Kiaise

Yesterday, I had a work meeting over lunch with food provided. That food happened to be pizza and salad with water. I was famished and ate a couple of pieces of pizza along with a bowl of salad. Once the quasi-hangry had subsided somewhat, I realized I wanted seconds... of the salad. The textures and different flavors of the vegetables were tempting, while the pizza tasted greasy and processed. Win. I've been walking the dogs in the morning despite the cold and wet. I noticed this morning on my way to work that I felt.. lighter and looser. It might be just my mind playing tricks on me, but I feel like I can tell when I'm gaining weight. I feel heavy or weighted down. Perhaps this is the opposite.

*crinkling up the virtual paper, throwing it in the virtual garbage, getting out another sheet* So the holidays threw my calorie counting and step tracking off and then I fell off the program completely. Honestly, I've been afraid to post here, fearful of admitting to myself and anyone who is reading that I failed again. Looking back, I see I fell victim once again to trying to do too much too fast. While I don't like the small steps approach, I'm feeling that's the way it has to be. A successful approach for me needs to accommodate my worst days, not my best. I tend to make my plans on Sunday when I've had some time to rest and regain energy the week has sapped from me. I need to plan for how I feel on a Thursday morning, not a Sunday. These postings also need to be gut level honest. Ugly, if needed. No trying to impress anyone or sugarcoating reality to myself. Reality simply is, however I would prefer to spin it. On that note, my weight went up. 222.6 as of yesterday. So respawn, try again. This time, something simpler and smaller. Next iteration: I've changed my calorie counting to simply carrying around a small notebook in which I write what I eat. No numbers, just a tool to help me diagnose of why calorie counting is so tough for me. I cooked a batch of meals this weekend that I thought I would eat for dinner this week, but are working out better for breakfast, surprisingly. I'm noting that for the future. Also, I grabbed a container of pre-washed greens and have been eating salads when I have nothing else cooked. Having these culinary crutches in place is critical to my being even remotely on track with my nutrition, as without a plan or something quick that's healthy I will just snack/eat junk. I've proved that to myself countless times. Finally, I joined Heroes Rising. After some initial hesitancy, I think it's going to be helpful for me and I am doing the quests there.

Week Three Wednesday, 1/4/2017 Tuesday, 1/3/2017 Weight: 220.2 lbs. BF: 39.4% Calories: Under by 359 Steps: 6,120 Weight is surprisingly down from last week, as is body fat %. Monday, 1/2/2017 Calories: Under by 242 Steps: 10,770 I had the day off, so I went out for a short and horrific run. I had no stamina at all and made it a bit less than two miles before calling it quits. My holiday sins caught up with me. Sunday, 1/1/2017 Calories: Not tracked Steps: 5,754 Spent the day cleaning, organizing, and preparing for the year, including buying a new couch!

Week Two Saturday, 12/31/2016 Calories: Not tracked Steps: 8,769 Did well in calories tracking through lunch but didn't track through the NYE festivities. Friday, 12/30/2016 Calories: Over by 159 Steps: 6,437 Did not get in my planned run today as I was feeling ill. Thursday, 12/29/2016 Calories: Over by 256 Steps: 6,186 Academy bodyweight workout 3A again. I blasted through it more quickly than Tuesday. Yuss! -- Wednesday, 12/28/2016 Calories: Over by 94 Steps: 11,357 Treadmill run after work. 5 minutes walking, 25 minutes running, 5 minutes walking. 2.36 miles covered in total. Felt like I haven't lost too much ground for taking off a few days over the holidays. -- Tuesday, 12/27/2016 Weight: 221.4 BF: 39.8% Calories: Under by 193 Steps: 4,684 Completed the academy's bodyweight workout 3A. Strangely not punished for holiday eating in terms of weight gain, but body fat went up by .1%. -- Monday, 12/26/2016 Calories: Not tracked Steps: 4,621 Travel again for the holidays. Things will settle starting tomorrow. -- Sunday, 12/25/2016 Calories: Not tracked Steps: 5,061 Christmas! Lots of eating and family time.

Week One Saturday, 12/24/2016 Calories: Not tracked Steps: Not tracked Relaxing for the holidays. -- Friday, 12/23/2016 Calories: Not tracked Steps: 3961 More travel for the holidays and much food. -- Thursday, 12/22/2016 Calories: Over by 454 Steps: 7215 Work all day then traveling for the holidays. -- Wednesday, 12/21/2016 Calories: Over by 63 Steps: 11,890 Treadmill run at the company fitness center last night. 5 minute walk, 25 minute run, 5 minute walk. Total distance 2.34 miles. I was able to hold a faster pace than Monday (a 13:20/mile vs 13:38/mile, but still). I needed more time to recover when my heart rate got up above 160, though, leading to about the same overall distance. Baby steps and I'll take it as progress. Oh, and it was only after I got on the treadmill that I realized my shorts were on backwards. Turns out they work either way. The next few days are going to be heavily holiday-oriented with a lot of driving. I'm going to do my best to keep my calories in check even if I can't exercise. -- Tuesday, 12/20/2016 Calories: Under by 14 Steps: 7027 Weight: 221.8 lb. BF%: 39.7% My scale at home also calculates body fat percentage, which is where the above number came from. I have no idea how accurate it is, so I'm just going to be looking for it to go down. That being said, almost 40% (should it be accurate) an appalling number and honestly, I want to hide from it. But I won't this time. Hiding from it is what got me here in the first place. Also completed bodyweight workout 3A from the academy last night. I'm happy to say that I can still do a decent knee pushup. -- Monday, 12/19/2016 Calories: under by 172 Steps: 12,738 Workout tonight was 5 minutes of walking to warm up, 25 of running at approximately setting 4.4 (which I believe means 4.4 miles per hour or >13 minutes/mile), then 5 minutes of walking as a cool down. Total distance: 2.35 miles. Yeah, it's slow. Very slow. My heart rate monitor is key for me when I run. I'm no good at telling not wanting to run faster from not being able to run faster, so I try to keep a steady comfortable pace. If my heart rate is consistently at or above 160 bpm and keeping pace feels difficult, then I'll slow down to walk until it's back down to 130ish, then pick up the pace to run again. There's no need for me to push the tempo at this point. I'm just trying to keep my legs moving. The treadmills at the fitness center have televisions at eye-level, of course, but also closed captioning. I don't have cable at home, so seeing live TV is now amazing and utterly distracting. My show of the moment on the treadmill is Alaska State Troopers. It's complete trash, brain candy at best, but fantastically diverting. -- Sunday, 12/18/2016 Calories: over by 39 Steps: 7062 Most of the day was at the in-laws celebrating Christmas. It was remarkable the number of times I had to say "no" to food or drink! I'm proud to have landed close to my goal calories for the day. Tuesday mornings are going to be weigh ins with the first Tuesday of the month additionally a picture day. Monday's plan is time on the treadmill at work's fitness center.

Yep, I'm going to say the usual things people say which is that I've tried many, many times to get back in shape and lose weight, but it hasn't worked. My weight has only gone up over the past year. I've tried many combinations of gyms, programs, exercises, apps, tracking, food philosophies, etc. to reverse that trend, but to no avail. I've come to understand that your body is a reflection of how you've been living. I've been taking a hard look at how I've been living life, evaluating what needs to be adjusted. I know that I weigh right now more than I ever have, over 220 lbs, which is not acceptable. I know that getting my body where I want it to be is going to be journey of changing myself. . I'm trying to view those repeated failures as iterations that will get me to a solution that works. In that light, seeing my failed attempts as an experiment, I know my two failure points are stress and lack of visibility/accountability. I'm hoping writing this log, knowing others can see it, will help keep me accountable. I'm still working on the stress piece. I have a stressful job and when I'm stressed, all I want to do is get away from it. With greater self-awareness, I'm seeing that food is one way I do so. The plan right now is to use myfitnesspal to track calories and actually stay on a pace to lose a pound a week. I've resisted myfitnesspal in the past, but looking at it now, I see the appeal. It seems to be fairly straightforward and powerful. I despise tracking calories, but I know it works if you stick to it. And you can't outrun your fork, right? My main source of motivation at the moment is that I'm planning to travel to Japan in summer 2017 to climb Mt. Fuji. I would be mortified to travel halfway across the world and not fulfill a life goal because of my fitness level, so cardio is an emphasis right now. I've been working on a couch to 5K plan for several months and while my pace isn't fast (12+ minutes/mile), I can run 25 minutes continuously. I'm going to keep on that plan since it's almost done and start running longer distances after the new year. I'm getting older as well (early 40s), and as a female, muscle mass just goes away. I need to do some weight bearing exercises too to maintain myself. I joined the nerdfitness academy a while ago and am at bodyweight level 3. My goal is to integrate a few of those workouts a week as well. The holiday season is going to make me flex most of the above, but that's okay. I see moving on this now as rehearsal for when things settle down in 2017.

Well, fellow adventurers, it's taken me a bit to come to terms with the fact that my life's priorities aren't with this right now. I've been walking to Mordor and cooking so those are getting done, but have realized that exercise itself and filling out my quest log (sharing) aren't. Tempting as it is to say I've been too busy, I know that doesn't exist. It's all priorities. So I'm going to step away from this challenge and wish you all the best on your adventures, fellow rebels. Perhaps when my life's priorities change, I'll be back. For the rebellion!

It is completely addicting. Definitely challenging and humbling too.

Routine is starting to be established again. On Monday night, I went to the Y to run on the treadmill. I was able to run at a 12 minute/mile pace for about five minutes before having to drop back down to a slower pace. Ugh. I feel sad about how far my fitness has slipped. Last night, I completed a beginner's body weight workout. I love the intensity of it and that it can be completed so quickly! I wasn't able to get through all three sets of lunges without my form deteriorating markedly. Hopefully by the end of this challenge I'll be blasting through those. That epic cooking on Sunday is paying off this week. I eat so much better when I can just pull leftovers out of the fridge instead of trying to rustle up something to cook when I'm already hungry. Tonight is another round on the treadmill at the Y. Onward!

This weekend was an epic win for my cooking goal. I made three dishes (two tasty, haven't yet tried the third) last night, including my first roast ever. So. Freakin'. Simple. Who knew? I updated my challenge spreadsheet this morning and everything's on track except for my exercise goal. I brought my workout gear with me so I'll hit the Y after work tonight. Amazing how such a little thing such as having clothes with me affects whether I'll work out or not. Looming larger and larger in my mind is the winter adventure race in early February and how much I don't want to slow down the team. After several weeks of wonkiness (ice storm, power out, holiday travel, snowpocalypse, snow days off of work), I hope today will be the start of getting back into a normal routine. Habit is a great tool if I can train it and routine will definitely help with that.

On my drive home last night to retrieve my workout clothes, I was almost hit twice and almost got stuck twice. The roads haven't been completely plowed, so being forced off the single lane by oncoming traffic means being driven into the deeper snow off to the sides. Yeah. After that experience, I decided not to go out to the Y. Tonight is my first beginner body weight workout of this challenge. The short week at work has been chaos. Bring on the endorphins!

I'm back at work today after two days off due to the cold and snow. Nice to be back in the saddle and busy. I love my home life, but cabin fever sets in after a while. I ate a couple of boiled eggs (made this past weekend, literally my second time boiling eggs successfully) as my main dish for lunch. I forgot my workout clothes at home (d'oh!), so need to go snag those before heading to the Y for a run or swim tonight. I walked to a meeting in another building today rather than take multiple offered rides. Felt bada** as one of the few people trudging through the squeaky snow.

Thanks, ladywildross! We got 12-14 inches all told, I'd say, QofC. I helped my girlfriend shovel herself out then shoveled my own driveway, which is fairly long. I was lucky enough to have a friend snowplow part of it, but it was still a lot of work!

I shoveled for over two hours yesterday. Definitely counting that as exercise!

Well, the first day of the challenge has thrown me a curve ball. A huge snowstorm rolled through yesterday and the entire city is shut down. Literally. The mayor declared that all nonessential commercial, public, and private traffic on city roads is prohibited. I even have today off from work, which hasn't happened in years and years. Not sure I'm going to make it to the Y to get on that treadmill. Shoveling massive amounts of snow counts as exercise, right?