This Week's Challenge!

I know I am posting a bit early this week, but I have discovered a few things and I would really like to keep the motivation wagon moving. The more I write here, the more accountable I am when the wheels stop.

Motivation Status

Firstly, I did weigh myself on Friday. The results were that I have in fact gained back again all of what I lost in January and February, plus interest. I knew that would be the case. I was dismayed, but not surprised.

Age 18, 145ish soaking wet

I also discovered that one of the best motivators for me is going to be looking at pictures of myself from years ago. The only problem here being is that I have never actually felt skinny. I don't actually look particularly skinny in any of these pictures, but I know now that I was actually right around what I should weigh. I just wasn't fit, so it sort of doesn't look it. 

Clearly I have been the weight I want to be before in my adult life. Sure, I was still a bit chubby here and there, but I have quite literally ALWAYS had a belly. Ever since 8th grade, when I was shocked into body image consciousness. However, I think that with the right effort, I can lose the weight and the belly, I just need to do the right exercise.

From October 2006(?) at 135ish

I'm in the back, in the magenta. May 2007. My hips are tiny!

Exercise Status

Last week I went on 2 walks. 1 on Sunday, and another on Friday. I also went swimming on Wednesday. So I succeeded in exercising 3 times last week. 10 dollars for me (20 in all, I'm getting better!) Total I walked 3 and a half miles.

I absolutely love walking out by the lake. It's calm, quiet and usually populated with families, other runners/ walkers or people out fishing. Everyone pretty much keeps to themselves, and there aren't any shadowy hideaways for would-be bad guys. I feel safe there when going by myself.

Zombies. Run! has been a true godsend. It's the entire reason I have the motivation to go out and walk. My options in the evening/ afternoon have become: sit around, be lazy and play on the computer, or the xbox for 4 hours, or, go out and play Zombies for a while and also achieve your exercise. Zombies, being two birds with one stone, often wins. This is a good thing.

I hope to start seeing results soon, but I think I have a lot of muscle to build first. I have already noticed that walking is easier. It used to be quite difficult for me to walk long distances at any sort of reasonable pace, but now I can keep up with Jon. I've also learned that most girl pants and girl shoes are simply not meant to be moved in, just by comparison of my speed depending on what I'm wearing. I have a way easier time going speedily if I'm wearing running shorts and shoes, than if I'm in skinny jeans and Toms. 

In terms of the belly I referenced earlier, the plan at the moment is to focus on the walking until results start happening. I will worry about ab exercise at another point.

Food Status

Not much has changed since last week (though we did go grocery shopping on Friday), but it's only Monday. I have however, begun a detox.

I saw a thing on pinterest that was a recipe for super detox juice recommended by Jillian Michaels. I'm not following the recipe exactly, but I did get the jist. It's just water really. But simultaneously, it's more than water. I have a 32 ounce Gatorade bottle filled with the juice of a quarter lemon and cold water, with a tea bag of Detox tea, with dandelion leaf. I actually really like the tea. It's a very subtle flavor, but it's sweet, spicy and interesting with the lemon. The original recipe also calls for a bit of cranberry juice, but since I don't need the juicy temptation sitting around the house, I decided to leave it out. I drink 2 of these bottles a day, getting 64 ounces of water. Supposedly after a week it's supposed to have kicked out 5 pounds of water weight. I doubt this, but it is a great way to get lots of water and it does seem to be helping me somehow. It's been keeping me from getting quite as hungry at odd times. Actually, over the past couple days that I've been doing this, I've been finding myself wanting to drink MORE than the 64 ounces. For example, right now, it's 12:30p and I have just about finished my first 32 ounces. I will probably finish the next 32 before I leave work this afternoon, and then I will need more water for my walk this evening. I will drink ALL the waters!

I'll let you know later this week (or next) about how this holds up and how the rest of the eating goes.

This Week's Challenge

This week, I will exercise 3 times again, probably mostly by walking. My goal is 6 miles, which means three 45 minute walks. I get 10 bucks if I do this.

New Motivation!

When I started this blog, my big weight loss motivator was Burning Man. That fell through when tickets became near impossible to obtain, and well, everything sort of flopped.

Now, however, I think I have a new motivator, and this will do not only for the weight loss but also for work, making it extra good.

A trip to Hawaii has become financially viable. I will have a place to stay for free once the school year begins, which will greatly reduce overall cost of the trip. The plan (at least in my head, I do need to discuss this with Jon still) is to wait for the cheapest tickets possible, then promptly buy them, get the time off for a week and go.

This serves as a motivation for both weight loss and work because:

1) Hawaii means beach. Beach means bikini. You see the connection here with weightloss. One might be able to argue that summer in general should provide that motivation, but I'd like to point out that I live and work in San Francisco/ the Bay. The water here is cold, I am cold in the city all day, and when it is warm, I am usually inside. Sure, I go swimming every now and then, but then its only with my family/ Jon and it's at least semi private. Hawaii is much higher self-conscious stakes than that.

2) Hawaii is expensive. Not only will I need the money to shell out on airplane tickets, theres also the cost of food, travel on the island and general monetary freedom while vacationing. I'll need to do some calculations and make a reasonably sized budget. But, before I can do that, I need to keep earning money. To do that I need to work, and I need to work my full hours so I can earn as much money as possible so I can go to Hawaii and not be concerned financially. Therefore: I wanna go to Hawaii? I gotta earn it. Motivation!

So, back to our regularly scheduled fitness/ food update:

I didn't set any goals this past week, but to some extent I do feel that I met the undefined ones. Jon and I went walking last Thursday evening, just as I had said I wanted to. It was a bit more uphill than originally intended, but it was good and both Jon and I felt a bit better afterwards. Zombies. Run! is indeed excellent motivation for walks. We went again Sunday evening, to a different place that was much flatter and prettier. I think we will return there when we next go walking. I went swimming yesterday with my family. So I have been pretty good about getting in some real exercise (walking a mile or more, swimming for an hour) about every 3-4 days. It's not as awesome as it could be, but it is better than nothing and definitely better than before.

In terms of food, the tossups remain. I am generally trying to avoid sugar and carbs (or at least severely reduce consumption of both), but there are several aspects of my diet in which that doesn't work. I've had several run ins with lactose in the past week, and I think I am discovering that certain pills are more effective than others, despite the fact that I need to take them more often. I also have noted that the almond milk I love so much is sadly filled with sugar. So, as soon as I have consumed it all I will need to get the unsweetened kind and sweeten it myself with splenda. But! A good thing I have noticed is that I have started eating significantly less. On days when I am at home, I simply munch all day on whatever we have, often fruits, veggies, cheese and whole grains like oatmeal. On work days, I have breakfast before I leave home (oatmeal and almond milk or whole wheat bagel and cream cheese), a snack midmorning (goldfish), lunch of some kind, and then I don't eat again until I am home and I either make dinner, order dinner, or initiate varietal munching.

Dinner remains somewhat problematic generally speaking, but it's mostly that I am cooking or ordering for 2, and Jon eats very differently from the way I should be eating. Jon absolutely hates being hungry, and so he likes to eat big, fortifying meals that will protect him from the hunger monster later. It makes him nervous to eat little meals, and he becomes worried when he doesn't think whatever food I'm making will hold him. This is somewhat contradicted by the fact that he doesn't want me to change whatever it is I'm making just because he's worried about being hungry later. Oh, and combine this with the fact that we don't go grocery shopping enough, so there's hardly ever anything in the house that he wants to eat that is simultaneously easy for me to cook or for him to make for himself. What I really need to do is to find some meals that are light in small portions and heavy in big ones, easy to cook and good for long-term storage. I can think of one right now, chili... but I will need more than that. Ideas anyone? Preferably I'd like to stay away from any "health food" ingredients (yes, even though they are delicious), since I am also contending with the "this food is weird, I'm not really all that hungry, you eat it" tendencies of a 23-year-old male who likes normal things and looks askance at whole wheat pasta. [I love you Jon, even if you don't like whole wheat pasta]

I have not weighed myself in a week or so, despite the seeming to stick changes in both diet and exercise regimen. I will probably weigh myself tomorrow when I get up, since I have the day off and it will be something like noon.

Anyway, I'm looking for dinner ideas, if you've got 'em, send them my way!

On the bright side, breakfast!

As you all have probably figured out by now, I don't post when I haven't done anything. And really, I haven't.

The running didn't happen again. I was never presented with a timely opportunity. It bothers me, especially because I bought the game ZOMBIES. RUN! for my phone and I just plain old haven't had the chance to use it. I am trying to figure out ways to get myself to go out and run, or walk for exercise (rather than just to get someplace) or even do yoga. And I've been having a really hard time finding the time... or more like the motivation when it actually comes around that I have some free time.

I decided yesterday that I am going to do SOMETHING tonight. I discovered two things relatively close to me: a yoga studio in Hayward that has regular classes at 7:15 and a sweet introductory offer (as well as a yoga bootcamp, which I may want to try), and also that there are a couple parks within 5-10 minute drive of my apartment. I think that, generally speaking, I will be more inclined to exercise if I have someone there doing it with me,and I'm going to have a much easier time convincing Jon to come walk around the lake with me while playing ZOMBIES! than I will convincing him to come to a yoga class. So, I will try to convince him to come with me tonight to The park to go on a walk/ run / saunter. If he cannot be convinced (or his legs hurt from work) I will either go by myself or I will go to yoga at 715. Sort of nervous about doing that by myself.

In addition to all this...attempts at exercise, my diet has been changing around constantly. I discovered about a month and a half ago that I have become somewhat lactose intolerant. It's not violent, but it is uncomfortable, and so I have been attempting to rid my diet of lactose. Here is where you should be saying "whaaaat? but Kiersten you love cheese!" And it's true, I freaking love cheese. This is entirely why I can't go vegan, or even get rid of lactose completely. So, what I've been doing is drinking almond milk (which is delicious) and taking a pro-biotic lactase pill once a day when I eat dairy. It amounts to most days. It has helped. Even so, I have cut back on dairy generally speaking. When I think about my lunches, I find myself calculating 3 different ingredient possibilities: dairy, sugar and carbs. It's pretty much impossible to avoid all 3 unless you get a salad, and the last salad I had wasn't very tasty, and totally turned me off to the whole thing. Not good. So what I have been eating has been a series of burritos, japanese, chinese and lasagna, mixed in with low calorie but high carb frozen meals from Safeway. That's lunch. [On the very bright side, there's a Chipotle opening a block away from my work some time this summer, yay!]

Dinner and breakfast are different stories. Dinner is, for the most part, still pretty low carb. I make the chicken and zucchini bake at least once a week, and have at least one night where I don't eat much other than grapes and cheese. There are of course, also many nights where I just microwave frozen cheese ravioli from Costco (easy AND delicious) and cover it in marinara sauce of questionable sugar content. I mean, it's delicious and theoretically healthy (sometimes I add veggies too), but it's a complete failure if I'm trying to rid myself of sugar, carbs and dairy, since it has all three.
Breakfast! I have actually started eating it. Last week I purchased some oatmeal (a whole grain!) and Jon bought me some whole wheat bagels. I figure, on a scale of 1 to clif bar, they're about a 5. Plus I like them better. I eat the oatmeal soaked in cold almond milk. I cannot describe the creamy deliciousness, you should try it. I of course, put cream cheese on the bagels. duh.

This past weekend, before Pride, I made cream cheese crepes. There's a recipe in the YUM pins on my pinterest. They were good! Sort of hard to flip, but good! I recommend them.

Related to that, I got a blender! It blends things! Like smoothies and other smooth delicious things. I am excited!

IN CONCLUSION: I have been bad, but simultaneously good in weird ways. I'm trying to fix it and find some consistency. I have achieved breakfast! I will achieve exercise! Then I will battle lunch and achieve it too.

Running

I am not a runner. My body is simply not built to run. My bones are too heavy to have a good relationship with the ground at high velocity.

However, running is a very good way to get aerobic exercise. And I can get the exercise at the level I need most efficiently if I run. It is therefore, perhaps, a necessary torture.

It has been pointed out to me that the best time to exercise is in the morning, before your body has a chance to figure out what's going on and initiate shut down. I have to get up at 5 all this week to take Jon to BART (we've had some...transportation related issues of late), so, I figured I would take the opportunity to trick my body into figuring out running again.

"Again"?

I had to run every day in middle school. It was part of our daily PE program to run for 8 to 12 minutes at the beginning of each PE class. Even on the hottest days of the year, we still did the 8 minutes. Now, I was never fast. I was always at the back. There were only a couple people slower than me. When I graduated 8th grade, my mother told me that she had a discussion with the PE teacher, and that he had said that I had done an amazing job keeping up with it, even though I was just not built to run. If we had a swimming pool, I would have been doing that instead, and pretty much everyone who ever taught me PE knew it. I knew it. I am an evolutionary swimmer (though, being of general northern European decent, I can only guess at where my ancestors needed that skill). So, I have a swimming pool, why am I choosing to run?

The pool we have is small, not open (really) until 8 or 9, and is in the middle of the other half of my apartment complex. That doesn't make it far away, but it does make it public, and therefore deters me from using it. Also, when I come home from work everyday, it's filled with screaming children. No good for the kind of intense aerobic exercise I need. For running, all I have to do is work up the guts to run the whole way around the block and not die of hyperventilation.It doesn't take long, though it may seem like eternal suffering.

I went on my first run this morning. It was...interesting. Aside from the body over heating, ragged/ difficult breathing upon return to the apartment (both quelled by an immediate cold shower), it wasn't too bad. Though, I either need a hardier sports bra or I need to tape my chest down, because there's a lot of force involved and it makes it hard to breathe while running. Any ideas?

The only long term/ day of effects I have experienced are increased tiredness, hunger and a sort of confused "I exercised earlier..." feeling. I say confused because it's not entirely as pleasant as I would prefer, but it's not bad. I imagine the fatigue is mostly because I'm not used to it, and the hunger partly because I still skipped breakfast. I need to figure out a way not to do that... hmm to be contemplated.

Update: I've been sitting at my desk all day. My hip joints are displeased. Unsure if this is related


In terms of last week:

I did exercise 3 times. I did a whole lot of Jackknifes against the Wii Fit Yoga Trainer. I did 40 of them last time. I'm working on making that the main exercise on Wii Fit, along with general yoga stretches and the Advanced Step.

So. Success! Hurray! 10 dollars for me! Thats a grand total of... 10 so far. Wow I'm awesome at this (sarcasm).

Anyway. This week's goals are a little bit late in coming, but:

Run Wednesday and Friday. Wii Fit Thursday and sometime on the weekend. If I manage the run on Friday, I get the 10 bucks, if not, no 10 bucks. Wii Fit is worth an extra 5. So, if I manage all of that I get 15.

Preemptive goals for next week:
Jon goes back to working a little bit later, so it will make it a little tougher to get the run and a shower in, but I think I can still do it.

So run twice. However best fits my sleep, determination and confidence levels. It must happen twice to earn money though, otherwise no success.

Onwards!
. 

Zucchini and Chicken Bake

So, I made a delicious last night that I absolutely must record for posterity (and also so I can make it again, since I drastically altered the recipe).

I got the idea from this recipe, which I originally found on Pinterest.


Zucchini, Chicken and Cheese Bake


Prep time: 10 minutes
Bake time: 25 minutes
Total time: 35 minutes




Ingredients:
4 chicken breasts or equivalent
EVOO
3 medium zucchini cut into chunks (I did rounds)
1 large clove of garlic, minced
Fresh basil, chopped. (I used about 8 small leaves)
1 tablespoon (ish) dried oregano
Freshly grated pepper
Salt
The zest of one lemon
a handful of shredded parmesan cheese
4 tablespoons (ish) of goat cheese


Preheat oven to 425

1) Put the chicken, zucchini, basil and garlic into a baking dish
2) Drizzle EVOO over the top of everything (use about 2 tablespoons) and sprinkle the oregano, salt, pepper and lemon zest over the top.
3) Move everything around with your hands a bit to be sure the herbs and oil are spread evenly.
4) Sprinkle the parmesan over the top
5) Stick it in the oven!
6) After about 15 minutes, check on it, it should look mostly done. Add a smear of goat cheese to the top of each piece of chicken. Return to the oven and lower the temperature to 350 for another ten minutes or until the chicken is done.
7) EAT.

No Prize for you!

I totally failed this week. All goals failed.

I made a batch of flax bread tuesday morning, but didn't eat very much of it. I bought lunch 2 out of the 3 days I worked (I took friday off due to exhausted body rebellion), and I definitely did not exercise. So, complete failure, no prize for me.

I have yet to earn a prize, but I think it's more because I'm disobeying my own rules and giving myself too many tasks. I lack focus, and so it's bringing down my success rate. I'm simultaneously trying to not eat too many carbs (I'm not doing awful, but I'm certainly not succeeding either) and trying to get myself to exercise as well as dealing with just regular life things. So, it's too much and I need to back off somewhere.

So, for this coming week, exercise takes priority. I should pay attention to what I eat and be a bit careful, but it's not the priority of the week.

My goal is to exercise 3 days this week, hopefully MWF. If I can get some in tomorrow (sunday) I get an extra 2 dollars, making the prize for success this week 12 dollars.

-----------------

Now, on different, life related topics!

Work has... gotten worse. I've been reduced to data entry. DATA ENTRY. That's....intern level work. Now, if I were interning, that would be one thing, but I am distinctly NOT. Now, if they want to pay me $20 an hour to do data entry, then ok, but dear god am I unhappy. This is NOT what I signed up for. If I had known, or seen down the road that this is what I would have been doing, I would have taken the other job, because seriously? Not what I want to do, I am above fricking data entry. Admin for an internet start-up is much much closer than this nonsense. Sure, the data entry is vaguely VAGUELY marketing related (It's actually mostly accounting and admin related), but that doesn't make it better. I don't need experience with data entry, I need experience with marketing things and design things. I get those in tiny shreds, and the projects that matter to me get sidelined hardcore. I am upset and unhappy and I can't do anything about it. I have to wait until November to start looking for other work.

In the meantime though, I have purchased a set of classes from e-careers via a super awesome Groupon. The classes will teach me the basics of Web design and e-commerce. So, if I wanted to I can launch my own website and such when I'm done. If I can come up with any really cool possibly viable business constructs that I can hire my friends for, then maybe that is what I will do. At least for a bit.

Another thing that has come up recently in "argh life sucks lets change it" sorts of discussions with Jon, is something that a friend of ours is doing. Moving to Australia or New Zealand for the tourist season, finding gainful employment on a work and holiday visa, taking advantage of the benefits of higher minimum wage and less tax in those countries and earning a lot of money while exploring a new place. Our friend is going to Australia, Jon and I were thinking of going to New Zealand. This wouldn't happen for at least a year or so, because we can't both pay for it right now, and in order to enter NZ on a Work and Holiday visa, we need to show that we have both the minimum required funds to stay (to pay for the trip) and enough money for a ticket out of the country. That comes to about 5,000 NZ dollars each, not counting the original flight down there. I think that it would be a good experience for both of us, and there is a possibility that Jon could just internally transfer down there, so I would be the only one who needs to find a job. We couldn't really go until our lease is up here (next may) so that gives us a year to figure it all out. It might not happen, but it is something we both want to do, and that I think would be really good for both of us, both financially and life-wise.

So, by this time next year, I will have lots of Web design training, and we will hopefully be preparing to move to New Zealand. Now wouldn't THAT be cool.

Whew!

Well, this week has been a train wreck. I've been exhausted all week, been going into work late, I stayed home tuesday. Just not very functional in the general scheme of things.

I completed 3/5ths of my goal though... or I will this afternoon. I managed brief bouts of wii fit both monday and wednesday (half an hour each, a whole bunch of different exercises), and I plan to do it again tonight when I get home.

I also DID make flax bread (courtesy of my day off on Tuesday). I need to get a proper toaster, so I can toast it, because its a bit fluffy and airy for my general bread tastes. It's delicious with butter and honey though!

So, the goal next week is the same. I plan to make another batch of flax bread (perhaps 2 batches) on Monday (Memorial Day equals no work! Yay!) and also get some sandwich makings when I go to the store so I can take sandwiches to work, instead of buying lunch. On top of that, M-W-F Wii Fit. That's a lot for one week, so hopefully I can manage it.

I've been having a lot of trouble managing fatigue lately. I've been very tired this week, despite my going to bed early. When my alarm goes off at 7:30, I just can't will myself out of bed. Even if there's warm coffee waiting for me in the kitchen. [Courtesy of my super awesome boyfriend... who unfortunately goes in to work 2 hours before me.]

Part of the problem, I know, is that I am unhappy at work and I see very little point in going in these days. Today I heard about some possible progress and a possible return to my old project so, here's hoping I have purpose at work again soon.

Until then, I'm just going to work on getting my exercise in so that I can be healthier and sleep better. As well as just eating better generally speaking. With the flax bread I have managed to avoid the starchy carbs this week for the most part, but I have have executed a massive fail on the sugar front. That comes from it just being a rough week, though I know that at some point it does just make it worse. Doesn't keep me from eating the ice cream and sour patch kids though. Me and sugar have an instant gratification sort of relationship. We always have. I've eaten sugar like that since high school, and I know it's bad. I also know that the only way for me to defeat the weight at this point is to reduce the carbs and hit the relative gym (no actual gyms). And attempt restraint on the sugar front.

In terms of motivation... When I started up the Wii the other day it reminded me that, according to BMI, a healthy weight for me is 129. Now honestly, I think I would be a stick at 129, and I don't think I could sustain that weight, but I am curious as to what being 129 would be like. Keep in mind that that's a 60 pound drop for me, and at the current rate/ without me spending money on a trainer to kick my ass, laser surgery (they do that for being overweight now) or a diet meal plan thing, that will take me years. To be honest, at this instant a trainer doesn't sound so bad, but I don't have the money. I have also realized that as long as I'm doing the exercises that work for my body (ie, not running) it's actually kind of fun. Wii Fit works as a consistent, light weight sort of exercise, but long term it's probably not going to be enough... if I want to get down to 129, which is less than I have ever weighed in my adult life. The lowest I remember seeing on the scale was 133, and that was my junior year of high school when I was doing yoga and being on dance team, as well as basically not eating (I was one of those sleep study internet friends sorts, food was not high on the priorities).

A lot of me would really like to get back to that lifestyle, but as an adult it's really difficult. Dance and yoga classes require money and time, cooking is a daily activity. Eating is built into the work day, exercise is not.

Admittedly, there is a 24 hour fitness in the basement of my building. Comparatively, they are a cheap gym and they do have Yoga and Pilates classes at times I could possibly manage (noon and 4:30). But I just checked and their monthly dues are 40 bucks. Yeah no. I need a Planet Fitness with good classes. But there aren't any that are convenient. Le sigh. Stupid gyms.

Anyway goals are

1) Flax bread sandwiches for lunch at least twice next week
2) Wii Fit MWF (and this coming sunday, double)
3) Zumba? Maybe?