Farm Share Week 2

This week's bounty:
This week we got $10 to "spend" and a head of lettuce. I got a pound of radishes, collard greens and a half pound of spinach (which is actually a big pile of spinach). I haven't determined yet if it's actually worth the money since I'm still supplementing with other veggies that I buy. However, it's fun to go to this church in the Italian neighborhood to pick up who knows what. I'm excited to see what he'll have next week.

As an aside, I think collards are an acquired taste and I didn't grow up eating them. But I'm giving them the old college try. I found a recipe for Lemon Sesame Glazed Greens from Alton Brown that's good at taking away some of that bitter flavor.

Calories Calories

Yesterday was supposed to be my super high calorie day in the calorie cycle. 2233 calories. Um, that's a lot of food. I missed it by 650 calories. I had some friends over and just never got around to eating any sort of evening snack. Not that I could have covered that much ground in a snack, but I might have gotten a bit closer. So I bumped the high day to Friday, called yesterday a lower day (despite my 2 mile swim in the morning) and am moving forward.

Jason is sure that he has identified my problem with reaching my high calories: I eat too much healthy stuff. Last night he told me I'm never going to get to 2200 calories if I keep eating food like skinless chicken and broccoli. He offered to drive me to Wendy's right that minute so I could get a Frosty. (Tempting!) I tried to explain it's not just quantity, but quality I'm going after.

No swim this morning. The Friday work meeting got canceled so I can swim tomorrow now and I decided to give my body a rest. I did do a half hour of strength exercises this morning. I've decided that the best way to get better at push-ups is to build up my arm strength. So I did 20 modified push-ups first (on my knees, or, if you prefer, "Girl"-style, though my feminist sensibilities say, Do not like.) Then I did 2 sets of 6 real life push-ups. I need to get better at doing these more regularly so I can actually, you know, improve.

Bzzzzzz

To preface this morning's story, I have to note that I haven't been drinking soda lately. Maybe once a week. And I only have caffeinated sodas maybe once every 2 weeks or so.

This morning I woke up at 4:30 with a headache. So I took some Excedrin. On an empty stomach. I know that's not good, but I didn't really want to eat anything. While you might think the acetaminophen would give me an upset stomach, the real issue wound up being the caffeine (see the no soda note above). I'm still feeling a little loopy and my head is buzzing. Bzzzz.

On the upside, I was in the pool by 6:05, swam until 7:17 and did 3550 yards. That's 2 miles. Also, I did an 800 in 13:50, which is my best time in awhile. Also, I did 10 50's on the minute, but finished every single one at around :46. Then I did 6 100's on 2:00 and finished them all at about 1:37. The point is, I had looong rests because I was moving so fast this morning.

Is caffeine allowed in sports because wow, what a boost when your body isn't used to it?

Today's Swim

2400 yards this morning. I swam a 1500 in 26:20. Also, the only person in the pool lapping me was this very fast guy who I have named Splashy McSplasherson due to the GIANT splashes he makes whenever he flipturns.

Also, in wow-it's-a-small-world news, today I discovered that a man who I always see swimming used to work at the Department of Health and knows my boss. He recognized me from a public hearing I attended last week. I thought he looked familiar, but at the pool he was out of context, and, you know, in a Speedo.

I discovered today that I may not be able to swim on Saturday. Jason is going out of town and I have to drive him to the airport right in the middle of the 2 hours set aside in the early morning for lap swimming. Then I just called to schedule a massage (which I have been wanting to do since probably February) and the only appointment they had left was 15 minutes after the other Saturday lap swim ends. I think I can squeeze in a short swim, though. Hopefully. Note to the Y: always have 1 lane open for lap swimming.

By the way, according to Jillian Michaels on her radio show, she gets a massage every week. Ni-ice. I might start shooting for once a quarter. My office is very ergonomically unsound and my right shoulder is ALWAYS sore and stiff.

Monday, Monday

I am an introvert. Saturday I co-hosted a baby shower. Saturday night we went to a black-tie affair and sat at a table where we didn't know anyone (thank goodness the other people at the table were pretty awesome and we wound up talking all night). Sunday morning we went up to Cambridge and then stayed for a church picnic. Thus, this weekend was really fun, but completely exhausting, and this morning I could not wake up.

We have a department meeting in Boston on Friday, which means I'll be catching the 7:12 AM train. So Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, I'm coming for you! Get ready for some swimming!

Saturday, I swam 2 miles in 75 minutes. I definitely think I'm getting faster.

Farm Share Week 1

*Sorry for the cross-posting at my other blog, but I know not everyone reads both*

I signed us up for half a farm share from a local farm. Yesterday afternoon I went and picked up our first week's bounty. The farmer* has a neat set-up. Instead of giving us a box of stuff, we get a certain amount to "spend" in his makeshift veggie store. So yesterday I got a plant and $10 to spend.

Behold:He had all sorts of herb plants and one kind of green pepper and 3 kinds of tomatoes. Since we currently have 10 or so different herbs growing in our house, I opted for a tomato plant, which I will be guerrila gardening at the side of our parking lot. I grew one tomato plant outside last year too since I couldn't find anyone to take it and I didn't want to kill it. It did pretty well and the landlady didn't seem to mind.

I also got a pound of radishes, 2 bags of collard greens and a bag of kale. Collard greens were on last night's menu. This recipe, actually. I had never cooked them before so already I'm branching out.

I'm realizing I will need to supplement a bit from the store. Like, I planned to bake a chicken today and I needed onions for that. So I'll still buy some staples unless Hippie Farmer Man starts bringing the staples to his shop.

* Read, hippie.

What To Do?

I'm officially tired of this. In the past week and a half I've been 187, 193, 191, 190, and today 193 again. Why am I so all over the place and why is the weight not going down? I'm eating well (well, except for the Auntie Anne's night. Although, I did lose a pound the next day so make of that what you will). I'm drinking water. I'm working out.

I decided to review my SparkPeople records. Here's the nice thing about anally logging all my calories and fitness: I have records! Records of what I was doing when I was losing weight.

I've just been looking at my workout and food logs for last May, June and July. My workouts were very similar, although I was doing a LOT more Pilates. Need to get back into that. I was also doing HIIT elliptical, which may have something to do with it. But mostly I was swimming like I am now and overall, the calories I burned over the course of a week were about the same as they are now. What is the big difference between then and now? Last year I was eating a LOT more food.

I'm always talking about how you need to fuel your body when you're working out, but I have to admit I've been slacking on that myself. I honestly just haven't been as hungry. Last year I was calorie cycling and I felt like I was eating ALL. THE. TIME. On my high calorie days (2200 calories), I would often make myself a big chocolate protein shake in the evening just to meet my calories. And in June I got down to 178 - the lowest I had been in many, many years and a heck of a lot closer to my goal than I am now.

Ostensibly, I have given myself a 1450-2000 calorie range, but I can't tell you the last time I ate near 2000 calories. Even on the days when I've had treats like cake or ice cream, my daily calories have still been hovering between 1300 and 1600. I know I've written about needing to eat more before and have had it confirmed by my resident experts (Hi, Rachel!) so I just need to do it already. I'll shoot for around 1800 calories a day and see where that gets me.

Um, so, right now I need to eat some more food! I've only had 500 calories today so far and it's 1 PM.

Shenanigans!

Today I'm up 3 pounds. Anyone else think my scale is full of crap?

The Latest

Last night we went to the movies and I couldn't get home for some dinner and ate at the mall. Dinner was Auntie Anne's pretzel sticks and an apple that I was going to eat earlier in the day, but saved. I know, dinner of champions. I also drank 2 cups of milk when we got home because I was hungry, but it was also close to bedtime.

Scale says I lost a pound this morning.

To the scale I say, what-EVER.

110 lengths this morning.

More Weight

I know I should just stop, but I have a morbid curiosity. Today I'm back down 2 pounds.

In other news, I actually did some strength training this morning in lieu of swimming. I had to drive to work today (and will again tomorrow), so no walking, but I'm glad I got up and did some weights, crunches and push ups. Granted I could only do 6 piddly push-ups at a time, but it's a start.

SRSLY?

As of this morning, I'm up 6 pounds in one week. I now weigh 1 pound more than I did at the beginning of January. Something is going on, and I don't know what it is...

Regardless, I am pressing on. Today I swam 2400 yards and am walking to and from work. I am also rededicating myself to the monthly splurge day idea. Hopefully I can do it for real this month. Jason will be gone for about 10 days this month so I won't have anyone telling me about all the ice cream on sale and will just avoid that aisle at the store altogether. Also, I signed us up for a Farm Share and am really excited to pick up our first box of vegetables this week. I'm looking forward to learning about new veggies and cooking with them.

Hopefully the weight will go down someday. I was moaning about this to Jason last night. Last Spring and Summer I lost weight, the Spring and Summer before I lost weight. This year is a wash so far.

Even if the weight isn't going down, at least I feel more fit. I swam for 50 minutes this morning and did 96 lengths. The sets I did totally kicked my butt, so I felt good about the workout overall. And on beautiful days like today, I love, love, LOVE being able to walk to work!

WHAT?!

Talk about a rude awakening. I stepped on the scale this morning on a lark and it told me I am up 4 pounds! I totally call shenanigans on my scale! There is NO way. I've been eating well within my calorie range, and have kept my sodium low for the last several days. Someone want to explain this to me?

The only thing I can think of is the joint pain I've been experiencing all week after my jog has caused me to retain some stress water. Or the cortisol is out of control. Or something.

Regardless, I swam 2700 yards yesterday and 2250 today. I must be getting faster because yesterday I swam 110 lengths in 60 minutes and today I swam 100 in 50 minutes. If nothing else, I need less recovery time in between sets. Tomorrow I plan on a long 75-90 minutes swim.

On Second Thought...

I think the jogging may have to wait until I can get the right shoes. I have wide, flat feet (a la Fred Flintstone. Very pretty. Very feminine.), along with weak ankles. This morning I could barely walk, my ankles hurt so bad.

I had planned to swim this morning, and even woke up bright and early on my own. However, when I crawled out of bed and put weight on my right leg, I nearly fell down. So instead I popped a couple Alleve and went back to bed. Alleve is my new best friend (it was also my new best friend when I had a cracked rib).

The good news is, my sister-in-law's dad is a running shoe guru. He had some advice for getting the right shoes and may be able to hook us up with some nice shoes for less than retail price. Nice!

I am shocked with how much of an impact a few minutes of jogging has had on my body. I walk 4 miles in a day easily, but 6 1/2 minutes of jogging have done me in. Of course, SIL's dad pointed out that when you run, your legs absorb 5-7 times your body weight with each step.

Jogging Aftermath and Weight

Hi there. I am very, very sore. Apparently jogging works all these muscles that swimming completely ignores because, as I mentioned, I am very sore.

You would think the soreness would be a deterrent, right? No, this is how crazy I am. The fact that I am sore means that I'm working something new and exciting, and, the fact of the matter is, I don't want jogging to beat me. I have given up my crazy competitive nature with regard to board games and I'm the consummate peacemaker during conflict and Jason complains that I don't argue enough because I can see multiple sides to many issues and because I just don't like aggressive discussions in general. However, this whole exercise thing brings out my competitive side.

For instance, I have been working on swimming 60 minutes in the mornings before work instead of 45 because I wasn't feeling pushed enough by the end of 45.

Also, I set a goal to conquer the hill in between work and my apartment. It's a big, steep hill. The last time I walked up it, not only was I not huffing and puffing so much, but I also proceeded to go a different direction after the big hill, which meant I walked up a bunch of little hills too. Because I beat the big hill and thought to myself, "I'm going to do those little hills too. Because I can."

So that's how my brain works and now I find myself thinking I should start at the beginning with the couch to 5K program and work jogging into my mornings. Because I'm crazy.

In other news, the scale went down on Saturday morning. If you count the weight I gained back, I lost 3 pounds. If you just go from my recent low weight, I lost 1.2 pounds. Either way, it's moving in the right direction.

Jog

Today I went for a jog with Jason. It reminded me that I hate jogging. Oh right.

I was lame and woke up too late to swim, so I thought I would head out with Jason. He was shocked that with all my swimming, I couldn't keep up with him on a jog. I tried to explain how they're different sports, you have to get used to any kind of sport, etc.

I've never understood all these people who can run like mad, but are in awe of my swimming ability. Because, seriously, I can NOT run.

My bones rattle with every step as my feet pound into the ground. And I can feel my flab bouncing. And my boobs. I guess I need a tighter sports bra. The point is, it's not pleasant.

Also, I tweaked my ankle somehow. I have weak ankles, which periodic yoga has helped make stronger, but I guess my right ankle turned a bit on one of those jogging steps. It's not a big deal, just a bit sore when I walk.

These sorts of things do not happen in the pool! Score one point for swimming.

Tomorrow, it's back in the pool for me.

Swimmy-Poo*

Made it back to the pool today. Because I am a rock star.

Actually, I kind of impressed myself because I did 90 lengths in 45 minutes. Which meant I was basically going the whole time I was in the pool. I used to do 80 lengths in 45 minutes as a rule. Maybe I'm getting faster.

I also walked to work and I'll be walking home. It's actually kind of hot outside so I'm sure I'll be nice and sweaty by the time I get home, but I will also be flushed with my awesome sense of accomplishment.

Apparently swimming puts me in a really good mood. Must remember.


* How many variations on the word "swim" can I use in these titles?

Food Issues

The last couple of mornings I have had the worst time getting out of bed. I wake up on my own at about 5:30, then Tiny the cat nudges me out of bed to feed him at about 5:45, and I know I should get up and go for an hour swim, but I just can't. So I sleep until 7 or so and get up in time to get ready and still be able to walk to work. Which, you know, walking to work is good and all, but I need to swim since I don't think walking 3 1/2 to 4 miles per day is going to get rid of these 30 pounds when I spend the rest of the day on my bum in front of a computer.

Or maybe it will. Since I haven't been that successful thus far, maybe walking is the magical key.

I think ice cream is the reason I'm so lethargic. See, Breyer's was 2 for 1 this week. AND we had a coupon. 2 things of ice cream for LESS THAN 1. Score!

Only, not really when dessert for the past two evenings has been chocolate ice cream. We got the low fat version and I've been good about doling out portions in little bowls (or, last night, tiny plastic Paw Sox baseball caps). But I know how my body reacts to simple carbs and I feel like that's where the dragging is coming from.

What happened to my monthly splurge day, you ask? Yeah, that kind of went by the wayside. But I need to bring it back. I thought about it this morning and decided that I would much rather have a lovely pint of creamy, full-fat Ben and Jerry's or Haagen Daaz once a month, than the crumbly low fat pseudo ice cream every night.

I have also realized that it is seventy-five thousand times harder to be super-diligent when I have a husband in the house. When it was just me, I cooked for me and I bought groceries for me and I stuck to my plan. No questions. I still cook for us, but with Jason around I find that I tend to slip more easily. Like we're at a party and he eats a cookie. Well, darn it, I want a cookie too! Or he tells me about the sale on ice cream that we also have a coupon for, when, honestly, I wouldn't have cut out the ice cream coupon and I wouldn't have even looked at the ice cream sales in the store circular.

He's been doing really well with his jogging, and he's been eating what I cook and really thinking about his own health and that's wonderful. But I think he just doesn't have the same issues with sugary carbs that I do. I have a bad habit of eating and eating and eating when confronted with large quantities of treats. To the point where he's actually commented on the fact that I get out of control. I have to set limits for myself and I have to keep the junk out of the house. When I shopped only for me, it was very easy to follow those rules. Now it's harder and I'm trying to figure out how to make this work.

Weight

Recently I told a friend of mine that I want to lose 30 more pounds. She looked at me like I was insane. I told her, well, I want to get down to 160, and let her do the math. She said, "Oh" because I'm sure she had no idea that I weigh 190. I tend to look about 20 pounds lighter than I am due to large leg muscles and my pear shape.

160 is still well within the "Overweight" BMI for my height. I have no desire to get down to "Normal" because I know it just wouldn't be sustainable for me. Lately I'm wondering if it's even possible for me to get to 160.

Yesterday I was feeling pretty good about myself. I feel like my stomach is flatter. I feel like my pajama pants are so baggy that it's only willpower and my huge bum that are holding them on. So I weighed myself this morning and I'm back up to that weight I was at a few weeks ago. I mean, it's only a pound and a half more than my last weigh-in, but still.

Usually when I combine swimming with a lower carb diet, I lose weight. Not dramatic weight, but steady weight. It just doesn't seem to be happening this time and I'm feeling a bit frustrated.

Strength

Long silences usually indicate a relapse into bad eating ways. Not true this time.

OK, so I did eat some junk when we went out of town last weekend. I also hiked, so it evens out.

I have been doing pretty well with the eating. This week has been nutso at work so far. However, we got a product out to a client this afternoon, they're happy, and now we get to work on all that other stuff on our to-do lists rather than just the one, huge, must-be-done-immediately project. I've come into work early and left on the late side, so I haven't been to the pool this week. However, I have been walking to and from work. Today it's windy and cloudy and threatening rain, but I'm leaving in a few minutes to walk home anyway.

Also, yesterday morning I woke up early enough to do some strength training. I know, I'm as shocked as you are. Despite not feeling like I was doing all that much, today my arms, chest and stomach are SORE. I think that's more indicative of my weak muscles than of my actually doing anything fierce with my strength training.

I did 10 push ups! OK, 2 sets of 5. But still. I absolutely and completely stink at push ups. You would think the swimming and the defined triceps would give me some upper body strength, but I guess it's the wrong kind of upper body strength.

First, I did 2 planks for 30 seconds each. Those in addition to the 50 slow crunches and 60 bicylce crunches is why my abs are sore. But then I decided to try push ups. I didn't get very low and they were totally pitiful, but I did them. Proud of myself.

Podcast Recommendation

I walk to and from work at least once a week and on those 2 mile treks I like to listen to fitness and health podcasts. FYI, there are a lot of BORING podcasts out there. I just want to ask some people why they think they're being interesting enough to warrant an hour and a half podcast because they're sooooo not.

I have found a few that I like: Dr. Fitness and the Fat Guy, Livin' La Vida Low Carb, Fitness Rocks. These are entertaining enough to hold my attention and usually have some good information as well. I don't always agree with what they have to say, but it's interesting to hear what's out there in the fitness and health world.

As you've probably guessed, I'm a big fan of The Biggest Loser this season. I've actually never watched a complete season through to the end before this season. Usually I catch an episode here or there and then other things get in the way. But I am hooked this time around, and totally rooting for Tara. I know that there are some serious flaws in the methods used, but I do like the time that is spent talking with some of the players about their emotional issues and why they eat. I also like how they all seem to gain such new strength and energy and revitalization from their time on the ranch and how some of them are trying to be an inspiration to others (i.e., Kristin and her motivational speaking, Filipe and his Tongan exercise class).

I recently discovered Jillian Michaels's podcast. She has a Sunday morning radio show on LA Station KFI. You can get the podcast on itunes. I've only listened to a couple of episodes, but so far I really like what she has to say, mostly because I think she's "real". She can be kind of brusque, of course, and she doesn't take crap from people, but I get the sense that she honestly cares and wants to help the people who call or write in with questions. I've heard her deal with someone who was obviously emotionally fragile in a very delicate way.

She also talks about her own foibles. At the beginning of one episode she talked about how she had a crap weekend food-wise and found herself in binge mode. She had to catch herself and step back to try to figure out why she was eating that way, deal with whatever issue was there, and move forward. She talks about how she kind of hates going to the gym. I appreciate her honesty and her acknowledgment that it's kind of a pain in the butt sometimes to look the way she looks.

Saturday Weigh-In: The FINALLY! Edition

The scale moved.

I lost 1 1/2 pounds last week. And another 3/4 inch or so. Jason would probably be a total downer at this point and tell me how weight fluctuates and the 1 1/2 pounds may mean nothing. (he also likes to tell me how there's probably an error rate of 1/4 inch or so on the measuring, but I ignore him or tell him to be quiet and let me be happy about my progress, illusory or not)

Yesterday I kind of threw my food plan book away. I don't know why exactly. Maybe it's the lack of sleep for the past 4 or 5 days, but I just didn't feel like passing up on the few treats I was offered. Also, there was a mango lassi involved at some point. Yum!

So yeah, a couple cookies, mango lassi, and an ice cream sandwich. I was still within my calorie range for the day.

I've had faux sleep apnea for the last few nights, wherein I'm so stuffed up that I have periods of not being able to breathe and I keep waking up. I missed out on my swim this morning because miraculously at 4 AM (I know the time because I was awake), my sinuses cleared and I could breathe through my nose again. I fell right to sleep and figured I needed some real sleep more than a swim.

Saturday I swam for 132 lengths, 3300 yards. I discovered that chlorine fumes are an awesome sinus cleanser. I wasn't gross about it - no blowing snot into the pool, which, by the way, I have seen people do and it's foul. After pulling on my swim cap and stretching and showering, by the time I actually got in the pool, my head was clear. So if you have a cold and don't feel like working out, go for a swim. Preferably an indoor pool where you have the maximum amount of contained chlorine fumes.

New Swimming Personal Record

Today I swam 2000 yards straight, which...I don't think I've ever done, actually. I always swam short distances on swim team so never had to do any real distance training. When I got to the pool this morning, it was super crowded. There was already one lane circle swimming, and the others all had two people already.

I've decided to not be such a pill about circle swimming. Yes, it's a pain because no one goes the same pace. The other woman in my lane today kept passing the man, and I kept passing both of them, though I was swimming slower than usual. But instead of being so rigid about my routine for the day, which is usually pretty hard to maintain when you're circle swimming, I just swim straight until there are only two of us left in the lane and then I pick up with my routine.

Only there were 3 people in my lane the whole time, so I just kept swimming and wound up doing 80 lengths straight. I still had some time left, so I did a 200 kick to finish. I'm just kind of impressed with myself because a few weeks ago I never would have been able to do 2000 yards straight.

How Do You Get Excited About Strength Training?

So I'm all over the cardio. I love to swim and love to challenge myself and feel myself getting faster and stronger in the pool.

Where I fall down is with the strength training. I have several pilates DVDs and I do them occasionally. Now that I've done them all a couple of times, I'm not really that excited by them. I don't really care for weight machines, even though I've done them a lot. I'm just having a really hard time feeling excited at all about strength training. I know it's important and I should do it. But, frankly, my time is limited and if I'm going to spend time exercising, I'd rather be in the pool, swimming laps.

Anyone have any ideas about ways to liven up the strength training aspect of your workout?

No Swim Today

After watching The Biggest Loser last night*, I was all fired up to swim this morning. However, I had an early work meeting. My options were to catch the 7:48 bus or the 8:08 bus to make the 8:30 meeting. Considering the 8:08 bus has been consistently running 10 minutes late, I figured the only way to definitely be here by 8:30 was to catch the 7:48. Which means I need to leave by 7:45. And it takes me about 50 minutes to get ready in the morning. So I would have to end my workout at 6:40 to get home and in the shower by 6:55. And so forth.

All said, it would have meant getting up much earlier than I wanted to. Since it's just Wednesday, I still have 3 days to swim this week so I'm not concerned.

I'm amazed at how hungry I'm not when I don't swim in the morning. On my swimming days I need to be eating at my high calorie range just to curb my hunger, whereas today, I knew it was lunchtime, and I ate, but I was kind of meh about the whole thing.

* Team Tara!

Need More

I swam today without using fins because the fins have caused their own set of problems. Namely, blisters on 6 out of 10 toes. I found a set of fins that some people have said are good for wide feet, so I may be investing in a set of my own. My shoulder feels better today, though, after having a few days off.

I felt distinctly dissatisfied after my swim today. I think part of that was due to my carb-tastic dinner last night. We had sushi, which I haven't had in ages and I LOVE and I figure if you're going to have a carb-heavy meal, sushi is probably one of the more healthy ways to go. So I was feeling kind of sluggish at the start of my swim.

But then I got on a roll and swam an 800 in 14:15, which is slow, but better than my last time from a couple of weeks ago. Then I realized I only had 6 lengths left in the workout. After swimming 90 minutes on Saturday, swimming 45 minutes on weekdays suddenly doesn't seem like that much. However, the only way I can swim longer is if I wake up earlier and get to the pool earlier and that doesn't sound like fun at all.

I suppose if I keep feeling dissatisfied, I can TRY to wake up 15 minutes earlier and get in a full hour. It's so HAAARD, though.

Saturday Weigh-In: SRSLY?!

Guess what? I weigh exactly the same as I did last week. And the week before. To the tenth of a pound, says my digital scale. Is it too much to just want the numbers to change a little? Preferably in a downward direction?

I did lose an inch and a half, including a quarter inch on my waist, hips, and chest. At least I'm toning up uniformly. Also a quarter inch on my right upper arm, which is random, but I'll take it. That means I've lost about 5 1/4 inches in 3 weeks.

So yes, I know, gaining muscle, losing fat, blah blah blah. I would still like the scale to go down a bit. I thought for sure this week I would have lost at least a pound. At least I can feel a difference in my body so I know it's really changing. For one, my jeans are baggier. For two, I feel incredibly energetic and excited to hit the pool and to find other ways to squeeze in some exercise. My boss even offered me a ride home after work on Friday, which was kind of a brain-melting day and I was exhausted, but I said, no thanks, I'm going to walk. Go me.

Saturday morning's swim was another kick-centric workout. My shoulder is still not great. I think I'm going to go to the doctor and try to figure out what's going on. My mom has severe arthritis, my maternal grandfather did too, and my paternal grandmother had bad knees, so it's not inconceivable that I would have some joint issues. I did 7 sets of 300 kick, 100 pull, 100 swim, plus a warm-up and cool down. I love the kicking, except the fins are starting to give me blisters. I wonder if they make fins for people with wide feet...

So I swam 4300 yards, which I think is a new high for me. That's 172 lengths. I was shooting for 176, which would be about 2 1/2 miles, but I ran out of time again and they starting breaking up the lanes for some swim classes that were coming in. Also, I did the last 100 in my long set in 1:25, which I'm very pleased about.

I Heart Fins

So I've never done kicking drills wearing fins before. I've snorkled and scuba dived (dove?) and I know fins are great and make you go fast, but I've never used them in the pool. Lap fins are a lot smaller than snorkling fins, but it's the same principle.

The Y has fins available with the kickboards and pull buoys and I decided to try them out since I knew I was going to have a kicking-heavy workout today to spare my shoulder. I was kind of dreading my workout since kicking makes me bored. However, with the fins it's superfun and I go superfast. I alternated free, fly and back kicking, breaking up the sets with a 100 swim. Not only did I sail through the water, but I could feel my leg muscles working hard as they pushed against more surface resistance.

Usually after a swim, the skin over my triceps is bright red because those muscles have worked hard. Today, the skin over my outer upper thighs was bright red. Tone the upper thighs? Yes, please!

Also, I did my last 100 in 1:29!

Although there was a girl swimming in the lane next to me who was doing 100's in about 1:02. I have work to do! I actually like it when there are fast people swimming with me because it makes me work harder.

2000 yards today
400 swim warmup
4 x 250 kick, 100 swim. Alternate free, fly and back kick.
200 fly kick cooldown

Tomorrow I plan to swim for 90 minutes. I'm going to go heavy on the kicking again and see if I can get my shoulder back into good condition. It's not sore today since I only used it for 800 out of my 2000 yards.

Darn Shoulder

I'm having problems with my right shoulder again. Yesterday during my workout, it started aching toward the end. I iced it while I was getting ready for work, and last night laying on the heating pad seemed to make it feel better. Still, I woke up this morning with a very stiff shoulder and the beginnings of a migraine. I nipped the migraine in the bud, but my shoulder still hurts. My extremely non-ergonomic workstation isn't helping.

Breathing on just my right side seemed to aggravate the shoulder more, so I've been working on breathing on my left. Only, now that it's hurting again I have to wonder if it's just swimming itself that aggravates it, rather than my particular breathing style.

I've had problems off and on with this shoulder for a few years now and it's driving me crazy. I didn't USED to have shoulder pain when I swam. I assume it's because of old age. Maybe it's a problem with initial overuse. I get enthusiastic about swimming and I go a little crazy with it. Last week I swam Wednesday through Saturday without a day off. I would have thought waiting 3 days to swim again would keep the shoulder from freaking out on me, but I guess not.

Tomorrow I'm going to swim, but I'm going to focus on kicking. This is when I REALLY wish I had a swimp3. Kicking by itself is really, really extremely boring. I'll try to mix it up and alternate free, fly and back kicking, but still. However, my legs and bum can always use some work, so I'll try to wear them out tomorrow.

In other news, I am so proud of Jason. He went for a run yesterday! I found a Couch to 5K program for him and he's actually doing it.

Up the Calories

I'm trying to figure out a good way to increase my calories, without increasing the carbs too much. Now that I can eat some fruit and whole wheat bread again, I am having some of both with breakfast. I'm also trying to keep my calories high enough that I'm not ravenous all the time and that I'm giving myself enough fuel to swim.

I have a meeting after work tonight so I'm going to run home and probably eat a leftover pork chop and the easiest side would be a slice of bread with some peanut butter. I do need the calories, but I don't need the additional carbs. If there's anyone else out there watching the carb intake, how do you get in enough calories, without getting your carbs too high? Oh, and without feeling like you're eating an entire pig or chicken in the course of a day.

My goal is to keep my net carbs under 100 g per day, but I haven't been able to do that for the last few days because I made some yummy whole wheat bread this past weekend and it's, you know, basically all carbs.

What Do You Do?

Yesterday I was poking around some of the Providence SparkPeople blogs just to see what other local people are doing. I came across one girl's blog that really worries me. She's calorie counting and keeping track of her fitness, but at completely unhealthy levels. She's basically eating about 700 calories per day, and then making sure to work out and burn at least 200, sometimes 400 calories through exercise. She's written this all down in her blog because she's proud of it. Proud of her "strength". (Does that sound like the mantras of the pro-ana sites or what?)

I suppose there's nothing to do, really. If I said anything to her via an email, I'm sure she would just tell me to mind my own business or ignore me completely. It just makes me sad to see this 21 year-old girl heading down this dangerous path.

Sigh.

Saturday Weigh-In

This is the part of starting exercising that is kind of frustrating. I weighed and measured myself on Saturday only to find I haven't lost an ounce. I weigh exactly what I did last Saturday morning. So while I'm glad I wasn't weighing myself every day this week and feeling frustrated every day, it's still a little disheartening to feel like I've done all this good work, but to not have the scale move.

However, then I measured. All told, I've lost a little more than 2 inches all over my body this week. That means I've lost 3 and 3/4 inches in the past two weeks. Nice, right? This week alone, I lost a half inch off my waist and a quarter inch off my hips. So even though I didn't lose any weight, I lost fat this week, and in my mind, that's better. There are so many reasons it's better. For one, muscle burns calories faster than fat. So no wonder I've been so hungry.

I have always thought the fact that there was no measurement aspect to The Biggest Loser was one of its failings. On those weeks when someone has a lower number in the pounds lost, or even gains, I think there should be some way to say, "But wait! Let's see what the measuring tape has to say." Because chances are, that person didn't screw up that week, he or she just added some muscle. Maybe they should measure weight and body fat percentage. That seems a bit more fair.

Saturday morning I swam for 75 minutes and did 130 lengths. That's the most I've done at once since...well, I can't remember really. It's been a long time. I wanted to do 140 and get a full 2 miles, but lap swimming ended. I only needed 5 more minutes!

Saturday I caught a true second wind and it felt great! I warmed up, did 8 50's on 1:00 and then did the following set:

100 R :25
200 R :30
300 R :35
400 R :40
300 R :35
200 R :30
100

For one, I did that last 100 in 1:35. Those were lengths 104-108 so I'm pretty happy that I shaved 3 seconds off of Thursday's time. For two, I got a total burst of energy right in the middle of that 400. During the first 300, I kind of thought I was going to die. I've been working on breathing on both sides so as not to strain my right shoulder too much and injure myself like I have done before when I've started swimming again too quickly. However, when I start getting tired, breathing on my left gets more difficult and I feel like I'm a short inhale away from drowning. It's not quite that bad, but I definitely feel like I'm floundering.

After I caught my second wind, not only did I feel like I could keep swimming forever, but breathing on my left suddenly got a lot easier. Then after my workout, I had a total endorphin buzz. Instead of feeling exhausted after pushing myself, I felt great. Let's hear it for endorphins.

STARVING and Smoothies

One thing about swimming is, it really gets my metabolism revving and I need FOOD.

After my 80 lengths this morning, I came home and made a berry protein smoothie (recipe below), which I drank while getting ready. Then I walked to work and ate some Greek yogurt with honey. My stomach started growling again at 11, so now I'm having some milk and peanut butter (Jason thinks I'm weird for snacking on spoonfuls of peanut butter).

The thing is, I'm eating healthy and I've already burned something like 700 calories today so I say, bring on the food!

Berry Protein Smoothies for 2*
I haven't used the blender since last fall, when it officially got too cold for smoothies. I went to the grocery store Monday and they had strawberries on sale, so I picked some up and started making smoothies again this week. I always have to work out the kinks of the first few, but I think I got it right today.

12-14 medium strawberries
1/2 C. wild blueberries (hooray for giant bags of frozen wild blueberries at Costco)
1 1/2 scoops protein powder (tweak for your choice of protein powder since the flavors differ. For instance, if I use more than 1/4 scoop of the Whole Foods 365 whey protein, it makes the whole smoothie taste horrible. I don't buy that anymore)
1 C. Almond Breeze, original, unsweetened (you can also use milk, of course, but I like the way Almond Breeze tastes and it's low calorie and low carb)
6-10 ice cubes

The protein powder I use has sweetener in it, so with that and the berries, it's sweet enough. If you want more sweetness, I would suggest a half tablespoon or so of agave nectar.

* If I ever make a smoothie just for me, Jason gets all forlorn and looks like a sad puppy dog, so I leave him one in the fridge when I go to work.

Weekly Weigh-Ins and Confession

As a step toward staying sane, I've decided not to step on the scale every single day, which is what I usually do. I started weighing and measuring myself a couple of weeks ago and have determined that I'm only going to weigh in weekly - on Saturday mornings.

I will admit, though, to whipping out the measuring tape periodically to measure my hips and my waist to see if there are any improvements there. As of this morning, it looks like I may have firmed up a little since Saturday. Woot!

In the interest of full disclosure, I have to confess to having some ice cream last night. And some popcorn that was not my good, healthy Whirley Pop popcorn. Here's what happened. I brought all my food for breakfast, lunch and snacks to work yesterday. Then yesterday morning Jason said some friends had invited us to a hockey game. Fun! Only I didn't have dinner with me. I spaced out my snacks in the afternoon, but was still hungry when I got there and stadium food isn't known for being especially healthy.

Jason and I shared a big tub of popcorn. Then our friends got Carvel ice cream, which I eyed lustily. By the 3rd period I was still hungry and realized we probably wouldn't get home until around 10. I managed to rationalize that since I didn't get ice cream on my splurge day, maybe I could get some now. So I got some ice cream. Chocolate. Good quality. Totally worth it.

Then I swam 2000 yards this morning so I've got that going for me. I'm getting faster. I did a set of:
100 R :20
200 R :25
300 R :30
300 R :30
200 R :25
100

and I did the last 100 in 1:38, which I'm happy with because a) it was faster than I've done a 100 since I started swimming again, and b) it was the last 100 of the set and I was tired, but still managed to push myself.

Survey Fun

My friend Rachel has created a survey related to how your work environment affects eating habits for one of her final projects for school that you should go take right now.

Rachel is working on a Masters in Public Health at Brown and is my personal food guru. I always go to her when I have questions about diet and nutrition. Her life goals include bettering the world through nutrition education, which I think is a worthy goal. Also, she's just a really smart and fun person and I'm kind of jealous at how together she is, even though she's something like 8 years younger than me.

So go, take the survey. Pretty please.

Exercise Groove

I am buzzing with energy this morning. I hope I can keep it up for the rest of the day. This morning I swam 80 lengths, and then walked the 2 miles to work.

I've walked to and from work the last few days, but my shins are starting to hurt. I have flat feet and weak ankles, a combination that means even when I'm wearing supportive running shoes, my shins start to hurt when I walk a lot (ie, 7-8 miles in the last 2 days). This morning I put on my hiking boots to walk to work, which seems like complete overkill, but it did help to stabilize my ankles and my shins didn't hurt quite as much. I probably won't walk home from work, though, and give my shins a break.

This morning when I was doing sets of 50's on the 1:00, I was actually keeping up with the fast guy* in the next lane, which made me feel a bit smug. Never mind that he can keep up that pace steadily for his continuous hour swim. I like that 3 weeks into swimming again, I can keep up with the fast guy for at least a little bit.


* Who I have named Splashy McSplasherson because he insists on SLAPPING his calves on the surface of the water every time he does a flipturn, splashing people as far as 2 lanes away. It is completely and totally unnecessary to do your flipturns like that, and I would think that essentially doing a bellyflop with your legs would create additional resistance and slow you down. Also, it's really annoying.

First Splurge Day: Easter

The last day of South Beach Phase 1 was on Saturday. I had already decided that since it was Easter on Sunday, not only would it be my first day off of Phase 1, but it would also be my monthly splurge day. We went to the house of some friends on Saturday for an Easter egg hunt party and I ended South Beach a bit early so I could eat a shortbread cookie with a Reese's peanut butter egg on top that another friend made because, yum! Then I ate candy and carbs Saturday night and Sunday.

However, I didn't eat as much as I thought I would. My body just didn't want as much. What I did eat, I savored.

The whole splurge day concept works well for me. Restrict myself completely and totally, and I feel sad and deprived. Letting myself have a little bad stuff here, and a little bad stuff there, always turns into a junk food free for all. However, when I know that maybe I can't have the junk today, but I'll get it eventually, I'm able to be patient. Friday night I was stuffing plastic eggs full of jelly beans, M&M's, Hershey's kisses and chocolate mini eggs for Saturday's Easter egg hunt. Jason was nibbling on some M&M's and jelly beans and commented that having all the candy around must be driving me crazy. I shrugged and said, not really. I'll be able to have some Sunday and I'm fine with that.

I have to give credit to my law school roommate, Jenn, for the splurge day idea. She ate mainly chicken breasts and broccoli every other day, and worked out regularly. But one day a month she got to eat whatever. For her, she always had to have a Wild Cherry Pepsi on her splurge day. For me, it's usually ice cream, though I didn't get any on Easter. There's always next month.

I woke up a bit late today so I did some pilates this morning and walked to work in lieu of a swim. I'll also walk home. And maybe to the mall to see what they have over there. We're getting a surprise tax refund and I'm going to let myself buy some new clothes because all my current clothes make me depressed. The rest of the money is going straight into savings.

More Calories

Remember that whole calorie deficit issue? Well, it's 4 PM and I've only eaten 500 calories, so I think this day may win as the most calorie deficit ever.

It's not my fault, though. I went to the Boston office for a meeting this morning and brought a small snack for the train ride up and the train ride back. Then I was supposed to meet Jason for lunch, but today our clients decided to come crawling out of the woodwork and my boss is out of town. So it's 4 PM and I just ate a couple of pieces of turkey and cheese and finally got a chance to enter it all into my log at SparkPeople.

Jason will be picking me up later to head up to Boston again*. I guess I'll be wandering over to CVS in a bit to see what I can scrounge up there as a makeshift dinner. Nuts and milk? Dinner of champions!

* I know. If we had any sort of sense, I would have taken my work up there and worked in the Boston office all day, but apparently we don't.

Calorie Deficit

I'm going to try to keep track of my calorie deficits to see what's going on with my weight loss. I'm holding steady at having lost 2 whole pounds since starting South Beach. The last couple of times I did Phase 1, I lost about 6 pounds in the first week. I have a feeling the stagnation may be because I'm working out as well and possibly not eating enough.

According to the calculators, my Basal Metabolic Rate is 1641 calories. Basically that's how many calories I need to eat each day in order to stay alive and maintain my weight.

Figure in 45 minutes of swimming, at about 50 yards per minute, which burns 571 calories (not, unfortunately, the 740 calories SparkPeople says it does. That would be nice.)

So my calorie expenditure for today is 2212. To maintain my weight, I should eat 2212 calories.

Right now, with the food I've figured for the day, I'm going to eat 1497 calories.

Deficit = 715 calories.

I have a feeling that's too big of a deficit.

Metabomalism

My body is acting weird lately. I don't know if it's the working out, the South Beach, the meals and snacks spread out over my day? I will be absolutely STARVING, but then it takes just a little food to make me full. Then a couple hours later I'm STARVING again.

For instance, after stretching out my breakfast to the point that I didn't take my last bite until almost 10 AM, by noon my stomach was growling like crazy. So I ate some of my beans that I brought, but I didn't finish them because a whole cup of pinto beans with some cheese was just way too much for little ole me, apparently. I didn't even get to the 2nd part of my lunch - leftover eggplant lasagna.

Now, 2 hours later, I'm starving again. And my eggplant lasagna is heating up in the microwave.

I'll bet by 4:30 I'll be starving again and ready for my snack of celery and peanut butter. For the past few days I've been getting hungry every 2 hours or so, but I fill up very quickly.

Is this a sign that my metabolism is speeding up, or that it's out of whack?

Workouts:
Half hour of pilates last night.
40 laps, 2000 yards, in the pool this morning.

Mmmm...Deviled Eggs...

I think I have found my South Beach Achilles heel - deviled eggs. I made some with light mayo, dijon mustard, salt, pepper and a touch of curry powder. While I was making dinner last night, I kept popping little bits of deviled goodness into my mouth. I didn't eat them all, but I think they could definitely be on my list of non-ice cream-related binge items.

Speaking of deviled eggs, though, does anyone know a foolproof way to boil them or chill them or heat them up or whatever so that the shell comes off more easily? I wound up taking off a third of the whites with some of the shells.

Day 8

Swim-A-Thon: 55 laps.

I'm very happy with that, but I know I pushed myself beyond my current fitness level. Since 2 people donated money per lap it pushed me to keep going as hard and fast as I could until that hour was up. And as if to prove how bad a** I am, my swim cap tore as I was taking it off. I'm just that good.

The problem was, instead of feeling energized for the rest of the day, I felt pretty tired and wound up fighting a little headache all evening. Also, after losing 2 1/2 pounds this week, I gained 1 1/2 of them back since yesterday morning, before the swim. I know sometimes you gain weight after particularly hard workouts because of water retention, so that's probably what this weight is.

I'm pretty philosophical about it and know that 1) I will eventually get myself to the point where swimming 55 laps is a good workout, but not so exhausting as it is right now, and 2) I'll lose that weight again once my body balances itself out. Today is a rest day with the working out so my muscles will have ample time to recover before I get back in the pool tomorrow morning.

It's nice to know that even though it was strenuous, I could swim 55 laps yesterday, after only less than a week back in the pool.

Day 6 - Sabotage!

This morning I went to a breakfast meeting for work. They were supposed to have quiche, which would have been great for South Beach. I could just eat the filling and leave the crust. Unfortunately, there was a mix-up and the quiche never got there. Instead we had muffins! So exciting!

It was a small group and the host of the meeting was like a mother insisting, "Eat! Eat!" So I had about a sixth of a lemon poppyseed muffin to not be rude.

Sigh.

It always seems like there's SOMEthing to keep me from doing Phase 1 completely right. I'm not going to let it derail me, though. One little bread product isn't the end of the world and I'm just going to keep going.

I did pilates for my arms and shoulders last night and I'm really feeling it in my triceps. Hopefully I won't be too sore tomorrow morning for my swim. I'm inordinately excited about this swim-a-thon, even though I know it's just like a regular Saturday morning workout for me. Several friends have donated to the cause, which makes me feel like I have a real purpose with this swim. It's like the read-a-thons I used to do in elementary school, only with more action and less sitting on my bum reading.

Husband

Jason would never admit it, but I think he's been a little down lately. His work isn't everything he hoped it would be and I think he might be feeling kind of stuck. It's tough to get him to talk about things like this, but based on what he has told me, I think he's just not feeling so great right now.

More than ever I want to encourage him to exercise. He's been down about his expanding waistline as well, so it would be good for that, but I honestly think that getting into a good routine, with some regular endorphins, would give him more energy and drive to do what he wants to do with his work.

So I'm trying to encourage him. This week he's encouraged me with my swimming and he's also eaten the same healthy dinners as me. However, he has yet to go running (which he's been talking about doing for months now) and he's still eating some not so great things - like the Dunkin Donuts hot chocolate he came home with Tuesday night, and the giant bag of M&Ms he and his sister polished off while I was out of town last week. My fingers are crossed that as I continue getting healthier, that I can motivate him too.

Day 5

Day 5 of South Beach and it's amazing how easy this is. I mean, it's more labor-intensive since I'm cooking a lot more and then lugging a whole variety of tiny containers to work with my breakfast, lunch and snacks in it, but I have found it really easy to slip back into eating this way. I feel good, I'm down a couple of pounds, it's going well.

I did not swim this morning as planned. Last night after work I did one of my pilates DVDs and today I am sore. So I decided to give my muscles a break so I can actually swim for that whole hour on Saturday.

That round of pilates was really depressing. As of just 6 months ago I could do all of the segments and feel good and strong. Yesterday I cheated on some moves and just felt generally weak. But that's why I'm doing the pilates, right? To get stronger.

The cat was THRILLED that I was back on the floor with him. He loves to run under my arms and legs and plop down on my yoga mat while I'm doing moves. It's not very helpful, but it's kind of adorable as he purrs and rolls around and is just generally ecstatic that I'm down on his level.

I am determined that this year of weight loss and exercise will be different. This fall I will not give myself a million excuses to indulge myself, which will undo all the good I'm doing right now and will continue in the summer. That has been my pattern the last couple of years and I'm tired of it. I can have a treat on special days, but none of this weeks- and months-long birthday-Halloween-Thanksgiving-Christmas extravaganza. It's just not worth it to find myself on January 1 right back where I started LAST January 1.

Feeling Good

It's the bless-ed 4th day of South Beach. I'm through the withdrawals and I feel great. Yesterday was the worst. I had a moderate headache all day and felt like I was in a fog. Which makes for a not very productive workday. Today, though, I feel excellent, and am not practically falling asleep despite reading some very, very dry contracts. Also, I'm not craving anything.

This morning I swam 70 laps. OK, is it laps or lengths? I suppose technically up and back equals one lap if you're really looking at the definition of the word. So I did 70 lengths today. I'm going to do 70 tomorrow, rest Friday, and then the swim-a-thon on Saturday. Usually I can do 90-100 lengths in an hour, depending on whether it's all swimming, or swimming with some kicking and pulling. When I'm in my stride, I can do more than 100, but if I get to 100, I'll be happy.

My pace is SLOW. However, at one point during a set, I felt a little pop of endorphins. It was brief and soon after I was tired again, but it was there, giving me hope that I can get back in my prior swimming form pretty quickly.

Temptations

It's very interesting to see how often I am confronted with temptations to stray from my healthy path (that I've been on for 2 whole days and don't want to blow. Again). I had to go to a dinner meeting for work last night. I figured that I wouldn't eat much while I was there and would wait to have dinner until I got home, but when I realized the meeting was going to stretch out to a couple of hours, I knew I had to eat at least some of the dinner. I passed on the bread basket, the giant pile of rice on my dinner plate, and the berry shortcake dessert. I did eat a salad, a salmon filet, and wilted spinach*.

I actually made a grab for the bread initially without even thinking. I believe that's what they call mindless eating.

It's tough to keep up a healthy eating plan when life interferes. When I have strict control over all of my meals and snacks and can take the time to cook, it's easy to stay on the right path. Socializing or working late or any other little glitch in the plan can really mess up the eating goals.

This time last week I would have eaten all of those high-carb, sugary dishes with relish. I have determined that I need a little restriction with regard to my eating or I just go hog wild. Jason even commented recently on my lack of self-control, and you know it's bad if he notices. Usually I'm just his partner in crime with regard to eating tasty treats, but he knows I'm happier when I'm exercising, eating well, and not gaining weight. And in order for me to do that, I have to impose restrictions on myself. Otherwise I can TOTALLY justify eating ice cream every day.

*Although I have issues with cooked spinach (penicillin allergy plus creamed spinach equals trauma for the REST OF YOUR LIFE). There is a fine line between wilted and cooked. Some of that spinach stayed on the plate.

Here We Go Again

In an effort to dejunkify my system, I started Phase 1 of South Beach again yesterday. It reminded me that, oh right, I like vegetables. Particularly this, touted as the best broccoli ever. Jason and his sister agree that it's an apt description. I have an egg, sausage and mushroom breakfast casserole to see me through a week of breakfasts, and a series of yummy-sounding meals lined up for the rest of the days.

Maybe it's all in my head, but I feel better already.

Also, my body is finally well and I went swimming this morning. And now I am very, very sore. I feel like such a weakling. By my last few laps, I could barely get my arms out of the water. So this is what muscle atrophy feels like.

However, my Y is doing a swim-a-thon this Saturday and I signed up to swim for an hour. I donated $10 per half hour to swim and I can get donations from other people. The money is going to the Y's Financial Assistance Fund, which provides assistance for programs and services to those who can't afford it. Since the Y is on the edge of a semi-ghetto neighborhood, there are a lot of after-school programs and such to help kids. So if any of you who know me in real life would like to donate, let me know. You can donate either per lap or a flat amount.

Why Does My Body Hate Me So SO Much?

Saturday night I got a headache. It continued through the night and all day yesterday. I came home early from church to lay like a lump on the loveseat. I went out with Jason and his sister for an excursion to take pictures at the state capital, but after about 30 minutes outside walking around, I felt kind of sway-ey and like maybe I might possibly throw up if I didn't sit down really, really soon.

Despite that, I packed my workout bag last night and set my alarm for 6 AM.

At 6 AM, I woke up and my head still hurt. A lot. So I slept for another hour and a half and then finally dragged myself into work where I sat at my desk for a few hours, willing my head not to explode all over my computer and nice new desk lamp. Finally, I came home, grabbed my two-month old prescription for migraine pills and headed for CVS. I had tried over-the-counter remedies, but nothing worked. Usually I can take 3 Excedrin and come out an hour or so later, feeling a little spacey from the caffeine, but mostly headache-free.

I think my migraines are getting worse. I took my prescription pill and went to bed with an ice pack on my head. Two hours later, I woke up with just a little residual aching. I took another pill for good measure. The residual aching is still there, but I don't feel like I'm going to die and/or throw up, so that's a plus.

The point of all of this is, no, I did not go swimming this morning. I'll try again tomorrow.

Plans

Oh, hello there. I've been writing a lot more lately on my other blog because, frankly, there's not much going on in my fitness/weight loss/health world.

That mysterious pain I noted a couple of weeks ago? Cracked rib. At least I'm pretty sure that's what it was since when I described to several people they said that's what it sounded like. So, basically, when I had the flu I coughed so hard that I broke a bone. I didn't bother going to the doctor because they would have just charged me money for an appointment and an x-ray and then said, "Yep. Cracked rib." and maybe have given me prescription pain pills. However, I discovered Alleve and that has made all the difference. This week has been 100 times better than last week, although the last couple of nights the rib has been hurting a bit more again. I blame friends who make me laugh.

If it's still feeling better, I'm going to try to go swimming on Monday. Then Tuesday. Then I'm going to a conference out of town and staying at a nice hotel with a fitness room so maybe I'll go walk on the treadmill or something. If I'm not completely fried from 8 hours of seminars. I'll take my sneakers and my workout clothes and make a valiant effort.

I have been listening to some of my fitness/healthy eating podcasts to try and get motivated and I think "Yes! So true! Absolutely right! Protein! More vegetables!" Then I go eat some ice cream. (Although, I would like to note that the chocolate raspberry ice cream, aka my arch nemesis, is gone now and will only be making occasional appearances in our house in the future).

Seriously, though, we're to the point where all my clothes are getting tight and I hate it. I much preferred it when the jeans were getting loose than that feeling of the fabric straining across my thighs. It's been very frustrating to feel like I can't exercise and do anything about it.

OK, yes, I could have been eating better. I could have been doing SOMEthing. Whatever. This is my blog.

Eating Healthier

This weekend, I sat down with my favorite recipe websites and figured out exactly what we would be having to eat for dinner this week. I thought about the ingredients I already had in the freezer and the pantry and looked up recipes according to those ingredients. I made a list of the main dishes and side dishes and will make whatever ones complement one another the best. Then I went to the grocery store with only about 10 items on my list and now I feel like I have a plan.

I figure this will be much better than my plan of the last few weeks, which has consisted of first, being too sick to care about food, then being too sick to cook food, then having no plan and getting take out every night. Not effective for the healthy eating.

The other part of my plan WAS going to be me getting back in the pool this morning. Sidelined again with some mysterious side/shoulder pain. It started a little over a week ago and aches pretty constantly, then stabs me aggressively whenever I move my arm or my back or my whole torso in certain ways. Or cough or laugh or sneeze. I hiccuped last night and thought I was going to die. A friend speculated last night that maybe I cracked a rib from coughing so hard when I was sick a couple of weeks ago. Jason thinks maybe I pulled a muscle. It's been over a week and it's not getting better. In fact, last night was probably the worst yet as I searched for a comfortable position to fall asleep. I finally contorted my arms and legs just so and it didn't ache anymore. If only I could figure out how to sit at my desk like that.

Anyway, I think I'll wait a couple of more days and if it's still not better, I'll go to the doctor In the meantime, I KNOW I have gained weight - I can feel it and see it - and not being able to do anything about it is driving me nuts.

Meh

I kind of don't care right now. I don't ENJOY the fact that my pants feel a bit tighter and I don't feel as good as I would if I was exercising regularly and eating right, but I'm having a hard time working up the appropriate level of dissatisfaction with myself. Jason pointed out to me last night that even though I can't exercise right now, I could still eat well. Then I asked him how his running program was going and that was the end of the conversation. He has this groovy new watch that will keep track of his running stats and a couple of weekends ago he figured out how to use it, but he hasn't actually gone for a run yet.

However, we're both coughing a lot, though. I was actually hoping to swim last week. And then I was hoping to swim this week. But since walking up two flights of stairs sends me into paroxysms of coughing, working out just isn't happening.

So I could be eating better and at least momentarily staving off weight gain. But like I said above, I'm having a really hard time caring right now. I'm enjoying having a couple Girl Scout cookies with my lunch and eating my fresh-baked cranberry bread.

Yeah, I know, another whiny post about my lack of motivation. I promise as soon as this cough goes away I will be back on the bandwagon. One of the perks of exercising regularly is after I slog through 90 laps, I don't really want to eat a bunch of crap to negate my awesome workout. Funny how that happens.

New Weight Loss Plan!

Getting so sick that absolutely nothing sounds good or tastes good. Except for the Frosty I had last night. But seriously, I had eaten about 300 calories up to that point in the day and a Frosty from Wendy's (or something similarly cold and creamy) was the only thing that appealed to me at all. Any other food I thought of made me want to throw up a little.

Today I managed to choke down a few bites of oatmeal, a few bites of the soup I bought for lunch (though the texture of the garbanzo beans in the soup was totally freaking me out), and a couple of slices of deli turkey. It's not that I'm nauseous, just everything is gross to me.

Obviously until this is over, and until every little move doesn't make me start coughing uncontrollably, I'm at a standstill with the working out.

Steel Cut

After a crazy week of visiting the in-laws, busy times at work and Valentine's Day, last week was kind of a wash. I was going to go swimming this morning, but I took advantage of this holiday by cooking some casseroles for breakfasts and dinners this week, plus a stew for tonight's dinner and that all took awhile and now it's 2 PM and I just got around to eating lunch and there's no more lap swimming today. However, we're having some people over for dinner and in an hour or so I'm going to start some heavy duty cleaning. That's always good for burning some calories.

This morning I made steel-cut oats for the first time and I am a new fan. I made one serving per the directions on the container and mixed in about 1/4 cup plain Greek yogurt, a small squirt of agave nectar and a dash of cinnamon. It tasted almost exactly like rice pudding, which is one of my favorite foods. Rice pudding for breakfast. Mmmmm.

Swimming Sore

76 laps yesterday
90 laps today

Today as I walked up the stairs to our apartment after running an errand I realized my legs were TIRED. Swimming is kind of like pilates for me. I don't really feel the muscles straining while I'm swimming the laps or contorting myself into odd isometrically-challenging shapes, but later on, ow!

So maybe it's a good thing I didn't swim 5 times this week. 3 seems to have been plenty for my body right now, and I don't want to injure myself. Again.

We're going out of town for a few days so no swimming until sometime late next week.

Encouraging

It's really nice after huffing and puffing through 70 laps, and feeling continually disappointed by my times, to be told by the lifeguard that I must be a "serious swimmer". I don't know what that means exactly, but it sounds positive.

We talked a bit and he said he observed that my technique is better when I breathe on both sides. Which I suppose is what my right shoulder has been telling me for a couple of years. When I only breathe on my right side, after a few days of swimming my shoulder aches like crazy.

However, when I breathe on both sides, I'm slower. Not by a lot, but some. Which is annoying since I'm slow right now anyway. So today I did about half my laps breathing on the right side and half alternating sides.

But the point is, out of the several people at the pool this morning (a couple of whom I thought looked really sleek), the lifeguard told me that I'm obviously the serious swimmer. Nice.

Weekly Recap

I meant to go swimming yesterday morning and this morning. However, Thursday night I was all buzzing with nervous energy because I had a work meeting on Friday morning at which I would be the only representative from our law firm for the very first time. I think I finally fell asleep at about 1:30, and I just couldn't get up at 6.

Then this morning I was lazy because I need to go into work soon and will probably be there for at least 6 or 7 hours. Plus, tomorrow morning I have a meeting at church at 8:15. Today was the only morning I could sleep in for a bit, so I did.

However, since I set my exercise bar relatively low, I succeeded in meeting my goals this week. My goal is to exercise 3 times per week for at least 30 minutes - which I did. Monday I walked to and from work (60 min), Tuesday I swam (30 min), and Thursday I swam (35 min).

I know next week will be better simply because of how great I felt after swimming. Even though I am slow and more breathless than I would like while completing my laps, the endorphins are kicking in. I felt great on the two days I swam, so Monday morning I'll be at the pool. Next week my goal will be the same 3 times per week, but I'm going to see if I can get in 5 days of swimming. Oh and also wake up early enough that I'm not forced out of the pool by my schedule after only a half hour.

Swimaroo

I swam again this morning. Yesterday morning I rolled over after my alarm went off and didn't reset it and woke up an hour later. Then I thought, well maybe we'll have a work snow day since it's so icy and I can go swim anyway. I brought work home just in case. So I waited until the last possible second and finally got in the shower. When I got out, there was an email from my boss about 5 minutes after I got into the shower telling us we had a snow day. Sigh. Time was conspiring against me yesterday.

I went today, though, and swam 60 laps in 35 minutes. I can't believe how easily I get tired and how slow I am, and I haven't hit that point yet where I get a mad endorphin rush afterward, but I know that's coming. I just have to stick with it. So far I've gone swimming twice this week, which is 2 times more than I have in the past few months. And as far as my speed goes, I did consistently lap the guy I was sharing a lane with and almost kept pace with the really skinny girl in the next lane with the waterproof workout flip chart, which I assume indicates she's hardcore. So I've got that going for me.

Pretty New Suit

In an effort to inspire myself a few weeks ago, I bought a new swimsuit. This one, actually:
I already had a blue swim cap and a couple of beach towels with lots of blue. Blue seems to be my swimming color lately (although red has had its time in the sun as well). I even bought some new blue flip-flops at Old Navy a couple weeks ago.

The suit is the Speedo Quantum Spliced Superpro, and I want to give it a shout out because it's the only training suit I've felt comfortable wearing for a really long time. See, my long torso means that swimming is a never ending struggle to not have a wedgie. Speedo makes one suit in long torso. It's a total grandma suit and comes in black or navy with padded boobs. SEXY!

Normally training suit fabric is not stretchy at all, and when it does start to stretch that's when you know you need to buy a new suit because the elastic is going and pretty soon there will be random transparent spots all over the suit where the elastic has disappeared completely. But the fabric on this suit is just stretchy enough that it stays on, while stretching longer to fit my body. I can't tell you how thrilled I was to come out of a flipturn yesterday morning and A) not have a wedgie, and B) not have the front pulled down to the middle of my breasts to compensate for the other end staying in place.

Can I Get A "Woot Woot"?!

I did it! I went to the gym this morning and I swam. Granted, I got there about 20 minutes later than I had planned and could only swim for a half hour, but I did it. It's the first time I've been to the gym since - um - I don't really know. November?

I am embarrassingly out of shape. Sigh.

In my absence, the Y decided to refurbish the locker rooms that go straight to the pool. So we now have to use the rec center locker rooms (which until this morning I didn't know existed), which are down the stairs and around the corner from the lobby and the pool. Which means instead of being able to rinse off (per RI Department of Health regulation) and walk right into the pool area via a door from the locker room showers, we have to gather up all our swimming paraphernalia and walk all the way back up the stairs, past the lobby and through another entrance to the pool altogether.

So now, I just put my coat and bag in the locker, change into flip flops, and walk to the pool, fully clothed and carrying my towel, goggles and swim cap. The Department of Health will just have to deal because, while I've gotten over my whole "appearing at the pool in a swimsuit" issues, I have not quite made it to the place where I feel comfortable walking through the Y and past the lobby in only my swimsuit.

While I was gathering my things together a wet woman in a swimsuit walked into the locker room and I asked her how long the locker rooms had been under construction. She said, "Oh, about 4 weeks. 4 weeks of 12, they say." I said, "And I guess I just gave away how long it's been since I've made it to the gym."

Seriously Lacking Motivation

Last night I was reading Such A Pretty Fat* and felt totally inspired to wake up this morning and go to the gym. Yes, I was! I had my workout clothes laid out and my work bag packed so that I could maximize sleeping, go to the gym and still make it to work on time.

Only then the alarm went off at 6 and I rolled over for a couple more minutes only I forgot to reset the alarm and then I woke up at 7. Sigh.

I need some motivation. I wish I had a workout buddy because then I would know that she would show up at the gym and I wouldn't be there and I would be wracked with guilt. I'm trying to find that inner motivation that I had last year, but I think it likes warmer weather and is dormant in the winter.

I can say I'm going to go to the gym and plan and prepare, but until I work up the wherewithal to pull my bum out of bed in the early morning, nothing is going to change. I did walk to work in 18 degree weather so that's something.

* Jason asked me last night why I only read fat girl losing weight books lately. I tried to explain to him it's because that's where my head is right now. I feel pretty good, honestly, but I'm in this eternal struggle to lose 20-25 more pounds. I know what I need to do, and reading about other people's successes and failures is inspiring and makes me feel like I'm not in this alone. Maybe it would help if I had more chubby girlfriends who were also trying to lose weight. Must work on finding some of those.

Spectacular Finish!

I finished Phase 1 of South Beach by going off of Phase 1 one day early. Jason's parents were in town this weekend and we went out to eat on Saturday at the Cheesecake Factory. I had a salad and wanted some cheesecake. Actually, it was my first meal of the day at 4 PM so I didn't feel too bad about that. We just hemmed and hawed about what to do until finally it was early afternoon and none of us were showered and dressed, but we were hungry!

I got the Tiramisu cheesecake and ate a little less than half of it. Let me tell you, my head was buzzing. Literally. I felt kind of loopy and could hear this high-pitched buzzing. Yeah.

Since then I've eaten a couple of slices of whole wheat bread, the rest of the cheesecake and a slice of sweet potato pie (which I have tweaked until it's basically just a baked sweet potato in crust) so my sensitivity to the sugar has died down. But that was sure an interesting wake-up call as to how sugar affects me.

Now the in-laws are gone, and I'm back on plan. Since I'm now on Phase 2, I had a piece of whole wheat bread with natural, no-sodium peanut butter for breakfast, but I'm not planning on having any more grains or sugars for the rest of the day.

Now if I could just get my bum to the gym. This is my Achilles heel this year. I just can't seem to do it and I need to work on that. Maybe watching The Biggest Loser tonight will inspire me to pack my swim bag and get up at 6 AM tomorrow.

Day...Um...Day 11

I seriously just had to look at a calendar to figure out what day I was on. Apparently South Beach isn't cramping my style too much if I'm not counting down the days to the end of Phase 1.

Last night I did have a small dish of chopped fruit. Some friends invited us over and she wanted to make us dessert. "Do you guys like chocolate?" she asked. I told her that oh, yes, we love chocolate. However, I'm not eating sugar right now (didn't feel the need to go into the whole rah rah South Beach thing). I assured her that whatever she made for them would be wonderful and I would not be bothered at all. Also, if Jason found out that he could have gotten chocolate and I put the kibosh on it, I would have been in serious trouble.

So we show up and our friend pulls out a lovely chocolate cake and...a bowl of chopped fruit for me. I just could not turn up my nose at such a sweet gesture. So I ate some, and it was yummy, and they also had milk, which I drank because I love milk and it is SB-approved. Hopefully the two combined made her feel like she was an excellent hostess for the evening. Because she was.

I still haven't been back to the gym because, I don't know if you've heard, but it's freakin' cold outside right now. I'm doing good to pull myself out of bed in time to make my bus, let alone hauling my bum to the gym.

I'm still down 6.6 pounds. I think this is probably about where I will be until I start exercising again. 6.6 pounds in less than 2 weeks is a-ok with me.

Sugarette

This morning on my way into work I was listening to a podcast interview with Dr Scott Olson, author of Sugarettes. The premise of his book is an analogy between the addictive qualities of sugar and cigarettes. He encourages us to think of sugar (and other things that go into your system the same way, such as most carbohydrates) as addictive. I haven't read his book, but based on the interview, I couldn't agree with him more.

When I was 13, my parents and I met with a nutritionist and were put on diabetic diets, with the mandate to cut out white flour and white sugar and to eat within the diabetic exchange system. The premise behind this particular nutritional approach was that refined sugar goes into your system and reacts the same way as alcohol. So does refined flour. Your body becomes used to that influx and begins to crave it, which is why you go through withdrawal when you stop eating it. At least I do. When I have been eating a lot of refined carbs and then I cut them out, I feel headachey and awful for a day or two, but then I come out the other side feeling a million times better than when I was eating the refined carbs.

Dr. Olson mentioned a mouse study where they fed the mice diets highly based on sugar and then removed the sugar from the diets (I'm sure he mentions it in his book too and there is probably a cite there). The mice exhibited increased aggressiveness, trembling and other signs of withdrawal for a short period. After the withdrawal period, they were fine. However, and this is what is key for me I think, when they reintroduced sugar to the diets, the mice completely binged, much as someone who is a sober alcoholic falls off the wagon hard when he or she drinks again. That sounds so familiar. If I limit myself to a little bit of sugar very occasionally, then I can keep my intake under control. However, as I just demonstrated in the final months of 2008, when I give myself license to eat what I want, I overindulge and wind up gaining weight, feeling awful, and exactly where I was before I started limiting my carbs.

Basically, I understand where the mice are coming from and I think it's interesting that the biological craving never really goes away, it's just a matter of being in control of it.

Day 8

-6 pounds

I'm still feeling great. For whatever reason I'm not getting bored with Phase 1 of South Beach this time around and I'm not finding it hard to do. I think it's because I'm making an effort to make my food as interesting as possible. Last time I had a lot of lunches that consisted of chicken breast and homemade tomato sauce. While that tasted great the first 3 or 4 times, after that I was so bored that I didn't want to eat at all.

This time I'm making great stews and tenderloin in the crock pot and getting more adventurous with spices and oils. It's definitely making this a more feasible way to live for the next week. Then I get to eat fruit again. Yay! I'm planning to make it to next Monday on Phase 1, but Jason's parents are coming into town this weekend and I don't know where we'll wind up for meal times. We may go to this French place Jason and I like and they have aMAzing bread. But you only get 1 piece usually so it may not be too bad if I indulge

Also, I went to the doctor this morning for my annual check-up because I'm making an attempt to act like a grown up who actually does things like have an annual check-up and my blood pressure is 110/70. Woo! However, my heart rate was 75 bpm. I had just been walking around the office, so my resting heart rate is probably in the 60s. Over the summer I had a low of 48 and that felt pretty cool so it's definitely time to get back to the gym and get my heart all super healthy again.

Day 5

For the record, I'm holding steady at -4 pounds. Those other 10 that I gained before December 31 may take a little more effort. I might have to start exercising and stuff.

However, I feel awesome. A few years ago I started taking antidepressants. I had a very understanding professor who let me postpone handing in a final paper because she had dealt with something similar. One day I was talking with her and I described the moment when the meds started working as "coming out of a fog." I honestly remember that very moment when suddenly I connected with the world around me. I was halfway through law school and wished more than anything else I could redo the first year and a half without being in a daze. Suddenly the things the teachers were saying made sense and I started participating in class without being specifically called on. I had the energy to be more assertive and even restarted an organization that had gone defunct. I got my first honest-to-goodness A that semester. In Tax Law. Yes, I realize that makes me a freak.

And that's how I feel today. Like I'm coming out of a fog. I got through the initial cravings of the first few days and now I feel physically great and mentally alert.

Yesterday I went to a (really boring) continuing legal education class. They provided a breakfast of many pastries. Before I went, I ate some mushroom and feta bake for breakfast, had a sugar-free hot chocolate at the class because it was FREEZING in there, and brought almonds as a snack. The lunch they served was baked macaroni and cheese, salad, and sandwiches and wraps. I loaded up my plate with salad, and pulled apart a couple of sandwiches to eat the meat inside.

And I did not come close to falling asleep at all. Usually at these things I am struggling hard to stay awake. Yesterday, I was alert through the whole thing. I still feel that way. No carb crashing at all.

The best part is how I feel like my brain is firing on all cylinders. I've felt kind of cloudy for the last few weeks and have seen it reflected in my job performance and my memory. For the past couple of days, I have been on the ball! I've felt totally in control of the cases I'm handling and can recall details on the fly that I know would have been just out of my mental grasp a week or so ago.

The ironic thing is, I was just listening to a Fitness Rocks podcast this morning that talked about a study on brain function in people who are on a low-carb versus a low-fat diet. They found a decrease in certain memory capacities for the people on the low-carb diet. I would argue that I have experienced the opposite and that I have felt similarly when I cut carbs in the past. Granted, I haven't cut my carbs down to below 20g like the people in the study, but the last couple of days have been around 30g, which isn't a huge difference.

I do think that everyone has to find a food plan that works for them, and for me that seems to be lower-carb, higher-protein.

Also, I got my new swimsuit and it's super cute (you know, as much as a Speedo can be) and I'm going to swim on Tuesday (because I have an appointment at 7 AM on Monday and I am not going to the Y at 5 AM).

SBD Day 2

Wow, my body does not like the carbs. Or mass amounts of the carbs anyway. I've lost 4 pounds since yesterday morning, says my scale.

Last night I made a Mushroom and Feta Breakfast Casserole from Kalyn's Kitchen, one of the best sources I have found for interesting and tasty Phase 1 recipes. I sliced it up into 8 servings and brought 1 for breakfast this morning. I am a huge fan of both mushrooms and feta so of course I thought it was fabulous.

I made Jason and I sesame salmon and veggies for dinner last night. I forgot how much I love fresh vegetables and just simple, unprocessed food. Duh. I hate how I forget these things when all I'm eating is chocolate and cookies.

Anyway, the salmon was very simple: just saute in a little sesame oil and sprinkle with some garlic powder. Finish with some toasted sesame seeds. For the veggies, I sauteed celery, scallions, bok choy, broccoli and water chestnuts in a little sesame oil and then sprinkled some soy sauce on toward the end. I probably cooked the vegetables for a total of 10 minutes and they were still crisp and flavorful.

I'm working the hardest at Goal #3, planning ahead, because when I plan, the healthy eating falls into place. For example, on Sunday while I was canning some apple butter (no sugar added), I washed and chopped the celery, bok choy and scallions. Then I scooped some peanut butter into a couple of tiny containers and made a couple of baggies of celery sticks for snacks. I also started some black beans hydrating, and I'm going to cook those up tonight.

Yesterday I had 60 g of carbs and 140 g of protein. I walked home from work and today I walked to work and plan to walk home. Progress is being made.

True Confessions

Alright, I'm going to be honest. I lost 17 pounds in 2008. I gained 14 of them back by December 31.

I believe I did something shockingly similar in 2007.

I don't know what it's going to take for me to not sabotage 9 months of hard work in the last 3 months of the year, but something has got to change. Oh, I know, maybe all of that "Just one little this" and "A taste of that" throughout the months of October to December isn't helping. Maybe.

Today I started Phase One of the South Beach Diet again in an effort to have some rigid guidelines to stick to. Jason thinks it's bad when I go to extremes, cutting out sugar and, for the next couple of weeks, carbs. But he doesn't understand that this is how I work. I need limits, or else I give myself way too much leeway. One cookie becomes 15 (that was Friday. I walked home Friday with an awful stomach ache because of cookies. How dumb am I?)

Also, Jason? Not the pinnacle of health and fitness that you might think.

I began today fully intending to walk to and from work, but it's a giant ice slick outside. I made it about 4 blocks and after nearly falling 5 or 6 times, I decided to hop on the bus after all. Maybe it will be more mushy and less icey out by the time I leave tonight.

I'm trying to get more motivated about exercising. I've had a sore throat for about 5 days and that's not helping matters. It's a sick type of sore throat - the kind that hurts when you swallow and makes me feel like chopping off my head when I first wake up in the morning because it's been so long since I've had any water. Usually sore throats like this evolve into a full-on head cold after a couple of days, but so far, no cold. Just a sore throat. Which is annoying and makes me not feel quite up to snuff.

Tomorrow morning I'll do Pilates and try to walk to work again. Once I get my new swimsuit I'm going to get it together and get back in the pool.

I can't even express how frustrating it is to start yet another new year back at square one.

Goals

I'm discovering that I'm really good at giving myself an excuse to celebrate. So I celebrated New Years with food. Wheeee!

I just got a great email from my sister-in-law (hi, Sarah!) who reminded me how awesome you feel when you get all of the junk out of your system and get past the cravings. It's really hard to remember when the dark chocolate-dipped cookies in the office kitchen are calling my name.

So here are some concrete, fo' real goals that I'm beginning on Monday, January 5, 2009.

Goal 1
Exercise for 30 minutes, 3-5 days a week. I'm being realistic here because I know some weeks I will barely get to the gym 3 times and other weeks I will be there 6 times and probably walk to and from work and do a Pilates DVD on the side. But my minimum should be 3 days. I just set a goal for myself on SparkPeople to work out for 10,000 minutes this year, which means I will need to average a little more than 200 minutes a week. Last year I had the goal of 10,300 minutes based on some crazy math that I did around June, and in September I was well on my way to reaching and surpassing that goal. However, the last quarter of 2008 was not good exercise-wise and I didn't make it. Boo!

Last week I ordered myself a new swimsuit, which is always good inspiration to get back in the pool, and I am psyched. I am not psyched about showing up at the pool again weighing several pounds more than I did the last time I was there. And yes, I realize I am the only one who knows that, but I feel like I was doing so well and then I got off track and then I got wildly crazily lost in the woods off track. So I guess I'm just kind of embarrassed about it all and mad at myself for letting my weight get back to this point. Sometimes I just want to give up and let the M&Ms take over.

Goal 2
Step away from the simple carbohydrates. I have already said this ad nauseum, so I'll just restate it quickly. No white sugar or white flour except for a splurge day once a month. 150 g of protein a day and less than 100 g of carbs per day (with a little wiggle room when those carbs come from good things like fruit, because unlike Dr. Atkins and Dr. Agatston I think fruit is right and good)

Goal 3:
Plan ahead. My downfall is when I don't prepare food the night before and show up at work not really knowing what I'm going to eat for breakfast or lunch. There aren't a lot of dining options in downtown Providence and I'm limited to not very good things for the girl who is trying to eat well. Just 20-30 minutes the night before and I can have everything tucked away in a bunch of little containers ready to go to work with me in the morning.

So that's what I've got planned for Monday morning. Exciting, yes?