Jeni’s Journey

Here’s one of my own.  I was hungry and bored this evening, so I decided to mix a thing I don’t really like with a thing I love.  Eggs and broccoli.  My own Green Eggs, minus the ham.

Ingredients:

3 cups broccoli (I love broccoli)
6 egg whites,  plus one egg yolk.

1 clove minced garlic

1 tsp McCormick Grill Mates Roasted garlic and herb

1 tsp Garlic Powder (I love garlic too. I’m sure other spices will work.)

Whisk eggs and mix in spices. Place broccoli in a food processor and blend until there are no solid pieces of broccoli, but don’t make it into a paste. Stir broccoli into eggs and pour onto a pan over medium to medium-high heat.  I scrambled mine, though an omelette style may also work… It’s yummy.

That’s how progress has been for the past month and a half…  After losing my job, being threatened with eviction because of some obscure law about students in low-income housing, and dealing with the *******s at Unemployment, I think I should just be lucky I’m still alive.  The main positives at the moment are I’ve managed to stop binge-eating for 2 days now, and I’ve been smoke free for over a month.  I did half a leg workout this morning, just spur of the moment, and feel good today.  After gaining 10lbs, losing 11lbs, gaining 15lbs, and losing, I’m currently at 166lbs… 7 up from my lowest weight… I don’t want to go back up again.  It feels so horrible… I will update more often; I need to keep track of this and remember that even if it happens again, it’s not the end of the world…

…I would have easily quit smoking because I know how much it is affecting my energy and ability to exercise, not to meniton my overall health.

…I would not have consumed 1400 calories in one sitting because I was that stressed out.

…I would be exercising daily as I should, because it would help with the stress and quitting smoking, as well as keeping me going with weight loss.

…I would not have gained 4lbs in the past 4 days (possibly water weight, but with how I’ve been eating, who knows?)

…I would not have started smoking again. I only lasted 4 days.

But it isn’t a perfect world.  I’m not perfect; not even close.  I’ve screwed up so much lately that I’m starting to wonder if I can pick myself back up and start over.  I have trouble doing that when I’ve gone so far off track.  Stress from my job, finances, relationships, and just life in general are making things so much more difficult.  When I started down this path of weight loss and exercise life was going much easier, so it was much easier to stay on track.  I’m not sure what to do now…

Sometimes I can’t stand this.  I’ve been suffering from cholinergic urticaria as well as cold urticaria for the past 3 years or so.  Basically I get hives if I get too hot or too cold.  It’s the worst when I exercise, especially if I exercise in the cold.  I’m going to the doctor tomorrow to get a referral to an allergist, hopefully this doctor actually cares about it.  I can’t even drink cold water or a cold protien shake after an intense workout because it makes my tongue and throat swell, but I’m not about to give up working out.  I’ve come to far to do that.  It just gives me a little more of a challenge in that every time I exercise it’s very uncomfortable for me for the two hours that follow.  Another thing to test my dedication, I suppose.  I’m not sure why I’m posting this honestly.  Do any other people out there have the same thing?  Or, rather, do any people that will read this have it? 

Even after only a few days of exercise I’m already starting to notice that I feel a lot better.  When I walk I feel lighter on my feet.  My legs are almost to the point where they don’t rub together anymore! Yay! I’ve been getting into the habit of standing straighter and pulling my stomach in. And I definitely have more energy.    Also, my hip doesn’t hurt today… guess it was just the stress of unfamiliar movements.

Did my workout today, already getting to the point where I really didn’t feel like it but I did it anyway. (Yay!) Anyway, workout went fine, broke a sweat once again… I felt like I was doing all the moves properly but a few minutes after I was done and cooled down my right hip started to ache when I moved.  Walking and the act of standing up make it hurt the most.  Mom said she had the same problem and that I shouldn’t do squats or work my legs until the pain goes away.  So, hereditary hip problems, yay! lol  Love you, Mom, really.

Been doing stretches, used my massager thing on my hip and lower back which seemed to help for a little bit.  The ice pack I tried to use just got my pants wet with condensation and didn’t do much else.  Oh well, I don’t think it’s anything like a serious injury, just some soreness from too much stress on my joints.  Side lunges = bad for hips.

Breakfast:
1/2 cup oatmeal
3 egg whites, 1 whole egg
1/2 cup cottage cheese

Snack:
Sliced apples w/ 2 tbsp natural peanut butter

Lunch:
3oz Chicken Breast
1 cup green lettuce or veggies
1/2 cup brown rice (or sweet potato)

Snack:
Nonfat Yogurt + 1 Tbsp All-Bran cereal or Kashi cereal

Dinner:
3oz Chicken Breast or Salmon
1 cup green lettuce or veggies
1 cup nonfat milk

Snack:
1 Serv Protein shake powder
2 tbsp raw almond butter

I was just thinking the other day about how much my diet has changed since July 08, and how much better I feel now that I’m eating good foods.  Pre-changes my normal diet would consist of:

Breakfast:

• 1-2 cans of Dr. Pepper or Mt. Dew
• Sausage/Eggs+cheese/Hashbrowns/Pastries (Whatever my residents were eating at the time)

Lunch:

• 20 ounce iced or blended mocha with flavor, made with ice cream mix, always with whipped cream on top
• Sometimes I would eat something if the residents’ lunch looked good, sometimes I’d just skip it. I’d have a salad most days with 1/4 cup of dressing

Snack:

• 1-2 more sodas, something sugary or chips from the vending machine (assuming I ate at all.  Caffeine and sugar from the coffee kept my appetite down)

Dinner:

• Big Mac w/ extra sauce, large fries, big mac sauce to dip the fries in, largest soda they had.  Or burger king equivalent.
• Or we’d order pizza and I’d eat 4 large slices, plus chicken wings and of course, soda.

Late Evening:

• Soda, chips, candy, whatever tasted good.  I could eat a bag of Doritos in one sitting.

My diet now is SO much better, and although I didn’t start it out this way, I’m so glad I eventually made it here.  I drank slim fast for breakfast and lunch, 100 cal packs and nonfat yogurt, low cal granola bars, and then lean cuisine dinners.  It wasn’t the best diet but I cut out all the crap that I had been eating, and from what you can see, it was NOTHING but CRAP.  Now I’ve changed to the diet on the main part of my BodySpace I’m doing even better.  So yes, amazingly now I have a hundred times more energy, I don’t crash, I don’t get dizzy spells, I don’t get sick as easily, and I’m losing weight!  Haha who would’ve guessed?

Yesterday was different, I did the express version of ‘Rock it Off’ from the Firm…  It was still difficult and I was a little sore from the previous day, but I still got a decent cardio workout.  Added light 1lb weights instead of doing the beginner (no weights) modification.  Today is a rest day, back on track tomorrow with another workout!  Hoping I’ll catch on soon enough and stop tripping over my own feet while trying to follow along.

Attempted my first workout today on The Wave, a weird step-aerobic/core balance device made by The Firm… I felt so clumsy on that thing and realized that my living room is a little small to do all of the moves properly, but I did get a sweat going and felt pretty good.  As the guide suggested, I only did the express ’sculpting’ routine on DvD.  It’d be nice if they had a "slow down" option on that thing because I couldn’t keep up half the time!  I’m going to keep with it, I know I’ll get more coordinated the more I do it, and then I can start using the weights and resistance bands.