South Beach Lifestyle still going strong

I spent all day Saturday and Sunday sending about 30 plus resumes to potential employers.  On Sunday I received an email asking for an interview, I went today, it went very well, I think I have the job, keep your fingers and toes crossed.

In the meantime, I'm still on plan, I've down 12 pounds since August 10 (wow times flies) which is pretty darn good, I guess I'll never lose the 20 I envisioned for myself in the first two weeks but I'll let these 12 go, plus Wednesday is the 2 week deadline.  Today we had a busy day, hubby & I both had appointments and had to grab a bite in between, he had the fettuccine alfredo, chocolate cake, white bread and my cheat was a Cesar salad with croutons.  So I feel as though I haven't done nearly as bad as he and have stayed more on plan than he, not that it matters, it's my body I'm trying to heal.

I had gone to the Doctors this a.m. as well, found out I had high blood pressure, next week they'll put me on some MAP thing for 24 hours to see how it does in order to decide if I need meds or not.

Overall I'm in a good place, when I put on my clothes for the interview, I felt good, I still wore my Kymora Body Shaper and my stomach did look flatter (not flat, but flatter) maybe it's the 12 pounds, I have definitely debloated.  Weird how one can feel sexy at my weight, but that's how I felt today pretty darn sexy, though it was a bit awkward when the Doctor was checking my breathing with his stethoscope and he had to push my Kymora.  Though he was gentleman enough not to say anything about it.

The mentioning of the Kymora reminds me that I have yet to wear my Body Wrap from Shapewear I might try it on this week for my next interview, I think it might feel more comfortable than the day I bought it, where it was over 100F outside, I was 12 pounds heavier and had just ate lunch.

Well that's it for today, wish me luck that one of those jobs come thru, I have agencies that have called, I have another interview, who knows I might actually get hired for a regular 9 to 5 job.

Thanks again for visiting!

Sassle

Walking, Burpees, Tabata... Have I found my dream exercise?

Burpees

I love the internet!  Yesterday while searching for other SBD blogs, I came upon this Log My Loss which is an inspiring blog.  I was reading about his program and saw that he did this form of exercise called Tabata so being the curious girl that I am I had to research it and that brought me to burpees.

I think burpees are the exercise I've been waiting for my whole life.  For beginners like myself there are different ways of starting out, I did a search on youtube and the one that impressed me most, or made it seem doable for a woman my size was this one.



After watching it I felt as though I can at least do what she's doing and then when you see how far she's come in three weeks well heck that just encouraged me more.  Burpees work the whole body, you need no equipment, just enough space to do them and they burn a ton of calories.  I'm starting the burpees today, the beginner ones, I'm still looking in on if I should do them 2x or 3x or more a week and for how long, but my goal is to do them tabata style (that's a whole other post) where I would do 20 secs of burpees, 10 sec rest, 20 sec burpees you repeat this up to 8 times which totals about 4 mins of exercise and apparently is the longest 4 minutes of your life.  I am still studying as much as I can on the topic and will share as I learn.

Now if you want to know more about Tabata or Burpees, you can click on the links.  I think they'll explain it way better than I can.

Now before I go, I'd like to add that hubby, myself and our mini doxie went for an 8 block walk, I found a site called Gmap Pedometer that helped me figure out based on the route hubby and I took the almost exact amount of distance we walked and calories spent.  So according to Gmap I walked 0.87 miles that's 1.4 km in Canadian :) and I burned 180 calories (based on today's weight).

Also since starting on Wednesday I have dropped 7 lbs and I believe it was all water because I've had to pee endlessly since I started this lifestyle.  I don't remember peeing like this the two other times I followed this plan (February 2009, January 2011), but I'm not complaining.  Though it's a pain in the butt to wake up every hour to pee, but in time It'll stop and normalize itself.

On Aug 22 I have an appointment with my family doctor, I've had him since 1990 and well I haven't been to a doctor in over 4 years so I will request some blood work etc since I have no idea if I'm diabetic or not or how my heart is doing or anything.  Keep your fingers crossed please, I think I'm doing ok, I believe I'm blessed but I guess I won't know till he tests me.

Well I guess that's it for now... I'm still on plan, still going strong, still feeling good and still reaching out...

Have a blessed day everyone!

Sassle!

Sassle in Canada!

There's something about coming back to Sassle that always make me feel at home.  Speaking of home, the reason I've been off the blogsphere world is that hubby & I packed our things and moved to Canada.  It's been a wild, crazy and fun journey.  I got to meet my nephew, see most of my family and the odd friend.  We  are renting a nice home and trying to acclimate to our new lives.  We live in the province of Quebec which means it's French which poses no problems for me whatsoever, my husband on the other hand does not speak the language.  Since we got here, he has learned polite phrases, we have found an AA home group and I started a new job and quit it within the month (long story) oh and I gained 5 pounds.

So all in all since I first started this journey with you in January I believe my 30 to 35 lb loss is now a 15 lb loss (insert sad face).

But yesterday I went to the store and stocked up on my South Beach Diet foods and today is day 1.  I'd write how much I way but hubby is beside me and well that's the kind of information one keeps from one's hubby, at least till I've down 50 more pounds lol.

The latest 5lb gain I believe stems from my old new job, I worked 12 to 13 hour days without a break so what I did was eat at my desk and they had a wonderful vending machine with cookies, pop and chocolate bars.  So I ate my emotions and found the weight fast.

When we first moved here in April I have gained 15 pounds (Oh my God) and my stomach is bloated and huge.  It's hard, I have a headache right now as I type this but I want to lose weight.  I keep telling hubby at least we're trying and only quitters don't try.  I always want to go back to the Weight Watchers route, you know where I can eat what I want while counting my points, that worked for me in the past, yet for some reason South Beach is what motivates me.  Why fight it, the eating plan is delicious, I always lose weight so I might as well just accept it and go with the flow.

Now what am I going to do different this time?  Not much, it works if you work it, though I am going to incorporate walks in my day and maybe throw in Lesley Sansone's Walk away the pounds and Strength Training for Dummies.  I need a schedule or else I get overwhelmed.

Thanks for stopping by!
Sassle

10% Loss Plus Learning How to Cheat

Weird title but it's true, there have been days on the South Beach Diet where I was hungrier than usual and instead of going all ape sh!t over cake, cookies and chocolate, I'd eat an extra portion of nuts or string cheese.  I'd eat 2 oranges instead of one or maybe a bigger plate of pasta than usual.  This is good, because even though I did not follow the instructions to the tee I am not going crazy.

I've been weighing in every day for the last 2 weeks, I seemed to maintain a 26 pound loss which is good but today I got on the scale and have officially lost 30 pounds.  I weighed myself 3 times before I believed it.  That's a 30 lb loss, that is so amazing and what is even better than it being a 30 lb loss is I've officially lost 10% of my weight!!  So I'm sure that's made the world of difference on my blood pressure, heart, blood sugar etc.  Though I don't officially know this since I can't afford to see a doctor.  But I have faith.

I started fitting in some of my old jeans and this time I'm throwing out my fatty clothes, I think as long as I held on to my size 26 pants, I was reserving the right to get fat again.  This time they are going in the garbage.  I am not reserving the right to get fat again, I am reserving the right to get healthy again at a healthy weight.

Today I plan on tackling my closet, hubby & I are moving next month, we are putting our Ebay store on hold and are decluttering our lives.  Anything that is too big or too ratty looking goes in our dumpster.  I'm hoping by the time we leave next month that the size 20 jeans I have will fit nice and I can get rid of my 22's.  Yes I'm wearing 22's.  I can't wait to be a proper size 10-12 but I'll have to, one day at a time as we say in AA.

So I'll be getting together with my family next month, I'd like to lose at least 10 more pounds by then but ideally 20 pounds.  Is it doable 20 pounds in 38 days? Probably if I go back to Phase 1 which I'm considering, but we'll see...

That's it for now, I have 2 topics I'll be writing on later today, one on exercise and the other on bread.

Thanks for visiting!

Cardio Alone Won't Help Me

I'm down 25 lbs.  I took this week off from exercise, I started feeling as though I had no energy in my legs and thought I'd just do myself a favor and take a break for one week only.  I was also struggling with the fact that I want to tone up at the same time, yes I need to burn calories but I don't want to be flabbier than necessary.

So I was on Facebook the other day and a friend shared this article on Why Cardio Alone Doesn't Cut Fat it's a great read and only reinforced my desire to want to incorporate strength training into my life and this healthy eating lifestyle.

Now for the last three days (if not longer) I've been trying to find a strength training routine for the obese or morbidly obese online and aside from multiple articles on why it's a great idea I'm coming up with squat (no pun intended).  What I'm going to do is check out some of my followers blogs and some of the blogs I'm following, I'm sure there's a routine in there somewhere.

If anyone has a recommendations please include a link for me in the comments...

I saw these 4 tips on a website:

There are four ways to achieve a caloric deficit:

1. Eat less.
2. Increase your activity.
3. Elevate your basal metabolic rate.
4. All of the above - also known as "Cardio Alone Won't Work".

Thanks for stopping by!

Still On Plan and Still Feeling Good...

I've lost 23 pounds as of this a.m., two days short of a month on plan.  This has been quite the adventure for me.  When I first weighed in this morning I was a tiny bit disappointed, I thought great 2 more pounds but that's only 23 pounds that I've lost, then I realized I had not been on this plan for one month yet and that I had accomplished quite a bit!

I've also started doing things a bit different this time, yes the way I did it before worked but I realize that my mental and spiritual health are as important as my physical health.  So I've tried to incorporate different aspects of this to my new South Beach lifestyle.

Exercise
I've been doing Leslie Sansone's Walk Away the Pounds for Abs 1 Mile for the last 10+ days.  I'm trying to do it 6 days a week and i'm thinking of starting the 2 mile probably on Sunday.   I try my best to do it before 10am so that it's out of my way, yes that's how I feel about it because if I wait too long I'll have figured out some great excuses on why I can't do it.  As I'm typing this it's 9:40am, my usual routine is to start my omelet, cook it on low and start walking away the pounds, so this will go into draft until I'm done...

Meetings

I started attending 12 step meetings, helps me a lot, I work the steps or at the very least try to and do my best to try and do the next right thing.  Which believe me isn't as easy as it sounds.

Prayer & Mediation

I try to connect with my higher power on a daily basis thru prayer and meditation.  I don't always "pray" in the traditional sense but I reach out more now than ever, but I still feel as though there is much room for improving my conscious contact with my Higher Power who I call God but some may refer to him/her as  Goddess, Source, the Creator etc...

Sleep
This is a big one for me.  I've never been much of a sleeper from childhood into adulthood.  There's too much to do in order to sleep.  I don't suffer from insomnia (touch wood) I'm one of those lucky ones that once I hit the pillow its night night for me.  But I used to live off of 6 or less hours a night for years and years.  When I was an active alcoholic I even had less sleep than that (or shall I say pass out time).

About 2 months ago I woke up feeling hungover, I haven't had a drink in over 11 years so I couldn't understand what happened (did I tell you this story before) anyway that's when I decided sleep was going to be an integral part of my life.  I now sleep 7 to 9 hours a night and if I don't get that for whatever reasons, I will nap.  Sleep is part of me taking care of me, to think it took me 30 plus years to figure that out.

I have big news coming soon, I'll be writing about it in the next few days, it's big news to me anyway.

Thanks for stopping by!

Being Kind... to myself.

It's been a week since my last post and a great week at that.

On Monday I started Alanon, which is a fellowship of relatives and friends of alcoholics who share their experience, strength, and hope in order to solve their common problems. I got that from their site. My husband is a recovering alcoholic with over 10 years sobriety and I am happily married, however, a fellowship like Alanon can only help me be a better wife, be a better human being.
So Monday I went to Alanon and heard something, you know that little voice that speaks to us, well mine says stuff like "you're fat, you're ugly, they're talking about you, they don't like you, you're stupid, you won't succeed, you're scared and the list goes on... that little voice known as my ego does not like me in the least, so a gentleman from the group was saying that he has learned that he should just shut that voice off no matter what it says. So the minute my little voice says to me "you're fat" I just take that information and ignore it, it's a liar, it hates me. Now at first I thought, this is too easy, how can I just shut a voice off, but I've been doing it and it's working. Sort of like "uh oh, you go bye bye voice" and poof it's gone. Yes it tries to sneak back in but I'm trying to be persistent in being kind to myself...

That's another thing, being kind, being good, being loving to myself... I owe myself that, like I said, I'm the meanest person I've ever known when it comes to how I'm treated (did that make sense?). So with the wise words from my cousin, Alanon and other hints and clues here and there I keep hearing, Be good and kind to yourself. So that's my mission for 2011.

Thanks for stopping by...