Tap Tap

Hello out there, long time no post. The last year in my life has been a hectic one.
Moved out to Georgia at the beginning of the year, found that what we had been expecting, and told to expect, was nowhere near what the reality was. I worked [my husband had no luck finding work] for many, many reasons, I stopped doing a lot of online activity. I completely forgot about maintaining this blog, even though I was continuing my health journey as much as possible.
I grew alot this past year as far as my relationship with food, my understanding of bmr and calorie counting, and how my body reacts to the different ratios of the golden three: fats, carbs, and protien.
In the middle of all this, I became pregnant. I'm beyond excited about this, but incredibly frustrated at the lack of info geared towards women who were overweight or obese about health during pregnancy.
I currently am taking Bradley Method Classes, and am following the Bradley diet of high protien intake, something my body loves. I moved back to California in September. I've been very studious, yet very relaxed about the whole weight gain during pregnancy. I'm not calorie restricting, but I'm  not having a free for all. I feel like I could even be eating better, but I know realistically I'm not doing anything terrible to my body or baby.

I am up only ~5-6 lbs from my pre-pregnancy weight, and I have 3ish months left, so I feel I've definitely done well. I try to stay active, but formal exercise seems beyond me these days. I'm annoyed by the lack of definite should and should nots for pregnancy exercise. I kept getting vague answers, along the lines of stick to what my body was used to. Meh. I do some sort of walking [either wandering around a store or more formal exercise under 21 minute pace for 2 miles] and I've been squatting.
I have no idea where to start post partum other than to go walking, but depending on recovery time, I want to get back on some sort of program. I may give Zuzka another shot. I have so many options, and no one to ask what their preference was, or how long they waited. Another question is room. My current set up makes it hard, but I could feasibly do it.

So

So, a week ago I was madly packing, trying to stay awake to finish and eventually having my husband say it was bedtime. The next day, Friday,  I awoke at 7amish I didn't go back to 'bed' until 11:30 pm the next day. Now, I did have 2 or 3 1-hr naps in there somewhere, but my husband and I drove and gassed up etc 8:30pm pst Friday to 3:30am Monday est with only one big stop. It was stressful, from packing up the moving truck to dealing with 2 cats who were less than pleased to find themselves not only stuck in a giant box, but also less than pleased to be let out on leashes along the way. The trip itself was awesome with my husband. Everything surrounding it, from my MIL being a snarky bitch to arriving and dealing with squeezing as little of our lives into our host's generous home and mostly into storage, to time differences and new years eves parties that involved too much drinking to cover social awkwardness, I feel a giant stress ball.
I'm only barely acknowledging that I've made I giant leap into a different life.   I'm not homesick yet. Not for the godson who sends me voice-mails, not for the crazy I was extricating myself from. I miss my parents in random ways. I wish I could show them the different things here, keep having moments of thinking showing them can be next week, and then remembering that they are far far away.

I haven't abandoned exercising, but I'm not where I used to be. I live now in a house with 2 flights of stairs I traverse regularly each day. There is a home gym in the basement my husband and I intend to take advantage of, and the 'block' is hilly and good for our evening walks. I've been trying to do my squats challenge.
The house is going on the 'Whole30' diet that we all intend to be a good cleanse to our systems.

So what do I mean  by all the babbling?
Stress still rules but the other end of the tunnel is in sight. My posts will not be regular, still.
My role is different here and I'm adjusting.

Ok all. Keep faith in yourselves.

Where I check in

Hi.
I haven't been here for awhile, you may have noticed.
You see, I was ashamed. I have once again gained back everything I lost and then some. I'm angry at myself, at all the reasons that have contributed to it.
The stress of the wedding. The planning, the aftermath in which we had a second reception closer to home. The fact that I knew it would be stressful to live full-time with my MIL, but I have been drowning in it.
I know that alot of women complain about their MILs, but I now see why my husband reacts to her like he does. She responds to alot of situations with the maturity of a teenager, most likely due to the fact that not only was she playing with drugs in the 60s, she did it all over again in the 90s to deal with menopause. She will stay home for any reason instead of going to/back to work, and while really it's her business, it's hard for me because she doesn't like not having my full attention. It's exhausting to need to pay attention, talk, placate, etc for hours on end. I feel like I'm not even explaining it properly. All I know is being in this house feels poisonous. Recently, she has been waging a silent passive-aggressive war on me. She's mad we're moving far away in a month. She's angry I'm taking away the one son who doesn't blow her off. She's mad she's losing her captive audience.
Currently, I'm a home maker. I cook and clean. But I loathe being treated like I'm now responsible for the entire house. She doesn't cook, she doesn't do dishes when I cook, she leaves messes and expects me to clean them up. She lets her grandchildren make huge messes and doesn't have them pick up after themselves, nor do it herself. She doesn't take out the trash, just fusses that it's there. She doesn't keep food in the house, but will binge on our carefully budgeted food [his lunches], 'replace' it and binge on it but refuses to buy enough food to last 2ish weeks so when she comes home and asks me what's for dinner, I can make something.
Are these petty grievances? Because I don't think so. I married my husband, and we agreed to take care of each other. I didn't marry her, and I certainly didn't agree to become her live-in maid and chef.
So all that is rolling around, boiling inside. The only time it gets any kind of out is when my husband and I go on our evening walks and I shout it to the skies.
Now I know that it is ultimately my choice, but she has been the main reason I started drinking. It is a stupid response to stress, I know it. I can know it all I want, but the one drink to relax kept turning into 3 or 4 because I didn't realize that her plus my bipolar depression is a crappy way to be.
I stopped exercising. Between her flaking out and my own random goings on, we stopped going to the gym together, and I've yet to come to a balance between gym and home workouts. Right now I'm trying to do a squat challenge I found on Tumblr.

I'm not sedentary, as I said my husband and I go on walks, and there's always cleaning to do which keeps me up and at em.
But I know it's not enough. And because I know it's not, I feel shitty about myself because I make plans to exercise, and then don' do them. I either end up distracting myself with cleaning, or the MIL comes home for lunch and drains me emotionally, sometimes taking an emotional shit on me before she goes back to work, and I spend every minute of her lunch dreading her deciding not to go back.
I'm trying to fight my way out of the hole, I'm trying not to give up entirely on my health, because I know I deserve the respect to my body. right now it's walking up quicksand, but I know soon there will be something solid to stand on.
I don't know how often I will be back, but it will most likely not be happy entries until the end of the year.
Bright Blessings

Wave Hello

So I'm not going to do WWI until the end of the month. Between stress, constant travel, and my weekends being vastly different because of camping and food, my Weight has been bouncin around in a 7-lb space for the past month. It will be horrible until the end of the week, when it will get back to normal, then suck all over again. I'm however a little paicked my wedding dress will be a tad snug in 3 days.
Wow 3 days? I'm already disappointed I will be that sausage in white....
anywhos, I'll try to update a little more ofter

WWI Sabotaging Myself

Today's Weight: 203.3
 Difference: + 2.6
Total Difference:  -7.9
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Even though I survived the eating out all last week, I didn't survive the weekend well. I was really stressed out, for one, which I know doesn't help shed the pounds, and in general I just wasn't as good as I should have been. Risotto may taste good but it is not good for the waistline.
I feel like I'm subconsciously sabotaging myself from [re]achieving the 200-lb break. Between the not great diet choices in the past few days and the complete lack of feeling like exercising because of being some sort of sick, or idiotically leaving my Ri30 at one house and only kickboxing as a back up. I gotta say, Ri30 is full of interesting circuits, but I really, really feel like I'm not doing enough. I think I should have done this one first, I got used to longer workouts that drained me. I'm lost as to how to make these more challenging, or I guess just longer because they are challenging. Alot of it I recognize as going on to be in Body Revolution.
Must keep plugging on, I need to get this done.
Can't wait til after the wedding when I can go to the gym more.
Gods 3 1/2 weeks. Suddenly I feel like we have no time left to do any of the rest of the details. Trying to not stress about that too.
Enough rambling :)

WWI, a busy week

Today's Weight: 200.7
 Difference: - 2.5
Total Difference:  -10.5
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I'm surprised that my numbers went back down, I ate like crap this weekend and I had went to a birthday dinner at Red Robins last night. and I have another Birthday dinner tomorrow too. Perhaps they went down because I was horribly sick the last two days, not that I barely ate. In fact monday I was so sick all i could do was lie around feeling terrible. Yesterday I managed to exercise but I barely put my effort into because I still felt poorly.  I'm just going to keep going at it like I always do, good or bad, yay.
So between birthdays and working on the weekends, good luck to me in the next few weeks, especially that silly thing called getting married in 5 1/2 weeks ;)

WWI

Today's Weight: 203.2
 Difference: + 2.9
Total Difference:  -8.0
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I'm totally flabbergasted by those numbers, my weight held just fine this weekend, and here I have a big gain. Annoyed beyond belief.
 Started Ripped in 30 yesterday, seems decent. I don't know if my burn was really good because it was a new exercise routine, or if even week one will kick butt. I'm liking how basic it is, though, because it's something familiar and I don't spend half the workout flummoxed on doing certain moves.
I should prolly get to that...

Extreme Shed and Shred BnA and mini review

I really dislike that my belly nose refuses to go away
Couple of things: My after picture was taken after a large breakfast so I don't know if it's an accurate depiction of my progress. I will take them again Friday and compare.  I know too 4 pounds may seem measly but every pound counts as progress to me. Also, my original plan to do 2 weeks of the combined levels was foiled by my own self, by forgetting my dvd at the MIL's, so my last week was of Yoga and kickboxing.

So, Extreme Shed and Shred.
Level 1 is 42 minutes long including warm up and cool down, with 6 minutes of warm up.  It contains 4 circuits, each 4-5 moves completed twice.  Each circuit is good for keeping your heart rate up towards 85%, and the mix of things to do kept me from being bored. The cool down is long, ending in shavasanna  for a few minutes.
Level 2 is 52 minutes long and features the same warm up and cool down. This level features 5 circuits, and is a bit slower paced than the first level. It still gets you sweaty with, as Jillian says, heart gargling goodness, but still a little more low key than level 1. The extra circuit left me cursing at Jillian when she starts the second to last circuit, it made telling myself 'You're half way through, yay!' etc less effective.
Levels 1 & 2 is 1hr20min long, featuring the same warm up and cool down. This is  NOT for those who are newer to working out.  The length is for those who have been pursing fitness for awhile. It is something to work up to. That being said, this combined version still stops in the middle for brief respite, but while level 2 is lower key, by the time you hit circuit 7 you will be wondering why you thought this was a good idea. By the end of the cool down though, it will feel definitely worth it.

A few thoughts:
-Either level by itself is fine to do everyday, as suits your fitness needs
-The combined levels should be alternated with something like kickboxing or another short cardio session.  From personal experience, day after day of it will not give you enough rest in between.
-I highly recommend eating a protein bar, shake or something like greek yogurt immediately after.  The days I didn't I had bad blood sugar crashes, and felt sore for longer. This may be just me and my fitness level, but it's what I would recommend.

See you tomorrow for my weigh in!

WWI, oopsies

Today's Weight: 200.3
 Difference: - 2.8
Total Difference:  -10.9
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So my last week of this month got a little screwed because I left Extreme Shed and Shred at the MIL's. I realized it after I got home Monday, after not being able to exercise for various reasons. I spent all yesterday planning my time around the hour and twenty minutes it takes to complete it, and about an hour before the designated time, I remembered it wasn't here for me to use, so I had to survey what I had. At first I still wanted to do at least an hour's worth, so I turned to my Bob dvds. I ended up deciding against all 3; since my kettlebell is still at my fiancee's, I didn't feel like trying to modify with a dumbbell, and the confined space of my bedroom does not lend itself to some of the moves in Total Body Transformation. I wanted to save yoga for today,  because yes I sweat ad feel good, but since I hadn't had a good workout since Friday, I wanted something that really got my heart rate up. Looking at my Jillian dvds, I decided I still wanted to save my Ripped in 30 for next month, still no kettle bell, so I went for the ass whooping of Kickboxing. I'm sad I wont get to finish this month with the ES&S but oh well.
I was also annoyed to find that part of my heart rate monitor is missing. Livestrong's calculator never seems on for me, either too low or too high. I need to find the missing piece because for me, the HRM is a very helpful tool.
It will also be helpful to find out if I need to supplement Ri30 with kickboxing,  since the stepping up to 1:20:00 seems to have agreed with me. I want to go back to just 1:00:00, since the last 10 were always the longest because I had so little left.

Ratatouille
Mediterranean Salad
Pumpkin Ginger Waffles

Declaration

I'm going to say something frowned upon in the fitspo world:
I do not love my body.
For me, I do not subscribe to the popular saying that if I don't love my body now when I lose weight I won't love it then.
I'm not saying this is a wrong thing to strive for, but I'm sorry, it's not for me.
I love me. Ok, that took years. But I do, I love me, I love my personality, but no, I don't love this body I'm in. I'm working on changing as a sign of love to myself, I want my health. I detest my body's current state because it represents years of self abuse. I used food in all the wrong ways, purposely ignored opportunities to learn about health and how to change my ways. It represents years of self perpetuating hate, hate the body, hurt the body. I couldn't learn to love me because I fell into the trap of body is worth.
Now, I see a body I'm not happy with and I use it to get my butt moving because there are days, especially heat wave days, I have no desire to work out. But I look at myself and know if I don't like what I see, I need to change it. I can't complain about this body if I'm not willing to work on it. I will work out the rest of my life because I chose to make that my life style.
I also no longer hate myself for not working out when I don't get to and or/put it off. I don't hate myself when my diet is not my ideal. I forgive myself and move on. I don't need that negativity in my life anymore.
One day, I will like my body, and then love it, but for now, I want my health back.