Sometimes This Sucks

I like to think that for the most part I stay pretty positive during the many twists and turns of this hard journey. But every now and then one has to have a moment where they step back and say, "this sucks."  I don't do that often, but sometimes it helps to make a list of what sucks in order to expel that frustration and negative emotion. After that you feel much better and can move on in a positive and productive manner. 

• The scale sucks. Not every day, not every time, but there are some times when you're standing on it, knowing you did everything you could to make those numbers go down, and they don't....or worse yet they go up.  That sucks.
• The fact that Doritos taste so much better than celery sucks. Wouldn't life be so much better if we could get some veggies that tasted like Cool Ranch?
• The fact that it takes a 3,500 calorie deficit to burn one measly pound sucks.   The fact that you do the majority of that by the way you eat also sucks.
• Those days where you go down to the gym and have no idea what to do and you feel like you don't do your best, suck. 
• The fact that eating healthy costs so much sucks.
• Deceptive "healthy" foods that are high in calorie (and finding this out after you've eaten them) suck.
• Knowing that this will be a lifetime battle sometimes sucks.

Yes.  Sometimes the struggle sucks and it's okay to say that from time to time. Acknowledging that some days will suck keeps things in perspective and helps keep you on track during the peaks and valleys.  Yesterday I felt like my workout sucked and like I'd never lose another pound.   Today I found my joy back as I emerged from Step and Abs class covered in sweat, calves on fire, but satisfied.  Feeling frustrated doesn't mean your drive is gone or that you're destined to fall off your good path...take it for what it is. Say "this sucks." And then get back to business.   

Sunny Day, Shredded Legs, and Debbie

Not every day on a dieter's journey is great.  Some days you struggle. Some days it seems there aren't enough calories in the world and  you swear you're starving. Some days you're sore and frustrated.   Today, I am happy to say,  was not at all one of those days!

February teased us with spring-like temperatures and caused us to quickly make the decision to take our workout outdoors.  Some quick instant-messages to the girls to come prepared with sunglasses and water bottles and the seven of us were bursting out of the gym, heading for the river walk and relishing the sunshine.

Outside in the fresh air we did a "leg shredder" workout by the Cape Fear River including lunges, squats, jumping jacks, toe touches, and wall sits (or in this case, piling sits) until our legs were shaking.  Repeating that circuit twice, we moved on to sprints and step ups, planks and more jumping jacks.  It seemed like most of the gym crew got the seventy-degree weather memo as we saw quite a lot of them taking advantage of the day and the beautiful setting like we were.

After reluctantly returning inside, I finished out the day and then some members of the original and current Transformation Teams met up with a very special person for dinner.  I had the pleasure partially into my journey of meeting Debbie Daniels, a local who was featured on the A&E show "Heavy."  Months before meeting her I (who at the time was only a few months into my own journey)  had watched her incredible progress on TV and thought to myself, "She's from Wilmington. It would be so cool to meet her and pick her brain."  As fate would have it, I got a chance to do just that and made a great friend and awesome cheerleader in the process.

Tonight the new Transformation Team got a chance to meet Debbie and hear her inspiring story of how she's lost almost 300 pounds.  Debbie always has such a great perspective and every time I hang out with her, I leave with renewed energy.   It was great for all of us to get a chance to hear her story, tell ours, let loose frustrations, and share the ups and downs of the journey so far.

Everyone after a (healthy) dinner and even better conversation.

Debbie and I.  Love ya girl!

Millie and Debbie; two of my faves.

Not every day brings sunshine, but every so often you get rewarded for all of the hard work put in.  Today was one of those days.

Stamina

Not that our workouts haven't  been challenging lately (because they have been) but it's been a while since I thought to myself, "I don't know if I can do this."  Today that changed.  We were doing a crazy "stair blaster" workout where we'd run up and down the two flights of stairs outside the gym, come back in the gym and immediately drop down into a set of burpees, run the stairs again, come back in for some push ups, run the stairs again and do some V-sit crunches, back to the stairs....well, you get the point.  In the midst of all of this craziness, I thought to myself, "I can't do this."  But as they always do, my awesome girls kept me going and I made it through.  Walking into the locker room I said to them, "That was tough.  I didn't think I was going to make it.  Let's do that again on Thursday."  Yep, I really have drank the Kool Aid.

What I've realized is that while exercise is composed of  three "S" words - strength, speed and stamina - the most challenging of those is stamina.   Some things I've learned about stamina:

• It's the first hurdle you have to overcome when you start out. You have to make it through the period of time where you're saying "How much longer must I endure this? How many minutes/reps/miles are left?" to the time when you find yourself saying "I wonder how much longer I can do this? Let me see how many more minutes/reps/miles I can last."
• No matter what you do when you're there, stamina is about showing up at the gym every day.
• Stamina is climbing up onto the scale even when you don't want to.
• It is getting back on the horse when you know you've done badly the day before, instead of throwing in the towel for the week, month, year and vowing to start later.
• It's those desperate seconds when you swear you're going to drop the weights in your hands but you make it through to the end of the set anyway.
• It is the determination to hold yourself in plank position until the time limit is up, even though your arms are shaking, the sweat is running down your nose, and your abs are on fire.
• Stamina is what happens when you take a piece of that cake, have full intentions of eating it, but throw it in the trash instead.
• It's the decision to pass up your favorite menu item and eat something healthy instead, no matter how mad you may be about it. 
• It is every day spent on a plateau working hard to get off of it.
• It is doggedly working at something that is uncomfortable, embarrassing, or frustrating until that very thing is no longer any of those adjectives.  

In order to be successful at anything, especially losing weight, you have to have stamina.  It is about making it over hurdles, celebrating successes, and then finding a way to make it over the next hurdles that are around the corner.  It is about being more stubborn and more determined than your inner quitter tells you that you are.

Get Crackin!

I love comparison pics.   They get you inspired and make you push harder.   Something else that does that: a workout buddy.  One of the biggest blessings that have come out of this journey (and there are many) are the friendships I've made with the people I workout with.  When you conquer hurdles together, have achievements together, cuss the scale together, and solve the world's problems from the locker room together, it creates a bond.

So here's a couple of comparison pics of me and one of the BFFs I've made along the way: my girl Millie.

Here's Millie and I last May, about half way into our journey.

Millie and I tonight.

 If you're trying to to get this weight loss thing done, don't go it alone.  Find someone who can push you, encourage you when you lag behind, call you out when you aren't working as hard as you can, commiserate with you when the pounds don't come off as quick as you want them to, celebrate with you when they do, and keep you laughing through it because you'll stick with anything if it's fun.  Millie does all of those things and more for me (including telling me daily to "get crackin!" when I lag in the locker room running my mouth).   Love ya Millie!

My Own Two Feet

Sometimes life throws a monkey wrench in your plans, as I found out Wednesday.   After having a great workout week and tracking my calories faithfully on www.myfitnesspal.com, I was revved up and ready for Step class (aka the biggest calorie burn of my week) on Wednesday.   My car, however, had other plans for my day and I ended up having to take the day off to put it in the shop for repairs.  

When I got to the shop I was hating the fact that not only did I have a repair bill ahead of me, but I also was missing my workout.   However, as I got ready to get on my phone and call someone to pick me up at the shop, I looked outside at the beautiful, sunny day and down at the tennis shoes on my feet.  Calculating the distance to my grandparents' house as only a couple of miles away, I put away my cell phone and took off down the road. 

As I strolled down the road, I was struck again by the change in not only my body, but my attitude.   I imagined myself as very European (they walk by far more than we do over here) and soon I had gotten a great sweat going.  A lot of times we get so caught up in keeping our exercise in the gym, when really a workout can  be found anywhere.  It felt great to leave the repair shop knowing that I had the stamina to get to my destination with nothing but my own "steam".  Thinking back to my former state of feeling out of breathe just trying to do my regular grocery shopping, I reveled in the freedom I felt as my feet carried me down the road.  I had no idea back then just how trapped I was or just how sweet a strong body can feel.

Today I was back in the gym working out with my buddies in our usual sweaty way,  but yesterday (although it had its annoyances) turned out to have it's bright spots too. 

Putting In The Time And The Changes That Come With It

Kickboxing was on tap today at the gym, always my favorite.  It was also cool to have some of us from the Transformation 1.0 crew and the new Transformation 2.0 crew all sweating it out together.  As we staggered into the locker room with our sweaty shirts and red faces, Millie and I traded some of our old stories with Crystal who is part of the new group.  It has been interesting to look back at those early days and see just how the fitness journey has evolved us. If you stick with it and just give it the time it needs, the journey can truly transform you. But it takes time...and that time is essential to making lasting changes.  You have to experience the successes and the defeats, the tears and the triumph, the mistakes and the milestones in order to become the fit person that you picture in your head.  There's no magic formula; you just have to show up every day and do the work.

Today as we were trading stories in the locker room, I was telling the girls about a push up contest I had with my husband and I became aware of another one of the many changes that have occurred in me along the way: endurance.  When I first began working out, I suffered through high rep routines and classes thinking all the time, "How much longer do I have to do this? Ugh, how many more reps?"  My attitude was that of surviving my workouts and getting through them with sweaty desperation.  Somewhere along the way, without my realizing it, I turned into a person who looks at high rep circuits and marathon classes as a challenge she wanted to embrace. Suddenly I wasn't a person saying, "How many more do I have to do?".  I was a person who said, "Hmm...wonder if I can do that?" and then a person who said with a gleam in her eye, "I'm going to try to do a 5K, flip a big tire 18 times in 100 degree weather, the Navy Seal workout, a two hour zumba class" and all the many other fitness milestones along the way.   That mental transformation that comes with putting in the time day after day, is as thrilling as physical one.

Certified Gym Rats

I love the theme of the Biggest Loser this season which is "no excuses".   Each episode takes on a common excuse that people make when facing a weight loss challenge.  This week's excuse to beat was, "I can't do it on my own".  In the first part of my journey, I had trainers with me every step of the way and I really feared the time when my Transformation program would be over with and my team mates and I would be on our own.  I'm not going to lie - it was a tough transition for me....mentally.  Our trainers are still there for us as friends and resources, but now they have to turn their attention to a new group of Transformees and we have to move forward with the confidence in ourselves, our strong set of muscles, and the arsenal of knowledge they gifted us with.

I must say that I'm quite proud of our group.  We've learned how to train ourselves and kick our own butts. We take the things we learned with our trainers and add on to them with workouts we gather from the internet, other gym buddies, TV, and magazines.  We are developing a little bit of a following as folks see how much fun we have and sweat we generate, and we love it as new people add new things and push us to new levels.  We can now relive our initial journey through our friends who make up this years' Transformation Team.  We help motivate them as they renew our fire and motivate us.  We have moved on from our initial status as rookies and are, as Marisa (our trainer...I say it in present tense because she and Jeff will always be our trainers) said today "certified gym rats."

This can be done without a trainer and a Biggest Loser Ranch.  I have a friend who, no matter how hectic his day was or the fact that it's 11:30 at night and he has to get up early the next day, gets his workout in in the gym he's created in his garage. That's some dedication! Also, there are some excellent, free tools online like www.sparkpeople.com or my personal fave: www.myfitnesspal.com (you can find me there under the user name "jenniferminter".  It's like Fitness Facebook).  You don't have to be a certified gym rat in the beginning, you just have to use the tools that are out there and find a few buddies to "do it on your own with".   

Getting Creative With Cravings

Do you ever feel like you're predisposed to craving chicken fingers and ranch rather than grilled fish and asparagus?  Ever shake your head at people who eat healthy because they like it, rather than because they have to lose weight or for their health?  Ever wonder why you can't get as excited about carrots and turkey as you can about Doritos and pizza? Well there might be a genetic reason behind it and I'm not talking about that inherited slow metabolism some of us have been cursing for years. New research is showing that the craving for fattening food might be woven in our DNA.  A group of scientists have recently identified a  gene, CD36, that may show a genetic predisposition to liking foods that are higher in fats.   Depending on what type of this gene you have seems to predict whether your DNA makes you prone to reach for the junk food. You can read more about it here.

So what is a person to do?  Throw up hands in defeat, blame mother nature, and reach for the ranch?  Well, that's one approach, but I believe there is a work around for a lot of our cravings.  When you're trying to lose weight, you have to get creative with your cravings because if you severely deny yourself, eventually you're going to snap and that's never pretty.   Eating right for me is a constant battle...much harder than working out by far.  I try hard to cut the carbs down and keep my calories low and have a learned a few work arounds for the cravings that threaten to throw me off track:

• Chili is low in calories, high in fiber, and helps put a lid on my frequent pizza and spaghetti cravings. 
• Microwaveable edamame in sea salt has been a lifesaver.  Maybe I'm weird, but they sort of have a chip taste about them and really help when I crave salty snacks in the afternoon.
• Quaker makes a chocolate chip oatmeal that is 130 calories per serving.  It's not great on the low-carb scale, but when I have a cookie craving, it hits the spot. Oatmeal has a lot of great nutritional benefits and it takes a far longer time to eat than to scarf down a bunch of cookies.
• 100 calorie snack bags of almonds seem to always hit the spot and help me keep my portion control in perspective. 
• I recently saw on Pinterest an idea for dipping strawberries in Greek yogurt and freezing them and plan to try this out very soon.
• Speaking of Greek yogurt, it is coming a long way in flavor and variety these days.  I have tried some of the key lime-flavored and it tastes a lot like the pie itself.  My new favorite flavor, however, is honey.  I always reach for the Greek yogurt because it has more protein and seems more filling that regular yogurt.
• Laughing Cow cheese has a several different flavors that are really good. One wedge of it is around 35 calories and is great to put on baby carrots.

I'm not a nutritionist and I struggle daily with what I eat, but these are a few tricks that have worked for me so far.  Whether we are predisposed to craving bag things or if we're trying to break bad habits, there is always a work around.  That being said, please feel free to post a comment about the healthy work arounds you've found.  I'm always on the look-out for new ideas!

New Transformations Begin

Today the next round of the Transformation Program began with a new group of folks. This is the program that saved my life.  This is the program that truly transformed me from a person who could not walk the simple distance from her desk to the gym downstairs at work into a person who has done a 5K and works out every day and has a pretty decent set of "guns". Walking into the gym today with my fellow members of the first Transformation Program, it made my heart swell to see the new group on the tread mills, beginning their warm up before getting their butts kicked by Jeff and Marisa for the first time.

I remember how it felt to be excited and scared at the same time (I used to actually get a "pit of fear" feeling on the way to the gym to meet Jeff) and to step forward bravely into an arena where you are definitely out of your comfort zone.  As Millie, Jenn, Flo and I kicked our own butts through a challenging circuit I'd created (insert evil laugh here) I saw them on the other side of the gym making it through their first workout and felt everything I knew that they were right now experiencing.  In the locker room afterward, I recognized the red face and "I just got hit by a train" look that they had. To them and anyone else just venturing out (or maybe venturing out again) I say this:

• You are a rock star for showing up and getting through that first workout.
• It's okay to feel out of breathe, sick to your stomach, and jelly-legged.  Your body just went through a major shock. It will get better.
• You're going to be sore, but if you keep at it, you eventually won't be satisfied until something hurts everyday.
• There will come a day when the gym switches from a place you might dread right now into the place you look forward to going to.
• There will be something that you are sure your body will never be able to do, you will struggle at it, you will feel frustrated, you may even shed an angry tear or two but if you keep going, one day like magic you will be able to do that very thing.   This has happened to me countless times along this journey and still continues to happen.  Just this week I was able to finally do one handed planks. 
• Nothing can make you feel more frustrated or more elated, but the good far outweighs the bad. 
• You can do it.  You can do it. You can absolutely, positively do it! And I am here on this journey with you and for you.   

Me before

 

Me now.