Race to a Healthy, Happy Me

A few weeks ago, my life looked a little different.  I would go to work, come home, and sit.  Sure, I would play with my child and cook dinner for my husband and myself, but the thought of working out was just not present.

Yes, I had a baby almost eight (!!) months ago and it was definitely past time to start getting myself healthy, but I just couldn’t bear the thought of being on my feet at my retail job every day and then coming home to do even more physical movement.  I already had the tasks of making dinner, cleaning, doing laundry, taking care of my boys, etc on my list.  Could I really add another one?

I thought long and hard about adding in some exercise.  Well, actually it was a pretty short internal conversation:

Me:  I hate feeling tired all the time.  I have to work on my feet all day.  Why do I need to come home and do more physical movement?

Me:  You want to know WHY you’re so tired?  You’re out of shape!  If you get your butt in gear, maybe you’ll find energy you never knew you had.  And WHY should you do more movement?  To get healthy!  Duh!  You want to be a good role model for your little boy, right?  That’s why you make healthy dinners.  That’s why you keep the house clean.  That’s why you try to make healthy decisions, right?  Well, exercise is all part of that, my friend.  Now MOVE!

Me:  But I really don’t want to.  I’m fine the way I am.

Me:  Remember that picture you took when you were at a healthy weight and not classified as obese?

Right, that one.  You’re not gonna get that way by sitting on your butt.  Make a decision.  Be fat and lazy or be healthy and in shape!  Whatever your decision, just shut up and do it!

So, after that dialogue I made my decision.  Healthy and in shape is definitely the choice I choose.  I went to the gym the next day and started Couch to 5k!

Now, telling myself to move is one thing.  Having motivation that pushes me is another.  When Jo‘s husband said he was running in the Ghost and Goblin 5k in October, I made my second great decision.  I would sign up to run in it.  Before I could talk myself out of it, I paid the $20 and joined.  No turning back now!

Then, a few days ago, my manager told me our community at work was creating a group to walk in the Step Out Walk to Stop Diabetes.  Walgreens is an avid supporter of walking and getting healthy.  This is just one more way to get the word out there.  I immediately agreed to walk!

Last weekend, Jeff, Jake, and I went to visit Carolyn in Louisville.  While at breakfast at Wild Eggs (if you live in Louisville, you MUST go!), all these people had on white shirts covered in splotches of color.  What the heck?  Carolyn informed me there was a race called the Color Run that weekend.  Basically the concept is to run the 5k while being splattered with paint powder.  I’d never heard of such a thing, but it looked really fun!

(source)

Well, this morning I was talking to a different friend who mentioned there was a color run coming up in Cincinnati in October!  Yay!  I watched the video below and started to get really excited.

Please tell me…who wouldn’t want to be a part of “the happiest 5k on the planet”?  I’m stoked!

So, my friends, the morale of the story is I made the decision to be a healthy, happy me.  I started running again, I started going back to Zumba, I started eating better.  Basically I started caring for myself again.

And I’ve never been happier.

How are you making yourself a healthier, happier you?

Do The Damn Thing

I have never been a lover of exercise.  I wasn’t in team sports in high school.  I never was one to say “my favorite thing to do is go for a run.”  But I do, however, love the way I feel after a really good workout.  You know…the endorphin high.  There’s really nothing else like it in the world.

A few years ago, I woke up one day and decided “today is the day I’m going to change my life.”  I had had this thought several times over the years, but for some reason this time felt different.

I needed a plan.  I made a pact with Carolyn that we would check in with each other every week to discuss gains or losses, challenges we’d faced, and to get encouragement to keep going.  I told myself “you are hungry again a few hours after you eat whether you choose junk food or healthy food so why not choose healthy food?”  I made myself workout as many days as I could.  And you know what?

It worked.  (Weird picture, I know!)

From August 2009 to May 2010, I lost 30 pounds.  I looked and felt great!  I had one of the best summers of my life that year.  I felt so healthy that summer.  One of my main reasons for losing weight was to be at a healthy starting point for when I got pregnant.  As luck would have it, I ended up getting pregnant in September of 2010.

Then, after a tragedy, I started spiraling.  I ate what I wanted, stopped working out, and lost my direction.  When I got pregnant again in March of 2011, I had put almost all of my weight back on.  I never gained my direction back even though I tried many, many times.  By the time I gave birth to Jake, I was 70 pounds heavier than I had been at my healthy weight.

Now, seven months postpartum, I am still about 30 pounds away from my “goal”.  I still haven’t found my drive or motivation, but I have started to search for it.  After a friend’s husband told me he’d signed up for a local 5k, I decided I would too.  Then I began training using the couch to 5k iPhone app.  (This was about 2 weeks ago.)

A few days after that, I began seeing advertising all over the blog world about some boot camp thing.  Brittany had done it before and raved about it.  I have always complained that I needed to add strength training in to my cardio but never knew what to do.  This was my sign!  I signed up and convinced Carolyn to sign up with me.  We both need our butts kicked into gear.

So, to make a long story short (too late), I am starting the process to get healthy again.  In addition to training for a 5k and “going to boot camp“, I have begun logging my food.  I am focusing on eating more whole foods and choosing water over soda.  I am trying to remember to take my vitamins and get my sleep.  I am trying to do this.

No.  I am going to do this. 

For my husband, for my son, and for me.  I deserve it.

***************************************************************************

Update:
Went to the gym this morning (7.23) and KILLED IT!  Did Couch to 5k W1D3 and BBBC Workout A.  Feelin’ it!  I CAN do this!

Whole Foods

Diet.  Low fat.  Light.  Fat free.

When you’re trying to lose weight, the no-brainer move is to switch from full fat to fat free right?  Well…not quite.  When you switch to lower calorie options, more often than not, you’re replacing those calories with lots of chemicals and additives.  It might work to help you drop the pounds, but in the long run you’re filling your body with crap you could do without.

So where does this leave me?  Turning to whole foods.  I have decided to try to eat as much minimally processed foods as I can.  I am going to shop from the perimeter of the grocery store as much as possible and really focus on reading food labels.  Have you looked at some of those food labels lately?  They are a mile long and contain so many words I don’t even know how to pronounce.

It’s going to be a work in progress though because I use Sweet-n-low in my coffee and enjoy the occasional Coke Zero.  Baby steps, people.

To get things started, I went to the grocery store and think I did pretty good!

I ended up coming home with just a few things that weren’t considered “whole” foods.  But to be fair, they are for Jeff. 

It’s berry season, so I stocked up!  I’m planning on freezing some of these berries for future use.

Look at all that produce!  Some of those items will be turned in to yummy baby food for the little guy!

Have you tried roasted cauliflower?  I’m not a big fan of cauliflower, but I’ve heard roasting it makes it really delicious.  I think I’ll try it!

Carolyn told me she loved the gyoza potstickers with the gyoza sauce from Trader Joe’s.  I’m a huge fan of potstickers, so this purchase was a must!

I only have a small weakness for Chobani.  And wine.

With all the produce I purchased, I wanted to try something I’d seen on Pinterest a while back.  Have you seen the Salad in a Jar?  I thought it was quite a concept.  I love salads but am always running late for work, so I never have time to put them together.  This way, I can just grab a jar out of the fridge and throw it in my lunch bag.  We’ll see if this works…

I made three kinds:
Harvest Salad with Homemade Raspberry Vinaigrette,

Mixed Veggies with Asian Sesame dressing (store bought…boo!),

and Mixed Veggies with Ranch dressing (again, store bought.  I forgot I had the stuff to make homemade until after I put the jar together…fail!).

I bought the pint sized Ball jars, but realized afterwards I should have grabbed the quart sized ones.  Oh well.  If you’re looking for another blog post in addition to this one, check out Lauren’s guest post on Lindsay’s blog:

Salads in a Jar

After making my salads, I went to pick Jake up.  I discovered it was time for him to eat, so I strapped him to the high chair and had him try peaches.  The verdict?  You be the judge.

OMG he loved them!  He was actually asking for them by opening his sweet little mouth.  (Watch the whole video for a really sweet interaction between the two of us.  He’s so sweet!)  Towards the end, he was starting to lose interest, but perked up again when I tried BLW (baby led weaning) with a banana.

I can’t decide which way Jake prefers his food, but we are going to keep trying both ways.  No matter which way he chooses, it’s going to be as many whole foods as possible for this family for the foreseeable future!

Question:  What’s your best tip for losing the pounds and getting healthy?

Encouraging the Masses

I’m not normally one to get on my soapbox and spout my beliefs for everyone to hear.  I think everyone is entitled to their opinion and I try to respect everyone’s point of view.  The fact that we are all different is what makes each of us special and unique.

That being said, I must pull out the soapbox and dust it off today.  I’m not sure how many of you watched Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution on ABC last year.  If you didn’t, you missed out.  Luckily, it’s on again this year targeting the LAUSD school system in Los Angeles.

LAUSD (Los Angeles Unified School District) is the largest public school system in California and second largest public school system in America (NYC’s public school system being the first).  They are responsibly for molding, shaping, and most importantly feeding nearly 700,000 children in the LA area.

With that amount of children’s health at stake, Jamie decided to try to improve the dietary guidelines in the school district.  California, after all, is known for healthy, active lifestyles, so you would think the school district would be concerned for their children’s health, right?

Guess not.  The reason I’m so irritated this morning is how obtuse the Superintendent and his staff are being as far as Jamie coming in and trying to improve the situation.  He was barred from entering the schools and was told if he tried to enter, the police would be called.

Here’s my question…if you believe you are doing a good job and you have nothing to hide, why are you not allowing just one person to inspect your cafeterias and the quality of your food?

I am a huge advocate of the prevention of childhood obesity.  I believe we should give our children wholesome, healthy foods as much as possible.  Whole grains, bright cheerful fruits and veggies, lean proteins.  That’s where it’s at, man.

One of the main topics of last night’s show was the prevention of sugar laden milk in the schools (think strawberry and chocolate milks).  Jamie did a presentation where he piled one week’s worth of the sugar found in flavored milk alone into a school bus.  By the time the sugar was emptied into the bus, there were HUGE piles of sugar flowing from the cracks and crevasses of the bus onto the ground below.  It was appalling.  All that sugar is unnecessary.

Granted, I am not a mom.  Yet.  I don’t have kids.  Yet.  But I do know what it’s like to buy school lunches every day.  I remember very clearly what my school’s lunch program was:

Day One:  Pizza
Day Two:  Cheeseburgers
Day Three:  Frito Chili Pie
Day Four:  Chicken Strips
Day Five:  Pizza
**Every day french fries were available and most of the time I would get those covered in ranch dressing.  It’s no wonder I have had weight issues my whole life!  (Disclaimer:  my mother did her best to encourage healthy eating at home, but she wasn’t there to slap the fries and ranch out of my hand at lunch!)

In fact, when I moved out and went to college, I lived on cheeseburgers, fries, pizza, chicken strips.  Typical college fare.  It didn’t help that I worked at a diner that made these foods readily available.  Luckily, in my third year of college, I began rooming with Carolyn, who slowly and gradually helped me see what exactly I was doing to my body.  Thanks, friend!

I really want to encourage everyone to pay attention to the health of the humans (and most importantly the children) around you.  Yes, it can be hard to eat healthy all the time, especially when you are used to eating fat and sugar and CRAP.

Make little changes.  Swap out whole grains for white bread and pasta, pick a yogurt that has more fiber protein in it (Chobani versus Yoplait or Dannon), drink one extra glass of water instead of that soda. If you made one change a week for one year, think of how much healthier you’d be by April 2012.  If you won’t do it for yourself, do it for your kids.  Promote a healthy image for them!

If you feel like helping Jamie’s cause to bring healthy food to the children of America, visit his website to sign the Food Revolution petition and get tips on being active in your community.  Over 23,000 people have signed the petition in Ohio alone, yours truly being one of the few and proud!

Do your part, America.  GET MOVING!

(That is all.  Storing my soapbox under my bed for at least a week.)

Challenge Extended

“Challenge extended.”
“Deal!”
“Challenge accepted.”
“All right, we’ll start with…apples.”
“We’ll be starting with apples.”
“Stop that now!”

I have this problem finishing things I start (just ask my mom).  For this reason, I have an entire “scrapbook center” in my basement I haven’t visited since we moved in two years ago, a half completed cross stitch pattern I started for my mom about four years ago, and several stretches of blogging (followed by several stretches of silence) over the past few years.

Today, after much discussion with Carolyn, I poised a challenge:  do Jillian Michaels’ 30 Day Shred and blog about it on a regular basis.  She agreed and so a workout challenge (and blog topic!) was determined.

Here’s the breakdown:

1.  Complete the workout every day.  No exceptions.
2.  Blog about our results, progress, pros, cons, etc. every five days.
3.  Whittle body down to nothing!  (OK, OK, really just get healthy and incorporate regular exercise.)

It takes 30 days to develop a habit and, as luck would have it, JM’s video is 30 days.  Here goes…

Pep Talk

Every now and then, everyone needs a pep talk.  More often than not, you need to provide your own pep talk to yourself.  I don’t know about you, but getting myself to eat right and work out is a daily (sometimes hourly) struggle.  There are days (like yesterday) when all I want to do is curl up on the couch and sleep.  That’s when my inner dialogue begins:

“I really don’t want to work out.”
“But if you do, you’ll feel so much better!”
“I had such a long day at work.  I’m so tired!  And this couch feels so good…”
“You promised yourself (and Carolyn) you were going to Zumba today.”
“She’ll understand.  I bet she’s tired too.”
“You won’t lose any weight or get any good, heart healthy exercise by laying on the couch.”
“I could clean the house.  That would be exercise.”
“You and I both know you’ll SAY you’re going to clean and then you’ll get sidetracked reading blogs, watching YouTube videos, or sleeping and you won’t do it.  Quit making excuses.”
“But it’s so far away!”
“Are you kidding me?  It’s five minutes.  Plus, remember what Carolyn said…you’ve never regretted doing a workout.  You have, however, regretted NOT getting up off your butt.”
“OK, OK, you win.”

There are a million reasons I tell myself as to why I can’t, don’t want to, or shouldn’t work out, but really there is no good reason.  I mean, heck, if you can’t do anything else, just go for a walk!  It doesn’t have to be a super speedy walk.  Even just getting out and enjoying the sunshine is good enough.  Chances are, when you get dressed and get out there, you’ll go longer, harder, faster than you planned.

The other day I absolutely did not want to exercise at all.  I’m talking I was laying in bed trying to take a nap because I had gotten very little sleep the night before and had worked a full day that day.  Then Carolyn asked me if I’d walk “with” her (in spirit because we live two hours apart), so grudgingly I agreed.  Know what happened?  I ended up run/walking for 45 minutes.  I did the Couch to 5k program’s Week 1 Day 1 one and a half times!  That’s typically what happens to me.

So, when you find yourself not wanting to workout, remind yourself how great you will look and feel after!  And then GET MOVING.

But have your best friend’s number on speed dial.  Just in case.

 

 

Confessions and Motivations

A little less than two years ago, I looked at myself in the mirror and realized I didn’t like who was looking back at me.

(Crap picture, I know, but I didn’t have a whole lot of pictures from the neck down to choose from!)

More specifically, I didn’t like the extra pounds I was lugging around.  My 5’2″ frame is supposed to weigh (at the highest) around 125, not the 165 I had packed on to “keep myself warm for the winter”.  So I decided to make a change.  I cut calories, increased exercise, and tried to make healthy decisions.  Little by little the pounds crept off.

I got down to 138, which is still high, but it was 27 pounds smaller than my highest!  What a great achievement!

So what happened?  Why have I found myself back in the position?  I can tell you exactly why.  I got lazy.  When I got down to my low, I decided I could just eat whatever I wanted.  I had done such great work, I deserved a break!  I wouldn’t put the weight back on!  I’d always been able to each whatever and keep the weight off!  (I mean, really???  Then how did I end up overweight??? This is a prime example of lying to yourself!)

I also got pregnant, which, even though I KNEW better, meant I could eat whatever I wanted cause it was “what the baby wanted”.  Bullshit.

What did this get me?  Uncomfortable and self conscious on what I consider to be one of the best vacations I’ve ever been on.  (I just got back from a week in Maui.)

So, today I can make a choice.  Continue on the path I have been on for the last several months, making bad decisions, not exercising like I should, eating crap OR do what is best for my body.  The main reason I started eating better and exercising before is because I wanted my body to be healthy for my future child.  I wanted a safe, healthy environment to grow my offspring.  What’s changed?  Nothing.

That is my motivation.  Not to look good in a bathing suit, not to feel comfortable in my clothes again, not to feel proud instead of ashamed that I don’t get winded going up the stairs.  Nope.  Those will all be bonuses, of course, but my main motivation is to be a healthy mommy for Baby D.

So, little baby, just know Mama is getting healthy for you, whenever you decide to show up.  I’ll be waiting…