This week has been pretty good as far as sticking to my eating and staying in my calorie range, AND doing it the way I'm supposed to... drinking no sooner than 30 mins after a meal, protein and produce exclusively for main meals, lots of drinking no calorie beverages, and getting exercise in EVERY day.
Today I had apple & peanut butter for breakfast. It took a while to eat, but I did get it all down. I also had some yogurt this morning. A few cups of tea, some crystal light. Last night I made some really delicious scallops for dinner...garlic, herbs de provence, butter and white wine. They are the tiny bay scallops, so they were already perfectly "me" bite sized. I think I waited too long to eat because I wanted to SNARF that food down. I paid the price for it too. Let's just say I didn't get to keep my lunch down. I think I kept a little down, but it's hard to be sure. Last night I had problems with the last bite of steamed broccoli I had. It caused me to lose all my veggies. I NEED THOSE THINGS DAMMIT! So I had some warm hot chocolate and assumed the "I'm not going to throw anything else up" stance. (which requires I slouch WAY down in my chair almost to the point of lying down, and breathing slowly to try to get the food to dislodge and go on its merry way to my stomach)
Don't know why I am tight today. I am tired for sure. Maybe that's all it takes- get tired enough and my system gets altered /inflamed. I am stressed a little bit about two of my coworkers leaving in the span of 2 weeks. They found better adventures. The stress there is made up of excitement for them and their new lives, a sense of impending doom as attrition keeps us from hiring replacements for them, and the redistribution of work that will have to happen as a result. And WE ARE AT CAPACITY! But I can only do what I can do. No sense in stressing it.
I am really on high-alert internally to make sure I stay WITH myself regarding food. I have rededicated to training for another 5K and I went for my first run last night since maybe October. It's NOT pretty. I am SO out of shape. I used to be able to knock out 3 miles like it was nothing, but I had to run/walk 1.5 miles last night and today I am FEELING it. I feel ashamed for letting myself slip on this. I feel horrified that I have taken a 30 lb step backward in my progress. Realizing that THIS is my reality, not the la-la-land that I have been living in over the holidays is a shock to my ego and my system I think. Hence the high-alert.
So after PBing last night, and PBing not 20 minutes ago, I realize that it is EXHAUSTING having to do that with my food. I mean I am literally WORN out after I regurgitate. Part of it is trying to feed my body and not being able to... and part of it is just the terrible stress that it creates for me internally. Everytime I PB, I am not achieving my goals to get on track.
I think once I get back into my groove and working out and regulating my food intake goes back to being "just the way I roll", I will feel more relaxed, more trusting of myself, and more in control of myself.
INHALE
EXHALE
This is all I can do now. Stay with the breath.
xo
j
Wednesday, December 29, 2010
Monday, December 27, 2010
My Calendar is Off...But In A Good Way
The insanity of food-a-palooza is finally over for the year. I made it through Christmas without going completely overboard...anything I ate, I sweated off in the kitchen. I basically spent most of Christmas Eve Day cooking my ass off for a 6 p.m. dinner. On Christmas Day, I spent time making Creme Brulees, then cleaning up the mess in the living room in preparation for a 4 p.m. dinner. Don't get me wrong, there were cookies and candies and wine and champagne, but nothing was overdone. So not feeling too bad about the caloric intake of the holiday.
Christmas Eve day I signed up for my next 5K which is 10 weeks away. I begin my training today. According to the lap-band rules, I should expect to be losing 1-2 lbs a week, so if I stay on track for training and eat as I am supposed to, and drink drink drink (water & low-cal liquids-I'm actually abstaining from drinking alcohol for my training), I should be down 15-20 lbs by the time the 5K rolls around. This will be a GREAT relief to me. I feel like I totally FLUSHED all my success down the toilet with this weight gain. It's really sad and disheartening. But, as I told someone before who commented on my weight gain (I WAS PISSED AS HELL, but reigned it in and said:) "Well, I know what to do and I have all the tools I need to help me get the weight off again, I'm confident in my abilities".
And I need to be confident in them because I am the one who did it before-of my own volition and under my own direction I became a runner! I trained myself for my first 10K. That's significant and it shows a great deal of dedication to my health and my goals. I'm WITH me, not abandoning me.
So I begin today with renewed confidence and drive to achieve this goal. I feel good about it not being the "New Year's Resolution bandwagon" sort of thing. It's just a re-dedication to the life-long goal I made to be healthy and happy and have a life that I want! My body hurts from inactivity, my clothing doesn't fit as well as it did- in fact, some shirts I can't get into because my arms are too big... or my bust is too big, and I have been PLAGUED with depression and aimless longing for something... It's been there all along, I had just quit going to that place. The meditation that is exercise & running. I ALWAYS feel good after a run. I ALWAYS feel that my heart is more peaceful, that my anxiety is not an unmanageable monster running my life. This is the right path for me to end/begin.
I must remember to start slowly. I wasn't running a full 3 miles instantly when I started training for my first 10K. I need to remember to be gentle and consistent. THAT will get me results and keep me from injuring myself. I think I will start going to yoga at least once or twice a week as well. It's a nice augmented exercise for me and DAMN does it make me strong!
Well, onward!
xo
j
Christmas Eve day I signed up for my next 5K which is 10 weeks away. I begin my training today. According to the lap-band rules, I should expect to be losing 1-2 lbs a week, so if I stay on track for training and eat as I am supposed to, and drink drink drink (water & low-cal liquids-I'm actually abstaining from drinking alcohol for my training), I should be down 15-20 lbs by the time the 5K rolls around. This will be a GREAT relief to me. I feel like I totally FLUSHED all my success down the toilet with this weight gain. It's really sad and disheartening. But, as I told someone before who commented on my weight gain (I WAS PISSED AS HELL, but reigned it in and said:) "Well, I know what to do and I have all the tools I need to help me get the weight off again, I'm confident in my abilities".
And I need to be confident in them because I am the one who did it before-of my own volition and under my own direction I became a runner! I trained myself for my first 10K. That's significant and it shows a great deal of dedication to my health and my goals. I'm WITH me, not abandoning me.
So I begin today with renewed confidence and drive to achieve this goal. I feel good about it not being the "New Year's Resolution bandwagon" sort of thing. It's just a re-dedication to the life-long goal I made to be healthy and happy and have a life that I want! My body hurts from inactivity, my clothing doesn't fit as well as it did- in fact, some shirts I can't get into because my arms are too big... or my bust is too big, and I have been PLAGUED with depression and aimless longing for something... It's been there all along, I had just quit going to that place. The meditation that is exercise & running. I ALWAYS feel good after a run. I ALWAYS feel that my heart is more peaceful, that my anxiety is not an unmanageable monster running my life. This is the right path for me to end/begin.
I must remember to start slowly. I wasn't running a full 3 miles instantly when I started training for my first 10K. I need to remember to be gentle and consistent. THAT will get me results and keep me from injuring myself. I think I will start going to yoga at least once or twice a week as well. It's a nice augmented exercise for me and DAMN does it make me strong!
Well, onward!
xo
j
Friday, December 24, 2010
It's Beginning To Look A Lot Like Fat Pants...
...Everywhere I go...
The holidays are upon us. There are treats and candy and junkfood surrounding us from all directions. There are evil & deceptively calorically-INSANE holiday coffee drinks being sold on every corner. There's a distinct message of "oh come on- it's the holidays! You deserve a treat!" coming from every television, radio, and store window. And as you walk down the sidewalk towards Starbucks, the holiday lights twinkle and the air is brisk. And you think "It's Christmas Eve! I think I'll have an eggnog latte!" and being at least slightly health-conscious you ask for it cut with nonfat milk. It was delicious. It was satisfying. I went to log it in my calorie program and I wanted to throw it back up. 450 calories for this drink I just ingested. FOUR HUNDRED AND FIFTY. Jesus-Effing-Christ!
Damage now done, there isn't anything I can do about it. I will be eating some good food tonight some meatloaf and potatoes, maybe a little lasagna, and I will be drinking champagne. I am not going to NOT do this because of this goddamned eggnog latte. However, I CAN choose to exercise when I get home instead of jump straight into cooking. I can afford to take 30 minutes and burn some calories and give myself some meditation time.
It's very frustrating. I really love the "feel" of the holidays... the giving, friendly mood, having something to look forward to and projects (gift making/acquiring) to accomplish. But I am looking forward to the holiday season being done. It's torturous for the food addict who is trying to abstain from overeating and over-indulging and trying to maintain-let alone lose excess body weight.
Looking forward to getting back on track with my goals. I am working on learning to take better care of myself each year. This year I have discovered that if I do not pay attention and I am not mindful of my diet and exercise, I will gain weight. Plain and simple. It is NOT an option to just float through life without structuring my food intake and my exercise at all times. I need to get over this mind-block I have about it being a DRAG... being a pain in the ass... being something that "NORMAL" people don't have to do. Because it's SO not true.
Everyone who has a normal adult metabolism and a relatively sedentary job has to pay attention to these things. EVERYONE. Making myself pay attention and be mindful is a good way of caring for myself each and every day. I need to look at it like that. It's not a "have to", it's a "want to". Because I do want to take good care of me. I do want to live a long life, I do want to live in a body that is strong and lean and sexy. I do want to live in a body free of pain and ailments.
I want to do these things for myself because I deserve it. Hard to remember when you have had 5 hours of sleep, you forgot to go to the grocery store to get fruit, you got stuck in traffic on the way home, and when you finally DO get home, you don't want to do anything but stuff your face and/or go to bed.
It's a journey, and I am an imperfectly beautiful work in progress...
The holidays are upon us. There are treats and candy and junkfood surrounding us from all directions. There are evil & deceptively calorically-INSANE holiday coffee drinks being sold on every corner. There's a distinct message of "oh come on- it's the holidays! You deserve a treat!" coming from every television, radio, and store window. And as you walk down the sidewalk towards Starbucks, the holiday lights twinkle and the air is brisk. And you think "It's Christmas Eve! I think I'll have an eggnog latte!" and being at least slightly health-conscious you ask for it cut with nonfat milk. It was delicious. It was satisfying. I went to log it in my calorie program and I wanted to throw it back up. 450 calories for this drink I just ingested. FOUR HUNDRED AND FIFTY. Jesus-Effing-Christ!
Damage now done, there isn't anything I can do about it. I will be eating some good food tonight some meatloaf and potatoes, maybe a little lasagna, and I will be drinking champagne. I am not going to NOT do this because of this goddamned eggnog latte. However, I CAN choose to exercise when I get home instead of jump straight into cooking. I can afford to take 30 minutes and burn some calories and give myself some meditation time.
It's very frustrating. I really love the "feel" of the holidays... the giving, friendly mood, having something to look forward to and projects (gift making/acquiring) to accomplish. But I am looking forward to the holiday season being done. It's torturous for the food addict who is trying to abstain from overeating and over-indulging and trying to maintain-let alone lose excess body weight.
Looking forward to getting back on track with my goals. I am working on learning to take better care of myself each year. This year I have discovered that if I do not pay attention and I am not mindful of my diet and exercise, I will gain weight. Plain and simple. It is NOT an option to just float through life without structuring my food intake and my exercise at all times. I need to get over this mind-block I have about it being a DRAG... being a pain in the ass... being something that "NORMAL" people don't have to do. Because it's SO not true.
Everyone who has a normal adult metabolism and a relatively sedentary job has to pay attention to these things. EVERYONE. Making myself pay attention and be mindful is a good way of caring for myself each and every day. I need to look at it like that. It's not a "have to", it's a "want to". Because I do want to take good care of me. I do want to live a long life, I do want to live in a body that is strong and lean and sexy. I do want to live in a body free of pain and ailments.
I want to do these things for myself because I deserve it. Hard to remember when you have had 5 hours of sleep, you forgot to go to the grocery store to get fruit, you got stuck in traffic on the way home, and when you finally DO get home, you don't want to do anything but stuff your face and/or go to bed.
It's a journey, and I am an imperfectly beautiful work in progress...
Wednesday, December 1, 2010
Best Intentions Foiled Again
Challenging day today. I had a late start working. At 8 a.m. I started my workday shopping at Target. Picking up odds and ends for displays I have to make. I continued on to Michaels. By 10 I was on the road headed to Seattle. Got to work, unloaded the shit-ton of stuff I bought, and reloaded a shit ton of prepped displays back into my little trunk. Off I went to set up a display at a branch.
I remembered my xanax. I remembered copious amounts of coffee. I didn't remember to eat. By the time the branch display was finished it was 12:30 and I was completely ravenous. My displays sadly have a candy-land theme this season and so there was a LOT of opportunity to make some REALLY poor choices in front of me at my WEAKEST moment. I only ate a few hershey kisses. No biggie. Returned to my desk at work, got rolling on some other projects and tried to eat some tunafish and cheese on a cracker. A reasonable lapband meal. I think I got maybe .15% of it to stay down. It wasn't pretty. I tried to calm the stoma by giving it hot tea. It calmed down some. I snuck in a few more kisses. I ate a Special K protein bar. I ate another. I ate a snack pack of canned peaches.
Then suddenly it hit me. The crazies for chocolate hit me like a mack truck. I was fine for the longest time and then my level of tiredness, hunger, boredom, foreboding of the coming HTML class tonight, and my overall malaise got the best of me. Two LARGE handfuls of miscellaneous chocolates later... I feel ill. I'm pretty sure that I have met, if not exceeded my calorie intake for the day and the ironic thing is that I didn't really eat any REAL FOOD.
I have to get a handle on this. My weight is going in the wrong direction. My clothes are starting to not fit. My coats are starting to not fit. My body is starting to ache. My body is speaking very clearly and consistently to me about what it needs. It needs regular exercise- regular as in EVERY DAY. It needs more water. It needs good, whole, nutritious foods. And it needs regular and consistent rest.
I am trying to handle the emotional hoo-haa that comes with the Holidays. I am trying to get an emotional handle on what is happening at work with the upcoming merger and whether or not I will have a job at this new organization. I am trying to help my one large freelance client get her website to a place that is profitable and can be measured and more useful for her. AND I am trying to absorb as much as I can from this class I am taking. Hating that I can't seem to give it my 100% because I don't have that much to give to it. SO glad I have this book to help me, but I know there are things I am missing and pieces that don't quite make sense yet. And I'm exhausted and have a hard time keeping myself from leaving class early.
So with that large workload of STUFF on my mind and on my plate as regular everyday life, I am struggling a great deal to make sure that my personal needs are being met. How do I get so out of whack? It SURE was easier to keep myself the priority when it was just me and the cat. But I honestly can't blame my relationship for my inability to do ALL these things well. I have to admit that maybe I am taking on more than I can handle all at once.
When I was at the height of my training for my first 10K, the only other thing I had in my life was work and my emotional recovery from my divorce. And the exercise was necessary to work through the emotional stuff. One fed the other. I still had my freelance, but it wasn't all that demanding.
Now I have a man and a house and a household and freelance projects and an ongoing jobsearch and a class to make me more valuable in the marketplace. AND I'm still working on the emotional stuff, the eating stuff, the baggage I still carry around with me from my childhood and past life as a married person. No wonder I'm fucking exhausted.
Tomorrow is another day. And I can make good choices going forward. No sense in beating myself up.
INHALE
EXHALE
xo
j
I remembered my xanax. I remembered copious amounts of coffee. I didn't remember to eat. By the time the branch display was finished it was 12:30 and I was completely ravenous. My displays sadly have a candy-land theme this season and so there was a LOT of opportunity to make some REALLY poor choices in front of me at my WEAKEST moment. I only ate a few hershey kisses. No biggie. Returned to my desk at work, got rolling on some other projects and tried to eat some tunafish and cheese on a cracker. A reasonable lapband meal. I think I got maybe .15% of it to stay down. It wasn't pretty. I tried to calm the stoma by giving it hot tea. It calmed down some. I snuck in a few more kisses. I ate a Special K protein bar. I ate another. I ate a snack pack of canned peaches.
Then suddenly it hit me. The crazies for chocolate hit me like a mack truck. I was fine for the longest time and then my level of tiredness, hunger, boredom, foreboding of the coming HTML class tonight, and my overall malaise got the best of me. Two LARGE handfuls of miscellaneous chocolates later... I feel ill. I'm pretty sure that I have met, if not exceeded my calorie intake for the day and the ironic thing is that I didn't really eat any REAL FOOD.
I have to get a handle on this. My weight is going in the wrong direction. My clothes are starting to not fit. My coats are starting to not fit. My body is starting to ache. My body is speaking very clearly and consistently to me about what it needs. It needs regular exercise- regular as in EVERY DAY. It needs more water. It needs good, whole, nutritious foods. And it needs regular and consistent rest.
I am trying to handle the emotional hoo-haa that comes with the Holidays. I am trying to get an emotional handle on what is happening at work with the upcoming merger and whether or not I will have a job at this new organization. I am trying to help my one large freelance client get her website to a place that is profitable and can be measured and more useful for her. AND I am trying to absorb as much as I can from this class I am taking. Hating that I can't seem to give it my 100% because I don't have that much to give to it. SO glad I have this book to help me, but I know there are things I am missing and pieces that don't quite make sense yet. And I'm exhausted and have a hard time keeping myself from leaving class early.
So with that large workload of STUFF on my mind and on my plate as regular everyday life, I am struggling a great deal to make sure that my personal needs are being met. How do I get so out of whack? It SURE was easier to keep myself the priority when it was just me and the cat. But I honestly can't blame my relationship for my inability to do ALL these things well. I have to admit that maybe I am taking on more than I can handle all at once.
When I was at the height of my training for my first 10K, the only other thing I had in my life was work and my emotional recovery from my divorce. And the exercise was necessary to work through the emotional stuff. One fed the other. I still had my freelance, but it wasn't all that demanding.
Now I have a man and a house and a household and freelance projects and an ongoing jobsearch and a class to make me more valuable in the marketplace. AND I'm still working on the emotional stuff, the eating stuff, the baggage I still carry around with me from my childhood and past life as a married person. No wonder I'm fucking exhausted.
Tomorrow is another day. And I can make good choices going forward. No sense in beating myself up.
INHALE
EXHALE
xo
j
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