Two Weeks In

So you have decided to change your life. You want to eat better, sleep better and just all the way around be healthier. Yeah....me too! Right now though, I am not just in the "I want stage" but I am in the actively proceeding forward, "I am doing it" stage.

A little over two weeks ago, I decided that I was going to give Trim Healthy Mama another go and I was going to see what I could achieve to better my health, my joy and my life. I knew THM would work....if I worked it. After all THM didn't quit on me.....I quit on it and more importantly, I had quit on myself. So here we are.

This time around, since I am not as much of a novice where THM is concerned, instead of focusing on how actually to work the program, I am focusing on how I feel and how to best tweak the program to work for me personally. Yes, that is the beauty of THM, there is leeway there to let you make the program work for you. Of course, you have to be mindful of your body and your health and pay attention to how eating, drinking and moving differently affects you personally. Then it is as simple as keeping what works for you and putting what currently doesn't on the back burner. I say put it on the back burner, because what I have learned about THM is, that just because something doesn't work for you in the here and now, doesn't mean that later on it won't be just what you need.

As I stated above, this time around, I am much more familiar with the program and how it works, so I am able to be a little more experimental. One thing that I notice, that I think I touched on in another blog post was that, as you become more entrenched in the program, your taste buds change. At least mine did. I remember when I first started out, things like apple cider vinegar in my drinks, mashed cauliflower, and the different breads made without white or wheat flour tasted off and admittedly, not appetizing at all. The fact that sugar was a no no, forced me to take out stock in Truvia as it was the only sweetener I could stand and I had to have a ton of it in everything. Things like Gentle Sweet and Super Sweet were not in the least appealing to me. Now though, here I stand today to tell you that I live on Good Girl Moonshine with yes....apple cider vinegar, I eat cauliflower in all forms and put it into just about everything and although I am still not a fan of some of the breads, I can eat them and I have grown a real affinity for sprouted bread. As for my sugar addiction....once again it is under control and I have grown a true appreciation for Gentle Sweet and Super Sweet as I have learned to use them in my cooking. I also no longer feel the need to add as much Stevia either and have lowered my intake dramatically.

This time around, I am also taking advantage of my THM cookbooks and trying different recipes such as Reuben in a Bowl as well as going back to some of my families favorites like Egg Roll in a Bowl. I am also learning  as I have stated before, that by doing a little planning ahead, making a weekly menu and a reciprocating grocery list, that I am cutting way down on our food bill as well as waste. Also, most of these recipes make enough that there is plenty left over for lunches or to freeze for future meals. It cuts down on the impulses to go grab fast food because you are tired and by using your crock pot and/or Instantpot, you save a great deal of time in the kitchen.

So since starting back on THM on January 13th, as of today I have lost 4.8 pounds. Of course the first week is when I lost a big part of that, as not only was I eating better, but I also started drinking more water, which always flushes the system and sets your body up for success. Also, without getting too graphic or throwing out TMI, when we don't eat and drink well, our bodies don't process well. Our systems don't function efficiently from sleep to flushing waste from our bodies. Too much sugar, fat and carbs together and not enough vegetables and healthy fats can cause our systems and our metabolism to slow down to nothing. We can feel like slugs moving through our day. Once back on THM though, I could feel everything starting to work properly again and I was functioning better, enjoying my food more, sleeping better and just all around feeling better. So while the weight loss is nice, the NSV's that are associated with all of this are sometimes even better.

NSV's you ask? NSV's are non-scale victories. While the numbers on the scale might be my goal, the NSV's are what will actually keep me motivated between weigh-in's and help me to stay focused on what is important in all of this.....me and my health. From time to time you may notice me putting far more emphasis on the NSV's in my life than on the numbers and that is the way I feel it should be. In fact, in my opinion, the NSV's have far more value to me than the numbers ever will.

In the little more than two weeks I have been doing this, my blood pressure numbers are also getting better, but I am still not where I want them to be and I refuse to rely solely on medication to get me there. After all....my end game is to be off blood pressure medication altogether (another important NSV for me). As I have been focused on getting back into the swing of eating these last weeks, starting this week, I plan on adding some movement and dare I say exercise into the mix. I had already started doing some very light yoga in the morning and in the evening and it does help how I function throughout the day and sleep at night, but this week there will be walking. We shall see how that goes in the days to come.

The one thing that I have learned through my past on THM and through my life in the last year is that......any goal is achievable if I want it badly enough and am willing to work for it. I have also learned the valuable lesson that I can do nothing without help from my Higher Power, meaning that when I am weak of will, He will pull me through....all I have to do is ask. I am also fully aware that in order to change things, I must be willing to put in the work and love myself enough to want the best for me. I can't do anything for someone else. I MUST do it for me. And finally, I can't eat an elephant in one bite, but I can eat him one bite at a time. In other words, I will not lose 100 lbs, be healthy and feel great in a week. However, if I take it one step at a time, one meal at a time and one NSV at a time, I will not only reach my goals, but quite possibly exceed them.

So there you have it. I am two weeks in and still going strong. Yay me and yay THM!

Until next time.........

Today's The Day

Celery Girl here......and what a week it has been! Okay, compared to some of the weeks I tend to have, this one has been a walk in the park, but still...... So today is the day. You will have to bare with me here, because today.....I am baring it all! Get your mind out of the gutter!

The awesome news has been that I have had some really good feedback on the VLOG...From Here to Healthy at 50 and Beyond. The bad news is....technology hates me! So far I have only been able to put out two vlogs in my thirty day vlog because I can't get my video camera and youtube to play nice together. Someone suggested it might be user error. That person is now dead to me. I am hoping that my college son will be able to take a few minutes away from his college life and help his poor technologically challenged mother beat the camera and youtube into submission. Hopefully this will happen today. Until then though....you are stuck with my words of wisdom here on the blog...with a B!

Well....it has started! The diet and lifestyle change are in the works and this time.....I am raising the bar by calling in reinforcements and eventually putting it on the vlog so that the world will know my shame if I don't stick with it. I am also lowering goal expectations. I have.....are you ready for this....60-80 lbs to lose! Yeah, I know. It sucked for me to see those numbers on the scales too, but the fact is...I worked hard for those numbers by doing nothing and eating all the wrong things. The reality is.....it is not going to come off in a month! I have no expectation of 5 lb weekly losses. I am setting my weekly loss goal at 1-2 lbs. Yes, this means slow going but it also means definite steady results that will keep my body healthy and help me to dust the cobwebs off my metabolism.

When you lose weight too quickly so many things happen to your body that you don't even realize. First of all, in order to lose weight quickly, you are immediately setting yourself up to gain it all back (and more) just as quickly. You are not training your body or your mind to eat properly, you are merely depriving your body of proper nourishment for a quick and temporary fix. Instead of band aiding the problem, I plan on making this a permanent fix this time. I don't want to lose 60 lbs in six months, be hungry all the time, watch my skin and hair take a beating for lack of nourishment and then a year from now be back in the same spot I am in today. My end game, is not only to weigh less, it is also to be healthy body, mind and spirit and to not have to fight this battle again. I want this change to be a permanent one that will take me through the next 50 years. Yes, as a matter of fact I do plan to be around until I am 100! And yes, this should scare any number of people!

Okay, why did I say 60-80 lbs? That is a 20 lb discrepancy. That is at least a size and a half difference. Yes, but I am not 20 anymore. By the way.....it is okay for me to say that. Not anyone else. At 20 or even 30, I could be pretty darn skinny and get by with it. At 50ish, I won't be that lucky. You have seen older women who lose too much weight and rather than look good, they look unhealthy in a different way. Their body looks frail and wrinkly, skin hangs in the wrong places and they just don't look as good as they might have had they not lost so much weight. So I might lose 60 lbs and have curves but by losing slowly, working out and eating healthy, I might look just great.....OR....I might need to still lose another 10-20 lbs. I will play it by ear and see how it goes. I will never have the body of my 20's or 30's again, but I hope to have a healthier body than I have ever had when all is said and done and wearing a size 8 wouldn't suck either. 

So how am I going to do this? Well, I have been doing some research on diets. It is safe to say that over the last three and a half decades, there aren't many diets that I haven't been on. Most were fads and unhealthy, some were very expensive and not worth the time or the money, but the tried and true that I always seem to come back to is Weight Watchers. However, this time I am switching it up a bit. There is a new diet plan that a lot of women that I know are trying and having excellent results on. It is called Trim Healthy Mama or THM. I have a friend who by the way will be my guest blogger next week, (yeah....that's a thing now) who has had great success with THM and she looks fabulous at 50. I think you will love her story. So to make this all work for me, I am taking the journaling and weight loss tracker of Weight Watchers along with some of their basic tried and true principals and incorporating THM foods and recipes in the mix. For me, the two are a good match with my life....and that is what this journey is all about....things that work for me and with my life which will in turn make me successful in the long run. Remember, what works for me, might not work for you. It is all about doing the search and finding out what works with you and your lifestyle.

Of course, no lifestyle change is complete without working out, but regardless of what those prime time weight loss shows tell us (i.e. Biggest Loser and the such) most normal, un-medically supervised, personal trainer lacking mere mortals can not go from 80 lbs overweight to running a full marathon in a month. Especially now that I learned a really valuable lesson about overdoing and still being able to function (remember that unfortunate little twerking incident?) I now know I need to take it a bit slow and let my body be my guide. To start, I plan to give my body several days of water and diet change and then begin with walking. I will gradually add in weights and cardio so that my diet and my workout compliment each other. Somehow though, I think there maybe an inner athlete in me,  that has been crushed under apathy, low self esteem and a Big Mac. I hope in the next couple of months to find her, save her and let her be all that she can be!

Okay, so there are no quick fixes. There will be good days and not so good days. I am human and my human frailties and weaknesses will obviously rear their ugly heads from time to time, but this isn't a quick sprint to the finish line. This will be a process and along the way, through journaling, exercise and the occasional help from my arsenal of good friends and supporters, I hope not only to lose my unhealthy weight, but to also gain some really healthy insight on me, my life and just where I want to be in the next 52 weeks!

The Numbers:
Weight:  194.6
Height: 5'1"
Chest:  45"
Waist:  41"
Hips:  44"
Thighs:  24"
Calves:  16"
Upper Arms: 12.5"
Wrists:  6.5"

The bad news is...the numbers don't lie....nor do the pictures. Sigh! The good news is....this is the last day that I will look like this and the last time that these are my numbers! Yay me!