Adjusted Reality

So it’s July, and that means the year is half over (huh?  how the heck did that happen?  someone tell me…), so that means it’s time to take stock of how I’m doing on this year’s goals.

1.  This is the most important and different one for me – for one year, I am going to not attempt to lose weight.  As long as I maintain under 155, I’m going to put any pressure on myself to take off weight.  I’m going to focus on my running, and continuing to eat healthy.  This break really put into perspective how healthy I usually eat – I’m not eating horribly at all, but I’ve been feeling blech from eating not homecooked food for most meals and the sweet crap around the house (popcorn, almond roca, truffles, etc etc).  Now, if I *do* take off weight somehow, I’m not going to be opposed to it, but the biggest present I’m giving to myself this year is the gift of stepping on the scale, and not wanting to be less than I am, for once in my life.

I have not had a weigh in under 155.  Hell, I haven’t had a weigh in in almost a month and a half.  However, I am continuing to maintain what feels like a healthy weight that fuels my training and I haven’t had to buy new pants (I’m just having to avoid the smallest ones).  Eventually, I would like to bring my weight back down around 150.  However, I’m coming to terms with the fact that it may not be due to a calories in calories out thing, and I am spending the last half of the year trying to clean up my eating (less sugar, eating more for lunch, etc).

2.  Running – I want to do a half marathon in under 2 hours, and I want to run a full marathon (no pace goal, just run the whole thing… well, who am I kidding, I’ll have a pace goal by the time I finish training, but anyhoo…) this year.  After that, decide what’s next.  Martial arts?  Triathlons?  More marathons?  Ultras?  Also, I want to make sure to not forget stretching and yoga.  That’s when I start getting injured like I am now with hurty butt.

Well, I got super sick and am just glad I finished that half within 3 mins of my PB hacking and coughing.  I decided to go a different way and am NOT pursuing marathons at this time (just think about training in the 98 and humid outside today makes me happy I decided against it…), and instead going after first a sprint and then an olympic triathlon.  I’ve thought about them in the future, and ever since I did the Du in April and loved it, and figure that swimming a mile, biking 25, and running a 10k back to back is about as athletic an endeavor as a marathon.

I’m also thinking another half in November.  The same half I was going to do the marathon since they have one.  I just need a little revenge.  I am planning on trying a completely different approach… for the last one I was SO WELL TRAINED.  I got my 5k PB by barely training and just busting it out on race day.  I’m going to run, sure, but I’m going to do less focused training, just make sure I feel capable of the distance with some long runs and have loose legs with some speedwork, and maybe even work some hills in there so I’m ready for those and see if I can get a PB.  Even if it’s just 2:15:59.

I have been really really bad about stretching/yoga lately.  I’m feelin’ it.  I’ll consider this a reminder to get back to it.

3.  I will dedicate 6 hours per week to writing, revising, reading other books, or outlining.  I want to finish what I started for NaNoWriMo, and then move on to another one.  It would be peachy keen if I could do some necklaces, I would love to start songwriting, but I think this is my year of writing.

Just EPIC FAIL here beyond actually getting into a fantasy novel series I’m slowly working through.  2010 is not the year for this.  I’m totally ok letting it fall off the radar.

4.  I’m not sure exactly what I want to say here, but I want to figure out what’s next career-wise.  I have spent the last few years keeping my head down and trying to stay out of the way so I can support the creatives, get my check, and go on my way.  That is SO not me.  I can’t continue to do that forever.  I might not have the ability to get what I want just yet, but I want to have a direction by the end of the year.

Number 3 really fell off due to a big change here with #4.  I got the opportunity in February, and got the official title last month, and it’s been an entirely awesome but…life .  My brain is a little more wasted and in need of unwinding at the end of the day.  It used to be screaming for a creative outlets.  Now my job is one big creative outlet.  I had figured I had topped out in the games industry and needed to explore other options, now I know I just had to be patient.  In the 5 years I held the same position and felt like my career stagnated, I lost over 100 lbs, ran 2 half marathons, moved halfway across the country, bought a house, got married, and a bunch of other stuff I’m surely forgetting.  So I’ll take it.  But I’m definitely ready to rock.

5.  Some one liners: Travel outside the country.  Be more spontaneous.  Continue to whittle down my smoking.  Try something new with my hair.  Continue to draw things out of the magic hat.  Host some game nights at the house.   Attempt to keep a cleaner house so it’s not embarrassing when someone comes over unannounced.  Do more industry events and get over my boredom with networking for networking sake.  Play more games.  Continue to live a life where I can have at least ONE memorable thing I do each month (2009 has many more than 1 per month, but that’s my absolute minimum requirement).

Mexican/Caribbean cruise in Jan. and then Italian/Grecian Honeymoon next year.  This year, it’s been all lower 48.  The money will be there next year so it’s ok.  I’ve been working on being better with spontaneous eating and plans but it’s still a challenge.  I am smoking much less than I was in January.  Hair has been chopped.  Magic hat has been lonely, but we have been definitely having adventures.  House cleaner = fail… I’m coming to terms with the fact that I need to pay someone.  Been a *little* better about industry events.  Been playing more games than when I wrote this, but still would like to play more.  And…uh… my life rocks.  Most every week there is something memorable.

All in all, the year is definitely not going as planned, but it’s going swimmingly.  So how is your year going?  What is your biggest success this year?  What’s something that you want to focus on in the latter half of 2010?

Today is day 13 without desert.  The first few days were a little tricky but I got through it, and now I’ve pretty much broken the habit of “eat dinner, have desert”.  I talked myself out of coworker cookies and monthly birthday cake at work.  I’ve realized that when limiting sweets (I’m thinking when I complete my month detox, maybe allow one desert a week), very few things are actually worth it.  My first sweet on August 6th is going to be either some for real frozen yogurt or a milkshake.  These are things that are worth it.

One of our guilty pleasures is buffet food.  I’m not a horrible wild woman, but I enjoy the freedom to have a BIG ASS SALAD and some soup, pick at some entrees I would normally not try, and sample some bites of a bunch of different deserts.  Today, I’d been up since 9 and it was 2:30, and my breakfast consisted of 1 apple, and I had been cleaning all morning.  We decided it was a buffet day.  I got there and had my typical gigantic salad, and picked at some food, and then had some fruit.  It was… lacking.  Without the desert course, it was thoroughly unsatisfying.  It was kind of an eye opener.  I don’t think I’m going to frequent buffets as much anymore.  I’d rather go have a salad and then an entree of my choosing somewhere.

I think I’ve missed my window of having a productive weigh in.  It’s about to be that TOM and I’m feeling it, so I’m just setting myself up for disappointment.  I think that the most reasonable thing to do is to wait until my month of no deserts is up and see what that’s done to my poundage.  However, I think month by month is a good way to pick at my bad food habits (hell, habits in general) and slowly try to figure out how to live in a way that would make my body the most happy.  So I need to figure out what next month will be.  Maybe give up fried stuff for a month?  Maybe make a big official thing about eating most of my calories before dinner?  Any suggestions?

Anyhoo, I didn’t count calories again, so the numbers won’t be terribly productive.  Most of our lunches were bigger and dinners were smaller.  We went out Monday night for the yelp event and Wednesday to support a coworker at a karaoke competition, but stayed in all weekend so it sorta made up for it.

Monday: 4 mile run (500)
Tuesday: weights (150)
Wednesday: 12 mile ride and 2 mile run (700)
Thursday: off
Friday: 50 mins running speedwork, 1.5 mile walk (700)
Saturday: 25 mile bike ride (800)
Sunday: housecleaning (seriously, cleaned for like 6 hours today…it is worthy of being on the list)

Next week:  I have ZERO plans except heading up to la casa de parental units.  I’m sure that will change, and the schedule will roll along with that, but here’s the penciled in version:

Monday: 10k run (700)
Tuesday: weights (200)
Wednesday: 12 mile run, 5k run (800)
Thursday: off
Friday: 30 mins arc trainer (400)
Saturday: 25 mile bike, 5k run (1100)
Sunday: swimming (400)

Also this week: going to track again to see how I’m doing and make sure my intuitions aren’t off.  Along with my no deserts thing and a full workout schedule and fairly empty dance card, hopefully it will be a healthy-type week.

So my question to you: what is the one not-so-healthy habit you’d change?  Feeling a little too sweet?  Fast food junkie?  Stuck on one type of cardio?  Ideas welcome of things to try in the months ahead…

Once upon a time (2002) in a land far far away (San Diego), when I was a fairly heavy smoker, there was a coworker, who I will name C.  We were both overweight, but he was a non-smoker.  He would always preach to me about how horrible cigarettes were, and my counter was that lots of things are drugs (that is, causing pleasurable chemical reactions in your body that made you want more), for example, sugar.  I bet I could go longer without a smoke than he could without sugar.  He made it until lunch and got a jamba juice without really thinking about it and I was still not even really yet craving a smoke.

At that point, I was also on Atkins so any victory in my cold, carbless life made me feel a little less of a shell of a lifeless person.  But it still made me feel validated.

I’ll point out that sugar was never what made me fat.  Sure, I’d indulge in deserts now and again but what really did me in was salt.  Potato chips.  Bagels.  Pizza.  Burgers.  Fries.  Taco combo plates.  I wouldn’t turn down the ice cream social day or birthday cake or some candy from the candy jar, but I rarely sought it out.  I actually find that the skinnier I am, the more I skew towards sugar.  As a kid, I ate candy like no other, but in my late teen years til about 30, I’d rarely ever eat sweets.  Since I’ve picked up distance running and am smaller again – the sugar smacks come back.

It’s not to the same level as it used to be.  As a kid, I’d have a candy bar EVERY DAY at lunch.  As a young adult, I would have a smoke after a meal in the same way you might eat desert.  Now, I have shifted back to having a sweet after dinner – though it might be healthier like a 60 calorie sorbet or a bowl of whole grain cereal and almond milk, or a hershey kiss or two, it is still something I feel like I want/need/deserve just about every day.

Also, I used to have the “oh, I’ll have deserts when I’m out, but only on a special occasion”.  This last week and a half of no deserts made me realize that there are a damn lot of special occasions.  So far this week I’ve had to turn down cake twice, tim tams, snickerdoodles, and a few other things I’ve certainly blocked from my mind.  I have done  9 successful days without deserts (beyond fruit).

I’m going to try to go a full month.  Yeah, I know.  I think I’m crazy too.

The reasons are twofold.

One, I’ve tried everything else to lose weight, and maybe the answer isn’t to eat x-amount of calories.  Maybe I really and truly need to spend some time cleaning up my intake, and examining that, one area I really can work on and not feel horribly deprived cutting out is desert.  A chocolate or 2 while I’m PMSing or having some bacon chocolate brownies or my friend’s amazing fudge at a party?  Totally should be in my life.  Feeling compelled to get up and snort the sheet cake from costco in the break room?  Blech.  Having to have some sort of sweet at the end of the day just about every day?  Badness.

Second, I just want to prove to myself that I can.  Nine days in and I still feel like my workouts are missing a lot of pep.  I don’t like feeling like things control me.  I CONTROL THINGS.  And not having had much of a sweet tooth when I was 265 lbs, it feels like a STEP BACK to have one now.

A minor reason?  I want to be able to have the deserts I *want*.  Rather than a hershey kiss every day or some sorbet, I’d like to once a month be able to go out and order a slice of key lime pie.  Or the fro yo I’ve been craving.  Or a milkshake.  I want to feel justified that I can enjoy the REAL THING and not just have to make due with a substitute.  These are things I’m trying to incorporate in my diet as well (like real cheese instead of plastic cheese, etc) but baby steps.

So the eating rules are thus:

-Fresh fruit in any quantity is allowed.

-A fortune cookie or a starlite mint does not count.

-I’m not worrying right now about HFCS or the sugar content of anything that is a FOOD, just trying to stay away from anything you could classify as a DESERT.  Cereal and milk are banned because I eat them like a sweet, but if I was eating them for breakfast instead of my protein bar, it would be ok.

-No sugared drinks (though it’s not like I drink them anyway).

-My 110 cal 1g sugar protein shake is allowed since it’s consumed as an after workout recovery, not desert.

I think that’s it.  I figured I should get this public before I reconsider. 🙂

We’ll see how this goes.  Wish me luck!  Have you ever done a sugar detox?  How did you feel?  Anything you feel like giving up this month? Who’s coming with me?

Life is the picture of overwhelming right now.  Even though I’m getting enough sleep, I’m just a lot more DRAINED than normal so getting stuff done on weekdays outside of working hours (which are some days creeping past 8 into 9 or 10 hours) is impossible.  I mean, I’m up at 8:30, to work by 9-ish, get out of work usually around 6:30 or 7 (and that’s working through lunch), head to the gym for an hour or so, come home, make dinner, and it’s about 9:30 or 10pm by the time I’m done eating, and then I have about an hour and some change before it’s time to get into bed.  Rinse and repeat.

Usually weekends are my saving grace.  However, spending EVERY WAKING MOMENT of 4th of July break out of town and then heading straight into work exhausted and sleep deprived, didn’t help.  And since we weren’t home, there was so much to do this weekend.  Plus work spilled over into the weekend.  And the house is a FREAKING DISASTER and getting to me.  Anyone who really knows me would discern that it would have to be pretty bad – as generally I don’t mind living in chaos.  But this is getting ridiculous – there is so much crap on the kitchen counter that I’m trying to avoid making anything for food that takes prep.   And… this weekend I thought it would be a grand idea to go party both Friday and Saturday nights.  So I’ve spent the entire weekend either drunk or just tired.  No bueno at all.

I’m not even sure how I’m going to keep it together this week.  I’m anticipating a most hellacious week at work due to deadlines and stuff.  We have after work obligations tomorrow and Wednesday.   It’s Sunday night and instead of relaxed and happy and rested I feel exhausted and stressed and frazzled.  Not a great way to go into said week.

I either need to just get up and start dealing with stuff or decide to push it out of my mind.  The house being messy is NOT an emergency and can wait.  If the laundry doesn’t get put away, who cares?  The problem is since I *do* care, it’s stressing me out that it’s not done.  So I think that’s my answer – sacrifice my Sunday night to get shite done even if I’ll be a little less rested, because sitting here stressing about it isn’t restful and isn’t doing me any good anyway.  So there.

It’s not all horrible though.  I made good on my sugar reduction last week.  I did not have desert once, minus a few starlight mints and a fortune cookie, neither of which count in my opinion.  I gave myself free reign with fruit, and mowed through a lot of it.  I also found some really yummy 110 calorie protein shakes which are my new favorite after workout snack (only 1 gram of sugar too).  However, since they’re expensive, I’m saving them for particularly intense workouts.  Any suggestions for protein shake type things that are low sugar and about the same amount of calories?  110 calories for 30g protien is a GOOD DEAL calorie-wise, but at 8 bucks for 4 shakes, not a viable every day consumable.

I also started moving back to making lunch my biggest meal of the day and starting to feel better overall about it.  I’m not a huge believer in the “no eating after a certain time” thing, but I feel like I have less of the “hungries” overall.  And…on big workout days, it’s much more satisfying to have a 800-1000 calorie lunch at a restaurant than 500-700 calories of dinner and 300 calories of random snacks.  Plus now that I’m eating so late, it’s nice to not go to bed so full.

However, I kinda screwed up and didn’t track my calories.  I also completely botched my training plan due to just sheer exhaustion.  I think that I did alright with calories in and out and eating good stuff, but I certainly can’t quantify it.  Here is what I did workout-wise last week:

Monday: off (driving)
Tuesday: 40 mins arc trainer (525 calories)
Wednesday: off (exhaustion, felt like I was coming down with something)
Thursday: 12 mile bike ride, 3 mile run (just didn’t have 5 in me) (800 calories)
Friday: 45 mins arc trainer (600 calories)
Saturday: 12 mile bike ride, 40 mins arc trainer (900 calories)
Sunday: off

This week will really depend on how crazy work is, and how tired I am, but here is the plan.

Monday: 4 mile run (500)
Tuesday: DDR or arc trainer and weights (450-ish)
Wednesday: 12 mile ride and 5k run (800)
Thursday: off
Friday: 45 mins running speedwork (600)
Saturday: 25 mile bike ride (800)
Sunday: off

More running, a nice long bike ride, less arc trainer, and while I’d like to fit 2 weights sessions in there, I just don’t think I have time.  So it is what it is.

I’m just realizing that something has to give for now.  I had hoped to blog a little more frequently, and I even have a really burning post in my head as a mid-year wrap up (as it is now WELL past July 1st), but every time I go to write anything but these weekly wrap ups, I just can’t do it.  While I’m still obviously making strides to make sure I’m eating healthy/enough/not too much, and still definitely working out more than the average bear, I just don’t have the mindshare and give-a-crap to track and be neurotic about it.

Tomorrow is one month away from the scale, and I think that I’m going to continue on at least one more week.  I’m all worked up enough with everything else going on to freak out about my weight.  My pants still fit fine, I know I’m not doing too bad, so I’ll find out later this week or next week when I feel like I *could* handle it if I have gained a few.  I have really liked not worrying about the number.  I think I’ll continue monthly weigh ins unless I find I’ve gained.

Alrighty, going to get up and be productive.  It will be a good week.  No deserts, bigger lunches/smaller dinners, and staying sane and trying to figure out how to get my life under control.  Looking forward to hiring minions to delegate some of this stuff to at work, and perhaps its time to consider doing the same at home (maid service – next on the money list once we get caught up right after “nicer gym”).  Question of the week: what one thing would you hire someone to do if you could either professionally or personally?

There is really no place like home.  It wasn’t always that way.  As a kid, the last day of vacation was always so sad to me.  I’d have to be dragged kicking and screaming from the pool the last day.  People at summer camp would get homesick, and I never understood that, I’d just get sad the last day when everyone else got excited to go home.  It’s not that home was bad at all, it’s just that I loved different.  I loved new experiences.  I loved having a break from the norm.  If I would have caught a break to do it earlier in life, I might have easily taken a job with tons of traveling and been happy as a clam.

However, that train left the station years ago.  It took the left track and I took the right, and now I loathe being away for too long from my leezards, my couch, my bed, my kitchen… my house in general.  If I have to take a trip without my Zliten, forget about it.  I’m counting the hours until my plane lands. It’s sick and sappy and perhaps pukeworthy, but it’s almost pointless to go away without him unless I have to, because I barely enjoy it, even after 11 years of being together.

The last few years, it’s also a desire to be back into a routine.  I come back from vacation craving veggies like an addict in rehab, and after shaking off the tireds, enjoy resuming the hardcore workouts.  This time I did definitely keep up the activity the two days we weren’t driving all day, but usually it’s just a lot of walking.  And since I follow the ethos of letting go on vacation, it usually just barely (if at all) makes up for the revelry and merriment.  I’m ok with that because we go away a few times a year, and it really hits home how good I feel when I eat healthy.  Seriously – when I get grumpy because I can’t let go and eat anything I want, I remember how I feel after a few days on vacation.  It’s worth it, but I am always so happy to be back to healthy food.

So to tally up all the so bad/so good things I remember eating, there was pizza, homemade waffles, fries, a bowl of frosted flakes, oreo cookie frozen custard, movie theatre nachos (complete with the fake orange “cheese food” that is so low quality it tastes like plastic but even still has a soft spot in my heart), a few types of wedding cake, crackers and dip, and much more.  Not to mention for-reals moonshine, dequiris, beer, and copius amounts of whiskey.  Against that, I ran 3 miles, ellipticaled 2 miles, did 20 mins weights, swam over half a mile, and walked about 7 miles total.  On the way there and back I stuck to subway because damned if I was going to splurge calories on fast food nastiness.  So, it wasn’t all bad.

It was totally worth it to see my two great friends get married.  They both looked awesome, everything about the wedding was country and adorable and just felt like it was done up with love.  They both lost it multiple times during the ceremony and it was just fantastic.  Not to mention the “nuptial picnic” after out in the middle of nowhere.  There was a taco buffet, lots of homemade appetizers, a daquiri machine and kegs of beer, five different types of wedding cake.  We played bingo (and won an inflatable monkey and some other prizes cuz we were lucky!) and watched kids light off hours worth of fireworks (no one even lost any limbs or had to be rushed to the hospital), drunk Elvis came out, we drank moonshine, and I convinced the groom to do a kegstand.  By doing a kegstand myself.  Don’t judge.  Do notice the good form, my gymnastics coaches would be proud.

This week, it’s back to the grindstone.  Monday was a too big breakfast (two plates of fruit, half a bagel, a piece of peanut butter and honey toast), subway turkey, and then veggies and fiber pasta w/chicken and spicy sauce for dinner, so fairly healthy, but I did have some sweets in there.  As of yesterday, I’ve actually decided to do a mini sugar detox – no deserts for as long as I can stand it.  I had a fortune cookie, but that totally doesn’t count.  After dinner I had a bunch of frozen fruit instead of a random sweet, so it’s off to a good start.

I’m almost considering putting off weighing one more week – I’m not entirely sure I want to know what I weigh 6 days from now.  We shall see. Last week by the numbers is pretty much useless, but I’ll list out my workouts.

Monday: 6.75 miles running (725 calories burnt)
Tuesday: Arc trainer for 30 mins, 45 mins weights (600 calories burnt)
Wednesday: 12 mile bike ride, 5 mile run (1075 calories burnt)
Thursday: off (packing)
Friday: off (driving)
Saturday: 3 mile run, 2 miles eliptical, 800m swim, 20 mins weights, 1 mile walk (1200 calories burnt)
Sunday: 5.75 mile walking (500 calories burnt)

4100 calories burnt.  585 on average per day.  Considering I rolled at a significant deficit the first 4 days of the week, I’d have had to done like 3500 calories per day on vacay to really and truly gain weight.  I might have gotten close one day, but not all of them.  So I’ll say – that’ll do pig, that’ll do.

Here’s the plan for this week, which is already underway…

Monday: off (driving)
Tuesday: Arc trainer for 45 (600 calories)
Wednesday: 12 mile bike ride, 5 mile run (1075 calories)
Thursday: weights + somesortacardio for about 30 mins (500 calories)
Friday: run of some sorta TBD (10k, sprints, hills)  (500-750 calories)
Saturday: weights, walking adventure (600-1o million  calories)
Sunday: off or something mellow-active like a bike ride or walk or some such (who knows)

Kind of a TBD week.  I felt really super exhausted yesterday after work and almost took a rest day, but a mellow workout did me right, I do believe.  Today, I have crazy planned, but if I’m still not feeling 100% I might ratchet down to just mildly insane.  It’s going to be a hard week at work, and I’ve got lots to do at home, so we shall see.

Hope you all had a great 4th…or may the 4th be with you? 🙂