay tuned!!!

A Good Day

Football season is over. It was a fabulous ending to a long couple of months. We had a lot of fun, but it brought havoc on our schedule. Only on Fridays would I get home before 8:30 or 9:00 at night. I literally drove into the driveway from work, loaded the car with the kids, and headed off to practice. The crazy schedule led to a LOT of eating take out, a LOT of eating on the run, and a LOT of late-night dinners.

But that is all behind me – at least for now. And this week, my focus returns to ME!

Saturday I started again. I started tracking everything I ate – no matter what it was, no matter how many points it was. I started being butt-ugly honest with myself, evaluating why I was making certain choices and why I had allowed myself to slide. AND I started writing again. All of these things are sending positive signals to my brain.

And today….

I hit the gym – thirty minutes of hard cardio at lunch and thirty minutes of strength after work. I can do that every single day if I want to; and why wouldn’t I?  I’m definitely worth it.

I’ll let you in on a little secret. It doesn’t hurt one single solitary soul if I take care of myself. It makes me stronger physically, emotionally, and spiritually.

And I’ll say it again. I am WORTH IT!!

Time for Honesty

For some crazy reason I decided to be totally honest throughout my entire weight loss, return-to-healthy-me journey. This complete transparency may help someone else, at some distant point in the future, but its primary value is forcing me to be honest with myself, preventing me from hiding inside my own thoughts and listening to the crazy, self-defeating tapes in my head.

I got up early this morning and went to WW. I had convinced myself that the number wouldn’t be THAT bad. Seriously? You can’t eat anything you want and not exercise and still continue to lose weight. It goes against some law of nature. AND, if by some insane freak of the scale I had lost weight, it would not have been the slap in the face I needed to get my head back on straight.

I did gain – 4.2 pounds – over the last two weeks. It’s done. It’s time to put it behind me and move forward. It’s time to return to the practices that I know move me forward.

Falling Out of Focus

It’s time to get back on track. I’ve preached to so many that you can start over the next morning, the next meal, the next minute. I’ve have SO not been practicing what I preach.

The tooth thing morphed into laryngitis. While I didn’t feel all that bad, cardio was tough because whatever was attacking my body took up residence in my lungs. I exercised a little bit – ok not that much – and quickly fell into some of my ugly habits. I was sick (I had a very impaired voice and it got old) for four and a half weeks! Honestly, I just got to the point where I was tired of being sick and didn’t want to do ANYTHING.

OK, enough excuses. First I slowed down on my exercise (more like stopped). Then, I started snacking on a little bite of this, and another tiny bite of that. THEN came Halloween. YIKES!

The one thing I LOVE from Halloween is a peanut butter pumpkin by Reese’s. At Christmas, it’s a peanut butter tree; Easter, a peanut butter egg. You get the picture. But I haven’t had one peanut butter anything since Easter 2009. I know the point value, and I could have had one. I could have make a deliberate decision to have one. ONE!

However, I decided that I was going to forego the tasty treat and move forward in strength! Yeah right!

So instead of making a deliberate decision to eat something that I actually enjoy, I ate a bunch of Whoppers. Seriously?! Who even LIKES those crazy things? I could have planned and enjoyed, when instead I reacted and consumed many more points than I would have, than I should have, because I bored and wanted some candy.

Dumb decision. Decision made in the past. Time to move forward.

FINALLY. It’s one week after Halloween. I’ve worked out three days this week. Definitely an improvement, but I could do soooooo MUCH better.

And tomorrow – it’s time to pay the piper. I’ve got to weigh in. YUCK!

Oh well, whatever happens, happens. It’s time to get back on track. I think I’ve just about gotten my head back on straight.

It’s just another step on my path towards the new, stronger me. Off I go.