Search This Blog

Friday, June 25, 2010

How I lost that last five pounds

Maybe you don't care how I lost that last five pounds. Maybe you do. Maybe you "hate" me because I only weigh 100lbs and you are thinking "Oh gawd, you already have an advantage, you aren't me I don't care, shut up!" Fine. Whatever, get over yourself. I've been there. I still feel that way sometimes. It reminds me of those boys in 5th grade during fitness testing who could only do one pull up and I did two (haven't been able to since, I was so buff!) and they tried to rationalize it away. "Well you only weigh sixty pounds!" It's all relative. I'm smaller so my muscles are smaller, everything is smaller (well, except my head maybe, lol). Let's put things in perspective before I continue. 120 lbs is chubby for me. Here's proof:



Omg barf! I really hate this picture but it GREAT motivation. I use it as a reminder for how far I've come on days I don't feel good enough. This was early 2006 about 6 months after I got married. I'd gained 8lbs since my wedding day. This was a pic I sent to my sister to show her my new jeans (yeah, I actually thought I looked good). I weighed 117 lbs.

Fast forward: I ended up losing 11lbs and a whole lot of body fat. My waist shrunk like 3 inches. Since then I've maintained. Then my life fell apart and I dropped like 8 pounds from stress. 98lbs people! Oops, not good. Scared the crap out of myself. Now that my life has a new normal things have evened out. I gained about 6lbs back and then started taking care of myself the right way. So here I am at 100lbs.

I can't say for sure how it happened or why. There is no science in these answers. These are just the things that are different in my life since I first lost that 11lbs and was at 106lbs. I am real, not a celeb, just your average 30 ish sorta single female with lazy days and cravings and a budget.

1. I'm "single": Okay this wasn't really a choice and probably isn't one for you but you might learn something from it. I eat a lot less cheese and butter and hot dogs. A lot less bad fat basically. What is it with guys and cheese and butter and hot dogs anyway? One hot dog is like 160 calories, a bun is 100 to 200 calories. A slice of cheese is 100 calories, a tablespoon of butter is 100 calories. That's a lot less calories too...just not eating those three things. Guys like to eat, a lot. You don't have to eat what they eat, when they eat, or as much as they eat. You can't. You shouldn't. Muscle is where our metabolism lives and they have a lot more of it.

2. I have taught myself to always look at the calorie count of foods: This is a huge one. HUGE. If I am going to have cheese, I have a slice. I know what I'm putting in my mouth. Know what you are putting in your mouth. If you are going out to eat, go online and look at the nutritional data first.

3. Record what you eat: I use Daily Burn. I love it. They have a free iPhone/iTouch app that syncs with their FREE website. FREE. No excuses. Pretty much anything and everything you eat is on there. You can add things into their database if it's not. You enter in your weight, age, activity level, and goal weight and Daily Burn will give you a daily calorie range to shoot for. I kid you not, just using this tool, without worrying about exercise, took off 2lbs.

I basically eat what I want. I am not a crazy fruit and veggie eater. I do eat potato chips, dessert, etc. I do drink alcohol. The difference is, I eat smaller portions, I record it, and I make sure I stay in my calorie range. It has become second nature. If I eat ice cream after dinner, I don't have a glass of wine too. Usually doing that will push me over my goal.

3b. Sorry, alcohol counts: Basically, an alcoholic beverage (shot, 5 oz. wine, a beer) is going to cost you 100-160 calories. Mixed drinks are way more. Sucks right? Oh well. Deal with it or get ready to love your beer belly.

4. Don't eat junky fast food: I don't have much reason to eat at places like Taco Bell, Jack in the Box, KFC, etc. these days. I do enjoy Subway or Chipotle on occasion. The first three I listed...I mean, who knows what kind of additives are in that stuff right? I think that might have something to do with why it's been so much easier. Fast doesn't have to be bad but in most cases it is.

5. Walk: I don't know how much this has made an impact but it's a big difference in my life the last few months. You don't have to power walk and you don't have to walk for hours. I walk my dog twice a day for a total of about 30 minutes a day. One day a week we walk about 2.5 miles for 30-40 minutes.

6. It only takes 20-30 minutes of sweat a day: Besides my walking I make to sure to do something for my body almost every day (5-6 days a week). Whether it's yoga, strength training, or some cardio, I do it. If you are going to do cardio, do it in intervals. What I mean is get your heart rate up high (for me 180 bpm) for a couple minutes and then let is slow down for a couple minutes. Repeat. It seems like everything I read these days says to do interval training. My sister runs miles and miles every week and can't seem to drop any pounds lately. I think it's all about keeping your body guessing so mix it up. Don't do the same thing every day.

So, I'd love to put a great (recent) after pic but apparently nobody is really taking my picture these days so here's the link to my Facebook page. There are photos as recent as April, good enough I think.

I hope this helps. I hope this takes some of the pressure off. Give yourself a break if you have a bad day. What matters is that you start again.

Tuesday, June 22, 2010

Pet Peeve: Installment 1

It seems like lately, things have been getting on my nerves. The same things...over and over. I am going to try to use this blog as a way to purge my mind of these annoyances. I'm sure you'll be able to relate to some and maybe even get a kick out of it.

Reply All isn't that hard

In the last couple of weeks, it seems like I have had to be an event planner in my personal life. I don't know what is going on with people but they seem to have forgotten that communication is key when planning even the smallest gathering. We all need to know where, when, and how or it's not going to happen, right? With all the networking tools we have today it should be easier. Apparently not.

I've had two situations, one with a group of five and one with a trio, where an idea for a gathering was started with an email and then everyone suddenly stopped hitting Reply All. In the first case, communication stopped completely, verbal agreements were made between two of the five, and suddenly the rest of us were completely lost on what was going on! In the second case, I sent an email invite to two friends, one replied all, and the third....sent me a text with a possible date and time she was free. A text? Obviously you are reading the email so why are you texting just me? Hit Reply all and ask both of us.

So then I txt back, "Yeah, I can but we'll have to see if E can do it". Then nothing. So here I am the next morning and I pull up our email thread and I have to Reply all and say EM txt me she can do it this time, what about you E?" All of this could have been avoided if EM had just hit reply all.

It makes no sense to me. It's like we have too many forms of communication and people just can't decide what to use anymore. Remember ten years ago when we just had email? No Twitter, no social networking, no texting, no Evite. Remember a few years before that when we just had phones? Paper invites?

I have been considering an "Open House" day for my apartment so anyone that hasn't stopped by, can. I'm worried that unless I send a paper invite that looks official (like I put a little time in it) I'm going to get some e-replies and a bunch of no-shows.

What do you think? Does this happen to you? Are people forgetting the basics of communication and planning because we rely so heavily on all our fun new tools?

Sunday, June 6, 2010

Hello Sunshine

Spring and Summer are finally here! That means I get to be a little bit happier. I get to pull out my tank tops and get pedicures. I get to lay by the pool and swim (one of my favorite things to do) I mean, really, Mother Nature, it's June. I know we have like, totally screwed up your ecosystem but you keep fighting you hear me? There are a bunch of us that really to love you (ME!). California is even about to ban those awful plastic shopping bags you are choking on. I mean I know there are a bunch of us who are really dumb and insist and screwing things up (BP) and I'm so so sorry. I wish they would just drown in the oil they love so much.
The Welcome Picnic at work I planned went off without a hitch. Supposedly people were even complimenting how it turned out. That is a huge relief since I have zero experience planning events besides my um, wedding...moving on! We don't have an events team at Sugar so basically whenever the company does anything fun it's up to the admins, Facilities and HR. That's a total of 4 people at our company. Yep. So now I'm responsible for two more summer events to which my sister asked, "So you're the Events team now?". Uh, yeah. See she is on Verisign's Events TEAM. She gets paid way more than I do to do it.....The Chinese employees arrived and are all settled in which is nice. I get a couple of mellow weeks this month and then I get to deal with end of quarter with accounting. Yippee. The excitement of dual roles never ends!

Other than all that it's been a rough couple of weeks. I am feeling really hopeless about my future. Basically all I see right now is A)things working out in my marriage and my life changing pretty dramatically or B)ending up alone because I totally suck at getting to know new people especially guys. I mean, I'm not 21 anymore so it's not like I have all these available single people to hang out with to meet other single people. I have a bunch of coupled up 30 something friends and family, that despite all their declarations of "We'll have parties and we'll do this and that with you!" aren't really doing that. I'm not surprised and I bear no ill will. I don't expect them to leave their mates home alone to be with me all the time. I think they didn't realize what they were saying when my couple hood took a dive.

I know, I know. Being a victim is lame. I am trying hard not to be. It's just been tough lately. He is feeling pressured though I'm not intentionally being impatient. I'm just lonely. I love him you know? He's making progress but it's slow. It may be worth the wait...that's what I hang on to. Don't think I'm just pining away not considering alternatives. I am. I have days where I wonder if I really want to give this another go and days where I'm completely certain this person is supposed to be in my life.

My days are becoming so robotic and I worry I'm getting OCD or ADD or something. I think about each of my meals before I even get out of bed (I mean, what else do I have to do?) I have to have my phone and itouch with me at all times or I feel all disconnected from the world even if nobody is calling/txting/twittering me. I bounce around from one thing to the next in my apartment trying to keep it just right. I've started weighing myself daily which I know is totally weird and pointless. I can't go one day without logging my calorie and exercise. At first it was just to lose a couple pounds (which I did yay) and getting a better grip on what I put in my body. Now I feel a little anxious if I don't record it. Uh oh. Not good right? Sis says "stay skinny" and called me a "hottie" (so weird since she's the family hottie). He said I'm too thin and to eat more. I think he's just worried or worried I'm too hot (oh snap! lol).

To put it out there, I'm 4'10" and weigh 100.5lbs. A completely healthy weight for me. I exercise about 30 min a day and eat 3 meals plus snacks so no, I'm not going to become anorexic or something. I love food too much and I will never love exercise that much.

I just don't really like how my thoughts are right now. I think it's me trying to control what I can control since my marriage is so out of control? I don't know...My life is in limbo and it's really frustrating.

Anyway, off to go walk Tully, do my workout, get ready for lunch at grandma's...(see there I go making a list again)