One week on!

Ok- it's been a long time, but I have good news.  I signed up for Weight Watchers MEETINGS again and went to my second today.  I love 8.4lbs this past week!  That's certainly great motivation.  A great loss even though I used a good deal of WPs on wine last Friday night at Rocky Horror.  I'm feeling pretty great about it and I hope that this helps.  Ok- more later, just wanted to share the good news with... really no one in particular since I haven't reeeeeeeally told anyone about this blog.

A million dollars?

Ok. Yeah. May. I see it, too. Last time I posted.

So, this summer has been rough for me and food and the gym.  I've had good days and even good weeks, but the bad days and weeks seem to even it all out.  I've lost and gained the same 7lbs for months.  It ends now. Or. Yesterday. Technically. Seriously this time.

I guess I don't understand where my motivation goes sometimes.  Weight Watchers is a wonderful program. It's not difficult to follow. You can literally eat whatever you want as long as you plan for it.  I think part of me gets angry that I have to worry about it at all. I know I feel better when I'm on plan. I know I feel 100% better than that when I go to the gym.  I know that I'll get more work if I lose weight (as an actor).  Yeah, I think I just get mad that it's something that I have to worry about at all.

So, I thought maybe I'd use the new season of The Biggest Loser to motivate me (don't judge my reality show watching).  I changed my weigh in day to Wednesday (because that is when I will most likely watch my DVR'd episode every week) and hoped that it would help.  Wednesday last week started off awesome.  I went to the gym and ate well.  Thursday-Monday... less awesome.  Not horrible.  I think it involved some vegan pizza and some guacamole... possibly some dark chocolate... beer...  Again- all of these things would have been FINE if I just COUNTED them.

So there I was on Monday. Ready to start over again. Sort of. I had had some Nyquil the night before and I kicked. my. butt.  So, yeah.  I think I had some pita chips and some plain pasta that day. (Oh, by the way, I had a terrible cold, it wasn't recreational Nyquil)  So, I knew I had to get back to it, but I wasn't feeling super motivated.  I needed a sign. Ugh, I just decided to watch TV.  Aaaaaaaand sign- Dr. Oz is pairing up with Weight Watchers to do this Transformation Nation Million Dollar You contest. Hm.  I need to lose weight... I'm a Weight Watchers online member... I've done it before... I don't expect to win a million dollars, but what the hell.

I went to my local Weight Watchers location yesterday and had my official complimentary weigh in and started to fill out all of the online forms.  Someone's got to win, right? And regardless (irregardless. Oh God. Spell check didn't fix that. WHYYYYYYYY????), I'll lose weight.  So that's still kind of winning something.

After weighing in, I went grocery shopping for lots of produce and dried beans (I'm trying this again. I have some weird inability to prepare beans from their dried state.  Before I went vegan, I had a similar problem preparing bacon. Just can't do it. Not sure why.)  I tracked all of my food and ended up 2 points under (not on purpose).

Today- I tracked all of my food.   (still deciding if it would be useful/interesting enough to post what I eat?) and made it to the gym.  I went to Body Combat.  I love it. It kicks my ass.  I usually would do strength training as well, but it's been so long that this was about what I could do today.  I love Body Combat and shadow/kick boxing so much, that I'm debating joining a boxing gym when my current contract is up.

So here I am at the end of day two feeling optimistic.  I had enough points left over for a pumpkin beer.  See.  Awesome program.

Oops again? I suck

Ok, so... I haven't been to the gym, BUT I have been coughing up gunk for like three weeks and couldn't go more than 5 minutes without a huge coughing fit.  I'm better now...

So- despite being away from the gym, I am down about 10lbs. Awesome.  It's amazing how when you follow the Weight Watchers Plan you actually lose weight.  Wait, no it's not.

The recent 10lb loss has also put my past a big personal milestone.  I'm under a number I haven't been able to pass in a couple of years now, and that's very exciting. 

I signed up for an early Spin class tomorrow morning, too. It's a tough class to get a reservation for, so I'm hoping that will motivate me out of bed!

Oops

So, I decided to add an entry and noticed a draft from the middle of March called "Accidental Week Off".  Yeah... I guess, month? Now?

Ok. I'm back. Sort of. Starting tomorrow.  I'm not really sure what happened.  Man, vegan pizza is good. There is no good excuse. 

What I don't understand about myself is that I'm completely able to keep vegan with no problem, I've just been finding high calorie vegan treats like cookies, some bread, pizza, french fries, beer.  I'm not sure why I have a problem staying away from those kinds of things if I am ok avoiding so many other foods.

I have been keeping up the workouts, though... so there's that...

Alright, back to it tomorrow... why tomorrow? Because I got home from the gym, made coffee, sat down to get some stuff done, looked at the clock, and noticed it was like 2pm and I hadn't eaten or been grocery shopping yet.  So... going to the grocery store starving wasn't the best plan and I ate a bunch of bread.  So, I guess... technically, back on plan starting with dinner :)

First try at spaghetti squash

Well, these things last forever, luckily.  I bought a spaghetti squash a couple of weeks ago and didn't do anything with it.  I got another one shopping on Tuesday (I ended up leaving with 6 kinds of squash... I may have a problem) just in case the older one wasn't good anymore.  So... I'll just save that for later!

I made another recipe from How it All Vegan - Stuffed Spaghetti Squash.  Yum! 


(PS- they just bleeped out 'the f word' on Dr. Phil.  Not the actual word.  "the f word")

So I wrestled with the squash for a bit to cut it open. These things are such a pain to cut. The recipe said to scoop out the seeds and leave the flesh.  Seeds out, check.  I had no idea about the stringy stuff... was that the spaghetti-like part of the squash?  Or... is that like any other squash and you scrape that out, too?  And when does it start to look like spaghetti? I had never even tasted this stuff before, why did I try to cook it?

I left some of the junk in just in cast that was the actual spaghetti stuff.

The filling also contained something that I haven't really cooked before (though I had eaten them), lentils.  Yet another ingredient that had been sitting my cabinet for a while. This picture is really just because I love my nesting measuring cups.  So cute.

Anyhow- here is the finished product.  I loved it!  My boyfriend, as it turns out, not such a fan of spaghetti squash itself, but liked the stuffing a lot.  Also- I should have scraped out all of that stringy stuff.  It was easy enough to just kind of get rid of it, but, ya know, for next time.

New (to me) food

TVP

I've had a bag of TVP sitting in my pantry for months.  I felt like I saw 5094343 recipes in my books that used it, so when I saw it at Market Basket (whaaaat? no really) I bought a bag and thought I'd figure it out.  Turns out there was one recipe and so it sat.


I finally decided to use it last night in some Vegan Sloppy Joes from the fabulous book, How it All Vegan!  I've been happy with everything I've tried in this book.  I realize that I've never had non-vegan sloppy joes, so I can't say it's better or worse or just like, but they were good! 

I didn't have all of the ingredients I needed (no tomato paste) and made some substitutions, so the sauce was probably not quite right, but still yummy.  They were the prettiest things I've ever made, but what can you do.
Made some cajuned sweet potato over "fries" on the side.  One thing- I was in a bit of a hurry to get to rehearsal, so I had to eat quickly.  A smoking hot sloppy joe is a terrible thing to eat quickly... mouth and throat- burned. Ouch.

Weigh in day

I'm down 2.6 this week!  It's my first week in a while tracking every day and really concentrating on EVERYTHING I consumed.  That's 37.8 down from my highest weight.


I have to say, I felt in control all week, and that's fantastic.  Knowing that I can have a beer (or 2. or whatever...) as long as I make room for it in my points is comforting.  Knowing that I can always have a zero PointsPlus piece of fruit if I'm hungry is great!  I know that's it's my first serious week on in a while, but I'm feeling optimistic.

I got some bad news from Jennie, my fabulous trainer, last week.  Due to a mix up that happened during sign up, I wouldn't be able to see her for a while!  I had been told I was signing up for 2x a week, but apparently only was supposed to be seeing her 6x a month.  Lame.  So, I'm letting time go by to make up for the extra sessions I had.
The good thing is, I know that I will be seeing her again soon enough (and she's still in the gym while I'm there), so I'm not slacking off.  I'm still pushing through, adding weight when I can because I know she will expect to see my progress.  That's definitely good motivation.

C25K is going alright.  It's still frustrating to think of where I was compared to where I am now, so I try to focus in on where I was about a month ago, Week 1 Day 1.  I'm going a little more slowly than I would like, but I'm doing it!  Instead of taking a couple of seconds to stop during my run portions, I'm just slowing the pace a bit and pushing through.  I want to work on getting through the minutes, and then I'll work on my pace.

Running

I can't wait until I can just run without stopping again.

I don't know what made me start running a few years back. Maybe it was because I couldn't run for so long with my old giant boobs? (I had a reduction in 2002) I did the Couch-to-5-K plan to start. Well, technically, I started and stopped a bunch of times, but eventually, I finished it and started running regularly.
I was never a very fast runner, but I liked distances and, for some reason, wanted a medal. I signed up for a half marathon that was set for November of 2007 in New Hampshire. I had stayed pretty true to a schedule I found on Hal Higdon's website, and was feeling confident that I'd be ready to go in November.
On a trip to Salem, MA, I noticed a sign for the Wicked half that was going to take place in September. I thought "Maybe I'll be ready by then" and then forgot about it for a bit. I came across the site for the race a week or so before the event and thought... maybe... The night before, I set and alarm and informed my boyfriend at the time that I was thinking about running a half the next day in Salem (even though I had only run 10 miles in a row before) and that as long as I was able to get up (damn you have to get up early on a Saturday for these things), I was doing it. His reply "I guess you're probably not doing it then, huh?" Well, that sure settled it, I was doing it. "Will you come and watch me cross the finish line?" I asked... the response included excuses about being bored waiting and not wanting to waste the morning, and some other junk. Alright then.
I got up at whatever ungodly hour it was, put on my running gear, and headed to Salem. I wasn't sure if I had what I needed, or too much, or what the hell I was really doing. I brought some safety pins to pin money, my car key, and my bib to my shirt, a sweat shirt in case it was cold, and my iPod (I know, I know, you're not supposed to). I signed up and had a long wait for the start. My bib number was 420. I took that as a good sign because I was currently involved in a production of Reefer Madness. "I think I'm going to finish this thing".
Towards the beginning of the race, I tried to keep up with a group that seemed to be going a steady pace, but ended up falling behind along the way. WHY didn't anyone remind me how many friggen hills are in Salem and Marblehead?! Oh right, because I only told one person I was even doing it.
The course was a loop around, so I figured since we ran UP so many hills, the second half would be easier. Not really. I don't think I remember running down hill for the entire race. At one point, I ran around a corner and was faced with another giant hill. I said, apparently out loud "oh, what the fuck!". The man next to me said "SERIOUSLY?!?!" At least I wasn't alone.
It wasn't all bad. It was a very pretty course with lots of cheering stations around. I discovered that gatorade and that goo stuff really do help.
I crossed the finish line in a respectable amount of time for someone that didn't train enough and I wasn't even close to being the last one. It was exciting and then kind of disappointing realizing I had no one there to share my victory with. I grabbed a bagel and got in my car.
I drove to visit my dad at work to show him my medal. It was a long ride to Natick and a painful exit from the car once I got there (Oh why didn't I stretch!?). "Dad, I got a medal today for running a half marathon!". "Oh cool... wait, what?" (I have to mention my dad was very proud once I explained and he was happy that my first stop after was to show him the medal)

I'm very proud of my half. I had come a long way from not being able to run for 2 minutes at a time. Also, due to a knee injury, I didn't get to do the half I signed up for that November... lame.


I just finished week 4 of the C25K program, and I really am looking forward to just running. My goal is to run in the Wicked Half again this fall, but to be more prepared. I'll get there. It's getting easier.

Day One. Again.

This is actually from last Thursday- 3/3/11

3 month Weight Watchers Journal- check
Points Plus Calculator- unavailable… lame
Complete Food Companion- eh, ok- check

Wednesday was my first day back on Weight Watchers and my first real run at the new program. So far, so good. Being a vegan, it helps that most fruits and vegetables are zero points.

I’ve been dieting for as long as I can remember and been on Weight Watchers multiple times through a few different variations on the old Points program. It works. I know it does. I just have to actually do it.

This time is a little different. I’ve been working with an awesome trainer at the gym and it really makes a huge difference. I work harder when we have our sessions together because, well, because she adds weight to machines or hands me a bigger weight and there’s not a whole lot I can do about it. I work harder on my own because I know I have to write down what I did and she’ll look at it.

So here we go. Again.