Going, going, GONE

I have been avoiding the scale for a few days because I have been somewhat off the diet.  I then told myself, this is part of the reason I gained in the first place.  Denial.  So I stepped on the scale and I weighed in at 288.8.  I don’t even know when I crossed the 280 mark.

In part it has to do with being out of the house and moving around this past week and last weekend.  It also has to do with the fact that…what?  I don’t actually know. I have been eating when I am hungry and not eating when I am not. That is the way it is supposed to work, no?

In other news, the treadmill will arrive tomorrow, and then the assemblers will come and put it together sometime this week. I am very excited about this, considering the past weeks’ events.  I am not sure how much distance I will cover the first couple of weeks. I don’t believe that I can simply start working at an aerobic pace; I need to just walk for a while.  

I plan to walk every day, at least a little and work up from there.

Too bad the thing is going to have to face the wall.  The only saving grace is that I will be able to plug my Ipod into it and walk to the music.

What else…I have decided that I am not going to stay with the diet-to-go meals.  I think that it is too expensive and I am not eating nearly as much as I should.  It just sits in the fridge and then I need to put things in the freezer to keep them from spoiling.  I am going to force myself to eat what is in the refrigerator this week, and my husband will eat what is in the freezer and then I am going to have to come up with a new plan.  I cannot live on shakes alone.  What is weird about my weight loss this week is that I hardly had any shakes. I need to think about that for a little bit.

In other news, a friend and I purchased meat from VermontGrassFedBeef.com.  OK, now to be completely truthful, I purchased bacon (they are huge and require only 1 piece for a serving…I will never eat another kind of bacon for the rest of my life), sausages, ground beef patties and pork sausage all without nitrates. All of this can go in the freezer so that we can have them as treats now and again.

I will have to think about what I will eat as my “lean and green” for the Medifast diet. 

I will have to come up with my own “low-carb” meals but do them on my own.  I suppose I can purchase more chicken from Omaha Steaks since they have pre-cooked options which I can microwave.  Then all I need is a salad or veggies to go with that, and lo and behold, there are individual microwave vegetable packets that I can purchase from the store.  As long as I only need to microwave, I can stick with the plan.

So, some changes on the way, as well as some good news.  Today is a good day!

I am so very excited.  I have been waiting for the money to come in so I could purchase this.  I have been bummed out because I did not have a way to truly walk…Walk Away the Pounds is hard on my knees.  The order should arrive in a week and a half, and I got them to throw in a maintenance kit since they would not take the coupon code over the phone. I paid for assembly because there is no way that I am going to get that thing put together by myself.

Now all I have to do is work on sustaining my walking which works for me.  I like to walk (inside) and this little unit has a port for my Ipod that plays music out loud.  I am SOOO excited.

In other news, I have lost about four pounds in the last few weeks. Until I have a uniform exercise schedule, I am not going to see the weight loss that I desire.  I have to rethink my summer goal and work my butt off to get there.

I am also starting to notice that my stomach is going down. I have a long way to go, but I can finally close the 26 size pants I have been trying on every month.  Of course, the legs are completely baggy because they are a 22 or 24, but there is nothing I can do about that until my stomach goes down even more.

I am committed to crunches and ab work.  It won’t take the fat away, but I have noticed that it is easier to tuck my stomach in.  Whoo Hooo.

If anyone is interested in the machine that I got, you can go here.  Proform has good reviews and if you are thinking of purchasing a treadmill, this is a great company to buy from. Of course, you don’t have to take my word for it.  There is a great website called treadmilltalk that has terrific up-to-date reviews on numerous treadmill brands. 

Well, that is it for now.  Will update soon.

I am ordering my new treadmill next Friday.  Not sure how long it will take to get here, but the great news is that I will have someone come and install it for me…for a charge of course.  Still and all, the idea of a treadmill next to my bed (no where else to put it) is exciting.  I can do 10 minutes at a time several times a day working up to the 45 minutes that I wish to do every day.  I have the Walk Away the Pounds videos which I will also use to change things up now and again.

For resistance training, I have to think about it.  I really liked the training I did in Vermont but that would mean purchasing weights.  Since I have the total gym, I don’t want to make extra purchases, but I am not going to be able to use the total gym until I lose at least 50 more pounds.  It hurts my back to be on it now, and it is not wide enough to accommodate all of me.

Exercise  is the key here, and if I can remember that, I will start to shed pounds more rapidly.  I really wish that I had a pool to work out in, and am still really mad at that real estate agent who sold the house with the pool out from under us.  

When I think about moving, one of the first considerations is “Is there a pool nearby?”.  I could move back to SS, but it is expensive to live there.  I could move to PGC but I still don’t feel that it is super safe there. What to do, what to do?

In the mean time, all I can do is hit the treadmill and work as hard as I can.

Man, talk about a ramble…

This is a short one.  I am really trying not to lose hope, but I read all of these posts of people who are losing steadily.  I cannot wait to get my treadmill.  

It is official.  I am stuck at 300 lbs.  I have been here for a week now, perhaps a little longer.  I know that some people plateau for a month or more, so I know I should be patient.  I was down to 295 and was so excited to be down in the 200’s.  Then my weight popped back up.  The good news is that I am not gaining any more.  This has helped me learn the amount of calories it will take to maintain my weight, so that is something.

I need to kick up the exercise a notch which I think will help.  

A lot of people on 3FC’s are listing goals, but I have not been able to do that.  I do not know what is realistic.  I guess the best goal I can set for myself is that I am able to fit back into the clothes I wore last summer so that I don’t have to buy new clothes.  Right now, I am wearing sweats or house dresses because I don’t have any clothes that fit me and I refuse to buy new ones since I am losing.  It occurs to me that even though I lost 23 lbs, I have no idea if I lost a dress size because the dresses I wear are to put it mildly, tentlike.

If I can get into a 26 pant by summer, I will have capris to wear.  But for the first time in my life, my bottom half does not match the top half so I require two different sized clothes.  

I read somewhere, “Last on, first off”.  This seems to be true in my case, but that means that my weight loss is going to be extremely lopsided.  I gained in the weirdest places at the weirdest times.

K.  Done with the ramble.

Onward and downward.

When I decided to lose weight, I started research on which plan to use.  I had tried Medifast, and had great success on it.  I decided to give it another try, but I also wanted an option that did not require me to cook the evening meal. And, my husband wanted to lose weight, and I did not want to have to cook for him so I was a bit desperate. I seriously considered finding a personal chef.  Then, as I was poking around the Internet, I came across Diet-to-Go. Fresh meals prepared by a chef (whoo hoo) and supervised by a nutritionist.  I figured this was the way to go.  

I drink Medifast shakes five times per day, and then have a fresh Diet-to-Go lean and veggie meal (the low-carb plan) for dinner.  This is truly the best option for me because I do not have to cook whatsoever (would rather scrub toilet bowls), can stay out of the kitchen, and have my portions measured for me.  

I believe that when I am on the maintenance plan, I will use DTG to keep on track.

There are many scientific and medical definitions of the word flux, but this is the psychological one I am referring to:  Flow (or flux) is the mental state of operation in which the person is fully immersed in what he or she is doing by a feeling of energized focus, full involvement, and success in the process of the activity.

This is how I feel about my weight loss journey.  

I have lost and regained hundreds of pounds and find myself at the heaviest I have ever been.  This is a place I do not wish to be.  So, I am focusing my energy on becoming a happier, healthier (most important) me.

It is going to be an exciting journey, and I invite you to come along with me.  

I am certain there will be ups and downs, but the singular focus this time around is something new, and something exciting.  I cannot wait to see where I go from here.

I have never blogged before, so this will be interesting

Onward.