Wednesday, September 7, 2011

NutriSystem Day 1

My NutriSystem food arrived yesterday! I was so excited to see the big box sitting on the porch when I came home. I started the program this morning, and so far, after two meals, the food has been pretty good. I had apple cinnamon oatmeal for breakfast, which tastes almost exactly like the Quaker instant oatmeal only less sugary. For lunch I had Pasta Parmesan, which I beefed up with some steamed broccoli and it wasn't bad. I'm surprising myself with how easily I'm incorporating the required veggies so far, since I've never been a big veggie eater.

My new food today: Greek Yogurt. I'm still undecided as to whether I actually like it, the texture's a bit thicker than I expect for yogurt, and it's weirdly tangy. I'll give it another shot, though!

Saturday, August 27, 2011

Fed Up!

I knew I'd lost my motivation. Fallen off the wagon. Jeff's away working out west and I haven't been eating well. Between lack of regular child care (aka Jeff being home, LOL) and the cost of the gym child care (when it wasn't already full by the time I got there with my 3 kids), I ended up never being able to go, and cancelled my membership to avoid wasting the money. What did that amount to? Clothes started being a little tighter. My old jeans were worn out and I had to break down and buy another pair of size 18's. Meanwhile the size 16's I was thisclose to fitting into are still sitting in the drawer. All of this, and I still was feeling lazy and unmotivated and depressed about my weight. I pointedly avoided the scale.

Last week, I finally got up the courage to step back on it, and staring me right in the face was the dreaded number: 200. I'd allowed myself to get back to 200lbs, a place I swore I'd never see again after finally kicking it to the curb last year :( There's just something extra depressing seeing that number start with a 2 instead of a 1.

I knew I needed something that would help keep me motivated, and after looking into a bunch of different diet plans I decided I'm going to try out Nutrisystem. By putting a portion of my weekly grocery budget aside, I'm able to pay for it easily, and they have a great online message board. There's also an active group of Nutrisystem users at 3 Fat Chicks, which I've found to be a great motivation in the past.

As for the exercise, I've downloaded copies of videos of several of my favourite gym classes so that I can do them here at home.

Wednesday, April 27, 2011

Good News and Bad News

I seem to have trouble finding (making?) the time to update this blog. I really need to work on that, because it does help keep my accountable, so it's definitely worth taking the time to do. I do have good news, and bad news, as well as some pretty middle-of-the-road news to share. The boring news is that I haven't lost any weight since my last update... but I haven't gained any, either. I figure the two more or less cancel each other out, right? *sigh*

The bad news is that Jeff is leaving next week to go back out west for work. Besides missing him like crazy, and taking on all the responsibility with the household and kids, it means that my gym time will be seriously restricted due to child care constraints. My mother-in-law will watch them a couple times a week, which will help, though.

The good news (just about the only good news about him going away to work) is that the extra money makes it so much easier to eat fresh, healthy foods. Hopefully I can find a good balance between the eating and the exercise and actually make some headway on this weight loss!

Monday, March 14, 2011

Onward!

I'm feeling really optimistic today. I'm not sure why, since this past week has been pretty pitiful as far as wight loss goes. Corban has been sick and running a fever off and on over the last 4 days, which means I haven't done much of anything besides taking care of him.

On the positive side, though, Jeff got a great tax return this year, and I was able to rejoin the gym. I'm so excited about this, I find it much easier to stick with eating healthy and counting calories when I'm also going to the gym. I just don't want to mess up the hard work I've done, I suppose! I'm going to get back to the Couch to 5k program I had started before, and I found a great app for my iPod Touch that gives all the cues while letting me listen to my own music, so I'm really excited about that. I also discovered that MyFitnessPal also has an app for keeping track of my calorie counting, so I can quit carrying around a separate notebook with me everywhere.

Saturday, January 8, 2011

A New Year... I Hate Resolutions

I feel like I should be posting "A New Year, A New Me!", just like millions of other people who resolve to lose weight once January 1 rolls around again. The past 9 months or so have been difficult for me, and I badly fell off the weight-loss wagon. Jeff left last June to work out west, and was gone until the end of October. It became practically impossible to get to the gym, since I was home alone with 3 kids. I felt badly asking nearby family (inlaws) to watch the kids so I could go to the gym any more than once every couple of weeks. And while my gym offered child care, it would either cost me $10/visit, or almost $80/month for child care membership for 3 kids. I just couldn't justify that kind of cost while we're trying to pay off our debt so we can buy a house in the next few years. And then, since I wasn't going to the gym, I just couldn't justify paying out all that money for my membership, especially when we weren't sure how long Jeff was going to be gone. So I canceled it. And now that Jeff's home, we're living off of his unemployment so can't afford a new membership right now. *sigh*

Along with no gym, I found myself doing a lot of evening snacking while I sat home by myself missing Jeff. I ate way too much fast food and tv dinners because I didn't feel like cooking a big meal that no one but me would like. When it was all said and done, I gained back almost 15lbs of the weight I had lost, which just sent me into a bout of depression and crummy self-esteem. Seems to be the story of my life. And even though I started this blog with every intention of posting both the good and the bad, I found myself almost hiding from it, ashamed to put into words exactly how badly I'd failed myself.

Now, here we are, in 2011. The Christmas season was so difficult. When I started really trying to lose this weight last year, I encouraged myself by thinking about how awesome I'd look when Christmas rolled around, and all the friends and family members I haven't seen since last Christmas would be shocked at how great I looked. Instead, I was just as big as always. Even though I've always hated those predictable and never-kept resolutions, I told myself (as I stuffed my face with all those stupidly delicious Christmas goodies) that come the new year, something had to change.

So here I am... changing. I hope.