This morning I was discussing the upcoming weigh in with my mother.  I was telling her that I know that I have not put the time in at the gym necessary to show a big weight loss.  I said that I was just hoping to show a loss period.  Then my 7 year old daughter chimes in with “you just need to try harder mom”.  I told her that she was right and that at the moment I am doing the best I can.  “After all” I said to her, “it’s not about winning, it’s about getting healthy.”  She said “I wanna see you win Mommy!”

 

Hmmmmm, maybe I should hire my daughter to be my personal weight loss coach….LOL!

I downloaded an application on my kindle yesterday called C25K (couch to 5K).  It is an application that is designed to help you slowly build up your endurance over a specified period of time to enable you to be able to run a 5K marathon.   I remember reading in the past that other Lighten Up Contestants had used it and found success so I thought I would give it a try!  I will keep you posted!

I knew when I began this journey that getting to the gym would be the most difficult hurdle for me.  I discovered that as an employee of the hospital I was allowed to use the cardiopulmonary rehab room and all of its equipment on the “off hours” for a nominal fee each month.  I work third shift (11p-7a) Mon thru Fri so my plan was to arrive at work and be in the gym by 9pm at least 4 nights a week.  It made perfect sense on paper.  By that time of the night, my 7 year old daughter is in bed and my 12 year old son is on his way and his father is here to see that it does happen so I could very easily leave the house shortly after 8:30p.  I could work out for about an hour, grab a shower and be bright eyed and bushy tailed for work by 11pm! 

 

Well, I had forgotten that many, many days throughout the week that I am unable for one reason or another to get enough sleep during the day which makes it necessary to take a “nap” in the evening before heading off to work.  This has been one of those weeks.  Between illness in the family, a trip to the ER with my son (he’s fine by the way) and assorted other issues I have had to take a nap every night this week and have not set foot in the gym once!  I fear that whatever weight I may have lost in the weeks prior has found its way back onto my body! 

 

Only one more week until the first weigh in so hopefully this next week I will see better results!

While I said earlier in my blog that we strive not to eat a lot of processed food, every Friday in our house is the exception to that rule. For years Friday nights have been pizza, pop and movie night.  It’s meant to be a special treat at the end of a long week and we unwind from a busy week together as a family.  It’s a night that I believe my kids look forward to.  ( I know my 7 year old daughter does for sure, now that my son is a pre-teen sometimes I think it’s more like torture for him!)  Anyway, awhile ago the adults stopped eating the pizza and usually would eat something a little healthier.  So today as I was enjoying my homemade turkey chili which was loaded with veggies and very tasty I found myself intently watching my kids enjoy their pizza.  (I may have even been drooling!)  I hope that maybe someday I can eat a slice of pizza here and there, but for the time being it’s better for me to just leave it alone!

Just like most families with young children, my life is anything but routine.  I am finding that because of the lack of routine each day holds a new challenge to make it to the gym and stick with a nutritious eating plan.  Unlike most people however my family and I are very blessed that my mother lives with us.  (I know some people would not consider that a blessing, but we are very lucky!)  My mother cooks just about everyday and helps out tremendously with the kids.  It has been challenging for us over the last few years that she has lived with us to make our cooking styles mesh.  Although I grew up eating her meals, I have learned to grocery shop and cook quite differently than she did.  Not because there was anything wrong with her cooking, but because when I was growing up there wasn’t the emphasis on healthy eating that there is today.  I grew up with your basic meat and potatoes meals, canned fruits and veggies and cream soup based casseroles.  While many of these things I would still love to eat, I know that they are loaded with fat, salt, and tons of carbohydrates!  I try to shop the perimeter of the grocery store and avoid the aisles where the majority of the processed food can be found.  Also, I grew up eating a lot of red meat.  We probably eat red meat 3-4 times a month now and the rest of the time we eat chicken, turkey, pork and occasionally some kind of mild fish such as orange roughy or tilapia.  I believe that we have been successful in making our cooking styles mesh and will be forever grateful to my mom for making changes to benefit me as well as the rest of the family!

As the article said, I wrote a poem about myself as my contest entry.  I have received multiple texts and emails from friends & family requesting to read the whole poem so here it is.

 

There once was a woman named Shelley Weber

She went through her entire life eating whatever.

 

She knew all along that it was wrong

To obesity and all its complication she wanted to say “so long”.

 

Her obesity had even caused infertility

Producing a baby would never be a reality.

 

Then along came two Guatemalan angels, Heaven sent

Deep into motherhood she happily went.

 

Macaroni, chicken nuggets and ice cream

It was a food-aholics dream!

 

However the more weight she gained

The more difficult motherhood became.

 

Her children are still young

She is unhappy with the mother she has become.

 

She knows that exercise and proper nutrition is the key

To helping her become the mother she always wanted to be!

Is it just me, or does everything in life tend to revolve around numbers?  Age, date of birth, phone number, address, social security number, PIN numbers, etc, etc.  The list is endless!  Well I feel this way about weight loss as well, however for me it isn’t necessarily the number on the scale, or my measurements (which I must point out are a perfect hourglass.  A very FULL hourglass mind you, but an hourglass just the same!)  Anyway, while those numbers are obviously important to me especially since they will be posted publicly in a very short while, they are not my main concern.  The numbers which matter most to me at this point are blood pressure, triglycerides, and hemoglobin A1C (a 90 day look back at your average blood sugar).

 

These are my numbers as of the end of November 2011….

 

Blood pressure 140/92  (120/80 is optimal)

Triglycerides 1500 (less than 150 is normal)

A1C 7.6  (5 is normal)

 

I plan to have my labs checked at about 90 days after starting the contest and I hope to be able to share the good news of “better” numbers at that time!

 

Also, I hope to have let a little sand out of my “hourglass” by that point as well!

 

Is it just me, or does everything in life tend to revolve around numbers?  Age, date of birth, phone number, address, social security number, PIN numbers, etc, etc.  The list is endless!  Well I feel this way about weight loss as well, however for me it isn’t necessarily the number on the scale, or my measurements (which I must point out are a perfect hourglass.  A very FULL hourglass mind you, but an hourglass just the same!)  Anyway, while those numbers are obviously important to me especially since they will be posted publicly in a very short while, they are not my main concern.  The numbers which matter most to me at this point are blood pressure, triglycerides, and hemoglobin A1C (a 90 day look back at your average blood sugar).

 

These are my numbers as of  the end of November 2011….

 

Blood pressure 140/92  (120/80 is optimal)

Triglycerides 1500 (less than 150 is normal)

A1C 7.6  (5 is normal)

 

I plan to have my labs checked at about 90 days after starting the contest and I hope to be able to share the good news of “better” numbers at that time!