Wednesday Weigh In - 166

Up a pound! I guess it's back to water-reducing tea, oolong, and salads! Which, to be honest, I really should be doing anyway. The salad part, anyway.

Goal for the next week: Get that pound back off, and get another one off, too. We walked three miles in an hour today, and burned almost four hundred calories, so I think that's a good start.

one of the ways I'm trying to slim down is with my hula hoop

I like doing it, and over on fatSecret.com (which has the worst name ever, really), there's a challenge going on for the next month where we're going to try to hoop for 20 minutes each day. I just did my first twenty minutes, and it wasn't that bad. Longer than I thought 20 would be, but not debilitating. I watched the tail end of Human Planet while I did so I wouldn't count it and make it longer.

This is the first exercise I've done since my back was hurt. Hooping is pretty low-impact, so my back is fine. Maybe even better, since the weight of the hoop sort of massages it. My knees, and the back of my thigh where that nerve is twinging all the time don't like it much, but they're doing fine, too.

Overall, a good go, I think.

I am once again trying to lose weight

Because I'm tired of being a fatty fat fat. I'm starting as soon as the videos are done downloading, and I'll keep you updated on my progress. Here's the starting stats:

Weight: 148
Waist: 34.5"
Bust: 40"
Arm: 11"
Hips: 44.25"
Neck: 13.25"
Thigh: 24.75"

All measurements up almost where they were before I started losing weight again, so I need to do something about it.

fat girl goes slim: i joined a gym

World Gym is having a tenth anniversary thing where they're only charging 10$ a month, and that's a steal. There's one not far from here, so J and I joined up.

We've been twice-- we're due to go back again, but I'm Girl Timeing, so I might hold off a few more days, or just go and stroll on the treadmill or something.

But already, I feel stronger. My muscles are sore, but not debilitating, and I've already lost another pound. And my hips are an inch smaller than the last time I measured them, but I don't think that's from working out. It was ages ago when I measured them last. It's not nice to see what 43" looks like when you unloop the measuring tape!

According to the Spark People App on my iPad, if I lose a pound a week consistently through the holidays, I can reach my goal weight somewhere around the end of January, which means I'll be almost there when I go to school at the beginning. If I can lose just a little more a week, I'll make it by New Years which would be awesome-- it'll be the first year I DON'T have to resolve to lose weight!

I've been trying to pay more attention to what I'm eating, trying to make better choices. According to the scale in my room, which is the one I can read easier, I hit 140 this week! It's amazing. That's officially half way there, 20llbs less than when I started, back down almost where I was when I graduated college, on my way to where I was when I started college.

So I'm hopeful again.

fat girl goes slim: january 2010

I weighed myself this morning, and I'm edging under 150 despite all the BS and crap food. I'm glad there's progress, because I was getting annoyed, starting to think that maybe I should just give up.

But we also went to the Converse outlet, and there are Cons that fit me for half price because I technically weir a kids' size, and they have the most adorable retro running shoes, and if I can swing it after this week's bills and such, I'm going to get them. I want to run. Not jogging, I hate hate hate jogging and it makes my knees and hips hurt from old injuries, but run. Flat out. Like I'm being chased by monsters. The Harry Dresden- Dr Who Companion workout plan. I figure I'll start just sprinting up and down my block-- I'm very out of shape, and my lungs are quite crap*, so that should be fine for now. When I get stronger, and I build up some tolerance, I'll head out to the running track, or around the lake like the school's track and field team. I'm not really concerned with marathon-levels of stamina; I juls like the feel of opening up my hips and hitting that rhythm where I used to run across sand dunes back when we used to dance on the beach.

Meanwhile, a friend of mine was talking about how fat doesn't necessarily equal unhealthy, and I think she's right. I feel better when I eat better and move more, but i haven't lost that much weight. It's just moved around, and I'm fine with that, for all that I have these annoying dreams where I realize I've never been fat, I've just been looking at myself skewed, and when I realize it, I'm suddenly where I want to be. Maybe there's some internalized pop culture voice telling me I want to be a bony bitch, but that's not true when i'm conscious-- I don't want all my chest bones showing, I just want to be able to see my collarbones. And to not be accidentally anorexic or the opposite there of again.

Weight is such a minefield.

*When I was in seventh grade, I got bronchitis seven times in a school year (I missed 160 days, and they couldn't hold me back because I still had perfect grades. Take that Florida Public School System!), and it left me with a tendency toward lung problems, a habit of not breathing deeply, and it took my previous ability to hold my breath for just over three minutes. I haven't gotten any of that back in order yet, so I'll have to run just a little bit at a time and trick myself into doing it right.

day to day: 1-14-2010

Most of the time, I sort of assume that I'm just getting by, that I'm not horrendous, but I'm not really good looking. It's not fishing for compliments to say so (but people tend to think it is and that's why i don't mention it much), it's just how I see myself in the framework of the world and all the beautiful people in it. I don't like the shape of my mouth, or how it looks when I talk or smile, I don't think i'm all that photogenic, and generally my hair is something of a plague theme at best.

But today-- today I think I'm looking pretty cute. I managed to lose ten pounds while I was sick, and I've kept them off as I've gotten better, I started a round of leg exercises yesterday, I only coughed a little right when I woke up, I picked up a job reviewing books (and some of the reviews will even pay!), the lack of humidity has kept my hair smooth and flat, I managed to get a whole shift in today (and, believe me, that's an accomplishment with how slow it's been at work lately), and my waist is down an inch and a half. I'm feeling pretty (tentatively) awesome, and I wanted to share.

Both shirts are from Target. The cleavage is mine, and look! I almost have a collarbone again! I'm not wearing any jewelry today because I was running late for work and didn't have time to decide on any. Today's makeup is my brand new Flip for It compact in LA, the equally brand new Regenerist Eye Kit which Avon sent me for demo (it's a wrinkle-correcting eye cream and a light-deflecting highlighter, and it's not for sale yet), Ideal Shade in Translucent powder foundation, and mark Dew Drench lipstick in Ruby Glaze. Yeah, I totally only have Avon makeup on most days, since I only owned, like, three pieces of makeup before I started selling (::ahem and buying ahem::) Avon. The only things in my hair are a little smoothing spray from, like, three days ago when I straightened my bangs, a rubberband, and a clip for the weird side of my bangs that I'm getting pretty good at denying.

fat girl goes slim: weight, again

As soon as it got cold, I got fat again. Man, it'a annoying. I don't think I'm eating any more than I did before, though I'm probably eating more bad things again, but I'm still being active...

guh.

I need groceries. I keep having to eat at work, which means I'm eating icecream. Not good.

fat girl goes slim: progress!

This morning, I weighed in at 150! Down ten pounds from the start of this adventure, and one quarter of the way to a healthy weight! I have to figure out how to keep it here, and how to keep going, but I'm going to tentatively say that it's working!

I figured out how to turn in a circle while I hoop today, which was both fun and upping the effort it takes to hoop, and I practiced a few silly arm-things-- pulling the hoop from around my waist, up over my head and back down on the other side. I can't manage it when I'm actually hooping yet, but it's a nice flow and I'll eventually figure out how to get my hand under the moving hoop without knocking it down to the ground.

I get paid this week, and I'm going to stock up on decent real foods as much as I can; I'm tired of the icky feeling that crap food gives me, and Lean Cuisines, even when they're good, never seem to satisfy. I've been re-reading French Women Don't Get Fat, which I first read the last time I was trying to lose weight, and I managed to do pretty well on it before, so I'm going back to mindful eating, never over-eating, never depriving, more movement, fresher food. And I looked up herbs I can make teas out of that will help control cravings-- don't worry; I found the ones that do so by nourishing, not the ones that make me not think of eating. A well-nourished body needs less to eat and therefore craves less.

fat girl goes slim: update-itude

I knew that Thanksgiving would ruin me. So I'm not surprised that I've regained five of the six pounds I lost before hand. But that doesn't mean it's not annoying.

So this paycheck, after I pay all my bills, I'll be getting the stuff to make my own weighted hoops so I can work out a little more as I hula-hoop my way to weightloss. That's how I got those six pounds off, and it'll work more than that, too, damnit.

I'm also looking into herbalism. I've got all these herbs-- for a while, I wanted to get a degree in herbalism and just sort of never did, mostly because of a collision of no-money and no-opportunity-since-there's-not-a-school-here. I figure it's time I started suing them to balance out my crappy systems, and see if that helps. I made up a tea for cleansing the gallbladder that will hopefully help me get past my gall-stomach-intestinal issues, if the interwebs are right about how it works, and it's not the best-tasting tea ever, but it's nowhere near as bad as that cough-tea I made that one time. And I only need to take a cup or so a day.

I went through all my various supplements, and I'm taking them again: Multivitamins always make me sick, so I take them separately, which looks alarming, but does so much better in my stomach, and things like omega-3 supplements help keep my teeth from hurting, calcium helps that and keeps my PMS in check, coconut oil is supposed to regulate appetite and help with weight loss, spirulina helps with intestinal issues and has iodine which should help with my thyroid-- you know, everything all at once. Yay Puritan's Pride.

And probably the best of all, though it's horribly inconvenient: since my bike was stolen, I'm waking much more, and that's definitely a bigger work-put than seven minutes on the bike, which was mostly coasting even when I tried not to.

fat girl goes slim: setbacks!

Work slowed down, the weather got crappy, and next thing you know, I'm off work for four days and I start putting the weight back on. Just a few days less on my feet, and I can't keep it off, it's crazy. So I'm going to try to squeeze in some extra movement again, doing something fun-- I have rollerskates I need to learn to use, and I have a hulahoop, and somewhere I have a jumprope...

And I found something online that said just holding your stomach as far in as you can for as long as you can a few times a day can burn fat the way yoga does.

And I'm going to start biking the long way home-- it adds about five or ten minutes to the haul, and goes over rougher roads.

And I might go on a minifast when I get paid next. I've been eating really poorly lately, mostly carbs and salt, and that's got to be counterproductive, so I think I'm going to get some protein shakes and some low-sodium soups and some lemonade and a bunch of salad fixings and so on, and go off wheat for a week and see if it helps any. I used to do that for most of the summer, but I've been so poor lately that I've been eating poor-people food, and it's not doing me any good.

I think what I really need is to get my flippin' period. I skipped last month entirely-- every time I try to get back in shape, I skip a month or three-- and I keep feeling like I'm getting all the water-gain and none of the water-loss that should happen once it starts, because it's not starting. I think that's probably a totally different problem that I've been battling for years now, but hormone imbalances are supposed to be helped by fixing diets, too...

Okay, now I'm just rambling.

fat girl goes slim: progress!

I'm below 155! Our scale is not terribly accurate, and when I'm trying to read those little lines from all the way up by my head where my eyes are, they all sort of blur together, but it's most def below the 155 mark, and closer to the 150. Which is awesome. I don't know how much longer this will hold out, but I've basically just been eating more mindfully so that I generally eat less, even if I'm still not able to afford to eat better, I've upped my oolong tea intake, which kick starts my motabolism back to where it used to be when I was a tea fiend rather than just a tea addict, and I've started moving more when I'd usually just sit still-- like when I'm at work and I'm waiting for a customer, any customer, and I'd normally just be leaning against the counter, I try my best to stand upright, I tighten up my abs, I swing my arms back and forth, I bend and un bend my knees like little bitty shimmies. It ptobably makes me look impatient or wired, but it keeps me out of the no-customer malaise, and it burns off a little more than I burned before. Oh, and I tightened up my bike so that it's not so easy to coast and it's a little harder to pedal, which keeps me actively involved in getting to work, rather than just coasting around corners the whole way.

I'm also just trying generally to take more care of myself. I cleaned up my room for the first time in ages yesterday, I've been using my day and night face creams, washing my face more, brushing my hair more, and I started wearing makeup again, even though there's no one who cares whether I do or not (which was my excuse for not wearing it before). Tomorrow, I'm going to do my hair for the first time in about four months, and when the next Avon order goes in, I'm getting a revitalizing hair mask. I'm paying more attention to when I got to bed, and trying to get up at a decent and consistent time in the morning. I've been researching suppliments that help with moods, with balancing hormones, with managing acidity imbalances, and as soon as I have money (ha!), I'll be adding a few to my diet here and there.

I figure, if I take care of myself better overall, maybe some of the weight gain will reverse just because it was a dumpiness of character that caused it. Hey, it couldn't hurt.

fat girl goes slim: again

I've decided I'm done with being fat again. And now that I have my spiffy new planner to remind me of things, I have a better chance of remembering what I've eaten and keeping track of what I'm doing. So there.

Currently, as you can see,
I'm somewhere around 155. This is bad, because I'm supposed to be at around 110, according to those charts, which always seem a bit on the light side and don't seem to take muscle mass into account (so i'm aiming for around 120 at first, and we'll see how I feel there), and good, because a week ago I was at 161.

I'm not sure how accurate my scale is, because when I first stepped on, it looked like 153ish, and I know my camera doesn't weigh two pounds, but a rough estimate is probably good enough.

In the first picture, the orange in the foreground is my shirt; I can't see my own ankles because my boobs and belly are in the way, and that's part of what we're working on here.

Current measurements are as follows:

Chest: 34"

Bust: 39"

Arm: 12"

Waist: 35.25"

Hips: 45" at widest part

Thigh: 24" half way between knee and hip

I remember when I had a 25" waist... Depressing as this is, I'm going to work on it, trying to lose weight and keep it up until I reach my goal-- 5ish down, 35ish to go!

Repurposing

I've decided that this is going to be a different blog, but I'll keep the name because I like it. It'll now be my space for building my whole self: spiritual, mental, physical, social and inetractive. I'm going to try to find something beautiful in each day, preferably outside or at least outside of me, I'm going to practice finding things to be greatful for, I'm going to list things that I've learned, I'm going to track my education and my attempts to get back in shape, and I'm generally going to blog the things I do and know and feel that aren't one of the other specialized blogs I already keep up. 

The comic will continue somewhere down the line, though probably not here and probably not soon.

Day 86: Feb 23

I'm under 150, thank the goddess of short fat girls, but I'm yoyoing around-- I was down four pounds and now I'm up two from there (but my bracelets feel loose now??). So I decided to stop worrying about my weight and just have a weigh-in on monday mornings, after I pee and before I eat to keep track of it in a looser sort of way, rather than going into that obsession spiral that seems to be what scales are made of. 

I'm at 148.

In other news:

Remembering to refuse plastic bags is getting easier.

I haven't folded a paper crane in weeks.

I'd planned to relaunch my comics tonight, but I still don't have my new printer ink and my printer seems to think it can't scan without ink, so that'll have to wait a bit. Hopefully not that big of a bit.

It's easier to keep to Seasonality now that everyone knows I'm doing it and is asking questions and verifying before feeding me.

The gardrn is getting pretty planted. In the window.

Day 38

22. Do something new to green my life once every two months.

and

26. Plant, grow and actually maintain a proper kitchen garden and get a real harvest out of it.

Two points with one project! I'll be the first to admit that I'm addicted to water in bottles-- our tap water tastes bad, and there's no water fountain or the equivallent anywhere near work-- and that means I've got piles and piles of empty and mostly-empty water bottles all over my space. Unrelated, I thought, was the problem of where I'm going to plant all my herbs and trees as I prep for the garden. And then I spontaneously made the leap to combining the two: turn the millions of bottles into planters! So I cut the last quarter or so off the top, disgarding the pour-spout, and not I have tons of little planters all lined up along my windowsill, and best of all, water bottles actually fit on my windowsill, unlike actual pots meant for planting.

As a plus, I'm now throwing away less than a quarter of the volume they had whole, so that's neat. I need to see about getting recycling pick-up here, but I think we'd have to pay for it, and that just seems rediculous to me, when Florida passed that law ages ago saying recycling needs to be mandatory.

I planted tons of herbs and greens this morning, and hopefully they'll take to growing and we'll start having fresh greens to add to the seasonal foods and foraging.

32. Learn a new crochet stitch a month, and use it in something practical and easily-finished.

This month's stitch will be the fan stitch, and I'll get started on it as soon as I get back from the Food Show I'm going to in Orlando.

23. Keep a calendar up to date with deadlines, accomplishments, failures, holidays, notes, full moons, birthdays and anniversaries, schedules, etc for the length of this exercize.

So far, so good. But it's really only been 5 days into this new year, so we still need to make it a long way...

34. Use only reusable shopping bags or paper.

This one is harder than you'd think. I keep a bag in my purse, but if we're out somewhere and I didn't take my purse, that kind of leaves me having to buy a new bag each time (which means I'm getting quite a collection of reusable bags), or having to only buy what I can carry. Alot of places don't even have paper bags, as I learned recently, and I think that's just weird. BUT, I have managed to keep my plastic bag use down to a minimum, and there's less and less each time. 

I think it's the extra planning I'm having trouble with-- having to think about what I'm doing before I leave the house and being prepared for buying things when I don't expect to be going to the store...

As an addendum to this one, I'm starting to notice all the ziploc bags I use in making my lunch for work, and that whole rinse and reuse idea only lasts a few times before it splits or gets too greasy and you have to throw it away anyway. So I'm going to green up my lunchbox, too. I've already bought a sandwich container, but I think I'm going to trade up to one of those washable sandwich wraps. And I've bought a few snack containers for the side things. I need a plastic bento bowl and a set of lunchbox / bento silverware, and I think I'll be able to get through a week without throwing anything away.

45. Keep my Etsy shop full and with a good selection, and start selling handmade gifts and cosmetics regularly.

I have this whole month off of work, and I'm going to devote big chunks of it to taking better pictures of the things I have and to getting more stock-- and refilling the shop so I can start to make some money off of it.

72. Learn to play at least one ideal song for all the flutes I have.

I'm learning the pennywhistle! And so far it's not that hard-- it's just doing it well and naturally that's hard. And I bought a new flute: a Japanese traditional-style one. I have no idea how to use it-- it's one of the side-hole ones like a professional flute and like that beautiful bamboo one I have, and so far, I think those'll be the challenge in this step.

92. Lose 30 lbs at 1-2 lbs a week, then level off successfully and keep it off.

This one's proving difficult. I've actually put on weight since making this list, but I think that's because I made it right before the Thanksgiving-Christmas food madness. Now I'm on the seasonal plan, and I'm making more of my own food and eating less junk, and I'm optimistic that I can do it.

Fat Girl Goes Slim: Running

Okay, so I've never been a fan of running. When we used to go to those sweet even beaches for full moons, I used to sometimes lope, but that's not the same thing-- that's stretching legs and hips out as far as they will go and landing on your toptoes and covering alot of ground with little energy expenditure. And sometimes when I lived in hillier places, I'd go mountain-goating, which looks like running but is more of a bouncy climb at high speed so gravity can't pull you down-- dynamic balance and forward momentum and all that. I've been wanting to do those things, but there's nowhere to lope where I'd feel safe to be early in the morning or late in the evening when I'm not working, and mountain-goating is out of the question because a) it's way way way too flat here, and b) there's no big-construction I could break into a pretend the sandpiles are mountains (which is also dirtier and not safe). 

But H has this treadmill. And it kind of represents all the bad things about exercize to me-- staring at a wall, separated from other people and the world, repetative motion and no variation. I could program it to go up and down, but it doesn't react fast enough to be like a suitably steep hillside. 

But it's all I've got, and I'm tired of feeling like a cow. So last tuesday, I ran for twenty minutes in two ten minute stretches. I woke up pretty fine on Wednesday, but when I got to work, all the standing brought on the pain, and by last night I couldn't hardly move my legs. And the same today. And, uncharacteristically, my brain is interpreting that as a challenge, not as a signal to quit. Who knew?

Hayden lost 80 lbs by running every day. I'm going to ease into running every day, but I'm going to do my best. All I need to lose is 30 lbs. And I have three days off a week.

Even though no one mentioned that walking on a moving surface like that messes with your balance, and mine is somewhat suspect at the best of times...