Day 4, new day, new attitude

I got home from work last night at 11:30pm. I sat in my car and cried before I came in the house. I do that when I'm mentally and physically past exhaustion. I cry. I couldn't remember the last time I cried. It's been a while. The last time was probably over work too. Seems like it always is about work.

I left my phone on my desk last night. I woke up at 4:40am, which is when my phone alarm usually goes off. I thought, well, it'll go off any minute so I should just get up and go to the gym. After only three hours of sleep I rolled over and fell back asleep. The next time I look at the clock it was almost 7am. My husband had left for work, and I didn't hear a thing (and he didn't wake me up!).

My first thought was "Oh shit! Dave is going to be furious at me." Dave is a guy that sits on the other side of the wall of my cubicle. He comes in at 5:30am and I don't usually get in until 9am. The last time this happened he had to listen to the alarm for about three hours. He didn't know how to turn it off. He told me he didn't know anything about "these fancy phones". It's just a Blackberry. Nothing special. Poor guy. I felt really bad. I called him this morning and he said it was ringing when he came in but he figured it out. I asked if that meant he'd smashed it against the wall. He said he saw the button to "dismiss".

Long story just to tell you I'm skipping the gym today. I've had five back to back, hour plus workouts in the last five days. My body is tired. I think maybe I need a day off. If it's not raining at noon I'll walk, but it's looking pretty dismal outside right now.

About my new attitude. My last several posts seem to have had a negative tone. I don't like that about myself.

Today I woke up (the second time) feeling great. I read a few really inspiring blogs this morning, Helen and Allan. They both made me realize I need to cut the bullshit and really get on with my weight loss. I mean, I ate M&Ms last night? What the hell was that about? I ate 20 total but I hardly ever eat candy. It's the first time I ate out of the candy bowl at work. Of course it was late and I was starving and I can make up all kinds of stupid excuses. Like I said, I need to cut the bullshit.

It's off to work now. I think if it is raining at noon I'll head down to our little workout room at work. It's really a tiny little room with some exercise bikes and weights and a few other oddball pieces of exercise equipment. It's enough to get in a light 30-minute workout. New day, new attitude and no excuses.

Day three and a really quick post

I'm just getting ready to leave work (10:23pm--longest day ever!). My work life really sucks lately. I spent three days of my four-day weekend working. To say I'm sick and tired of work is an understatement. I had a three-week vacation scheduled starting December 10, but that's been delayed until December 15. I guess at least I have a job (somehow, that doesn't really help make me feel better right now).

Today was suppose to be our Rope Challenge Course team building event in Mt. Vernon. We got rained out. What a surprise, rain in the Pacific Northwest in late November. Instead we did a tour of the Everett Boeing factory. It was interesting for about ten minutes then I wanted to go back to the bus and sleep. Big airplane pieces being assembled. Big yawn. The only factoid I remember is that it's the biggest building in the world, and they build 747's. I work for an airline so I guess this tour should have thrilled me. It didn't. They didn't even allow cameras or cell phones so no pictures.

Afterwards I had to come back to the office at 3pm and work until now so I could get my work done. Something terribly wrong with this picture (remember, it was suppose to be a "fun" team building event).

My eating was okay today. We went out to lunch after the tour at Mongolian Grill. I had a ton of vegetables and maybe 3 ounces of chicken, with just a touch of sesame seed oil. It's the teriyaki sauce they poured over it after it was cooked that probably had a million calories. It tasted good but I was hungry by 4pm and I didn't bring any food with me today.

About two hours ago I snuck into the candy dish at a coworkers desk. First time ever. I had ten M&Ms and ten M&M coconut candies. Mainly because I'm at work and that's the only food available. I ate a Weight Watchers instant oatmeal first (been in my desk forever). It was really icky. Just for the record, I didn't really enjoy the candy either. 34 calories for the M&Ms and no idea for the coconut ones (and they really weren't good). I'd rather have had a big Honeycrisp apple.

I'm back on the Stairmaster for my cardio at the gym. It's killing me. I'm amazed how a twenty-five pound gain is making my workouts so much more difficult. When I was 155 I could do 140 flights of stairs in 30 minutes. It was hard but doable. I was doing it almost every day. Now at 180 pounds I'm really struggling to get 120 flights done in 30 minutes. Every morning I think I'm not going to make it to the 30 minutes. 25 pounds is a LOT of extra weight.

Not much else to write about. Just that I'm very tired and have to drive home now in the cold and the rain. Sucks to be me today.

New PointsPlus Plan - Weight Watchers
Oh my gosh! Before I walked out the door I wanted to quickly glance at the new Weight Watcher PointsPlus Plan on their website. Today is the first day of the new plan but my meeting is on Saturday.

They've really changed things around. They upped my PointsPlus to 29 (it was 22), but then they say food has more PointsPlus in it. Instead of calculating Calories/Fat/Fiber in foods, now they use Fat/Carbs/Protein/Fiber to get the PointsPlus.

I want to be positive about this but I can't  help but feel like it's a marketing ploy. I hope I'm wrong. Supposedly, according to my lovely brainwashed Weight Watcher leader (can't help but thinking of "take me to your leader" every time I call her my "leader")....there's a lot of scientific research behind these changes.

I wonder if it's really that much better than the old plan.

Alert! Parasites Can Make You Fat!

Believe it or not, parasites are a major hidden source of weight gain. Here's how to get rid of them.

Fish or meat that's raw, rare or cooked in the microwave isn't exposed to the high heat needed to kill parasites like protozoa an worms.

Once in the gut, these organisms absorb the nutrients needed to keep blood sugar balanced and energy high. And this often results in sugar cravings and chronic fatigue. Plus, they send biochemical signals to the digestive tract that the body registers as hunger, causing overeating.

To get rid of parasites, try an annual cleanse with parasite-killing herbs like black walnut and garlic. Two liquid extracts with proven herbs: Uni Key Verma Plus (a worm remover) and Uni Key Para Plus (a protozoa eliminator).

Outsmart Cravings with this Color!

This hue suppresses appetite and stress-related snacking, according to a study at Johns Hopkins Bayview Medical Center in Baltimore.

Keep your sweet tooth from striking before bedtime by putting on pink pajamas after dinner.

Color therapists say the electromagnetic frequency of pink prompts the brain's pineal gland to release serotonin, a neurotransmitter that helps nix nibble.

One day down, 364 more to go

Yesterday was a pretty good food day. It was the first time in weeks that I didn't have a crazy late night binge. My binges these days aren't anything like they were three years ago when I weighed 240 pounds. I use to eat bags of candy, chips, cookies or whole cakes or pies, all in one sitting. I gave the word gluttony new meaning.

These days a binge is an extra chicken breast or a bag of light popcorn or a couple Weight Watcher ice cream bars. Or maybe all of that plus some, but all healthy foods (except the WW ice cream bars that are really junk food in disguise).

I still consider these binges, just a more healthy version of a binge. Last night I ate two WW ice cream bars and a piece of turkey breast (probably six ounces). It put me over my 22 Points (my 180 weight gives me an extra Point). Still, this is considerably less than I've been eating late at night these past weeks, hence the 6-pound gain in three weeks.

Even with an hour of cardio yesterday that was too much food. In order to lose weight I have to maintain my exercise of a minimum of an hour a day AND cut back on the calories.

One good thing is I've made peace with Dave's Killer bread, the thing that's been my downfall for a few weeks. I LOVE this bread. It's organic, tasty and full of healthy ingredients. It has 20 more calories than one of those sandwich thin things (130 calories, 3 grams fat, 4 grams fiber). It's two Points versus one Point but it's so much tastier and healthier than fake bread. I allow myself one slice a day, with my breakfast. It's really removed that "it's forbidden, I must eat it all" attitude I had about it.

After dinner tonight I'm going to try to totally resist eating anything. Just to see if I can do it. Tomorrow is going to be hell day at work so I have to go to bed early anyway. I deal with "hell days" better when I'm well rested. So I'll be in bed by 9pm, up at 5am for the gym, and physically at the gym by 5:30am. That's my normal gym time but I'm often not asleep until midnight.

Not much planned today except a few work things I have to get finished for tomorrow. I've been working on them for the last two days, and I'm almost finished with my project. Tomorrow is the start of alpha testing which is always extremely stressful for me. The work I did is for another team so it's a bit unusual for me. The people doing the testing are very experienced and are perfectionists, which is a good thing, but again, it stresses me out big time.

Other than that, I'm going to the gym at noon, home to shower and then hit a movie this afternoon. I really wanted to see Unstoppable, the train movie. I love trains. I know, I work for an airline, but really love trains. They've always fascinated me more than airplanes. My husband wants to see the Harry Potter movie. Since I almost always get to pick the movie (and usually a chick flick and he's good with those), I think I'll let him have this one. I'm not a huge Harry Potter fan, but the movies are usually okay (although the last one was horrid).

By the way, it's 364 days until I absolutely will be at goal. I know this is a lifetime thing, I'll always have food issues and will be fighting them to my dying day. That's pretty much a given, but it's 364 days to goal weight. That thought helps me focused.

Weight Loss Shakes - What is it

Have you ever dream of laying down near the beach and lose your weight at the same time. The secret lies in refreshing drink you need to have while lying on the beach.It seems unbelievable for me at first. After I found out that there are many companies that produce these so-called weight loss shakes, this weight loss drink seems to be
truth. In this article, I will give you a brief explanation of this weight loss meal replacement shakes and the reason behind its popularity.

What is weight loss shakes? Like I stated previously, weight loss shakes is a drink that can help your reduce weight. This shake can replace your entire lunch. The reason why it can replace the lunch is that the shake contains many high energy nutrition such as protein. This protein can give you enough energy in each day. The weight loss shakes contains very little sweet which is the reason why you can reduce your weight while drinking it. No unnecessary nutrition will be injected to your body. You will decrease your weight because sweet is one of the major reason for fat people.

DIY Although ,like I state previously, there are many instant weight loss shakes on the market. You can see most of them on your local supermarket. Unfortunately, most of them are not cheap and some of them have too much sugar which destroy the weight loss purpose we want to have. I suggest that you should start doing weight loss shake by yourself. This is possible because most ingredient such as frozen fruit and skim milk can be found at your fridge.

Delicious What people like most about weight loss shake is its deliciousness. Most weight loss diet will force you to eat healthy but gruesome taste which make weight losing become more or less a torture in itself. Weight loss shakes or weight loss protein shakes is different from these uneatable food because it made from fruit and milk, the taste of it will be similar to milk shake in the ice cream shop. And You can add more flavor by putting frozen fruit or peanut butter to the shake as well.

(Article Source: ArticlesBese, http://www.articlesbase.com/supplements-and-vitamins-articles/weight-loss-shake-what-is-it-1340634.html, Posted: Oct 15th, 2009, Author: jumboa7)

My weighin and feeling more positive

After my pathetic post earlier today about considering myself an epic failure in the weight loss arena, I almost blew off my Weight Watcher meeting. I was feeling like why should I even bother, I can't do this anymore. I'm sick and tired of trying and failing over and over.

I couldn't help thinking it doesn't do any good to go to the meetings anyway. I go, I listen, then I chose to ignore the advice. Thankfully I ignored my stupid girl voice and went to my meeting.

What was really cool about the meeting was our leader's excitement about the new program. She told us she wanted us to consider today the last day of our Weight Watcher year. This year was past and a new year was starting this week with the new ProPoints program and all new materials. She even played Auld Lang Syne at the end of the meeting and told us we had to hug each other (yes, the meetings are often a little touchy-feely, but they're fun).

After the meeting I sat in my car and looked at my weighin results. I knew it was bad and it was exactly as I had anticipated. I weighed in with a 6.2 pound gain at 180.8. No surprise. I gained it in three weeks. My last weighin was 11/6 at 174.6.

I looked back in my Weight Watcher weighin book and on January 9, 2010, I weight 180.4. Interesting. Basically, I stayed the same this year. That's a first for me. I've lost significant amounts of weight in the past but never kept it off for more than a few months.

Instead of feeling defeated about the weight gain and not making any real progress in a year, I feel energized. I've decided this is going to be my year. This is the year I'm going to make goal. After almost three years of Weight Watcher meetings, I tired of just sitting in meeting after meeting watching other people make goal. I want to make goal.

My year starts today, right this very minute. Not on January 1, but today, November 27, 2010. One year from today I will be at goal. I'm definitely feeling more positive.