In Which I Eat Crackers...Lots of Crackers

I am finally starting to come back to life after the evil that is known as the Norovirus. Five days of crackers, soup, and instant breakfasts. There also was a cheese debacle, but we won't discuss that (yes, Amanda, you were right, I shouldn't have tested my luck).

So basically I planted my ass on the couch and didn't do anything for a couple days. I did try a walk on Friday, and we went to the hockey game (where I was back to overcome funnel cake temptation). Sunday we went to church, but then an apple fritter got the best of me.

FYI: just because it supposedly has apple in it, this does not balance the deep fried pastry. Trust me.

Also, let us discuss cheesecake for a moment. Cheesecake is a wonderful thing, and they've got those awesome tubs of JUST THE FILLING.

TWO WORDS:
So far I have been able to mostly avoid the tastiness that is my cheesecake, but it's a daily fight. I'm trying to limit myself to small slices. Miniscule slices. Slices that could hardly be considered slices.

As far as working out, I haven't really. I've done some walking, but that's the extent. I'm going to attempt the gym today after I bring my kids to school, so we will see how that goes. I may have to bring my trusty barf bucket.

Charming, eh?

Original Weigh In: FAT.
1st Week Weigh In: LOST 11 pounds!!

In Which I Learn Another Valuable Lesson

When I first started losing weight, I thought that getting down to 170 pounds would solve all my problems. That I'd finally start thinking that I was beautiful, that I'd be able to wear a bikini, that I'd start being able to control myself when it comes to food.

Now two years and eighty pounds later, I realize that being skinny doesn't exactly mean that you will be happy. While it's great to be falling out of a pair of size 10 pants, I'm not necessarily any happier with myself than I was when I was in a size 20. For some reason, that self-confidence is still nonexistent and I still see the fat girl in the mirror.

I still can't wear a bikini because my stomach is all stretched out from having 2 kids and weighing 80 pounds more than I should. I can't control myself when it comes to food. especially if it's Italian food or sushi.

Now that I'm at my goal weight, I will continue to work out and attempt to make the right food choices (and stay away from Olive Garden), but I'll also start working on trying to get over my self-esteem issues. I want to see the beautiful girl that my husband tells me I am.

In Which My Wii Fit Tells Me I'm Epic

I bought the Wii Fit awhile back...and I mean awhile. I always mean to use it, but...yeah. So since I know I've lost weight, I figured I'd go wipe the dust off the balance board and see what it told me.

Since last October, I've lost 43 pounds. This makes me happy. It also told me that I've squeaked out of the "overweight" category and am teetering on the edge of a normal BMI.



I think the game wept with happiness when it changed me from the fat Mii to the normal looking one. I did a little too.

In Which I Have Flatulence

As a nursing student, I come across some really nasty stuff. Coffee ground emesis (that's indicative of an upper GI bleed, thank you), that unique smell of someone with C. Diff, gangrenous toes (vomit), diarrhea after someone drinks CT contrast (which I had to clean up after and almost died) and weeping wounds.

I try my hardest to not gag and embarrass the patient, though I always go back and laugh about it with my fellow nursing students. Sometimes I think humor is the only way to get through nursing school.

But I digress.

After a consultation with my physician, it was suggested to me that I try Alli to get those last "20 or so pounds off", to quote the MD. Since it's FDA approved and worked for my uncle, I figured I would try it, what with being on my whole "I'm going to lose the rest of this weight or die trying" kick.

So after I drop the kiddos off at school, I head to Hell-Mart, get myself the Alli starter kit, some Slim-Fast, a pedometer, a new scale and some Crest Whitening Strips, because if I'm gonna be skinny, I want to have a beautiful white smile as well, right?

I get home, shimmy off my clothes, step on the scale and...I've only gained one pound from the last time I weighed in, so I was 178.6 this morning.

Commence happy dance.

Feeling uplifted, I drink my Slim-Fast and eat half a banana, take my Calcium supplement and the Alli pill and head to the gym. Now, being a good girl and doing what my MD said, I set the timer on the treadmill for 60 minutes, figuring that I'll do the weights for the other 30. No biggie, right?

Wrong.

So I'm happily jogging along at a fine speed of 6 mph at a 2% incline, and all of a sudden, I feel my stomach lurch. You know the feeling, don't tell me you don't. And I've got 20 minutes left on my timer for the treadmill and I'm all like, I can do this, no problem.

Then they start coming. Farts, toots, foofies, flatulence, passing gas, whatever the hell you call them. First they're the little ones that you can pass off as a squeak of your chair if you're in class, or the sound of your shoe on the floor. Then the big guns started. It was reminiscent of my grandfather after a ham and bean dinner during the holidays.

Good news is, it stopped eventually and no one was harmed in the noxious fumes.

In Which I Say Screw The Gym

It is Monday freaking morning. I hate Mondays. It means that I have to wait another week before I get to watch football again, another week until I get to spend hours with my children, and another week until I get to sleep in past five thirty.

Stupid Mondays.

I decided that I was going to skip to the gym today. There are so many reasons that I'm rationalizing in my head: I don't have any clean gym clothes, my back hurts, it's raining, my contacts aren't going in today, and I'm feeling a cold coming on. I should go to the gym because I totally binged on cookies this weekend (Keebler is the devil) but...no.

Whine, whine, whine. Bitch, bitch, bitch.

I had to get the kids to school (and of course the bus was late), and now I'm going to sit my fat ass on the couch and work before my friend comes to pick me up for class.

Someone told me I need to stop being so negative all the time. Okay, so let's try this again. I got to sleep until 5:45 this morning. I got snuggles from a baby boy. My ass is decidedly smaller, so I will sit my not-so-fat ass on the couch now. And because the bus was late, I got to see that super hot daddy putting his kid on the other bus that comes here. Om nom nom.

On that note, maybe I should go to the gym...

In Which I Do Not Die

Today was the second day of this five week period of nursing classes. For those of you who do not know me in real life, I am a first year nursing student. The school that I go to does their program in five week sections, so I have three "classes" in one semester. This means I am doing the same amount of work in one five week section as a student in a four year program does in their one semester. Doesn't exactly seem fair, eh? Oh well.

Anyway, so second day of class. Yesterday was the first, and my husband had to work, so I made the decision to wake up at 0400 to go to the gym. I was so tired when I got there that the entire workout was just half-ass. Burned about 250 calories in 45 minutes. Not bad, but not great.

Today, even though I tried, I just could not get out of the bed at 0400. So I got up at 5;30 and got the kids ready for school, then went to class myself. But class was only til noon, so I went right after class.

My treadmill was taken, but my sheer rage that came up was quickly soothed by the friendly man who was working out with me. He actually lives in the same building as I do, just on the third floor. I've seen him around, but never had the chance to really talk to him. We had a wonderful half hour of conversation while I killed myself on the e-is-for-extreme-lliptical. We discussed the weather, how much I miss New Hampshire, my kids, my school, what he did for a living before being retired, politics...it was nice to have a workout buddy. He even praised me for my workout skillz.

I love this man.

So anyway, after my new buddy finished his workout, I hit the weights (figuratively) and grunted over my now 20 reps instead of 10. I am upping the ante, as they say. 20 pounds at 20 reps for all my arm exercises, 70 pounds at 20 reps for my legs (people always comment on my fantastic calves. not exactly what I would like to be complimented on, but I'll take what I can get).

After the weights, I went to the treadmill. The treadmill and I have a love-hate relationship. I love the way I feel after I work out. I'm energized, I feel like I can take on the world, and I see the calories shedding away via that little kcal counter. However, I feel like my knees are going to fall off, that my ass might begin flapping in the wind, and when I look down I can see my thighs jiggling if I'm wearing shorts. I suppose that I just choose to look at the positive and try not to peek down at my thunder thighs.

So I get on there, and I'm doing a warm up, get bored with the 2 mph walk, bump it up to 4 mph, then get bored with that and start a jog. I don't know what mph I was running, I was too busy trying not to fall and remembering how my father taught me to breathe (in-in, out-out) that I wasn't focused on that. But I'm listening to Taio Cruz's "Break Your Heart", The Veronica's Untouched, and Joan Jett's Bad Reputation and I'm running like my head is on fire and my ass is catching. Finally I look down and I see that I've done a mile...IN LESS THAN TWELVE MINUTES!!

Commence celebration. I'll wait while you do the "Beckie Happy Dance".

Granted, it was a 11:54 mile, but that's the fastest I've ever done a mile! Finally, it seems all this hard work is paying off. I did however, have a mocha frappe and a cinnamon melt with my best friend before class this morning, but I am trying to avoid the feelings of guilt I have over that.

Life is good.

In Which I Cry In Happiness

Let's face it. I have an almost two year old son. His favorite pastimes include eating Reese's Puffs cereal ("ball cereal"--that's a whole other story that I'm going to have to clear up when he gets older. I don't want him to think it's okay to eat balls for breakfast), trashing the house, tormenting his sister and taking baths. While in the bath, his goal is to get as much water as possible out of the bathtub and onto the bathroom floor.

Alas, my digital scale was a fatality in the carnage that was leftover after one of his tsunamis.

I've been too broke to get a new one, because let's face it, it's not like I'm getting paid to do these clinicals, which really blows because I'm essentially doing the nurse's work. Let's just say that when I'm a nurse, I'll love having nursing students with me.

Anywho, so after dropping the kids off at school, I headed to Wal-Mart (aka Hell-Mart) and searched the store for a scale. Of course, my local Hell-Mart is in the middle of a remodel and the scales are no longer where they used to be. I spent fifteen minutes in the freaking store trying to find the aisle that held the bane of my existence. I finally found it in the Automotive section (WTF?!) and proceeded to be astonished by the cost of scales.

THIRTY FIVE DOLLARS FOR A FLIPPING PIECE OF CRAP SCALE?!?!?!

You've gotta be kidding me.

After pawing through the poorly marked scales, I finally found one that didn't measure my BMI and record all my weights, because let's face it, I don't really wanna know. So I get up to the register and of course, it doesn't have a scan tag on it. I waited at customer service for ten minutes so they could find another scale with a UPC on it. Grr.

So I finally get home with my scale and impulse buy of cherry chapstick, and I do the ritual of taking off all the clothes, emptying the bladder of those few precious ounces and step on the new scale of wicked. Look down and...

177.4 pounds!!!!

Oh, happy day! This means that I have lost 23 pounds (give or take) in the past seven weeks! I'm sure that I can thank the side effects of Prozac and Ativan for my weight loss (for some strange reason I got the rare weight loss compared to the more common weight gain of the meds) but I think I can give myself a pat on the back too. I mean, I've dieted, I've suffered through the SlimFast shakes in the morning, been doing the vegetarian diet for five days and not cheated once even though there is bacon in the fridge, and drank enough water to keep a camel hydrated for two years. I've fought the elliptical and treadmill every day. I think I can rejoice from this.

It's just hard not to celebrate with a Bud Light Lime and Chinese food...

In Which I Forget To Blog

Okay, so...i fail epically because i just forget that i have blogs. i go into them thinking...YES! a new thing to do, i'm so excited, let's play, blah blah blah. I had a shit load of stuff go on last week blah blah blah...but hopefully I'm back.

Well, kind of back, because I died a little today. Want to know why?



Yeah, a friend of mine sent me this picture wishing me luck on a test. Thanks to this, I promptly forgot everything I was doing...which at the time was not a good thing, seeing as how I was at the time cooking low-fat, low cal cookies. They burned because I was still sitting at my desktop drooling. I managed to save the next batch, but once I tasted them I realized that I shouldn't mourn the first batch. They were god-awful.

Sooo, my diet. It's going well. It's been five and a half weeks, and I'm down to 182 pounds, so that's 19 pounds from where I started. That's impressive. I've been pretty good about the gym, I think I might have missed one day? Two? And I'm stepping it up, both literally and psychologically. I bumped the evil-liptical to level 16 out of 25. For like...seven whole minutes. I got home an hour ago and I'm still trying to catch my breath. I thought my legs were going to fall off when I stepped off the machine. I stumbled around like a drunken monkey for a full minute, trying to get all the blood back to where it should be.

Thank God no one else was at the gym. I was able to gather my sweat while watching Grey's Anatomy in peace. I'd missed like the last season and a half of Grey's so as I'm grunting in exertion at my badass level of the elipti-satan, I was trying to figure out what the hell was going on. AND...I also realized that TayLau would make an excellent Doogie Howser-like doctor on Grey's. I should have my people call his people.If I had people, they could call his, anyway.

In Which I Say "HOLY CRAP!"

Holy shitnuggets, Batman!

I started this weight loss program one month ago, and while I decided I'd do a weekly weigh-in so I wouldn't stress myself out too much, I'd kind of gone lax on it. So when I woke up today on the dreaded weigh in day, I padded into the master bathroom where the digital scale stands. Normally I cower from it. I try to not look at it, pretend it isn't there. But today, that scale was going down.

I did everything I could to make sure that I had lost weight. I did ten jumping jacks. I took off all my clothes. I made sure I didn't have to poop. Finally, I realized that I had to get on the damn scale or I was going to be late for clinical, a huge no-no in the life of a nursing student.

I stepped on the scale, eyes closed, pleading with God and any other deity that was watching that I had at least lost SOME weight. Finally, I realized that I had to look down because this scale was not going to read itself.

I lost FIFTEEN pounds! Amazing! I'm so stoked. I happy danced on the scale. It was awkward and ungraceful, and after I was done I looked around to make sure that my husband hadn't seen me, which fortunately he hadn't.

WOOT!