Week 25 HYC Check In

As you may, or may not, have noticed I've been away for a few days. I don't have to tell any fellow blogger that rarely means that it's because we're just working the program so hard we didn't have time to write. I got a little off track for a few days. Not sure why, although it's TOM and I have had the emotional symptoms of that pretty bad for a few days - all antsy, hungry, and mean - really, ask DH if you don't believe me ;)

Anyway, I really didn't do anything bad or eat a bunch of junk, I just didn't do most of the things I normally do. I was fine up until Friday afternoon. Since then I didn't drink all of my water some days, didn't get my 5 fruits/veg every day, didn't journal, didn't 'officially' count points, etc... I did keep rough track in my head, just didn't feel like writing it down. I also did NOT weigh myself today as TOM has my guts feeling all heavy and swollen. After being off track for a few days, I did not need any mental crap to deal with. I am back today counting, writing, fruiting/vegging, hydrating, etc... so I have already moved on.

Things did go pretty well on the exercise front at least. On Friday I met one of my BIG personal mini goals. Are you ready........

I RAN 30 MINUTES WITHOUT STOPPING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! It wasn't even that hard!

I was so excited I just couldn't believe I had really done that. I remember when we first started exercising and we would huff and puff up this one really big hill. More often than not, runner-guy (that's what we call him) would run past us up the hill and then once or twice more before we'd made the big park loop. I remember saying, "That's ok. One day I will run the entire park loop, including the hills." When I said it, I only kind of believed it, but I kept saying it just the same. It was so cool to actually achieve that goal. Saturday I just walked because neither of us felt well, and I wanted to give my legs a well-deserved rest. Sunday we didn't do anything but chores. Now you know how obsessive my personality is, so you can guess what I did last night. I had told myself that I wasn't going to do the 30 again for a week, and instead go back to interval runs - upping the time. Well, last night I got to worrying that it was all some kind of fluke and that I couldn't REALLY run 30 minutes straight. So I did it again - 32 minutes actually, just for good measure - just to prove I can really do it. I am still in shock. I think I will only do the 30 once a week and do the intervals the other days. I don't want to risk injury, and I think the interval training is helping. I have actually chilled and am only running M/W/F/Sa now, and walking or doing some other exercise the other days. I think I've proven to my stupid brain that I actually do better when I don't run every day.

Not so good news on the 100 Pushup Challenge. I actually forgot to do them on Wednesday and Friday. Seriously. Is that not sad? I guess I need to write it in my journal. I was going to start over yesterday, but we moved a sectional sofa on Sunday and I hurt my left bicep. The right one is just sore - like I moved a couch - but the left feels like I actually HURT it. It hurts just to touch it. My elbow on that arm hurts also. So pushups, even girly ones, are out until it heals. I am planning to re-start that program on Monday.

So, that's it. Sorry it's so long. Hope you all had a good week.

Here are my Week 25 goals - which I promise to work a little harder this time:

Goal	Status
Water 64+ oz 7/7	0/7
Journal food 7/7	0/7
5 fruits & veg 7/7	0/7
Stay on plan 7/7	0/7
Run 30 min per day 4/4	0/4
Earn 30 AP's 30/30	0/30

HYC Check In - Week 24

Weight: 207 (-3)

Well the 206 didn't stick, but I ate late again last night, so maybe it'll be back. I'll gladly take the 207 which puts me 8 pounds down from the fake weight that scale boy gave me last Wednesday, and 3 pounds down from what I'm pretty sure I really weighed which was 210. I had weighed 210 every day that week except WI day - and now that it's a week later and I'm 207 I'm even more convinced that I really weighed 210 because it's hard to believe I lost 8 pounds. Anyway 3 pounds sounds good and I'll take it.

I did good on my HYC goals for Week 23. Here's the final status report:

Goal	Status
Water 64+ oz 7/7	7/7
Journal food 7/7	7/7
5 fruits & veg 7/7	6/7
Stay on plan 7/7	7/7
Run 30 min per day 4/4	6/4
Earn 30 AP's 30/30	36/30

I actually hit every goal except for the 5 fruits/veg. I had one day where I was short by 3. But 6 out of 7 days for me is still most excellent.

So I am awarding myself the following:





Not too bad huh? Looking forward to checking in on all of you.

100 Pushup Challenge - Week 1, Day 1

Sad really. Honestly, I don't know how I get through life with so little upper body strength. It's downright embarrassing.

That said, here's my

Week 1, Day 1 100 Pushup Challenge Report:

Level 1: 2 DONE
Level 2: 2 DONE
Level 3: 2 DONE
Level 4: 2 DONE
Level 5: 5 DONE

What's so sad is that not even one of those was a real 'true form' pushup - even of the girly variety. As I remember telling someone back when I actually could do pushups years ago, "You can't do a pushup without trying to do a pushup." In other words, the only way that you can develop the muscles that you need to do a pushup is to do the closest thing to a pushup that you can. So, that's what I did. I really did try to do a good form girl push up, but I fell to the ground and could NOT lift back up. So what I did was to just go as low as I could without going so far down I fell. It was a good work out. The muscles in front of my armpits are still twitching.

So what I'm going to have to do is to go through the program doing bad girl pushups until I can do a good one. Then I'll start over with that until I can do a true pushup, then I'll start over with that. After all, the goal is not to be 'finished' in 6 weeks, but rather to achieve 100 real pushups without stopping. It's just going to take me a while to get there, but I WILL NOT GIVE UP!!!

Onward and upward - or downward maybe since it's pushups.

Hope you all did better than I did. :)

Weekend update...

Well, I've done pretty well this week. Scale boy seems to actually be reflecting that too. He's been giving me progressively smaller numbers over the last few days. This morning, he actually said 206! I don't know if that will stick or not, but I sure hope it does. That would put me only 7 pounds away from One-derland - where I so long to take up permanent residence.

I actually decided to take Saturday off from exercising. I decided early in the day, so I didn't feel like I just lazed out - it was a decision that I actively made. I know I sound a little obsessive - because I am - about the exercise thing. It's just that I'm so determined not to lose any ground on the progress I've made, or risk slipping into a non-exercising slump. So, decision made, I enjoyed giving my shrinking body a well-deserved rest.

I almost ended up missing running last night - that had miss obsessive freaked out let me tell you - because DH kept f*cking around and it got late. Then he got a phone call that he really did have to take, and that took about 40 minutes. It was 8pm then and he didn't want to go any more. I was going to take Turnip (my agressive little pride 'n joy) with me and go alone, but DH then decided he didn't want me going there alone so he came with and sat on the tailgate making sure no one got me while I was running. Since I took Saturday off, I was determined to do my 3 10/1's. My legs were not so sure. It was like running through molasses. 3 minutes into the 2nd 10 I was already making deals with myself about only running for 20 minutes, or maybe at least splitting it up into 5's or 6's. When it actually came time to the end of the 2nd 10, my obsessive voice overpowered my old fat voice and said, "Are you kidding me? You're not going backwards to running 20 minutes. Just for that, you'll do 35. Do you have anything to say about that, cause we can keep adding minutes if that's what you want?" So, fat-voice shut up and my legs somehow kept running for a 3rd 10 minutes. After 1 minute walking, I did another 5 minutes just to show me who was boss. Also, I had it in my head that I needed to get 6 APs...

I have done pretty well on the HYC challenge except that was one short of getting my 5 fruits/vegs in yesterday. Poop! Other than that, I've done well.

64+ oz water - CHECK
journal food - CHECK
5 fruits/veg - 4/5 days
stay on plan - CHECK
Run 30 min 4/7 days - CHECK (5/7 days so far)
Earn 30 APs - CHECK

Also today I am starting my 100 pushup challenge. I'll be starting with girl pushups because I can't do even 1 of the other kind. I'm ashamed to say that I can only do a couple of girl ones. I'm getting ready to run to the grocery at lunch to pick up some lunch stuff for the week. When I return I'll shut the door and get started on them. Hope no one walks in to see me on the floor in my skirt doing girly pushups and looking (I'm sure) like I'm gonna die. I'll let you know how it goes. I'm so exicted to see so many familiar names on the challenge list. This is going to be great!

Gotta go now - wish me luck on staying at 206 or lower for WI tomorrow!

Crunches challenge

Kitzzy asked about a Crunches Challenge. What a great idea! I looked and could only find challenges that strived to get 1000 per week, or 10000 per year. I'm looking for something like the pushups and C5K where it's basically a training program.

I wish I knew more about this stuff, we could make up our own. I'm wondering if we couldn't use the same formula for the pushups one for the situps? I don't know how many we should be building to, or how fast. When I was in my 20's and 30's, I used to do 100 situps every morning and also before going out. Then more during step class.

So the question is, what is the crunch equivalent of 100 pushups or a 5K? What number is hard enough to take 6-8 weeks to get there, but is reasonable for a person starting out to strive for? 200, 250? Is that enough?

Does anyone have any ideas for this? Does one of you have/know a trainer that you could ask what a reasonable goal is?

I'd love to do this if we can figure out a plan.

So far so good...

Weight: 209

OMG, I accidentally typed that as 290 the first time! What would you think of me then if I actually gained 80 pounds since yesterday. Better question, what would you think of scale boy?

Anyway, I was happy to see the 209 this morning - so happy I'm not even upset to give up a point. I'm at 25 points as of today instead of 26. Woohoo!

Started out to do an 'easy' run (I swear I don't know who I am any more) last night. I've been trying to stick to the 3 10/1's on M/W/F/Sa and do 30 min of running, but in easier increments on Tu/Th/Su. Anyway, I was planning on doing 6 5/1's, then I started thinking how if I did 6/1's I'd only have to do 5 intervals instead of 6. So I decided on 6, but when I looked at my watch, I had already run almost 7 without realizing it (again - who am I?) so then I had one minute to make a decision. I decided to do 4 7/1's and a final 2 min run. The first 7 went really easy. I was relaxed and it was no biggie. The 2nd one was a little harder, and the last one passed being fun at about the 3 min mark. All that said, I completed it and that's what matters. The workout also included about 15 min of brisk walking for a total of 45 min exercise.

Ate late again last night, but it was pretty light. DH had bar-b-qued chicken breasts before I got home, so all I had to do was nuke it and pour some salad out of a bag - et Voila! It was really good. I looked it up and had plenty of points, so I ate the delicious crispy skin and all. YUMMY!

HYC Checkup

64+oz water - CHECK
journal food - CHECK
5 fruits/veg - CHECK
stay on plan - CHECK
Run 30 min 4/7 days - 3 days so far
Earn 30 AP's - 18/30 earned so far

In other news, I found this new challenge that I'm going to start next week. It's like the couch to 10K only for pushups. At the end, you should be able to do 100 pushups without stopping. For me, this will be like having a heavy sofa on top of me to a 10K, since when I did the test I could only muster one decent push up - and decent is probably being kind. Anyway, I've always hated not having any upper body strength, and I am planning on wearing a slinky dress to the Christmas party this year. It would be nice to get more fit and have a killer back and arms for the dress. I'm slightly skeptical of this one, but then again it's only been 2 months that I went from barely being able to run 1 minute to being able to run 10 with relative ease. For any of you who want to join me in this foolishness, here's the link: http://hundredpushups.com/index.html

Have a great weekend everyone!

My scale and I are trying to work things out...

Weight: 210

Ok, I know I said all those bad things about him, and it's true - he does frequently lie to me and make me feel bad, but this morning he said he was sorry and he seemed so sincere. He also told me I really do weigh 210, and also that I'm looking pretty good these days. What can I say, I'm taking him back - on a trial basis. I did tell him that if he did it again he is out and that I will replace him with a newer, sleeker, more high-tech model. I think he's going to be on his best behavior.

Sorry - feeling a little silly this morning. Must be the fasting. I had my annual exam this morning and it required that I fast and have blood drawn. So it was 9:30 AM before I got to eat breakfast and I'm used to eating between 5:30 and 7:00. I'm a little lightheaded.

As you can see from the above, my scale read 210 this morning. Curious to see how much it's off from the doctor's office scale, I put on my clothes and weighed again so that I could see how much I weigh at home in those clothes and compare it. 213 it said. Strangely, it's not far off. The doc's office scale told me 214. That's good to know. I've always been prepared to add another 2-4 pounds to what i think I weigh because most home scales read lighter than the fancy medical ones. Maybe scale-boy isn't so bad after all. Hmmm.

I changed docs last year when mine was unavailable, and I really like this one. She actually 'talked' to me about things. We talked for about 10 minutes after my exam - I've never had a doc do that. I was 20 lbs lighter this visit than last time, and she was so excited for me. She kept saying, "Way to go! Great job!" She was also really happy to hear about my 7 day a week exercising and had some really nice things to say, as well as recommending a book on nutrition called "The Omnivore's Dilemma" http://www.amazon.com/Omnivores-Dilemma-Natural-History-Meals/dp/0143038583/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1213286134&sr=1-1 which I don't really know too much about, but since I'm trying to eat more natural foods I'm going to check out. Another interesting thing, I found out today that I am shorter than I thought. The thing at the docs office said I am 5' 5", which is what I was in high school. Someone told me in the early 90's that I was 5' 7", but either I shrunk (not the way I want to shrink!) 1.5 ", or they were wrong. Anyway, that means I need to look at some calculations that I have that are partly based on height.

HYC checkup

64+oz water - CHECK
journal food - CHECK
5 fruits/veg - CHECK
Stay on plan - CHECK
Run 30 min 4/7 days - 2 days so far
Earn 30 AP's - 12 of 30 earned

Oh here's something else I'm proud of. I felt really bad when I got home yesterday. I was cranky and tired and just felt like poo in general. Also it was 95 degrees and humid. I did not feel like working out at all, especially since Wednesday is one of my regular run/walk days and I'm working on the 10 min intervals now. My husband even suggested that we take a day off. I have only missed 2 days exercise I think in about 3 months, so I just couldn't. I said that I would go, but I didn't think I was going to do my 3 10/1's. DH suggested I walk. Well, by the time I got out there, my obsessive personality had taken over and I ended up doing the 3 10/1's anyway. The first one was actually almost effortless even. The last 2 were a right b*tch, but I did them anyway. It may not have looked pretty, or been fast, but I maintained a jogging motion moving generally forward at all times just the same. It was ugly running, but it was still running. I was so proud of myself. In my old life, I was always the fat girl with all the excuses. Now my inner voice is pushing me forward instead of pushing me down. It's like the good voice and the bad voice have switched places - or the power they have shifted. Geez, reading that back I sound like a schizo or something with all the 'voices' talk. Oh well, if this is crazy, I'll take a second helping please :)

I am looking forward to getting my bloodwork results in a couple of weeks. I'll let you know if there's any improvement. In the mean time, I feel fit, well fed, and in control.

Life is good today ladies. I hope you all have wonderful days as well.

Goal Check

HYC Goal Check for Tuesday:

64+ oz water - CHECK
Journal food - CHECK
Min 5 fruit/veg servings - CHECK
Stay on plan - CHECK
Run 30 min 4/7 days - 1 of 4 CHECK
Earn 30 AP's - 6 of 30 earned

I used to run only on M/W/F/Sa and walk the other days. Lately I've been running every day. I don't want to overdo, so I'm trying to run easier intervals on those old walk days. Yesterday was a walk day. I did 5 6/1 intervals + an extra 15 min walk. My legs were so tired yesterday. It was even cooler than usual after the rain, and I normally don't have tired legs until near the end. They were tired from the start yesterday. I was so glad it was an 'easy' day. There's no way I could've run 8-10 minutes. I had to fight for the 5 6/1's.

Ended up eating really late last night. I have to quit doing that. I just don't want to eat any APs I haven't earned, and it was late by the time we got back from running and my brown rice was done. I have extra for today though.

I decided to let the scale live another day. It said 212 this morning, which was a little easier on the ego. Hopefully I can stick to all of my goals for this week and I'll see a loss next Tuesday morning.

I have to go to the doctor tomorrow for my annual. I absolutely HATE that. The only good thing is that I will have bloodwork to compare to last year's. I am curious to see how much/if any difference in cholesterol and such.

Oh well, I have a ton of stuff to do at work so I gotta run. Still catching up on your blogs. Thanks for the encouraging words yesterday - you guys are the greatest.

Week 23 HYC Check In - 215

215. Well crap!

I'm so mad at my scale. It had the nerve to tell me I gained 5 pounds last week. That little lying piece of s....

Anyway, I don't see how it could be true. I had that night I told you about, but I did not eat ten thousand extra calories over plan. That was Wednesday and I did pretty well with staying on plan Thursday through yesterday. Also, I ran 30 minutes a day, every day but Sunday. Yesterday I actually did 3 10/1 intervals at that hilly-ass park.

I did NOT gain 5 pounds. Did I? No, I really don't think I did. I did end up eating dinner late yesterday, and it was on the salty side (sausage - healthy turkey low fat sausage, but that's probably still salty), and I didn't do that well on water at all while I was in Dallas. They only let me out 3 times a day, and I cannot drink the amount of water I drink and make it with only 3 tinkle breaks in 9 hours. We were out of the good water at home, and I left my water cup at home on Monday. Sorry excuses I know, but it added up to me not getting all the water I should. I'm really hoping that has something to do with it.

I'm nothing if not honest though, so I did update my numbers - even my badge was exchanged for a 25 pound one (sniff sniff). Full disclosure. I have posted my Week 23 HYC goals, and I am gritting my teeth and trudging on. Even if it turns out I really did defy the laws of science and gain 5 pounds for real, I REFUSE to be knocked down. It's like yesterday, I was 3 min from completing my 3rd 10 min run and still had the biggest hill in the park to run up. It was so hot and humid and my legs were really tired. It was hard. That made me mad for some reason, so I started running faster. I ran up that hill as fast as I could. It really made me feel better.

I will do this. I may get pushed back, but I will not be pushed down. I will keep eating right, drinking my water, journaling, and running. I won't quit no matter what that *(@%ing scale says. I'm going to give it a talking to tonight, and it had better get it's sh*t together by tomorrow morning or I'm liable to take a hammer to it. Wonder how many APs that would burn?

Can't wait to read all of your blogs. I need some inspiration.

It's a tie...

Hello all...

This has gotta be really quick, but I didn't want to leave without posting something.

In the battle of me v. the road, it's pretty much a draw. I had some really good moments, the road had a few as well. Brief summary:

Working out - I did awesome with that. I worked out a minimum of an hour a day, which I have never done on the road. I ran every day. One day I even ran 3 10 minute intervals + a 7 minute. Yep, me. Can ya believe it? I earned something like 34 APs I think that week.

Food - meh. I did pretty good here. I went to the grocery store the first day and bought fruit for snacks. I did pretty good with meals. I ate some stuff I wouldn't have eaten at home, but I wrote it all down and I didn't go over my Flex. I normally don't eat all my flex, but I did use almost all of them this time.

So - I was doing pretty good until the trip home on Wednesday night. I ended up having the chicken quesadillas at Friday's - it's not a full portion, so that's not terrible. What wasn't too good was that I also had a giant margarita - yes, it was in fact giant. Then I had er 'some' beers. I'll leave it at that. Then, if that wasn't bad enough, I got upgraded to first class and the guy next to me asked me if the margaritas were any good. I really had just been wondering that I told him. He asked the flight attendant. She said they were good, but they were really good if you added the little bottle of Grand Marnier. "How about I bring you a couple and you can check them out?" she said as she jumped on me and twisted my arm painfully behind my back. "Drink it! Drink it, or I'll throw you off this plane!" she screamed at me. It was so painful and I was so terrified that I did what any sane person would do and agreed to have the margarita. (Note: portions of the previous story may be less than true.) So, I have no idea how many points all that sh*t was, I don't think my journal goes up that high. Anyway, it was fun at least. I think the road won this round.

When I weighed Wednesday morning, it said 210 (no change). Meh, I guess I can live with that. Since I didn't get to work out Wednesday, I ran last night at the park instead of walking. I really wanted to see if running the 10 minute intervals on the treadmill was a fluke due to maybe the treadmill being easier than outdoors (this was my DHs opinion and it was starting to get to me), so I decided I would run until it seemed like I should stop and see how long that was. I got all the way around the park to the bottom of the big hill. I had never run anywhere near that far before. I looked at my stop watch. TWELVE minutes! Can you freaking believe that? I walked about 3 minutes - until I got up the tough part of that big hill, and then ran another 12 minutes. The first 12 was almost effortless - the 2nd, not so much. I worked pretty hard to get from 9 to 12 minutes on that last one. I still can't believe it. I think I will run either 6 or 7 minute intervals a few times as the 12 seemed a little over my head and I don't want to hurt myself.

Weighed this morning and saw 212. yuck. Oh well, it could be Wednesday night paying me back, or it could be from abusing myself with the 12 minute runs. Not sure, but I'm going to try to get my sh*t together for the rest of the week. I'd love to see 208 next Tuesday.

Well, gotta go. I can't wait to catch up on everyone's blogs - I'm so far behind from having a craptastic internet connection while I was in Dallas, and from being swamped at work.

Have a great weekend ladies....