Giving Up Coffee?

I love coffee. No, really. I mean I LOVE COFFEE!!! Here's the thing. My love for coffee began as a necessity back in my high school years when I was attending a college prep school away from home with some really intense classes. (Man that was a really long run-on sentence, LOL). Anyway, my roommate introduced me to coffee and I didn't like it at first. Due to the age of our dorms, we were not allowed to have coffee makers in our rooms. So we were forced to use instant coffee in the microwave. ICK! :P

Since then, though, I have been through many phases of coffee love. First, I tried black like my mother takes it, but just couldn't get used to the bitterness. Then I tried it "a-la Daddy" which is sweet and light. My love affair began. I tend to like a hint of flavor in my coffee so I buy flavored creamers whenever I can afford them. Sometimes I even stock up when they are on sale or I have a coupon (or better yet, BOTH!). My favorite has to be the Christmas-time flavor of Peppermint Mocha!

So with all of this trying to eat healthy and clean, I have struggled with the whole coffee issue. One article you read says coffee is bad for you. Then you hear a news story on the benefits of being a coffee drinker. Who are you to believe? The fact of the matter is I live in the "coffee capital of the United States". Starbucks was invented here. And for good reason. We. Get. NO. SUN! Do you realize how difficult it is to pry open your eyes when the sun hasn't shown its face for weeks?

I tried it last year and lasted for about three weeks. The withdrawal from the caffeine wasn't as hard as I anticipated, but I just couldn't get adjusted to a morning ritual of hot tea. My brain knew the difference. Now that the sun is trying to make it's yearly appearance, it may be easier to give it up. But in all honesty, I just don't think I will. I will miss the flavor. I will miss that warm mug of blissful frothiness as I write and spend time with just me and God. It's comforting to me. So I will have to continue spending a couple of my Weight Watchers points on my creamer indulgence and find ways to cut corners elsewhere. To me, it is worth that simple cup of pleasure to wake me up each morning.

What is your guilty pleasure?

The Little Girl Inside : Remembering Your Passion

So I was trying to figure out why I have a hard time blogging and it just hit me square in the face.  I'm actually scared of the fact that I am succeeding right now.  I know it sounds weird, but I think I'm truly afraid of writing it down.  Even now as I write this post, I am having writer's block.  I have goals.  I have been working slowly toward those goals.  But for the last 20 years, I have been running away from my true passion and I believe that has caused me to be afraid of success.

You see, I remember a little girl with a passion, a love.  She was so determined to accomplish her dreams that for years, she fashioned her life around success.  I can remember her seeing a poster as she walked through her middle school hallway.  That poster changed her life and set her on a path that would take her to new worlds.  For three years, she searched out ideas about how to accomplish certain tasks and was rewarded for her dedication.  After another three years of living out that dream, the tide changed.  Choices were hard and tough decisions had to be made.  Those decisions threw her onto a different path.  One that was nothing like she had imagined.  In some ways, it was a path of least resistance and it made her sad. 

In a way, I have been trying to find that young girl inside of me for these last 20 years.  It saddens me a little that I lost her along the way.  Sometimes circumstances cause us to make decisions that don't jive with our dreams.  Sometimes we make the wrong choices.  Sometimes God just wants us to take a different path.  It's hard for me to fully understand how many of my choices were God's path and how many of my choices took me away from God's path.  Regardless, I feel like I am coming full circle now.  I am trying to come back to my first love and by doing that, I am trying to align my character with God's plan.  What that means exactly is complicated.

I know that part of it is losing weight.  Not so much that act of losing as it is the act of taking care of my body.  My body is a vessel for God so how can I expect to become the woman He wants me to be if I don't take care of it.  I am trying hard to change my thinking from "I need to lose weight" to "I want to be healthy".  So far that has meant attempting to make better choices and smaller portions as well as getting up off of the couch and moving.  I have lost 27.4 pounds so far but I have so much farther to go.  I still binge eat sometimes (like tonight when I inhaled the rest of the croutons while cleaning up the dinner dishes).  I have weeks where I only exercise once a week.  But I am slowly making progress.  I have lost weight every week except for one.  I know I will get there soon.

The rest of my changes are just ways to make myself the best version of the woman I am already.  I want so badly to be proud of myself again.  I miss that little girl and want to rekindle her spirit once again.

Weight Loss Update - 10% Loss!

I started to write an update about a month ago, but it just never happened.  Yes, I have continued to lose weight on Weight Watchers.  It has been a slow and steady progress with some amount of loss every week except one.  I have now been on WW for almost 16 weeks and I have met many small goals along the way.  I figured I should put out the before and after pictures of 20 pounds before I actually hit the 30 pound mark.  So here goes.

My actual loss so far has been 27.4 pounds (as of Thursday, 4/11/13).  I only had one week where I gained and it was a very small amount, 0.4 pounds.  I have gotten my 10% goal key chain as well as my 25lb medal to add to it.  I ran a 5K on March 3rd in 48 minutes and 26 seconds.  It was slightly over my goal of 45 minutes, but I'll take it.

 

 

All pictures are showing my starting picture in December and my after picture taken on March 13.

 

Here are the measurements I took on the same day as the pictures:

 

 

                   Area                               Starting                      20 pounds lost

 

                 Breast                                   45"                                   43.5"

                 Chest                                    39"                                   38"

                 Waist                                    41"                                   39"

                  Gut                                      49"                                   44.5"

                  Hips                                    51"                                    49"

               Left Thigh                             29"                                    28.5"

             Right Thigh                            29.5"                                  28.5"

              Left Calf                                 19"                                   18.75"

             Right Calf                               19.5"                                  19"

         Left Upper Arm                           15"                                   14.5"

        Right Upper Arm                         15.5"                                 14.5"

       Left Lower Arm                            12"                                    12"

        Right Lower Arm                        12.5"                                  12"

                 Neck                                    15"                                   14.75"

 

 

Some of the pictures and the measurements show that there is an obvious difference while others, you can hardly tell any difference at all.  But now that I am close to 30 pounds loss, I can really tell a huge difference in my clothes.  I am now three notches into my belt and I am able to button up (albeit very snugly) a skirt that I haven't worn in almost 4 years and I was able to wear a pair of size 14 black pants this week that have been hanging in my closet for the same amount of time.

 

Seriously, I let my clothes stare me in the face.  I can't seem to let them go.  I am always optimistic that I will get back down to that weight again.  And now, I finally am!  I am determined that this is THE LAST TIME I will ever lose weight in my life.  After nearly 20 years of yo-yo dieting, I am tired of feeling exhausted and winded.  I was having trouble keeping up with my kids.  I couldn't even bring in a load of groceries without being winded.  Now, even after losing just a little over 10% of my weight, I can dance around and play with my kids, bring in several loads of groceries without being winded, and run at a pace of 4.8 miles per hour for intervals of 90 seconds each.

 

So for my next goal, I want to get under 200 pounds.  I am (as I write this) 6.6 pounds away from that goal.  On average, I lose about 2 pounds per week so I should hit that goal in 3-4 weeks.  Here's to hoping! :)