Progress, not Perfection

Hi, all!

Happy Tuesday! How are you all doing today? I'm doing fairly well and I'm enjoying this new week. It's the final full week of the month, how are you doing on achieving your goals? My goals are going well thus far, especially the monthly ones. :)

I began writing a post yesterday and I was going to write about how wonderful my day was going and talk about the week ahead. Well, that didn't happen because I received some unwelcome mail that turned my day quite negative. Thankfully I have everything all worked out, as of last night, and I was able to stay on track nutritionally. After receiving the piece of mail, I started applying to jobs around here and, amazingly enough, I have an interview tomorrow morning and I just applied yesterday. I'm hoping for a positive outcome to this interview because it would help my situation a lot!

Although yesterday was not pleasant throughout the day, I have something very exciting that came out of it. During the troubled time, I did not turn to food to help me work through it. Typically, I would have turned to food as soon as I received the piece of mail. I would have eaten a large quantity and done so throughout the afternoon and evening. I've gotta tell you, I'm incredibly proud of myself for not turning to food and sticking with my nutritional goals. In fact, when this happened, I didn't even think about turning to food. At all! I didn't turn to food, that is SO FREAKING AMAZING! This means that I'm making progress with my food addiction and that makes me so dang happy. This kind of thing may not always happen and I may turn to food sometimes, but this is progress. I'm not perfect, but all I can ask for is that I continue to move forward.

Okay, now that I have all this news out of the way. Yesterday I did really well both nutritionally and with my fitness. I was under my calorie goal by a couple hundred calories and I had a 41-minute walk. For some reason, my legs were feeling sort of fatigued, so I didn't get to walk at the level I normally do. But, a workout is a workout.

Well, I'm off to enjoy the rest of my afternoon. I hope that you all had a wonderful Monday and your Tuesday is even better. Until next time!

~Sara~

Life

Hi, all!

Happy Wednesday! How are you all doing today? It's another beautiful day here in southeastern Wisconsin and I'm just feeling happy today. I was blessed with another day to live my life freely, without many restrictions. This is something not all people get to say, so I am thankful. Last night and earlier this morning I was pondering on this and I the fact that life is short was forefront in my mind. After losing one of my best friends 6.5 years ago, I realize how short life is and how it can end at any moment. I think this is something that we forget sometimes, we don't realize how any of us could be gone in a minute. Each of us have been blessed with another day of life and we need to embrace it and live. Today I want to remind each of you (and myself) to live, don't focus on the past because we can't change it. Live for today and look toward the future. Most importantly, do things you love, pursue your passions, don't take people for granted because you never know when it will be your last day (or theirs). When my best friend died, I wasn't able to say goodbye to her because of our accident and that haunted me for awhile. I never told her how much she meant to me and that her friendship was precious to me. Don't make the same mistake I did, tell your friends and family how much they mean to you because if you don't do it now, you might never get to.

I have to tell you, I'm feeling extremely blessed lately because I've had more good days than bad. This is something that probably won't always happen, I accept that fact, however, I'm glad that things are like this in the beginning. There will be days that I struggle and there will be days where I do well, however, I am going to use each day to learn more about myself and work through my food addiction. I have come to the realization that I will probably never eat completely clean, I will have some processed foods in my diet. I'll go out to eat from time to time. I'll have pizza, nachos, Chinese, Italian, chips, ice cream, and thousands of other foods. And yes, sometimes I will eat more than I should, it is a part of life. I'm not perfect if you didn't already know that, and you aren't either. None of us are perfect, 100% of the time. There will be times where we overeat or eat something that isn't 100% healthy. So what? That's life sometimes and we deal with it. Heck, there will be weeks (sometimes months) where we maintain or gain weight, but we shouldn't be ashamed. These things are all a part of our journey and there's  nothing we can do about it. We each need to own up to our mistakes and the things that we struggle with if we don't then we can never move past them.

Okay, moving onto yesterday's results. I had a pretty good day, I was under my calories again and had a shorter workout. I'm proud of myself though because my mother and I went out for dinner (it was teacher appreciation day and she got a free meal. Also, my father was working last night.). The restaurant we went to has a variety of yummy food, plus a lot of higher calorie options. However, I ordered foods that would fit into my nutritional goals, plus it was delicious. In the afternoon, I also had a shorter workout. I started out walking with 2 lb dumbells, but my ankle and hip were hurting, so then I just did some upper body strength training. In the past, I probably would have just stopped and not worked out because of this. Honestly, I probably would have just eaten crappy then as well. Things are different now though and I continued to eat within my calorie range and I exercised in a way that I could without pain. I may do the same today or I might have a rest day, only time will tell.

This morning I went out for coffee with my best friend again, I'm loving these get together's with her. Sadly, within a few days things will get back to our normal and then I won't see her for awhile. In fact, I may not see her in person again before I move. This is life, being an adult and being away from your best friend isn't fun. Distance won't get in between our friendship though. I'm going to be seeing her again tonight and we'll either be getting coffee or dinner with another one of our friends.

Well, I'm off to make myself some lunch. I hope that you all have an amazing afternoon and evening. Until next time!

~Sara~

Weigh-Ins and Skinny Fat

Hi all!

Happy Thursday! How are you all doing on this beautiful morning? I'm in a very chipper mood today, if you couldn't tell and I have good reason for it. I'm happy to relay that I do not need to do the honesty thing today. I ate at my calorie goal yesterday and I got a small workout in, that is major progress for me!

I was on myfitnesspal this morning and one of the threads that popped up was a woman who just started her weight loss journey. She had lost 9 pounds in her first month. Before I continue, I have to tell you, she is weighing herself daily. This morning she stepped on the scale and she hadn't lost weight, she was so disappointed to the point of tears. I'll admit, at one point I did weigh myself every day and it was horrible to see the number go up or stay the same but I realized that I was setting myself up for failure by doing that. Honestly, if I saw the number go up, I'd just say screw it and eat whatever I wanted that day. It was a horrible cycle and I'm glad to have broken it. Now I try to only weigh-in once a week and if I do step on the scale more times, I don't get discouraged by the number, I use it as a tool to help myself improve as the week continues. Like this morning, I stepped on the scale with all my clothing on (I don't weigh-in with this much clothing on typically) and I was still down about a pound (don't know how that happened after my binge a few days ago), but it makes me want to continue to work hard, eat at my calorie goal and exercise to get that number down even more by Sunday. Now, I don't want to bring down anyone who does weigh-in daily, but remember that weight fluctuates each day. It can change on the amount of sodium you eat, your water in-take, hormones, clothing weight, and many other things. So don't base your whole day on that number, no matter what. You are worth more than the number on the scale.

Another thing, I was looking at another thread on myfitnesspal and a woman was talking about her gym being closed. Then an argument ensued about how you don't need to workout to lose weight, all you need to do is eat at a deficit. Yes, this is true, but the original poster wrote something that I agree with 100%. She said something along the lines of, being skinny isn't everything. I want to actually be in shape and not be skinny fat. From that point, this huge argument just ensued and it was over something really stupid, in my opinion. I just wanted to say, I think we all know that we need to eat at a calorie deficit to lose weight but you know, working out will help you burn more calories and help you get the shape you want. It's not rocket science. And why wouldn't you work out? It has so many benefits and it can help you to achieve your goal at a more consistent rate.

Anyways, today is amazing. I'm doing well nutritionally and I got in a great workout. The whole upping my protein yesterday helped a ton and kept me fuller, longer. So I'm continuing on that path today and it's working well so far. That's my plan to the near future as well, I'll keep doing it until it doesn't work anymore. But it's time to go an relax a little now since my back is hurting. :( Have a wonderful day everyone. So until next time!

~Sara~

Year 1 Day 152 (Day 517)

Hello all!

How is everyone doing today? Just another cold February day here in the great state of Wisconsin. I just returned from physical therapy, my back/hip is hurting like crazy but I won't let that stop me from having a great day. How can it be bad? Abid called me this morning, and after not hearing his voice since Sunday it was much needed. :) Plus I'm happy, because I've been doing a lot better with my nutrition, exercise is still out of the question but I'm doing what I can.

Speaking of nutrition, that made me think about some forums that I've been reading and things in my own life.  There have been so many negative people in my life that have told me that I could lose weight a lot fast if I decreased my calories. In fact, one person told me I should only be eating 1200 calories! 1200!?! When I heard that, I literally told them that they are crazy. I am 5'10.5" tall, I'm a big girl and eating 1200 calories is severely unhealthy. For me to lose about 1 lb/week I should be eating about 2180 calories. To all of those people who think eating as little as possible will cause me to lose more weight, thanks for your advice but I've done my own research. And I've experimented with how many calories to eat and I'll stick with what I'm doing, because it seems to be working.

Last night I was watching a show called, My 600 lb Life, it profiled a few individuals over a 7 year period about their weight loss journey. I watched 2 segments of it and honestly, it really made me think about my own life. When the people and their families were talking about some of their struggles, I could really relate. I understood, to an extent, the pain in their eyes. Now don't get me wrong, I am no where near 600+ pounds, I am half of that weight plus some. So I don't necessarily understand the mobility issues and things like that, but I do understand the pain of feeling like I'm not worth it. Or that I am not normal and that food is my only comfort. Oh believe me, there were days when I weighed my heaviest where I just felt like my life wasn't worth living anymore. But you know, it's all about our own attitudes and confidence. Those are the things that the right people notice and they will want to be with you for those qualities.

One thing that was mentioned a lot in the show was this question, "how did I ever let myself get this big?" This is something that I have questioned quite often. I wonder why when I was 250 lbs in high school, that I didn't do something then. I was a lot closer to my goal then compared to when I started trying to lose weight in 2011 at 315 lbs. Honestly, I know why I let myself get that big. There is no doubt in my mind that it is because of my emotions, I'm an emotional eater. I've had quite a few traumatic things happen to me in high school and directly after, but that doesn't account for why I was always an overweight child. That is my parents, especially my mother, she was my enabler (honestly, she still can be). My family is the type where food is always present, it's what we use if we're happy, sad, lonely, ect... Most of the people in my family are over weight, some not as much as others, but there are hardly any of us on my mom's side that are at a healthy weight. At our family get together, holidays mostly, there is plenty of good food, but even more of an abundance of delicious desserts. It's definitely been a lot harder since I've started trying to lose weight, but I'm getting better and I have no doubt that holidays will always be a struggle for me. But then there's my father, he is tall and thin. He eats whatever he wants and won't gain a pound, probably because he has a very physically demanding job. It stinks though because he always wants to keep ice cream and chips and other things like that in the house. What he doesn't understand is how tempting those things can be to me, not so much the ice cream but the chips are killer. It's amazing that I haven't touched the chips that are in the cabinet this week.

But I suppose. I've been slacking on the paper I've been writing. So I should probably get to it. Until next time.

~Sara~