52 Weeks....to the Real Me

Well. I ... today wasn't HORRIBLE. It wasn't terrific. But I can live with myself. I didn't get to exercise (still kinda sick) but here's the food list:

zone bar

diet coke

easy mac-n- cheese
yogurt w/meringue
applesauce

2 mini bags of pretzels (halloween size)

McDouble (just sandwich - no extras. I said NO to fries. NO to cookies.)

3 tablespoons of cake batter

carrots and low fat ranch dip (I said NO to reese's peanut butter cup enticing me)
and I'm going to have a zone bar before bed.

I KNOW I need more protein.


Tomorrow are conferences. YAY. Home late. Food on the run -- I'm going to pack lots of GOOD food to munch on! NO PIZZA!

Thanks for all the support and advice. To answer everyone at once:

• No, I didn't finish my 100 day burpee challenge, I made it to day 50 though!
• Mom does try to hide the food - but in order to find things I DO NEED, I hunt. -- I end up finding bad stuff. (or like the Oreos hidden in the closet now - I know they are there)
• Unfortunately getting her onboard in a productive way is harder, instead of not buy the stuff, she'd rather chastise at dad for eating it.
  

Again, thanks everyone. I'm going to be better about posting. See.. 2 days in a row! Now I'm going to finish Duplicity and head to bed. =)

40 days till Hawaii!!!
(Boss approved.. need to forward papers to the Superintendent... then I'm set!)

Technically I'm on week... umm... I kinda lost count. I will re-calculate and CONTINUE. I knew I had slipped up. I knew I let things get to me. I knew I let myself go. It was bad. It was ugly and I ignored the evidence. I knew my clothes were getting tighter, I knew I was looking plumper. I ignored it. I blamed it on my schedule, I blamed it on monopoly, I blamed it on a stressful professor, I still - partially at least- blame my mom. But I know the only REAL person to blame is me. I put the food in my mouth. I sit on the couch. I "drove-thru" for 3 meals a day. I know part of it my own sabotage thinking-- that I can't do it in this environment. (My house and current situation) but the reality is -- no matter how hard it is... I HAVE to.

I went to the doctor last week and was forced to face the numerical reality of the past 3 months. I've gained back WAY TOO MUCH. And am now headed forward on my journey. I REFUSE to buy bigger clothes. -- in fact I have TONS of motivation to move smaller again. I'm going to HAWAII!! .... and soon. DECEMBER.

My environment will be my biggest challenge. I've managed to get my fast food addiction cured -- mostly because it costs too much (and I'm saving for Hawaii). But I know once I get back in the good habits -- for whatever reasons -- it will become second nature again. Dad has mentioned getting healthy too, but right now we face the same problem(s) -- a house full of (currently) 4 candy dishes and 2 cookie jars and often several types of chips and other junk foods, including chocolate milk (tons of sugar!!). I'm going to be back on the Zone. I'm not sure exactly which plan dad wants to follow but we have to get Mom on board and I don't know how.

I've tried convincing her she needs to eat better too -- by the way she bought a bag of "blonde" Oreos on Saturday. Today they were gone. She had 3, I had 6. (or maybe 9) Dad ate the REST in 3 days. He's diabetic. Do you see the problem? Yes, I know he needs to take responsibility for his actions and what he eats -- but if it's not there to tempt him (us) isn't that easier -- at least until the new habits take hold. One of my biggest issues in my latest relapse was due to Oreos. Seriously, How do I get her on board? How do I convince her that by enabling our binging and poor eating habits she is literally helping us kill ourselves?? I'm serious. We need help. I know I can't force her to do anything but how can we get her to UNDERSTAND? It's not that we are weak willed, it's not that we don't know better, it's HARD. This whole process is hard and she isn't helping. I'm tired of using excuses (her being the biggest one) but I don't know how to do this surrounded by pastas, cookies, candy, pizza, ice cream... etc. Like I said I've tried getting her to get on board with us -- even simple things like suggesting baked chips over regular ones. (to no avail.) Ok I'm done rambling.

I'm currently recovering from "flu-like" symptoms so as soon as I'm on my feet (and my appetite returns) it will be exercise and eating healthy for me. (and hopefully Dad -- and Mom-- too)

All advice welcome.

07.11.2009
I have one more week of crazy classes, then things will calm down a little -- I hope.

The good news-- while I've been behind in blogging... I have been keeping up with all my workouts and burpees!

So Tuesday was the crazy rowing day. Wednesday was easier.

The main WOD was overhead squats, essentially maxing out. Overhead was a bit too tough, so must of us women did back squats (where you set the bar on your upper back)
Well unfortunately my arms and upper body maxed out WELL BEFORE my legs even got close.
I had a hard time getting the bar positioned -- it was heavy. lol. But once I got into the squat it was too easy. I'm not sure how to fix this.
My warm-up squats were
3 x 45lb bar
3 x 35 lb bar
2 x 25 lb bar
Maxing out -- weights include the 35 lb bar.
1 x 45lb
1 x 55lb
1 x 65lb
1 x 75lb
1 x 85lb

I had not problem doing these weights at all as far as my legs were concerned. I just had a heck of a time getting the bar where it needed to be and balancing it.

In addition to the 5 extra burpees I owed, I did my daily 31.
Side note: I'm watching the CMT Country Music Awards -- a rerun and I just learned that Darius Rucker (Country Star) is the former lead singer from Hootie & the Blowfish. (I guess if I paid attention to the names of people in a band I would have realized this sooner) Cool!

Thursday
Today was supposed to be an easier day since it would be day 4. (most people do 3 days, rest one, then do two more. but because of my schedule I've been doing 4 on 3 off)
My punishment for coming on day 4 was to row a 2000m. You can read about my fun rowing on Tuesday. So Today I did my burpees FIRST. (all 32 of them!)
Then I started my row.

I'm proud to say that I rowed straight through -- no stopping for a break. I finished my 2k in 11:59.5 which puts my pace at 2:59.9 (according to the monitor on the machine). On Tuesday I averaged 3 mins for my 500m. I am quite proud that I was able to keep that same pace for the entire 2k. It was NOT easy. My legs hurt, my back hurt, my arms were sore. But WOW did it feel good!!!
(A rowing machine -- in case you haven't seen them) In the past I've only done stationary rows - or rows with barbells, I've never done them on the "sliding" rowers before. It kills my legs!

Friday.
Rest day. It would be great if that were true. I did rest most of the day. About 10:30 I started my burpees (much like I will tonight). I was watching a movie (Music & Lyrics) and did them in chunks of 10. I did 43. (which takes 10 more off what I owe!)

I had a minor meltdown... I stepped on the scale. EEK. I was up 8lbs. Now, I'm not one for excuses, but to be easier on myself, I acknowledge that this is not the "typical" time that I weigh myself, in fact it's about as far from my normal time as possible so I know that played a role in it. I know people say that muscle weighs more than fat.. blah blah. To me that was always just an excuse. But I'm kinda beginning to believe it. Why? Because I've noticed more definition in my legs, my back, etc. My clothes fit nicely. I even wore a pair of shorts the other day that I bought last summer and needed to "get into" and they looked good! So something must be working right? I measured myself on the 1st and compared it to my measurements around the 15th. Most of them were larger.. ugh. So I'm a bit frustrated. What I can say is that I can do 5 burpees easily, 10 with moderate effort, and I can do about 30 in less than 25 minutes, taking breaks. I'm trying to see the positives.

Food has been decent. Most of this week I ate 2 meals and 2 snacks that were dead on Zone. My dinners were not exactly zone, but I noticed I don't get late night cravings, and I'm not hungry at all! (and I figure worst case, I'm not eating any worse than I was when I was eating "healthy" before)

That brings me to today.
I am planning on doing an extra 10 burpees again today. (as soon as I get the motivation to go do them)!

** And I'm super proud of Charlie, a member of the Barn, who is competing in the CrossFit Games! Right now after 4 events, he's in 50th out of 74, there are 4 more events to go (1 today and 3 tomorrow).

I did it. or was at least really close! I had a great 2 block "snack" before my crossfit workout. A great 3 block breakfast after it. A 3 block lunch between classes, a zone bar snack and a good dinner. Dinner is my "almost" I went to Red Lobster. I ate 1 chicken breast and 2 shrimp, my salad, some mashed potatoes, two rolls. It was a tad high on carb, but I also brought home 1 chicken breast, 4 shrimp, and half my potatoes!!

I was kinda tired earlier but as the day went on I felt better and better. I don't know if it's realizations about my life, a new calm in my math class, the food combination, or maybe a combination of all of the above. But tonight I can say without a doubt, for the first time in a LONG time. I'm content. Maybe even happy.

I've tried to explain why I like crossfit so much. Why I want to train like this, how I can put in terms people can understand. I've used examples like Survivor and that new movie coming out, but today I realized what it REALLY was. (not that I ACTUALLY want to do this... but ...) I want to BE ABLE to compete (competently) on American Gladiators. I loved that show back in the day and I used it as inspiration when I was "running" on the elliptical. I want to be able to do stuff like that!! That's why I like CrossFit. It's helping me be like that!


Todays' warm-up
750m row
agility practice

WOD
150 jumping pull-ups (for time)
After every 2 minutes, we owed 100m rowing.
I finished with a time of 9:42
therefore I also did an original 400m row.

Plus I did my 24 burpees.

So I've decided to give TheZone eating plan a try. I've read most of "Enter the Zone", read CrossFit's mini-guide to it (and if you are curious about which frame-size you are - this site shows you how to find out.), and flipped through several other Zone related books and websites.

Websites:
Dr. Sears' Main Site- Has information about The Zone, as well as other health related news, like how Cheerios is now in trouble for advertising its "lowering cholesterol abilities."

Dr. Sears' The Zone - Dr. Sears is the guy who did the research and developed the plan. This is the site dedicated to The Zone's products and supplements. If you register (for free) you can plug in your stats and find out your number of blocks!

FormulaZone-I subscribed but think I might cancel. It is a site designed to allow you find tons of recipes and plug them into your meal plan and it will calculate for you. Although, it gave me meal block plans like 5! It also doesn't allow you to just build a meal, the way I did this morning. They have a 14day money-back guarantee, I think I'm going to take them up on it. If I can't find a site that allows you to build meals, I'll just have to go back to my trusty spreadsheet!

By my deductions, my meals should be 3 blocks and my snacks 2.

I just made breakfast and realized that this is A LOT of FOOD! I still have tweaking and learning to do, obviously, but here's what I came up with for breakfast:

3 scrambled eggs
1 apple
1/2 cup grapes
1 1/2 tsp of peanut butter

(and I also tried one blueberry -- I had never had one before, it was pretty good, but I can't imagine eating a 1/2 cup of them. -- maybe if they were IN something that would be ok!)

I have to research a little about "natural peanut butter" -- not sure what the difference is. I also noticed that my peanut butter was reduced fat, which kind of defeats the point of it being my fat block.

So that's where I stand now. I did my 12 burpees yesterday. Today I have to do 13, plus I'm going kayaking.. I'm excited!