My version of backsliding...

The magic number + holidays + time with friends and family = backsliding!

I don't know WHAT it is, but I swear I have this magic number that I can't seem to get below. Two years ago I was cracking into the high 130s and these days, I see 150 on that scale and I am stuck. The combination of finally relaxing and spending time with my friends and family, around wine and food, can be disastrous. I may be exaggerating. I do think that my idea of overeating (and healthy eating) is much different from what it was in years past. I am more controlled, I have a breaking point that comes much sooner than it used to and there are limits to the amount of alcohol, second helpings and desert I will consume. When all else fails, I just walk away...

Still, because it's so different from the way I eat when I'm on a normal schedule, I worry about the outcome. I am definitely paranoid... you know that feeling when you lose weight that at any moment it can all come back? That's how I feel now. Instead of 3 glasses of wine and a plate full of desert tonight I had one glass of wine and one small desert. But I feel like I ate the entire table for dinner. Imagine that, exercising and finally practicing eating in moderation and still worrying about gaining the dreaded holiday weight?!?!?!

Like everything in life, I over analyze everything to death. The solution when I do this is to refocus on training. So here it is... today was a great day at the gym (and by great I mean I hate Kirk). We went in early again and Kirk planned for 60 minutes on the Stepmill. I have never done the Stepmill so I thought I would give it a shot. I ran for 30 minutes and joined him for the last 24 on the Stepmills. Holy crap! Talk about a workout... my legs and butt are going to be so sore tomorrow! I had to keep it slow to keep my heartrate in check, but I was sweating like a madman... that is SO much harder than the treadmill at that heartrate. I hated it but I think I'm hooked! Why do we like the things that make us hurt? I guess we love the fruits of the labor...

Tomorrow I'm going to join an early 45 minute cycling class at one gym and then head to the other gym for some more cardio and strength training.

Hola!!!

Yes, I'm still alive and can't believe that I haven't posted since December 8th. To be honest, it's just been so hectic. I left for my 3 glorious weeks at home (Ontario, Canada) on Friday morning. The last week at work was just insanely busy, and the nights were filled with Christmas parties and shopping and preparing for my long trip home!

Jessi said it best, I'm just tired. I have been working out but not the 6 days/week that I'm used to. I decided that it was more important to get sleep and eat really well... and as a result, I'm feeling much better and am down 11 lbs since the marathon! I'm back to eating balanced meals, and am going to spend most of my holiday time trying out all of the recipes from Jodi's recipe blog! I LOVE TIME OFF WORK!!!

Ok, I say that, but I have a hard time really taking time off work. For one, I worry about what shit might hit the fan while I'm out of the office. Secondly, I'm now in Peterborough. Don't get me wrong, I love Peterborough, but there are only so many things you can do here. Yes, we are the home of the highest hydraulic lift locks in the world... but we also have more senior citizens per capita than all but one other city in Canada! Not a lot to do around here and you can only go down to THE MALL in town so often!

I love spending time with my parents... but I'm here for over 3 weeks! The panic started to set in a little over the weekend, OMG, what AM I going to do for 3 weeks without my friends from Seattle?!?! The answer came to me this morning. Today I met Kirk at the gym. I am linking to his blog in hopes that this will pressure him to post (sorry my friend). Kirk and his wife Ange are my favorite people in Ptbo. They are just a lot of fun... it's non-stop laughs when we hang out! They are both very active people and love sports! Tonight I'm going to their indoor co-ed soccer game!

After the gym we went back to their house to have breakfast and catch up. Thank God for them! Side note, they have the cutest kid I have ever seen... 8 months old, teething, wakes up from a nap and is all smiles. I pick her up and she says "hi". No crying for mom, no after nap grumpiness... just a big smile and "hi". So we're planning on doing the morning gym thing most days while I'm here, I really hope they don't get sick of me! They will keep me sane!

So that's all for now... more on what I plan to do while I'm in Ontario tomorrow. :) For now, I must create my shopping list for those recipes...

Turkey and Swiss?!?!?!

Quick summary of foods consumed at last night’s outing:

1 and 2/3 glasses of red wine
Lots of water and chamomile tea
1 jumbo shrimp
1 skewer with a chilled scallop, salmon and olive
1 small crab cake (I know deep fried was off the list but this was pan fried and wasn’t your typical heavy mayo crap cake… and it was small I swear!)
NO BREAD
NO FRIED CALAMARI
Mussels (shared with my boss)
King crab legs
Fruit for desert (I know I also said no desert but they brought out huge desert platter so it was fruit or bust)

After dinner, all the drunkies in the group wanted to go out. Since I was the DD, I got to escort them to a bar where I proceeded to drink water. All in all, could have been much worse last night! The crappy part was that I was feeling worse as the night progressed, and having gotten home after 1 am I didn’t think it was a good idea to get up at 5 am to workout. Had I gone to bed at 9 pm I probably would have, which actually would have been a mistake given how sick I feel today. All of the marathoners warned me that this would happen after the event, and I tried to do the right things to prevent it. C’est la vie.

One thing I have to vent about before I sign off for the weekend. I went down to the cafeteria today to get a turkey burger patty to eat with my shake for lunch. I clearly ordered “a grilled turkey burger patty ONLY, NO BUN”. 15 minutes later they call out “turkey burger with Swiss”. After 2 minutes of no takers, I was like… really, could they have gotten it that wrong? So I tell the guy that I ordered a turkey burger patty only, no bun and definitely no cheese. He looks at me and is like “oh no”. Takes it to the woman at the grill and they consult about it (keep in mind, it’s all open… no secrets that we can all see what’s going on and she looks so irritated). She turns around, takes my burger to the garbage… throws out the bun and picks the cheese off the burger! NOT A WORD OF A LIE. What if I had some bad allergy or whatever… isn’t that just wrong? She didn’t get all of the cheese off either. Anyways, it didn’t kill me but I thought that had to be against some policies or something. Here’s the best part… I heard them telling another guy that they were both leaving to open a restaurant, guess they don’t care who they piss off on their way out.

Water Consumption

Some days it goes down soooo easy, other days it does not. Today, I’m struggling to meet the water quota. My cute, purple 1 liter Nalgene bottle is looking at me saying… green tea, though it suppresses your appetite, is NOT a substitute for H20. And why is it well after lunch time and you haven’t downed one of me yet?

I think I have a theory for the poor water consumption performance today. I drank A LOT at the gym this morning. I did a cycling class (side note, most boring class ever… endurance ride with… BRUTAL MUSIC)! The only good thing about the class was the eye candy! :) Back to water, I drank about 1.5 liters of it in that class. Then I did some strength training and before leaving for work I finished another liter. Right now, I’m struggling… but I’ll play the mind/body game in honor of Jodi and Wes.

Mind (while Body is staring at the water): Drink your water!

Body: But I don’t waaaaannnnnaaaaa…

Mind: But you have to!

Body: No I don’t!

Mind: Yes you do!

Body: No, I’m hungry!

Mind: You JUST ate your lunch. You’ve eaten enough, you just think you’re hungry because you’re dehydrated. Drink up!

Body: I’m not rational, I’m all about my “gut” feeling.

Mind: That’s why you have me… to tell you that you’re on track and you’re going to stay on track. Key number one, stick to the food plan. Key number two, stick to the hydration plan. Even you thought you were looking sexier in the mirror lifting weights this morning! Don’t give up! Jess says don’t slide!

Body: Blah, I hate it when you’re right! Gulp, gulp, gulp…

On that note, I have emptied the Nalgene in the time it has taken me to write this post. Off to the water cooler for a fill up… pit stop, washroom.

What a difference a good sleep makes!

I did the math, 10 glorious hours of sleep… I was out like a light last night! I would say I would average about 6-7 hours of sleep a night. So when I can sleep in, my body wakes me up early because that’s just what it’s used to. This morning, not the case! Normally I look at the alarm clock 2-3 times in a night, I don’t even remember turning over last night. No cold medicine before bed, I really just needed the sleep… obviously!

So today I feel great! Well, much better than yesterday! I’m still feeling cold-like symptoms, low energy, achiness, stuffiness, sneezing… but I’m not sleepy. Does that make sense to anyone? Not having a lot of energy, but not actually being sleepy? I may not be able to run a solid 10 miles right now, but at least I haven’t done a face plant on my keyboard this afternoon (yet)!

It was really a treat to sleep in and not run outside this morning. Some days you just need a warm bed and to work out indoors. I’m going to leave work after my meetings at 3 pm and hit the gym. That way I’m not fighting the after work crowds. I think I’ll aim for 60 minutes of cardio (elliptical, stair climber) at a lower heart rate and maybe some core strength training.

Diet update, still going strong! It’s so nice to feel the slow release energy, gradual and healthy hunger rather than the ups and downs of the high sugar diet. I feel like I’m running an experiment these days... part of me wants to eat a leftover cookie from the party on Saturday, not because I’m craving it, but just to see if I notice a big change in how I feel. But I know better, if I eat that cookie now, I’ll eat the bunch and polish of the ice cream in the freezer to boot! Not going there! This morning I was at 153.6 lbs… I can’t wait to dip into the 140s, haven’t seen those since March of this year!

Weekend Recap... and Day 6

What a busy holiday weekend! Friday I stayed in and worked most of the night... and got some sleep before the Diva Dash! It was a great team of woman that came out and we had a very cold but fun time. We ran the race at a very comfortable pace... and I loved every minute of it! I was (and am still) recovering from the marathon... combined with the carb cutting I was in the perfect zone on Saturday. Two things everyone said before/right after the marathon:

1 - It will take 6 weeks to recover. You'll have weird aches and you'll be out of breath just climbing stairs. CHECK! Is this ever amazing... my boss and I were coming back up the stairs at work this week and he looked at me and said smiling "what's the matter with you, didn't you just run a marathon?"

2 - You have to get lots of sleep and take Airborne or Emergen-C after the marathon because you'll get sick. CHECK?!?!? Started to set in today around 11 am... I hope with sleep tonight I can kick it! I was going to run outside with Tosha tomorrow morning but I'm going to sleep instead, and hit the gym indoors in the afternoon tomorrow.

The diet is going very well. Six full days and I haven't cheated yet! My roommates and I went to this White Elephant Christmas/Engagement party on Saturday night that was actually a desert party. They had 5 different types of cheesecake, 3 other types of cake, 4 types of homemade cookies, chocolates, and a number of other bars and goodies that I didn't even look at! I ate right before going so that I would avoid the food and alcohol. I sipped water all night and did not touch a single desert! I know, moderation is key... but with sugar, I take one bite and it's over.

After 5 hours I gave in and ate the carrots, celery and tomatoes from the veggie tray. That I would consider a huge win for me because I'm such a sucker for desert... so even though I'm not on veggies yet, I didn't care one bit. I weighed myself the morning after the party, and it must have been the first time after a holiday party that I actually LOST weight! So far, so good! I'm feeling like I might get back to my old self again... and I can start back on a well balanced diet soon. Finally try out some of Jodi's vegan treats! :)

This morning I did spinning and weights with the girls. I don't have the energy back yet but I'm working on it... most of the soreness is gone, except for some aching in the back of my knee. Nothing to write home about, just this weak feeling I get after long runs. Because we run and cycle so much, weights are always centered around upper body and core. I think I'm going to become much more regimented in my weight training over the next couple of months and really work on my legs too to strengthen some of the support muscles, ligaments and tendons.

It was great to catch up on all of your blogs today, I swear I have withdrawal when I can keep up over the weekends. ;-)