3 Month Plan Week 9

Posted on 05/20/2013 by Angie

I missed my update last week, as I wanted to share my triathlon with you, of course breaking my toe.

The last week wasn’t great. I used food to distract from thoughts I didn’t want to deal with. I think the thoughts came about as I wasn’t busy being off work, and therefore had time to think. I only had one day where I ate more than I burned, but my overall calorie deficit is down. My weight also went up when I weighed in on Friday. I did sleep better with an average efficiency of 71%. Not my best, but better than the mid 60% I was getting the last couple of weeks.

Activity was way down, which is not surprising as I spent three days on the sofa and another few days on crutches and didn’t do any activity until swimming at the weekend.

It’s frustrating. I thought I had moved on from the thoughts of last year, in terms of not knowing what I’m doing or where I am going with life, asking why I can’t just be happy, but this last week they have returned. The self doubt and fear is horrible. I think it’s because I’ve had too much time to think. I’ve also been on my own a lot. Maybe it’s because I broke my toe and it knocked me off my plan. But it sucks. I turned to food as it’s the only thing I know how to do. I wrote lists of things to do when the urge to binge surfaces, but I haven’t yet got the switch to make me stop and think. I just want the feelings and thoughts to go away. I’m glad I go back to CBT this week as I’ve missed it and want to move on to the next step and dealing with things I’m not dealing with on my own. It’s going to be hard, but I know it will be good for me and help me.

I spend so much time beating myself up that is it no wonder I won’t let anyone else in. I hurt myself more than enough and know I couldn’t take it if someone else did it as well. But then I have and I’ve survived the last year. Resilience is often I word I hear form people who know me and my character. But I associate that with struggle and I want to be over that for now. I want to be content and happy with who I am and what I have. I want to like the person I am so others will in turn and I can let people in.

Too many thoughts this last week that I’m not processing well. I now live in my own home and want to be comfortable, yet I still stop myself crying when I’m sad. I talk harshly to myself, when it is the opportunity to show myself love and compassion. I could talk to myself and not feel stupid, yet I don’t, but I want to. I want to be the me inside my head on the outside, but I have spent so long telling that part of me to be quiet, for various reasons, and now she stays silent. I won’t even let myself be me when I’m on my own, how will I let myself be me with people. I don’t like feeling like two different people.

I want to end on a positive note as this last week has been hard, but I need to remind myself of the good things that have happened and that I’m grateful for:

I completed a triathlon!
People helped me out with no hesitation
I can swim and bike with a broken toe
I caught up on some favourite tv shows
I love my house
I have a job in the field I studied

There are more than these, but that will do for here. Stay positive everyone

Things I’m Loving… Organic Fruit & Veg Box

Posted on 03/23/2013 by Angie

I totally forgot to do this post yesterday!

I decided to sign back put to a local organic farm veg box scheme and got my first box Thursday!

I also got milk and eggs added to my weekly delivery

My plan is to base my weeks meals around what I get in the box. This week was lots of root vegetables so I plan to do some roasted veg tomorrow then make a potato based salads for lunches

A Ki Fit Year In Review

Posted on 03/05/2013 by Angie

I have come to the end of my year long subscription to Ki Fit and wanted to do a review of the entire time.

I started out weighing 239.6lbs and last time I weighed 214.4lbs on the 10th Feb (I moved and need new scales). Overall I lost 25.2lbs! That is fantastic and looking at it like that shows the progress I made last year, even when it didn’t feel like I was making any. That is the equivalent of half a pound a week, which is good rate of weight loss

I wore the Ki Fit armband the majority of the time. I took it off for a month in October as I needed a break, then missed February when I couldn’t sync. Also in February I noticed that my arm started to feel much better and that I think the armband restricted my arm during strength training. Other than that I got data for everyday. I don’t think I used it to it’s full potential over the entire year. It was easy to get bogged down in the data and then not use it at all. I would often forget to sync each day and therefore not track my food in line with what I burnt.

I wanted to lay out my pros and cons after using it for a year. There are definitely more pros than cons, but the cons have made me decide not to renew my subscription straight away and start looking at alternatives.

Pros:

Accurate
Reliable
Goal Orientated
Linked with My Fitness Pal
Breakdown between moderate and vigorous activity
Whole lifestyle orientated

Cons:

Armband is noticeable (conscious of it at work)
No wireless syncing
Armband started to affect my arm during strength training
Subscription only

Overall I love the Ki Fit and would love to continue wearing it if a few improvements were made, mainly if it was smaller and had wireless realtime syncing to dashboard or app.

I am currently looking at the Fit Bit and Nike Fuelband as alternatives as they are much smaller, but I know they won’t be as accurate as they do not take as many readings as the Ki Fit. I can’t decide at the moment, but know I want to continue getting this kind of data as I find it motivating and I tend to push myself a bit more when I know my activity levels and calorie burn. I am drawn to the Fit Bit as there are linked wifi scales that go with it, but I worry I might lose it. Whereas I like the idea of a bracket for the fuelband. I need to weigh up the options

I highly recommend the Ki Fit for anyone who wants to learn more about themselves. I think I will sign up for another subscription when I have specific goal I am working towards, or if they bring out a new wireless armband

Food Tracking and Me

Posted on 02/03/2013 by Angie

I think the key for me to lose weight is to track my food. I said last week that was going to be my focus for the week, and I started off well, but got distracted when the weekend (Friday) arrived. I would like to find a way to reduce the impact this has on me.

My friends Linz and I have been trying to use My Fitness Pal and she is doing fantastic! But I am not so much. It’s frustrating and disappointing. I know it’s my choice to ‘forget’ to use the app or the website. They make it so easy to track everything, especially now you can scan the bar codes of everything!

But I am not doing it. I know lots of people don’t agree with tracking or counting calories, but for me it provides order and structure and stops me over eating in an uncontrolled manner. For me it is about building awareness and becoming conscious of my eating habits and changing them to support the life I want to live.

Talking with Mara has made me think I need to add to my food tracking by adding how the food makes me feel when I eat it and some time later. This could allow me to become aware of more than just the immediate hunger and build up a better picture of what foods allow me to be the me I like. I’m not sure how to connect this to MFP, but I think I will try somehow, even if it’s just writing in the notes each day.

I forgot to weigh in this morning, but I don’t feel I’ve lost any weight. I don’t think I’ve put any on either though. My fitness for the last week was great. I didn’t exercise on Thursday and noticed how tired I was on Friday as I didn’t sleep as well as I would have liked. I think exercise tires me out and allows me to sleep better, so I am going to try and do something every evening this week to test that theory.

My goal for this week is to track everything on MFP and make it a habit to do so!

My Motivators

Posted on 01/20/2013 by Angie

This week went off the rails a bit. I put on 1.2lbs. I didn’t exercise as much as normal and then the snow came and the exercise I was going to do got cancelled – here in the UK we do not cope with snow well at all! We had about 10-15cm and that ground my town to a halt and work allowed me to work from home. Overall though I’ve felt a bit rubbish. I usually find having sports therapy releases some emotions, but this week it really took it out of my mentally and physically. I think I was a bit burnt out.

I think the tiredness from the new job and commute set in. Also having my Chartered Environmentalist interview was on Monday and I didn’t sleep well. I was then exhausted. I feel better after having a restful weekend and went to the gym this afternoon and felt good. This coming week is going to be a long one, but I want to concentrate on food as I know my exercise will still be affected by the weather and work arrangements.

I’ve also been looking back through my old Weight Watchers stuff before I re-join a meeting where my new job is located and came across the topic of motivators. I haven’t looked at these in a long time and like the distinction between internal and external motivators.

I have come to believe that having good internal motivators will be more beneficial in the long term than external ones. I think I have always had more external motivators in the past due to lack of belief in myself.

I want to change that, so here are my current motivators:

Internal

Self belief that I am enough and worthy of love and care
Pushing myself with new fitness challenges and knowing my body could do anything
Setting personal goals and working towards them to achieve them
Knowing I am working hard to overcome depression
That feeling after I complete a good workout – the best!

External

Getting medals for my fitness achievements – always nice!
Getting compliments from people
Buying new clothes in a smaller size
The number of the scale – it is a motivator even if I don’t want it to be

I also believe that motivators changes over time, depending on lots of different things. I would like to look at these again during the year. If they don’t come up in a meeting I will have a look in 6 months (reminder set!).

What are your motivators?

Do any one mine resonate with you?

Any you disagree with?

Wandering Angie

Not All Those Who Wander Are Lost

Category Archives: Healthy Living