My Goal

Goal: run this path by the end of this semester!

I am back in the game!

The last few tries of "re-starting" didn't feel as good as this.Before, I was holding on by a thread, making excuses, and giving up before I got into a second week! Plans change all for me! I feel so good this time. I'm not looking back. I hear that weight loss is a long journey. For me, it had a road bump, but not a huge one. By Christmas 2011 I'll be down to 130 and starting the next phase- true maintenance. I have until then to come up with a new plan that needs to stick. I'm hoping to be down to 150 by May. I know that it takes longer to lose weight once you are at a "healthy" weight, so I'm willing to be patient. Next Christmas at 130. Senior recital in a beautiful dress at 130. I think I can handle that : )

I Love Plans!!!!

I work best with a plan. It has always been that way. I'm not one to just jump right into something without having a plan of how to accomplish my goal....and when I have a goal, I intend on accomplishing it. My problem last time when I reached my goal was that I didn't have a NEW goal, which gave me benchmarks and rewards to stay healthy. I'm starting this time around with a clear plan that's neatly outlined in a book with easy to understand recipes and instructions. It's going well so far. I've lost 4 lbs since Monday and lost a bunch of bloat, so of course I feel better. I've also gone back to square one and wrote out a reward system, just like last time. This helped me a lot because I always looked forward to updating my caloriecount profile with the updated rewards : ) I'm keeping my starting weight at 208. This has been a long journey. Just because I made it to 142, doesn't mean that I was done losing weight.

OFFICIAL GOALS AND REWARDS
SW: 208 (Jan. 2009)
CW: 173.0 (34.4 lbs lost!)
GW: 130

5 lbs lost: Download a Zune song
10 lbs lost: Starbucks trip
15 lbs lost: Download sheet music
20 lbs lost: $20 for a new outfit
25 lbs lost: Go to see a movie!
30 lbs lost: Day at the Aquarium!
35 lbs lost: Download new sheet music and a Zune song
40 lbs lost: Mommy and Lauren (and friends) Day of Fun : )
43.6 lbs lost: Day in NYC!!!!

Same old, same old....

I sound like a broken record. I swear, every five posts on this blog says the same thing. This time though, I have a PLAN. Plans that actually work are hard to come by. Most diet "plans" look like Atkins or the magic acai berry diet or something. This plan comes from the Biggest Loser, a show that I watch a lot and subsequently get very encouraged and forget about what ever it was until the next week...

I found the 30 day jump start plan at Borders and after some tense decision making moments, I resolved to complete it. It changes both how you move and what you eat. I am a little nervous about the food part. After this month, I go back to campus and I have to buy my own food. I need to be able to afford food. Right now, I'm spending only $50/month on groceries. This is accomplished by getting all processed/frozen food. All of which aren't healthy and encourage sugary, lazy tendencies. Maybe I'll be able to afford this...if I work really hard....

My hope is that I can encourage my family to eat the same way. Most of the recipes make multiple servings, so hopefully they'll join in. If not, I'll freeze and save them for when I go back to school. Things will work out one way or the other.

Really?

Those posts that I wrote not even a month ago. Really? I'm totally disgusting. I'm losing it! I want to be healthy, and then I ate like a complete pig when I was in NH. I said I was going to run everyday...and ran once and did the easiest C25k. I need to save my life here. End of story. I need to get real about this. It's not about looking great or getting a great guy. It's not about people liking me or wanting to hang out with me. It's not about the size that I get to wear or where I can shop. It's about saving my life. It's about creating a better future for me and my future kids. Do I really want to see my kids go through what I'm going through?

New Rule for Lauren

After measuring out my dinner, like a great little calorie counter, I left the rest on the stove. After eating, I went into the kitchen to get some Smart Pop popcorn. While it was popping, I ate a whole other serving of biscuits and chicken.

New Rule: After making dinner and serving it, the rest gets put away in the fridge immediately!!!!

Luckily, I'm still only about 250 over what I wanted to be for the day, but still!!! I shouldn't have done that!

Today wasn't good or bad, it just was. As far as being healthy though, better than most. Woke at 9, had breakfast (tea, Peanut Butter Cap'n Crunch), read a few Psalms, out the door at 10 to walk to campus. I wanted to practice for a few hours. Went to the door, swiped my card to open it, doesn't work. Go to next door. Doesn't work. Walk to the library to use the pianos in the basement. All doors locked, library closed until the 22nd. Look across and see a door helpfully left open to another building. Practice on a piano that I don't really like, but practice nonetheless. Regardless of this very annoying locked door escapade, I did walk a bit more than I would have. I walked 20 minutes to campus, and then another 15 minutes around campus trying any door that led to a piano. Anyway....

after practicing until about 12 I came home (more walking!) and got some lunch (1 cup of Three Cheese noodles from yesterday, pretzels with honey mustard) and lazed around for awhile. Then I left at 3:30 to go to a wedding dress rehearsal. Came home from the rehearsal around 6:15, made dinner (Betty Crocker Complete Chicken and Biscuit Meal) around 7. And that brings us to me eating dinner and watching, of all things, Secret Life of the American Teenager on fancast. No kidding. I don't know why I let my brain rot, but alas, there's nothing I can do.

Well, here we go again.

Stop blogging=weight gain. I don't know why I let myself stop. It's so simple. Take five minutes out of my day to blog about my life. Benefits of doing so: no overeating, actually exercising, feeling really good about myself....

Well, I'm back into the swing of things at school. Classes haven't started yet, but I'm here practicing and getting ready for everything. So I might as well get back to my routine. Lately I've been eating like an empty trashcan. I can eat anything and everything in sight. It's actually quite disgusting when I think about it. I feel bad about it after, but then I inevitably do it again in a few hours. Some days I start off wonderfully with a fantastic breakfast. For example, yesterday I had yogurt with some granola mixed in and some tea. Wonderful, delicious, and perfect for the start of the day. And then the day spiraled from there....

My wonderful roommate and I are starting back on the road to being healthy and feeling good. We both have stopped running, which has led to both of us feeling less than stellar. We are becoming the new 'Sisters of the Traveling Pants' except that we have rechristened it 'Sisters of the Traveling Dress'. She has a beautiful dress that is size 8. Neither of us can fit into it but we both have a goal. Over winter break it will travel between us and we both will wear it! We can do it!!

Confession: January 2009 I was 210lbs. By the middle of the Fall semester I was floating between 140 and 145. May 2010 I was about 160 and I told myself I was going to stop. Now, in August 2010 I am close to 175.

Simply Sunday

I love Sundays. They are (generally) stress-free and easy days to manage. This morning, I let myself sleep in a little longer (!) and drove my sister and I to church in the morning.

Breakfast today was one of my absolute favorites! Nutri-grain low fat waffles from Eggo. These are AMAZING. I don't even feel the need to lather on unhealthy peanut butter or syrup. They have just the amount of sweetness and that rich waffle taste. Each waffle has only 70 calories, so 2 makes a nice breakfast. To go along with my waffles, I had a cup of orange juice. Great start to the day!

Church was great today. I went over with the Sunday school to help out in my old class. We were doing a follow-the-leader game with a twist. Everyone had to hold hands. It was an exercise in unity because you had to do everything together. Each child (and I) got a turn to be the leader. It is a great feeling to keep up with 5 and 6 year olds!

Church was also special today because it is what we call "Guatemala Sunday". Our church is paired with a parish in Guatemala and we take the day to learn more about the community that we support. For lunch, we served traditional Guatemalan food. I had 4 corn tortillas (25 cal/per) with a bit of rice/vegetable mixture on each. Healthy, easy, and filling!

After church, my sister and I went over to a local park that has a really nice walking/jogging track around it. Throughout the track there are various stations for different strength exercises that you can do. The first one was SO hard. I couldn't do it....yet. It looked like a big metal railing. The goal was to stand on one side with both hands on the bar and lift your legs together to the other side. I couldn't do it today, but I will be back and will conquer! All in all, my sister and I walked about 1 mile while doing some of these exercises. Each lap is actually 1.1 miles. 3 laps=5k=new favorite training spot : )

It's getting late, so here is the speedy version of the rest of the day. Dinner was the amazing salad I made yesterday with some modification. Greens, grapes, turkey, light three cheese ranch, hard boiled egg. Delicious! Watched some Biggest Loser. That show is a real motivator. I don't have to work tomorrow so I'm hoping to do a good 2 hours at the gym or so. Dad wants me to start a BL competition at church....we'll see. I'm making dinner tomorrow night for the family: healthy here we come! (Hopefully they like it...) I'm making Chicken Parmesan Bundles....found on Kraftfoods.com. Made with the healthy modifications they are 380 cal. per. Not bad!

Alas, it is now 6 minutes into Monday morning. Today's events: organize room (and find the floor again from all my college stuff....), intense gym session, make dinner, plan the week. Sounds good!

Back home...and back to the gym!!

Today was actually VERY good. This morning, I got up and finished packing up my room to go home! Breakfast was a Luna bar (170 cal), courtesy of my room-mate. YAY! After getting everything in the car, I finished getting ready for commencement. It is so wonderful (and sad!) to see all of the graduates. A plus for the commencement is that it is a small walk to get there. Nothing extraordinarily long, but about 20 minutes. After commencement, I hurried back to campus to get checked out of my room and go home!! Before leaving town, I stopped at Subway and got a foot long oven roasted chicken breast sandwich. Wheat bread, no cheese, no dressings, lettuce, tomato, and sweet peppers. I had half for lunch before leaving town. 310 calories. Wonderful!

The drive was great home. It has been hard lately to get out of town because a key road has been closed for construction. I found out that it was opened! This made my trip out MUCH easier. It cut my driving time by literally half an hour. I was home in around an hour and ten minutes. After getting home, I got another workout by unloading the car and taking all of my stuff upstairs.

Early dinner was the second half of my sandwich. Another 310 yummy delicious calories. After hanging out for a bit, I went to the gym around 6. I had just found out that the Y closes at 7 and I wanted to make sure I got a good workout in.

With only an hour, I wanted to tackle as many areas as I could. I did 30 minutes of weights. However, after a set of reps, if I felt like I could have done more, I raised the weight instead of only doing more reps at the lower amount. I was trying to push myself and see how hard I could go. I also tried holding positions, not just releasing right away. This gave me a burn that I'd never really felt before. I think it was good (?).

After this, I went on the treadmill. With only about 20 minutes left, I really wanted to challenge myself to do the best. Right off the bat I hit with an incline of 7 with a 3.0 speed. I'm still new to the incline, so this really was a challenge for me. After 5 minutes of this, I dropped the incline down to 5 and increased speed to 3.5. After five more minutes, I decided to throw it all out. I left the incline at 5 and increased speed to 5.5. This is the highest speed that I've ever tried to stay consistent at and I was working at it! I held this for 2.5 minutes, and then dropped it down to a cool down. Ended the treadmill and then stretched it out and came home.

Since I had last eaten at 4:30, around 9:30 I was hungry again. So I made the most GORGEOUS salad ever. Romain lettuce, 2 tbs 'Sweet Vidalia Onion dressing', 1 tbs 'Light Ranch', chopped chicken, and grapes. It tasted SO good. A bit later, I loved the taste of grapes so much, that I had a few more : )

And one of the best moments of today!! I was watching the "Biggest Loser" tonight with my sister. She's not the healthiest kid on the planet. After we were done, she asked me if I wanted to go walking with her tomorrow morning! And she said she wants to try and eat healthier : )

And now, church is tomorrow and it is time for bed. Good night!

the good, the bad, and NOT the ugly : )

I came back to school for the end of this week, so I was unable to go to the gym. I was definitely afraid of this! Who goes to the gym strong for 3 days, and then takes off for 4 and expects to keep up the intensity? Well, this morning (after giving myself a day of recovery yesterday) I was determined to prove that I am worth every ounce of effort.

So I set the alarm for 7:30....got out of bed at 7:38..... and pulled on sweatpants and a tank top and went out to work out! I went over to the local park that has a nice little running path around the outside. It's not terribly big and has a nice incline to it, which gives me a bit of a challenge.

I was worried at first how I was going to motivate myself, being that my Zune was un-charged. Being without music while running is something that I DO NOT enjoy. The music gives me that little bit of motivation with the beat and the words to keep going. However, I had already made up my mind to go!

I walked on over at a slower pace to warm up a bit. I left at 8:00 and got there 10 minutes later. Took a minute to stretch and then went running. I tried to keep at a higher pace than I usually do, which was hard without the music to judge my pace. I ran solid for about 10 minutes, and then I decided to do more. I'm using the gym to focus on weight training, so I decided to do some of my own right there.

I headed over to a bench and did some dips. This really gives your arms a work out! Sit on the edge of the bench with your palms on the bench with finger tips facing straight out. Then walk your feet out until you are suspended beyond the bench with your arms supporting your weight. Use your strong arms to dip your body down and back up. I did some with my knees bent and others with my legs straight out, almost like a backwards push-up. Wow did my arms feel it!

Another way to use this position is to bring your legs in slightly so that your knees are just bent. Then use your leg muscles to support your dips up and down. You will definitely feel this in your thighs!!

After doing these, I decided to do some abs. Plank position is a great way to use your ab muscles. Plank position looks just like a push-up in the "up" position. Hold for an extended period of time and feel those abs working! I also used the bench for this by putting my hands on the edge of the bench to hold myself up. I think the angle of the body also provides a nice challenge!

Then I decided to do some squats. I did a couple of sets of these. At first I kept my legs in semi close together, about shoulder width. Then I moved them out to work on different muscle groups. It felt great : P

After doing this set of exercises, I decided to run back the other direction and stop and do a few more dips at every bench I passed. I only passed 2..but I ran hard until I got to the end of the path. Then I had a nice cool down walk home.

I was only actually in the park working for a bout 25 minutes, but I was definitely sweaty and gross by the end of it. I don't know how many calories I burned, or if I even did that much good, but I know it felt great to know what I was able to accomplish in such a short amount of time!

As far as food goes today, I was pretty good! I went to a bridal shower this morning and despite the chocolaty treats and cupcake goodness that there were, I had a bit of fruit, 3 multi-grain crackers, and a 2 small rectangles of cheese. For lunch, I had a veggie burger with mustard, lettuce, and tomato on whole wheat bread. On the way home from rehearsal I went to a "serve yourself" frozen yogurt place in town. I had only a little amount, which was just enough to settle the craving. I mixed a chocolate yogurt with sugar free vanilla and topped it with fresh strawberries. Dinner was a turkey wrap with tomato, lettuce, and pickles (no cheese or mayo!) and 24 frosted mini wheats for dessert. After dinner, I have had simply fruit fruit roll up, a matzo, and a sesame seed bagel. All in all, I'm pleased with the day. I had frozen yogurt, but I didn't get an obscene amount and didn't top it with candy, cookie dough, or syrup. The only thing I'm not so pleased with is having that bagel! I could have had 2 more matzo's and STILL not reached the calorie count of the bagel. It was convenient. That's why I ate it. There was no reason behind it. My body didn't need that influx of carbs this late at night. No idea.

Well, my fridge should be close to defrosted by now (have you wondered why this post was so long???) and I hope to pack up my car before heading home tomorrow!! Good night!

Back to the gym tomorrow!!

Summer 2.0

Welcome to my second summer as the new me. This time last year I was around 162. Unfortunately, I do not have much to show for a year. I'm around 158-160 or so right now. I was down to 145 at some point, but nevertheless, it fluctuates. I can say that I am proud to not have gained it all back in one year. I am still at a "healthy weight", although it is not the weight I would like to have. Also new is my desire to do weight lifting as well as cardio. I've joined the YMCA in my area and have been orientated to the crazy looking machines that they have. Some of them look like something out of Star Wars! However, I think its going well...in the one week that I've used the machines. I'm also hoping to train to run a half-marathon in November. I'm hoping to run the Philadelphia marathon. Fingers crossed!!!!

My goal for the coming summer is to lose 30 pounds. If I work hard, I think I can do it. With this new Y membership, I have the best tools available and I will not take it for granted. I plan on running, doing more cardio, weights, swimming, and participating in classes. Bring it on!! I'm also working a full-time job. I WILL DO THIS! I have about 17 weeks until the next semester begins. That's a little under 2lbs per week. If I eat right, and am committed to myself, I know that I can do this. BRING IT ON.

Going strong!

I've had an excellent week! I've done some running, some stairs, and I've been doing a new Jillian Michaels DVD. I've also been watching what I've been eating and I can really see some differences. I think this new combination of things is working well. Even other people are noticing. On Tuesday, I walked into bible study and someone said, "Wow, each time I see you, you keep getting smaller!". And on Wednesday someone made the comment at how thin and fit I was. What?!? Me? Thin?? That could NEVER happen....and yet it did! It reminds me of when I was first losing the first big bunch. There were a lot of changes back then. I guess I've been sort of the same for so long, that these new changes are noticeable. That's wonderful! Still can't fit into Size 9 jeans, but my 11's feel great! Only problem is I can't get an accurate weight. My scale here at school has never been totally accurate and we think that the one at home is extremely off. It kept putting me around 155-156-157, consistently rising. It didn't make any sense. Besides, my clothes were getting looser. So I think we need to invest in another scale. But other than that, I'm doing well!

Welcome Back Spring!!

I awoke Saturday morning to the most beautiful day I'd seen in months! I've been missing running. All of the snow has made it difficult to say the least. So on this gorgeous "spring"day, I laced up my sneaks, and set out. I decided to challenge myself on my first day back to the outdoors. I've been doing stairs instead of running outside, so I know I've been gaining muscle strength. I decided to do a loop of about 2 miles that goes up and down 3 hills. 2 are long, slow climbs and the other is steep. I haven't ever tried this loop before...mostly because I was scared I wouldn't finish. I decided to give it my all. And I succeeded! 2.12 miles, up hills, 25 minutes. My goal by the end of the summer is to do this loop 4-5 times in a row without stopping. That will be about 10 miles. Let's do it!

Hello 2010!

Welcome back to reality. Again.

It seems as if I am always leaving and coming back. At least I always come back.

Yesterday was fantastic...until dinner. I had it in my head that I would get back to being healthy slowly....meaning that since my lunch was impeccable I could now have mashed potatoes and gravy to my delight and have ice cream for dessert. Well, we learn these things the hard way.

This morning I was at 151. Not pretty. However, it is definitely not a permanent fixture on the scale. With my poor eating habits, I am sure that will correct itself as I eat cleaner and drink more water! At least I didn't go from 210 (what I weighed last January) to 220!! 142-151 is much more manageable I think.

So today I had 2 plain waffles dipped in lite syrup for breakfast. Simple and delicious. For lunch I had a Red Baron flatbread melt. It wasn't fabulous. Note to self- just because it is on sale doesn't mean it is worth it. Now for snack. Boy, did I impress myself!

We have Cool Whip Free in the freezer. If you don't know what it is, shame on you. It's incredible! I'll eat it right out of the container. However, if you take 3/4 cup of frozen strawberries, thaw for 1 1/2 minutes, put that on 1/2 cup of Cool Whip Free, and top with 3 crushed vanilla wafers, you have heaven in a bowl. So delicious, so yummy. And only 150 calories!

Oh yeah, and I ran/walked the stairs this morning. Only 9.5 minutes. (My Zune died before I got to ten....) But it was a start. After not doing anything cardio for over a month, I needed that little wake-up call. And stairs is a good workout even if you only do 10 minutes a day. It kicks your butt into shape..literally!