Empress2k’s BodyBlog

I’ve gained 16 lbs since my last entry 8 months ago… and that’s not muscle..:(  I cannot even use pregnancy as a excuse.  Been there, done that - four times. So.. what is my excuse?  I stopped shopping for clothes and lost track of my waist line.  Long behold, I went from low size 4 to full size 8.  It didn’t help that my husband hasn’t been critiquing me either.  So here I am all blown up and nothing to wear with full closet of cute Summer clothes.  The conclusion - I better get my butt moving and do it fast.  Just ordered the Figure Book which supposed to have a very structured plan how to come from point Z to point A.  God speed!

My week rocked!  Loved it through pain.  Felt so positive that almost had myself get up at 6 am to go to the gym for more.  Then realized that the last thing I want is to burn myself out.  Hence, instead, I am taking my kids for a 3 mile walk.  Of course they’ll be using their scooters while I will be pounding the pavement of the famous Rose Ball…:)  I am so on top of my diet, I am really proud of myself.

Well, today is my 39th BD and I haven’t done as well as I wanted…:)  While I managed to maintain my loss of 6 lbs in the last 4 month, truthfully I made some steps back between Thanksgiving and now by gaining 7 lbs back…:(  Nevertheless, I don’t allow it bring me down.  I am back on track as of this morning.  I was in the gym at 4:30 am walking up some sweat.  I have a year to whip myself in the best shape of my life!  Happy New Year!!!  And I am going to do it right without putting too much pressure on myself.  I’ve done so well for the first 8 weeks that I now I can do it again.  I will create a quarterly plan for myself with each mini goal set for the end of the quarter.  Today I will post my current pictures and stats and set the clock…;)

So I messed up… Between Thanksgiving, partying for 2 weeks and getting sick, what can I say in my defense?  Not a big deal.  As I sit here in my office munching on an over-saturated dark chocolate chip cookie and drinking a 50% diluted cran-grape juice…:) thinking about the fact that I have 16 days left before my birthday.  I made some accomplishments but they are not anywhere near where I wanted to be.   Or well, at least I am not turning 40 yet.   That would really kill me.  I know in my heart that this time next year I will be in the best shape of my life…:) but for now I am happy with where I am.  Not to say that I gave up though. 

Well the pictures were posted yesterday and they spoke fot themselves.  Now a huge progress but still.  Made me recommit to work out even harder.  My measurements said much more about my accomplishment so far.  Still dropped at least half-inch in most areas.  Tomorrow I’ll be checking my BF %.  Keeping my fingers cross.  Anyways, I have only 40 days left before my Birth Day and that means pulling all the stops and focusing on one and only one thing from this point on…my body!  That means seriously reshaping my diet and adding more cardio to my resistance days, so I could lean out.  I have 16 lbs to go and, since they are the last lbs, they won’t give up easily…LOL

Despite some very rough times and a lot of stress at home, I am working hard at keeping my head above the water.  I am half way there and feel great about my results.  Though a dear friend told me that I look a bit dehidrated and un nourished, so I am going to add some more vitamins and drink more. Today I reintroduced green tea into my diet and committed to drink at least two cups daily. I had to agree with him because the last couple of weeks I have been neglecting my nutritional needs.  It’s time to take control over my stress.  I think the next body fat measurement will show significant loss though.

I cannot believe I haven’t blogged for 5 days. That’s a long time… Things are going well.  I am very goo d with my exercises and pretty clean with my diet.  For sure no white flower, sugar and potatoes.  In fact, I am still sort of struggling with appetite which I am using to my advantage.  It’s easy to control what you eat when you don’t want to eat. 

The workouts are going awsome.  I feel so much more powerful.  Look forward to my progress pictures this Sunday.

While reading a chapter on the issues people have with negative self-image from Jillian Michaels book, I couldn’t help but wonder what about all those folk like me who are so full of themselves that they might oversee their major imperfections and wrongfully assume that they don’t really need to work hard because they are already there.

I spent most of my childhood fighting against the negative image other people tried to impose on me.  “She doesn’t know how to behave,” “she talks too much,” “she is disruptive,” “she doesn’t pay attention” were the most common impression people had after meeting me.  Then as I’ve entered adolescence and teen years it got worse.  “She is horrible,”  “she is uncontrollable”, “she is a slut”, “don’t be friends with her,” “she is a drunk.”  So how I handled it?  By not believing a word they were saying.  By inflating my self-image so big that its shadow would prevent those negative comments get to me. 

Not to say that I didn’t have anything to build on.  By the time I was two I knew the whole alphabet, by the time I was three-and a half I was reading elementary schools books and so on.  There was nothing I could accomplish through my mental capacity and that’s how I fought with those who wanted to bring me down.

On the negative side, part of my fight was the rebellion.  I remember acting even worse then what was expected just to piss people off.  As I would get a strong reaction out of them, my sense of personal power would grow.  Of course that was not the kind of power one would be proud off, but it did help me to maintain my confidence.

Yes, it’s great to be confident and to think that there is nothing you cannot do, but it can be very self-destructive and hinder potential progress.  I would like to illustrate this point by coming back to the present day.  When I look at myself I see an attractive woman, who looks and feels much younger then her age, who have accomplished a lot, lived through a lot and has a lot to offer.  As I observe the changes in my body and feel stronger and tighter, that alone could potentially allow me to make excuses if I want to skip a work out and eat the wrong thing.  I subconsciously chose look past the areas of dissatisfaction so I force myself to stop and focus on what is not changing as fast as I wish.  Like the cellulite on my thighs for example or the lose skin of my tummy, focusing on that is that’s what keeps me fired up.

So for those of you who think that you look great just the way you are and who don’t have any negative image about yourself, please take a moment to look at the areas of yourself or your life that are still bellow your personal standards and don’t try to briefly scan through, focus instead so that you continue to remind yourself what needs to be done.

My husband, while supporting my efforts to work out daily, doesn’t understand the importance of me going to bed on time.  For example, last night, as I was about to go to bed at 10 pm, he announced that he was hungry, that he hasn’t eaten all day and that the left over from kids pizza wasn’t good enough.  I got really mad, so did he.  Then the kids woke up with various requests.  Finally by 11 pm I ended up warming up the pizza and making my way to bed. 

The good news… I woke up at 4:17 am on my own.  Yes, the alarm went off at 4:00 am, but who listens to it when all you want is sleep.  However, my own body, after getting up at about the same time for the past 3 days and another week prior to today, decided that it was time to get going. 

By 4:35 am I was in the gym.  My frustration from last night continued due to the fact that I had to go back home and make a breakfast for my ailing dad I brought in from a convalescent home a couple of days earlier.  Hence, I had to rush through the circuits and not taking the equal amount of pleasure as I do when I go to work straight from the gym.  Oh, well, like is a one big compromise between what’s good for others and what’s good for you, which are most often not the same.  Another 70 days and I will be able to throw myself a little celebration honoring my accomplishment and anticipating another big success as I will be entering the next stage of my complete transformation

I really felt like working out today, even though my quads were slightly burning.  I could see now how someone could get to a point of overdoing it with exercising.  Well!  Day off is a day off.  I have to obey the rules of the program.  I don’t want to burn out and stop in the middle of the way.  I’ve got 74 days (a little less then 11 weeks to go) and need to monitor my internal state as well as external.