Journey of 75 Update

As I mentioned in my last post, I think a weight of 150 might be too low for me so I have a working goal of 160lbs at this time. I might be able to get to 150 IF I can add fitness activities to my life. More on that later.

So to date I have lost a total of 60lbs. I have a BMI in the "normal" range for the first time in about 25 years. I weigh less today than I did the day I found out I was pregnant with my daughter (who is now 25 years old). My doctor has removed the diagnosis "Obesity" from my record. I can sometimes fit into a size 10 but most of my pants are size 12. I never thought I'd be able to say, "size 14 is too large" but I can indeed say that today. I lost nearly one-third of my starting weight.

I lost the weight with a minimum, and I do mean minimum, of fitness activities. I've had neuromas in both feet for about 20 years and the pain they cause prevents me from doing anything repetitive like walking, hiking, riding a bike, eliptical, etc. It has been incredibly frustrating. When they were first diagnosed I had to give up wearing heels. No big loss I thought so I gave up wearing heels. Then I had to give up wearing dress shoes, even flats, because the pointy toes squished my toes together and triggered the pain. I tried walking with nice wide shoes, sneakers, and in time that became a problem so I tried the eliptical machines which was also a problem. Hubby and I bought two new Trek bikes and I thought there was no way the neuromas would catch me on that bike but they did. It would get so bad I'd have to get off the bike, take off my shoe and pull the bones in my foot away from one another to get some relief so I could finish the ride. That happened more than once this past summer.

SO, with encouragement from a friend who had neuroma surgery, I saw an orthopedic surgeon who agreed that under the circumstances surgery was warranted and suggested that I have both of them done at the same time. If I could heel-walk for a few days then it might be best to do them both so I wouldn't have to go through it twice. This made sense to me so I had the surgery on 12/21/12. It has been a week, much too soon to determine if it was successful, but I'm looking forward to finding out if this coming summer will be The Summer of Fitness for me. Until then I have some recovering to do.

Journey of 75 Update

It has been 219 days, just over 31 weeks, since I began the Journey of 75. At this time I am unsure if a goal of 75lbs of weight loss is realistic for my age, body type and genetic composition; I have not been at that weight since I was in high school so I have no idea if it's achievable. For now I will just keep working toward it and see what happens as I get closer.

It took 17 weeks to lose 12lbs "on my own" through a combination of diet and exercise. Because I was frustrated and unsatisfied with the results, I started a program called Prism Weight Loss Program (www.pwlp.com) and made a conscious decision to focus on the diet/nutrition aspect of weight loss first and add a fitness component later. Since starting Prism 14 weeks ago, I have lost an additional 26 lbs for a total loss of 38lbs. I have not set foot in a gym, nor have I participated in any regular fitness program or activity in that 14 weeks. Having arrived at the halfway point of my goal, I think I am ready to add a fitness component back into my journey and I think my body will adjust to it much better than it did when I was trying to work out with 75 excess pounds on my frame.

Some other statistics of note:
1) I have lost 17% of my starting body weight
2) I have reduced by body mass index (BMI) by 5.4 points

Additionally, and more importantly, I now have the knowledge and tools I need to maintain this improved nutrition and eating behavior and for the first time ever, the confidence that I can keep it off for the rest of my life.

I'm only halfway across the bridge, but I'm 50% further than I was when the journey began back in November 2011.

I am the daughter of the King. My Heavenly father, who calls me daughter, has loved me, preserved me, and saved me, in spite of my sin and imperfection. I will honor and praise the LORD and give Him glory through becoming the person He created me to be and living my life as one worthy of the crown.

I am an overcomer. Through the sacrifice of Jesus Christ I have been saved from sin and death. I will testify to this truth in my life so that others may know and accept Jesus as their Savior too.

I was made to love God and to love others. It’s not about me. God has given me the ability to put my own needs aside for periods of time to tend to the needs of others. I recognize this as a gift from the Father and I will strive to allow Him to lead me to those He puts in my life to care for. I will endeavor to do this in healthy ways as the Holy Spirit leads me, and not become an enabler.

I am a student of Rabboni/Teacher – Jesus. He has given me a desire for learning and the gift of intelligence so that I may share knowledge and truths of God’s creation, and especially the Word, with others.

I am a leader with a servant’s heart. The gift of leadership is not to be taken lightly and God has given it to me for very specific purposes. I am to lead under the LORD’s banner (JEHOVAH-NISSI) and always with my heart and mind in a posture of servant-hood; not only to God but to those I am leading.

I am a temple of the Living God. I will strive to maintain the beauty of the temple, inside and out, worthy of He who lives within me, and not allow it to fall into disrepair or be destroyed by myself or others.

I am free. I am no longer a slave to sin; the Son has set me free and the yoke of my former slavery has been removed. I will strive to keep myself free from the chains and imprisonments of my own doing and not be subject again to a yoke of slavery by focusing my eyes on Jesus, by faith and the power of the Holy Spirit who lives within me.

I am a new creation. The old is gone. I will put my past sins, hurts and strongholds behind me and not give them dominion over my future in Christ.

DAY 200

Today I mark the 200th day of dedicated effort toward changing my life by changing my food and fitness behaviors. I started on this journey back in November and although I made very slow progress until I found the Prism program, I still consider it my starting point and celebrate the fact that I made a conscious decision to change what was broken. I've been journaling nearly every day since I started this journey. Sometimes, like today, I go back and re-read past entries and I realize how far I've come not only in weight lost but in my thinking. I think I am most surprised by how emotional this has been. Clearly this was more than just eating habits and nutrition (science) and I'm so grateful to have learned so much about myself in both body and mind. I had no idea there would be so many layers to this thing.

One Sunday afternoon in February

Yesterday afternoon we spent a few hours with Abby (5) and Bella (2). We read stories, drew pictures, and eventually we started a game of hide and seek. Abby decided that Opa should count to ten and she and Bella would hide. Things were going along just fine, the girls squealing with joy as they ran all over the house trying to find hiding places. Well, actually, Abby found the hiding places, Bella just followed wherever Abby went. During one of the games, Opa closed his eyes and began counting and the girls ran off to hide. "One, twoooo, threeeee, four... five... six... seven... eight... nine... what comes after nine?" And from the bedroom came a little voice, "TEN!"

Kicking and screaming

I woke up in a bad mood this morning. My attitude was crummy
before I even shuffled to the bathroom for my morning ablutions. I performed a mental and emotional inventory, searching for a source, and I realized that I
was angry that the weekend I envisioned turned out to be 180 degrees from
reality. I also noticed that the more I felt like I wasn’t getting what I
wanted, the less I wanted to make myself available to anyone or for anything
else. I saw myself as a small child throwing a tantrum after not getting
something she wanted. The spoiled girl voice in my head said, “Fine, then I’m
not going to church early for the prayer group. In fact, I may not go to church
at all!” To which God replied, “It’s not about you.”

Learning to take a God's-eye view of Jerry Springer situations

So I was reading along in Genesis yesterday about Jacob being deceived by his future father-in-law Laban. He worked for seven years to get Rebekah and he gets Leah instead (surprise!). I don't even want to go into how he didn't know it was Leah; that's a conversation for another day. Anyway, so Laban basically says, "Well... just take Leah for now and I'll give you Rebekah if you agree to work for me some more." Jacob agreed to this. I tried to put myself in Jacob's shoes... I would have been angry at Laban. I would have felt betrayed and tricked. I would have felt kind of bad for Leah because she wasn't the one I really wanted (and Leah knew this). I would have felt horrible for Rebekah but I would wonder if she was in on it and therefore was also part of the betrayal. She might have been innocent in which case I would have felt bad about having consummated with Leah. My point is that this was a pretty Jerry Springer kind of situation. What's amazing to me is that God knew all of this, planned it all out, and the 12 tribes of Israel came from this mess. It made me think about all the times in my life when I've thought to myself, "This is so messed up" or "Life is so stinkin hard sometimes" but God knew it all, planned it all, and brought His will out of it anyway. All this in spite of what it looks like to us from our perspective.

The Journey of 75 - How to get to "there" from "here"

The journey of 75lbs begins with...

I'm SO full but this ______ is so good; just one more.
Now my jeans are tight around my calves? Really?!?!
Where are my "fat jeans"? These are too tight (again).
Why am I so tired all the time?
Why do my feet always hurt?
My cholesterol is HOW high?
"They just admitted Dad for emergency quadruple bypass surgery."

I really don't want to take high cholesterol medication.
"Uncle Bob died of a massive heart attack last night."
Side effects of statins include changes in liver function, muscle & joint pain.
I can't stand this anymore; I have to do something about it.

How do I get "there" from "here"?

You don't just wake up one morning and lose 75lbs but you can wake up to the fact that you have to do something about a serious health risk and decide to do something about it. The problem to be solved is figuring out what you're going to do to, what changes you're going to make, how you'll eat, and what your fitness regimen will be.

After spending some time on a bicycle this past summer - a valiant effort to get off the couch but my bicycle seat isn't nearly as comfortable as my recliner - I found out that I can actually enjoy some fitness activities. And before the bikes we were doing more hikes - a little hard on my feet - and I enjoyed that too. Of course those two things aren't going to be enough; I'll have to do more, much more, fitness activity and I'll have to do it daily. Not only that, but eating better, eating less, cutting the garbage out of my diet. I certainly have my work cut out for me.

Like the positiion I was standing in when I took these pictures, I am at the beginning of this journey. There are going to be quite a few steps needed to bridge the gap between "here" and "there". I won't get anywhere unless I begin to take those steps.

Here I go!

Things that make you go hmmm...

Found on a friend's FB status: "So let me get this STRAIGHT... Kelsey Grammer can end a 15 yr marriage by phone, Larry King is on divorce #9, Britney Spears had a 55hr marriage, Jesse James & Tiger Woods, while married, were having sex with EVERYONE, 53% of Americans get divorced & 30-60% cheat on their spouses. Yet, same-sex marriage is going to destroy the institution of marriage? Really? Does anybody else find this ridiculous?"

Given enough time, humans can, and will, find a multitude of ways to mess up.


From JSOnline: Koss' $34 million loss first came to light in December 2009, when American Express notified the company that Sachdeva was paying her personal credit card bills with money from the company. Sachdeva stole the money over a period of at least six years, with the amount taken escalating over time.

Mulvaney is accused in court documents of assisting Sachdeva in hiding the illegal transactions. The SEC complaint says she maintained a binder referred to in the complaint as "the red book." There, according to the complaint, Mulvaney wrote down the false entries she was making in the company's records.

The complaint says she also prepared falsified accounting books and records and maintained them in a series of colored folders referred to as the "rainbow files." The files were green, orange, blue or yellow, depending on the year, and included more than 100 fraudulent transactions, the complaint says.


Very organized, not very ethical.

Toward a simpler kind of life

I've just finished reading a book entitled, "Tis a Gift to be Simple: Embracing the Freedom of Living with Less" by Barbara DeGrote-Sorensen and David Allen Sorensen. This book was given to me as a 'secret sister' gift about two years ago by someone whom I would have thought didn't know me very well but, as it turns out, hit the nail on the head. I found it recently when I was rearranging some books on a shelf and decided that it was a very timely topic for me and indeed it was. I've given quite a bit of thought to the idea of living a simpler kind of life over the past year or so.

Truthfully the thinking has been going on longer than a year but the serious thinking started in winter during a few particularly cold, snowy and treacherous commutes to and from work. As I mentally argued with myself about the fact that I was attempting to drive 30 miles to work in a snowstorm or on slippery roads, "Nothing about accounting is THIS important," I told myself, I felt a desperate need to make a change. Something had to give in my life and my lifestyle; I just hoped it wouldn't be that I would give up my life trying to get to the office in bad weather. It was around that time that I learned how to take the bus to work. Learning to take the bus may sound strange considering that I took the city bus to school from fifth grade through college but that was when I lived in the city; living out here in mostly rural Ozaukee County doesn't offer the same ubiquitous transit system that living in Milwaukee offered. Nor do the Ozaukee buses run as long or as frequently. Therefore, learning was required. For example, not every bus goes back to the stop where I left my car that morning. I only had to be burned by that lesson once. Also, the last pick up from my stop at the end of the day is 5:30pm. In my world, that's still fairly early. There have been many frantic runs from my desk to the busstop while simultanously putting on my coat or shoving my laptop in the case because I still had work to finish. Missing that last bus would make for a very miserable night.

So I learned to take the bus and I've gotten pretty good at it. I try to take the bus to work more than I drive my car which saves 60 miles of gas, wear and tear each day I do so. I read on the bus, respond to e-mails, sometimes I make to-do lists, sometimes I pray and/or listen to worship music, and sometimes I just look at the window because I don't have to worry about the traffic. It does take a bit longer than driving... a guaranteed hour each way by bus versus about 40 to 50 minutes by car during rush hour... but I think my relative lack of stress while riding the bus makes up for that in some ways.

I feel as if taking the bus was step one in my pursuit of a simpler life and my latest effort, working from home at least once per week, is step two. This one hasn't been going as well. My boss and my boss' boss are all for it. They've encouraged me to work from home but it's more difficult than I thought it would be. Part of the problem is what I call the "you're home, let's talk" syndrome. My husband starts his job at 11am and ends about 8pm so when I get up and start working at 7am and he meanders over to whatever room I've ensconced myself, he wants to talk about things on his mind or tasks on his lists or other matters that are not work related. I will indulge him for awhile but then I gently remind him that I have work to do and he'll apologize and only interrupt me about five more times before he leaves for work, usually with, "Sorry, one more thing..." as his introductory phrase. He's a love.

Another, and more troublesome, part of the problem is the fact that it's very difficult to do my job without a number of references and resources that are kept in very large, three-ring binders stored in my file cabinet. Most of the documents contained in those binders are also available to me on my laptop but I often have to reference more than one at a time. I've tried bringing them home; it requires a suitcase with wheels and a telescopic handle. Furthermore, when I work from home I am working over the company's virtual private network (VPN) which bogs down during certain hours of the day or on snow days when the entire Midwest region is working from home and sucking up all the bandwidth the VPN can manage. I still make the effort, however, and I've learned to save a working copy of the file to my local drive so I can avoid the delays. Just another of the many little tricks I've learned in my quest to simplify my life.

I plan to continue the effort to work from home at least once a week. Perhaps I can even try twice per week if I can iron out all of the wrinkles. So now I am trying to think ahead to the next change I will make. I think there are a number of drawers, cabinets and closets that need to be ruthlessly cleared out and de-cluttered; but then I must decide what to do with all that stuff.

Who knew that simplifying life could be so fraught with complications?

Love

The scenery barely registered on my brain as I rode the bus to work on Wednesday morning. It seemed inconceivable that Saturday through Tuesday could have already been lived. Four glorious days spent in the Salt Lake area with our daughter, son-in-law, and 12 week old grandson. Tears stung the corners of my eyes as I recalled sitting on the patio just 24 hours earlier, coffee ignored and growing cold on the glass-topped table beside me, while I stared into the sleeping face of the brown-haired little boy who had captured my heart in record time.

The bus driver snapped her gum incessantly and the air conditioned bus was too cold. The driver's habit of making slight adjustments to the steering wheel had long ago forced me to give up reading 'The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo' but it had started out slowly so not much of a sacrifice. Besides, the first day back to work after a four-day weekend spent in Utah didn't feel like a good day for a crime novel, no matter how incredible it was purported to be. My heart just wasn't in it. I found myself thinking ahead to my next solid (read: more than 5 mile) bike ride but this would not likely be the day for that ride since rain was forecasted all day and into Thursday. My heart felt as heavy as the rain clouds looked.

I recalled an article I had just read online about a Norwegian mother who had been reunited with her 16-year-old daughter after the bombing and massacre near Oslo. The mother, in trying to convey the daughter's anxiety level in text messages she was sending throughout the siege by the gunman on the resort island, had said that the daughter texted, "I love you" to her mother. The mother went on to say that Norwegians aren't like Americans, who are "so clever to tell anybody that you love them but we in Norway, we normally don't do that." I found that I was personally offended by her comment because I say "I love you" quite often, and yet, not as often as I'd like for fear of making someone feel uncomfortable or obligated to respond in kind. The woman’s comment had me questioning whether I’ve ever said those words casually; have I ever said them when I didn’t really mean them?

I suppose there have been a few “I love you man” moments that were meant to be jokes imitating the old Bud Lite commercials. There may have even been an “I love you” to a boyfriend I thought I loved when I was really too young and inexperienced to fully comprehend the meaning. By and large, however, my expressions of love have been truly heartfelt and the words have grown more meaningful to me with time. Likewise, when someone says “I love you” to me, I take them at their word and treasure it in my heart. On the other hand, I have been accused more than once of being emotional and even overly-emotional by some people so I leave it to you to form your own opinion. I’m about to tell ‘anybody’ that I love them.

I love my husband. I love my grandkids. I love my kids (natural, step and in-law kids). I love my Mom. I love my family. I love my friends and their kids too. Does this make me “clever”? Nah, just blessed.

July

Last July we had rain, lots and lots of rain. Six months ago we had snow, lots and lots of snow. This month we have near drought conditions plus oppressive heat and humidity. Call me sick but I'll take the heat and humidity. Granted, I don't work outside for a living, but this is just my opinion based on my experience. All that rain and flooding was scary and all that snow was a pain in the back. In the heat I go from my air conditioned house to an air conditioned car or bus to an air conditioned office. It's okay for me so I'm not complaining.

Successterol!

Cholesterol down from 247 to 160 in six months. Now that's what I call success! Yeah baby!

Are we there yet?

We were in Springfield, IL last weekend. It was 86 degrees on Sunday. I laid on a lounge chair on the deck in the sun like a cat and fell asleep. My winter weary bones were quite happy to feel warmth again.

In spite of my love for flora, I hate Spring. I especially hate Spring in Wisconsin. I hate the roller coaster ride of warmth and sun teasing me and then turning to cold with snow/rain. I hate the way it drags out and goes on for weeks and weeks. I have no patience for that cycle and it depresses me. It is getting steadily warmer by an average few degrees per week so I guess we're going in the right direction.

On another note, in an effort to increase my good cholesterol and reduce my bad cholesterol (not to mention my pants size) I've committed to a 3day per week routine at the gym. This started sometime around the 1st of the year but I have yet to make it 3 days in any one week. Today might be the day!

Here again, losing weight and gaining fitness is such a long, drawn out process with highs and lows. I have very little patience for the ongoing cycle - too bad I've done it nearly all my life.

In other news, I am studying to take the CMA (Certified Management Accountant) exam in Sept/Oct this year. I've discovered there's an awful lot of information that I don't know or don't remember. This exam typically has somewhere between a 50% to 60% pass rate. This is not going to be a piece of cake.

I believe it was the Cheshire Cat in Alice in Wonderland who said, "If you don't know where you're going, any road will get you there." Okay, so I think I know where I'm going and I'm on the right road, are we there yet?

Ch-ch-ch-changes

Turn and face the strange, changes.

I'm starting a club that I'm going to call PMC for "peri-menopause club". Peri meaning "around" or "about" and of course you know the rest. Back in the day this was spoken of in hushed tones, as in, "she's in her changes" and supposedly we all knew what that meant. I just found out a bunch of stuff about being pre-menopausal that I wish I had known about six months ago... it would have saved me a lot of "WTF" moments. No one told me about all this stuff! I knew about hot flashes, hahaha that's hilarious comedic material right there, not. And even night sweats, although no one really wants to talk about those, kinda gross. But no one said anything about debilitating fatigue, depression, moodiness, irritability, insomnia... those are just the ones I feel okay about mentioning in this blog. There's a whole host of others! I won't tell you all the symptoms I have personally experienced already, but suffice to say there have been enough of them to make me feel a bit relieved at this point to know that there's a reason for what I've been living with for months and wondering what the heck my body was doing to me!

Wanna join my club?

Happiness is...

Happiness is finding a long, lost friend and picking up where you left off. Yesterday I reconnected with my long, lost friend Heather. We met as neighbors when we both lived in VA in 1996. In a very short span of time we became fast friends and as close as sisters. She was the last person I hugged, the person I waved good-bye to, as I began the long drive back to Milwaukee after my marriage broke up. In six short months of friendship we had been through so much together. I believe God put her in my life to give me strength. She says I was the strong one. After I moved we managed to stay connected via phone calls and e-mail for awhile but then, between moves, name changes and life changes, we lost each other. On Friday night I finally found the breakthrough I needed and yesterday we talked on the phone for the first time in about ten years! With tears and laughter we caught up on each other's life - kids, marriages, jobs, moves, homes and just about everything else we could think of that happened since the last time we talked. We peeled away ten years of living like it was 10 minutes. We both said we had thought about each other often and missed each other. Although we're about ten hours apart by car, we're hoping to get together sometime soon. I am so happy that we've reconnected!

I agree...

I'm really not political... honestly... but I did watch the President's State of the Union address the other night. I watched mostly because it was on right after Biggest Loser and because there wasn't really anything else on at that time that I wanted to see. He said something that resonated with me (see my 2010 blog "I'm just sayin...") and I wanted to mention it here. He said we should celebrate the winners of the science fair like we celebrate the winners of the Super Bowl (paraphrase) and I just want to say that I agree that we (myself included) have placed a high priority on the sports entertainment industry, and entertainment in general, to the exclusion of more important things like education, poverty, etc.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not going to sit here and spout off some idealistic rhetoric as if I'm not going to watch the Super Bowl next weekend; I'm just suggesting that we should be mindful of how we prioritize life and be sure to keep sports in proper perspective.

Lose Yourself

Look, if you had one shot, or one opportunity
to seize everything you ever wanted - One moment
Would you capture it or just let it slip? [Eminem, Lose Yourself, 2002]

Believe it or not, this song (clean version) is the first track on the workout playlist on my iPod. I probably don't seem like the typical Eminem fan... overweight, farsighted, 46 year old woman... and I guess I'm not really a fan of pottymouth rapper boy BUT this song never fails to morph me into a workout maniac no matter how crappy I feel when I get to the gym. I mean, if the song is true and the movie that this song is from (8-mile which I did not see) documents the truth of his journey from mobile home park to stardom, then I guess he has something that I'd like for myself... guts, courage, persistence, dedication, motivation, fight, perseverence.

But for now, I'm going to take a couple of ibuprofen and curl up with a good heating pad.

On burning one's journals

This morning on the bus on my way to work I mused about writing, as I often do, and I was suddenly struck with a memory of the night, about five years ago, that I burned (shredded actually) every single diary and journal I had written in my youth. (!!!!) This does seem a bit shocking in retrospect, especially because what I was musing about on the bus was a question of whether I might, at some point in my future, write my memoir or at least a semi-autobiographical work of fiction at which time I would find myself regretting having shredded my personal written history. I asked myself, "Will I remember what I need to remember if I ever need to remember it?" To which I immediately answered, "Probably not and thank the dear Lord for that!"

I recall the journal-shredding evening quite clearly. It wasn't pretty. I remember being very, very depressed. Over what I don't recall but it must have had something to do with or been somehow related to my past. I pulled out the lockbox that contained all those diaries and journals, sat down on the floor, and read them, page by page, book by book. I remember loathing - no that's not too strong a word for it - the person who wrote all those words. How it drove me crazy to read that every single boy I met made me act stupid (writing my first name with his last name) and every argument with my parents made me feel helpless (I could never win). The shame and embarrassment of being a member of Weight Watchers at the age of 13 - back when I still had hope that one day I'd be thin. The pain and heartache of girlfriends who invited everyone but me.

As I progressed through the journals the immaturity left but the painful memories didn't. Heartbreak, arguments, weight problems, dysfuntional relationships, they were all there in my somewhat more matured life, and I still couldn't stand the person that wrote about them. Furthermore, every mistake, every embarrassment, every sin, was there on those pages for anyone to read if they ever got into that lockbox. That was certainly not anything I wanted my children to see someday! Oh dear what a frightening thought.

No, I don't regret shredding all that history. The way I see it, if I ever do write my memoirs or even a semi-autobiographical work of fiction, and they actually do get published, I plan to take some literary license and make them sound a whole lot better than they actually were!

a favorite thing

Not really that into raindrops on roses or whiskers on kittens or bright copper kettles, though I know for certain I have enjoyed my warm woolen mittens here in Wisconsin.

Thanksgiving may possibly be my favorite holiday mainly because of the food but also because of family and friends. Yesterday was no exception. Turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, gravy, sweet potatoes, butter carrots, biscuits, cranberry sauce. Husband, Daughters, Sons, Grandbabies, Friends... my literal and figurative plate was full yesterday. And if that wasn't enough, Abby and Bella stayed overnight and we spent the morning playing. At one point Bella decided she wanted to be held for awhile and then I remembered one of my absolutely favorite things... a baby falling asleep in my arms. Ahhhhh... thank you Lord for moments like this.