Microblogging wins again…

As the past couple of months have not been very exciting, I’ve taken to microblogging on Facebook and sharing my photos there.  And why shouldn’t I, after all, since most of my readers are my friends as well 🙂

Today is my brother’s 23rd birthday and he’s entering his new year as an engaged man! The woman that he loves has stolen the hearts of every member of my family and I am *so* looking forward to calling her sister-in-law.  The two of them together just embody hard work, determination, financial savvy, and a heavy dose of love, silliness, light-hearted fun, and generosity.

My sister and her husband recently acquired a dog, I swear that they couldn’t be happier.  Although Darwin gave me a taste of just how much work dogs can be, it seems like he’s actually a good boy and a great fit for the family.  They have news of their own, but it’s not ‘facebook official’ quite yet, so I won’t be sharing it here.  We have friends in common, after all.

Jeff and I went ‘facebook official’ with our own news last weekend.  Part of why things have been so mum around here is because I’ve been sitting on my hands lest I write something too telling* or let the secret out too soon. We started letting the news out with a trickle.. first Jeff’s brother, then my parents, his parents, my siblings, his best friend, then mine.. and now the floodgates are open and we made the scary, nerve wracking, world-shifting, exciting  announcement that we’re expecting again.  Our little rainbow-baby is due at the end of September.  We managed to wait ~13 weeks this time before spilling the news.  Now we’re giddy, anxious, and excited.

I think that one of the funnest things to come of this development is that Jeff has taken to practicing his dad jokes.  One of my favorites that he came up with has to do with who is the best at hiding, and the response (while pointing to himself) is disguise (pronounced: “this guy”).

There have been a lot of changes on the fitness front, as well, ones that I hope to catalogue as time goes on.  I am really interested in getting back into blogging, and so I will queue up the next post to talk about some of those changes.

MegsFitness on Nerd Fitness – Battle Logs!

I’ve blogged in the past about how much happier and more content I feel when I am following the core strengths of health and wellness – including eating well, sleeping well, exercising, and making time for personal goals.  So, it stands to reason that now, more than ever, I need to get back into the patterns of healthy eating, getting enough (and higher quality) rest, exercising, and making time for personal goals. 

This blog has become more of a personal journal for me, which will definitely incorporate health and wellness, but it’s always been about more than that.  For me, it’s been about recognizing the fact that my journey — whether it’s to weight loss, muscle gain, social changes, or family life — is going to be completely different from someone else’s journey, even if we share many of the same characteristics.  To that end, I still have every intention of maintaining this blog and getting back into writing about things that are fun, interesting, or relative to my personal narrative.  

My day-to-day fitness narrative is going to be captured at Nerd Fitness.  It’s a community of fitness-minded individuals and I really feel like that’s the sort of encouragement I could use at the moment.  What that means for the MegsFitness blog is that I’ll be cross-posting my weekly summaries here, so that at least part of this journal can resonate with the “-Fitness” part of the name 😀

I’m ready to get back to good.  I’m ready to lose weight, gain muscle, find my confidence, and conquer the world.  If you’re interested in joining The Rebellion, my “battle log” is found here: http://rebellion.nerdfitness.com/index.php?/topic/52946-amis-last-first-post/

[Begin Crosspost]:

Name: Aminarra, aka “MegsFitness”

Occupation: Corporate Fleet Management Resolution

Previous Fitness Experience: 2 years on SparkPeople, 3 years with Weight Loss Warriors, 3 attempts at Weight Watchers, 1 attempt at Herbalife; 4 years high school strength training, 1 obstacle 5k, 10+ regular 5k Races, greatest weight loss 42lbs.

Current Level of Fitness: Sedentary.  It’s been 2 years since I’ve worked out consistently due to a severe back injury after the Warrior Dash.

“End Game” Goal: Working out 4+x/week, Settling at a healthy weight, ideally ~180, but more importantly having functional strength and physical health.

Short-term Goal: Begin working out 1-3x/week, at a beginner level to become re-acclimated to the fitness world. Begin reintegrating Paleo Lifestyle into eating plan  

Plan of Action:  Use Nerd Fitness to launch new fitness goals; integrate fitness guild with gamer guild for inspiration.  Generate weekly goals in the areas of nutrition, exercise, and personal.  Update status on goals at least weekly.

Outside of NF: 
https://megsfitness.wordpress.com/
http://www.vexxgaming.com/

Wibbly Wobbly

The Doctor:  People assume that time is a strict progression of cause to effect, but *actually* from a non-linear, non-subjective viewpoint – it’s more like a big ball of wibbly wobbly… time-y wimey… stuff.

[spoiler] If you are sensitive to the subject of miscarriage, for your own sake, read no further.

Gotta dash. Things happening. Well, four things. Well, four things and a lizard.

Summer TV and Exercise

Per my previous post, I am taking a break from Facebook.  Did you also know that I’m taking a break from gaming?  The two are not related.  I sort of quit my guid took a hiatus from my guild when I decided to focus on fitness instead.  It’s been a couple months, now, and I’ve only logged in a time or two.

I *have* spent more time working out, but it’s not nearly the amount of time that I anticipated.  I’ve gotten a lot more walking in, some mild strength training, and a whole lot of excuse-making.  Oh what? Excuses??  Pssh.

I like to think of it less as excuses and more like some quality TV watching time.  I completely blitzed through Orange Is The New Black  and now I’m watching How I Met Your Mother, Bones, and Baby Daddy.

I would probably actually get more home-gym workouts done if Netflix had commercials, but as it stands, I try to do calisthenics while watching the episodes 🙂

The plan seems to be working, though, I’ve lost 8 pounds so far 🙂

The paleo plan is still at about 60% and going strong.  I crave more veggies these days and I don’t miss bread much at all.  Some days I just want a slice of buttery toast, but I think that might just be because I like butter 😉

So how are you spending your summer?  What are your favorite shows to watch?

 

 

Playing with Paleo

It is so good to be BACK! I’ve been thinking a lot today how I’d like to organize this blog and I started trying to think of alliterations that could lend themselves well to my blog content.  Work Out Wednesday is easy, and Menu Monday.  But how do I fit in all of the other things to talk about?  Well–there’s every other blogger in the blogosphere.. and then there’s me!

I guess the name of my blog gives me a little bit of a scapegoat away from formatting and structure 😉

Lately, I’ve been experimenting with the Paleo plan.  NerdFitness has a fantastic starter’s guide to the paleo diet that I highly suggest you check out.

nerdfitness.com

One of the hardest things about starting a paleo eating plan is ‘wtf do I eat?’  I mean, think about it!  The average American diet (at least, in the midwest) consists of cereal for breakfast, a sandwich for lunch, and pasta for dinner.  I was honestly stumped! What, besides eggs, could I eat for breakfast?

Well–anything.  Who says you can’t have a steak at 9am? 😛 Granted, I usually don’t, but that’s the gist of it.  Food is just food.  There aren’t rules around what time of day you can eat the food.  So, I dove in.  I ate a lot of eggs.  I got tired of eggs.  I ate a lot of salads, I got tired of salads.  I ate a lot of bacon, and then I realized I should not eat near as much bacon…

It prompted me to buy a cookbook.  The one that came highest recommended from the Nerds of NerdFitness was Practical Paleo by Diane Sanfilippo.  I’ve made a number of recipes from the book including the broiled salmon, pumpkin pancakes, swirly quiche, chorizo meatballs, and pumpkin cranberry muffins.  We’ve used the seasoning mixtures to spice up the meats we generally use, and eating has been a lot more whole-foods focused.

Now! All that being said, I’m not 100% of the way there 😦  There are still times where I get caught up in the “I don’t feel like it” attitude.  I had nachos tonight, and I’m still eating at the gas station too frequently.  When I did 1 week of about 80% paleo, I dropped 6 pounds.  SIX WHOLE POUNDS!! I also felt more energetic and pretty excited about staying committed.

Then life happened, and stress eating, and convenience.

It’s a lot more effort to plan ahead, cook, and deal with all of the food associated with paleo eating. The dishes in the sink below?  That’s just from cooking breakfast and prepping lunch:

Now imagine that for 2 people 3x/day, 7 days/week.  Our grocery bill has skyrocketed and our dishwasher never gets a break.  This week (Saturday to next Saturday) my goals are to have 5/7 days 100% paleo (excluding cheese.  I love cheese.  me and cheese have something special going on.)

I’m hoping to drop some weight and feel happier/healthier by the end.  I certainly appreciate you rooting me on! If you know me IRL, kindly refrain from offering me non-paleo food.. if there’s a treat at work, for example, just tell me ‘thanks! you do good work! Have a fantastic day! *high five*”

Cheers to the coming week!

-Megs

Team Doge – Week 1 Update

Good morning!

The 1^st mini challenge is off to a great start.  Nicky made use of her social network to draw in many votes yesterday, and I’m proud to report that we are in

*drumroll…*

Ninth place!  At the beginning of the day yesterday, we had only about 8 votes, so to have 40 votes at this point is quite a feat!  Way to go, Nicky!

Now, some people are wondering, why do we care about votes?  What’s the point?  Well, the point is motivation and accountability.  If you’re asking people for votes, you’re explaining what it’s for—and the more people that know you’re part of a challenge, the more people who will help you meet your goals or cheer you on in your efforts.  For example, someone yesterday gave me a Cadburry Crème Egg.  I told them I was part of a 12-week weight loss challenge, and gave it back to them—and asked them for their vote!  Now, this person knows what’s up and won’t offer me chocolate any more, and we added 1 vote to our total.

How are you doing with your personal goals?  Please comment with ONE or more successes from the past week 🙂

If you would like to vote, here are the three easy steps:

1.       Access the HealthyWage website: http://www.healthywage.com/leaderboards/team_standings/?team_challenge=80&secondary_filter=1

2.      Using the drop-down menus, select “GE HealthAhead’s Lose Weight, Win Big 2014”  and “Mini Challenge #1: Best Team Name and Before Photo”

3.      Click on “Team Doge Wow Such Weight Loss!” and follow instructions to cast your vote.

Breakfast: liquid and non chewy

I’ve already had two doctor appointments this morning… One for a giant filling (thanks, candy addiction…) and another for a chiropractic adjustment.  Understandably, there’s no actual breakfast today. And no coffee either 😦 with my mouth being numbed up, I don’t want to risk burns.

I found the end of the internet

I received an inter-office envelope today. I never receive these, so my curiosity was piqued. When I opened it, there was but one sheet of paper enclosed, bearing the message:

It would be a fine idea if you were to refrain from the consumption of candy today.
–The Phantom

I grinned because I know who the phantom is and he’s quite inspiring. His note helped me refuse a chocolate covered salted caramel today. And when a colleague offered to bribe me with chocolate, I confidently announced that I’d prefer baby carrots.

Today was a pretty good day. I had a lot of lean proteins and a lot of spinach. Of course, I had a poptart and crackers, too.  This blog is about progress, not perfection, so I’ll continue to tell it like it is.

I told it like it is to Jeff tonight. After surfing to the end of the internet, (did you realize there’s a page on tickld that doesn’t have a “next” button??) Anyway, after surfing to the end of the internet, I got angry with myself. Here I had paged through 45 pages of things of little consequence and wasted hours of time. Time that could’ve been spent cleaning, exercising, crafting, painting, or even sleeping. 

Then I shut down the computer and said to hell with it.  Jeff is going to help me block the trouble sites and I’m going to redouble my efforts to be more productive with my time.

Feelings and Free Things

The (guided) physical therapy certainly didn’t last long, did it?  Seems like I get a “first…” post and then it pitters off like it never existed.  It’s like posting about it jinxes it.  Jody called me on Friday to let me know that apparently policies had changed and she wouldn’t be able to handle my training any more.  She said that she’s still open to talking with me about nutrition, though.  She is someone who has recovered from disordered eating, so I think she has an interest in my patterns and potentially helping me with that too.

Lately, I’ve been feeling really off.  During lunch last week, my work-friend asked how I was doing, and I said that I just didn’t feel like myself–and that was enough to make my eyes well up with tears.  So then I’m apologizing and scrubbing at my face, and explaining I didn’t know where the emotion came from, and her eyes are welling up and she’s panicking “don’t cry! You’ll make me cry!”

So I talked to her a little about some of the things that have been stressing me out, and even though it was mighty embarrassing, I’m glad I did, because her reply was priceless.

Never apologize for the feelings that you have.

That was really helpful, and it prompted me to post on my weightloss group to see if anyone had any experience with disordered eating/coping.  One of the girls, Christy, said this:

 I think it’s really important to dig in and really confront your emotions with a compassionate heart and allow yourself to feel them completely, and know that it’s okay. It’s amazing how therapeutic it can be to have a loud, messy sob fest! The key is just allowing yourself, completely free of judgement, to feel everything. Even if part of you is saying you shouldn’t feel what you’re feeling, just tell that part to shut up because whatever you feel is legitimate. It doesn’t mean you have to let that feeling dictate your actions, but you need to let yourself feel it. Are you jealous? Pissed off? Lonely? Scared? Doubting? Self-pitiful? All valid!!

That’s definitely a route I’m trying.

Tonight, Jeff was simultaneously the best and the worst.  I’m a dum dum who decided to pour marinade on my pulled pork, thinking it was bbq sauce.  He burst out laughing, “I’m Megan, and I don’t read the bottle,” meanwhile I’m staring at my plate in mourning. Once he realized I was bummed, he switched to reassurance mode “don’t worry, it’ll be good, I promise.”  Then, as if to make good on his promise, he put the marinade on his own pulled pork sandwich, too.

Today on Facebook, the Guthrie Theater announced that they were giving away free tickets to go see Othello.  I thought for sure it was an April Fool’s prank, (look at the date, after all!) but my co-worker scored a pair so I picked up the phone and called immediately.  Let’s just say I’m going to go to a play tonight for free 😉

I don’t know if I’ll actually *like* the play or not, but you can’t argue with free, can you?