My Fitness Pal - I Hate the Scale

There. I said it. I hate the scale. I hate weighing myself. I do it once a week, the same day, the same time. And I hate it. Usually I'm okay with it, but today when I stepped on the scale it had gone up 3.5 pounds from last week.

 Really? Three and a half pounds? I know I made some bad choices this past week but I didn't feel like it was 3.5 pounds worth of bad choices. I'd actually been feeling better this week, like I was starting to lose some weight. I thought my time with the scale today would be a good time, not a disheartening time that sent me back to bed for another 15 minutes, just running that number through my head over and over.

 The problem with the scale is it shows me a number I don't really see when I look in the mirror. Could I stand to lose some weight? Yes, of course, I see that. But the amount of weight the scale implies I should lose? I just don't see it...

Then I see pictures of myself and think, there's no way I'm that big. But the scale and pictures don't lie.

Sigh. I hate the scale.

I have to not let it get me down, I need to go back through the last week and point out my big mistakes to myself and figure out ways to not repeat them. I need to go back to the week where I lost a pound and see what I did right that week versus this past week. 

My Fitness Pal - Running

Well it's time to be better!

This week was my last week hosting with Events & Adventures and one of the reasons I wanted to quit hosting was so I would have more time to focus on me and my weight loss journey and bettering myself. Too often I let other things get in the way of my workout schedule.

 So to help with that... I let a friend talk me into joining this group:

http://usafitfortbend.com/

 I start on June 29th at 7am with a group run with my pace group! I put myself into the Purple group - the walkers, the 5K/10K. We'll see how it goes. One day I would like to be able to run an entire 5K, not just walk it with little spurts of running. 

My Fitness Pal - Walk to Wellness Wednesdays

This is a new health initiative that my wellness committee at work started. I like it!

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Hello everyone,

On behalf of the Wellness Committee, we would like to introduce and encourage all of you to participate in WALK TO WELLNESS WEDNESDAYS starting TODAY.

For every Wednesday this summer, we encourage you to USE THE STAIR WAYS instead of the elevator. For those of you who already use the stair ways frequently, GOOD JOB AND KEEP IT UP. For those of you who don’t, TODAY IS THE DAY to start.

There will be signs to remind and encourage you all to WALK TO WELLNESS WEDNESDAYS. Thank you.

Fun Facts:
- Climbing just two flights of stairs everyday could result a loss of 2.7kg or 6lbs per year. Six flights a day could help you trim nearly 18 lbs.
- Adding stairs to your day can add years to your life. Studies show that risk of cardiovascular disease and death is lower among those who are regular Stair climbers.
- Stair climbing is a 'green' activity; the only energy source used is what is stored in our bodies.... good for you and the environment!

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 So I got to work and headed over to the elevator up to my floor and there was a Walk To Wellness sign posted huge on it, staring me in the face, making me feel guilty if I took the elevator. So I didn't. I took three flights of stairs up to my office and now I'm sitting here with my breakfast of yogurt and a banana, feeling good!

My Fitness Pal - Grazing!

Another blog post from My Fitness Pal.

Grazing
Okay I was terrible this Memorial Day Weekend with my eating and my logging. I couldn't log as I went like I usually do because I was up at a lake house that doesn't really have wifi and my phone's reception was sketchy so I couldn't use the app.

For the first day, I wrote things down that I ate on a list app on my phone and then I just said, screw it, it's vacation, and stopped. And I just sat down to try to log what I ate over Saturday and Sunday. I got most of it but I know not all of it. It's hard to remember what day did I have that handful of M&Ms? Did I have a handful of M&Ms every day? What about those goldfish crackers or peanut butter sandwich crackers when I was feeling snacky?

Oh well...

I will make it a mission to do better the next time I have a grazing-like situation! Which will be 4th of July weekend... 

My Fitness Pal

Ooops, I totally abandoned this blog... Whoops.

Been busy. Been using My Fitness Pal for about two and a half weeks. And I've put up two blog posts over there. Here they are!

BodyBugg returns! 
Posted on 2013-05-10

Well it's time to do this. Time to lose weight and be healthier in general.

I started a four-month-long health seminar on preventing diabetes last week, and one of the requirements of the class is that I keep a food log. I've tried to keep food logs before, but I wasn't as detailed (or as honest) as I needed to be, so it didnt really tell me all that it should. So far, so good! I've kept a food log for a week now. Some of the portion sizes I've had to guess at, but I'm being as honest as I can be.

Last night I charged up my BodyBugg again. I used it religiously for about 4 months then stopped around Valentine's Day. I want to get a more accurate calorie count for my exercising so I figured - why not? The subscription per month is only $6 and it's really useful. So I'm wearing that today and will continue wearing it!

Lessons Learned, Still Learning
Posted on 2013-05-20

I've been using My Fitness Pal for about two and a half weeks now and I've learned a few lessons.

* It's easier for me to eat better during the weeks. Likely because my schedule is pretty much the same every day. Get up early, work, lunch, work, go home. Eat small snacks I have at my desk during the day. Drink water. I definitely drink more water through the day when I'm at work than when I'm at home.

I can have a small but healthy breakfast (yogurt, fruit, etc.) and I bring my lunch or I go the Park Shops and I'm starting to do research about what's healthier before I go eat so I know what I'm eating, before I eat it.

* I definitely don't eat well on the weekends… No breakfast because sometimes I sleep late or I just don't eat it and then I head off to run errands. I've also had a few "extenuating circumstances" that allow me to snack and make it hard to log all of the food. A graduation party with lots of food last weekend, fondue dinner for my birthday this weekend, a baby shower with far too much food and desserts.Oh and drinking... so much drinking this past weekend.

I am learning to be a bit better at parties with large spreads of food. Scope everything out to see what's there before I make my choices, hunt down the veggies. Get away from the food table and go sit down to eat. These are situations that while they aren't every day, they are frequent, so I just need to continue to get better at handling them.

I'll have my next challenge this weekend... Memorial Day weekend at Canyon Lake with a lot of friends. A lot of food, a lot of snacking options, a lot of "grazing" options -- where you just nibble nibble nibble all day, and never really have a meal. A lot of desserts. A lot of soda in the fridge (one of my downfalls!).

But there are a lot of options for exercising. Swimming in the lake! I tend to wake up early -- early morning runs! The neighborhood is confusing and easy to get lost in, so I could just go for a run along the lake shore. Can't get lost there.

Catch up - did you miss me?

Oh my gosh, busy January, how you thwart my blogging schedule!

Phew... it's been a busy month. Can't believe it's been more than two weeks since I last touched this thing. I kept meaning to blog but I spend so much time starting at a computer at work it's the last thing I want to look at on the weekends sometime and especially the week nights.

So time to play catch up. What have I been up to? Warning... I don't know why, but there are links all over the place with this post.

• W-2 Season. It kills me dead every year. There's just so much to do with the year end wrap up. I've kept my calendar relatively clear this month because I have to with my work demands. Not doing something every night though, I must admit, has been nice. Must continue to keep control over my schedule like I was forced to this month! I'm not going to bore you with the details of what I've been doing day to day at work. It's done, for the most part. I don't really want to think about it anymore.

• Won an award at work! Go me! It's basically an Employee of the Month program we have, except it's quarter based instead of monthly. Every quarter, they ask for employees to nominate their peers as the new One Team All Star -- basically the best of the best, an employee who always gives it their all and exemplifies the core values of the company. It's kind of a big deal.

My first trophy in forever!

• Have not been cooking a lot but I was able to try out a few restaurants I've been meaning to for awhile: BRC Gastropub on Shepherd -- so yummy! -- and Mother Teresa's in Lake Jackson. Authentic Italian food! So delicious. Chris and I went down to have dinner with some friends who live in LJ. Figured it was only fair, almost all the other times we've seen them, they've come up to Houston. 288 is a two way street!

• I've done some Zumba at Tropa Z Fitness. Not nearly as much as I should be doing, but things come up. I'll be better! And I have a year long membership that I'm going to be charged for each month. I MUST be better. I also used a Groupon deal with a friend that we both bought for Vault Houston - we tried out an intro class to Vault AIR-TONE. It was interesting... different. I'll try it again. And this Sunday, the same friend and I are going to enjoy another Groupon deal we bought for a class at S Factor. Pretty excited about that. I've tried out another pole dance workout class and enjoyed the class itself but not the location. 

• Successfully hosted a Slumber Parties party at my apartment this past weekend! Had to kick the boyfriend out for that. Slumber Parties is a direct sales, home party company for bedroom accessories. Let's just leave it at that? ;) My consultant is great - here's her website. My party is still open until the end of the month -- if you see something you want, contact her and let her know you were referred to her by me, Laura B. All of their products are great. I got $400 in product for $150, thanks to free or discounted merchandise hostess benefits! I had so many ladies in my apartment, oh my gosh, and it's really not that big, when you start talking about fitting 15 people in the living room. I actually  had to borrow folding chairs from E&A earlier in the week. I was looking at the RVSP list and the number of people who'd said yes, and looking at my living room, and the two recliners and one desk chair and four kitchen table chairs.... yea, that wasn't going to work. Thank goodness I was able to borrow chairs! Life savers!!

•  Finished reading The Hobbit! One book on the BBC Big Read List, down! And to stick with my 2013 reading challenge, 2 more to go! Or 12. But I still don't know if I'm that ambitious... We'll see. Next on the list... I think I'll try reading Tess of the d'Urbervilles.Got it for free on Amazon for my Kindle! 

• Ordered this -- The Legend of Zelda: Hyrule Historia. It's a little embarrassing about how much I'm looking forward to getting this. But not really. If I wasn't a nerd, Chris and I wouldn't work as well as we do. 

• Loving on Pandora!!! Seriously, was I the last person in the world to discover how cool this thing is?

• Watched Spank! The 50 Shades Parody, a Fifty Shades of Grey parody. Pretty funny. It did inspire me to read more of 50 Shades, before I was only about one chapter in... Oh my god, it's so bad but oddly compelling. I don't understand it! I am so tired of reading about the main character's "inner goddess". Just call it what it is!

•  Got a new battery for my car. That was... thrilling. It could have been a lot worse though. I thought it was going to be much worse. Luckily I was off on Monday. So discovered my car wouldn't start, Chris tried to do a jump start, didn't work. Called my dad and told him the issues and he thought it might be something wrong with the relay. So Chris heads back to work and I call up Honda Care to set up a tow to a dealership. The tow truck comes by and takes a look and he is able to jump it! Yay! I guess the tow truck had a lot more juice than Chris' car, cos we did everything right. So then I headed over to AutoZone to get the battery tested and it was bad, so I bought a new one. The annoying this is now my car says Enter Code when I try to turn the radio on, since the battery was disconnected. Need to find my owners manual, I need the car-specific security code.

I think that's it...  Phew. And there's still a week left to this month. I need it to be February already!!

But then it'll be the month of All Star. Yikes.

Maintain, don't gain!

At work, we're having a holiday challenge with our One Life Wellness program - Maintain, Don't Gain!

I did a weigh in on Thursday (Nov 15) and I'll do another weigh in at the end of the holidays, on January 3rd. If my weight is +/- 2 pounds of our November weight, congratulations! I didn't go crazy over the holidays and gain that average 5 pounds!

I am not putting my weight here. That is between me, the scale, and the One Life Wellness committee member who logged the weights in yesterday. 

I'm trying to be ambitious and am hoping to LOSE pounds over the holidays. I am not off to a good start though. I had McDonald's today. Mmm. So tasty, so bad for me.

So time to get my game plan together!

1. Plan out my meals for the week better -- bring my lunch more. Don't end up having no clue what I'm doing for lunch so I end up at the closest, and probably worst, place.
2. Exercise -- at the very least twice a week! I bought a Living Social deal for a Zumba place near me I want to start. I've looked at their membership pricing and it's really not too bad. Maybe I can check them out next Tuesday. Also soon, one of my good friends who is my workout buddy gets back from her Latin American cruise. Yes - workout buddies are the best. I need more of them. 
3. Take it easy with the holiday eating. Remember what you learned in the Healthy Holiday Eating class work held: at parties, survey the entire spread of food, THEN choose what to eat. Have a small plate. Put three things on the plate, then get AWAY from the food and eat. Eat sitting down, not standing up -- research actually shows you eat less if you do this. Odd huh?  Choose your treats wisely -- pass on the items you could have every day and indulge instead in the holiday-specific treats that your friends and family members really only make once a year.

That's pretty much my game plan. Very simple yet would go so far. It's a game plan I've had for awhile, I just have my good weeks with it... and my terrible ones. I have no plans tonight though. I'll probably just do a quick errand, make sure I have everything I need tomorrow to go Over The Edge with Special Olympics Texas (cannot believe that's tomorrow!!! I'm rappelling down a 22 story building!) and then maybe squeeze in a quick workout. Wii Zumba or since the weather is so cold, do a walk around the block. The only problem with the walking option is it gets dark so early now! I hate it! Maybe I'll just work with my resistance band some - found this playlist on Youtube that has a lot of Xertube resistance cord exercises that look easy to do while at home, watching TV.