Love Thyself (Challenge #2)

I have a confession to make: I let other people influence my eating habits.

When I was younger, I was a bossy child. I had opinions, both right and wrong ones, and I stuck to them with a fervor and passion that could not be taken away. However, as I grew up, I became insecure and lost my confidence. Suddenly, my ideas, thoughts, and opinions, seemed weak and I was ready to toss them aside for almost anyone else’s.

I decided, almost three years ago, that I no longer wanted the eating habits that had plagued me for years. I revamped a lot of the things I did. I no longer drank regular soda. I no longer ate fast food multiple times a day. I actually started eating fruits and veggies. My husband was left in the wind. When we met, it was a whirlwind of late nights, fast food wrappers, and bad decisions. We loved spending time together, spending money, and eating. I can see that, to him, I have become a different person. I am trying to budget our money. I do not want to go out to eat. I spend more time in the gym. I talk about nutrition, running, lifting, and other things that he has no interest in. I see why he does not support me. I am not the women he fell in love with or married. At the same time though, people are constantly changing and evolving. Maybe one day he will change his mind and join me, or just support what I am doing.

Until then, I cannot let others influence the decisions I am making for myself. If my husband wants fast food then I must let him but not have it myself. I have to be able to stand up for myself and say, “No!” In the end, my husband might not feel guilty for eating junk food but I do.

This is the part of the journey that has been the hardest for me. I need to learn to love and respect myself. My whole life has been about putting other people first. I am always trying to make others happy. But what about Heather? I always seem to forget about her. I am always so willing to throw away what I want to put a smile on someone else’s face.

This is my new challenge. I messed up on my first challenge. I had fast food. I lasted a full week, but my challenge was a month. My husband wanted it Sunday night after the gym and I ate it with him. My next challenge: For 14 days, the span of two weeks, I need to stand up for myself. I want to rid myself of fast food and the daily junk in my life. I will have many opportunities to speak up and say, “No thank you, I do not want any of that.” If I do not learn how to stand up for myself, love myself, and respect myself I will lose control again.

Two Toddlers

I knew all last week that I was dangerously close to being completely sick. Today, I woke up with a forehead on fire, a nose oozing snot, and the crackling voice of a boy going through puberty. My eyes hurts. My whole body feels incredibly weak. I woke up today and found myself in hell.

I do not deal with sickness. I am glad I did my workout last night (at 2am because I am a thug) so I did not feel guilty about spending most of my day sleeping.

See, when I become sick I become a toddler. I am a sniffling, whiny, cry baby that throws fits, barely eats, and naps. It is not a good look when you are not an actual toddler.

 

This meme almost cures my sickness. I love basketball and hate LeBron James. Anyway, last night I lifted and did my week 1 long run.

My workout was something like this:

Back squats: 2×10 @ 115lbs 1×10 @ 120lbs
Pushups: 3×10 (sooo close to the floor, one riser on an aerobic step)
DB Bent Over Rows: 1×10 @ 22.5 lbs dbs 2×10 @ 25lb dbs
Step-Up: 3×10 @ 20lbs on an aerobic step with 3 risers
Prone Jackknife: 3×10 on 65 cm stability ball.

Then, I did my week 1 day 7 run. A 5.25 mile run in 56 minutes.
My iPhone has recently decided to not really play music while in my little armband. Voice control keeps popping up or it will skip songs, pause a song, or replay a song. I have never had this problem before, but during my last two runs it is like my phone is possessed. I have always ran with music so….I prefer to do it that way. I have only ran once without music. It was not too bad. Tomorrow I will try to wake up on the early side to get a morning run in. Sometimes I do not feel like a runner because I never wake up at 4:30 in the morning to run. And look what I found when I googled “runner memes”, it’s another Ryan Gosling “Hey Girl” runner meme.

 

Time for a night time sleepy sick pill. I am hoping to wake up in the morning feeling amazing!

What? Who? Me? You? … Leave a Message After the Beep.

 

BEEEEP

 

I pray to the Gods of college, coursework, and education in general that last night will be the last time I have to attempt an all-nighter until spring semester (or never having to attempt one again would be nice too). I went to bed around 6-6:30am and woke up on and off from 10 until 11:45am. If you asked my random facts about myself today, I probably could not tell you anything past my name. I am checked out today folks. If my training log did not tell me it was Sunday, who knows what I would say the date is.
My blender bottle is full of coffee and whey protein mix. A nice little dish in front of me is pilled with steamed broccoli. One, if not both, of these things better perk me up and help me become partially functional.

 

I took my measurements today and was not thrilled. I did lose a pound and a half but apparently I am only slimming down my thighs. Damn the lower belly pooch of childbirth, will I ever see you disappear?! I see that I need to cut some sodium out. (I am not bingeing, so that is good. My weekly calorie totals are just about where they should be, give or take a couple hundred.) I know part of it is TOM, that bastard, but putting hot sauce on everything might just be part of the problem soon. I am also worried that with marathon training I will lose lean mass too and not just fat. I am still lifting while running (thus far, however I am nervous about when my mileage really starts to go up) so I am hoping to combat this issue. I had a (now ex) friend tell me that I could never develop my lean muscle mass and just lose fat if I was running. If that is true, then I will take being skinny fat forever.

 

If I came home to that ^ I would run every single day. Wait, I almost do that now! I love to run. As much as I would love to be a sexy bulk of lean firm muscles, the feeling I get during and after a run (especially one ranging from 6-13 miles) beats that desire.

I lost track of my days and of the daily fit thoughts. Damn my need for a higher education. (If there is still such a thing in America.) I will figure out if today is Day 9, 10, or 11 later and then I will post on how i’m doing without fast food and what the fit thought is today.

I only have an hour to three of homework today and I will be able to fit in my gym time. YAY!

Can someone find a way to have Ryan Gosling at my house, waiting for me, when I come home from the gym? justathought.

Day 7

I got home on the later side last night and had no energy to blog.
Yesterday was a nice day. My grandmother, hubs, my son, and I all went to into LA to spend the afternoon/evening. I was taken around the LACC campus. I will be a TA there next spring. My grandma thought it’d be wise to check it out as much as possible before then.
Then, we went to the LA Zoo. This pair of Sea Eagles freak my son out. They were fighting for dominance and my son was gapping at them. Poor kid was shaking. As we left, I asked him if wanted to work with animals and he said, “No Eagles are bad boys.”
After that we headed over to the Griffith Observatory. Sadly, the sky was too cloudy so we could not look out of the big telescope. Hubs and I did see a cool show about the Mayan calendar though.
Finally, we headed to the main tourist-y area of Hollywood. We ate at Mel’s Drive-In. I had fish n’ chips and a vanilla diet coke. My drink was to die for!
What shocked me was how I was able to control myself despite having only my coffee protein shake before the dinner. We went out all day and had no snacks, nothing. My grandma tends to do that. Not healthy, but we do not go out with her like that frequently.

Anyway, it was nice to have a family outing. I don’t speak to my dad and his side of the family. Even if I did speak to my dad, my dad, mom, and two sisters live in SC anyway.

Oh, and for those of you wondering: my roots are not orange (:

Moms Cannot Do All-Nighters

 

I was all set up to be in bed by 11pm last night. What did I end up doing? Surfing the internets, texting, and watching Vampire Diaries. I want to blame this need to stay up until 3am on my sore scratchy throat. How could I go to bed when my throat was on fire? Obviously, I could not.

Disclaimer: Do not make fun of my love of Vampire Diaries. I’m not a fan of Twilight, or fluff books/shows in general. For some reason, I cannot help but love Vampire Diaries. I think it has a solid plot, well-developed characters, and decent acting. Most of all the show as this:

 

Are all you ladies awake now?! Haha, I know I am! ❤

Anyway, staying up late led to me eating 1/3 a bag of cheddar n’ sour cream Ruffles (because my hubs likes to bring shit food into the house) and then 3 serving sizes of tortilla chips. I like to put a drop of hot sauce on the chip and then eat it. Clearly salty goodness is my weakness. I went over 500 calories. I am not disappointed like I usually would be. I recognized that I had a small-ish dinner and I stayed up to late. The combination led to some bad choices. I know today will be better though. Even despite the lack of sleep.

My hubs woke me up when he got home from work at 4:30am. Then, I usually have incredibly strange dreams. One of those woke me up at 6am. Then, my son woke me fully up at 9am. This is why moms cannot do all-nighters. If we stay up past midnight, we pay the price.

I have to wrap up this post because there is dye on my roots and I do not want to have orange hair. (:

Daily Fit Thought #9

 

Because I am sick and my brain is only at half-capacity (see my Day 6 posting for proof) I will leave today’s daily fit thought at this:

Do not give up on yourself. Always pick yourself back up and love yourself enough to try again.

Practically Dying: Day 6

I woke up dying thanks to my allergies. When I wake up with a hacking up mucus and suffering from a sore throat and a man voice all day, I am especially thankful to my mother’s side of the family. NOT.

I ended up getting out of bed at 10am and then, because I am a good girl, I got started on homework. (We are watching Fast Food Nation and Food Inc, which I hope helps me with my fast food addiction.) By noon, I was beginning to feel like a fully functional human again. What did that mean? I headed to the gym and decided to beast it.

My workout today:

Deadlifts 3×10 @ 100lbs
Dumbbell Should Press 1×8 & 2×7 @ 20lbs
Lat PullDown 2×10 @ 72lbs 1×7 @ 86lbs
Split Leg Lunge 3×10 @ 95lbs
Reverse Crunch 3×10

My marathon week 1 day 5 training run was a 3 mile and I ran 3.65 miles in 42 minutes.

I have been prolonging everything else since I got home for the gym. I still have a head of broccoli and a bowl of zucchini to eat. I also have to watch the new Vampire Diaries.

Tomorrow will be a family day. I will not be going to the gym. We are going to the LA Zoo and Griffith Observatory. I am excited for my son to go to those two places. He loves animals so I am sure he will flip out when he sees animals he has never seen before! (:
I am going to make the best food choices I can and I will be avoiding fast food!

Hope y’all all had a great day.

Daily Fit Thought #8

The daily fit thought today is about setting realistic goals. For most people, especially those with “ED”s, setting unrealistic goals can eventually lead to the destruction of any good eating/training plan.

I got down to the high 160 range during the late summer/early fall of last year. I did this through a combination of spending 2-3 hours in the gym 5-7x a week, eating 1,200 calories a day (without taking into effect all that I was burning), and training for a half marathon. When I look back on those 3-4 months it was a blur of cardio. I would do my run for my training, then go to the gym and hop on the stairclimber for 30-60 minutes, and then get on the elliptical for 30-60 minutes, and then I would do a mile or two of speed work on the treadmill. WTF? How did I not die from exhaustion? Looking back, I do not remember “feeling tired” but I do remember always thinking about burning calories. I was constantly worried about getting in a workout and it seemed like cardio of any form became my entire life. Sure, I was becoming pretty freaking skinny (I am about 5’9″), but I was working out like an animal to keep up with unrealistic goals. I wanted to lose 10-15 pounds EVERY month. I woke up every day and my mood for the day balanced on what the scale said. NOT HEALTHY.

I ended up gaining some weight back. I did not get back up to 280, but I was at 225 again. I was a sad girl for a while. I felt like a loser. Then, it hit me. I could not keep up with that obscene amount of cardio every single day. This led to a slight weight gain of under 20 pounds. Add some emotional turmoil that triggered my binge eating and I was fat again. Ultimately, I had built a weak foundation. The first minor storm to hit me ended up making me crumble.

I have been on my revamped fitness journey for 170ish days now. I spent a lot of time, earlier this year, thinking about what worked for me and what did not. The biggest lesson that has stuck out is what today’s daily fit thought is about.

Do not set unrealistic goals. You cannot keep up with them forever. We all want to wake up fit tomorrow but that will not happen. If you rush this lifestyle change by setting unrealistic goals, then you will never be able to reach the real goal: changing your lifestyle to one that is moderately active and full of healthy eating habits.

Day 5

Thus far, my day has been good. Even though I stayed up late last night (working on some possible money making opportunities with my grandmother), I was able to get up at a decent time to get my day rolling. I filled up on a big breakfast (see below post on my pro-huge-breakfast belief) and then was able to hit the gym. I had the car seat already in the car so there was going to be nothing standing in my way!

11/14/2012 Workout:
Back Squats: 3×10 @ 115lbs — I was able to get a lot lower than I thought. Last time I did this workout I was only able to do 105 so the ten pound increase is very exciting! I was complimented on my form today by a trainer. I am happy to know that my squats are not shit because I freaking love to squat now. All that weight on the barbells…..watching the strain in my legs (thanks gym mirrors)….I just cannot help but feel super freaking powerful (and supremely bad-ass). Haha.
Push-Up: 3×10 — I set up an aerobic step with only 1 set of risers. When I first started doing push-ups off of my knees I was using two risers and only doing 5-8 at a time. I was very excited to be able to do the whole amount closer to the floor.
DB Bent Over Rows: 3×10 @ 25lbs dbs (so 50lbs total) — I LOVE ROWS! That is all I have to say.
Step-Up: 3×10 @ 20lbs dbs (so 40lbs total) — I HATE STEP-UPS! I have progressed from an aerobic step with two risers to the smallest black step/box thing in the training area. I’m not sure how high it is but it is higher than what I was using before.
Prone Jackknives: 1×12 2×10 on 65cm stability ball — For those of you that do not know, these are like a swiss ball plank w/ a pull-up. Well, that is what I have been told anyway. Google it if you do not know. These bad boys are … well exactly that BAD BOYS. I love them while i’m hating them. It’s clearly complicated.

So after all of that I did my marathon training run for the day (week 1 day 4), which was a 4 mile run. I ended up doing a 4.20 mile run in 47:15. It was a nice comfortable run.

Junk food is not on my mind. I am in a good mood. I feel energized and happy.
I also just received an email from my film & lit teacher informing me that I currently have the highest grade in the class. 3 1/2 weeks left and I will make sure it stays that way! I am so thrilled that all of my hard work is paying off.

Dedication and staying positive always pay off!

Breakfast Believer

For many years I would scoff when people would tell me how breakfast is the most important meal of the day. Can you get a Big Mac at 9am? NO! Why would I want breakfast then?

Since I started this lifestyle change, I decided to start trying this breakfast thing. At first, it was only a piece of whole wheat toast. Slowly, I made my way up to a big hearty protein shake. Then, I went back down to coffee with protein powder in it.

I noticed that if I had breakfast at 9am, I would be starved again by 11am because I was not eating enough. In the back of my head, I realized that I have been worried about consuming too many calories before my day really starts. The stupid part is that this way of thinking can lead me to a bingeing session for lunch or dinner.

My solution is to not listen to that little evil “ED” voice in the back of my head. This week I experimented with having 350-500 calories for breakfast. I feel great. I have a piece or two of fruit, a piece of whole wheat bread, one egg, and my coffee protein shake. I feel full and am able to make it through all my morning routines before I go to the gym.  Also, the big calories at breakfast have not led to me going over calories or massively overeating. I had 3 meals, a snack, and a desert last night. I stayed in my nice 1750 calorie range.

My eyes have been opened. Breakfast really is the most important meal of the day. I am a believer in the importance of breakfast.