Please don't squeeze the Charmin!

In preparation for the big doctor's appointment/checkup/weigh-in on Oct. 20th, I called to book my very first mammogram today. I told the nice Scottish lady who answered the phone what I was calling for and that there was nooooooo rush whatsoever, to which she replied, "How's Monday at 10:30 a.m.? No time like the present!". Unpleasant task avoidance: FAIL.
But really, it's a good thing...this way my doc might get the results back in time to discuss them when I go in to see her. I'm also going to have my annual bloodwork done, which I've been meaning to get around to since my physical...in March. On the ball with routine maintenance tasks: FAIL.
Not much has really been going on lately...the usual. I have been maintaining my workout schedule and ended up going 5 times the last couple of weeks and 4 times this week. However, despite KNOWING that getting up at 5:45 A.M. (!!!!!!) means that I NEED to go to bed earlier, my earliest bed time this week was after 11 p.m. So yeah, I'm dumb!  And this means that all my other household chore-type activities have suffered...by which I mean I have done exactly as much as I had to in order to keep functioning and not much more. Which is bad.  However, since I've been good about the working out thing (which is HUUUUUUUGE for me!), I'm filing the whole week under: WIN.
Also filed under the win column is the fact that I'll be spending the balance of Monday enjoying his day off with my love. Plus, we're booking dentist appointments for the 20th, which will check another thing off my "stuff I just haven't gotten around to in a while (3+ years!)" list, and then we'll get to spend the rest of that day hanging out too! Edit: After consulting my love's work schedule, it seems not only is he unavailable on the 20th, he is actually in the middle of a week and a half long out-of-town stint. Oh, how I HATE his job sometimes. Let's go right ahead and file that where it belongs: FAIL.
Anyway, back to the positive. I am finally starting to notice a bit of a difference from the exercise I've been doing.  I think maybe my clothes are fitting a little easier these days and I KNOW I'm feeling better. It's getting easier on the bike too, even though I've now bumped it up to interval level 3...level 4, here I come!  I'm not going to post my weight until the official word after the 20th, but I'm feeling good and that really is the most important thing.  I'm putting off buying a dress for my love's brother's wedding in November until after this too; hopefully, a positive outcome there will buoy my spirits enough to carry me through clothes shopping...bleah.  I'll also enlist my sister to make sure I actually buy something, one way or another, since showing up to this wedding naked would not go over too well, even with my totally new and improved bod!  ;o)

You know what's worse than sitting in traffic?

Getting up EARLY to sit in traffic!!!  Thurs.- Mon. I got up early, as usual (alright maybe not *quite* AS early as I have been but still!), and was on the road by 6:25 at the latest...only to sit in traffic for 50 minutes!  GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!!!  Anyway, I've rectified this and have been getting out the door a bit earlier so it's been better the past few days. 
And I've been working out!  Even when I've gotten to work late, I've been doing something, which I figure is better than nothing...even if it's only 10 minutes on the elliptical.  Which is HARD, by the way!  So, I decided to add it to my routine; this week, I've done that Mon. (10 min.) and Wed. (12 min.) and then I did the bike Tues. and today (30 minutes each). My plan is to up the elliptical to 15 minutes tomorrow with another 15 or 20 on the treadmill afterward to walk it off.  I'm taking it easy-ish because I'm out of shape and I really don't want 1) to hurt myself and get discouraged or 2) give myself a freakin' heart attack!  Slow and steady wins this particular race, I think.
On other fronts, I was VERY happy Monday to welcome my love back home from his stint away...and then we promptly had a disagreement yesterday and didn't talk the rest of the day. It's mostly my thing, I know, but I am having a really hard time figuring out how not to fall into the same patterns of reaction that I've always used.  I feel a certain way and I lash out, before I have time to think things through and apply some sort of logic to the situation.  I've suggested preemptive therapy to him and he seems receptive...I think it would be helpful now, early in the relationship, before we have all our bad communication habits set in stone.  We do pretty well in the area on our own but we both have some issues left over from previous relationships and I think having a professional guide us through some of the pitfalls would really be beneficial.  I think I'm going to put looking into therapists on my to-do list for very soon...what we have is pretty great and I've seen firsthand what breakdowns in communication can do to a marriage.
Now, I'm off to dinner with my love for his brother's birthday. And then we get a whole Saturday together!  With nothing necessarily planned!  AMAZING!  :oD

Who's a ROCKSTAR???

It's me...just sayin'...  :oD

Just wanted to post a quick one to say that, despite what you thought about me getting up and working out this morning (and don't worry, I understand since I was pretty sure I wasn't going to do it EITHER!), I totally got up and worked out this morning! 
Since I went to bed early last night, the dog (who is confined to the kitchen at night) decided we should get up early too and started fussing around 5:30 a.m.  I only didn't kill her becasue I was set to get up at 5:40 anyway!  So, I got her walked, got my food for the day together, fed all the four-footed creatures I am responsible for and got out the door by 6:10, which meant that I was at work and ready to go by 6:40 a.m.  Consequently, I was able to squeeze in 45 minutes of exercise, during which I stationary-biked 9.9 virtual kilometers and burned almost 400 REAL calories!
So YAY me!
As you were...

Back to the grind

*sigh*
Why is it that vacation time goes by twice as fast as regular time?
Anyway, getting back into the daily routine has been exhausting, especially since I am still not feeling well. Plus, my love is in another city for the week, helping to open a new store so that means I'm a bachelorette for the week. Which sucks.  I miss him already...and yes, I am being a HUGE baby right now but it's hard being apart after we had a rare 4-day weekend together.
Vacation was wonderful! After the first few days spent slacking, I took my dad to a casino on Wednesday and we played a few slots and just got to spend some time together. Miraculously, he managed to walk out with $250.00 profit in his pocket even after funding my black-hole-of-bad-luck ass!  Even better, it seemed to really lift his spirits and even though it was a little tough on him physically, I think we'll try to do it again soon; give him a little fun and something to look forward to.
Thursday, my love and I went to a baseball game with some people from my work. It was fun and since we were in the nosebleed section, getting to our seats was an excellent workout as well - LOTS of walking!  I also managed to take the dog out for a couple of longer walks too (2 kms or so) so I did get a *little* exercise in during my holidays, although it was not every day by any stretch of the imagination.
Then Friday and Saturday were spent gambling and swimming (read "goofing around in the pool") and eating good food with my honey in Niagara Falls. It was so wonderful to have some uninterrupted "us" time as we don't often get to indulge in that kind of thing; his job usually precludes it due to his long hours and working weekends. We had to fight pretty hard to get this time too, since he had been scheduled to do the store opening and that had been unfortunately bumped up to conflict with our vacation. So it was twice as precious when we did finally confirm we could go.
Now I'm back to work and struggling to try to get back into the swing of getting up early and working out.  Instead, yesterday and today I slept in (for a WHOLE extra half an hour!) and paid dearly for the priviledge by spending 45-50 minutes in traffic. I'm all bronchial and nasally and I just wasn't feeling up to getting up at 5:45 a.m., especially after not getting into bed until after midnight last night, thanks to a trek out to Cambridge and back to drop R off.  And that was after a cell phone acquisition trip gone wrong, which took an hour and resulted in us still NOT having acquired the cell phones!
Also, during the phone debacle, the dimtwit who was "serving" us managed to endear herself to me further, after making us wait half an hour, by referring to me as R's mother, so that was DELIGHTFUL!  Seriously?!  If you aren't sure of a relationship (despite multiple references to us wanting a COUPLES plan), you might want to exercise caution when referring to it...say, "Let's get the lady set up first", not, "Let's get your MOM set up first"!  Also, unless you believe I was 10 or under when I gave birth to him, this was a ridiculous guess anyway...and we really don't even look 10 years apart, being as objective as I can about it.  /end rant
Anyway, the "extra" sleep is NOT worth it, so expect to hear in my next post that I've dragged my butt out early again for the rest of this week...back on track with me, dammit!

Vacation - day 1

Today is the official start of my last week of vacation for the year. *sigh*
However, I do have some fun stuff planned so I can't be too sad about the end of summer (which I always consider to be finished when school starts, despite the fact that it has been MANY years since that was of any consequence to me!); off to see a baseball game with all the guys from work on Thursday and then off to Niagara Falls for some poker and strippers with my love on Friday and Saturday!  WOOHOO!
We will also be dog-free for a couple of days which, for you people who have kids, is almost the equivalent of being child-free for two days...in other words, AWESOME!  I love the dog but she is a lot more work than the cats and not just because I`m a cat person. Dogs require a lot more constant attention and if you don`t give it to them, like kids, they tend to get in trouble. They also need more exercise, which is good and bad...bad because I`m lazy and would generally rather sloth around than take the dog for a walk but good because contrary to my nature, these days, I am *trying* to get off my ass more.
So, to that end, on Saturday and today, I`ve taken the dog for a 2 km walk. Nothing too strenuous, but enough to get the heart pumping and the sweat flowing (especially Saturday, which was MUGGY!) and I figure for vacation, that`s pretty good! At work, I`ve been doing around 7 or 8 km on the interval setting on the stationary bike, or about 1.5 km on the treadmill at a 2 incline and 4km/hr speed. Keep in mind that a) I'm just starting and am really out of shape and b) I'm doing this before work so sometimes I'm restricted by time since my drop-dead stop time has to be 7:25 a.m. or I don't have enough time to get showered and ready for work at 8.
When I get back after vacation, I'll slowly start pushing the intensity and length of time up but I want to be careful not to do too much and get too sore and discouraged. I am in this for the long haul but I know I have to work within my own limits too...I know me and it doesn't take much for me to lose interest or feel like it's going to take too long or be too hard. There are lots of reasons for me to stick with it this time but there always have been and there are also LOTS of obstacles, not the least of which will be the commute once the weather starts to get bad.
I'm going to do something now that I've NEVER done, something which is intended to hold me to this commitment I've made...I'm going to reveal my starting weight. I'm doing this because if I do what I say and stick to this, this should be the LAST time I ever see that number; it should sit here on this page and dwindle in my rearview mirror as I drive off into the sunset of smaller numbers. Don't get me wrong, I am in no way obsessed with this number or any number in fact...the commitment I'm making is to eating better and to exercising at least 4 times a week. I figure if I do that, the numbers will take care of themselves so I'm not planning on weighing myself, or reporting it here, very often. However, there's no way around the fact that weight will be a decent indicator (at least for the first while) of how I'm progressing.
So, with no further ado, here it is, as of this morning when I got up, after a pee and before any food or exercise:

280.6 lbs.

I'm 5'9" tall so by any standard, I am morbidly obese. What a horrible tag, and yet it's true.  I have been for most of my adult life so really it's about freakin' time for me to take control of my life in this final way. I have all of the tools and I have all of the reasons so now it's just about doing it. We'll call that my official starting weight, although I have been exercising for a month now with reasonable consistency...since I wasn't sure I was going to stick with it, I didn't weigh myself before I actually started. I guess I could get the number from my doctor when I see her in October since she is the reason I have started this at this time...
Over the past two years or so, I had been being really good...not exercising, just watching what I ate really closely and I had lost, and kept off, 40 lbs. Then I met my fiance and my mom got sick and there were just any number of reasons why I didn't maintain the good habits I'd established. Which resulted in me gaining back 20 lbs. of the 40 I'd lost when she checked at my last appointment in March. This really pissed me off because it seemed so stupid so I decided I ought to do something about it...eventually! In July, the opportunity presented itself in the form of an office move from right around the corner from my house to 20 minutes away (if traffic's good but traffic is never good!). Now, to avoid rush hour traffic, I get up at 5:45 a.m. and get ready, take the dog out and head out to arrive at the office around 6:45, so that I can exercise for half an hour before work.

So, apparently in these long haul deals, it's helpful to have short-term and long-term goals to keep you motivated along the way so here goes: my first short-term goal is that I want to be back to the weight I was before I put the 20 lbs. back on by the time I see my doctor again on Oct. 20/11. Let's call that weight 270 lbs. which is totally reasonable as that's just over 10 lbs. in six and a half weeks...completely doable! And let's set a first longer-term goal too...by the new year, I'd like to crack 250. Again, doable because that's 30 lbs. in total between now and Jan. 1/12, which is 16 weeks from now.
If I manage that, I will be the lightest I have been in...actually, I am not sure the last time I was 250 lbs., but I think it would be safe to say it's over 10 years at least. Definately worth working for...

The dreaded first post

I've decided to try again at this blogging thing...I certainly waste enough time in front of the computer so I figured why not spend at least some of it doing something potentially useful. My last blog only lasted a few posts but the first one I did a few years back helped get me through some very rough times.

I've started working out, trying (once again!) to get in shape and I'm hoping that this will in some way help keep me on track. I think I have a better shot at it this time as there are other factors at play which should assist in my motivation; avoiding my new, long commute by getting to work early and working out sounds good to me!  The only thing I hate more than getting up at 5:45 a.m. and exercising is uselessly sitting in traffic, raging at the gaggles of morons crowding the highway (can you say "road rage"?).

Also, I'm going to be getting married again, which is huge since I said I wouldn't ever do it again when my marriage of fourteen years broke up.  And we're talking about possibly having kids, which is even MORE huge since I just turned forty and had mostly resigned myself to the idea of being a crazy cat lady one day. I was actually kinda looking forward to having my own episode on some sort of animal-hoarder intervention show...but alas, it appears maybe I'm not meant to be a t.v. star after all.

So, it seems I may have some stuff to talk about in the coming weeks/months/years (?) and who better to share it with than a handful of strangers on the internet?  Stay tuned...