PJ Weight: 158.8
Week Loss: -1.2
Cumulative Loss: -32.8
Seth Weight: 174.2
Week Gain: +0.4
Cumulative Loss: -24.9
First off: A rant
The folks who say "Nothing tastes as good as thin feels" are eating the wrong things.
Losing weight and looking nice and being trim and fit and healthy are all wonderful things. But I like to eat. I love it. I love to eat large quantities of food that is terrible for me. I revel in it. Small quantities of delicious but unhealthy foods are a tease, and large quantities of healthy foods are just plain depressing.
I miss eating.
The thought of making a lifelong commitment to constant dieting and exercise - making them a permanent part of my life - makes me sad, almost depressed. I hate dieting. I hate exercising. I like eating. I like relaxing with a good book. And while the angel on my shoulder says "If you stay trim and exercise a lot you'll live longer", the fellow on my other shoulder says "If you have to watch what you eat all the time and exercise all the time, what's the point of living?"
So our compromise is this year-long commitment. It's a good chunk of time. It's long enough to make a very real difference in our physical well-being, but not an unmanageable amount of time that's too big to get our heads around. We're hoping that the weight will take some time coming back. I'm not going to be going out once our year is up and eating a full pound of pasta with bacon and cream sauce for every meal (mmm....carbonara...), but we won't be as strict, and eventually the weight *will* come back. Maybe we'll say "if our scales are up by over x pounds, we go back on a diet". Maybe we'll try to follow some kind of maintenance program. But we'll see.
I just wanted to get that off my chest. I don't like this. I've never liked it. It's very likely that I never WILL like it.
But I'm doing it.
Which brings me to:
Power 90 - Days 1, 2 and 3
We started our exercise program first thing Monday morning. We're rising an extra hour or so early, going downstairs, and flailing about in front of the little TV we've put down there.
The dogs don't think much of the whole thing. They came down with us and spent the workouts trying to lick me while I was doing push-ups, and watched us in confusion the rest of the time.
So far, these are my impressions of the Power 90 workouts - Phase I/II
Circuit training - Or "Sculpt" as they call it - This was the first workout we did. I did it with 3 pound weights, and Seth tried the resistance band that came with the DVD package the first time through. He found the resistance band somewhat difficult to work with, and possibly too heavy for our current level, so this morning he went with hand weights. The hand weights seemed much easier to handle for both of us. I purposefully used light weights, so I could concentrate on trying to learn the exercises and get the forms correct before I start piling on resistance.
The exercise coach Tony is a lot more mellow than I expected him to be. He's still depressingly chipper, but not nearly as overwhelmingly in-your-face enthusiastic as I was dreading he might be. I can more or less handle this level of chipper at 6AM, even if Seth & I do snark back at him. He doesn't seem to mind our snark.
The exercises were straightforward and relatively easy to follow. You stretch, go through a set of exercises for each muscle group, stretch and then do another set of slightly different exercises for each muscle group, stretch, do a third modified set of exercises, and end. It took about 40 minutes.
Mostly it made me sore in the legs. While I can use light hand weights, there's no real way to lessen the impact of lunges on your legs other than to do less of them.
Cardio/Abs - Also known as "Sweat" and "Ab ripper 100". This was our Day 2 routine.
Again, it wasn't obnoxious. Well - not as obnoxious as it could have been. Getting up an hour early to go jump around like an idiot is obnoxious in and of itself. Tony didn't make it worse. I found myself doing a whole lot of walking in place while he and his helpers jumped around like loonies. Something tells me it will be a while before we work our way up to the Phase 3/4 workouts.
There was stretching, a warm up with some yoga moves, and then the main workout consisting of some marching in place, a bunch of jumping jack style exercises, some kickboxing-esque stuff, and some boxing maneuvers. Then it's down to the floor for 100 crunches at varying degrees of sadism.
Total time - about 40 minutes again.
I'll need a thicker mat for the crunches. The foam mats we have on our concrete basement floor are fine for most of the exercises we've attempted thus far, but I found the pressure on my back painful and want a bit more cushioning. I'll see if my old yoga mat will do the trick. If not, perhaps I'll have to pick up another yoga mat and double-layer them.
The way the program works, you alternate Circuit training and Cardio/Abs every day for 6 days, and rest on the 7th day. We'll be doing the same workouts until we've progressed enough to move on to the more advanced of the DVD's (phase 3-4).
Wednesday, November 16, 2011
Thursday, November 10, 2011
Week 23
PJ Weight: 160.0
Week Gain: +0.4
Cumulative Loss: -31.6
Seth Weight: 173.8
Week Loss: 0.0
Cumulative Loss: -25.3
Plateau is one of the ugliest words in the English language.
If you look at my losses for the last several months (in 4-week chunks), you can really see a trend:
July/August: -6.4
Aug/Sept: -3.4
Sept/Oct: -3.6
Oct/Nov: -1.2
All this tells me is that I've now gotten down to the point where my body fights me to keep every ounce. I suppose it's good that we start exercising on Monday, though I'm really not looking forward to it.
There was a period a number of years ago when I exercised religiously for perhaps a span of 2 years. It felt good to be fit and healthy, but I never developed any liking for exercise. It's a sweaty, uncomfortable, unpleasant business, and I don't enjoy it. I doubt I ever will. But I'll do it for these three coming months.
So this is my plan: Power90 is a 90 day program, and our workout challenge is a 90-day commitment. With the exception of the Thanksgiving holiday (when we'll be traveling Weds - Sunday), we'll try hard to stick to the 6-day-a-week routine.
If the baby wakes in the middle of the night and keeps us up, or we catch a nasty cold, or have some other compelling reason not to wake up at a ghastly AM hour and exercise, then we won't do it. And that's that. I'm committing to TRY this, and do as many days as possible. One day at a time. I don't plan on guilting myself for missed days.
Tune in next week for the first exciting episode of THE SORE AND THE HELPLESS, when it'll hurt to walk, and washing my hair will be rather more than my shoulder muscles can stand. At least, that's the prediction. (I'll try to ease into this so the prediction doesn't come to pass...)
Week Gain: +0.4
Cumulative Loss: -31.6
Seth Weight: 173.8
Week Loss: 0.0
Cumulative Loss: -25.3
Plateau is one of the ugliest words in the English language.
If you look at my losses for the last several months (in 4-week chunks), you can really see a trend:
July/August: -6.4
Aug/Sept: -3.4
Sept/Oct: -3.6
Oct/Nov: -1.2
All this tells me is that I've now gotten down to the point where my body fights me to keep every ounce. I suppose it's good that we start exercising on Monday, though I'm really not looking forward to it.
There was a period a number of years ago when I exercised religiously for perhaps a span of 2 years. It felt good to be fit and healthy, but I never developed any liking for exercise. It's a sweaty, uncomfortable, unpleasant business, and I don't enjoy it. I doubt I ever will. But I'll do it for these three coming months.
So this is my plan: Power90 is a 90 day program, and our workout challenge is a 90-day commitment. With the exception of the Thanksgiving holiday (when we'll be traveling Weds - Sunday), we'll try hard to stick to the 6-day-a-week routine.
If the baby wakes in the middle of the night and keeps us up, or we catch a nasty cold, or have some other compelling reason not to wake up at a ghastly AM hour and exercise, then we won't do it. And that's that. I'm committing to TRY this, and do as many days as possible. One day at a time. I don't plan on guilting myself for missed days.
Tune in next week for the first exciting episode of THE SORE AND THE HELPLESS, when it'll hurt to walk, and washing my hair will be rather more than my shoulder muscles can stand. At least, that's the prediction. (I'll try to ease into this so the prediction doesn't come to pass...)
Wednesday, November 2, 2011
Week 22
PJ Weight: 159.6
Week Loss: -1.4
Cumulative Loss: -32.0
Seth Weight: 173.8
Week Gain: +0.2
Cumulative Loss: -25.3
I survived Halloween week with a hearty loss to show for it - I've finally made it down into the 150's. Unfortunately Seth had a not quite as great week, but he had a 2 pound loss last week, so it evens out. I had one of those weeks the week before last. They happen. I'M STILL VERY PROUD OF YOU, SETH!
My Halloween strategy was this: I get 5 pieces of candy on Halloween, and I set aside points for all the leftover candy I consume. No sitting down to a stack of candies this year. (There's nothing quite like eating yourself sick on your favorite candies, and swearing that you never, ever want to see another Reeses' Piece or Snickers bar as long as you live. I missed that this year. Alas.)
But I had a plan and I stuck to it, so yay, gold star for me.
The exciting news of the day: Today I wore size 10 pants to work!
Everybody at the office is calling me Skinny Minnie, and I got a whole bunch of compliments. My personal favorite was that I look like I'm a size 6 (thanks Jen). Knowing that I've lost enough to really be noticeable is really a wonderful motivator, so I appreciate all of the positive comments.
We also took the plunge and ordered our Power90 exercise DVD's, so that's a thing and it's happening. We joined an old-friend-I-rediscovered-on-Facebook's team beachbody challenge, which means there will be a few of us doing programs at the same time, sharing experiences and giving support and the like. And it's nominally possible we'll win stuff. (But as I never win anything, this will not happen.)
The challenge starts up on November 15th, so we'll be starting 2 weeks earlier than we'd originally planned. I'll have to cherish "sleeping in" til 7am each and every day until then. We're going to have to rise and shine pretty early to fit in the workouts before I go to work.
With that thought in mind, I'll now scuttle off to bed to appreciate said sleep.
Have a great week!
Week Loss: -1.4
Cumulative Loss: -32.0
Seth Weight: 173.8
Week Gain: +0.2
Cumulative Loss: -25.3
I survived Halloween week with a hearty loss to show for it - I've finally made it down into the 150's. Unfortunately Seth had a not quite as great week, but he had a 2 pound loss last week, so it evens out. I had one of those weeks the week before last. They happen. I'M STILL VERY PROUD OF YOU, SETH!
My Halloween strategy was this: I get 5 pieces of candy on Halloween, and I set aside points for all the leftover candy I consume. No sitting down to a stack of candies this year. (There's nothing quite like eating yourself sick on your favorite candies, and swearing that you never, ever want to see another Reeses' Piece or Snickers bar as long as you live. I missed that this year. Alas.)
But I had a plan and I stuck to it, so yay, gold star for me.
The exciting news of the day: Today I wore size 10 pants to work!
Everybody at the office is calling me Skinny Minnie, and I got a whole bunch of compliments. My personal favorite was that I look like I'm a size 6 (thanks Jen). Knowing that I've lost enough to really be noticeable is really a wonderful motivator, so I appreciate all of the positive comments.
We also took the plunge and ordered our Power90 exercise DVD's, so that's a thing and it's happening. We joined an old-friend-I-rediscovered-on-Facebook's team beachbody challenge, which means there will be a few of us doing programs at the same time, sharing experiences and giving support and the like. And it's nominally possible we'll win stuff. (But as I never win anything, this will not happen.)
The challenge starts up on November 15th, so we'll be starting 2 weeks earlier than we'd originally planned. I'll have to cherish "sleeping in" til 7am each and every day until then. We're going to have to rise and shine pretty early to fit in the workouts before I go to work.
With that thought in mind, I'll now scuttle off to bed to appreciate said sleep.
Have a great week!
Wednesday, October 26, 2011
Week 21
PJ Weight: 161.0
Week Loss: -0.6
Cumulative Loss: -30.6
Seth Weight: 173.6
Week Loss: -2.0
Cumulative Loss: -25.5
Seth finally got past the 25 pound mark today. He's been more or less stuck for the last month, but this week: BOOM, he dropped 2 pounds. Go Seth!!
The big excitement for me this week was that last night I tried on a pair of my size 10's and they more-or-less fit. They're still too tight for me to consider wearing out and about, but they close without a lot of effort and I don't feel like the front button is likely to detach at a speed high enough to put out the eye of some unfortunate bystander. PROGRESS: I AM MAKING IT.
My weekly losses have slowed a lot recently. Part of it is just that I'm sick of dieting, but part of it also is probably due to the fact that I'm slowly working my way toward stopping breastfeeding. As I reduce the amount of milk I make, I need to cut back on the amount I eat. That's been rough.
(And this is kind of an aside for a diet blog, but it's my diet blog, so NYAH. I don't have any idea if any other moms feel this way, but I've been having a really rough time with getting myself to stop nursing this time around. I guess it's because unless the unexpected happens, Raven's my last baby, so this will be the last time I'm going to be doing this. It's been very emotionally difficult for me. I mean, I don't really enjoy making milk, but the concept of stopping now has become pretty painful. Enough that I tear up thinking about it kind of painful. Even though I can acknowledge that there are probably hormones at work here, they're not easy to ignore.)
But anyway, we're doing well. We just have to keep on and not completely fall off of our wagon this coming Monday what with the piles of delicious candy that will be strewn about the house. We'll set ourselves aside a few pieces each. Then we'll see how well we can stick to that.
Right.
Wish us luck & Happy Halloween everybody.
Week Loss: -0.6
Cumulative Loss: -30.6
Seth Weight: 173.6
Week Loss: -2.0
Cumulative Loss: -25.5
Seth finally got past the 25 pound mark today. He's been more or less stuck for the last month, but this week: BOOM, he dropped 2 pounds. Go Seth!!
The big excitement for me this week was that last night I tried on a pair of my size 10's and they more-or-less fit. They're still too tight for me to consider wearing out and about, but they close without a lot of effort and I don't feel like the front button is likely to detach at a speed high enough to put out the eye of some unfortunate bystander. PROGRESS: I AM MAKING IT.
My weekly losses have slowed a lot recently. Part of it is just that I'm sick of dieting, but part of it also is probably due to the fact that I'm slowly working my way toward stopping breastfeeding. As I reduce the amount of milk I make, I need to cut back on the amount I eat. That's been rough.
(And this is kind of an aside for a diet blog, but it's my diet blog, so NYAH. I don't have any idea if any other moms feel this way, but I've been having a really rough time with getting myself to stop nursing this time around. I guess it's because unless the unexpected happens, Raven's my last baby, so this will be the last time I'm going to be doing this. It's been very emotionally difficult for me. I mean, I don't really enjoy making milk, but the concept of stopping now has become pretty painful. Enough that I tear up thinking about it kind of painful. Even though I can acknowledge that there are probably hormones at work here, they're not easy to ignore.)
But anyway, we're doing well. We just have to keep on and not completely fall off of our wagon this coming Monday what with the piles of delicious candy that will be strewn about the house. We'll set ourselves aside a few pieces each. Then we'll see how well we can stick to that.
Right.
Wish us luck & Happy Halloween everybody.
Wednesday, October 19, 2011
Week 20
PJ Weight: 161.6
PJ Week Gain: +0.4
PJ Cumulative Loss: 30.0
Seth Weight: 175.6
Seth Week Loss: -0.2
Seth Cumulative Loss: 23.5
Well, that was a depressing weigh in.
I'm not completely demoralized by the small gain, though. Last week I was shocked to see a 2 pound loss. I think the scale might have had a hiccup last week, even though I weighed myself a couple times. I wasn't all that good the week before I had that loss, and I was relatively on track this week, so I'll call it an average of 0.8 loss per week over the two weeks, which was about what I was averaging previously. That sounds MUCH better than a 0.4 gain, so we're going with that.
I had a delicious Indian buffet lunch with Seth on Tuesday, which probably didn't help the scale number this morning either.
In any event, my sights are still set on the 150's, so I'll try to keep my spirits and motivation up this coming week.
December 1st is looming up on the horizon - just 6 weeks until we start our exercise program. We've pretty much decided to try Power 90, from a company called Team Beachbody. I've heard good things about the program's big brother P90X, but Seth & I aren't up for anything that intense. As programs go, Power 90 appears to be the right level of challenge for us.
Well that's all the news for this week. Here's hoping for better results this time around!
PJ Week Gain: +0.4
PJ Cumulative Loss: 30.0
Seth Weight: 175.6
Seth Week Loss: -0.2
Seth Cumulative Loss: 23.5
Well, that was a depressing weigh in.
I'm not completely demoralized by the small gain, though. Last week I was shocked to see a 2 pound loss. I think the scale might have had a hiccup last week, even though I weighed myself a couple times. I wasn't all that good the week before I had that loss, and I was relatively on track this week, so I'll call it an average of 0.8 loss per week over the two weeks, which was about what I was averaging previously. That sounds MUCH better than a 0.4 gain, so we're going with that.
I had a delicious Indian buffet lunch with Seth on Tuesday, which probably didn't help the scale number this morning either.
In any event, my sights are still set on the 150's, so I'll try to keep my spirits and motivation up this coming week.
December 1st is looming up on the horizon - just 6 weeks until we start our exercise program. We've pretty much decided to try Power 90, from a company called Team Beachbody. I've heard good things about the program's big brother P90X, but Seth & I aren't up for anything that intense. As programs go, Power 90 appears to be the right level of challenge for us.
Well that's all the news for this week. Here's hoping for better results this time around!
Wednesday, October 12, 2011
Week 19: The 30 Pound Mark
PJ Weight: 161.2
PJ Week Loss: 2.0
PJ Cumulative Loss: 30.4
Seth Weight: 175.8
Seth Week Loss: 0.4
Seth Cumulative Loss: 23.3
Another milestone this week: 30 pounds! YAY!
I got Seth's consent to start including his results both to help keep him motivated and because I'm really REALLY proud of how well he's doing. He's 16.8 pounds from his lightest (pre-marital) weight of 159 pounds. Go Seth!!
I have somewhat farther to go. My lightest was 140, and that leaves me 21.2 to go if I want to see that figure again. (Double meaning! Figure! Ha! Look! I'm clever! Moving on.) We'll see if I get there.
I picked up a cheap pair of jeans this past week because my old ones were quite literally falling off. The new ones are size 12 and fit reasonably well, but I wasn't all that choosy since I will hopefully not be wearing them for very long. I just needed an 'in between' pair to get me through until I can get into my size 10's.
Funny, that. I could have sworn I had a whole pile of size 12 pants lying about in a bin somewhere, but I've searched every closet and bin in the house to no avail. Size 10's - bunches. Size 8's - oodles. No 12's, though.
I suppose that means I just have to lose some more inches.
I've got to say, though, having 2 babies really does change the shape of your body. When I was last this weight, there was a lot less tummy to squeeze into my pants. I also used to have these contraptions called abdominal muscles to hold it back. (Now, where did those get to?) I have to wonder if the 10's will ever really fit properly.
Hopefully the exercise program starting in December will help with the sad lack of abdominal musculature. At this point I'm somewhat surprised I haven't been recruited for Pillsbury ads. Tee-hee.
In any case, I'm going to be pretty motivated this week to see if I can break into the 150's by next week. Recently the weekly losses haven't been that great, but this week I pulled off a 2 pound loss. If I can do it again, Goodbye 160's, Hello 150's. Oh wait. That means I lose another Weight Watchers point.
Damn.
On that depressing note, I take my leave. Wish me willpower!
PJ Week Loss: 2.0
PJ Cumulative Loss: 30.4
Seth Weight: 175.8
Seth Week Loss: 0.4
Seth Cumulative Loss: 23.3
Another milestone this week: 30 pounds! YAY!
I got Seth's consent to start including his results both to help keep him motivated and because I'm really REALLY proud of how well he's doing. He's 16.8 pounds from his lightest (pre-marital) weight of 159 pounds. Go Seth!!
I have somewhat farther to go. My lightest was 140, and that leaves me 21.2 to go if I want to see that figure again. (Double meaning! Figure! Ha! Look! I'm clever! Moving on.) We'll see if I get there.
I picked up a cheap pair of jeans this past week because my old ones were quite literally falling off. The new ones are size 12 and fit reasonably well, but I wasn't all that choosy since I will hopefully not be wearing them for very long. I just needed an 'in between' pair to get me through until I can get into my size 10's.
Funny, that. I could have sworn I had a whole pile of size 12 pants lying about in a bin somewhere, but I've searched every closet and bin in the house to no avail. Size 10's - bunches. Size 8's - oodles. No 12's, though.
I suppose that means I just have to lose some more inches.
I've got to say, though, having 2 babies really does change the shape of your body. When I was last this weight, there was a lot less tummy to squeeze into my pants. I also used to have these contraptions called abdominal muscles to hold it back. (Now, where did those get to?) I have to wonder if the 10's will ever really fit properly.
Hopefully the exercise program starting in December will help with the sad lack of abdominal musculature. At this point I'm somewhat surprised I haven't been recruited for Pillsbury ads. Tee-hee.
In any case, I'm going to be pretty motivated this week to see if I can break into the 150's by next week. Recently the weekly losses haven't been that great, but this week I pulled off a 2 pound loss. If I can do it again, Goodbye 160's, Hello 150's. Oh wait. That means I lose another Weight Watchers point.
Damn.
On that depressing note, I take my leave. Wish me willpower!
Wednesday, October 5, 2011
Week 18
Weight: 163.2
Week Loss: 0.8
Cumulative Loss: 28.4
This week was another week of less than amazing weight loss, but it's still a loss, and I got through my birthday dinner and Carvel ice cream cake without gaining weight. That's cause for celebration as far as the diet is concerned.
Our combined weight loss is now 51.3 pounds, so hooray for hitting the 50 pound mark.
I don't have much more to say this time around. My friend's mother passed away this week, and much of our attention and energy has gone to worrying for him and his family. I don't have much left in me for dwelling on the minutiae of weight loss.
Week Loss: 0.8
Cumulative Loss: 28.4
This week was another week of less than amazing weight loss, but it's still a loss, and I got through my birthday dinner and Carvel ice cream cake without gaining weight. That's cause for celebration as far as the diet is concerned.
Our combined weight loss is now 51.3 pounds, so hooray for hitting the 50 pound mark.
I don't have much more to say this time around. My friend's mother passed away this week, and much of our attention and energy has gone to worrying for him and his family. I don't have much left in me for dwelling on the minutiae of weight loss.
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