Friday, May 31, 2013

Frustrated But Hanging In

Well, my official weigh-in is tomorrow but the scale still said 229 this morning and I don't see much changing overnight.  I've tried to be patient knowing it's cycle week, and I suppose I could be thankful that I didn't have the normal 3-5 lb. gain that I normally have during this time...but I'm still frustrated.  I don't like posting maintenance weights when I'm supposed to be reporting losses!  Doing everything right this week and still maintaining has me a little frustrated.  :)

My food has been good this week, I'm drinking a truckload of water, and I've been consistent in making myself walk every single day.  I will say that it's getting easier to walk up the one hill in my neighborhood.  I'm not huffing and puffing quite as hard as I was a week ago.  Progress!  Maybe my hormones will mellow out in another day or two and I'll feel happier next week.  Also, I think I will be going back to calorie counting next week.  I always have an estimate in my head just from having so much memorized, but I've proven again and again that the only thing that really works for me is writing down every single calorie before I put it in my mouth.  The numbers never lie.  It aggravates me...I get sick of it....but it's hard to argue with what I know works.  I'll post again when I actually lose a pound.  Happy Weekend everyone.  Make it a great one.  :)

**And yes Pat, lol, 120/17 was the wrong blood pressure number, lol...sorry about that.  I would probably be dead if it were that low.  I meant to say it was 120/77.  Sorry for the typo! :)

Wednesday, May 29, 2013

Moving Along

I jumped on the scale this morning hoping to see some movement downward but nothing yet.  Still the same 229 I was at weigh-in last Saturday morning.  I'm being mindful of my food, walking every day and drinking 3 to 4 32 oz. glasses of water every day.  Of course, I started my cycle Sunday night, so that may have something to do with it.  All I can do is just keep on the same path and know that results will show eventually.  I'm still doing one lap around the neighborhood and feeling like I'm going to die when I make it back home.  So, so out of shape.  My knees and lower back hurt terribly. 

I went to the doctor about 2 months ago and actually had them do a blood test to see if  I have an auto-immune disease.  I have so much fatigue and joint pain and didn't have an explanation for it.  I was starting to worry.  The test came back negative but did show that I have high iron.  The doctor asked me if I had started taking iron supplements because I've never had high iron in the past.  I told him no...that I had just started trying to lose weight again and I'm eating lower carbs/higher veggies & protein.  I told him I eat spinach nearly every day and he said to stop eating it.  That's the first time a doctor has ever told me to stop eating something healthy!  I was also eating almonds for snacks and it turns out nuts are high in iron also, so had to stop eating those, too.  My blood pressure was perfect...120/17...but my cholesterol was 50 pts. too high.  I told him I had been eating a lot more eggs in the last month to up my protein and make up for not eating many carbs.  He said to cut way back on those, so I have.

Someone asked me about swimming to make the exercise easier on my joints.  That's a fabulous idea, I just don't have access to a pool right now.  I don't want to join the YMCA because I don't want to create another monthly bill.  I just got done paying off all of my debt and am enjoying keeping what's owed to just my cell phone, car insurance and the house utilities.  Sales on Ebay are never guaranteed.  You can do great one week, and fall in a hole the next.  So it's necessary for me to keep my bills very easy to maintain.

On the ebay note, I had a good sale today.  I bought a set of Bavarian Schumann dessert/salad plates at a yard sale a couple of weeks ago.  I got 6 plates for a total of $5.00.  I just got them listed a couple of days ago and they sold this morning for $135.00.  I love it when I have no idea about what I'm buying...just bought them because they were pretty...and it turns out to be a fantastic find.  :)  Here's the link to the sale:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/370821565180?ssPageName=STRK:MESOX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1559.l2649

And here's the link to my store if you want to see what I've got listed right now.  I put several things up for auction this week so feel free to join in on the bidding!  LOL  Shameless...I know. ;)

http://stores.ebay.com/TJs-Timeless-Treasures?_rdc=1

I hope everyone's having a pleasant week...I'll check back in a few days.  :)

Monday, May 27, 2013

Green Memorial Day

We went to Dwayne's mom's for a cookout yesterday.  I had 4 baby back ribs, a spoon of potato salad and coleslaw (both were vinegar-based...no mayo) and 1 slice of bread.  Dessert was a watermelon cake.  I had 2 bites of a small slice and left the rest.  She bought it at Whole Foods and it was actually kind of gross.

Today Dwayne and I spent the day at home.  I've been working all day on my Ebay stuff and got a ton accomplished.  For dinner, Dwayne grilled Cajun chicken sausages, asparagus, and mushrooms/onions/bell peppers.  I steamed some broccoli and heated up some leftover ribs from his Mom's.  I also made us both a salad.

I decided to skip the buns on the sausages and I skipped the ribs, too.  I loaded up on tons of green veggies, thus my green Memorial Day.  I had 2 chicken sausages cut up, steamed broccoli, grilled asparagus & grilled mushrooms/onions/green bell pepper.  I decided to throw some more veggies in and had a salad w/ romaine, tomatoes and cucumbers w/ 2 TBSP of ranch dressing.

Getting ready to head out the door and do my walk.  I'm only able to do 1 lap right now....I'm just too out of shape.  It takes 17 minutes to make the loop.  Hoping to make it up to 2 rounds by next week.  I weighed in on Saturday morning and I'm at 229.  I'm really trying to make myself focus more on the walking/healthier food and less on the stress of house hunting.  It does drive me a little nuts to have to put that much thought into my food to keep me in line, but things get out of hand way too fast when I throw caution to the wind.  I'll post again later this week.  :)

Tuesday, May 21, 2013

Resuming Walking

I haven't exercised in a long, LONG time.  The truth is, I've been dreading it because I have a lot of joint pain that I didn't used to have, so it just hurts.  The shin splints are a killer, too.  But I've got to make myself start doing it again.  I made the decision when trying on a pair of shorts at Target today.  I looked in the mirror and saw sagging skin above my knee caps.  Ummm....I don't think so.  As fat as I am, and have been for most of my life, my legs have always been the most decent thing about me...the thing I was least ashamed of.  I have the calf muscles of a marathon runner and have never had much problem with cellulite or the like on my thighs.  Apparently that has changed, and it's time to do something about it.  I know walking again will tone them up a bit so I'll be starting that tomorrow morning before I shower for the day.  I'll start w/ 30 minutes and work up from there.  The shin splints are going to suck but I'm hoping they'll ease off as I go along.  Wrinkly legs of a 70 year old will be fine...when I'm 70.  Not when I'm 40. 

Friday, May 17, 2013

Maintaining Again

I maintained at 240 lbs for nearly 2 years.  I finally decided to jump back on the wagon and try to lose some more and I got down to 225 over the last few weeks.  Naturally, after I start blogging again, I've maintained for the last 2 weeks.  That figures!  It's apparent that I'm eating too much to show a loss and I know it's due to the unbelievable stress of house hunting.  Dwayne and I have looked at 32 houses so far and still haven't found the right house.  Yes, 32 of them.  Our realtor told us at the beginning that the average person looks at 11 houses before they make their decision....obviously, we're not average.  So for now, I'm back in the maintenance phase...and now hoping this stretch doesn't last another 2 years!!  I do know that I need to lose a good bit more...225 lbs is not acceptable.  And as always, my first goal is to get anywhere below 200 lbs.  I'm 26 lbs. away from the first goal..and I'm hoping to reach it sooner rather than later.  Enjoy your weekend.  :)

Friday, May 10, 2013

Hanging In There

I swear I cannot remember to post!  Trying to get back into the blogging.  I'm still using Friday as weigh-in day.  No loss or gain this week....stayed the same.

And just real quick...here is why I love Ebay.  I went to some garage sales this morning looking for inventory.  I made it to an estate sale and paid $30 for some sterling silver flatware.  There were 12 pcs in the box...6 teaspoons and 6 dinner forks.  I got home and looked them up and according to completed sales, it looks like they're worth around $500.  I just got done polishing them and will be putting them up for bid this evening.  Enjoy your weekend.  :)

Sunday, May 5, 2013

Getting Back Into It

I almost forgot to post tonight.  It's going to take some getting used to again, and I think I'll try to do a post every couple of days for now.  I might get into a Mon - Wed - Fri routine.

We had a good weekend.  It rained all weekend but I guess we need it.  Had a friend over for dinner Saturday night, did a lot of household chores, grocery shopping, etc.  Then today I did a Walmart run for some essentials.  I thought I might pick up a couple of cheap summer tops while I was there but that didn't happen.  I've never seen so many sequins and horizontal stripes in my life!  I just couldn't do it, lol.  Afterwards, Dwayne and I went to see the new Iron Man movie.  Eh.  It was ok.  I liked the first one better.

My change up for me on food for this week is a new breakfast.  My cholesterol is 50 pts too high due to too many eggs, so cutting way back on those and this week it's smoothies from the blender.  Eventually I might buy one of those Nutribullet thingies to grind up some veggie drinks, but the blender's not strong enough for that, so this week it's fruit.  I bought some strawberries, blackberries, blueberries, pineapple, bananas & Fuji apples.

Breakfast this morning was a blackberry smoothie...pretty tasty.  Here's what I put in it:

1 scoop whey protein powder - 130 cals
1 c. skim milk - 80 cals
1/2 c. Chobani plain yogurt - 70 cals
1/2 c. fresh blackberries - 37 cals
1 zero calorie Stevia packet

So total cals around 317 if I added that up right.  That's a decent amount for breakfast.  I can't say it was extremely filling, but it's fine to get me through til lunch time.  I made chicken stew for dinner tonight w/ just chicken breast, tomatoes and onions.  There's enough leftover for lunch for a couple of days.  I'll probably throw in a few garden salads too in order to make sure I'm getting my raw vegetables in.

The plan for tomorrow is to photo some glassware to put up in the Ebay store.  Lighting is always tricky with glass...sometimes it's hard to get good definition.  I've already photo'd these pieces once and didn't like how they turned out, so it's time to re-do them and get them listed.  Talk to you again soon.  :)

Friday, May 3, 2013

Hey Er'Body!

Wow it's been a while!  I've been reading my regular blogs all this time but for whatever reason decided to do a new post today.  Just a quick one to say how I'm doing. 

Still running my Ebay store and now have an Etsy shop as well for vintage items.  I love working from home...it is such a joy.  I spend my days surrounded by Scarlette and lots and lots of inventory. 
I'll post my links here in case you want to check them out.  :)

http://stores.ebay.com/TJs-Timeless-Treasures?_rdc=1

http://www.etsy.com/shop/FiddlestixandFancy

On the weight loss front, I hung around 240 lbs. for almost 2 years.  No more bingeing, but then there's no need to binge when you're eating whatever you want and restricting nothing, right?  While I'm glad that I never climbed back up over the 240 mark to the 340 I used to be, it still takes a whole lot of calories to maintain 240 lbs. 

After dropping the first 100 lbs, I got way too comfortable.  WAY.  No desire to drop anymore weight, until a few weeks ago.

Today I am 225, so I've lost 15 lbs. in the last 7-8 weeks or so.  I don't know exactly what happened...just woke up one day and said this is ridiculous...I need to try and drop some more weight.  So I started.  Nothing crazy or fanatical...just trying to eat less than I did before.  No timeline.  No major stress.  Changing things up every week or so as far as what types of things I eat.  For me, boredom is a diet killer.  But I have an overall low-carb thing going to get my diabetes under control.  Definitely addicted to carbs....definitely hard to restrict them.  But I'm trying again.  It feels good to be back at it.  It's still as hard as it ever was with Dwayne eating his usual stuff right beside me.  I guess I'll always be a work in progress, but I'm still here.  Still kickin'. 

Dwayne and I are looking for our first house to buy.  This was not the happy,  euphoric experience I thought it would be.  It is actually a living Hell.  Neither one of us are enjoying it.  We've had more fights in the last 30 days than we've had in our entire 9 year relationship.  Seriously.  I'm sure we'll be happy when we finally set up home in one....but getting there is real pain in the ass.  I think we're just about ready to give up until this Fall.  Hopefully by then the rush to get a house and get your kid in a new school will slow down.  Right now, everything is under contract.

So just stopping in with an update and to say hi.  I'll post again in couple of days.  Have a great weekend.  :)