Skinny

My weekday morning routine is always the same...

Step 1: Hit Snooze
Step 2: Sleep for 8 more minutes (I'm always paranoid that I accidently turned the alarm off so I never make it the entire time)
Step 3: Check emails
Step 4: Respond to any emails from my boss's boss who likes to send emails at 5 AM (so basically I pretend that I've been up working since 5 AM too)
Step 5: Forward good shopping related emails to my mom
Step 6: Get out of bed (15 minutes later...good thing I set my alarm to go off early...I have an additional alarm set to remind me to get in the shower)

Yes. This my actual alarm...and no it still never seems to get me out the house on time!

Usually I don't pay attention to models much further than what they have on and how I can make it work on my not-so modelesque body. But then I opened up an email (from one of my favorite retailers...one I actually used to work for) and I saw this...

 Is it me or is she WAY skinny? I understand that she is on the runway but she does NOT represent the majority of real life women. I don't knock skinny girls ever, but what about the strong, healthy girl? What about the girl that hits the gym up and has the muscles to prove it? What about the girl that has thunder thighs because she can leg press 325 lbs?

No worries model girl...I'll do some extra squats for you when I hit the gym at 6 AM.

The Job

I'm baccckkkkk!!! I'm so sorry for my extended absence. Work has been kicking me in the butt repeatedly but its paid off. Literally. I ended last week with a raise!! Praise the Lord. I'm so happy because I was honestly feeling underpaid and that does work on a girls motivation.

Speaking of motivation, I had an interesting conversation with a friend of mine last week. She is incredibly smart, she just finished her Ph.D and is someone that I've looked up to my entire life. She also does marathons, half-marathons, 5ks, 10ks, half ironmans, etc. Needless to say we could totally nickname her superwoman.

(note to self, never google images "superwoman" unprepared to see some things that can never be unseen)

Anyway we were talking about all the things that we've been disciplined enough to accomplish in life. We can make sure the bills are paid, go to work everyday, keep tabs on our friends and families, study hard enough to get good educations, yet somehow we have issues disciplining ourselves enough to eat right and work out.

Doesn't make sense. I can turn in every work assignment in on time, make all the necessary phone calls, and return every email in my inbox inbetween 8 million distractions in 8 hours or less but I can't make healthly eating decisions or workout consistently? It shouldn't be THAT hard?

It kind of got me thinking. What do I need to help keep me going? What motivates me at work...a paycheck. What motivated me to finish school...graduating so I could get a paycheck. Clearly I'm motivated by money. So why am I not paying myself?

I always say that I'm going to pay myself as I lose pounds, but that isn't promoting healthy weightloss. At work, I get paid as long as I show up and put effort towards my projects and then get extra when my projects succeed.

I'm applying this same principle to weight loss. Everytime I spend an entire day withing my calorie range...cha-ching. When I complete workouts...cha-ching. When I actually lose weight double cha-ching. The thing is, I have to figure a way to pay myself extra...its kind of silly if I'm just going to spend the money on stuff I want whether I pay myself or not. Since I'm in desperate need of a tight budget, any money that is not paid to me as a result of healthy eating and working out goes to neccessities and gas. Thats it.

So there...two problems are solved in one. Here we go!

Obsessions

Happy Tuesday!!

I have two obsessions this week.

I am all about some Hunger Games. The previews for the movie looked good but I have a horrible habit of seeing movies without reading the book first (i.e. Twilight...yes I've seen all the movies so far and LOVED them...don't hate). The first book is AMAZING. I finished it in 2 days and so this week I'll be getting the next book. If you haven't read it...do it.

Okay, maybe work isn't that bad...but close enough.



This is true. I would so be the first to die. Thank goodness I don't live in Panem.

Okay, enough being a Hunger Games Geek. My next obsession is the fact that I have signed up for the Peachtree Road Race which is a huge ATL 10k held every year on the 4th of July.

Once upon a time, when I was 15, I ran the PTRR. I remember it being fun and easy. I don't remember the hills or or the heat and I pretty sure it went by fairly quickly. However, I was 15. At 15 you have the ability to just pick up and run 6.2 miles without any training beforehand. But things are so different now....

So now i'm on a pretty serious training schedule. My personal trainer and I are working on getting my stronger and I'm working on my running and endurance. I'm doing a short version on C25K for the next 4 weeks and the bridge to 10K following that.

Obviously my plan is to run the whole way but who knows what will happen. I just want to finish the 6.2 miles...run, walk, or crawl!

What are your obsessions this week?

Non-Expertise

Recently a friend over at Sparkpeople messaged me and asked me what my weight loss secrets were. I was absolutely flattered that someone thought that I was sucessful enough at weight loss to ask me my secrets. Let me tell you, I am no expert. In fact, somedays I think that I stink at it. However, having been on this crazy rollercoaster since July, I have picked up a few things. So I'll share for those of you that have been wondering what I'm doing.

First and foremost, remember that this weight loss/health journey is NOT easy. It's hard and there are days when you will not want to participate. Something I learned recently, was that you just have to push through the crappy days and then pat yourself on the back when it's over with.

Here are the things that I try to do consistently:

1. Drink LOTS of water. I have 3 water bottles. One for the house/car/gym, one for the car, and one for the office. As soon as they are empty, I fill them back up. Also, for me, drinking through a straw makes the water go much faster. Strange but true.

My current nightstand situation. H2O and chapstick, what else do you need?

2. Snack! I don't plan all my meals, but I plan every single one of my snacks for those times where suddenly I feel like I'm starving. This keeps me from reverting to my old "peanut butter cup" ways. Some of my favorite snacks are almonds, luna bars, sugar free jell-o, frozen blueberries, and carrots with hummus. I always take atleast 2 pre-packaged snacks with me to work everyday

3. Eat breakfast. I don't care how late I am for work, how tired I am, I ALWAYS eat breakfast. It gets the day going and keeps me from going crazy at lunch time. I try to have a smoothie but when I'm in a hurry a toasted english muffin with peanut butter and bananas does it for me. Plus I can wrap it up and eat it in the car if I have to.

My "Go-To" Smoothie

4. Hit the gym. No matter what's going on I'm always in the gym atleast 3 times a week. I'm lucky enough to have an awesome trainer, but even if you don't there is no reason not to get in a good workout. There are tons of great free workout videos, you can walk, run, walk the stairs for 15 minutes...anything to burn calories. And when you are at the gym give it all you've got. There is nothing better than peeling off super sweaty clothes and hopping into a luke-warm shower before bed.

5. Don't completely deprive yourself. I love ice cream and if I go without it, eventually I'm going to break down and you'll find 3 empty cartons of Ben and Jerry's Half Baked around me. I have an ice cream cone every night aftern dinner. NO joke. It's the Skinny Cow brand ice cream with way less sugar and way less calories but it does the trick. Find a healthier alternative to your favorite food and enjoy! (I also treat myself to a soda about once a month too)
6. Don't beat yourself up. If you have a bad day, make a bad decision, skip a workout, it's not a big deal. Shake it off, keep going, and do better the next time!

The last thing I can tell you is something that I haven't even completely mastered but I know it works. You have to find the fine line between tough self talk and positive self talk. When I want to make excuses about why I can skip a workout or why I can eat those peanut butter cups, I have to look in the mirror and give myself a little lecture. Some tough love...but you can't be too tough on yourself because that's not motivating at all. The other side to that is loving yourself no matter what. I try to look in the mirror every morning, tell myself that I'm beautiful, amazing, and blessed. I congratulate myself on my accomplishments and encourage myself for the road ahead. Honestly, if you don't believe you can do it, then it won't happen and as long as you keep going, it will happen!


My progress to date...I guess something is working!



Hey Sexy

You ever just have one of those days when you look in the mirror and think "Damn. I look good!"? Since really battling my weight and being honest with myself about my body it's been a long time for me. But today it happened.

This chapter of my weight loss story starts back in January. I was having a particularly crappy day and my mom was in town so she suggested shopping. Out of the blue I decided to try on these red Ray-Ban sunglasses. I immediately fell in love but they were fully collapsable which was weird. So I called every single Sunglass Hut in ATL (literally) looking for them. Nobody had them in stock so I checked the Ray-Ban website. There they were! I ordered them that night and got my package in the mail a few days later. When I opened it I discovered that I had ordered the wrong glasses! I accidently got orange ones because they looked red on the website. I sent them back and found out that the ACTUAL red ones were available. I finally ordered the correct pair and they came in the mail yesterday!

Cute right?!

So I decided to plan an outfit around these glasses. I wanted to do all black with leopard to really make the red pop. I was in a hurry this morning because I had training before work so I wasn't really thinking and just threw something together.

So the outfit is whatever but look how thin I look!!! DAMN I LOOK GOOD!! haha! What a good feeling to look in the mirror and like what you see. It doesn't always happen like that for me so this was a really good way to start my day! I guess the day that I didn't want to go workout and went anyway immediately paid off (well, if only it were that easy...)

Also my not really a problem weight loss problem of the day is that all my rings are too big. So annoying but I shouldn't complain!

Have a great week :)

I Saw the Sign

So earlier today I got home from work with a headache. Before I even pulled into the garage I had decided that I wasn't going to the gym, despite skipping my workout on Monday for a dinner party. I had about 20 excuses for why it was okay to skip. I started writing a blog about how unmotivated I am and literally complained for about 3 paragraphs. Then I had a thought...

I kind of hated that I was being such a baby. That's when I got tough. I basically yelled at myself, put on my gym clothes and took my butt to the gym.

Okay so, no I'm not motivated, and I could easily take some time off until my motivation returns but what if my motivation doesn't return until I'm back to a size 18, what if it doesn't come back until I've gained back all the weight that I've lost plus some? Then where does that leave me? Where does that put all the hard work I've done for the last 6 months?

So I guess I learned a pretty valuable lesson today. If I waited to change my life, to get in the extra workout, to eat healthy, until I was motivated or until it was convenient either it would never happen or by the time it happened it would be too late. Maybe that is the secret to losing weight and keeping it off forever. I guess we'll see. In the meantime...

So stop making excuses about whatever it is and just do it.