Positive Energy

The last few weeks have been really bad for me and my bulimia has pretty much took over my life but I feel like I can see the light at the end of the tunnel.  I feel like the fog has been lifted and maybe just maybe I can do this.  My eating has been good so far today and I'm getting ready to go walk.  I just have a positive energy in me right now that I'm definitely going to take advantage of.  This could be the stepping stone I need to get me back on track and get this weight off for good.  Thanks for all your support and if your going through a rough time right now with your weight loss just give it alittle time and don't be to hard on yourself, you will come out on the other side to.

A Question?

I'm trying to get my eating back on track and find the motivation to exercise.  My question to all of you is what do you do to get back on plan with your weight loss?  What inspires you?

Reviewing my Goals

When I started my weight loss blog I set these goals for my progress.  As you can see I should be at 191 lbs right now and as of just a few minutes ago I weighed 218.4 lbs.  Yes I've gained but I've even been putting off my weigh in.  I should be 26 lbs lighter right now but by allowing myself to get sidetracked I have thrown my weight loss in reverse.  I thought maybe by reviewing my goals I could motivate myself to get back on track. 

August 10, 2010- 247 lbs (starting weight)
September 7, 2010- 237 lbs
October 5, 2010- 229 lbs
November 2, 2010- 221 lbs
November 30, 2010- 213 lbs (34 lb loss for Thanksgiving, thats a lot to be thankful for)
December 28, 2010- 205 lbs (42 lb loss for Christmas would make it a very merry Christmas)
January 25, 2011- 197 lbs
February 22, 2011- 189 lbs (under 200 for valentines how sweet that would be)
March 22, 2011- 181 lbs
April 19, 2011- 173 lbs
May 17, 2011- 165 lbs
June 14, 2011- 157 lbs
July 12, 2011- 149 lbs ( 2 days before my birthday what a wonderful birthday present to myself)
August 9, 2011- 141 lbs (this would be the smallest I have ever been)

My next goal for this year is to walk 600 miles.  To meet this goal I should be walking 50 miles a month and we are halfway through February and I've only walked 7.1 miles.  Time to get my booty moving.

Next I have a biking goal of 300 miles, I've only rode a pathetic 1 mile and I should have already rode 37 miles.

I have a goal of going to the gym which was to do strength training at least 3 times a week and swimming twice a week and I haven't stepped one foot into a gym yet.

I also set a goal to do 100 crunches every other day and so far I've only done it 4 days.

I don't have to go to school tomorrow and its suppose to be pretty here so I plan on getting my lazy butt out and walking, maybe doing something for my health will help me get my motivation back.  I don't want to be retyping my goals a year from now and still being in the same spot with my weight or even worse weighing more than I do right now.

All my other goals concern my eating and I'm listing them here as a reminder.

Water Goal: I had a goal in 2010 of drinking at least 128 oz of water a day but of course I never hit that goal so for 2011 I'm just going to work on drinking as much water as possible without setting a goal.

Eating Goals: The following are my goals for my food intake daily:

Sugar- I have greatly reduced my sugar intake already but its still something I need to continue to work on.

Fruits- I love fruits especially sweet fruits like bananas, apples and grapes but I have learned that fruits have alot of natural sugar in them so you do need to watch how much you eat so my goal is to continue to keep my fruit intake to a maximum of 1-2 servings per day.

Vegetables- I have always been a vegetable eater but I have had to learn to replace some of my carbs like macaroni and cheese and mashed potatoes with vegetables instead. I am learning to try new vegetables that I've never had before to add some variety into my eating and vegetables really are good for you and help to fill you up. So I plan on continuing to try at least one new vegetable and make sure I get my daily servings of veggies in.

Carbohydrates- This is probably one of my favorite types of foods, I mean who doesn't love macaroni and cheese and pasta dishes and breads but if you aren't careful these types of food can put alot of weight on you. So I plan on continuing to really watch my intake of carbs.

Soda- I have mainly been drinking water but I have been sneaking in a couple diet sodas a week and I want to completely give up sodas again.

Fast Food- I try to pick the healthiest thing when I get fast food but like a friend pointed out to me no fast food is healthy. I'm only picking out the least unhealthy thing on the menu so this is definitely something I need to give up. So my last goal is to completely avoid fast food.

Recommended Daily Allowances:
(not really a challenge but something I need to keep an eye on)
Calories: 1760 to lose 2 lbs a week
Fat: 64 grams
Fiber: 25 grams
Carbohydrates: 300 grams
Sugar: 40 grams
Protein: 50 grams
Sodium: 2400 milligrams

I know it seems like alot but it all goes hand in hand with each other.

Broken Heart on Valentines Day

Just to make a long story short the guy I've been dating decided to break up with me on Valentines Day, wasn't that sweet of him?  Oh well the story of my life.  The funny thing is you would think this would be triggering me to eat but its having the opposite effect.  I guess every dark cloud has a silver lining.  Just wanted to wish everyone a Happy Valentines Day and remember don't forget to tell the ones you love how much you love them, you never know when you aren't going to have that chance anymore.

My Struggle with Bulimia

I'm not sure why I'm writing about this besides its whats going on in my life right now but maybe it will help to talk about it.  I've wrote a few times on here about my bulimia and how I've struggled with it for over 10 years.  Up until last week I had been purge free for over 9 months.  Alittle over a month ago I started the Eating Clean plan which I was really enjoying until I started to slip some on my eating and then my sense of perfection became my downfall.  The little voice crept back into my head telling me all I had to do was get rid of whatever I had eaten wrong and everything would be fine, just one time and I could get back on track.  Well that one time turned into more than once, I should have known better, that same voice is what got me started down this path in the first place.  I remember the first time I purged, it was only suppose to be once and thats all it took to get me addicted.  Bulimia is just like any other compulsion, you think you are the one in control when the opposite is true, the compulsion or addiction is in control of you.  The compulsion is so strong and even though I know I'm damaging my body and purging really isn't helping me to lose any weight, as a matter of fact it has the opposite effect, I still can't stop.  Over the years I have realized there are many different sides to bulimia.  Sometimes I just used it to maintain my weight until I could gain my strength back to do it on my own, other times I would try to use it to lose weight by purging everything I ate, but I've never been skinny from being bulimic.  I know rationally that the only way to truly lose weight is to do it the healthy way, eat right and exercise but right now this demon is stronger than I am.  It makes you feel like such a failure to not be able to control your own body.  Sometimes all it takes to set off my bulimia is to eat something that I feel is going to make me fat and sometimes I intentionally plan out my purges if even by accident.  Like yesterday I had planned to take my kids out to eat and I was going to get something little, something I felt wouldn't set off my bulimia and then my mom suggested we go eat chinese which is one of my favorite foods.  I knew at that point that I was going to purge when I got home so why not just eat as much as I could, if I was going to damage my health I better make it count.  See how irrational that thinking is, its not like I don't know what I'm doing but I find myself to weak to say no.  Bulimia does so many bad things to your body from damaging your teeth, which I've had lots of cavities and lost 2 teeth, luckily in the back where you can't see.  It also throws off all the chemicals in your body which I've been told by my counselor contributes to my depression because one of the chemicals it messes with is the chemicals in your brain.  So many times I've worried that my heart is just going to stop or one of these days my esophagus is going to rupture when I'm purging, which can happen.  How can I know that what I'm doing can lead to death and keep doing it?  I keep telling myself well at least I'm only purging once or twice a day and not 4 to 6 like I use to, but once is to many.  Its just so hard dealing with this on top of having a food addiction, I want to beat it, I want it to go away, I want to be stronger than this but how?  Thanks for listening to my rant and if any of you have thought of turning to bulimia or any other eating disorder please don't, it doesn't help it only adds one more problem on top of what you are already dealing with.  Here is a post I wrote earlier with lots of information on all the different forms of eating disorders http://nevertheskinnygirl.blogspot.com/2010/10/eating-disorders.html.

A New Beginning

The last week has been pretty rough, between not having control over my eating and fighting my builimia but I can't keep letting this rule my life.  I've asked myself a million times why I can't just stop eating?  How can I want to lose weight so bad but can't control myself enough to do it?  Maybe thats the problem, to much focusing on food.  When you spend every waking second thinking about what you are going to eat next or what you aren't going to eat next its no wonder food is the center of your life.  I know at this point my main focus should just be getting healthy but to be honest and it may sound alittle vain I want to be skinny, I want to like what I see in the mirror, I want others to like what they see and I want to inspire someone else to be the best they can be.  I'm tired of being fat, I'm tired of being self conscious and I'm tired of hating who I am.  How can I treat my ownself with respect and love when I don't like who I am?  Everything else in my life is going good but how can I truly be happy when I'm not happy with who I am?  I need to find some balance between failure and perfection, a middle ground where I can just let food be something that feeds my body not my mind.  I can't control my emotions by stuffing them down with food, I can't eat away my pain and I can't treat food as a cure all for everything.  Its time for a new beginning, a rebirth into who I want to be not who I have been.

Losing the Battle but not the War

Some of you may have noticed that I haven't posted in a few days which for me is unusual.  When I started my last eating plan which was the Clean Eating diet I was gung ho on the plan, eating all the right foods at the right times and it seemed to be working for me even though I still hadn't gotten back on track with my exercise yet.  Well as time went by I started to lose my momentum and began slipping back into old patterns.  This last weekend has been really rough on me because I've pretty much eaten anything I wanted and so now I'm feeling guilty for that.  On top of that my bulimia is back, its not something I want to admit and it can make you feel really ashamed but I thought if I put it out there for all of you to know then I would find the motivation to get back on track.  I've in noway given up on losing weight, that is a battle I will never stop fighting, I'm just going through a rough patch right now.  I plan on starting my blogging back tomorrow and trying to get back on track.  I definitely dont want to gain all the weight back that I lost so I need to tackle this right now before it gets to out of hand.  Hope I haven't disappointed any of you to much and I'll be back to my posting tomorrow.

Weigh In

Today is weigh in day.  I weighed 211.2 lbs last Friday and today I weigh 212.2 lbs so I have gained 1 lb.  I was hoping for a loss but I knew with how I've been cheating this last week on my clean eating that I was going to have a gain.  This next week I'm going to stay away from fast food, drink more water, reduce my portion sizes and start exercising again.  I'm hoping these changes will lead to a really good weight loss next week.  I'm tired of staying around this same weight I'm ready to be under 200 lbs.

Changes I've Made Part 4

1.  I've switched from using canola oil to olive oil.

Benefits of olive oil:
-extra virgin olive oil is high in polyphenols (a powerful antioxidant) and monounsaturated fat which contributes to lowering bad cholesterol
-olive oil may be just as effective in the prevention of colon cancer as fresh fruits and veggies. A diet rich in olive oil has been shown to reduce the incidence of colon, breast and skin cancers.
-extra virgin olive oil may help to lower blood pressure.
-replacing other fats with olive oil will reduce the risk of alzeheimers
-Olive oil promotes the secretion of bile and pancreatic hormones naturally and lowers the incidence of gallstones.


2.  I keep healthy snacks handy so I don't grab for something thats not good for me.
 
3.  I eat 5 meals a day every 2 to 3 hours to keep my blood sugar from spiking and to keep my metabolism running efficiently.
 
4.  I shop the perimeter of the store where the healthier foods are sold such as fruits and vegetables and I read food and nutritional labels so I know what I'm putting in my body.
 
5.  I avoid alcohol because it contains a high amount of sugar.
 
6.  I either avoid salad dressing or only use a very small amount.
 
7.  I've switched from high fat cheeses to lowfat cheeses.
 
8.  I eat lean meats such as ground turkey, chicken and turkey breasts and lean cuts of beef and pork.
 
9.  I've switched from white rice to brown rice, from white bread to whole wheat bread and from white pasta to whole wheat pasta.
 
10. I've increased my intake of veggies daily and only allow myself 2 servings of fruits daily.
 
11. I've replaced mayo with ketchup, mustard, red pepper hummus or guacamole.
 
There are still a few things that I have to try that either I haven't found yet or just haven't gotten around to buying yet.  If anyone has tried any of these please tell me how you liked it.
1.  Chia seeds
2.  Quinoa
3.  Hemp seeds
4.  Edemame
5.  Bee pollen
6.  Coconut oil
 
Also if anyone has any suggestions for other healthy things I can try I would love any ideas you have.

Clean Eating Day 22

For breakfast I had 1 cup of Kashi cereal with 1 tbls flaxseed and 1 cup soy milk.

My midmorning snack was a protein shake made from 1 cup soy milk, 1 tbls flaxseed, 1 banana and 1 scoop of GNC banana cream protein powder.

For lunch I had a lite club from Jasons Deli and a cup of fruit with fruit dip.

For dinner I had a salad made from spring mix greens, a couple slices of onions, 1 tomato, 4 oz diced turkey breast, 1/4 cup walnuts and 1 tbls lite ranch dressing.

My midevening snack was a protein bar.

Its been awhile since I've included any of my photography on my blog and this week I've been very busy taking pictures in the studio at school so I thought I would post a few here.  In the first shots I had my son be my model because as you can see he has his own personal style, he says its his way of expressing himself.  The other pictures are my guinea pig named ziggy and another girl in class brought in a rabbit so we shot them together and seperate.

Changes I've Made Part 3

I decided since I'm bored with nothing to do I would go ahead and continue my series of posts on the changes I've made.

1.  I start every morning off with a nutritional breakfast.

Benefits:
-people who eat breakfast take in fewer calories daily on average, leading to easier and better weight management over time.

2.  Packing my own lunch.

Benefits:
-saves you money
-you can control your calorie and fat intake over eating out at restaurants
-great way to use up leftovers
-gives you a chance to get in extra servings of fruits and veggies

3.  I've replaced sodas, tea and coffee with water.

Benefits of drinking more water:
-helps you keep hydrated
-helps to lose weight
-natural remedy for a headache
-helps to make you look younger and have healthier skin
-helps you think better, be more alert and concentrate
-water helps you to feel more energetic and helps to fuel your muscles during exercise
-helps in digestion and constipation
-less cramps and sprains
-helps to fight against the flu and other ailments such as kidney stones and heart attacks
-relieves fatigue
-reduces the risk of cancer

4.  I eat a snack between each meal.

Benefits:
-helps to maintain normal blood sugar levels, which keeps your energy high throughout the day
-helps to keep you from feeling too hungry, preventing you from overeating at meals later in the day
-great opportunity to include more fruits and vegetables

5.  I've traded out using regular peanut butter for using almond butter or all natural peanut butter.

Benefits of almond butter:
-Almond butter is beneficial in reducing heart disease and cholesterol through the high monounsaturated fats in the almonds
-high in fiber and protein in addition to having monounsaturated fats
-helps to regulate blood sugar
-rich in antioxidants and contain important vitamins and minerals including vitamin E, vitamin B2, magnesium and calcium
-Almond butter is a beneficial substitute for peanut butter for those who suffer from peanut allergies, as it typically can be tolerated by most people
-helps to lower blood pressure because it contains calcium, potassium and magnesium

Benefits of peanut butter:
-Peanut butter is also rich in antioxidants
-helps to lower the bad form of cholesterol known as LDL.
-Peanut butter may also help prevent Alzheimer’s disease since it contains Niacin
-One of the many benefits of eating peanut butter is that it contains large amounts of dietary fiber, equal to about 8 percent. Fiber helps in the process of controlling blood sugar and cholesterol levels. Another benefit of fiber is that it can reduce the chance of developing colorectal cancer.
-Peanut butter contains high amounts of proteins--as much as 24 percent by weight. Along with protein, peanut butter contains vitamins E and B3 and the minerals copper and iron. It also contains calcium and potassium.
-Peanuts contain an interesting nutrient called resveratrol, which is a natural antimicrobial product and is created by the peanut plant. This nutrient helps to protect against bacteria, viruses and fungus.

All of this information was found on the internet and I'm in no way a medical professional so please do your own research before making any of these changes in your own diet.

Clean Eating Day 21

For breakfast I had 1 cup steelcut oats with 1 tbls agave nectar, 1 tbls ground flaxseed, 1 tbls wheat germ, 1/8 cup golden raisins and 1/4 cup walnuts.  I also had a protein shake made from 1 cup skim milk and 1 package of chocolate hemp powder.

My midmorning snack was a protein bar.

For lunch I had a salad from a restaurant topped with 2 tbls ranch dressing. (Not a picture of my actual salad)

For a snack I had a 3 musketeer bar.  ( I was craving chocolate)

My midafternoon snack was 1 apple with 1 cup of Greek strawberry yogurt.

For dinner I had 2 pigs in a blanket (Not clean eating but they were good and I wasn't very hungry)

Changes I've Made Part 2

This post is part 2 of the series I'm going to post about the changes I've made in my eating.

1.  I've changed from regular yogurt to Greek yogurt.

Benefits of Greek Yogurt:
-It's higher in protein.
-It's lower in carbohydrates.
-It's thickier and creamier.
-It's lower in sodium.

2.  I've added fish to my diet.

Benefits of salmon:
-High in protein.
-Rich in Omega 3's which reduce inflammation in the body and decreases your chance of heart disease or a having a heart attack.
-Salmon also is high in fish oil, which promotes smooth skin and reduces redness.
-Salmons oils makes you feel fuller longer.
-Salmon has been found to decrease your risk of Alzheimer's and to speed up mental processing even in younger adults.
-The oil in salmon is unsaturated, meaning it will not clog your arteries.
-Decreased risk of arrhythmias, which can lead to sudden cardiac death.
-Decreased triglyceride levels.
-Salmon is one of the foods that helps to lower blood pressure because it slows down the build up of atherosclerotic plaque.
-Salmon, like other cold water fish, fights arthiritis.
-Salmon and other fish high in omega-3 fatty acids helps to heal your nerves.
-Salmon and othe foods high in omega-3 fatty acids interrupts the progression of early symptoms of schizophrenia into full-blown schizophrenia.
-Salmon is rich in iron, which helps to remedy some forms of anemia.

Benefits of Tilapia:
-Tilapia provides a low calorie, low fat protein alternative.
-Tilapia is a source of Omega 3 fatty acids which is good for heart health.

3.  I've added 100% whey protein powder to my diet.

Benefits of whey protein powder:
-Lowers cortisol levels which reduces stress.
-Increases muscle mass.
-Increases glutathione in the body which is an antioxidant that helps with immune function.
-Whey protein is easy to digest, and can be taken by those with lactose intolerance.
-Whey protein helps in weight loss and weight maintenance because of its calcium content, lactose sugar, protein and leucine. All of these work together to regulate metabolism.
-Whey protein helps improve immune function because it contains cysteine, lactoferrin, immunoglobulins, BCAAs, and because it helps maintain glutathione in the body.
-Whey protein as a supplement is more effective than casein at improving exercise performance.

I found all of this information on the internet and I'm in no way a medical professional so please do your own research before you make any of these changes in your own diet.

Clean Eating Day 20

For breakfast I had 1 cup Kashi cereal with 1 cup skim milk, 1 tbls ground flaxseed and 1 scoop of Jillian Micheals triple chocolate protein powder.

My midmorning snack was a protein bar.

For lunch I had a organic whole wheat wrap with turkey, tomato, alfalfa sprouts, guacamole and ranch dressing.  I also had a cup of fruit and fruit dip.

For dinner I had a veggie burger with no mayo and no cheese from Burger King.

My midevening snack was 1 apple with 1 cup Greek strawberry yogurt.

No exercise today.  I need to find my mojo to get back on track with my exercising, but at least I am staying busy doing other things.