City of Trees

In my previous post, I eluded to the fact that there has been a lot that contributed to my weight gain. I also barely touched on so many different topics, I feel that each unfinished thought deserves a blog or explanation.
In December of 2014, I was promoted and moved to the Sacramento area. We knew that the promotion and move were coming but as my official start date came closer, we were unprepared. We had made several trips to the area to find housing, however had failed. We did not know how competitive the housing market is here. Eventually my start date came and I moved in with my grandmother while my family stayed in the Salinas Valley. Although I was familiar with the company, the position was brand new to me. I was an Administrator for a Mental Health Facility. When I moved to the area it was a 16 bed facility and while I was there it grew to be 28 beds, with more beds planned to open in the immediate future.
I worked, a lot, and when not working I was house hunting. I desperately missed my family and cried from King City to Fremont the day I left. The tears did not abate, it took a month for me to find housing and get my family moved to the area. I was FaceTiming my husband every night, crying and trying to figure out how I could keep pushing ahead when I felt so alone and overwhelmed.
Since graduating from college I have chose to dedicate my life to helping the mentally ill, it is not a decision that I regret, ever. I have worked with children and adults, and I find my job rewarding and fulfilling. That being said, it can be very stressful. I have been in many different roles with two different companies. Expectations are exceedingly high, and for good reason. Our consumer is one of the most under served populations around. Along with keeping our clients, happy and healthy we are also subject to State Licensing expectations, add on to that the company expectations and the pressure was relentless.
I was on call 24/7, even when I wasn't on call. I went to work on my days off because the State would make surprise visits. I took calls and text messages from the owners of the company day and night. I was a slave to my phone, constantly reading and responding to emails, making sure that I always had it in my hand, in my pocket or in my purse. I never begrudged my role as Administrator, in fact I loved it. I knew what I was signing up for, but eventually the pressure became too much from me.
As I mentioned before I started having health issues. Almost all of my health issues were related to stress. I was losing my hair and packing on the weight. Before becoming an administrator I was a residential counselor, as a residential counselor I moved around a lot, my whole day was spent on my feet. With my promotion I had become much more sedentary and more prone to snacking and eating my feelings. I had tried on several different occasions to improve my eating habits, without incorporating any exercise, however I wasn't committed. I was too stressed and did not give myself enough time to really focus on it. I did discover a few different places that I like to eat, that could be healthy if you made the right choices, one was Vibe Health Bar in Oak Park, close to where I worked. Vibe has some of the most creative and delicious smoothies that I have ever tried, one of them is called City of Trees. The other location I discovered was Anna's Vegan Cafe, I am not a vegan, not even close, but I really enjoyed the food there. If I could afford to be a pescetarian, that would be ideal for me.
I went on like this for nearly two years. I was becoming really unhappy, where I used to love to go to work, I was now dreading it. The company and the clients deserved better and luckily an opportunity arose for me to go back to working with kids, so I resigned. I truly do miss some of my co-workers from that facility and really miss some of the clients. In this industry we are never supposed to have our favorites when it comes to clients, but we all do. Some clients just have a way of working themselves into your heart, even when you have really good boundaries.
With my resignation I now feel like I have more time for myself and my family. I missed so much while working with the other company. Family parties, holidays, parent teacher conferences. Very recently I have completely forgotten about my phone, leaving it in my car, leaving it in the bedroom for most of the day, to be fair I also now have an iPad that I utilize for all my social media and it is a big part of my weight loss plan/routine. I'll soon have a blog all about technology and weight loss.  I have made myself a commitment that I will spend time on myself in the form of a gym session 6/7 days a week. A friend of mine likes to add #strongmom to her fitness posts and pictures, I realized that's what I want to be. Being a strong mom means being strong physically and mentally strong, being present for my family and children. Just because I changed jobs does not mean that I don't have stress anymore, but I can tell you that I am coping better with the stress that I do have.

City of Trees Smoothie (inspired by Vibe Health Bar)
1/2 cup frozen pineapple
1/2 cup frozen mango
1 cup spinach
1 frozen banana
1/4 seeded and cored jalapeno
1 finger tip of ginger
1 TBSP Chia Seeds
1 cup Coconut Water
I asked my husband and kids to try this smoothie and they did not love it as much as I did. They both said that it tasted like salsa. I personally didn't get that impression but everyone's taste buds are different.

Laziness and Stress and Weight Gain, OH MY!

I fell off the wagon, and I stayed there for a long while. I recently rediscovered my blog and remembered how much I enjoyed writing about my experience and struggle with my weight. I do not aspire to be skinny, I want to be healthy. As I work on this blog again, it is important that I remind myself and everyone that I am not doing this to become what society dictates as perfect, acceptable, beautiful. I am doing this for me and to some large extent for my family. I have been hospitalized for extremely high blood pressure, like 200/100 range. It was scary, but it still wasn't the wake up call that you might think because although my blood pressure was astronomical, my heart according to all tests that are available is healthy. I know that does not rule out the fact that I was also a stroke victim waiting to happen. My wake up call was my 4 year old affectionately playing with my belly while my 5 year old called me fat. There was no intent to be hurtful from my children, but their words and actions cut deep and resonated within me. I cried, a lot, I still get teary when I think about it.

Let me tell you, falling off the fitness wagon completely is delicious. I have eaten with wild abandon, turned 40 and kept eating. I watched as my waistline steadily increased from a size 10 to a size 16.
So much has happened since I dared to blog. We moved from Monterey County to Sacramento because I got promoted. My promotion contributed to my steady weight gain. I have some many excuses about why or how it happened.

Stress, OMG, the stress. It is hard to be a manager. I love working with the population that I work with, however it does definitely have its challenges. I'm an emotional eater and I eat my feelings, this is a life long struggle for me. I do my best to control it and integrate other skills, but it is the skill that I have heavily relied on for most of my life.

I love to cook for my family and I want to make them food that they will enjoy eating. I love making them homemade Macaroni and Cheese, Chicken Alfredo Bakes, Swedish Meatballs, Enchiladas, Posole, Mozzarella Stuffed Meatballs with Spaghetti. There was a time when I was able to control my urge to sample and make myself a lightened version of what everyone else was eating, but after my promotion and the move, it became too difficult and I became too lazy. I did not want to spend all evening in the kitchen making two different dinners and I did not want to inflict my dinner on the rest of the family. With our move, we are also a lot closer to all kinds of different fast, convenience food. Costco pizza is only $9.99, that is so affordable when trying to stretch your pennies. I have continued to question why the healthy food is the most expensive.

I am embarrassed that I have put on so much weight. I had thrown away all my "fat" clothes in order to discourage weight gain and ended up having to buy those sizes again. I have been trying and failing to hide behind my children when taking photos. I am only 4'11'', I always have to be in front in the group photos. While taking a selfie with my husband the other day, I just couldn't believe how big my face was, it was not possible to get a good angle shot. It seems to me that being fit is almost a full time job in itself, with the meal planning, the meal prepping, the exercising. It is so time consuming.
But as my health began to fade and my jeans became bigger, I gained a new perspective. Being healthy is an investment in yourself, it means that you find yourself worthy of spending time and money on yourself and the tools that you need to become healthy. I have so many tools and gadgets at my disposal now: a Nurti Ninja, Planet Fitness (comes with unlimited "Design Your Own Program" with a Fitness Trainer, Nike Apple Watch, blue tooth headphones, a Fabletics wardrobe, and the best gift of all, a supportive partner.

So now I am back on track, eating better, going to Planet Fitness along with a job change.  I do not love the 5AM alarm to get up and go. Right before my 41st birthday, I had a full on tantrum and cried because I didn't want to go to the gym. I still went, no one is making me, I am my own worst enemy. Due to my meltdown, I have given myself permission to make Wednesdays my rest day from the gym. Although the trainer is doing a 5 Day A Week program for me, I was pushing myself to go to the gym every day.

The 5 Day Workout Plan

I kinda think the Trainer hates me, this is the routine that goes with the workout plan. 

Some of my favorite Christmas Gifts

The Smoothie that I have affectionately named La Fea
1/2 Cup  Frozen Pineapple
1/2 Cup Frozen Blueberries
1 TBSP Almond Butter
1 Cup Kale
3 oz Light Vanilla Greek Yogurt
3/4 Cup Water
1/2 TBSP Chia Seeds
1 TBSP Maca Powder

Lunch at work.

I do not look cute when I work out, but always feel better about myself when I finish my routine. 

Yoga Dreams

As I restart my fitness journey I have rekindled my love for yoga. This has caused me to aspire to be bad ass in yoga. Nothing like a vague fitness goal to keep me practicing. I know that I need more than yoga to get into shape. I also utilize my eliptical for cardio and do Yoga Meltdown,  that is instructed by the charmingly sadistic Jillian Michaels. As I attempt to contort my body into various different positions, engaging my core, melting my heart to the sky or earth and practicing my breath; I find complete peace. After my first yoga workout I promptly fell into a deep and heavy sleep and woke up with a sore core and shoulders.

So, what does it mean to become bad ass in yoga...does it mean doing the flying pigeon or perfecting various feats of strength?  In truth I do want to become a full yogini and I don't know how realistic that is. For now I will settle into the routine of daily yoga and know that every day I practice, I improve.

My Inner Thighs are Besties

So basically my long hiatus from blogging has not been figure friendly. Have I gained all my weight back... well no; but I have put more back on than I care to admit. So many things have happened since I last blogged, so many potential excuses available;  but the only thing that really happened is that I became lazy, complacent and discouraged.

I lost the healthy challenge at work, even though I had a solid second place finish, there was a mix up at the YMCA that resulted in my disqualification.  I was so upset. I had dedicated so many hours, made so many sacrifices that it was unbelievable that bad record keeping cost me a prize. Even with that disappointment,  I continued to push forward with my exercise regiment although admittedly at a much slower pace. This lasted until about February when it fizzled out completely.  I also got promoted at work, extra responsibilities, extra stress and a whole lot more hours. This took almost all the exercise time out of my schedule.  While working part time I was able to dedicate more time to exercise and meal planning.

I reached my plateau, I got down to 148lbs, and was unable to lose another ounce. I became so frustrated!  I know now that it was time to push myself harder in my exercise routine, but I was too distracted to notice that was my problem.

I have developed plantar fasciitis in both my feet, I noticed it when taking Zumba classes last year. I thought for sure that it would go away,  but it has gotten worse. With some stretching in the morning before getting out of bed the pain is more tolerable, and then continuing to stretch throughout the day.

My eating habits were a little slower to change,  I remember a couple of days that I indulged.  Of course my beloved Carne Asada Fries were among the deviations, I also discovered Garlic Crab Fries and Pulled Pork Fries. Yeah I was bad, really really bad and it all tasted so good!

In September our family participated in Color Me Rad, which was an amazing experience for all of us. I want to be able to run the whole thing next time! I was physically ill the day of the race and untrained to boot, I was very disappointed in my performance. I knew that if I had just stayed the course I would have done so much better and felt proud of myself.  I'm still proud that we all got out there and ran, for fun!

At the end of the day I am really ashamed of my behavior.  I don't even like to look at myself in the mirror anymore. I'm not proud of how I look. So I come back humbly to my blog, at the one year anniversary of its inception, to hit the proverbial reset button. This week I have exercised more days than not, I have eaten less and drank more water. I have not yet stepped on the scale yet, because honestly I'm not ready to cry over my relationship with gravity quiet yet.

Bare with me, I'm starting all over again.

Side Effects

As I continue to lose weight there have been some less pleasant side effects that I had not been completely prepared for. I have always had a rather generous bottom and although that has not changed much, it has indeed changed. Several years ago I was walking down icy stairs at my house, I slipped and landed several steps below where I had started and landed on concrete. This accident resulted in a fractured coccyx, which essentially means that I broke my butt. Breaking your butt hurts!!! You may think it is soft and padded and of no consequence, but believe me if you break it you will know it and you will know it for months, years or possibly the rest of your life. I knew that I was still suffering some of the consequences of this injury. When I was in labor with my last two children I felt the contractions primarily in my bottom. What I didn't realize would happen was that as I have lost weight and have less padding, I now have a difficult time sitting down for more than thirty minutes without some pain and discomfort. As a rule I tend to relax on the couch on my hip with my legs to the side, but when at work I don't have that luxury and standing up from a seated position becomes very uncomfortable. If I am not being mindful when I am sitting in the car I will run into the same predicament as well.

Something else has happened that I can not in memory ever remember, while sleeping on my stomach sometimes my rib cage begins to bother me as it settles uncomfortably into the mattress. I'll have to squirm and wiggle in to just the right position to stay on my stomach for an extended period of time. Protruding bones have never been a problem of mine, in fact I have still yet to see my collar bones.

I've developed a strange click that appears to be coming from my sternum, when I take deep breaths I feel an uncomfortable pop and hear a sound. I'm not sure what it is, besides weird.

I have a different kind of love/hate relationship with shopping now. I used to hate to go shopping and try on clothes. Now I love to shop and I want to try on clothes, but there are new frustrations that come along with it. Who knew that every woman on the Central Coast was a 10P? It feels nearly impossible to find my new size. Forget about being able to buy clearance, it's hard to find my size on the regular racks. Now, I'm not done losing weight and my ideal size is probably a 6P, but I don't see a lot of that size hanging around on the racks either. When I was bigger it was much easier to find my size.

I wouldn't trade any of these slight unpleasanteries for having my weight back. I just didn't expect to have negative side effects to my weight loss.

Surviving Thanksgiving and the Leftovers

The holidays are upon us now, and already presenting it's challenges and temptations. Not quiet sure how I did it, but I managed to squeeze in a workout while the turkey was in the oven. I can not claim that my Thanksgiving day was healthy perfection, but I can say that in general I am proud of how I did. My sampling habits were what I relied on to get me through the day. In the morning I made sure to eat breakfast, and we skipped having snacks all together. Somehow I also managed to only have a bite of each of the three different kind of pies that I made. That is a major victory. I am a self declared carbaholic, so having stuffing and mashed potatoes in the house is awful for my self control but I only had about four bites of each and relied heavily on baked sweet potatoes, green beans and white meat turkey.

For whatever reason I thought that because Thanksgiving day was over that I would no longer have food temptations, but that pretty much ended when I opened my refrigerator on Black Friday and saw all the leftovers. I really wanted to have a piece of pie for breakfast, especially since a new recipe that I tried out (Caramel Apple Crunch Pie) had been so successful. I had two eggs and two corn tortillas instead and packed my lunch for work. Again this presented a challenge because I wanted to make a turkey sandwich with mayo and stuffing, but I figured it out.

Turkey and avocado sandwich with Superfood Salad

White Turkey meat, green beans, sweet potato

Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday of the year because it is not about commercialism or a fictional guy in a red suit, but instead it is about being grateful for all that you have. I had an abundant Thanksgiving and am thankful for all the challenges that it presented. I am thankful that I am reclaiming my health and my body, I am thankful for my new ability to go forty five consecutive minutes on the elliptical, I am thankful that I no longer enjoy carnitas like I used too, I am thankful for losing 35lbs., and making it through Thanksgiving without putting an ounce of it back on, I am thankful for my entire family, I am thankful for my soulmate/best friend Richy, I am thankful.

It's Weird to Be Wearing Skinny Jeans

After a lifetime of buying flare or boot cut jeans, I purchased my first pair of skinny jeans...ever. Now they are humble and are Mossimo brand jeans because at this stage in the game, although I really want to buy new clothes I know that it better to wait for the new wardrobe for when my weight loss is complete which is another three to six months from now. I feel weird walking around in skinny jeans, and the irony that I had to buy the curvy cut does not escape me. I will always have to buy curvy cut, genetics gave me a smallish waist, large hips, butt and thighs.

There have been many things and people that have helped me along my fitness journey, even though I have not finished yet and have loads of work to do I think it is important and perhaps even helpful for me to share what has helped me along the way. Some things may be surprising to you, others may not.

First and foremost I have had an amazing cheerleader, he has kept me accountable every step of the way and said some things that were sometimes hard to hear, but very necessary. My Richy has driven me to my classes at the YMCA, watched the babies while I worked out, moved the elliptical into the house from the garage, bought me rewards to celebrate my victory, kept my scale batteries fresh, tuned up my elliptical, shared links to my blog and the literally the list of what he has done for me to help me along the way is endless. He complemented my willpower when everyone was enjoying pizza and I was eating a salad, and is always asking where I would like to go to eat so that I don't feel limited by the menu options. It was an adjustment period for both of us though, while ordering a cake for our daughters' baby shower Richy was pointing out to me all my favorite pan dulces that I love in the bakery display case, he then got a serious look on his face and apologized for tempting me. I explained that I was not tempted but so appreciated that he is always so eager to feed me things that he knows that I enjoy, nowadays whenever we go to the mall Richy finds my favorite kiosk and purchases a large cup of fruit for me with salt and lemon for flavor. Not only do I truly enjoy eating it, but it is healthy too. To me Richy's patience and support are nothing short of amazing! Richy has always told me that I am beautiful and that did not change when I ballooned up and it has not changed now. When I asked him about how I looked before he said, "Honestly I didn't notice how big you had gotten, because I love you no matter what your size." 

Other people have helped me and supported me along the way as well, my Mom for one. She is cheering for me from afar and really wants me to share all my secrets and thoughts as I go through this whole process. My Mom knows firsthand about my lifelong struggle with my weight. Many of my co-workers have helped me as well, since we all started this fitness challenge together we have all been able to watch and learn from each other. 

I count my calories, and keep my phone handy at all times to enter meals, and work outs. I use the MyFitnessPal App for android. This program is super simple to use; you start with a base amount of calories a day, mine is 1250, (it was higher but now that I have lost weight I get less calories) and if you exercise you get to consume more calories based on the calories burned during your workout. Entering data is easy, you can search for the food consumed or simply use the barcode scanner to enter the data. I have found other apps that are helpful and that I liked, Accupedo and MapMyWalk.

My goal is to do a minimum thirty minutes on my elliptical every day. I have not always met this goal, and get pretty hard on myself whenever I make excuses not to exercise. Along with my elliptical I have a set of small hand weights for toning, a medicine ball, a yoga ball, a stick, and a belt. The stick I use to do different types of twists to help slim the waist, I could do the same exercises without it but I find that I benefit from it more if I use it. I have had a separated abdomen throughout this process that has made traditional core training difficult, I have used the belt in order to make some adaptations to exercises.

I have attended Zumba classes at the YMCA, in addition to Zumba I have taken CardioKickboxing, Yoga, and Flex Power. I have enjoyed all of these classes and look forward to attending more. Since I can't always make a Zumba class at the YMCA and the kiddos have a Wii, I have taken advantage of the situation and started using the Zumba Fitness game for Wii that Richy purchased for me. It is lots of fun and I think it helps my performance in classes.

Something a little bit unusual that has helped me significantly along the way is my Kindle Fire. In the beginning  thirty minutes on the elliptical seemed an unbearable eternity and I found that if I read a book while I was working out it helped the time pass, plus it hid the screen that was counting away the minutes of the workout. Whenever I didn't cover the screen the workout seemed to last forever. I have also used my Kindle Fire for Pinterest. On Pinterest I have found so many suggestions for mini-workouts, recipes and inspiration; a little pseudo retail therapy never hurt anyone either. To fully take advantage of my Fire's capabilities I have downloaded magazines like "Women's Health" and "Shape."

When I need little extra motivation, it is always close by. I simply have to look at my new pant size to see that what I am doing is working. Sometimes it feels like a painfully slow process, but then I see myself slipping into a size 10 for the first time since college and remember that it is all worth it. 

Every once in a while I need to remind myself to just breath. I get so focused that when results are not as quick as I would like them to be I get pretty upset. Daily reminders to just breath and do a mini-meditation on it.

One last key element to my success is simple, good training shoes that I am excited to put on every time. I love the obnoxious color combination because they seem to yell, "look at me, I'm working out!" 

I see myself needing to update this blog entry at some point when I discover new tips and tricks that have helped me succeed. I know this for sure though the scale is so close to saying 149 that I can taste it, even though when I reach that weight I still have another 25lbs to go, it will seem like such a victory!