Monday

I am off to bed before I eat anything else today. I want to eat but I think it is because I am bored but really sleep is the smartest choice. Here is a quick recap of my day.

I had gone to bed by 11 p.m. last night and by some miracle I actually woke up at 7 a.m. I was still lazy and hung out in bed till 8 a.m.

I got up and did a 20 minute Firm Express video. If I was going in order I would be on a cycle 2 with Rebekah but she jumps too much which frustrates me. So I moved to to cycle 3 with Alison it was great. I pushed myself and could do most of the exercises with her or already knew modifications.

After a shower and getting dressed it was time for breakfast. I made myself a chocolate banana protein shake. It was delicious and about 300 calories. I had some time so I also cut up the 2lbs of strawberries I had bought the night before.

Next I was off to my college library. I had a book to return that I had rented. That's right Rent-a-text. I also had to pick up some books for my summer classes. My two classes this semester is Critical Reading and Family Child Care: Intro to Business Management. 

I had carrots and cherry tomatoes for snack. Lunch was salad with cucumbers. I did have a cookie from the teacher's lounge but works into my calories. I came home work and went straight to Holy Yoga. It was good. I hadn't eaten in hours and had a pot pie for dinner. Since I was a kid my mom always served them to us upside down so I still eat them that way. They are about 600 calories but my calorie level is 1900 so 600 is a good amount for dinner.  

I watched Hawaii Five-O and had a little snack. I am totally in love with Dole Peaches & Creme Parfait's. Totally full of sugar, I know, but they are so delicious! I also had a little Chex Mix. I have plenty of calories so that was ok. In fact I only ate 1700 of my 1900 calories. Plus I burned 504 calories. So today has been awesome but now off to bed so I don't start snacking. 

New Week

My weekends feel like they fly by. I can barely remember what I did this weekend. I guess the biggest thing I did was finish my last final for the semester. I spent hours and hours working on making the site look great for my teacher. Compared to some of the other sites I found I probably went above and beyond but I like to give 100%. Plus I don't know how this might benefit later classes so I want to make sure I do my best. All of my major assignment go on a site called TaskStream that I read in one spot that I will use for a portfolio for my final class before graduation. This was one of those assignments.

This evening I was trying to think of the week ahead. What do I want to do different? What goals should I make for the week? Here is what I came up with:

1. No Denny's for 7 days.
2. Exercise 3 times this week for  a minimum of 30 min
3. Track what I eat and why
4. Don't weigh until Saturday night

In reality as I write my goals I want to say be perfect. Stay within calories, exercise 60 min a day, track everything, win every battle. But that is not logical. So I push that idea aside and go back the reasonable goals that I have made.

So here's to this week and good choices. Have you made any goals this week?

A Battle Lost

I have been eating horrible all week. I have been eating some of my fruits and veggies that I packed at the beginning of the week. Which is great. The problem is that I have been eating thousands of calories of food every evening. I also have not exercised since monday Yoga which doesn't count much since it was relaxation yoga. Every night this week before bed I have weighed myself and watched the number go up, up, up.

Sun 22nd - 276
Mon 23rd - 277
Tue 24th  - 277
Wed 25th - 276
Thur 26th - skipped
Fri 27th - 278
Sat 28th - 279

I hate that I am eating this way but then don't do anything about it. I know what to eat and how much. I have exercise options at my fingertips and yet, nothing. Some weeks are such a battle.

I was recently reading someone's blog (can't remember whose or I would link.) They referred to women who were at their goal weight who were interviewed about their food habits. The women said that it is a constant battle every time they eat or don't eat something. That is so true both now for me and when someone reaches their goal. I read blogs from women who have been at their goal weight for years and they struggle and look for encouragement. I have had this on my mind all week and all week I felt like I am not strong enough for this battle. I am not a fighter I am a lover. Seriously, I hate conflict! I can not be in the same room with people who are arguing or as some people call it 'having a loud discussion.' It drives me crazy. You may have seen the drop on Wednesday. All day long I was fighting with myself over every little thing. I think that was the day I drove to Denny's, sat in the parking lot, convinced myself not to go in. Then tried to stop at Taco Bell on the way home but they were closed, pulled into the McDonald's parking lot and again fought with myself not to buy food. Then went home and proceeded to eat my regular dinner plus 400 calories of popcorn and 500 calories of ice cream bars. I won two battles at Denny's and McDonalds and then went home and was exhausted from a day of fighting and couldn't fight anymore.

Tomorrow is a new day. I will try again at what I know is the good choice. I will try again at what I know is the right thing. I know the battles get fewer the longer you have been fighting but starting over is so hard. Hope your week was better than mine.

School and Work

Sitting in Denny's working on my last final for the semester. It is for my early childhood guidance and discipline class. I have to not only create a web site but also come up with a philosophy. I am not sure which is harder. Actually it is the website that I am stressing about. My two brothers are all about computer programing so as I create a free web site on google it looks horrible and I hate it. I try to remind myself that this is not a web design class, I am not supposed to be amazing at it. But I want it to look decent. It is pretty easy to do a search for other classmates web pages and most of them are very basic and barely cover the information that assignment requests. This makes me feel a little more confident. I am almost done, I have to research some resources and do an annotated bibliography and then I will be done.

So I work at a pre-k through fourth grade school. I help for an hour and a half during lunch giving preschool teachers a lunch break. I have a two hour break and then do the after school program for K - 4th grade. I work under the extended day/ summer coordinator. My boss has been thinking of changing to a teaching position, she has a BA in education. So while she is subbing in classes I am subbing for her. The last three days have gone great. She has been around to check in on me and I could ask her questions but it has been fun doing everything. The next two days she is out of town so I am really on my own. I am kind of excited. I am nervous about a few parts of the job, like hiring people and working with external vendors who do classes for us, but overall I think I could totally do this job!

Last night I kind of started to freak myself out. I started to get nervous about what if I don't get What if they are not really considering me for the position? I really started worry and well I ate way too much food. It was crazy. I am still trying to figure out this not emotionally eating thing. I kept reminding myself that it is all in God's hands. If I get it great and if not then it isn't the right thing. I will be working full time so it will make going to school even harder. If I get the job I will start over the summer. Intellectually I think that I should be worried about taking so many classes but I am totally calm about that. I feel confident that that is the right choice. I have to trust myself and not make myself worry about something I feel calm about. That would be stupid. In fact I keep running into all these bumps in the road concerning my summer classes but every time I don't worry about it. I just figure it out and keep going. I think I have to describe it as a peace that goes beyond all understanding, if you know what I mean.

I have been good about eating my fruits and veggies that I had pre-packed for lunches and snacks. I forgot how filling they are. I ate like 250 - 300 calories for lunch the other day and I was so stuffed. I was hungry a little earlier then normal but that was fine since I had more fruit packed to eat.

It is late and I am finally starting to get sleepy (it is nearly 1 a.m.) So I am going to post this and head home.

Food Prep

Today has been a good day. I ate well but didn't exercise. I went grocery shopping afterwork and had pre-made a list to use. It worked pretty well and I mostly stuck to it. I did buy a box of Skinny Cow ice cream bars. Tonight I ate two but at least I didn't eat three. :) My dinner was low in calories so I figure it is okay that my desert was a little on the high side. 

I was trying to get to bed early when I realized I only had 10 minutes left on my load of laundry in the washer. That wasn't much longer so I thought I would make good use of my time. I prepped food for work the rest of the week. 

I love carrots and cucumbers but have never been a big fan of tomatoes on their own. I thought I would give them a try anyways. I divided them up into containers that will be easy to take with me to work each day. 

  

   

I am the pickiest salad eater. I hate heads of lettuce and bags of salad that are full of yellow lettuce. Yellow lettuce just does not seem appetizing to me. Several years back I had switched to fresh spinach. It is slightly more expensive but more expensive then something I won't eat seems reasonable to me. When I did lots of research on being vegan I found out that spinach on its own is not good, it can actually hinder the absorption of iron in your body. This can be counteracted by having fresh citrus added to your salad but I don't really go for citrus salad's. So I tend to mix it with another type of lettuce  to make my salad more well rounded. I picked up a light caesar salad kit and a tub of spinach. I mixed them together. I split the salad into three containers (including the one it came in.) I put the croutons and salad dressing in individual containers to take with me and portion out when I eat each salad. 

Now I have lunch's for the rest of the week all ready to go. I also cut up some fresh strawberries and had bought some small cans of V8 juice. Doing all this probably took about 30 minutes but having it already cleaned, cut, and prepared makes it totally worth it. 

Day Unexpected

I woke up this morning with a migraine. I didn't want to go to work but it is a hectic weeks so I really didn't want to call out. I took some advil and went back to bed but forgot to set a new alarm so i woke up late. Then as I was driving to work I was distracted by a truck covered in post it notes so instead of ten minutes late I was fifteen minutes late. I explained my migraine headache and everyone understood but I still hate being late.

I was still feeling awful by the time my break came around. I tried to think of something and what should I eat and then I just didn't care. I wanted to feel better so I got a burger and fries at Islands. I didn't want a fake burger from some drive thru. Instead this is all meat and fresh veg. It was great.

After work, feeling like my day wasn't going as planned anyways, I went to Holy Yoga with my sister-in-law. She goes every monday night and always asks and I finally said yes. It was interesting. It is really based on relaxation and is like a foreign concept to me. We would be doing positions and many were very difficult to do but I kept wanting to be burning more calories. Working harder so that I would have more results. At the end we laid on our backs just relaxing but my brain was still all over the place. I was literally thinking, 'Ok, if it's over then lets go.' Like why am I wasting my time lying here. I couple times we did child pose and we would just lay there for like five minutes and both times my brain was all over. I kept looking around, 'are people really just laying here?'

I have a lot of things on my mind. My final project, summer classes and financial aid for them, plus continued possibilities of my getting a promotion at work. Then add eating healthy and exercise and it is a lot to deal with. I still don't know how some women do all this with kids of their own on top of it all. If that is you then I totally look up to you! Good job. So relaxing for an hour and a half is hard to do. My first reaction is that, 'no I don't want to go back.' A lot of the poses are really hard for me to do and I was constantly doing modifications. But now that it has been a little while I realize that I probably need this time to just shut my brain off. Maybe spend the time focusing on God. As a side note I believe there are Holy Yoga classes all across the country. You can look and see if there is one near you at www.HolyYoga.net.

For the last couple hours I have been fighting the craving for ice cream. I want some so bad. In fact I got out of my pajamas and into real clothes wanting to go to Denny's or even just get a carton at local Fry's or Walgreens. But here I am about to go to sleep and I did not go out. I am pretty proud of myself. It wasn't that I was hungry in fact my dinner left me satisfied. It is the feeling of the food in my mouth. The pleasure that I associate with eating ice cream. Your food might be different then mine. I have always gone to ice cream occasionally donuts. It is a mental association with the food. 'If I eat ice cream I will be happy. For those moments as I eat this food I don't think about other things, it is kind of my high. I need to replace it with things like relaxing in yoga. What is your go to food?

Honesty is Tough

I was tempted. Rather, I am tempted to not post this. A month ago I wouldn't have cared. I would been honest and posted it without thinking. But now that I have followers and people that comment on my blog I worry. So I am going to take a deep breath and post the truth because that is all that I have to give you.

The last two days I have eaten horrible. I do not even know how many calories I have had in the last 48 hours. Last night I got dressed in my workout clothes but never made it on my Gazelle. Sometimes I feel guilty about it and wish I did better and other times I don't. I know that I have been eating bad for more then a decade and it will take time to learn... I don't know. I know what I should eat and how much I should eat. I guess it is just... I don't know why I do this. I need to figure it out. Why I choose food I know I shouldn't eat. Why I overeat.

I have never tried it before but I think it is time to keep a food journal. Listing what, when, and why. I think I will just put it in a note taker so I can see it all listed. I just went and found an app called Push+Pop where I can just list the information and then it is ready for the next note. It puts everything on one list so I will not be able to use this app for anything else but that is ok. I will let you know how it goes.

That is about it for now. Till tomorrow.

Grammar

Over the past five months I have begun to realize how my bad grammar really is. I always struggled in school through elementary, middle, and high school. Even through college, which is why this is my fifth attempt over 12 years at getting just an associates degree. So what changed? Why am I just noticing it now?

1. In Dec I started in a weekly writing/editing group
2. I have not turned in a single assignment without a  grammar error
3. I opened my blogging up to the world, who in return let me know my problem with homophones

I don't want to have bad grammar. I wish I knew my comma's and homophones and whatever else I am messing up. But I don't and it is not going to fix itself. Awhile ago I posted my frustrations about this and then later spoke my older brother about it. He recommended a few things.

1. Go through old posts and correct the errors (He advised me I have 5-6 errors per post.)

That is a great tip but I can't start there. If I knew what my problems were then I would catch them when I re-read what I have written.

2. Go through my old edits writing down my common problems

That is good. I can see clearly what my errors are.

3. Go to our local Lake Shore Learning to find workbooks that can help me.

This sounded like the perfect starting point.


I did some research and found online that most of the error's that I am aware of are things you really start to learn in third grade. (Side Note: I am now very concerned about 3rd grade if I started gaining weight and stopped learning that year. I have always had problems with multiplication which I remember trying to learn in 3rd grade and now english problems. But that is a different story.) I went to Lake Shore Learning and started flipping through books. The third grade books did look like the right place to start. I kept wanting to upgrade myself to a fifth or sixth grade book but I felt like I needed a better base that the third grade books offered. So I bought three and they were not cheap!

As I go through these books I feel silly doing books meant for third graders. But I will go through them. I will learn what I need to know so that I sound/write like an adult. I will teach my brain the difference between lose and loose and between roll and role. I will do this because I want to spend more time worried about the content of my assignments then the grammar of my assignments. I will do this because I will not let grammar keep me from a better job.

Unexpected Motivation

Today has been good. Well, mostly good. I was running late for work and didn't have time to grab breakfast. I was doing really good and almost made it to lunch when in a moment of weakness I ate ice cream. It was about a quarter cup so the calories compare to the cup of dry multi-grain cheerios I eat most mornings but of course not as healthy. Lunch was good, didn't do any snacking in the lounge today or from the kids snack. Dinner was also good. It was eight and I was still under my calories.

I watched Grey's Anatomy, I love that show. Then during a rerun of The Mentalist I worked on my school schedule. I thought I had already figured out what classes I would take this summer. In fact I had already registered for them. Some things going on at work are leading me to believe I may have the opportunity to take over my bosses position or at least apply for it. I want to be prepared if that happens. There are a couple business management classes that are part of the degree I am going for. I was planning on taking them later but they would directly relate to some of the duties in this new position. So after lots of thought I am actually taking a full 12 credits over the summer. This is a little crazy for me, I only took 9 credits this semester. The school I go to offers classes in 8 week blocks so I planned everything out to give me the best advantage. The thing is, over the summer I work more hours then normal. My hope is that with the break I am taking from my writing group I will have plenty of time to get my assignments done. The classes can still be changed so I am going to keep thinking and praying about it. I will mention it if anything changes.

After I scheduled my classes it was ten. I was feeling a little hungry and had a few more calories left so I was thinking about having a bowl of cereal. I knew the better choice was to exercise but it is so much easier to just choose food. I knew what the right choice was but didn't want to do it. In fact I was wishing I could ask someone else to make the decision for me. Just then I check my phone and I received an e-mail. Whenever someone leaves a comment an e-mail is sent to me. It was a lovely and encouraging comment. I knew after reading the comment that I had to get up and exercise.

I set a timer and did ten minutes on my Gazelle. I took a five minute break then did five minutes on my stair stepper while doing bicep curls with an overhead extension. I wasn't using any weights but I was still feeling it before the five minutes were up. After another five minute break I finished up with ten more minutes on the Gazelle. I really pushed myself trying to keep my abs locked and firm with my arms pumping back and forth as I glided. I had initially hoped to do more, but twenty-five minutes is better then none.

After working out I was starving so I did have some rice chex but still stayed under my calories only eating a few of the calories I had just burned. I am happy about today. I did a good job and said no to unneeded calories throughout the day. I needed some motivation but I finally exercised after three days of not exercising. I can do this!

Denny's Addiction

I did not wake up early this morning. Instead I slept 12 hours. That is forever and I don't know why my body wanted to sleep so long.

As I was getting dressed for work I stepped on the scale. I was looking for motivation to eat healthy, thinking my number would have gone up from the last few days of over eating. I step on and I have lost a pound and am down to 274. That doesn't make sense but I know the scale doesn't always.

I had a good breakfast and packed a good lunch then I walk into the teachers lounge and see this. The upside and downside of working at a school. We tend to get fed a lot. Though of course I know this is a common site in break rooms. I grabbed a few items and tried not to go overboard. Luckily everything is still in it's container so it is trackable.

I have been getting headaches the last couple days. I think it is due to caffeine withdrawal. I hate being so reliant on caffeine and that it is so painful when I don't get enough. I need to quit it again. These headaches make any benefit of caffeine not worth it.

***

As I was mid-post on my two hour break at work a teacher came in and asked me to cover her class. There seems to be a stomach flu going around and she was the latest victim.

After work I went home but not for long. I decided to head to my local Denny's. I am three assignments away from finishing my last class for the semester and I wanted to knock out the two due this week. For those of you just joining. I am going to a community college for an Associates degree in Early Education. I take online classes so I can fit them into my schedule. I just went back to school in January.

When I go to Denny's I think about ordering something from their Fit Fare menu, all items less then 500 calories. But of course I don't. Instead I get the Western Burger with season fries. I then finish it off with a banana split. So I definitely went over my calories for the day. My maintain level of calories is 2900 and I ate about 3500 calories today. So not good. The worst part is that I felt so sick afterwards because my body didn't want to eat that many calories in one sitting. I did get lots of studying done and finished my two assignments for this week. I also started to prepare for next week's final project. It is a huge project so I am glad I am starting early.

I again didn't exercise today. My body is starting to feel sore. After I have exercised regularly and then stop my body gets sore and my muscles tight. I am thinking it may actually be part of the cause of my before mentioned headaches. My neck seems to be very stiff. I am up late again so I don't know when I will get exercise in tomorrow. Probably after work.

Quick Hello

First, I want to say hello to any new followers. I may have not be blogging on the prior fat girl site but I will still be blogging here. As a warning I will tell you that I am very honest when I blog. If you read my last blog you will see that. It doesn't help anyone to be dishonest, least of all me.

Today I stayed within my calorie goals but didn't eat very healthy things. I did not exercise but am going to bed early in hope to switch to a day schedule. My plan is to exercise before work tomorrow. The day could have gone worse so I am happy that I stayed within my calories. My hope is that if I get back on track for this week that I can at least maintain my 275 weight and not gain this week.

It is only six weeks till I fly out to see my oldest nephew graduate. I was hoping to be down to 240 by that date but that is not going to happen. I think 263 might be a more reasonable goal. That would be 2 lbs a week.

Keep Calm and Carry On

Here I sit wishing I wanted it more. I know it hasn't been long since I said this before. I wish that I wanted to get up and exercise. I wish I wanted to eat healthy things. I wish that my desire to be healthy was rooted deeper inside of me because right now it is more like an idea then a desire.

Today I ate horrible. All day, even now I sit typing this while drinking a Smirnoff ICE (228 cal.) I did not exercise today or yesterday. I know that I should. I know the long term benefits would be good but today I wanted junk more. I wanted to be lazy and didn't care about watching my calories. Yesterday I was ravenous all day. I would eat and be starving an hour later.

This morning I weighed myself and I was 275 so I lost the two pounds I wanted to. I know that I can do it  so why do I then go and eat a million calories? Why do I make bad choices all day long?

The truth is that I am feeling unworthy. Unworthy for prior fat girl. Unworthy for my writing group. Unworthy for my college classes that point out all of my grammar errors. Unworthy for the job I may be offered for next school year. So I hide. I hide in my living room watching dumb tv shows and old movies. I hide behind food that satisfies my desires and doesn't tell me how unworthy I am.

I have always known that I do not completely love myself. This is why it is hard for me to love others and believe that they could love or care for me. I want to do better. I strive to do better. I try to "fake it till I make it" but really I can only fool myself so long.

***

With all this said, tomorrow I will keep trying. I will keep pushing myself. I will track my calories and I will exercise for at least 20 minutes. I will try again because I have to. I can't stop here. This is not all God has for me but He needs me to keep reaching for it. I can't just stand here in my rut hoping grace will fall down on me. I need to go out and find it even if somedays, like today, I fail.

I was watching some tv show last night and it used the phrase, "Keep calm and carry on." I thought yeah, that makes sense. I could get upset about today and yesterday but no I need to just keep calm and carry on. Totally stupid I know, but hey any motivation is good motivation right?

Catching Up

Voting for the Prior Fat Girl blogging position went up today. Currently out of 515 votes I only have 18 and most of those are because I posted the link to vote on Facebook. If you want to vote you can at this link. Honestly I don't really mind. After I received the negative comments and fewer positive comments then others I kind of realized that this might not be best thing anyways. I still love the blog and will continue to follow it. The three girls currently in the lead are all girls I relate to so I am excited for whichever girl gets the spot.

I have read this blog off and on for a couple years. She sells a couple items with her logo on them. One item that I have always liked is a bracelet, one of those rubbery ones. It says "One bite at a time. One decision at a time." She is having a 50% of sale so I bought two (incase I loose one.) I have been wearing it the last couple days. The first day I wore it with the words facing out. I wanted someone to notice, someone to ask me about it. That was Tuesday. As you know Tuesday night did not go very well and Wednesday I was kind off my game. I did not wear the bracelet. I noticed, at lunch time, that I wasn't wearing it. I was sitting in Islands eating nacho's and thought about what I was eating and how many calories it was. I stopped mid meal because I didn't need any more. Thursday I wore the bracelet. At the school where I work kids often bring in cupcakes. I was halfway through eating one when I glanced at my bracelet. "One bite at a time." I threw the rest away, I didn't need to keep taking bites just because I started. Later at the grocery store I was walking down the bread aisle, which in my store has all of the Hostess and Little Debbie products as well. A bag of Little Debbie Krueler donuts caught my eye. I love those. The problem is I eat an entire bag in one sitting. As I walk away I look down at my bracelet, "One decision at a time." If junk is not in my house then I can not eat it. Will the bracelet fade into the background in a couple weeks. Sure, that is how life goes. But for right now it helps me make those hard decisions; like throwing away half a cupcake that tastes so delicious.

I love Island's. I only ate half the sundae.
Oh, and did I mention I am
drinking soda again?

Wednesday I did not exercise. Thursday after work I spent all night at Denny's doing homework so no exercise. Both days I ate over my goal calories but not over my maintain calorie amount. I count that as success. Today I knew I had to get back into the swing of things. I had a reasonable breakfast and packed a good lunch. I even managed to eat only four goldfish while I was handing them out to kids for snack. After work I did succumb to my desires and had ice cream but I just worked it into my calories for the day. I had a good dinner and then it was time for exercise. I did two Firm Express video's: Cycle 1 Sculpt which I was supposed to do on Wednesday then Cycle 2 Sculpt+Cardio which was scheduled for today. I had planned on doing some additional cardio on the Gazelle but after forty minutes of video's I was exhausted. This does put me back on track with my video's for tomorrow. 

Tomorrow my big plans are to get rid of my adjustable bed that is driving me crazy because I can't get anyone to actually come and get it even free. Then I need to work on my final project for one of my early childhood classes. I have to do a PowerPoint presentation and I have no idea what I am going to do for it. And yes, I should have started it by now seeing that it is due by midnight, sat night. At least I have all of my other work done so I focus directly on this project.

Cause and Effect

I believe that most things that happen in your life are truly of your decisions. Yes, some things are outside of your control; a family member dying, not getting hired where you want, well even that you can keep trying. So when I have no time I have to look and see where I am spending that time. When I am frustrated and upset I have to figure out why. Because it is my choices that are causing it.

I am sensitive. I have been overweight since third grade and I have never had self confidence. I have learned how to fake self confidence but when it comes right down to it I am weak and easily knocked down. Because of this I choose to be around positive. Positive people with positive comments.

I have realized that my writing group is a double edged sword. On one hand it is great friends and many laughs. At the of the night when I look through the notes on my novel it is painful. I tried to express my frustrations and the notes got nicer. Then this Saturday the notes felt like a knife to the gut. I wasn't sure I wanted to go Tuesday night and I should have listened to my gut reaction because it felt like they took the knife and just twisted.

Today my priorfatgirl post went online. On my break from work I check my e-mails and have received an e-mail telling me I have received a negative comment on the post. I take a deep breath and go look. Instead of saying lose weight I have said loose. Someone has pointed out my error. If it was my blog I would go in and fix it and comment back "sorry for the error. I was a little nervous when I posted this." but I do not have that control and so it sits there. (please do not comment anything rude please.)

I do feel a little upset about this post because between school and my writing group I have realized how bad my grammar is. And here it is with someone pointing it out for the world to see. I read that post a million times before sending it to Jen (ok twice) and I still missed that. So is writing for priorfatgirl really a good idea? Maybe I am not educated enough. Though here I am at thirty and I don't know how to fix this. I would love to blame my dyslexia but I don't think that is accurate.

But it goes past blogging. I may be offered a promotion at work to extended day coordinator but that involves sending e-mails to parents, admin, and teachers. Will I be able to do that? Will they give me the job and then fire me because I can't write?

If my life is made of my choices then what now? I am no longer part of my writing group. I still want to do priorfatgirl but I am not sure I will be picked anyways, the other nominees are really good. And for work, I don't know. I thought that was what I wanted, the promotion. Maybe it is not right for me. But even teachers have write too parents and other teachers. So could i even get a teaching job? There are many unknowns and choices I will have to make. But what they will be only God knows, literally.

Nomination and stress

Do you remember how I told you about the Prior Fat Girl blog that I applied to blog on? I was selected as a finalist so I sent her a blog to post. I found out there were ten finalists. One was posted each day all last week and then this week. My blog will post tomorrow. I am a little nervous. I have read the first seven and everyone seems great. I like some better then others. I read through the comments on each to see what  people think of everyone. I don't know how they are doing voting yet but if you want to check out what I said this link should work after 10 am Arizona time http://www.priorfatgirl.com/?p=9563  .

This evening I have found myself at Denny's again. This is not a good thing when it comes to counting calories. Then add to that my friends not liking my novel, like at all. This is not a good mix. So I had picked a good dinner, their Fit Fare Omelet, which was about 400 calories. Then after a stressful conversation about how much my book sucks, that yes did result in my crying in the middle of a Denny's while all my friends did was laugh about how insulting each other were being, I ordered a Pancake Puppies Sundae. Which I can not even calculate the calories on. So I need to go home to exercise because I am surely over my calories. I need to do both my Firm Express video and some cardio work.

***

Further stressful conversation while I was trying to type this blog led to me leaving the Denny's. I am so frustrated that I want to cry, scream, and eat everything in the house. Ok, that last one is not true. Thinking about all of the calories in the pancake puppie sundae is actually making me feel nausous. That I would let myself be controlled by my emotions and instead of getting up and leaving like I should have when they were so rude, I instead consumed lots of empty calories. I do not need that negativity! My writing group is supposed to be fun. I totally just dumped them. I wrote a breakup facebook post on our private group board and then left the group. Seeing that I really just want to curse at several of the members of the group right now I figure that was the politest way of doing this. The real problem is what about this November, what if I am their ML again. Will that be totally awkward? Should I not apply to be ML because I don't want to edit anymore? I don't know and thinking about it just makes me want to cry more.

I am going to make myself stop blogging and get up and exercise. Exercise is supposed to help aleviate stress, right? I hope so.

Success?

This evening I worked out. I actually managed to do twenty minutes on my Gazelle and today's Firm Express video. So forty minutes of working out and according to the iphone LoseIt app I use I burned nearly 600 calories. Nice job! Though that seems a little high for forty minutes, doesn't it?

The reason why I am not sure I want to call this a success is because of what I ate today.
Breakfast: Two bowls of Rice Chex with Silk Milk
Lunch: Chef-boy-r-dee Beefaroni, 5 club crackers, and two frosted sugar cookies
Dinner: Sandwich on a roll with provolone cheese and turkey breast meat
Dessert: 4 mini danishes and 1 cup of ice cream

According to my Lose It app I should eat 1,954 calories to loose two pounds a week. Today I ate 1,956 calories so only two calories over. But I know that there was a lot of junk calories in what I ate today. I need to try to eat calories that provide nutrients which ice cream, danishes, and cookies do not have. I can say that the 563 calories I burned is subtracted from the 1,956, so I did not eat my exercise which is good. I want to mention I am not hungry. I do feel a little dehydrated so I am drinking lots of water as I type this.

I had told you I bought a new scale. I have it in my bedroom and from time to time I step on. The problem is that the numbers are all over the place. I thought I was down from the 277 to 275. Then Sunday after church I weighed myself. If you remember I volunteered for five hours and hadn't eat anything, I was down to 270! That was exciting. Of course that was gone by the end of the day. Sunday night I was 277 and this morning I was 276. So I guess no change? My pants are fitting a little better but I am not back in my skinny jeans yet. My goal is to shed two pounds this week and know it. So if I can keep up with my tracking and the exercises I know I can do it.

Below I am posting two pics I took. One is from when I was trying to get myself to get on my Gazelle. You can see it is in front of the tv ready to go and yet I just kept sitting in my chair. The other is after the forty minutes with my face all red and sweaty.

For now I am off to bed. People say you shouldn't exercise right before bed but exercise always makes me sleepy.

Sunday Night Update

My body is yelling at me. On Friday night I went to my friend Kandie's gym where she works. I took her Body Pump class which is weight lifting, lots of weight lifting. She says the class burns an average of 530 calories and is 800 reps. My whole body was shaking before the class was even over. Yesterday my shoulders were killing me and today my triceps are extremely painful.

Then today I was being extra helpful at church which means that for five hours straight I was working. Setting up food, watching kids, refreshing food, and then cleaning up. I was so exhausted. In fact you know how you can hit a wall while exercising? I totally hit the wall mid cleaning up. I pushed through, wasn't really an option to stop. But it was all exhausting. Working with all that food and somehow I never stopped to actually eat something. On the way home I stopped at McDonald's. I was starving. I bought 2 Big Mac's, 10 nuggets with honey, med fries, and med drink. So much food. Though really, its late and that is all I have eaten today so not so bad right? Ok, yes bad. But so delicious.

The weekend was great. After Body Pump Kandie and I went to Red Robin, we were both starving. I tried the Royal Red Robin, I had heard great things about it so I thought time to try it. The Royal Red Robin, if you haven't heard or tried it, is a bacon burger with a fried egg on it. It was interesting, not my favorite but it was really interesting. I am glad I tried it. We walked around a few stores at Norterra and then headed to our hotel. We stayed at the Drury Inn right off the I 17 and Pinnacle Peak. It is a beautiful hotel and the rooms are very large. They offer appetizers and three free drinks from 5 -7 though we were out at that time. We did have the breakfast which was very large: Waffles, oatmeal, bagels, toast, eggs, sausage, french toast, biscuits and gravy. Oh and coffee, juice, and soda. Mmmm free soda. They have no pay-per-view which sucked but free HBO (Micheal Moore was none, no fun.) So lots of fun and a great hotel.

My writing group went well. Until I read the comments people gave me. They are ruff but I know my friends were just trying to be helpful. Went to church to set up some of the food for this morning. I had lots of help so that went well. I have never been in charge of such a big production of food before. I didn't do so bad. I didn't order any of the food but preparing everything and making it look nice is it's own job.. Everything seemed to come out ok. I am going to make some notes for myself so I know how to be better prepare if I do it next year.

I do want to follow up, most of the apples, banana's, and cucumbers ended up in the trash last week. I need to try harder this week to get my fruit and veg in. Last week I did not do a good job at exercising so I am starting my 30 over again, they were supposed to start last week.

Monday:      Cycle 1 - Cardio + Sculpt
Tuesday:      Cycle 1 - Cardio
Wednesday: Cycle 1 - Sculpt
Thursday:    Rest
Friday:         Cycle 2 - Cardio + Sculpt
Saturday:     Cycle 2 - Cardio
Sunday:       Cycle 2 - Sculpt

Six days of exercise. I know ambitious but they are each only 20 minutes. I want to also stick some cardio in there too but will fit in wherever I can instead of on a planned schedule.

Tomorrow it is back to work.

Different Point of View

As I have mentioned I have been working on changing my living room. I decided the fun way to do it was to take lots of pictures to show you.

Before

After

This is during the cleaning process. The living room got very very messy. Even as I emptied boxes the empty boxes still had to go somewhere. Anything I wasn't keeping ended up outside my front door. Where I happen to be also trying to sell a refrigerator and a tv. 

Instead of throwing away all of my cd's my brother recommend I get a cd case and transfer the cd's and books into the cd case. That became interesting because I found a case on Walmart online that holds 350 cd's for $25 but when I went to the store it was $35. I knew I had more than a hundred cd's so I go ahead and jump through Walmart's hoop and bought it online, had it "shipped" for free to the store (they just go get one off the shelf,) and then went to pick it up today. It was kind of silly but whatever if it saves me ten dollars.  I alphabetized and sorted by Christian or secular artist/band.

Here is the final product. There is now lots of floor room and space. The couch is no longer in front of the tv and so when I sit I am at a bit of an angle. I am not sure how I will feel about that long term but for now it is ok. My table is on the side of the room and now my chair is also facing the tv. I haven't yet but I hope to clean off my table and be able to actually use it for homework and then I will be more likely to use it instead of going to Denny's, which I am sitting in right now. I have both my stair stepper (the ball is sitting on it) and my gazelle ready to be used and plenty of room for me to do my video's. The only thing I want now is a rug to put down because although there is carpet it is very thin and there is nothing between it and the cement below. So any floor exercises totally suck. 

I am glad it is all finally done. It is like a breath of fresh air to have the clutter gone. The last step is tomorrow GoodWill is coming by. They are getting an adjustable bed I haven't been able to sell on Craigslist and hopefully I can get them to take away the other bags of stuff I do not want.

***

I don't know when I will blog again. Tomorrow I have a Passover Service at noon. Then I will go home and pack and I and check into the hotel (remember the one for my birthday I going to with my friend.) Check in is at three and then I am going to go to my friend's gym, she has a BodyPump class at 5:30 so I am going to do that. Then shenanigans will ensue. 

Check out is eleven and then I go straight to my writing group meeting. Right after that I go to church to prep breakfast for the next morning and service. Then I have to get to bed because I have to be to church at seven the next morning. So maybe Easter afternoon I will have time to post. I will be busy but it should all be a lot of fun. 

Up Late

It is very late, 3:30 am to be exact. I babysat till 10:30 tonight but instead of going home I stopped in my local Denny's to work on my novel. While there I realized that I had some major tense issues and tried to go through correcting them. It took hours to just get through one chapter, I think I have another eight to fix.

I know that I don't have to work tomorrow but should I really be changing my sleep schedule this drastically? Probably not. What happened to going to bed by 9pm every night. I miss that goal. I think I want it back. Though I am a night owl so how about 10:30, bed by 10:30 should be possible. But 3:30 is way to late. How will I wake up tomorrow? I have things I need to accomplish, my living room is still a mess. Which by the way is going really great and I am just saving pictures to post all at once after it is done.

Food had been going ok. Last night I ate too much right before bed. Then tonight Denny's put me over. I really need to watch this late night eating. Although I did not exercise yesterday I managed to work out today. I stuck in a Firm Express dvd, this time it was cycle 1 sculpt. I was very weary as I remember how I do not like this trainer but on this video she is really pretty decent. She actually tells you before hand, on most exercises, before you are supposed to switch. Once she even showed the move before we had to do it. I was so proud of her. This time she did not mention that their was an option for modifications by one of the other girls which is good since the other girls don't do it anyways. There were a few moves that I could not do but I just kept moving. Today, because my living room is a mess, I did my video in my brother's living room. I am sure I drove him crazy because I talk back to the trainers. Usually telling them how crazy they are and how much I hate what they are asking me to do. Or when the are positive and saying "look how great you are doing." When I totally just failed at doing what they asked me to do. This seems to work for me, talking back. It gets the emotions out letting me focus on the moves I am trying to do.

I am supposed to be three day on and one day off but I kind of messed that up. My three days were supposed to start on Sunday but actually started today. Although I kind of want to stick with the calendar I printed out I think it might be best to stick with the three on and one off so that I can go through all of the video's. I really want to see how each one is so I can make a full decision about how I like them. So tomorrow I am thinking cycle one cardio. I will let you know how it goes.

Change in post

I was going to post all about how I spent the day sorting boxes and moving things around. Tell you how I have nearly everything figured out and the next step is finding room in the storage sheds.

But all I can think about is here bad choices I made. I didn't exercise today, I haven't for three days now. There is no excuse seeing that I didn't work today. Plus I went over my calories. I knew I was going over and rationalized, oh I will work out later so I will be under again or at least really close . Well not only did I not work out but then I ate even more! So now I am eight hundred calories over for the day. I need to get in better control of my eating.

So tomorrow issue new day. I new set of choices. I have boxes to move around in the morning and then in the evening I am babysitting. So between I need to do at least one video, maybe two. I want to come through the week with a loss. Oh, speaking of I weighed myself this morning, with my new Eat Smart scale and weighed in at 276. This is only one pound lighter then Friday but my pants do feel looser so that is nice. My goal is to fit back into my size 26 work pants by next Monday. Don't know if it is possible, I haven't fit in them for awhile, but I still want to try.

Lazy Sunday

No exercise yesterday, my legs were so sore. Actually my right thigh still is. Yesterday I got my homework done and watched lots of hulu.

 Friday night and again last night I worked on sorting my boxes. I still have a lot more to do. As I go through my boxes most things are easy but other things are a little trickier.

I have a photo from my sophomore summer Christian camp. How long do I need to keep that? Will I ever actually hang it on my wall? Probably not. So in the trash it goes.

A little trickier is the bag of random stickers I have. When I was growing up I collected pencils and stickers so I could have them when I was a teacher. I decided to keep the stickers as I do work with kids now.

I have a huge Rubbermaid tub of old shirts that I have been saving. From camps, school, things I went to. I will never wear these shirts but it is hard to throw them away. I have decided to take pictures of them and place them in a small flip album. As photo's they will take up a lot less room and yet I will still kind of have them.

Some things are not really trash but I don't want to try donate everything. I always try to be green so it is hard. Like I have over forty old cd's and I hate throwing them all away to go into landfill. But if ZIA and Bookmans don't want them, does Goodwill really want them? They did end up in a trash bag. It is interesting to see how much stuff I buy and never use. What a waste of money.

***

Today after church I met with my writing group at Denny's. We have been here five hours now, which means my computer is dead. That is why I am on my blogger app writing this. I don't want to leave because I am having so much fun with my friends even if I don't know what to work on. Here are a couple pictures of the girls. I love these girls.

Today my eating has been a little off. I ate a bagel and cream cheese at church for breakfast. Then went home and had a bowl of rice chex for lunch. Went to Denny's to hang out and had a hush puppy sundae and now it is nine and I am hungry again. Plus I haven't worked out yet today and I really want to get at least one 20 min work out in before bed. I haven't tracked my calories yet so I have no idea how much I have left for dinner. So I better get off here and and get to that. Till tomorrow.