back at it.

Whoa! Time passes so fast! I'm sorry its been two weeks since I last updated.

So, I've been back in workout mode this week (and most of last week). I decided that one of the best motivators to being in shape and having physical goals to accomplish is the Olympics. Every day when I get to the Y, I plug my headset in and listen to the inspiring stories and watch as people from all over the world compete in so many different sports. As I see them achieve this amazing dream of being an Olympian, I find myself burning quite a few more calories than I normally do. I'm not fostering any false hope of one day being an Olympic athlete, but I might do something else....like run a marathon (following in the footsteps of my younger sister Jenni who just ran her first marathon in Richmond in November). We shall see.

I've developed a fairly good routine at the YMCA. I have been using the Precor AMT 100i Elliptical Trainer which goes above and beyond a regular elliptical machine by allowing you to instantly change your stride and speed as often and freely as you would like. (Click here to read a more detailed description of this machine so you can find it at your local gym). I do this for 35 minutes on varying speeds and resistance levels and have been burning an average of 400 calories during this part of my workout. I follow this with some stretches and core/ab workouts that I learned from P90X. Next I use several nautilus machines to exercise my leg muscles which I am working on strengthening and toning. It takes about an hour overall and I feel great afterwards.

I have to say I haven't been able to eat as healthy as I would like to the past week or so because I am running out of food and all I have left in my pantry is stuff that I bought before my fit lifestyle plan. So, here's to my next paycheck!

Sick.

This week has presented a challenge to the whole "get fit and healthy" plan.

Last Friday, Luke and I took on the Plyometrics exercise in P90X. It is an hour of intense cardio workout and you pretty much have to be in serious good shape to make it through. Well, I stuck with it for about 25 minutes (which let me tell you was hard as heck) and Luke beasted the whole thing. Little did I know at this point that it was not a good time for me to be doing a hardcore workout. Sickness was coming upon me.

By Saturday, my entire body was aching which was a combination of soreness from P90X as well as the bad cold I was getting. But, as it snowed about 12 inches overnight, I was not going to miss out on the fun outside and played in the snow with my friends. We attached Luke's snowboard to the back of Brad's Durango and drove around the apartment complex snowboarding behind the truck. It was lots of fun and a lot of strain on my already sick body.

Basically, by Saturday night, I was miserable. I couldn't stay warm and was achy all over. I contracted a stuffy head by Sunday and pretty much all week I haven't been able to work out because I haven't had the strength, nor is it good for you to work out when you are sick because it keeps your body from recovering.

This morning I did a little Yoga and Kempo Karate (Kickboxing) to try and get my heart rate up a little bit and barely made it through that, so I am definitely still not at 100%--but I am recovering, so that's good.

Here's to next week and hopefully being able to get back into the workout mode!

Saving and Losing.

I have continued to put off writing a new post because I really wanted to be able to weigh myself so I could include weight loss info. Unfortunately, I just can't seem to gain access to a scale as of late, so lets just say I think I have lost another couple pounds. Fortunately, the lack of a scale will soon cease to be a problem because I was hired by the YMCA this week! Perfect job, huh?

Its only part-time, but I get a free membership with the job, so it will give me access to not only a scale, but fitness classes and workout equipment. I am pumped. I will most likely continue with CardioX from P90X at least two times a week because I really like the all-over workout I get from that DVD, but I will be able to get back into my previous routine (and something free to do outside of the house), which will be really nice.

As far as diet goes, I am really learning the balance between eating healthy, but still allowing myself to enjoy the occasional Dr. Pepper or Chick-Fil-A combo meal. I had lots of fun grocery shopping this week for healthy food on a completely shoe-string budget. Obviously, I still have no income since I don't start putting in hours at the YMCA until next week, but my section of the fridge and pantry were starting to deplete, so late Sunday night I began googling terms like "coupons" and "grocery sales". I happened across a blog that I now officially LOVE that teaches you how to combine deals at Wal-Mart, Kroger, etc. to get items dirt cheap. Here is the link for you coupon junkies and broke college students: Coupon Saving Game. I also love coupons.com. Long story short, I stocked up my kitchen with enough food to last me (personally) about two weeks for only $35. I felt pretty proud of myself.

Au Revoir for now.

Gettin Movin

I've gotta say, exercise is probably a life saver for me right now. I have this need to have my days filled with something whether it be cleaning, a job, school, spending time with friends or whatever and since Monday, I feel like my days have been pretty pointless.

Most of my friends are back in school or have jobs and I don't really have anything I have to do. I need to have things that I have to do.

So exercising has been good. Even though it is something that I am just doing at home right now, it is forcing me to get off the couch or out of bed, get my pajamas off and exercise clothes on and get my heart rate up.

I would normally find other things to do as well, but since I don't have a job right now, I feel a little restricted on what I can do. I can't run errands because that would involve purchasing things. I can't drive to a cool hike or anything because I can't afford the gas. I can't really even go to a coffee shop, at least not often, because I feel like I need to buy something since I am taking up a seat. I know this has only been going on for a week and a half and it is probably just a brief season in my life so I'm not complaining (I mean, seriously, I have so much to be thankful for, especially compared to so many others in the world), I am just saying...

All that to say that I just feel like my days went from very full to pretty empty and at least in this time while I am looking for a job, I have something that gives me some motivation, generates positive endorphins and gets me moving.

By the way...I have gotten three callbacks for job applications I have submitted, just since last night. I have an interview tomorrow at Aflac. It would be fun to be able to answer "Aflac" when people ask where I work. It might be hard not to say it like the duck though... hahah.

Day 9: Minus Two

Nine days later and I am 2 pounds lighter!

While this may not seem like a major success, it is exactly what I was hoping for. My goal is to gradually burn 2-3 pounds a week until I reach my goal of 25 pounds (which will leave me weighing 140). At this rate, it will take me almost exactly three months which means I should be in shape and at my ideal weight by the middle of April--just in time for warm weather!

So, yesterday was my last day at the Y--at least for now--since my one-week trial membership ended. So, as a replacement, today I started P90X. I told my sister Jenni to pick me out the easiest cardio DVD in the set (and easy by P90X terms is still really hard for most of us). She selected DVD #11, "Cardio X". The guy comes on the screen and tells me we are going to do Yoga as a warmup for the first 10 minutes of the 40 minute workout. I started thinking this wasn't going to be as hard as I was expecting. Let me just say, Yoga is a LOT harder than it looks in the movies. You have to have serious endurance and strength to last very long doing it. Definitely the hardest warmup I've ever done.

The rest of the video got my heart rate up nice and high and actually made me sweat. You can ask anybody who knows me--I never sweat. I had to quit with about 7 minutes left in the video. I felt like a wimp, but I'm just not in shape enough to do the full thing yet. Maybe by the end of this week or next week I can finish it. I am not really doing the P90X plan which focuses on using all the 12 DVDs in the set in various orders to utilize muscle confusion to really make you ripped. I just want to use the Cardio DVD so I can keep working on building my endurance and getting in shape until I hopefully get a job and can join the YMCA and get back to my regular workout.

Things have been going well eating-wise. After a good amount of research, I purchased two cookbooks to help me eat better. I decided that my goal isn't really to eliminate all things delicious from my diet, become a vegetarian and only drink water. I still want to eat the things I love, just in moderation and hopefully in a more healthy way. I am really trying to cut out fast food and soda as much as possible and not eat things very often that are actually bad for me.

Cookbook number one is The Most Decadent Diet Ever! by Devin Alexander. This book provides over 125 recipes that are just lower fat versions of all sorts of foods we all love to eat including chocolate cake, burgers, pizza, pasta and more. Yesterday morning I prepared the Western Skinny Scramble which is on p. 40, minus the bacon. The recipe is basically just a concoction of eggs, peppers, onions and bacon all scrambled together. It was delicious. To be honest, it was the first time I have ever eaten just egg whites, but I really liked it and that reduces most of the fat content of eggs.

Cookbook number two is Cook This, Not That by David Zinzenko and Matt Goulding. It is a little bit more lenient about the fat content and calories in food and a book that I will probably be using more once I reach my desired weight and am focused on maintaining rather than losing. It is a similar idea as the first cookbook but has dishes like macaroni and cheese that wouldn't really be considered low-fat, but the recipe provided by the book is just a lot more healthy and low fat than the macaroni and cheese you would purchase at The Cheesecake Factory.

The idea behind both of these books is that you can still eat good food and food that you love and lose weight if you eat them in moderation, specifically if you are using these recipes to replace much more fattening versions of the foods you have been eating.

Since I love to cook, the worst thing to me about a "diet" or weight loss plan is losing the joy of cooking. I feel like I have to limit what I eat so much I can't even be creative with it or make it taste good, but this just isn't true. As long as I use self-control, eat in moderation and exercise, I can still cook and enjoy many of the foods I love. I am so excited about that.

Day 6.

I know it would make sense for me to begin this blog with a post entitled "Day 1" but that would not be accurate and therefore I begin with "Day 6." 

Over the past couple of years, I have put on a few extra pounds but not enough to matter all that much to me until this summer. In June my boyfriend and I took a road trip across the country and for the entire month ate out at least once every single day. As you can imagine, this was not something that my figure appreciated and once I got home I determined that I was gaining too much weight and needed to get back in shape. 

Well, time passed and as I continued to eat whatever I wanted and rarely exercised, the pounds continued to creep on. I was reminded many times by my fitness-obsessed, kinesiology majoring sister that I was gaining weight and I needed to be healthy. (I know it was only out of love...)

Finally, in December, it really hit me that I needed to do something because while I still wouldn't have slapped the label of "Fat"on myself, I was definitely overweight for what a person of my height should be. I determined to take action. 

I decided the holidays wouldn't be the best time to start as I was constantly surrounded by delicious food and to not partake would just simply be scrooge-ish of me. I was home for the holidays and made the decision that the best time to begin my new way of life would be when I returned back to Lynchburg, where I currently reside. 

So, this past Monday, January 11, I began living fit. 

Over the weekend I had made sure to stock up on healthy food so that I could start eating a healthy diet once the week started. Here is a summary of my meals Monday and Tuesday:

Monday: Breakfast - One lowfat vanilla latte, a bowl of Cascadian Farms Organic cinnamon raisin granola cereal and a glass of orange juice. Lunch - A sandwich with oven roasted chicken breast, white american cheese and baby spinach leaves on whole wheat bread with 1/3 of a glass of Simply Rasberry Lemonade and a clementine. Dinner - sushi grade salmon and rice, veggie stir fry and teriyaki chicken.

Tuesday: Breakfast - One vanilla latte. (Should have had more, but I only ate breakfast twice this week. Trying to get in the habit of eating it every day.) Lunch - Oven roasted turkey breast, white american cheese, avocado and grilled onions on whole wheat, grilled. 10 bbq chips from trader joes and water. Dinner - Talapia basted with a little extra virgin olive oil, lemon juice and cilantro, boiled sweet peas and carrots and corn off-the-cob with the tiniest bit of butter for flavor. 

I don't want to go on and on about the food I ate all week, but that gives you a general idea. My goal is to eat healthy and low-fat and stop eating as soon as I am full instead of waiting until I am stuffed. 

On Monday, Luke and I went to the YMCA to start our 1-week trial membership that I got in the mail. I have been exercising for 30 minutes every day on the this elliptical-type machine (I'll get a name for it this week). I love this machine. I burn between 330-380 calories on it each day. Then I have been doing leg and ab workouts with nautilus machines to try and burn fat in those areas and strengthen and tone my muscles.

The first day at the gym I weighed in at 165 lbs. That is more than I have ever weighed in my life and I am determined to get at least back down in the 140s. It is not only important to me to be thin because it looks good, but also for my health. I want to be in shape so I can hike with my friends and keep there pace and enjoy life without constantly getting winded.

So, here I go - Living my life as I see fit.