Eating on track

It seems that my eating is mostly on track now. I've been making rather healthy dinners and packing wonderful, big, delicious salads for lunch at work. My breakfasts have either been Kashi Go Lean Crunch with yogurt or peanut butter toast.

I'm still pretty bad about indulging in a fun-size or bite-size piece of candy from one of the numerous candy dishes around my office. I'm pretty sure I am not doing better about that because, well, I looove those things in the candy dishes. Especially when I happen upon a 3 Musketeers bar.

My exercising is what I can't seem to get back under control. I had an extremely terrible week last week, and somewhere in the fray, I lost my gym card. Now, I've been in once since then and the let me sign in instead of "beep" in, but I don't know how long that will last. Honestly, I've been really "good" at using the missing card as an excuse NOT to go to the gym.

I have been walking, though. Granted, not like some women who are out at 5am with ankle weights and dumbells! (Yes, I have them around my house.) I heard about this Couch-to-5K program and it sounded really interesting. Problem is, I would want to use a treadmill... and those are at the gym and... I don't have my card...

See how this cycle works?

Kudos to my friend, Erin, who's lost another pound!

Delicious and Healthy Dinner!

I made a fantastic (and super easy) dinner last night. I'm just so excited about it that I had to share. I don't know what to call it though. I just threw together a bunch of things I had sitting around.

1 lb ground beef (I buy 80% lean)
1/2 a large red onion
2 bell peppers
about 1/2 a jar of tomato sauce (I used Ragu)
salt
garlic powder
Italian seasoning
pepper
worchestier sauce
shredded cheese (I had a "Mexican" mix)

I buy my ground beef in bulk and portion, cook and freeze it when I get home from Sam's, so I already had the 1lb cooked.
In a bowl, combine chopped onion, chopped bell peppers, ground beef, and tomato sauce. Sprinkle in seasonings and worchestier to taste.
Pour into a glass baking dish
Cover with shredded cheese
Bake at 350 for 30 minutes.
Turn the oven off and let sit until you are ready to eat. (Mine sat about 20 mintues until hubby got home.)

I served it in a bowl with toasted up crusty bread (that I had stored in the freezer) on the side. It made enough for 4 servings. I'm going to have leftovers with tortilla chips and carrots for lunch today. Soo excited about my lunch today!

Ahhh Tuesdays...

Today is going well so far. I had the same breakfast as yesterday. For lunch, I had a salad with 2tbsp of dressing (yes, I measured!) carrot sticks and a mozzarella cheese stick. We'll see how long the good behavior lasts. I'm back in another meeting this afternoon... with my arch nemisis, Candy Dish!

I forgot my gym card today, so I will just go home and take Athena for a walk. My mom and dad have Eric downtown so I couldn't go get him earlier even if I wanted to. That's good for my exercise regimine. :) Need something to fill the time? Walk the dog! I just hope it stops raining. My lab (yes, lab as in "water dog") hates the rain. She will splash and swim all day in any body of water, but if it's falling from the Heavens, she's having no part. She also refuses to walk in wet grass or soil. She'll try to run you off the sidewalk if you make her walk in wet grass. Yep, that's me, the owner of Prissy Princess Athena.

I fudged up my dinner plans tonight. I was going to make barbacoa beef and have it for tacos, but silly me forgot to put it in the crock pot this morning! So as of now, my Plan B is pasta with meat sauce and garlic cheese bread. Yeah, it totally breaks my aformentioned "No carbs after 1pm." There is no possible way that I can keep that up, not with pasta being such a cheap "emergency" meal. At least it's better than going to McDonald's!

Two more hours of work to go now... I should be called up for that meeting any time. I would say wish me luck, but I am totally craving a Three Muskateers bar right now! (I just went to the website to find their "less fat" slogan and found out there are a ton of oh so yummy sounding 3 Musketeers recipies! http://www.3musketeers.com/recipes.shtml)

Damn Candy Dishes!

I did really well yesterday... except for the candy dish passed around the 4 hour meeting I was in.

Ok, so the good stuff first.
Breakfast - 1 serving LF vanilla yogurt, 1 serving Kashi Go Lean Crunch (in the yogurt)
Lunch - Homemade, LF Spinach-Artichoke dip with tortilla chips, carrots and a cheesestick
Dinner - SteamFresh Meals for Two microwave meal.

Gym - 15 minutes + 3 minutes "cool down" on the Eliptical
30 minutes on a stationary bike

And... the bad
During my 4 hour meeting I had (all "fun size"):

• 3 - Three Muskateer bars
• 2 - Butterfinger bars
• 1 - Starburst chew

Oh yeah, I also had a sugar cookie and a spoonful of lemon-cream cheese frosting. (Did I mention I'm a fantastic baker? Yeah, not good for losing weight!)

Emotionally, I did much better on Monday. I actually ate (mostly) well and did some good exercise at the gym and it did put me in a good mood for the rest of the evening. I guess that's just one thing that I have to remember. Good diet and plenty of exercise makes me happy!

Better Day

Today has been much better diet wise. I had a bagel with peanut butter for breakfast and a big glass of milk (yum!) For lunch, I ate carrot sticks, one slice of wheat bread with peanut butter and a mozzarella cheese stick. Oh, and 4 mini Hershey bars. (Hey, I didn't say work was any better!)

I've got dinner in the oven right now, toasted meat ravioli! It could literally be my favorite food. I'm serving it with veggie filled tomato sauce and a side of fresh (woo hoo! I actually found some) green beans. I think I'll probably have to jazz them up with a little butter and garlic, though. Today is my dad's birthday so hubby, baby and I will be heading over there for something sweet and delicious. Don't know what, though.

I have NOT exercised though. I just didn't have time to get home, make dinner AND go to the gym before my dad's "party." My husband isn't home yet, so I can't take the dog for a walk. (Ok, maybe I'm a wuss, but I am totally paranoid to try and take the dog and push the stroller. One or the other, please!)

This is off topic, but I think I need some outside input. If your job totally sucked and you didn't like anyone there (that could get hurt by this...) and you knew of some completely illegal stuff (as well as quite a bit of fiscal irresponsiblity) happening, would you be the "whistle-blower?" After what happened today, I'm ready to call up TV stations, write to the newspapers and report them to the Department of Labor. I really, really hate where I work! Oh... yeah... it's a public school district.

Anyway, back to the food...
All in all, I'm feeling minorly successful today! Maybe I should work on one thing at a time? Or is that just another way to slack waaaaay off?

Stupid Me

Stupid me for trying to start on the path to a healthy life this week. Yeah, it's all been pretty much sabotaged by work. I am eating, not terribly, but definitely not as healthy as I planned. I mean, how can you get to eating healthy when you get to work at 7am and can't even take your lunch until 2:30pm?? (That was Wednesday.) Or... like today, where you don't even take a lunch AT ALL! Yeah, I ate, but sitting in front of my computer munching Junior Mints and carrot sticks is sooo not a lunch. Not to mention the fact that I've been leaving work so late (2 hours late) that I skip the gym. Yeah, I technically could still go, but I would be sacrificing even more time with by baby boy and I just can't bring myself to do that. No way.

So what's causing all this trouble in Lindsey's diet world? Report cards. F--king report cards. Ok, they were supposed to be printed TODAY but we still didn't even have one programmed and finished! It makes me want to scream!!!! Literally today, I wanted to laugh (from sheer exhaustion,) cry (from the stress) and scream and throw things (because people are stupid and I HATE my job.) I only laughed and ate a ton of Junior Mints.

I guess I'll start over this weekend. It's just so frustrating...

Oh well, baby's crying and hungry (ha! know that feeling!) At least I get to hold and cuddle my little man some more tonight. He some how makes all this crap ok.

Can you say "Failure"?

Ok, so I don't really want to call my day today a failure. If I label it that, it's just a downward spiral and I end up saying "F--- this, I'm going to Silky's!" (For those that don't know, Silky Freeze is the most wonderful frozen custard on the planet. YUM!!!)

I started off today with a chocolate chip bagel with peanut butter. My mistake for starting a diet with no groceries in the house! (Hey, the bagel was free!) It got better from there, I packed a cut up orange bell pepper and a roast beef sandwich (with olive oil mayo, mustard, onion and cheese) for my lunch. I actually ate my lunch today at work. Well, then our system shut down and I literally could not work. My friend and co-worker, Amanda suggested going to Target. What's so significant about that? She bought be a box of Junior Mints and I took them and ate them when we got back to the office. (What, like I was really supposed to say no?! You can't refuse a gift!)

Now, I'm not even going to go grocery shopping on my way home from work. Want to know why? Because I left my friggin wallet and cell phone AT HOME when I left for work this morning! AHHHH! So... no groceries tonight... what's that mean? McAlister's Deli, oh yeah! (www.mcalisters.com) Check it out, it's actually a lot better than regular fast food. I loooooove their Chicken Grill Salad with paremsan peppercorn dressing! Delicious.

So as it goes tonight, I'm pretty much going to call today a kind of sucess as long as the following things happen:
1. I really get only a salad with chicken at McAlisters
2. I take Athena for a walk tonight (since by working 2 hours late, I've missed my gym window.)
3. I make it home without getting pulled over or into an accident (as I have no driver's license on me)

Maybe later I'll post about why today (at work) sucked so much. Maybe I'd rather just not think about it and enjoy my husband and son tonight...

The Plan

All right, so the first of the month seems like a good time to start a new lifestyle. It's not totally new, I used to be better at this whole eating right and exercising thing. I used to be skinny. I used to be fit. I used to be a size ten (hey, that's pretty thin on us taller girls!) I used to be able to run a mile in ten minutes or less. I used to love shopping because things FIT without migrating over into the "Women's" (read: plus-sized) section of the store.

I AM SICK OF ALL THE "USED TO BE"!

I want to be all of those things again. I've been there before, so I should be able to get back, right? The only question... how in the hell do I get there again? Well, here's my idea. Got a better idea? I'm willing to listen.

DIET:
Rule #1 - Eat full number of servings of fruits, veggies, and dairy each day
Rule #2 - Eat most of my daily carbs before 1pm each day. Stick to vegetables and protein after that.
Rule #3 - The majority of my carb intake needs to be whole grains and natural (not added) sugars.
Rule #4 - Meal plan to avoid processed foods and take-out. (Gross fact - I learned that your poop won't smell if you cut out processed foods. Not sure how true that is, but interesting side effect of eating healthy!)
Rule #5 - Don't deprive myself of the yummies! I learned a loooong time ago that when I deprive myself 100% of the things I love to eat, I will just fall hard off the healthy diet wagon.

FITNESS:
Rule #1 - Walk Athena (my lab) 1 mile or more at least 4 times a week. (She's a big dog and I just can't handle her while pushing a stroller too. Since I need someone to go with me or to stay with the baby, I don't get the chance to go every day.) Besides, I love walking with her, so it's like my "me time" also.
Rule #2 - Go to the gym at least 4 times a week. (Again, the combination of work hours and baby kind of limit how often I get to go.)
Rule #3 - Do more strength training! I'm soooo uncomfortable with weights. Even when I had a trainer, I hated strength training. I always feel so awkward on the machines and especially with free weights.
Rule #4 - Get over being so self conscious about it and do AB WORKOUTS!!! There's only one way to really tone up those abs again and that's to work them out!!


TRACKING MY PROGRESS:
I'll be using this blog, of course, to track my progress. I'm not sure yet how I'll do it, though. Most likely, it will change each time I post. I plan on posting my diet/workout information everyday. I'm thinking that to really track my results, I need solid goals. Goal 1 - I want to lose 40lbs and get back down to 160lbs. (Less than that and I become anemic.) Goal 2 - Run a mile (again) in 10 minutes or less.

So... Tomorrow it begins! I hope I'm ready for this!

What You Need to Know

Before we get going, there are some things you'll need to know.



About the Numbers:

• I use the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute's BMI calculator. It can be found at http://www.nhlbisupport.com/bmi/


• Normal weight is 18.5% - 24.9% BMI


• Overweight is 25% - 29.9% BMI


• Obese is over 30% BMI


• There are NO BMI calculations for when I was pregnant and nursing since the BMI calculators can't take those special factors into account.

Now, about me...

I had a baby in June. While I was pregnant, I gained 35 pounds. I lost 27 in the first week, but quickly gained back 2 pounds. I am 5'8" tall and 23 years old. Here's my weight history:

1 year pre-pregnancy: 160 lbs, 24.3% BMI

1 month pre-pregnancy: 180 lbs, 27.5% BMI

At delivery: 225 lbs

3 months post-partum: 200lbs, 30.4% BMI

My Goal:
First and foremost, I want to be healthy and fit to care for and be an example for my son. I need to lose 40 pounds to get down to a healthy weight (160 lbs.) I also want to build up my flexibility, strength and endurance. When I was in high school and college, I could run a mile in 10 minutes (or less.) Now, I feel lucky if I can finish in 15. For me, that is just not acceptable.