Plateaus

The Tibetan plateau.

Two weeks ago I went on vacation to a beautiful, sub-tropical island. People tend to gain weight on vacation, especially the frozen drink, beach with lounge chairs, resort variety, but I was determined to use my leisure time to step up my commitment to taking care of myself. There was a decent gym at the resort (I was a little wary of too much time in the sun) so I worked out every single day first thing before my husband and daughter were up. I didn't fall into the frozen drink trap (I don't like alcohol, so the sugar is the big enemy for me) and only had water with meals. All of us have heard the "don't drink your calories" advice, and I stuck to it. I didn't order any desserts except for the last night I was there, and then I shared it with my husband. Full disclosure: I've been guilty of moving my spoon from dessert to my mouth at twice the rate as my husband moves his spoon back and forth, resulting in a 70/30 ratio of dessert sharing, but I've turned over a new leaf with that. He even got the last bite this time!

I was pretty proud of myself when I got home. I couldn't wait to wigh myself. I stepped on the scale and…

I lost one measly pound. WHAT THE FUDGE? I hadn't had any fudge. I swear. I was irritated at first, but then I started thinking about two things:

1.) I FEEL really good. The whole time I was away I felt energized and with zero lethargy or bloating. I feel stronger and my clothes are a little looser.

2.) Plateaus happen. A great number of diets are derailed by plateaus. I know several of mine have been. I start feeling the "Life's not fair, I've worked my butt off and my butt's not off yet" feeling and then I start eating more and worse food almost out of anger. But who am I punishing with that anger? My father used to say about a great variety of trials and tribulations, "This too shall pass." This apply to plateaus. The plateau will pass, and then there will probably be more.

I got on the scale again this morning and another pound has dropped. When I got back from vacation, I went out and bought healthy food to restock my fridge and then participated in a 5K yesterday followed by a healthy picnic with my family, rather than throwing in the beach towel. I'm really glad I made that choice, rather than letting the plateau derail me.

If you've hit a plateau, even if it last for two weeks, don't quit, just stop and enjoy the view from where you are.

Love,

- Michelle :)

Compare and Despair

Approaching the competition at the race that goes nowhere

I used to feel self-conscious at the gym, and I still do sometimes, for different reasons. I used to compare myself to everyone else there in terms of how thin or in-shape I was. Now I just worry I'm in the way in the weights area trying to figure out where to stand while I do my lunges with curls. To those who feel self-conscious at the gym - much like every other area of life, for the most part no one's looking, and anything you can imagine those who are looking are thinking is merely your own projection. Anyone who is actually comparing themselves to you is doing it out of their own insecurity. Don't let imaginings of what other people are thinking dissuade you from doing things that are good for you.

Meetings, phone calls, and never getting to the exercise

These models are just saying peas and carrots over and over again.

If you work for yourself, or at an office, or are taking care of children, relatives, a sick dog, etc. you know that some days there are deadlines that can't be missed, and meetings that get scheduled so there's no chunk (if the word chunk just made you think of chocolate chunk and made your mouth worry, please go drink some water or eat a HEALTHY snack, stat) of time to exercise.

That's how I'm feeling today. I'm sticking to eating health but must get to the store to restock. Always have healthy food that's easy to prepare or requires no preparation at all on hand. Especially on those days.

So here's my plan. I'm going to exercise tonight after all the life chores are done. Not ideal, but worth doing. Some people may find it impossible to workout before bed. Others may find it impossible to do so in the morning. Find at least two or three options that work for you so you have back up plans to fall back on. That's my back up plan today.

- Michelle :)

Have a plan

Helen won Biggest Loser last season. According to BL trainer Bob, she always had a plan.

Facing the day with a plan

If you're like me, mornings can really vary between excitement to get the day started, neutrality, and utter despair at facing the day. So how to you deal with each circumstance. I'd say the same way: Have a plan. And a back up plan.

One thing I need to know I learned from Biggest Loser

I will admit that Biggest Loser is a guilty pleasure of mine – guilty because it takes half the show to just weigh in the contestants, the shameless product plugs are so brazen, and because the formula is the show. But anyway, something one of the trainers told one of the contestants during the past season really stuck with me. He said to have a plan. All the previous winners had a plan every day. It seems so simple but can be so easy to forget what to do.

Make a list and check it twice

I'm a big fan of lists. It takes all the worry and anxiety that a bunch of things to do spinning around your head can create and puts it down on paper, where you can prioritize things and even decide if some of the the things are even worth doing. The three things that should always be top priority are your eating, your exercise, and your sleep. Everything else will come so much easier if you keep these three things in check. Put those at the top and then prioritize each other item by importance and due date, then figure out how much time each task will realistically take. Then DOUBLE it. Seriously. Then think about how much time your have in your day and divide appropriately. Phew.

What's happening right now

It's 11:36 am and I just finished my first cup of green tea today. I made sure to listen to my hunger at 10:30 at ate a healthy, balanced snack. Always include some protein in your snack, but don't make it exclusively protein. I had string cheese and half a banana. I also have a healthy breakfast of high fiber (at least 3 grams, people) cereal and skim milk.

Love you guys!

Green Tea

Green tea served in a garden up tranquility.

I've been hearing a lot about the benefits of green tea for a long time now. If you read any fitness magazines, you'll know they like to recycle this gem every couple of months. I've always been a fan of tea, although mostly the most pedestrian of teas - Orange Pekoe* -and I'm a fan of tea with milk (skim milk) and sugar (lots of), or occasionally lemon and sugar. So this is new for me. My goal is to have two cups of green tea per day - starting tonight, both for its purported medicinal value, and to help give me a full feeling and discourage me from unnecessary** snacking.

* Orange Pekoe is really a generic term for black tea, which I never knew until five minutes ago. Moderately interesting bits of ground information here:

** Don't skimp on necessary snacking. That's snacking when you're actually hungry between meals. Plan out your snacks and don't let yourself get too hungry so you don't end up eating 3/4 of a Trader Joe's two-bite brownie container like I did. (See previous post.)

Read about the benefits of green tea here.

Welcome To My First Post

Trader Joe's Two Bite Brownies, of which I ate 3/4 of the box in two days.

I am a perfectionist. And I like monkeys. And I've been struggling with my weight since my late twenties - I'm 39 now. The struggle became especially challenging after I had my wonderful daughter. I hope this blog will help others like me, who are smart, hard-working people, who end up feeling (wrongfully) worthless because they can't reach and maintain their goal weight.

Sometimes you'll here stuff like "it's as simple as calories in, calories out." Other times you'll hear about how tough it is to lose wight, but follow plan X and you'll be a success. At this point, there's so much information out there, that those of us who've struggled with our weight loss know what we need to do - we need to exercise regularly, and eat moderately. That's it.

But that's actually the "easy" part. The hard part is consistently convincing yourself that it's a priority to make those two things happen, and to consistently make yourself believe that you're worth making those things a priority.

This blog will include a lot of data about exactly what I'm doing to get healthy, but more importantly, it will be an honest, detailed account of the successes, setbacks, and emotions, that go along with this kind of journey.

Loving yourself is really the only way to get and stay healthy. I wish all of you and myself the best.

Until next time,

- Michelle :)

A little inspiration from Nada Surf