Yeah, I'm still around.

I've been struggling a lot and I've gained 10 lbs back. Yuck. It sucks too, because I was just at the weight where I start to feel "normal" and was able to shop in regular stores.

A couple months ago my boyfriend of 3 years broke up with me. I won't get into the details, but basically it was over a fundamental relationship issue that we've been disussing for our entire relationship, but we had started fighting more frequently about it and he felt like we wouldn't be able to work it out. On the day he broke up with me, I weighed in at 169 lbs (my low weight). We stayed living together because he is moving to a different city in a few months, and it didn't really make sense for us financially to find different places to live for that short time. On top of that, I started my nursing consolidation (where I work full time with an RN, 12 hour shifts, days and nights), which stressed me out and completely messed up my eating and sleeping schedules. So yeah, at first I didn't gain any weight, mainly because I had no appetite. When it came back, I mainly ate junk and binged. I stopped exercising (though, I did start swimming in my apartment's pool a bit so I'd get some exercise and could clear my head). I also closed my Weight Watchers Online account because I wasn't really using it and I wasn't sure how my financial situation would be since I was planning on living on my own.

Since then, we've gotten back together and things have been really great, but my eating and sleeping schedules are still messed up and I haven't had much motivation to get back on track. I bought myself a nifty little food tracking journal.. used it for about a week, dropped 5 lbs (probably mainly water weight from eating junk and being stressed).. but then fell off track again. This morning I weighed 179.4 lbs.

I only have about 2.5 weeks left of my consolidation, and in that time, I only work 4 more shifts. Then I have a month off before we move and I start working (in good news, I received a job offer yesterday!). So, I guess the plan is to get back on track as best I can during these next two weeks or so, and then really get back on track during my month off so that I can hopefully be back to my low weight by the time I move.

I didn't eat the most healthy brunch today, but I did write down my calories, so that's a start. Now I'm trying to find the motivation to work out, but I'd rather just be lazy and take a nap because I work from 7 until 7 tonight.

Starting Weight: 202.4 lbs
Last Week's Weight: 173.7 lbs
This Week's Weight: 172.3 lbs
This Week's Loss: -1.4 lbs
Total Loss: 30.1 lbs

It's taken awhile, but I'm finally down 30 lbs! Less than 20 until I'm at a healthy weight. :)

A NSV: Yesterday I went out for brunch with some friends. Normally I order the standard breakfast of eggs, homefries, sausage, and toast. I really didn't want to give up my chance to have some sausage but I wanted to make a healthier choice, so I ordered the fruit bowl with a side of sausage. I'm pretty sure I saved like a million calories by not eating the homefries, eggs, and toast.

Bleh. This week hasn't been going so well. I've been doing The Biggest Loser Boot Camp DVD (all three levels, which kick my ass), so that's good. But it's been my reading week. I've been eating out more than usual, which was fine because I staying within my points, but then the boyfriend and I started fighting and I let my emotions effect my eating. Yesterday I ate a cookie from subway, then I bought a bag of Crispers and ate most of them.. and then I went out to a restaurant and got the buffet. I ate about a plate and a half, but there weren't very many healthy choices on the table. Ugh. My weigh-in is on Monday, so I'm going to try to do really well over the weekend to make up for it. Hopefully I won't be up on the scale.. but I was really hoping I'd be able to lose some this week.

I know I shouldn't compare my weight loss to other people's. We're all different, different weights, different muscle mass, different eating habits, different metabolisms, whatever. But sometimes I can't help it. I feel like I've been trying to lose weight my entire life and I just can't seem to get there. I know I've done great--I'm down almost 80 lbs from my highest weight. But it's taken me so long and I've had so many set backs. I weighed about 165 lbs two years ago, but couldn't seem to lose anymore.. let it discourage me, and then gained back 40 pounds. Now I've lost 30 of those, but it's taken me almost a year to do so. I just wish my weight loss was was consistent. I've tried eating less calories, eating more calories, varying my calories from day to day, exercising more, exercising less. It doesn't seem to matter. I feel like I'm constantly gaining and losing the same pounds over and over again. I've come to accept the fact that I'm a slow loser--that even expecting to lose 1 pound a week is a high goal for me. But.. it feels like my efforts are futile.

A friend of mine just mentioned to me today that she met her weight goal that she set for herself last April. She's lost 40 lbs and looks awesome. I had a suspicion that she was working to lose some weight, because she looked like she had slimmed down a bit and I noticed her eating habits when we hung out, but she hadn't come out and said anything about it. Anyway, I want to be happy for her.. but in the back of my head it just makes me feel like such a failure. I've been working on this for years and I feel like I should be at my goal weight by now.. but it still seems so far away. I'm just under 175 lbs right now. That's only 20 lbs to go before I'll be a healthy BMI. I just wish that I could get there.. and in a reasonable amount of time. I feel like I can't even set weight loss goals for myself because, even though i set them fairly low, I never seem to meet them.

sigh.

Bleh. I normally buy Fiber One bars, they're so tasty and only 2 points. Well, today I saw Kellogg's All-Bran Chewy Dark Chocolate Chip bars. They're also high in fiber, only two points, and looked good on the box, so I thought why not try them? Well, I mean.. they're edible, but there's no way I would choose these over Fibre One bars ever again.

Starting Weight: 202.4 lbs
Last Week's Weight: 174.8
This Week's Weight: 173.7 lbs
This Week's Loss: -1.1 lbs
Total Loss: 28.7 lbs

This past week or so has been a mess. I think winter is getting to me. I feel down and unmotivated in every aspect of my life. I can't bring myself to do school work. I was working out 6-7 days a week.. Last week, I worked out like.. once or twice. I havent been keeping track of my points every day and even when I do, I go over and/or eat a lot of junk/comfort foods. I feel awful and I really want to get back on track. Yesterday I forced myself to do a short Turbo Jam workout (20 minutes) even though I had a paper for school to work on. I guess that's a start. I don't have anything I have to do tonight, so there's no excuses.

Please come back, warm weather. :(

Starting Weight: 202.4 lbs
Pre-Holiday Weight: 175.4 lbs
Post-Holiday Weight (Jan. 1/09): 183.0 lbs
This Week's Weight: 174.8 lbs
This Week's Loss: -8.2 lbs
Net Loss: -0.6 lbs
Total Loss: 27.6 lbs

Heh. It seems pretty crazy that I lost 8.2 lbs this week when my average is less than a pound a week, but I realize that it's mostly just water weight from all the junk I ate around Christmas. It feels good to be back on track and moving downward. Five more pounds until my short-term goal. :)

Oh, and two NSVs:

1. Over the holidays Phillip and I went shopping with our Christmas money and I bought two new pairs of pants: a size 13 in dress pants.. and a size 32 in jeans (I have never bought jeans that are sized that way before.. so I've always been afraid to try them.. the largest size in the store is 34 so I think that probably equates to a size 15.. so I'm guessing the 32 are size 13? :D yay!)

2. My brother is visiting us right now and he bought a tube of chocolate chip cookie dough last night.. and baked them. I didn't have a single one. :D

You can do it.

some pictures: the first one is about 8 months ago when I met Bob Harper... the other is from NYE and I think my tits look great.

( click here )

Well, I survived.

I'm finally home again after visiting family since December 17th. Things started out well. When we got to my moms, I was so happy to find that she had bought lots of healthy food for us, and we cooked a lot of the meals while we were there. I tracked my points almost every day (minus a day or two) and worked out every day with Phill. My kid brother even joined in with us a few times.. and we inspired my sister who is looking to lose some post-baby pounds, so I burned her a few workout DVDs.

One of the things that I noticed is how much Phill and I walk when we're home in Toronto. We live right downtown, so we walk everywhere. We even gave up our transit passes, so we rarely ever take transit. I easily get 10,000 steps when I wear my pedometer (and sometimes 20,000+ when on days that I work). At my moms in Windsor, it was almost impossible to walk, even when we wanted to. The city is so unfriendly to pedestrians. Everything is so far apart. Even trying to walk from one store to another located across the street proved to be difficult. Hardly anyone shoveled their sidewalks, and there are hardly any cross-walks to cross the street.

Anyway, we spent about 10 days in Windsor before going to Sarnia to visit Phillip's family. That's when I fell off the wagon. It was the complete opposite of being at my place, as his family had tons of goodies and loved to feed them to us. They already had tons of desserts, and then his stepmom made MORE because we were there. We had a couple big family meals as well. His dad and stepmom made most of the meals while we were there and they prepare things a lot differently than I do for myself. For example, his stepmom's mashed potatoes had sour cream and cream cheese mixed in them, and then shredded cheddar cheese on top. Or like, his dad made us pancakes for breakfast one morning. I only had one, but his dad pre-buttered it for me (I don't really put butter on anything). They also gave us Christmas stockings with candy in them. Anyway, my self-control was not that great and I ate way too many sweets and stuff. We still exercised every day, but it was more difficult because I felt uncomfortable working out in front of his family. He has a young brother and sister so his family is usually up really early, and if we waited until after they went to bed, then we couldn't shower after our workouts because it would wake everyone. During the first few days there, I used their exercise bike after everyone went to sleep for an hour.. and near the end of our stay we did break out some Turbo Jam and did it in the living room while his parents were cleaning the kitchen after dinner. His little sister did it with us, which was fun and gave us the opportunity to do some teaching about the importance of keeping active and healthy. His parents saw us doing the video and I guess we inspired them as well, because they asked us to burn them a few too.

We came home on the 31st, but after being gone for so long we didn't have any groceries, so we ended up getting delivery for lunch. And then in the evening we went out for NYE and drank way too much. :P

Yesterday was.. okay. But I didn't exercise and I didn't track my points. But today I'm back on track. Phill and I did a pretty intense workout for an hour and I've been eating healthy all day so far. I weighed myself and I'm up a few pounds, but I don't feel so bad. Hopefully its mostly water weight and after a few days of exercise and healthy eating it will go away.

I don't usually make New Years resolutions, but I thought I would set a few health goals this year.

I'd like to lose 50 lbs this year to get to my goal weight (that works out to be a little less than 1 pound a week, I just have to stay on track!). I'd also like to eat more whole food and decrease the amount of carbs and sugar I eat. I want to continue my exercise regimen of at least 5 days a week.

This week isn't going the greatest. I'm on my period and its particularly bad this month. My weight is up 3-4 lbs (though I'm fairly sure its just because I'm bloated). I feel out of control even though I haven't gone off plan. I have no motivation to exercise. I've been forcing myself to, but my heart and mind aren't in it. Hopefully if I just keep going through the motions, I'll get back into it. I'm also hoping that someone will give me some money for Christmas, so i can buy a bunch of new workout DVDs from amazon.ca.

I'm going to a Christmas party tonight. Hopefully I'll exercise some self-control. I've already decided I don't want to drink. I made healthy spinach and artichoke dip to bring (60 calories for 1/4 cup). If it's a hit, I'll post the recipe for you guys.

Starting Weight: 202.4 lbs
Last Week: 177.9 lbs
This Week: 175.4 lbs
This Week's Loss: 2.5 lbs!!!!!!!!!
Total Loss: 27.0 lbs

Omigoodness friends, down 2.5 lbs this week! I'm feeling so great! My Christmas goal is to be 174ish pounds and I'm so close to making it! Also, I'm almost to 30 pounds lost! Annnnnnd, I'm almost to my short term goal, which is 170 lbs! Not to mention that I'm only 10ish pounds away from my lowest weight ever (165ish)! :D

This morning I was going to do one of my workout videos, but I really wasn't feeling it. I have a bunch of favourites, but they get kind of repetitive after awhile. My reward for making it to 170 lbs is going to be some new ones, I already have them on my amazon.ca wishlist, ready to buy. Anyway, I went through Phillip's CD collection and dug out some dance/techno mix CDs he had and popped them in. Then I did a "create-your-own-workout". I danced my ass off for over an hour, incorporating all my favourite moves from my DVDs. It was great fun and then I gave myself an awesome stress afterward. :)

I hope you're all doing well!

*edit*

I was just updating my tickers and I realized something.. I'm now down 75 lbs from my high weight!

So, I took my measurements this morning. I measure in three places that are significant to me:

1. under my bust (I've never worn a bra that was under a 38 before)
2. the smallest part of my waist
3. the largest part of my waist (at my bellybutton)

Anyway, since I started measuring myself (I didn't write down a date, but I think it was since April), I've gone from 38 inches to 37 inches under my bust, from 38 inches to 34 inches at the smallest part of my waist, and from 42 to 39 inches at the largest part of my waist. It feels so good to be under 40 inches around my middle! :)

I had a bad night last night.

I went out to Milestones for my work christmas party. I had looked at their menu online beforehand and wanted to pick something on the healthier side, but when i got there they did not have the item that I wanted on their menu. So, I ended up ordering their Grilled Mediterranean Chicken. It seemed really healthy (though I know that there's always hidden calories in restaurant food), except it did have some goat cheese in it. It was two small chicken breasts, stacked with the goat cheese between them. They were on a bed of steamed greens and (a small amount) of chickpeas. I was pretty satisfied with my choice health-wise, but not so much tastewise.. so when everyone decided to order dessert, I did too. I thought I chose one of the least calorie-offensive options. The menu said it was a warm cookie served with a scoop of vanilla gelato. I imagined it would be a cookie about the size of Subways cookies, which I know are about 5-7 points. But no, when the waitress brought it out it was the biggest cookie I have ever had. And between my weakness for cookies, the stress of exams, and the holiday spirit, I ate the whole thing.

Now, previously I've had a pretty unhealthy relationship with food. I've been trying to lose weight pretty much my entire life (my guess would be for about the past 10 years, which is a long time considering I'm only 23). Normally at this point I would decide that I failed at dieting, beat myself up about it, and then go on to sabotage myself with the idea "Well, you've already fucked up, might as well eat everything in sight for the next few days."

Now I've gotten to the point where I say to myself, "Well, you've used poor judgment, but its only food. Time to move on, you can learn from this mistake and make a better decision next time." Instead of sabotaging myself by taking a few days to get back on track, I get immediately back on track and usually I have a really healthy rest-of-the-week, where I get my exercise in every day and stay within my calories everyday (plus I tend to eat healthier foods throughout the week).

So yeah, I was a bit disappointed in myself for having the cookie, but no big deal. Not to mention that I'm pretty sure it fit into my plan anyway. I've been following Weight Watchers and I had 11 points left for dinner, and my entire 35 flex points for the week. I counted my dinner and dessert as if I had used all of these points to be on the safe side. 46 points is approximately 2300 calories, which I think should more than cover both my chicken dish and my dessert.

The bad part of my night started when I came home and told my boyfriend about my diet-slip-up. He got upset with me about it. Yeah. He told me that he was 'disappointed' in me for eating dessert. This pissed me right the hell off. What right does he have to make me feel bad about eating a cookie? I have enough to deal with with my own self-loathing and guilt surrounding food. I have enough of my own disappointment that I don't need someone else's too.

He explained himself more and I get what he's saying, but I'm still incredibly upset about this. He talked about how much he has invested in my weight loss--and it's true. He has been incredibly supportive of me through this. He works out with me all the time, he eats healthy with me even though I'm sure he'd rather have something tastier and higher in calories (he certainly doesn't need to lose any weight). He also listens to me talk about weight loss and health issues all the time.. and I'm starting to realize that maybe I have been a bit obsessive about this. I just find that if I'm not actively working on/thinking about losing weight, then I fall off track so easily. I have to be really focused on it in order to stay motivated, or else I start letting myself slip up more and more until I'm off track completely and up 10, 20, 30 pounds...

He's also upset about the fact that I weigh myself almost every day, but I don't think I do it in an unhealthy way. I don't feel like I have to weigh myself every day (there are days when I don't), and I don't take the numbers to heart. I realize that my body fluctuates from day to day. I just like to see what my body is doing. If my weight is up, I just use it as motivation to choose healthier foods and make sure I get my workouts in. If my weight is down, I'm motivated to keep it down or to see if I can lose even more, so again, it motivates me to continue having a good week.

I dunno, I'm going to try to talk less about my weight loss to him, because I'm sure he doesn't want to hear about it all the time..

Starting Weight: 202.4 lbs
Last Week: 178.7 lbs
This Week: 177.9 lbs
This Week's Loss: 0.8 lbs
Total Loss: 24.5 lbs

I was hoping for at least a pound, but a loss is a loss, right? :)

Hope you're all having a great week. I'm just wrapping up another semester of school and I have one more exam left. I can't wait to be finished! Luckily, I've kept my eating in check and have been exercising pretty much every day, despite the stress.

Starting Weight: 202.4 lbs
Last Week: 179.7 lbs
This Week: 178.7 lbs
This Week's Loss: 1.0 lbs
Total Loss: 23.7 lbs

I'm feeling pretty good. Since I went back to counting Weight Watchers points instead of calories I've been consistently losing at least a pound a week and it feels so good to have a bit of consistent weight loss for a change. Before it felt like I'd lose one week, then gain or stay the same for three weeks.

This next week or so is going to be a little bit difficult because school is wrapping up and I have finals. I'm going to try not to stress eat and to fit in at least 30 minutes of exercise a day, even if its just going for a walk.

I'm also a bit worried about Christmas vacation. Phill and I are going to my mom's for a week or so and then to his dad's for a week or so, which is going to make exercise and food choices a little more difficult. Hopefully I'll be able to stick with it so I can come close to my Christmas goal.

Damn you 500 calorie starbucks hot chocolate!!!!!!1111

So, I found myself at the mall yesterday with a bit of extra time. Now, I know that I'm about a size 15 in regular stores (though not every store carries that size), but I always avoid the jeans that are sized like 30, 32, etc. because I have no idea which one I fit into or even if I can fit into them. I got up the courage and patience to try some on yesterday and they fit! I'm a size 34. They fit pretty well in the waist (maybe even slightly big), but the legs were too big so they didn't look awesome (so I didn't buy any), but its so nice to know that I fit in regular-store pants again. :))) I asked Phill if he would go shopping with me when we're on vacation (and back home where the malls aren't so busy and hectic) so I can find the perfect pair. :)