Getting there!

I have been missing in action for some time, mostly due to my crazy life at work. It is the end of fiscal year and things have been so busy, that most of the time I don't have time to think about food or even really think for that matter!! Helps the ol' waistline tremendously!!!! :)

The exercise front was pretty much non-existent last week except for a short 3 mile run. I can't begin to tell you all how guilty I feel for last week. I feel like I failed myself. I've only got a few days left of this panic before the end of the month so this will be back to "normal" soon.

I did manage to go out with the girls on Saturday, for a much needed get away. I just needed a break and some ME time. It was extremely enjoyable until we went out the the bars. I was one, very under dressed compared to the women around me, and two all my insecurities I have been working so hard to get rid of, came flooding back in a matter of 2 seconds. It was a horrible experience and after losing 30 pounds I now feel like I'm starting all over again. I was just at the point where I was feeling good about my loss, I was getting compliments, and feeling somewhat proud of what I've done so far. But this weekend made me feel like I hadn't done enough. Maybe it was good for me on the other hand. Maybe it will just start me again to push harder. I'm still working on it day by day. I just don't plan on going to the bar anytime soon! I'm WAY over that scene.

Self portrait before my night out!!!

I need to catch up with all of you now. I feel so out of the loop it is driving me crazy!!!!!!!!!!!! Hope you all are well. Let me know how you're doing as I've missed you all!

I'm back!

Today is a rough day for me. There are so many of you going through heartache and loss right now, that it makes me sad. I know that grief all too well and it really hits hard today. One year ago today I lost my Uncle in a very sad, unfortunate motorcycle accident. He had climbed onto his stepsons brand new motorcycle and took it out for a early evening ride. Unfortunately he lost control of the bike and veered off the roads and into the woods. He was wearing a helmet, but the impact was more than his body could take and in an instant he was taken from us. He was more than a Uncle to me, he was at times like my second dad. He was there for me during troubling and hard times and always had a shoulder for me to cry on. He was a teddy bear and I miss his hugs dearly. He was always so happy to see me and he always brought a smile to my face. Took quickly we forget to cherish the ones we love, when in an instant they can be gone.

So hug your family and friends and cherish every day you have with them. We never know what the future holds!!

I love you Uncle Jon and miss you as much today as I did a year ago. I'll get that big bear hug one of these days!

I'm tired........just plain tired!!!

I'm tired of being walked on!

I'm tired of feeling unimportant!

I'm tired of putting myself last!

I'm tired of not being supported!

I'm tired of feeling lost!!

I'm tired.........I'm just plain tired!!

What a weekend!

I weighed in at 206.8 Sunday morning. Down another pound and down 27.2 lbs. It's all starting to pay off. :)

Finished my 5 mile run this weekend in a time of 1:05:40!!!!!!!!!! I beat my goal by over 2 minutes. My goal was 1:08:00! Can you tell I'm excited??

The run was absolutely amazing. I went solo for the whole thing and it was such a great experience. At the end as I was coming across the finish line, a runner behind me came up grabbed my hand raised it up in the air and said we did it!! I really almost cried. And to make it even cooler they called my name as I was coming across the finish line with her. I am so jazzed and pumped for my half marathon in August. Keep on running!!

Hope you all had a wonderful weekend as well! I've got to go catch up with you all now!

I'm Struggling

I am just now getting back from the gym. I was scheduled to run 4 miles this afternoon. I decided to do it on the treadmill as I am finding it difficult to run at home unless it is 10:00 at night. If I do that I don't end up getting to bed until 12 or 1 and then back up at 6 am to get ready for work. Anyways......I went to the gym to run my 4 miles. I only made it to 2 miles!

I am confused. I can run forever outside uphill and downhill, but when it comes to the dang treadmill I get all flustered and can't get very far. I mean I have done 3 and 4 miles on it before, but it feels torturous.

DO any of you runners have this problem??? Or is my mind just not letting me get past it??

I'm struggling and I need your help!

A glimpse into my life!!

Besides being a weight loss obsessed mom of two, I thought I would give you all a little insight into my life beyond just my weight. I have two jobs and one of them is my real passion. I do on location portrait photography. You can find most of my work at my website. I love capturing those special moments for others. So I decided to share some of my passion with you and let you in on what I'm doing when I'm not crying at the scale!!!

I still work a full time job as an Account Executive for an office supply company, but this is the job that I hope to one day work full time with!! I just love being behind that camera.

Life isn't all consumed with weight loss and physical appearance, as good as it may feel. It's about doing what you enjoy in life. I'm learning that I don't have to obsess over one thing at a time. I'm learning I can still be active, healthy and continue my weight loss without sacrificing the things that I love!!

I've learned to work my workout schedule around my family, as my youngest absolutely hates it when I go out for my nightly run without him. He will cry until I get home and it is just heart breaking. So for the love of my family, I either go after he's gone to bed or bring him along in the jogger. I'm amazed at the ease this juggling of life and weight loss comes. So after 5 months it's become second nature.

You can tell your getting thinner when.........

You can bend over and paint your own toes with out cutting off your airway or circulation!!

I painted my own toes today, and I could breath the whole time!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Just thought I'd let you know! LOL

I moan and groan, whine and cry about my weight. Throw a 2 year old tantrum, by laying on the floor kicking and screaming and what do I get??

A 2.6 pound loss!!!!!!

Now I know why my 2 1/2 year old throws a fit like that. They get what they want in the end. So now I am at 207.8 lbs. I really can't believe it. I have lost 26.2 pounds in 22 weeks. Not fast at any means but I'm really liking it.

I have gone from a somewhat tight 20, to a size 16. I can actually buy clothes from a regular store right now. That is the biggest prize of them all. I remember my trip to Vegas in October and I had to make sure each mall we went to had a big girl store in it. I was jealous of my sister in law as she was buying the most adorable clothes in all of the stores. I had to resort to buying jewlery or shoes from these stores and sdaly that's the only thing that would remotely fit.

I just gave away two huge black garbage bags full of too big clothes. I am not leave anything in my closet to go back to. So for now I am on a limited wardrobe. One pair of jeans, 2 pairs of black dress pants, a pair of brown dress pants, and a pair of grey dress pants. That's it. So if I'm wearing the same thing over and over again it's because I don't own any clothes anymore. Such a shame!!! :)

So if you ever feel like throwing a fit to get what you want I can give you a few pointers as it seems to have worked really well for me!!!

Off and Running!

So I posted yesterday about my obsession with the scale and how I am a loser and weight myself every day in hopes that the little weight fairies will come and pluck off a pound or two while I'm sleeping. Yeah right......Keep dreaming lady!! Well of course I didn't get up and decide not to weigh myself this morning. No, I got up and my first thought was maybe the scale is going to surprise me today. i get on and low and behold the scale says 209.8 lbs. Woo Hoo!! Even if it was a little drop it was still a drop. I'm sure the scale was being nice to me so that I wouldn't drop kick it into the corner of the bathroom again. Thank you scale for complying with my obsession and give me a little string of hope to hang on to!!

I am running the Anchorage Run For Women next Saturday. It is a 5 mile run for breast cancer. I am so freaking excited for it. Imagine that, a fat girl excited to run for 5 miles!! Yep, that's me! My run has gone from about a 14.20 mile minute to about a 13 mile minute. I am hoping to finish in an hour and 8 minutes. I'm adding a little extra cushion as to not disappoint myself!! Some of you would not consider my timing a run, but for a girl that is still 80 pounds overweight, I VERY MUCH consider this running. I can't believe the that in 7 1/2 weeks I have gone from running a full mile to running 5 miles as well as increasing my time. I remember my excitement the
first time I ran a full mile.

SO here's to a glorious weekend full of a 4 mile run tonight and a 6 mile run on Sunday, as well as keeping away from Fast Food, or any bad food for that matter!!! Hope you all have a great weekend and I will see you on Monday for weekend updates!

A much needed kick in the butt!!

A HUGE thank you goes out to Dawn for giving me a little kick in the butt to get back on here. It helps to have someone watch over you and I can't thank you enough!!! I haven't had much to post about, or at least I thought I didn't!! I do have a few little things to say though!

After my horrible guilt fest of a weekend I ended up going for a run on Monday. Although something was/is up with my body. I was supposed to run a 3 miler, but once I got to 2.5 miles I couldn't move a step more. I don't know what was wrong. Perhaps it was my body telling me to never eat all that processed garbage ever again, or don't leave me hanging for 4 days without getting me moving. I was feeling like a slug.

Tuesday I was supposed to have my session with the trainer, but he had to cancel on me, but still gave me a list of things he wanted me to do for the day. I of course took this as a excuse not to do anything and that's what I did. I ate great, but never made it to the gym. I have been feeling sluggish and tired and kind of blah. It is slowly getting better though.

Wednesday was a much better day!! :) I spent an hour in the gym and did a full body strength training day. I was spent by the end of my session. Thomas, my trainer, came over to chat with me for a minute and asked me if I got my workout in for yesterday. I was honest with him and told him I totally slacked off. He just smiled at me. I knew what he was thinking!! :) I came clean with my horrible weekend and about my run on Monday. That my body wasn't working like I wanted it to. I have been sneezing a ton and the throat is a little scratchy, so maybe I was coming down with something. He was so understanding and didn't make me feel like more of a loser. He cracked me up because the first thing he said to me after I confessed my sins was "well, I hope you don't get upset for me asking you this, but is it that time of the month??" I just started laughing. Why is it that men always think that's the reason for everything!! :) I told him no and he said to shake it off, get my butt in the gym every day and listen to my body and not my mind. Thank you for the awesome advice there Thomas!! So last night I made it out for my nightly run. 3 miles was on the schedule so out I went and actually made it this time. I was feeling a lot faster than normal last night and can tell my stride is definitely getting longer. I felt accomplished yesterday and will kick butt again today!!

I have also been obsessed with the scale. I get on every single morning to see if it has changed. And of course the last few weeks it hasn't changed at all. It frustrates me to no end, but I am hoping that I am losing inches versus pounds. I just feel like I work and work and work at it with no rewards. I will be having my husband hide the scale from me for at least a week. I've got to concentrate on getting ready for my half marathon, and quit destructing myself with the dang scale!!

Thanks to everyone for their sweet comments on my crappy days. I am feeling refreshed and ambitious today so I'm going to make the best of it!! Have a great day!

Slacking....

I can't believe it's been almost a week since I last post! Perhaps that's why I fell off the wagon this weekend. I am feeling guilty and beating myself up royally right now, so maybe if I get it out, realize my screw ups, and make the next step in moving on I can stop beating myself up. Take it as a lesson learned and keep on chugging baby!

So it all began with Friday! I was supposed to go out running as I skipped Thursday. Obviously I never went. That was okay though, I could deal with missing another day. I still had Saturday and Sunday to get it in. Friday night the hubby went to "TACO HELL" and bought dinner for us. :( He got me a chicken quesadilla, and 2 volcano tacos! I was a bad bad girl. But it tasted oh so good!!

Saturday I went and bought flowers with my mom and ended up going through the "Taco Hell" drive thru again! I knew I was being bad. So I ordered a Fresco bean burrito and another volcano taco. Again not the best choices, but what can I do. Dinner again was a disaster, as we had no children for the night and went out for dinner. I split a Philly cheese steak and fries with the hubby, had 2 hot wings, half a potato skin, half a piece of chicken strip, and half a mozzarella stick. Gosh I feel like a pig now, as I write that all out!

Sunday didn't get any better! I had a leftover bean burrito for breakfast, a cheeseburger from McDonald's for lunch, and then by the time dinner came around, the guilt had really set in, so I opted for a salad and a fat free hot dog with a bun. I'm sure my calories were all within range for yesterday, but I still feel really guilty for not eating quality food and opting for junk instead. Lesson learned, moving on!! Oh.......and I still never got a run in for the weekend. So 4 days without any form of working out!!!!!!!!! Boy will my trainer be pleased with me!!

Today has been much better. For breakfast I had half a grapefruit and a light orange yogurt. I've nibbled on a few almonds for a snack, some iced coffee, and for lunch I'm gobbling up a light chicken Cesar salad with garbanzo beans and smoked sun dried tomatoes! I'm getting back on track and leaving my horrible weekend behind me. Getting on the scale this morning made matters even worse. Up 2.6 pounds, but my fingers are so swollen I can't get my rings off. Lately they have been so loose I have considered getting them re sized soon. So bad eating = too much salt and not enough water! :(

This has been my first horrible weekend since I began 21 weeks ago. I'm not giving up though and will take my own advice as it just being a bump in the road, and to keep on going. Thanks for letting me vent. Here's to better days ahead!!!