I'll be back after Finals...

It has been a little over a month since my last post. There has been a lot going on in my life. i.e. serious family illness, month long study abroad trip, and many other things. Right now I'm concentrating on all the huge projects my professors have decided to assign the month before finals. So I'll be back May 10th to post about the latest developments in my life.

A Little Wiser?

Today is my birthday. I'm hoping that I am hit with instant wisdom, or some kind of clarity in regards to my life but that has yet to happen. Losing weight is still a struggle for me. I thought that once I lost weight that would be the end of me being fat. But I know now that's not the case. I've learned that it's definitely a mind over matter type of thing and my mind and heart as of late has not been in it. I'm not sure as to why but that's something that I'll have to explore in therapy. I haven't lost total hope but it's hard.
Anyway I thought I would update with a post on the weight loss front.

Currently I'm taking three classes which keeps me rather busy. I'm taking Spanish 101 and this summer I'm going to attempt to take Spanish 102 in Spain! I just have to raise the money for the trip.

That's all the news that's fit to print. I start back swimming next week. I have a new waterproof mp3 player so I think I can muster through the monotony of swimming laps from now on.

Confession Time

So... I have been debating about doing this. I know that I've gained some weight and today I decided to weigh myself to see exactly how much weight did I gain. Well it's quite a bit. I've gained about 31.5 pounds. I know that it's not the end of the world. It's my fault so I won't make excuses. I'm just determined to get that weight off. I do have a bit of fear and trepidation. I just hope that I don't back slide like I did before.

Today was the cardio portion of my workout. I thought it was a bit weird changing the intensity of how I worked out on the elliptical machine but I think that I had a good workout since I was very tired and my feet hurt afterwards. Now on the Body For Life I'm only supposed to do 20 minutes of Cardio and that's called 20-Minute Aerobics Solution
I did change the intensity of my workout minute by minute but I stayed on the elliptical for another 12 minutes. Typically I opt for the weight loss portion of the program on the elliptical so every 4 minutes the resistance changes on the machine so I think the change of the intensity of the workout coupled with change in resistance really helped me burn a lot of calories.

Tomorrow will be a strength training day and the focus will be on my lower body. I had to do some research for some of the exercises. I bought this new book called "The Women's Health Big Book of Exercises: Four Weeks to a Leaner, Sexier, Healthier YOU!"

I figure that I can mix up the exercises once I master some of the ones that I've started to do this week. I don't think I will run out of options. For example, the book lists 23 variations of a push-up and I thought there were only 4 or 5 of them. I'm happy that I made that purchase and maybe I'll look into mixing up the exercises sometime next month.

Workout: Cardio
Meal 1: Cereal and vanilla milk
Meal 2: Chicken and spinach
Meal 3: Banana and peanut butter
Meal 4: Turkey sub on wheat with cheddar, spinach, onions and spicy mustard
Meal 5: Cereal
Water: Eight 8 ounce glasses of water
Foods That I Lusted After: Snickerdoodles from Subway

I'm Serious Now

Okay okay. I've been saying that I'll blog and get back on the fitness band wagon for some time now. But now I really think I'm back on it. It is the end of the holiday season so I only have to deal with the usual daily food temptation instead of cookies and other non-healthy treats associated with Christmas and Thanksgiving. I just have to get it together with the emotional eating.

As for the exercise portion I've decided to do Body For Life. It's similar to the Operation Boot Camp method. I didn't try it at first because all of the exercises looked so daunting and I was worried about my form. I did a bit of research online and tried to remember everything that I learned in my Body Works Plus Abs class and applied it to my workout today. I still need to practice, and do more research before I do my next round of strength training on Wednesday. As I continue doing this I hope I become more proficient and efficient at weight lifting. The strength training exercises are supposed to be completed in 46 minutes which is a far cry from the hour and 20 minutes it took me to complete the workout today.

Tomorrow is the 20 minute aerobic solution. I think I'm going to like tomorrow since I can probably be in and out of the gym in about an hour. I'm going to get on the elliptical machine which I like quite a bit since I can check my heart rate and make sure that I'm exercising hard enough to get up to the cardio/fat burning level.

In short I feel good. I just need to keep this up through a grueling semester of school.

Workout: Strength Training (Upper body portion)
Meal 1: Cereal and vanilla milk
Meal 2: Sesame chicken with rice (My work place bought lunch for us
today. I only had half of my entrée. I'll do better throughout the
rest of the day.)
Meal 3: Granola Bar
Meal 4: Mesquite Salmon
Meal 5: Slimfast Bar
Water: Six 8 ounce glasses of water
Foods That I Lusted After: C is for Cookie

Happy Holidays!

I just wanted to wish everybody a happy and healthy holiday season. I'll be back to blog over the weekend.

No More Teachers....

Well at least for the next 3 weeks. School is out until the Spring semester resumes in early January. I'm possibly going to do the dumbest thing imaginable... Take a full course load while working AND trying to fit in a workout into my already hectic schedule. This will be quite interesting. I'm trying to work on my time management skills. They are horrible, and I think it would make my life easier in all areas of my life. I do have a couple of ideas but I will need to test things out and see what works for my schedule.

For now I will hit the hay since I'm trying to make it to the gym before I head into work in the morning.

I'll Be Back

I should probably state that I've not given up the weight loss fight. It's definitely been difficult as of late with the onset of new injuries. It's weird because with all that I've learned about myself and how much I've grown this last year you would think that I'd be able to snap out of it or bounce back immediately but I can't. I think it just affirms how much of a mental game losing weight can be. So as of right now I'm taking a break from blogging until after my finals. My last one is on December 9th and at the moment I'm trying to do well where I'm not obligated to take some of them so my focus will be on that. If anyone still reads this blog I would say avoid the posts from July until November. I will dub that as the dark period. Anytime before July is fair game. I started this blog hoping to inspire someone and I feel that some posts aren't that inspirational, especially since I'm in dire need of inspiration myself.

Happy reading.

I'll see you soon.

So Far, So Good

It's weird how you can feel so full of energy, so positive about losing weight and then a few hours later not so much. I had planned on working out in the morning but my bed was so warm and comfy that I had to sleep in. Some how I managed to make it to the gym after work. I felt pretty good afterwards. I just hope I can keep it up. My right knee began to hurt a couple of hours after the workout. I think I might need to rest tomorrow. I should probably tell you what chondromalacia feels like. Do you remember how it felt to be kicked in the shin by a little kid? Well it feels like that constantly, even after the cortisone shots. I can't help but wonder how much more weight I need to shed for it to make a real difference. I'm in constant fear that each step that I take could possibly bring me closer to knee surgery. I'm going to have to shed some serious poundage and quickly. I'm not going to do anything drastic but I need to keep a steady weight loss pace and try to keep it together mentally so that I don't comfort eat. This will be very difficult since finals are quickly approaching and work will be extremely busy and stressful until the end of the year.
Sunday
Workout: Swimming
Meal 1: Cereal
Meal 2: PBJ on wheat english muffin
Meal 3: One ounce of cheese
Meal 4: *Buffalo cheeseburger, no bun, with sauteed mushrooms, and a salad
Meal 5: One ounce of cheese
Water: Six 8 ounce glasses of water
Foods That I Lusted After: I wouldn't mind a double chocolate chip cookie
* I bought this from Trader Joe's. It already has porcini mushrooms inside of I think that lessened the amount of meat that I consumed.


Monday
Workout: 20 minutes on elliptical, 10 minutes on row boat, strength training
Meal 1: Cereal
Meal 2: Slim Fast shake
Meal 3: Granola
Meal 4: Turkey sub on wheat with cheddar, lettuce, onions, and spicy mustard
Meal 5: Buffalo cheeseburger, no bun, with sauteed mushrooms, and a salad
Meal 6: One ounce of cheese
Water: Six 8 ounce glasses of water
Foods That I Lusted After: Red Velvet cake from Kroger's

New Developments

Yes I know I was supposed to blog next week but there have been many, many developments going on in my life. I've actually had to write down what courses I will need to take to achieve my degree. It will be very interesting because soon the courses that I will need to take will only be offered during work hours. Also I've been studying for a test coming up and then I have a speech to make this week and I will jump for joy when this speech class is over with. I've also seen the Ortho's for the pain in my knees and the frequent lumbar sprains in my back. As for the lumbar sprains the doctor said that my back is fine. Nothing looks out of the ordinary, I will just need physical therapy to help out with that. Also the doctor get's lumbar sprains too so it was a comfort hearing that I wasn't the only one who suffered from it. As for my knees...well...that news is not so good. I've been in constant pain for about a month and a half so far. I've iced down my knees after a workout but I knew something was wrong when sometimes that didn't alleviate anything. I wrote down my symptoms before I went to the Ortho and the diagnosis is this. I have chrondomalacia in my knees. Basically the cartilage is wearing down and so is my patella(knee cap). I can only dream about high impact exercises at this point. As for even walking, I have to do it in the water. That sucks. I feel like I'm 80 now. I did receive cortisone injections in my knee so that does help but I really have to be careful with the exercises that I do even if I feel that I'm physically capable of doing them. There's no cure for chrondomalacia exactly. I do need to do physical therapy exercises and of course lose weight to help with this. I was going to try to add Step Class to my fitness repertoire but I think that's out for the moment.

On the plus side I get to decrease a pant size last week. I'm officially in the 3x for my bottom half. Actually 3X consists of two sizes a size 24 and size 26. I'm a size 26 at the moment and I'd like to be a size 24 pants by Christmas because that means I can buy jeans and pants off the rack. (Target here I come!) My brother is sick and tired of seeing Old Navy packages arrive every other day.

I have a lot of thinking and planning to do in regards to my fitness and exercise plan. I will write more later this week.

A Change Would Do You Good

I'm here. I'm actually doing a little better now. I didn't fully
reorganize my life last weekend but I am making quite a bit of changes
since my schedule is more demanding. I think the biggest obstacle for
me as of late is getting to the gym to exercise. Either I'm to tired
after class or I stayed up way to late working on homework that it's a
bit difficult to get up early in the morning. For now I'm just going
to have to suck it up. This strenuous school schedule will end in
early December, and thankfully October is almost over. In my Fitness
for Living class sometimes there's no lecture. My Professor just
wants us to exercise for the duration of the class time and that's
fine by me. I do tend to look like a hot mess when I have to go to my
next class but I guess it's better than rolling out of bed and going
to class in my pj's. So here are some upcoming changes. I'll blog on
Sunday, Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday. Those are my least busy days
of the week. We'll see how that pans out especially since after
Thanksgiving I will be extremely busy at work and Finals will be going
on at around that same time too. YAY!

This Friday I will have an appointment with the Ortho for my back.
It's been over a month since I've had a lumbar sprain so I'm excited
about that. Next Monday I will go to see the Ortho about my knee. My
knees have been bothering me quite a bit. It probably didn't help
that my personal trainer tried to kill me in the gym on Saturday but
that's okay. I did a boot camp workout last Friday and I ran a bit.
It felt good to do that, but my knees are sore and tender. I think I got caught up in the merriment. I probably should have walked quickly but I don't regret it and I made that choice so I'll have to suffer the consequences.


Workout: Body Works Plus Abs
Meal 1: Cereal with two sausage patties
Meal 2: Special K Protein Shake
Meal 3: Turkey sub on flatbread with lettuce, onions, cheddar, and spicy mustard
Meal 4: Low Fat Oatmeal Banana Bread with milk
Meal 5: Cheeseburger, no bun, sauteed mushrooms, and a salad
Meal 6: Low Fat Oatmeal Banana Bread
Water: Seven 8 ounce glasses
Foods That I Lusted After: Cookies! They are everywhere!!!