Busy Bee

What a week! Last Thursday, my best friend got engaged. I spent the next 48 hours eating and drinking like it was nobody's business. And planning and getting our nails done and doing what girls do. Fortunately, I only skipped one workout so I didn't completely fall off the wagon, but I didn't lose any weight last week either.

This week was much better. I still haven't lost any weight, but I did up my calories again - this time to 1,650 - and I know it takes a few days for your body to adjust. It basically stores them because it thinks you're going to nearly starve yourself again. Once it realizes it's getting 1,650 every day, it will let go of the reserves. Or this is how I understand it.

I saw my dietitian on Tuesday morning. She is pleased with my progress so far. I saw in her notes that my ideal weight is 100 pounds. Ha! I weighed about 105-110 pounds when I was ripped yet skinny in high school, and it would've been unrealistic for me to weigh any less without sacrificing muscle mass. So she's dreaming a little too big (or little) for me. She is a stick with no curves so it's easy for her to use BMI as a guideline when I have been told by all my doctors that BMI is good for general populations but not for individuals, especially ones who tend to be more muscular. Which is not me now, but will be when I reach my goal measurements and weight.

After the dietitian appointment, I went and saw my orthopedic surgeon - the one who performed my knee surgery a million years ago in 2005. He no longer operates (I think I noticed some tremors) but said he would be willing to evaluate my suspected shin splints. When I got there, the first thing they did was X-ray both legs in about 14 different positions and angles. Alas, no stress fractures. Just severe shin splints, so he prescribed three ibuprofen three times a day and physical therapy. I didn't know the dosage of ibuprofen until his medical assistant told me, and I don't know why I didn't speak up, but I will not be taking that much. That's how I ended up with an ulcer in 2011. And it hurt a LOT. So no thanks. However, I start physical therapy Monday evening, and he wants me to go twice a week for four weeks and then reassess. I'm hopeful they won't tell me I have to stop running, because I'm really starting to enjoy it for the first time in my life. I ran Wednesday night before my regularly scheduled session with Jillian Michaels, and it wasn't so bad (minus the cold).

It doesn't look bad yet, but believe me,
running in it a whole other thing!

I ran again this morning, but as soon as I put on my running shoes, the snow began. And it's not going to let up for another 24 hours or so. I'm glad I managed to squeeze in a run, but it was so blinding, cold, and slippery! I have a newfound respect for people who run year-round.

I also signed up for a 5K, but it wasn't until after I paid the $20 that I realized it's the same day I'm taking my mom to the American Cup in Worcester. The race starts at 10 a.m. and the meet starts at 11:30 a.m., 90 minutes away. So I can't run. Which is OK because there will be plenty of other 5K options this spring and summer, but I kinda want my $20 back. I think I'll just have to consider it a donation to the food bank.

My trip to Dallas is officially booked, and I leave two weeks from yesterday. I'll be there for three full days and three nights, and can't wait to meet other Junior Leaguers from around the country. And hopefully I'll have some time to catch up with a good friend from grad school who I haven't seen since we graduated, which is insane to think about!

Jillian Michaels is my Trainer

I never really watched The Biggest Loser before. I had seen a few episodes here and there, and I think I remember watching one of the finales a year ago or so. But I knew who Jillian Michaels was because when I started working on Sanibel, the girl I replaced (she was moving to the UK) mentioned her name like every five minutes. So I decided to check her out. In 2011, I acquired her 30-Day Shred and Yoga Meltdown DVDs. The latter was just too hard for me - I wasn't a yoga regular yet so trying to add cardio to yoga was insane. And the 30-Day Shred was doable, but once I got to Level 2 (of three), I was dying. I was also trying to do all of this while fighting with my thyroid, so it was really hard most days to even get out of bed and work nine hours, let alone do an intense workout. Every now and then, I get out the 30-Day Shred and do a workout, but never consistently.

That changes now. I started her Body Revolution on Sunday. It's a 90-day extreme weight loss program. I'm not going for "extreme" - slow and steady wins the weight loss game (not a race, to me) - but she is intense and inspiring. I know her style is too rough for some, but 14 years ago, my gymnastics coach molded me into someone who thrives on tough love when it comes to working out. He used to call me a baby and tell me he was going to make me wear diapers if I didn't man up and throw tumbling passes that scared me. And he wasn't kidding - he would have gone to the store and bought adult diapers and made me wear them if I didn't do what we both knew I was capable of doing.

Anyway, I completed Day 3 on Tuesday at 6:15 a.m. Of course, I set alarm for 5 a.m. but after hitting the snooze button once, bundling up, and taking the dogs for a walk in the (dusting of - not the 2-4" I was promised) snow, it was 5:45 before I finally hit "Play." So I decided unless I have something going on at night, workouts before dawn just ain't happening.

The program works like this for the first two weeks:
Day 1: phase 1 workout 1
Day 2: phase 1 workout 2
Day 3: cardio 1
Day 4: phase 1 workout 1
Day 5: phase 1 workout 2
Day 6: cardio 1
Day 7: rest day
Day 8: phase 1 workout 1
Day 9: phase 1 workout 2 (tonight)
Day 10: cardio 1
Day 11: phase 1 workout 1
Day 12: phase 1 workout 2
Day 13: cardio 1
Day 14: rest day

After two weeks, you go to the next phase, repeat that phase for two weeks, and so on.

I started on Sunday, so that means I'll always get Saturdays off. I'm not sure how I feel about that - Sunday is easier for me to workout since I refuse to do anything other than errands if I can help it, but it also might be nice to have an entire day with nothing to do. We'll see.

I will being updating on my progress regularly. Juls and I are trying to keep each A. motivated and B. in check, but it's hard when we're 90 miles apart and working out separately. I am also sticking to my 1,200 calorie daily limit, with one meal per week that doesn't count. Two weeks ago, it was dinner at Chili's with my mom. I had steak fajitas and a skinny margarita, followed by a glass of wine at a family party. Last week's cheat meal was dinner at Max Burger with the girls before our Junior League meeting. I can already tell my body can't handle these big, greasy meals as well anymore because I couldn't finish my 8 oz. burger and fries, and even still felt like crap for the next three hours until I started to digest. It was kinda nice to be affected by all that fat, grease, and sodium - it makes me not crave it nearly as much when I know how awful I'm going to feel if I overindulge. Last night I enjoyed a buffalo chicken wrap with fries (my weakness - can't you tell?) and two glasses of wine. And a cupcake that I made from scratch (frosting, too) - so no artificial ingredients or preservatives.

My weight numbers are private, but my goal is 35 pounds of weight loss which is what my physician recommended even though it would mean weighing less than I did before I got sick. I was really muscular but still a little overweight, so 35 is my magic number. I lost 5 pounds since starting this program and actually following the 1,200 calorie per day limit. I know it's best to only weigh myself once a week, but since I'm too curious to wait that long, I'm going to weigh myself daily but only record once a week. I also read that some people actually gain weight - scale weight but not actual body weight - when starting an intense fitness program because of the fluid that builds up to heal sore muscles. So my hope is that once my body adjusts to these newly awakened muscles and stops hurting all the time, the weight will start coming off more consistently.

I'm also working with my dietitian - as I have been since November - but sometimes I feel like we are just going in circles. Fortunately, insurance covers X amount of visits per year with no co-pay, so at the very least, I'm learning little tips and tricks here and there from her.

Oh, and in case you were wondering, I returned my FitBit Zip. It really was just a pedometer that also gave you a running total of your TDEE and upped that number when you were running or walking, but since most of my exercise is not running or walking but other cardio and lots of strength, it wasn't doing anything for me. It was also wildly inaccurate, so I got my $50 back.

Note: this is a running total, so if you're reading this in the future, it will tell you how much weight 

I've lost as of the day you're reading it, not as of the day this was posted.

Get in Shape, Girl

Despite Sandy’s best efforts, there was no “damage” to our home or property. A lot of tree limbs and small branches that died during the October 2011 snowstorm fell down, and the yard is a leafy mess again, but that’s it. Power never even flickered, but I still got two hurricane days off from work, so I’m happy to have – once again – avoided an actual hurricane (she was only a post-tropical system and we only got the outer bands).

I started feeling pretty lousy shortly after waking up on Monday. I chalked it up to my brain saying, “Oh, I get a pass today? Cool. Let’s shut it down.” I was exhausted. I napped, lounged around in my PJs, and never left the house. My crockpot meal was delicious, but I woke up around 3 a.m. with horrible stomach pains. I ended up getting sick a few times, but when I woke up Tuesday around 9:30 a.m., the pain was gone. However, within an hour or so, it was back along with all the symptoms of a head cold – blocked ears, headache, congestion (different from the post-surgery congestion I’ve had for a month), chills, extra runny nose, and just general aches and fatigue. I laid pretty low until my dietitian appointment.

My dietitian, KT, is a little bit odd, but she’s probably used to obese diabetics. She really spelled everything out for me even though I admitted I know how and what to eat, but cravings take over. We set four goals for me:
1. Eat better breakfasts so I’m not starving 90 minutes later. I can still have oatmeal, but I need to add fruit or protein to it. I am going to alternate that with an egg scramble that includes one egg plus two egg whites (or was it one yolk and two egg whites?), equal parts chopped veggies (today was red, yellow, orange peppers and mushrooms), and turkey sausage if I want it. It was great. I wasn’t ravenous at 10 a.m., and knowing I had to make real food encouraged me to wake up earlier, which makes me feel a lot less stressed in the morning. I tend to sleep until the last possible minute, and that’s a bad habit. I even drank my coffee at home instead of making it five minutes before running out the door and then drinking it at my desk. That way, I can start drinking water once I get to work, helping me get more water in.
2. Add fruit or vegetables to every meal, and by vegetables, I don’t mean starchy vegetables like potatoes, or vegetables dripping in butter or dressing. For example, last night and today for lunch I just added a spring mix/baby spinach salad (two cups) with a tablespoon of fat free dressing (Catalina is my current dressing of choice). I tend to eat poorly when I am tired or busy, and that’s every night after work, so I bought a bunch of bags of plain, frozen mixed vegetables that I can steam or microwave to add to my dinner when I get sick of salads.
3. Work out six times a week. This includes hardcore yardwork like the 1,500 calorie day I had on Sunday, but does not include cleaning the house or other small tasks. If I had tried to do an Insanity workout on Sunday, I might have died. I could barely shower after raking the entire yard and putting 40 barrels worth of leaves into the barrels.
4. Stick to 1,200 calories a day. This is total calories, so if I eat 1,500 calories but burn 300 doing a workout, I’m OK. However, the fewer calories I consume, the more weight I lose, so...you do the math.

I see her again in four weeks, which puts us at the Tuesday after Thanksgiving. Although we didn’t set this as a goal, I want to try and really cut out sweets (candy, chocolate, ice cream, pastries) between now and then, so that I can splurge a little during the holidays without destroying my progress or feeling bad. The only successful “diet” I’ve ever gone on was when I gave up all the aforementioned sweets for Lent. I think it was my junior or senior year of college, because I was working at Target. I remember bending down to “zone” (Target speak for neaten and pull products forward) a bottom shelf and my pants almost fell down. My totally hot boss noticed and said something about how small I’d gotten and I felt the best about my body that I had in a long, long time (and probably since then). I was a lot smaller to begin with, but I think I remember losing 5-10 pounds during those 40 days and realized how disgusting my eating habits were…because I didn’t do anything differently except avoid sweets. Then again, I also had a ridiculous metabolism back then and I could eat cake for dinner and not gain weight. Now, I eat dinner and then want cake.

We did agree on some alternatives to help satisfy my sweet and salty cravings without falling off the wagon entirely. For salty, I can have a dill pickle (even better since I make my own), plain popcorn (also make my own straight from the kernel with nothing but a few drops of olive oil), kale chips (love them!), pretzels, or nuts—all portion-controlled of course. For sweet, she suggested peanut butter on an apple, frozen fruit bars, any fresh fruit with either Splenda or a small bit of real sugar sprinkled on top (I don’t like using artificial sweeteners), or a banana rolled in a few chocolate chips.

I explained to KT that it’s important to me to eat “clean” while eating healthy. She asked how I felt about frozen meals like Healthy Choice and Lean Cuisines. I told her they are never filling, are loaded with sodium, and taste microwaved (because they are). I don’t know if she was suggesting them or just testing me, but I told her I won’t go that route. However, I did allow myself to buy into the frozen vegetables simply for convenience (yes, I know they lose some nutritional value when frozen) and also picked up a few refrigerated precooked chicken breasts that you can just nuke and either eat plain or add to a sandwich or meal. It sounds gross but I had one last night along with some multigrain bread and a plain salad (working on achieving that perfect plate), and it was really good.

Despite feeling like crap, I have nothing to do tonight, so I planned on doing an Insanity workout tonight (today is cardio power & resistance). I just ate my 460 calorie dinner (pasta with sauce, chicken breast, and mixed veggies), and if I work out, I am in the clear. Otherwise, I am 23 calories over because I indulged in a Mint Three Musketeers mini bar. It's going to be a tough decision. In fairness to myself, my $100 running sneakers that I purchased over the summer are great for running, but terrible for Insanity. Even Shaun T. told me I needed cross-trainers, but I ignored him. I think I'll wait, not because I'm lazy, but because it's so painful in the arches of my feet and then later on I get shin splints.

I'll Wash Your Eye Out with Soap

...wait, no. That's not right. Well actually, it is for me. It feels like I got soap in my right eye. It's only felt like this for a few hours, and it doesn't hurt as much as it's just strange and uncomfortable, but it caused me to have a hard time fully relaxing during shavasana (the guided meditation/nap at the end of yoga). And during downward dog, I was trying to look at my left armpit without moving my head (don't ask) and that same eye was killing with the effort. Not sure what's going on there, but I did work six hours today, which is the longest I've worked in almost a month. Crazy, huh? I should be back to regular hours on Monday but I haven't heard back from Dr. C and HR requires a letter from him so we'll see. Not that I mind part-time but my paycheck is going to start taking a hit soon - I'm close to using up all my time off.

Anyway, back to yoga. I bought a pass for one month of unlimited yoga. It made much more sense economically, especially since I really like the Monday and Thursday classes, but I'm going to try and go even more often. I don't know that I'm strong enough for lifting or my Jillian Michaels DVDs yet, and yoga always helps me become stronger without even realizing it, so I'm going to stick with that for now. I'm going to go to some more challenging classes (I've been going to gentle classes for the last two weeks) and work my way back up to my pre-surgery strength and endurance.

Without meaning today, I went vegetarian today. Just for the day. I normally have some sort of meat or fish for lunch or dinner, usually both. Here is what I ate today, for inquiring minds:

I promise I didn't go to McDonald's, but I did go to Semolina Bread Company and have their California Vegetarian Wrap sans tomatoes. It sounded good, so I didn't care that there was no meat. I actually ate half for lunch and half after yoga, if you really want to know. And yes, I did eat a whopping 25% of my soup before I decided it was gross and threw it away. And that's where I had the Orange Hi-C, but hardly anyone sells that anymore, so I found it under McDonald's. And after eating half my wrap, I went to the new fro-yo place in town, and the cookie dough bites were just screaming my name. The cupcake flavored fro-yo, however, was disappointing. It tasted almost sour. I was expecting something like Coldstone's cake batter or sweet cream but it was weird.

I eat a lot of carbs. I love carbs. And sugar isn't on there, but I know I eat too much sugar. I'm really looking forward to meeting with the dietitian. I start my official food diary on Monday. Thank goodness, because the girls decided we're having a cookout on Saturday and the theme is surf 'n turf - scallops and steaks. Then the list of items the girls are bringing for brunch the next morning includes breakfast pizza, a strawberry & cream cheese pastry, muffins, French toast, and my contribution - sunrise mimosas. That will be a day I don't track what I eat!