From small beginnings come great things.
Yesterday was just supposed to be another boring day in my boring life. Breakfast with mom, then some mundane errands with the possibility that I might pick up a new book. My first new book in ages, actually. But what was supposed to be the highlight of my dad was actually the lowlight. Target was sold out of the book I wanted! How rude!
The highlight turned out to be Fashion Bug.
Back when I was in college hoping to become a landscaper and make the world a more beautiful place to live in (seriously, some of the landscapes around here? shit. ty.), I was in plant propagation class. In that class, I was trying to figure out how the hell ferns reproduce. In the end, I decided I would never ever try to propagate them because they were evil (complicated might be the more accurate word, but I’m sticking with evil) and not really that pretty.
Well, I have found another evil in the world. It is called The Soy Allergy.
(To be fair, I haven’t been officially diagnosed by a practicing allergist, but mayoclinic.com AND webmd.com can’t possibly be wrong, right?)
It all started with me trying to eat less meat, which turned out to be not such a hard thing to do because I actually love the Boca and Morningstar soy products. Sure, it’s not exactly like eating a burger, but I still liked the flavor anyway. I was doing really well with the meatless thing, too. But after awhile, I started noticing that I was just feeling miserable all the time. For one thing, I was even more lethargic than I usually am (which I blamed on my depression over not losing any weight), and for another, my sinuses were being serious pains in the ass. So to speak. But I chalked that up to a hellacious allergy season (it was all over the news, y’know).
And then my face went berserk. Which is not unusual as I have psoriasis, which can break out anywhere for any reason. But this stuff itched a LOT. And hurt. And because Donna had gone through the soy allergy hell before, I finally put two and two together. Thank the heavens!
Alas, upon further investigation into the soy allergy world, I discovered that 99.9% of all food contains some kind of soy (I’m guesstimating). This includes some of my faaaaavorite things; white cheddar rice cakes, bread, peanut butter chip brownies, some meat, my faux butter, some ice creams, salad dressings (oh cucumber ranch, how I miss thee *sniffle*), most mayonnaise, and CHOCOLATE. ALL THE CHOCOLATE EVER CREATED, in fact. Apparently, soy lecithin makes a good emulsifier or something. I dunno. I just know it means I can’t eat it. And y’all know what happens when you’re told you can’t have something, right? You want it more than you want to BREATHE (or so I’ve heard).
But, with some hard work, patience, and a lot of time spent in the grocery store, I am finally coming to terms with my affliction. I can actually have chocolate, so long as I make the cake or brownies from scratch. Hellman’s makes a canola mayonnaise that I can use. Real butter isn’t mush worse than faux butter, points-wise. And Panera has four different types of soy-free bread I can buy that doesn’t cost and arm and a leg, and also doesn’t taste like cardboard. The other stuff, as much as I love it, wasn’t really the best stuff for me anyway. And because they were low in points, I would just eat more, which costs more money, and takes its toll on my body as well.
Someday, maybe, I’ll get to have a mounds bar again…
*sigh*
I think I am finally starting to get into a kind of routine. It’s still rough, but I’m getting there.
When I last blogged, I was doing a pretty good job of walking on a regular basis, about 5.2 miles five or more times a week. But it wasn’t getting me anywhere as far as losing weight. Which kind of depressed me a little. And that led me to eat more. Which also didn’t help me to lose weight. But I think the problem was that I was walking too much at one time, which made me feel like not wanting to do anything afterwards, and then I’d get frustrated about that. Which also lead me to eat.
A lot of things lead me to eat, apparently.
But in April, I cut the walks back to just over 3 miles a day, five days a week, with one extra long walk a week — sometimes. Depending on if we got together for The Biggest Loser — with Vicki. And that seemed to help. Because between April 1st and today, I’ve lost 10 pounds, just a little over 1 pound a week, which is a rate I suppose I can live with.
Now, if I could just get into a blogging routine, I might be getting somewhere!
By the Numbers
Last Blogged Weight: 331 pounds
Current Weight: 322.8 pounds
Difference: 8.2 pounds
I really have lost 10 pounds, though! I went up a little in March, which I didn’t blog about (shame on me). And, obviously, I broke the 330 barrier — FINALLY — after bouncing between 330 and 340 for an entire year. That was no small victory, I gotta say.
Man, I really need to get in a groove with this blogging thing. Kind of like how I seem to have gotten into a groove with walking.
(Nice segue, huh?)
I started out slow with 3 miles. I hadn’t walked in a long, long time, and I wasn’t sure what my knees could handle. It wasn’t bad, so for the next walk, I made it 4 miles. That was still pretty tame, so I plotted out a 5 mile route, which feels pretty good. I can do it for 2 days in a row, but then I need a break for a day, which is a tad annoying, but I suppose I should be proud of walking 20 miles a week, give or take.
However, I am a Biggest Loser watcher, thanks to Vicki (*grumblemoangroan*), and it got me thinking the other day about figuring out a “Last Chance Workout” of sorts. A longer route that I can do on Fridays before my Saturday meetings. Because I am nothing if not an overachiever.
Sometimes.
Anyway, for those of you that don’t know what the Last Chance Workout is (because it’s totally not self-explanatory), it’s where the contestants — who don’t work out enough during the week — work 17 times as hard right before the weekly weigh-in. Because it’s not like they don’t work out for 381018343 hours during the week, of course!
I thought about it and thought about it, and decided on a route that I would plot out, just to see how long it was. To compare, here is the original 5 mile route. My house is where the big red marker is:
And this is the “Last Chance Workout” I’ve been thinking about:
Doesn’t really seem like too much of a change, I don’t think, but as it turns out, the new route is TEN MILES LONG.
*sigh*
Now, I admit that I can be an overachiever at times, usually not at the appropriate times, but I think even 10 miles might be pushing it.
And yet, I’m just enough of a masochist to reeeeeeeeally want to try it.
I haven’t said anything about my weigh-ins the past few weeks, but that doesn’t mean it’s bad news. In fact, since February 20th, I’ve gone from 336.8 to 332.8lbs, which averages out to a pound a week. Frustrating slow, I have to say, but the better news is that with the free weight work I’m also doing (because it can’t all be cardio), my clothes feel looser. For the 830185013rd time. Heh.
I went for another walk today. I meant to mention my walking last night, but completely forgot. I do that a lot. It’s part of my charm.
But I digress. I do that a lot, too.
The weather here is starting to feel more spring-y, with a dash of winter thrown in. Like last week, it was in the 60s every day last week, up until Friday afternoon, when it started getting cooler and cloudy, and then finally snowed a little bit overnight. After a day of melting, today was back to near-50 with no snow on the ground. Though, there was a pretty biting wind coming from the north. And since the sun was out, I decided to take a walk.
Now, I have a problem working out “in public,” as many people my size do. It comes from years of being stared and pointed at. I am always just a teensy bit paranoid that it’s still happening. Because, let’s face it, adults still judge. Though, probably not as bad as I fear, but i’m working on that part.
Today, however, I sort of ran into some people I knew from school way back when. I was doing so well with that, hiding in my house all the live long day. I didn’t have to worry about seeing people I used to know, and having them find out how very little I’ve changed, and how very much I’ve grown (girth-wise, not height-wise). The small piece of comfort I cling to, though, is that I’m not sure they realized who I was. I was wearing sunglasses for one thing, and not everybody has my memory for faces. Plus, they didn’t call out to me or anything, so… I think I’m in the clear. But it still bugged me at the time, and for awhile I just wanted the ground to open up for me. I wish there was a magic pill to get over those feelings of inadequacy. It’d certainly make my life a lot easier.
Instead, I’ll just keep walking.
So…
As it turns out, I kind of fell off the blogging wagon for a bit. I knew I might. This is an entirely new thing for me, being completely honest with people I do and don’t know. And when I stuttered, weight-wise, I returned to my shell. Which I am trying desperately to break. So I’m back.
It’s hard to get back on the wagon after falling off. I’ve been wanting to do a post for about a week now, but wasn’t sure what to say. I have a few new things starting this week, though, and I want to talk about them.
First new thing is I’m starting a Biggest Loser Challenge with my 30-somethings with 100 or More to Lose team at Sparkpeople.com. If you’ve never heard of Sparkpeople, it’s very similar to Weight Watchers, I think, but is exclusively online. And also free. It’s a nice little supplement to the WW program, I think. WW is great as far as the point system goes. I find it much easier and less time-consuming than counting calories, anyway. And I like the meetings, of course, but sparkpeople is there all the time. And as a person who talks to nearly everybody via the internet in some way, I find it very easy to use.
Er, that totally sounded like a commercial for Sparkpeople. I swear, they did not pay me to say any of those things. And until recently, I wasn’t even really using my SP account. But I need a jump start, and I thought this biggest loser challenge would be a good way to go. If you’re at SparkPeople, look me up! Being a bit of an introvert, I don’t have many friends there yet. But I’m working on it!
Getting back to the getting on the wagon thing, I’m on a bit of a streak workout-wise. January and February sucked as far as being sick and icky women stuff that I won’t ever subject you to. Plus, the weather was not great and my S.A.D. was in full swing. But March has been good to me thus far. I got sick and tired of bouncing between 330 and 340 on the scale, so I finally put pen to paper (so to speak) and started working out again. This is the beginning of week three, averaging about 1 hour a day of exercise, with one day off (Saturdays). I feel like I’m getting slimmer, if not losing weight, so that’s a good sign. And I really do feel better after I’ve worked out. I’m a weird one in that I like to work out. I like to feel the burn in my muscles, and I like to have to mop the sweat off my brow.
Last week was the best, though. It was the nicest week of the year thus far, with temps in the 60s and the sun shining every day. I thought about going for a walk in the afternoons, but didn’t make it until Friday. And boy did I WALK. 4.2 miles! It was chillier than it had been, plus it was cloudy, but it felt really good to get outside. And it is soooooo much easier for me to walk outside than it is to walk on the treadmill, even if I’m watching tv. This week is supposed to be nice, too, so I’m going to make sure I get outside as much as I can.
The final new thing for me this week is that I’m setting some mini-goals, that aren’t necessarily weight-related. One of them is that I have to get to bed by 9:30 every. single. night. Though I will give myself a 10 minute window. Everybody’s gotta have a little bit of leeway! But this is something that I had done in the past with quite a bit of success, however I’ve been pretty lax with it recently. It helps me to get up in the morning, which helps motivate me to work out. Win win all around.
Another goal I’ve set is that I have to cut my sugar intake. I have been eating waaaaaaaay too many sweets, and even though they’re low in points, it’s still not good for me. I was able to do it once for a couple of weeks, but it all went to hell when I got sick (do we see a pattern emerging?), so I’m taking small steps to climb back up on that wagon again. Although… I am giving myself one day to have two sweets, but for this week only. Seeing as how Thursday is my birthday ;)
The final mini-goal is to start using my neti pot at night, as well as in the morning. I suffer from seasonal (also called year-round) allergies, and I KNOW that I feel better if I use it, but just can’t seem to get in a groove. Until recently. The past few weeks, I’ve been using it right after I take my morning vitamins. So now I’m going to try to remember to do it at night after I brush my teeth before going to bed. I did it last night and noticed that I didn’t feel the pressure in my face like I usually do when I wake up.
Y’all are bored to tears now, aren’t you? Hah, well, I’ll get better at this blogging thing, I promise!
Is there anything worse than being sick?
Well, I suppose there is, but seeing as how I’m sick right now, that’s the most horrible thing.
It just screws everything up so much. I can’t exercise, I can’t sleep, I don’t have the energy to do ANYTHING, I don’t feel like eating much, and the stuff I feel like eating is the absolute worst food I could eat. Y’know, all of the comforting things like macaroni and cheese, and… er, macaroni and cheese. I’m sure there are other things, but I have mac and cheese in the fridge right now (ww-friendly, of course), so I have that on the brain.
But I’m trying to be good. Impossible as it may seem, I’ve been drinking even more water, and ingesting obscene amounts of Mrs. Grass soup (I was once told that the golden nugget has magical healing powers. Sadly, I was sold a bill of goods. Curses!). On Wednesday, though, I went out to breakfast with mom before going grocery shopping, and I indulged in some hash browns, and I wish I hadn’t. I reasoned that I deserved them because I hardly EVER have them and I was sick. I even looked up the points value beforehand, so that I could track them. Alas, they weren’t cooked quite well enough, so it was sort of a waste of my points.
On the plus side, I started feeling much better on Wednesday afternoon (despite the hash browns). My voice was starting to come back, and the sinus pressure was beginning to abate. But, of course, Thursday came along and beat me back down.
So, now it’s 4:53 am on Friday, and I’ve totally just had an entire box of Mrs. Grass soup and a big bowl of macaroni. Oh, and some bread.
*sigh*
One of the things I’ve finally learned, in all my years of dieting, is that you absolutely have to have a good support system. Which is, often times, easier said than done.
The first diet I remember being on, I had told my best friend (at the time) about how my mother was restricting my eating and all of that. We started band camp just a few short weeks after that, and I was so excited. It was the first time away from my parents, and I would get out from under my mother’s ever-watchful eye, which never ever helps the dieting process. I didn’t intend on gorging or anything like that, I just wanted the pressure to let up a little bit. Instead what I got was a so-called best friend who announced very loudly to the entire cafeteria, “Are you sure you’re allowed to eat that? You know your mom put you on a diet.”
The saddest thing is, that didn’t even open my eyes to what a snake she was. That didn’t happen until she was out-and-out ridiculing me in the middle of class at our new middle school a few months later.
There is the possibility that a friend can swing too far the other way, too. The one who, when you acknowledge what size you are before anybody else can, just kind of shushes you. As if to suggest that not physically saying I’m fat will suddenly make me not fat. Well, I’ve always been allergic to bull shit, so that kind of thing just drives me up the wall. Especially since my mom tried for 20 years to convince me that I was “pleasantly plump” or “big boned.”
Uh, no.
I’m fat. I know it, you know it. Saying it isn’t going to make me fatter, or break down in sobs. It’s just stating a fact, like the sky is blue or the grass is green. Trying to imply otherwise is just an insult to my intelligence.
The slayer, in this case, being me and the watcher being my fat.
Which is my way of saying I got the workout in! I used the treadmill instead of stair-stepping today, so we’ll see how I feel tomorrow.
My body sucks.
Just when I’m about to get on a roll (a two-day roll, but still a roll!) with working out, my body betrays me.
I manage to wake up at 5:30 for the second morning in a row, and I feel pretty good. But when I bend over to pick up the cats’ food dishes and stand back up again… Hooo boy. I can’t even really describe what I felt, other than it felt like the left side of my body was trying to make a break for it. So, no workout this morning.
I think it was a combination of doing stair-stepping yesterday morning, and messing around with my stability ball last night. Oh, and then there were the side bend things I was doing, too.
My weight loss plan isn’t strictly relegated to one program. I have my core food program, and then I’m using several different sources to craft my workout routine. Yesterday was the first day, and what it entails is doing 5 minutes of cardio, 5 minutes of upper body strength training, 5 minutes of lower body strength training, 5 minutes of core training, and the 5 more minutes of cardio. In between the sets during weight training, I was doing a stepper-type move to keep my heart rate up. So, I think I’m going to have to change that for the future. Experimentation and all of that.
Then, last night I was using my stability ball as a chair again. I have severe issues with posture, and I’ve heard from friends that the ball could help. However, I was kind of/sort of fooling around on it last night, which is never a good idea, obviously.
Except now it’s 8:00, I’ve eaten breakfast, and it doesn’t feel so bad anymore. So maybe…
The Small Victories 