tewie-building

so in my drive to find a way to regain the FUN of fitness… i ran across a video on shanbl’s page where a man took pics of himself everyday of his diet and turned it into a flip book on the net type thing… so neat!  i LOVED it.  so what better way to give myself a daily push than to… DO MY OWN FLIP BOOK!!!   i think i’m ganna shoot for the first fifty six days to the wedding but then after i’d like to continue to 100 days with the exception of the wedding day obviously.  if i can commit to doing the right thing one day at a time for 100 days, and make it fun… then i’ll be back on track for certain… afterall it took me nine plus the three months he’s been born to get this far gone, i can’t complain if i need to behave myself for 100 days to get back right!!!  SO HERE I GO!  i’ll post the pics when i’m far enough to have a neat progression… and figure out how to get them on here with my parents computer. (hyper hubby disconnected our net at home!!!)  saturday will be day one but i will actually start now, just i like the week to week thing so satruday i’ll start the pics.   this will be fun.   i’m excited actually.

okay so my new mom story.  when i registered for my breast pump i remember being really upset that it was discontinued and afraid i wouldn’t get it before they’d sell out and not have it anymore but i guess i’d forgotten that the reason i was SO set on that specific pump is because it was like 50 bucks as opposed to the average 200-300 dollar pumps i kept comming across.  well… i guess there is a reason.  my pump took a shit yesterday morning.  i was so engorged the poor babe could hardly latch on when i got home from the gym and i could only relieve it minimally by squeezing some out but that is painful and not effective when you are backed up as far as i was.  it felt like there was a rock on the side of my right boob and it HURT.  well i finally got enough out to get him latched on and filled his belly well… but now the problem stood tht i have no pump and no money.  so i was worked up explaining the situation to my hubby.  i told him i wanted to get a decent one since i plan on doing this for another nine to twelve months and any future babies… plus as long as i have milk i’ll probably keep pumping it for his cereal till i dry up (hey it’s less painfull than deciding to dry up right haha… so half  of this is cause i’m a wimp)  he agreed to give me fifty bucks towards a new pump.  i don’t work anymore so i only have a little bit of money that i make here or there doing hair and i like to have that money to buy things such as pb2 (hey it’s 1/4 the cals of pbutter but jeremy wouldn’t understand that need!!!)  and such.  so i agreed that i’d give him the money i earned at my next hair doings towards any i go over.  he agreed and i set out in search of a 100 dollar pump or less…
guess what…  turns out that’s like trying to find a computer for 50 bucks.  if you find it… you probably can’t trust it.  i found ONE, count it ONE other than the new version of the one i’d just busted and therefore don’t trust anymore.  i checked the reviews for that one on line as well as the one i’d had and found that there were two good reviews out of almost fourty and a similar finding on the one i’d had.  UGH.  i went home and did the girl thing and cried my heart out about this to my jerems and he finally said, "go charge it."  so i went to target to return the crap i’d bought just in case, and thought i could exchange it since i’d seen it in the store earlier.  too bad i forgot i was in west york when i saw it.  east didn’t have it.  i had to leave the store pumpless and it was twenty till ten.  no way i could make it to west york target in time.  so i ran to wallyworld and tadaaaa low and behold they had the "cheap" 150 dollar pump that i’d seen better reviews for on line.  i got my pump and got home.  now the peices needed sterilized.  so that was another half hour of taking stuff apart, reading the directions on what was to be cleaned and not… sterilizing took twenty minutes.  i fixed up some salads and made tuna salad while that was going and started some laundry… basically tried to be super woman… cleaned the kitchen up and then realized it was damn near one in the morning.  ugh.  so i went to bed.  how about my son sleeps till 7:30 when i walked inthe door from the gym.  i’m glad i had the pump since i needed to get rid of some milk before i went to workout, but… the kid FINALLY lets me have a whole night without feeding interruptions and i spend it up trying to be super housewife instead of sleeping like i should have been by ten!!!!!  this always effs up my diet since exhaustion is my NUMBER ONE downfall.  i still got up and hit the gym by four thirty this morning, came home, fed him, took a shower, cleaned the bathrooms, dusted the whole house between changings and feedings and rockings, and have three loads of laundry in some phase of doing. (one washer one dryer one folding) … wouldn’t a smarter woman take a frigggin nap!!!?!!!!  yes but i lay down and i think, "oh but this that and the other thing could be done right now." so i don’t sleep till i crash.  this is the habit i most need to change to get back on track with my diet, and also with my moods!  i know i’m moodier from being so sleepy.  who can blame me… but then it is my fault when i don’t sleep when the opportunity finally arrives.

my goals this next week are as follows:  1. pump TWICE a day instead of my morning pump only.;  2.  take a nap!!! (just 20 minutes) everyday.  3.  h20.  i was doing good and slipped on that one.  120 ounces minimum a day.; 4. 2000ish calories a day… CLEAN cals.; and 5.  go to bed by 10:30 LATEST. (shoot for 10).

don’t you love morning cardio?  that time when you are alone in your head and you get to set the day for yourself.  sometimes i read (eliptical and steppers.. i’ve mastered moving my legs as fast as possible while not bouncing my body to avoid cramping when i drink or eat too much before a workout… now i can read when i do it at pretty intense levels except for hiit)  anyway… sometimes i read, sometimes i watch tv, sometimes i listen to music, sometimes i flip through magazines, sometimes i talk to someone next to me (through puffs!) and sometimes, i pray.  the prayer days are my favorite.  they usually start something like this, "Thank You, Father, for another day, another opportunity to improve." or, "God please provide me with the energy to get through this workout!" on a sleepy day.  or on leg day, "Dear Father, it’s leg day… heaven help me!"    then i do my favorite thing to do… and what i know is God’s favorite thing too… i talk to him.  just talk to him.  tell him about my day, my baby, my husband, my mom and dad, how ticked i am that the sink broke or how greatful i am to have a sink (when i’m in a better mindframe!)  sometimes i am so convicted on these days that i am nearly in tears on the trainer!  today… was one of these days.

my dad shattered his wrist on wednesday last week.  when it happened he called for my sister from the yard, (we just so happened to be at my parents house visiting) and i looked out the window to see him laying on the ground clearly unable to get up.  when i first saw him and did not yet know what happened, my heart sank.  i grabbed brayden and ran out the door with tears streaming down my face before i could even get to him. i have nightmares about my father falling… and that being it… my brain assumed the worst immediately. besides, daddy’s aren’t supposed to break, but all i can say is how greatful i am that it was just a broken bone and not my more deep fears.  daddy went in for surgery today to have the whole joint rebuilt with pins and plates.   i wanted to pray for him to not hurt too bad, but as many prayers (haha or blogs for that matter) go, i got off track and somewhere started to pray about my own crap (selfish nature of humans… or me at least haha).  i was (again) running over my frustration with myself and how i don’t understand why, just like in the book of Romans, what i want to do, i do not do, and what i do not want to do, i do!  (i think paul wrote that?) he’s saying that he wants to stop a sin but he keeps finding himself doing it.  i feel this way about my diet so often and i repeat that verse in my prayers begging for some help and forgiveness in my lack of discipline even though it’s not really a "sin" persay.  it’s something i don’t want to do but i continue to struggle with it. i had so many thoughts so forive me if this is scattered… maybe someone out there can follow my head a little?  then i was thinking how self perception is such a big part of humanity.  a painter sees themselves as an artist or they’d never paint.  a business man sees himself as someone who can close a deal or he’d probably chose a different profession.  i see myself as someone to whome fitness is such an integral part of who i am, that i expect myself to behave accordingly.  when i do not behave as such, i am not only dissapointed in myself, i actually feel such a strong disconnect with myself that i can barely identify me in those times. (yes that means lately)  now having brayden, i feel like there is this whole other self that i am… i am mom.  that’s huge and i’m still adjusting to this, but i don’t want to lose myself completely either.  i hope that doesn’t come off as selfish… but i do want to maintain my premommy self in some capacity.  plenty of women do it… there are a ton of women on this site to prove it…. and i don’t think that it takes from being a mother at all so please don’t read this as my priorities being mixed up.  what i mean is just that my self perseption is so strongly rocked that i feel such a disconnect with myself before Brayden… bb as i call that time haha… and i just want a sence of that normalcy of myself back.  i want to feel like me again… me as mom.  so this led to the next thought… when i was a trainer, i worked with a ton of moms.  hell i worked with my own mom.  and i remember thinking time and time again, "your body is the perfect frame… you could really look fabulous if you’d just do what i told you to do!!!" and feeling frustrated that they didn’t eat right or care enough to just make some small changes and they didn’t trust me that if they did it in two weeks they would start to see differences!  i mean these women could have been HOT instead of just pretty… if they’d only just given a little effort and the chance and had faith in what i told them to do.  why couldn’t they just gie me two weeks.. they’d see the changes and be motivated to continue to reach a place they couldn’t believe that they could reach. it was frustrating!

what time and experience does to us… ha… i glanced in the mirror.  i was getting ready to tan before leaving the gym, and i was completely naked.  i turned around and checked out the bum to make sure it hadn’t completely fallen to my knees.  when i saw myself standing there and really looked for the first time since the week brayden was born (i did a lot of looking that week… mostly just in amazment that my body had created this other little body and how we were so different and so similar at the same time… having a baby is amazing)  but this time i looked at it and saw what i used to see in those clients.  i thought, "wow you’ve got a great frame.  you could look great.  too bad you’re too lazy or don’t trust what it oculd be anymore… if you just………" etc etc.  then i realized i was having these thoughts about myself.  weird.  funny how your perception is different for yourself when you are in the SAME position as your totally different view of someone else.  so i thought, "what would i say to myself if i came to me and we had a talk about this situation?"

myself: i don’t know what the hell to do. i can’t seem to get a grip.  i’m so frustrated.  i can’t figure out how many calories it takes to keep me running every since i had brayden.  none of the guides on line seem right.  i cut too hard and then i get so tired that i just eat for energy and it works but then i am left with the extra pounds too.  then i go right back to overcutting.  i can’t friggin put the crap down.  i behave for a couple days and then i step on the scale, see i lost and then figure okay so i still know how to lose weight and it still works so i can wait to care, but can’t figure out what i’m waiting for!  what do i do to give myself that kick in the butt?
i: well you need to know what you want worse.  you need to wake up everyday and decide.  worse yet… with diet, it’s not even a daily decision, it’s a moment by moment decision.  what you decided to do this morning (eat right and take care of yourself) may not be what you decide later in the day when a snickers bar is at your fingertips… you have to make a whole new decision again.  so you have to committ and recommitt constantly.  remember to identify yourself for who you are… if fitness is such a central part of your being, then you need to be it or instability will take over as that central being.  you get to chose everyday!  dieting should be a challenge… changing your body is fascinating and neat and fun to watch… i mean it’s really amazing to see what we can do by manipulating our diet and workouts… so keep that wonder and amazement.  if it’s not fun, don’t do it.  choose to have fun with this challenge.  in just two weeks you’ll see such a difference that you will be hungry for more… that hunger, not food hunger… that will drive you and… man you’d be hot if you did it!  trust me, and i will show you how cool it feels to go to bed each night and say, "i had another successful day today." and on the days that you aren’t as successful, just remember that’s life and it’s okay, you get another day to try again tomorrow.  just knowing you gave it your best everyday… that feels so good… so just do what you can.  if you get tired and have to eat more one day, it’s okay, just be smart about what you eat and stop before you get carried away and then move on and get over it or you’ll only set yourself back worse.  trust me… try this!
myself: what if i can’t do it.
i: then you’re no worse off than you are now… but at least you are living in your passion and purpose.  at least you’ll have your goals and your discipline.  at least you can feel good about giving something all you’ve got.

and when i talked to myself as though i were someone else… there was a whole new feeling to my thoughts.  i have always said i’m good at telling other people what to do but i never know what to do for me. (both in the sence of diet/exercise and life in general haha… i own that personality flaw!!!) but if i can remember that and use that on to talk to myself… maybe just maybe i’ll get myself back.  maybe i can be mommy and the buff chick that i used to be all at the same time.  i lost the fun when i got frustrated with myself for falling so far off the boat… but what i learned from my little conversation with me this morning (am i freaking you out like i have split personality yet haha) is that this is supposed to be challenging… otherwise i wouldn’t enjoy it so much!  so when i screw it all to shit for longer than i would like, guess what, i have more changes to recover!  i got into this whole fitness thing because i loved that it was the one thing that you have direct responce to the work you put into it.  the challenge is that unlike a sport or an instrument, it’s not a matter of practicing for an hour or two a day… it’s practicing 24 hours a day… at each opportunity to eat you have a choice to make…  the more good ones you make, the better you will look and feel.  the more poor choices you make, the further you will be from your goals.  none of this is news to me or to anyone who dared to read this insainly long blog, but maybe it’s what i needed to "hear in my head" this morning, and perhaps someone else out there will get something from it as well…

i feel a little renewed. who knows in a day or two i could be feeling defeated and bloated from another slip up, but for right now, for today, for right here in this moment and since i stepped on that eliptical this morning… i feel good and refreshed… so maybe i won’t be defeated and frustrated again in a few days.  maybe this time i’ll keep my self respect in check and remember that i knew i could help other women, and i can certainly help myself if i can take myself out of myself and remember why i love this so much, enjoy the challenge and finally get back into my before baby clothes again! (cause i got some hot fashions waiting for me! hehe… or at least myself thinks they are great clothes! haha)….

till the dress.  ugh.  this has not been as easy at it used to be. i can fight hunger no problem but after about three days of dieting i get so bogged down and tired that i end up eating crap just for an energy boost.  does it work? yes it does… but the scale shows it.  i can’t figure out how many calories i should be eating for breast feeding and am so scared to eat too many for fear of how i will deal with cutting back when i’m done nursing that i end up overcutting and then rebounding.  this is a crock and i’m having a terrible time here.

i want to know something from ya’all out there…   regarding "unclean eating"  i want to know which way people tend to be more successful… do ya’all find you stick to a diet better by allowing a few things that aren’t exactly the best choices or do you find you do best by strictly adhering to a clean plan with very minimal exceptions?  i have always believed the best diet is one you will follow.  i find that once i get sugar out of my system i can lose the strong urge for it but one slip up can be far more disasterous where if i allow myself to keep it regularly in a smaller capacity, i can get back on and my slips are less disasterous but more often perhaps.  i can’t figure out which way is better.  so i just was hoping to get some input from those of you out there who suffer with a sweet mouth (more than a tooth a whole mouth of them!)  any input out there!?!

well i hope that opposites attract and what i want to do will be not what i do! (get it… the old song opposites attract… me wanting to eat bad being the opposite of my goal… okay so cheesey whatever… keep reading!) … so after two weeks of behaving myself and a few good compliments from my mom easter hit and derailed me.  how can one little day do that!  well i normally don’t keep sugar in the house outide of dark chocolate hershey kisses because that’s the one thing i can be good with… and my mom definately made us easter baskets and just having the crap in the house has effed my day up. i always find that after about four days of eating super clean i will start to lose my drive to eat crap… but all it takes is one day to make me remember how that sugary shit melts in my mouth!!!  now here i sit back to where i was four weeks ago having wasted two good solid weeks of discipline with a wedding around the corner.  i guess that i am one of those unfortunate souls who will have to adopt the "no cheat because it gives me a taste for the crap" rule.  it’s kind of like smoking.  when i quit i wanted so badly to be able to just have a ciggy every now and then… just when i drank or like as a weekend party fun thing… ya know just sometimes… but i couldn’t do it.  everytime i tried i’d end up smoking more than i would have if i just didn’t think about it.  when i got pregnant and had to cut it out for real all together i had NO trouble at all.  the day i took the test that revealed little brady’s existence was the last day i had a ciggerette.  that means it’s been almost a whole year and only on rare randome occasions do i miss it.  those few times come out of no where and then they flee ALMOST as quickly as it came.  i bet sugar could be the same way.  the big difference is that my mother would have NEVER put ciggerettes in an easter basket and said here i did this for you!  ya know.  she would have never said, "oh it’s okay to have a little."  with treats there’s always a reason to jump off the boat and have a lil sugar fix… but for some people… people like me… that little fix turns into a HUGE monster that can’t be fixed.  i guess that the best option for me… is to just write the crap off altogether.  i don’t really worry about offending people either unless on the rare occasion that something was made especially gluten free for me… then i would feel guilted into eating it because i know that is expensive and stressful on those who do that for me.  fortunately my mother is the only person i would run into that with more than just here or there very rarely.. and i think that with the wedding and my pre pregnancy wardrobe sitting in her basement, she may be a little more cooperative.  i think with her it also helps to give her other options like telling her that fruit would make me just as happy and not just as round! the other dilema i’d had was that i TRULEY believe that SOMETIMES cheating does help boost the metabolism.  it has always given me a kick in the pants with energy and i’ve had better workouts from an occasional cheat and find that i always lose what i gain from a cheat and then some when i did a weekly cheat… the problem is keeping it to that once a week.  so the solution i can think of for that is just that instead of letting those cheats be sweets… i’ll try something like nachos or lasagna or something like that… i like cheesey stuff and don’t normally eat that and can eat it and feel satisfied and get back on track no problem so when i feel i need a boost or a break i’ll just do fruit and cheesey stuff is my plan.  (open to input)

so with two weeks behind me completely wasted… here i go again.  i’m smoking my last ciggerette so to speak.  no more sugar other than the hershey kisses (i normally have two a day and am good with that 50 calories with coffee)  i’m quitting!

this weekend has been pretty busy with the holiday as i’m sure most have been.  i’ve been dragging sick of this weather and want to know where global warming is occuring so that i may go there instead of here.  i’m starting to be certain that brady and i will never get to go for walks!  by the time it does get nice we’ll probably skip spring all together and just have a blistering hot summer. ugh!

on a brighter note… Gold’s gym was running a special this week and i finally talked jeremy into letting me switch so i went up and cancelled my planet membership on thursday and ran to golds to sign.  it’s only ten bucks more a month and i still get unlimitted tanning (though so far i think their bed is weaker but it’s only ten minutes so i don’ tmind having to do it more days a week and plus it’s stand up so i don’t feel so dirty)  they have daycare if i ever cut the umbilical cord and allow someone to watch him while i workout (right nwo i sneak out of the house at four in the morning so he doesn’t knoe i went anywhere and his daddy is there so no sitters needed)  i can’t even leave him with our families yet!  i get sick just thinking about it and some days even just leaving him with jeremy i can barely get home soon enough.  i walk in and have to sigh relief to see him and then i just want to hold him and realize how much i miss him for that two hours!  sick i know but what can ya do!  anyway there was that and they also have bodypump.  it’s a little girly of me but I LOVE BODYPUMP and if you really think it’s that girly of me… try it with the bar loaded… it’s not just some chick class.  in fact i’ve dated guys who were VERY tough that didn’t take it cause it was too hard!  this class is the same thing as group power for anyone who is familiar with the american version.  bodypump is just hte new zealand version and grouppower is the version that formed when the american marketing group broke off to start their own company and leave les mills the new zealand group. i prefer the body classes but they are not very different.  i’ve never foudn a workout dvd that was as awesome as those classes though… and as i’ve posted many times before if anyone is familiar with any that good (great music, difficult and athletic in nature) please let me know!!!

so i started going there this week again.  it’s been three years since i was a member there and i still recognize some faces even at that early hour!  there’s something re-energizing about going to a new gym don’t you think!?!  definately gave my workouts a nice boost and i’m sitting here with sore legs today!

i didn’t take pictures this weekend but did measurements and all were down again so that was a boost to my mentality, but this week i don’t feel like i’m maknig much improvement.  i may have to drop my weekend cheats.  i’m always torn:  is it better to have them and get a little out of your system… plus i often find that it does give me a kick  of energy and i burn more than i gained from them over the week after, but i am not very good at cheating in moderation so i feel pretty shitty the day after i do it and also i find it is harder to get back on track.  i guess everyone is probably different so asking ya’all what works for you would be nothing more than a statistical lesson….

i’m starting to fall asleep at the computer so i suppose a nap is in order!  hope everyone had a great easter and is havinga great week!

tomorrow marks twelve weeks from the "suedo-wedding." (the part where i walk down the isle with the man i’m already married to haha)  i have really cleaned up my act the last two weeks and my had my mom take some new pics from two weeks ago and as soon as i got undressed she said, "oh i can tell." so that really perked me up and made all the early mornings and hungry nights feel more worth it.   also that’s a great motivator.  i had considered trying to plan a competition close to the wedding as added motivation to diet right, but since i can’t supplement because of breast feeding, i decided it’ll just have to wait for another time.  for now, diet and exercise will just have to do!  i did buy my wedding dress which i’d feel great getting married in tonight if i had to so that is good, but i really wanna knock it out in twelve weeks.   my theory is that if i am spending that much money on one day, i want to feel like a million bucks.  i refuse to spend all that and then feel uncomfortable with everyone looking at me walking down the isle.  after all.. the dress is why i still wanted a wedding right haha… (well!!!!)

so this weekend is the official start to the wedding cut, though like i said i’ve been sort of sneaking it cleaner for the past several weeks.  isn’t it amazing how much better you feel when you do eat right.  i’ve been a little piggy today in anticipation of the strictness to come, and already feel like the sugar is in my eyeballs!

my neighbor whome i mentioned in previous blogs… (see also my blog on the kindness of strangers) and i have gotten to be pretty good friends and our growing friendship has really lifted my spirits in a way that is so different to me. i have not had many close friends in my life… my mother has really always been my closest.  she and my hubby have been the center of my world for the past three years… and i have felt very blessed just having them.  with brayden and my connection with my neighbor… i am so overwhelmed with love that i don’t know what to do with it all!  anyway, we went out last night and bought her an eliptical (i have one) and she is going to be able to start going to the gym with me on some what of a regular schedule a few times a week starting here in about two weeks!  nothng beats a friend that will get into fitness, don’t you agree!  i think it’s hard to maintain friendships with people who are not into eating right and working out… just because it’s so time consuming that it’s a good way to see them (working out together) and it takes the stress of going out with them away when they get your dietary "requirements".  she’s super respectful and interested in joinging me to at least some degree….  she LOVES my baby, and is just all around wonderful!  last night she got brady a giant stuffed bunny for easter (you know those huge ones!!!)    hehe… then then then… she knew i had stopped for some groceries and she came over and helped me unload my truck so that i could feed brayden who was not happy about the trip to the grocery store after our walk and trip to get the eliptical. (he was a hungry boy by then!) what sort of friend comes and unloads your truck so you can sit on your ass and feed your baby!  i mean… she’s really just awesome.  i wish there was a way for me to thank her for all she does for me.   so if anyone out there is a poor broke sister like myself and has some financially suave ways to show someone how special you genuinely think they are… i’m definately up for ideas. 

the day has brightened so brayden and i must be off to take care of our business today!  i hope everyone is fabulous and loving the spring season!  i miss being on here so much since my hubby lost his temper and disconnected our internet!  keeping up as best i can…!!!