Tuesday, April 28, 2009

Goals, dreams and aspirations

Since I'm sharing my journey with you, I figured I should let you know what my goals are in more detail. Of course the ultimate goal is to be healthy and happy. But I'm motivated by a little more than the fear that I won't live long enough to see my daughter grow up. You see, I really want another baby! My husband would agree I'm sure. I know that right now is not a good time after what we went through to have Olivia. I don't want there to be complications that I can have some control over so that's one of the big reasons I'm doing what I'm doing. So here's my first goal; lose 100 pounds and then have my blood pressure evaluated (one of those 24 hour monitor tests) to see if I can get rid of some of my medications and find out what the dr thinks about having another baby. If I get the go ahead, we will try to add to our family at that time. I'm not putting time limits on myself because I feel that will just set me up for failure and disappointment. My smaller goals are to lose 5 pounds at a time again with no specific time limit. So far I've reached that goal almost 5 times!
My second goal after having another baby is to lose at least another 100 pounds if not more. This will no doubt be very difficult but it will bring me closer to a "normal" weight for my height. My bmi is quite high right now and according to a healthy bmi score I'd need to weigh 130 pounds. I don't think I'll ever get to that but even below 200 pounds would be a great start.
Unfortunately I wasn't able to weigh myself yesterday because my scale doesn't work! We just bought it a few weeks ago but it's been faulty. It only worked two or three times and won't turn on now even though we just replaced the batteries. I think we need to email the company and get a replacement. It's too bad I bought the cheaper scale instead of the weight watchers model. It's also too bad I didn't keep the receipt or the packaging.
Today, Shawn had to walk home from work to pick up the car at Canadian Tire so on a whim, I decided to pack Olivia up into the stroller and walk to meet him. I wasn't sure if he'd have the car yet or not. It turned out we got as far as the mall (about 1 km away) and he was just leaving in the car. Luckily he saw us and stopped and we went to the dollar store and then drove home. Tonight's dinner was Low Fat Spaghetti Pie which turned out pretty well and fairly low calorie. We also had the Asian Island Crunch salad which is so yummy! I'm just resting before my strength training workout for the day. Then I have a bunch of crafts to work on for the table I'll have at the Spring Fest in 2 weeks. Thank you for all the supportive comments, you rock!

Monday, April 27, 2009

Things I can do now and other changes I've noticed

Here's a list of changes I've noticed as well as a few things I find much easier to do since losing a little weight.

1. My rings are much looser. I'm now able to wear my promise ring on my right hand and it's actually still loose. I haven't worn it since before I got married 7 years ago.
2. My face actually looks thinner, my chins aren't as large. They're still there but I'm working on it.
3. I can move around much quicker when I'm trying to cook or do other projects.
4. I don't get out of breath as quickly.
5. I can touch my toes.
6. I can balance on my previously broken ankle.
7. I can hold difficult yoga poses such as the palm tree and chair.
8. I can do step aerobics (step up step down) for 20 minutes.
9. I can jog for short periods of time.
10. I have more energy in general.

Sunday, April 26, 2009

What does it mean?

I've decided to start this blog to try to help encourage others to do what I'm doing, lose weight! And the reason for losing weight is to gain my life back. About the start of February 2009, I was afraid. I was terrified of dying. I have a daughter, Olivia and I'm the only one who can do the job of being her mommy. I take my job very seriously and I know she needs me. I hit rock bottom and I knew a change just had to be made and it had to be done right away. I have been overweight my whole life just about but I always shrugged it off and avoided the mirror as much as possible. It wasn't until I truly looked at myself and the way other people see me that I realized I had to do something. After tearfully talking it all out with my husband into the wee hours of the morning, we decided on a strategy. We decided I would start very slowly to get active. I had a bellydancing video that I started to exercise to and although I couldn't do every move, I was able to get in a good 20 minutes of exercise a few days a week. I cut back on my calories very slowly so that I wouldn't send my body into starvation mode and honestly didn't see many results right away. In a month I lost maybe 3 pounds and I was a bit discouraged. My sister sent me her Wii Fit and I decided to try that out. I couldn't even use it when I got it because there is a weight limit and it wouldn't allow me to do any of the exercises. Thanks to this youtube video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U-j8tYpZxvY I found a way to trick the system into letting me use it. Again I started out slowly and still didn't see much of a difference on the scale but I did find myself more balanced and I recovered pretty well from the broken ankle I got in late November. After March break, I was devastated to find I had gained back one of the 3 pounds I had lost previously. I decided to change my workout and make it more structured. I now alternate between strength training and aerobic step each day doing 20 minutes of each 5x a week. Two weeks later, I had lost 12 pounds! I couldn't believe it and I know that I had a lot of help from God in order for me to lose that much that quickly. I again decided to change things up and started tracking everything I put into my mouth at sparkpeople.com . I limited my calories to below 1800 and it seems to be working still. Another 2 weeks later (and this brings us up to April 21st) I had lost another 9 pounds. The total now is 23 pounds which is the exact weight of my 21 month old daughter. I kept telling everyone I lost a Livvy. It's now Monday April 27th and I probably won't weigh myself until next Monday unless anyone thinks I should. I hope I can encourage others to either start to live more healthily or continue doing what they're doing or even kick it up a notch. I want to again mention that I in no way can take full credit for this loss and continuing motivation. I give it up to the Lord and the people He has put in my life to love me and help me keep going. Thank you Jesus and thank you friends, I love you all. Oh, here is a before and after photo or should I say before and in the process photos. The first was taken in February and the second was taken a few days ago.