FITNESS FRIDAY, the 22-lb Edition!

Yes that’s right folks, my hoped-for goal to lose 20 pounds by the end of the year HAS BEEN MET. AND EXCEEDED.

SUCK IT NONBELIEVERS! (and by that I mean the me of four months ago.)

There are two things I really would like to talk about regarding this whole thing:

1. Support Systems
2. How you have to do it.

1. Support Systems
To my surprise, my biggest support for all of this has come from my coworkers. I get encouragement and understanding from these people that I didn’t know they were capable of. There are a couple in particular, but in general basically everyone in the office that I’m friends with has noticed the results and has been very encouraging. It’s really been an added bonus and motivation to keep this up. I do spend most of my time with these people, so I’d just like to acknowledge how awesome they’ve been. It’s a little annoying in that my success has become encouragement to other people, which means that as an unexpected role model, I can’t slack off! Phooey! (LOL!)

It’s really nice that people have been noticing my hard work though! I like that.

2. The Process – How you have to do it
It’s pretty annoying to learn that in order for this to work, the old standby call of “diet and exercise!” is actually how it works, and how you will keep it off. And I don’t mean diet in terms of weird crash diet or extreme calorie deficits or cleanses or whatever. I mean it in its actual meaning:

di·et¹

noun

1. 1.

   the kinds of food that a person, animal, or community habitually eats.

   “a vegetarian diet”

Because for me, this is a very huge lifestyle change. I’ve gone from someone who would eat out a couple times a week for lunch and have a lot of convenience foods at home, to someone who brings lunch everyday and pretty much cooks from scratch every meal for the most part (though not spaghetti sauce!).

I have to admit that one of the harder things I’ve had to do is cut out a lot of the “fun” eating – meaning, I didn’t have that much crazy food at home or anything, but I definitely have had to cut out eating out A LOT, and I think that is a tough thing to have to decide to do, especially when so many relationships revolve around going out to eat, or meeting up for drinks, or whatever. I’ve even cut out most of my Starbucks consumption (which I had earlier anyway because $$$) and so I’m not even that fun to go grab coffee with anymore! I just have to make different choices and I choose not to eat out so much, and to not have white chocolate mochas. <insert SAD FACE>

I still drink a lot of coffee but I make it at home and add creamer. I like the Safeway/Lucerne brand Italian Sweet Cream and International Delight Salted Caramel Mocha (which is, sadly, limited edition for the holidays). Actually the Lucerne brand makes a lot of really tasty creamers; I also like the Cinnamon Vanilla one.

I measure out my portions and make sure everything is accurate, and more or less obsess about everything I put in my mouth. I have to decide if I really want something. And for the most part, I do really want things, and I don’t feel like I’ve had to give things up. For the nights out that I did go out, I tried to make sure that I had a pretty good idea of where I was going so I could decide in advance what to get. Like when we went for mojitos, I knew I wanted two mojitos and knowing the people I was out with, the revelry would probably devolve into shots, so I would most likely have one – and I was able to stick with it. Another time that was a challenge was the Brazilian steakhouse for my dad’s birthday and then the Italian place the office always goes to for a Christmas lunch. I had a pretty good idea of what I wanted to get and I was able to stick with my plan for the most part. I think it’s totally possible to go out and have fun and not blow 4,000 calories on your day out, but at the same time, I’ve had to distance myself from these kinds of things.

And I lost 5 pounds in December – despite Brazilian steakhouses, office parties, and Italian restaurants because of it. As of right now, I’m down 22 lbs since September 2.

I’m pretty proud of myself.

2014 GOALS

For the new year, nothing’s going to change. I’m going to keep tracking everything in MyFitnessPal, try to eat well, and try to finish Ripped in 30 (I got sick last week and haven’t had any energy to do the videos, though I’ve still been walking every day). I completed Week 3 and now have to start Week 4 (aka “The Mother of All Workouts”. I also have the Jillian Michael’s Six Week Six Pack, and for Christmas I got her Yoga Inferno AND the Body Revolution set! I’m excited about that – and considering how long these videos take me to do, I’m set on workouts for probably anywhere from 6-8 months. Then I’ll start over with the 30 Day Shred and see how far I’ve come! I bet it will be pretty easy so I’ll up my weights.

I also plan on trying out new recipes – I have two new Weight Watchers recipe books, the Chicken one and the 50th Anniversary one. My goal is to try at least one new recipe a month. I think that’s reasonable. Usually if I like something it gets added to my ongoing repertoire. This year I didn’t do too much from cookbooks but I did figure out some lighter recipes and I crockpot chicken once a week now, in addition to turkey burrito filling and I made applesauce, which was fun.

I’ve switched to whole grains for almost everything except tortillas (whole wheat/grain tortillas are disgusting, I don’t care what anybody says) (As a Mexican I’m offended by whole grain tortillas being disgusting) and I’ve even added ground flax to other stuff. I plan to expand my healthy grain horizons and figure out more ways to eat quinoa.

So that’s about what I expect from 2014 – more of the same and also just MORE. I just want to be more hardcore, and hopefully WAY LESS SICK next year – as I’m currently fighting off yet another cold, and for those counting, I’ve actually spent two full months sick in 2013, which has been unpleasant, to say the least. Here’s to not only fitness in 2014, but actual health! Where I’m not coughing! Ack!