Too Much Coffee

I had five cups of coffee today. Five.

I always start my day with a cup and then have my second cup somewhere around 2:00 in the afternoon. Rarely do I have any more than that. I have a little 4-cup pot, so those two cups a day are it. Lately I've really gotten to ordering hot tea if I stop at Starbucks at Target, but not today.

Today I was cold, so I had extra coffee at home. Then a friend stopped by for a cup and number four made it's way down my throat. In the evening I had a cup - after 8:00 pm - while at a practice at our church. I think that was the final straw.

And five cups is why at midnight my mind is wired, but my body wants rest. This is not good. Not only have I had TONS of caffeine, but I am not going to get a full night's rest.

Also, I've noticed that as my mind is racing it's reminding me of how awful I feel during TOM and how I've munched again this week, and how I really, really need to get back on track to eating better. It's been an off two weeks for me health wise, and a mind that has nothing better to do than think a lot late into the evening can come up with some scary thoughts that have to be put into submission.

Thus my blogging at midnight to remind myself...

Note to self: Get back to drinking the green tea after the morning coffee. Too much coffee is not good for you - physically or emotionally.

G'nite all!

Visit With Mom

Before I share a little of my visit with my mom, here's an updated comparison of her.

My mom in March 2009 and then November 2010.

She began her journey a little over a year ago and hasn't let the challenges of being diagnosed with Type II Diabetes and Breast Cancer last spring stop her from losing weight. She is truly inspirational!

Not only is she inspirational, but she continues to be helpful to me in my weight loss journey. My visit to see her a few weeks ago was proof of this.

My last visit to her house was very emotional for me. I was not careful about how I ate and it showed on the scale. This time I decided that I would ask her to help me eat like she does. She's lost about 70 pounds over the last 15 months, and this time I wanted to glean from her.

I didn't even have to ask for her help. She saw the challenge I was taking part in on my blog and emailed me before my arrival that she would help me stay on my challenge while visiting. She sure did. First, there was a fresh case of water...

Then she cooked for me, weight loss portions and healthy. We enjoyed a few treats, but in moderation. I was reminded of lessons about portions and balancing out a special treat with healthy eating in the day.

We even baked and decided to make weight-loss portion sizes of one of our favorite treats - Pumpkin Whoopie Pies. The "bigger" of the two shown below is still about a third of what we used to make and eat. wowsa! We took some of the cookies used for these sandwiches, cut them in half, spread a smaller amount of cream on them and then made ourselves even smaller treats. They were perfect for our healthier lifestyles!

I had a very nice time visiting my mom and even more, I enjoyed being on this weight loss journey with her. There was a time we used to eat and eat and eat, but not this time. We were able to enjoy a good visit and not have the focus be entirely on food. I even managed to lose 1.5 pounds that week. Glory!

Thankful Days - Hope

This morning I woke up and decided I had to carry on my thankful theme one more day to say I am thankful for hope.

hope (verb) : to expect with confidence

At my highest weight of 231 I felt hopeless. I had learned to love myself as I was, but was still gaining weight. My luck with dieting always lead to failure, so I had decided I was meant to be fat.

It wasn't long after this picture that I realized I needed to love myself enough to take care of my health. There was a little something deep inside me that knew I had to be able to do something to stop the consistent weight gain in my life.

A few conversations with my husband and a dear friend later I decided to take the small steps necessary to lose weight and take care of my health. I read a few blogs, watched a few episodes of The Biggest Loser and small sparks of hope began to ignite the smallest chance of change in my life. Just maybe I would be able to conquer this demon of overeating.

As I began making small changes to my eating and began exercising regularly I saw weight begin coming off.

By Christmas 2009 I was down about twenty pounds and the spark of hope that I could lose weight had turned into a steadily flickering flame in my life. Exercise had become a regular habit and my eating habits were changing for the better.

It's been another year and another twenty three pounds. With forty three pounds lost I'm almost halfway to my goal and I'm so thankful that hope prevails in my life. As we enter into the holiday season I am no longer hopeless about my weight and health. The thought of cooking and eating Thanksgiving dinner and baking for Christmas doesn't scare me.

• I know I will not eat everything I make.
• I know that I will exercise.
• I know that I can lose weight during the holidays.

I know I can accomplish these goals, because I am able to hope, or have the expectation with confidence, that I will reach my weight loss goals and gain control over my overeating instead of gaining more weight.

Thankful Days & Hot 100 Update #9

This week hasn't been the best for a challenge. As I posted yesterday, I am up half a pound. It's been that week where as I reach to munch on something I think "I don't care." Some of the time I felt like I was watching myself from the outside and commenting, "This is so strange how you have control all the other weeks of the month, but this one week you don't care and you aren't even bothered by it...until bedtime."

Yes, a few nights I was miserable at bedtime when I thought about what I'd eaten. The overeating always hit in the evenings, but I seriously didn't care until later in the night. This is obviously going to be an issues I must deal with. And I will.

In the meantime, today I am thankful that for a PMS week my gain was only 0.5 and not any more. I'm thankful I was able to get a grip on my eating early enough so as to not see a huge gain.

Now on to my Hot 100 goals:

WEIGHT GOAL: Lose 0.5 - 1.5 lbs a week (Beginning weight 194.0). I am up 0.5 a pound this week, but I know I'm still within my range of where I should be for the challenge. So, yellow it is. I look forward to seeing a loss again next week. Have I mentioned that I can't believe I'm in the 180's??? It's amazing to me. I

ACTIVITY GOALS:Exercise four days a week, no skimping down to three during the holidays. No. I have exercised only two days this week. Having company in from out of town has kept me busy. I'm okay with that choice.

Be able to jog at 4.8 mph for 25 minutes. This gives metime for slight warm up and cool down on the treadmill that has a 30-minute limit at the gym. I believe I'll get there.

FOOD GOALS: Drink at least 64 oz of water daily.YES! I've been drinking anywhere from 64 - 96 oz. of water daily. It's just been so easy. The only cold drinks I've had have been a few sips of my husband's "real" Coke and one of my own...another sign of TOM coming, although it was not enjoyable beyond the first gulp or two. LOTS of water though, and coffee ( 1-2) cups a day and hot tea. :) Journal all my eats and drinks and stay within my calorie goals daily, with the exception of one high-calorie day that I allow to throw things off a bit. No. I think I journaled one day. Honestly, I am going to get my book journal back out, and I didn't journal some things because I was munching and knew I couldn't keep track of how much. Sad, but true.

EMOTIONAL GOAL: **I've decided to make my emotional goal the goal of visiting one new blog each week. Connecting with others on this journey is the emotional support I need at this time. No.

HOLIDAY GOAL: Only one or two "foo-foo" coffee drinks from Starbucks the week I am visiting my mom in November. I will stick to regular coffee and cream the rest of the weeks. Done. Not even a skinny anything this week. :)

I hope you all have a nice weekend! My grandparents are in town until Monday and we are going to do some baking, maybe some crafting, some game playing and definitely some Christmas tree decorating. :) It's the most wonderful time of the year...

Thankful Days - Throwdown Challenge

It is the end of Thanksgiving Day for us here in the United States. I've had a wonderful day of cooking, visiting, cleaning up and then relaxing with my family and visiting grandparents. It's been quiet and cozy.

Since it is Thursday it is also my weigh-in day and I did indeed weigh myself. My munching, M&M crunching week resulted in a 0.5 pound gain. Being that I've been pretty PMS'y lately, I'm not surprised and I'm thankful I reigned in the craziness before it ended up being much, much more. I have been drinking TONS of water and I'm sure that helped.

Now on to my Thankful Thoughts for Thursday. (nice, huh .. LOL )

I want to take a minute to share my thankfulness for Barb for inviting me to be in this challenge with her. I was shocked she would ask me, and touched that she considered me a friend enough to ask me. I tend to freeze up during weight-loss challenges, but I figured I'd agree and, if nothing else, be a cheerleader for her to reach her goals. Now, three weeks into the month, I find myself actually losing weight and being in the lead. A small miracle considering my track record.

Joining Barb in this challenge has proven to be greatly motivating for me. Even this week of mindless eating was curbed in because I knew I had to weigh-in today. I'm grateful she asked, and I'm even more grateful that she hasn't given up herself, even if her weeks haven't been what she may have wanted.

We have one more week to go and I will not get lazy. She could still come from behind. :)

Thankful Days - My Savior

Today I would like to keep my post simple with this one undeniable truth. I am a born again Christian and I'm so very grateful for my Lord and savior Jesus Christ. That he would give his life for mine is awesome, in the truest sense of the word. That he would continue to work in my life after all these years is amazing to me.

When I gave my life to Jesus he not only forgave me of my sins, but he offered me joy and peace no matter what life throws my way. This includes struggles with weight.

Many times in this weight loss journey I have struggled with fears of failure, inadequacy and more, but He always sees me through. Sometimes it's a sermon at church or a scripture in my daily Bible reading. Other times it's words of wisdom and encouragement spoken in person or written on a blog.

No matter the venue God has ministered to me so many times in my weight loss journey that it wouldn't be right to not give Him proper praise. The bondages I've had to food could not be broken without his help.

As I write I'm reminded of a favorite scripture of mine. ...
"Delight yourself in the Lord and he will give you the desires of your heart.". Psalm 37:4

One of my desires is to have control over food in my life. With God's help I'm blessed to say I'm in the process of seeing that come to pass, and I'm so very, very thankful for that.

Happy

Thanksgiving!

Thankful Days - Family & Friends

Today I'm thankful for my family and friends who have loved me through thick and thin. Today I literally mean, whether I was physically "thick" or "thin".

Growing up I have rare memories of being made fun of due to my weight, but I often noticed the difference between me and other girls and would be sad because of it. One place I never felt out of place due to my size was my home. It was made clear at home that I was loved for who I was, not what I looked like.

My mother also loved me enough not to let me eat anything and everything I wanted. Due to the fact that she would limit the amount of cookies I ate I was only a chubby child, never did I reach the obese range in my health. If I shared feelings about wanting to not be the chubby girl my mom would offer solutions to help me, but she never pushed the issue to the extent that made me feel like I wasn't good enough. It was a good balance.

As I grew up I used to wonder if any guys would ever like me. Hello, I knew they always liked my thin friends. I also knew that when I lost about 20 pounds doing Weight Watchers with my mom I suddenly got more attention. Thankfully, I wasn't so boy crazy as to solely base my life on whether someone liked me, but I was a teenager with my own hopes and dreams of getting married some day.

When I met my husband and he finally told me he liked me I was in awe. I told him I was awed that he would like me when there were other thin and pretty girls at the conference we'd met at. Again, I fell in love with someone who didn't base their approval or love of me on my weight. On our wedding day I was 5' 4" and about 170 pounds, and he made me feel like the queen.

Sadly enough, over the first year of our marriage I let my eating go out of control and gained the first 30 pounds that would take me away from 170 for years. I knew 170 was overweight, and I cried when I realized, somewhere near 200, I needed the "huge" size 20w jeans. Only one other time in all these years of being married have I reached 170 and had some control over my health. It was a glorious two years where I felt so much more alive, but you know what? My husband didn't love me any more for getting thin. When I gained it all back, and more, he still loved me and told me how beautiful I was.

Through all of this I've also had good friends who have loved me no matter what my size. My friend, Stephanie, whom you all met a few months back, has been my friend the longest now and she's always struggled with weight like I have. Though she kept much better reins on her health than I did as we became adults. Yet, though I got bigger in my 20's and she slimmed up she never commented on it.

I have other friends who when shopping together they were kind enough to not say anything when I had to look in the larger sizes. When I was losing weight, they cheered me on. If I was gaining back the 10-20 I lost they kept their mouths shut. I was never treated any different based on my size. My friends have been amazingly supportive in my weight loss journey now as well.

Another amazingly supportive group of friends in my life is my blog friends. I want to take this minute to thank Diane at Fit to the Finish and Lori at Finding Radiance for their support. These two ladies have been kind enough to answer some questions in email for me. They've shared wisdom and offered support over the past year when I might've already given up on someone like me.

Along with Diane and Lori I'm also thankful for my blog "friends" and readers. I started to write this blog to journal my weight loss journey. I know that seeing into the hearts and minds of those dealing with weight issues is very helpful to me, so I when I started my own journey I decided I would use my love of writing to share my own struggles and victories. The fact that people comment and are so supportive has been the proverbial icing on the cake. I'm always so thankful for the support that comes through comments left on my posts.

This weight loss journey of mine has truly been the start of a new me. It's not been easy, but the changes being made are deep. Ultimately, it's been up to me to make it all work and to see the weight come off. Yet, through it all this kind of undertaking does require some love and support.

So, again, I'm very thankful today for all the love and support I've received from my family and friends. Yes, support and love even back when I was heavy, because had I not felt love and acceptance back then, who knows if I would've ever felt confident enough to start this journey at all.