Progress Report

This past week has been trying in just about every way possible. I almost did not even weigh myself this morning, as I knew I had probably gained. I felt like if I didn't go ahead and weigh I would not be 100% truthful and that is not okay with me. I woke up Wednesday morning feeling puny. I had a pretty bad burny throat and absolutely zero energy. As the week went on, instead of getting better I felt worse. There were days I really struggled to stay on Weight Watchers because I felt so bad. Overall I am pretty proud of myself. I only used about 6 of my extra weekly allowance points. I did zero exercise. I pretty much stayed in bed when I was not working. Most days I did good to get in 1,000 steps. I know that's pretty pathetic...trust me! All in all I was not looking forward to weigh in day. To my surprise I barely gained anything. In my mind I basically maintained, but technically I gained 5/10 of a pound. I can knock that off pretty easy this week...I hope.

I did not keep much of a food journal in my fitness pal this week. I will go ahead and post what I do have. Most of my diet consisted of Halls, tea, and water.

The other thing I forgot to mention is pretty early in the week...Wednesday to be exact, my microwave decided to blow. I don't cook meals every single day. Maddy is not a left over type of person, so I generally cook one or two things throughout the week. All I had on hand were frozen burrito's and a few vegetables. I've learned just how much I took my microwave for granted. Something that used to take 1 minute 30 seconds, now takes 28 minutes in the oven. I just started feeling better yesterday, however, I ended up with a migraine all day yesterday. I was so nauseous and finally remembered pickles were zero points, so I ate a pickle and drank a little of the juice. 

I did measure my waist and hips today. My waist stayed the same, but I lost half an inch off my hips. I would love to see a 3 pound weight loss this week, but that is almost unrealistic for me. The thing to remember is to keep going even when you want to give up. Have a fantastic week!

Jeremiah 29:11 

The Results Are In

I am so beyond excited to share that this past week I lost a total of 1.8 pounds!!! I was hoping I would have at least a full pound lost. So in 3 weeks I have basically lost 3 pounds...woohoo!!! For these weekly updates I will share screen shots of my fitness pal entries to show what I ate and then explain my exercise. Before I begin sharing pictures I want to add that I am still doing weight watchers. I count everything that goes into my mouth and I weigh everything before eating. I do not use any of my weekly allowance points, nor do I add extra points for activity. I strictly eat my 26 points.

Wednesday
I did not add my food to my fitness pal, so I cannot share what I ate because I don't remember. It shows I had 4,720 steps from my fitbit. I also cannot remember if I exercised. If I did, I would have done 20 minutes of body rock. Wednesday's are usually my off days because it is a night filled with church.

Thursday
I did not enter in all my food entries. I will post what I did enter though. I am also not sure if I exercised, but if I did it would be another 20 minutes of Body Rock tv.

Friday

I am pretty sure I did not exercise Friday.

Saturday

I did a hour long step class at the gym Saturday morning and then did 5-10 minutes of the Zumba class afterwards.

Sunday

I did not workout other than going to the park and playing with Maddy

Monday

I did an hour Zumba class at the gym.

Tuesday(Today)

I did another hour long Zumba class at the gym. 

One thing I forgot to add to today's is I will probably have one more glass of sweet tea, otherwise, I will not meet my 26 points. 

As you can see I tend to eat a lot of the same things over and over. It is not a have to, but a want to. If I find food combinations that work for me then I tend to stick with them. I have never felt hungry since starting weight watchers. I have also been drinking more water. I get the most water when I work out at the gym. Since I now only have one glass of sweet tea during work hours, I drink more water. I have to have a drink with me at all times. 

I have just started noting my measurements, so the next update will include if I lost any inches. I'm not sure what next week will bring, but for right now I am very pleased with my progress. I do plan to keep my weight watchers up through Thanksgiving, so we will see how that goes. I hope you are having a great week!

Jeremiah 29:11

Getting My Body Back

I have been trying to get my pre-pregnancy body back for 5 years. I have tried a few things off and on over the years. I did a lot of reading to see how other people lost their baby weight, but could never find anything detailed enough that would help me. I had tried weight watchers in the past and knew it worked, so two years ago I signed back up online. I bought the weight watchers frozen dinners and stuck to the point system. I think I may have lost 2/10 of a pound my first week. I was really discouraged. The next week I lost close to the same amount. I talked to my mom who was also doing weight watchers and it just wasn't working for her either. I decided to give it up and try something else. In the long run I didn't really try to do anything else other than eliminate as many processed foods as possible. October 2014 I started a program I had never tried, but could not hit the numbers I needed to in order for it to be successful. By this point my mom had signed back up to weight watchers. 4 weeks into her journey she had lost a decent amount of weight. I decided I would give weight watchers one more try. Weight watchers allows you to eat whatever you want, but you have to stay within your points. If you eat chips and candy, then you're gonna go through your points fast and still feel hungry. If you eat lean meat and vegetables, however, you will feel satisfied and still have points left over. Weight watchers allows room for error, or as I like to call it a cheat day. You have a weekly allowance of points outside of your main point system, in case you do go over your points. I think it's designed to help you not feel like you completely messed up. Most fruits and vegetables are zero points, so if you have exhausted your points for the day you can just go find you something that has zero points. I did not weigh myself before I started weight watchers because honestly I couldn't handle what the scale might tell me. I weighed myself starting on my second week and was still pretty horrified. My first week of weighing I lost 4/10 of a pound. I still felt very discouraged and if I hadn't known my mom had lost quite a few pounds I probably would have quit. I thought maybe I didn't lose much because I wasn't getting in my 10,000 steps each day. My third week I tried my best to get my steps in, but I rarely made it. I did exercise two days my third week and then it was time to weigh again. I was scared I didn't lose anything, but luckily I lost 9/10 of a pound. I weigh in on Tuesday mornings and found another problem that might have prevented me from losing 1 pound a week. I usually have about 3-4 big glasses of sweet tea. When I started weight watchers my tea consumption dropped a little, but I was not counting my tea as any points. I plugged in the tea information into my fitness pal and realized the amount of tea I drink is probably at least 4 points each glass. If I have 3 glasses that is 12 of my 26 points gone. I am hoping since I have been counting my tea as points now to see a bigger weight loss. I am also starting to go to fitness classes at the gym I belong to. Saturday morning I got up early to go do an hour of step class. It was not just step, we also did a lot of squats, push ups, and abs. My legs are so sore right now it isn't even funny lol. Right after step is zumba so me and my mom did as much as we could of that. We used to do zumba every friday morning, but my work schedule got hectic and I wasn't allowed to flex as much as I had in the past so we quit going. This week we are going to go Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday afternoon to see which class we like best. Then on Saturday mornings we will do step and a little Zumba.

My whole reason for posting this is if you have struggled with weight loss for any reason at all, I just wanted you to know there is hope. I'm not sure if I will ever really get my body back, but I am going to work hard at getting it back as much as I can. There are many different programs out there that can help you lose weight. I chose weight watchers because it doesn't limit what you eat, it just limits how much you eat. I plan to give a little update each week on my weight loss. I want to include things I eat and what exercises I do to help lose the weight. When I did weight watchers in the past I mainly ate the weight watchers frozen meals. Since I have cut out processed foods (as much as I could), I am not buying them this go round. I eat mostly the same foods throughout the week because it works for me and I like them. I save most of my points for the evening. During the day I will have a glass of tea and then in the afternoon I will have either a pack of peanut butter crackers or a healthier granola bar. For dinner I have half a cup of mashed potatoes, 1 cup of shredded chicken breast with BBQ sauce, and either some baked beans or broccoli with cheese. For snacks I have a cup of popcorn if I have points left over or a small bag of chips or a cappuccino blast from baskin robbins. If you can't or don't want to go to a gym a great at home workout site is: http://www.bodyrock.tv/ I lost inches from their workouts prior to weight watchers. On days I don't go to the gym I will continue using their workouts.

I hope this time next year I will feel much better about myself. I have started this process so many times before and ended up quitting. This time I am pretty serious about sticking with it. I told myself I would not be where I wanted to be by this Christmas, but if I keep going I can be by next Christmas. Challenge accepted :) I will not post pictures on here of me, but I may post my numbers later on.  I am going to include a snippet of my fitness pal on here because I can't stand a plain blog post lol.

This snippet from my fitness pal was pre-weight watchers. It was when I was on a new to me program that required a lot of protein. I was basically eating nothing but protein and just felt so full all the time, but could never hit it. The bottom picture is from my fitbit app. I have the fitbit one and I absolutely love it. It is very accurate and they've added challenges you can create with your fitbit friends to motivate you to get moving. This was one of my best days. I was in a challenge with two people and I am very competitive lol.