Ready, Set, Go!

I received an email today that is just what I needed!  My gym is holding a weight loss challenge beginning next week.  There will be a fitness test to begin the contest, followed by two more over the course of three months.  The winner is determined by overall improvement in fitness and the highest percentage of fat loss.  Woohoo!  I am so in!  This was just the motivation I needed right now.  Funny, I don’t even know or care what the prize is.  I just want to win!  Not to gain any prize from the gym, but to show myself that I am still a competitor.  I know I can do this!  So, after my initial fitness test, I will share my stats and detail my daily plans.  Getting to the gym at least five times a week will be a priority – and I am aiming for a nice long walk or good swim on my two off days.  Just need to stay active every day.

On a side note, I caught an episode of the show Ruby on Style Network tonight.  The show chronicles an overweight woman in her quest for health.  She has already lost over 150 lbs. and still has at least that much more to go.  In tonight’s episode, Ruby and her friends participated in a Race For The Cure event to raise money and awareness for breast cancer.  She walked the entire 2.7 miles, even though the furthest she had ever walked before was 1 mile.  It was such an inspiration to see her keep pushing when her body was tired and hurting.  It gives me new resolve to keep going even when I feel like quitting.  Ruby – you have shown me that my weight loss efforts, as daunting as they seem to me, are all about perspective.  Thank you for putting yourself out there to encourage and inspire others.  I can only hope to do the same.

Small Victories

Today my family celebrated my son’s seventh birthday. As is the tradition in our household, he got to choose his favorite birthday dinner, as well as the type of cake and the flavor of ice cream we had. After changing his mind about 6 times, including twice today, the birthday boy wanted his daddy to grill his famous (at least in our household!!) hamburgers. Mmm-they were delicious! Probably not the healthiest dinner, even though we used low fat beef. The dessert for the celebration is what I dread about every birthday around here. I have a serious sweet tooth, and where there are treats in the house I have a hard time staying away. Which is why I try not to bring them in except for special occasions.My sweet boy had picked a yellow cake mix with cream cheese frosting (Oh no! One of my favorite combos!) and he picked Mint Chocolate Chip and Moosetracks ice cream. (Shoot! These ones are my absolute favorites!)

I have to admit, I was so proud of myself for sticking to one burger at dinner (I’m telling you, these suckers are good!) and filling up on watermelon instead of the Doritos. And then, when it came time for dessert, I took a small slice of cake and 2 small scoops of Mint Chip. I am trying to live out the mantra “everything in moderation.” How freeing to be satisfied with a small portion! I considered overindulging, but knew I would feel sick as well as guilty later if I did. I also considered skipping dessert altogether, but knew I would feel deprived and crave it later tonight. So I opted to have a small portion celebrate my son’s birthday without regret.

As I am writing this, I am realizing that this is the first birthday celebration in nearly 10 years that I haven’t felt stuffed or guilty from the amount of cake and ice cream I had consumed. Yay! What a victory. Small changes. Daily changes. Life changes.

Motivation

Motivation is defined as “the internal condition that activates behavior and gives it direction; energizes and directs goal-oriented behavior.”  It is what keeps us moving in the direction of our goals. Motivation is, in essence, our ability to make things happen. I want to talk a little about what motivation means to me.

There are a variety of things that motivate me in my daily life, but I want to specifically talk about my health and fitness. First, I want to be a healthy role model for my kids. I want to be around for them for years to come. Losing weight and getting in shape will allow me to be able to run around and play with them like I want to. Soccer and basketball at the park, playing tag, jumping rope and all the other fun things they want to do tire me out so quickly. I want to be able to tire them out for  a change! Getting in shape, for me, is also about improving my self esteem and self confidence. I want to feel comfortable in my own skin and for the past 12 years, I haven’t. Shopping for cute clothes and having them fit is something I am looking forward to very much. But I think the biggest motivator I have is my health. Aside from being overweight, right now I am otherwise a healthy woman. However, there is heart disease, diabetes and high blood pressure in my family health history. These are not conditions I want to deal with. And by taking control of my health now, hopefully I will be able to avoid them in the future.

So why haven’t I let these things keep me motivated in the past? The thing that has held me back the most has been not seeing immediate results. After dieting and working out so hard for weeks and weeks, if I didn’t see the results I wanted I would feel like a failure. I have been afraid to fail by not losing the weight so I would push too hard. And I was afraid that I would regain any weight I had lost. And I always did. I didn’t stay focused on my goals.  And I made far too many excuses.

What am I going to do with my motivation now so I can keep on track and stay focused? First of all, I am going to be realistic about the journey I am on. I will be honest with myself about my diet and my exercise. I am setting realistic, obtainable goals and working on them regularly to achieve them. I am allowing plenty of time to accomplish what I am setting out to do. This is not an all or nothing thing for me anymore. This is a life change. I am reducing stress and making this journey fun. And I am sharing my journey with others, hopefully encouraging and inspiring some along the way!

No More Excuses

Excuses. I have had so many of them through the years:

1. I didn’t feel good.
2. I didn’t have time to work out.
3. I was tired.
4. It’s too hard to work out with all the kids running around.
5. I couldn’t afford a gym membership.
6. I’ll do it tomorrow.

I could go on and on with this, but I am stopping all the excuses today. I am ready to take complete responsibility for where I am. No more excuses. This whole process for me is not so much a physical transformation, but an internal change. I have buried so much away over the years and I am finally letting it all go. Once that internal transformation is complete, I know the physical change will happen so much easier. The woman I have felt I wasn’t good enough to be is finally ready to make her debut!

Commitment

15 kilometers. 9.3 miles. I have committed to completing that distance in a race next summer. I have 48 weeks to train for it. I know I am capable of finishing the distance, it’s just a matter of pushing myself to do it. I have plenty of time to ready myself- to push my body.  Small daily goals will ease me closer to the big picture goal. At this point, I just want to finish the race, but I know as race day gets closer and my health and running ability improve, I will want to try and run the whole race. Right now, though, I need to focus on the daily challenges and the whole objective will come into focus sooner than I can imagine. I am still looking for a local 5k in the area this fall. And perhaps a 10k in the spring just to give myself a taste of what I’ll be doing next summer. Completing the 15k is a very big goal for me, and I am 100% committed to finishing the race in a respectable time. I’ll keep you posted on my progress!

Competitor

After having my first two children, my weight has been an issue for me. I gained 70 lbs with my first, but lost most of it. Then I gained another 70 lbs with my second child, but never could seem to lose the weight I had gained. Over the past 11 years I have lost and gained, over and over. I had three more children during that time period and never gained more than 35 lbs with any of them. I actually lost 50 lbs in the first trimester of my last pregnancy, before I knew I was even pregnant. Gaining that weight back was devastating to say the least. The up and downs with my weight have taken their toll on me emotionally. I have gotten upset and cried more than once about it. And that would get me motivated to work hard to get back in shape. I would workout hard and diet for a month or two, see no results, get frustrated, give up and eat. And the cycle would repeat. I have tried so many “diets.”  Most of the diets you can quickly name, I’ve tried. Most never worked, while a few worked initially, but as soon as “banned” foods were added back in, I regained everything. No matter what I lose initially, I can’t ever seem to maintain it if I backed off on working out at all. The only time I managed to maintain any sort of weight loss, I was doing 40 minutes of strength training along with 60 minutes of cardio EVERY day of the week. Any less than that and I would regain. I have been to doctors to make sure its not a hormone or chemical imbalance in my body. Every time they tell me I am healthy, just carrying some extra weight and to "try diet and exercise for another year."  That’s what I have been doing for 7 years!!! And it’s getting very frustrating. I weigh nearly 40 lbs more  than I did 7 years ago. So obviously its ot working or I am doing something totally wrong. I’ve hired personal trainers and nutritionists. I took a class at my gym that is supposed to help you get into your best shape in 12 weeks. I took it twice and only lost 20 lbs. I gained 12 lbs of muscle also. I was working out 60-90 minutes 6 days a week. I even participated in an indoor triathlon the gym put on. And I didn’t finish last! The tri is what helped me to rediscover that inner athlete, the competitor inside of me that I thought I had lost. I loved the adrenaline rush I got, pushing myself to the limit. Swimming was a lot harder than it had been when I was competing on the swim team in my youth, but my team mates and I had practiced a bit before the race. I had never been in a cycle studio before the race, never been on a spin bike, but I rode hard and fast for 30 minutes! The running portion of the competition was the part I was concerned about. I knew it was only 20 minutes and I could walk what I needed to, but I really wanted to run as much as possible. I could run in 3-4 minutes bursts in class, but usually just walked briskly at at a steep incline ot get my heart rate up. But on race day, I pushed and pushed, running for 7 1/2 minutes straight and could’ve gone longer but time was up! I had run for a total of 13 minutes of the 20 minute run! I know that might not seem like much to moist people, but I was so proud of myself. I never thought I would ever be competing in a race again, and now I can’t wait for the next indoor tri to beat my times from the last one!