Still not quite back on track.

Frustratingly my motivation has been slipping, I keep telling myself next week, next week will be different.

I certainly hope that next week will be different.

Ok, I am not the only one whose motivation is slipping the reality is my training buddy is terrible at keeping me on track. No I am the one who keeps him on track, but not lately and I am self sabotaging as well.

At the moment I just want to hide at home most evenings and I haven't been planning ahead like I should. This has meant my diet has included more take away than it should. Oh and cake and chocolate. Argghhh.

Where has my attitude gone, my I am an amazon, I am strong, I can do anything?

I guess we all get influenced by our emotions and lots has been going on in my personal life, but do I really want it to manifest as eating badly and not exercising. Why don't I equate looking after myself and protecting myself to going to the gym and eating well?

I need to look after myself, if I don't who will.

Tomorrow I have a day full of study and I have to do something for my family. A very sad thing has happened and I want to do something for the people I love. The day after I go on holiday and while there won't be a gym, I do intend to do lots of exercise, walking and swimming.

It is good to know I am not the only one who struggles. No matter what the size we all struggle.

Before/After

As you might know I have been reading this blog.

http://www.uncoveringme.com/

It is a really great source of motivation. The best thing is how she refers back to how she used to feel.

Now I have never been quite as large as her, but I was really out of shape and frumpy, especially after an extremely stressful time in my life.

Me cutting a 10 year olds cake.

I always knew I could be more, that I should be more. That I shouldn't accept the way I was and even though my husband told me he loved me and told me I was sexy, I just didn't feel lovable or in the least bit sexy.

Your own opinion of yourself matters so much. I don't think it is enough to just accept the way you are, because the reality is I was right. I was overweight, I was unfit and as a result I was unattractive and moody.

You have to face the truth and then make the changes you believe you need to make. This applies to everything in life. If you don't like something, do what ever you can in your power to change it and yes have the wisdom to know what you can't change. For example my breasts are not going to get bigger, unless I invest some serious money into them.

Now I feel a lot better about myself. Sure I still have my unsexy days, but I am more confident. When young men flirt with me despite my age, I am indeed flattered, if not perplexed, but 4 years ago that didn't happen because I wasn't looking after myself.

Would I have believed that men 15 years younger would find me attractive 4 years ago? Not on your life.

Do I want this attention, not really. Still if I had a choice of being older and unfit without any unwanted attention or older, fit, confident and having to deal with it, yeah I choose the latter. Seriously, who wouldn't?

Yes, that is me cutting a 13 year olds birthday cake. Amazing what difference just 3 years can make.

Food

I haven't had a great week foodwise.

I am mostly back on track, but geez am I getting hungry.

Now this makes perfect sense, I am exercising more, building muscle and doing everthing to speed my metabolism up. The thing is I want to reduce my body fat and I am tempted to ignore the hunger pangs and not eat, but is this the path to a slower metabolism?

I suspect that if I try to lower my calorie intake or even not increase it, I will indeed lose weight. For awhile. Then when I eventually listen to body complaining about being starved I will go and eat more and have it all turned to fat, with a slower metabolism.

What to do?

I had some home made crumbed fish as a snack tonight. I feel bad even though fish is for the most part a healthy food.

Breakfast was 2 pieces of toast (wholemeal) with 100% fruit spread and margarine. (lots of fat)

MT was nuts and dried fruit, one handful.

Lunch: cheese and ham sandwich . (low fat cheese)

AT: yoghurt, carrots, oh and some brownie. sigh then 3 large left over chips.

Dinner: pie and snow peas.

Supper: fish

Ok, now I look at it I really have eaten a lot and not all of it great and I am still hungry. Genuinely hungry, not bored hungry or sugar craving hungry, real need to eat hunger. I even woke up with hunger pangs this morning.

Right I think it is time to add a protien shake to my daily intake, that way I will be getting my extra calories that I obviously need without searching the fridge for something else to eat. (and possibly ending up with a brownie)

I think I will try having it in the evening, sometime between dinner and afternoon tea, or after dinner. Soon I will start working out earlier in the day so after my workout will be perfect.

BTW I am now using Musashi P3as my protien shake, it has lots of whey protein which is fantastic for you, much better than the cheaper soy protein most shakes use. Not the cheapest option but not the most expensive either and has the practical advantage of being sold at my local woolworths.

So tomorrow I will shake it up and see if this helps.

Um

No gym tonight.

Bad food.

Lack of planning and lack of caring has added up to getting way too hungry and pigging out. Also dinner was organised so late that it ran into gym time.

Hmmm, I will just have to focus better tomorrow and remember I need to think about what I am going to eat before I get ravenous.

No gym tonight

My training partner didn't want to go tonight.

I was going to establish the habit of going without him, but it is all moot because soon enough I will training on my own all the time.

I will miss having someone to share this all with. On the other hand the times that I can go become a whole lot more flexible and I think I will sleep better if I can get to the gym earlier. Also I think my kids will prefer to have me home at night.

1 and 1/2 weeks till he leaves, but I know that my routine will only improve. Can't wait.

Great day

Food has been balanced and healthy.

Best of all, I did a run tonight. I haven't run for a few weeks as I have the occassional knee problem.

So, instead of running I have been riding, rowing and using the eliptical machine. I have been building my leg muscles and taking glucosamine, for my joints.

I noticed yesterday that I hadn't had any kind of joint pain in ages. Not even the teeniest twinge. It is normal for me to get a sore knee after a long day on my feet, but it has been fine lately.

The other thing I have done is bought several new pairs of walking shoes. My very old sneakers are still in my closet, but I suspect they might be the cause, as I injured my knee while wearing them.

Anyway tonight I ran, no I didn't just run, I did my interval training. My god, it was hard. I got a stitch, but I ran through it. I felt my muscles burn and I wasn't sure I could do a full 20 minutes, but I did.

Yay me!!!

No excuses

I just read this

http://www.uncoveringme.com/2009/09/no-excuses.html

and I thought about how I always have excuses.

and how I only seem to be able to really focus on one goal at a time. Uni first, exercise is second.

I would like to make it first, but I can't and both of these are after family. So what do I do?

How can I keep my committment to both these things, fully?

I need to think on this one. I will let you know if I find the answer.

slipping a little

Well I haven't posted for awhile.

At first it was because everything was going fine and what can a person really add to that, but I have noticed a few bad habits slip back in.

I did have my usual menstrual based cravings, but I am still being a bit hungry for sugar. I missed my vegies one week and my vegies went off last week so that isn't tracking as well as it should either.

I only got to the gym twice last week, so I haven't increased the number of times I go yet either.

Sigh time to step it up a little. Sure I quite like the results I have gotten, but I can't take them for granted otherwise I will start going backwards and I really don't want that.

On a positive note, I ran into an old school friend and they did notice the weight loss.