Day four, four, count 'em! Perfectly on program again today, worked out, the whole bit. Wow, I see that Trish has kicked ass for four days too. Everyone seems to be totally back into the swing of things after the holidays. How excellent are we all? Why, very, as it happens!!

So, tonight after work, we went out on a produce run. Last night, we were out for dinner with the little old guy and stopped off at the "trendy expensive" grocery store that is near his place after we'd dropped him off. The produce was for poopie. The organic section was all full but the rest of the produce section was really picked over. What was left, looked horrible. We found some okay looking zucchini and baby bok choy but the rest of it was truly terrible. I suspect that it's partly because of the weather (we figured that maybe one of their produce trucks had been frozen or something) but mostly I think it's because the University students are back and they're stocking up on stuff. I noticed, from a distance, that two-thirds of the bakery section was empty. Totally empty. I had not seen the shelves that bare since the Ice Storm in 1998. We didn't have any power for a week so it was a little crazy around here. Yikes.

Tonight we went to our tried and true discount grocery place and stocked up on all kinds of fun and yummy things for the next few days. I was getting low on cereal (I'm a Special K girl) and grabbed another box tonight. It had a free pedometer in the box. Kellogg's is doing a promotion right now and they're giving a bunch of them away. I'm wearing it right now. I put the groceries and the laundry away (and hung some stuff up to dry) and used 245 steps. It's very cool, and free, so you gotta love that!

As always, I'm concerned about this weekend. A lack of structure can sometimes spell doom for me. I'm going to work very hard to not let that happen this weekend. I have a bunch of stuff that I'd like to do around the house this weekend, I also want to get through Dr. Phil's book. I have noticed that I have no desire, whatsoever, to snack while reading his book. Thank goodness for small favours huh? It's supposed to be bitterly cold this weekend so I suspect that we'll be hibernating. Oh well, I will worry about the weekend when it gets here. Right now we're stocked up, totally on healthy stuff that's good to eat so it shouldn't be too much of a problem *fingers crossed* In the meantime, I'm just basking in the glory of four days, yay me!!

So, day three was great. Again, I was perfectly on plan. How seriously am I rocking!?? I know, it's just 3 days but boy, it feels sooo good. I've actually had calories to spare over the past three days and, today, I got my designated water intake in before I left the office tonight. I can't tell you how many times I ran to the ladies today but, hey, I'm all watered up!! It sort of helped that our office was five million degrees today for some reason. Yesterday I struggled with water because I was freezing and drinking cold water just didn't do anything for me. Today though, those old rads were banging and clanging and it was a sauna in our little cubicle village.

I'm so happy that Carla brought the Weigh-in Wednesday back this week, I missed her and the WiW.

Did you decide to start fresh again in 2004? Are you as excited now as you were a year ago? Where are you now compared to where you were a year ago? What have you learned during the year? If you kept chugging all along, what has helped you through the holidays?

I did start fresh again on January 5. I didn't intend to take a break over the holidays, it just sort of happened that way. I really admire those folks who were able to keep it together during the holidays (or the ones who re-started January 1 -- once I decided that I was on a break I figured that I'd go straight through until the weekend was over). Compared to where I started, I'm doing great. I exercised at least 5 days a week for the best part of 2003 and I'm very proud of that. My eating wasn't always the best, particularly in the last part of the year when (as I wrote about yesterday) I shit going on that was beyond my control. In 2003, I learned how to eat healthy and not feel deprived. I also learned how to actually enjoy exercise and pushing my body. I never thought that you could actually like exercise. That statement isn't entirely true actually, I know many folks who love exercise but I always just thought that they were sick or something!!

Overall, I lost a nice chunk of fat and gained some muscle along the way. I've become reacquainted with my family doctor and I now see her once a month (sometimes for just a few minutes, sometimes longer). It's nice to have someone keeping an eye on me who is an actual health care professional, someone who knows me and who cares about me. As, I'm sure many other fat girls (and former fat girls) have done, I used to avoid going to the doctor at all costs. It's not that my doctor ever said anything directly about my weight, it was just a weird paranoia that I had, like she wouldn't take me seriously if I went in about something because I was fat. I now see how stupid that was. Fortunately, she's given her blessing to my entire program, is a great cheerleader and a fabulous source of advice. Also, she's run a huge number of tests on me and, fat aside, I'm ridiculously healthy.

The most important part of it is that I'm feeling good, physically and emotionally. I know that 2004 will be another successful year in my quest for health and fitness. It'll happen that way because I want it to. I will do good things for myself because I deserve it!! That might even be my mantra for 2004!!

Wow, I feel great tonight. I had another perfectly on plan day. Today, however, was not as "easy" as I thought yesterday was. I knew last night that yesterday was a false "high" if you will. That I still the last dregs of some doritos in my blood stream. Today, I was hungry mid-morning and mid-afternoon. My snacks yesterday seemed unnecessary, I mean, I ate them but I didn't feel like I really needed them at the time. Today, I was glad to have them. I also drank a lot more water today than I have in a while so I was running to the loo a lot (yay, cardio at work!). Anyway, after today, I know that all the crap residue is out of my system and I'm feeling better for it. I also worked out again this morning, which was awesome. By the way, did any of you know that Rita Rudner has a program called "Ask Rita"? TBS has been showing it at 5:30 a.m. the past couple of days. I just wondered because I'd never heard of it before. I guess the premise is that folks write her letters asking questions (duh!?) and then she and 4 "guest comedians" answer the letters. It looks syndicated, but that's neither here nor there, is it?

The lovely Taylore left me a comment about yesterday's post and wanted to know how I had was able to get back into the mode of knowing that I can succeed. I know that I can do it because I've done it before. At the weight I started at last year, many folks would have thought that going for WLS would be a better option than trying to lose weight the way I've been doing it. But I lost 70 pounds last year. I was doing really well until a bunch of stuff starting happening at work in the fall that threw me for a loop and slightly off my program. During that off period, I learned that I could maintain my weight loss. For the first time in my entire life, I lost a bunch of weight, and kept it off. Now, over the holidays I did gain back a little of what I lost but not too much.

I let myself get really down about it though. This past weekend, I felt incredibly guilty about the gain. On Saturday, I felt as fat as I ever did. I looked at myself in the mirror and could only see myself as I looked 70 pounds ago. I even went so far as to pull out my fattest fat ass jeans (I know I should get rid of them but they are the one "big" item I've kept, so I can show myself how far I've come when I get to goal) and put them on. I wore them out for dinner (yeah, one last hurrah! before restarting on Monday). All evening, I kept having to hike them up. When I finally got home and went upstairs to change, they were falling down me. When I got to the top of the stairs, I had to step out of them or I'd have tripped myself up. This was a huge wake-up call for me, another light-bulb moment if you will... I realized that I wasn't that girl anymore, that I was fully 4 jeans sizes smaller now and that those stupid pants were never going to fit me again. Despite the small gain, I'd still maintained a fairly substantial loss and I was going to keep going.

This year, I'm not going to allow shit at work to mess with my program (because it was the one thing that really did interfere with it last year). I'm going to focus on my health and my family's health and our needs will come first, ahead of work. My job has been adversely affecting my health but I'm not going to let it get to me anymore. I'm not going to get stressed out over stuff that I can't control. I'm going to go to work, do the job that I love to do, do it well, and go home at the end of the day. I'm going to leave work, at work. I'm going to try to keep the political shit out of my head when I'm not there. This too will be tough but I am confident that I can do it. If I can sort my work shit out, I will be able to keep on my program and do what I want to do. I mean, I was able to maintain during the worst of it, when I was letting it totally bug my ass. This year, I'm not going to let that happen, hell, I'm never going to let that happen again. I will not let anything get between me and my health!

I started reading Dr. Phil's book last night and there is a quote on the first page of Chapter one that says, "Change can come in either of two important ways: Start behaving positively or stop behaving negatively." He's absolutely right and I'm going to work really hard in 2004 to replace my negative thoughts and actions with positive ones. I now understand what everyone has been saying about his book, it's good stuff. I'm only just starting it but I'm getting what he's saying and I know that I can combine what he's talking about with what I've been doing already and I'll get to my goal.

Back on track

Okay folks, feel free to pat me on the back. I got through today, perfectly on plan with a side of extra exercise.

Today was my official program restart and I feel really good right now. I remember how I felt on the day I started in January 2003. I was nervous and cautious. I was excited about the prospect of getting healthy and losing some weight but I remember how difficult it was during those first few weeks, how it felt to slowly develop healthier habits concerning what I ate and what I did. I don't feel that way anymore. I'm not afraid of failure right now because I know that I can succeed. Last year, when I started doing this, I didn't tell any of my offline friends because I was worried about what they might think if it turned out that I couldn't do it. Eventually, when I started to see results, I started to share what I was doing with others around me.

Although I'd taken a vacation from my program for a couple of weeks, I really looked forward to getting back into the groove of it. This morning, I got up and exercised. I also ate a healthy breakfast and packed a nutritious lunch (and snacks) to take with me to work. It wasn't a struggle today, it felt right and easy. I managed to get through the day with calories to spare and I didn't feel huge pangs of hunger or big cravings for anything in particular. I feel great right now. I even did some extra floor exercises tonight after dinner while watching Dr. Phil, extra abs and extra leg exercises. I am really loving my new mat and resistance bands. They are so easy to use and I can really feel my muscles working when I use them.

Oh, speaking of Dr. Phil, I finally picked up his Ultimate Weight Solution book tonight. I had done some Christmas shopping at Chapters and they gave me a coupon for $10 off purchases over $30 but it wasn't any good until January 5. Tonight after work, we scooted over to Chapters and I picked it up. I've heard such good things about it on the W-B Board that I wanted to check it out. I already watch the show and have been following the Weight-Loss Challenge every week. I'm looking forward to reading what he has to say. I understand that many folks have been inspired and motivated by it. I figure that a little extra inspiration and motivation certainly can't hurt, right?

Well, it's back to work in the morning, and back to being 100% on program. Boot camp begins again tomorrow for us. We really slacked off on things during the 3 weeks I was off work. I really enjoyed the time off but I think I just did too little exercise and ate too much food. I've gained a few pounds of holiday weight but I'm confident that I'll have them gone in a week or so and be back to where I was before the holidays started.

Tomorrow morning, I'll be working out at 5 a.m. again. We went to the grocery store this morning and picked up odds and ends that we needed for week, lunch stuff for me, lots of veggies and healthy stuff. So, the crap is out of the cupboard and we're ready to go. I'm actually looking forward to it!!

So yay me, after being a lazy lump for over a week now, I actually exercised this morning. I rode my recumbent bike on the basic interval program and did some arm and ab work. I tell ya, after that big of a break (I'd not done any proper exercise since Christmas Eve), I was really hurting at times. I felt so good afterwards though, I'm sooo glad that I did it. I had a good, healthy breakfast after I was finished and feel better today than I have in a few days. As much as I've enjoyed the break from work, when I'm working and in a regular routine, it's easier for me to exercise. I find that when I have all day off, I just keep putting it off and then, blammo, the day's over and I've not done it. Technically, I'm still on "vacation" from work, and my program, until Monday but I thought I'd get a jump start on the exercise part of it and I'm really happy that I did!!

The first day of the year was pretty uneventful around our house. My hunny went out to work at 4 a.m. so we were in bed really early last night and I was up early this morning.

I'm starting to feel the effects of not having done any proper exercise since Christmas Eve. TOM has been kicking my butt this week and I've not done much at all. Today at least, I got inspired while watching the Clean Sweep marathon...I got my laundry done, vaccuumed the whole house, packed away the Christmas decorations and managed to throw out an entire bag of crap. I've been weeding through a lot of my Christmas stuff and just chucked a bunch of it because it's just old and nasty and I've not used it ages.

Anyway, resolutions wise, I've made a few:

1. Starting Monday, January 5 -- get back on plan 100%. When I'm eating healthy and exercising regularly I feel better (sooo much better). I mean, the whole purpose of the plan is get (and stay) healthy and fit. The weight-loss is important to me too but I really want to have a super strong, healthy body. Ideally, I'd like to lose another 70 pounds in 2004.

2. This could almost be 1 b I guess, I will exercise at least 5 days a week for at least 30 minutes each session.

3. Get our finances in order and actually save some money this year.

4. Finally get rid of the remaining clutter in our house. This a project that I started working on in 2002 and I've done pretty well so far. My hunny and I are both big pack rats (or were) and we live in a small house. We've gotten rid of a tonne of useless stuff over the past 18 months but I'd like to finally get the job done and dusted in 2004.

I think that all of these things are reasonable and manageable and they'll all help to make my life better. Wish me luck!!