HELL YEAH, BITCHES!

Ok, so I took a little detour in July. That detour had me parking my ass at Glutton City and eating everything that wasn't bolted down. But it ain't no thang, baby! I'm back on track and rejoined Weight Watchers after being away for about a month or so.

Tonight was my first weigh-in and I'm down -6.6 lbs. Woot! I had a great week: was really focused, ate well, and did a lot of dancing. Rinse and repeat this week, kids.

I'm not sure yet if the Alli pills are making a difference or not. I'm not really doing that program at all, except for the low fat content. I keep my fat grams around 19 a day and keep within my points. Anytime I have a meal with fat in it, I take a pill. I'm not sure if it's making a difference or not yet...but we'll see in the longrun!

Taunia & Alli

Well kids, the weight-loss hasn't been going so well. I haven't gained anything, but I haven't lost anything either. I think I'm burnt out on Weight Watchers, although I know it's the way of life/eating I have to adhere to for the rest of my life. So I've decided to kick-start the weight loss a bit with this new product: ALLI.

It's the first FDA approved, over-the-counter weight loss pill. It's apparently supposed to have amazing results. They've been working on it for 22 years and it was finally approved and put on shelves about a week ago. Unlike other diet pills, alli doesn't affect your brain, your heart, or your blood. From my understanding, you take it with a low-at meal and it breaks down the fat and removes it from your system. This obviously means dramatically fewer calories are soaked up into the ol' intestines and you lose weight. The pills are supposed to help you lose 50% more weight than you normally would without it.

I've done some reading and research on the site and message boards and so far, it seems like a great product. There are a very few people who get some nasty side-effects, but if that happens, you just stop taking the pill. The program forces you to eat lower fat (my big problem) and a healthier diet, and also recommends exercize to help speed the process. The cost is slightly high: a 20 day supply is about $50.00.

I'm willing to give it a shot. I'm going to combine it with my Weight Watchers plan (one of the only plans they endorse combining it with) to help kick-start my weight again. That, coupled with the start of my Couch to 5K program will help move things along (hopefully).

My plan is to be down at least 25 lbs by the end of the summer. That would be kind of sweet!

I'll keep you posted of the effects and progress! I start this on Friday. :)

I'M STILL HERE - PROMISE!

I have NOT fallen off the wagon - honest! Ok, well, maybe a little. :)

Although my excuse is lame, I had to move. I pretty much decided it was pointless to go food shopping right before I moved, but I had no food, so I ended up eating out a lot. I figured even crappy food combined with all the bending and lifting would even out. Not so much.

So last week, I went to WW and did not weigh in. I went to the meeting and participated and got back on track. This week, I've been doing quite well, and I even decided to start the couch to 5K program - finally. I also had my mac-daddy grill delivered and I have only cooked on that grill for the past week - so everything's been pretty healthy. I LOVE grilling.

I'm not sure how weigh-in will go this week, but I'm definitely weighing in. At least I'm all moved in and back on track! :)

WEEK 4 & 5 RESULTS - BUH-BYE CAMERA!

Sorry about the car alarm in the background!

WEEK 3 - NONRESULTS!

Ok, so PMS hit me like a ton of bricks this week. I overate a bit - but nothing really dramatic. I didn't write anything down and had water weight gain beyond my control. Needless to say, I did not weigh-in.

HOWEVER...

As much as I wanted to just sit home and wallow in my self-pity pms, I went to the meeting. I knew skipping it would mean that I'd slowly fall back into my pattern of getting off-track again, so I forced myself to go. Actually, Cynthia's encouragement really helped too - so thanks, Cyn!

The thing is, I have a love-hate relationship with the meetings. They always feel just *slightly* condescending to me, but I ALWAYS leave motivated to do better and work hard. In fact, I'm still dealing with monster cravings and have only been able to make better choices because I was in the right mindset.

So hopefully next week's weigh-in will at least have me back to where I was prior to the PMS meltdown. See you next week with the results!

WEEK 2 RESULTS : THE FLU WAS HERE

VIDEO FRIDAY - STAY TUNED

No video today because I just don't have time....but wanted to tell you to stayed tuned tomorrow! I had
a VERY good weight loss this week. Results tomorrow!

I'M BACK, VIDEO-STYLE!

So, after a very long hiatus, I decided to restart WW. I'll be updating weekly with a video post, so I hope you'll stick around and subscribe on YouTube to my channel. Thanks!

LET'S RECAP, SHALL WE?

November has not been a stellar month for me. I'm not sure what happened, but I definitely got off-track. At the end of October, I was down 11.8 lbs. Then all this bullshit happened:

11/8: +3.2
11/15: +0.2
11/22: would have been a loss, but I never got to weigh-in
11/29: +4.0 (damn you, Mr. Turkey!)

So, in the span of a month, I gained 7.4 lbs back. WHAT THE HELL? I have no idea what happened to me, but I was hella mad last week and decided to kick my own ass.

This week, I ate really well. There's an organic/health-food place right outside my building, and I started getting their 100% veggie soups for lunch - and they were delicious. I also had Poland Spring start home delivery so that I would ALWAYS have water - no excuses, and no more diet soda in the house. Then, I did what I needed to do: I added in a lot more exercize and got my ass MOVING.

It didn't even take very much. I did the following program:

*4 walks per day with Julip (my dog)= 2 miles
*20 mins on the treadmill every morning
*5-7 mins of ab crunches immediately following the treadmill
*5-7 mins of weight training for arms

In total, I probably did about 60 mins of exercize each day, but it was broken up into smaller/more bearable increments. I walk Julip 3-4 times a day anyhow, so that wasn't a huge change in the schedule. The other 40 minutes I did at about 10:00 every morning after I had my coffee and breakfast.

And I didn't die from it. In fact, I kind of look forward to it now. I set my laptop up on the bookrack of the treadmill, take out my Netflix movie, and watch a movie for 20 minutes while I walk. It couldn't be easier. And each week, I'm going to try and add a few more minutes.

And it paid off: I lost 3.6 lbs this week. Now I'm back down a total of 8 lbs. 3.8 lbs to get back to where I was and moving forward again. Probably two more weeks for me to do that.

I'll be going into 2007 proud that I'm a loser, not a gainer!

IT WAS UGLY

Ok, I had it coming. Eating, drinking, and making merry for four days in a row does not make you lose weight. I just didn't realize how much I could gain. I'm sure most of that is bloat from the alcohol and also from my current PMS state, but still yo. I sucked ass this week. Fo' shizzle.

The one thing I did do different this time is not give in and be defeated. My normal pattern is to say, "fuck it" and blow off my meeting and weigh in and then spiral out of control until I eventually quit. This time I didn't. I forced myself to both weigh in and stay for the meeting because I knew seeing the numbers and being at the meeting would motivate me to do better. And I was right.

C and I have started this new "competition" where we see who can get the most activity points during the week. The lowest score puts $5 into our "fatty fund" and we let it accumulate until we decide it's time to spend it. At that point, we'll split the dough and get something nice for each of us. That hopefully won't involve food. Maybe a haircut or manicure or something like that.

In any case, it's motivational for us to get up and get moving and it's positive competition because we both encourage each other to do our best. C is kicking ASS, though! She's been jogging and working her thang and she's looking great. She's so motivational to me right now and I'm so proud of her. But since the jar now has $10 of MY money, I'm going to beat you this week, C!

So, the weigh-in was ugly and embarassing (hence why I'm not posting it), but I feel good about getting back on track. Feel free to drop me an encouraging note in the comments section. I could use it this week. :)

NO, I HAVEN'T QUIT.

I'll admit it, I've had a rough few weeks.

Two weeks ago after the 3.2 lb gain, I weighed in again to find that I gained .2 lbs. It was really a blow to my motivation and I was pissed, so I didn't post.

Last week, I was actually excited to weigh in because I had done well and had tons of activity points. Because of the holiday, I decided to go to an earlier meeting at a different location, so I drove the 20 mins to the meeting only to find the doors locked. I went home, checked the schedule online, and realized I was looking at the wrong day. DOH. And because I had a friend in town and a hella busy schedule, I never got to weigh in last week. Which is too bad because it would have been good, unlike this week.

I started eating on Thanksgiving day and don't think I stopped until yesterday. Not only that, but I rarely drink and I had wine and mixed drinks every day as well. Not good. I was away in NYC for a gig over the weekend and we just ate out and ate crappy food every day. GAH. Stupid. I got home and everythign felt tighter and I was crazy bloated.

I got it back together yesterday and today and I'm back on track and focused, but I am SO not looking forward to tomorrow's weigh-in. I'm nervous I may have gained everything back. Yes, that bad.

Fingers crossed.

AWESOME PIZZA FIND - GO GET YOURS!

LEAN CUISINE BBQ CHICKEN PIZZA - 7 POINTS

Oh good lord, I think I may have died and gone to heaven! This pizza ROCKS.
It's brick-oven style and has big, chunky pieces of chicken on it. The bbq
is good and there's also yummy red onions on it.

For a girl like me who loves a good BBQ Chicken Pizza, this totally rocks my world.
7 points is a little higher than I like for a frozen thing, but points well spent.

PMS, 1. DIVA, +3.2

PMS wins again.

I knew it wasn't going to be pretty, but to be honest, I expected only 1-2 lbs. 3.2 blows. I know I'll lose it this week, but it still sucks to know that every month I'll have one week of a gain and a week after where I practically starve myself to take that off and catch back up. But such is the life of a recovering fat girl.

Tonight at the meeting, our leader Jean (who's AWESOME) was asking us what was different about this time and why we were succeeding. I realized that what's different for me (as corny as it sounds) is that this time I forgive myself for gains like this. In the past, a gain like this would make me say "screw this" and be impetus for me to jam more food down my throat. Instead, I just feel motivated. I know that PMS is a force that I just cannot control and that I will just have to forgive, forget, and move on. I WILL lose it this week. I just feel motivated to continue on. It's slow, but it will happen. I just know it this time.

So just stay tuned for next week, where I will kick ass with a nice big weight loss!

I'M RAVENOUS

All I want to do is eat right now. And not good stuff. PMS is kicking my ass.

I finally got my appetite back after being sick for a few days and I CANNOT STOP EATING. JUNK. For the past two days, I had chinese food. What the HELL am I thinking?? I haven't eaten a vegetable for a week now. I am so off-track and I need to do something about this ASAP.

First in order: find some kind of over-the-counter and/or alternative medication to help with PMS symptoms. It's really out of control. I've been severely depressed for a week now. I have absolutely nothing to be depresessed ABOUT, as my life is really good...I just AM and I can't control it because my hormones are out of whack. Add to that being sick, and then being hungry and eating uncontrollably - it's not pretty.

So today, I told PMS to fuck off. I went to the kitchen to find something disgusting to eat and I just stopped myself and talked myself through it. Then I grabbed a video tape, threw it in, and starting exercizing. And now, I feel AMAZING.

It's no lie. Endorphines rule. And I'm going to be self-medicating myself through PMS with exercize from now on. Fuck PMS. I'm going to win this battle if it kills me!

NO WEIGH-IN TONIGHT :(

So, I'm home sick today with a stomach thing. FABULOUS. Gah. It's not even at the full-blown stage yet, but I'm really weak and tired and I can't even muster the strength to take a shower.

Normally, this would probably result in a big loss next week since I'm not eating and my body is purging just about everything, but next week is week 4 and you know what that means:

PMS, BITCH.

Bleck.

WEIGH IN # 6 - HUH?!?

Ok, somewhere along the lines, I forgot how to count past 3. I screwed up my weigh in weeks. But tonight was my 6th weigh-in, and it kicked ass!

All week, I've been shooting for the .8 lb loss so I could get that stupid bookmark. Well, turns out you get the bookmark at FIVE lbs, and don't get anything for 10. GAH. No matter, because my weigh-in was reward enough:

I LOST -2.6 LBS!

That brings me to a total of -11.8 lbs, which averages out to just under 2 lbs a week. A nice, healthy and safe way to lose and MAINTAIN my weight. I'm really doing this. Hells yeah.

Also, I realized tonight when I was getting changed into my jammies that I can pull my jeans right off. No unzipping or unbuttoning. They slide right off. Granted I have no ass, but still. Yay!

THE RED SHIRT

A lot of you know that about 4 years ago, I did WW and lost 50 lbs. It was a HUGE accomplishment for me since I had never been able to lose weight before. I was at my heaviest then - a number that I'm too embarassed to even type out. Unfortunately, I quit the program and gained back about 39 lbs of it. That was also embarassing AND frustrating.

So when I started this time, I was down approx 11 lbs from my original weigh in. So naturally, I keep two tallies in my head:

-TOTAL WEIGHT LOSS *NOW*
-TOTAL WEIGHT LOSS FROM MY ORIGINAL HIGH POINT WEIGHT

Right now, I'm down a total of 9.2 lbs. In the grand scheme of things, it doesn't seem like much, but this weekend I was reminded of the real way it's affecting me:

I was out to dinner over the weekend with my friend Kendra. We had some time to kill before we were seated, and I had a coupon to Lane Bryant, so I decided to poke around. I always do well with pants there, but because I'm so busty with a long torso and big belly, the tops are either too small or unflattering.

I found this top in red and brown - both on clearance for $9.99, so I figured I'd just give it a shot and try them on. They fit, but I've been wearing big, loose tops for so long now, I immediately thought it was too tight and form-fitting. Kendra made me show her, and when I came out of the dressing room, she gasped and told me how great the top looked on and that I HAD to buy them.

Once she said that, I took another look in the mirror and realized that this top WAS loose and that it DID look good and fit perfectly. It was like staring at my self-esteem in the mirror. And I always have trouble with their sizes, so I was surprised that only a 9.2 loss would have this fitting so well. But then I remembered, I may be down 9.2 now, but I'm down EXACTLY 20 LBS from when I first started WW a few years ago. And twenty lbs DOES make a difference in how my clothes fit. And it felt DAMN GOOD to realize that my body IS changing and it's ok for me to not wear big, baggy clothes all the time.

So, I wore the brown top with pride to my weigh-in Wednesday. I love how it looks, but I love even more how proud I feel that I'm taking the weight off again and that I'm really making changes physically.

The red one is being saved for a special event - to be worn with a kick-ass skirt and the tall, black boots I just ordered. :)

PHEW. WEIGH IN # 4 !

Ok, I had a good week and a bad week:

BAD: My online account where I store all my point tracking and progress got completely screwed up and WW online was NO help. After sending 10 emails, I got NO RESPONSE. I used that as an excuse to be lazy about tracking my point.

GOOD: I still was VERY good about staying in my points - even though I was keeping track in my head. And looks like I may need to track my PMS week differently, because I lost this week:]

-2.6 lbs

Yay! It's really good that I lost. I feel motivated again and back on track. But I'm pooped, so that's all your getting for an entry tonight. :)

UNIMPRESSED. WITH MY BODY.

Shit.

I gained 1.8 lbs this week. And it was unexpected for the most part.

I ate well this week. I exercized a LOT: lots of walking, Tae-Bo, a dance video, arm free weights, crunches and ab work. I ate more veggies and an ENTIRE DINNER of vegetables. So I ask you: WHAT THE F!?!

I had one night of "cheating" when I had chinese food at poker because I was literally going to pass out from hunger. That's it.

My hope is that THIS WEEK was the PMS / water bloat week, and that will result in a giant weight loss next week. If so, I can deal with the gain. If not, it doesn't leave me a hell of a lot of motivation to eat well and exercize.

But you know, regardless of the gain, I am still motivated to make this work and make this stick. I'm glad that I have C (who lost 2.8 lbs this week - rock it, girl!) and the other gals in my group to hang with and vent to.

In other news, looks like I'll be sleeping in later:

ARTICLE

I LIKE TO MOVE IT, MOVE IT

Yesterday, I went to Target with my 8 year old neice and she kept singing that song: "I like to move it (x3)...I like to...MOVE IT!!" It was cracking me up. Who is that? Sean Paul? I have no idea. I'm getting so old. Anyhow, today I moved it, moved it. This is my new at-home program and I did this ALL today:

-Walked Julip for 2 miles
-Did free-weights for my arms (10 mins)
-Did the treadmill (10 mins)
-Did a 10 minute ab workout video
-Did a 10 minute cardio dance workout

So overall, I did about 1 hour and 10 mins of exercize today. HOLY CRAP.

But I feel good. I always feel like I'm getting stronger if I'm working out and using my body. I'll try to do at least a combination of 3 of these things every day - although walking with Julip happens EVERY day.

I can't wait until I lose enough weight that I'm not working against my own weight. I want my body to move because I command it too, not because it just DOES. lol

Anyhow, it was a good workout day and I'm curious to see how it affects my weight loss now!