21DSD day 3

Day three done

Weight down .5 total .9

Sugar 0

Gluten 0

Booze 0

It wasn't as easy as the other days. Walked through Walgreens and stared down all the Halloween candy. That was a little rough but I tried not to think about it. Pretty much just managed my hunger and ignores my mild cravings throughout the day. Nothing too exciting - I'll take that. 

I'm feeling very restless and struggling with some instant gratification. So I played with my hair a little bit. I was hoping for a cut vintage look but ended up with just curly. Guess I need to keep trying though it's distracting me from food at least. 

21DSD Day 2 Level 1

So I promised myself I would blog every day during this 21 days. And here I am.

Weight:  Down .4 Total -.4
Sugar: 0
Gluten: 0
Booze: 0

Feeling pretty good today. A little bit of a headache but I think it's more from lack of sleep then any diet changes.  Couldn't fall asleep then couldn't stay asleep most of the night last night.  That's not unusual for me when I make a diet change and certainly not unusual when I get a visit from Aunt Flo... and she decided to visit today.

Food was on plan - no gluten, no sugar.  Had lunch 'out' today luckily I found it fairly easy to stay on plan because we ate at a taco truck - corn tortillas plus some chopped steak topped with a little cilantro.  Breakfast was my standard eggs + cheese and dinner was some fried sweet potatoes and sausage.  I snacked on cashews at work and a few dill pickles when I got home.  All in all a good day.

I didn't have any 'real' cravings, but the minute I got in the car to drive home I started thinking about getting a cheese quesadilla from taco bell on my way home.  I don't know why.  I couldn't associate it with a particular feeling or thought except, "I'm going home, I get a quesadilla now." So I'm going to assume it's just a habit I've created that I need to break by just saying "No"

Tomorrow I'm starting a run/walk plan to get ready for a 5K in December - we'll see if my knees are going to hold up to that.  Next week I MIGHT try going to the gym in the morning.  More to avoid the morning traffic then anything else.  But I'm not making any promises just yet.

Aaaaad 2/21 complete

BTW

If something looks strange here, that's because I moved all 12 years of posts from my previous blog over to this one so that all my trails, tribulations, successes and failures can be in one place for me to review and learn from.

Say Hey

Well, guess what...

It's me. And no, this isn't my annual 'fly by'.  I'm dedicating myself to 21 days of blogging to go along with my 21 day sugar detox.

So, to catch you up with me...

I'm not in a great place right now.  I'm the heaviest I've ever been in my life.  My knees hurt, my feet hurt, my back hurts and I'm in terrible (cardio) shape.  I can still lift very heavy things and put them down again, but I'm not at the strongest I've ever been either.

After time after time of failed programs I find it harder and harder to get motivated to try again.  But I haven't given up either.

I have had one success though.  Back in July (or so) I had my last diet soda.  It was a strange thing how that happened.  I woke up one morning and we didn't have any soda in the house.  I rushed around all day doing other things and by the end of the day realized I had going all day without picking up any - or having any to drink and strangely I felt ok.  The next day I really didn't have any major cravings.  I started to get a soda out of habit at one point, but then realized that I didn't HAVE to have it, so I put it back.  And I haven't had one since, or for that matter, had any bad cravings for it either.  I was a miracle I swear.  If only the same thing could happen for junk food right!?

So, what am I doing right now?  Well I'm doing the 21 day sugar detox http://21daysugardetox.com/  I'm hoping that this might motivate me to do even bigger and better things as the month rolls on.  I have other goal goal then that at the moment.  Just do 21 days of no sugar and see how I feel at the end of it.  Oh - and blogging every day too.

So, it's the end of day 1 and I was sugar free and I'm feeling fine about that.  No big cravings, no major feelings of hunger.  Not too tired either -- here's to sugar fee.

1/21 complete

Easy Goals vs Challenging Goals

I discovered something about myself recently. The past year (or more) I've been trying the - "Be kind to yourself" approach. Trying not to diet (most of the time) and setting easy easy goals. Strangely enough what's happened? I gained weight. I gained a LOT of weight. (40 pounds in 2013)

If I'm truthful with myself there were some 'fuck-it' moments in there and those didn't help, but on the other hand I had thought that those were caused by my ultra strict dieting plans. Turns out that's not 100% of the problem.  So, by having this easy going - no crazy goals - diet plan,  I would lose 1/2 to 1 lb in a week for a few weeks, then have a 'fuck-it' week, gain five and have to start all over again - only from a higher starting point.

I also found that when my goal was 1 lb a week, that I tended to be a LOT less focused and spent a lot more days going - eh, I can focus tomorrow, it's only 1 lb.  And then a week would go by and I hadn't done anything.

So - I'm ditching all that.  I'm setting myself some aggressive goals for a short term deadline that's important to me.  I have a plan that's extra strict, but that I know will give me CLOSE to those results, but it'll mean sticking to it -- daily.

So, the plan...

I'm going back to Medifast, with a focus on convenience foods.  Bars and shakes.  Why?  Because then I don't have excuses.  Those foods are even easier then stopping for fast food.  5 Medifast meals + 1 lean and green meal. done and done

Exercise is going to be weight lifting only for three weeks. I want to give myself a chance to fully flip into fat burning mode. Then I want to slowly build up to training for triathlons again. I miss that drive that challenging myself on the weekends used to give me.  I'll stick to sprint triathlons at first so that I'm not pushing the 45 mins of exercise a day prescribed on medifast.  I'll also have to build up extra slow because I got runner's knee a few years back training for a 1/2 marathon and want to be able to run pain free.

I'll watch my body fat % numbers pretty close.  If that looks hinky I'll start throwing extra protein in the mix, but it's going to take at least a month of lean losses to make that happen.

The short term goal is 55 lbs before my chorus goes to competition in April.  Our costumes for comp are tight black leggings, tight black top and a leather jacket.  I want to look HOT...

Not a hot mess like I did for our Christmas concert

Still Fighting...

Hi! *waves* I've been quiet here, I realize. Good news, I'm still alive. Bad news, I'm still overweight and out of shape. But - I'm still fighting. Still looking for that n=1 formula that will allow me to finally hit my goals and maintain them. Check this spot again - cause I may just start blogging about it again.

It occurred to me that tomorrow (or today really since it's past midnight) is seven months from my 45th birthday.

For some reason 45 is bothering me much much more then 40 did.  Maybe it's because time seems to be going past so quickly.  Maybe because it's 5 years later and I feel I've made absolutely no progress toward my lifetime goals.  Maybe it's because I'm just in one of those moods these days.  But it keeps ringing in my head that I'm almost 45 and I'm still overweight, unhappy and at the moment also unemployed.

The unemployed bit will be taken care of shortly, but if I'm ever going to take care of the other two I need to start practicing good habits daily.  EVERY day.  This on again, off again stuff is for the birds.  I'm tired of being tired.  Tired of avoiding the mirrors. Tired of these aches and pains that I KNOW are caused by crappy diet.  I have a plan.  It's a small one.  It's a simple meal plan that I've written for tomorrow.  That's all I can handle focusing on for now... tomorrow.  But it's something at least.

Week one goals:  Plan meals every day
Walk 10000 steps every day

and that's enough for now