Health and Strength (Emily Sue)

I have no idea what I weighed last time, but today I weigh 72.8kg, which is down a bit. And that's good, but I've had a bit of a brain-shift about how I'm handling this.

I have spent most of my life with body image issues and related disordered eating. I feel like I've been following diets and food rules my whole life, and I'm always feeling guilty about eating 'bad' foods or not exercising enough. (How much is "enough" anyway?) So I must ask myself... is that any way to live? I'm thinking NO.

It occurred to me recently that having a weight loss goal is not helping me. By that I mean, having weight loss as my ENTIRE goal. It means that every time I exercise, I see it as a means to lose weight. When I eat something 'healthy', it's to lose weight. When I deny myself something 'bad', it's to lose weight. This is probably not news to anyone, but that is not actually enjoyable. Further, once I lose weight I know I will stop exercising, stop eating healthy food and go back to the 'bad' foods. Even calling them BAD foods is so unhelpful. Food is not good or bad; it's just food.

So my goal has changed. I'm still counting calories and staying within a specified amount that will help me lose weight sensibly, but weight loss is not my ultimate goal. I am aiming to be healthy and strong. God gave me a body that works well (knees and eyesight not withstanding) and it is a JOY to be strong enough to do things like walk to the shops instead of drive, or walk up a big hill because there's a fantastic view at the top. It's a joy to be able to pick up my podgy cats (they're pretty heavy). It's a joy to know my body is capable of doing 50 minutes on the treadmill - I certainly wasn't capable of that a year ago, and now I feel strong when I finish.

Having this little mind-shift has been incredibly helpful. I've just discovered green smoothies (basically it's a mix of 60% fruit - whatever you like - and 40% green leafy vegetables like spinach, kale or chard, plus a cup or two of water, blend until smooth and drink) and I'm loving them - not because they are a 'weight loss' food, but because they taste great and I honestly feel fantastic when I start the day with one. I know they sound horrible, but they are soooo good. And you can't taste the spinach. This morning's smoothie had apple, orange, pineapple, banana, almond meal (for protein) and spinach. It was delicious.

I've had the same mind shift with exercise. So this morning when I was doing a workout from a DVD I wasn't thinking, "Keep going, you need to lose weight"; I was thinking, "Hey, I can do this one a bit more easily now. I must be getting stronger. Awesome!"

This doesn't mean I leap out of bed every morning all excited about exercise and healthy eating. I still have to employ the 'don't negotiate with terrorists' method to get me out of bed. I still eat chocolate and chips and other things, and sometimes I still have a total calorie blowout. But I am no longer punishing myself, and I'm no longer obsessed with the NEED to lose weight. I'm concentrating on health and strength and if it leads to weight loss, that's great. If it doesn't, I'm still going to rejoice in the things my body can do, and in how healthy I feel.
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Yearly check-in? OR, a fresh start (again)? (Manda)

I'm doing it again. You know, checking in once a year to apologise for being absent and assert my plans to stick around this time.

New plan / incentive: I'm in a competition with my best friend K and her mom, A. We each have a goal (mine is to lose 5 kilos, K is losing 5 and A is going for 7, but weighs more and thus should find it equally challenging).

The fun twist: The winner (the closest to goal on June 25th, or the first one to reach the goal before that) is paid $80 and $60 dollars by the people who come second and third, respectively.

This is cool, because going to Weight Watchers would cost more than that, but I think the incentive of having $140 dollars to spend in whatever I want is going to spur me on a little more than WW would. And we're going to support each other by exercising together occasionally, so it's friendly and spurry.

So, goal: lose 5 kilos, going from 74.5 to 69.5, the lowest weight I'll ever have been since I started weighing myself

Plan:
- keep running (you heard me, running! I can actually do it now, albeit not as well as an actual runner friend would), playing sport, rockclimbing;
- portion control, occasional treats, love food, concentrate on enjoying what I eat

Yea!

Oh, and to make up for not being present for a year, I'll be extra-present and include a picture of what I look like now.

Encouraging, but unofficial (HJ)

I only weigh myself once a week.

More frequently than that is only going to end in heartbreak with the little blips (or blimps?) that occur. I want to see the trend that is heading downwards. Monthly would probably be better, but there's no way I have the patience and motivation to sustain a healthy life for a month with no feedback.

But this morning I couldn't help myself. Partially frustration after last Friday's non-event, partially because this morning I was going to morning tea and needed to know precisely how much I could afford to eat, partially because I've been rowing each day and refusing food and that should be making a difference, surely???

900 grams. Gone. Yaaaaaaaay!

Now to hold onto it until Friday's official weigh-in.

An Unexpected Burst of Energy (HJ)

Is it that it is Spring?

Is it that the vitamins and supplements that the doctor has put me on have had a couple of weeks to kick in?

Is it that the cold I've been fighting for months has finally died?

Is it that my brain is feeling stimulated by the reading I'm doing for my next assignment?

Is it that I've been able to do more rowing than just the 5min warm-up, 5 min warm-down that has been all I could manage while suffering with the dreadful cold?

Is it that I've been having fun at Zumba?



Whatever it is, I like it!

Sometimes good intentions are not enough (Emily Sue)

So don't get me wrong - Operation Skinny Cow is great and I have no intention of leaving. However, I'm realising that posting every three months and never actually changing my habits is - for some bizarre reason - not really working for me. Go figure.

This morning, inspired by a friend who did the same thing last Thursday, I joined Weight Watchers. It's not that I don't know how to eat properly, nor do I want to give up on the OSC support, but given that it will be TWO YEARS in October since we started this blog and I am now heavier than when I started... well, it seems I'm not doing so well on the 'motivating oneself' thing.

Today's weigh in: 77kg
Healthy weight range: 66-53kg
Goal weight: 64kg (that may change, but it's what I got to last time and it was a good weight for my body shape and height)
Motivation: pretty high... well, it's Day 1! :D

I'm going to meetings on Saturdays so I'll update after I get home each time.
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I think I'm back (Emily Sue)

I can't remember the last time I posted and I can't remember what I weighed then, but I know for sure I've put on weight since then. In fact I think I'm at my heaviest Skinny Cow weight now and I'm only about 7kg off the weight I was when I joined Weight Watchers several years ago. Sigh. That's NOT good.

So... remember all my grand plans? Fit by 40? C25K? Ahem... yeah, not doing so well. Actually I was doing well on C25K (and by extension, on Fit by 40) but then I injured my ankle and by the time it finally healed my motivation had packed up and moved north to a little beachside cottage. Who could blame it, really?

But anyway, now I'm back. I just did Week 1, Day 1 of C25K and I didn't die so I reckon that's an excellent start. It was hard but not so hard as it was the very first time I did it so I suppose that means I haven't lost ALL the fitness I gained... just MOST of it. Still, I'm pretty pleased to have dusted off the treadmill and actually done something. Feel free to motivate me (ie, nag).

Weigh-In Wednesday (Manda)

Last week: 71.3

This week: 71.9

Change: a gain of .6

Total loss so far: a loss of 4.1

Nnngggg. Gotta bother more! No giving up.

On the upside, I am feeling really good about my weight at the moment. Since that is half the battle for me (or so I have just decided), I'm going to be happy about that. 

1 forty-degree day down

3 to go

If I live, I'll see you next Wednesday.

Weigh-in Wthursday - scary but not terrifying (Femina)

Thanks Manda for "Wthursday"... it's useful to have another day in the week!

Last time I weighed I was 73.5. Actually that's the last time I officially weighed - I've weighed myself at various times over the last fortnight, with sometimes alarming results (don't weigh yourself at the end of the day right after eating a bowl of risotto, that's all I'm saying).

Anyway, today's weight was 74.6. Ouch. To be honest, though, it's not as bad as I expected given what I ate while my parents were here, and given that it's... uh... Lady Time right now. Oh, and given that we had the most amazing staff Christmas lunch yesterday!

I do expect next week to be better as my anxiety and stress levels have decreased quite a lot (hey... and my parents have just gone home again... coincidence???) and so I'm less likely to comfort eat. Now I just have to get back to the gym again. I was loving it for a while there but since I took a break from it I'm finding it very hard to whip up the enthusiasm to go. I'm sure the enthusiasm will come back after I've been a few times so I guess I'll just have to ignore my own whinging and force myself to go. :)

Another week, another weigh (Louisa)

I was feeling nervous this week girls...in fact let me share my patheticness (??) with you!

I was due for a weigh in and was feeling OK about it. Realistically aware the loss wouldn't be huge because I weighed in the morning and on a different day last week and would be weighing in the evening this week. That was Wed. At the gym. After my workout.

Wed night come home and say to the hubs "I really feel like eating those Tasty Jacks I bought today for Sunday".

Hubs "We have Tasty Jack's?!?!?"

It's important to note two things here...
1. Hubs is VERY supportive of my quest...he's not a saboteur...just a pain in the bum because he's so super skinny, but that's hardly his fault!
2. Hubs has been longing for Tasty Jacks for about a month now...so it wasn't really fair of me to mention it...though perhaps that was my subconscious being not-so-subtle

Of course, out come the Tasty Jacks (again, I should note that I was the one who got them after HH saying "You just want me to say we should eat them!") and I ate a third of the packet.

Gah!

Then went to Mother's Group on Thurs and was met with a feast of epic proportions.

Double Gah!!

Driving home from Mother's Group on my way to WW and really wasn't sure if I could face seeing that I had gained weight so...enter my patheticness.

I drive near my gym.

I detour to drive past my gym.

I go into my gym, hand over LP to the manager (who is pregnant and clucky) and get on the scales there!!!

Satisfied that it won't be an entire disaster, and just before getting a parking ticket for being parked in a clearway (how desperado is that!) I went off to WW.

Loss 0.4kg.

I'm cool with that.

Pathetic-ness overcome (Femina)

Okay, pathetic-ness isn't a real word, I know. Here's what happened: I went to the gym this morning feeling only slightly motivated. After about 15 minutes I walked out of the gym area to take a toilet break... and decided I couldn't be stuffed to do any more exercise, so I got my bag from the locker and went out to my car. I unlocked it, sat down and then thought, "Oh come on, that's a pathetic effort!" I went back in to finish - and my reward was, I ran into a friend and we motivated each other to do a decent workout. (And now we're going off to have a nice, low-fat lunch!)