Trying to locate the wagon so I can climb back on

In the last three months I've regained 20 lbs.

I am agitated.  About weight and health stuff, about work, about my general sense of purpose/belonging.

I am trying to figure out how to pull things back together, reorganize, direct myself toward personal goals.  The thought of where to start is a little overwhelming and leaves me sitting on the couch.  I hate to even give voice to the things that are weighing on me because that might make them even more real.  So, despite my self-awareness that I should take some of these things on, doing so is likely to cause even greater levels of distress and I am not sure I am equipped right now.

My employer was doing free metabolism tests today so I went in and got that done.  A nutritionist was giving them. It was a train wreck.  The testing part was fine, but then we filled out a ten-item survey that asked questions like "Do you drink 8 glasses of water a day? Do you exercise 3 times a week?  Do you eat 5 servings of vegetables a day?"  The questions that I responded "no" to (honestly), she "counseled" me by speaking slowly about how to do said things... "You should drink more water.  Here's an idea... keep a bottle of water at your desk and refill it.  Do you think you can try that?" "Try to keep some fruit at home.  Bananas are an example of a fruit. You can do it!"  She didn't ask me anything about myself, where I get stuck, what the barriers are for me.  It made me sad, feels like another disappointment on my journey to try to improve my health.  She kept saying things like "You can do this! You'll feel so much better! If you have a good attitude, things will be good. If you have a negative attitude, things will be bad." Ugh.  she kept bending over to get paperwork, which put her red thong underwear on display. Multiple times.  I know, I have an awful attitude. Obviously this means that things will be bad.

I have that "coming out of my skin" sense of restlessness and discomfort, which is usually reserved for summer break when the busy-ness stops long enough for me to settle in to my existential anxiety. It shouldn't be hitting the first day of a 4-day weekend.  But here we are.

It's not like I have nothing to do, I have plenty to do. I have a podcast project that I was initially very enthusiastic about, but I have settled in to a serious case of impostor's syndrome which has led me to question what right I have to say anything about anything, and has frozen me in my tracks.  I have also been replaying a pretend conversation in my head that I would like to have with co-workers about how their gossiping behavior is certainly as splitting and isolating as any that they complain is perpetuated by other people's behavior. On the other hand I am trying to convince myself to just STFU and keep quietly so I can peacefully (??)  avoid the drama.  Trying to be with people who are mired in dysfunction fuels my sense of anxiety, pulling away fuels my awful sense of isolation.

Meanwhile, I just want to shove every piece of chocolate in my mouth that is within commuting range.  And no amount of water bottles at my desk is going to fix that.

I'm still here

I haven't updated in months.  I don't have much to update.  I haven't gained a pound in months, or lost a pound for that matter. I've been slow to do a lot of things.  I am still going to Weight Watchers meetings most of the time, but I am not really tracking or following the points program.  I am not doing low carb anymore.  I am not going to the gym much.  I am not walking much.

So what am I doing?  I am working a lot.  This is one of my triggers.  I gain weight, typically, when I work too much.  I put on 100 lbs over the few years that I was working 60plus hours a week.  I was able to lose weight over the last year in part because my work schedule was more relaxed.  But it's creeping back up on me, and I tend to jump in to work and not take very good care of myself.

I have been struggling against depression.  I am feeling lonely. I don't get out much. Between the lack of physical activity, working too much, and lack of human connection, I am just feeling down.  I have struggled against depression at several different times in my life.  My mom and grandma both struggled with depression in big ways.  I know I am prone and that I need to watch myself.  I was thinking about trying meds again, but have been slow about it, I keep thinking it will resolve on its own.  I went to the gym one day last week and felt great, so I kept thinking if I can only manage to get myself there I'll feel better.  But it was my first time in months, and I haven't been back.

I have been traveling a lot for work. The trips have been fun and they've been good for professional networking and development. But they throw everything off... I have to catch up at work, I eat out, I get thrown off any kind of eating/sleeping schedule.  The travel is hard on my health routines even when I enjoy it.

That's where I've been.  I am trying not to beat myself up since I lost 60 lbs this year.  That's a big deal.  Even though all those pounds were in the first eight months of the year, I've maintained.  I am going to try to pull myself back together for the new year.  Wish me luck.  Hope you out there are doing ok.  xo

all about me

So here's my update.

I've had a frustrating 3+ weeks losing and gaining the same three lbs, bouncing between 207-210.

I could be all strengths-perspective about it and say yay, I've maintained good weight loss.  But I admit, it's frustrating.

I am doing the right things... eating healthy, 1200-1400 calories a day.  I am active- 10,000 steps (about 5 miles) a day.  I ran my first 5k last weekend (45 minutes.. not fast, but I did it, jogged most of the way.)

I haven't been to the gym much and need to get back to it.  I am not eating enough vegetables.  I am still low-carby but more like under 100g than under 20g, so not in ketosis. But that's ok. I am eating food that fills me, mostly not processed, no high sugar.

I haven't thrown everything out the window like I've done in the past. I am not soothing myself with cake and ice cream.  I am still in the game, but I am frustrated.

I was feeling sulky and was wondering if maybe I was depressed.  I have family and personal history of depression.  But I think it's actually the opposite is true... I am feeling healthier and more active, and craving more activity and interaction and am frustrated about my struggle in finding community. Although work is generally good and I like where I am, I don't have anyone to adventure with and am feeling bummed out about it.  And maybe I am not trying hard enough or feeling too old and specific about what kind of company I want.  But I had friends and community in my old towns and it's not happening for me here and I don't know what that means for me.

I will try to up my activity a bit and get back to veggies and keep doing what I am doing and keep thinking about how I want to spend my time.

This post has a lot of "I's".

/selfabsorbedreflection

Update on weight loss, low carb diet, etc.

The new semester has started, and I am falling in to it. Each semester is like a restart point, a new group of students, a new opportunity to re-evaluate goals and reflect on the last season, a new set of things that need to be done.  Mostly I am feeling lucky to be where I am, although too busy with details.  I need to carve out time this semester to work on my own priorities and to figure out my real goals (beyond surviving another semester).

I have also just survived a visit home to see family, which is trying in its own ways. I love my family very much. There are reminders of my mom (my best friend) who died 5 years ago in her 50s.  During this visit I took my dad to the emergency room after a heart attack scare (no evidence of a heart attack after 5 hours in the ER, but still scary.)  He has high blood pressure, cholesterol, diabetes.  My sister is there, and I'd buy the moon for her if I could, but feel like I really can't help at all, and I wish she wasn't sad.  My nieces are adorable and I long for them and feel guilty I am not there every time I leave.  We had celebrations and a party and I saw extended family. Everyone comments on how I look (code for weight; "you look good!" or "you look tired") whether it is up or down... luckily it was down this visit.  I ate a lot, drank a lot, and was eventually glad it was all over.

I am still using my fitbit and LOVE it. I love the charts and graphs and datapoints and everything about it. It makes me walk more. I highly recomend it if numbers and graphs motivate you. If not the $100 fitbit, then even a $30 pedometer helps (or at least helped me pre-fitbit).

I am down to 209 naked this week. I had a big loss in the last week, about 7 lbs, half of it (I presume) water weight after returning to my low-carb diet.  The diet experiment has gone ok.  I am eating very low carb, which means less than 30 grams a day. This means mostly meat and vegetables. I am eating more of both of those things than usual, and no: candy/treats/chips/breads.  I have been researching this like crazy, reading all the literature, which basically says that people on low carb diets lose weight and it's generally not unhealthy, although it can be, just like any other diet.  Personally, this is what I have found:

• it makes me feel full sooner, sometimes I can eat 1000 cal a day
• I peed on a stick, and yes, I have ketones in my pee. I like the science-y proof of diet-related tests, but am a little troubled by the biochemical changes. What does it REALLY mean that your brain usually uses carbs for energy and has to change processes in order to use fat? 
• eating 1000 cal a day makes me a little lightheaded/dizzy
• low carb followers will say potassium/etc, drink broth... but I'd rather just eat food and not be dizzy
• I usually do not get enough protein in even on a meat diet
• I still have some concerns about nutrition related to this diet
• There is a super-great supportive community at reddit.com/r/keto and it always helps to set a goal with a supportive community.  I need community.  More than I currently have.
• I pee all the time- the diet is dehydrating, and I am worried this is not so good for me
• I have lost weight.  About 10 lbs in 6 weeks, which is just slightly above what I was doing on WW alone, although I was hungrier on straight WW (was actually eating under points because I wasn't losing on full points.
• I am more aware of what I eat and I eat less junk.

I haven't stopped doing low carb yet, but probably will slowly start adding in some things like sweet potatoes to eat a more "paleo" clean diet- although I am not giving up dairy.  So my basic plan is to keep eating veggies, a little more fruit, avoid processed food. I'd like to go back to doing some spinach and fruit shakes, which really helped me with my veggie intake and filled me up and made me feel good.

I feel really good about my weight loss.  Today I am wearing a shirt that I've been carrying around 15 years because I love it, although this is the first time it fits in all that time.  I feel like my head is finally around this.

Five years ago I had weight loss surgery.  I had a lapband placed.  I was up and down with it... starting over 300 lbs and then down to 280 by the surgery date (mandated pre-surgery loss) and down to 265 after a few weeks on liquids right after surgery.  I made it to a brief 250 when the band was really tight and I was puking a lot. Really, I never knew whether I was going to be able to eat a meal or not.  I had most of the tightness ("fill") removed from the band and was eventually creeped back to 270 lbs.  I haven't seen the weight loss surgery doctor in a few years, but sometimes something still doesn't go down right and I have to "walk it off" in hopes that the too-big chunk will pass down my esophagus. It is often unpredictable.

  I suspect that the lapband helps in some sense to keep me feeling fuller now.  I certainly can't gorge on bread. If I try, it will make me feel tight in my throat and then eventually feel sick- saliva wells up until it can't be swallowed and I have to puke it up. It's all pretty disturbing.  Obviously my head was not in a good enough place post-surgery to make the most of the lapband tool.  Now, more often than not, I do not know that it is there. I can eat most foods and automatically avoid the ones I can't. It trained me to chew my food better. At this point I don't know whether I would have been as successful with my current loss without the surgery or not. It is probably helping some but the big change had to happen in my head, and it has.  I had to make a plan and stick to it.  I had to stop giving up.  I had to stop eating sugar because I don't eat it in moderation.  I know that diets, long term, are very unsuccessful, and that surgery has a greater risk of long term success.  I don't think I regret doing it. I am happy I finally know how to make my head work, and will take along whatever other tools will help me make it through.  I don't tell usually tell people about the surgery because I don't want the baggage that comes with it- the misunderstandings about what it is, but I guess also probably because of something I internalize about it- that I wasn't strong enough or smart enough or SOMETHING enough to just lose weight.  Well- I am certainly proof that surgery doesn't fix the problem, and if a donut doesn't go down a small hole then ice cream certainly does.  

Food/body/weight/image will always play a big role in my life... it's just the way it is. Since I was in sixth grade and the boy used to yell "earthquake" when I tried to play basketball on the playground, since when I was 10 and I kept my legs from resting on the seat of the chair in class so that they didn't press down and spread out and show their full width- since then, my fate has been sealed.  I wish I could tuck all this away and say that being big and beautiful and confident and healthy and active is part of my world, but it isn't.  I have fibromyalgia and my body aches. It aches worse when I am fat. It weighs heavy on all my bones.  So I have to do this- I have to stick with it, and I have to take care of my body.  I am afraid of killing myself with my fat and it is a big deal that I am finally making changes. And I am happy with the changes- happy I can run across a field, that I can jog to my tight connection at the airport, that I can shop for cheap crappy clothes at Old Navy. That I can wear a 20-year-old tshirt. That I am not "morbidly obese."

It makes me want to be better at everything, to change my whole life. If I can do this, what's to stop me from being a better housekeeper? A better wife, a better organizer, a better researcher and teacher, a better artist. A better friend. A better sister, aunt, mother.  Better at speaking up and letting go.  I want everything. I want to be more present in my life. I want to think about things less and do things more. I want to set goals and achieve them. Clearly this is possible. 

Suddenly July

I have a new Fitbit, which I love. It is an electronic pedometer with a web interface, and automatically uploads your step count (and a few other things- stairs, calories burned) every time you go near your computer.  I like monitoring. You wear it at night and it tells you how many hours you've slept and how many times you woke. I thought I slept a lot more than I actually do.

I also got the scale, which is wifi and uploads your weight and body fat to the site. The accuracy isn't as good as my medical scale. But the charting feature is nice. The body fat is off and jumps around if you weigh yourself consecutively. I am disappointed that it tracks my BMI much higher than online calculators, but it is probably more accurate.  :O

fitbit, under $100 at Amazon, no subscription fee

I have been trying a very low carb diet. I've done tons of reading in scientific journals and feel like the concept is well supported and often leads to good weight loss outcomes, especially in those with a lot to lose.  I've basically cut out all artificial sugar, and most natural sugars as well.  The fat and protein keep me fuller, and the diet has some natural properties that stave off hunger. I am tracking my food and shooting for a 1000 calorie deficit each day, which is safe and should lead to a 2 lb a week loss.  I have not seen the immediate results I hoped for, and my weight loss stalled for a week (I gained 1.5 lbs actually!) even though it made no sense because I have had a 1,000 calorie per day deficit (between food and exercise).  I should have lost 2 lbs a week.  Anyway... I am hanging in and trying to let my body adjust to it all.  It is hard to never eat a break-room cookie, and I miss some foods, but I am certainly paying attention to what I eat.

Today I appear to be down to about 218 naked, which is about 221 fully clothed, which means 5 lbs in 3 weeks if it sticks. Not amazing but stll moving in the right direction.  Sometimes I feel like I am working so hard and the payoff should be more substantial. Seems like it comes on so easy.  But... I am in it for the long haul. I never want to weigh 300 lbs again.

In a few weeks I am going to a wedding and to see my family. I was really hoping that I would be down to 210 by then- don't know why, except that I can hardly remember the last time I was down that low. It looks like I won't quite make it. I am the biggest person in my family and feel judged all the time. People make fat jokes. Never directed at me, but I still feel it.  I have to try to hang up my fat baggage and have a good time but it's tough.

The summer's been hot and humid and I do most of my walking very late at night, like 11pm. I am looking forward to cooler weather, but not to the ice that will eventually come.

All for today- I'll report back, maybe with a wedding pic.  :)

Summer sunshine

I've been busy, traveling for work a lot over the last month. The good news is that  I have stayed on task and have been losing weight. I am down to 225 with clothes and shoes on!  Huzzah! It's been a long time.

I finally worked up the bravery to post progress pics on my page, so if you're reading via feed hop on over and check on my progress.  It's coming!

I am still going to WW meetings but I have stopped counting points and am currently counting carbs and calories.  I just started a trial of sugar free/ketosis diet. I'll let you know how it goes. So far- less hungry.

July is my designated extreme fitness month.  I am gonna go to the gym 3 times a week and I will walk 10k steps a day (about 4.5 mi) on non-gym days.  I am in a wedding and have a visit home in August and then classes start for Fall, so it's my slowest month of summer and I want to make the most of it! Who's with me??

I haven't been running, but have been wearing a pedometer, and am walking 7500-10,000 steps most days, at least 5 days a week, and more often 10k. Maybe I'll go back to running some days in July. I feel like I haven't lost or gained ground in that area, and I am ok with that for now.  :)

Hope you're having a healthy feel-good-about-you summer too!

Still here

It's been a slow-going month, but on the WW scale this week: 235 lbs. I'm still in it to win it.  :)

Trying to get back on track

So far this week I have made it to the gym twice, and was down 2 lbs today at WW, so back under 240 (239, in fact- but only because they make us wear clothes at these meetings.) Though I was a bit grumpy in my last post, I am mostly optimistic about this work and feel like I am in a pretty good head space. I am working hard and making progress. Even in weeks that I don't have much loss, my clothes are still fitting much better than they did when I started. I am managing my emotions and not eating to self-soothe.

I scaled back to week 1 on the C25k program after two months of not going to the gym at all. But I did my usual 45 minutes Sunday and then went back yesterday and stayed on week 1 but picked up the pace a little bit. My pace was not off much from where I was last, considering my long absence.

My eating has been good, although I have not been good at tracking my WW points. Actually, I know I am eating quite a bit less than my daily points, not eating any of the weekly points or activity points. My metabolism is slow and I know we hear that we need to eat enough to keep it up, but I've done the research and the reading I've done suggests it really only slows at under 800 calories or so... and I am not eating that little.  Probably closer to 1200-1400 calories, although WW says I should be closer to about 1800 because of my size.  Anyway. I am working really hard to avoid simple carbs.  These have been my go-to foods:  chiobani greek yogurt, spinach and cherry tomatoes, spinach/fruit smoothies, chicken.  I tend to eat pretty light throughout the day until dinner, and then whatever my husband sticks on the plate at dinner, but he's trying hard to be supportive and has helped scale back the too-big portions that he's prone to serve up.

This week marks the end of our academic semester, and I lost a total of 31 lbs this term. Nothing to scoff at, huh?  And, I can officially say that I now REALLY "only" have 100 lbs to lose according to the WW goal... I never wanted to say "130 lbs to lose" but it sure will feel nice to have "less than 100 lbs" to lose. It feels achievable.  Ok, maybe I can't imagine myself weighing 138 lbs, but it certainly feels like 200 lbs is within my reach.

Here is a picture of me right after my treadmill run, red-faced and exhausted and sweaty. I haven't worked up the courage to post body shots yet. Maybe I will regret it later but I've spent so many years trying to keep my body out of any photo that it is hard to get in front of the camera now to allow people to gawk at how terribly heavy and round I am. Maybe I'll reconsider this next week or so.

I have weaned off Skinny Cow (because I am trying so hard to avoid HFCS in all forms) and have transitioned to frozen bananas, which I make in to an ice cream-like treat in my Yonana Ice Cream Maker. Check it out on Amazon, I'll post a product review in the next few weeks.  :)  Really pretty good.

Also- pedometer- it's nice to track steps and is sometimes motivating, and isn't as big of a pain to wear as I had imagined. If nothing else, it helps confirm or refute my own perception of how much walking I've done. And it's eerily accurate, even when I walk/jog on the treadmill.  The one I am using is made by Omron and was $30. It does so many things that I don't even know how to use all the functions- but I can scroll through each day in the memory since I started using it, and it calculates in steps,miles,  km, and calories. It has a total number based on my start date as well as a daily number. (300,000 steps since I started using it, I'm averaging about 7k a day).

That's all tonight... if you stumble upon this I hope that you are encouraged in your own journey. The path is bumpy for each of us- just keep putting one foot in front of the other.

Still here

I think I am ready to get back to the gym.  I am finally wrapping up my first year at the university, and summer will allow me a lot more time to get refocused. If I can make good habits during the summer, surely they will last in to the next school year?

I have had frustration with weight loss.  I feel like I have been working really hard with food, and dipped down below 240 finally but then shot back up to 243. Although this is a small fluctuation, I have been in this range for 3 weeks and felt like a huge failure. Then got stuck in a cycle of negative thinking... "this is because of that waffle I ate last week, I make horrible choices" (not true, the waffle was not bad at all!) and "why even bother" and my other self-talk ranged between things in the "eat whatever, it doesn't matter, you'll always be fat" and "liquid diet- fast, spinach smoothies- it's the only way" type extremes. I know this isn't reasonable, and I haven't acted on any of these thoughts... but that's where my head is.

So... on the WW scale I am back to 240, which is still 30 lbs down from where I started. We're going to the gym tonight. I am going to try to pick up a yoga class and maybe some others this summer.

I have been wearing a pedometer, and it's helped a little bit to have a target. I have hit 5000 steps most days this week.

eating real food, sitting on my butt

I hate it when I find a blog where someone's gonna do something and then the posts just stop.  Did that wanna-be runner finish the marathon and get too busy to blog, or backslide in to milkshakes and quicksand?  So I am going to try not to do that.

I have not been going to the gym.  I am not moving hardly at all to tell the truth. And I feel shitty about it. And I have the will to do something, but having a hard time with action.  I have a membership at a great gym, and a husband who will go out with me if I prompt, but it's just not happening.

I have been doing really well with food though.  I've tried to cut out most processed foods.  I am still eating canned beans and a few low-processed foods, but not much.  I started making green smoothies.   They look awful but you really can't taste the spinach at all so they are mostly fruity. It's a guaranteed way to get in fruits and veggies.  I feel pretty good about what I'm eating for the most part.  I even tried bake kale with garlic salt, and it was just fine.  I am saying no to crappy food almost always.  And I am still not drinking soda- this is my longest without soda ever.  I used to drink a six pack of diet coke a day sometimes, and now I am drinking tons of water.

Last week at Weight Watchers official weigh-in I hit 25 lbs lost. (Actually down 26 since Jan).  If I lose this week I'll hit my 10%... 27 lbs lost of my 270 lb official weigh-in.  My weight watchers "goal weight" is 138 lbs, so maybe in the next few weeks I'll be an ACTUAL 100 lbs from my "goal weight"- although right now I can't even imagine weighing that little. (Last time I weighed that was in 9th grade, and only for a few minutes.  Of course, I thought I was a cow.)  If I get to 180 I think I'll be feeling pretty great.

So- I am making progress.  Not as fast as my 2 lb a week the first month or so, but still on average losing over a pound a week.  Slow and steady wins the race, right?

Tomorrow I start a fitness challenge at work, and I am hoping it will help me  kick the activity back up.  I know I need it.

Here's a green Smoothie recipe:
1 banana (frozen or not, but I like frozen), cut into chunks
8 frozen strawberries
1½ cups water OR orange juice OR other juice (I've used light cranberry)
2½ cups baby spinach
1-2 tbsp. honey or stevia/splenda (optional)
1 serving protein powder (optional)

You can really mix up this set of ingredients. I pour my liquid in a
bit at a time until it's enough, usually 1-1.5 cup. I prefer the fruit
frozen- if you use fresh, you can use less liquid and add a few ice
cubes. Water really is a fine mixer, but for a stronger fruit taste
use a juice or juice/water mix. In the blender, add some dense items,
then spinach, then more dense items, and pour the liquid over
everything and use the pulse or "Blended Drink" function.

Other good possible additions, depending on desired flavor, are
pineapples, apples, celery, kale, cucumbers (peeled), PB2. Search the
internet for "green smoothie" and lots of things will pop up! Some
people add flax seed or chai seeds for more bulk. Don't look at it,
just drink it.

losing it

It's been almost exactly a month since I worked out, and just made it to the gym today.  This is no way to sustain a habit. I went on two different work-related trips, each for a week. It was very hard to keep up with my c25k program during my trips. Then I came back to piles of work, feeling overwhelmed, and a little bit of feeling generally run down.

However, there is a positive side:
1. During my trips I kept my meals reasonable, didn't gain any weight, and even lost a tiny tiny bit.
2. I had some bad days but didn't throw all my progress out the window.
3. I've stuck with my Weight Watchers meetings, am still tracking my food, and have been down every week, if only a little bit.
4. Today I went back to the gym, got on the treadmill, and did almost as good as I did in my last workout.

The treadmill was tougher today. My heart rate didn't recover as fast.  Running 90 seconds straight was more difficult than I remembered.  I scaled back to Week 2 (I was week 3 last time I worked out) and it was tough.  But I did it- my whole 45 minute routine.

At my last weigh in, I was at 246.6 on the WW scale, which is down about 23 lbs since I started all of this.

I have a lot of different things brewing in my head, and wrote some blog posts in my mind over the last several weeks since my last post.  One of the things I've been thinking a lot about is my mixed feelings about people commenting on my weight loss.

I am working hard and it is sort of nice that people are noticing. Several people at work have commented on how "great" I am looking. Some people have asked how many pounds.  I appreciate the well-intended support. The other side of that is the icky feeling that people are looking at me, judging my body, and that thinner= better, great, is something to celebrate. What if I don't keep it off? What about the fact that my body is still so far away from "greatness"?  What about me being great no matter my size?

Even though I work in a place of highly educated folks (most of my coworkers have graduate degrees/PhD's) in a helping profession, lots of them have their own food issues. There are a lot of women fretting about their weight in my workplace. When I told my program director that I am enjoying my Skinny Cow ice cream, she shared that she didn't like them ever since she came home after a hard day of work and finished off a whole box of them. Made her sick.  Food issues.  The idea that thin women have it figured out, are healthy, don't have food issues is not true.

Women with 20 lbs to lose often comment on their grotesqueness in front of me with little thought about how that might make me feel. Perhaps it is supposed to be some kind of bonding ritual, but it gives me a sinking feeling. If they hate their bodies, what must they think about mine? It happens constantly, and has my whole life in every workplace I've ever spent time in. Maybe they think I will relate. I don't want to hear it though. I am doing my own work- have been to counseling, used trainers, and throughout my life been on every diet. I have taken extreme measures to try to escape my fat. Now I have switched gears, am trying to be kind to myself. I don't want anything to do with their body hate.

I stay silent when this happens. Perhaps I should speak up. I am also scared of being an outsider though, and don't know if I really want people to stop commenting on how "great" I am looking. Cue internal conflict.

I guess what I want is for people to cheer me toward my goals without judgement. As if I were rebuilding a car instead of becoming less hideous.  "Go you!" without the judgement. "How great of you to be healthy" without the "I need to get off my fat ass too! Good thing you're finally doing something about your fat ass!"

In one of my classes last week we were talking about eating disorders. Although we talk about this as a clinical issue, nowhere in our program are issues of body image and women dismantled. I gave it a few minutes because the students were engaged. They began sharing their own stories. One woman talked about her friends giving her a hard time for looking too thin "and sickly." She said she was at a healthy weight when this happened. Perhaps it is coming from a place of concern, but that everyone feels such permission to comment on our bodies with judgement seems so invasive. Why is it such a public exercise? I would not comment on a co-workers breast size (unless we were pretty close) or make public critical comments about where they got their degrees.  That we can talk so much about our own weight and the weight of others speaks to the way that women's bodies are commodified in the media and society, valued by some ideal shape-- it is normal to dish and diss. And we internalize it in such a way to believe it- whether we like to think we do or not.

Perhaps I needed to process some of my internal conflict about this here, and say to someone- whoever is reading this- that I value my body. I love that it is allowing me to move, to gain speed, to pick me up every day and carry me around. It is doing this even though I am still 100 lbs overweight. It works pretty well for me. I don't hate my fat. I am glad to be working toward my own definition health, but I will never have a figure that is prized by the media. I refuse to sit in the break room and talk about how fat I am. I am a whole person, a good person, no matter my shape. I am taking care of myself. I like who I am.  Not some future version of myself, but who I am today, right now.
(/internalconflict)

There's a 5k at the end of April. I am going to sign up. I don't really have a time goal or a run goal or anything else. I'd like to finish it. I did a 5k a few years ago, walked the whole thing, and finished that. I'll try to jog a little bit of this next one.

That's all for tonight. Thanks for sticking with me.

Checking in

Forgive me Blogger, it's been 10 days since my last post.

I came down with an ear infection, now a cold, and backed it up with a case of lazy. The last time I posted was the last time I went to the gym.  :/

Tomorrow I leave for a conference for a week on the West Coast, so I will not go to the gym.  Hopefully I will spend some time walking in the city.

The good news is that I am down to 245 lbs (naked at home early in the morning), which is the lowest weight that I have been in many many years. (Probably the first time since 2003). My official WW weigh-in is 248.6 (they make me wear clothes, and I weigh in the afternoon with shoes on.)  That means I am down 21 lbs. Not bad for two months, huh?  :)

I am doing great with water drinking. My challenge continues to be to get/keep my fruits and veggies up.  I am doing the best right now with baby spinach, grapefruit, and frozen bananas.

Week 2, c25k

Went to the gym tonight first time since my week off for vacation.  I did the C25K Week 2 again, officially my third time doing it but spread over two weeks.  I am really making progress- my walking speed is up to 3.5-3.6, which was my jogging speed when I started.  My jogs are up to 4.0-4.1 (and occasionally 4.2).  My heart rate tonight was up higher than it has been, and when I was 5 minutes from being done I got pretty bad cramps (but kept going).  I burned almost 400 calories and went 2.75 miles in 45 minutes!  (last best was 2.69- yay me!) My son went along and walked 3 miles in 30 minutes, but he's 100 lbs lighter than me so I'll chalk it up to that.  I feel victorious.

My eating has been good, and I was down 1 lb at weigh in at my WW meeting today.  Really, based on food alone, I feel like I should have lost more than that.  But my weight just doesn't come off unless I am exercising too. I hate to admit it because I hate exercising. But my metabolism is crap and I think my body will just keep adjusting to calorie deficit unless I keep my body moving.

I am starting to feel the difference, and am excited by being so close to losing 20 lbs.  I hate to project way in to the future (and then beat myself up later) but if I can keep up 1-2 lbs a week and exercising on plan, I could be running and getting close to a normal weight at the end of the year. The thought of having all the clothing choices that come with normal sized stores is exciting. (Heck, even broadening my selection at the goodwill is exciting.) One foot in front of the other!

I have only been doing c25k- no other exercise- and am feeling like I need to get in some strength training now. I am losing weight in my arms and they are feeling flappier.  There is a 30 min sculpt class on Tues/Thurs at 5, and I am thinking I should go check it out.

still working on it!

I am just back from a week's vacation, which is customarily excuse to eat, drink, and play. Although I have not been to the gym in a week or kept up with my running (no excuses, I took my running shoes), I did a good job of making healthy choices, not eating until I was sick, and taking opportunities when I could to be active (a few steep sets of stairs, running on the beach.)  Tomorrow's weigh-in day and I think I'll be down a pound, which is good news in my book.  Down 17 lbs total at last weigh-in, I am inching toward the 20 lb mark in only two months. I am still tracking my WW points, still going to meetings. I'll report back!

C25k Week 2

Today was my first time running  jogging and walking through the C25k at Week 2. I have done the week 1 routine about 8 times now... That's a 5 min warm up, 90 sec walk, 60 sec run, X9 and then cool down.  I actually stretch it out a bit because I want to build a little more endurance- I got for 45 minutes, which is about 12 cycles.  Anyway, today I started the Week 2 program, which is 90 sec of running.  I didn't realize that Week 2 also gives you a longer walking time- 2 minutes- this helped recover from the time added to the run.

Verdict: it didn't kill me. And that's great news.  :)  I went 2.63 miles in 45 minutes, which is still turtle-pace compared to anyone who runs, but pretty speedy for me.  I have bumped my regular walking speed up to 3.4mph, and my running speed up to 3.8-4.0, so you can see I am making tiny progress.

My legs feel pretty ok. I have a bad ankle and it is a bit irritated by this routine, but not to the extent that I feel like I shouldn't do it.  I posed some questions about whether to reach for speed or bump up my running time over in the Runner's World forums, and everyone said running time was priority, so that's why I decided to move on to Week 2.  Some of the more experienced folks there also advised that maybe I shouldn't be trying to do the minimus shoes because of my size, and more support might be better.  I don't know, I am torn about it... I think I'll stay in these shoes as long as they continue to be comfortable.

On the home scale I was down to 249 this morning (but was a little dehydrated, so we'll see if it sticks!) which is my lowest weight in about 3 years.  And when I weighed that for a minute 3 years ago, I was hardly eating.  So I am feeling generally victorious about this whole thing- that's about 16 lbs since the new year.  :)  I sure hope it keeps coming.

Eating's going ok. I am eating a lot of beans. I am trying to avoid carbs, but am not swearing off of them.  Good days and bad days getting fruit and veggies in. In reality I am usually eating fewer points than my daily and not eating enough bulky food. I am trying to make good choices and focus on my hunger. Some days are better than others. I am going to my WW meetings.  Next week I fly to the West Coast for a while, hopefully I can stay on track away from home.

If anyone's reading this, hope you're well- have a great week!

good food and making progress

I am eating grapefruit, also like it cold... just peeling it and eating by the section. Good fiber in grapefruit. Also- cherry tomatoes make me happy. Sometimes in my spinach salad but sometimes just on their own. :) My son and I share a love of cucumbers with vinegar, and we had those this week.

I have been eating baby spinach almost every day. I love it, I'd say one of my top foods these days (and I didn't really start eating it until a few months ago.) I usually eat it with lemon juice. Sometimes with a bit of chicken breast on top.  I get it in the big grocery containers and each one lasts about a week. Once it starts to get soggy it's all over with... has to be dry and fresh. I am so happy to find greens that I like.

My kiwi experiment went pretty well. I ate about 6 kiwi's last week. They were fairly easy to bring to work. I discovered that I like them much better cold. They started getting a little soft/mushy after about 8 days.

I tried this recipe for broccoli:  http://www.amateurgourmet.com/2008/11/the_best_brocco.html and it came out pretty well. My son and I split a whole tray of it for a late-night snack. It's not as soft as steamed and not as firm as barely-steamed... (that's an awful description).  I didn't find it to have a slightly baked texture, which is what I expected. But still good- we ate it all.  Tonight I had broccoli from one of the Green Giant steamer bags with cheese. Pretty healthy, but I am trying to eat fresh (not processed) as much as possible, and I am sure the cheese has funky stuff in it.

Wait... yes, here's my hive mind.  Broccoli and cheese ingredients: 

Broccoli in a Sauce Containing Water, Modified Corn Starch, Chicory Root Extract, Cheddar Cheese (Milk, Cheese Cultures, Salt, Enzymes), Baker's Cheese (Skim Milk, Lactic Acid, Cheese Cultures, BHA [Preservative]), Salt, Butter, Whey Protein Concentrate, Whey, Onion Powder, Sodium Phosphate, Sodium Alginate, Hydrolyzed Corn Gluten, Xanthan Gum, Parmesan Cheese (Milk, Cheese Cultures, Salt, Enzymes), Natural and Artificial Flavor, Garlic Powder, Autolyzed Yeast Extract, Dextrose, Buttermilk, Paprika and Annatto Extract Colors, Disodium Inosinate, Disodium Guanylate.

uh,yeah, who needs all of that? I will just get more fresh broccoli. Anyway... moral of the story... I am not eating 7 servings of fruit and vegetables a day (what percent of Americans do you think really do that??) but I am eating way more veggies than I have in my whole entire life and feeling accomplished.

At this week's WW meeting I weighed in down -2.2, which brings me up to 12 lbs lost in about 5 weeks. Go me! My gym stuff has been going just so-so... still just doing my C25k, but only making it to the gym like 2-3 times a week vs my goal of 3-4 times a week. Today I planned to go but came home and took a nap instead.  It's back on the calendar for tomorrow.  When I went to the gym last on Tuesday though I felt like I was close to being ready to do Week 2 of the program- so I am going to try to bump up to that next week.

We have a nice gym with lots of fancy equipment, and I have been to the gym,used trainers, etc in the past.  I would like to find an app that gives me a suggested routine that I can alter using the machines. I prefer them to free weights because of various injuries.  There are a zillion apps but they are all based on free weights... so if you find one that uses gym machines let me know.  I don't want to use a trainer because at my university gym they are (a) not used to working with fat people, and (b) generally know nothing about fibromyalgia and other issues specific to my body.  I need to listen to my body and pace myself, and can't work with some young trainer with a "work it til you feel it" mentality or else I will not be able to crawl back to the gym for two weeks. I am really trying to avoid the routine of overdoing.  That said, I guess I shouldn't beat up on myself for only going a few times a week so far... I didn't go at all for the six months prior, so this is progress.

I did get new walking/running shoes, the Minimalist from New Balance. I've only worn them once so far. I ordered a half-size up, which is good advice- they run small. Since I am heavy I have always purchased shoes with tons of cushion. Cushioned shoes typically also make your foot rigid. The Minimus has support, but they are super light weight and not rigid at all so your foot can bend, which changes your running form.  I felt like I was able to move faster in them, but also found that I worked new muscles which made me a little sore. I hope they turn out to be good for me. They get great reviews on Amazon, where I got mine. I kinda love the daring yellow and the bright blue sole.  

back on the treadmill

I got back to the gym tonight- the last time I was there was last Sunday. I expected to have lost momentum but I did pretty good.  I am still slow like a turtle, dreaming of the day I'll work up to even a 4mph jogging pace.  But I was at least as fast as the last time I was at the gym.

2.5 mi, 338 calories burned, avg heart rate 154

I am still doing the first week of the C25k program but it's getting a little easier.  The program is 5 min of warm up walk, 60 second jog, 90 second walk, 60 second jog, repeat 9 times... followed by a cool down. I have been pretty consistently reaching 2.5 miles in 50 minutes.  Today I tried to split up my 60 second runs- using half to jog at slow pace and half to jog at a faster pace. (My times are really slow... this usually means 3.6 and then 3.9, and my walking pace is 3.3).  I am hoping that this propels my routine a little bit so I don't get stuck.

Because of my weight I am worried about injures or pushing myself along too quickly, so I will stay at Week 1 a little longer. I felt like I could have gone faster today, but my heart rate was registered at max (163) and I didn't want to have a heart attack in the gym, so I am hoping my cardio improves a little and my heart rate comes down- this will give me confidence to push a little harder.

I hate lacing up and getting out there.  But I feel good when I am done! My goal this week is every other day at the gym.

slow progress, mindful thoughts

After my husband (and workout buddy) slipped on the ice and tore his hamstring last week, I stopped going to the gym. I haven't been to the gym since last Sunday, so when I go later today it will have been seven days since my last visit. I know this is not the way to my running goal. I  have felt sloshy and unmotivated. My eating is off (I am still under my WW points limit, but eating fewer veggies and more carbs) and have been sooo tired.  I have been weighing myself daily (I know, bad thing to do, but I do it) and then beating myself up after finding myself up a pound.  (Self talk: this is never going to work, I work so hard and gain weight, why bother at all, might as well go have a milkshake and be happy.)

I distract myself with the internet, randomness, tv, radio, all the things that keep me tuned out. So my goal this week is to work on mindfulness. I am going to work on self kindness, paying attention to how I am doing, to my hunger, to whether I am focusing on thoughts that are useful and healthy.  I will try to focus on self-thoughts that affirm my health, my progress, and my positive goals. I will also work on getting my veggies back up and carbs down because it will make me feel more energetic and less hungry.

I was at a lecture last week and the speaker talked about a study that suggested we have between 40,000-60,000 thoughts each day, and that 80% of them are negative. This may have served us well as cavemen when there were so many things in the world to be worried about.  But today we mostly live to old ages and there are fewer legitimate worries. That leaves a lot more room for positive thoughts.  Try it with me?

My love-hate relationship with Weight Watchers

So far I've been on Weight Watchers for 3 weeks. Here's the top five list of reasons that I love to hate and hate to love the program.

5. The "eat less/move more" chatter. I find it over-simplistic, and resent that people are always going on with the "eat less/move more" thing (especially thin people, especially thin people who can eat all day and never gain a pound, especially thin doctor people who tell me that I have a cold because I am fat and I should just eat less and move more and then want me to be suddenly enlightened because they have given me the Answer to the Universe). Ok, fine. It's good and basic. But it does not address issues like metabolism, genetics, problems real people have with moving more, eating less, etc. And it causes such a visceral reaction for me because I've seen doctors for years who think every ailment I've ever had is weight-related, from an ear infection to a broken toe.

4. The crappy online interface.  Although the options for recording food are pretty simple and user friendly, I can't enter simple exercises such as a run at a certain speed for a certain time. And the points offered for activities are not based on my weight. The group formats are crappy, as are the challenge format. These guys have money spilling out of boxes- $40 a month per person, you think they could hire a GD web developer to neaten this stuff up. The website should be so super-charged that people are fighting to get in. There are better ad-supported sites (oh yeah, their site also has ads) out there on the interwebs. Really, get it together WW.

3. The lack of nutritional tracking. And I am pretty sure "points plus" is not designed to simplify eating for the end-user-- it keeps the measurements propitiatory so that you need to be a member to figure out your points and how much to eat. It does not allow one to track nutritional information to see the split of carbs/fat/protein. It does not track calories or vitamins. I would like to see the whole picture. Sometimes I double track in a free program to see these other things- why couldn't they incorporate a system like this?

2. The weight-focused philosophy. It's all about how many pounds. Although I am trying to keep a healthy mindset and escape from my lifelong scale-focused fight with my health, this brings everything back to the digits on the scale.  Meeting handouts say things like "what were you doing the last time you lost weight?"  Goals are weight-focused, high-fives are weight-focused, success stories are weight focused.

1. The Happy Meeting People. The leaders of these meetings are so cheery, and may very well remind you that they have Kept The Weight Off, even if it's their post-baby weight and it was only 20 lbs. It does not endear me to their plight or make me feel more optimistic about my lifetime struggle with weight and the 100 lbs I have left to lose. Occasionally there's the Meeting Confessional where someone admits to eating the Whole Box of Cookies and shames herself in front of the group (and then gets a star for admitting it out loud). I usually feel like I know more about food, nutrition, health, and exercise than these folks who want to give me a sticker for being "On Target" every time I open my mouth. (I have neatly saved all of my stars in my weekly weight log-in book, thank you very much.)

I didn't even mention the bounty of stuff for sale at every meeting. I think women trying to lose weight should be a protected class not exposed to the bounty of Things To Buy that will supposedly help make them slim. Most of the women in my New Year's meeting were buying $50 start-up kids that included menu planners, special notebooks for tracking food, the WW calculator and so on. Fortunately (for me) all of this stuff is free on the web and WW does have a few good phone apps as well. At every meeting they also push their expensive snack food and bring free samples to share. I know they won't be sharing veggies at meetings until they figure out how to brand them.

All that said, I am tracking my food like a maniac, weighing in at every meeting, collecting my high-fives like I am on a victory tour, and losing weight. So I'll eat my words (zero points) and keep it up.  I am not turning away any tool that keeps me feeling like I am making healthy progress at this point, and right now WW seems to be helping me toward my goals.

Thinking outside of the box (and can)

I am rebuilding my way of eating. I grew up eating lots of single-serving foods out of the can (Thank Goodness for Chef Boyardee) and, when I became a mother at the age of 18, we continued eating on the go. We ate a lot of fast food, and did little cooking at home. We ate cheap food, which is also notoriously the least healthy. We are horrible at getting in fruits and veggies at an epic level. However, I have often eaten low-calorie- two meals a day, maybe eating out once and a bowl of cereal at home. I have rarely eaten breakfasts in my life. As a result of this and genetic history of family obesity, my metabolism is screwed. Last year I had some testing done which confirmed that I burn calories at an extraordinarily slow rate.  Most people my size would burn in the 2300 calorie range, and my natural sedentary daily burn is closer to 1300 calories as measured in the doctor office. (This can improve with activity level, and i have also taken some prescribed medication off and on that helps a tiny bit.)

Since starting Weight Watchers this month, I've eaten out only a couple times. Therefore, I have had to find ways of preparing easy foods at home. We are still only cooking a few nights a week, and also eating leftovers or quick snacks in between.  My husband and I have dissimilar tastes which makes the process more difficult. Whereas I prefer soups and chili and snacks, he prefers meatier foods. We have swapped out our ice cream habit with Skinny Cow drumsticks, and that helps stave off feelings of deprivation.

My goal is to try a new kind of fruit or vegetable each week to help expand my choices for healthy food. This week I bought kiwis. I am also collecting recipes on pinterest, and the pictures have inspired me. I love allrecipes.com because I can read feedback from others who have tried a meal.

I have also quit my diet coke habit. As hard as I tried to deny it, more and more research is linking diet coke to weight gain. I am trying harder to avoid preservatives and artificial sugars and chemicals in general, which is another reason that makes diet soda a non-starter. I've pretty much stopped diet coke completely since the 1st, and I've made it past the headaches but not the cravings. What I've found is that my water consumption has skyrocketed, and I think that my cravings for sugar are also reduced. I was drinking about 4 cans a day, so this is a big change.

Fewer preservatives means I need to cook more. Since it is often just the two of us eating, and because my hubby's not big on leftovers, I am trying to learn how to moderate portions. I am still trying to figure out how to make tasty veggie sides that work with our meals. I am doing new things. I am loving baby spinach with lemon juice. I have also transitioned to some "sometimes snacks" that are still full of this and that- (like the Skinny Cows even though they contain the dreaded HFCS, and Special K Cracker Chips) as I work on new habits of eating. I am trying to get out of the box.

Learning to run?

Isn't it silly that I need to learn to run? And that even though I've studied and read about running I can't do it? Even though it was a perfectly natural thing to do and proceeded easily from walking when I was just a few years old, now I am a 37 year old fat woman. After many years of college (12 in all) and neglecting my body, I have finally settled in to a less stressful job and am ready to turn some attention inward to take care of myself. Although I know I can never get back what I lost, I feel committed to changing my health and lifestyle.

Along with many other women and men across the world, I decided that the New Year would be a turning point for my health. I have held 266 pounds pretty consistently for the last 4 years, down from a previous high weight of 300. While I know it was good that I got rid of those 30 pounds and it's good that they didn't crawl back on, I still have over 100 extra pounds on my 5'5 frame. I've made half-hearted resolutions before; in fact, it was a ritual when I was growing up. On New Year's Eve my mom and I would go on a candy-bar buying spree and eat as many as we could before midnight. At midnight, the diet was on. Sometimes for a week, sometimes for months, but it never stuck. All those extra pounds were all that stuck. I have struggled with my weight for all of my life.

I joined Weight Watchers on Jan 1. In the last 4 weeks I have lost 10 lbs. I have been going to the gym 3 times a week, 45 minutes on the treadmill each time. I have worked up to about 2.5 miles at a go, and decided I want to go further. And faster!  I want to run.  My only experience with running was when I took it up (in a weight-loss attempt) in my mid 20's, and I worked my way up to 10 mile stints over 6 months.  I was about 80 lbs lighter then and it was HARD TO DO. When my husband returned from his military deployment I went back to grad school and stopped running, and climbed back up from my 190lb running weight to my 235lb grad school weight to my 300lb doctoral program weight.

 But it's a new day. I weigh about 260.  I have slowly started trying to incorporate a jog in to my walks. My walking speed is 3.2-3.4 MPH, and my jogging speed is 3.5-3.7.  So far, I have started jogging for 1 minute for every 5 minutes of walking. It's a slow start, but I don't want to hurt myself. I am running on the treadmill at the gym with no incline. For now my goals are speed and distance.

Last week I tried to start Couch 2 5k. But it was too soon. After two tries of week 1, I ended up with some shin splints. I have decided to move a little slower as a result. Once I get going on the C25K, I will stick with each week until I feel capable of moving on (by being able to finish the previous week, breathe without exhaustion, and no significant pain.) But I hope to use this blog to document my efforts toward health, my C25K experience, my weight loss, and other things related to working toward increased endurance, self care, and self love.

One last thing... I think that I was finally able to get to the point where I am able to really take my health seriously due to the Health At Every Size movement. Fat shaming is wrong. And people can be large and healthy.  I have not been very healthy; although I do not have high cholesterol or high blood pressure or symptoms of heart disease or other things that people assume I must suffer from when they look at me, I do not have the aerobic ability to climb two flights of stairs without losing my breath or to enjoy other outdoor activities I like to do. Feeling healthy is my real goal here, although tracking weight is one way that I will assess my progress. Although I appreciate support toward my goals, I have spent a lifetime hating my fat and am really trying to switch my perspective toward loving myself and striving for health. HAES reinforced the images of large people doing active things happily and that I need not be ashamed of being in public because of my girth.My weight says very little about who I am as a person. In fact, the only thing is REALLY says is that I am fat. I have more general motivation that most people, am more educated about food than many people, and eat better than plenty of thin folks. I know that my weight (and yours) is influenced greatly by genetics, but that there are things I can do to feel healthier.

 I hope that I might be an inspiration to others who are in the same place, but this blog-based documentation is mostly for me, and I have little interest in strictly weight-centered chatter.  I know that for a long time I'll run big and clunky like a rhino, and am not a graceful gazelle. I also know that I have power, and that anyone who doubts me better just get out of my way because I'm coming through.