The Sunny Side of Life

I’m reading so many people here lamenting about how watching calories, counting points, eating low-carb… is a pain in the butt.  That they are getting bored and/or frustrated with it, and can’t see themselves doing it for life or don’t want to be relegated to a lifetime of doing it.  Well, I’m sorry to tell all of you, but being healthy is a responsibility.  IF we still lived in a time where there wasn’t fast food, processed food, etc., then it wouldn’t have been, and wasn’t then, so difficult.  But we’ve genetically or chemically altered food so much, that in our laziness (yes, laziness) for “fast food”, less time cooking, etc., we’ve become addicted to the easy, fast, processed stuff.  

But the truth of the matter is that living a healthy life (with eating choices being a cornerstone of that life), do come with responsibilities.  You can’t just run through life eating nilly willy whatever you want…if you want to get and remain healthy.  We are all PROOF of that, aren’t we?  We’ve spent the better part of our lives eating whatever we want, whenever we want.  Where did it get us?  Obese, that’s where.  Unhealthy, with usually some or all of the following:

1. pre-diabetic
2. (or diabetic)
3. high blood pressure
4. high cholesterol
5. low energy levels
6. lack of stamina
7. feelings of guilt
8. low self esteem
9. sense of disenfranchisement: i.e., feeling alone with ourselves; not fully joining in with everyone else in life (regardless of whether we are married or not, have a lot of friends or not.  We feel slightly ‘not part of the group’)

There is no scientific or medical question where continuing on in a life of obesity will get all of us:  into the grave sooner, and with more painful, debilitating and inconvenient illnesses prior to that.  Let alone the emotional toll it takes; we mentally beat ourselves up over and over and over again whenever we eat something we know we shouldn’t, whenever we can’t partake in activities everyone else is doing; whenever we can’t shop for clothes like other women; whenever we are ignored or silently put down for the way we look.

Sure, we could say “screw it” and embrace our large, beautiful selves, but that is denial.  That’s denial of what we are doing medically to ourselves.  Sure, it’s good to feel good about yourself.  But if you are committing medical suicide by the way you eat, by lack of regular exercise… putting on a happy face and saying you love yourself just the way you are and/or “I just have big bones” is total bullshit and doing yourself a GREAT injustice. 

If you truly want to feel good about yourself, you have to consciously take the steps to get healthy.  To give your body a chance to recuperate from years of abuse and neglect (yes, neglect) and do what it takes to get healthier.  Because there is no question whatsoever that what we are now, what we have done to ourselves to get this overweight/obese…can and WILL kill us if we don’t change something.  That’s just a fact!

Ask or watch anyone who’s had a heart attack.  Well, anyone who seriously doesn’t want to ever have another one.  I have; up close.  An ex boss of mine.  He became immersed in changing his life.  We wouldn’t touch fatty foods or sugary foods if his life depended on it.  (and of course, it did.)  His resistance was 100% strong and true.  He became, over time, a runner and an avid snow boarder-all over the age of 50.  He amazed me.  And awed me.  And even though I didn’t start down this path until over 2 years after I left his employ (my choice LOL)….he still, I can see now, set the stage for me.  Took his machete and cleared the path for me.  Showed me that temporary enjoyment of food wasn’t worth sacrificing your life over.

Frankly, to me, this is no different than a kid wanting to run into a store and buy everything or even STEAL everything.  You don’t take a kid to a movie or a carnival or the circus and let them have every single thing they want (food or junk toys.)  Why have we done that to ourselves, though?!?!  It’s about control and responsibility and, yes, MATURITY.  It’s realizing we have an obligation not only to our own bodies, but also to everyone who loves us, whom we love, and to whom we have a responsibility for and to.  It’s about being a grown up.  We can’t do whatever we want at work.  We can’t do whatever we want out on the road.  Or at ballgames.  Or at parties.  Or at family functions.  ANYWHERE.  There are social mores and rules and we, as adults, law-abiding adults, must follow them.  It is the same for our diets. As mature, responsible adults, there are medically proven guidelines we must follow to get healthy and do our best to allow our bodies to live optimally.  No matter what choice/path you choose to get there, to have an optimal body one must:

1. limit calories
2. limit unhealthy fats
3. limit unhealthy carbohydrates
4. limit processed food
5. limit sugar items
6. exercise regularly-at heart rates that qualify as ‘cardio’

We all know it.  It’s medically proven a hundred times over.  And yet, we fight it and resist it and try to cheat on it.  Why?  Why are we thumbing our noses at medicine and science and continue to try and live the way we want to, ignoring all the studies and their results?  It feels like masochism, actually.  Oh, and trust me, I spent 57 years doing it.  I totally “get” it.  But I totally also “get” that it’s wrong, and at least for me, the clock is ticking and I.MUST.STOP.IT.

I can’t make the choices for anyone else. I can only control my own life.  But I can try to be a good influence on others that cross my path or walk it along side of me.  I have to be a good role model.  We ALL have to be good role models.  Because believe me, someone, lots of someones, are watching.  But bottom line, we have to do it to lead the life we truly want to live…are meant to live.  And to live it for as long as is humanly possible.  The choice is yours, and you make that choice every time you choose any and every item to put in your mouth.  Are you choosing those foods like a child, or like an adult?

I’m sorry; I hate to be preachy, but I just don’t want any of you to die sooner than you are meant to die. I want you to have a longer and healthier life.

The 20-pounds lost reward bracelet has indeed arrived!!!!!  If you don’t know what I’m talking about, follow this link:

http://3fatchicks.com/diet-blogs/sunnygee/2009/05/30/reward-no-1-of-4-coming-up/

I’m off to enjoy the rest of the evening, AFTER I update my photos in the “Who is Sunny” page 

Yes, I KNOW I promised not to weigh again until Wednesday.  But I had such a kick-ass weekend (food selections and exercise), and I “KNOW” the bracelet will arrive today or tomorrow, and I just.couldn’t.wait.  My bad.  But it was worth it!  I lost 1.5 lb. since Saturday morning!  I’ve actually lost 20.5 lbs!!!

That’s all I’ve got for now.  I promise to take a picture with the new bracelet on, once I get it.  And I will be updating my profile picture before Saturday.  I promised myself to do that at every 20 lb. loss juncture. 

Anyhow, hang in there ladies!  It seems like a lot of you are emotionally struggling right now, and that makes me really sad for you.  I wish I could say or do something to take away your inner pain and turmoil.  Just know that I’m right beside you, cheering you along.  You CAN do this!!!

p.s.  the ticker below rounds up.  God bless ‘em! 

I don’t know about anyone else, but as a little girl/baby boomer, I grew up loving and wanting to be Tinker Bell.  Tink was everything I wasn’t:  she was beautiful, petite, independent, flirtatious, ferociously in love, dedicated, had that awesome magical pixie dust, and had more sass than anyone I knew.  In my house, in my generation, young girls/even women were taught to behave, ‘mind our manners’, do what was expected of us, not make waves.  Some of us rebelled in the late 60’s and burned our bras, but many more of us were too ingrained in the “good girl behavior” to do something as outrageous as burning our bras.  We towed the line, just like we were taught to and as was expected of us.  Still, I always loved Tink.

Looking back now, I can see that all of this “towing the line” behavior is the root of why we with weight problems almost ALL are emotional eaters.   Don’t you see it?  In essence, all along, we were trained to ignore our inner Tinker Bell ways, our “ugly” emotions.  It wasn’t right for us to be angry, pissed off, jealous, or really show any serious emotions whatsoever.  We simply weren’t supposed to make waves.  So what did we end up doing?  We shoved them down….deep, deep down inside WITH FOOD.  Lots and lots of food.  Food that tasted really good and gave us the levels of satisfaction that we couldn’t achieve by merely letting our feelings out…because we couldn’t let those feelings out.  We weren’t supposed to.   We couldn’t be Tink.  We couldn’t be pissed and let it show!

We couldn’t get angry at someone and emotionally or verbally duke it out with them!

We couldn’t JUST.SAY.NO.

Heck, most of the time, we couldn’t even laugh uproariously anymore, either! 

All we could do was bottle up our real feelings.  So we ate and we ate and we ate to try and stuff those feelings down.  By the time we were old and independent enough to do it, it was kind of too late.  The bad habit of eating instead of expressing ourselves was already set.

So here we are now.  I learned, via the testosterone of menopause, to let part of my inner Tinker out.  I learned it was ok sometimes to say NO!  To get pissed and let it show.  To belly laugh when I really felt like it.  To show my feelings.  Sure, sometimes there were repercussions.  But that’s ok.  At least I was being honest.  Other people were entitled to their reactions to my reaction.  Such is life.  I guess I had to get good enough at doing that-being myself and letting my real feelings show and be expressed-before I could get to this juncture to where there really is no good, legitimate reason to overeat anymore.  To get to the point where I respect myself, my body, and my future enough to change the lifelong bad habits.  To not only let my inner Tinker Bell out, but to embrace her in all her imperfections.  To feel and express my passions, both the good ones and the “bad” ones.  To be TINKER BELL.

I owe a lot to Tinker Bell.  I learned to be a full fledged, imperfect, but honest woman.  Now, I can stop hiding behind food, stop ignoring what I was really feeling, and let my passion out/show.  I can stop going through the motions of life and REALLY start living it and FEELING it!  And dang, it feels AWESOME!!!!

So please, please, start letting your inner Tinker Bell out.  Release her!  Let her belly laugh and get pissed and throw a tantrum and be flirty.  Be who you REALLY are.  Once you are, you won’t need the mounds and mounds and ridiculous mounds of food to hide behind anymore.  I promise!!!

ETA:  because I did some research, and Disney says it’s Tinker Bell.  As in Miss Bell. 

YESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

OMG OMG OMG!!!!!    I lost 1.5 lbs. since yesterday morning!  I’m at 178.5!!!!

Unbelievable!!!!  So, that makes it officially 2.0 lbs. lost for the week, but we all know that’s closer to 4 lb. for the week, since I gained over a lb. from last weekend!  Yeehaw!!!!  PLUS, this past week, I lost .75 inches from the bust, .75 inches from the waist ( ),  and .25 inches from each arm!  All in all, I’ve lost:

2.75 inches from my bust

3.5 inches from my waist

4.5 inches from my hips!!!!!

1 inch from each arm

1.75 inches from each thigh

All this in seven weeks!

AND this means I’ve lost 19 lbs. in all, and I’m outta the 180’s FOREVER!!!!!!!!!

I have to admit, I kinda went back to South Beach Phase One since Thursday.  I think I’m going to do a week of Phase One once a month.  It will help me re-focus (LOL, Tawyna!), and adjust for my post-menopausal body’s attempt to keep metabolism lower.  And I don’t really mind Phase One, and a person can’t really beat it’s results. 

Soooooooooooo, the bracelet reward for a 20 lb. loss is just a day or two away.  That said, I HAVE to (for my own mental health), stop this daily weighing.  I am promising myself and now all of you reading this, that I won’t weigh in again until Wed. or Thursday.  As hard as that’s going to be.  LOL  It’s funny, when I saw 178.5 this morning (and I was praying for just 179.5)….I couldn’t believe my eyes, and stepped back on the scale two more times before I got dressed.  I just couldn’t believe I’d lost that much in one day!

Well, I guess my perseverance and the ab crunches have paid off.  That, and I’ve upped myself pretty consistently in the nighttime dancing to being for 45 minutes straight, up 15 minutes.  And I try to squeeze in an extra 15 minutes of commercial break dancing too.  So that’s helped.  I do plan to add wall push-ups this week.  I’ll wait to add weights until after I’ve reached my 20 lb. loss marker.  I’ve got plenty of time. 

Anyhow, to say I’m stoked is quite an understatement.  Seven weeks in, at my age, a 1.5 lb. loss in one day is pretty damned amazing!  And that’s with steak 2 nights in a row, and lunch out with the girls yesterday.  It’s been fun, these past 7 weeks, going to the various restaurants we have our Friday lunch out at, and first researching online the restaurant’s ‘nutrition information’ web pages to determine which of my fav foods I can eat/adjust to eat, then doing it, and realizing that since I gave up sugar and fake sugars, just how amazing my taste buds now are.  It was so dramatic the first week or two in, but you know, after a while you get in a kind of rut and almost lose that mental momentum, but every once in a while you have a meal like I did yesterday, and realize how sensitive your taste buds are, and can really bask in how delicious such a simple, low-calorie, healthy meal one can taste.  And it’s pretty damned cool and heady every time it happens!!

Not only that, but I’m just feeling, overall, so darned good about myself.  I’m taking more of an interest in my jewelry; nice pieces that have sat in a jewelry box for literally years!  I’m just more interested in how I look, because I am just feeling so much better about myself.  Life is just coming alive for me, and it’s such a trip!  The rewards far, far outweigh any so-called limitations the SB diet has ‘put’ on me.  It’s so worth it, that it’s gone from being a rather fun challenge to stay within the dietary guidelines, to a situation where you couldn’t PAY ME to vary far from the path.  Have I become addicted to the South Beach way of life?  To exercise?  Damned straight I probably have!  So what?  They are both healthy and good for my body, my soul, my lifespan.  If one has to become addicted to something, it appears I’ve finally found the right thing to be addicted to.

Anyhow, have a GREAT Saturday, ladies, and stay true to your goals!!!!  Here is some Sunny fairy-dust™ to sprinkle over you to remember me each time you think about straying off your own path!

…for a mini-rant / semi-pity party…

I’m pissed.  I’m pissed at myself for letting myself go until the ripe ole age of 57. I’m pissed because, at that age, it is SUCH a fine line I must walk between low enough caloric intake to lose weight, balanced against enough caloric intake to avoid a physiological “starvation mode” reaction from my body.  In other words,  I must stay between 1000-1200 calories….some days I lose weight, some days I stay the same, some days I GAIN weight in that 200 measily calorie range.  That just sucks.  10 years ago, I would’ve and DID -eat more calories, exercise less, and regularly drop 3-4 pounds a week.  Now, that’s just not happening or going to happen.  Sure, early on here, I’ve had a few stellar weeks, but everyone does starting out.  Over six weeks in, that’s just not going to happen anymore. 

Don’t get me wrong:  I’m NOT a stupid woman.  I know:

• weigh loss of more than 1-2 pounds a week isn’t healthy.
• sustained weight loss of more than 1-2 pounds a week isn’t realistic, especially for a post-menopausal woman
• there are going to be plateau periods, no matter how well you mix things up and upgrade your activity level
• at my age, one can only upgrade their activity level so much and so fast, before the body starts complaining by producing aches, pains, or actual injuries

THIS.ALL.SUCKS.BIGTIME.  

There.  I’ve said it.  It pisses me off royally.  I spent the weekend living at the 1200 calorie range, and ended up gaining close to two pounds.  I drop back down to 1000-1100 calories, and I lose the 2 pounds over several days, then nuthin.  Nada.  In fact, gain half a pound from yesterday.  WTF?!?!  Looking deeper:  Fat content:  check.  Sodium content:  check.  Exercise level:  check.  Seriously…WTF?

That said…HELL with the scale.  I HAVE been an idiot this week in one regard: weighing myself every day.  I KNOW BETTER.  But I was so concerned with the gain, I was checking daily to make sure I was doing the right thing to get it back off.  NO. NO. NO.  I can’t do it.  If for no other reason, than it sends me into one of these reactions.  Once a week, Sunny.  THAT.IS.IT.  Keep to the straight and narrow, (friggin extremely narrow, dammit to hell), and do what you know you must.  It’s that simple. 

Don’t get me wrong, ladies.  I could stay the same weight for a friggin month, and I won’t steer off the course.  This lifestyle is just that:  a LIFE style.  I’m not going back.  If this ends up to be my final weight (I know it won’t), I’ll just learn to live with it, because I KNOW I’m eating so much more heathfully (is that even a word?) now, and my exercise level is precisely where it needs to be.  I KNOW I’ve increased my lifespan with the changes I’ve made.  I KNOW my heart and veins and God knows what else is SO much healthier now than it was seven weeks ago.  And ultimately, that is what matters.  So the scale can screw with me all it wants.  It can just bite me.  Bite me where the sun don’t shine.

End of rant. hehehe

Have a GREAT day, ladies!  Stay true to your goals!!! 

ETA:  You ladies are ABSOLUTELY THE BEST.  Thank you all!!!  And more group hugs like above! 

No, I’m not talking about the new healthy lifestyle….I’m talking about eating unhealthy things that I love.  Even if I eat it within my own pre-determined caloric framework (i.e., small portions)…the fat content and/or sodium content just make it sooooooooooo NOT.WORTH.IT.  Perhaps it’s because I’m rapidly approaching 58, and the body just isn’t as forgiving.  I don’t know.  I just know even small portions of “naughty” food…the affect it has on my body is worse than it used to be.  Not only do I slow down my weight loss progress, but I end up feeling like crap for a few days afterwards.  So for WHAT?  A few moments of good taste going down?  I’m not a stupid woman.  Imagine me now, holding both hands face up, like a scale:  a few minutes of something tasty on one hand, feeling like shit and delaying my weight loss progress for a few days on the other hand.  It’s a complete no-brainer for me.  I just can’t do it anymore!  Not that I’ve done it much, and like I said, even when I DID do it, I made sure the portions were small enough to not break my calorie limits.  However, it still sucked.  My gut is apparently too used to GOOD, healthy food, and reacts pretty strongly now to any shitty food.  I guess that’s a good thing.  Talk about negative reinforcement! 

I had the lemon chicken-MAYBE a cup of it, last night for dinner, with 5 low fat Wheat Thins.  I swear my entire day’s worth of calories was well under 1200.  I exercised for an hour an a half throughout the day/evening.  I drank my water.  To not give too much info, my gut (lower intestines-that says enough)…well, I was in the restroom LOTS yesterday (from the weekend food)…believe me, medically and physiologically speaking, I should’ve dropped 1-2 lbs.  Seriously.  But only .5 lb.  (so I’m still a half pound above my Saturday weekly weigh-in.)  So here I am, approaching the middle of my weight week, trying to get back to where I was on Saturday.  Criminy that’s criminally stupid on my part.    I even noticed this morning, putting on my eye make-up, that my lids were slightly puffy.  Not “crying” puffy, but certainly a tad puffy…so I’m retaining water.  I’m assuming from the last of the lemon chicken I had last night.  Oh well, back to my totally healthy eating today.  This too, shall pass. 

Well, as far as June is concerned, there is only one “event”, and that’s the slightly premature 1st birthday party for my youngest grandson on the 27th.  (his birthday is actually 7/2.)  I swear, if I have ANY cake at all, it will be one TINY forkful.  South Beach has a 3 bite dessert rule.  That’s for the young and footloose and fancy free young folk.     As an aging old broad, I’m limiting that to a TINY 1 bite dessert rule.  And that will be ONLY for desserts that are culinary masterpieces.   And frankly, those are few and far between (and certainly usually never for a one-year-old’s birthday cake). 

So, this is all part of the learning experience.  Learning is always 2 steps forward, with the occasional one step back episodes.  I’m still very definitely headed in the right direction, and my determination is a powerful, powerful thing!  I have that great bracelet due to arrive at the end of the week, and I don’t want to have to stare at the unopened box for too long. 

So, onward and upward.  I will reach my goal.  There isn’t a shred of doubt in my mind.  It’s only a matter of when, not if.  I’m still set with a mid to late December goal in mind.  But even if it ends up being next Jan. or Feb…to reach a size 4 or 6?  Hell yes!  That does NOT mean I am conceding that possibility.  It does mean I’m realistic.  At 57-58, a ‘2 lb. a week every single week’ scenario probably isn’t entirely realistic.  Sure ain’t gonna happen this week.  But I have no one to blame for that but myself. 

That said, I am WOMAN.  Hear me ROAR!!!! 

p.s.  the photo above, I took in “up country” Maui. 

p.s.s. Breakfast of Champions: 16 non-salted natural almonds, 16 low fat Wheat Thins, and 2 Light French Onion Laughing Cow wedges. yummmmmmmmmm

p.s.s.s.  Read Jillian’s tip on my side bar.  We both apparently have “aging” on the mind.  I didn’t see/read it until I was done with this post!  LOL

Have a GREAT day, and stay true to your goals!!!     

Time to reflect on the last month, and plot out the new month.    

 Overall, last month was great!  I lost 9.5 lbs, and inches everywhere.  I went from zero exercising a day/week/month, to exercising a minimum of one hour a day, seven (not five or six!) days a week.  I feel I’ve totally accepted this as my new way of life.  My dedication is strong, and grounded in my addictive, OCD personality.     I could use that personality for good, or for bad, and for the most part, I feel I’m using it for the good.  I’m obsessed with my health now, and it’s a great change of pace from where I was at even the start of April.   

There is a problem, though.  I got too obsessed with Eileen’s Weight Challenge.  To the point I was exercising (and / or exercising too much) on days when my knee or knees were hurting.  My concern about performing well and gaining those stars outweighed common sense and looking out for my body first.  I am too competitive.  I never expected to win (any month), but I put that concern about my results over my own health and welfare, and that’s just wrong.  So, my major change that I’m instituting for June is that I’m not going to compete in her June challenge.  Instead, I’ve created an exercise ticker to get to my end-of-month goal of 30 hours of exercise.  I honestly feel I might accomplish 40ish hours, but my age/knees might not take to that, so I’m going with 30 hours instead.  That’s still an average of 1 hour a day.  But this way, I’m just competing against myself.  I don’t have to worry about what anyone else is doing.  (yeah, I was doing that too!  )  I’ve also created an exercise log page, to daily track exactly what I do each day.  Knowing my mentality, I just think that this is just a better thing for me to do for me.  It will allow me to listen to my body and not risk further knee pain (that ultimately would just end up costing me longer “down” time.) 

Other than that, I think I’m doing well.  I ate items over the weekend that weren’t good for me (Italian roast beef sandwich, onion rings, BBQ beef, lemon chicken)…but I was careful to manage my calorie levels and keep portions under control to stay within my daily calorie allotments.  That said, the food was still all probably high sodium and higher fat than I’ve become recently used to, and it did show on the scale this morning; I gained a pound back despite 3 hours of weekend exercising.  Lesson definitely learned.  But it was 3 meals eating out over the weekend, so I guess in the long run that’s not bad.  The worst part is that it’s delaying my getting to wear that new bracelet (see 2 posts below) that I ordered for my 20 lb. weight loss goal achievement which is now 4 lbs. away, not 3. 

So, back to my food plans, and my revised exercise plans.  I do also plan to start doing old-fashioned calisthenics (abdomen crunches, and leg and arms exercises a la Jack La Lane for you baby boomers ) and I got stretch bands, so I’m going to start doing stretch resistance exercises for my upper body, too.  Finally, I’m ready to stop being a lazy pig and keep my house cleaner….I feel stronger and have more energy and I’m going to be investing it more consistently on my house now, too.  (you’d think with OCD I’d have a spotless home, but, erm…NOE.)     It’s all good.   

Have a GREAT Monday, and stay true to your goals! 

Well, my mom and I will.  I took this picture Mother’s Day Eve, 2008, on the highlight day of our 15 days transatlantic cruise together.   Don’t get me wrong:  I don’t have lots of money….Mom paid my entire way!  And Mom grew up in the Depression, so she and dad were great at saving.  Anyhow, Paris has been on my mind a lot this month, because of our trip a year ago.  That was was the highlight of a very bizarre cruise (maybe some day I’ll share all the sordid details LOL)…we had a twelve hour trip off the boat to Paris, which included a lunchtime cruise down the River Seine.  (that’s the way they say it, not Seine River.)  The moment I first glimpsed the Eiffel Tower on the tour bus, I started crying.  It was THAT emotional for me.  I’ve always loved the Eiffel Tower, and was so amazed at how it looked when they celebrated 2000 there…  and I NEVER thought I’d ever get to Europe or to see it live, so it was just an AMAZING day.  I wish I’d had longer there than simply a few short hours in the town, and I wish Mr. Sunny had been there.  He has promised me that some day he and I will go, and I hold dearly to that promise!  It was THE most amazing city I’ve ever been to, and I wasn’t even there to see it lite up, and it was seeing everything by bus drive-by, except for the Seine cruise and the 20 minutes we got to stop at the Eiffel Tower.  Still, it is a memory I will hold dear until Alzheimer’s or some other dementia hits.  (I know, I shouldn’t joke about that, but I guess it’s gallows humor, since Dad had it at the end before the ticker got him, so I kinda assume there is a good chance I’ll get it too, but I digress….)

Anyhow, on this last day of May, one year later, I wanted to pay tribute to the City of Lights and my eternal love for it.  Next time I see Paris though, I’ll be spending a week there, REALLY seeing it, and I’ll be fit and trim and in great shape for LOTS of walking.  Funny, that Seine lunch cruise was my last real foray with wine, and lots of it.  How appropriate is THAT? 

Anyhow…..memories.  That was one of the very best days of my life.  But I KNOW better times in Paris are yet to come, and that is so cool!

One more photo of the Tower….for old time’s sake….

Funny….I didn’t eat poorly, but I didn’t eat up to the standards I have set for myself the past five weeks.  I had a small amount of sweet, bottled BBQ sauce on 2 ribs yesterday.  I had 1 Jimmy Dean sausage with my egg and a small amount of hashed browns for breakfast, too.  (no lunch)  I had 3 onion rings with a hamburger patty and 1/2 the bun on Sun. for dinner, and carne asada steak & eggs with a tiny amount of hashed browns on Sun. for breakfast.  Each day I DID stay within my 1200 calories, and the rest of the weekend was spot on.  But my stomach reacted pretty poorly to the extra grease from Sunday and Monday.  My energy level was down too, and my desire to exercise wasn’t as burning as it was prior to those meals.  It’s funny how the slightest bit of eating not so perfect/healthy so drastically affects me now.  It doesn’t kick my motivation or dedication off the charts or even back to the starting line, but it most certainly deflates both a bit.  As with the last time I “indulged” even slightly (Mother’s Day), I feel it’s going to take 2-3 days to get back in the swing of things mentally, emotionally, and physically.  It just goes to show how weeks, months, years of eating crap was responsible for making it so hard to start this path.  No, all but impossible.  It just further bolsters my belief that I simply can’t eat white flour, or anything sugared or even artificially sweetened.  My body, my mindset…is all or nothing.  Even tiny bits of sugar weakens my resolve.  And medical tests have proven that even the artificial sweetners have the same effect…that’s why I’m 100% water 100% of the time.  I can’t afford diet sodas.  I can’t afford 100 calorie snack packs.  They get my taste buds back to craving the damned poisonous sugar, and then I have to go through the withdrawals and re-dedications all over again.  It’s simply JUST.NOT.WORTH.IT.

But somehow, even though I wasn’t feeling 100% yesterday and the gut was still hurting, I still DANCED.  This is SO foreign to me!  It’s not even just a desire to work out; IT’S A BURNING NEED.  I’d always heard about getting addicted to exercise and the endomorphine high, and although I’m certainly not to the point of addiction, I could see how it happens now.  Well, I guess better to be addicted to exercising, eating healthy, and blogging about it (LOL) than being addicted to sugar, alcohol, THE COUCH. 

So, it is onward and upward, even when I’m momentarily down….two steps forward, only a half a step back.  STILL forward progress.  I don’t quite know who this new woman is residing in me that is becoming so dedicated to exercising and living a healthy lifestyle, but I really like her.  And I’m proud of her!  Not easy to go to your favorite restaurants and turns down food that you’ve spent years and years loving…but know you must because they just are WRONG.  Wrong, wrong, wrong!  Who gets up and exercises simply because she knows she needs it.  Who likes the probably infinitesimal changes she’s seeing in her profile in the mirror…already. 

Have a great day, and a great rest of the week!  Stay true to your goals!