Bye Bye Mayo, Hello Healthy

Today I had an aha moment while making my lunch. I was having a sandwich for lunch, which is not something I eat that often but for some reason today I was in the mood. Before I gave up eating meat I loved snacking on slices of lunch meat, so in order to keep protein in my diet I now snack on fake lunch meat. Tofurky slices, to be exact. Since I had some fake lunch meat on hand, I decided that a sandwich was calling my name.

Prior to my dieting days I would make all of my sandwiches with mayo, and a cheese slice. When I was even younger I thought that the best sandwich was made with white bread, mayo, cheddar cheese, and bologna. That makes me sound a little bit like white trash. Oh well, it's what I liked. Although now, the thought of white bread freaks me out, I can almost feel the bread sticking to the roof of my mouth!

Anyway, I love mayo on a sandwich, even an egg sandwich. I love sauces in general, it's wired in my brain that I need to have sauce on both sides of a sandwich. Back in my fat girl days I would put ranch on one slice of bread and mayo on the other. Go ahead, you can judge me. So today when making my sandwich I was trying to figure out what I could put on my sandwich, since I try to avoid ranch and mayo.

As I was riffling through my fridge I also realized that I did not have a slice of Weight Watchers cheese to put on my sandwich. And that is when I had my aha moment! I did not need cheese or mayo. I always tend to have Laughing Cow Cheese Spread on hand (or in this case Crystal Farms, since it was on sale) so I figured that I could just spread a wedge of the cheese onto one side of my sandwich. Which would take care of the naked side of bread AND solve my cheese problem.

I smeared a fourth of an avocado on the other slice of bread, added the meat, tomato and drizzled mustard all over the top. 

Low Carb Bread: 2 points (1 point per slice)
Tofurky Lunch Meat: 2 points
1/4 of an Avocado: 2 points
1 Cheese Wedge: 1 points
Mustard: 0 points
Sandwich Total: 7 points

I realize that this post may seem like I am taking my sandwich making skills a little too seriously (and I probably am). But that is what dieting and more specifically, that aha moment is all about. It's all about figuring out those little dieting tips that make healthy eating so much easier.

Goals for the Next Year

I recently hit my one year anniversary. For the last year I have been going to the gym religiously, and avoiding  fatty foods. Last year the only goal that I had made for myself was to lose weight and get in shape. And in the last year I have done exactly that. I have lost 55 pounds and I am in the best shape of my life. Do you I still have some weight to lose? Absolutely. Can I get in even better shape? Without a doubt. But that's the beauty of exercise, there is always a new area of fitness to master, and a new part of the body to condition. Recently I explored a new form of fitness that is really foreign to me, I went running. I wrote a post about it here, and while writing that post I realized that I have so many more fitness goals than I did last year.

I think it's good that I make some goals for the next year of my life. I am finding out that I tend to have a lot of weight plateaus, so in an attempt to keep myself motivated, I think it would be smart to have goals that I am working towards, besides just losing weight. So without further ado, here are my goals for the next year:

1) Run a 5k. Or two. Or maybe even three. Okay, three 5k races might be pushing it but maybe not. For now I have a goal to run at least one 5k race and we'll see what happens from there. Here are some that I think I would really enjoy running in:

• Glow Run  

 

• Challenge Obesity 5K
• MN Aids Walk
• The Naked Foot 5K
• Warrior Dash  

 



I think this is more than a 5k, but it would really test my endurance!

2)  Get an ass. I currently have a flat butt. It almost curves in, rather than out. It's sad, and pathetic. What I am lacking in the ass department I make up for in the boob department but I want an ass, no more pancake butt! Sorry if this is crude or inappropriate, but it's real life. My real, sad, assless life.

3) Participate in a triathlon. Not a long course triathlon, or that crazy, unfathomable thing called the Ironman Triathlon. My YWCA hosts an annual women's triathlon. This one seems a little more manageable, it would be a 500 yard swim, then a 15.5 mile bike ride and a 5K run. I could not participate in this sort of triathlon in my current state but if I started training, I really think I could get there by August!

4) Get toned arms. Now that I have started losing my fat girl arms, I yearn for skinny, toned, sleek, beautiful arms. My arm inspiration?

Jennifer Aniston:

 Source

Or Cameron Diaz:

Source

Amazing, right? I cannot wait for the day that my arms has even the slightest bit of definition like these women!

5) Figure out my role in the fitness community. One thing that this past year has taught me is that I want to work in the field of fitness. I want to work with people who understand the benefit of living an active lifestyle or are on the path to living a healthy lifestyle, just like me. I want to help inspire people and equally be inspired by others. Now the hard part is figuring out what path I should take. Should I do personal training? A health/wellness coach? A group fitness instructor? Weight Watchers Leader? Or something else entirely? I am not sure, but I plan to figure it out!

Running? Me? What?

I did something last Thursday night that I never thought I would be able to do or want to do. I went for a run. Yes, you read that right, I went running. By choice. No one was chasing me. I just felt like running would clear my head. And it did. And guess what? I want to go running again. Gasp! Who would have ever thought? Not me, that's for sure. But let me back up a little bit, and explain why the thought of me running is such exciting thing!

I hate running. No, I loathe running. I always get shin splints, my knees crack and parts of my body jiggle that I would really prefer not to jiggle. In high school when we had to run the mile, I would walk. Yeah, I was that kid. I thought it was better to walk and get a slow time than run and still get a slow time. So a year ago, when I began this magical journey to weight loss, I had no false hopes that I would become a runner. Did I wish that I could run? Yes. I so desperately wished that I was one of those people that found running to be therapeutic. But I was not. Running was painful and embarrassing.

I have 2 friends that go to my gym and both of them can run. I always wished I could sign all 3 of us up for a 5k race, the only problem was that I needed to start training. So in attempt to test my running ability I tried to run around the track at the gym. Awful. It was a complete disaster. At the time, my boobs were much larger than they are today, so with every stride my chest would pound down and it felt like the wind was being knocked out of me. Lovely, right? I made it one lap around the track and gave up.

Ever since that failed running attempt I have slowly been trying to run more. My Monday night Circuit class starts out with running laps around the gym, and this used to be the hardest part of the class for me. Actually, I didn't even try going to this class for months because I dreaded having to run, even for 3 minutes. However after months of running laps in class it became a little easier each week. It may have helped that I have since dropped 3 whole cup sizes, so now it doesn't feel like I am going to collapse from air lose. But parts of body still jiggle that I would prefer not to jiggle. Oh well, I must remember to cheer the small victories!

So when last Thursday rolled around I had no intention of going for a run. But I had a pretty bad day at work because I was working on a deadline, and was being tempted with donuts that someone had brought into the office. At the end of the day I left work in a complete funk. I was not in a good mood, I felt so out of it, and going to the gym was the last thing that I wanted to do. But I knew that I needed to do something. If I had sat at home I probably would have binged. It was just one of those kind of moods.

And all of sudden I had an aha moment and I knew exactly what I wanted to do. I wanted to run. People are always talking about going for a run to clear their heads, and that was just what I wanted, clarity. So I strapped on my tennis shoes, secured pepper spray in boobs, and set out to the wealthy part of my neighborhood. I figured that the bad guys would be casing houses, not looking to mug me! And I was right, I didn't get mugged. So they were either casing houses or I was too fast and they couldn't catch me! HA! That's unlikely.

I started out with a fast paced walk, which quickly turned into a jog. I was able to keep up a moderate jogging pace for about 4 blocks. Then I walked for a block. Then I started running again. Then walked. You get the drift. Even though I didn't run the entire time, I ended up running more than I walked. And for an overweight, non runner that is pretty triumphant! As I was running through the neighborhood I passed several other people that were running, and I even got a head nod of approval from a couple that I crossed paths with. I must have fooled them into thinking that I was a legitimate runner! If I can fool other people, maybe I can also fool myself into thinking that I am a runner. One can only hope.

And to avoid those dreaded shin splints that I figured I would get, I spent the rest of the night icing my shins. It worked, I woke up the next morning with minimal pain! Hooray!

It Was Worth It.

Here I am today.
A year later.
54 pounds lighter.
Down 3 cup size.
Stronger than I was a year ago.
Stronger than I was yesterday;
Mentally. Physically. Emotionally. 

And after completing a whole year of dieting, exercise, and moderation,
I can honestly tell you that it was worth it. Every single minute of it.
It was worth every single squat, lunge, plié, and dead lift.
It was worth every cookie that I didn't consume and every happy hour that I skipped.
It was worth every minute spent on a boring elliptical machine when I could have been on the couch.
It was worth it. 
It was worth working through every weight plateau.
It was worth every workout that I finished when I wanted to skip it instead.
It was worth every bowl of vegetables that I ate instead of ice cream.
It was worth it.
It was worth every workout that I wanted to walk out of but stayed because I don't quit.
It was worth all of the times that I was so sore I could barely get out of bed.
It was worth every drop of sweat and every heavy breath.
It was worth it.
It was worth every time that I felt like I was going to puke. Or pass out.
It was worth every tear that I cried when I felt like I couldn't do it.
It was worth every dollar that I spent on gym clothes, a gym pass and healthy foods.
It was worth the perseverance that it took to get me where I am today.
It was worth it.
It was so worth it.

It was worth it because I can fit into clothes that I haven't worn in 4 years.
Because I can run just a little bit further than I could last week.
Because the number on the scale keeps moving down and the number on my dumbbells keeps moving up.
It was worth it because I have gained self confidence.
Because I am proud of the body that I worked for, not the body I was born with.
Because I love photos that are taken of me instead of being critical of every photo.
It was worth it because now I love looking in the mirror.
I love seeing my body change with every passing day.
It was worth it because I worked my ass off and got results.
Because I no longer have fat girl arms.
Because now I have self control.
Because my body can do things that I never thought I would be capable of.
It was worth it because I am living a healthy, and happy lifestyle and I never want to go back.
It was worth it because today I look like this:

And not that:

Now and Then

As I stated in this post, I am a week away from my one year anniversary of adopting a healthier lifestyle. The biggest challenge for me was definitely changing my eating. I love all foods that are bad for me. So I wanted to take a look into some of the foods that I was eating a year ago, compared to what I am eating today.

A veggie burger for dinner: 

Then: A heaping plate full of tater tots dipped in ranch dressing accompanied by a veggie burger, with cheese, a bun, mayo and ketchup.
Estimated amount of WW points: 30-32
Estimated amount of calories: 850-870

Now: Sweet potato tots (counted out to reach the exact portion size) dipped in ketchup, veggie burger without a bun and cheese, and a pile of broccoli.
WW points: 7-8
Calories: 260-280

Pizza at home: 

Then: 3/4 (sometimes a whole) of a frozen cheese pizza, with ranch dressing drizzled on top. 

WW points: 24-30 

Calories 840-990

Now: If I am craving pizza I will use 1 whole wheat tortilla topped with spaghetti sauce, veggies, low fat cheese, and hot sauce drizzled on top. 

WW points: 8-9 

Calories: 260-280

Bagels:

Then: 2-3 bagels a day. My roommate used to work at Panera Bread and would bring home bags full of left over bagels every night. No wonder I got fat, right? 

WW points: 18-27

Calories: 660-990

Now: 1 bagel thin, maybe 2-3 a week. 

WW points: 3

Calories: 110

 Burrito: 

Then: A burrito with tortilla, rice, black beans, queso, cheese, and guacamole.
WW points: 28-31
Calories: 1,000-1,240

Now: A burrito bowl with no tortilla, no cheese, no queso, a small drizzle of sour cream, sometimes rice but usually no rice.
WW points: 12-13
Calories: 460-555

Egg Sandwich:

Then: To make an egg sandwich I would use a bagel, a slice of cheese, slices of avocado topped with ranch dressing. Before I knew much about healthy foods, I thought I should cut out fat from my sandwich by removing the avocado but keeping the ranch. 

WW points: 18

Calories: 670-690

Now: I realize the value of avocado and the benefit of having good fats in your diet. Now if I make an egg sandwich it consists of a bagel thin or a tortilla, with a wedge of Laughing Cow cheese spread, egg whites, and slices of avocado.
WW points: 7
Calories: 275

However, most of the time when I am eating eggs I do not make a sandwich. I usually eat egg white, with a wedge of Laughing Cow cheese and slices of avocado.
WW points: 4
Calories: 145

Coffee Drinks: 

Then: A grande pumpkin spice latte or white chocolate mocha made with skim milk and no whip from Starbucks. I was at least smart enough to know to get skim milk and no whip!

WW points: 7 or 10

Calories: 260 or 350

With whip and 2% milk. 

WW points: 10 or 13 

Calories: 380 or 470

Now: A grande skinny vanilla or caramel latte from Starbucks
WW points: 3
Calories: 120


Doing this post was absolutely shocking. I bet that I was easily consuming 2,500 calories in a day. Yikes!! As you can see, my eating has definitely shaped up. I have cut down on my carbs, I have started monitoring and measuring out portion sizes, and I have eliminated ranch dressing from my life.  Ranch used to be a fairly regular part of my diet but we had to break up. I still love ranch dressing with my whole heart, but I have realized that my relationship with ranch was very unhealthy. Another thing that I had to break up with but I am still in love with; coffee drinks. I love a white chocolate mocha or a pumpkin spice latte or a salted caramel mocha. However when I only have 30 points in a day, I cannot justify using 10 of them on a coffee. Alas, sugary coffee drinks have been eliminated.

As sad as I am about not consuming ranch, pizza, and sugar love in a cup, I am so much happier at the thought of the number on the scale going down!

How I Got To Be This Size

I am about 1 week away from my one year anniversary. One year of dieting, exercising, and losing weight. And because I have been conducting this sort of lifestyle for the last year, I thought it would be appropriate to dedicate my next several posts to reflecting upon the last year and what I have learned about dieting, about exercise and about myself. For this post I thought I would reflect on my life before the aha moment occurred. With every major weight loss story, there is also a weight gain story. So after a year of reflecting on why I spent at least a decade struggling with my weight, I have decided to share some insight into my weight gain.

I have struggled with my weight for most of my life. I have always loved junk food, and hated exercise. I am naturally lazy and drawn to fatty foods. As a kid I could never wear a two piece bathing suit, or borrow friends clothes. Believe me, I was a chubster. I used to sneak extra pieces of candy and avoid family walks. Pathetic, right? My mom did the best that she could, but I spent weekends with my dad and afternoons with my grandma, and neither of them worried about my eating. They loved me no matter my size. My grandma expressed her love by giving me food. My favorite after school snack that she made was tortilla chips smothered in melted cheese.

At 13 years old I was worried about being fat. I wanted to look like Avril Lavigne, or Hilary Duff. I wanted to be as skinny as the girls that I was watching on the Disney Channel. So in order to lose weight I decided to give up sugar and become more active. I lost some weight, but of course gained it all back the minute I started eating sugar again. And so I spent the next 5 years being lazy and overweight. Like most teenage girls, I thought I could starve myself, but after one day of not eating breakfast I realized that I was not anorexic. This is what I looked like when I graduated high school in May, 2007: helloooo double chin!

This was when I started college in September, 2007: 

Shortly after this photo was taken I joined a gym as an attempt to lose weight and tone up. I wanted a new beginning. During this time I didn't really change my eating, nor did I monitor my eating, yet I was still able to lose 20 pounds in about 4 months. I think the fact that I wasn't consuming alcohol may have helped the weight come off. After losing the 20 pounds, this was what I looked like on January 1st, 2008 (freshmen in college). Notice that the double chin is gone, and I have quite the sexy jawline forming.

Once summer came along, I moved home and took a job as a nanny.  I figured this would keep me active enough to keep the weight off. Boy, was I wrong. As a nanny I may have been active, but instead of planning meals around my own cravings, I was now planning meals according to the kid's cravings. I shifted from eating a veggie sandwich for lunch, to eating mac and cheese with tater tots. The family that I was caring for did not believe in left overs, so to avoid waste I usually ended up finishing off what was left. I also began eating more frequently, having to plan twice a day snack times. As I am sure you can guess I gained weight over the summer. I didn't gain all 20 pounds back but at the end of summer my shorts were definitely having some trouble staying buttoned.

When I went back to school that fall, I did not hit up the gym again, nor did I change my new eating habits. I kept on traveling down the road of junk food and large portions. Slowly over time I stopped caring about anything that I put into my mouth. And slowly over time I started packing on the pounds. This picture is January 1st, 2009 (sophomore in college), just a year later. The double chin is creeping back, and I definitely lost that sexy jawline.

As a college student, I knew that my eating habits were not the best, but I was eating and drinking at the same rate as my peers. The only problem was that I was gaining weight at triple the speed that any of them were. I always felt alone. I never had someone in my life that struggled as much as I did. My friends could eat a whole frozen pizza, why couldn't I? Why was I the fat one in the group? I think my roommate loved (and still loves) food more than I did, but somehow she weighed at least 80 pounds lighter than me. It just didn't seem fair.

 

 

 Left: Fall 2009 (junior in college).


 Right: December 24, 2009.












All throughout college I kept shoveling unhealthy foods into my mouth. In my senior year of college I would regularly consume a bag of chips, bagels, mac and cheese, frozen pizzas, and probably the most detrimental thing of all, alcohol. I had just turned 21 and I took full advantage of my legal drinking rights. And at that point in my life I was drinking vodka drinks with sprite and grenadine. Or gin with cranberry juice. Talk about sugar rush in a glass. Here are some photos of me in my senior year, spring 2011. Ignore the mustache, I have shaved it off since this picture!

I was big and getting bigger. I am sure that I was gaining weight with every passing week. Yet, I still did not have an aha moment, even when I looked at these photos. I convinced myself that it was just a bad angle. That my dress was ruffled the wrong way, or that I was tilting my head in a way that made me face look large. I was in denial, so I kept eating. I was sad about being the fat friend, so I binged. No one around me was dieting, so I didn't either. However I don't think that I really knew how big that I was getting. I stopped wearing jeans in my sophomore year. I started wearing dresses and leggings. So to this day, I don't know what my largest pant size was, but if I had to guess I would say a 20 or 22.

After I graduated college I got a new job (the same job that I have today) and my eating got even worse. I know what you must be thinking: "her eating could really get worse than chips, pizza and mac and cheese?" Oh yes, it could. On top of those unhealthy foods that I was woofing down, I added office treats. You know those treats that I complain about in this post and this post? Yep, I was eating those, which explains the vendetta that I have against them now. Eating a cookie became a normal part of my day. And the dinners that I made were large, and rarely included a vegetable. So after 2 months of eating poorly, and being very inactive, I finally had my aha moment. I saw a picture that changed my entire life. This has to be more than a double chin, possibly even the start of a triple chin? Gross.

I did not recognize this girl. To this day, I don't know who she is. I never saw myself as being that big. Either the mirror had been lying to me or I was in such denial that I was completely delusional. So after spending my college years whining over being fat, I decided to change. I stopped making excuses. Those pictures were not just bad angles, my dress was not ruffled wrong and my head wasn't titled poorly. I was fat. So I finally listened to the skinny girl that was trapped inside of me. I decided to work hard, to change, and to live a healthy lifestyle. And even though I still throw myself a pitty party from time to time, I now know how strong I am. And how much I am capable of. I have fought to be where I am today, and I am proud of the body that I have worked for.

And here is a current photo of me. Not a full body shot, but you can still see that I have smaller arms, no double chin and I am extremely happy. 

Okay, so maybe I lied, I grew my mustache back! 

Sad Life

In another post I have discussed the fact that my office is not exactly a diet friendly place. At least once a week there are sugary treats sprawled out by the coffee pots, which happen to be about 10 feet from my desk. Normally I have a good amount of willpower but I have been struggling for the last couple of weeks. I have more slip-ups than I once did and my weight is definitely reflecting those slip ups, as I have not lost a pound in over 2 months. UGH!

This morning on my way into work I walked past a market that was baking cookies and the aroma of fresh baked chocolate chip cookies got me really sad. I wanted a cookie. I wanted to be able to carelessly shove a warm chocolate chip cookie into my mouth and not feel guilty after eating it. But sadly, that is not my life. I have to worry about every single thing that I put into my mouth. So after being sad about my inability to eat cookies, of course today is the day that an extravagant amount of treats are set out in the office. And my willpower is put to the test.

BEHOLD: 

Needless to say, I am not a happy camper. It is taking all of my energy to not shove about 15 cookies into my mouth and wash them down with a doughnut. But instead, I will practice willpower. I will sit at my desk and pretend that cookies taste like sand. Delicious mounds of sand. Instead, while everyone else is eating donuts, I will be eating my breakfast; a bagel thin with fat free butter spray, cinnamon, a small amount of cream cheese, and a banana.

And you may be wondering why I only put a small dab of cream cheese on one half of a bagel thin, and not the whole thing. Well, that is 2 points worth of cream cheese and I am desperately trying to get my weight moving again (preferably moving down and not up). I didn't want to chance it and cover my whole bagel thin with 8 points worth of cream cheese. I am living the dream, I tell ya.