For Sale: Wagon - well used but sturdy.

Will consider a trade for leaves (new only).

Alright, alright, enough kidding around. Yes, I'm off the wagon. Yes, I'm once again vowing to turn over a new leaf. I went to the gym yesterday (thank you Katrina!) and found my gym diary showed my last workout was June 3rd, three weeks ago. Ugh.

So I've done some thinking. What's behind this gym resistance? I had a conversation recently...

me: Ugh, I don't feel like going to the gym lately. I'm so apathetic.
her: What do you think that's about?
me: ...well...I just don't feel like it.

Brilliant, aren't I? So I did some introspecting, trying to gain a better understanding of it all. I came to two conclusions. Well, three, I suppose.

#1. I am both rebelling against my new found lack of freedom and using it as an excuse. I used to be able to go to the gym whenever I was inspired to do so. Now I have to schedule it in. I have little windows in which I can go. Let the window pass and I'm stuck. It's very easy to let that window pass and then be comfortable in the knowledge that now I can't go.

#2. I think this is the biggie. I am angry that I have to lose weight. It's just not fair. In the past when I've re-gained weight I've lost it's been nothing but my own fault. This time, despite it not being entirely accurate, I view it as not my fault. I mean, I was pregnant. Of course I could have eaten better and exercised more while pregnant to avoid having to lose 30 pounds now, but that's not what happened. I choose, however, to ignore that part and pretend that I was powerless to the weight gain and am therefore angry and resentful at now having to lose said weight. I am angry at the unfairness of it. When I started this journey in February '07 I said I didn't know if I had it in me to lose the weight, and that I better get it right because I sure as heck didn't have it in me to do it, fail, and have to do it again. Well, here I am. It's true I no longer have 80+ pounds to lose (now there's something to be grateful for) but I realized that I'm angry to be back in a position of starting over, in any sense.

#3. I just don't feel like it. No, seriously, I think I'm dealing with a bit of self doubt. I don't really believe I can get back to where I was. I don't know why I doubt this, there's plenty of evidence to suggest I can, but I do. I need to change that thinking. I need to stop focusing on where I was, start from where I am, and make some short-term goals. Like really short, because even thinking about trying to lose 5 pounds sounds tough right now. Heck, I'm not even meeting my goal of going to meetings.

So the worst part of this spiral is that I am gaining weight. I haven't been to a meeting in weeks (surprise, surprise) so I'm not sure of the official gain but I think it's in the order of 5 pounds or so. I'm pushing 190 (!!) and the size 14 pants I purchased recently are getting tight (!!). I am at a fork in the road and I damn well better get a grip. [Today's blog is brought to you by metaphors]

No, that's not the worst part. The worst part is that I feel like crap. I'm getting more and more tired every day, inactivity begets inactivity and although I'm getting better and better at online Scrabble, it's not doing anything for my state of mind. So, time to take a bit of my own advice. Start again. Better than stopping again.

Oh, let me share a phone conversation between Miguel (husband) and I while he was driving home from work.

him: We need to go to the gym. Come on, meet me there.
me: No, I don't feel like it. I'm tired. You go.
him: But you need to go.
me: Why?
him: Because we're paying for it.
me: Let's cancel it then.

Yeah, well, what can I say? When I resist I resist. So, I'm looking for a new meeting. The leader I was going to left me with the impression she was talking to children. She had great things to say but her delivery didn't do it for me. If I have to go to her meetings I will though. Not as many choices around here as there used to be for some reason.

I have three weeks before I return to work. If I hit the gym for three weeks I'll be in good shape to keep it up once I'm back in the rat race. I'm really hoping these new insights will help me to move on and get back in the groove. Some good news is that I was able to do the same routine I was doing three weeks ago. 30 minutes of cardio (elliptical and walk/run treadmill) and weight training. And not sore today.

So, you all do such a great job of liking my pictures...I'll close with a few from the past weeks.

One of my favorites:

Marek and I and Miguel and Marek at the mother's club family picnic:


I actually went on a hike!

With my grandfather over Father's Day weekend.



Thank you for stopping by :) I'm off to change, feed the baby, and hit the gym.

When You Find Yourself in a Hole, Stop Digging.

The good news: Last week I did not gain 3 pounds as I expected. I only gained 2. I suppose that's a stretch for "good" news, but I'll take it where I can get it.

The bad news: I gained .2 pounds this week.

Maybe I should flip those. The bad news being I gained 2 pounds last week and the good news being I only gained .2 this week. I guess it's all about perspective. But I have more good news. I've made it to the gym a few times in the past two weeks. Again, could appear to be bad news but, for me, the way things have been going, every trip to the gym is a small victory. Also, I rode my road bike for the first time on Memorial Day. I wish I could say it was great fun but it wasn't. It was chilly, the wind was blowing in my face the whole time, it was hard, and I was alone. Next time I have to figure out a way to ride with someone else. I planned to ride up to Stafford Lake (about 7 miles) to meet Miguel for a picni. Instead I made it a little over 5 miles and asked him to pick me up when he passed, before I hit any of the hills. Ah well, at least I got my butt on the seat for a little bit.

I'm also battling a large appetite right now. I've been eating too much and now my body expects it. So I'm dealing with hunger, which isn't fun. I'm upping my protein, especially in my snacking, going for the Fage yogurt, oatmeal with a scoop of protein powder in it (an old BFL trick), cottage cheese. All things with high protein to keep me full. Nothing like hunger to make me feel I'm "entitled" to eat something. But I know my hunger cues are out of whack and I need to get them back to a more normal state.

My mood has been so-so. I am a broken record on this but working out just makes all the difference. When I don't exercise my mood tanks, and then I really don't want to work out and the cycle continues. Anyway, I think my motivation is on an upswing, and lord knows I need it. A good thing is I've eaten all the red light foods in the house and vowed not to purchase any more. I can't even purchase any yellow light foods because with my currently limited self control yellow light foods are essentially red light foods. Basically I can't purchase anything that is even remotely like a treat, which stinks, but it's what I have to do until I get things under better control. The tricky thing about being a food junkie is you can't banish it from your life.

One more thing is I'm not liking my current WW meeting. It goes past 30 minutes, which I don't like, the leader doesn't always start on time to boot, and she's very, I don't know, it feels like she's talking to us like we're children. She makes great points and has a lot to offer content-wise, but the delivery isn't doing it for me. We'll see, maybe I'll try a different one next week. Bottom line though, I go to a meeting every week, like it or not.

Baby update: Marek continues to do well. He's growing perfectly, which is always a relief. He's 11 weeks already! I think I'm still having milk supply issues but I've started taking Fenugreek to address it. It could be him though too, I don't know if this pulling and crying at the breast is due to not enough milk or him not wanting to "work" for it anymore. I'm starting to wonder if when the milk flow is no longer gushing out he starts with the pulling, latching off, crying, latching on, pulling, etc. Anyway, I will carry on. I will make it to my three month breastfeeding goal, and then we'll see. That's all for today. Please humor me in looking at a few pics of my baby :)

Ouch!

I'm continuing to meet my goal of going to meetings, and throwing in a little more for good measure, but it's a slow road. I went to the gym on Saturday for a leisurely workout. It felt good to get myself moving. I played racquetball too for a few minutes, hilariously, but can see it'd be a good workout if I knew what I was doing. I went back on Sunday and did cardio and weight training (chest and triceps). Then back yesterday, Tuesday, for more cardio and weight training (shoulders and legs). My chest is letting me know it and my legs are hurting today! Ouch. I did squats and lunges, haven't done those for a while. I got fancy with the squats and used this machine by Freemotion. I did 3 sets of 8 reps at 30 pounds and boy was it a challenge in the end there. And lunges (with no weights, my body weight is plenty!) - I was barely able to eek out the last two. Anyway, my legs are sore today. Sitting down and standing up are not fun. Still not sure if I'm going to the gym today. We'll see.

Oh, but I hopped on the scale. Ouch again. Home scale says I'm 183! Up 3 pounds? Damn, I need to do a much better job on my eating. But I'm having milk supply issues so I'm nervous to do much. Though I'm sure cutting out that second helping of ice cream in the evening won't hurt! I'm trying to at least make better choices with my eating. For example when out to lunch the other day I wanted to order the fried zucchini appetizer. I refrained and was plenty satisfied with my cheeseburger and onion rings entree. I'd like to say this type of meal is a once a week thing but it's not really. No mystery where the 183 on the scale came from. I'm not ready to make big changes but I am trying to make tiny ones.

Quick baby update. Marek took a daytime nap in his crib for the first time yesterday morning. Here's a picture of him all swaddled up and snoozing.

Welllll, what can I say?

You don't exercise, you eat way too much...it's no mystery what happens next. I gained .6 pounds this week. Ugh. Obviously I'm not surprised and, truth be told, I'm just thankful it's not more. I'm all ready to start hitting the gym again. I was feeling so good before rash week/s sidelined me. I want that feeling back. We've got doctor appointments this afternoon so I'm plotting an evening trip to the gym. Friday evening gym visits are the best, it's usually pretty empty. Sunday mornings are good too. So are Saturdays. Alright, no excuses.

I don't have to worry too much about my eating. I'm learning more and more that when I exercise the eating part comes easier. It's probably a stress thing. I exercise and the stress gets burned away with the calories. No exercise and the stress gets taken in with the calories in the form of food. It's funny, I don't go around feeling stressed but I'm pretty sure that is what's happening. Either that or I exercise and can't stand ruining my hard work by overeating. Ah, like most things, it's probably a combination of things. All I know is exercise = better eating.

And of course I'm feeling super fat these days. That just adds to the lack of inertia. What a trio, feeling fat, overeating and no exercise. If that's not a recipe for gaining weight I don't know what is. Gotta intervene. Exercise it is!

On the baby front - Marek is doing well. I'm still breastfeeding, something I'm very proud of because it's been a challenge. He's growing and changing so much! The biggest things are smiling and "talking". I took some video. Here we are chatting it up. Enjoy!

Mother's Day should be Mother's Weekend.

Where is the time? I can't believe it's been over a week since my last post. It was a pretty busy week though. First and most upsetting was I was struck with two rashes. TWO! I'll try to make this brief. First rash started and I believed I had some awful contagious disease and Marek was going to get it and I was going to have to kill myself due to the guilt. I went to see my doc who referred me to a dermatologist. Turns out it was an allergic reaction to a mango. Who knew? Second rash was due to my not knowing how to properly deal with my milk jugs. I'll spare you the details. All in all, I'm the new queen of the creams. The good news is both conditions are clearing up nicely. The downside is that I was sidelined as a result, didn't exercise at all last week.

On to some good news. I went to my WW meeting this past Friday and am happy to report I LOST A POUND!! Yippee!! It always feels good to lose some weight. After this past weekend, I'm going to have to re-focus if I want to keep it off.

But first, on Friday afternoon we headed out for a hike. I recently heard about a trail I'd never been on so we decided to explore it, the Terra Linda/Sleepy Hollow Divide Open Space Preserve (north section). The trails were very nice, not too steep, not too flat and with beautiful views. The only downside is there could have been a bit more shade, though Miguel did a good job of keeping Marek shaded. We'll definitely return here on a cooler day. Lots of trails we did not get to explore. Some pictures from our 45 minute hike...


I have so few pictures of Marek and I together. I'm always behind the camera. So after a post-hike diaper change I plopped down for a picture with my little man!!

After the hike we went into town and had burgers at The Broken Drum in San Rafael. And after that we hit up Cold Stone Creamery where I had a small mint ice cream with Oreo bits. I know, it's just not right to be describing burgers and ice cream on a fitness blog...but in real life we can eat those things AND lose weight :) All in moderation...and coupled with some exercise. Anyway, Friday was just one of those days, perfect.

What did I do for my very first Mother's Day? Well, my mother treated us to a night at a local country club resort in Napa!! We checked in on Saturday afternoon (Miguel went ahead early Saturday morning to get in 18 holes) - my mom had brought all sorts of yummy snacks in which I promptly indulged - bread, salami, cheese, mayo, cookies, chocolate...on and on. Enough about food. Before dinner Marek got a bath. The bathroom sink made a perfect bathtub!

...and was all clean to head to the restaurant!

We went out to dinner and I had some yummy salmon, mashed potatoes, etc.

On Sunday morning grandma got some baby time...

...and then we hit the brunch. I again ate a ton...bacon, eggs, waffle, butter, croissants, butter, potatoes, butter...Are you seeing a pattern? Yeah, lots of friggin' butter! But it was yummers. After brunch mom and I went to the spa to chill while Miguel chilled with Marek in the room. The spa facilities were niiiice. I didn't get any treatments, just laying in the sun with music and a magazine, and a little champagne!, made me happy enough.


Now that I have a baby I often find myself asking, "Why didn't I do this more often before"? I am comforted to know my life is no longer a wasteland of couch and TV time. That's one of the best things about health and fitness, life is no longer passing me by! Thank you Mom for a wonderful weekend!!

I indulged a bit too much in that lovely sunshine and now have a bit of a burn on my chest and back. That, together with my not quite completely healed rash(es) is making me hesitant to go to the gym. Rash + Sunburn makes sweating no fun. I have another busy week ahead, lots of doctor appointments. I'm going to focus on healthy eating and try to get in some gym time later this week. Let's hope I can hold on to that 1 pound loss!!