Meg, I think this will be the right car for my needs. I don't drive much except to all these long distance Dr. appt's for me and Lacy. In a way, I'm sad to be giving up the luxury of my big Eddie Bauer Expedition, but I'll love the savings on gas. It's sad, I can't have it all. LOL. The great thing is that my payment on the new car will actually be quite a bit less and so will my insurance. I'm all for saving money. LOL.

Ladies, I told you of how I got back on plan last Friday. I've exercised every single day in addition to working in my garden. I just got dressed and I feel absolutely slim. It feels so dang good. My tummy looks completely flat, not bulging like it was a week ago. I just feel pretty hot and sexy. LOL. Dang, I need to remember how good this feels the next time I want to pig out. Why can't I bottle this feeling and take some out when my willpower is low? LOL.
I am still refusing the scale, but the clingy outfit I have on today, I tried on last Thursday and refused to wear it cause I looked fat in it. So, I know I'm doing some good. It still amazes me that eating less and exercising really does work. LOL.

Now where's a 'scraping bow' emoticon when you need one? How about this, instead: ?

Ok, so I did the elliptical. The Precor hurts my hips so I use the 'Life Stride' instead. It has fewer fancy options than the Precor, so I just set it to random and did my own intensity intervals instead. You're right about the heart rate. When I run, I aim for 155 with periodic pushes into the 160s when I do sprint intervals. On the elliptical, however, I was mostly above 160 the entire time. I saved two whole minutes on my workout (to burn 300 cals). BUT, I will say that I did not feel that I was working as hard to keep my HR above 160 as I usually do to keep it at 155 on the treadmill, no doubt because my body has gotten pretty used to running 3.25 miles 4 or 5 days a week. The other thing is that when I read the summary on my polar watch, it said I had only been 'in zone' for 14 of my 30 minutes; the other 16 minutes were evidently above my cardio zone, even though it didn't feel like it. I suspect my watch has not figured out a way to adapt to my increased fitness.

Ho hum. It's always good to mix things up. I want to add in the exercise bike, to help train for my outdoor rides, but I have a hard time getting my heart rate up above 150 on the bike--bike muscles aren't quite strong enough--and I hate to feel that I'm 'wasting time' spending 40 minutes burning 300 calories when I can do it in 32 on the treadmill.

Ennay, if you're happy with running, keep running, but I found when I first started that different brands of ellipticals treat the body differently. For instance, the Precor kills my hips and there's another one that hurts my knees. I had to do a bit of trial and error to find the machine that suits my body and my gait.

Good job Lily! Yay you.

Thank you everyone for all of your well wishes.

DD and I took the boys to the vet after first checking with our neighbors to make sure no one had put any poison down. I was sure they hadn't because they both have dogs themselves. And of course I was right.

Chico checked out fine. The vet couldn't determine what it was that I saw, so I'll just keep an eye on him.

Buddy's symptoms could have been from an inner ear infection (negative) or a brain tumor (not probable per the vet) so she called it idiopathic vestibular disease. She likened it to when you turn around and around and around really fast and then stop--you know how dizzy you are and sometimes you fall. That's what he is experiencing. It probably hit him really hard and fast last night and that's what made him throw up and since he was so dizzy he couldn't get up and walk. He was doing a little better on the way into the vet. While there they did a complete blood and urine workup (all negative) and gave him an IV with fluids. He also ate a little baby food. But on the way out, he was very dizzy again. She said that the way his eyes keep darting around is because of the dizziness and he can't focus on anything and that just makes the dizziness worse. He holds his head crooked from it and she said he may never hold it straight again. Poor old guy.

We'll keep an eye on them through the weekend. DD is home with them now.

BTW--I completed day 1 of week 4 of the c25k program. I didn't think I could run for 5 minutes, but I did--twice!!

Way to go, Baffled! And welcome to the elliptical club.

There have been studies showed that the elliptical is not perceived to be as strenuous as other cardio, even though your HR is elevated and you burn the same calories. Perhaps it's the lack of an impact?

The reason you have a harder time getting your HR up on the bike is that it's seated exercise. Any time you're on your feet and moving your entire body weight, your HR is higher and you burn more calories. But it's not a waste of time to cross-train and occasionally do more moderate intensity cardio, like the bike. Shakes things up, keeps the body from adapting.

Apropos of nothing except that we're talking about heart rates -- the highest HR I've ever hit on my HR monitor was doing a set of squats (over 100% of max). That really surprised me. And I'll routinely be in the 140's doing bicep curls. It's really interesting how weight training can be cardio too, especially if you superset or cut down the rest periods.

Allison, I'm glad you got to the vet. It's great that Chico is fine. Hope Buddy will be better very soon.

Here I was thinking that when I get my HR up to 160's on my elliptical that I am killing myself. LOL. I get off that thing feeling like my heart is thumping out of my chest.

I've noticed that I get well into my cardio zone while lifting. I've never gotten as high as I will with an all-out treadmill sprint, but lifting heavy definitely elevates my heart rate. Deadlifts and squats in particular get my HR right up there. I'm always at least in the 'fat burning' zone while lifting. I count the calories burned.

Allison, I'm so sorry about your poor doggy. Give him some extra love from me.

I'm 15 years younger than you, Lily. It makes a difference

But my HR actually got up to 171 today. That's quite high!

Lily, a rough guideline to heart rates is to take your age and subtract it from 220. That's your (theoretical) max heart rate. I'm 52, so my max is 168. When I do cardio, it kills me to be in the 160s for long but I'll try to do a minute or two and drop back and recover, then go back up there.

If you're in the 160's on your elliptical, you're doing an outstanding job!!

That can't be right! That would make my max heart rate 188 and I think I'd absolutely die. Probably literally. The highest I've ever seen (to my recollection) is 174, and that was during a longish, very, very hard sprint on an incline. And my heart was pounding like crazy.

Ok. Wait. Phew. I just realized that I'm supposed to work at 80% of that, which is 150. *Much* better!!!

I thought for a second that I was a terrible, out-of-shape slacker who only *thought* she was doing hard work at the gym. Yikes!

It's only a VERY rough guide, which is why I always qualify and say it's the theoretical max. The only way to figure your real max HR would be in a lab.

I know that my actual max HR is probably in the 170s rather than 168. I shouldn't be able to sustain an average HR of 90% of max for a half hour but I do, so obviously the numbers aren't quite right for me. But 220 minus age is a good place for most people to start.

Although I've never been on an elliptical, I do have a story to share. DD has a gym membership and she decided to try it. She couldn't even stay on it for 5 minutes! She can run on the treadmill for 20, but couldn't manage the elliptical and she's only 16! I imagine it HAS to be a good workout--regardless of the impact!

The consent forms for the National Weight Loss Control Resgistry came yesterday. They're all filled out and in the mail today, so in a few weeks I'll get the questionnaire to work on.

Confession time - I haven't been exercising or logging my eating in my journal for almost 3 months now. My appetite is still low due to the meds so I'm back to ticker weight for the week. I keep a running log of how many times I've eaten in a day in my head. I know from the months that I kept the journal that I'm below 1,400 calories per day. Sometimes I even eat at the end of the day when I'm not hungry because I think I need to to maintain where I am and not lose any more.

For instance, last night I didn't get to sleep until after 2 am so I slept in until 10. (I've got to get enough sleep or it triggers my mood swings) It's after 4:30 pm and I'm just starting to get hungry. If I drank some water, the feeling would probably go away, but I know I need to eat something. I'm just not motivated to go into the kitchen where there's only eggs, cheese, milk, carrots, and bread in the refridgerator. I didn't want to bother going shopping today because I'm leaving tomorrow morning for the shore. There's tuna and a can of corn in the cabinette for dinner later.

Today, I gathered up all the supplies I need to teach a class in crazy quilting tomorrow down at the beach. I finally got motivated to use my fancy new sewing machine and work on a small crazy quilt I'm making for my friends' daughter. She wanted one of suns, stars, and moons. Today, I used the machine to embroider things like "a total eclipse of the sun", "vernal equinox", "first star I see tonight", and so on. I'll use it as an example for the class.

Allison, just getting a chance to post. I hope things are well and take good care of Buddy!

Anne

I had another stomach pain episode, this time after a grapefruit. I was just getting used the the idea that someone here said that maybe it was an allergic reaction to tomatoes developed later in life, but now grapefruits??
I'm still thinking ulcer, I dunno. I hate doctors though and don't really want to go to one. Any ideas on what this could be? Is it just a conicidence that it coincides with my losing 65 lbs?