Thanks Vicki for reminding me that I haven’t been here in a awhile. Everything has been okay but hectic. I’ve been taking on more call than usual in preparation for my vacation that starts today. Yay!!!

So to recap. Week 8th through 10 I didn’t lose much weight. Maybe half a pound. But I have buckled down in the last two weeks. I’ve been kinda disappointed in the challenge. We started out with 4 people in the group. then one person changed her mind about the time so we ended up with three. On the third or so week, another girl went MIA because her Uncle came down with a brain tumor. So she postponed her challenge then in the last two weeks, I have been the only one there. I’m proud to say that I never missed a trainer session.

This week of course is going to be the challenge. After all, who doesn’t like to eat good food when were on vacation. Bad thing is that I’m going to miss a session but she says I can make it up when i get back. Also when I get back, I;ll get weighed. Oh fun. 

I gotta get paking now but I’ll be in touch more this week.

My trainer let me off easy last week. She didn’t do the weigh in. She could see I had a bad week, poor choices and generally high stress.

I am still in a high stress mode today so I think I may go and work it off tonight at the gym.

I don’t feel well at all. I had a piece of cake and I think it’s taking it’s toll on me now. I don’t feel groggy but I feel tense. Not to mention the fact that I ran across my ex-husband and his new wife on Facebook. I don’t know why I’m mad all over again. It’s like the divorce happened yesterday and it’s been almost 3 years. Yuck. I don’t like feeling this way. I suppose it’s just compounding the “not feeling good about myself” mode that I seem to be in today.  I”m not sure how to kick it.

Aside from the piece of cake eaten in celebration of an event, I haven’t really done too bad today.

Here’s my theory on why I’m so angry at the ex today. I’m really pissed off that my sister is still living with me. Again she was helpful in the beginning but truthfull if it weren’t for my a–hole of an ex husband, my sister wouldn’t be living with me today. So it is all his fault after all.  Funny how things turn out. I heard that song “So much for my happy ending” yesterday. It just made me reminisce about the time when I still believed in such fairytales.

Enough angry rhetoric. Time to get to work.

Well at least I made it here today. It hasn’t been a good two weeks. No excuses just a lot of emotional eating. I have managed to keep up with the exercise but the reckless eating got out of hand this weekend. There was a lot of tension in the house. I just don’t know what to do about it. 

It’s been busy at work and in the house as well. With the weather getting better I have a whole list of things to get done and yes unfortunately, eating at regular times just didn’t rank high enough in priority. The aquarium I set up which was supposed to be a relaxing item in the house is causing much stress. It’s not the aquarium per say nor is it the fish but my sister’s constant nagging and critiquing of how I’m managing it. She’s constantly on my ass about how one or more of the fish looks sick, I must not be changing the water often enough. Day in and day out she’s giving me an earful yet she won’t lift a finger to do anything with the aquarium being a germophobe and what not. It’s so aggravating. I really needed a break from her this weekend but it wasn’t meant to be. About 4 weeks ago, my sister was venting to me about my father and she called him an idiot and did so in front of my daughter. DD promptly told my father and since then he hasn’t stepped foot in my house. My sister won’t apologize (just because she never does). She was suppose to go hitch a ride with them to Indiana to visit my other sibs thereby leaving me and my daughter alone in a QUIET and STRESS-FREE environment but because my father was still pissed at her, my parents deliberately left her. Not only were we stuck with her for the whole weekend but now we have to listen to her vent about  my parents stranding her here. Aaaargh!!!!

Sounds awful doesn’t it. Don’t get me wrong, I love my sister. She was kind enough to come live with me after my divorce and help with my daughter. But mind you, that’s all she does. She doesn’t cook nor does she clean. She basically does DDs laundry because she won’t touch mine and picks her up after school. That is all. Otherwise she sits and watches TV all day. I think that is a big part of the problem. She needs to get a job and distract herself with a career. Perhaps then she would stop being hypercritical.  

I’m in desperate need of coping strategies that don’t involve food. I can’t believe it. I’m almost happy I’m going back to work tomorrow. I need some time away from my sister. I just wished I could take my daughter with me. 

So today breakfast was oatmeal, soy milk and coconut.

Lunch was leftover tenderloin with stuffing.

Dinner was a tunamelt and chips then dessert was a juice smoothie. 

Doesn’t seem much but it all adds up. 

Exercise yesterday was 20 minutes cardio and an hour of strength training. Today was an hour of cardio. 

Goal for tomorrow. Cut down the carb intake. Get the stress down. 

Well, last week wasn’t so great on the food front. I can get my self to prepare for a 24 hour stint as far as food is concerned but 48 hours was just too much. Worked all memorial day weekend and was extremely busy. This translated in not getting my food in every 3 hours like I should and then making bad choices when I get really hungry. 

Despite all that I still logged in a 3 lb weight loss in the first 4 weeks of this program. I know it’s not much but at least I don’t feel like I’m starving myself. What I do feel is Old. The joints are aching, and my immune system is a little depressed. I can feel a cold coming on. 

I got the fish tank all up and running. Cheetoh has a new home. What does he do, when fist gets there? He eats the landscaping. He’s gone through two of the plants thus far. I’m half-tempted to let Linda’s cat go fishing in the tank. If he doesn’t quit it, he’s going to end up in a pond somewhere. Of course, my daughter would probably stop talking to me. 

Today, I need to eat better and get my cardio in. Still sore from the session yesterday. We did a lot of arms and shoulders. I need to go shopping for groceries too. My trainer just shook her head when I told her about the butterpecan ice cream on memorial weekend.

Do I feel any different? I feel like I have had more energy. I haven’t stepped on the scale yet though. It’s not that I’m afraid but I’m notorious for letting the scale dictate my moods. I’ll just wait till I get weighed at the gym. 

 This week was good for food. It’s always good when I don’t have any restaurants bills in a week. My sister who lives with me is feuding with my folks. So they’ve pretty much stayed away from the house. We go out to eat with them a lot. 

In other news, I went to Petsmart yesterday to pick something up for Cheetoh (the fish). Spent a whole hour there till they closed and didn’t accomplish a thing. I was too busy talking to one of the other customers. I had seen him before last time and he gave me some really great ideas for my tank. Well, he was there again and this time we talked a little about what we did for a living. He was just so interesting. He’s married with two sons. He works as a consultant for million dollar development projects and he was in the military for 9 years. I was fascinated since I had just been watching NCIS before I went to the store. He worked in special forces doing encrypting work for the government. He was passionate about fish. 

I know what you all think, but remember I said he was married. I was just relieved that I could find someone so interesting. It reaffirmed my faith that there are people out there that I may want to interact with. Sure this guy was married but the next guy may not be, so who knows. 

I’m a lot more sore today than I’ve ever been. We did upper body last night and s ome lower body as well. I was under the impression that you were only suppose to do one or the other in a day. Oh, well. Didn’t get yelled at too much for the Mother’s day brunch. I’m a bit more prepared for the food this week than I was last week. I actually cooked on Sunday.

I’m on call again tonight and I brought a good supply of food to eat. It should be a busy night as it always is when the barometric pressure drops. Everyone comes in with ruptured membranes. It’s almost as bad as a full moon.

My trainer said to do the steps when I’m at work for the cardio portion of my workout. Unfortunately, my knees are shot today all thanks to her from yesterday.

We’ll see what we can manage.

So I got a little bit off schedule with traveling. I wasn’t able to get to the gym when I was suppose to. So I went Sunday, Monday and then Tuesday our team met with the Trainer. I’ll never do that again. My arms are still sore. She told me not to work the same areas two days in a row. I couldn’t bear to tell her that I did it for 3 days straight. She already yelled at me for indulging in Spring Rolls. I didn’t want her to think I was a total idiot. 

The new exercise she showed us involved putting our feet on the exercise ball and lifting our butts off the mat. It’s so sad that I’m the only one that ended up with a charley horse on my abs. It was a pain. All my trainer could come up with was “well, those muscles don’t get used much until now”. You think that would discourage me but I actually got mad at that comment. I’m even more determined now to do this.

For the last week, I’ve eaten 5 or 6 small meals a day. It mostly consisted of veggie and protein wrapped in wither a whole wheat pita or tortilla. I haven’t weighed myself since I started this and I’m not going to untill 4 weeks. I don’t want to get or not get a false sense of security.

I’ve been getting a little creative with my spices too. I found some indian recipes and actually made a curry like dish with cauliflower, tomatoes and tofu. It was delish. I came to the realization that I can get the same exotic flavors but using healthier base ingredients instead of the fatty type. Thus I substituted veggies and tofu for lamb or beef. 

I’ve still not had any type of real dessert. I’m kinda proud of that fact since it was my favorite part of the meal. The sweetest I’ve gotten is the Clif bars for snacks. 

This program is called the Transformation challenge and that’s what I hope it’ll turn out to be. I don’t really want a diet. I want a change of lifetstyle and approach to food. 

This weekend will be another test. We’re going to a Mother’s Day brunch.  I hope they have a good salad. 

Tomorrow I have four surgeries. It’s going to be difficult getting 6 meals in between there. So I may have to settle for three. Happy Mum’s day if I don’t get a chance to say it tomorrow. Hope the Ladies have a wonderful weekend.

So this weekend was not a complete disaster. I thought it would be since I went home for my brother’s b-day. It’s usually a foodfest but not this time. We did go out to an Indian buffet but I stuck mostly to vegetables and then had a tiny sliver of b-day cake.

But I did work out yesterday so that felt good.

I didn’t weigh myself today. I decided I’m just not going to do that. I’ll wait for the trainer to do it four weeks from now.  The diet hasn’t been too bad. I have to eat 6 times a day and I have to get a protein and a carb in. I guess I like the diet because I’m not counting anything. I’m guestimating 4 oz of protein but as far as carbs are concerned, as long as it’s a veggie I can have whatever. I’m limited only on certain carbs like beans, brown rice and wheat bread. But even that’s  not that bad.

I really thought I would be craving sweets even more but I haven’t. We’ll see. It’s only the second week.

I’m kinda hoping this won’t turn out to be just another diet for me. I want to truly transform my life which includes the eating part. I’m glad that the program addresses both.

I’ve been gone for awhile but I promise there’s a good reason. I’ve joined the Transformation Challenge at the fitness center. It’s a 12 week program. I’m in a team of 4 and we meet once a week with a trainer. After that meeting we meet as a team to work out and essentially encourage each other. We have a food log. I can say that thus far it hasn’t been too bad as far as keeping the log. There are foods that I can’t have for twelve weeks but I’m not missing them that much. I’ve been on it for a week now and I think I’ve gotten over the sugar and flour. I’ve switched everything to wheat. We also have nutrition classes once a month and motivational meetings too. Our trainer looks at our food log and critiques it. 

As far as being pescatarian, I made it to 20 days. After that, I had to finish the deli slices because they were going to expire. So I had them with wheat pita. I still haven’t eaten real chicken. No beef yet either. 

I know that Linda’s been telling me to plan for awhile now, and I think that finally I may do it. 

Emotionally, I’m doing okay. I’ve actually been pretty happy. I gave up caffeine. I got headaches for the first couple of days but that’s better now.

My sister was in the house when the cleaning lady came the other day. She and my sister talk a lot. Apparently, she was commenting on all the unfinished knitting laying around the house. So she told my sister that I needed to get laid. I just laughed. Is that her solution for everything? 

So my goal for this week is to get to the gym three times, at least. This I promise myself. 

I can’t believe I’ve lasted this long “sans” beef or chicken. I told my nurse I was becoming a pescatarian and she thought I was changing religion. So let’s see if I can keep this up 18 more days. If I can save a few chickens and a couple of cows from going to slaughter then I would’ve accomplished what I set out to do.

This weekend was good. My father got on his cooking kick and served a lot of fish for dinner. It was great. I got to work out on the yard which I’ve missed for the past 6 months. I even played tennis with DD. Over all not a bad weekend for fitness. 

I caught up with facebook today and I saw a lot of my old classmates on there. Wow, how we’ve all changed. Everyone is just getting older. How depressing. I’m hoping we don’t have a reunion. Being 70 pounds heavier than high school just doesn’t sit well with me.

I was reading CNN this weekend and got throughly depressed. It wasn’t on a global level. I wasn’t really worried about world affairs because we are all adults and we ultimately make our own choices. I was sad for the children. I realize we are in a recession but why does it have to involve the children. I’ve read too many stories lately of fathers killing his whole family because of some major stressor. Job, marriage, homelife, whatever. If someone wants to off himself because he couldn’t handle the pressure, why take the family with you? I get so angry at these stories. Then I begin to wonder. Just as some women go through postpartum psychosis and do harm to their babies, do men have the same type of psychosis when under a tremendous amount of stress? Maybe extreme stress for men can trigger the same tendencies as in postpartum psychosis. I’m not sure, I just wish someone would find a cure for it.