Elimination diet…. kind of

So… Here I am in the middle of the third week of this elimination diet my integrative doc put me on. I have been ridiculously good, but not quite perfect. I am supposed to be eliminating all beef, nightshade veggies, oranges, GRAINS, dairy, caffeine, and of course all processed foods. I’ve done a very very good job, but definitely not perfect. I have here and there slipped and had a bite of something I shouldn’t. I feel pretty good though, and definitely know I’m detoxing, which is the whole point of this. I had assumed this was to try to figure out what sort of things I’m allergic or sensitive to, but from what I gather the further we go with it, I think it’s to detox. It’s to detox and set my body up for a healthful nutritional plan I can follow for the rest of my life and really thrive. So, while I haven’t been perfect, I’ve done well and I do feel GREAT. I have tons of energy. I’m calm, relaxed and not stressed. I’m sleeping very soundly at night. I’ve lost some lbs (YAY!). My acne is clear. My thinking is SO much more clear. I’m focusing better at work. I feel happy.

….. then I got the results of my allergy panel back. And.. whoa. Let me give you a little background on my pre existing food allergy situations.

So, I have had a strange dairy allergy on and off my whole life. I remember having a spreadable cheese when I was very young, maybe 10, and suddenly feeling like I couldn’t breathe. My throat felt like it was closing. My parents gave me a breathing treatment and it slowly, slowly resolved. I started realizing that if I ate ice cream, the same thing happened. Then it happened once with cheesecake. I made sure I always had my inhaler on me because as soon as I felt that feeling, I stopped eating what I was eating (it came on immediately), took 2-4 puffs and relaxed best I could until it passed about 1/2 hour later. I ate a whey protein bar once in high school and my throat closed. My inhaler once again saved me, but it always caused so much panic and an uneasy feeling. I finally started realizing that I needed to stay away from processed cheeses as much as I could. It was weird though, because never did I have a problem with cheddar, mozzarella, feta, and other cheeses. Something that sucked was I realized I got this reaction when I went to pot lucks because many of those dishes are condensed milk based casseroles. Really bad. I decided to get an epi pen from my doc, just in case. PS those are EXPENSIVE.

So I have always known I do definitely have food allergies. It seems to be things that have a concentrated dairy or whey protein content. I’ve had random reactions to foods that Im not 100% sure what all the ingredients are (usually home made by other people). SO.. although expensive, I was super stoked to finally get an official allergy panel done to see at a cellular level what my body is NOT liking.

Here’s the list of things I have a true allergy to:

Almond (therefore all tree nuts are off limits), Corn, Egg white, Milk, Peanut, Soybean, Tomato, Wheat

… WHAT?! seriously? That. Sucks. The milk and wheat doesn’t surprise me as obviously my hx with milk, and wheat has been tearing up my stomach SO bad… but the rest of them? Almonds? Really? Which REALLY sucks, because, on this elimination diet, I’ve been eating almonds every day. The Egg white part sucks, because, that is such an excellent (Eggcellent.. HA) source of low calorie protein. The peanuts and tomatoes… I’m blown away. Who’s allergic to tomatoes? Obviously the thing is, I’ve been eating almonds, tomatoes, peanuts.. and i don’t get a rash. I don’t get short of breath or throat swelling. BUT… apparently… on a cellular level in my body, those foods are causing inflammation, damage and making it work harder than it needs to to heal itself. This is exactly what I wanted to know- I wanted to know the things that are going to give me the best life possible. I want to thrive, and I want to decrease inflammation in my body as much as possible. My knee pain? Acne? Bloating? And any other symptom? It’s all inflammation, and that’s what an allergic reaction is.

Because I have so many true allergies, I’m also prone to many sensitivities as well (intestinal permeability). Foods that I am not truly allergic to but sensitive to are:

Banana, Egg Yolk, Flaxseed, gluten, grapefruit, Oats, Poppyseed

Banana?…. siiiiighhh. I honestly don’t think I can live without banana. And Oats??!? What?! That is honestly probably my favorite food in the whole world. All I’ve been wanting is to have a big bowl of oatmeal when the elimination diet is over. My doc said that the sensitivity ones are things I could add back in, but the allergy ones, not so much. I question this, because, if something gives my body a bad reaction, whether is a sensitivity or full blown allergy, I feel like I would probably want to avoid it. But I dunno, I don’t know if I can not eat bananas and never eat oatmeal again. Wheat and dairy are something I definitely need to avoid at all costs, wheat because it tears up my stomach, and dairy because its not worth possibly being able to not breathe. 

So I’ve been trying to cut out nuts from my diet (it’s been HARD….), and also bananas. I have not been perfect, but I’m trying. At this point my diet consists mainly of fruit, veggies, occasional chicken, avocados, small amount of olive oil, plant based protein powder, and small amount of daiya vegan cheese for a little variety. I’m looking forward to being able to add back in some things like rice and quinoa. 

I have been recently adding in a LOT more veggies, and more fruit than normal. In 2 weeks I read Joel Fuhrman’s book Eat to Live. It is an incredibly comprehensive review of studies behind why a plant based diet is the best thing to follow for optimal health. He recommends eating 1 lb of raw veggies, 1 lb of cook veggies, a variety of fruits, 1 serving healthy starchy veggie, and one healthy serving of healthy fat such as avocado or nuts. He recommends avoiding dairy, oils, animal products and processed foods. It’s super aggressive, and basically to me, what seems to be the best thing you can do for your body. Flood it with the nutrients, vitamins and minerals of a super high amount of leafy greens and other things that come from the earth. Some might ask where’s the protein? But 100 calories of broccoli has more protein than 100 calories of steak. So if you really eat this many veggies and fruits in a day, you’re getting more than enough of every. Everything maybe except for Vit B12, which is easily supplemented.

I’ve been trying to increase my fruit and veggie intake (especially since having to cut my nut intake) by using my vitamix. I’ve been making sure that I always have a blender full in my fridge so I can easily get lots of veggies in per day. I’ve been making green smoothies by:

add water (a few cups) and 1/2 a lemon to the blender. Fill the rest of the blender with spinach and then add some kale or swiss chard or another leafy. Put the lid on and blend on the smoothie setting. Add in fruit such as a banana, apples, strawberries, and peaches. Also add ice. Blend once more on the smoothie setting. Enjoy 😀

I finish this blender in a couple days, so I’m eating a very large amount of spinach and other leafy’s as compared to what I was before. The key when making these smoothies is 1. use a high powered blender that actually pulverizes the greens 2. make sure to use a ton of spinach, spinach will make your smoothie sweet. trust me. and 3. use enough fruit to cover up most of the green taste. It should taste earthy, but for the most part fruity and sweet.

I have an appointment with the doctor and nutritionist next week (4th week of elimination diet) to talk about a eating plan. I’m debating on whether or not its worth it to talk to them about the Joel Fuhrman way of eating, as I’m interested in doing it/continuing it. I have a feeling they would probably push more animal protein and less fruit than the plan calls for, but I’m not sure. Maybe they’d be open to the idea. I really really want to lower my cholesterol, keep my weight going in the right direction (I was up at about 174 something and today I was 167 something.. yay!), and become what Joel Fuhrman describes as a Nutritarian. 

A Nutritarian. That is AWESOME. It means that while others are focusing on being the type of eater that is defined by meat eater, or veggie eater, or no grain or low carb eater, or plant and meat eater… I will define myself as one who focuses on ingesting nutrients. Yes. I’ve been waiting for that concept.

So not as easy as it sounds though. I have been doing pretty well, but I also feel like if I don’t have a peanut butter cookie or a piece of pizza or SOMETHING junky, I’m gonna explode. I do love eating well and ingesting mostly fruits and veggies, but yes, I do still unfortunately crave crap. I just do. Sigh. I hope it gets better, or that I find a true balance of being able to do a 90/10 rule or 80/20 and maintain a healthy weight and a healthy life.

If you’ve made it this far, I applaud you. Lately I feel like theres soo much going on in my life on the health front these days and I’m stoked to share it but having trouble organizing it. Hopefully this made some amount of sense. I recommend reading Eat to Live by Joel Fuhman. I recommend investing in your health, whether its an allergy testing panel, drinking more water, moving more, or investing in a high powered blended so you can make spinach and kale taste good. I’m so loving my journey. It’s grand 🙂 The prospect of learning new things every day that will prolong and improve my life is exhilarating and I can’t seem to soak up enough. If you have your own tips, tricks, questions or comments on how you incorporate more fruits veggies, or how you cut down on the junk thats poisoning our society, please share!

Cheers, to your health! Eat your veggies! 🙂

A Little More Integrative

Ok, folks. Ya might as well sit down for this one.

So… I was doing the Advocare 24 Day Challenge. I got through the 10 day cleanse and saw about a 5 lb weight loss and about 6 or 7 inches all over gone. I went on to the next 14 days of the challenge and was doing very very well. I was drinking only water and spark (the advocare energy drink), and I had cut out like 98% of processed foods. I want to say 100% but i’m sure I wasn’t perfect. 

Then I hit a snag.

I went on vacation 7 hours away from home for the long fourth of july weekend. I took (what I thought was) all of my advocare stuff…. but upon arriving up north, I realized I had forgotten the MNS packets!! AHH!! That’s like the main part of the challenge from days 11-24. I decided that I would continue my clean eating, spark, and the other advocare supplements I did manage to remember to take. I did really really well for the first three days of the five day trip. The last two days not so much. I got home Tuesday evening and returned to work Wednesday. 

Sooo another part of the story I need to interject here-

My parents have been seeing a holistic doctor for probably about 6 months now. They live in the detroit area and consequently about 5 hours from me. I had not had any experiences personally with a holistic doctor, but I tried to take in everything my parents told me about it. They have had massive success with their health, both of them, since seeing this lady. When they first started seeing her, they each had a full allergy and toxicity panel done, and they both found out they were toxic with certain substances (aluminum for my mom) and allergic to a boatload of foods. They are both severely allergic to wheat, gluten, corn, oats, and eggs. They have since changed their eating habits to limit these foods as much as possible, and they both have switched to organic products to lower their elemental toxicity levels (such as aluminum free deodorant). My mom has since seen impressive improvements with her GI health. I remember growing up and her always always having a stomach ache after eating almost anything. I wondered why. To be perfectly honest, it eventually got annoying to me as a kid, but now I get it. Gluten was tearing her up. Now with practically no gluten on board, she does much better. My dad always struggled with his weight. He’s lost about 30 lbs. That leaves me the only one in the family left with a weight problem… but this paragraph isn’t about me, and hey, I’m happy for him 🙂 I want nothing more than to see my parents happy and healthy and alive for a long LONG time to come. 

Anyway, my parents tossed the idea out there of me coming up to their town and seeing their doc for a consultation, some testing, and what not. With my schedule at the hospital, it just never was realistic. 

About a month or so ago, my parents called me, on speaker as usual, both shouting into the phone LOL, and told me they had found and already called a integrative doctor about an hour away from me. Side note- if you don’t know, I live in po dunk, Indiana. We are about an hour (at least) away from everything with any type of culture. I mean, don’t get me wrong. There are definite pros about living in such a small town. It’s incredibly quiet, safe, and our house was incredibly affordable for what we got. But……. a grocery store is at least a 20 minute drive, and if you want to get really fancy, a whole foods is an hour away. So, this doc they found was south an hour away, near the whole foods. They said they called and they are taking new patients- apparently it is incredibly hard to get in to see an integrative doc these days. My parents had to make an appointment a YEAR in advance… whaaat?

The other little side of the story with an integrative doc is that they are PRICEY. Insurance usually doesn’t cover anything, and to see the doc, have nutritional consults, buy supplements that are recommended, and get the labs/tests done, we’re talking thousands of dollars. Thousands. Out of pocket. I have money saved up in my savings, but given the frugality of my soon to be husband, I figured it probably wouldn’t fly. My parents generously offered to cover any expense I would accrue at the integrative doc- talk about being one lucky girl. Yes, my parents are pretty well off, and its because my dad has worked his ass off for the same company for 35 years. I am lucky enough to be on the reciprocating end of his generosity, along with my brother, and I know there is never any way I could repay him, ever. He never accepts money from us, and it pains him when we try to not accept money and gifts he gives us. I repay him with my love and respect, and someday with taking care of him, and I hope that’ll be enough. Ok, before I start to cry, lets move on.

So, long story short, I ended up making an appointment at the integrative docs place the day after coming home from 4th of July vaca. At that point, I decided to push the advocare thing aside for now. Advocare is AMAZING, and I would recommend it to anyone… but I had an incredibly expensive coming up with an expert in healthy lifestyles, and I decided I was going to take whatever she had to say completely in. All of it. 

So I left work a little early to get to the appointment a week and a half ago. I went in and filled out a little more paperwork (I initially filled out a LOT of paperwork online). I had my vitals taken. Then I stepped on the scale. I had worked hard for a few weeks to get from 175’ish to 170’ish. Well, thats in the AM without any clothes on after going to the bathroom. Getting on the scale there I was 174, of course (clothes on, two full meals, tons of water). That number just sucks and I hate it and it made me mad, but moving on.

I then had a consult with the doctor. We went over a LOT of information. She told me about herself. She was an ER doctor for 12 years and then switched to the holistic side of things. I find this totally awesome because being a nurse, I find the medical side of health incredibly important. Knowing anatomy, physiology, pathology, etc, it’s a must. However, I think western medicine is missing a huge huge piece of the health puzzle. We treat diseases, with medicine and surgery, we don’t prevent them. And that’s our problem. Integrative medicine focuses on healing yourself through modifications to lifestyle, and then preventing further disease by continuing this healthy lifestyle. Also, not that I care at all, but for anyone a bit skeptical about integrative docs, mine has the ER experience to back her up as well. I laid out my problems for her, among which were fatigue, anxiety, depression, and weight gain/issues losing weight. She created a map of my life, starting when I was born. She went over some pretty cool details. For example, I was a c section baby, and c section babies miss out on some vaginal secretions that natural born babies get by going through the birth canal. These secretions I missed may explain some of my allergies and sensitivities and intolerances to some food and environmental triggers. Craziness. 

She did a brief physical exam and actually found some right sided thyroid fullness. I’m scheduled to have an ultra sound to make sure it isn’t a nodule. Is it freaking me out a little bit? Yes. But it is what it is, and I’m not going to worry about it until I get it done. She hooked up some electrodes to me and did a body composition analysis. This disappointed me. She came up with 34.5% body fat. WHAAT?! Holy crapola. I’m assuming its more accurate than my own fat caliper method I did on myself months ago and the device I held in my hands that said 31.5% body fat in april at my employee wellness physical. Disappointing. 

Next was probably the most fun part- my blood draw. I have absolutely pathetic veins and no one can ever ever draw any blood off of me. I’ve had doctor appointments that involved six failed blood draw attempts. Needless to say, I was a bit nervous and I always am. They were going to have to draw more blood than I ever had drawn for all the tests too. It was pretty awful. The two phlebotomists each had a failed attempt, and deferred to the doc. THREE attempts (and many bruises) later, she was able to tap into a vein that slow dripped blood, and by slow dripped I mean slow dripped. Usually those blood tubes fill up in a steady stream when you connect it, but mine literally was drip…..drip… drip… it was terrible!! 45 minutes… yes 45 minutes later… they somehow managed to get as all the blood they needed from me. Talk about literal torture. But they were so nice, felt SO bad, and in the end, yes it did become a bit of a bonding experience. 🙂 After the blood draw, the doc went over her plan for me. And wow, that deserves going to a new paragraph. 

The plan was going to include a complete 4 week elimination diet….. EEEEKKKKKKKKKKKKK!!!! For those of you unaware of what is involved with an elimination diet, it’s pretty intense. The purpose of it is to cut out all main allergens for several weeks, let your body heal itself, and then slowly incorporate back in the foods you had cut out one at a time, slowly.  SO… for four weeks…. here’s what I have to cut out-

The DO NOT EAT list- grains (all), wheat, oats, quinoa, corn, rice, eggs, diary, beef, soy.. and a LOT more than I’m blanking on. It would probably be easier to tell you what I can have.

What I CAN have- The plant based protein I got from the office (soy free), any fruit except oranges and orange juice, all veggies EXCEPT for nightshades (tomatoes, chilis, egg plant, bell peppers, etc), all starchy veggies except for white potatoes and corn, avocados, olives, coconut and olive oil, all nuts and seeds are ok except for peanuts, legumes are ok except for soy products (…peanuts are legumes… but ok 🙂 ), dairy alternatives are ok if they are Daiya brand (these are rice based…. i’m cutting out rice.. but rice based cheese is ok.. this is a mystery to me). Protein is sort of the most difficult I think….  I can have the plant based protein from the office, burger alternatives that are mushroom or veggie based, fish that is wild caught but no shellfish, meat that is grass fed and hormone/antibiotic free but no beef so that would include buffalo, elk, lamb, venison, wild game, or free range poultry including chicken, turkey and cornish hen. 

I think that covers it. That, my friends, is a comprehensive elimination diet. 

And I’m on day 5. 

And how is it going?

Well…. I actually am having a harder time incorporating all the healthy things I know I need to get in, than I am having trouble cutting things out that I’m not supposed to have. Not having beef is tough. Not having oatmeal is killing me, slowly. Not having a grain product with my meals is weird and different and sometimes I am psychologically not as satisfied. Theres just something about having a lean protein and veggie that can seem dreadfully boring and not filling….. but I know that’s all in my mind. Of course the processed crap I just want to have every once in a while (cookies, donuts, sweets, etc) are totally out of the question, but yes, for example right now, I’m craving a donut or anything cakie, gooey, and sweet. I’m finding it hard to eat veggies at every meal, of all colors of the rainbow. The best I’m doing with my veggies is a spring mix for a salad, and asparagus with dinner. Not so good. The way i’m thinking I’m going to be able to get in as many veggies in as I need is to blend them up into a smoothie.

Ok so, get ready to laugh. Hysterically. I had to take a stool sample too…. HA. Yup. A POO sample. Not only was it just ONE stool sample.. it was THREE days worth of poo! I had to take one sample the first day, two the second day, and two the third day. All of them but one stayed at room temp, the other one went in the FREEZER. We had my POO in the freezer! HA! Then, best part, someone from fed ex came and picked UP my poo after I was done taking the samples. Ok, moving on from the poo. (I’m sorry, I’m a nurse. Poo and other bodily fluids are just hilarious to me). Next I will have to do a saliva 30 day test, starting when my next period begins. Should be in about 2 weeks. 

Another part of this whole process is supplements she recommended. And theres quite a few of them. I have a probiotic, two different supplements for anxiety/relaxation, a digestive enzyme, an allergy supplement and an omega supplement. I’m integrating them, one at a time, every few days, to make sure I can tolerate them and I’m not allergic to anything in them. 

One other thing I have included in my health package is once a week massage ands sauna treatments. This past wednesday and the next three wednesdays, I will go  down to the office and enjoy an hour of deep tissue and lymphatic drainage massage followed by 37 minute infra red sauna session. Sweatin those toxins OUT. 

Whew! This is a LOT. But I am sooo glad I have been given this AMAZING gift by my parents. This is an incredible opportunity, and I am so lucky. I have taken this, head on, and am sooo excited to be on this road to health with an expert. A professional! I have by no means done perfect this week, but I’ve done really well, and I’m excited to, with the help of my doc, get better and better.

Advocare 24 Day Challenge- Day 12

Today I find myself a bit sentimental, a bit emotional. I think it’s due to the fact that 1. I’m completely calm, relaxed as I’ve had the entire weekend to do nothing.. and it’s been much needed and 2. I’m finding that Im beginning to have success in terms of my weight loss and healthy lifestyle (I’m not going to say the word Diet). Anyway… after a long, trying week at work, and finding a comfort zone with this Advocare program, I’m in a bit of a zen like state of mind as of right now. That hardly ever happens, so I’m going to take full advantage of it.

I’ve been doing ridiculously well with the nothing processed, whole foods deal lately. I’m on Day 12 of the 24 day Advocare challenge, and it’s really changed my life. I’ve always, always wanted to successfully follow a whole foods diet, and here I am, doing it! Doing it really really well. Eating whole foods makes it almost impossible to over eat. I’ve not once found myself ‘too full’ in the past 12 days. It’s really hard to over eat fruit, almonds, chicken or lettuce. I still have cravings and find myself sometimes wanting to reach for something ‘easy’, ready to eat, and processed.. but it just SO isn’t worth it right now. I know I want to do this for the rest of my life, which sometimes sounds daunting, but for now I’m taking a somewhat surface, or shallow, perspective on the situation and I am focusing on making it to my wedding. In other words, keep on eating healthfully and dang you will be beautiful, glowing and confident on your big day. But in the end,  the point of this truly is to be healthy. Actually… no, lets just be real. As health is number one, squashing any lack of confidence I may have is right up there with it.

I’m tired of having trouble finding clothes that fit me. I’m tired of dreading clothes shopping. I’m tired of  having to wear size 12 pants and shorts. I’m tired of feeling self conscious about the cellulite on my legs. And I’m tired of falling into the trap of being allured by processed, junk filled crap for a short term instant gratification high, only to feel worse, physically, mentally and emotionally in the end.

Another thing majorly motivating me right now is my desire to inspire others to achieve their goals. I want to be someone that people look to and TRUST, because they seem to know what they’re doing. I feel like lately I’ve really been connecting with my cyberspace family and friends via Facebook and blogging, and what an amazing support system we have. I want to continue to be a strong part of this network, and maybe even a leader someday. I signed up to be a distributer for Advocare, at this point to be able to get a discount on my products because I know I’ll be ordering more and more of them as time goes on, but maybe someday I could be someone’s coach and help them achieve their goals as well. I want to spread health and happiness for a better, more cheerful planet.

On a lighter note, I have to share some of the amazing things i’ve cooked recently! Last night I made burgers. I got 93/7 ground beef and added extra virgin olive oil, balsamic vinegar, salt, pepper, onions, garlic powder and a little bit of grill seasoning. WOW were they delicious!!! The boys put theirs on hamburger buns and topped them with cheese, ketchup and mustard. I topped mine with wholly guacamole, pico de gallo, a sautéed peppers and onions. I wrapped the whole works in a crispy iceberg lettuce leaf, and WOW was it delicious. Today I made a crock pot chicken recipe that I got from my Facebook group. It was chicken, tomato sauce, salsa, garlic and spices, cooked on low for 6 hours. It ended up being so delicious, shredded with a fork and was totally melt in your mouth tender. I put mine over lettuce with some guacamole and the boys had theirs on flour tortillas with cheese, sour cream, and all the fixins. Being able to have a staple/base of the meal, and then being able to have different options of fixing it up as people choose has really helped me as I don’t have to cook different things for different peoples. I more or less just need to have different vehicles for delivery (tortillas, rice, salad, etc) and condiments or toppings.

That’s all for now 🙂 Cheers… to fueling your body, mind, spirit, soul and stomach every day with exactly what you need to live your best life.

Advocare 24 day challenge- day 11 results

Starting weight: 174.6
Current weight: 170
Goal weight: 145
Ultimate goal weight: 135-140

Lbs lost to date: 4.6
Inches lost to date: 5.75

Was hoping for more but this is a great start!

Advocare 24 Day Challenge…… Last Day of Cleanse!

Today is day 10 of my 24 day Advocare challenge, which marks the last day of the ‘cleanse’ portion. It’s really been AWESOME and I’m feeling very good about the level of control over my food choices I have re gained. I have eaten probably 99.9% clean and whole foods. 

Today was probably my least clean day  (unfortunately, last day of the cleanse and day before i will weigh and measure… uhg). So the slip ups came today when I went into work with ZERO of my own food!! AHHH!!!!!! Totally set myself up for failure right then. We were out of almond, which have become a staple snack. I should have eaten oatmeal before I went in, and then set myself up for the successful snack in between meals of fruit that I could have easily gotten from the cafeteria. I wasn’t too worried about lunch, as my cafeteria has a salad bar with lots of fresh veggies and chicken. The only catch there was gonna be dressing, so I figured I’d go with a balsamic vinaigrette… not great but probably the best choice they’d have. I would normally take my own dressing (extra virgin olive oil, balsamic vinegar, salt and pepper) but I was out of little condiment tupperwares…. sorry excuse! Welllll….. this day turned out bad lol. I went to the cafeteria for breakfast and got oatmeal, peanut butter, walnuts, a banana…. which would have been GREAT. But I got some scrambled eggs.. and put KETCHUP on them. Ketchup! High fructose corn syrup super processed grossness. Uhg. I went down to lunch looking forward to the salad… and they had a fruit bar. Great.. but I needed protein. Bad. So they had a build your own taco salad. They had chips, sour cream, cheese, etc.. but I tried to make it as healthy as possible- lots of lettuce, chicken, rice, olives, salsa and onions. So, all in all it was pretty good choices in terms of whole foods, non dairy, low fat, etc… but I KNOW that the chicken and rice were both cooked in a salty broth, or just with a lot of salt… because it tasted like a salt lick. Having eaten completely clean for 10 days, my senses are SUPER heightened. Anyway… I just  felt like I was immediately retaining water. A couple hours later I was starving anyway (the chicken portion they dished out was nowhere near what I needed), and I found myself downstairs getting berries, a banana and peanut butter. After work I headed to get a pedicure and manicure… and totally didn’t have my typical spark, catalyst and snack waiting for me in the car. So… yeah. After my pedicure and manicure, my fiancé said him and his kid wanted to go to the pizza buffet for dinner. TALK ABOUT A TERRIBLE IDEA FOR ME omg!!! Pizza is one of my major, all time weaknesses. Recently I’ve been having issues with any type of gluten or bread or wheat laden thing…. so between doing the cleanse for 10 days, feeling GREAT, having pretty much zero gluten or dairy…. I was completely able to control myself at the pizza buffet and completely resisted the mozzarella, sausage and pepperoni goodness. It did smell amazing, and I would be lying to say I wouldn’t have taken a bite had my fiancé offered.. I’m SO glad he did NOT. It was bizarre- I was sitting there, and I could smell the grease on the pizza, I could hear the way the pizza crust crunched against his teeth every time he bit into it. Observing someone eat pizza, one of my most craved foods ever, despite not really truly wanting any at that exact moment, was a whole sensory experience. Who needs illegal drugs to heighten senses? Just cleanse for 10 days! HA! Just kidding! But seriously…

Anyway….. I did REALLY well and ONLY had two helpings of salad, which were composed of lettuce, egg, cucumbers, and peas…. but my issue came with the dressing choices. For some reason I went with blue cheese. Both times. A lot of it. Sure it tasted pretty good, but it overpowered EVERYTHING and was SO harsh, strong and salty. It immediately made me feel sick and my stomach was immediately in gassy knots. 

So… I mean… I could have, and would have 11 days ago, made MUCH worse choices. But with the cleanse especially, and really really wanting to get healthy and shed some weight, I’m holding myself to a higher standard than I did today.

Tomorrow is Day 11 and my weigh in/measurements. If I hadn’t done what I did today, I would probably be up for much better results tomorrow. 

Ok, so enough about beating myself up. What did I learn from today? It’s REALLY important to be prepared! I need to stock my fridge, again, and keep it stocked. If I run out of almonds, berries, or any of my other staples, I must immediately go and get more. Yes, even if it means driving into town. I need to start baking chicken, cooking brown rice and quinoa, again. I need to be prepared, again. I need to up my water intake and my vegetable intake. I need to continue to eating whole foods only, and even do better with that. I need to continue resisting temptation.

I need to keep asking myself every time I make a food choice…. is this choice going to get me CLOSER to my goal? or further from it? and I going to feel better after eating this? or worse? I have to ask myself… do you love having a flat, non bloated stomach? do you love feeling your clothes fitting better? do you want to love how you look in your wedding dress in a few months? do you want to live long and have a really fantastic life?

Tomorrow everything changes in terms of the program. I need to continue to eat super clean, but the supplements change up a bit. There’s also something about burn days and refuel days…. which I’m a bit confused about and need to research. 

I ALSO still need to start pressing play on my zumba dvd!!! I invested in it, even got brand new zumba friendly shoes… I have the luxury right now of doing a cleanse that i’m eating a ton of delicious whole healthy food and have tons of energy… and i haven’t taken advantage of it to burn some calories and get moving!! That needs to change. I have a hard time multi tasking in terms of diet and exercise. I usually do really well with one or the other… not usually both. Time to get my big girl panties on. Yup, I said panties… 🙂

Day 6! Advocare 24 Day Challenge

I’m going to preface this post with the fact that we had an emergency case come up today at work in the OR. It was intense,  a bit nerve wracking, tons of hard work, and lasted forever.  So, I’m exhausted. Absolutely exhausted. Sorry if this post lacks vigor. No worries- I’m doing ok! i’m in a pretty good place with my emotions and stress/anxiety as compared to lately, so don’t take my lack of enthusiasm as me being down. I’m just wanting and needing to go to sleep, but have SO been looking forward to the first chance I would get to update my blog about my journey.

I’m on Day 6 of my 24 day advocare challenge. The first 10 days are the ‘cleanse phase’ in which you eat clean (Which is a running theme… forever) and you take in supplements more geared towards gently cleaning you out. Day 11-24, you continue to eat clean and the supplements switch over to a more nourishing type of deal vs cleaning you out kind of deal.

Anywho….  it’s really going fantastically awesome! The thing I love love love about this program is that you create your own meal plans. You are given guidelines and suggestions, but in the end, its up to you to decide what to nourish your body with. This has been challenging and a fantastic learning process for me. I’ve been learning what is good for my body, what it needs and when. I’ve found that I most certainly need a good chunk of protein for lunch to carry me through the rest of the day without getting insanely overly hungry. Chicken has become a very good option for me, and I’ve been getting creative with different spice rubs and ways to make it delicious and varying in flavor from one day to the next. Hard boiled eggs have been a pretty awesome staple as well. Almonds and berries are a usual snack in between meals, which has satisfied me, held me over and crushed any cravings for bad food I may have.

Day 1-3 last week I was at home and had pretty awesome control over my environment. I was getting up at 5am to get my day started, take my supplements, fiber, spark, etc and cook my lunch/prepare the rest of the days food. Friday night I headed home to the Detroit area to spend the weekend with my parents and also attend an old college roommates wedding shower. I was a bit worried pretty much only for the shower. I’m so lucky to have parents that are WAY healthier than myself and are always up for completely and totally accommodating me. As I expected, meals with the parentals were awesome. They got all organic produce, free range/organic/hormone free meat and seafood, etc. It was amazing. I wish I lived there all the time, I’d be 20 lbs skinnier immediately with my own personal chef(s). The shower was a HUGE success for me. I sat down to a table with water, and declined the mimosa everyone else was drinking. I had no desire, at all. The food was served buffet style. Options were greens with walnuts, with blue cheese crumbles (on the side) and a pink creamy dressing (on the side). Fruit. Pastries. Crepes with fruit compotes and whipped cream. Oven Roasted Potatoes. A chicken dish with some sort of creamy gravy. Cupcakes for desert. I went up to the buffet and loaded more than half my plate with the dry greens and a few walnuts, no dressing no blue cheese. I later picked out the pesky dried cranberries hiding beneath, plotting sabotage. The rest of the plate was fruit. I took a few small pieces of the oven roasted potato for a complex carb and something to feel like it was filling me a bit. Unfortunately I was out of luck for a protein… which made my decision to have a few hard boiled eggs right before I went a really good idea. Dessert was a plate of cupcakes that was passed around the table. I was last and put the plate down without taking one for myself. Total victory. Felt great to have such good control and motivation. 😀

I couldn’t help myself and got on the scale Saturday morning (Day 4). I know it was a different scale than I got on for Day 1 (I Was at my parents place on day 4), but it said I Was down a whole 5.2 lbs!! In THREE days!! According to that scale I was at 169.4!! Back into the 160’s, and I hope to stay there… well briefly until I Get into the 150’s. Wowza haven’t seen a 15 anything for more than a year now. 🙂

Today was a bit more challenging than the past five days. I got home super late last night and didn’t have time to stop or pick anything up for the next day, let alone the week. I slept in this morning because I was so tired, which left me scrambling around to put together anything healthy I could find- a few hard boiled eggs, wholly gauc, fruit, a sweet potato, almonds, quinoa. I thought, phew, not bad. This’ll do.

My day ended up being a bit… difficult. I failed to eat breakfast before leaving for work. That was a mistake. I’ve been eating breakfast before laving in the morning, therefore avoiding the “will i get breakfast or not??” dilemma at work. This way, if I do get a break around 9am, I will have something small but satisfying (like nuts and berries), but not be in a position where I’m STARVING and haven’t had ANYTHING so I go and get something HORRIBLE for me. And if I don’t get a break, well I’ve had breakfast, and I can make it through. At 10 or so, I finally was able to get something, and at that point I was starving. I had oatmeal, a banana, almonds and peanut butter. Could have been a bit better, but overall that was ok. Then we got an emergency case and crap sort of hit the fan. I was able to get lunch around 11:30, which was awesome. I had my hard boiled eggs with gauc, fruit and almonds. But then I wasn’t able to get anything else again until 5. And whoa was I hungry. I really really needed a snack in between, but there just wasn’t a chance. At 5 when I got out I was able to have some quinoa and strawberries. On my way home I decide to pick up a steak for a simple dinner. I got home, was REALLY hungry (that not eating small things every few hours really threw me off!) and started cooking my steak. I ended up burning it and contemplated having something else… although the grocery supplies were limited. I also couldn’t really swallow the idea of wasting/throwing away a steak, so I ate it. It was charred and bitter and I found myself eating the fat I usually trim away to try to find some moisture and flavor. I was dipping it in some guacamole, still didn’t help much. I ate most of it bc I was hungry, but yeah, was totally NOT satisfied. I’m going to get up early enough tomorrow to cook some chicken and plan some stuff out. In a perfect world I’ll have time to hit the 24/7 grocery store before work to grab a few things.

I think I some how need to up my veggies. I had a bunch of farm market sugar snap peas I should have eaten at some point today, but didn’t. Eating more meat than usual to up my protein and bring down the carb count a bit has  been different for me. I’m not used to the amount of grease and fat, even if it’s not a huge amount, from the lean meat. I find myself still craving sweet things, but hopefully that’ll continue to taper down.

I’ve also been pooping, multiple times a day, up until today (Sorry, I just sort of put that out there. There it is. Now we’re talking about my poop. Yup). I did drink less water yesterday than normal, which might have something to do with it. But I don’t want to suddenly get backed up and not be able to go, therefore stalling weight loss. The fiber drink I did Day 1-3 probably really helped move things along. That comes back to the program Day 8-10. We shall see.

I could write so much more but my brain is mush!!!! Good night!

Day 2- Advocare 24 Day Challenge

Ok so yesterday seemed super easy. I was SO happy to be eating healthy. Everything tasted fresh, clean, and nutritious… unlike my diet in the past few weeks… months.

But today was a different story. I’m trying REALLY hard to not think of what I’m doing as a diet. No, I won’t take the fiber supplement and other supplements that are included forever…. BUT… the eating plan is very reasonable. Nothing processed. Everything whole. Fruits, Veggies, healthy fats (EVOO, avocado, nuts), lean proteins (chicken, egg whites, etc) and complex carbs like brown rice, hummus and the such. SO…. it’s basically super clean, no added sugar, no fatty or fried foods, nothing processed. Should I be able to keep up this sort of eating style forever? Yes, absolutely. Will I be able to? No, most certainly not. Am I thinking that I’ll be able to do a pretty good job especially as soon as I start seeing and feeling results? Yes.

But.. anyway. Yesterday it felt good to be back on the healthy eating band wagon. Today was a bit more difficult. I have to say I wasn’t quite as prepared- I had fresh berries with me all day and had eaten breakfast before going to work. Today, not so much.

I got up and had spark and 3 catalyst. 15 minutes later I had the fiber drink (not pleasant at all but not the worst thing i’ve ever tasted) and two glasses of water. A water bottle of spark mixed in, the fiber drink with 8 ounces of water, and 2 glasses of water to immediately follow, all in the morning, on an empty stomach, is kinda rough. Fills me up, immediately. That’s probably a really good thing! Anyway… A typical breakfast I can already tell is going to be eggs. But I love love love sweeter things in the morning. I usually do oatmeal with brown sugar or strawberry protein powder with thawed strawberries and cinnamon. I did eggs yesterday morning no problem, but I was dying for oatmeal this morning. Oatmeal is totally ok, but I’m not a huge fan of it on its own without something mixed in to sweeten it up a bit. I decided to go with some oatmeal and strawberries, and put my thinking cap on to what would make it a bit richer in protein. Quinoa! I cooked some up, and mixed it with the fruit, oatmeal, and also some vanilla and cinnamon. I started scarfing it on my way to work… and realized… it wasn’t that great. It was missing something. I think a small amount of coconut oil, or even walnuts would have made it a LOT better. So… I didn’t end up eating much of it at all. I got to work an a few hours later was able to go on a break, and got some oatmeal from the cafeteria, with only cinnamon and a banana. I literally almost put a tablespoon of brown sugar in it OUT OF HABIT!! What is that about?? I got back up to the lounge and realized, yup, still don’t love oatmeal without something to mask the oatmeal taste. So we had some peanut butter, and i used a little and it made it so much better. 

For lunch, I had the other half of the chicken breast from yesterday I baked off, brown rice and avocado over mixed greens. That was pretty delicious. After work, I headed to the mall, had a spark, 3 catalyst and munched on some almonds. I stopped at the meat market on the way home and grabbed a couple new york strips and sweet potatoes. For dinner, fiancé and i split a new york strip and we each had a medium sweet potato.  Belly’s growling a bit but it is 9:30 and I’m sure thats probably normal. I think a couple hard boiled eggs may have helped with the protein content today, because I think I was a bit lacking. Yesterday I drank more than a gallon of water, but today I think I was a tad bit shy.

I think I’m dong REALLY really well, howeverI need to make more of an effort to plan a bit more ahead of time…. but things are going to be a little hairy in the next few days. Tomorrow I’m headed back to my hometown 5 hours away after work. I will need to have something for dinner on the road, but here I sit, at my house, with no ideas for what to take with. I think Its going to have to be something simple like almonds, a banana and hard boiled eggs. I do really well if I can keep meals that simple, but obviously this gets boring pretty fast. 

As I said before, my parents are incredibly healthy eaters, healthier than me, so I’m not worried about being able to stay on point while I’m home. The only hiccup might be the bridal shower I’m going to on Saturday. I’m hoping they have some sort of salad or lean protein and veggie option. I’m a bit worried about drinking enough water tomorrow as I’ll have to be on the road for 5 hours and I would prefer to not have to stop to pee every 20 minutes. Hmm. 

But, my original point was…. today was tough. I found myself almost reaching for things out of habit. I thought to myself so many times “if i wasn’t doing this 24 day challenge, I would totally have grabbed a cookie…. or that pop….. or that pasta salad…… or that cookie.” I would really like to actually start putting food into my body that is fuel only, much like what I’m doing now… but for it to feel… NORMAL! So backwards… gooshh my food addiction sucks. 

Ok. Should be an adventure!!!! Hopefully I’ll have some amazing, I REALLY did well and nailed this challenge despite obstacles here and there.

Oh, side note- I purchased some new shoes that I think should be awesome for the new zumba/zumba step dvd program I got 😀 I still have yet to try it out. I need to get on that bc I’m supposed to exercise as part of the challenge too!

Day 1

SO.. I woke up today and tackled the 24 day advocare challenge HEAD on!!!! So heres a run down of how things went today…..

I woke up at 5am. I did my measurements… and WHOA. UHGGG it was just as bad as I thought!! I almost didn’t do them.. but I bit the bullet and DID them, knowing I’d want to see the progress in numbers/inches and also I kept repeating to myself, this is ok because this is the LAST time you’ll see these numbers. Never again past today.  My biggest areas I’m going to be looking for improvement are my weight (174.6 lbs was official starting…. didn’t quit make it to the obese category surprisingly… shy by .4 lbs) and my hips/butt measurement… wait, sit down if you’re not. Ready? 45 inches!! LOL. I mean, my derriere has become so large it’s comical. 45 inches? Dear GOD. I have ALWAYS had a larger butt. Always. But, forever since I’ve been an adult it’s been about 42 inches. I gotta say, I was pretty SHOCKED when I saw those 3 extra inches crept up on me somehow. My waist has always been around 26 inches (yeah 26 inch waist, 42 inch butt, think about that)…. it was 28.5 today. So I’m definitely looking to have my backside drop some serious inches. My thighs have also grown. Usually they measure about 22 inches and they were about 24. I’m hoping these inches drop sooner than later, and stay off. But, I do also know this is a process. After having a day of eating totally clean, and knowing theres a long battle ahead, I so desperately want to be thin RIGHT NOW. But this weight didn’t come on over night and it’ll take a bit longer than overnight to get off.

So anyway…. continuing on.

After taking measurements…. I had a spark (energy drink) and a supplement called catalyst. 15 minutes later, I had a fiber drink and 2 omega 3 capsules. I drank a ton of water. I cooked some food for lunch, showered and made breakfast. I totally BLEW breakfast, bad. I burnt the onions and peppers i was sautéing, and the egg whites totally stuck to the pan. I totally burnt my ezekiel toast, BAD, to the point of it being a brick. But I had NO time left and had to get to work. I ate as much of the torched breakfast as I could, chugged some more water. Several hour after arriving to work I had a bowl of blueberries and strawberries. Lunch was 1/2 a chicken breast over mixed greens with 3/4 cup brown rice and a 100 calorie Wholly Gaucomole pack. I wasn’t able to have anything after that until about 2:30 and by that time I was REALLY hungry. I had 3 catalysts, a spark, and a handful of almonds. Upon arriving home, I was still pretty ravenous so I had more berries and 2 hard boiled eggs. Go me for eating so clean so far!!! I think not being able to finish my breakfast, and only have 4 oz chicken at lunch really wasn’t enough. I’ll make sure I am able to get more in for breakfast and up my protein portion at lunch. I’m doing my best to follow the guidelines, and create my own healthy menu, but I think I need to, as recommended by people on the Facebook page, eat until comfortable, not hungry anymore. I was planning on chicken and asparagus for dinner… and now suddenly I’m realizing how fast baked chicken (no matter what spices are on it) is going to get boring. The key to all this I’ve realized is to be able to make meals that are simple enough that I continue to make them, but also interesting enough that they don’t get old too fast.

I really really like fruit punch spark. Mango-Strawberry was the other flavor recommended to me, but yeah… not a huge fan. I’ll DEFINITELY be getting a huge canister of spark. It’s going to be hard to only have 2 of these guys a day. I hardly have any caffeine, and both spark and catalyst I believe have caffeine in them, and after having them this morning, I was a bit sweaty, a bit jittery, but that went away. I felt very awake and very ready to go. I just had another 3 catalyst and spark with my snack and the jitteriness is gone. 

Feels good to feel like I’m back on track. I like this program bc it gives you guidelines, but the meal planning is completely up to you. I’ll be able to have a very good idea after the 24 days of how to cook/meal plan/prepare, etc. It’s a good day 🙂

Also, I ordered the newest Zumba system (which incorporates a step!) and it arrived today. Thinking about doing it today, if I can muster up the energy (and time! we have a championship 10youth championship baseball game tonight). Might be a project for tomorrow. 

Gosh I can’t wait to slim down, tone up and just start feeling better.

Panic Button

So after exercising with my heart rate monitor and carefully counting every single calorie for a week and being in a calorie deficit, I ended up gaining a lb. I know a lb is JUST a lb, but JUST a lb after JUST a lb has added up to being 2 lbs away from the obese category. And as I’ve said before, its terrifying me. I got so frustrated I can’t even tell you.

I had some struggles in the week following my failed effort to have a true caloric deficit to ensure a weight loss. I had some major stressors including being thrown into an OR room with a doctor that I’ve never worked with before and to say the least people aren’t very excited to get assigned to his room. That event in itself sent my anxiety through the roof. Sidenote- I’ve struggled with major anxiety issues my whole life, stemming from some traumatic childhood events and genetics (my mom has some struggles with anxiety). For the most part it’s under control, but it rears its ugly head when I am in situations that just REALLY freak me out. Anyway, I knew the assignment for the day had me stressed, but when I got off work finally and out of the situation, the anxiety was releasing and was pretty overwhelming. I had to run to the store and get ingredients and make cupcakes for the kids baseball team and deliver by 6:30. I got out to the parking lot and DROPPED an entire dozen egg carton, and heard them all crack. I had to make another stop somewhere else because all I wanted to do was get in the car and drive. Then when I finally got home with a complete ingredient list, I could not for the life of me measure out 4 cups of flour. I mean, was I having a stroke or something?? Seriously.  Then after I got all the cupcake foils filled, I realized I had forgotten the brown sugar. So I decided to put about a tbsp of brown sugar in each muffin tin. Miraculously it turned out great. I was really really struggling!!

I also found out that my organization changed its PTO/time off policy on april, after I had turned in all my time off for the year, and it made it impossible to take the time off that I had requested. Therefore, the one and only week I took to be up north with my family will be cut super short, which has pretty much broken my heart. But I’m trying to get over it. My fiancé is having some pretty tough times with his ex wife continuously taking away more and more time from us with the kids. And we have no control over it because she is the custodial parent. I wonder if I am being a good soon to be step mom. I worry about the step kids seeing me someday with children of my own, inevitably with a different/closer relationship and being spiteful. Am I being a good soon to be wife? I should cook more. We’re super under staffed at work and everyone is stressed, morale is low. And, on top of everything…. I am likely at this point (having not weighed for a few days), over the obese threshold.

I woke up that night at 2:30am, totally panicking. Wide awake, heart racing, feeling sick to my stomach. I’m fat, and I’m always going to be fat. I’m going to not fit into my wedding dress and I’m going to have to have it taken out, and the style is definitely not going to look right on an obese woman. And everyone is going to be looking at me. If I get pregnant, I’m going to get even more obese and not even recognize myself. I couldn’t sleep, my mind was racing. I had to go to the couch so I didn’t keep my fiancé awake. I took a couple of my rhodiola root pills (a natural herbal remedy you can find at whole foods that seriously takes the edge off of anxiety by managing stress levels and cortisol, and it helped. I fell asleep for a short while until my alarm went off at 5 to tackle another day at work.

I decided I need help. I know I’ve said recently no more programs, no more meal plans, no more systems. But I need help and I need it now. Something that comes to mind is the beach body ultimate reset, but theres some problems with it. It focuses on clean eating and supplements, but some days are so calorie restrictive that you are not supposed to exercise for the 21 days. It has something specific you eat every day and there really isn’t a plan for post reset. They suggest redoing it backwards at day 21, but after sometimes having 800 calorie days, not being able to exercise, etc…. falling off the healthy band wagon was almost inevitable for me. Exercising with tony horton and beach body with P90X3 was amazing, and I do hope I finish it someday, but he recommended eating 1800-2100 calories a day, which I think is what ultimately lead to my weight gain (I know at least part of what I gained was muscle… but still, the scale moving up closer to that obese category isn’t making me happy). 

I’ve decided to give the Advocare 24 Day Challenge a try. I’m sure that most-all of you have at least heard about this, and probably are very familiar with it and have formed opinions about it. Several people from work have done it and have had great success with it. I’ve been researching it online for the past couple weeks and I think it’s going to be a good fit for me. It is a 24 day ‘challenge’ in which you take supplements bought from the company and eat clean. I know I could just eat clean but at this point I really feel like I could use the help of some supplements as well. There are general guidelines of what to eat, but you are free to eat fruits, veggies, lean meat and grains. You do not have to eat as restrictively forever, but the 24 day challenge sets up the framework for how you could eat for the rest of your life to maintain optimal health. My package should arrive on tuesday, so hopefully i’ll be set and ready to start wednesday. It’s a bit risky bc in the next 24 days I’ll have a few things (Wedding shower, 5 day vacation up north with family) that could make it a little difficult, but I’m tired of waiting to get skinny. My time is running out. Life is too short. I’m tired of it. I need to get on track.

Running, Walking and Tracking, Oh My!

So, I’m on day 3 of my serious tracking, serious exercise thing. So far, so good. 

My thoughts when I wrote a few days ago were to, simply, burn 1,000 calories more than what I eat each day. So my BMR says I burn 1567 just existing. Therefore my goal was to see if I could eat 1567 calories or less and then burn 1,000 calories on top of it. I had a feeling that was pretty ambitious and I’d have to be focusing mostly on cardio, at least at first. I invested in a heart rate monitor to help me on this endeavor. I would be able to know exactly what I was burning, and I Was going to re dedicate myself to tracking, to the calorie. Just so I could really, once and for all, finally know. 

I knew that I was going to have to go through a process of trial and error to figure out what activities I like and will stick with, AND will burn the most calories. I mean, 1,000 calories? That’s a lot. If I eat 1567 calories a day and burn 1,000 a day (on top of my BMR), that’s only 2 lbs in a week, so I have to burn At LEAST that many, or eat less. So, anyway… I decided to start out with something basic- walking.  

Friday morning before going to work I woke up and went outside for a walk. I had my heart rate monitor on. It didn’t take me long to get my heart rate up to about 120. I decided to run, thinking that if I ran intermittently I would burn more calories. So, I ran until I got my heart rate up to 180, held it there for a few seconds, then slowed back down to a walk. I would walk until my heart rate got back down to 120’ish, then I’d run it up again to 180. I only had about a half hour, so I continued my walk run cycle and then headed home. A half hour later according to my heart rate monitor I had burnt 266 calories. Seemed pretty accurate and I was pleasantly surprised. I figured that if I could bump that morning walk up to about an hour, maybe a little more, I could burn at least 500 first thing in the morning. I ended up not  doing any more activity that day as we had a busy evening and once dinner time rolled around, I was ready for relaxation and sleepy time. That day I consumed 1616 calories (a little above goal) and burned 266 calories. No where near the 1,000 calorie deficit, but I felt like I did good and was on my way.

Saturday, I woke up and had a snack then ventured outside. I needed to go probably about an hour earlier because it got hot really fast. Anyway, I  ended up walk/running for about an hour and 20 minutes. I burned 724 calories!!! Heck yeah! I was STOKED. I came home, completely cashed.. and very curious what my calorie burn was. When I am working out, it just shows me what my heart rate is. So, when I’m finally done, and inside, its like this big reveal. It’s kind of like getting on the scale. Seeing what the result is. Except when I’m working out, I know it’s always going to be a victory 🙂 I do need to see if I could get to a setting that shows me a calorie burn mid workout to know where I’m at. Anyway, I at about 1500 calories yesterday, with a total calorie burn of 788 calories (went for a short walk later), which was much closer to my 1,000 calorie deficit.

Today, I woke up and had a snack and made breakfast for my family. Then I was headed out to work out, and my fiancé said he’d join. It was great!! I would have probably stayed out longer if 1. I was alone and 2. the kids weren’t home. We ran/walked and talked for about an hour. Heart rate monitor said I burned 543 calories. Woot! Not bad. Hopefully I’ll get back out there for a bit more activity later. 

I feel like I’m slowly re gaining some control. Feels good.