The Pictures Say It All

September 5, 2009, 10 days Post-Surgery

November 28, 2009 - 2 Months Post - Surgery

May 8, 2011 - Approx. 20 months Post - Surgery

May 8, 2011

One of Those Days

Yesterday was one of THOSE days.   You know those days?  

You feel like you are never going to achieve your weight loss goal.

You feel as though you have sacrificed so much for nothing.

You just want to go out to a restaurant with your husband and order whatever you want without calculating the calories and becoming depressed.

Your scale isn't moving even though you are working harder than you have than ever before.

That you just want to eat, eat and eat some more.

I had one of those days yesterday.  One of those days when I'm just sick of counting calories, watching what I eat and obsessing over what the scale says.  Am I the only person who has those days where you long to be "normal" in regards to food?

I ate over my calories yesterday, in the ballpark of 1800.  Not that much over in the grand scheme of things but it was one those days that it could have easily turned into 2800 calories if I didn't exercise some will power.  

I'm ready to hit my ultimate goal.  Next month will be TWO years that I have been following an eating plan with my surgical clinic and worrying about what I put into my body.  In August it will be two years since my surgery.  I don't feel as though I should be where I am, I should be further along.  That frustrates me and it frustrates me that I'm still 125lbs from my ultimate weight loss goal.  It's taken me TWO years to lose 95lbs.  I can't be in weight loss mode for another TWO years.  Sigh.  I need to break through the 100lbs loss barrier or I'm going to lose my mind.

I'm writing this post so I can stop having a pity party for myself today, eat my 1500 calories, drink lots of water, get some exercising in and enjoy the day with Marc.  I have lots to feel lucky about and I just need to focus on that.  

Thank you for listening.

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No more pity party!

Over Halfway There.

My body is sooooooooooooooo sore today.  

Seriously.

Sore.

Sore.

Sore.

This morning I woke up, put on my workout gear, laced up my sneakers and walked to a local park, did three laps on the trail they have (a little over 1 mile) and then walked home.

A grand total of 96 minutes of exercising.  

Pretty impressive when my goal was 70 minutes.  While I was out running my errands, I drove down to the park to get an estimate of how far the park is.  Round trip from my driveway to the park and back to my driveway on the road is 3.5 miles!

I can't believe it's that long.  I mean, it feels like a long walk but usually I think it's a long walk and my butt is dragging and then I measure and it's about a mile.  LOL.  I'm proud of all the exercising I have done this week, I have worked really hard and I have worked out SIX days in a row.

Tomorrow I want to do something but it's going to be on the light side, like 30 minutes or so and probably just a walk.  My body needs a little bit of a break.  

I'm at 527 minutes of my 1,000 minutes, only 473 minutes to go.  

I can do it!

Bodybuggin'

Today was a good day, not as great as yesterday as i ate a bit over 1500 calories, 1593 to be exact but I did exercise for 72 minutes, over the 60 minutes that was my goal.  I will take that.

Today has been a huge challenge with not snacking.  I haven't really snacked but I did make Marc & I a dessert for after dinner that involved chocolate chips.  I guess I was feeling cocky/confident at the grocery store that I could handle having them in the house.  I ate two servings over what was in the dessert during the day.  I counted the calories so I'm holding myself accountable but I do feel a teeny bit guilty.

So according to my bodybugg, yesterday I burnt 3444 calories, my goal being 3150.  I consumed 1425 calories, my goal on bodybugg being 1400 but I'm eating 1500 so my calorie deficit was 2017 calories.  Something that makes me extremely happy.  Especially since I only exercised for 30 minutes yesterday.

This little bodybugg gadget is keeping me motivated which was the point.  I am hoping that tomorrow is a better day with the snacking urges.  I'm thinking of having Chipotle for dinner so my burrito bowl is about 740 calories so that doesn't leave me a whole lot to play with during the day if I have the snacking urges agin.  We shall see.

Goals for Tomorrow:

*Exercise for at least 70 minutes.  That will mean I'm just over halfway to my goal.

*Eat under 1500 calories even if we do have take-out.  This will be a huge accomplishment for me!

*Keep busy - don't let snacking get the best of me.

Confused & Proud.

Hey all you BodyBuggers, I need help!  I don't get why everytime I plug in my bodybugg it's telling me to install the software.  Does this happen to you?  I'm following the instructions in the booklet exactly and each time I want to upload my data, it has me install and restart again.  I'm super confused.

Today has been a very successful day.  

#1 - Under my calorie goal of 1500, when all is done for the day I will have consumed 1425 calories.

#2 - I exercised for 31 minutes...in the rain.  My body needed a more restful day today.  So I ran errands, did some house cleaning and after dinner Marc & I went for a 31 minute walk.  I'm proud that I made myself go even though it was overcast out and it sprinkled rain for most of our walk.  

#3 - I was home alone ALL day today and I stayed under my calories and DID NOT snack at all during the day.  That is one huge gigantic achievement for me.  I love love love to snack.  I am having berries & cool whip tonight while watching tv but it's planned and included in the 1425 calories. 

#4 - I bought myself some workout tank tops at fashion bug today.  I bought the 3X but when I got home and wore one of them around, I've decided to return the other three and get 2Xs.  They are a bit big.  I only bought a pair of workout capris and they are...wait for it......size 1X!  I feel pretty darn good in my new clothes.  

I'm so proud of myself.  It seems when I set mini-goals for myself that I'm better to sticking to them.

Tomorrow I would like to be under 1500 calories & exercise for at least 60 minutes.   

122 minutes!

That's right!  Another 122 minutes of exercise.  I walked today, it was nice but I'm exhausted.

Time for a shower!!

I received my bodybugg today, even though they said it would be here on Sunday.   Grrrr.  Luckily they are refunding my shipping costs.  Anyhoo, I wore it while I exercised and I'm still getting use to the bodybugg web program.  I'm anxious to wear it all day tomorrow and to see what it says.

Lovely Days for Bike Rides

Saturday turned out to not be a good day for me eating wise but I moved past it and rocked the calories on Sunday.  We also went for an 81 minute bike ride at Minuteman National Historical Park in Lexington/Concord, Massachusetts.  This was only our second bike ride and it was hard but totally rewarding.  I just kept thinking to myself that we never would have gone on a bike ride before surgery.  

Of course I took a few pictures...

He looks so skinny from behind!!

I think I kinda look like an Oompa Loompa on my bike.  LOL.

The trails are great here, very well maintained.

The ride was hard work but totally worth it.  The hills are killer with a one speed bike so we did walk up a few of them but towards the end of the ride I was more determined to keep pushing myself and I did. 

After we got home on Sunday night I decided that I would drive back up to Concord/Lexington and go for another bike ride on Monday.  And I did!

I woke up super early, went to the dentist, grabbed a bagel from Panera Bread and after a few more errands went back to the park.  

I started my ride at 11:03 and got back to my car at 1:08PM.

TWO HOURS and FIVE MINUTES!!  I was a riding fool.

I made a map of where I went.  I can't figure out how many miles I biked but I think it was over 6 miles according to some markers I saw on my trip.

I know the map is teeny BUT if you can see the purple circle, that is where I parked and started my ride.  Then the blue circle on the left hand side is how far out I went, the park trail ends at the shaded green border on the left hand side, from that end of the park trail to the blue circle was roughly a mile according to a marker.  That was was on a "real" road.  I passed Orchard House where Louisa May Alcott wrote Little Women and I also passed The Wayside where she lived earlier in her life.  I've taken a tour of Orchard House and it's amazing.  Her little sister May who Amy was based on has preserved drawings all over the window casings and walls in the house, she was very talented.  Plus the inside looks JUST like the movie Little Women with Winona Ryder.

Anyways, once I got to the center of Concord (blue circle), I took a little rest, had some water and then decided to head back to my car (purple circle).  I had an awesome ride back and it had been about an hour.  I decided that I wanted to keep riding because I had a goal of 2 hours of exercise.  So I kept going!

There is a killer hill that I had to walk up but I did ride more up it than I did on Sunday so that was a small little victory.  I rode all the way to the blue circle on the right.  I was feeling good still but I knew I had a long way back.  About halfway back I was so winded and hot but I kept pushing myself.  I did walk a bit more but I kept going.  While I was walking I decided to call my nutritionist and see if she could see me that afternoon.  I was feeling good with my exercising and eating but sometimes I just need to touch base with her.  She could see me at 2:30 so I had plenty of time to recover from my crazy bike ride.

I finally made it back to my car (purple circle) and drank lots and lots of water and enjoyed the AC of my car immensely.  I had a great appointment with my nutritionist and I'm planning to keep my appointment with her next week too.  She's helping me keep focused, plus we talked about a lot of things that have been getting in my way of progress this month and I'm more aware so that should help me stay on track.  I have a post coming up about my mentality with "bad foods" which is a big problem for me mentally.

So with my two long bike rides my exercise total is at 206 minutes for my Vacation Challenge.

I'm planning on the gym this morning, I need to give my bike  a rest after two days in a row.  My body is SORE but a good sore, an accomplished sore.  I like it.

I'm looking forward to a lazier day today after the gym, read a bit, catch up on my DVR.

I'm so excited!