Amazed

I feel so rejuvenated this week and I am not entirely sure why. Over the past few weeks I have noticed my mood has improved and I am so much more energized! There is something to be said about eating healthy and staying away from processed foods. It has been a challenge to try and get those 5 servings of veggies/fruits in a day but I am still chugging along. It has not happened every day but I am keeping my head up. There is no quitting in this and each day is new and I have to look at it as an opportunity to improve my quality of life and better myself.

I decided that I would not fully jump on the Shred band wagon until I have time to sit down and digest the whole program. From what I have read it is a very good program and while I may not use it for the rest of my life, it would be good to use the program as a "cleanse" for my body once or twice a year. I will be starting it completely on April 5th and do it for the full 6 weeks. It will certainly be an interesting process.

While it may seem trivial, I am amazed and shocked about how people are beginning to notice that I have lost weight! It still seems so unreal to me that I have lost as much weight as I have and that I look so different. It is nice to be acknowledged and obtain the affirmation I need to keep my head up and keep on going. My goal is attainable, I can do this and blast this extra weight out of the water.

What kind of affirmations have you heard in the past few months that have made you realize how worth it this journey is? Write them down, post them on a wall at home, maybe they will bring you the inspiration you need to get your butt in gear. Make the changes you need to, to be the best person (mentally and physically) that you want to be for the future!

☺Ashley☺

50/50

I decided to put off the shred program until I can sit down and actually look at/write down what I am going to eat for those weeks. So I plan on starting April 5th and going until May 17th in hopes that it will help me get into Onederland by May 18th. We will see if that actually is the case but I just want to figure out what the schedule entails and towards the end of the 6 weeks I will have flexibility since I will not be working (I think). I have begun to write down meal times and options for eating in a spreadsheet. Each week has a new sheet so that I can distinguish between them all and print them when I need to. I will also be able to write notes during each week. Call me OCD, I will call it being organized. 

I had a wonderful weigh in this week. I have finally hit a loss of 50lbs! I am still shocked to see the picture because it has taken so long and never really realized how much better I feel/how different I look. Those two jars have really been my motivation to get myself into shape so that I look AND feel good. I found a picture of me from last February and people cannot believe I looked like I did! I wake up in the morning knowing that what I am doing is the best thing I can do for myself. Pushing to make me better than who I once was. I do have to admit, there is saggy skin starting to show but that is not going to deter me from losing the last 50 lbs in my journey to be healthy. I found my BMI from when I first started and what it is today so I thought I would share.

June 25, 2012 my BMI was 41.4. 

March 15,2013  my BMI is 33.6

If you want to lose the weight bad enough, you will find the way. Do not get discouraged over plateau's or feelings of helplessness. You need to sit down and get a game plan together so that you can continue to move forward and achieve things you never thought were possible. There is so much to life and I enjoy life a lot more now with the weight gone. I may never be perfect or look perfect but I am happy with who I have become. I have learned so much about myself and food in general that I do not ever see myself going back to the young woman I once was. Do not give up on your dreams. If you want to be healthy and lose weight, fight for it like it was life or death for someone close to you. There are people struggling with cancer and other diseases every day fighting to live. What is stopping you from fighting to live?

☺Ashley☺

Slim Shred

So one of my older sister's owns a gym and decided that she was going to join a Slim Shred Challenge. It follows a book written by Dr. Ian Smith called Shred Revolutionary Diet. On her Facebook group she opened the challenge to any one and so I took the bait. I am always hesitant to join something like that because when I see the word 'diet' I tend to cringe. I have gotten myself to the point that I see this journey as me eating healthy and changing my lifestyle. Diets always tend to end and then people gain the weight back, with a change of lifestyle there is no end, it continues forever. As I said, I was skeptical but after looking it over, there are many things that I already do within my diet such as eating multiple meals and staying away from processed foods as much as possible. The promise of 4 inches and 2 sizes seems too good to be true so I am staying away from that idea. Just going to focus on other things, if it is an outcome great, if not that is okay too.

Looking deeper into the program and meal suggestions, I am going to be focusing on spreading my calories out per meal. I refuse to cut my calories down to the amount mentioned in the book (1,600 per day) because right now I am at 1,988 calories and that is comfortable for me. My BMR is about 1,700 so I am in the perfect range as far as eating goes. I will not sacrifice eating under and starving for a 2 week trial "diet". I need to also start mixing up my snacks. If you look at my book, you can pretty much tell what I am going to be having for snack. I am just a predictable kind of girl: luna bars and animal crackers. Not exactly the healthiest option (animal crackers) but it certainly works for what I do and I need something fast and I do not have to prepare. 

Once I begin to get into a groove with this, down the road I may purchase the nutribullet but for right now, I am going to stay away from shakes. Also, because I tend to like them in the morning, I would feel bad waking anyone up just because I would be pissed if someone did that to me.

Tomorrow I will be starting this and it will go until the 24th of this month. So some things I will be focusing on:

1. Exercising more
2. Spreading calories out
3. Changing snacks

It may seem trivial but I am a bit overwhelmed at the moment because I am introducing so much new stuff into my diet and some things that I did not expect to add. So, I just need to sit down and re-plan the next 4 weeks of my food eating life in order to not be stressed. I am totally excited about trying this new shred program though. I am looking towards the future, towards good health. Here is to hoping for a fabulous 2 weeks!

☺Ashley☺

Early March NSV's

 I decided to stop running altogether in early November. I found that with me running 5 days/week my left knee was giving me trouble. My knee felt heavy and stiff all the time no matter if I put heat or ice on it. When I tried to bend down and then stand back up I had a hard time so I would have to hold on to something. Using the kneelers at church became a problem also. So I decided that as much as I love running, I did not want to sacrifice my ability to use my knees on a daily basis. I quit cold turkey.

Today, I am about 20 pounds lighter than I was when I stopped running so I decided to give it a try yesterday (Saturday) to see if I would be able to accomplish a run and how I would feel afterwards. It was not complete running, I chose to walk 5 minutes/run 5 minutes to see if that made any difference. This morning I felt fine after yesterdays run so I decided to run for a little longer.

The first picture is Saturday's run, note the calories between treadmill and HRM. The second is of today's run, also not the calories between treadmill and HRM.

I had some NSV's besides being able to run on the treadmill and not have my knee hurting. 

1. Walking at a 4.2 pace. Nov. 3.6 pace
2. Running at a 4.8 pace. Nov. 3.8 pace
3. 1 mile- 13:41 minutes
4. 2 miles- 26:59 minutes
5. 5K- 41:33 minutes

Overall today in my 50 minute run, I ran 3.75 miles. I am totally stoked with this number. I plan on running only on the weekends to give my knee a break, especially since I do Zumba during the weekdays. 

So, while the scale might not be very nice to me these past few days, I will certainly take some NSV's to remind myself it is all worth it!!

☺Ashley☺