Walka Blogga Day

Hi ladies, sorry I haven’t been updating lately. Things have been pretty hectic and stressful in my neck of the woods. Things are starting to calm down a bit now though, so I’m here to share my (mostly good) news on my progress.

I started back at the gym on Monday. I’m not sure what clicked exactly, or what made me take the time to pack that gym bag on Sunday night, but lo and behold, during my lunch hour on Monday I found myself sweating it out with my little pink iPod on the Elliptical machine at the free gym at my work. I got in a 45 minute workout, it felt great, and I was so relaxed afterwards. I really needed to release some tension in my poor muscles and joints because of all the stress I’ve been under, and that really did the trick. I’m planning on going back tomorrow during lunch, so we’ll see what happens.

On the physical front, I’m down 24 lbs. now since the middle of August. I thought the going was just getting too rough there a couple weeks ago, but I seem to have made a little comeback. This is all new to me. Usually what happens is I’ll try for a little while, burn out, fall off the wagon, and feel so demoralized that I couldn’t stick to it that I wouldn’t even bother trying to get back on again. My attitude is a lot different this time, as I’m just taking it really slow and easy with myself, only taking on as much as I know I can handle, letting myself slip here and there, not beating myself up about it or calling myself names, and getting back on track again fairly quickly as a result. It’s really working for me. When I get a craving, I try to tell myself, “you don’t need to have that today, maybe later”, and most times the craving flies the coop. Not always, but most of the time. And when it doesn’t fly the coop, I try not to beat myself up about it. I try not to look at it as a bad thing. I look at my slips as an opportunity to be reminded how important it is to make healthier choices. When I make an unhealthy choice I feel sick, lethargic, depressed, anxious, nervous, stressed, you name it! Nothing positive ever comes of it.

I haven’t taken my measurements lately, but I don’t think they’ve changed a whole lot. I’m actually looking forward to working out again tomorrow, I had fun on Monday. I love the elliptical, and I love pedalling on it to the beat of my music, so it’s a great way to spend my lunch hour. I don’t even remember the last time I had fun at the gym, gosh! And it’s so easy, it’s right downstairs at my work, plus it’s free, so you can’t go wrong there. Hooray!

Anyway, off to bed I go ladies. You’re both doing great, keep it up. Let me know how you are.

Why do we call ourselves ‘good’ when we make a healthy choice, and ‘bad’ when we make an unhealthy choice? Is it really a moral issue? I don’t think so. It’s about loving ourselves. When we make the choice to eat a food that is unhealthy, or to sit around instead of get up and walk about, in that moment we feel like it is the right thing to do for ourselves. We feel like it’s the easier, softer way. In that moment, we feel like we’re treating ourselves, giving ourselves a break, comforting ourselves, quelling our boredom, easing our fears, swallowing our discomfort. We are so focused on the food in that moment, that we’re unaware of any uncomfortable feeling that may be brewing underneath our intent to eat that unhealthy food.

In reality though, we know that making an unhealthy choice for ourselves is not a loving thing to do. We have been conditioned to believe that it is, and that is why it is so difficult for us to break that cycle. We see healthy alternatives as deprivation from what we really want. But sometimes what we want does not match what we really need. If we work on changing our perception of those healthy choices and associate them with self-love, we will find that it will become easier to make more healthy choices and fewer unhealthy ones.

Let’s make a promise to eachother and to ourselves. Let’s try to stop calling ourselves ‘bad’ or ‘cheaters’ when we make an unhealthy decision. Let’s try to be gentle with ourselves, and remember that we have been battling with food for a very long time. Let’s try to be really honest with ourselves and try to look at what’s going on inside us when we get those cravings.

I’m going to post this on my other blog too.

Nice! I really have to learn how to do this on my blog, it looks so cool. When I have the patience I’ll get it going.

I have a great thing to report… as of this morning, I have officially lost the most weight I have ever lost in my LIFE! The weight I’m at right now I’ve been at before — several times — but I’ve never actually lost this much weight before, I’ve just gone up up up… down a bit… and up up up again.

So the official total lost from my highest weight is now 22 lbs. You have no idea how grateful I am! 8 lbs more and I’ll officially be below 300… which I haven’t seen in almost 3 years… so that’s something to look forward to, as long as I can stay on my food plan one day at a time! I’ve also lost 1/2″ off my waist, 1/2″ off my hips and 1/2″ off my calves since October 28th. Hooray!

I even dug out a pair of retired jeans this morning and got them on with a bit of room to spare. These particular jeans I retired back when Lord of the Rings 3 was in theatres, which was in early 2004. I remember that because I wore them to go see the movie by myself and felt suffocated the whole time, and I think wore them only once after that and into retirement they went!

I’m thinking about investing in a kitchen scale. I don’t know how to measure meat and cheese and stuff like that, I never know how much I’m eating. So if I can find a cheap kitchen scale, I think that would help me a lot with portions. That whole ‘deck of cards’ rule never seems to work for me.

That’s all my news. Keep it up everyone!

fruit