Check-in

I've been quite slack with updating, I don't know how I feel about keeping a blog but seeing people make page hits with no new posts to be treated with makes me feel a bit stink!


Yesterday morning I weighed in at 91.8 so I'm down a total of 4.5kg now and met my January target of 4kg. So now we're heading into February the goal is to lose 3kg. A bit of hard work will get me there I'm sure. At 90kg I will be taking progress pics and finally revealing the initial before pics. Lookout for that. Gulp.


I'm still having the odd slip up (wine, thai take out and chocolate anyone?) but it seems to be my recovery from these slips that is making the difference. In the past I would have beaten myself up for days about it, which then leads to days of binge eating and a total fail. This time around I just pick myself up, dust myself off and think about how I can learn from it. I have learnt that wine and I don't mix on Friday nights. In fact, Friday nights are a real high risk time for me so this Friday I'm challenging myself to have a coke zero and go home to my lovely Boyfriend on time and enjoy a home cooked meal, rather then getting silly on free wine at work, talking rubbish to my colleagues and stumbling in the door excitedly talking about takeaways an hour later than I said I would be home!


On Sunday a friend and I walked for 5 hours (29,000 steps) to the Pencarrow Lighthouse. (I was not even sore the next day ohgodhowawesomeamI)


Here's some quick pics before I go:

Time to Chat

It's time to chat.


For the second week in a row I've gained weight. Why? Last week was probably due to TTOM, because on Tuesday I magically dropped 1.5kg. This week is because we went away for my birthday and I let it become an excuse.


So I sit here and reflect on what I've done, and I need to make some confessions.
- There were chocolate cookies I baked for my workmates last Friday
- There was chocolate chips left over from making said cookies
- There was a night out at an Indian restaurant which not only involved creamy curry, naan bread but there was also...
- Red wine
- Birthday cake
- Lunch out at cafes x 2 (one of which was eggs benedict)
- Cheesecake
- More birthday cake
- Fish and chips to top it all off because "I'd blown it anyway"


F&$%!!!!


I set a goal to have dropped 4kg by the end of January.


I need to achieve that, my wedding is getting closer and closer!!!


Time to refocus.


My biggest problem areas are:
- travelling
- celebrating
- alcohol


So no more of those three things! 


The silver lining is I made sure I exercised A LOT when we were in New Plymouth, which isn't something I'm normally good at when we go on holiday. So I guess that is something positive to take away from it...


I will report in tomorrow with the official weigh in damage (although I'd prefer not to tell you at all...) and with a progress report.

Motivation

I feel like my motivation is waning, and that is NOT a good place to be!
The scales are up and down each day, but not below 92.8 which is really frustrating, I know I slipped up a bit on the weekend but I still think I had an overall calorie deficit for the week. I just wish it would sort itself out!


Seeing no results makes me question whether what I'm doing is working and makes me want to throw in the towel. A few extras have begun to creep in and I'm swaying to temptation a lot more. I haven't given in (a co-worker brought in banana cake and left it on my desk for people to help themselves to yesterday... the smell was like torture but I stayed strong). 


But seeing no results *should* have the opposite effect. It should make me even more determined. I should be blogging everything I'm eating and all my exercise, I should be relying on Boyfriend's support to help me. He would help, if he even knew anything was wrong. But instead I'm grumpy and upsetting my friends (seriously just want to quit facebook right now... oops) and putting up giant walls around myself.


It's time to bust them down and get on with it! I'm strong and I can do this, but that doesn't mean I have to do it alone.

93.0

I gained 200grams. Annoying! However, that being said I did indulge while staying with friends (last post) and last night we went to have dinner with family and they put on a three course meal! I was still full when I woke up this morning!


This weekend we are flying up to New Plymouth for my Birthday... So I guess the aim of this week is to maintain. Although, in theory we are going out for ONE birthday dinner, so I just need to remember there is no excuse to make this a full weekend bender. Keeping this shiz under control!


(I just ate a massive amount of lemon meringue pie which was given to us last night instead of throwing it away as intended... I feel a bit sick and icky)

Update and Wedding Venue Pics!

It seems ages since I've written! I have been very busy!


My Bodymedia FIT arrived! So exciting! I have worn it every day and it has really opened my eyes to how sedentary my lifestyle is if I don't make an effort to get moving more. It has also made me realise that going to the gym does not give me a pass to eat a few extra treats, as I need that trip to the gym just to have a normal calorie burn! 


On Thursday night I went to the gym after work and did some time on the cross trainer and treadmill, as well as lots of arm and shoulder weights as that is the area I really want to tone up for the wedding dress. After that I had a really upset stomach (I think it had been coming on all day, I just ignored it and made myself work out) and was pretty miserable for the rest of the night.
Yesterday Boyfriend worked in Palmerston North so he left super early, I caught the train up after work (almost missed it too... I can't be trusted with transport!!!) and we had dinner and stayed with some friends, it was so sweet they got me early birthday presents and also got me a surprise birthday cake!
Yesterday was really hard food wise. I was feeling a bit down because the number on the scales hasn't budged since Monday. I know I shouldn't weigh myself daily but I can't help it! Also work ran out of fruit on Thursday and I wasn't really prepared snack-wise for that. I made ok choices but it did leave me a bit hungry, probably just in my head but felt like hunger!


So on the train I was a bit naughty:

Then we had corn fritters and birthday cake... .Along with a lot more wine!!! It was nice to be with friends and I don't want to ruin it by making everyone miserable about my diet. I thought it was a bit cute that my friend thought to ask Boyfriend if I would eat something super unhealthy and he said no, make the cake something a bit less evil. So they made me a banana cake. Too cute!


This morning I went to my old hairdresser and got my hair cut and coloured and then we met some other friends for lunch at our favourite Palmerston North cafe - Stage Door.


The real purpose of the trip to Palmy was to show Boyfriend around our wedding venue and get his seal of approval before I go ahead and book it. 
We are getting married at Caccia-Birch House. I absolutely LOVE it, I love the old fashioned feeling about it and I also love that it sits next to the Lagoon and over the bridge there is another nice venue where we will have our reception.


Here is the house:

I love the driveway, I think it would be the perfect spot for black and white photos:

Here is the ceremony area, it overlooks the lagoon which is really pretty:

And the indoor backup area:

The house has a huge grass lawn, I think it might be nice to set up croquet or petanque for our guests while we are busy getting photos:

We drove back to Wellington after that and arrived to find two very hungry kitty cats and our back yard furniture had been blown all around the place by this crazy wind! The wind also took out my basil plant and the outdoor table landed on my pumpkins which really peeved me off!!!


Boyfriend is out meeting his geek buddies tonight, so I'm off to read blogs, watch Gilmore Girls and put on my Moringa Body Butter from the Body Shop which he oh-so-hates!!!

Monday

I'm sure you can guess why, but today has been a great day all around!
Seeing that number on the scales this morning has only motivated me more to keep up the hard work.


Today was the first day back at work and didn't go too badly. I'm finally beginning to see some areas where I can add value and that makes me a lot happier with my job.


This morning I had my usual cereal (Uncle Toby's) with trim milk and I also had sculpt vanilla made with ice, water and instant coffee. Boyfriend says it tastes like metal, but to my refined, sugar deprived, caffeine craving taste buds it's great!

For morning tea I took a banana with me to work, and at lunchtime I had left over chicken and broccoli lasagne from last night - so so yum (from the Healthy Food Guide of course!).

Afternoon tea was two mandarins, I'm lucky in that my work provides fruit for staff, so I never have to panic or plan ahead too much when it comes to snacks throughout the day. For dinner we had tacos, but I'm not very good at making pretty tacos and I was too hungry to care so I had a sort of mince and taco shell salad with a dollop of sour cream! (I was so hungry I started eating before I remembered to take a picture...)

All in all, not a bad effort. Once I've had 7 and a half squares of dark chocolate I will be at 1,381 calories for the day. 

I had one depressing episode today when I decided to hit the January sales, I went to Max and Jacqui E and tried on clothes and felt bitterly disappointed when I still looked like I did last week. Also, my work pants are still very tight and digging in. Then I reminded myself that it's been one week, and that this process will take a long time but when I finally can fit into dream outfits it will all be worth it. So I turned it from a negative into a motivational positive.

After work the weather had cleared up and the sun had finally come out, so I decided to go for a run/walk along the waterfront before catching the bus home. It was sooooo good! So much to look at and so many other people out enjoying the sun. They say you can't beat Wellington on a good day, whoever "they" are they are totally right! I love the smell of the sea so much, I grew up in New Plymouth which is coastal and it just feels like home when I smell the sea air. I was "that person" on the bus - you know, the sweaty gross one who has clearly just exercise and may smell a bit funky. I don't care, there are plenty of smellies on the bus that haven't got exercise as an excuse as well as germies who cough and splutter all over everyone. What goes around comes around y'all!

Weigh In 9.01.2012

Last week: 96.3kg (212.3lb)

Today: 92.8kg (204.6lb)

Loss: 3.5kg (7.7lb)

That's HUGE!!! So happy with that!

More later :)

My Support System

I've been thinking a lot about support and how important it is to a weight loss journey recently and I really want to get these thoughts out.


I'm no stranger to losing weight, in fact I'd say over the years I've gotten pretty good at it. Problem is, I'm even better at putting it on!
When I reflect on the most successful attempts I've had at losing weight there are two that spring to mind.


- When I was 18 I got to 84kg and saw a photo of myself with what looked like a tyre around my hips... It was just fat. I was so embarrassed about admitting I had a weight problem (like people couldn't guess or anything...) that I spent a month plucking up the courage to tell my mum that I wanted to join weight watchers (I lived at home in my first year of Uni to cut costs, so I knew it would affect the meals she prepared for me and wanted to run it by her first). To my surprise, she was 100% supportive and even promised not to tell anyone until I was ready for people to know (never!). I got down to my healthy weight range and hit 72kg before it stopped working I gave up and slowly put it all on again. But Mum was brilliant. She had done weight watchers before so she dug out her old cookbooks and every night would tell me how many points were in my dinner. She would try to keep the cupboard stocked with healthy snacks and I'm pretty sure she'd sneakily try to feed my brothers their high-fat dinners (how is it that my brothers have the opposite problem to me!?) while I was out walking the dog each night. I feel a little guilty now that I've written this that I never took the time to thank her and appreciate what she did for me.


- This time last year I got over my depression by realising I needed to look after myself better and create a life I wanted to live, rather than one I endured. A friend who had been through a similar situation really helped me. She texted me each day to ask how I was going and even came for walks with me and was always interested in my weight loss journey. 


These two successes, while short lived, both had common factors. I communicated my needs to another person who I trusted, and that person supported me through what is, at times, a difficult process.


Which brings me to this time around. Sometime in the week between Christmas and New Year I looked at Boyfriend and sort of whispered "I can't get married looking like this, I just can't. I'm so angry with myself". Then I cried. He cuddled me and said once all the visitors and celebrating is out of the way he is sure I can succeed at this and we will put things in place to make that happen. He made me make a list of fast food that fits into a low calorie diet so he doesn't suggest or go to any others with me, and we then came up with strategies for dealing with our high risk times - normally after work when we're really tired. So now we will always have a McCain's pizza in the freezer as a back up plan!


His support over the last 7 days has been nothing short of phenomenal. He's found me biggest loser episodes to watch even though he hates the show, he's walked with me without complaint even though he isn't a fan of that either, he's eaten every healthy meal I've cooked (including one particularly awful failure which tasted horrific) without complaint, and gotten out of bed early to hit the farmers market with me on Saturday morning (totally denying his love of sleeping in). I know that tomorrow when I see my first weigh in result he will be interested and happy for me.


That's how I know this will be a success. Not only am I in the right head space and finally ready to make the change, but I have the most amazing person supporting me and to give up when the going gets tough would just throw it back in his face. I owe it to him to tell him when things are getting hard, and I know he'll be there for me. This change affects his life a lot, and he's embraced the change with open arms. 


I have so much to be grateful for with that man! 

That's better!

I'm glad to say I'm in a much better mood and overall headspace now. Bf and I walked (there's that walking thing again, is this a habit???) into town as he wanted to go to Rebel sport and find some walking shoes and I wanted to check out the local fitness centre on the way. That seemed to kill my headache and my terrible grumpiness really well.


I'm undecided about how and where I'd like to work out. Currently I have a membership at Configure Express which is reasonably close to both work and home as they have lots of gyms all over the place. Their facilities are ok, not as much weight equipment as I'd like and I get annoyed using the equipment on the circuit as you can't even do one set properly before you get kicked off to the next station. And, to be honest, the Lambton Quay one smells. Literally, like feet. And in a women only gym that should not happen!!!


I'd love to join a boxing gym and have it out with a punching bag, but the good one is in Mount Cook which isn't really convenient at all. 


The overall dream gym for me would be Les Mills Extreme on Taranaki St. But... at over $25 per week, that's probably not going to happen. 


I did find out that there is a spin studio very close to our house, so I'm going to buy a concession pass so I can get bf working out (he has allergies to exercise, makes him break out in a sweat and get short of breath and he's not about it at all really).


At the end of the day though, all these things are excuses. For years I've been the Queen of excuses, e.g.
- I can't work out, my tummy is bloated
- I can't work out, I have to do the supermarket shopping
- I can't work out, there's no point because I ate a biscuit and ruined my diet this morning (totally weird way of thinking but hey that's me)


My excuses for not working out are pathetic!!! I have a good gym membership which they make some decent profit off considering since I moved to Wellington in November I've used the gym (I'm ashamed to even write this) 3 times.


Admittedly I have been running outside quite a bit, but still... 3 times!!?!?


Anyways.
Last night we made one of my favourite meals for dinner, which happens to be a salad! Amazing! It's from the Healthy Food Guide and is a grilled chicken and orange salad with pine nuts and toasted bread chunks. Quite high calories for a salad (452) because of the olive oil in the dressing and the bread but soooo good.
Here's a pic, I almost forgot to take it before I ate it all!

This afternoon we ticked something off the "List of Reasons I wanted to move to Wellington" and visited cafe L'affare. It's no secret that I am a complete coffee addict and coffee snob, and L'Affare is by far my favourite coffee bean brand. As predicted, going directly to where they roast the beans guaranteed the best coffee, Bf ordered a triple shot large flat white, I ordered a large trim latte (can't think of a better way to spend 88 calories to be honest!).

Here they are in all their glory:

So soooo good! One of the best things about Wellington = amazing coffee everywhere.


Right I'm off to watch some biggest loser!

Grumpy!

I want to write a big long post about how it's going and whatnot, but I'm in a major grump! Not about anything in particular, today is just one of those days that you wake up feeling annoyed with the world. 


My eating is still spot on, although I have not done any exercise at all over the past few days and that might be what's making me grumpy. There's no reason to be annoyed with myself over that, it's my first week and I knew I'd be a little slow to get started, the most important thing is to get my eating right this week and that's exactly what I'm doing.


It would also help if I got a decent night's sleep tonight. Since we moved house recently our cats are having some territory issues and they are making my life miserable at night time. To compound that, when I'm sleep deprived I get crazy anxiety so every little sound I hear I get up and see what they are breaking or if they are having an accident inside (and it's always a false alarm). Tonight I'm going to sleep in the spare room by myself with the door shut and hope they don't know I'm there, I really need some sleep!!!!


I've got today off work to make one more long weekend before I get stuck in again next week. I'd like to say I'm doing something really fun and productive, but I think it will just be a lazy day. I should really catch the bus to Kilbernie to use the gym. Boyfriend and I are also going to wander over to the local fitness centre I discovered online recently and see if it's any good. My work is moving buildings soon and I won't be close to my gym anymore, time to find a new one!

Coffee, Walking and Lanterns - oh my!

Today is my last day of being on holiday - I'm back at work tomorrow and Thursday before being back officially on Monday. Boo!
I'm really not looking forward to going back, I'm still the new kid at work (I've been there 4 weeks) and I'm just sick of feeling like I don't know anything and that I'm not worth my pay. I know it's just what happens with every new job and it will pass, but it definitely doesn't make tomorrow any easier!


Today the weather has finally gotten better so we walked (!) into town to do some shopping with the Stevens vouchers we got for xmas from my family. It was a really nice walk and we cut through the Basin Reserve which I love and I took my camera, got it out so I could take some pics for the blog and... "No Memory Card". Duh! I'd left it in the laptop. Sorry!


We stopped in at Carribean Coffee House on Cuba St for a trim latte before heading down to start shopping.

Stevens was an absolute fail, there was nothing there we needed or wanted, so we are going to leave it a week or so until we go up to Palmy where the Stevens store is bigger and better. However, all was not lost! While mooching around in Farmers we found some awesome table centrepieces for the wedding in the bargain bin. So we grabbed 14 lanterns that hold tealight candles, 10 large and 4 small:

With a bit of imagination they're going to be great! Boyfriend was so excited, not because he's an active wedding planner, but because he gets to spraypaint them a vintage cream colour for me, and boys are all about spraypainting!


I want to find some nice scented candles to put in the centres and attach some small butterflies or something like that to them to make them a bit more romantic and a bit girlier. 
The best thing is, when the wedding is done I can throw them on trademe as a bulk lot and probably get most of our money back. Perfect!


My eating over the past few days has been spot on, it's days like this that make me wonder why I can't do this every day. However, when you're on holiday with loads of sleep and no stress it is always easy to eat well. Tonight I'm making a chicken and gnocchi bake which will make enough so I can take leftovers for my lunch at work tomorrow. I'm taking my backpack to work so I can run home as well. 


I'm off now to watch some more episodes of the Biggest Loser, I have found it really motivating and while I know their results are just crazy compared to what anyone can achieve in real life it is still nice to watch people change their lives for the better.

Stuff I love today

1. Living in Wellington when the sun is shining
2. Wellington coffee (courtesy of Kialla's cafe, Newtown)

3. McCain's ultra thin pizza at 195 calories for 1/4 of the pizza, half a pizza with salad is the perfect lunch!

Weigh-in

Ugh....

Weighing in for the first time is never easy!

Excuse my hideous feet, you'll be seeing a lot more of them!

So my goal for this week is to get in the 94-95 range. 

2012

Another set of resolutions, except this time I get the overwhelming feeling that once again they will fail. And it sends me into a bit of a spin.

You see, this year my resolutions can’t fail, because in 14 months I am getting married to the guy of my dreams. And I can’t deal with getting married fat.

I might be vain, stuck up, disordered, mental… whatevs. But if my wedding photos show me as a chubster I will cry and hate them for the rest of my life. And I will be angry with myself. So angry.

So, by my wedding date I’d have like to have lost 30 kilos. I’m going to aim to do it in a year, so I have a little leeway. It’s a big ask, but all goals should be challenging yet achievable.

Weight tends to drop off fast initially, so I’ve tried to adjust timeframes to reflect that:

1 April, 2012 - 10kg lost

1 August 2012 - 20kg lost (clothes start getting awesome about here!)

1 January 2013 - 30kg lost (GOAL!!!) (Virgin fat, amazing clothes!!!)

From then on - toning and maintaining. 

Bring it on… I'll leave you with some inspiration - not a stick figure.