Zenea’s BodyBlog

Well, the day is finally here!  I am so excited!  Hopefully, it will be fun!  Wish me great luck!  Hope to see some of you there!!! If you do come, say hi! I am on today, Friday, at noon.  Figure Masters class 40+.  Then finals are at 7 p.m.

Look forward to seeing you there and if you come, yell loudly for my number during judging so the judges will notice me!!!

Love,

Z 

Well, the day is finally here!  I am so excited!  Hopefully, it will be fun!  Wish me great luck!  Hope to see some of you there!!! If you do come, say hi! I am on today, Friday, at noon.  Figure Masters class 40+.  Then finals are at 7 p.m.

Look forward to seeing you there and if you come, yell loudly for my number during judging so the judges will notice me!!!

Love,

Z 

Well, I did it!!!  I finally achieved my dream and goal of competing!!!  You haven’t heard from me because I have been busy training for my first ever figure competition!!!  The good news:  Mission successful!!!  I hired a figure coaching team (SG2Victory, Bellevue, WA) and an online trainer for workouts and nutrition (Mike Davies Fitness Factory) and with their help, transformed my body into that of a figure athlete!  How marvelous is that????!!!!

I am now going to compete in my second competition, tomorrow!  The Emerald Cup, in Bellevue, WA.  I am excited and nervous and excited!

Amazingly, I have achieved a body fat of under 10%!  I NEVER thought I could achieve that!

I look great and feel great and am so proud of myself!  My emotions are all over the place, as well as my energy - damned pre-contest diet and training!!!!!!!!!  But I am ready to go!

Thanks to all of you for your inspiration.  What a gift to be able to do something I have long wanted to do!!!!!!!!

Hurray for 45 years old!!!!!!!!!!!! 

Hello all, again!

Well, I AM DOING IT!!!! I finally decided to do my first figure competition!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  Oh my god!!!!!  I am SO nervous about it and afraid!  I am afraid I won’t look right!  But I have found some FANTASTIC people in the industry who coach for competition and so I am committed as of today to start my journey to March 28th in Vancouver, WA!!!!!!!!!  Oh my god!!!!

I went to my first posing seminar, where I sucked, but that is ok.  It was fun.  Many more to come!  And I am enlisting a fantastic online coach for nutrition and workouts…  Haven’t gotten my first plans, yet, but soon…

I am feeling bummed that I am not ALREADY in contest shape!!!!  Discouraged about that!  I have been working SO HARD! I have been working so hard for 12 years and also since this past April 1st when I started back on track with my food and totally changed my workouts!!!!!  I feel I should ALREADY look like a figure competitor and like you women out there who are already cut!!!!  So that is discouraging, but my coach insists I WILL be ready with proper nutrition and workout.  So I hope so!!!!!!!!!

I look forward to your support and meeting you also, at upcoming shows in Washington State in 2009!!!!

Love,

Kathy 

Hello all!

Well, things are going very well, I would say!  My weight is stabilizing sort of at around 127 or so, now.  Still wanting to go to 125, for now.  I am getting buff, though!  My body is definately cutting, slowly!  That is cool!  Today I took the day off from working out, which is unusual, due to my personal trainer suggested it and I have been pretty exausted, so it SHOULD do my body good!  Although it always freaks me out to take time off working out!  I am afraid my body fat/weight loss will stop!  Well, you know how we can obsess about these things, especially us with eating disorders/body image issues!

I am going to a posing workshop on Saturday! My first! I am rather scared, but hopefully, it will be fun!  I will let you all know!

I was reading a post and a bodybuilding.com friend was talking about how now figure is looking for less muscle and more bikini-model style bodies in the competitions.  This is disappointing to me, as who’s definition of a WOMAN’S FIGURE are we going for, here?  Obviously, some man’s!  It is very unfair.  Why should we have to have BREAST IMPLANTS, HAIR EXTENSIONS, FAKE NAILS, AND HIGH HEELS to be a woman in competition?  And no muscles?  It is defeating my own purpose of what I believe to be a muscle-toned woman’s figure.  A woman should be curvey and I like the muscle aspect of bodybuilding.  But we have different hair, different shapes, different figures, and different breast size.  When we diet down to show off our hard-earned muscle, we lose breast size.  So what?  Why should we have to have a life endangering surgical procedure for someone else’s benefit?  Someone else’s artificial idea of beauty for a woman?  Why are our REAL bodies NOT ENOUGH OR NOT GOOD ENOUGH?  What kind of HORRIFIC message is that sending to us women, men and their idea of women and beauty and girls all over this world????

This is getting very horrific.

Anyone else’s thoughts?

Back to another track, I am doing very well with no gum chewing!  I am proud of myself for that.  Also continuing to eat clean.  And, of course, working out!  YAY!

Hello all!

Well, things are going very well, I would say!  My weight is stabilizing sort of at around 127 or so, now.  Still wanting to go to 125, for now.  I am getting buff, though!  My body is definately cutting, slowly!  That is cool!  Today I took the day off from working out, which is unusual, due to my personal trainer suggested it and I have been pretty exausted, so it SHOULD do my body good!  Although it always freaks me out to take time off working out!  I am afraid my body fat/weight loss will stop!  Well, you know how we can obsess about these things, especially us with eating disorders/body image issues!

I am going to a posing workshop on Saturday! My first! I am rather scared, but hopefully, it will be fun!  I will let you all know!

I was reading a post and a bodybuilding.com friend was talking about how now figure is looking for less muscle and more bikini-model style bodies in the competitions.  This is disappointing to me, as who’s definition of a WOMAN’S FIGURE are we going for, here?  Obviously, some man’s!  It is very unfair.  Why should we have to have BREAST IMPLANTS, HAIR EXTENSIONS, FAKE NAILS, AND HIGH HEELS to be a woman in competition?  And no muscles?  It is defeating my own purpose of what I believe to be a muscle-toned woman’s figure.  A woman should be curvey and I like the muscle aspect of bodybuilding.  But we have different hair, different shapes, different figures, and different breast size.  When we diet down to show off our hard-earned muscle, we lose breast size.  So what?  Why should we have to have a life endangering surgical procedure 

Just got back from the gym this morning and now I am  back to where I was before that 5 lb weight gain last week!  Back to 129!!!  YAY!!!  I am SO excited!  Now perhaps I can break that 129 barrier and get down to 125!!!

Wow!  I can SO feel the difference with this dinner diet change!!!!!  Who would have thunk it?  Actually, I am just damned stubborn when it comes to food (well, perhaps everything else, as well…..) and if it hadn’t have been for that scarey jump in weight last week, I never would have changed up my food!  So I am GRATEFUL for finally finding the willingness to change it up!  I can’t wait to see the outcome of this!  I feel SOOOOO much lighter!  I FEEL like I am cutting!  So I can’t wait to measure and see the results!  Now I might really get somewhere in terms of those stubborn areas of body fat!!!!  Yay!!!!!

I am still working hard at the gym, and am gaining some of my old hard earned muscle back, which is a relief!  Getting stronger by the day and week.  It was a bummer to lose my years of muscle with my losing weight…  It is funny, though…. I am just taking it like any part of lifting weights….  at the beginning of any routine change, you have to start light and build up!  So it is not devastating, just another challenge!  Which to me is what weight lifting has ALWAYS been about, AND I LOVE IT!  I LOVE A CHALLENGE!  So, that is cool!  I can’t wait to show you all my results, too, when I get to where I want!  I am very excited about that!!!!

In my personal life, my stupid ex boyfriend who I went on that date with the other day and who was pissed that I wasn’t going to stay out but was going home to go get up early to go to the gym in the morning, instead…  He left a HORRIBLE AND AWFUL message today on my cell phone.  How rotten.  I am struggling NOT to let it affect my self-esteem….  Emotional abuse works, you know… it fills you with self-doubt, degradation, shame…..  just the point of putting someone down!!!!  He said I was controlling and stupid and blah blah blah… He said it was my fault that I am single at 45 years old blah blah blah…  that everything is my fault, of course…. 

But that is not the reason I am single at 45!   It is because I have picked LOSER BOYFRIENDS all of my life because of my low-self esteem!  HIM INCLUDED!!!! 

 And you know what?  Big deal, anyways!  I don’t care if I am single!  In fact, I REALLY LOVE IT!!!  It is not important to me, today, to have a relationship or a boyfriend!  For me, the point of life is to ENJOY MY LIFE and find happiness every day and be happy!!!  And that is what I do!!!! My life is wonderful and I am SO SO SO GRATEFUL for my wonderful life!!!!  So who cares?

It is wonderful to have fulfilling work that I love, my own house, car, etc.., and a gym to go to to KICK ASS EVERY MORNING!!!!  It is wonderful to have passions and be able to engage in my passions!!!!!!!!  And to have a community of friends who are positive and supportive and loving!!!  And I am grateful to find these bodyblogs and find you all who relate and love to kick ass in the gym, too!!!!

And it is wonderful to have my HEALTH and my family and friend’s health!!!!  How KICK ASS is THAT?

So f*** him, and onwards to the gym in the morning to KICK SOME ASS!!!!  

So my change of dinner is doing very well.  I am down almost two more pounds, this morning, so only one more to go to get to where I was before this little weight blow up!!!  So that is AWESOME!  And I am hoping this diet change will also trigger more weight loss, as I have been stuck at 129 for a long time, now, and really want to get down to 125 AT LEAST!!!!!  So, I am in a MUCH better mood!

Isn’t it tragic how much we let those numbers on the scale bother us???  Sigh!!!!

So, all is well again!  I can’t wait to weigh in next week!!!!  See how things are progressing!  I do think I see a difference, too….  Tighter in my abs….

It is frustrating to be SO sensitive to food- stuff….!  With my genetics and stuff and my love of food, I can SMELL food and gain weight!  AAAAACK!!!!!  I really have to be careful about what I eat and don’t eat, and my portions.  The portions part is the hardest part, right now… I DO LOVE FOOD!!!  YUM!!!!  But I am feeling SO much better in the mornings, now, not all bloated feeling from too much soup for dinner and all!  So it is encouraging, though still a difficult change.  I need to come up with a dish I love for dinner again, so I am equally happy as when I was eating my soup!

I

Ok, so last night, I changed my food for dinner.  I have been eating the same foods for a long time… and dinner has been a soup I make that is handy and oh so tasty each night!  Well, after reading all of your stats on what you all eat, decided to go with chicken breasts and my usual tons of steamed vegetables (that I pour my soup over, usually) with just the leftover soup now more of a tomatoey sauce that I spooned on top of the combination.  It was good and filling and I woke up feeling SO MUCH BETTER!  I have been way overdoing the soup each night figuring hey!  It’s just soup! (with my vegetables and measured protein in it, like beans or tofu or occasionally chicken or ground turkey… but mostly beans!)  But wow!  What a difference!  Feel so much lighter and less bloated for the first time in a very very very long time!  So that is going to be my new dinner and I am excited about it!!!  Cooked up chicken breasts, yesterday and weighed my portions for each meal so everything will be all set!

And WHEW!  RELIEF!  After my workout, I weighed in as usual and found I was down two pounds from Saturday, so that is GREAT!  My goal is to lose the five pounds I gained last week ASAP which today is two down, and hopefully by two weeks.  Should be a done deal with these new dinners. 

I AM SO EXCITED!!!!  :  ) 

Had a good workout, this morning, after my Sunday off which is always helpful…. so that felt good, too!