Closing a Chapter...

Wow, I can't believe it's been a month since I last blogged!

I've been so wrapped up with family get togethers, family health scares, and preparing to change jobs that I've kind of turned exercise and eating healthy 100% of the time on the back burner.
I've gained about 4 lbs....that's why i haven't been updating my weekly weigh ins. :(
So for August I'd like to get back to my old ways that worked best for me and get the scale moving back down...and not up anymore.

Today was my last day at work. I've been there since I was a senior in high school ( 8 and a half years!). It was kind of bittersweet. While there are many things I won't miss about the job, I really will miss all the people I've had the privilege of working with and meeting over the years. They surprised me while I was eating lunch with a sweet card and gift card from everyone, a cake and a little container of fruit in case I didn't want to eat the cake(they know me so well). But the cake looked good and so I had a little piece! I'll have next week off to finish up some things like shopping and getting my hair did! Then my first day of the new job is the 13Th. YEAH!!! I'm so excited!

Here is a few pics from today!
My Cake! You can see part of the fruit over on the side. Which I left in the fridge on accident!
This is my office manager and closest friend at work, Kristy.
A few co-workers that I've worked with the longest.

Water is my new friend

Sunday I wrote out some goals & here's how I'm doing so far.

Yesterday was my first day of tracking my water and I stopped counting at 100 ounces. It wasn't as hard as I thought it would be. I drink a lot throughout the day anyway, I've just never written it down or tried to get in my water before I had any tea(w/splenda), or diet coke. I prefer those drinks over water, but I know thats not good for me. My diet soda consumption was getting a little out of hand. It's actually kinda fun to have a daily goal. I found an iPhone app called 'Water Your Body' that I started using to help me.

Then for my monthly mile goal I've got 5 of the 25 done so far.

I'm at lunch now and I'm sitting in the break room and someone has brought in there leftover goodies. Pretzels M&M's, regular M&M's, white chocolate pretzels, and iced sugar cookies. All foods I like. All easy to grab each time you walk by. But I haven't had any. Then I was thinking...why can I be stronger about saying no to foods at work than in my own home? If those foods were at home I would eat them. This is why I don't buy them.

Hmmm...

Back to work!


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Goals

I've been struggling a lot lately. I've been eating WAY too much...plain and simple. I haven't been "tweeting" about it because it's embarrassing. But this is a process, this is life, and I write about all the good so why not write about my struggles too?

This weekend I was around some family members (my side of the family is all obese) and just seeing some of there health problems and how much they aren't able to do because of there size was startling. I don't want to be like that...ever. I can get control of my eating habits, and I have to do it now. So today I'm re-dedicating to my weight loss goals! I had to revise my bodybugg goal because i was so far off track. The new goal is to be down to 160 by October.

Some other goals this month:

Limit my coke zero intake to ONE a day only after I've reached my daily water goal.

Exercise 6 days a week,with Wednesday being my off day as long as my daily calorie burn is still met that day.

Write down/log EVERYTHING! Everything that goes in must be accounted for.

Walk/Jog a minimum of 25 miles this month. First time doing a monthly goal.

Get more sleep.

When I find myself wandering in the kitchen looking for food- get a glass of water or some gum and LEAVE the kitchen.

I used to have motivational quotes on neon cards all over the fridge & microwave and I took them down about a month ago. They are going back up.

I'm sure I'll think of some more goals but for now I've got to go to sleep. This is going to be an exciting and stressful week. I have an interview Thursday morning! I'm nervous already. Yikes. Goodnight!

5 pounds gained,5 pounds lost

This week turned out to be a pretty good week. I heard back from the dermatologist that the results from my excision were clear(no more melanoma) and I also got my stitches out on Friday. The nurse that took them out told me my scar was ,"one of the prettier melanoma scars she's seen." Odd to hear, but i guess that's a good thing. :)
I logged all my food and as I started feeling better I started walking more on the treadmill. Which apparently paid off and I lost 5.1! It's exciting but it's just the same 5 pounds I gained the week prior to and week of the surgery. I really thought it would take me 5 weeks to get it back off. I'm so glad that's not the case. Next goal is to get out of the 170's...again.

I've gotta kick in into high gear because it's summertime and vacation is right around the corner! I'm so excited!

I went shopping with my mom & aunt while in OKC this weekend. There was a great store called Shoe Carnival that had Buy One, Get One Half Off. :) These were my finds!

Starting Over...again

I had my lovely surgical excision on Wednesday to remove the melanoma. It wasn't bad. They numbed it up, so I couldn't feel a thing. My husband came in with me, and my parents waited in the waiting room. My husband was there for moral support with such comments like ,"Wow, look at that!", and "You're gonna have a cool scar babe!" It was great! Lol. But really It made it a little more light hearted and I made it out without crying, and if you know me I cry about everything! Matt told me the incision was about 3 inches by 2 inches and they went down about an inch deep. A little bigger than I'd first thought! But the doctor said since it's on my back they can take a larger area and that is fine with me. As long as they get it all out, I can live with a scar. I'll find out the results sometime this week and I go back to have the stitches removed on Friday.

I haven't done any exercise until today. I walked a mile on the treadmill at a very slow rate, since I'm not supposed to do anything that makes me sweat. I stayed home from work both Thursday and Friday which means I was home all day with food, and food, and more food. I have been eating. Nervous eating. Bored eating. It's been terrible. I stepped on the scale last night and my eyes about popped out of my head. It was so scary! I know the majority of the gain is because of my poor eating and lack of exercise both last week and this week. Then I also have been on a new BC pill that my doctor said would make me gain water weight. It's my 2ND week on them.

After the facing of the scale last night, I decided I had to get a grip! I'm back to logging everything, measuring everything, and eating only when I'm hungry not just because there's nothing else to do. It also feels great to walk a bit, I'll try to do that a few other times today. I know I need time to heal physically I just got to get things under control emotionally and get back to eating healthy. Eating crap = feeling like crap, eating healthy = feeling healthy and HAPPY!

Tonight we have a concert to go to. Nickelback, Shinedown, and Breaking Benjamin!!!!!!
We bought the tickets MONTHS ago and I've been excited to go, but didn't foresee this happening. I asked my husband last night to see if any of his friends would want to go but since it's such short notice, no on can. So I'm going, and I hope I can handle sitting/standing that long. Doors open at 5:30 and I'm sure Nickelback doesn't go on til pretty late. Last night was the first time I could actually lay on my back, I haven't been able to lean back in a chair yet. So we shall see! We will eat an early dinner and I'll smuggle in some good snacks in my purse just in case. :)
I hope y'all have a healthy and active weekend!

My battle wound.

Things are looking up!

I feel so much relief after everything today. I finally heard back from the dermatologist office and they scheduled me for next Wednesday. I read on there website what they will be doing. It's called Surgical Excision & it's the most common treatment for melanoma skin cancers. I feel SOOOO much better knowing this is scheduled, and everything will be fine.

I also had been nervous about my first breast sonogram. Matt knew I was worried(he's actually been worried too), and he left school early to meet me at the office. I thought that was very sweet of him, and it made me feel a lot better. They were super nice and right off the bat after the doctor started the procedure, she asked me if I'd lost a significant amount of weight. Apparently that accounts for the lumps that they found at my gyno visit, and she said had she examined me, she would have sent me to a specialist too. But she said everything was normal and there's no need to worry. I also found out I'm not "high risk" like I thought. But since my g-ma who had breast cancer had no siblings, and my mother had the preventative surgery before she was diagnosed there's no way to tell if I have the genetic marker for breast cancer.

So things are looking up! I got off my bad food wagon today. Today has been great! I've only had 1300 calories. Well under my 1800 limit. After the crap I've consumed all week, I think it's okay to have a couple low cal days.

I'm looking forward to the weekend. We are going to OK to visit family. Normally this is a caution area when it comes to food. My family is all big because we LOVE to eat. I mean who doesn't? But I'm not stressing over it this time, because my brother has been counting calories and wearing his bodybugg so i know I'll be okay at his house. He lost 9 pounds his first week! Punk. No seriously I'm happy for him. :) Hooray for healthy family members to help us in the weight loss process! I love it!

Gotta go get my jog on! :)

Weigh Day!

This morning was my weekly weigh in. I lost another pound! I am pleased with that. We've had a busy weekend. Yesterday I went to a wedding shower, then an art festival, and then saturday night church. Today my husband ran in the Warrior Dash 5K (with crazy obstacles). It was a lot of fun to watch. He's never done any 5k's before and he did a great job!

I'm not really looking forward to this week. I should hear back from my doc and get my dermatologist appt set up. I talked to my good friend who also had a melanoma spot removed and she said she had her consultation on one day and two days later they did the surgery. So i'm expecting it to be fast. Then Thursday I have my breast sonogram.

So it's going to be tough, but I know everything is going to be alright. I just gotta keep eating right, logging everything, and working out. I don't want this to derail me.

Matt right after he crossed the finish line.

with two other teachers from his school that did the race too.Matt finished ahead of them :)