Losing Half, Gaining More

If you’re looking for some Good Food motivation, here’s one that doesn’t seem to be at the forefront of discussions: Harvest for Hope: A Guide to Mindful Eating by Jane Goodall.

I’ve been spending quite a bit of time on food research lately to understand exactly what it is that I’m putting into my body(and my family’s bodies). This is the book that sparked it all for me 5 years ago(can it really be that long??) and I decided to re-visit, knowing how much it moved me. It began my desire to not just lose weight, but to learn about and appreciate the fuel that I eat daily. It also sparked for me an intense desire to understand the larger global impact of the food that we eat and that we can so readily access here in the U.S. It was an incredible introduction for me because Jane Goodall is amazing – her gentle nature and  beautiful voice convey the things that she discusses in the book with so much grace. Her strong convictions matter and she manages to deliver them in a manner that’s somehow not overwhelming, daunting and seemingly so much larger than us.

It’s funny, the more I get to “know” people through their weight loss blogs, the more I see so many similar sentiments that are expressed regularly. One of the things that I have especially notice is that many overweight people seem to be in the same boat as me – we could tell you nutritional and food information up on side and down the other. The challenge continues to be in applying that information to our own lives. I have a feeling that if you’re reading this post because you have a blog of your own or just a general interest in weight loss or food issues, much of this information is probably not new to you. I still felt like sharing, though – just in case it might help someone out there who wants to start to gather more knowledge about the food we consume.

Along with this book, some other resources that you might like if you’re also looking to learn more about our food sources and the larger impact that our diets have:

• Michael Pollan’s The Omnivore’s Dilemma: A Natural history of Four Meals, In Defense of Food: An Eater’s Manifesto and Food Rules: An Eater’s Manual
• Barbara Kingsolver’s Animal, Vegetable, Miracle
• Eric Schlosser’s Fast Food Nation
• Carlo Petrini’s Slow Food Nation: Why Our Food Should Be Good, Clean and Fair
• Eric Schlosser’s documentary Food, Inc.
• The documentaries King Corn and Super Size Me
• Food Week – a blog post in one of my favorite, thoughtful, inspiring blogs – Aura Joon
• You Are What You Eat and Just Eat Food – two fantastic family-focused food posts on In the Little Red House
• Grocery List Part 1 – also family-focused – at The Clean Eating Mama – looking forward to more from her!

So, that’s my list. For now. There’s more – always more. But that’s my list for today. Have more to share with me? I’d love it! It all makes me even more excited to get started on our garden – I can’t wait to get digging in the dirt!

I’m still here. Not making the best choices, but being conscious and mindful.

Trying to come to terms with how much time and effort I really need to put into this. Struggling with spending so much time focused on my weight/body/food choices when there are people in the world who have their children crying for food and they don’t even know where they’ll be able to get them food, let alone how they’ll pay for it.

Yet, I need to get my health in check and to a more normalized weight so that there’s less stress on my body – my joints, my feet, my organs, my hormones, my emotions…but then I go back to feeling completely self-absorbed to spend so much time obsessed with this.

If you’re out there Readers, what do you do for yourself to create a balance between obsession and making health and the assumption of taking care of yourself a part of everyday life? I could use some input!

p.s. I’m still working on a list of 101 Reasons I’m Happy Just the Way I Am Today – care to join me?

I am majorly in need of more exercise in my life. I need it for weight loss, but I need it so much more for my mental health. Why is it that we spend so much time and energy on the things that aren’t good for us and avoiding the things that we know will make us feel good? Eating a bit less…getting out for a walk…Taking an extra 15 minutes to spending quietly…taking a few extra deep breaths…

I’m realizing more and more that so many things are tied to this all or nothing obsession with things being perfect. This applies so much to exercise. I have this idea in my mind that I need to run and I need to do intense workouts and it all just seems so overwhelming. So what do I do? Nothing! Literally. Yes, I do need the big workouts. But I also need ANY movement of my body!

So, as I was blog hopping, I found this post by simpledaisy and this quote really sparked something for me:

“A vigorous five-mile walk will do more good for an unhappy but otherwise healthy adult than all the medicine and psychology in the world.” ~ Paul Dudley White

SO TRUE. So so so true. I love the word “vigorous” in there. It conveys strength and energy and just taking a huge deep breath – all of the things that we need to gain from exercise and using our bodies. I spend my time not exercising and not just moving my body nearly enough out of the {ridiculous} fear of not being capable of doing the unrealistic goals I have in my mind when I could simply be taking a walk daily and doing something more than nothing!

So, I’m setting a goal of getting out for a walk every single day. Even if it’s 10 minutes to take my kids to the park and back or just go around the block, it will be fresh air and good for me mentally and physically. Plus, we all know that the biggest challenge is taking the first step. Getting out there every day inevitably leads to increasingly more steps and more energy and it can just potentially snowball from there into incredible workouts.

First, though, I just need to go for a walk. One step at a time.

A friend shared this link from Cheeky Lotus about being a role model for her daughter and I just needed to share. I worry every single day about how my weight issues are going to effect my kids and it’s a big part of why I NEED to do this for myself NOW. I need to take care of myself and be an example of healthy and reasonable and realistic beauty – I deserve it and my kids deserve it.

There’s so much talk about Fat-Talk Free Week and it’s all so positive. I think a huge part of that positiveness is that the lack of Fat-Talk also means that it’s less for young girls to be hearing and internalizing and taking through life with them. If I can make myself healthier and stop even one minute of my daughter doing that to herself, every difficult step of this weight loss journey will be worth itself a million times over.

Isn’t it silly how motivating it can be to have something new? Shiny new sneakers are just the ticket for me. I got my old sneakers 4 years ago in what feels like another lifetime – before marriage, babies, new houses, living across the country. They didn’t see nearly enough love and use, but after 4 years, I think it was still officially time to let them retire.

I took about 10 pictures until it dawned on me that it just *might* be a bit easier to take a picture of them OFF my feet…Internet Folks, she’s not always as bright as she looks;) (Just kidding – I blame this sort of “incident” directly on having kids!)
So here’s my pic of my new sneaks. Feel free to judge my mess in the background – it’s a basically perfect representation of my day-to-day life right now:)

I had to buy these shoes in a 9.5. When I got married 3+ years ago, my feet were a size 7.5/8. After I had my 2 year old, they went to more of an 8.5/9. Now I’m well into the 9/9.5 range. I can’t help but wonder how much of that is pregnancy related and how much is the constant weight of my body on my feet. Thought I weigh a lot, I’m not an inherently large person. I’m not tiny by any means, but I do always fit so much better in Women’s Petite sized clothing if I can find it(hardly ever). I’m 5′3.” Even at 260-something lbs, my wedding rings are a size 5.5 and 6. So it just makes me wonder how much of my feet getting big is just the constant swelling and pressure on them and just a general spread to continue to support the weight of my body. One more reason to get this weight off ! If it’s pressure on my feet, the pressure is also felt everywhere else – my joints, my knees, my heart, my lungs – the list could go on and on!

On a not-weight-loss-or-health-related note – can you see the globe in the background of that picture? My Mother-In-Law brought it over on Tuesday as a leftover remnant from finally re-doing my husband’s childhood bedroom. The kids LOVE it, but I had to look a little – you know it’s as old as we are because it has the Soviet Union and Zaire and a split Germany. I’ve been going on circles about how appropriate it is for them to have an incorrect globe? They won’t be able to read for at least a few years, so now it’s just outlines and geographic representations. And globes are just so fun. Maybe a good compromise would be to get a new globe, too, so that when they really start learning it will give us an opportunity to throw some history in, too? I don’t know – just thinking out loud!

2 Questions:

1. What would you do(if anything) on the globe situation?

2. I need new workout clothes that aren’t going to cost me $100 for 1 pair of pants and half of a tiny t-shirt I could never wear in public. In plus sizes. Not from Old Navy. Any suggestions for places to shop? I’m sick of feeling like a slob in workout clothes!

I posted yesterday that I was just feeling icky, unmotivated, like I was getting sick. I was – I have strep throat. I didn’t go to Weight Watchers to weigh in last night because I wanted to do nothing but lay in bed and stare at the wall by the time my husband got home and it was time for our meeting. I’m hoping that with antibiotics I’ll be feeling a lot better in a day or two and I will go to a Friday or Saturday morning meeting. Popsicles, gingerale and tea are all doing very little to help the pain that makes me wince every time I try to swallow, but it sure might help to move the scale a little bit this week;)

My body feels good. Well, actually, it hurts. That feels good. The kind of hurt that lets me know that I’m actually using my body again. Getting moving just feels so good. Achy good.

It’s amazing how the little changes fall in line together when you make a decision to commit to something. I’ve been telling myself that I need to get my rear in gear and get it moving regularly for what feels like years on end. It feels great to finally be doing something about it and have the motivation to want to continue feeling good about myself. Even with a number on the scale that I may not love, I know that I feel a ton better about myself in general when I am actually taking care of myself and prioritizing exercise and being healthy in general. I’m well aware that I won’t feel this way every day and every time I need to exercise, but I’ll take feel like this some of the time over doing nothing all of the time! Plus, it’s already making the day where I’m dragging a bit easier to just get myself up and moving.

At our Weight Watchers meeting this week, we discussed this and someone made a really fantastic point that resonated with me:

“At some point, someone was discussing weight loss with me and fitting time into your life for exercise, food planning, etc. and how it just seems so time consuming sometimes. But, it’s necessary. We make time to brush our teeth. We make time to shower ourselves. We take time to feed our families healthy, nutritious foods.We need to place the same priority and necessity on taking care of ourselves in relation to weight loss.”

It’s so true. I would never in a million years let my kids eat the way I have been eating. Never.   Diane pointed out to me in the comments of my first post that her youngest children don’t have any memory of her looking any different than she does today. I’m so thankful that my kids are young enough that they won’t ever know me like this and that they’re young enough that they won’t learn the bad habits I have been modeling for them.
p.s. Want to know how I know I’m changing bit by bit? I bought some Little Debbie 100 Cal packs at the store last night thinking that might be good for my husband to take to work or for me to grab as a snack. I don’t know what I ws thinking, I should have known better.

1. I can’t control myself with stuff like that. I’d eat the whole box in two seconds flat.
2. It’s still JUNK, even if it’s only 100 calories of junk instead of a few hundred calories of the regular size.

So, I opened the box and the “100 calories” is literally a maybe 1″X2″ tiny cake. TINY.  Not even slightly worth 100 calories and 2 WW points in my day that I could be using for something that will actually fill me up and make me feel good.

I threw the box away. In the outside gross, stinky trash can that goes to the curb. That’s how I know I’m changing.

Stats on the Progress page(I added measurements – should have started that when I initially started the info, but oh well!). I’m up 1.2lbs this week and I’m actually ok with it. I know that I wasn’t as careful as I need to be about my portions and keeping track of what I was eating. I’m also really proud of myself because although I didn’t lose on the scale, I have so many positives about the past week!

• I went to a wedding and actually made conscious decisions about the food I chose.
• I joined the gym and actually went!
• I didn’t eat fast food once. I don’t think I even went through a drive-thru window(except maybe Starbucks for a Sugar-Free/Fat-Free Cinnamon Dolce Latte;).
• I got myself a few new sports bras and t-shirts to stay motivated and not feel slobbish going to the gym(so that I can’t use that as an excuse!).
• Oh, yeah – and I started this blog!! Can I please just state for the record how much I can’t believe I was missing out on in the blogging world?? There are so so so many amazing and inspiring weight loss blogs out there and I am so glad I started searching around for them. It’s such incredible motivation and support to see how many other people are on a similar journey!
• I’m committing to signing up today for the FitBloggin Conference in March. I know I’ve just started with this blog, but this will be one more source of inspiration and something to look forward to. Anyone else already making plans to be there?

All of this and I don’t even feel completely overwhelmed – I call that a successful week!