A Road Block (and Getting Ready to Leave)

Just a quick post.  I'm sorry I'm failing at the challenge posts... I feel like I've been failing at everything that even remotely involves being healthy, dieting, losing weight, twitter, #7daychip, or this blog lately and I am really sorry and feel pretty bad about it.  I feel like every time I go to start something or set a goal with the first hiccup it all falls to pieces and I'm back to where I've started.  Like the first mistake or misstep turns into a road block that keeps me from getting back on track and doing what I said I would do.  I never used to feel like this, why now?

That said, I hope to get back on the horse starting tomorrow.  Not going to write any goals right now because I don't want to let myself down again, I just really want to survive the next (get ready for it) 6 days before I fly home to America!!!  I've been busily packing and getting my affairs in order... and letting my eating and exercise slag in a big way.  It's really caught up with me all of a sudden today and I've been really bummed out and feeling huge and disgusting all day.  After I post this, I'm off to bed so I can MAKE MYSELF get up and RUN tomorrow before work.  I'm going to do it.  I am. I am. I am.

This week I've also really started thinking about going back to WeightWatchers when I get home, more specifically for the summer.  I checked my loan repayment plan (I'm trying to REALLY accelerate it to be out of debt ASAP) and paying for 4 months of the monthly pass change the end date of my new plan at all.  So, I'm currently thinking I'll sign up with a goal of doing it for the summer.  If at the end of summer, I'm not taking advantage of it and I'm not at least 10lbs down... then I'll stop my subscription when we move and go back to using CalorieCount for free... What do you guys think?  I think that with this plateau and the way I've been feeling, I really need my meetings (and my AWESOME leader at home) back.  Something needs to change and I need to kick myself in gear since Jon and our friends have a packed schedule of fun races and other event we want to do.

Anyway, sorry for the rambling post, just wanted to put out how I'm feeling to the blogosphere and remind you all that I'm still here.  I'm working on a few posts right now: moving out (with photos), a new challenge post, a plan for the summer, etc.  Stay tuned!

Update: For the first time in I think all of 2011 so far, I actually DID get up at 6am and go for a run after this post.  I hope that this is the start of me being back on track, one mile at a time.  Stay tuned for the next post, I just saw it's going to be my 200TH!!!

30 Day Challenge!

I've decided as a way to get myself to be more consistent with blogging, I'm going to do the 30 Day Challenge! I'm going to try and get a post up every day, either about France/healthy stuff/my life in general or with one of the days of the 30 day challenge. As a result, this challenge will take more than 30 days for me to complete since I don't want to inondate you all with posts about my life AND the challenge.

So you have an idea what all you can look forward to hearing about, here's the list:

I'm pretty excited about participating, I think that there'll be some good things for me to talk about and hopefully this'll get me back into blogging more regularly!

Check back later today for the first post of the challenge! Let's get ready to rumble!!!

Weekly Weigh-In and Goal Eval

Let me start off by saying that this week is not going to be my first #7daychip. I spent almost half of it (Saturday-Monday) sick, not being able to eat, and not exercising. Then, for the remaining 4 days, I've been over my 1,200 CC calorie goal every day and over my 1,400 max personal calorie target by at least 80 calories each day too. Always under my burn for the day, but still not where I want to be calorie-wise. Now that I'm feeling better, I'm hoping to kick it into gear next week, but it's going to be really difficult since Jon arrives on Wednesday!

That said, here how I did with the updated goals I set for myself once I got better on Monday:

1. Get in 2 runs (one on Tues or Weds and one on Friday)

Check! Got in the really difficult run on Tuesday and my first "speed" workout in a long time Thursday night after work.

2. Do 1 full-length P90X workout either Tuesday or Wednesday

Check! Wednesday morning, I did P90X Yoga all the way through for the first time probably since December. I can STILL feel it--I love those kind of workouts! Might try to do it again tomorrow morning.

3. Clean/organize my apartment

Not really. Did go through and organize a lot of my papers and get that all sorted, but I still need to REALLY clean and do laundry before Jon gets here.

4. Get no more than 7.5-8hrs of sleep a night. No naps.

CHECK! This might actually be what I'm most proud of this week. On Wednesday, I got myself out of bed and got my day started earlier than anticipated, ate my breakfast, then got my yoga in right away... Great way to start the day. THEN, for work both Thursday and Friday I woke up (and got up) about 10 minutes before my alarm clock because I went to bed on time. I'm so proud of this and I'm feeling great about this choice already! :)

As far as weigh-in, here are this week's results:

Weigh-In:

Starting weight: 193.8

Last week: 70.5kg (155.4 lbs)

Today: 70.0kg (154.3lbs)

Change: -.5kg (-1.1lb)

Wow, a whole half kilo down? It doesn't sound like a lot in kilos, but I'll DEFINITELY take a 1.1 pound loss! Plus, this puts me in a great position for next week: I mightcould break into the 60's for the very first time!!! Woo! It's not a fast process, but these little losses will totally add up!

On the whole, I'm pleased with my overall goal turn out and tracking this week. Even if I'm not elated with my intake, I've tracked everything and it's led to this next week's goals!

In order to get my first #7daychip, here are my goals for next week:

1. Run 4x: Saturday with Jeanna, Monday after work, Wednesday before meeting Jon, and Friday WITH Jon to show him Ile-de-la-Barthelasse. I plan on making Monday a speed workout, the others TBD.
2. Do P90X Yoga and Ab Ripper X at least one time each (planned for Sunday and then Thursday night)
3. Stay under 1,400 calories for at least 4 days, with 2 days in the 1,200's.
4. Keep up with my intuitive, 7.5-9h sleep patterns
5. Drink at least 1.5L of water each day. (I know this is under the 64oz. but I want to start with a manageable goal and work from there).

I know I've laid these goals out really specifically, but I want to be able to KNOW without a doubt if I've earned my chip or not and if I'm on track to do so, especially since Jon is coming too! For the workouts, if the days change, it's okay, but the overall numbers are what count.

Anyway, I wish you all an AMAZING weekend and now it's time to GET TO IT! :)

While I was sleeping... #7daychip Weekly Twitter Chat

If you follow me on Twitter, I'm sure you've seen that I'm now really excited about being part of the #7daychip community on Twitter and Facebook. Since coming to France, one thing I've missed most is my weekly WW meetings and having the #7daychip community has really been like having all of that support and more at home. I still haven't reached my first chip, but I'm looking forward to hitting that first milestone and continuing to grow with the community!

That said, sadly the weekly chats happen between 3 and 4am France time, so I have to miss them. Another chipper mentioned replying on her blog the next day, so that's going to be the plan for Fridays until I come home!

Without further ado, my responses to this weeks #7daychip chat! If you haven't checked out the group, I HIGHLY recommend it!

Q1: What is your present "primary" goal? How long have you been trying to achieve it?

My present "primary" goal in my 'healthiness journey' is to get down to my goal weight of 140-145 pounds. I know I should have an exact number, but I want to hit 145 and see how I look and feel and go from there. I've been working on this goal since June 2009, and with renewed vigor since the beginning of March 2011.

Q2: Do you have any other goals (secondary) you are working towards? What are they?

I have a bunch of other goals I'm working towards as far as health is concerned:

-Not oversleeping and aiming to get 7.5 hours a night

-Run a half marathon on 2011 (started running in 2010)

-Tone up

-My newest goal (from yesterday): To speed up my average running pace to someday hit a 9 minute/mile average.

Q3: Can you give any examples of goals that you have been successful reaching?

Back when I started my blog, my goal was to finish C25K, I passed that with flying colors and haven't looked back! In my 'professional' life, I also reached my goal of graduating summa cum laude from my university in 2010 and successfully applied for graduate programs and was awarded a fellowship to continue my studies.

Q4: Why were you successful reaching those goals?

I have been successful with my running and my academic career for a few reasons: Never allowing myself to give up, keeping my eyes on the prize, and by having the constant support of my family and friends. I know I wouldn't have started this blog, started running or even KEPT running without Jon by my side at the time to help push me to run on days that I was lacking in motivation.

Q5: What can you bring from your successful goal attempts to your present struggles?

These three reasons totally apply to my new goals. I think talking about your goals so more people can hold you accountable is really important. Furthermore, I just need to keep my head down and keep trudging on. NEVER give up.

Q6: Do you have any tricks/tips that help you to reach your goals?

I set myself mini, weekly goals and try and use my blog to log them and keep myself accountable on a weekly basis. This is a long-term journey, not a crash diet, so it's easy to get demotivated without seeing progress or if you're not able to "restart" at some point each week.

Q7: Do you have any thoughts why your longstanding goals are so hard to achieve?

Anything work having is hard to have and is worth working hard for: relationships, health, success in general. My weight loss goal is so hard to achieve because I'm trying to not deprive myself too much because I'm not just trying to lose the weight, I'm trying to completely change my lifestyle and there's no way I can maintain a lifestyle without red wine and chocolate.

Q8: If you could give yourself goal reaching advice from “the outside” what would it be??

Keep your chin up and keep pushing on. Try not to compare your journey to that of other people. Your WL journey is your own.

Q9: Do you think you will reach your most challenging goals eventually?

I know I will, I just need to be prepared for a) it to take a while and b) the lifelong commitment and struggle to stay at goal weight once I get there.

Alrighty, off to work to make up from taking off on Monday! Have a great day, chippers and bloggers!!! :)

Weigh-In Day and a Make-Up Run!

I actually did what I told you all I would last night and got up this morning at 7am, donned my running apparel and hit the road for my 4 mile run that I was supposed to do yesterday (but got sidetracked by the sun):

Not only am I proud because this was actually longer than 4 miles (I forgot to turn Mr. Garmin back on when I stopped to take off my jacket), but I'm really proud because it's the first time I've successfully managed to drag myself out of bed to workout in I can't even remember how long!

Also, this is Saturday morning, so it's weigh-in day! I stepped on the scales before heading out for the run and this is what awaited me:

Weigh-In:

Starting weight: 193.8

Last week: 71.5kg (157.6 lbs)

Today: 70.5kg (155.4 lbs)

Weekly workouts:

Runs: 3x

Crosstraining: 0x

I'm so excited! This week was really hard for me both personally and, as a result, food-wise and I'm really happy to see that my eating intuitively and trying to make up for my epic splurges on Monday paid off on the scale. I know I only ended up meeting 1 of my weekly goals (since I didn't crosstrain at all and I didn't do well at the party last saturday), but I still think this week was a stunning success. :)

Anyway, instead of posting my weekly goals here now, I'm going to include them in another post later today along with my new involvement in #7daychip! For now, I'm off to finish getting ready because I'm spending the day visiting the Bambouserie (a bamboo forest) with one of the teachers I work with and her family! Don't worry, I'll take plenty of photos!

Have a great day!!! :)

"Apéro" fail.

So, I admit: It's already Sunday and I've failed on one of my three weekly goals. I had set myself up for dinner with the girls last night out at a restaurant. I'd decided I was only going to get a plat (main dish) and a dessert. I was so ready mentally for that and felt so good going into the evening.

Fast forward to arriving at the train station and meeting Christèle:

"So, what are we doing tonight?"

"Oh, just a heavy apéro (i.e. appetizer buffet) at the apartment with everyone."

Oh dear, I don't know about you guys, but appetizer buffet party things like this are the worst for me. Instead of ordering smart and really controlling what I eat, I always end up eating too much and grazing the whole night. Pringles. Pizza. Dried sausage. M&Ms. If I had know, I would have brought a veggie tray.

That said, I ended the day with 2,400 calories (cough, cough, two days worth) and feeling pretty disappointed in myself. I was so mentally prepared for one outing that when I got confronted with an unexpected change and a calorie-trap that I hadn't devised a plan for, I really messed up. I look around at these kind of events and everyone else seems to be able to have one small bite of pizza then be done... Why am I always compelled to overeat? Ulgh.

Anyway, nothing left to do but carry on! At least I 'fessed up and tracked it. Now I'm home and have cleaned the apartment and put a load of laundry in... All that remains is keeping up with Goal #1: Sunday's Run! Off I go... Gotta work off those peanut M&M's!

Does this kind of thing ever happen to you guys? What do you do?

2011 is MY year!

I'm back in France and ready for action. Or at least I will be once this bout of jetlag goes away. For some reason, I'm so much more tired today than all the other flights I've done here—I actually caved and took a 2.5 hour nap today, which doesn't bode well for getting used to France time! Case in point: I'm now wide awake at 4:30am!

December was a rough month, though it's getting a LOT better and I'm really looking forward to all the exciting things that 2011 has to offer. Here are a few goals and things to look forward to in the coming months!

Goal 1: Read at least 20 books for pleasure. That doesn't sound like a lot of books, but I'm really bad at getting off the computer and reading. I need to work on that.



Goal 2: Keep tracking and lose 10lbs. ProPoints is going to be my ticket to a successful year. Goal weight would obviously be ideal, but given the fact that I only had a 4-pound loss in 2011 (though I did lose 2 pant sizes), I don't want to set unattainable goals. I'm very okay with this being a journey and not a fast sprint!


Goal 3: Run my first half marathon. I ran my first 4 races in 2010, so an additional subgoal here would be to try and run at least 5 in 2011.

Here are at least 2:

The course for April 17th Marseille half
I'd also like to run in Cincy's Turkey Trot when I'm home--I've never done it before
Goal 4: Cross train using P90X and my new resistance bands. I'm going to try and run 3x a week to start and want to incorporate at least 2 days of strength each week on top of that.


Goal 5: Ask a guy out on a date. Or at least make the first move. I'm usually more of the wait to be asked out variety (which does happen, I promise!). I'm actually relatively shy when it comes to that sort of thing, so I think this would be a good goal to push myself out of my comfort zone this year.

Beer seemed like an appropriate photo for this since we'll probably drink one together if things go well AND I'll probably need one to quell up the courage!

Goal 6: Get into grad school, find an apartment and move to one of these beautiful cities:

Atlanta
Nashville
Madison
Columbus

Goal 7: The most important and all-encompassing goal: Be Positive.

Is it just me or do plus signs look kind of odd out of context?
Heather @ Leading the Weigh just wrote a post about one-word resolutions. If I had to pick a word for my 2011, it would be "Positive." Dictionary.com shows why in it's first four definitions of the word:

World English Dictionary
positive (ˈpɒzɪtɪv)

— adj
1. characterized by or expressing certainty or affirmation: a positive answer
2. composed of or possessing actual or specific qualities; real: a positive benefit
3. tending to emphasize what is good or laudable; constructive: he takes a very positive attitude when correcting pupils' mistakes
4. tending towards progress or improvement; moving in a beneficial direction

I'm going to focus on the good things (everything happens for a reason) and using this year to keep moving in the right direction in all of the spheres of my life (love, friends and family, health, weight-loss, career). I'm going to take advantage of the new opportunities that are presenting themself to me and make this year the best I possibly can. No regrets!

What are your goals for 2011?

Leaving on a Jet Plane

Working on formulating my resolutions for 2011--I'll get those to you all soon. I'd better be good because I'm only taking these new Size 8 jeans back to France with me, so no weight gain is allowed!!!

On that note, I have to go finish these suitcases because I have a flight at 1pm to start the journey back to France!

À bientôt! :)

WW Weigh-in and back to work

Finally, after a little over a month, I was able to go to a WW meeting and hit up a weigh in. Here are the official stats:

Weekly weigh-in: 173.2
Loss: -.8
Total loss: 20.6
Emotion: Ready to kick butt!
LBS to go to 164 mini-goal: 9.2

It was up a few from Sunday morning, but that's what you get when you weigh in pre-food first thing in the morning and then after work. Still, I'm down from the end of Alabama, so I'm counting that as a win. Plus, I'm at 24.5pts for today (out of my allotted 24 daily points +.5 from weekly), so I'm feeling pretty good. I really just need to focus on storing up points for this weekend's trip to Chicago to get my French visa! I can do this!

It felt so good to get back to the meeting and into the groove. Now I just need to recapture the zeal I had last summer. Hopefully, being back at LPK for this month will help. Plus, I'm going to try and start weight training (as per Christina's reco), so I just need to figure out a place to do that and we'll see what happens!

Happy Monday, all! :)

W9D3--Successful Completion of C25K!

I suppose that I probably completed C25K a week or two ago since my runs have surpassed the 30 minute C25K training time, but with counting, this does make yesterday's run my last "official" C25K one. Thankfully, it was a great run. Jon has been in Alabama for the weekend (he's still not back) and I woke up Saturday early (without an alarm), saw the beautiful sunshine, and knew I had to go for a run. It was kind of amusing, because shortly after this decision, Jonboy called from 'Bama and said he was on his way to get a powerbar and go for a run as well. I guess it's a little taste for how we'll train together once I go to France.

Anyways, this was what I saw when I checked our local weather:
It was a little chilly, so I got to break out the new North Face long-sleeved running shirt I'd bought on super sale at a trunk show a few weeks ago.

The run started out as usual. I don't usually run in the mornings, but I might have to start. There was no one out on the bike path and I could really appreciate how pretty it was just being out alone on the path. As this was my last official C25K run, I also got to reflect a bit on how far I've come since I started this. At the beginning, I was skeptical of my own abilities and a 5k seemed daunting. I remember reading an article about quitting the program and how essential weeks 5 and 6 were, so I committed to completing them, even though the mere thought of having to run 20-25 minutes was really daunting. BUT, I survived. I can't believe that as I get ready for these two weeks before the originally planned 5k, I'm thinking of running one this week for fun and trying to find a 10k to train for next.

I still haven't seen any significant weight loss since starting C25K, but that's okay. I know I've slimmed down and that the weight is beginning to come down. Furthermore, I just feel good. That's the best part. When I put on my new running gear, I'm really proud and I feel like I actually look and *feel* like a runner/jogger. After 9 weeks, I've proven that I can do this and I'll stick with it and that's the most important.

That said, yesterday after my run (15 minutes walking + a 60-minute jog), I got on Amazon and ordered myself the Garmin Forerunner 305 GPS watch with heartrate monitor. It's an investment, but I've proven to myself that it's worth it. Be on the lookout for more detailed blog updates from then on (I can't wait till it gets here!). I'm also going to get myself a few more running tanktops and leggings (probably 1 each) so I don't have to keep washing this one set. Check out this running wardrobe building. Woo.

Anyways, today's a rest day. I've cleaned the house and I'm hoping to start studying for my May 5th GRE test (Ahh!). Tomorrow starts W10? I'm not sure what to make of it.