Good Sunday Girls

I thought I would start the new thread this week, hope no one minds...

It’s rainy here, but it is badly needed...I’ve been pretty busy since last Thursday, but food wise it’s been good but only good and not excellent as I’d like it to be. Exercise wise I have missed 2 out of 5 days last week, because I was going to bed too late and could not get up at 4:30AM. I am DEFINITELY a morning person, so to go to the gym in the afternoon or evening is out of the question for me... I should really work on changing that because I would have plenty of time to go around 1 or 1:30 in the PM...Specially on days I miss in the morning....

~ JC ~ Yes, I did start it ... It is very doable for me except I cannot eat 3 meals in a row of chicken, so I add some CC and strawberries in between the 2 chicken meals.... I was also wondering what you take for a fiber supplement? I put 2T of ground flax seed in my post-workout protein shake... The first day I was hungry a bit, but only had to wait an hour or so for the next meal so that was no problem, I had a cup of green tea, which for some reason fills me up, and water of course... Thanks for the idea of adding some sugar free syrup to strawberries, which is yummy...JC I still am in denial about my size, I guess it’s because people tell me I look good, but I know deep down I certainly could look better because there are still back rolls under the bra. I am working on that tho... HA! Here I am thinking that MOST people tell me I look good and muscular, BUT last Monday night I had a rude awakening. I was at a night class I am taking on nutrition, given my the Eastern Ontario Healthy Unit, a lady who I had seen the week before, didn’t recognize me from a job I had years ago and we worked together. So “I” approached her and said hi... (BIG MISTAKE!!) She said, “I thought it was you, but you gained soooooo much weight I wasn’t sure...” Holly F***, (‘scuse the language) I thought I was going to slap her!!! This after just that morning, my g/f at the gym said I looked awesome... Maybe it’s because I’m muscular and this lady considers this too much and this was her way of saying so, or because she’s just rude... Whichever it is it has made me ponder and want to work harder...

~ Audrey ~ I’m sure you’ve mentioned it but I cannot remember what PFA stands for.... I just had a light bulb moment... YOU are the one getting married!! You mention the surprise shower for yourself and your makeup problem... I thought all along that it was a friend’s wedding you were wanting to loose weight for to! Well excuse my moment, and belated congrats to you.... I sometimes read the posts so quickly that I miss stuff... Sorry 

~AireGrrrl~ It is certainly amazing how much we can eat, and be satisfied, with clean eats... Specially large salads with every meal and then a plateful of veggies and a protein portion, good grief if you aren’t full will that, you’ll never be, works wonders for me...

~ Dip ~ Congrats on not giving in to that temptation....

~Meg~ My nickname as a kid was “Ilène la baleine” which is the quite close to Moby Dick. I was not overweight as a child, it was because it rhymed, in French my name is very close to the pronunciation of “Elaine” so it rhymes with “baleine” but because kids would say that I believed it and felt fat... ... I believe it just goes to show, if you call someone stupid often enough they will believe it... Kids can be sooooo mean....

~Mothers~ Yes mine drives me a bit crazy too, but in other ways ... Food wise she is pretty cautious herself, because her and dad are borderline diabetic, they are 75 yrs old... and she accepts that I am cautious too, although she can’t understand why I cannot have just ONE cookie, well I can’t ....What drives me crazy is that she refuses to believe that exercise will help her, “ I walk enough in the house, I did 3 loads of laundry and stood up all day at the counter cutting veggies” so to her that’s a lot of exercise... BUT she has a very difficult time going up 4 steps, to get into her house, she needs to pull herself up the banister... Her excuse is that she’s been like this since she’s very young, in her teens she says... but I can remember her walking to centre town and back from her place and that’s a good hour walk...But she seems to have blocked that from her memory... My mom also thinks that I am lazy and do nothing but sit around all day in the pool (in the summer of course) or spend my free time on the internet (well I kinda do but not THAT much  I just hafta come and see you gals...) I try to avoid going over when I’m PMSing.... It saddens me tho that if the circle of life goes as it usually does my own daughter will be saying things about me when she gets older, and I too without even knowing it will rub her the wrong way...I sometimes do now... like the other day she sees me measure out some chicken and rolls her eyes and says, “Gee do you hafta measure EVERYTHING you eat!!” I thought that was pretty funny... So that will probably be a thing she will talk about with her g/f’s when she gets older, or maybe she does that now, it wouldn’t surprise me because she’s quite vocal... (Like her mom, oh gawd help us!)

Oh, I almost forgot to mention that we have a new member in the family.... Last Thursday I hear D run down the stairs saying “OMG!!!!!” then I hear these loud, very very loud meows (you know where I’m going here) and this kitten is under one of the vehicles in the driveway... So Mia brings it in, it is starving... It is very clean. Therefore, I tell her to go around the neighborhood to see if it belongs to anyone. We put a sign up “Have you lost a kitten?” I reported it to the radio station, and the animal shelter. No one has claimed her... So guess who has claimed her? Yes, us!! But she’s such a cutie, I think it’s a she! We’re not sure... I’m taking her to the Vet tomorrow... I have never seen such a quiet lazy kitten; I sure hate to see how lazy she will get as an adult cat... ~Karen ~ How long did it take your two cats to like each other? Our 5 year old cat’s nose it quite a bit out of joint...

Well I’ve babbled long enough D is wanting to get on the ‘puter...

Whew, I survived both the hurricane and my whirlwind trip to Scotland. (I'm getting ready to post a few pics from the trip in the LWL photo album - speaking of which, awesome progress pics Frannymae and Lois!!)

My power went out on Thursday (along with most everyone elses' in the state of Virginia!), and was still out when I left on Friday for my trip. I missed a lot of the commotion, as I was alone on Thursday, and left all of the hoopla behind on Friday, as I took off for my flight to Scotland. Several of my coworkers are still without power, and one of the trainers at my gym lost everything in an apartment fire caused by the hurricane. Very sad...

I basically gave myself a free week while in Scotland, but don't feel too badly about it, as I spent most of the time walking up hills and stairs it seems. Our hotel in Glascow was a Holiday Inn Express, thus no gym, but the Holiday Inn we stayed at in Edinburgh (for one night) had one, so I did manage to get a lifting workout in - a rather lame one due to a pretty weak equipment offering, but felt great to get it in nonetheless...)

Ilene! I tried Day 1 of the workout you posted in the "favorite workouts" thread. For the first time since I began lifting weights in earnest (almost 3 years ago now), I worked my chest muscles to failure - wow, what a feeling! They were throbbing by the time I completed my last set of dumbbell flyes. I only did 10 minute sessions, though, because I didn't make it to the gym until 9:15 and it closes at 10pm. Oh well, something to improve upon next week. And OMIGAWD, I cannot believe your former coworker said that??!!??!! I'm sure you handled it much more gracefully than I would have

Damnit, why did I have to bring back all of these cookies and chocolate bars?? Somehow, I don't think grilled chicken, a cookie and 1/4 of a candy bar is a BFL authorized meal...

I have a lot of cathing up to do on the thread here - later all!

Hi Colleen, welcome back and happy to see you had such a wonderful time altho you left behind some pretty devastating scenarios... We didn't get much at all of the storm up here in EAstern Ontario, just a tiny bit of rain and some intermitent wind... Oh, I'm so happy you tried and enjoyed the workout! I can't wait to try it tomorrow, I haven't tried particular w/o of EDT yet, I'm really excited to try it out now... Just viewed your pics Colleen very beautiful scenerie, and you and hubby are a very cute couple...

Cindy -- Just saw your pics... Great progress!! Keep it up!..

ok I am up for it - the first week of GTC will perfect eats. I will post my intake every day for this week starting today.

Today's eats;

Meal 1: 2 whole eggs, 2 egg whites & 1/2 grapefruit with a drizzle of sugar free syrup. a cup of coffee

Meal 2: chicken breast with a cup of mixed veggies

Meal 3: chicken breast with salad, Udos & nut mix, a diet coke & sugar free red bull.

Meal 4: PP shake with 1/3 cup whole milk, glutamine, glucosamine & fibre supplement

Meal 5: Fish with salad & strawberries (with da vinci vanilla SF syrup), diet coke

No meal 6 for me. 4-5 litres H2O.

Will read the other posts and be back soon. I just wanted to get that out of the way.

JC

Thanks JC, I have just cut and pasted that to a document, thankyouverrrrymuch...

Here's a pic of our new no-name-as-of-yet fur baby....

Ilene: you beat me to starting the new thread! The fibre supplement I take is pysllium husks (I think that’s how it’s spelt) which is 100% fibre. I would be careful on the ground flaxseed adding too many additional calories. Oh the vanilla Da Vinci sugar free syrup on strawberries kills all of my sweet cravings and you only need a tablespoon to be able to taste it. I can’t believe the woman actually said that! How rude!! I know how you feel though – I am at the stage where I feel comfortable in clothes and think I look good and then I get undressed and feel horrible. I still carry so much cellulite on my thighs and it makes my thighs look 1000 times worse than their actual shape.

Mothers: mine does that as well – ‘I am a nurse and on my feet all day so I don’t need to exercise.’

the kitty is soooo cute.

Colleen: how was your trip? You are back already?? I though that you would be gone for at least a month!

Today is going to be great I KNOW IT! I feel strong and I am back on the wagon. I have a very busy day but that's not gonna distract me from eating correctly! (I am ignoring the tray of cookies in the kitchen).

Check in everyone! I need your strength.....

JC

PS - are your pics up yet - you know who???

Colleen - what part of VA are you in? You got to miss all the fun!! My power was out for 5 days, and then I could not get back online for a few more days....talk about torture

Does anyone here do a weight training program called periodization or heard of it? If so, what are your thoughts? I need to change my routine, as I am about to go into the fat-burning phase of PT. I can explain what it is if need be to get your thoughts

JC ....what is GTC??

Robin

Yeah, what's this GTC, hmmm?

Robin - I am in Fredericksburg, you? Yes, I am quite aware that I missed all of the "fun" - my friends and coworkers didn't even want to *hear* about my trip.. they were so disgruntled that I was quite the world traveler, while they sat around with none of life's modern conveniences, hehe...

JC - I *wish* I could have gone for a month. My bro will be over there for the next year, so hopefully, I'll get to make a few more trips. This one was on my parents' dime, so I wasn't too concerned about the short length of the trip - If I'd been paying for it, I don't think I could have justified paying $500+ for airfare to only stay there 6 days!!

Robin: I have heard of periodization. I tried to do it early on but confused myself too much and gave it up. It is a true and tried program of lifting though used for a long time by many body builders with lots of success.

GTC = Give Thanks Challenge – our ‘current’ challenge that runs to Thanksgiving (US date). Join us!

Colleen: It only cost $500 to go to Scotland? The airfares over here are up to $1500 to go to the UK.

JC

Hello ladies - I've been lurking a bit lately, just trying to get through the end of this Challenge. Well, today is finally the last day. As Ilene noticed already, I've posted my new progress photos on the MSN site. One good thing about the photos - they show some progress even when everything else says there hasn't been any! Really, only the back photo shows progress for this latest Challenge. As Meg commented before, I am losing from the extremeties in. :-(

That said, although I'm proud to have finished a second Challenge, I'm determined to make the most of my third. I'm taking this week off to figure out what approach I want to take. I've been reading your comments about tweaking the program. Can anyone give me a good link for info about BodyRx? I'm not at all familiar with it, and want to look into it as well. I'm sure one of these plans or a hybrid of them will be what I decide to try.

This is kind of my weight loss MO - I can usually lose 15-30# in one try, but then it just stalls. I've never had the motivation to try to push it farther before, but this time I want to see if I can. I would really like to lose another 30, and hope I can do it without having to wait a year until my body is willing to cooperate!

I'm thinking I may want to modify my workouts as well - more like the splits you gals are doing, instead of the BFL plan.

Well, I'm just thinking "out loud" at this point - please feel free to offer your suggestions, and I'm sure I'll have more questions as the week goes on.
Cindy

Catching up on other topics:

Ilene - your new baby is adorable! I just LOVE kittens - they are so irresistable!

JC and Tidey - I'll be joining you next week on your "clean eats" Challenge.

Colleen - welcome back - can't wait to hear more about Scotland - saw the photos you posted, and it looks beautiful. Couldn't help noticing the Michigan State Crew sweatshirt on the guy in the one photo - I'm a Michigan native!

Robin - what is PT?

About Mothers - mine makes me crazy as well..... she's been saying she's going to start the South Beach Diet for weeks. Supposedly she was going to start tomorrow, so she went grocery shopping today, but bought all kinds of fresh fruit and soy milk and stuff that she can't eat during those first two weeks! So, of course, now she can't start..... LOL!

Cindy - awesome progress! You've lost an entire roll of under-the-bra back fat! Man oh man do I wish I could get rid of mine! I'm like that with weight loss too - it seems like i'm in a perpetual stall, but anytime I get on some new fitness kick, I'll lose about 10 pounds within jsut a few weeks, then I'll stall out again until the next craze comes along.. lol... (first spinning class, then aeroboxing, then running...)

What a week that was, and what a weekend. This is the first free moment I've had to post in days, although I've tried to keep up with the reading.

Ilene, many years ago, I lost 55 pounds in 90 days on one of the liquid fasts -- remember those? Well, I gained back about 65 pounds in about the same amount of time (and forever ruined my digestive system in the process.) A friend I'd seen at the low point encountered me again at the high point, and was clearly aghast, and out of her mouth came the words, "Goodness, Robin, what on earth has happened to you." I think she regretted them for years, but I was devastated. It's odd, I haven't thought about that incident in a very long time, but even now I can remember first, how hurt I was, and then how furious I was.

Those kinds of comments, along with the swell remarks delivered by unthinking mothers, and cruel nicknames bestowed on us by family and "friends" can leave an ugly mark, can't they. What I've discovered at this point in my life is that it's up to us to decide how to deal with them. What I tell myself is that those kinds of observations don't have anything to do with me, and they have everything to do with whoever's doing the talking. So, all we can do is consider the source, move on and keep on lifting. As someone else said earlier this week, we're walking the walk, not merely talking the talk. Let 'em talk.

Now, if you all can stand just a little more from me ... I've had a lightbulb moment!! An epiphany. And I've set a new goal for myself.

The first ah-ha moment, came from another thread in the last week -- someone asked for advice, and Meg answered that although she weighed 130-something, she wore a Size 4. then, someone else -- JC? Audrey? Forgive me, I forget -- made a reference to a squishy body -- someone whose weight was OK, but who looked pretty padded.

Well folks, that's me. My weight's OK, I guess -- 140 at 5-foot-4, but I'm a cross between an hourglass figure and the Pillsbury Dough Boy. I'm soft. I'm squishy. It's not my WEIGHT that has to change; it's my BODY.

So, here's my goal. I'm giving myself a year to re-create myself. I figure it will take some time because, first, it always does. Second, I'm going to have to build strength and endurance. And third, my eating is not entirely BFL-clean. If my husband cooks butternut squash, salmon and brown rice for dinner, I'm probably going to eat it. He's very supportive, but sometimes he loses track of details, and he does a lot of the cooking, because he's retired, and he can. We eat very healthy in this house, but we don't always eat on BFL terms.

I want to see how much I can accomplish. I turned 55 on Friday, and I want to see how fit I can be when I turn 56. I just don't buy the notion that I am destined to become weak, soft, heavy and generally unhealthy just because of menopause and age. Not for this kid.

So, that's what I've been thinking about in the last several days. I've enjoyed a week of clean eating (except for my BDay dinner last night, which was quite wonderful, thank you), and several really good workouts. I like this challenge.

Thanks for hearing me out. I'll try not to be so long-winded next time.

Cheers,

Airegrrl (aka Indiana Robin)

Lana, I'm glad that you've not taken what your, ahem, acquaintance said to heart. You're obviously the sort of person who draws strength from within. That comment would've destroyed me, by the way. And congratulations on your kitty, it is very cute!

JC, I'm sending you vibes! I need your strength too! I'll post my GTC goals/eating plan in a seperate thread.

I just checked out the MSN site again, and I wish to emphasise again HOW MUCH PROGRESS EVERYONE has made! It's really quite comforting to know that what we're doing works... even if I am taking a while to see results. :P

By the way, dip, what breed is fox? He looks a bit like a maltese/poodle/terrier to me, but I'm not very good at recognising breeds.

About Clean Eats and the GTC:

I worked up the nerve to measure myself today, and to my shock and horror, I realised that I had managed in less than a month to binge 4" on my waist and 5" on my hips. (is there an emoticon for crying???) And I think that I have gone down a little in the past three weeks or so, so I shudder to imagine how bad the damage was before. My goals for the GTC:

to lose 12lbs (this is a bit tricky because I don't know my current)
to lose 2" off my waist
to lose 3" off my hips
to lose 2" off each thigh

Plus I of course want to build up strength and cardiovascular fitness, but I'm not certain of what exact goals for these should be.

With regards to Clean Eats, I will get my protein in the form of lean meats, eat as much vegetables including tomatoes and some pumpkin as I want, and have up to a serving of fruit a day. I will have one cheat meal a week.

Today, I've had a small mixed fruit salad and a chicken vegetable stir fry is on the cards for lunch. Dinner will be out at a Japanese restaurant, so I'll have sashimi and maybe cold tofu. I will snack on salad and tuna.