Weekly Weigh-In: Sore & Swollen Muscles

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weekly weigh in april 25

My new workout routine caused lots of sore muscles all over. Which means up up ever so slightly this week.

Last week I jump started 2 workout routines — running and resistance training. My arms, abs and legs are feeling the burn as they say. Thanks to that soreness (a.k.a. swollen muscles), I’m up a a whopping 6 ounces. My guess is sometime this week that will fall off and I can expect better results next weigh-in day.

Why Resistance Bands & Not Barbells?
Turns out the local rec department I planned to use twice a week for weight lifting got rid of their free weights. Ugh!  Who does that?

Anyway I figured I’d just dig out my resistance bands, load up the Fitness Blender YouTube vids and workout. Turns out my old bands were lacking the resistance I needed. So I gave those to my mom as she wants to start building muscle (yay!) and picked up some new bands.

That doesn’t mean I’m giving up the dream of working with barbells. Turns out my parkour gym offers weight training classes. Once I go through the initial class, I can come in anytime and workout with the free weights. I’m hoping to hit the newbie class this Saturday.

Running Again
I stopped running because I was freaked about what I read regarding cardio exercise and IVF success. But it turns out that’s more related to over exercising. That doesn’t mean I won’t stop once we start treatments. That’s a very real possibility. But for now I want to run.

Rather than trying for a personal best, I’m just doing intervals to help me get back into the swing of things.  Last week I did 1 minute run/2 minute walk for 21 minutes. This week that flips to 2 minute run/1 minute walk for 30 minutes.

While my first run was awesome, the next 2 were more challenging. My legs were so sore from squats, lunges and mountain climbers. My leg workouts are the day before a run so my poor legs never got full rest. If that happens again this week, I may have to rethink the timing of my leg workouts.

 

 

Losing Weight In Public — Week 4

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Me, looking at pie.

Week 1 weight: 305 pounds
Last week’s weight: 297 pounds
Current weight: 295 pounds
Weight lost since last week: 2 pounds
Total weight lost: 10 pounds

My fourth post. I am a stranger in this land of 200s. Mysterious and frightening be their ways. They eat and then they stop! Their bathroom scales, they do not break! At first, I was but a scared traveler in their midst, scurrying from shadow to shadow, nibbling as I went, afraid at any moment they would see me and shout, “That fat guy has no clothes!” What are they doing in my bathroom at 7 a.m.? I DO NOT KNOW!

Last week’s big successes:

Ok, I’ll just say it right here: last week was mostly great. We had one round of catering at the office and I didn’t eat any of it. Also, though I went out to a few restaurants, I didn’t order any dessert. Yay for me, please pass the ketchup.

Last week’s failures:

Isn’t the world more fun when you don’t blog about your mistakes? I sure think so. Ok, so last Friday at the team potluck was a total fricking bust. I tried like 4 different desserts, and then I tried them all again. I had carbs up the wazoo. How they got up my wazoo, I have no idea, but they were there when I woke from my sugar coma. Really stupid on my part, and it’s a miracle I lost any weight at all. If anything, that shows you can screw up and still succeed, but therein lies a problem. Now I know I can screw up and succeed. Pandora has left the building, and she’s carrying an open box of Twinkies.

This week’s coming challenges:

I can’t think of anything specific, except for the possibility of a meetup group of some sort. Oh yeah, we might go to a seafood place for happy hour. I can eat seafood until my head falls off. Woot.
One challenge we should go ahead and acknowledge: desserts. Every week of this whole “Losing Weight In Public” thing has shown I can’t stay away from them. So it’s safe to say that’s my biggest challenge this week: not eating desserts.

Conclusion:

I’m really looking forward to getting my eating under better control. I need to plan better. I need to figure out why I do the things I do. Am I trying to escape? If so, from what? Am I trying to fill up a hole of some kind? Or am I just a human with millions of years of evolution weighing me down, screaming, “Eat before you starve! Eat before you starve!”

I’d like to blame it all on Darwin, but you know what happened to him?

He died.

See you next week!

Weekly Weigh-In: Down 3; Lowest Weight In 25 Years!

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weekly weight april 16

After losing 3 pounds this week I’m officially at my lowest weight in more than 25 years. Woohoo! 170s here I come!

I’m down 3.1 lbs. this week, weighing in at 181.4. That’s the lowest number I’ve seen on the scale for more than 25 years!  I finally feel back on track and have my sights set on saying hello to the 170s very soon.

So what worked this week? How about putting a stop on nibbling on cheese, seeds or nuts between meals. Anytime I walked into the kitchen I asked myself, “Am I hungry?” Presto! No more snacking. Don’t get me wrong, it took practice to get me into the habit of asking myself that question.

Instead I kept my focus on drinking water. The last couple of weeks I made a big effort in drinking my daily 90 ounces. Since I only use 24-ounce Tervis Tumblers, it’s pretty easy to track. As long as I fill those tumblers up 4 times a day I’m all set. This week I was hitting the mark.  Sweet!

Plus I’m finding I’m not that hungry. One of my consistent problems is not recognizing my hunger and satiety signals. I know that decades of bad eating really does mess with those hormones. But ghrelin (the hunger hormone) and leptin (the satiety hormone) do correct themselves over time with eating healthy, real foods. My hunger signal is working just fine. But it feels like my satiety signal is finally kicking in.

I’m noticing two things that might signal my leptin levels are normal again: Read More

John’s Little Problem — Week 2

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cobler

Cobbler: omg, so good…

Beginning weight: 305 pounds
Weight lost since last week: 5 pounds
Current Weight: 300 pounds

Today begins the second week of my big fat experiment. Last week had a lot of challenges, but I seem to have done all right. If I hadn’t, I would have posted anyway, because I said I would — and that looming embarrassment kept me more or less on track all week. Thanks anonymous Internet people!

Challenge 1: Catering To My Needs

Last Tuesday, my job had three meetings with an unholy amount of catering, and they stacked it all in the common area when they were through. Worst of all, they had my favorite thing in the world: cobbler, in two flavors — peach and apple. Who doesn’t love apple cobbler? Crazy people, that’s who. I avoided the cobbler and settled for a few pieces of chicken (breaded … ugh, I know).

Challenge 2: Dining And Whining

The wife and I went out a few too many times last week (see her Sunday blog post). The problem, I think, is we don’t have a lot of friends in the area. Ok, none, really. Our closest friends live about thirty miles away, and we only see them about once a month, tops. So the wife and I tend to go out. There’s background music, atmosphere, drinks-drinks-drinks (whiskey or wine, not beer), food we don’t have to make, cheerful waitstaff, etc. And way too many opportunities to over indulge.

Challenge 3: Revenge Of The Cobbler

On Saturday, I ended up breaking down and eating some blackberry cobbler on one of our little outings. I felt bad about that. Not the end of the world, and not in unlimited amounts (like those giant vats at the office…), but definitely the end of ketosis for about 24 hours. Sigh. Something to work on.

This Coming Week…

This week’s challenges are mostly unknown, except for Friday. The wife and I joined a meetup group that’ll be going to a bar for happy hour. “Are you out of your mind?!” you say. Not entirely. We’d probably go out anyway at some point. At least this way we can meet a few folks, make new friends. Also, it’s scheduled fun — for Friday. Not “I’m bored, let’s go mess up” fun three days in a row. And we do need more friends in the area. We’ve joined a few other meetup groups as well. Each will have its food challenges. One’s a bowling group. The other’s an eclectic group that does all kinds of odd things, from board games to happy hours to going to museums.

I’m feeling pretty good about where I am. Five pounds is an awful lot to lose in a week, and I’m sure next week will be more realistic. We always lose the most weight in the first week of a “diet,” whereas “lifestyles” produce less spectacular (though longer lasting) results.

See you next week!

Weekly Weigh-In: Self Sabotage!

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april 10 weigh in

I’m up 2 pounds from the last time I posted a weigh-in. Eating out is the culprit. But I’m back in the kitchen with abandon.

Holy crap! I haven’t posted a weigh-in since Feb. 29. Truth be told I’m working on a big project that’s consuming a lot of my time. I can’t say anything now but hopefully by this summer I’ll have good news to share.

After reading those awesome books by Steven Pressfield, I’m determined not to let my weigh-ins slide anymore. So weekly posts are back.

My Feb. 29 weigh in had me at 182.5 lbs, but by the time April 2 rolled around I was back to 187.5. With some changes this week, I dropped 3 pounds and now weigh 184.5.

So I’m trapped in a weird super moon bounce of my own making. Just bobbing up and down 5 pounds. What the heck is going on, Dot?

Self sabotage, that’s what! Grrrrrr!!!!!
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Man vs. Fat

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fork and measure

My husband has finally committed to getting healthy. So Mondays he’ll post about his weight loss escapades. Image courtesy of FreeDigitalPhoto.net and Mister CG.

Let’s face it, the overwhelming majority of weight loss products and information target women — 85% in fact. But what about men? It feels like with all the news about Oprah buying into Weight Watchers and the latest weight loss gimmicks (lose weight eating chocolate), it seems like men are getting left out in the cold.

Well here at dot2trot I’m an equal opportunity type of gal. I recognize that guys who want to lose weight also need some TLC and encouragement. So every Monday my hubby, author John L. Monk, will document his weight loss journey. Yep, he’s committed to openly discuss his temptations at work (all the donuts!), bad eating habits (eating off the wife’s plate!), and finding motivation to get off of his butt for evening walks.

Something tells me you’ll enjoy his trials and tribulations more than he does.

Weekly Weigh-In: Same As It Ever Was

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feb 27 weight

I ended February weighing as much as I did when the month began. Thanks to lots of eating out, I put the brakes on my weight loss, loss sleep, experienced digestive problems and had no energy.

I started February weighing 182.9 pounds. I end the month weighing 182.5 pounds. While I hoped to leave the 180s behind, I see this as a small victory. Even when I’m “bad” I can maintain or course correct pretty quickly with my eating habits.

Now when I say “bad” I’m talking about eating out and enjoying wine way too much. The middle of the month the hubby and I ate out about 10 times.  Of course, I had wine with my meals.  Ugh!!!  Thankfully the last 10 days I’ve worked diligently about cooking my own meals and forgoing the vino. And the results showed not only on the scale, but in how I physically felt.

Lack of Sleep & Feeling Crappy
What did all that eating out and wine get me? Between February 8-21, I gained 5 pounds. I know some of that was water retention, but when the pants started fitting a little tighter than normal, it was time to make a change.

Besides the pounds, I noticed a couple of things about my physical health: 1) poor sleep ensued, and 2) The morning after, my body let me know it did not approve of such behavior. Read More

Weight Loss & Wedding Rings

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new ring

A new ring to rule them all…yep I got my new wedding band for Valentine’s and lost nearly 4 sizes in the process. Yay!

My husband surprised me on Valentine’s Day with a new wedding band. I haven’t worn my wedding band or engagement ring since April 2013. That’s when I tried to dry my hands by frantically waiving them in the air the rings flew off my finger. Thankfully I was home at the time and found them.

After that incident, I put my rings up for safekeeping thinking I can resize them once I hit goal. Turns out, resizing was out of the question due to how the stones were set within the band. Grrrr!

So nearly 3 years later, I’m down 145 pounds and have 30 more to go, but the husband thought enough time passed and I needed a new wedding band.

I settled on a band similar to the original — sapphires and diamonds (stones not embedded into the band) but with white instead of yellow gold. The big shock came when measuring my finger. I went from a size 10-1/2 to 6-3/4.

Yikes! I was so busy focusing on losing weight in the obvious places — stomach, thighs, bat wings arms, and butt — I never expected fat loss from my hands.

But I’m not complaining. All weight loss victories are welcome.

 

 

Weekly Weigh-In: Up A Little

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weight jan 30

I’m up slightly and it feels like most of that weight is in my plugged up sinuses! Yep, my bug is back with abandon. And I’m fighting it the best way I know how…lots of sleep!

Well I’m up nearly half a pound, but I don’t consider that anything serious. My guess is my returning illness has more to do with it than what I’m eating. Yep, I’m sick again (or is it still?). Two weeks ago it was painful sinuses that turned into a head cold with a chaser of a bad earache. Well that earache turned back into painful sinuses with another shot of a head cold. Ugh!

So I’m doing what I should have done the first go-around — plenty of sleep and meds.

If I’m not fully recovered by Superbowl Sunday, then I’m raising the white flag and heading to my doctor’s for something stronger.

My appetite has decreased with round 2 of this bug. However I’m now craving comfort foods. Pizza, pancakes and chips. Oh my!

I took care of the chip craving thanks to a stash of zero carb pork rinds. The beauty of pork rinds is that you need water after every big, fluffy chip.  I can only eat a handful as I’m loading up on liquids to get them down. Unlike potato chips where I can eat a whole bag in one sitting.

As for the pizza and pancakes, every time a craving kicks in I just head back to bed and slept for 4 hours.  Seems silly, but it works.

The one silver lining in all of this is that as I recover the snow is nearly all gone. Hopefully early next week the trails and sidewalks will be snow and ice free and I can go walking again.  I’m also toying with hitting our country rec club’s weight room. My resistance bands aren’t cutting it anymore.

I can’t wait to be germ free again.

 

Weekly Weigh In: Down 2

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weekly weigh in Jan 9

Just 2.6 pounds before I finally break into the 170s. Super excited!

What happens when you eat right and take a 30-Day No Alcohol Challenge?  Weight loss!  I’m finally closer to breaking into the 170s after losing 2.1 pounds this week.

But what happens when my no alcohol challenge is over January 31?

Right now I’m eager to continue the challenge  into February.

Since I started my challenge on Jan. 1, I’ve lost 4.1 pounds. Clearly I made a big error by not cutting back on wine sooner. I significantly slowed (heck, stopped) my weight loss progress and was stuck in a plateau for about 7 months.

No use crying over drunk wine. I’m on track now and that’s what counts.

Today’s weigh in puts my total weight loss at 142.5 pounds…nearly 45% of my total weight gone.  Sweet!

So I’m roughly 26 pounds away from goal. Whoa…