Run like the wind...or, like the chubby girl.

One of my new friends here up in Happy Land is a marathon runner. She gets up before everyone else in her family, almost every day of the week, collects her neighbors big dog for company and takes off through the mountain where the only other creatures stirring at that hour are the mountain lions. Yeah, that's what I said.

I used to love running. I was never really good at it. And I've yet to be able to run a solid mile without stopping to walk some of it. But the challenge of running a little more this time than I did the last time, 3-4 times a week, was such a great motivation for me. And running was one of the only ways I was able to take weight off and keep it off.

Sooooo, fine. Tomorrow I'm going to march my ass down to the 24 Hour Fitness a few blocks from my house and sign my life over to them. If my friend K can run marathons and brave mountain lions (well, apparently her running companion dog is pretty big and scary), I can drag my sorry butt to the gym 3-4 times a week and wheeze on a treadmill.

Full-on FAIL

Note to self: if you don't eat breakfast and you wait until after 1pm to have lunch, you will spend from 1pm until dinner time with food in your mouth. And then you won't want dinner until 9:30pm and by then you'll just want a bowl of cereal.

And if you're GOING to do that, please just do yourself a favor, pull out the baby carrots and padlock the rest of the refrigerator shut. Then just eat baby carrots until you turn a weird shade of orange.

I need an ass whooping....

I haven't written down a WW point all week. I've not been eating entirely crappily, but I'm not keeping track.

The #1 proven way to motivate yourself to lose weight is to write down what you eat. I know that. I've done that. I know I can do it. So why don't I?

Someone kick my butt. Right here. Through the internet.

Thank you.

Water, Water, Everywhere...

Okay, so drinking enough water is such a down fall of mine. Unless it is super icy cold, I am just not interested. And I know that's a problem for me and my weight loss. I know that drinking lots of water is healthy for me and will fill up my belly so I'm not stuffing it with tasty treats like muffins and chips, etc (mmmmm, muffins).

When I was pregnant and on bedrest the nurses gave me a giant plastic mug with a cover, a handle and a straw and I was expected to drink the equivalent of six of them a day. The peeing was insane--I know part of it was the baby using my bladder as a trampoline, but the sheer volume of water I had racing through my body was impressive. And my skin? Never better. I can't really speak to any weight loss since I was gestating and watching my mass increase seemingly daily, but perhaps it slowed the weight gain and kept me at a, ha ha, reasonable 40lb surplus instead of 50-60+lbs (I do love chocolate, after all).

I have tried in the past to up my water intake by using those flavored powders and I will definitely drink more if I can just grab a plastic bottle and go. But the flavored powders whisper, "I'm gonna give you cancerrrrrrrrr" and the plastic bottles whisper, "forever in a landfilllllll...oh, and I'm gonna give you cancerrrrrrrr," so I have a tough time keeping up with either of those practices. And regular old water in a glass or even a stainless steel bottle just doesn't appeal to me. I'm weird, I know.

But weird or not, I have to start drinking more water. I already eschew sodas, both diet and not; I rarely drink coffee or juice. I can go almost entire days sometimes without drinking anything except the water I wash my Zoloft down with in the morning. Not good.

So my challenge to myself this week is to drink up. Lots of water every single day. In a glass, with lots of ice. No plastic bottles (shhhh, don't tell the bottle of Ethos water next to me right now), no flavored powders. Just water. And I'm betting in a week my body will feel better, my skin will look better and I'll have cultivated a new habit that actually promotes my overall health. Imagine that.

Weigh-In Tuesday

Okay, so I lost .8lb over the past two weeks.

Meh. It's okay. It's not bad. Given the fact that I've been digging into Ethan's Halloween candy with alarming frequency (until the dawn of yesterday's tooth ache--I mean, I'm a glutton, but not for punishment) and that Husband brought me a mini chocolate lava cake for my birthday, I'm amazed that I didn't GAIN 2-3 lbs.

I am however, ticked off at the scale at the RE's office. Last week her scale had me at a full 9lbs over what I weighed today and what I weigh on my scale at home. I hate doctor office scales. Hate them.

Other scales, though, I'm starting to like a little bit.

A New Development in My Weight Loss Strategy

The tooth ache I woke up with this morning. The one at the very top, in the very back of my mouth, on the right side, where I apparently chew everything (which is weird since I'm a lefty). The one that feels like every pain receptor in my brain has a direct link to that tooth. Super.

I am not what you'd call a fan of the dentist (fine, you got me. No one is). When I was a child, I went every six months like a good little kid whose responsible mother made all her healthcare decisions and appointments. Once I flew off into the world post-college, making my own money and healthcare and appointments, I sort of lost track of time. For a few years. Um. Ooops.

That being said, the only cavities that are filled in my mouth date back to the early 80's; two on the bottom right (apparently I've ALWAYS chewed most on that side). After a few years hiatus, the last time I went to the dentist, I expected to be told that I'd require daily visits and a mouthful of fillings in order to get back on track. Surprisingly, I heard neither. So either I do a good job with the brushing and flossing on my own, or that dentist was a quack.

Getting busy with parenting has in many ways, given me indirect permission to stop taking care of myself. Hence the whole fatty fatfat thing I've got going on now (although I have to be fair and say that it's more chubby chubchub at this point, but it still feels fat). But the self-neglect also extends itself to my healthcare. And right now my tooth is telling me that it's no longer okay to neglect myself unless I want to end up smacking my toothless gums together sometime way sooner than would be remotely socially acceptable.

So today I think will be a day of few and soft food choices. Not the ideal way to lose weight, but hopefully shaving a bit off of the scale before tomorrow's weigh in will be a silver lining in this throbbing pain taking over my head.

Now I'm off to locate a dentist who will take pity on me and hop me up on nitrice-oxide and make the pain go away.

The Bermuda Triangle of Weightloss

1.) I've been sick--sick Sarah neeeeeeeeeds carbs

2.) It was my birthday--birthday Sarah neeeeeeeeeeds cake

3.) It was Halloween, people!!---Halloween Sarah neeeeeeeeds candy

So, yeah. In the face of the above Trifecta, the weight loss has pretty much stalled in the past week or so. I skipped last week's WW meeting solely on the basis of the fact that it was the day after my birthday and turning 38 was tough enough without hearing "Did you eat an entire cake yesterday? Because you gained 350 lbs!" at weigh-in.

But I'm feeling better (sort of; there's still a lot of coughing going on). And I've gotten the birthday cake thing out of my system. And I'm sending Husband to work tomorrow with ALL the remaining Halloween candy. And there's fish, fish, fish on our menu for this week.

Tuesday I go back to my WW meeting. I don't expect to see a loss, honestly. I hope I don't have to change the ticker above to show a gain. Tomorrow will probably be a water and orange slices kind of day, know what I mean? Sigh.

My hope is that extending my NaBloPoMo challenge to this blog will motivate me to stick more clearly to my goals and encourage me to actually lose some significant weight now and going into the future.

And if anyone wants to give me your best tips for getting through the holiday season WITHOUT gaining 50lbs, I will gladly take them and incorporate them into my "don't get fatter between now and Christmas" plan. Thanks!