A New Day

I went to the gym at my new apartment today after work and worked out for 30 minutes. I ate my designated meal prepped meals, with the exception of two chocolate chip cookies at work. I wish I wouldn’t have had them, but everyday will be a challenge.

I am going to challenge myself to work out 30 mins a day, five days a week. I am going to eat as healthy as possible and no meals or snacks after 9:30pm. As for today, I feel good. But the first day is always the easiest. It’s the days that follow that are always the hardest. I will conquer them this time. I have to..

Reality Check

I think it’s time that I have a reality check. Here it is the end of September, going into November, and nothing has changed. Reading my old blog posts from the beginning of the year has truly made me sad. Disappointed. Angry. This weight loss shit is hard. It’s even harder when you feel like you just can’t do it. I have a defeatist attitude when it comes to it. I am defeated before it even gets started. I have seen people change their lives from the beginning of the year to now while mine has stayed stagnant. I am tired. I am sick of associating negative words with my life. I want to live and be happy. I want to be free from myself, because at the end of the day, I’m the only one holding me back. Admitting this is easy. Doing something about it is the hard part.

My body is constantly in pain. My back, my legs, my feet are constantly sore or hurting, I am tired of being lazy. Of feeling lazy. Of wishing and hoping and pretending to be ok when I’m not. I am the cause of my own unhappiness so therefore I know I can hold the key to my own happiness. It is hard, but I know I have to do it…..

Day 1

So far, day 1 of my 30 days of accountability challenge has been going well. I woke up, gave thanks, and said something nice about myself. Today I focused on the fact that I’m funny and have a great sense of humor. This is one of the things I like the most about myself. So far, my eating is right on track with what I meal prepped. For breakfast I had low fat vanilla yogurt with pineapples & granola. I had a snack which was a Special K Moments bar, the salted caramel one. It’s only 70 calories so it’s a tasty little treat and not too bad for you. For lunch I’m having brown rice & salsa and a chicken fajita with green, yellow, & red peppers, and a little shredded cheese, on a whole wheat tortilla. During my hour long lunch break, I plan to eat first, then spend 30 minutes walking around downtown for my exercise today. Not the most invigorating form of exercise, but the point was to get moving for at least 30 minutes a day. Now I will say this will be my one and only set back today because my alarm was set for 4:45am so that I could be at the gym at 5:30 this morning but…I just couldn’t get myself out of the bed! I bought a new foam mattress topper thing and it is EVERYTHING! Seriously, I sleep like a baby. My mattress is good and firm, but I need a little softness and support because my back was killing me and since I’ve been sleeping on it, I’ve noticed my back has been hurting a lot less the last few days. Ok, that was off topic but anyway! I also have to work at my part time job tonight so..a brisk walk downtown during my lunch break will have to be the extent of it today. Luckily at my part time, there’s lots of walking and lifting of heavy boxes so..I think that should count toward my exercise as well. I’m honestly not too disappointed because at least I’ll be moving, which is better than the alternative. I will make more of an effort to get up early in the morning to workout. 

I plan on taking my dinner with me to work tonight so I can eat it while I’m there because I won’t be getting off until 9:30pm which means I won’t get home until around 10. I’ll be having a grilled chicken salad with baby spinach and a mix of lettuces, salad toppers, peppers, feta cheese, and an avocado ranch dressing (2 tbs is 130 cals and it’s really yummy). Once I get home I plan on getting straight to bed! I don’t want to get ahead of myself, but it seems like day 1 is shaping up to be a sucess!

xoxo.

30 Days of Accountability

There are things in life that I can’t control. I can’t control whether or not a job will hire me, no matter how qualified I am or how well I perform during an interview. I can’t control the weather messing up my hair or other people’s opinions about various topics. But what I can control is my happiness. My destiny. My health. 2014 has not been going at all the way I thought it would be. I have spent so much time focusing on things that I just can’t change, and neglecting the ones that I can, such as my health and this weight loss journey. I have come up with my own challenge for the month of April. One that is just for me, not one that someone else created that is going to help them succeed. This one is for me, by me, and only I can make it happen. I’m calling it 30 Days of Accountability. 

It’s officially Spring, and I’m ready to wash away all the feelings of hurt, shame, and inadequacy that I have been experiencing the last few months and start over with a clean slate and a new perspective. I may not have the job of my dreams. I may not be making the most money. But even if I lose all of that tomorrow, one thing will remain and that’s me and my health. My life has felt so incredibly out of my control lately, so I need to focus on the things that I do have control over like what I put in my body and whether or not I’m working out. I just want to feel like I’m accomplishing something in my life, because as of late, I haven’t felt like I’ve really accomplished anything. During these 30 days I will basically be focusing on 3 basic points: food, physical activity, and mental health.

30 Days of Accountability:

• Meal Prep!
• Stick to meal prepped food/snacks ONLY. No additional snacking throughout the day, no treats at work, & no eating past 9:00pm.
• (At least) 30 Minutes of exercise 5 days a week! Whether it’s at the gym or at home..I have to get moving for 30 minutes. 
• Wake up and give thanks. Say something nice about myself (has to be a different thing each day).
• Go to bed and reflect on one positive thing from the day. Must be in bed by 10:30pm during the week.
• Write a blog post every day to track progress & measure accountability.

These may all seem like simple things to you..but for me, being accountable for my weight loss has been harder than I could have ever imagined. With so much going on in my life..I have made excuse after excuse not to take better care of me. But it’s affecting me in more ways then I know..and I have to get on track. I want this more than anything…and I literally feel I’m at a point where I’m ready to fight for my life..fight to be the happy person I used to be. Day 1 starts tomorrow.

Over it [dot] com.

I used to pride myself on being a really positive person. On being happy. On seeing the good in everything and every situation. Now I’m wondering if I ever really was, or if I’d just gotten so good at pretending to be happy for the outside world that even I started believing it was the truth. Lately I’ve been in such a dark place. Nothing in my life seems to be going right. Job stress. Money stress. Car stress. And I recently learned that someone stole my identity and tried to file taxes as me. Smh…I feel like I can’t catch a break. I can’t focus on working out or losing weight when it seems like my life is falling apart at the seams. At this moment, in the space in time, I just want to run away. I know that this is temporary and “this too shall pass” but in this moment, it seems like it never will.

Back to the Basics!

This week I had somewhat of a break down/ wake up call/ come to Jesus moment, whatever you want to call it. But I realize that my weight loss journey is my own. Only I can do it, and no one can do the work for me. So I knew I needed to start fresh and have a clean break. I went grocery shopping after I got off work Monday night and I bought everything I needed to meal prep for the week.

Breakfast: Low fat vanilla yogurt, peaches or pineapples, granola.

Snack 1: Celery, hummus, and sliced pepper jack cheese.

Lunch: Chick fajitas (whole wheat tortilla, chicken breast, onions, green pepper, red pepper, jalapeno, 1tbs cheddar cheese), brown rice & salsa.

Snack 2: Granola bar or chex mix.

Dinner: Whatever I feel like making when I get home. More than likely a salad or lettuce wraps with chicken, cheese, salsa…

Optional Snack: Skinny Cow ice cream sandwich.

Meal prepping is so beneficial to me. It really takes the guess work out of what I’m going to have for lunch and it actually saves me money. I don’t even want to know how much I’ve spent on eating out the last month and a half. I really want to focus more on my eating habits. I know I have a terrible relationship with food. My main problems with food is overeating, binge eating, and emotional eating.

Even yesterday…I meal prepped..I did great all day at work eating my meals at the respective times. When I got home, I ate my dinner. Then I went back for a little more. Immediately after I ate some chex mix. A little while passed and I was having my “Optional” snack. All of this happened within a span of two hours. I don’t even know if I was hungry. Just knowing the food is there…is enough to make me go eat it. Even if it’s healthier options, I still binge. I feel like that’s even more of a reason to. I don’t feel happy afterward…I question myself on why I ate all of that food. I feel disgusted. And then I do it again the next day. It’s a battle. But I’ve got to start practicing some type of willpower or I’ll never be able to accomplish my goal of losing weight. I think eventually I want to start seeing a nutritionist and maybe even a therapist to work through my issues with food. I think once I can conquer my relationship with food, everything else will fall into place.

“You don’t have any athletic ability.”

Said my best friend. -______- I wish I could say this was the first time she’s mad a little dig like this at me but unfortunately it’s not. She’s also told me that if a person gets mad at me the first thing they think is, “Fat bitch!” Yeahhhh so needless to say I know what she thinks about me when she’s mad. But for her to tell me I have no athletic ability when I grew up playing sports is ridiculous. Anyone can be an athlete if they work hard for it. And that’s exactly what I plan to do. Ugh.

“Do you want me to get you a donut?”

One of my supervior’s at work asked me today. “No, thank you. I’m fine.” I replied. “Are you sure? You don’t want one?” he asked me again. “I’m sure, thanks.” “You sure, you’re sure?” he asked AGAIN. “I’M SURE THANK YOU!” I replied loudly. “Ooook.” he said in his stupid sing song voice that annoys the shit out of me.

Like seriously. What. the. fuck.

Just because I’m a bigger woman doesn’t mean I have to gorge myself with donuts every time they’re offered to me. I already don’t care for this supervisor, but at times I feel like he’s personally taking little digs at me and I’ve about had enough of it. If you ask me if I want something and I tell you no, say ok and keep it moving. 

This journey has been difficult enough. I have stopped and started and given up and felt let down and felt defeated and felt fat and depressed and disgusting so many times throughout it. And then there are times when I’ve felt strong, and good, and capable of doing this. When a situation like this occurs, where someone makes the assumption that because I am overweight that I want something bad that they’re having it’s like a slap in the face. I would love to say that he said this and I let it roll off of me but it bothered me. It made me angry, and it hurt just a little bit.

Something has to change.

“You look like you eat healthy…”

Says the cashier at the grocery store as she rings up my groceries. I politely respond, “I try.” Because I do try. I may not go to the gym or workout nearly as much as I wish I did, but I do try my best to eat as healthy as possible. Just the other day I had a conversation with a friend telling her I for the life of me, can’t remember the last time I ate Doritos. Doritos used to be my favorite snack in the WHOLE ENTIRE WORLD. Seriously. But I honestly can’t remember the last time I bought or ate them. And I’m ok with that. It’s funny because when I go grocery shopping, junk food like that doesn’t even cross my mind anymore. I’m much more apt to buy pita chips & hummus or low fat yogurt & granola for a snack then I am for the crap that I used to eat.

That’s why I know this journey hasn’t been all bad. I’ve succeeded in the healthy eating department and making better choices. It’s just hard to stick to it when I have thin(ner) friends who eat whatever they want and encourage me to have what they’re having. I’ve said it once and I’ll say it again..they support me…but it seems as if they don’t care/don’t want me to succeed. Sad, but I’m dealing with it…and I guess the only way to truly handle it is to not give in to the temptations they bring around me.

But I’m excited for the new year. I was approached to be apart of a really cool project that I’m super excited about that’s taking place in January. I’ll share more as the date approaches, but just know it’s super cool and I’m really excited to be apart of it because I think it’s something that will (hopefully) open a lot of eyes.

xoxo.

Lazy much?

Why am I so freaking lazyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy. I’m tired of complaining and whining about it and doing nothing to change it. I can only be mad at myself because I’m doing it to myself. Ugh….so annoying. I will get up and go to the gym in the morning. I will, (ignoring the tiny voice in my head that says I won’t.)