Hello there. I am at work and tired as usual. I am still a really terrible sleeper for the most part. It either takes me a long time to fall asleep, I wake up earlier than my alarm or I don't get into a deep REM sleep. Whichever is happening on any given night means I'm a zombie at work and it really sucks. Monday, was awful. I was tired all day and then had class from 7-9:55pm. I must have slept a little better Monday night because Tuesday I felt human, but today I'm back to zombie status and I have to do cardio at the gym after work. Sigh.
I finished my 8 week program at the end of February. For the first 6 1/2 weeks there was not a single ounce of progress. That was so hard. Sore body and aching knees every day, not a single work out missed, only 1 cheat meal and nothing. My parents started walking 10k miles a day in January and had both lost weight by the time I saw them mid February and I had gotten nowhere. It wasn't until the last week and a half that I finally saw the scale go down. I lost 3 lbs. I am now the same weight I was before I gained those three pounds in November/December, but my body looks much better. Between my bust, waist and hips I lost about 4 inches. My body fat percentage went down a tad as well. I am the same weight I was exactly 1 year ago, which is rough but I am happy about the physical changes. My muffin top area slimmed down, my booty area side profile slimmed down also. The little saddle bag part of my hips slimmed down and my thighs don't feel quite so large. The program included 5 days a week of workouts. Mostly weightlifting, but a good number of cardio, leg, and arm circuits mixed in. Some core, but very little concentrated ab work. Weight lifting day in day out is very boring for me and the exercises were so complex that I had to google all of my workouts before hand and refer to my phone during workouts. Some of her exercises had you jumping from machine to machine for supersets which isn't reasonable in a busy gym. My gym started shutting down this one area for classes which really annoyed the hell out of me because these classes were extra on top of gym memberships. The gym only has one class room plus a cycle room, and I didn't think it was fair to cut into everyone else's space like that. I stuck with it for the first 4 weeks but after that I just couldn't do it anymore. I was exhausted by the complicated workouts, bored with lifting and felt I wasn't getting much out of it. Plus, my arms are plenty toned and bulked enough. After that, I stuck with the circuits. I repeated some here and there and added in other circuits to keep up 5 days a week. Her circuits were really, really hard. Even harder and longer than Bikini Body Guide 1.0. It took me 45-60 minutes to finish each one and now I have an awesome resource of 24 extra circuits to keep using. It was a rough 8 weeks, but I'm so glad I stuck with it.
I thought about taking a slight break, but I am not where I need to be so I am now in week 2 of BBG 2.0. I really liked having nutritional support so I have signed up for another 4 weeks of macro support with someone else. The first girl was really nice and encouraging. I expressed frustration at lack of weight loss and she told me she could see the changes in my pics. Keep going and my body would respond eventually. She put me on macros that ended up being about 1,500 calories and I was rarely hungry. I was hoping that by the end, my food would increase. I saw a few of her other girls say they were eating 2,000 calories a day, but since I was barely loosing weight I guess that wasn't going to work for me. I was too scared to have a cheat meal so I only did that once. I'm only in my first week of these new macros and I'm a little nervous
about it because I heard that typically you don't ever need more than1
gram of protein per lb of body weight and I'm at 155. I'm still at 1,500 calories, but the protein is so high that I have to do a protein shake just to get it all in. The fat and carbs went down and I'm already feeling hungry on it. She recommends 1 cheat meal and 1 cheat dessert a week and I think I'm definitely going to need to have it. 155 carbs is low for me and I think that's why I'm peeing a lot. It isn't technically low carb. It's moderate carbs, but I don't want low carb because that would not be sustainable for me. I would worry about only losing water weight and gaining it all back once I go off. I got nervous because during bbg week 1, I gained a pound I had lost, but as of today it went away again. It takes so much effort for me to lose any weight that I am really nervous about gaining any of it back. I prep all of my lunches and dinners for the entire week on the weekend. They are pre portioned out into individual containers so that all I have to do is grab it and go. This is a HUGE help, because between work and working out I don't have time to cook during the week. My husband is also doing a focused meal plan and between the two of us we spent about $500 bucks per month in groceries in January and February. I am forcing him to shop at Walmart now even though he claims to hate it because the prices are so much better. I am eating about 5 lbs of chicken a week. When we are both eating like this, who cares if the store gets on your nerves. We need to save money.
I cannot tell you what a thrill it was to actually lose some weight. This is literally the first time in two years this has happened. Two years!! It was only 3 lbs and I have technically made no scale progress, because it was the 3 lbs I gained at the end of last year, but it's something that I have not been able to do for a long time. I worry that I won't be able to lose any more or that I will gain it right back. I feel that my body is probably about where I was at after bbg last year. The difference is that last time I kind of gave up after that, but this time I'm not. I didn't give up, but I was exhausted by the structure of a strict exercise program and I cut back. Last year I believed that if I didn't get the results I wanted in 12 weeks it was basically hopeless without considering that maybe it will take me longer than that. Maybe it will take me double that. Maybe it will take me all year. Maybe I was too impatient. Maybe this is how long it takes me to lose weight when I don't starve myself.
I go to Hawaii in October and I plan to keep at it until then. My first mini goal for more progress is June when I am supposed to go to Vegas with the girls. The Vegas trip may or may not happen. We'll see if people start flaking or whatnot, but no matter what I will be going hard until then. I can't even put a number on it because weight loss does not come easy for me, but I would seriously hope I have lost 10 lbs. That would be AMAZING. 12 weeks of BBG takes me to the end of May just in time for bikini season. I'll be doing 3-4 circuits per week plus 1-2 days of cardio. Five days a week total. After that, I will reassess and decide how to proceed from there.
More updates later.
Showing posts with label 140. Show all posts
Showing posts with label 140. Show all posts
Wednesday, March 9, 2016
Wednesday, November 4, 2015
New Friend?
I was truly devastated about my manuscript and writing endeavors. Thank you so much to everyone who commented to lift me up. It was so obvious how upset I was. I was down, but as always I'm glad to have that moment and those feelings documented to look back on. I went home and cried in the shower and then cried some more and then dusted myself off. I never spoke a word about it to my husband and silently vowed that regardless of what I decide to do with it that I will not mention my novel again to anyone. I spoke to the lady who critiqued my novel and that helped a lot. She went into greater detail about some of her critiques and why she felt that way. She is also a writer who has made a business out of doing beta reads and editing. She admitted to being harsh and says that's just how she is. She has had writers yell at her and get really pissed off. Anyway, she says she believes that my story is salvageable. If it was a total scrap she would tell me. I made some edits and have since had an unpaid beta reader read it. I was terrified, but the feedback on that was actually pretty decent. There are a few more changes I have in mind to make, but I know that my novel is not as good as the ones in the bookstore. I'm not a good enough writer and my story isn't good enough to be traditionally published. I think that's just the reality of it. I haven't given up hope, but I need to be realistic with myself.
As stated in my previous post T is brilliant. She is highly educated, smart, ambitious, published, award winning and very talented. She is really nice and fun to hang around with too, but I've always held back from getting to know her better. We have plenty of things in common. Of course we do. We chat easily and have no shortage of things to talk about. We initially bonded over our movie watching obsession. We like to travel. We share a love of words and writing and are both kind of introverted; although she much more than I. We started emailing and then exchanged numbers and started texting. I went with it, because I have always had the sense that we could be really good friends. Finding new friends that I genuinely like and truly want to get out of the house to hang out with is no easy task. We have done double dates with our husbands for years now, but what I knew all along was confirmed last week on our first solo girls outing. We are not on the same level. I'm not saying that we can't be or shouldn't be friends, but my discomfort lies with this pervasive feeling that I am not who she thinks I am and therefore by default I am pretending to be someone I am not.
In a previous conversation we had about writing she mentioned that my not being pressured by an agent or deadlines to write my novel is a good thing. "You have a successful career, and writing isn't your bread and butter so it can be a good place to be." I'm not sure how she got the impression that I have a successful career much less a career at all. I purposefully never speak much about my job around my husband's friends. I don't even think she knows what I do. My husband is pretty smart and successful so I think she just assumed. I did not correct her. On our girl date we were chatting at the bar and she was talking about a circle of friends from back home and a successful girlfriend of hers who is having a hard time finding a partner within that group but doesn't date much outside it. "They have jobs, not careers. They are content to go to work and then come home and watch TV or just go to happy hour. They don't do anything. No wonder her relationships don't work out. I'm not like that. I constantly want to be learning and doing more," she said. I did not contradict her, but the reality of it is that what she said describes me and it was very clear that those are not traits she views in a positive light.
T is working on her novel full time. She is a full on creative. She likes to take classes. Crafts, extension courses, whatever. This is all part of her continued process of growing as a person and a thirst for knowledge. I don't have that drive. The reality for me is that work takes a lot out of me and thus far I have found nothing I am motivated enough to do outside of that 45 hours a week. Exercise is about all I can manage on a regular basis and sometimes even that is a stretch. When my alarm goes off in the morning I drag myself out of bed and when I get home I am spent. I get to together with girlfriends for happy hour after work here and there. The weekends are filled with errands, housework, television, exercise, fun outings with my husband and relaxing as much as I can before I have to start up a new week. I live for vacation and sleeping is one of my favorite things. My job is just a job. I am on no career ladder to speak of and will probably be doing the same thing 5-10 years from now. I don't plan on pursing a masters. I have (mostly) come to terms with how I am but I feel weird pursuing a friendship with someone who I already know might think poorly of me if she found out the truth. Most of her friends are like her. The one I met was a really nice psychologist with her own private practice. She was really nice too. I don't think she is a snob. I just think she has certain standards for who she typically associates with and I'm pretty sure that I am not it.
I have written exactly one novel that probably isn't going anywhere and I write a blog that hardly anyone reads. I can fly under the radar with my mediocrity, for a little while but if we become better friends that's not going to work after a while. I still don't want to talk about work. I am happy talk about her writing, but I don't want to talk about mine. She is poised to do great things while my path in life is very linear and if I continue to pursue this friendship it's only a matter of time before she notices. What happens then?
As stated in my previous post T is brilliant. She is highly educated, smart, ambitious, published, award winning and very talented. She is really nice and fun to hang around with too, but I've always held back from getting to know her better. We have plenty of things in common. Of course we do. We chat easily and have no shortage of things to talk about. We initially bonded over our movie watching obsession. We like to travel. We share a love of words and writing and are both kind of introverted; although she much more than I. We started emailing and then exchanged numbers and started texting. I went with it, because I have always had the sense that we could be really good friends. Finding new friends that I genuinely like and truly want to get out of the house to hang out with is no easy task. We have done double dates with our husbands for years now, but what I knew all along was confirmed last week on our first solo girls outing. We are not on the same level. I'm not saying that we can't be or shouldn't be friends, but my discomfort lies with this pervasive feeling that I am not who she thinks I am and therefore by default I am pretending to be someone I am not.
In a previous conversation we had about writing she mentioned that my not being pressured by an agent or deadlines to write my novel is a good thing. "You have a successful career, and writing isn't your bread and butter so it can be a good place to be." I'm not sure how she got the impression that I have a successful career much less a career at all. I purposefully never speak much about my job around my husband's friends. I don't even think she knows what I do. My husband is pretty smart and successful so I think she just assumed. I did not correct her. On our girl date we were chatting at the bar and she was talking about a circle of friends from back home and a successful girlfriend of hers who is having a hard time finding a partner within that group but doesn't date much outside it. "They have jobs, not careers. They are content to go to work and then come home and watch TV or just go to happy hour. They don't do anything. No wonder her relationships don't work out. I'm not like that. I constantly want to be learning and doing more," she said. I did not contradict her, but the reality of it is that what she said describes me and it was very clear that those are not traits she views in a positive light.
T is working on her novel full time. She is a full on creative. She likes to take classes. Crafts, extension courses, whatever. This is all part of her continued process of growing as a person and a thirst for knowledge. I don't have that drive. The reality for me is that work takes a lot out of me and thus far I have found nothing I am motivated enough to do outside of that 45 hours a week. Exercise is about all I can manage on a regular basis and sometimes even that is a stretch. When my alarm goes off in the morning I drag myself out of bed and when I get home I am spent. I get to together with girlfriends for happy hour after work here and there. The weekends are filled with errands, housework, television, exercise, fun outings with my husband and relaxing as much as I can before I have to start up a new week. I live for vacation and sleeping is one of my favorite things. My job is just a job. I am on no career ladder to speak of and will probably be doing the same thing 5-10 years from now. I don't plan on pursing a masters. I have (mostly) come to terms with how I am but I feel weird pursuing a friendship with someone who I already know might think poorly of me if she found out the truth. Most of her friends are like her. The one I met was a really nice psychologist with her own private practice. She was really nice too. I don't think she is a snob. I just think she has certain standards for who she typically associates with and I'm pretty sure that I am not it.
I have written exactly one novel that probably isn't going anywhere and I write a blog that hardly anyone reads. I can fly under the radar with my mediocrity, for a little while but if we become better friends that's not going to work after a while. I still don't want to talk about work. I am happy talk about her writing, but I don't want to talk about mine. She is poised to do great things while my path in life is very linear and if I continue to pursue this friendship it's only a matter of time before she notices. What happens then?
Wednesday, April 22, 2015
Still Fat
It's been going on 3 weeks of strict Whole30. Four altogether if you count the modified week. I'm going on three weeks of Bikini Body Guide exercising 5-6 days per week. All this effort and all I've got to show for it is that I've gained and lost the same exact pound for the last month. I see no changes in my body, meanwhile my husband has lost five pounds in the same amount of time.
I should have lost at least one real pound this year at least. Yesterday I wanted to quit. I still might. In the end, I just said, "whatever" and did the work out. It's hard to stay motivated when you are 98% certain that you will not see results. The diet isn't the hardest part for me it's the sweat and the pain of exercise. I am really, really tired today and my knees hurt. I would be a lot easier to go about getting sweaty, pushing through and barely being able to walk up stairs the next day if I was making progress. I am putting in all this effort now with no results so what happens when I finally give up?
It's been a really tricky road for the last year and half. Each step of the way I researched my little heart out and did what I felt was best at the time but my body sends me so many mixed signals and there is so much conflicting information. A year ago I still had hope that even if I allowed my body to gain the weight it needed in order to stabilize my metabolism I would at some point be able to lose it. I can diet and exercise with the best of them. That's not my problem. The problem is that my body refuses to budge, there really isn't anything I can do about it, and after trying for so long all I want to do is give up. Every day I jump from website to website trying to find the magic solution. The thyroid diet, the anti-inflammatory diet, Whole30, paleo, plant based. They all contradict each other and I could probably spend the next year trying every one of them and still not lose a pound. I research exercise and it's the same confusion. At first I was finding that some form of daily cardiovascular exercise was good for the thyroid and now I'm reading that it could be damaging. I thought I had a plan and now I'm STILL not sure if what I'm doing will hinder or help. I haven't told anybody outside my mom and husband that I'm doing Whole30 in combination with a 12 week exercise program because when a person goes all out like that you expect results. The big question at the end of it will be, "So, did it work? Did you lose weight?" I already know the answer will be no. Most people lose weight on Whole30, or at the very least get a boost in energy or a change in body composition. I'm not seeing any of that. It will be pretty embarrassing to admit that I embarked on this drastic exercise and diet regimen only to end up in the exact same place I started.
If I could pin point a moment where my body switched over from re-feed weight gain to slow thyroid weight gain I'd say it was January. Up until then my body was stubborn but there were moments where I could see a possible light at the end of the tunnel. I was resting my body because that's what I thought was best at the time and my body was not responding to heavy exercise well. Would it have been any different if I'd tried Whole30 in December? I doubt it but, 15 lbs later I wonder what I could have done differently and wish like hell that I could have avoided gaining these last 10 lbs because I don't think they are ever coming off. It's all been a guessing game so the the only thing I might do differently is try to hire a real nutrition coach sooner, but I kept hoping that maybe my body just needed a little bit more time. The first one was rubbish, but you get what you pay for. The second one said she could work with me but that I should get labs done, or else I might be spinning my wheels. I agreed. Then I found out that my TSH was high. Now, it's probably too late.
Maybe I should have never thought it was cool to be 110 lbs in the first place but to this day I still don't know how much of that was choice and how much of that was an eating disorder. What a cruel twist of fate it is for someone who used to lose weight for sport, fit into a size two (sometimes zero), and model for extra money to find themselves 30 lbs heavier unable to lose a single pound. It KILLS me to look at old photos. This is a total and absolute living nightmare for someone who may or may not have an eating disorder. Last month my agent called and left a message about a modeling job that she wanted to book me for. I just told her that it conflicted with work because I'm too ashamed to admit that I got fat. I used to be able to show up on any job and know I'd fit into the clothes and now I can't even fit into my own. I was the skinny ideal and now I'm hiding under maxi skirts, haven't worn pants outside of leggings and the few pairs of jeans I bought to accommodate my size. I'll definitely be saving money on clothes because I don't see myself taking pleasure in shopping ever again. My original plan was to avoid any castings until I lost some weight which isn't too hard since they are few and far between. It doesn't look like I'll be losing weight any time soon, so I'm thinking of sending her an e mail telling her that I'm moving out of state. My how the mighty have fallen.
My doctor's appointment is next week. I have this bad feeling that I'm going to be what is considered "sub-clinical" which basically means hypothyroid without severe symptoms and not bad enough to treat. I don't want to be hypothyroid either, but at least if I was I could take some medication that might bring my levels down to normal and allow me to lose weight. Maybe the fatigue and insomnia are related. Even with this perfect diet of whole foods I still get exhausted and I have take a sleeping pill every work night so I can get to sleep and wake up the next morning. Also, if my TSH remains high and I'm not treatable hypothyroid now, there is a good chance I will be in the future.
I know I'm really negative, but can you blame me? I am physically and biologically unable to lose weight and it sucks.
I should have lost at least one real pound this year at least. Yesterday I wanted to quit. I still might. In the end, I just said, "whatever" and did the work out. It's hard to stay motivated when you are 98% certain that you will not see results. The diet isn't the hardest part for me it's the sweat and the pain of exercise. I am really, really tired today and my knees hurt. I would be a lot easier to go about getting sweaty, pushing through and barely being able to walk up stairs the next day if I was making progress. I am putting in all this effort now with no results so what happens when I finally give up?
It's been a really tricky road for the last year and half. Each step of the way I researched my little heart out and did what I felt was best at the time but my body sends me so many mixed signals and there is so much conflicting information. A year ago I still had hope that even if I allowed my body to gain the weight it needed in order to stabilize my metabolism I would at some point be able to lose it. I can diet and exercise with the best of them. That's not my problem. The problem is that my body refuses to budge, there really isn't anything I can do about it, and after trying for so long all I want to do is give up. Every day I jump from website to website trying to find the magic solution. The thyroid diet, the anti-inflammatory diet, Whole30, paleo, plant based. They all contradict each other and I could probably spend the next year trying every one of them and still not lose a pound. I research exercise and it's the same confusion. At first I was finding that some form of daily cardiovascular exercise was good for the thyroid and now I'm reading that it could be damaging. I thought I had a plan and now I'm STILL not sure if what I'm doing will hinder or help. I haven't told anybody outside my mom and husband that I'm doing Whole30 in combination with a 12 week exercise program because when a person goes all out like that you expect results. The big question at the end of it will be, "So, did it work? Did you lose weight?" I already know the answer will be no. Most people lose weight on Whole30, or at the very least get a boost in energy or a change in body composition. I'm not seeing any of that. It will be pretty embarrassing to admit that I embarked on this drastic exercise and diet regimen only to end up in the exact same place I started.
If I could pin point a moment where my body switched over from re-feed weight gain to slow thyroid weight gain I'd say it was January. Up until then my body was stubborn but there were moments where I could see a possible light at the end of the tunnel. I was resting my body because that's what I thought was best at the time and my body was not responding to heavy exercise well. Would it have been any different if I'd tried Whole30 in December? I doubt it but, 15 lbs later I wonder what I could have done differently and wish like hell that I could have avoided gaining these last 10 lbs because I don't think they are ever coming off. It's all been a guessing game so the the only thing I might do differently is try to hire a real nutrition coach sooner, but I kept hoping that maybe my body just needed a little bit more time. The first one was rubbish, but you get what you pay for. The second one said she could work with me but that I should get labs done, or else I might be spinning my wheels. I agreed. Then I found out that my TSH was high. Now, it's probably too late.
Maybe I should have never thought it was cool to be 110 lbs in the first place but to this day I still don't know how much of that was choice and how much of that was an eating disorder. What a cruel twist of fate it is for someone who used to lose weight for sport, fit into a size two (sometimes zero), and model for extra money to find themselves 30 lbs heavier unable to lose a single pound. It KILLS me to look at old photos. This is a total and absolute living nightmare for someone who may or may not have an eating disorder. Last month my agent called and left a message about a modeling job that she wanted to book me for. I just told her that it conflicted with work because I'm too ashamed to admit that I got fat. I used to be able to show up on any job and know I'd fit into the clothes and now I can't even fit into my own. I was the skinny ideal and now I'm hiding under maxi skirts, haven't worn pants outside of leggings and the few pairs of jeans I bought to accommodate my size. I'll definitely be saving money on clothes because I don't see myself taking pleasure in shopping ever again. My original plan was to avoid any castings until I lost some weight which isn't too hard since they are few and far between. It doesn't look like I'll be losing weight any time soon, so I'm thinking of sending her an e mail telling her that I'm moving out of state. My how the mighty have fallen.
My doctor's appointment is next week. I have this bad feeling that I'm going to be what is considered "sub-clinical" which basically means hypothyroid without severe symptoms and not bad enough to treat. I don't want to be hypothyroid either, but at least if I was I could take some medication that might bring my levels down to normal and allow me to lose weight. Maybe the fatigue and insomnia are related. Even with this perfect diet of whole foods I still get exhausted and I have take a sleeping pill every work night so I can get to sleep and wake up the next morning. Also, if my TSH remains high and I'm not treatable hypothyroid now, there is a good chance I will be in the future.
I know I'm really negative, but can you blame me? I am physically and biologically unable to lose weight and it sucks.
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