Saturday, March 24, 2012

After the whine

After the other day's whine about being on a plateau, I discovered the very best way to take a leap off that plateau: play a two and a half hour long singles tennis match in 80+ degree weather. The first person to suggest that it's all lost water weight will be flogged. ;-)

Friday, March 23, 2012

Plateau

Just call me the plateau girl. My weight is not budging at all. Two weeks of bumbling around within the same pound. :-P I know people hit plateaus when they are consciously working on losing weight but it stinks to join the masses. Obviously this is my body's way of telling me that I need to change things up and shake it out of its complacency. And I don't mean by inhaling several handfuls of M&M's like I did last night. As an aside, how did I get to be this old (another year older as of yesterday) without fully understanding how evil my hormones really are? I'm sure my husband could have told me long ago but the light bulb went on for me last night when there was nothing, absolutely nothing in this world, that could have parted me from those M&M's. Damned hormonal chocolate cravings! Anyway, any suggestions on how to find the edge of this plateau so I can climb down? I'm debating going to my friend's trainer so I can do so light weight lifting to build more muscle (apparently the only way to permanently lower your metabolism is to make more muscle) but I'm not sure I have the time (or money) to do that for long. What other ways can I wake my body up and get back to the business at hand?

Wednesday, March 14, 2012

Big news

I bought a pair of shorts in a size I haven't seen since college (or before). They do not look nice on me. But they do button and zip without acting as a waist tourniquet. This is enormous progress. And I'm keeping them.*




*Looking forward to reporting that they look nice on me sometime in the future.

Thursday, March 8, 2012

More randomness

I notice it's been a while since I posted anything here. First, I should say that I did manage to climb down off the ledge I mentioned in my post last week. I think I bloodied my knees a bit on the way down but the chocolate remains unopened. So that's a huge win. (The pretzels took a hit but we can't all be perfect all of the time, right?)

I've had a busy week since then, faced some more challenges, fell down a couple of times, but dusted myself off and am marching onward. The biggest news is that as of last Saturday I was a mere 0.4 pounds off of losing 10% of my starting weight. That's a big milestone for sure. People have started noticing and commenting on my loss, even if I constantly have to remind my husband to mention how skinny I'm getting. ;-)

Better than other people noticing, I am finally noticing myself! One pair of my running tights is starting to cause me problems by being too loose. I have to keep hiking them up until I get good and sweaty so they stick to my skin or I'm afraid they might just slide down and expose my bucket to the entire neighborhood. And you just know the day that that happens no one will be at work and they'll all be out in their yards just so a maximum amount of people can catch the spectacle. Might be time to pop them in the Goodwill pile to prevent such a happening! I'd hate to have to move just because of something completely preventable.

Caught sight of my profile in the mirror today and while it is definitely slimmer, I have the doughiest abs known to man. A muffin top is the pouch below your belly button, neh? My biggest lumpy bump is above my belly button so I'm going to have to find some exercises that will target the abs my kids ruined. (OK, I ruined them all on my own but it's more fun to pass the blame onto the ungrateful little buggers instead, especially now two of them are teens and one is a preteen--the most ungrateful ages known to man.)

My exercising has been pretty steady. I've either run 3 miles or played tennis (sometimes both) almost every day for over a week (the two days at my daughter's dance competition were lost exercise days but that couldn't be helped). I've even gone out to run in the rain. Hoo Rah! I am woman and all that jazz... I actually don't mind running wet; maybe because of the former swimmer in me I do everything better with water. Seriously thinking about signing up for a half marathon in Myrtle Beach May 20th. It's one of the Diva marathons and you get a feather boa and a tiara on the course. Yes, I am shallow enough to choose races for the fun goodies they promise. I'm not really trained for a half though, so I don't know (not that that has slowed me down before, but I'm getting smarter--maybe).

Because of my daughter's dance competition, I faced a pair of days with only fast food-ish type options for all my meals. I've come to the conclusion that it's just best for me to avoid fast food if at all possible so I'm going to start packing meals from now on. We'll see how that pans out. And speaking of meals, here are the outstanding things I've made in the past week and a half:

Roasted Grape, Goat Cheese and Honey Stuffed Sweet Potatoes for Meatless Monday. These were absolutely delicious, to the point I was trying to push the leftovers into hiding in the back of the fridge so they'd all be mine.

Homemade Gyros using falafel instead of meat. I know, I know. My family was seriously displeased to find that I had two veggie meals planned in one week but they forgave me when they tried these.

Crockpot Sesame Chicken over brown rice. Sweet and tasty, everyone loved this one.

Epic Fish Tacos. Now I don't eat fish. In fact I loathe fish. But my family loves fish so I occasionally make it for them. They said these were the bomb. As for me, I made mine bean tacos instead by mashing up kidney beans, black beans, and pinto beans and stirring in water and taco seasoning. I used the guacamole and watercress from the fish tacos on mine too though and they were tasty-cakes indeed.

Ham and Cheese Sliders. Be forewarned that these are terrible for you but they are heaven on a bun so I just saved enough points to enjoy two of these little guys for my dinner and then filled up with the steamed green beans.

This home-cooking thing isn't working out too badly as long as I get all my shopping in before Monday hits. And it certainly is easier to judge (and control) my intake at my own kitchen counter than it is at a restaurant. That said, I have several restaurant meals coming up shortly. Should make for an interesting weigh-in on Saturday. But I think I want that 0.4 off badly enough to make a concerted effort.

Hope you're all having success with your weigh loss and living a healthy lifestyle too.