Rock Fucking Bottom

I had a lazy day today. In reality, most of my days are lazy, but I didn't even shower until 2:30 today despite having tons of things to accomplish. While getting ready to go out and do grocery shopping I came to a world-shattering, ego-destroying revelation: I have one pair of pants that fit, and those pants were wet and on the drying rack. I tried on every other pair of jeans in my closet and no fucking dice. I weighed myself: 165.8. This isn't even the heaviest I've ever been, but I got rid of all of my pants from back then.

So I cried, and started to panic while my dear fiance tried to help me wear the closest-to-fitting pair I had by rigging a key ring to keep the zipper up, which made me cry even more. I don't want to be like this. I certainly don't want him to see me like this. We both deserve better. And yet I don't feel like I can do anything about it. My initial reaction is always, "well, guess it's time to stop eating" - my super unhealthy coping method. Also the only way that's ever worked for me. I can't do moderation, and I haven't been able to turn the food craving part of my brain off so I just eat constantly. I'm disgusting and an embarrassment, and I need to change.

Hell, I'm writing this post from the car in pants that don't close while my fiance does the grocery shopping. If that doesn't scream the need for an intervention, I don't know what does.

"New" Workout Plan

Hello blog-o-verse!

Can you tell I'm not very good at sticking to a plan (i.e., updating this blog regularly)? Could be part of the reason I haven't been super successful in losing weight in the past. I find I get very restless and take on a bajillion projects, and that often ends up in most (or all) of them being neglected! At the moment I've got this blog, I'm working on starting up a YouTube channel (unrelated to this project), planning a little balcony garden, thinking about going back to school, looking for a new job, planning a wedding AND trying to balance my everyday life! I have a real problem with taking on too many tasks, but I'm not satisfied with one or two. :( That's a personal issue to work out, I guess...

BUT in the realm of health and fitness, I have made some strides this week. There were a couple of days where I consciously chose to make a healthier lunch than the one I was initially planning. I have also started a new workout plan that's been circulating around my Facebook friends. It's one of those "30 Day X Challenge"s. Well... I actually took the two most recent plans I've seen and kind of merged them together a bit, to get my own challenge to follow along with. It's definitely not the most balanced workout plan, but I think it will be good in getting me to do something active on a daily basis.

My bastardized hybrid of the two plans... 

I have it taped to my bedroom wall, and as I go, I use some of my (super unused) teacher stickers as reinforcement, haha. So I've got three beautiful silver stars for the first three days. Yay, effort!

It's going to be a busy weekend ahead with work and life, so here's hoping I don't fall off my wagon...

Categories: conscious eating , healthy habits

Starting Up The Engine

I recently made a commitment to do the Couch to 5k program with a friend. That will be interesting, I've never really had an accountability buddy before. I'm hoping it will help us both, and we'll be on our way to being happier, healthier people. In the past couple of weeks though, I've been getting antsy to do some exercise. I almost started without her, but this morning I decided I'd just hit my apartment gym while my laundry was happening. Knocked out a quick treadmill warm-up, and some strength training with the dumbbells (and logged it into Fitocracy). Sexy, healthy body - here I come! 

Right this second, I'm struggling with a food craving, and figured what better way to deal with it than to blog about it! My lovely fiancé and I were preparing dinner, and I got to thinking I could have a snack while it cooked since I was hungry. STOP! Yeah, I'm a little bit peckish but nowhere near full-on hunger. I don't actually need to have a snack, dinner will be ready in an hour. Part of me wants to eat simply because I was thinking about food as it was being prepared, and that's all kinds of messed up. I managed to put a halt on that, and am now sitting here, blogging and chugging away at my water-filled Guzzler. 

A whole slew of healthy decisions today! Way to go, me. :) 

Categories: accountability , c25k , conscious eating , healthy habits

It's My Body!

This is a bit of a boring post, but I had to write it down to show myself that it is possible for me to overcome my cravings and temptations.

Last night was a friend's birthday, and as always, we got good and drunk. The day after a heavy night of drinking is usually a write-off for me in terms of caloric and nutritional intake as I want nothing more than to stuff my face with greasy, carb-y garbage with the hope that it will just absorb the brewing hangover. Today was no different. As soon as I woke up, all I could think about was pizza and chips. I spent the entire drive home thinking about greasy, cheesy pizza (sad, right?). I had some stuff to do before lunch, and at some point during those tasks it clicked - yeah, I want pizza, but I don't need it. I'm trying to eat healthier and look better, and pizza isn't going to help either of those things. So I put it out of my mind and had a wrap instead. Victory!

I also chose not to bring chips to the gathering knowing full well that would be my breakfast and lunch today. They're small victories, but they will add up!

Categories: accountability , conscious eating

Accountability

After yesterday's reflection on applying discipline from other areas of your life to health and fitness goals, today is all about consciousness and accountability. My challenge for the day is to make conscious decisions about everything I put in my mouth, and to log every one of those things on MyFitnessPal. Tracking has been a problem for me in the past, as it's far too easy to just eat something "bad" (or outside of the plan) and decide not to write it down, as if that somehow erases the fact that it occurred. Today I am trying my hardest to be accountable to myself and my health, and to stop lying to myself about what I've eaten. Yes, if I screw up it's going to look bad, but the only way I can change my eating habits is by being honest with myself about them.

Part of today's challenge involves sitting with the feelings of wanting to eat, and finding ways around them. Eating has become a habit for me. I do it when I'm bored and there's nothing else to do, I do it when I'm at the computer, I do it when I'm playing video games. I just eat, all the time, for no good reason. So today, when my brain is like, "Hey, you know what would be great right now? Some food." I'm trying to sit with that thought and talk it down. "You know what, I'm not actually hungry right now, I just want food for some unrelated reason. Let's do something else..." It has been hard so far, and it's only 2:00pm. However, my goal is to just get through this one day at a time, and slowly make that the habit, rather than mindless eating.

My Guzzler O' Water is helping, too. :)

Categories: accountability , goals

On Motivation & Discipline

After each failure (or setback, if you want to be optimistic) in my struggle to lose weight, I find myself saying "I need discipline" or "I just don't have the discipline to stop (insert destructive eating behaviour here)". It's almost become an excuse to fail. Sure, stuff your face with a pizza, you don't have the discipline to stick to a healthy eating plan anyway. Go ahead and drop out of the 100-Pushups plan, you never had the discipline to stick with it in the first place.

While I still think this is true to a degree, I found a very interesting quote by reddit user TheLushCompanion that made me rethink the subject of discipline:

"Now, the good news is, unless you are a total fuck up who can't pass a class, keep a job, or be depended on in any way, YOU ALREADY HAVE THE DISCIPLINE TO DO THIS. You just haven't applied it to this project yet."

Her comment probably gave me the most pause I've ever had on reddit - it's ridiculous how true it is. Let's look at my job as a prime example. I absolutely loathe my job. If it suddenly ceased to exist, I'd be nothing short of jubilant. That being said, I still go in every day, work through breaks and even take work home with me (much to my fiancé's dismay). I absolutely cannot stand this job, yet I still put 110% of myself into it. It's a responsibility, something I have to do whether I feel like it that day or not. So why isn't taking care of myself another one of those responsibilities?

The obvious answer is accountability; if I don't go to work and perform as I am required to do, I will be held accountable by my manager. I am only accountable to myself for my health and weight loss, and I simply don't have enough care for my body to hold myself accountable (problem #1). However, I also have an intense amount of integrity when it comes to things I've committed to. I am a perfectionist, and I expect no less than perfection in all of the things that I do - whether I like them or not. So yes, I hate my job, but I also must do it to the best of my ability otherwise I will be disappointed in myself.

The TL;DR version is this: I have demonstrated that I do in fact have the discipline required to stick to a healthy eating plan and to take better care of myself, I simply have not yet applied that discipline. Taking care of myself needs to become something that I have to do, regardless of how I feel that day. After all, this is the only body I'll ever have. If I don't take care of it, I'll lose the use of it.

Now I just need to apply that discipline...

Categories: accountability , motivation

Small Steps

I have the weekend off, which is great because it gives me more time to get things done around the house (especially since my fiancé is away). However, weekends off also kind of suck because I don't usually have enough to do to keep myself busy. That being said, while I won't be on my feet for eight hours a day this weekend, I am working on the small steps that make up "the plan" I mentioned in my first post.

Drink More Water:
I have one of these babies:

It is the 32 oz. Guzzler from the Rednek mason jar collection. I loooove it, especially in the summer because I can fill this bad boy up with the refreshing adult beverage of my choice and not have to refill for... well, it doesn't last as long as it would with most people, but it lasts long enough! However, I also made the connection that it is fantastic for monitoring my water intake! I've been popping a chunk of lemon in there, filling it up with nice, cold water, and going to down. This weekend, I am committing to finishing three of these per day. I am almost down one for today!

Move More:
While I haven't started a formal exercise regime (too many things at once leaves me overloaded and giving up, I've found), I am trying to integrate more movement into my day. My fiancé and I are both working on the "100 pushups program" using apps on our phones, but I am also trying to add more steps into my day. I don't have a pedometer, but I realized last Wednesday that taking the stairs down from my 11th-floor apartment to the basement (to do laundry) adds 250 steps onto my day.  So far today, I've done that twice, plus walked up from the 6th floor twice (lets say that's about 100 steps each). 250 + 250 + 100 + 100 = 700 extra steps, just by (mostly) forgoing the elevator! On an otherwise idle weekend, this adds some valuable activity.

Eat Less: 
This right here will be my struggle, especially on days off. Food is still my comfort; I'm used to eating constantly throughout the day, despite attempts to curb it. Logging calories hasn't worked because if I overeat (as I usually do), I just don't write it down. I am hoping that drinking a ton of water will help by making me feel too full to eat, and then after a few days/a week of that, I might be able to work on actively refusing food when I don't need it.

I am the queen of long posts, whee!

Categories: the plan

The Beginning of The End...

This sure is a blog.

The title of this post should actually be, "the beginning of the end of my struggles with my self, my appearance, and my weight", but that would be way too long.

My name is Jen, and I have been engaged in a constant struggle with my weight (my self, as well, but this is mostly about the weight) for as long as I can remember. The first anxieties I suffered around my weight were in the fifth or sixth grade when those Child ID cards that never panned out brought my attention, and that of everyone else in my class, to the fact that I was much, much heavier than everyone else. I had always been active, but I guess I have also always loved food. As much as I hate to echo the same sentiments as many others who have gotten ridiculously overweight, food was not only delicious but it was my best friend; made me feel better when I had a bad day at school, when I was stressed out. Devilishly enough, food also comforted me when I was stressed about my weight.

I've been trying to actively lose weight since the eighth grade through a number of different methods: less snacks (and certainly no cookies after dinner), Herbal Magic (which did help me lose weight but also messed up my stomach for life, was insanely expensive, and was not sustainable), obsessive calorie counting and restriction (in my 3rd year of University, I restricted myself to 500 calories per day; to its credit, this is what helped me lose the first 30ish pounds which I have mostly kept off), and lowering my carb intake. That last one was a preventative measure against gaining ridiculous amounts of weight on the evil drug prednisone, and it helped a bit! Somewhere in that mess, I also got very sick (later diagnosed as IBD) and got down to my lowest adult weight ever, 136 pounds. It's a little sickening to know how much I enjoyed seeing that on the scale, despite how much pain I was going through at the time.

Today, I weighed in at 162 pounds. The older I get, the more I realize that this much weight on a 5'4" frame is not only extremely unattractive, but also very unhealthy. I started this blog to allow me to reflect on my successes (and probably moreso my failures) with losing this weight once and for all. I don't really have anyone I can talk about this in the offline world, so I hope that keeping a blog will help me (a) be accountable, (b) have a place I can rant and rave about my cravings while I am trying to stave them off, and (c) keep track of the steps I have taken towards my goal. I don't have a plan, mostly because every time I make a comprehensive weight loss plan, it ends up being disregarded after a week or so, so I am just starting simple: work on eating less, drinking more water, and moving more. That's "the plan".

Categories: history , introduction , the plan