Hello - it's me again.
As I was running on the treadmill tonight (horray, ME!), I was thinking about an article I read about diet and exercise, which says that you can diet, or you can exercise and it has the same effect on the body as doing both together. But doing both only works if your exercise (calories burned) cancel out your diet (calories consumed).
In terms I can understand, that means it doesn't matter how much I run if I still cheat on my diet. In other words, my body is smart enough to know it's not going to let go of any more fat until I start eating right. Crap! Foiled again by my own body! What a traitor!
Getting on the treadmill, or going outside for a run if it's decent outside (read: really and truely spring, summer or fall) just takes a little ambition. Sticking to the diet takes willpower. Willpower is alot harder to come by than ambition.
Although I am not obese (anymore), my BMI (Body Mass Index) still is in the overweight catagory of approx. 27.5 (normal weight would be a BMI of 24.9 or lower, I'm going to have to loose 13 more pounds to get to "normal". On the flip side of that, I'm also 12 pounds away from once again being obese. Okay, so I'm "middle of the road" overweight.
People must forget how short I am when I tell them how many more pounds I'd like to loose, because I hear how that is just too much weight for me to try to loose. (Thinking of a certain relative who recently admitted that the nurse is not allowed to say their weight out loud during physicals and the eyes are closed during the event.) Maybe they want to feel better about their own fat, who knows. Given my height, 4' 11" - my ideal-in-my-mind weight would be 105 to 110. So I have about 25 to 30 pounds to go. According to the BMI calculator I found on the internet (and there are lots of them out there!), I'd have to weigh 91 pounds to be underweight, and honey 105 is a long way from 91! I just don't see how I could starve myself that much, especially with running. I haven't seen 91 pounds on the scales in close to 25 years (think jr. high). If you want to throw out the scales completely, I can also say I'd be happy if I was wearing a size 4 in women's clothes. I certainly couldn't see myself in a size 2 because although by then I'd be almost completely flat-chested, I still have hips!
So I guess I've ranted enough on my body being sneaky and sticking to it's guns about cheating on The Diet, so I'll update my miles for the week and get off the computer and plan my meals for tomorrow.
Tuesday, January 30, 2007
Friday, January 26, 2007
The Death of January
Last night has we were lying on the couch, J says "So, are we done running now?" He was referring to the fact that if we do not run by tomorrow, we will have not run in a whole week. So much for spending $_____.00 on a treadmill. I explained to him our busy work week (and school work for him also) and how all of the motivation I've had this week is to plant my butt on the couch after work and then go to bed. So with less than one week left in January, we are pretty much calling it a wash and starting fresh in February.
This weekend we will be cleaning the carpet upstairs and then moving our bedroom up there, so we will officially have a spare bedroom and a workout/office room. We can unpack the weight bench we bought, and J is getting me a Pilates ball w/DVD (he won a contest at work and got to pick a prize from a booklet full of "stuff").
So with an actual room to work out in, instead of the spare bedroom with the mattress up against the wall and the weight bench still in the box we feel we will be adequately motivated.
Next we need to work on the food issue. Sure we need items like sugar-free fudge sickles (35 calories!) to keep us going, and sometimes a handful of pretzels satisfies that need for a food that's crunchy, but we should not have succumbed to buy-one-get-one-free Doritos! BAD T & J, BAD!
One of my New Year's Resolutions was to keep a food journal. I meant EVERY DAY, but I hate keeping a food journal, so I think I have maybe one or two days written in there. I'm going to make an effort to start on Monday and keep it rolling. I'm also going to make some foods this weekend that I can use for lunches instead of buying frozen dinners that I get sick of anyway. So "starvation", welcome back! I'm sure my body has never known starvation, but when you reduce the amount of calories you eat in a day - your body sure acts like it's starving.
I could even even be lazy about it and look through last years food journal and copy days that match the calories I want to be at, and I still haven't been doing it! Somethings gotta change. If I want to meet some of my other goals, like improving my 5K times, loosing weight will help me with that I'm sure. So far, I think every resolution I've made is in the toilet. Someone slap me, quick!
P.S. I hate winter!
This weekend we will be cleaning the carpet upstairs and then moving our bedroom up there, so we will officially have a spare bedroom and a workout/office room. We can unpack the weight bench we bought, and J is getting me a Pilates ball w/DVD (he won a contest at work and got to pick a prize from a booklet full of "stuff").
So with an actual room to work out in, instead of the spare bedroom with the mattress up against the wall and the weight bench still in the box we feel we will be adequately motivated.
Next we need to work on the food issue. Sure we need items like sugar-free fudge sickles (35 calories!) to keep us going, and sometimes a handful of pretzels satisfies that need for a food that's crunchy, but we should not have succumbed to buy-one-get-one-free Doritos! BAD T & J, BAD!
One of my New Year's Resolutions was to keep a food journal. I meant EVERY DAY, but I hate keeping a food journal, so I think I have maybe one or two days written in there. I'm going to make an effort to start on Monday and keep it rolling. I'm also going to make some foods this weekend that I can use for lunches instead of buying frozen dinners that I get sick of anyway. So "starvation", welcome back! I'm sure my body has never known starvation, but when you reduce the amount of calories you eat in a day - your body sure acts like it's starving.
I could even even be lazy about it and look through last years food journal and copy days that match the calories I want to be at, and I still haven't been doing it! Somethings gotta change. If I want to meet some of my other goals, like improving my 5K times, loosing weight will help me with that I'm sure. So far, I think every resolution I've made is in the toilet. Someone slap me, quick!
P.S. I hate winter!
Tuesday, January 23, 2007
OT - Why do you blog?
I ran across this Survey on one of the blogs that I read, I took the survey and thought it was interesting even though I've only been doing this for a few weeks and couldn't really completely answer all of the questions. So if anyone out there reading this has their own blog, take 5 or 10 mins and take the survey.
Sunday, January 21, 2007
Krispy Kreme Challenge
Came back home tonight from spending the weekend with my cousin (JC) and her SO. J & I had lots of fun - good things to eat and drink, neat places to see. Ann Arbor is a nice town. Fun place.
JC and her SO are getting ready to fly to NC next weekend to run 4 miles in the Krispy Kreme Challenge. Run 2 miles downhill, eat ONE DOZEN Krispy Kreme donuts, and run back 2 miles to where you started. Which means you would be running uphill on the way back. Oh yeah, did I mention you are to do this in ONE HOUR?
There is a video on the web site, and there is a person getting sick on the video. How could he not get sick?
Instead of figuring out how to get to NC next weekend to do this crazy event (although it would be fun to do, you can register to run the race sans donuts but still get the t-shirt), I registered us for the Mackinaw Bridge Memorial Day run and booked our hotel. Unlike the KKChallenge, the Bridge run is uphill the 1st half of the race (5% incline) and downhill the rest of the way. Then you get breakfast at the end of the race before the awards start - but probably no donuts.
JC and her SO are getting ready to fly to NC next weekend to run 4 miles in the Krispy Kreme Challenge. Run 2 miles downhill, eat ONE DOZEN Krispy Kreme donuts, and run back 2 miles to where you started. Which means you would be running uphill on the way back. Oh yeah, did I mention you are to do this in ONE HOUR?
There is a video on the web site, and there is a person getting sick on the video. How could he not get sick?
Instead of figuring out how to get to NC next weekend to do this crazy event (although it would be fun to do, you can register to run the race sans donuts but still get the t-shirt), I registered us for the Mackinaw Bridge Memorial Day run and booked our hotel. Unlike the KKChallenge, the Bridge run is uphill the 1st half of the race (5% incline) and downhill the rest of the way. Then you get breakfast at the end of the race before the awards start - but probably no donuts.
Saturday, January 20, 2007
Life After Calibration
By looking right at my weight loss ytd being a positive number, instead of a negative number - it appears that Red Lobster last night for dinner and then the rest of it again right before bed was a poor choice. Oops!
Earlier in the week running on the new treadmill was fast and fun. I was running for about an hour at a time, and doing about 5 miles. Then J decided maybe we should have calibrated the machine before we started using it. Life after calibration is slow. Now my pace is back down where it should be, and I'm huffing and puffing after 1 mile. Which is why I ran 1/2 of a 5K this morning. That, and we are getting ready to visit my cousin in Ann Arbor (shout out to JC) and we need to get to the bank and make tracks.
I think I liked life before calibration better. Reality sucks.
Earlier in the week running on the new treadmill was fast and fun. I was running for about an hour at a time, and doing about 5 miles. Then J decided maybe we should have calibrated the machine before we started using it. Life after calibration is slow. Now my pace is back down where it should be, and I'm huffing and puffing after 1 mile. Which is why I ran 1/2 of a 5K this morning. That, and we are getting ready to visit my cousin in Ann Arbor (shout out to JC) and we need to get to the bank and make tracks.
I think I liked life before calibration better. Reality sucks.
Wednesday, January 17, 2007
"Health" Food Conspiracy
I say "health" because the foods in question may or may not be truely healthy. But they sure tasted good. But my grocery store doesn't want me buying (or is that eating?) them anymore.
Over the past few months foods J & I like to buy have started disappearing from the shelves. First it was Slim Fast Low Carb 4 packs, then it was Ocean Spray Diet Cranberry Juice (but that re-appeared). Now it's the Ragu (low carb) alfredo and cheese sauces.
I checked Ragu's web site, and I don't see them listed. Guess no one liked the sauces except us. They were really good.
What's next? Dare I mention my current top four favorites for fear they too will disappear?
1) Thomas' Light English muffins. Favorite why? One muffin has 100 calories, 1.5g fat, 6g of protein and a whopping 8g of fiber which brings the carbs down to 16g, which isn't bad. Also, super-yummy toasted with a tablespoon of reduced-fat Crunchy Jif.
2) Mission Carb Balance Soft Taco size Tortillas. One tortilla has these stats: 110 calories, 2.5g fat, 5g of protein and it's 11GRAMS of fiber knocks the carbs down to SEVEN, and they make really tasty soft tacos, chicken or beef. Sometimes just for fun we eat two at a time! That's a lot of fiber!
3) General Mills Fiber One Oats & Peanut Butter Chewy Bars. This one had me in heaven when I discovered they taste like peanut butter rice krispy treats. Hell ya! A little high at 150 calories with 4.5g of fat and a little low with 3g of protein, these babies knock your socks off with 9GRAMS of fiber, which brings the carb count to 19grams.
4) Quaker Instant Weight Control Maple & Brown Sugar Oatmeal. One packet has 160 calories, 3g of fat, 7g of protein, 6g of fiber and 23g of carbs. Just not a good stand-alone breakfast, as 160 calories only fills me up for about 1.5 hours.
Can you tell I like my fiber? But it has to taste good too. I'm not gonna eat tree bark just to get fiber.
Over the past few months foods J & I like to buy have started disappearing from the shelves. First it was Slim Fast Low Carb 4 packs, then it was Ocean Spray Diet Cranberry Juice (but that re-appeared). Now it's the Ragu (low carb) alfredo and cheese sauces.
I checked Ragu's web site, and I don't see them listed. Guess no one liked the sauces except us. They were really good.
What's next? Dare I mention my current top four favorites for fear they too will disappear?
1) Thomas' Light English muffins. Favorite why? One muffin has 100 calories, 1.5g fat, 6g of protein and a whopping 8g of fiber which brings the carbs down to 16g, which isn't bad. Also, super-yummy toasted with a tablespoon of reduced-fat Crunchy Jif.
2) Mission Carb Balance Soft Taco size Tortillas. One tortilla has these stats: 110 calories, 2.5g fat, 5g of protein and it's 11GRAMS of fiber knocks the carbs down to SEVEN, and they make really tasty soft tacos, chicken or beef. Sometimes just for fun we eat two at a time! That's a lot of fiber!
3) General Mills Fiber One Oats & Peanut Butter Chewy Bars. This one had me in heaven when I discovered they taste like peanut butter rice krispy treats. Hell ya! A little high at 150 calories with 4.5g of fat and a little low with 3g of protein, these babies knock your socks off with 9GRAMS of fiber, which brings the carb count to 19grams.
4) Quaker Instant Weight Control Maple & Brown Sugar Oatmeal. One packet has 160 calories, 3g of fat, 7g of protein, 6g of fiber and 23g of carbs. Just not a good stand-alone breakfast, as 160 calories only fills me up for about 1.5 hours.
Can you tell I like my fiber? But it has to taste good too. I'm not gonna eat tree bark just to get fiber.
Sunday, January 14, 2007
No Excuses
We bought a Treadmill and a weight bench yesterday. We used some of our Christmas money and the rest will come from our tax return. Of course it's not as heavy-duty and posh as the Precors we run on at Delta College, but it should be a good start.
The weight bench is just a very simple one with an incline, nothing fancy.
Now we have NO EXCUSES to work out! We even set it up last night in the spare bedroom (front) and J is working on getting heat upstairs right now so we can move our bedroom upstairs and turn the back bedroom into the "workout room" and the front bedroom back into the spare.
I should be able to update my Mileage YTD later today! I am 97% well again. Just a runny nose and a little rasp in the throat.
The weight bench is just a very simple one with an incline, nothing fancy.
Now we have NO EXCUSES to work out! We even set it up last night in the spare bedroom (front) and J is working on getting heat upstairs right now so we can move our bedroom upstairs and turn the back bedroom into the "workout room" and the front bedroom back into the spare.
I should be able to update my Mileage YTD later today! I am 97% well again. Just a runny nose and a little rasp in the throat.
Tuesday, January 9, 2007
Top Ten
How pathetic am I? It's Day Two of the diet (and only 1/2 way into it) and I'm already making a list of things in my head that I hate about dieting. So I thought I would counter-balance it with an equal number of things I love about dieting. :-) Here they are, in no particular order.
Hate:
1) Planning my meals in my food journal. Figuring out what I can and can't eat for a certain day. (Nope, can't have ____ today, too much fat/carbs/protein, etc.)
2) Being hungry "all the time" until my stomach figures out what I'm trying to do. It obviously didn't get the memo the rest of my body did.
3) Wanting to cheat here and there - which just leads to chucking the whole thing out the window.
4) Not being motivated to excercise like I should and coming up with excuses. (Too cold/dark outside to run, I'm sick, don't feel like going to Delta, wish we had a treadmill, etc.)
5) Going grocery shopping and seeing all of the food I am trying to avoid. Thank goodness that most of the "junk" food is clumped together and I can just avoid those isles all together!
Love:
1) Having the support of my husband on my weight loss adventure!
2) My clothes getting baggy and being able to go to the store and buy the next size (or two) smaller!
3) My skin getting soft and squishy (around my middle) but more toned (around my arms and neck).
4) The sparkle in J's eyes when he puts his hands around my waist and feels my ribs.
5) Being healthy/less likely to get sick and also my skin is clearer. Also not being tired all of the time, just having more general energy/ambition.
Hate:
1) Planning my meals in my food journal. Figuring out what I can and can't eat for a certain day. (Nope, can't have ____ today, too much fat/carbs/protein, etc.)
2) Being hungry "all the time" until my stomach figures out what I'm trying to do. It obviously didn't get the memo the rest of my body did.
3) Wanting to cheat here and there - which just leads to chucking the whole thing out the window.
4) Not being motivated to excercise like I should and coming up with excuses. (Too cold/dark outside to run, I'm sick, don't feel like going to Delta, wish we had a treadmill, etc.)
5) Going grocery shopping and seeing all of the food I am trying to avoid. Thank goodness that most of the "junk" food is clumped together and I can just avoid those isles all together!
Love:
1) Having the support of my husband on my weight loss adventure!
2) My clothes getting baggy and being able to go to the store and buy the next size (or two) smaller!
3) My skin getting soft and squishy (around my middle) but more toned (around my arms and neck).
4) The sparkle in J's eyes when he puts his hands around my waist and feels my ribs.
5) Being healthy/less likely to get sick and also my skin is clearer. Also not being tired all of the time, just having more general energy/ambition.
Monday, January 8, 2007
01.08.07
The first picture is obviously from the start of the race. J is the one in red with the big grin (#84). The 2nd picture is J's finish, it was a tough one - he was pushing it!
He wanted to finish with a time of 26.00 and he finished with a 26.15 - not too shabby! I'm very proud of him. It was a drizzly day and quite windy, I'm so glad I didn't try to run.
Today is Day One of "the diet". But I've almost completely lost my voice to laryngitis, so I'm holding off on working out until I feel better.
Today is Day One of "the diet". But I've almost completely lost my voice to laryngitis, so I'm holding off on working out until I feel better.
Friday, January 5, 2007
01/05/07
Tomorrow is the next Reese Winter Road Race in the series. Since I'm now starting to loose my voice, I'll have to sit this one out. Time to wait by the finish line with the camera and cheer J on, he is trying for a PR of 26.00. I'll post photos soon.
Time for bed - 'nite!
Time for bed - 'nite!
Thursday, January 4, 2007
My New Years Resolutions
Maybe if I post my 2007 New Years Resolutions on my *shiny new blog* and not just have them taped to the wall next to my bed, I will have to pay even more attention to them. We can only hope. Here ya go:
T's 2007 New Year's Resolutions / Fitness Goals
1) Start and maintain a blog to:
a) Keep track of my miles
b) Inspire me!
2) Supplements:
a) Drive 2 liters of water per day - minimum
b) Take my vitamins every day - not just during the week
c) Cut down/cut out caffeine
3) Loose 15 to 25 more pounds while toning my body.
4) A resolution I'm not sharing with the General Public.
5) Reward myself for each 5 pound loss.
6) Run at least (1) road race per month. Do the old favorites, and try some new ones too.
7) Stick with my diet, one week at a time by keeping a journal.
8) Decrease my average pace at least (1) minute per mile by the end of the year.
9) Run 4 times per week, with an average of 20 miles per week.
10) Besides running, work out 3 times per week.
Here's the run-down so far, 4 days into the new year:
1) check!
2) forget it - I've been sleeping the past 72 hours! I have had only (1) cup of regular coffee in the past 72 hours though, I think my caffeine headache may be gone.
3) only sleeping since Monday has caused me to be down about 1.5 pounds - but that's not what I had in mind!
4) none of your bees-wax!
5) nothing yet
6) January is done - check!
7) not this week, baby.
8) nothing yet
9) nothing yet
10) nothing yet
Okay, so I have a way to go. But I also have 361 days left to do it in.
Happy New Year!
So here it is. I said I would do it; start a blog to track my running. Suddenly I realize it's Day 4, and I have no blog . . . and I've already ran a race this year! (See above)
J and I found a 5K race to run on 12/31/06, starting at 11:45pm. We were going to run into the new year. Only problem was that it was 3 hours away in Ohio. That was easily solved by J, he sent the check to register us for the race, printed some maps and booked us a room.
We start out running together, and since it was thru residential streets and a "Rail Trail" similar to ours at home, it was easy to know when midnight struck. Lots of people honking horns and shooting - whatever it was they were shooting. So we yelled "Happy New Year!" to each other and those around us and got off the trail for a moment to celebrate with a new years kiss. Then it was time for J to take off and go his own pace. Have I mentioned it was at least 45 degrees, raining and gusting 15 to 20 mile per hour winds?
Two guesses who got sick and the first one doesn't count. Yep, ME! I had a sore throat by the time the race was over. I was hot from my winter running clothes and soaking wet. Wonderful. The race sponsors gave prizes 7 deep, but I finished 14th in my age group and J finished 10th in his. We did finish in the top 300, so we each received a blinky necklace with the Midnight Train logo on it. I certainly didn't "pull out all the stops" like I had hoped and set the world on fire with a new PR (personal record), but I did finish with a time of 33:58 which is a 10.49 minute mile. (About my average.)
Tuesday and Wednesday were spent alternating between the couch and bed, with lots of sleeping and DayQuil. Today was my first day at work in the new year and I'm not 100% yet. Which makes me wonder, will I be ready for my next 5K race on Saturday? Only time will tell.
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