Parting Is Such Sweet Sorrow - Final Thoughts On Miraval

My last few hours at Miraval were uneventful - I packed up, had breakfast, picked up my boxed lunch and caught the shuttle to the airport.  On the way there I watched the scenery roll by and reflected on my visit:

This was one of the best vacations I've ever taken.  Everything was just perfect - the food, the accommodations, the scenery, the spa, the lectures - you name it, it was perfect.  But the best part was the focus on fitness - as someone who struggles to fit exercise into her schedule it felt positively decadent to work out several times a day at my leisure.  I also learned that healthy food can be incredibly tasty and I've already requested the Miraval cookbook from the library so I can try out some recipes on my own.

Upon my arrival in Philly I caught the train to the suburbs where Ken met me with a nice warm car.  At home I crawled into bed and slept a deep, satisfying, dreamless slumber.  Thursday morning dawned with sore muscles along with excitement about putting my learnings from Miraval into practice.  I had a geat workout with Rena, dropped into Whole Foods to stock up on my favorite fruits and veggies, then headed off to the mall to pick up a BOSU and a new exercise mat for my workout room.

This morning I was greeted with some great news from the scale - I have officially hit the 20-pound mark, which means my time at Miraval gave me a 1.6 pound loss!  This is especially notable since I didn't count calories during my stay, rather I tried to make good choices and eat according to my body's needs.  The food was so flavorful that I didn't need to eat a lot to feel satisfied, and I was so busy going from class to class that food was low on my priority list.  What a nice change to come home from a vacation weighing less than when I left!

Overall I would recommend Miraval to anyone looking for a relaxing vacation, a jump start to their fitness routine or diet, or even someone just looking for some great spa treatments!  The resort exceeded my (already high) expectations and delivered a memorable experience that I will never forget.  Thanks Miraval - I hope to come back soon!

The Beck Diet

For the past several days I've been reading The Complete Beck Diet For Life and really enjoying it - Judith Beck is a cognitive behavioral therapist specializing in weight issues, and in this book she provides excellent techniques for changing thought patterns.  Today I was delighted to see the Beck Diet Newsletter pop up in my email box.  I urge you to give it a read, because it provides some good food for thought as well as a flavor of what's in the book.  Hmmm, does anyone else notice how many food-related descriptors I use...

In the newsletter she writes about the idea of 'strengthening your giving-in muscle' every time you eat something that wasn't in your food plan for the day.  In other words, you are actively reinforcing a bad habit when you give in to the candy dish on your coworker's desk - in the same way you are reinforcing a good habit when you follow your plan to have a piece of fruit for a snack instead of a candy bar.  I love this concept!

I also strongly identified with the story about Laura, because I've been there all too often - my carefully crafted plan is derailed due to circumstances beyond my control and I turn into a deer caught in the headlights, hesitating for the briefest moment...and instead of heading back into the woods I jump right in front of the oncoming car.  I always feel a twinge of panic when my original food plan needs to change - and I often end up using the situation as an excuse to eat something I know I shouldn't.  Why?  If I've chosen to include something in my daily food plan it's because I think it will satisfy me.  Deviating from that plan means that I might not enjoy the alternative...and the thought of not getting emotional or physical satisfaction from my food scares me.  Not sure why that is, but it's the honest truth and it's something I need to work on.  There's always another meal, always another snack but sometimes I find that hard to remember.

I guess what I really took away from Laura's story is that it's important to plan for success - but even more important to be prepared for the unexpected and make sure these events don't derail the overall course of your journey AND your ability to enjoy that journey.

Anyway, the book expands on all the concepts in the newsletter, and provides training on many other skills to help you handle situations where a choice is needed.  So far I've learned a lot and I'm getting ready to move into Stage 1, where you begin to document your practice of the various skills - including things like daily motivation, distractions from craving, and rehearsed answers for sabotaging thoughts such as "It isn't fair, other people eat whatever they want".  There is a lot of writing and daily homework to keep you focused on learning new behaviors, which is critical to success for someone like me - I am a creature of habit and it takes A LOT to make me change my ways.

If you want to join an online discussion group about this book, share your experiences, or just hear what others are saying, check out the first assignment (pages 1-50) here at PriorFatGirl.com.

Happy reading!

Analogy and confession...

Hello everyone!  Many many apologies for my long absence - I was out of town for a few days, and then we had some computer difficulties here at home which have been stealing away my attention.  I have been trying unsuccessfully to upgrade my laptop from Vista to Windows 7 - after three attempts I am still unable to complete the upgrade, but of course I am going to try over and over again until it works, because the new operating system will be worth the effort.  Actually, I think this upgrade is sort of a metaphor for my weight loss efforts...while Vista is a usable operating system, lots of features don't work properly and it keeps crashing...and while I can function at 248 pounds I'm definitely not operating at top speed (and I keep crashing).  The upgrade process is confusing, complicated and lengthy, and my first few attempts didn't work, but I know the result will be such an improvement that I'm willing to keep trying until I get it figured out.

If I'm completely honest with myself, however, I could have found a way to write amongst the traveling and computer problems.  The truth is, I ate mindlessly through the holiday right up until a couple days ago.  And I wasn't feeling too good one day last week and missed my workout...and then didn't workout for several more days.  The guilt over this lapse has kept me from posting.  Sigh.  When will I learn?  Writing down my thoughts, feelings, struggles, successes - that's what keeps me honest, whether I write it publicly or privately.  As of this morning, my weight is the same as it was a few weeks ago, and I am thankful that although I haven't made any progress on the scale, I haven't gone backwards either.  In the past, I would have gained 5 or more pounds by now, which means that I must be learning to eat less while I'm overeating (does that even make sense?).  So that's something to be proud of.

This holiday season has definitely been a learning opportunity - I didn't plan ahead for anything, let my feelings of discouragement get the best of me, and once I started on the junk food I just kept eating (all or nothing thinking).  It seems like I'm the poster child for everything that you shouldn't do when trying to get to - or maintain - a healthy weight.  The best I can do at this point is pick myself up, dust myself off, learn from my mistakes, and try to install Windows 7 one more time...

Crisis of Faith

For the past week or so I've been struggling to keep myself motivated to eat well.  I've been trying to jolly myself along with inspirational quotes but this weekend I really let things go.  Friday was a company Christmas party and the only choices were fried.  Fried cheese, fried potato skins, fried chicken...although I counted everything I ate, I ended up skipping dinner to compensate.  On Saturday night I allowed myself to eat with something resembling reckless abandon...the food was yummy and I was enjoying my visit with an old friend, so I decided to absolve myself of guilt and vowed to eat only healthy foods the next day.  Sunday started well, with fruit and almonds and green tea...but then later in the afternoon I was hit with such a feeling of overwhelming mental fatigue contemplating all the hard work I have ahead of me.  Constantly watching my food, making an effort to exercise 5 days a week, trying to make choices that will help me reach my goals - I became exhausted just thinking about it! Day after day, year after year, I know it will never be easy for me to reach my goal weight or to maintain it.  But you know what would be easy?  Giving up on the exercise and just eating whatever I want.  So very...very.......very...............easy.

So I ate.  Somehow I found myself with a piece of Popeye's chicken in one hand and a biscuit in another...fast forward a couple hours and I finished off an entire Amy's organic pizza.  Although the scale said 248 this morning, I know that the damage I did this weekend will catch up with me eventually.  Today was lunch out with some coworkers, tomorrow will be the same - I feel myself getting pulled back into the old habits and I'm scared.  It feels like the momentum I was gathering has stalled, and it would be so easy to order a pizza and wash it down with a pint of Ben & Jerry's...so very very easy...is this how heroin addicts end up on the streets again?

I'm trying to head this off at the pass before it becomes a full-on binge.  I feel like I'm at a crossroads, and I can take the high road and dive back into my new life, or I can slide back towards my old self and then spend weeks fighting to get back to where I am now...I need an intervention, I need to take a stand!  I can't take the easy path, eating comfort food and lying on the couch, because although right now that is the path of least effort, it WILL NOT be easy to recover from a heart attack or stroke.  It will not be easy to take medication for type II diabetes.  It will not be easy to recover from a knee replacement when I am 60 years old and 300 pounds.

But what I really need to remember, every time I see a cookie or a slice of pizza...IT IS NOT EASY to weigh 248 pounds - nothing fits, I'm out of breath walking up 2 flights of stairs, I can't sit comfortably in an airline seat, I can't cross my legs, my wedding ring doesn't fit...in fact NOTHING about being overweight is easy.  Absolutely nothing.

Every Challenge Could Have Paradise Behind It

I have been struggling with my food intake for the past several days.  I haven't binged, but I haven't been making wise choices and have definitely not been eating mindfully.  Today in the car I was listening to a Blues Traveler song and the lyrics really resonated with me - I think I needed a reminder that changing my habits will not be easy but there's a reward at the end if I persevere:

Stand

The answers are getting harder and harder
And there ain't no way to bargain or to barter
But if you've got the angst or you got the ardor
You might faint from the fight but you're gonna find it
For every challenge could have paradise behind it

These Are A Few Of My Favorite (Fitness) Things

Raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens...bright copper ket....oh wait, that's someone else's list of favorite things!  

The list below contains a few things that I really rely on to keep me eating healthy, working out regularly and just generally motivated to keep making those lifestyle changes.  I thought I'd share them with you, and hopefully you'll have some to share as well - please feel free to post a comment!

In no particular order:

1. The Perfect Recipe for Losing Weight and Eating Great, an awesome cookbook by Pam Anderson.  Check out her recipe for mini-pumpkin muffins - I LOVELOVELOVE these yummy little muffins and frequently have 2 of them for breakfast with my morning latte.  I usually skip the orange glaze and sprinkle a few mini chocolate chips on top of each one a few minutes before I take them out of the oven - the calories are similar and I love the combo of pumpkin and chocolate.
2. My iPOD.  I'm honestly not sure if I could work out on my own without this thing - having all of my favorite workout music at my fingertips means I can make the most of every workout.  
3. Audiobooks!  When I was training for the 3-Day, many of my training walks were several hours long.  Although I did quite a few walks with my teammates, there were some that I did on my own.  These walks were also at a slower pace as I was building muscle endurance rather than cardio endurance, so motivational music wasn't all that necessary.  Listening to an audiobook felt like someone was walking along with me, telling me a story!  Some of my recent favorites include Eat Pray Love, Middlesex, Pretty in Plaid and The Help, all of which were downloaded directly to my iPod for a reasonable fee from Audible.com. 
4. Enell sports bras.  Even when I was at a nice healthy weight in high school, I was blessed with cleavage.  Fast forward 125 pounds and you can imagine just how...ummm...even more blessed(?) I am now.   Now think of how painful those blessings are when you are working out.  Fortunately, I came upon the Enell sports bra, which basically renders your chest motionless even during high impact activities like running or even jumping jacks.  They are pricey, but very well made and definitely worth the investment.
5. The Daily Plate on Livestrong.  This website allows you to track your food, weight and daily activity, and has an unbelievable list of foods from which to choose.  You enter your weight loss goals and the website provides an appropriate calorie target which you can supplement with exercise.  And as your weight decreases, your daily target decreases!  You can also generate reports and graphs of your daily intake and overall progress.  In addition to all that great personal stuff, you can form groups to share your 'plate' with friends to help keep each other motivated!  There are message boards and lots of informative articles about all aspects of fitness.  It's a great way to track your food, keep motivated and also learn a few things.
6. The internet.  Seriously, I search the internet daily for information about fitness, for like-minded people who blog about their experiences, and just for general information.  There are a ton of great podcasts & downloadable workouts out there (YogaJournal.com has some amazing yoga videos that you can stream absolutely free).  All of the major fitness and health magazines have websites with lots of articles as well as info that's not in the printed magazine, and at CookingLight.com you can get virtually all of the magazines recipes for free - with user reviews and a place to add your own personal notes.  And of course blogging has really helped me keep on track!
7. Wigwam Cool-Lite Pro socks.  These socks are blister-resistant (and believe me, when you walk 18 miles in one day without a single blister, you know the socks have something to do with it), cushy and durable!  They stand up to lots of abuse without showing any signs of wear.  I absolutely love them! 
8. My Wii!!!  There are so many great fitness games that you can get to go with the Wii - including the Wii Fit.  But honestly, my favorite is just the plain old tennis game that comes with the game console!  You're not going to get in killer shape using the Wii, but it will get you off the couch, having fun, and burning a few extra calories. 

So there you have it, my list of must-have fitness accessories and tools to keep me motivated and on track.  What's on your list?

Thanksgiving Day - Bring It On

Hello out there in blogland!  With the inevitable Thanksgiving feast just around the corner, I've been giving some thought to how I will navigate the 'feastivities' without completely going on a food bender and putting myself in the position of feeling guilty & disappointed in myself. 

I am hosting a small T-Day this year – myself, my husband and his parents. Unlike my family, my inlaws prefer to eat dinner late in the day, around 5-6pm. I’m used to a dinner time of noon, after which there is usually a nap, much watching of TV, and then more feasting on leftovers. This year will be different.  After a month of keeping the momentum going, and losing 8 fatty pounds, I can't afford to derail my progress and backslide. So it was necessary to devise a master plan to keep my mojo going:

T-Day Plan Part 1:
There will be a good long workout in the morning, most likely step class and then a relaxing swim. A light lunch, and then some yard work or a long dog-walk in the afternoon while the turkey cooks – keep that calorie burn going!

T-Day Plan Part 2:
At dinner, many of the traditional foods will make an appearance: cranberry sauce, mashed potatoes, pumpkin pie, apple pie, and stuffing (mom-in-law makes an incredible sticky rice stuffing with chestnuts – I will try to steal the recipe and post it later this week).  However, I will also be steaming lots of healthy veggies (green beans, brussels sprouts, broccoli) to accompany this feast.  The centerpiece of my plan is to fill my ENTIRE plate with veggies, eat them all, and only then enjoy the usual treats and eat until I am nice and full.  I’m hoping that I will be pretty well filled up with veggies before I start on the high-calorie stuff and thus will not have the belly space to do too much damage!  In addition, a later dinner means only one feast, rather than a second round of eating after a long nap. 

T-Day Plan Part 3:
Since this party is at my house, I need to worry about LEFTOVERS!  The final piece of my grand plan is to make smaller quantities of everything, so that the leftovers are gone by Friday and I can get back to my usual eating routine without the temptation of tasty treats in the fridge.

This is a new strategy for me - usually I just try to control my portions and fail miserably, thus triggering the guilt, disappointment, and mental flagellation routine - and then inevitably eat more to numb the bad feelings.

For more thoughts on Thanksgiving, check out this great post by MizFit. What are your plans for navigating this tempting holiday?

First Training Goal Achieved

Last night I achieved my first triathlon training goal: swim 200 yards without a break.  A small goal, yes - but more than I could do three weeks ago, so I'm feeling pretty good about that!  I've decided my next goal will be to jog 1/4 mile at a 5 mph pace.  Right now I can jog about a minute at 5 mph - so I basically need to work up to 3 minutes of jogging to hit that quarter mile target.  Hopefully I'll be there by mid-December!

Impatient, Discouraged and Re-energized

Today I was feeling both impatient and discouraged.  Impatient, because I've been at this for a few weeks and my pants don't feel any looser, and discouraged, because I am starting to feel overwhelmed about the huge task I have before me - although I don't have a firm goal weight in mind, I kind of like the idea of getting to 160 - which is about 100 pounds from now.

There's not much I can do about the impatience - I know if I trust the process, the results will come.  And although I've lost about 5 pounds in 3 weeks, I can't expect to see visible results on my waistline for awhile.  But what I can do is appreciate the muscle tone that I feel developing under all my insulation and use that as my confirmation that I'm making changes to my body.

Feeling discouraged - well, that's more of a concern to me.  That type of emotion can quickly lead to giving up entirely, and I need to nip that in the bud before it takes hold.  I talked over my concerns with my awesome trainer, Rena Raso, and she suggested some realistic long term goals might be in order.  My first thought was 'I want to be small enough by next August to fit into an XL wetsuit for the triathlon'.  So we talked about what that weight might be, and I think that would be about 190 pounds.  Which is about 70 pounds in 9 months.  Breaking it down further, that's about 8 pounds a month, or 2 pounds per week.  Which might be attainable for the first couple months, but as my weight decreases, so will the number of calories I burn...and so will the amount of food I can eat to maintain a 2 pound per week loss...and.....hmmm.  I'm not a contestant on The Biggest Loser - I have a real life to live with social activities and a full-time job.  Rena suggested that a more reasonable goal might be 10 pounds a month for the first couple months, then 5 pounds per month after that - a little over a pound a week - a 500-600 calorie deficit per day.  So I've set my sights on losing 50 pounds by July 1, 2010, or a mid-term goal weight of 212 pounds.  This means I might not be able to get a wetsuit that fits me before the triathlon, but really, it's only a half-mile August swim in the Schuylkil River, not a winter crossing of the English Channel.  I think I'll survive.

Now that I have a concrete goal in mind, I'm feeling much more energized and excited!  I've already lost 10% of my 50 pounds, and suddenly I see progress instead of stagnation and frustration.  And I'm thinking about mini-fitness goals to set as well - such as being able to jog for 5 minutes, swimming 200 yards without stopping, and conquering some of the yoga poses I've been struggling with.  And for those of you who would like to follow my numerical progress I have added a stats bar to my page for weekly updates, to be accompanied by occasional 'Now' pictures. 

I'd love to hear from everyone out there - what are your goals?  Do you prefer to break things up into mini-goals, or just keep your eye on the prize and work towards one big goal?