Progress

Well. 9 days into the new year and I'm actually feeling pretty good about how things are going. Could I be better? Of course! But I'm pleased with the decisions I've made. I've tried a new food already. Finished burning some of my CD's, I've created and have been sticking to a working out routine. I've been dairy free 4 out of 9 days. And gluten free 6 out of 9 days. And really it's not like I've horribly binged on everything dairy and gluten. For the dairy it was just the fact that I had a regular iced coffee instead of a soy one. The rest of the day was fine. And then today I had 2 cinnamon rolls. The icing I'm sure had milk in it, so I counted that as dairy today. Oh and then I had some chicken nuggets at dinner. And then the other day that I had gluten was the day I had a normal waffle in the morning because I was going to work out and hadn't gone to the store yet.And then stayed gluten free the rest of the day. I guess I forgot that I didn't start all these food goals until the second. So technically I'm one day off, but oh well.

The majority of the time I have made the right decisions and been gluten and dairy free. And I'm not angry or mad at myself. I knew that I was going to be easing myself into it. And I could tell today. I came home with a headache. Which I knew was from the food. So I can already tell that it's working. I just need to get that regular coffee down to once a week ;)

So my coworker the other day showed me a product on facebook that she had seen a picture of. It's called gluten-ease. And you are supposed to be able to take it before you eat gluten or casein. (Which is what I am allergic to) and it's supposed to help you digest the gluten or casein better and help your body with them. I'm pretty intrigued by it. At first I was a little leary about it. I don't want to be reliant on something to help me digest something I'm not supposed to be eating in the first place. But then I became curious and want to try it. Well mainly because I want to keep on drinking Dutch Bros :) I just can't handle a soy Iced kicker :( Not good at all!. So I'm probably going to end up getting some and trying it out. Not so I can get away with eating all the crap I was before, but if I want to get my coffee once a week, or if I'm in a social setting that I know I'm going to be served food I shouldn't be eating I can try it. I'm not willing to go soy everything. I can handle soy in my hot coffees. But not in cold. So yeah..that's just something that I saw. But it did have a warning saying it wasn't intended for people with Celiac's disease. I don't want to become dependent on something like that. But a little help now and them wouldn't hurt ;)

And the gym :) Oh I am quickly liking going the gym late at night. Like after 8 or almost 9. It's been pretty empty in there at that time. So I'm not fighting anyone over machines or anything like that. And I'm not being intimidated by what the people around me are doing. Except for the one guy running tonight. He had great form and was just going to town on that treadmill. I wasn't gonna get right next to him and start huffing and puffing haha!

So tonight it was Week one of c25k day 2. I'm seriously only running at a 3 mph pace. But I'm moving :) And its not hurting my knee still. Last night I was there and I did the strength training that I learned about when I went and had someone show me the machines. I was able to find most of them, but I can't remember what some of them are haha!! So I didn't get to do those ones. But it was good to get some strength training in. That's one of my weaker areas for sure. But having the clipboard there and writing down what I did is going to help me be accountable to it for sure! And then I'm not wandering aimlessly around the weights wondering what the heck to do. I'd forgotten how much I'd missed the machines! I'm looking forward into getting back into that for sure.

And I guess today I just started feeling a little smaller. It's been around a week now. I would think that I should be seeing some results. My stomach seems a little smaller, and either I really need to wash my jeans or they were fitting a little bit looser. Or it could be both. It's going to be interesting to keep going with the not weighing myself all year. I really want to know haha! But then again I don't really want to know. What if it was a much smaller number than I would have wanted? See I don't have any level of disappointment here. Only in the fact that I didn't do the goals. So I'm still thinking I'm going to be much better off in the process :)

Well I better get off to bed. I might be liking this night owl thing at the gym...but my body's internal clock is still waking me up too early! So yeah..it needs to act accordingly!

Contagious

It's also a good thing that I didn't make a goal of blogging every day ;) Because sometimes life just goes by in a blink!

So today I started my second college class ever. I woke up exhausted today. Don't you hate that when that happens? Water Aerobics kicked my butt yesterday. I LOVE my Monday night instructor. She had us doing BALLET under water and then a few minutes later we were jumping up and shooting baskets like we were playing basketball. I was highly amused. I was never one to say I was athletic when I was younger. The whole point of doing it in the water is to prove I'm not athletic..Haha..anyways. So I was pretty beat after the class and got to bed around 10:30. Needless to say 6 am came way to fast. (Just like it will tomorrow!!)

But today I went and did what I always do this time of year. Restart C25K ;) I am bound and determined to make myself a runner. I'm just a runner with a lot of breaks that's all. Yeah. That's it. And it totally just dawned on me after I got home. My knee didn't bother me one bit while I was on the treadmill. One of the reasons that I quit running on the treadmill at my grandparents house last year was that it was actually hurting my knee to run. Now granted that treadmill was ancient. (No offense Grandma) The ones at the gym are a little newer. And I kept the incline at zero. I mean c'mon. I"m gonna ease myself into this. But it didn't hurt my knee. So that's going to be encouraging as I continue to go.

Which I did in total icy conditions tonight. As I left class, ( Oh yeah, rabbit trail, I will get back to that) it had started to freeze rain/snow winter mix. Whatever you want to call it. Now it's no Polar Vortex over here...and I've got snow tires on. So I'm not too concerned about driving in it. I have driven in way worse blizzard type weather and I didn't consider this to be too bad. I got to the gym about 7:40 and there was literally like 5 people there. I'm thinking I'm gonna like going later in the evening because of the fact there is less people. I was actually expecting there to be a lot of people because it's the beginning of the year and people resolve to lose weight and all that jazz. There hasn't really been an influx of people in water aerobics and at 8 pm no one is working out. I think I picked a great gym :) I'm gonna see how crazy it is on a Saturday morning this week when I start running and THEN doing water aerobics. Cause I'm crazy like that. I needed to do 3 runs a week and I don't want to do them on back to back days. So I had to double up on one day. And well Saturday seems like a good day to do that..I'm gonna try it out this month and see how it goes.

Back to school.

Since it was the first day of class we had to do the obligatory get to know each other mixer thing. Well my teacher is very creative. We made a t-shirt out of construction paper. And we had to write our name, one word to describe ourselves, what we wanted out of the class, our favorite food, and one thing people wouldn't know about me. I secretly hate these things. So while we were at the table I said out loud..One word to describe me? And one of the gals who was in the class with me last quarter said the word "Contagious".

And it resonated inside of me.

Do people think I'm Contagious? Do they follow what I do? Does it make me able to get people to do things when they otherwise wouldn't? Does it make me a leader? Or is it just an attitude?

I WANT to be contagious. I want people to see who I am and want to be like me. I want to smile at people and have it change their day. I want to be able to walk into a room and shift the atmosphere of the room because I am there. I shouldn't be taking on the attitude of whoever is in the room. I should be creating it.

It gave me hope for this year. To learn how to be contagious. It's about getting people to catch on to what you have or what you are doing. To get people to come alongside you and be with you. To change people when they didn't even know they wanted to be changed ;)

I want to be contagious.

And I will leave you with this treat. I love Dutch Bros. Specifically the one right by my house. They literally know my order as I pull up and remember who I am. Yeah it makes me feel special ok? And as much as I need to go dairy free...DB is gonna be my dairy treat because dang it...I just can't get their soy kicker to taste good :( So today on my way to class I stopped by to get my drink. When I got to class I saw this:

It just made my night :0) Thanks DB for taking good care of me :) ❤️

Wednesday weigh in week 56

Well that was two short lived weeks :( I lapsed this weekend. I guess you could say it was a "yeah, I will eat the stuff I said I wasn't going to". Mainly dairy. I had some mozzarella sticks and ranch. Plus I pretty much haven't exercised in a week again. And Wham! On goes almost 4 pounds. Really? Dairy will up my weight that fast? It's kinda crazy to think that. I mean that would mean I would literally have to avoid ALL of it. And we use so much in our cooking it's just crazy. Sour cream, cheese, milk, cream cheese. It all makes excellent additives to the food we eat. So now trying to avoid it is just downright awful. Not going to lie. It really kinda sucks. So here we are 3 weeks into the new year now, and I'm a little disappointed. Disappointed that I didn't say no to the cheese when I should have, and disappointed that I didn't make the time to workout. If it wasn't so goshdang cold!! I have come to realize that as much as I want to think that I can go run on the treadmill over at my grandma's house, I can't. It hurts me more I think running on the treadmill then it does running outside. My knees and my back were almost instantly hurting on the treadmill, still, once I figured out the incline. So maybe I was just made to run outside? But running in feels like 9 degree weather? Oy vey. I'm gonna have to get really disciplined for that one...

Wednesday weigh in week 51

Woah. I can't believe that I have been doing this for almost an entire year! And I can't believe I have gained all about about 10 pounds of my weight back. This definitely wasn't how the story played out in my head in January when I was serious and started all of this. This was going to be my year, and I was finally going to do it! Flash forward to December. My mom has had surgery 3 times this year, and I have had 3 deaths in the family since October. Less than 2 months. Um yeah. I have learned this year that I definitely live by circumstances. I have periods of doing great. Especially when I have a goal! And then life throws me a curve ball, and well, Dairy Queen becomes my new BFF. The most I lost this year was 25 pounds. So 15 has crept back on. And boy can I feel it!

And I know the things I need to do. I need to quit drinking coffee. I need to quit eating dairy. I need to quit eating wheat. I know how my body feels when I don't have these things in me. Especially when I am allergic to them. It's just so. dang. hard. To all of the sudden throw out a food you have eaten your entire life. And the staples of your diet. I mean. I tell people all of the things I am allergic to and they ask me what the heck I eat. Um yeah. Not a whole lot. And then I sneak in the foods that I shouldn't be eating. And don't even get me started on exercise. Here's the thing. When I work out. I lose weight. When I don't work out? I don't lose weight. Plain and simple. Cut and dry. Well yeah. If I could just manage to stay away from all the foods that I'm allergic to, and work out 6 times a week, I would probably have it made :)

Oh speaking of running, since I really wasn't ;) I finally just jumped ahead again to week 8 of the Couch to 5k and ran for half an hour today. Well I really didn't jump ahead because it was the week I was scheduled to do it. But I haven't ran at all in the last 2 weeks. The last day I did was week 6 day 1. And today I decided since it wasn't raining, and I really needed to get back to my running, I would just go for it. And I am such a fashion crisis when I run. It's kinda just ridiculous. Blue ear warmers, red and green shirts, black pants and black gloves. Oh and a white passport belt around my waist because that's my poor girl's running belt. (I mean, I actually thought it was genius! I had a belt, and it will hold my key, phone, and other little things. And then it wasn't all in my pockets, which my capris didn't have).

But I did my 30 minute run. And the craziest thing came out of my mouth when I was done. "Well that was kinda easy!" uh yeah. Well the first mile was 19:09 and the second mile was 19:03. I apparently did really good on my breathing because I wasn't out of breath, and completely wheezing or anything like that. Either that or I just plan didn't work hard enough. But I did realize that when I run my virtual 5k for Katie's 31st birthday next month that I will have to pick up a little speed. I'm thinking I was stupid when I said I wanted to finish it in under 48 minutes I think. I'm pretty sure I forgot I was back up to a 19 minute mile and not an 17 minute one. Hmmm...How am I going to do it that fast? If I go the pace I ran today it will still take me almost an hour to run 3.1 miles.I definitely need to drop some pounds so my time will speed up :0)

I was expecting to be panting when I started my 5 minutes of cooling down..but nope. I was fine. I miss running. Of course we are getting into the cold part of winter. I don't have a treadmill. I can't afford a gym. So I am just heading outside. OH and my knee didn't hurt while I was running! That was nice. When I started my little training plan it kept twinging while I was running, and it didn't do that today. I was a happy girl.

Ok, I could just blab blab blab..so I am going to get my lunch ready for work tomorrow and head to bed. But here is my picture. of my gain. Next week will be different.

Wednesday Weigh in Week 9

Whew! This week I feel like my body doesn't hate me! Which is a good thing. I was kind of getting a little bit worried. But this week it was 2.6 pounds instead of .08 and that made me happy. :)

Which brings my total of 9 weeks to 18 pounds! Which averages to 2 pounds a week, which is what I wanted to lose. So that actually makes me completely happy to know that no! I am not behind. I am right on track :) I mean like every person I would like to lose more. But I have learned that I don't want to go all Biggest Loser and lose crazy amounts of weight each week. It would not be healthy for me.

This has been a very quick two months. It's gone by much quicker than I thought it would. But doesn't it always? And the cold/rain/snow/wind that we have gotten this week is driving me crazy. I am wanting to get outside to do my runs. And I am waiting for that day when one day a week turns into two days and then three days a week :) I can run in the cold, and the rain, and sometimes the wind. Snow is not something I want to run in. But I have a bike I can cross train on :)

Anyways. I feel much better about the weight loss this week. I am just happy it didn't shoot back up horribly. I mean it did go up .4 but that is not horrible. At least the main number stayed the same ;) I am doing really well exercising the 3 days a week that I am doing C25K but have been lacking the other two that I want to do. I have to figure out how to get that bumped up. But overall I am happy.

Oh! Did I say yesterday that my runs were 8 minutes with a 2 minute walk? Um yeah. I ran for 24 minutes yesterday and walked 6. Plus warm up/cool down. I still walk at a slower pace on the treadmill, and I don't know if I had the fitbit placed wrong or what. But they both said I did less than 2 miles which bums me out. For sure if I was out on the track I would have hit 2 miles.

But I still did it :)

Just another day

It's kinda funny to watch on facebook the status updates on Valentine's Day. Some people LOVE it, some people HATE it, and some people get spoiled, while other people don't. I mean hey. Preschool kids are awesome either way :) You still get hugs and cute little kid valentine's right? Right.

But back to facebook. My status was updated with a hot date that I had after school. Oh you know. Here He is!

Yep. My hot date was with the treadmill. I had to start week 4 today of Couch to 5k. And well that doesn't stop for Valentine's Day. And neither do I apparently. run 4 minutes walk 1 5 times. Oh I have a love/hate relationship with the treadmill. I love that it's inside and that I can run on it, but hate that I just feel like I am running in place. blah. So I needed a little motivation. And I needed to breathe. So I went upstairs to the kitchen and got this.

I decided since I had to run for so long that I needed something to focus on so I could concentrate on my breathing. That made it go much easier :) Except I kept looking down to see how much longer I had to run. I don't get to do that when I run outside, my phone stays in my pocket.

I do have to say I am getting a little anxious for Katie's garmin to get here so I can try it out. I think it's pretty neat of her to send it across the country for her readers to try it out. I just wish I knew how many people were in front of me so I know how long I get to wait :) If I could spoil myself with an expensive toy that would surely be it :)

Weigh in day is tomorrow. This morning I had magically gained a pound. Must have been too much salt yesterday? That's what I get I guess for saying that I was expecting a good weight loss this week ;)