Sometimes you have to give thanks for the lows

I hate to have even a bit of a downer post on Thanksgiving, but I also feel like if I don't continue to keep it real then I won't continue at all.  Because as I've said in the title, I do have to be thankful for the lows (and I am) -- because otherwise I wouldn't recognize the challenges I overcome along the way.

I think it started because of the overconfidence that developed when I had such a spikey workout yesterday.  This really did a positive number on my confidence, because I was thinking about the 5k we did earlier this year and how proud I was that I was under 17 minute mile.  And now, I'm hovering around 15 minutes.  So, that's down about 2 minutes in an 8 month time span that included like 4 monhts of not working out at all.  As always, I'm taking the NSV's where I can get them.

Then, I was helping my mom make an apple cake for Thanksgiving dessert.  I licked the spoon.  I was thinking about my friend Kiosk and how she'd asked me to be her support network during times when she was making cakes for people because cake batter triggers a frenzy.  I thought hey, one spoonful -- I can do this.  I was thinking about dinner and how, while I am looking forward to the variety of very non-healthy things we will be having, I did not plan to overindulge.  Just a regular plate-ful.  It's just dinner.  I don't need to eat to survive winter, like the Pilgrims. 

But things started slowly drifting downhill.  We hung out with our neighbors, whom we love but do not usually lead me to the path of good decisions.  We are making wine with them and we sampled a carafe.  It has a very high alcohol content right now...  We had Chinese food for dinner, like good Americans pre-Thanksgiving.  I continued to maintain a level of good decisions -- I skipped the lo mein, I ate a lot of broccoli (which I choose to believe is a better decision, even if it is slathered in sauce) and made a very small plate overall.  Fist sized portions of shrimp and broccoli and mostly the mushrooms from a beef and mushroom concoction. 

And then it happened.  We got home.  And I binged.  Like I haven't binged in a very long time.  Opened up tortilla chip bag and strapped on like a feeder.  But then that led to a self-loathing that can only be cured by chocolate.  Found some Christmas chocolate (that would mean it was from last year) and snarfed many pieces of that.  Was surrounded by wrappers and put the chocolate away.  But, I guess I still felt empty because I moved on to a snack sized bread pudding -- which was probably the only somewhat decent thing I binged on since it was teeny portion from Kozy Shack.  And I managed to stop at one.

And I managed to stop.

I headed for bed and made a call to Kiosk to try to talk me through it.  She was immensely helpful, despite being overwhelmed with her Thanskgiving prep. 

And this morning, I forced myself to go to the gym and get my workout in.  (Thank Goodness for 24 hour gyms!)  I have a plan of attack to try to not binge my way through the day.  And I'm going to work on being thankful that I'm capable of forgiving myself for these setbacks while not forgiving myself in to downward spiral. 

It's been a challenging year on the weight loss front.  I have been kidding myself into thinking I could procrastinate on dealing with the food issues.  I still don't know if I am capable of handling focusing on more than one thing at a time.  But, I do know that if I don't at least start trying that last night was just a toe-dip in the shallow end of the tidal pool of self-loathing that can evolve from denying that emotional eating is a part of my life. 

I'm thankful for you sitting here reading this.  I'm thankful that I have people I can call and can talk me down.  I have people who push me to keep trying.  And I am most thankful that I have people who don't judge me when I slide back and still love me and root for me anyways.  I want you to know that I'm rooting for you too!

Much love and gratitude,
Heather

See those spikey things?

That's where I was running! :)

2.0 miles by 30 minutes. Getting there!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Exercise your earworm

I have been listening to the same 30 minute-ish work-out list on my iPod for a long time.  Mostly because I've been too lazy to tweak it.  Tonight, I finally got inspired and decided to re-vamp it.  Here's the finished product for your perusal...

Bring Me To Life 3:59 Evanescence    27
Rolling In the Deep 3:48 Adele 21 Pop
Pump It 3:33 The Black Eyed Peas Monkey Business Hip-Hop/Rap  31
Moves Like Jagger (Studio Recording from "The Voice" Performance) [feat. Christina Aguilera] 3:21 Maroon 5 Hands All Over (Deluxe Version) Pop
Last Friday Night (T.G.I.F.) 3:51 Katy Perry Teenage Dream Pop
Sex On Fire 3:23 Kings of Leon Only By the Night (Deluxe Version) Alternative  35
Jump Around 3:36 House of Pain  Hip Hop  27
Animal 3:32 Neon Trees Habits (Bonus Track Version) Alternative  26
Misery 3:36 Maroon 5 Misery - Single Pop  12
Raise Your Glass 3:23 P!nk Greatest Hits...So Far!!! Pop  5
Stayin' Alive 4:45 Bee Gees Saturday Night Fever Soundtrack  56
When You Were Young 3:40 The Killers Sam's Town Rock  28
Bad Romance 4:54 Lady Gaga Bad Romance   43


The list starts with Bring Me to Life because I first created a target time list when I did the 5k in March.  I liked that it started kind of slow, but that slow guitar riff that builds gives me just enough oomph to push off.  Now, I'm kind of hooked on it being the starting song because I've used it that way for so long.
Rolling in the Deep is a new addition, but I've been wanting to see if it has the right sounds to get me going for a while.  I LOVE Adele, but not sure if she's going to be right for work-out material.
Pump It has long been a regular for obvious reasons.  That's usually when I start my first serious running attempt (I'm working on a running post now). 
Moves and Friday Night are also new additions.  I'm a little anxious about Friday Night because I'm not sure if it's going to be fast enough in the refrain to get me going, but I just get such a kick out of the song that I decided to give it a whirl.  But, I LOVE the Moves song and it hasn't quite been overplaid on the radio just yet. 
Sex on Fire has also long been on the list.  When I first heard this song, it practically wanted to make me write a movie just so there could be a montage of a guy training to this song.  And then I realized that Vision Quest and Rocky have already been made.  Perhaps my movie would be a female version of one of these?  Ooops, no -- Hilary Swank did the chick Karate Kid already. 
Jump Around...  Well, I mean -- I've got the skills, come get your pills??  I am that person in the gym who motions along to this song when it comes on.  Every morning I'm making gun gestures and yes, I have actually mimed "smacking your ho" in that line.  It's 6am, and I do not have time for shame.

I've always tried to time it so that song comes at about the end.  Because usually by the end, I am praying for death and need the kick in the pants that it gives me.  So, the last 10-20 minutes are really just fluff in case I want to shuffle.  And because some of them have been on there since the original list. 

I'm really excited to go get started with this one tomorrow, so perhaps I have been remiss in not playing with my lists more often.  On the other hand, I liked the sound association of the other list where I would hear certain songs and just get automatically kicked in to gear. 

Let me know what you're listening to....
Heather

Running down a dream

Sometimes I think my blog should be called how I wish I were a runner. Or Runner Hater. Well, not hater but envier to be sure.

I see people running everywhere. They make it look so easy. So natural. Like anyone could just pick up and sail with their feet over concrete and dreadmills.

Not so.

I really do not believe runners intentionally mock me. But.... In the early morning, when I go to the gym sometimes it seems like the only people on the dreadmill are runners. Sometimes it's a comedy of sorts. I'm the only one on the dreadmill then as people get on around me they're all runners. And yes, it does seem spiteful. I mean, you are nowhere to be found and then fat girl tries to run and you just show up to glide along?? Really?? With long sleeves on and not even breaking a sweat - and you're not mocking me? I just don't entirely buy it.

I fear that this is something I will struggle with for some time to come.
Maybe, probably I will never be a "runner". It just seems so unfathomable. To just pick up and start running. For more than a minute. And not from a criminal or a crime scene.

Maybe, probably that's okay.

But maybe it's not.

I mean, worst case I get in better shape by continuing to try!

Whew

Checked that box today. I wish there was a microphone in my head to record the thought progression from "shit I don't wanna" to "eff yeah I did that!"

The hardest warm-up exercise is getting over the apprehension.


Hmm...iPhone blogging delay. I wrote this yesterday or maybe even Monday.

Starting over

My nose has dried up, thanks to antibiotics. So now so have my excuses. Tomorrow morning I'm back to the gym.

But today? I sloth!

A Whiny Musical Interlude

Even if you're not a musical fan, you probably have heard at least a portion of Maria's gleeful song from West Side Story "I Feel Pretty." 

Yeah, well, my most recent setback has me singing a similar tune in my head, only it goes "I feel lumpy -- oh so lumpy and dumpy and gray!"

I know that I should just keep my head up and my resolve strong, but it's just brutal.  I've got some kind of sinus infection thing (my godmother calls it the Tidewater crud) and I've had a red nose from vacillation between clogged and runny for about a week.  I did make one foray to the gym last week at the on-set, but it got progressively ickier and harder to breathe so I've been pretty much seat-bound since.

And not feeling well also lends itself to less than wise eating habits.  Which means that I'm not doing the best job of controlling my environment and just mindlessly sticking food down my throat to make myself feel better.

Which only makes me feel worse because I can't move either.

Kiosk says that she has all kinds of workout routines planned out so she never has an excuse not to exercise.  I'm not sure how to get around the not being able to breathe through my nose thing though.  Am I just being too wimpy?  Or too hard on myself for not being more of a bad-ass? 

I'm not sure.  But I do know that between my red clogged nose and my general lumpiness, every time I pass a mirror I just try to avert my gaze and get past that as quickly as possible.  Which makes putting on my make-up and doing my hair pretty interesting, I gotta say! 

I'm weighing myself and luckily there hasn't been any upward scale activity as a result of my downward mobility, but I'm just afraid that I'll do like I always do and let this set back set me all the way back. 

I think it's a good sign that I am anxious because I can't exercise, but if I'm not pushing myself to get up and try I'm not sure how good of a sign it is...  I guess time will tell.

Venting,
Heather

Losing Weight: A Battle Against Fat And Biology

A link to an NPR story which has haunted me all week....

I found the following story on the NPR iPhone App:
http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/2011/10/31/141794801/losing-weight-a-battle-against-fat-and-biology?sc=17&f=1128

Losing Weight: A Battle Against Fat And Biology
by Patti Neighmond

- October 31, 2011

Part of an ongoing series on obesity in America

If you're among the two-thirds of Americans who are overweight, chances are you've had people tell you to just ease up on the eating and use a little self-control. It does, of course, boil down to "calories in, calories out."

But there's a lot more to it than that, according to obesity specialist Dr. Donna Ryan, associate director for clinical research at the Pennington Biomedical Research Center in Baton Rouge, La.

It's a popular misconception, she says, that losing weight is "strictly a matter of willpower." It's a gigantic task, she says, because not only do we move through an incredible buffet of food spread before us every day, but we also face a battle with our own biological responses.

It starts when we begin to shed those first few pounds. At that point, "the biology really kicks in and tries to resist the weight loss," she says.

Take 56-year-old Mary Grant, who's faced a lifetime battling fat, beginning in childhood, when her father humiliated her in front of the family by publicly weighing her every Saturday morning and insisted on her trying diet after diet.

In the end, Grant unsuccessfully tried "the grapefruit before every meal diet, Weight Watchers in the early days, when you had to eat chicken livers, the hard-boiled eggs and salad diet, the tomato soup diet, the cabbage soup diet, essentially anything," says Grant, "to get that weight off me."

But the weight did not "come off." It wasn't until after nursing school that Grant was successful in dropping 100 pounds after a medically supervised fast. Dramatic as that success was, it didn't last. Grant gained much of the weight back. Most people do, according to health experts.

And here's why:

When you begin to lose pounds, levels of the hormone leptin, which is produced by fat cells, begin to drop. That sends a message to the brain that the body's "fat storage" is shrinking. The brain perceives starvation is on the way and, in response, sends out messages to conserve energy and preserve calories. So, metabolism drops.

And then other brain signals tell the body it's "hungry," and it sends out hormones to stimulate the appetite. The combination of lowered metabolism and stimulated appetite equals a "double whammy," says Ryan. And that means the person who's lost weight can't consume as much food as the person who hasn't lost weight.

For example, if you weigh 230 pounds and lose 30 pounds, you cannot eat as much as an individual who has always weighed 200 pounds. You basically have a "caloric handicap," says Ryan. And depending on how much weight people lose, they may face a 300-, 400- or even 500-calorie a day handicap, meaning you have to consume that many fewer calories a day in order to maintain your weight loss.

This means no more grapefruit or cabbage soup diets: You need a diet you can stay on forever. For most people, that means high fiber, low fat and low sugar.

But you can fight back against a lowered metabolism. You can "kick" your metabolism back up by exercising every day. One recent study found people were able to burn up an extra 450 calories a day with one hour of moderate exercise.

It doesn't have to be vigorous jogging. You can walk briskly, bike or swim. Health experts recommend 30 minutes of moderate physical activity a day in order to reduce risk for heart disease. But obesity experts say if you want to lose or maintain weight, you have to double that and exercise at least one hour every day.

If obesity has touched your life, share your story with NPR and the Public Insight Network. [Copyright 2011 National Public Radio]

To learn more about the NPR iPhone app, go to http://iphone.npr.org/recommendnprnews

Heather 

Ugh

I've said it before. Easier to stay on track then to get back on it.

Live from the elliptical,
Heather