Day 73 to 80: The Long and Winding Road

 

Today is day 80 of Nutrisystem 2.0 and it's been a while since I've published anything. I've written plenty but then abandoned what I wrote and wrote something else, only to again abandon it. This sort of parallels what is going on with my diet and exercise. I tend to be really compliant during the day all week. Evenings can trip me up and so do weekends. I still haven't figured out how to overcome that. I made it through Saint Patrick's Day but that involved consuming 3 loaves of Irish soda bread and stashing a 4th in the freezer. I also had corned beef & cabbage for 3 days. The carrots and cabbage part of that are completely allowed on Nutrisystem, so the meat and potatoes are what you have to watch. I ate it for 3 days so I don't feel I overdid it. The bread was my Achille's Heel. 

I've been doing a lot better with my exercise. I exercise at least twice a day all week and I did do better last weekend. I also finally got out and got my hair cut last Saturday ! It felt so good to get that done and I'm super happy with it. Now I just need to have it colored ! Tonight I got to thinking about where I am, because a workout I did after work touched on not sitting on the couch once you reach a goal. It resonated with me because that's exactly what I did. I lost the weight, looked and felt great and then started eating whatever I wanted and not exercising. Now here I am desperately trying to lose it again. I'm depressed about that and I think it's impeding my progress. I'm struggling with the caramels I bought and honestly, I'll be glad when they are gone. I'm also struggling to get back into a self care routine. Days go by without me showering or brushing my teeth and that is just disgusting. I sit here night after night just watching YouTube video's on tv. I keep telling myself it will get better when the nice weather is here and I can be outside in the sunshine. Is sunshine really going to cure this funk I'm in ? You know, I don't know. Part of the problem is I sit here until it's late and I am tired, so taking a shower and brushing my teeth goes out the window. That is just stupid and lazy and an EXCUSE ! I doing a little better getting my vitamins in, along with my magnesium and Metamucil. I got a little sticker shock on the Metamucil when I bought it recently - it was $30 ! Walmart has their own brand but I compared the ingredients and theirs is full of silica .. aka sand ! No thanks - I'll pay the $30 for 100% psyllium husk. I could actually order it from Costco and save about $3, so I might do that next time I need it, unless I get over there before I run out.

It's the weekend and this is where I usually go off the rails. Last night was horrible. All I wanted to do was eat. I sat here eating caramels and then an entire bag of multi-grain crackers ! I didn't shower. I didn't brush my teeth. I didn't do skin care. It took all I had to get off the couch at 11 and go to bed ! WTF is wrong with me ? 

Today, I resolved not to let that happen again. I did relax on the couch until about 11 but then I threw in a load of laundry, loaded the dishwasher and put the plasticware in the sink to soak. Once that was done I sat down with a second cup of coffee and thought about where I am. I can't fix everything all at once. I'm proved that to myself over and over. If I try to address everything that is "wrong" it just becomes overwhelming and I do nothing. So I'm going to start with a schedule for evenings. Work days are really not a problem until 5 pm rolls around. I stop working at 5 and I'm typically in bed by 9, so it's not like there is a lot of time to work with. Right now I've been exercising at 5 and then having dinner, with the plan to exercise again afterwards. Well, that hasn't been happening most nights. I end up sitting here watching tv. As a result, I haven't been getting a shower every night. Starting Monday my schedule will be:

5 pm: feed cats, then exercise 

Post workout: dinner

6:30 pm: another workout (2o min. or less)

Post workout: shower, skin care

Post shower: evening snack, tv

9 pm: brush teeth, bed time

Pretty simple, yet pretty sad that at the age of 60 I have to make a schedule. I'm going to try this on the "honor system". If that doesn't work I will set reminders in my phone - which would be annoying ! I did write it out on paper and will keep it in view. I'm big on Excel so I also created an Excel spreadsheet to keep track ! Sounds crazy but I am going to do whatever it takes to turn this ship around. 

Despite the excess of the past week, I went ahead and weighed myself today. The scale read 235.8 ... which honestly surprised me. I was expecting a gain. Needless to say, I was HAPPY with this number ! It gave my mood a huge boost because in 9 ounces I will OWN the 70 pound bear again !

By nearly 3 pm I had the load of laundry done, the plastics washed and 4 cups of coffee in. I had waffles for breakfast and the usual pepperoni pizza melt for lunch. After lunch I had my morning yogurt. I didn't stress about getting on the treadmill. I had my afternoon cottage cheese & oatmeal cookies and dinner was green beans and roasted turkey medallions. Evening snack was a strawberry shortcake cupcake ... and some caramels. Sigh. I took all my vitamins and my magnesium & Metamucil. I also got a shower and skin care in, along with brushing my teeth at bedtime .. so that was a win !

I am starting to realize that I'm doing ok. I'm making progress and that is the goal. Is everything perfect ? Nope. It's not. What matters is I'm continuing to try. I am doing much better with exercise because I focused on what I can do now, rather than what I used to do. I was trying to go back to the cardio speeds I was doing at 160 pounds, instead of the fat burning speeds of 3 mph or less that I did when I weighed a lot more. Dialing it back just a touch has helped tremendously and I am seeing progress. My endurance has increased and the 3 mph speed is no longer so difficult. The India jogging series I've been doing this past week consists of intervals and even though I can't jog, I've been doing my own intervals. I've done 2, 3 and 4 minute intervals with 1 minute rests. Most of the time I'm doing 3 mph for the interval and 2.8 mph for the rest and I've been able to sustain it. I can get up to 3.1 or 3.2 but it's not sustainable yet. I will get there ! I'm not pushing myself to go beyond 3 mph because I need to stay in the fat burning zone. I'm working more on endurance and consistency and I am seeing the progression. I'm doing better at not finding excuses not to exercise. I make sure my shake is ready and my shoes are on before noon during the week, so I can clock out of work and hop right on the treadmill. I think the one thing that helped the most was going back to the Atlas Mountains walk that I did for weeks, way back when. When I was able to breeze through that I realized that I can do this ! Until then I was so depressed and thinking I would never get back my former endurance and speed. I will, it's just going to take time. It took me 2 years to be able to maintain speeds over 3 mph - so how did I think I was going to do that right out of the gate at 247 pounds ? That is just me setting more unrealistic goals for myself. THIS is the biggest problem I have. I set these lofty goals, fail and then I'm miserable and want to give up. I'm not setting any goals for a bit. I'm just challenging myself here and there. For example, on April 1st I plan to repeat the Kilimanjaro hike that I did for weeks and weeks back in the 2019. This was the progression from the Atlas Mountains, so it's another step towards getting back to where I was. It's 36 minutes long, so it's all about endurance.

I didn't use the treadmill today. I'm a little disappointed in myself over that but I have a plan. In a week or two I'll be rearranging the living room and will have room for the Total Gym again. If I'm not in a treadmill mood on the weekend I can easily use the Total Gym while watching tv. Exercise is exercise. The goal is to be more active.

I'm up. I'm down. I'm trying. I'm succeeding. I'm failing. I'm human. I'm enough.