Beginning again again.

As I sit here tonight, I am just over 2 months away from my 40th birthday. I am at the heaviest weight I have been in my life. I don't know exactly what I weigh, because my scale ran out of batteries and I haven't gotten a new one yet. That's on my "To Do" list. But when I weighed over Christmas break back in Missouri, I was just under 275 lbs. I NEVER thought I would see those numbers staring back at me.

I hate the way I look. My belly is bigger than a pregnant woman's. I hate that in a few short years, my sons will be embaressed to be seen with me. A friend of my oldest already asked him if his mom was the fat one. He was more hurt for me, but I told him I wasn't made at his friend. I am the fat one. I hate that about myself.

(I didn't tell him I hate that. I don't want him to feel sad for me.)

I can get really down on myself if I let myself, but I want to use this blog to write down the good choices I am making, with the hope that as my good choices grow more frequent, my weight will finallly start to go down. I have a long, long way to go. 100 lbs to lose. But I can only take it one day at a time. And so I do.

My good choices yesterday:
I ate a healthy breakfast.
I took a walk in the evening.
I did not eat ice cream or anything after dinner.
I drank water.

My good choices today:
I ate a good breakfast.
I brought my healthy lunch to work and ate that instead of going out.
I did not eat ice cream or anything else after dinner.
I drank only unsweet ice tea and water all day long. 

The time has come to do this, once and for all. I owe it to myself, and to my family.

Discouraged

I am having the worst time getting motivated again. I so desperately want to lose weight... but then I get in the moment and I choose comfort or ease or taste over what I know I should be doing/eating every time. I hate the way I look, yet I do nothing to change it. I hate that I am tired all the time, yet I do nothing to change it. I hate the way I feel, yet I do nothing to change it.

It's like I'm already defeated and I haven't even started yet. 

I've heard it said that nothing worth doing is easy. So I guess this journey toward health is worth it because it's one of the hardest things I've ever done!

WIS

Today was Weigh-In Sunday again, and though I do not want to post my results, I will. I gained 2 lbs this past week. And yes, I was expecting a gain because I am being visited by my monthly [non]friend who doesn't come along every month. 

(That's my period, for those men who may be reading!)

So I will do my best this upcoming week, and hopefully the scale will start moving down again.

Weigh-In Sunday (WIS)

Today was my first Weigh-In Sunday, and...

I LOST 5 LBS! I LOST 5 LBS! I LOST 5 LBS!

Did I mention that I lost 5 lbs? Cause I did! :)

What a great start! Here's to another great week!

Fear and Trembling

Tomorrow is my first weigh-day and I am feeling nervous. I REALLY want to see that scale move down a bit, but I'm just not sure what to expect. I really only made "small" changes this week, though important ones, so I'm not sure how those changes will be reflected in my actual weight. 

But because I am all about celebrating victories... even non-scale victories... I will be proud of the fact that for the past week:

1. I didn't eat sweets, except for one skinny cow ice cream bar OR one fruit bar a night. I didn't eat cookies, or candy, or fudge rounds, or even one bite of my friend's awesome-looking desert at Red Robin. That's pretty big!

2. I didn't eat mindlessly at night after the boys are in bed. This too is huge for me, because my tendency is to flop on the couch and watch Bones on Netflix while snacking on whatever I can get my hands on. I did still sit on the couch watching  Bones, but I allowed myself ONE of the treats mentioned above and That.Was.All. 

3. I drank more water. I still drank Diet Pop, but I drank more water.

4. I took all my medications. For some reason, I had gotten out of the habit of taking my blood pressure medicine and my metformin, so I started doing that again this past week. And you know what? When I went to the doctor on Wednesday for my monster ear infection, my blood pressure was really good. 

5. I stopped eating when I had had enough. I didn't eat until I was painfully full. I left food on my plate even! 

6. I kept my goals in the forefront of my mind all week, and when I was tempted (and I was... A LOT!), I prayed and asked God to give me the strength I needed to be obedient to Him in this area. 

So it is with fear and trembling that I face the scale tomorrow morning. And whatever it says, I will post here and be accountable. I hope with all that is in me to see it go down... but if it doesn't, I will celebrate the little victories and add more good choices into the mix this next week. 

Until tomorrow! :)

One year, 90 lbs to lose!

Over the past couple of weeks, I have decided that I am tired of living my life as an overweight woman. I feel that I am dishonoring God by allowing food to have such control over me. I feel I am missing out on things that He has for me to do because I am too fat to do them comfortably. I feel that I am not being a good mom to my kids because my weight limits what I can do with them. I feel I am not being a good wife to my husband because I have "let myself go". And most of all, I feel that I am putting myself at risk of a premature death by not dealing with the health issues that go hand-in-hand with obesity. 

It is time to lose this weight, once and for all.

Today is my 14th wedding anniversary. By my 15th wedding anniversary on July 25, 2013, I want to be at my goal weight of 160 lbs. I am currently at 250 lbs. Which means I have 90 lbs to lose over the next year. 

Is this goal possible? Absolutely! I know it will be hard, and I know it will take some major changes to my current lifestyle, but I know that it is time. So I will do what I know to do.

I'm terrified of putting this out there, but I need the accountability that comes when people know where you are at, where you want to go, and what you are doing each step of the way. I'm terrified that I will fail... and I'm terrified that I will succeed.

I have no idea how to live any other way. I've always had this weight to hide behind; I've always had this ready-made excuse not to try, not to reach out, not to live. I'm scared what God may ask of me when my last self-defense mechanism is stripped away.

I'm scared to lose this weight, but I'm more scared NOT to. 

So here we go!

Starting Weight: 250 lbs.

Goal Weight: 160 lbs.

Weigh-in Day: Sundays

First Mini Goal: 5% body weight - 12.5 lbs lost, 237.5 lbs

Second Mini Goal: 10% body weight - 25 lbs lost, 225 lbs.

Third Mini Goal: Under 200 lbs 

Fourth Mini Goal: 175 lbs.

Overall Goal: 160 lbs.

Here are some current pictures of me taken during our family vacation at the lake a couple weeks ago. While there, I worried that the life jackets wouldn't fit me, I avoided riding the Sea Doo because I thought I was too fat, and I wouldn't jump in the lake or tube because I was afraid I wouldn't be able to climb the ladder to get back in the boat. By this time next year, I'd love to be able to do all those things are more! 

 

 

Up then Down

...then down some more!

I am happy to say that after gaining about 6 lbs over a 2-month period, I am moving in the right direction again and have lost 9 lbs in the last month and a half! Which means I'm only 3 lbs down from my starting weight, but still. I've lost 9 lbs. Which tells me one very important thing:

When I follow the Insulin Resistance diet, IT WORKS!

Yep, it does!

I actually got to teach a few other people about it this weekend, which was a good refresher for me and really seemed to help them out as well. We've also decided to be a sort of accountability group for each other, which I know I need.

I am currently 12 lbs away from my first mini-goal and I'm planning on seeing that scale continue to move D-O-W-N!