Zenea’s BodyBlog

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!

An update on no more sugar-free gum for me…  That is going well, though it is at times, hard, however, what I am finding now is my weight is creeping upwards!  Monday was day one of no gum!  This morning, weighed myself at the gym and it is Saturday, and I am up to 134!!!  Yesterday, weighing 133, I FREAKED OUT!!!!  I thought maybe it is a fluke!  But today, now that I think about it, maybe it is water weight coming back, as the gum has a very significant laxative effect!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

So, now I am bummed about my scale weight.  But I will let things even out and then make a new plan of attack for that.  I am sure I can scale back more on my food.  I am enjoying my yummy meals much too  much!  At least I am eating clean, but too much.  No way to get the body fat down, I guess!  Well, measurements will tell the real story over time, too!

Wish me luck!

Just by chance, due to my training/working out lifestyle, I have developed a Potential Boyfriend Test which is that I go out on a date with a guy, and of course, I go to bed very early to get up and go to the gym and work out 6 days a week- and I work out at 3 a.m!  So, I am not one to stay out late or up late, so a date must be ok with not getting what he might want for the first few dates…  me to stay out late or staying up late!  So, if a guy can handle having to be patient or if he can be flexible enough or interested enough to work around my schedule, then he would have boyfriend potential.  However, turns out so far NO DATES have passed my Gym test! 

Just tonight, I saw my stupid ex-boyfriend, and kind of felt out whether I felt comfortable around him again, whether I could trust allowing myself to get close to  him again - BUT HE FAILED THE GYM TEST!!!  I told him I was not going to be staying up very late because I was going to the gym in the morning, and he got all pissy and threw a little tantrum about "his needs not getting met."  Too bad!!!!

So, if a guy is out there who is willing to wait to be able to hook up more with me, which means hey, actually wait more than one date!, then he might pass my test!!!!

Can any of you gym rat women relate?????????

On a more positive note, I saw my personal trainer today for another grueling workout (Ok, I really DO love a challenge!!!!) and she said she sees how my body has totally changed since we started working together about 6 weeks ago!  So that was great to hear!  She could notice!!!  Just when I had started to give up because I got on the scale on Thursday to compare my Monday weight and I HAD GONE UP THREE POUNDS!!!!  THREE POUNDS!!!!   It was really devastating to me.  Damn scales.

So that was cool.  My hard work IS paying off!!!  Thank god!

Hope you all are well!  I would love to hear my sister gym rat’s stories on dating! 

Well, it is going pretty well, so far, here on Day 3 of no gum!  Thank god!  But I find that I AM feeling more emotions that I covered up with chew-chew-chewing!  And I long to have something to chew on, too….  But I don’t ever want to go back to gum chewing again, so I am drinking tea (herbal, decaf) instead, and that is good because it ups my water intake, as well, which is always recommended, right?

Also, putting my emotions and energy into my difficult (thanks to my trainer!) workouts so that is good, too.

I think I lost 1/2 inch off of my waist, according to measurements today!  Nothing moving on my hips though…. :  (  But I am sure it WILL happen, eventually…..  RIGHT????

I hope you all are doing well!  I really appreciate your videos showing some of your workout moves, because now I am incorporating some things I have gotten from what you all are doing!  That is SO COOL!

Sincerely,

Kathy 

Ok, I am TOTALLY sick of my addiction to sugar-free gum, now!  I am fearful that I will give myself cancer, at this rate, from those artificial sweeteners that they use!  I swear, you would be astounded at how I have been chewing gum for months, now!  I am such a GOOD addict!  Now I am up to two pieces at a time, and quite chain-chewing  - - piece after piece after piece.  I buy my gum at the dollar store but leave with $6 worth at a time and that is chewed up in only a couple of days!  That is 15 sticks to a pack!  So, this  morning, I am gathering up all of my leftover gum to give to my mom when she passes through town on Wednesday!  (I hate throwing anything away!)  I don’t want to die of cancer or have tongue cancer, all from my stupid gum addiction!  I eat SO clean and healthy and work out, so I SHOULD be healthy for a long, long time!  This has been the only unhealthy thing I have put in my body for a long time!

Perhaps this might even help with my weight moving downwards a bit, again….  by stopping the gum chewing.

Can anyone out there relate?  When I embarked on losing weight again, I embarked on my gum addiction again, too.  So, I am SICK of it now and worried about my health, so I am hoping that TODAY IS THE FIRST DAY OF THE REST OF MY LIFE WITHOUT GUM!

A few years ago, I did the same thing, and had to go cold turkey and DID break my addiction, thank god.  So, I KNOW I can do it again!  I just can’t start with one stick, because my mouth says "Oh yes!  We love to chew!  We love food and taste in our mouth!  Let’s keep at it!"  So no, this is it!

You all can keep me accountable!

Had a good workout this morning.  Actually made it through my personal trainer’s workout.  Not as bad as I had feared - and believe me, I fear her workouts come every Monday when I know I am going to have to embark on them!  I am now taking Sundays off, so that always gives me a good start for Monday, too.

Hope you all are well!  I look forward to hearing from you! 

Well, the scale is still not budging.  I hope I am gaining lean body mass, though.  Been concentrating on buffing back up after losing what seems like most of my muscle as I lost weight.  I HOPE I am buffing back up!  It is fun to lift weights again, just back to straight weight lifting on my days off of my personal trainer’s workouts that she gives me for M, W and F. 

This week, she gave me another KILLER workout!  Aaack!  I wonder if I will be able to do it myself come Monday.  I hope so.  It is a pyramid-ing workout and works every body part.  It is a KILLER, I tell you!  I will let you know how I do!  So far, surprisingly, I have been able to complete every workout she gives me, so I am pretty sure I can do this one, as well, if I put my mind into it… I hope!

I think I am gaining muscle tone.  I hope so, anyways. 

I saw Mike was posting about body fat measurements.  I still don’t believe mine is so high, either.  One day, will get that re-done.  For now, when I do shit like that, I just feel so bummed out afterwards that it really is a sabotage for me.  Trying on new clothes and shopping for clothes is much more rewarding and shows me my results better!  Can you ladies relate?????????

I hope the economy goes back up, because I have been spending tons of money at the stores!   It is very fun and believe me I will be looking GREAT!  Too bad I have no dates to dress up for!  And I go to bed really early every night because I have developed a routine of going to the gym at 2:30 a.m!  So, not much of a social night life, but it is actually more fun to me to work out and focus on what I am working on trying to accomplish than wasting my time with some lame ass dude or being around stupid people!!!!!  Can anybody relate????

So yeah, it is the weekend and mostly I have been shopping, cleaning, cooking, eating my delicious meals, working out, relaxing, reading, organizing around my house (my new kick), and chewing WAY too much sugar free gum.  Need to get out to the garden and clean it up for the winter, too.  Today, I dug up a bunch of carrots out of my garden which was cool.  I am going to make a beet/carrot slaw tomorrow!  Fun!  That will be delicious on my daily salad for lunch!  Mowed my lawn on Friday, too, and now my yard looks very nice!  I love my garden! 

My ex-boyfriend who wouldn’t marry me after almost 13 years of on again/off again dating contacted me today and wanted to hook up and I actually said NO!!!!!  Can you believe it?  For the past 3 months I have been focused just on me, and really hanging out mostly by myself, here at home, working out a ton, enjoying my solitude and quiet, and I can see it is really paying off!  I am getting to know the whole me and appreciating the whole me and I refuse to sell myself short to people who couldn’t care less about the whole me!!!!  That is AWESOME!

I hope all of you dudes out there read this, because we women actually have thoughts and feelings and complexity!  There is nothing more of a turn on than a man that actually cares about what I am thinking about, what is on MY mind, my feelings, my life, my interests, etc..!  Most of the time with guys, all they talk about is THEMSELVES!  Most never even ask me how my day went, for example!  LAME!!!!

Women are deep!  WE ROCK!  AND HAVE MUSCLES!!!!

Hello, everybody!

Thanks so much to all of you who wrote me back regarding my last blog!  Everyone was very encouraging and informative, as well! 

I have decided that for now, 20 lbs would be just awful for me to lose, but 5-10 lbs would really show a difference!  Right now, I will focus on 5 lbs.  I am maintaining right now at around 129 1/2.  That is frustrating, but also pretty damned good, considering the last time I was maintaining for a couple of years, I maintained at around 140!  So that is pretty awesome!

So far, it has been a few weeks, so we will see… I am still going to work my ass off (I hope literally!) at the gym, as I have been, and more!

Today I got my heart rate up to 182 on intervals on the eliptical, so I am pretty darned proud of myself!!!  I wonder how I will feel tomorrow?  But for now, I feel fine!  So that was exciting!  Not bad for a 45 year old, eh?

I got in touch with Karen from a Transformation story, and she was very helpful in writing back.  She has an awesome blog, too, StrongSmartBeautiful, that is very informative.  I was awe-struck by her Transformation pictures.  What a great figure she has achieved!!!  I would like to be that buff and tight and toned in my core area, as well as everywhere else!  So that is my goal! 

Today I did my grueling workout given to me by my current personal trainer.  I think she is trying to kill me!  Oh well, I picture figure ladies working out and keep going!  Besides, I know it is good for me and for my body!  So I did that, then got on the eliptical for some high intensity interval training.  All went well!

I am still eating clean, but my portions are going up.  I just LOVE to eat and LOVE my food!  I could probably lose some more if I didn’t take that second bowl of soup or eat that third bowl of salad (Yum!), but I do stick to my measured protein, and no bread/rice/pasta.  Mostly it is protein, vegetables and fruit for me!  I eat 3 main meals with two snacks.  I just love love love my food that I make for myself!  And I feel so great now that I am no longer eating sugar and back to eating clean!

Hope you all are well and I look forward to hearing more from you!