Once a Loser, always a Loser

Sorry for the lack of updates this weeks, folks. I was laid off last Friday and it's made for a very blah week. I haven't been eating too catastrophically but I guess I've just been bumming around. I haven't been to the gym in almost 2 weeks. I also had to speak to my trainer about postponing future sessions until I hear more from my job about coming back freelance or something.
I am making a beef stew for supper. It's the perfect weather for a big bowl of warm beef stew!

That's about it for the update!

Quickie!

I have to run to class but I just wanted to get this thing started.

Brunch - Quiche! They did not turn out very nice. I got no "crusty" part on the bottom, just the top. I mixed in frozen peas, pesto, prosciutto, cheese, onion. It's very good, only would be better if the bottom was all pretty and crunchy.

Snack - No clue

Supper - Working

Viva la Ouch.

No pain, no 'gain'. Just a quick update because I'm sleepy and sore and I have a long day tomorrow.

Breakfast - RS oatmeal
Lunch - BLT on whole wheat toast
Supper - 1/2 fajita, 1/3 cup of rice, salad
Snacks - Granola bar, bowl of cereal when I got home from work, 50 calorie white tea peach popsicle, 1 rice cake.

Weight this morning - 188.1

Ouch.

My trainer kicked my ass this morning. Today was like last week 10 fold! It was amazing though, I feel like I could take on anything.
This morning he had me warm up on the rowing machine. That was hard after a while but nothing compared to what was about to come! 10 squats, 10 lunges, 15 forward-shoulder press things, 15 back-shoulder preses, and then the killer...10 jumping things pushing 25 lbs over my head. Those killed me. All this for 20 minutes. By the end I could barely bend my legs to lunge or squat. Going up the stairs after all this nearly killed me! We then did cardio, on the bike, and finished with some core work and lots'o'stretching. Made from quite an interesting walk home. It was awesome though, I really like this trainer of mine. He isn't too bad to look at either, which helps!

Breakfast - 1/2 cup FF greek yogurt, with splenda, drizzle of honey, blueberries
Post-workout snack - Apple, FF/SF latte, granola bar
Lunch - Rice crispies with milk
Supper - At work!

Yes, I had rice crispies for lunch. The joys of running back and fourth from the gym, work, school, and home! I will bring something to eat after supper at work tonight. Hopefully it's something good and healthy. That cereal I had for lunch isn't cutting it. I'm doing well on water today which is a nice change!

Aaaaaand I forgot to weigh myself, again.

Hello!

On the left is a picture from the big fat italian wedding I went to on Saturday. 8 courses my friends. EIGHT. I skipped 2 because I don't eat seafood...but I did have control and skipped a lot of the pasta and stuff. The protein didn't come until the end when I was full, go figure. I also left just as they were rolling out the sweet table. No words!
I haven't stepped on the scale since, but I will do so tomorrow before I hit the gym. I was still full yesterday so I didn't have too much to eat. I'm feeling pretty awesome right now!

Breakfast - 3/4 of an egg, 2 slices of bacon, 1/4 slice of whole wheat bread, piece of watermelon, a couple of potato wedges.
Lunch - Toaster strudel
Supper - Grilled chicken breast, salad, corn & peas
Snack - Granola bar

I haven't kept up with my water in the last week so I will have to catch up on that. Work meal tonight was grilled chicken with french fries. I skipped the fries (didn't even have 1!) and had salad and frozen veggies instead. The chicken breast filled me up big time (it was only 3-4oz too) and I was sick shortly after I had those peas & corn. Not a bad day at all if you ask me. Could have had a proper lunch instead of that toaster strudel. I simply ran out of time!

Personal training session again in the morning...wish me luck!

It's freezing outside!

It's fall :( When did that happen?
Our office got broken into early this morning. Third break-in in 4 months. We've only been in the building since November too. It was the same guy as the 2nd time, except that this morning he didn't take a thing. It was so strange. He spent 20 minutes in our office and we have no idea what he did for all that time.

Breakfast - Protein bar
Snack - Pumpkin muffin from Starbucks & a coffee. Bad bad bad bad bad.
Lunch - 1/2 hamburger, possibly 4 french fries...which made me sick and miserable for the rest of the afternoon.
Snack - 2 rice cakes
Supper - Beef stew, garlic rapini, and a piece of yorkshire pudding.

Weight this morning - 188.8

I got my butt kicked

I haven't had time to update in a few days. My schedule is so messed up right now. 1 week down, 11 to go! I've worked every day since I don't know when. When I'm not working, I'm in class. When I'm not in class I'm studying, trying not to fall behind.
I haven't been able to weigh myself in a couple of days either. My roommate's boyfriend was in town and since I have no curtains on my doors yet, I couldn't really hop onto the scale naked. I've also had a cold and haven't been eating as much. And I have no food at home. The joys of being a student.
I met with my personal trainer Roberto this morning. I told him I was sick and to take it easy. He said he would. He lied! First I biked for 10 minutes. We did intervals ranging from 80-90-100rpm. It was tough to do first thing in the morning. Then we did lots of squats, lost of shoulder presses, and rowing. And then to finish off the session, I had to do a circuit of everything combined. 100rpm on the bike for 30 seconds, 20 squats, 200m rowing (keep under 2:40/500m), 10 shoulder presses...all in 20 minutes. It hurt, but it felt really good.
After the gym I had to jump in the shower, run home, grab my books, run to school...then run back home, change clothes and now I'm at work. Crazy day to say the least!

Breakfast - PB&J sandwich
Snack - Apple
Lunch - None
Supper - Chicken casserole at work, with some salad
Snack - Pretzels

I caved and got the pretzels.

School sucks

Day 3 today and my days of [partial] sanity are definitely numbered. So much to review already. Is it December yet?
I haven't had much time to eat today, sort of a good thing. I also forgot to step on the scale before breakfast.

Breakfast - 1 whole wheat toast, FF PB
Lunch - Detour bar, starbucks frappucino drink (le sigh)
Supper - Small greek salad (not the healthy kind either), 1/2 greek pita bread
Snack - Maybe a hot chocolate, or a fruit popsicle.

Back to school!

Breakfast - 1.5 small slices of whole wheat toast with 1 tblsp. PB
Snack - Detour bar, banana, iced coffee with milk
Supper - Spaghetti yet again, with chicken in the sauce
Snack - Handful of pretzels, more iced coffee

Weight this morning - 189.3

I started classes again today. I think this semester may be the one that will cause the most stress ever. I might have to re-think this whole working 30 hours a week thing if I want to keep my sanity. My classes so far this semester seem very heavy. I spent tonight reviewing things from my summer course and found that hard. I can't imagine having to add to that.
It will be interesting to say the least.
I didn't have time to eat today really...I was running in between buildings all day and then had to run to work. I think I'll be having many days like these in the 12 weeks to come! I finally stepped onto the scale today and was quite surprised at how high the number went. I seem to be stuck between 186-189. I start the personal training a week from today so I look forward to seeing those results. I'm also retaining water this week I'm sure. It's been so hot this week (warmest week of the summer...in September, go figure).

Labour Day Monday!

Back to school TOMORROW. Argh. I feel like I haven't had time to enjoy summer because I've just been so busy working. Already back to school.
I stepped onto the scale Friday and was up 2 lbs, for no reason at all. Maybe I'm retaining water but it was enough to ruin my weekend.
Friday - I finally made this zucchini lasagna. It turned out pretty darn yummy. But then Friday night my roommate came home with ice cream and a movie, so I had some of that.
Saturday - I went to the gym for my pilates class, and then went to work since there was another wedding. I ate. They served spaghetti for supper, this small crepe thing filled with fruit, and I had pretzels to top it all off. Needless to say Saturday's gym session was useless!
Yesterday wasn't so bad. Had fruit for breakfast then went to a BBQ. I had a handful of chips, lots of raw veggies, corn on the cob, and 3/4 of a small chicken breast...which ended up making me sick.

Today:

Breakfast - Some granola cereal (no milk), strawberry protein shake, coffee
"Snack" - Iced tea (110 calories, which is what makes it a snack)
Lunch - I'm at work and all there is are pita pizzas
Supper - Leftover zucchini lasagna

Forgot to step on the scale this morning, will do so tomorrow before school.

...

I'm having a bad day today. Just a day where everything has gone wrong. Time has dragged on and I can't wait to get into bed and sleep-in tomorrow morning.
Food-wise, could be worse. As long as the scale is going down, which it is!

Breakfast - Protein bar, coffee
Lunch - Pita pizza, 1 cookie (felt sooooooo crappy after)
Supper - Beef stew with piece of whole wheat bread
Snack - 1.5 clementines, some sierra nut mix, detour bar

Weight this morning - 187.6 (down 1.2 since the beginning of the week!)

Plus demain :)

So there IS such a thing as too much melon

Before I forget:

Breakfast - Reduced sugar apple/cinnamon oatmeal
Lunch - BLT on whole wheat, watermelon, some m&m's
Supper - Big fat heirloom tomato with balsamic, oil, basil
Snack - 1 cracker, 4 graham cracker cookies, lots of watermelon

Weight this morning - 188.1 (down from yesterday...but I can't remember by how much exactly!)

I went to see my dad tonight and again he was kind of upset that no body had given him directions for when he goes home. The number of times I've already told him not to expect anyone to spoon feed him I tell ya...Oy! He's doing fine, no more insulin, BP was great, temp was excellent. He started passing gas but man was his stomach swollen. I don't remember mine being so big!

Must get back to some work...more tomorrow!

Bored and fidgety

I called the clinic around 2pm to see how my dad's surgery was and the nurse put me right through to his room since he was awake. He was pretty out of it, in quite some pain from the gas. I told him time and time again that this would be the worst of it but even he said he didn't believe how bad it actually would be. I only spoke to him a couple of minutes, I was surprised that he was awake!
When I spoke to him this evening he had been around and walking, he was feeling much better. They had to give him 3 shots of insulin though because his blood sugars were way high for some reason. Probably the stress from the surgery. It was 4.4 this morning (which is low-normal for you Americans) but went right up to 8.5-8.9 range which is very high. They were going to keep giving him insulin until the results got under 8. Hopefully soon.
Aside from that he was in good spirits. I look forward to seeing him tomorrow!

I've updated my consumption of the day down below in this morning's entry :)

Dad is out of surgery and doing well!

He survived the surgery, cool as a cucumber, as usual. He's got a bunch of visitors lined up and hopefully I'll get my chance tomorrow afternoon.
Last night wasn't too bad. I ended up having a bowl of cereal for supper. Honey Nut Cheerios nonetheless. Later on in the night I had a clementine, and a few more of those freaking graham cracker cookies. I also had 1 eggroll which made me very sick for some reason. Here is what I've consumed today:

Breakfast - 1/2 banana, 1 detour bar, coffee
Lunch - BLT on a white 6" baguette. It was either that or pizza.
Snack - Fruit cup, baby carrots and ranch dip
Supper - A couple of potato wedges and ham, a few green beans
Snack - 3 clementines and I was pretzels so bad. Urgh. Won't. Do. It.

Weight this morning - 188.8 (down 0.5 from yesterday)

No gym tonight since I work but definitely tomorrow once I go and visit my dad.

12 hours and counting

In less than 12 hours my dad is going in for his surgery. He doesn't seem nearly as nervous as I was. April 30th 2007 I was a nervous wreck. I seriously could not stop crying all day. I wasn't afraid or anything, just really emotional.
In any case, please keep him in your thoughts! I will be going to see him on Wednesday hopefully.


Here is what I consumed today:
Breakfast - 2 clementines, 1 banana, coffee
Lunch - 3/4 cup whole wheat linguine with pesto and tiny pieces of prosciutto, 2-3 slices of roma tomato
Snack - 4 graham cookies (in my defense they were very small might I add)
Supper - Not sure yet. I wanted to make those zucchini roll-ups but it's late now and I don't feel like cooking. I may just have a salad.
Snack - I have cherries, watermelon, and hot chocolate...I shall pick one!

Weight this morning - 189.3

Holy Zucchinis!

3 months after moving downtown I finally decided to brave the crowds and head to the farmer's market. Jean-Talon market is located in Montreal's own Little Italy. It is one of the biggest markets of its kind in North America. I had been as a kid a few times but I knew I would have a blast going again. The weather was so beautiful this weekend, perfect produce picking weather!
I got there just before 1 and went around all the booths and made a mental list of what I wanted. The heirloom tomatoes were the size of small melons, and their colours were just out of this world. I walked, I tasted, I bought then had to drag it all back to my place without ripping my canvas bag which was overflowing with goodies.
It was a pain having to clean and store it all away. I got a basketful of heirloom tomatoes, beautiful zucchini, a big crate of roma tomatoes, bunches of berries, onions, and clementines to last me until Thanksgiving.
I am so sore today from yesterday's pilates class. I don't think I'll make it to the gym tomorrow night...I'm suppose to go pottery painting!

Just taking a break from work to update! There's a wedding at the club tonight so it's been hectic. I finally was able to meet a personal trainer last night. His name is Roberto. We had a hard time finding a date that was good for the both of us after weeks of back and fourth e-mails.
We sat down and talked for about 2 hours. I told him everything about my past gym experiences, my surgery, my lack-of-exercise since the surgery, the weight I still wanted to lose, everything. I told him that ultimately, I would love nothing more than to be able to run a 5k. So that is our main objective. He kept telling me that I would hate him once we started our training sessions. He even showed me a couple of the things we'd be doing and I had to laugh at the thought of me even attempting to do some of it. We'll be meeting every Monday night starting September 8th, for an hour, hopefully for 10 weeks or so. If I can make it to the gym that 1 night a week for an intense workout, then 2-3 other days just running, yoga, or pilates. I've been going to this one pilates class Saturday mornings for 3 weeks now and I love it. It's just my pace! And the instructor is always giving us options so everyone kind of adapts the workout to their own level. It's a small class also (we were 9 this morning, the most we've been so far) so there's no intimidation either.
My eating is 100x better on days that I workout too. I feel better, I eat better. I did try a new protein shake this morning - gas problems galore. I wasn't bad-tasting, but for a vanilla protein powder, it didn't taste like much at all. I almost wanted to add splenda to my frozen fruit.

That's just about it :)

Eek!

I've gotten bad with the updates. I don't mean to, I'm just working 60+ hours a week.
Things are good. My weight has no budged despite me eating all over the place just to see some movement on the scale. My dad's surgery is next week and I feel like I'm reliving a lot of what I went through. It's amazing the things I've forgotten already. I'm hoping to tag along for his post-op appointment so that I can follow-up with my surgeon.

Quick update - I'm off to the gym!

Helloooooo!

I've gotten the lovely messages from my being away for so long and I'm definitely back and in for the long run.
As you know, I moved out of my parent's house and into my own apartment in June. I had gained 7-10 lbs since the beginning of this year and really thought moving out would change all that since I would be the one responsible for groceries and such. I did really well in the beginning but began to fall off the wagon and in recent weeks I had noticed my pants and a lot of my clothing started to feel snugger than it had. I went shopping this weekend for work clothes and I had to go up a size in jeans. I broke down and bought a scale (after not having one in 2 months) and was absolutely horrified when I saw the number that came up. I stepped on and off 10 times probably just to make sure that the number was actually my current weight. My jaw literally dropped. I had the worst nasty feeling in my stomach.
I immediately went through my kitchen and threw out anything a post-op should not have. Surprisingly, I had lots of it. I just couldn't believe how I had let myself go.
Today is a new day. I started journaling. I'm going to the gym. I've started talking to others again about my operation because for a while there, I'd stopped telling people.

That's my update. I need to stay on top of this because I now know what happens when I don't. Shocking!

Day 391

Two updates in two days = not too shabby! I feel like I'm re-living all I went through last year seeing as my dad's going in for the surgery in 2 weeks. I've been more than a little apprehensive about the whole thing just because while both my parents have been great in "supporting" me, they have done nothing to help me food-wise. They continued to buy junk food and maintained their horrible lifestyles. I've done what I can but it's still been one of my biggest obstacles to date.
I love my dad to bits but he has got to be the most stubborn human being on this earth. I'm exactly like him in fact. People warned me that hunger returns after surgery, that the surgery does not cure anything, that you can easily regain weight and I listened to all of that but figured it would be somehow different for me. He's in the same mindset and won't admit it.
He's done research and when I first told him about my initial consult he told he contemplated the same thing. Both my parents are absolutely clueless when it comes to nutrition. When I asked my dad how many grams of protein he should aim for after surgery he said 30. Oy. He knows nothing about food, he can't cook at all and I just can't help but think...if my mother did't really support me, how the heck is she gonna support him? My entire family needs a crash course on food.
That's my Monday rant. I'm sitting here at almost midnight and I feel like I'm starving. I had a pretty good day food-wise:
Breakfast - Fresh fruit
Snack - Starbuck's SF Soy latte, berry parfait (320 FREAKING CALORIES!!!!!!!!)
Lunch - Protein bar
Snack - Banana, 2 pickles
Supper - 1/6 slice whole wheat crust spinach chicken pizza
Snack - 2 apples (made applesauce with splenda/cinnamon)

Just under 1000 calories, 20g of fat, 154g carbs, 48g of protein.

Day 390

I know, I know. I'm a horrible blogger! No excuses really. I've just been the same old crazy busy. I had a nice 1 year surgiversary and an even better 21st birthday. I finished exams at the end of April and started summer classes 4 days later. Even those finish in a couple of week. I don't know where time goes. Things are going well. I'm moving out next weekend so I have been packing up and throwing a lot out.
Eating- meh! I have great days and not-so-great ones. Good thing about moving will be that I'll finally be able to control whatever comes into my kitchen. I'm really looking forward to walking down to the farmer's market every weekend stacking up on produce for the week.
I start my advertising internship next week also (day after I move, go figure) so being out of the house all day and making lunches hopefully will work on my side. I do better when I'm busy with less time to snack and more time spent on planning. Time will tell! If I fuck up now I'll have no one to blame but myself.

I'll try updating again this week before the move :)

Day 358

I'd like to say I'm having a good eating day but truth is it's 4pm and I'm at 160 carbs for the day. Not necessarily bad carbs...90% of them are from the fruit I've eaten.

Breakfast - Strawberries, blueberries, a banana
Snack - Grapes, 2 small apples, string cheese (eaten over the course of a few hours, of course)
Lunch - 2 slices whole wheat toast with 1 tblsp LF PB and a drizzle (maybe 1/4 tsp.) of honey
Supper - Not quite sure yet

Puts me at roughly 840 calories, 17g of fat, 164g carbs, 22g of protein. Yikes!

I have all this fruit to eat before it goes bad which explains the enormous consumption increase. I feel pretty bloated now and will try and stick to a light supper. We'll see how that goes!

And just for the heck of it, here's some recent weight stats:
All time low: 169.2 (Dec. 31st 2007)
Last week: 184.9
This morning: 182.3

Day 357

Breakfast - Strawberries, blueberries
Snack - 1 cheese stick, 1 banana, 1 iced soy SF latte
Lunch - Protein bar
Supper - I think we're going out for thai...eek.

Yesterday was a good day. I didn't end up going to the gym though and during the hockey game last night I ate about a cup of pretzels at work. My work had a crappy supper too so I didn't really eat much. I had a tiny bit of salad, a couple of oz of chicken and maybe 1/3 cup of white rice. I got home late with a huge headache and had some frozen yogurt and a couple of roasted baby potatoes leftover from my family's dinner.

So far so good today. I'm at the library and this morning I spent an hour sitting on one of the many terraces having my iced latte. It's so nice to finally have gotten through the rough winter we had. We still have quite a bit of snow on the ground though...it's weird because it's been so hot. It's like we never had a spring, we went straight from winter to summer weather.

Plan for today is simple...no eating unless it's a meal. I only had fruit for breakfast so I was pretty hungry by the time I got to school. I brought the banana and cheese with me and when I was at the coffee shop, I almost got a muffin but my friend gave me 'the look'. Thank goodness too because I didn't need the freaking muffin! I think we're going to this pad-thai place for supper tonight. They do have these non-fried eggrolls which are excellent. I wonder how bad they can be? I'll have to look it up...

I don't know when I'll be able to make it to the gym next. My last final is Saturday and it's a biggie!

Day 356

10 days until my big 1 year surgiversary! It's scary how quickly the past year has gone...where does time go?
I had my first support group meeting yesterday in a long time. I've been working on Sundays lately so hadn't been able to catch one in a while. It really clears my head when I go to these things and today I'm feeling 101% more confident in my eating than I have been.
What I need to do:
- Have a big breakfast which should keep me full for about 4 hours.
- I also need to stretch out my meals because I'm eating them too quickly and getting hungry quickly thereafter.
- Big'ish lunch & smaller suppers.
- Set a cutoff time for eating in the evening.
- Get back to exercising.
- Weigh myself regularly because I've gained weight and I've been in denial about it.
- BLOG MORE.

So...

Breakfast - 1 egg, 1 slice of whole wheat toast with 1/2 tsp. LF PB, 1 new potato with tiny piece of onion, about a cup of fresh fruits.
Lunch - 2 bocconcini balls, 2 roma tomatoes, some onion, some garlic, some EVOO with some form of protein which I have yet to figure out.
Supper - Whatever is made at work
Snack - Whole wheat crackers with cheese? Depends what time of day it is.

Water - Most certainly
Exercise - I sure hope so!

Boo!

I haven't updated in a long while and have gotten e-mails and messages like there's no tomorrow. So, here I am! Reason for not updating: I've just been really, really busy. School is taking up all of my time but the good news is I'm almost done. Classes officially end tomorrow and then all I have left to do is 1 term paper and 3 finals. Finals are the toughest part and just thinking about them makes me sick to my stomach from nervousness.
I had a horrible flu right after Easter and I was stuck in bed for a week. I'm just getting over the cold leftover from that. I didn't think it would ever go away...not cool!
My weight has been stuck since December. I've been bouncing up and down between the same 10 lbs. I can't say that I'm happy about it, but at the same time I'm not unhappy with what I weigh now. It wouldn't be the end of the world if this was it for me. Would I like to lose another 20lbs? Absofrikenlutely. However, maybe that just isn't realistic for me. There is a lot going on in my life right now so things will change.
I move out June 1st. Moving out of the house for the first time...and I'm terrified! Very excited, a little sad, and very nervous. Food is the number 1 issue in my life. Having surgery did not change that. I'll always struggle with making decisions. So not having as much crap in the house will probably do wonders for me...if I don't do the buying of course. I've always secretly resented my parents for buying junk food and making me fat and I've always said that if I lived alone, I wouldn't buy any of it. We shall see!

So that's my update. I'm house-sitting all week and then finals start and end April 26th. Oh and I start a second [full-time] job and summer school April 30th. It just doesn't end!