Whoops!

It's been a year since my last post. I bet you never thought I would be back! So many things going on right now and I am not sure where to start. I guess the biggest new thing we have is our newest dog Stanley. He is currently our foster to adopt but hopefully we will be finalizing on him soon. He is the best dog and we are so lucky to have found him. He and Wiggles are best friends and they help each other with their separation anxiety.  Wiggles is still her punky self but she has calmed down so much since Stanley (aka Bug) came into our house. He has only been here since the end of February but cannot imagine our family without him. I will get some pictures up of him and Wiggles because they are so cute together.

I am sure you have noticed that there is a name change to the blog. The Murray Milestones will be about our little family and the activities that we do together and enjoy. I will keep everyone updated with what is going on as we navigate married and family life.

So kick back and enjoy our blog! :)

My summer goals

This winter I have been really neglecting myself. Luckily I have not really gained weight but between working 2 nights a week and being in class I have not had time to take care of myself. That is going to change once my new schedule starts on June 10th. No more nights and I will be getting off work a little earlier than I had been. I have still been going to the gym to work out with Jacquie but I am only getting in around 1 or 2 days a week. I honestly need to get there more but it just does not work with my schedule right now. So my goal is once my new schedule starts is to work out at least every weekday. I am going to ride my bike and also start the couch to 5K because one of my goals this year was to be able to run a 5K by the end of the year. I am hoping that I can accomplish this goal and really start to take care of myself.

I have been riding my bike a couple of days a week and I love it but I want to be able to do more. So I am going to invest in a new bike seat and start riding.  I am hoping to be able to get some distance on my bike. It is fun to ride and it was one of my favorite things to do growing up. I am going to blog my distances and how I feel as much as I remember to.

So hear comes my summer of biking/running!

Excitement

I told Adam of my plans for the diet and workouts and he is actually on board and may actually help with it! I am excited because he and I can work as a team on this. Hopefully both of us can get into shape together and get healthier! Tomorrow is the big day and I decided that I am going to weigh in and take before and after pictures to keep track of my progress. I will try to post the before pictures on here if they are not too horrible haha.

Cannot wait to start!

Spiraling

Out of control.

No other way to describe it. My weight has gone up as my exercise has gone down. My food intake is out of control. I am having crazy cravings all the time for things that I would normally never buy. This happens every time my weight starts to go up. The crazy thing for me is that the scale says about the same weight as it always does but I look in the mirror and know that something is not quite the way it is supposed to be. Honestly I am not having any type of depression symptoms and my anxiety has been as in control as it can get. Because of school my stress is up which is to be expected. Also in January I was put on steroids for the eczema that got pretty severe on my stomach and legs. Finally it is starting to clear up. But it makes me feel pretty self-concious. My beautiful legs have red marks all up and down them from the infection that I got with the eczema. It looks a lot better than it has but I know it is there. A round of anti-biotics has made it better but there is still a good 2-3 weeks before they are hardly noticeable. Its tough since we are having unseasonably warm temperatures here in Indy right now. I have to make sure that my pants or skirt cover the bottoms of my legs so that no one can see. Although the main reason I don’t want people to see is because I just don’t want them to ask questions.  It is just frustrating. Not to mention some of the other stuff that we have been going through which I am not really ready to talk about on here yet.

So since my weight is spiraling I have decided that I really need to get things under control. Starting Sunday I am doing a total overhaul of what I am doing now. No more eating junk. More fruits and veggies. Limiting the processed foods. No alcohol. Limiting soda. Drinking lots of water. One of the main things that I need to get under control is my PCOS. With the PCOS it is so hard to keep my weight down. I would love to be able to get my weight down enough to be able to go off the Metformin and regulate my body so that everything is more regular. I am going to start to do my work outs 5 days a week and restart the couch to 5k. I am also going to start blogging more because it keeps me more accountable.

Eczema

A long time ago (like 20 years ago) I had a problem with eczema.  I can remember my ankle would get really itchy and the skin would get all scaly and red. I can remember being told not to itch it. My mom had a cream in a little jar in their bedside table that they would put on my ankle at night.  But all of a sudden it went away and except for a little patchiness here and there during the summer I did not have any outbreaks.

Fast forward to now: Starting in December I started getting patchy eczema on my hands. I thought nothing of it since it was close to Christmas and I was in the kitchen cooking a lot more. But it kept going so I went to the doctor and they prescribed a cream to put on it. By the time I went to the doctor it was on my stomach too.  Which once I put the cream on it started to go away.  Now I have it in a different place on my stomach.  It looks different this time now too. It also started on my legs. If anyone knows me one thing I do pride myself on is that I do not have fat girl legs.  I am able to wear shorts and I think I look good in them.   But now my legs look horrible. I am trying not to itch them although it is painful and itchy. And red.  I am frustrated and really need to go back to the doctor because I am afraid it is going to scar my legs.  Honestly I am scared that they are going to tell me that it is going to scar and that is why I am so afraid to go. Tomorrow I am going to go back to the Medchek that first gave me the cream. I know I probably need to go to my own doctor but honestly I think that I need to find a good dermatologist. My mom thinks that the stress from school and work and everything else is causing it to flare up so bad. Hopefully stress is all that is causing it because I can find something to help control my stress.  Hopefully I am wrong and overly paranoid and it really is not going to scar.  I know this post is a bunch of rambling but I needed to get this frustration off my chest!!

End of January update!!

Wow—January has gone super fast! Here it is already the 27^th.   Honestly this month has kicked my butt. School is keeping me busier than I anticipated and I still have so many online classes that I need to finish. I kind of bit off way more than I can chew in the online class department, but I am slowly getting them under control. I was able to get one class grade posted and it really helped my GPA. Here is hoping that I get good grades in the rest of these classes and my GPA continues to get higher!  I also am working very different hours right now than I am used to. Which is hard because I am working the same kind of hours as Adam but we are both so busy that it is hard to get time together, but we are working it out like we always do.  Sometimes I feel like I am just ready to have a normal marriage and time together but then I look at my married friends and very few of them have 24/7 to spend with their husbands anyways. I also remember that what we are doing right now is for the greater good and will benefit our family and future children someday.

Working out is going well. I am pushing along. I feel like I have been doing well but the scale is not reporting that.  For now I am just doing the best I can and hoping that someday the pounds will start to come off.  I also have to remember that I am battling something more than most people that are trying to lose weight with the PCOS. It is hard but I know I can get this weight off. I have done it before and I can do it again. Keeping my diet on track is the important part but also the hardest part. 

Well just wanted to give everyone an update. I am going back to the books. Hopefully I can get this online class over with this weekend which will take alot of the stress off.

Goals for 2012

I know it has been awhile since I have updated and I know I have said that I will update more and never have but this blog is going to be one of my goals for the year.  But I also have some other goals that I would like to do this year. When talking to Jacquie my trainer this morning I started thinking about what I would like to accomplish. There are many things that I would like to accomplish in the year or next couple of months. Here is a list of some of those things.

1. I would love to look in the mirror and be completely satisfied with what I see.  I would say since my back surgery I have not really looked in the mirror and like what was looking back. That is not to say that I hate what I look  like. I am just unhappy with it. That is when I feel like I really started to spin out of control is around October 2009 when I really hurt my back. I just want to be comfortable in my own skin again.
2. Speaking of my back—I would like to stop using it as my crutch . I feel like sometimes I am afraid to try new things because I am afraid it will hurt my back. I need to get over that fear and get out of my comfort zone. I feel like if I do not get out of my comfort zone then I will never accomplish anything.
3. I would like to be at a healthy weight. Right now I am considered morbidly obese. I am not sure what a healthy weight for me would be but I would like to be at it.  It may  be just losing 50 lbs but it may be losing 100 lbs. I am not going to rely on what medical science says I need to be though because I still feel like everyone is different and my healthy weight is going to be different than another person around my size. I am going to rely on how I feel when I get there.
4. This is really 2 goals in one. I would like to buy a smaller size and also to fit in everything in my closet. This kind of goes along with most of my other goals pertaining to my weight loss and other struggles but honestly would it not feel great to get in your closet and not have to avoid a certain outfit because it either does not fit or you do not like the way it looks on you.
5. This is not a weight loss goal but I would like to figure out if I really want to go to school for respiratory therapy or if I want to do something else.  I told Adam that I am going to take classes this semester and continue with what I was planning but if I am still not sure after this semester I am going to take time out and decide what I want to do.
6. Another goal that has to do with something other than weight loss is a family goal for us. I am hoping that we can put the house on the market and sell it this year. It is going to take some renovations and TLC before it will be ready to go up but I am hoping we can get it done this year.
7. Going along with the weight loss I would like to be at a healthy weight to have a baby. This is something that we have been wanting for awhile now and I do not feel comfortable with getting pregnant at the weight I am at now. I am hoping once I lose some significant weight I will feel more comfortable and be able to get pregnant.  Having a baby or becoming  pregnant is  one thing I am hoping will happen this year but I am not going to freak out if it does not because it is something that is out of our control.
8. This may sound strange as most of you know how obsessed that I am with Wiggles anyway but my goal this year is so spend more time walking and playing with her. Sometimes I feel like she gets neglected while I am working on other things around the house. I know she knows we love her but they do say that people with dogs that walk them regularly weigh less. So maybe it will work J
9. Scrapbook and finish started projects. This is something that I neglect every year. Last year I started a project with organizing all my pictures and dating them and such and I have totally put it on the back burner in the last couple of months. So keeping up on printing pictures and marking them is important this year.
10. Spending time with Adam. Sometimes this is something we take for granted, having our alone time. This year my goal is for us to do some fun thing s that we would not normally do.  Go to restaurants we would not normally try.  Go to some Indians games. Just have alone time since when we have kids we will not have a lot of alone time together for around 18-20 years.
11. Spend more time with my friends.  I have been bad about this recently and would like to change.  Again when I have kids my relationships with my friends will change.
12. Be able to run a 5K. Not that I would necessarily enter a race but I would like to be able to know that I can run one.  
13. Work-out at least 5 times a week. This one will be a tough one but if I set my mind to it I can do it!

So here it is my goals for 2012. They are not in any particular order and don’t worry Adam will not be upset that Wiggles is before him in the goals.  That does not mean she is more important! In June I will try to update everyone on my goals and let everyone know how I am doing with them!  Hopefully I will be doing well. We will see J

Have a great 2012 everyone!

Updates, updates, updates!

Wow! It has been a long time since I have blogged!  I know I still have not blogged about Vegas and I have also not blogged about our other vacation to South Carolina. I promise I will do that tonight when I get home and have access to pictures. Well anyway things have been going pretty well in the Murray household.  Thanksgiving is behind us and we are moving full steam ahead into the Christmas season. It is even supposed to snow today! YIKES! 

Well first off the weight loss is still going slow. I have been working pretty hard at the gym but I have not been working so hard at my diet. Honestly if I could get that under control I would probably lose a TON of weight! I am honestly working on the diet thing and am trying to see how much weight I can lose in the 3 weeks before Christmas. If I stick to my diet I should be able to do well. I did have a slight setback last week. I am pretty sure that I have a stress fracture in my right foot. The xray did not show anything but stress fractures do not always show up on x-rays. So I have been taking it easy and not doing anything to hurt it recently.  Hopefully it will heal and I will stop having pain.

Another new development is that Adam started a new job on November 7^th.  He is working at IU Health Saxony which is IU Health’s new hospital. This is a very positive change for us as a family. Hopefully we can get everything worked out and Adam and I can be on more of a normal schedule with each other. Already I have had evenings at home with my husband which I have not had in a very long time. It is so nice!

We had a great Thanksgiving. It was the first one since Adam’s grandma passed away so it was sad but I am sure she was looking down and smiling at the family she created. My family had Thanksgiving at my grandma’s house and it turned out great. Their new addition is very nice and it accommodated the family well.  Next year we may have to consolidate down to one Thanksgiving. We will see.  No black Friday mega shopping for me this year. My mom and I went to Hamilton Town Center on Friday but we did not go until later in the morning.  Later that night we went to see the Muppet movie. It was really good.   Over the weekend I worked and Adam put up Christmas nights. He did a great job. I got out the Christmas decorations and we are going to put up the tree tonight.  I am pretty much done with Christmas shopping for Adam.  I just need to get the stocking stuffers. I also need to start on our families gifts!   Yesterday was my  mom’s birthday and we went to the mall again (seeing a theme?) and went out to lunch at a place called The Local. It was really good food. Definitely would recommend it.

I will try to get the Vegas and SC posts up this week!  Be looking!

It happened. I turned 30.

This post is just a quick one to let everyone know that I survived turning 30. I don't feel any different. But it is strange to say. I am still chugging away at my weight loss. It is going slow but it is going so I have to be happy with that. We went to Vegas and it was great. I will write a post about that later. It is now fall in Indiana and it is starting to get to the point to go through my closet to get ready for the change in the season. This is usually a time I really dread.. I hate looking for clothes and going through my closet and trying to decide what to wear. I have bought some new clothes lately and I am hoping it makes me feel better about the direction my weight loss is going. We shall see.

Well I am going to go for now. I will update more later.

Weight Loss Challenge!

Today starts a weight loss challenge that my trainer Jacquie is putting on for the people in my gym. Of the girls I have the most to lose in this competition so hopefully I will do well. I already weighed in and worked out this morning so I feel like I am at an advantage over everyone else at this point. I am hoping that I can pull this off even with being at a disadvantage with going on 2 vacations in the 2 months of the contest. Jacquie is going to help by putting together a workout for me to do while on vacation so as long as I keep to that and workout every day and watch what I am eating I should be ok! That is a lot to think about though.

Starting weight is a little too high for me to put on the internet for everyone to see but once I get my final weight I will put it on here.

So as far as this challenge goes ready, set, go….

My favorite time of the year.

I love back to school time. Even though I am not going back to campus this semester it is still so exciting to me! I love school. I love learning new things. I love getting the sylabbus and looking ahead on the semester. I guess I am a dork for stating that, but it is exciting and new. My new classes showed up in Blackboard this weekend. Even though I still have my one summer class still hanging over my head I am excited to start working on other classes too. So good luck to everyone starting schiool this week and next and also continued good luck for the grade school kids that started in the last couple of weeks!

On my summer class....I did not get anything new done on it. But I do not feel too bad. I was able to finish a project that I have needed to do for a long time. I organized my pictures into photoboxes. It took about a month and I basically worked on it all weekend but it is done and from here on out I can workon it as I go. At this point I have all my pictures printed and on their way.

As far as weight loss goes...Jacquie is doing a weight loss challenge that starts next Monday. I am going to join it even though I am going to be on vacation two weeks of the challenge. It should help me keep accountable while I am gone. Last week I had Jacquie do my measurements and I really have not gone down too much at all. Very disheartening. My body fat percentage has gone down. But I did manage to lose the weight I had gained so that is good.

This week should be a good week. I am taking off Thursday and Friday to have a long weekend and then next week I am only working 4 days and then Adam and I will be on vacation! I am looking forward to having some time with my husband without his employees or boss texting or calling. Adam is not even turning his phone on while we are gone!

Remembering Grandma Gillen

I did not think this fit in any other post but I wanted to say that the world lost a great lady in July. Adam's grandma passed away at the age of 93. She was honestly quite a lady. Born in 1918 she was the valedictorian of her high school class! She went to business college and was a great business woman making the family farm and her children and grandchildren her life. Really an amazing woman all around. She was also an amazing china painter and we have so many of her pieces in our house. I cannot imagine what it would have been like for her living through the depression and WW2. Her and Adam's grandpa had one of those epic love stories that I can liken to the story of Noah and Allie in the Notebook. She raised an amazing family that I am very proud to be a part of. No matter what her children or grandchildren did she was proud of them. That is true love.

Thanks Grandma Gillen for taking me into your family. I am so glad I got to know you. You will forever be missed.

Summer update 2

Wow! July is done and we are almost to the middle of August! Summer is going super fast. Next week the kids in the neighborhood will be back in school. Crazy how fast it all goes.

First with our concert updates:

In July I had 3 concerts that I went to, Tim McGraw, Rascal Flatts and NKOTBSB (part 2).  First was Tim McGraw. My love affair with Tim started the first time I heard Indian Outlaw on the radio. When I graduated from 8th grade my mom bought be tickets to see him and Faith Hill at then Deer Creek To this date it is probably one of those concerts I will always remember. It was just before Tim and Faith announced that they were dating and I remember my almost Freshman self thinking that they seem awfully close to each other!

When I was in high school and college I worked at Deer Creek/VWMC for a couple of years. I saw alot of concerts in those years and Tim was always one I would definitely go to when I had the opportunity. That is why I was excited he was on the Megaticket this year. This year's concert did not disappoint. Megan and Lori brought their little daughters because they are fans of The Band Perry. The Band Perry was very good...they will definitely be superstars someday soon! Luke Bryan also opened for him..he is a cutie! It was a smaller group this concert than the others. Erin and Eric were the other ones there with us.  I even converted Sara into a Tim McGraw fan by the end of the night!

Next up was Rascal Flatts. Adam bought Sara's ticket and came with me. It was a hot one that day! It was just a few of us at this concert. My aunt Teresa came with Megan and my cousin Kaylie. It was a good concert too. My only complaint was the heat. We had alot of fun and I never realized how many Rascal Flatt's songs I know.

The next was NKOTBSB. Again the concert was amazing! It is funny how you can remember the lyrics to all those songs you sang as a child! This concert BSB was alot better than they were the first. I lost my voice screaming!

As you know from my last post we went to Virginia the last week in July. It was so much fun. It was just Adam and my dad and me. It was nice to go away and have my dad show us around Lee County. It is really beautiful down there and even though we barely know some of those family members they are always so welcoming. We had a great time while we were down there and unfortunately we came back to a sick dog. :( (more on that in my previous post)

My mom, aunts, cousins and I went to State Fair Band Day last week to watch my cousin Alyssa march for the first time. I cannot beleive my baby cousin is starting high school and her older brother is starting college! Natalie is even going to a new school!  Anyway, the Millers had a great routine this year. One of the most solid bands in the contest but of course they were underappreciated by the judges as always. But we had fun and I think Alyssa had a great time!

Adams sister and nephew were in town last week. It was alot of fun to see them and get to play with our nephew! He is so much fun and we are blessed to have him in our life. He seems to love his Uncle Adam and Aunt Katie. Hopefully we can start to set up some regular Skype dates so we can talk to him more often. We will see him when we go to SC in a couple of weeks. It will be fun to have a whole week of spoiling him!

So our summer has been pretty crazy and we are not even done yet. Tomorrow night we are headed to Symphony on the Prairie with our friend Amanda. Saturday we will probably head to the State Fair. We leave for vacation in 3 weeks and I think we are both so ready! It has been a year since we have been on vacation so we are getting anxious!

So far behind!

This is not a weight loss post. It is about how far behind I am on my second class from summer semester. Luckily it is a 9-month class so I technically have until February to finish it but I have set a goal this week to be done with my first assignment and have it submitted to my professor. Lets just say life gets in the way sometimes! The worst part is my new semester starts in 2 weeks. So my goal by the 22nd is to have at least half of my assignments submitted so that I can start my next round of classes in a timely manner!

So as I mentioned life gets in the way and things get busy while we had a little excitement last week in the way of the dog. The last weekend in July Adam and I went to Virginia with my dad for his family reunion. We kenneled Wiggles for the weekend. On Saturday we got a call from the kennel asking if Wiggles had been limping before we brought her. I said yes she had because she had jumped down and jarred her leg somehow and we were working on it with the vet. My mom went to pick her up on Sunday because we still were not home yet and she called and said the dog is not doing well she can barely walk. I thought it was just due to her anxiety from us being away and told my mom that she would be fine when we got home. Well she wasn't. We let her limp around like that until Wednesday when Adam could not stand it anymore and he took her in to get it looked at. Well the vet wanted to do emergency surgery and look at the leg right away. Really its a good thing I love that dog as much as I do because I was thinking crap...how much is this going to cost? Turns out she tore her ACL and they injected it with platelets and cortizone to help it heal. In case anyone was wondering that cost us almost $500. Not to mention we had just paid $72 for 3 days in the kennel and the 2 months before she went in and got an "adjustment" on her leg at $150 and $50 dollars. So that is over $700 this summer just on the dog! Now I know that is no excuse to why I have not finished my class yet but the last couple of weeks I have been preoccupied with Wiggles and her treatment and healing. We still don't know what the final outcome is going to be with her leg but at this point I am definitely not leaning towards surgery if it is needed! So prayers are needed for her to make a speedy recovery for her leg and that she won't cost us anymore money!

Also this brings up what we should do with her while we are at Litchfield with Adams family next month. Being a dog owner is not always easy but to me it is definitely worth it!

2 months!

So I am only a couple of days late with an updated blog. Ok I am over a week late but who is counting? Anyway things have been going well. Last week because of other things going on and it being my late week at work I was able to work out in the mornings 2 days. It was nice to know that my workout was done before I went to work and if I wanted to work out after then it was up to me. The best part about me working out in the mornings is that I was able to lose 4 lbs in a week. Yes, you read that correctly---4 lbs! The most I have lost since beginning this weight loss adventure and it is also the total amount of pounds l have lost to date. I am sure most of it is my working out in the morning because I was able to hold myself accountable but some of it may have been that I started remembering to take my Metformin like I am supposed to. Like I said before because of the PCOS and the insulin resistance the Metformin is to regulate my body and hormones. I think this is part of the reason that I have started to start losing weight. It also is helping a little with my appetite and helps me to feel full. That is one of the bad things about the PCOS/insulin resistance. So hopefully it is starting to reverse itself and the more weight I lose the better it will be!

Working out in the mornings is what I am going to start doing every other week and on my days off. It actually helps me to stay accountable throughout the day. Plus as I mentioned before I get more time with Adam!

Well that is my workout weight loss update. A July conclusion is coming up next J.

P.S. I have made myself a little challenge. If I lose 15 pounds in August I get to buy a pair of shoes from Shoedazzle.com for Vegas! J

Quick post

I will blog more tomorrow and just wanted to let everyone know! It has been a crazy week and it spills into the next 2 weeks. But I will share this in the next post! Hope everyone has a great weekend and stay cool!!!

Summer concert update!

As I mentioned in a previous post I bought alot of concert tickets for this summer! Well we are halfway done with the concerts at this point!

The first one we went to was Jason Aldean at Verizon. I was not too familiar with Jason Aldean and his music but now I am a fan! He is a great entertainer and he is super cute! The concert was alot of fun. The weather was ok. It looked like and felt like it was going to rain for most of the night, but it never did which is good. In fact I just downloaded a bunch of Jason Aldean music on ITunes. What did we do without Itunes before? haha. Here is the only picture I took at Jason Aldean. Sara and I look like we are having fun! :) (The guy behind us doesn't haha)

The 2nd concert of the summer was every girl born between 1976-1992's dream concert. It was NKOTBSB. In case you do not know what that stands for it was New Kids on the Block and Backstreet Boys together. On one stage! Jordin Sparks opened for them and she was really good. But the concert was awesome! We were at the United Center in Chicago for that one. I went up with my friends (who are actual sisters and sorority sisters of mine) Kara and Emily. It was so much fun! We obviously stayed up in Chicago. We also made a trip to Ikea while in Chicago! That was my second trip to Ikea and it is definitely one of my favorite places to go! But I have to say I am glad it is not in Indy because I know that is where all my money would go!

2 weeks ago we went to Kenny Chesney. First we tailgated and drank before going into the concert. That was alot of fun. The truck next to us had a Tiki bar set up. Apparently when I went into the concert I missed the squirt gun full of rum and the jell-o shots. The concert was great and he even brought up Brad Stevens the coach of Butler to sing with him! So cool.

Next Sunday is the start of 3 concerts in 9 days! First is Tim McGraw at Verizon, then back to Verizon for Rascal Flatts the next Saturday. Adam is going to that one with us. Then the next Tuesday is NKOTBSB in Indy!

July is by far going to be our craziest month! The weekend of the fourth I had a 3-day weekend and we went to the pool, cleaned our house and had a little get together for the fourth. Of course I did not take any pictures for that because sometimes I remember my camera and other times I totally space it! It was a nice get together with some of our good friends. We also went out to dinner on Saturday night with Adam's parents.

At the end of July Adam and I are headed to Virginia for the Ward family reunion. My dad is taking us. It should be fun. I have not been to Virginia since I was a teenager and I am looking forward to Adam seeing where my grandpa came from. It is absolutely beautiful down there but it is in the sticks which I love! I am going to load my Ipod up with plenty of country music for the trip down! :) Good thing Adam likes country! :)

August is a quiet month and then September starts the month of traveling Adam and I are going to do! But more on that later! :)

So that is last couple of weeks and next couple of weeks! :)



Umm...

That is about how I am feeling right now and I am not sure what to post. But I know I need to post since I haven't in a few weeks. This summer has just been super crazy busy. Everyday is pretty much planned out to the minute which is good because I like to be busy but it would sometimes be nice to do something spontaneoous too! Because I am working out with my training classes on Monday, Wednesdays and Thursdays I hardly have time to go to the pool. Which for me is a bummer. Normally by this time in the summer I have a nice rich tan going on but not this year. Today after I get off work Adam and I are headed to the pool. We already made this unanimous decision on our way home from dinner last night!

On Thursday I was ready to blog about how I have not had any backpain in awhile since I have started working out more. Washing my hair in the shower this is exactly what I am thinking. Gee...my back feels really good right now. Well around 2 hours later I am sitting at work in excruiating pain. Its not that my back went out but it just tightness and pain from the workout that I did on Wednesday. So instead of doing the cardio circuit with the group on Thursday I walked the treadmill for 45 minutes. It was not what I wanted but I can't push my back any farther than my body will allow. I always feel heavier when I have pain. I guess it is because my self-esteem starts to lower for some reason. Also I start to get whinier than usual. Good thing Adam is used to this..ha. It is slowly starting to feel better. Friday I did a quick walk on the treadmill to try to further stretch it out and it seems to hurt less. Today sitting at my desk in the office will be a true test. On my breaks I will get up and do things like sort laundry and shower and load the dishwasher. The joys of working from home! :)

Before I hurt my back I was not doing so well with the C25k. Hopefully on Monday I can start doing it again. I am less than 3 months away from turning 30. There have been some subtle changes I have noticed lately though. First my arms are starting to look better. They are not wonderful but I felt comfortable in the new dress that I bought to go without anything over it. Another is that I was looking in the mirror last night after brushing my teeth and my face is getting slimmer again! That is the one thing that really bothers me is when my face looks fat! But now it is starting to look slimmer. My stomach is also getting smaller. I know that will be the longest process because when I gain weight it is ALWAYS in my stomach first! The other day one of my friends was telling me that when I am pregnant the only place I will probably carry is in my stomach. Oh I know they are right which is why before we get pregnant I have to at least reduce the size of my stomach!

As I was saying earlier this summer is just buzzing along. In less than 2 months we will be on our vacation to Litchfield Beach. I am really looking forward to it this year because our nephew is going to be SO much fun! Also hopefully in the next two months I can really start to get some results. I started on a new dosage of Metformin that is an extended release tablet last week. I only have to take it once a day now and not 3 times like I was before. I have already noticed that I am less hungry. Metformin in people with insulin resistance causes weight loss and is supposed to suppress your appetite. So far so good this time around. So hopefully it will continue to not upset my stomach and help me to eat leass and get my insulin resistance under control by losing weight.

I am going to cut this post off here but I am going to post some concert updates later today.

PS:I also wanted to include a picture on this post of the new dress I bought at Old Navy the other day. I told you I bought a sleeveless dress and wanted to show it off!

Change is for the better sometimes.

Things are finally starting to move in a good direction. After last weeks breakdown and weight gain I decided I am going to make some positive changes in my life. I have been doing very well with the whole eating before 7 thing. I think the only night this week that I didn’t do it was Monday. The one thing I have to get used to is working out after eating. I tend to get a little neauseaus while working out really hard after I have eaten. It is definitely something I will get used to. Also this week I restarted Couch to 5k. (C25k) On recommendation from a friend I downloaded the C25k app on my Ipod touch. It is amazing! I would definitely recommend it to anyone that is wanting to try the program. Before when I started it I was looking at my watch and trying to figure out when to run and when to walk. The C25k app tells you when to run and when to walk over your music on your Ipod.

But I think that these two changes have made it possible for me to say that I lost 3 pounds this week!! I am so elated that I lost that much! But I am realistic and know that I have sooo much farther to go but 3 pounds is definitely a start.

Now since working out with Jacquie started a month ago I have tried some new things that I am loving! First off is the running shorts that I bought at Old Navy. They are so comfortable and lightweight. Perfect for running and doing circuit training. The shorts are the womens mesh shorts. They are currently down to really small sizes on the website so hopefully they will get more in because I love them! I also bought a sports bra from Old Navy that I am going to try today. I will let everyone know how those work!

While in the gym I heard my trainer and some of the other people talking about FUZE juices. So I thought I would check them out. The FUZE slenderize juices are amazing and they are as low as 15 calories per bottle! Its not like one of those other drinks that is like 15 calories but there are 3 servings in the bottle. I am drinking one with breakfast in the morning and I love them. Adam even likes them too. CVS has had them 5 for $3 for the last 2 weeks so we are well stocked on them.

Today is day 2 of C25K. I am feeling stronger and better than I have in a long time. Honestly I have not felt this good since before my wedding! It is a great feeling and is definitely keeping me moving.

A HUGE setback equals a huge change!

My attitude this morning is a little discouraged. Honestly I don’t know if pissed is even the word to describe how I feel about it right now. I am so upset with myself at this point it is not even funny. I have gained 2 pounds since I started working out with Jacquie. That is ridiculous! It is my fault too. I have been doing the workouts but it is more like I am just going through the motions at this point. I cried when I got off the scale last night. I keep getting farther and farther away from the point I wanted to be at by now. Jacquie told me that I need to stop eating after 7. Honestly that is going to be so hard for me because I don’t get off work until 5 or 5:30 during the week. On the weekends it won’t be as hard, but on the days I work it will be very difficult. I called Adam after my session last night and asked him if he could help me on the nights that he is home at 3. He said that he can fix dinner on those nights and have it ready for when I get home. Oh and that is another thing I am upset about. Adam’s store went to 24 hours over Memorial Day weekend. And one of his shift supervisors walked out. So now Adam is working 2 overnights a week. So that means I never get to see him again. But the nights that he is working overnights I go to Jacquie and I tend to eat better when he is not around so maybe it will be a benefit to me. But that means I have to come home and fix myself dinner and take care of the dog all before leaving again.

When I called Adam last night about having to eat before 7 I told him that if I don’t lose weight we will not being having a baby. There is no way that I will be able to get pregnant at the size I am now. Nor would I want to. I really have to start to kick this into gear because I am not going to let my chances to be a mother slip by me because I was selfish and could not lose weight. I know that this is something I can do. Before I met Adam I had lost around 25 pounds. I have packed on over sixty since I met him. I did lose 10 of the 60 pounds I had gained but still that does not even begin to scrape the surface of what I need to do.

I know I have said this so many times before but this is my definite wake-up call. I need to do something now about my weight because it is seriously out of control. I do not want to be fat for the rest of my life because when we do have children I don’t want them to look at me and say mommy is fat so I can be fat too.