Weight & Workouts

Struggling with my weight over the past few years, I have been trying a lot of different types of workouts that may help both tone me up and slim me down. While I am not one of those moms who heads to the gym on a daily basis, looking sexy in that cute tank top and slim fitting yoga pants, I do try to incorporate a work out routine in the comfort of my own home.

Over the past year, I have been working with an endocrinologist to figure out why it is that I simply can not lose weight. The current theory is that I am glucose intolerant. In laymen's terms, this means that, while normal peoples bodies break down carbs and use it for energy, my body does not recognize the glucose (broken down carbs) and it stays in the body, creating fat. I'm now on a special diet that vastly reduces carb intake. While I miss eating bread whenever, or cookies, or cake, I've grown used to it. I also got myself back on ADHD medication for myself, which helps reduce hunger.

With that on the table, even with my meds, a special diet, and working out, I am still not losing weight. But I am also not GAINING, which is an improvement. Still, it royally sucks to know that with everything combined, if I were a normal person, I'd have that hot little ass, tight abs, and thighs that could crunch a soda can with ease.


So J and I decided to switch things up a bit in the workout routine. He found a set that interested him called the Spartacus workout. Supposedly this is what actors use for six weeks before they appear on screen buff. It is a crazy little weight lifting routine that anyone can do in their home with ease. When I say with ease, I mean that it's easy to get what you need to do it. Ease in actually doing it is another story. I'm pretty tough and active, and this kicked my ass!

However, I will say that after three weeks of crying through it, both of us have noticed drastic changes in our bodies. I still have not lost weight, but I'm firming up. I even have indents where my calf muscles are!!!! If you want to check it out you can find the work out here. We do this work out three times a week on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday.

The other work out we started up was Yoga. When we first moved here, I tried out a Yoga class and loved it. However, it was a pain in the ass to get to a class when you had kids in tow. So I stopped. I've always thought about asking J to try it with me but with his lack of balance I always assumed it would be the one type of workout that he would not take to. However, since I joined him in Spartacus, he was kind enough to try out Yoga with me.

I hate doing the same thing every time, so we went through youtube to find some beginners videos. I also purchased an app that had whole sessions on it. After one practice, I was hooked! Two days after we started, I found myself popping on a twenty minute video here and there, not realizing that at the end of the day I had done over two hours of Yoga. The after effects hit me the following morning where it took me a long time to get the hell out of bed, moving stiffly as though I were made of wood. Of course, a little bit of Yoga helped stretch me out!

So now we have something to do every day, and we're really enjoying working out together instead of finding ourselves doing our own thing. In three weeks I have lost a couple pounds, but more importantly, a few inches here and there throughout my body, and my muscles are really beginning to define. I was so excited I even went out and bought myself a yoga mat and gloves. With a phone app I can toss on the morning for a five minute sun salutation, and either the Spartacus work out or Yoga in the evening, I'm feeling better about myself despite the frustration of my obstinate physical body.


Maybe one of these years I can actually try a bikini for the first time...

I'm Not Dead Yet....

I might have given myself a concussion today. Not sure yet, but if I start hurling, J is on notice to rush me to Urgent Care. And the day started off so well...

With the boys vacationing at the G-rents, I slept in this morning until 10. It was so wonderful to wake up naturally! I had a few errands I needed to run, so I popped in the car to get them over and done with, in order to come home before lunch and spend the rest of the afternoon lounging on the couch reading my latest book.

I stopped at the boys school to pick up Ashe's inhaler. While I was there, the school secretary mentioned she loved my ring back tone (Pirates of the Caribbean) so I taught her how to make her own. She had just bought her very first smart phone and was so excited to try out all of the new things her old cell phone couldn't do. We talked about multiple ring tones, ring tone editors, and how she could have a ring back tone for every day of the week if she wanted to. I left her giddy with excitement.

Next on my list was the kids doctors office. I needed to pick up Xavier's medication prescriptions. I figured I'd hit Ulta after that, drop of the meds, then head home.

Instead, after laughing with the doctors secretary over Xavier's recent sex ed debacle, when I went to open the van door, my spatial understanding seemed to have misfired and the van door smacked me upside the head like a bitch in a black market wrestling match. I went down.

Although I saw stars and planets, and maybe a comet or three, it didn't hurt at first. I glanced in the window and noticed that the side of my temple was literally indented. That's when I started to get woozy. I hung on to the car for a few minutes, trying to figure out if I was woozy from seeing my head  pushed in like soft clay, or if it was the injury itself.

After those few minutes passed I decided the best course of action was to not be an idiot and drive just yet. I walked back to the pediatricians office and ever so sweetly asked if they had an ice pack I could borrow. Ann, the awesome front desk manager, rushed over to take a look. I know she's seen some scary stuff so when her jaw dropped upon looking at me and my new mark of idiocy, I knew I was in deep shit.

She hustled me over to a quiet dark room, grabbed the nurse and an ice pack, then hustled back tsk-tsking. The RN, a new nurse to the practice,  asked if I was dizzy. I wasn't but I was seeing spots in my vision once in awhile. She asked if I had had breakfast yet (nope) and handed me two lollipops. It was then that I realized that if I was going to smack myself upside the head, I had done it in the right place. Sucking on a cream soda dum dum, I lay down with the icepack and waited to see if I was going to pass out.

The kids doctor sauntered into the room ten minutes later and she and I both laughed when she saw who was the mom who hit her head. I love the boys doctor. She has such a great sense of humor. She checked me out and said it was a shame I hit the side of my head.
"Why" I asked?
"Because if you hit the middle of your head, you would have looked like the perfect Klingon." We both gave the Vulcan hand sign and snickered.

She asked the normal questions one asks a person with head trauma: how many fingers am I holding up? What day of the week is it? What month is it? I got the first one right no problem. The other two I whined to her that it was not fair she ask me those questions! It's summer vacation and all days look the same. She laughed and asked me to try. Fortunately I knew today was Thursday (it is Thursday, right?) because tomorrow is Friday and we're headed to the symphony tomorrow. I also know it's June because the kids are out of school. So nyah.

After a lot of back and forth between the doctor, nurse, and Ann, it was decided that I would live. I was given another lollipop, gifted the ice pack, and told to head straight to Urgent Care if I pass out or vomit twice. I thanked them for their help, and now I am determined to send them a case of wine for the holidays. I also lament that I can not have them as my own doctors, as my PCP sucks donkey balls.

So here I am at home, alive but now in pain, sitting still and wondering if I am going to rush to the bathroom. I feel woozy once in awhile (not good) but that's the worst of it. Well that and the fact that my forehead is showing off a pretty little goose egg.


J just shook his head and muttered under his breath (although loud enough so that I could hear him) that it's my genes that cause Ashe to have so many Ashe-idents. I'd debate him on that, but I just want to lie down now and whimper.

Ugh

Diet Diary: Week One

 

Like the multitude of ants I kill trying to infiltrate my house for sustenance, I find myself constantly trying to find a solution to my weight. Now knowing that I have hypothyroidism, I at least have a sense of peace as to why I gained so much weight so quickly. That does not mean I have to lie down and accept that my pant size has grown by three sizes. Oh hell no, I refuse to go down ( or up ) without a fight.

I've tried cutting calories. No go. I've tried a liquid diet. Nothing. I've tried intense workouts five times a week. While my stamina is much better and I can Zumba anyones pants off, my scale still laughs at me. Bastard. I've tried a bunch of things that haven't worked, even with my new thyroid medicine ( granted its still new and I'm sure will need adjusting at some level, but I'm an impatient bitch).

But recently I found something new that actually seems medically logical to work. I'm not here to advertise it, so if you want more info, you can email me. But the logic behind this plan seems, well, logical. It's a plan that combines a lot of things both J and I have heard over the years to help with healthy weight loss and a healthy lifestyle all wrapped into one.

Essentially, it states that most of the food we eat nowadays is filled with high fructose corn syrup, and other fatty things, that are hard for your liver and colon to digest. Because of this, over time, your body stores a lot of fat that it can't deal with, because the liver and colon start to get clogged and can't keep up. Or something like that. Bear with me, I'm working on the barest of caffeine here.

So in order to effectively lose weight and get healthy, you have to clean out your liver and colon first.  Once that is done, you then work on eating organic foods, or foods without the additives, with cheat days built in so you can still eat yummy, fat inducing foods once in awhile.

There are three phases: raw diet, cleanse, and undiet. Phase one takes two weeks. Phase two will take three days, and phase three is for six months, or however longer you wish to continue.


This is a seriously hardcore, life changing thing to try, so J was kind enough to do it with me. Without him, I probably would have fallen off the bandwagon after day one. It involves multiple trips to the health food stores, trying new things, and being mentally strong enough to not nibble at the boys hamburgers while we sit there and crunch on radishes.

I waited to blog about this until we had gotten halfway through Phase One to see if it was something we could stick with, and if it was even worth blogging about. We hit our halfway mark this morning with decent results ( and no cheating!!!) so here is what we've been doing.

Phase One is a vegan raw diet, only we can not have grains of any kind. All we are allowed to eat for two weeks are organic veggies, fruits, nuts, and cooked beans from scratch. No dairy, no grains, nothing cooked ( except our beans ). No coffee, no alcohol, no salad dressing, unless we concoct our own using the only two oils allowed, extra virgin olive, and coconut oil.

We can eat as much as we want of these things, while drinking water and herbal tea. It sounds simple.  It is simple. But after the excitement of trying something new wears off, roughly five hours and your stomach is yelling at you, it gets boring. REALLY boring. Despite the plethora of fruits and veggies out there, there is only so much you can do with them without using your stove. I love love love asparagus on a regular day, but I refuse to eat them raw. And broccoli without dressing dip? Thanks, but I'm all set. For the last few days I've been living off clementines, walnuts, spinach leaves, and beans. Breakfast? Usually a cup of beans with a touch of garlic powder and pepper, a water bottle of filtered water, nuts, and a teeny tiny clementine. You know, the ones you feed to dolls when you play house.  Lunch is a salad with homemade dressing. Dinner is a handful of apricots, maybe some beans thrown in if I'm starving.


It's not pretty folks.

It's a war tactic to force your body into shock, while at the same time trying to rewire your brain into the belief that 14 bean soup is as yummy as your chocolate stash when you have Aunt Flo coming to visit in the next day or two. Waterboarding has nothing on this diet in regards to torture.


The first four days were excruciating. All I fantasized about was fried chicken, and I dreamt of cheeseburgers floating into my mouth, while fries danced on the sidelines, whipping their starched hair in fountains of soda. The headaches from lack of caffeine were killer, as was my mood. I had zero tolerance for rough housing mornings without my cup of coffee. But the worst was when we went to a Trunk or Treat and our favorite, mouth watering butcher shop was there, offering freebies of the steak tips my whole family would kill over. Right off the fucking grill. It was devastating to watch the boys down their juicy tender hunks of perfectly grilled meat and we couldn't even have a nibble. It took all the will power we parental units had to not cheat and quietly scarf that last piece of perfect beef that Soren decided he didn't want to finish.

However, I knew I hit a mental mile mark the other day, as I was cooking up Hamburger Helper for the boys. As I started browning the meat, I noticed my nose wrinkling at the smell wafting towards me. By the time I was stirring the faux cheese and milk into noodles and burger, I was quite nauseous. I came to the conclusion, as I stood there, arms out as far as I could go and still stir the concoction, that I would probably never view Hamburger Helper the same way again, let alone eat it. The situation reminded me of when I was pregnant and couldn't deal with certain odors.

And the other bonus was that I got to measure myself last night, after a week of food hell, and lost both an inch in my waist and chest, but also five pounds. Not too shabby for only a week. It was at least enough incentive for me to continue on this journey.

I'll keep an update going on my progress. I've got one more week on this raw diet before I do the next phase: The Cleanse.


 Ooof.

Weighty Validation

After a year of painful frustration dealing with rapid weight gain for no reason, today I finally received validation.

If you remember, I blogged awhile ago on how very quickly, with no change in diet or exercise, I gained 30 pounds in three months. I blogged on how I went to the doctor in a panic, and after a few blood tests he determined that I just had a "fat gene" and there was nothing I could do. I tried his weight loss pills to no effect. I started working out like crazy to no effect. I cut my calories and carbs down like crazy. To no effect. I even tried a pure liquid diet which worked for two weeks. Then I stopped losing weight. I tried thermogenics pills, best on the market, to no effect. I drank shit tons of water every day, staying close to bathrooms due to my new superpower ability to pee at a  moments notice. To no effect.

Finally, after trying everything under the sun, I returned to my doctor and demanded that he send me to an endocrinologist now. One week later I was having 15 vials of blood drawn while doing a glucose test. Today I got the results.


I don't have a fat gene. No, I have hypothyroidism and I'm pre diabetic. And I only found out because I refused to stop fighting for an answer. I knew I wasn't lazy. I have three kids to raise, plus I work out five times a week. I knew I wasn't stuffing my face, because I've kept my calorie intake very low. I knew something was wrong and a year later I got my answer. Not only do I have a answer but I understand what is going on with my body too.

My thyroid numbers came back on the "normal" side, but just barely. I also had every other symptom that pointed to hypothyroidism; rapid weight gain, exhaustion, dry skin, brittle nails, history of anemia, etc. On top of that, it was discovered that my body simply cannot break down glucose. In trying to combat this issue, my body produces ten times more insulin than the normal body, trying to break it down, with no success. My doctor explained this is why no matter what I do, I can't lose weight. It's not my fault. Its something I can't help on my own.

Starting tomorrow I am taking a low dosage of medication for hypothyroidism. My doctor says I should start to see the weight come off. I go back in three months, where we will determine if I get a higher dosage or add more medication on. I finally have a plan, a way forward, and medical help I have been crying for for a year.




So, douchebag doctor who said I had a fat gene, how bout them apples? Effective immediately, you're fired.

Diet Update: Week One Complete

I promised last week that I would update on how my hardcore diet went, if I was good, if I cheated, and if it worked. So here I am, ready to spill it.

Let me preface by saying that I don't eat much in general. However, I learned this week that not eating at all, and only drinking shakes is very different. By day 2, when J heated up shrimp scampi, something I normally gag on when I smell it, I started drooling and dreaming of creamy shrimp. By day 6, as I boiled eggs for Easter egg coloring, I fantasized about eating them right out of the pot. Again, I normally don't like hard boiled eggs.

However, I did it. I stayed true to my diet of 1000 calories a day, mainly on shakes. Once in awhile if I found myself standing in front of the fridge, door open and gazing longingly at real food, I'd trade a shake in for something solid so long as it stayed within my limit and was healthy. This was to ensure I didn't break my diet and go crazy later. And it was smart, because I stayed true.

And on Sunday morning I weighed myself and lost over five pounds. It's a good start, and I'm happy with the progress. I realize most is probably water weight, and I can't expect such good results each week. But it's a beginning I can get behind.

The other positive change I noticed on Sunday was my appetite. I allowed myself to forgo shakes yesterday and ate when I was hungry. I celebrated with a chinese food dinner that evening and that's where I realized the most significant change: my stomach is shrinking. where before I could go for second helpings and have another plate later on at night, I found myself stuffed to the gills on a small plate, and stayed completely full until morning. Even when J heated up a plate of my favorite lo mein at 10pm, I had no cravings for more.

The last positive thing about this diet so far is that I have zero desire for chocolate. If anything, I feel chocolated out with all the shakes, something I never thought possible. While the boys feasted on three tons of chocolaty goodness yesterday, I only ate one tiny mini hershey's that was forced on me by Xavier, wanting to share his bounty. And I could barely swallow it. I only did so out of politeness.

Back to the week, I am going to try and continue this diet. I may add more actual meals in during lunch, courtesy of Lean cuisine, but still sick to my 1000 calories a day. I want to retrain my stomach to eat less in general, and keep my hunger for the day and not night time. I'll update next week!