I am so angry right now I can barely contain it. Nothing happened, the kids are behaving about the same as usual, as is the rest of the world. But EVERYTHING is making me mad. Way more mad than any of it should be worth. Wish I could curl up under the covers and just pretend the world doesn't exist for awhile. I don't like being like this.

Yeah, we all know the reason I haven't posted. I'm caving and going to be measured for new bras tomorrow. I'm tired of being uncomfortable all the time. Maybe a couple new pairs of pants too. Seems like I can justify wearing sweats pretty much all the time now. :o(

I am working out though... Just eating unhealthy food in unhealthy quantities.

Well, I'm getting no where and fast. Blah!! It occurred to me tonight that I might very well die before I ever experience being 'thin' and having a flat toned belly. I've wasted 15 years of my adult life being fat and not liking my body. Wonder why that's not to get me to eat less? Double blah!!

Being fat is hard. Losing weight is hard. Maintaining lost weight is hard. Pick your hard. Today I picked: Being fat.

I haven't blogged in a few days (a week maybe?). Which, of course, means I've been choosing fat. Actually it hasn't been so bad. My eating has been hit or miss healthy and I haven't done any cardio, but I did do Jillian 4 out of 5 days this week and I moved up to level 2 as well.

Actually, it was just a crazy week. Mike started his new job. I was moderately sick all week. Rachel got really sick (again) mid week. Spencer got sent home from school with pink eye - which is what Rachel had at the beginning of this latest go-round with a miserable cold. I'm feeling better, but not great - my throat just will not stop throbbing, but it won't till my sinuses stop draining. Mike doesn't hate or love the job, but he's being a grown up about it. Kids are both on anti-biotics, well, stronger ones for Rachel and the first round for Spencer, so tey are feeling much better.

Here's the schedule for the week:

Sun - long run, outside
Mon - 6w6p, Elliptical
Tues - 6w6p, 5k Hill Intervals slow pace
Wed - 6w6p, Elliptical
Thur - 6w6p, 5k Speed Intervals
Fri - 6w6p, 5k
Sat - OFF

Need to work on dinner plans and finances, so that I don't use them as excuses in the morning not to run...

Being fat is hard. Losing weight is hard. Maintaining lost weight is hard. Pick your hard. Today I picked: Maintaining

Hmmm... The above tagline was supposed to motivate me, but all it seems to be doing is making me shy away from blogging. ;o)

Yesterday wasn't good in terms of healthy eating. Today wasn't much better. At least I exercised today.

Onto tonight and tomorrow. No sweets tonight. I'm drinking my chamomile & peppermint tea (aka Sleepytime) with 2 splenda packets hoping that it will work it's sweet magic and substitute for some sort of dessert option. We really don't have anything around, but that's never stopped me from eating handfuls of chocolate chips or making a full batch of chocolate chip cookies. I need to make a batch, freeze the scoops of dough and portion them out into baggies with 3 cookies each. It seems like a waste of baggies, but maybe it will help me to only bake 3 at a time. So I can have my sweet tooth and weight loss together. That's the goal right? Balance. Always about balance.

I swear that if I were had the balls to get a tattoo, it would be the word "balance" somewhere where I see it everyday. Make it look like a bracelet or something. Just to remind me that literally everything in life comes down to balance.

Tomorrow, I will get up with Mike - he starts his new job - and do 6w6p as planned. Grocery store to get some buttermilk for dressing and then salad for lunch. I actually find a salad quite filling, it's just not always easy to have all the ingredients in the house at the same time. Dinner is... let me check... Ranch Ham and Pasta and veggies. So yummy - just need to keep the portion size in check.

Left a $100 bill for a $65 meal at a restaurant tonight. Mike looked at me like I'd grown a second head when I told him not to ask for change. But he came around in about 3 seconds. MIL had given us the money for dinner when we didn't do anything to earn/deserve it. We enjoyed it and then passed the enjoyment onto someone else (I assume she was happy about it, we didn't wait around to see her open the folio).

Anyway, I'm babbling. Going to go look at my heart rate data from my run and log my miles.

Being fat is hard. Losing weight is hard. Maintaining lost weight is hard. Pick your hard. Today I picked: not worrying about it.

Stupid Easter colored m&ms. Did 6w6p this morning as planned. Ate healthy meals other than the m&ms. Lots of veggies at dinner and stopped when full even though there was still plenty in my bowl. I knew when I dished it at it epwas too much. Went out to drinks and a movie with a friend, had some bread pudding at bravo and a mojito. Delish!

Being fat is hard. Losing weight is hard. Maintaining lost weight is hard. Pick your hard.

Today I picked: losing weight.

Did well yesterday. Did well today. Had a biscotti over coffee with a friend. But fought the urge for Chipotle and went home for lunch. Didn't have time to eat much so I settled for a granola bar and followed up with a salad later in the day. Dinner was to be smoked sausage with mac and cheese and peas, but I switched it to roasted potatoes and carrots to curb the cheese aspect and up the healthy aspect. It was still just as good.

I did half of 6w6p this morning as planned and ran 3.1 tonight. Tomorrow will be 6w6p in the morning again, but probably I'm going out in the evening, so probably nothing there - maybe I'll go for a run on Sat morning to make up for it.

Being fat is hard. Losing weight is hard. Maintaining lost weight is hard. Pick your hard. Yesterday I picked: being fat.

Rachel had a friend over for an all day playdate. We made cookies. I ate most of them. Didn't exercise in the evening. :o(

Today I'm choosing losing weight.

The scale shows little to no change over the past couple weeks, but my clothes are looser, so that a little encouraging.

Starting tomorrow, I'm going to get up at 6:40 and do half of 6W6P. Going to do that every weekday. I originally wanted a 20 minute core workout that I could do in the morning. 6W6P seemed like the best option, though it is 35 minutes long. But it just occurred to me that the times that I've stopped half way through have been about 18 minutes (since she just repeats the whole set, it's not like I'm missing anything). So that way, I can do it everyday. I'd rather do 18 minutes everyday, than 35 minutes every other. It's just too easy to forget about it if it's not everyday.

Took a jog/walk around a local lake this morning and it was nice. Intervals tonight.

Being fat is hard. Losing weight is hard. Maintaining lost weight is hard. Pick your hard.

Today I picked: Losing weight.

Last two days have been hit or miss, but today was definitely back on track.

Usual breakfast, went to the mall to check out the new iPads and window shop. Mike treated me to Noodle's & Co for lunch, had Pad Thai. I kept debating whether to get the mac and cheese, then realized that I didn't really want it. I was trying to sabotage myself. So I got the small bowl of the lower calorie dish and it was exactly what I wanted.

Small granola bar as an afternoon snack and homemade Hamburger Mac for dinner. The hamburger make did involve some cheese munching during the making, but I stopped myself before I hit the 'why bother' point and just ate all the rest of the cheddar block. So that's progress. And I had a big salad before eating my entree, thus filling me up and not going after a second helping.

Hard elliptical workout - which is a bit of an oxymoron for me lately. I did the XTR program which prompts you to switch forward pedaling and backward every minute. That kept me from ever settling into a comfortable pace and made it challenging. For once I was actually really ready to be done with it, when usually on the elliptical it's more of a "I'm done now? Okay whatever..." kind of thing.

Mike took Rachel to the Aquarium today. Spencer is scared of the fish, so we don't go very often. When Mike wanted to have some quality time with her it seemed like a logical place to go. Spencer and I stayed home and played Mario Kart Wii. Then we worked on a puzzle magazine together while I made dinner. In the evening we played Uno, and I taught them Snap and Crazy Eights with a regular deck of cards. I'd forgotten how hard it is to distinguish between K, Q, and J when you've never seen them before. But they picked it up pretty quickly. At Snap, I turned it into three players, so I could teach them by example and I made them call out each card that they flipped over. I think this was really good for Spencer because he has a lot of trouble finding the words to answer questions when he's put on the spot. So forcing him to quickly name each card was a challenge that he rose to admirably. Also, the paying attention to the dropped card and if it matched another was a challenge too. Rachel had trouble remembering to name her cards, but that was because she was busy scouring to see if there was a match. She called out snap before I did lol.

Pretty good day today.

Being fat is hard. Losing weight is hard. Maintaining lost weight is hard. Pick your hard.

Today I picked: Losing weight.

Let Jillian torture me again this morning. Though today was the fourth time I've done it and I can definitely tell a difference. I still have trouble with a several of the moves and I still collapse into a heap while she works on through 5 more of some things. But it's not as hard as it was the first time. I think when I do it again on Sunday, I will just watch and listen to my own music, I think the lame backbeat makes it feel like it goes on for ever.

Usual breakfast, had some cous-cous for lunch. I'd never had it before and found it very tasty and filling when mixed with a little butter and parmesan cheese. In hindsight, I should have put some veggies in too - will remember for tomorrow. Went ot Red Robin for dinner - not my choice, familial obligation - had a chicken burger with cheddar, mayo and bbq sauce, and fries with ranch dressing. Could have been worse, Mike had the Royal Red Robin lol. Why, oh why, did my family members think it was a good idea to sit 10 people at one of those corner round booths that are made for 6? I couldn't hear anyone and had to sit with my butt hanging over the seat. Oh well, we will see the out of town family again tomorrow and will get a chance to chat then.

Did a 4.5 mile run mid day. That felt good. Kept thinking about picking my hard while I was running. I've never run that whole route without walking before, but I kept reminding myself that if it were easy, everyone would be a size 6. It is hard, it needs to be hard and I need to rise to (and even above) the challenge. So I powered on through the wind was pushing me backwards during the first couple of (uphill) miles. And through that seemingly never ending stretch of straight road that comes right after the 3.1 mile mark - where more than once I have started walking without even realizing it, my body is so used to running 3.1 on the treadmill.

I did notice something very interesting though. I wore the heart rate monitor for a change. I usually don't because under the tight running bra that I wear it rubs blisters sometimes. But looking at my data when I got home, I noticed that the times I wanted to walk/quit the most were when my heart rate was up too high. Today I forced myself to slow down, which pulled my heart rate down and allowed me to continue on. I didn't realize that was what I was doing. So maybe I'll wear the monitor more often and use the alarm thing to let me know when it's getting too high and I can avoid that feeling altogether. That would be nice.

Kids and Mike were great today. Spencer's fever did not return and they both had fun at school. My mom came for the afternoon and spent some time with them. They've missed seeing her since Mike's been home. Hopefully once he is back to work, we can see her again with more regularity. Dinner was good, I shouldn't really complain. MIL and her sister lavished Rachel with attention which Rachel just soaked up like a sponge. Mike's cousin and his wife got Spencer a couple new cars which he happily played with all through the meal. Rachel can write all the letters of her name, though I haven't seen her do them in order yet. I'll see if she wants to work on that tomorrow. Got an iPad app for tracing letters, I'm going to see if Spencer will work on that. He doesn't like to be taught (yeah, that's going to make for fun school years lol), so I'm hoping that seeing the little train move across the letter in the direction he is supposed to go will be a way to help him over come his current refusal to write. Also, he can't seem to pick a hand to use. I'm 99% sure he is left handed, but he still used his right hand a lot too. So I'll try to get him to do that tomorrow as well. And play some games. We haven't played UNO all week!

Being fat is hard. Losing weight is hard. Maintaining lost weight is hard. Pick your hard.

Today I picked: losing with exercise + being fat with food = maintaining?

Or more likely being fat, because I tend to eat more calories with the food than I could possibly burn off with the exercise. Usual breakfast, delicious coffee in the new coffee maker. Ran to Costco to pick up a couple things and Mike called asking about lunch. So I got one of their super size pizzas to take home. I had two pieces, which is somewhere between too much and way too much, but it was good. I wasn't hungry before we left for the indoor waterpark, so I didn't eat. I was a little hungry when we left, but the kids claimed there were starving so we went to Chick-Fil-A. I got a fried chicken sandwich with cheese and bacon and then slathered on bbq sauce and mayo. Finished with fries and a Coke.

Starting to see the "but it was good" pattern repeated a little to often on here. Something to ponder...

Had a great workout. Almost bailed, probably would have if Mike hadn't commented that I would. Nothing like someone assuming that I won't do something to make me want to do it lol. Wonder if that was his endgame? Probably not, he doesn't play games. So I got on the elliptical and cranked my new Ke$ha song. It put me in the right mood. I worked harder than I'd planned on for my half hour and then felt like running. So I did a quick half mile on the treadmill staring at 5.5 and working up to 7.0, so I ended up doing a 4:30 half mile and calling it a night. Felt really good.

Took the kids to an indoor waterpark and had a good time. Took some time for Spencer to get into the bigger play area, whereas Rachel couldn't wait to try it out. In the end we ended up doing several laps in the lazy river and spending lots of time in the younger kids section. But hey, they are still younger kids. It's ironic that I so often wish they would stay little, while forgetting that they still are. But I digress... They had a great time and it seemed to even snap Mike out of his funk for a bit.

Tired now, might have another cup of tea and call it a night. Good night.

Yesterday I chose lose weight.

6week6pack in the morning. Usual breakfast, Saldana for lunch. Healthy dinner of homemade marinate with tons of veggies. I had some leftover mashed potatoes as a snack (and a piece of cheese and a granola cookie). I had some ice cream for dessert, but kept the prtion respectable and skipped the magic shell. Got the juncture late at night and ate some broccoli and dip.

PTSD not to workout in the evening to allow my body to rest. I've been sore for a couple days one, so I'll wait till tonight to run again. It's not a full 48 hours of rest, but that is probably just an arbitrary time frame anyway.

Being fat is hard. Losing weight is hard. Maintaining lost weight is hard. Pick your hard.

Today I picked: Being fat.

Actually, yeah, it was completely my fault from every possible angle. I made the cookie bars last night. I didn't offer for anyone to take some home. I ate too many last night. I ate the rest today. Mike and the kids barely even got any. That's just sad. But they are one of my favorite foods in the world, and every bite was absolutely delicious, so while I feel a little guilty about the not sharing aspect, I don't feel bad at all about eating them.

Other than that though, it was a pretty typical day. Usual breakfast. I made the kids pizza for lunch and I opted to eat it too, rather than make something for myself. I only had two slices though, which is probably a personal record. Or more likely because I was full from the cookies *wink*. No snacking other than an apple in the morning. Made a delicious and healthy stir fry for dinner. Lots of veggies. Had some ice cream with the kids for dessert.

Did my run. I was thinking as I was dishing out my ice cream that by eating the ice cream I was opting out of a workout. It occurred to me how absolutely absurd that conclusion was, and I was a little disturbed by how quickly I jumped to it. Wonder how many times I've sabotaged myself.

Mike's funk continues. He spent the morning doing things for the new job and the afternoon playing a new game and having a pity party. I sure hope he snaps out of it. I'm slightly concerned that he's going to go into the job with a bad attitude with the subconscious (or maybe not so subconscious) plan of making it into another GE so he can quit with my support. But I think that's a pretty far fetched scheme, and he's not the kind of person to hatch a plan like that. We'll just take it as it comes and see what happens.

I taught Spencer how to play checkers today. I let him win, of course. He seemed to really like the game, but he likes games in general. Especially when it's just he and I playing.

Oh and the best news of the day: My prescription that costs between $120 and $130 at all the local pharmacies is only $33 at Costco!!! Even if I wasn't a member, it would still be cheaper to pay membership and the prescription. The three months supply at Costco is only $102! WTF is up with that. And it gets better. I was chatting with the pharmacist and we got onto the topic of our dogs. Turns out that her dog is a chow mix like Monkey and about the same age. Guess what medicine her dog takes? Yep, the same as Monkey. So I asked where she gets it from (cause it's spensive!!) and she gets it too at Costco. Said it's super cheap!! So his next prescription will be from there too lol.

Tomorrow, going to choose losing weight. 6W6P in the morning and maybe the elliptical at night. Usual breakfast. Salad for lunch. Spaghetti with meatballs for dinner. Got a new recipe for sauce, hoping it's as good as it sounds!

Being fat is hard.  Losing weight is hard. Maintaing lost weight is hard.  Pick your hard.

Today I picked:  Maintaining, I guess

Healthy breakfast and lunch, good workout this morning.  But went out to eat for dinner and then made appetizers for an MNO that no one ate.  So I ate them.  Oh well, tomorrow is another day.  Will workout if I'm not to sore from today's workout.  Jillian is one kick ass trainer.

Finally got all my books cataloged (over 200 on my Kindle alone!).  I have about 20 that I downloaded and never read.  Some I paid for, some were free.  So I'll be reading all or most of those before buying any new.

Mike had a tough day.  He's having a lot of trouble adjusting to the idea of going back to a corporate job wiht a little cubicle and 5 cups of coffee a day.  It's just not where he belongs. But there's a little voice in his head, and a very real voice coming from his father telling him to suck it up and deal with it.  You are not supposed to like your job.  He's got a rough road ahead of him.  Either he has to be true to himself and disappoint his father, or be true to his father and disappoint himself.  I'm not sure that it's possible to be true to both.  Sadly, it is possible to disappoint both, and that would be bad for everyone.

Still there are way worse problems to have...

Being fat is hard.  Losing weight is hard.  Maintaining lost weight is hard.  Pick your hard.

Today I picked:  losing weight.

I think I'm going to start every day's entry like that from now on.  Simple and to the point.

Today I chose losing weight, but not dieting.

I ate a 'horrible' sandwich for lunch, lots of mayo and double cheese, but delicious and worth the added calories.  And for dinner I made an amazing pot roast that I've been salivating about all week.  Mashed potatoes full of butter, cream cheese and half and half.  BUT, I ate until I was full and stopped.  I didn't leave the table with my stomach so full I wanted to throw up just to be comfortable again.

Also, most of the things I ate were minimally processed.  Which is something that I've been working towards for the longest time.  I wasn't even trying, didn't even think about it until just now, so that's even better.  It's become not a quest, but just a natural way of eating.

Oatmeal for breakfast - plain old fashioned oats mixed with sugar, cinnamon, raisins and boiling water.

Sandwich for lunch on homemade bread with real cheese (not 'pasteurized processed cheese product' - if the FDA mandates that it states on the label that it is in fact food, it's probably not something I really want to eat) and sliced carrots.  Mayo and sliced turkey were the processed foods there - wonder how hard it is to make mayo?

Dinner was the pot roast with fresh herbs, carrots and onions, and mashed potatoes.  I did use beef broth, but I bought the brand that had the fewest ingredients.  The store brand had a disclaimer on the package - something like beef 'flavored' broth.  WTF?  Anyway, I dropped the cash on the name brand because it's ingredients list was a little less intimidating.

Good run tonight - it got hard in the middle but I forced myself to get through without backing off the speed.  Thought of both the line at the top of this post and the article regarding lack of weight loss and comfortable runs.  Made it below 35 for a 5k.  Really as someone who has been running somewhat regularly for 2 years, that not much to brag about.  I think the hills and intervals will really help me increase my overall speed.

I've been toying around with doing the same half marathon that I did last year, next year.  My time was like 2:48, and I was thinking of trying for something drastic, like under 2 hours, but I think that might be a bit unrealistic.  I'm going to work on constantly changing my running routine for the next couple months and see how much I can improve my speed.  Weight loss should help too.  Every pound I lose is one less pound I have to haul around with me each mile...  We'll see...