No Weigh In

Since I'm doing the 20 day challenge, I've decided to trust calorie counting. As long as I'm not going over my calories, there's no reason I shouldn't be losing 1-2 pounds a week, so I've decided to not weigh myself until the end of the challenge. This will be really hard since I usually weigh myself at least twice a day, once in the morning and once before bed. I'm resisting the urge right now, because I know I've done we'll with my eating and it always feels good to see the numbers going down. I will resist though. 

I read a few health blogs and one of the questions I see over and over again is "How late do you eat your last meal?"  I think people ask this because of the study that came out in 2009 that showed that mice that ate during their normal sleep time (since they're nocturnal, this would have been during the day!) had a 48% increase in body weight. The problem with this study is that it's never been replicated in humans and that it doesn't take into consideration eating calories evenly spread out through the day. 

From my experience, it's not what time I eat that causes over eating, it's waiting until I'm starving or getting overly tired that increases the amount I eat. If I'm tired, my body needs energy, and it seeks that energy in food and THAT will cause me to over eat. I'm a firm believer that eating less calories than your body uses in a day will always (metabolic issues aside) result in weight loss. It's that simple...eat less, move more. I've found that for me, as long as I eat evenly throughout the day (not hoarding all of my calories for the end of the day), that it doesn't matter how late I eat. Sometimes we don't have dinner until 8pm! 

2 days down, 18 more to go!

20 day challenge

I'm more than halfway through the week, and so far I've done well sticking to my training plan.  On Monday, I cross trained by swimming 1/2 a mile.  Tuesday, I ran on the treadmill for 2 miles, did a ton of stretching to help my plantar fasciitis, and strength trained my legs.  I also ran a mile with my daughter when she got home from school.  Wednesday was abs, arms, and more swimming.  Today's workout was another 2 miles on the treadmill at a 12 minute/mile and lower body strength training.

My exercise is going well, and my eating was a lot better yesterday.  I even weighed myself and was back down to 196.4 lbs.  I do much better with eating well on days that I workout, but I need a little more motivation, so I've given myself a 20 day challenge.  I so badly want a Garmin watch.  I had planned on asking for one for Christmas, but it's an expensive present and I've already asked for another expensive present (a really nice digital camera).  I've decided that if I can stay within my calorie range for 20 days, I'm going to ask for BOTH presents! 

I never ask for anything expensive because I grew up poor and still live in the mindset that I don't deserve presents.  Growing up, our presents came from the local fire department's toy drive, so I've always felt guilty spending money on myself.  When I go shopping, I always buy everyone else something.  I've even gone shopping numerous times with the explicit instructions from the hubs to get myself some new clothes, and come back with absolutely nothing for myself, but bags of clothes for the kids.  I once wanted a 2" curling iron that was $30, and made myself wait almost a YEAR until I felt I had waited long enough and could finally buy it for myself.  I have no problem giving to charity, friends, my daughter's school...anyone but me.  Since I'm not working currently, I feel even less deserving of buying myself things.  So, I figure if I can set this goal for myself, then I will have earned the Garmin watch. 

One day down....19 to go!

Running with plantar fasciitis

After not running for 2 weeks, and then taking it easy (read falling off the exercise wagon), my plantar fasciitis has decided not to go away, instead, it likes it's new home.

I've been researching how to heal PF and I get two differing ideas. The first is to give up running. Well, that's not going to happen if I want to get this weight off, so option two is to stretch, stretch, stretch.  Option two it is. 

Remember last time I said I made a commitment that will force (motivate?) me to run regularly?  Well, I've committed to running the Chicago 1/2 Marathon in May with my friend Jessica!

Jessica and I haven't seen each other in about 5 years.  We met each other when our husbands were both in the Army and in the same unit. I had decided to go back to school for a degree that would actually get me a job.  She was already a year into the program that I was starting. 

When I met her, it was at a unit meeting, and I thought she was shy. That couldn't have been farther from the truth. She was outgoing once she knew someone, and best of all...she was fun!  We ended up having a ton in common. We're both self professed nerds who love numbers and math, and have similar OCD tendencies. We also both had an enormous love for (read addiction) Starbucks!  As moms of toddlers, more than full time students (20+ credit hours!), whose husbands were deployed, Starbucks (and each other) were our lifeline. 

Five years ago when I would ask Jessica to run with me, she would always joke that she didn't run unless someone was chasing her. Something happened last year though. I don't know what it was, but she gave up smoking...and Starbucks...and she started the Couch 2 5K program!  She's done VERY well with the program...and she's FAST!  As a beginner, she's running close to a 10 min/mile. I can only imagine how fast she's going to be. 

In order to stay motivated to run through the winter, she's signed up for two 5Ks. One of her 5K's is the same day I'm running the Chicago Hot Chocolate run with my daughter, November 3rd.  She wanted to schedule a race every month during the winter, to motivate her to run through the winter months.  I suggested she run a Half Marathon with me.  One that was a destination, so we could travel to it, stay in a hotel, have a girl's weekend, get massages after the race, and eat GOOD sushi!  Jessica is the one that got me to like sushi, and I've been in love with it every since.

We both got on the computer and started looking at Half Marathons online.  We wanted one in the spring before it got too hot, and one that was relatively flat.  Both of us live in parts of the U.S. where there aren't hills to train on, so we didn't want to kill ourselves on race day; having not prepared for hills.  We decided on Chicago.  I wrote out a training plan, and we start training the week after our November 5k.  We're both very excited and hope that it will keep us running through the winter.

Back On Track?

The past few days have been a lot better than the previous week.  My eating has gotten back on track, and I so badly want to keep it that way.  I had stepped out of ONEderland for a day, but I'm back down into it.  I'm trying to give myself motivation, so I keep thinking that it's almost winter (my favorite time of year), and I will soon need to fit back into my ski pants!  Skiing is my very favorite activity, but I couldn't do it last year because I was pregnant.  So, I'm so excited to get back to it!

One way I've gotten my eating back under control is by being super busy.  We had a Girl Scout meeting on Tuesday night, and it was the first I'd be leading for the Brownies.  I spent four hours Tuesday reading and planning the lesson for the night.  It was so much fun, but also so much more work than I thought it would be. 

Wednesday was just as busy.  I had a meeting in the morning with the bank and the other co-leader to take care of our Troop account.  Then I had lunch with a former co-worker that was about an hour away.  It was so much fun!  I miss having candid chats where I can just be my outrageous, crazy self.  Later that night, I had a Girl Scout leader meeting until 8:00pm.  I kind of felt bad for the hubs because as he walked through the door, I handed him the baby and yelled over my shoulder as I left that the Chicken Curry and rice were on the stove and he'd have to finish cooking them.  At the leader meeting, I learned that I didn't know diddly about Girl Scouts, despite all of the reading I did on Tuesday.  One of the lessons I had planned for the next meeting might not be a Go because the badge for it may not be still available.  I guess it was a specialty badge for last year's 100 year birthday of the Girl Scouts.  :(

Yesterday was a VERY good day for my eating.  By the time dinner was complete, I realized I had almost 200 calories left.  I decided on 3 ounces of wine once we put the kids to bed!  I think the reason that I did so well was because I had extra calories from my added activity calories from my 40 minute swim that morning.  I've decided that I have to workout EVERY day because I need those extra calories to eat.

Yesterday, I also made a huge commitment to make sure I stay on track over the winter months.  I'll talk more about this tomorrow, since this post is getting a little long.

Today was a strength training day, and MyFitnessPal doesn't give me any calories for weight lifting exercises.  Grrrr.  Surely, weight lifting for an hour and a half burns calories??!!  It's going to be really hard to get through today without the extra calories to eat.