slip ups

I have a secret to tell you...come closer...I'm human, I made a mistake.

Phew! I feel so much better getting that off my chest.

But then the hard work begins, because a little stumble is not going to derail all my hard work and effort. And that's just what this was, a stumble.

So why did I do it? Why did I eat something that I knew I shouldn't, and to be honest, didn't really want?

It started because I just wanted a little taste. That little taste turned into a fall down the rabbit hole.

I'm anxious and nervous about some upcoming events in my life, and in the past that has led me to parking myself in front of the fridge. I didn't go that far.

I have to pat myself on the back for:
- some of the restraint I showed
- understanding what led me to stumble
- coming up with a plan for next time, because the truth is that there will always be a next time.

And that was the biggest realization, there will be a next time. Temptation, stress and other triggers are always around me. How I deal with them will is what will make the difference.

Today my plan is to recognize that I slipped up. Move on. Stay focused on my goal and keep on going.

Are you going to keep on going?

i hate the word DIET

It sounds dirty.
It sounds wrong.
And you know what, it is!

To me the word diet is about the way you eat. Everyday! It isn't a short or temporary way of eating. The dictionary says that diet = food or feed habitually eaten or provided. and that is the definition I like.

I'm making a habit of eating better and providing nutrition to my body.
My diet is about balance.
My diet is about health.
My diet is about me losing weight!

So i'm taking back the word diet, and making it a "good" word.

sick!

there is nothing worse than being sick!
i hate it!

what's worse is that I know I still need to take care of myself, but all I want to do is hide under the covers and not see anyone.

I feel like someone has replaced my throat with Sandpaper, and has magically zapped all my strength! i'm weak and tired and i'm not hungry. But i know that i have to stay hydrated, so as much as it makes my stomach roll right now I'm have to keep on drinking water.

So even when you are sick and tired you still have to think about your health and your body and make the right choices. So today I'm choosing to rest. I'll be back tomorrow.

mom pants

i still laugh at the reference to the mom jean. you know the pants that pretty much start right under the bra.

Well lately i feel like all my pants are mom jeans. WHY? well because for the crotch of the pant to fit properly, i need to pull them up...a lot. So i guess i need to buy some new pants.

why haven't i bought new pants before today? I still look in the mirror and while i know that I've lost weight and inches it's hard to think that that translates to the size of my pants also going down.

But i promised myself that I would get rid of all my fat pants as i started losing weight. I didn't want the pants around to remind me of how much bigger I was, or worse, give me that excuse to gain weight because I've got pants i can fit into.

So this week i'm getting rid of all the mom jeans, all the saggy bottom pants, all the too big all around pants, and i'm going shopping. It will be nice and rewarding to wear something that fits me properly and shows off all my hard work!

have you gotten rid of your mom jeans yet?

mirror mirror on the wall...

so i'm in a new place.
it's not my house, it's my brothers house.
and it has no mirrors. OK it has no full length mirrors. at least not in my room.

I'm not a super vain person. and I don't like looking at myself or my body in the mirror. or so i thought.

not having a mirror has made me realize how much i did look at myself...not obsessively or anything, but I would look at myself when i was getting dressed. That's right i would look at myself naked! and you know what? i miss seeing my body naked!

It's not that I think i have some great figure or anything, but I miss seeing the things about my body that I do like.

For instance, I love the swell of my hips. I think it's very sultry and feminine.
I miss seeing the bump of my butt. It's not in the J-Lo category but it looks nice, and a lot better than it did before.

But most of all, I miss looking in the mirror and reaffirming that my body is healthy, strong, feminine and getting better each day!

I hope that everyone takes a moment to look at and appreciate their bodies! love their shape! and notice all the benefits that the hard work of proper nutrition and exercise can have on your body!

eating more

Have you noticed that skinny people and little kids have a lot in common?
They both have a lot of energy and they both eat at regular intervals and through out the day.
coincidence? i think NOT!

My nephew eats every 2-3 hours. and trust me he will let you know if he is hungry. not only does he get grumpy and cranky but he says MMMMMMMM a lot. That's his word for hungry.

He also eats very healthy. He has a whole grain baby cereal for breakfast and his milk. For a morning snack he'll eat a cheese stick, yogurt or a fruit. This boy loves his nectarines :) Lunch is usually mom and dad's left overs. Protein (usually meat, chicken or fish) with vegetable. later a snack after his afternoon nap and then another meal similar to his lunch. and of course the day finishes with his story time to wind down and his bottle. interspersed are moments of great productivity playing and running.

If you think about it, this is how we should live and eat. We need to feed and nourish our bodies on a regular basis to have the energy we need to thrive. Balanced meals every 2-3 hours. Regular exercise. And some quiet time to reflect and relax followed by a restful nights sleep to relax and recharge the batteries.

This is one of the benefits of working a program that utilizes MediFast meals...This is the lifestyle that they promote and recommend.

scales and moms

I have to start by saying that the most intense of warriors are moms!

They do battle everyday with their obligations, budgets, kids, and the list goes on.

I've got kids on the brain because I'm helping to take care of my nephew...an amazing 13 month old boy, who in his short time so far has had to face more obstacles than most adults will ever deal with. He is the most self adjusted, happy, curious and adventurous child. He is a word awe inspiring.

But taking care of him is work. Just like taking care of any child is work. And if you don't have kids around like me, well it's daunting!

There are schedules that you have to stick to. There are exercise and play time that has to be had. There are meals and snacks that have to be eaten. and there is nap times that has to be taken. I'm very grateful for naptime.

But all this is very similar to what we have to do to make the numbers on the scale reflect our reverse growth, if you will. In order to make a healthy lifestyle program work for you, you have to work it too!

You have to plan out your game plan. you need to know what you have to accomplish. You need to eat on a regular basis (every 2-3 hours). you have to stay active and move around everyday, and you have to rest! and then get up and do it all over again.

And if you ask any mom, she'll agree that it's a lot of work, but the end result is so amazing, that you just do see it work. So why can't we look at ourselves the same way. Sure it will take work, effort and some inner strength that we didn't know we had, to make a program like Medifast, or really any program, work...but the end result, the healthy happy lighter you is wonderful! So let's stop looking at it like drudgery and start looking at it like nurturing a new soul! Because I have to tell you that's it's pretty amazing.

when is enough enough

when is enough enough. it's a tough question, and it's also a tough answer.

it's personal.
When do you know that you are doing enough to lose weight?
when do you know you have lost enough weight?
when do you know it's time to give yourself a break?

I think as scale warriors this is the hardest lesson to learn. We have gotten so used to the constant dieting, the constant back and forth of the scale and then the emotional ups and downs that it can really have an emotional toll.

I've learned not to reveal a specific number of how much weight I need to lose. People get scared when you say anything more than 20. my husband doesn't know how much i weigh, or how much i need to lose, i just mention that I want to look like i did when we met, and he seems happy with that response.

when i lost the first 20 pounds on this journey, i remember feeling like i was floating! it was amazing. my ankles and knees felt like they hadn't in years! Every pound i lose just makes me feel that much lighter. I'll know when i get to the right size for me when i get there. I know that i don't want to be stick thin. I want to look healthy and i want to look attractive, but above all i want to look like me.

sometimes it feels like you are on this journey FOR EVER! and the truth is that, well, you are! this is a lifestyle. But every know and then you stumble. you eat something you shouldn't. and instead of giving into that negative thought process that tells you how you've blown it again and why bother, you need to realize that this was what it was...a brief moment. a minor blip. take a step back and realize that we are human, we stumble, we fall, but we get back up and keep on going.

That's what I'm doing ... i'm going to keep on going!

Scale day is on tuesday...i'll revise my battle plan then.

visiting mom & dad

visiting family while trying to lose weight is always ... challenging.

for me the difficulty is that food is such an integral way that we all interact! it was how we celebrated the good times, and how we get through the difficult times and pretty much each time in between. Food is how we remembered the milestones of our life.

with the new lifestyle that I am choosing to live I've had to make some food choices that don't always agree with the way that my family eats. And this has become more glaringly apparent when i come to visit my folks.

There are always little treats...temptations...and pretty much a lot of food that I just don't want to eat right now. But I have to remember that I am making a choice. I am conscious of the food that i am fueling my body with.

It's not easy, but it feels really good to know that i am doing something healthy and positive just for me. This doesn't mean that I will never be able to eat the cookies and cakes and other foods, I just won't be having them right now.

and the challenge I guess is that it's really a choice. everyday is a choice. every meal is a choice. and i want to make good choices!

hiding the scale

I've decided that starting today, i need to hide the scale!

WHY???
How can i do battle with the scale, how can i develop a battle a game plan if i don't know what the number on the scale is?

Well, I've become a little obsessed with the scale. I have to keep in mind that my ultimate goal is to be HEALTHY. part of being healthy included being at a lower weight, but that is not the only measure of health. But there are times when i get completely overwhelmed with the number I see on the scale in the morning.

If it's moved, i wonder if why it wasn't a great loss. and if the scale starts moving the other direction it gets me a little crazy.

So I've decided to develop a new game plan. The scale will only work 1 day a week.
I think that this will actually be a good battle plan because it will force me to stay focused on my program and stay focused on eating only the items that I should eat, on exercising regularly and consistently.

When I was weighing every morning, i was letting myself slide a little bit. That little piece of chocolate, that slice of bread, that extra helping at dinner. It might not seem like a lot, but it will catch up and and it will become a habit, a BAD habit. So I'm going to focus on creating healthier and better habits.

Drinking water.
Eating 6 balanced meals a day.
Exercising everyday, for 20 minutes.
Weighing only 1 day a week.
Being conscious when I eat.

This is my new battle plan!

family gatherings

Family and weight loss ... sometimes just doesn't work.

I used to hate getting together with family. Not because I didn't want to see them, but because there were always so many food obstacles. And then I would have something that I wouldn't need (can you say cookies, cake). Then I would feel bad about eating the wrong things, and then I would just spiral downward! It was a nightmare, and I desperately wanted it to stop.

This last weekend I was visiting family, and for the first time in years I wasn't worried. I wasn't tempted to eat the bad things. I finally felt in control.

When mother's day came around, I did have some bread. Bread and excess carbs are no-no's for me. In the past this would have sent me over the edge and would have resulted in weeks of bad choices. But this time I just knew that it wouldn't happen, and I was able to get right back on my good eating habits.

Family and weight loss really can go hand in hand for me now!

Scared...

Yesterday my girlfriend stopped by the house. As we were chatting she commented about an email that I had sent out, letting people know about this amazing new path that I have decided to take with my life. She told me that it was very brave.

Brave...I was scared! Terrified in fact. As I was writing that communication, and including the picture I posted yesterday, it meant that I had to be really honest with a lot of people. My husband never knew how much I weighed, either at my heaviest or now! And to put it out there for the whole world to see meant that I had to stop hiding behind this fear.

The whole night I thought about this conversation.
FEAR had held me back.
FEAR had kept me fat.
FEAR had kept me unhealthy.
FEAR made me unhappy.

I don't want to live in FEAR anymore. I want to enjoy my life and live it to it's fullest. But above all I want to help other people get out from under that fear and live a healthy life.

My first blog

This is my first blog.

So you might be asking "why start one now?"

Well, because I've been doing a lot of thinking lately and realized that I needed to do something about the one thing that I felt had always held me back ... my weight! I let the number on that scale determine my mood, my self confidence, my self worth. It's not a new thing it's been going on for years. Years of hiding, pretending and most of all denying myself a real life. Years of denial, of sadness and of just plain misery. Lost years as far as I'm concerned.

So what to do?
Well last year I started a program. What, another diet, you might be thinking, and in one way you might be right, but in so many other ways you are wrong. I started a program to change my life, to change my relationship with food, and most of all, to help me gain control of my life. I started a program that used Medifast.

Has it been hard?
YES! Not because it's a struggle and a chore, but because change is difficult, and so much of what I'm changing isn't just my waistline, but my head and the way I think about food. I've been successful. I still have a way to go. And as I'm doing this I know that I want to help others, so that's why I'm coaching others on this program.

Why?
Because I look at people on the street, all around me, who are unhealthy, and I see the same look that I've been seeing in the mirror. A look of sadness. A look of loneliness. A look of pain. But above all, a look of desperation. I don't ever want to see that look on another face.

So I'm waging a fight. A fight for health. A fight for well being. A fight against the scale. I am a SCALE WARRIOR. And I'm asking others to join me, and become Scale Warriors too!

If you need proof that what I'm doing can work for you, just look at my picture below.