JustShowUp

Ok - so THAT is the plan - apparently not only can it be done, but there are lots of people who have done it.  I found a game plan on the internet…it starts out super slow and easy - 1/4 mile walking a 1/4 jogging…and increases from there for 10 weeks and in the end you can run a 5k in 7 weeks or a 10k in 10 weeks.  SOOOOOOO…….

I signed up for a 10k in Dec.  Now I HAVE to do it right??  This is how I see it….it I focus on a tangible goal, then the weight should come of as part of the bonus plan right?  So I have 4 months to get it together….

Wish me luck people…the fat girl is playin’ NO more….LOL  It is time to get down to business!

I haven’t weighed-in in some time…scared of the scale…but I weighed-in this morning and after all the nonsense the last month and half with the move and the cross country trek and the visiting the family I gained about 7 lbs.  Not that great but it could have been soooo much worse…

I am going to go back to weighing in regularly and it will be interesting to see if the pounds come off as I start chipping away at those 10 weeks…

Wish me luck people…I think I might need it…fill you all in later!!

Have a wonderfully Blessed evening…

No, I did not die, I felt like I was gonna die, I felt like I wanted to die - but I did not die!!  I ran that 5k for breast cancer today and it was horrible and wonderful all at the same time.  I ran it in 36 minutes…and I wasn’t last…so I think that I rock!  LOL

I am proud of myself if you couldn’t tell - but at the same time it was a HUGE reality check.  It was hard and I walked/jogged the whole way…jog a little - walk a little…and it was hard.  A year ago I was running 4 miles 4-5 days a week…no problem…hated every minute of it until it was over…then I never felt sooo good!  How quickly and far I have fallen!

But I am going to see the silver lining in this…I did it!  First step finished!  On to the next step….so I am going to find another 5k run to do and I am going to train more and get better…and who knows?  Maybe I will up the ante a little and try a 10k someday…but in the meantime…every step is a step closer to being lighter and healthier.

Ok…I’ll stop now… LOL

I hope everyone has a very blessed day and that you also take one step at a time…those steps…they add up to miles…so be thrilled with those steps…=)

By the way - did you know I ran a 5k?  HAHA - ok I’m done….

Hey all!  I am finally back on board!!  My move across country is finished and I FINALLY have the internet up and running!  I kinda sucked the last couple of weeks with my dieting…but I am more motivated than ever!  Thanks to everyone who sent me kind words while I was MIA - they were a blessing!

Now I am back and rarin to go!  In fact…..believe it or not the first thing we did the day after we got here to WA was join a gym and my husband and I are even going to run a 5k tomorrow for charity.  I CANNOT believe I am going to run that thing…LOL  I am really, really excited!  I know that I will struggle but I also know that I am motivated and I can do this!!

So…life will now settle down and I will get back to my routine and I expect that weightloss ticker to start tickin!!!!  I am sooo looking forward to reading everyone’s blogs and seeing how you all are doing!

I am soooo glad to be back and I will post tomorrow to let you all know how the run went - Lord knows it will be funny if nothing else…and we all need a good laugh every now and then!!

Have a blessed night everyone!!

I can’t believe how much I miss getting on here and reading about everyone and their daily victories and struggles!  We made it to Washington and if driving 3000 miles wasn’t enough we made a 16 hour trip down to Southern California to visit family.  We are currently making our way back up north - slowly but surely - and should be back to WA next week.

As you all know I survived the trip cross country and felt really good about my food choices along the way.  I can honestly say, however, that I have failed miserably since being home and somehow that has managed to make me really motivated and really excited to get back north to make my own home and focus on my weight loss plan.  My husband is Mexican and I am Italian - so pasta and tortillas- not really weight loss food…LOL

I feel really okay though.  I am not sure why that is - maybe because I have been allowing myself the little indulgences but I have not been going overboard and I am still making good choices along the way (even if I did let myself have big bowl of pasta alfredo with rock shrimp and some of my mother-in-laws homemade tortillas - yummmo).

I think the key is that I don’t feel like I have lost control.  I think that even the not-so-good choices I have made have been deliberate indulgences and not a total loss of control like in the past.   In the past, that pasta would have sent me on a downward spiral for a couple of weeks.  What with the woe is me attitude that has always accompanied my overeating and the guilt that I used as an excuse to continue over eating.  Thats It!!!  It didn’t occur to me until right now that the reason those things didn’t send me over the edge is because I don’t feel guilty.  My LIFE has changed…so the commitment is still there…even when I momentarily fall of the wagon…LOL

You know what?  That feels really good!  I feel like God has released me from the bondage of food.   WOW what an epiphany!

As usual I get HUGE insight from posting on here….thanks for being there buddies!!

Have you ever heard a George Strait song?  Of course you have, even if you are not a country music fan you know who George Strait is.  All his exes are in Texas…and he sings of many, many other country towns throughout the U.S.  He makes them all sound soooo romantic and exciting…well let me tell you he is full of crap…LOL   On our trip from one side of the United States to the other, we travelled through many of these places….George Strait had me sooo excited.  LOL  Well all those romantic towns - not so much…LOL  Our moving truck broke down in Laramie, Wyoming and it took Budget 2 days to figure out what to do about it…trust me - 2 days in Laramie, WY is 2 days longer than anyone needs to be in Laramie, WY (sorry Laramian’s…=). But no worries - I still love George…=)

At any rate - we made it through and are finally here in Washington State.  This last week has been exhausting, stressful, boring (driving 10 hours a day…yuck) and emotional - all reasons I usually use to eat.  But NOT THIS TIME!!

I avoided french fries, ate a lot of subway, salads and fish.  I made a commitment to not look at any part of the menu but the lighter side - and if they didn’t have one then I looked at soup and salad.  We ate breakfast at a diner and I ate egg beaters instead of eggs, fruit instead of hash browns and I made these kind of  substitutions the whole way.  Veggies instead of fries..etc…I will weigh myself tomorrow but I think I am ok.  I feel strong and I can honestly say that I did not miss the other stuff that I usually eat.

I did allow myself some splurges a couple of times - but it was ok because of the other choices that I had made…

It was wayyyyy easier then I thought it would be.  This was the ultimate test - and I think I passed!

Like I said, we are now in our new home - the Tri Cities area of Washington State.  We bought a house today and construction will start in a couple of weeks.  We are going home to Cali for a little vacation…but we did rent an apartment to live in while our house is being built and I made sure we picked one with a fitness center because my new life has started and it is time to reinvent myself.  Nobody here knows me fat - so when I lose the weight they will only know the skinny me…=)

While driving cross country I had a lot of time to think.  I did a lot of soul searching…and I discovered a couple of things.  When my hubby was in Iraq I lost 40 lbs through a lot of sweat and determination.  But when he came back I put it all back on and I wanted to figure out why I did that.  Why would I work sooo hard to lose the weight just to put it back on again?  Why would I do that to myself?  What I figured out is that I did it all for the wrong reasons.   I did it because I thought my husband would be really surprised and would be so proud of me.  I did it for his reaction.  Of course, when he came home he was surprised and he thought I looked great.  But after he got used to me there wasn’t that “wow” reaction anymore.  I think I figured “oh well, he doesn’t care - why should I?”  I did it for HIS reaction and not for ME.  When we would go out to eat I would be influenced by his choices - he would eat whatever and I would eat it with him.  My husband loves to eat out so I need to figure this out FOR ME….because that is the only way that I can survive this weight loss journey and still eat out with my hubby.

The other thing that I figured out is this:  I am not a slave to food or my weight.  I am not defined by what I eat or what my pants size is.  I realized that I focus so much on how fat I am or what horrible thing I just ate that I start to think that it controls me.  That is a bunch of malarkey!  I control what I eat and how I feel about myself - I am not controlled!

Anyway - I just thought I would post about my “duh” moments…LOL  I am hoping that now that we are here and have the residential stuff out of the way that I will be able to get on more often and read up on everyone and the happenings in everyone’s lives.  I hope everyone is doing well and thank you to everyone that has sent me notes of encouragement…as I have said before - you all rock!

Thought for the day:

LOOK UP, GET UP AND NEVER GIVE UP!

I just wanted to pop in and say hi to all my buddies!  We are on our cross-country trip and are currently in Wyoming.  I have been hanging in there on my diet and have created a system.  I only look at the healthy part of the menu - don’t even peruse the other stuff and if there is no light side to the menu then I go right to the salads and soups.  If we stop at fast food I skip the fries and the soda altogether.  Have been drinking tons of water and if I splurge it is on a G2…so I think I am doing great!  I haven’t weighed myself this week but I actually feel as though I might have lost a couple of pounds.  I feel like I am in control of my eating and that is great!

Catch you all next time…hope everyone is doing well and having a blessed week!

So last night they had what is called a “Hale and Farewell” for my husband.  It is when the guys in his unit get together to welcome or say goodbye to guys that are coming into or out of the unit.  When my husband called me to come and get him he was feeling no pain.  When my husband has had a few beers he is inevitably hungry.  We ended up at a Chinese Buffet.  These places have FAILURE written all over them if you are not careful.

I was not only hungry by then - it was 9 pm and no dinner - I was irritated because my husband is embarrassing when he has had to much to drink…LOL  Way too silly in public…but I digress…so I am starving AND irritated both reason enough for me to overeat in the past…

But instead I made myself a salad from the salad bar with lots of cucumbers and tomatoes and instead of salad dressing I just put a little oil and vinegar and some salt and pepper.  I had 3 little peices of sushi - you know the ones that are the size of a nickel with just the crab meat in the middle?  And then I had 3 small shrimp and that was it!  To round that off I had some UNsweetened tea and for dessert I had a VERY small bowl - like maybe a 1/4 of a cup of that yummy chocolate pudding they always have at these places.  The pudding is always soooo thick and creamy I don’t even want to know what they use to make it….but where I would have had the biggest bowl I could find and then go back for seconds…I had the smallest bowl I could find and called it a night.

When I left that restaurant I was BEYOND proud of myself.  I held fast to my will power and stayed strong and I didn’t miss the other stuff one bit!

So I feel like I jumped a major hurdle last night and that has made me feel like I can kick this thing I have with food in the ever shrinking bootie!

Just wanted to share…hope everyone has a blessed day!

My mother always said that to us kids.  Waste not want not…her parents grew up during the depression and it was a sin to throw anything away if it could be reused, reheated or reconfigured.  Although my mother and father did not grow up in the depression they had the “clean plate club”.  We could not leave the dinner table until our plates were clean.  So I grew up not understanding the signals my body was giving me when it was full unless my plate was clean.  I recognized early on in my adulthood that that mentality contributed to my weight problem.  For that reason, I have never made my kids eat until their plate was clean….

Anyway - as I have mentioned before we are in the process of moving.  So I packing up our home and the time is getting closer to when we leave.  We leave on Friday morning but everything needs to be out of the house by Thursday night.  Because we are driving across country I can’t exactly bring all the food that is in the fridge.  I keep catching myself wanting to eat things that I shouldn’t so I don’t waste it…LOL  A much larger version of the clean plate club…LOL Fortunately I have come to my senses every time and I have stepped AWAY from the ice cream.  Instead, I called my neighbor and told her I was bringing everything that did not get eaten over to her house…

I know that sounds like a “DUH” kind of thing and it is…nevertheless it is a small victory…

Here is the deal, as some of you may know my husband is in the Marine Corps, and just like we do every 3 years we are packing up our house and changing duty stations.  Three years ago we moved from California to North Carolina and now 3 years later we are moving from North Carolina to Washinton State.

Overall, I am ESTATIC about this move - I am soooo excited to be heading that way.

But here is the thing - I  am not only packing up the entire house by myself my husband and I do all the loading and unloading ourselves.  While that is all great as far as exercise goes…LOL….it is soooo stressful that I ultimately choose bad food choices over good.  The whole comfort food thing….

In addition to that I will be driving our truck the 2900 miles while my husband drives the moving truck.   So that means I will be bored (driving is not all the exciting…LOL) and sleepy which means I will want to grab something sugary to keep me awake and it is sooooooo easy to make super bad food choices on the road.  I say I want to work out anyway - most hotels have a gym these days but realistically after driving 400+ miles a day for 7 days who wants to work out - I know I will want to sleep when I am not studying for the chemistry classes that I have to keep up with even though we are traveling.

I am just worried about the downfall and I need some SERIOUS support.  Plus we all know how turmoil and chaos translates in our lives…translates into food.

If all that weren’t enough - after we get there…we are going on a vacation visiting family in California.  More opportunity for great failure.  I need to just move to a state where there is no food.   Then it would be easy…I would be dead - but I wouldn’t stress about food…LOL  Ok that was joke….but you all know where I am coming from.

Any words of wisdom out there?  Any tips or suggestions?  Be prepared for many blog postings about the trials of weightloss on the road…

So today I decided to get on the scale…”don’t expect anything”  I said to myself.  I just wanted to be prepared for disappointment - afterall it has only been a few days since I re-commited myself to this process.  So I got on the scale with my eyes squeezed shut and what do you know - THREE POUNDS…LOL  I had to get off and back on the scale a few times before I believed it…LOL Three lbs - GONE…and I say gone and not lost because lost implies I may find them again someday and I have no intention of doing that - so they are GONE…WOOO HOOO!!!  I know it is only 3 lbs but it is a big three lbs. 

What a difference Slimbuddies makes…just being inspired by the people on this sight, knowing that I am not alone in this journey and that I have people that will understand and support me no matter what…THANK YOU!!!!   You all ROCK!