This Workout Brought to you by... Netflix

Recently, Mr. Kawaii and I joined the golden age of video rental by joining Netflix.  Although it's been around for years now, it took our local video rental store closing down for us to finally make the leap to give Netflix a try.  As we have been browsing through the instant downloads on our Xbox, I noticed that there are quite a few workout videos available to watch instantly, and DVDs available by mail.

This morning when I poked my head out the door and a blast of cold air hit me in the face, I decided to stay in and give the Netflix queue a try.  I quickly found Self: Bikini Ready Fast! and decided to give it a shot.  It was a pretty low-impact strength training workout, and I pulled my trusty Kidney Bean cans out of the cabinet to substitute for weights.  It was easy to follow along, and I was SUPREMELY pleased when at the end of the exercise the instructor gave tips on eating a healthy diet including a little bit of everything.  She spoke of the importance of including fats, carbs, protein and fiber into well-rounded eating habits as well as giving ourselves a break now and again to splurge on our favorite foods.

With all the hype of wildly popular shows like The Biggest Loser focusing on how to lose as much weight as possible - and fast - a big gap has been left for people who are looking for sustainable solutions.  Restrictive diets and hours-long exercise routines are difficult for most people to follow for more than a few weeks at a time, and it takes a big reality check for those of us who need to come to terms with understanding that eating 1,100 calories and spending 3 hours at the gym every single day is just not something we can do.

I have learned over the last year that the most difficult and rewarding part of living a healthy lifestyle is finding patience.  We need patience for ourselves so that we can move at our own pace and find long-lasting results, we need patience for others who think we aren't getting "enough" results and we need patience for our bodies to know that they will change in their own way and time.  Changing the way we live is a very difficult task, which is why so few people are able to see their goals through to the end.  The most important thing for me, and for you, is to just keep trying.  We'll get there when we get there!

Thanksgiving Thoughts and Reflections

It had been my intention to work out every day this week to get back into the habit of posting on this blog frequently.  Sadly, the plan got de-railed Monday when Mr. Kawaii and I had to make the difficult choice to lay our sick kitty to rest.  The event has thrown a wrench into all of our holiday plans, and has given me a chance to reflect on the things that are most important in my life.

It is easy when we are committed to trimming and slimming our waistlines to become so focused on ourselves that we loose sight of the world around us.  In the past, I have spent the holiday season analyzing every ounce of turkey, gravy and sliver of pumpkin pie in an effort to not gain weight, and although my intentions are always good it causes me to see the season through a filter of longing, faltering willpower and inevitable regret.  In the end, what really matters isn't so much what we put in our mouths at holiday parties and gatherings, instead it is that we are surrounded by people (and animals) who love us wholly and completely as we are - whether we lose that next 10 pounds or not.

This year, I'm going to take a deep breath and eat what I want the first time around, skip the second helpings and just do my best to stick with exercise whenever I can fit it in.  In the end, I know that if I stress too much over little things like rogue gingerbread cookies and attacks of marshmallow snowmen, that I'm going to miss the point of the season.

To everyone who has cheered me along on this journey, thank you.  I sincerely appreciate your support, and hope to see you out and about next week when we are all working off that little bit of stuffing. :)

Chasing the 4:35 Train

Adding some oompf to an otherwise computer-keying day, I decided to take a walk through the neighborhood to the local grocery store this afternoon.  On my way back as I crossed over the train tracks I noticed the afternoon train coming down the line.  I decided to try to beat the train through the neighborhood (the tracks run parallel to the road that I walk to get to my house) and held my giant bundle of toilet paper and brownie mix tight against my chest as I hoofed it across the concrete.

The train probably moves at 4 or 5 miles an hour, which is still slightly faster than I can walk and so I really had to push myself which is surprisingly difficult with 12 rolls of toilet paper filling both arms and a sack of boxed goodness pounding against your outer thigh.  The people in the neighborhood all looked at me in confusion as I peeked between the houses to see how I was progressing and trying to stay in front of the nose of the train.

Sadly the train beat me to the end of the street, but only by a nose.  I was even with the conductor's window at the end of the "race".  I take a proud second place though, realizing that the conductor has thousands of tons of steel, fuel and momentum keeping him moving and all I've got are a pair of New Balance shoes and the promise of frosted brownies in my future.

Recognizing My Own Success Story

I realized this morning that I have been blogging about my exercise adventure for just about 6 months now, and what a journey it has been.  I've seen my share of highs and lows over the last six months, have been witness to great changes in M and K, and even a few in myself.  I spent the morning on a 2.5 mile walk with Pooch, and we spent our time out on the sidewalk reflecting on where I've been and where I'm heading.

When I started this blog, it was with the idea that if I had some outside accountability that maybe I'd be able to stick with the whole "lifestyle change" concept long enough for it to start working.  Work it has, although not in the way that I had expected it to.  I was seeking instant results on the scale, expecting to drop 40 or 50 pounds within six months and be back to a size 8 before Christmas.

Although those aren't the results that I've seen so far, I am confident that they are on the horizon and I am taking one step at a time in the right direction.  Unfortunately, in my past I have done a number on my body through 10 years of binge eating and starvation topped off with 4 years of eating fast food roughly 12 times a week.  Because of my past diet insanity, my body is still afraid to let go of the pounds although it has started shifting things around and transforming some of those former lumps into muscle that are so real you can see and feel them lurking under my skin.

All those trips to the gym, laps around the track and yoga sessions in the living room have given me results that are frequent and substantial enough to keep me going, and through blogging about the craziness of trying to jog with a dog who wants to paint fences every 50 feet and being attacked by flora and fauna in equal doses in the back yard, I have been able to share my experience with others.

This experience has reminded me that sometimes we just have to recognize our own success story instead of comparing ourselves to others.  We might not all be millionaire-triathlete-raceway-superstars, but we are all treading the paces of our own journey to shape who we will become in the years ahead of us.  And while yes, it is great when there are enthusiastic people like M and K to encourage us along the way, there will always be those days when we just have to get up and be our own cheerleader.

So, in the spirit of cheering for myself, here are my awesome results that have stacked up over the last six months:

• Gone from barely being able to zip up my size 18 jeans to comfortably fitting into my size 16 jeans and size 14 dresses.
• Lost 3 pounds since starting this blog, and 6 pounds overall.
• Have traversed the gap in my belt, going from barely able to get into the last notch on the belt to now being 4 notches in.
• Discovered that I have "tank top arms" for the first time in years, with muscular shoulders and emerging biceps.
• Went from walking a 22 minute mile to being able to walk/jog a 16 minute mile.
• Have slimmed to a point where my fingers are thin enough to wear my wedding ring every day, even to sleep.
• Can see my wrist bones for the first time since 1997.
• No longer feel like I am "spilling out" over the edge of chairs, car seats or benches.
• Have more energy than I know what to do with some days!

Sure, I haven't met my goals of losing 40 pounds and dropping to a size 8, but look at all the things I HAVE done!  Most of the things I have achieved are things that I never even thought of as goals, but they went ahead and showed up anyway.  The proof is in the fat-free lactose-free sugar-free pudding, and I know that as long as I continue avoiding the drive-thru lane and keep finding ways to be active that I will continue to inch my way towards the smaller bottom of my dreams.

Nearing the Finish line at the 2010 Great Columbia Crossing
October, 2010

I'm Not Obese, I'm Bacon Enhanced!

Well, I've been talking about doing a blog to follow my quest for a smaller bottom (and waist and arms and legs and...) for the last year.  Now that I am precisely 105 days away from my target, and no less large than I was a year ago I figure it's high time I get myself in gear and make myself accountable for losing enough poundage to look like Lara Croft.

So, to start off, let's take a look at where I'm at and how I got here.

Here I am today:

No, I'm not Master Chief... that's me on the left.  The one with the crazy face.  I was originally conceived in a scientific experiment that involved melding human skin with an LCD screen.  The results are really amazing, albeit a bit pixelated.  You'll be able to download your own LCD Skin app from Apple in 2025.

Note in the photo that I've accumulated what we like to call a "Bacon Enhanced" physique.  I tip the scales at very near 200 pounds.  196.8 to be exact.  It's hard for me to type that... but it's the truth.  Four years ago I weighed 50 pounds less than than I do now.  I hovered between 145 and 150 and was a size eight.  I started to say "was a happy size eight", but that isn't really true.

I've had weight issues all my life, which I blame primarily on my upbringing (sorry, mom and dad).  When I was 12 my uncle told me he was thinking about breaking up with his girlfriend because she weighed 120 pounds.  At 12 I was as tall as I am today, and I weighed 125 pounds.  Now, that single exchange isn't what has caused me to focus so squarely on what the scale says every morning.  No, there were many such comments made by almost all of my family members about my weight, their weight, and the weight of just about everyone around them.  So, it's been something that I've worried about all my life and I've struggled with both Anorexia in my teens (I weighed an average of 107 my Senior Year of high school) and Binge Eating throughout my Twenties.

But somehow, I was able to gain and maintain a steady weight of 145 - 150 for about three years and while I always wanted to be "just one pants size smaller" in reality I was super healthy with exercise and balanced eating both included in my daily habits.  

Sadly, I lost my ability to control my eating and keep an active lifestyle when I got an amazing opportunity to spend 4 years sitting at a desk for 10 hours a day with unlimited free fast food at my disposal.  I've learned a lot about myself and about business over the last 4 years, but "healthy" hasn't been a part of my vocabulary in quite some time.  Between the chili-cheese-burritos and mozzarella sticks, the thousands of hours spent slaving away in an office chair and the stress of meeting deadlines I lost the drive, energy and desire to focus on the scale.

So now I am a curvy size 18 instead of a svelte size 8.  Being classified by my doctor, my BMI and my Wii as "Obese" really sucks although truth be told I do enjoy being called "Curvy", "Voluptuous" and a "Big, Beautiful Woman".  But it's time for me to go back to some middle-size so I've set a goal for myself to drop to 160 pounds and a size 10 by September 3rd.  It's totally do-able if I stick to it (and I do need your help, dear reader to keep me on track), and now that I've kicked the desk-job to the curb and distanced myself as far as possible from the free fast food I know that it is something that I can maintain long-term too.

So I ask from you, reader of blogs, to please comment on my posts with your own weight loss frustrations and victories.  I will in turn start posting my thoughts and activities several times a week (I'm shooting for daily, but as I'm spending more and more time outdoors I forsee there may be a few days I don't make it online).  By helping each other we can all meet our goals, whether they are the last stubborn 5 or 105 pounds on our trek to healthiness.  Let's put down the bacon, and look forward to a thinner tomorrow!