Two months later

July and so far, August, have been bad exercise months. I joined Peer Trainer some time ago, which helped me log exercise and food. It made me quite good at keeping track and keeping me motivated to exercise. End July was a tough time at work, and I'm going on vacation next week, so this week has been a bit hectic as well. Last week though, I got in 4 days I think... or at least 3.

The aim is still to eat sensibly and exercise, but the gym part has got a bit boring. On the upside, I've definitely lost weight. More clothes are fitting and looking better.

Am off for a vacation for the next week so this week and next week, no formal exercise. The week after that I should be able to work out, followed by another week out of town. That week can include exercise - I'll strive towards it :)

Need to get my ass back on track and I'm still committed to it, even if I'm being a bit lazy.

For the record, weight now should be around 71 kgs.

Moving... Forward

Moving is reasonably appropriate as I'm managing at least 3 days of exercise per week. Last week was bad, I only managed 3, but this week (it's just Tuesday) I've already managed 3. The exercise may only be half an hour of walking + abs, but it's something. Something that I'm finding time regularly for. And I'm also able to make healthier food choices ongoingly. And my clothes are getting a bit looser :) Things looking up I think.

Though, I don't believe I've lost weight really - I'm sure the next time I step on a scale, it will tell me that I've gained weight. Which I'm actually ok with, as I see a difference in myself. Have to keep reminding myself that weight is a number, the body being able to do stuff is much more real.

Regress

The day of the last post, I didn't exercise, but the day after that I did. When I weighed myself, I'd actually gained a full kilogram! I was in shock, but also figured that my period had begun and I was probably retaining water. Another day's break followed (gym was closed) and I went again yesterday. This time I was half a kilo lighter than the previous weigh, but still heavier than I had ever been.

Today, I've promised to meet a friend for dinner and am wondering if I can get out of that. Mainly cause meeting for dinner might mean I din't go to the gym, and all the food in the fridge, continues to sit in the fridge. On the other hand, I could go to the gym, go for dinner and eat the fridge food tomorrow.

A little conflicted, but believe that exercise is likely.

Progress

I'm a complete nutter. I've been exercising regularly so far - i.e. 3 days. However, I'm feeling very very virtuous. Like I've been exercising regularly for a month or more! Its like if I can do so regularly for three days, I can do so for ever! The other thing is, that I'm actually looking for changes in my shape and health - in three days! I'm trying to stay normal about this. Hopefully I'll manage.

At this point, I'm still only doing walking and cycling, but feel better about myself. I've been weighing myself every day and eating reasonably healthily. Which means to eat fresh, and home made. I've brought lunch again today - so that's the 4th day running. So feeling pretty good about that as well. With all the exercise, I'm too tired to cook in the evening, but will need to fairly soon (running out of food and have many veggies awaiting their fate).

I've been weiging myself every day and from my weight on Monday, I've lost 400 gms. It's an instant motivator. I'm not sure whether it's a general water loss but would like to attribute it to healthy eating and some exercise. I'm ready to exercise today as well, but am feeling very tired.

Tired cause I overdid it yesterday. While exercising, I could do it, walk rather fast for the length of time that I wanted to. Music pumping, walking one minute at a time. Got through it. And nearly passed out at home.

Today I must be reasonable.

Another Week

Last week passed without any exercise for a variety of reasons, primarily laziness. In Sunday I met my parents for a good amount of time. My mother expressed concern about my health and that freaked my husband out much more than my railing and ranting about my health.

Yesterday, being Monday, I realised that work wasn't too pressing, so went to the gym. I've also put a meeting in my calendar for the 2 hrs it takes me to go to the gym and get back home so that nobody can really schedule something for that time. I'm planning to keep that going this week. I also joined Peer Trainer. It's a free resource online that allows you to log stuff and join groups. Groups full of people who are trying to work out. It's just been a day, but hopefully it'll be of some value. One of the key things I already learnt, is that adding too much too soon is a recipe for failure.

I tried to do diet and exercise modification at the same time, failed. Now though, been doing the cooking/eating in a planned way for almost 3 weeks, and it seems to be working. So now can add exercise. Peer Trainer suggests that we only add 1 new thing a week.

So yesterday I went to the gym, did 25 minutes on treadmill and 10 minutes cycling. Felt good after that. Not too tired and no bad aches and pains. Today, no aches and pains either, which means I'm not overdoing it. I only walked on the treadmill, but did just over 10 minutes at 5.8 kmph which I thought was quite good. Got a good stride going, no knee aches or foot aches. Cycling was also good - I felt it working muscles without hurting knees.

Naturally, I feel all righteous because I did exercise yesterday and it didn't kill me. The plan is to follow the same process today. Work properly during the day (wasting little time) and leave with sufficient time to get to gym.

I realised that I ate a couple of sweets yesterday! Bad me! Still, I'm not too upset, since I did just about everything else right.

A New Week

I decided to plow forward in this attempt. So what if last week I didn't meet a target. I've re-evaluated some of my goals.

Long Term:

1. To get my periods back. I don't know where they've gone, but I miss them. They were a sign that everything was functioning ok. Not optimally, but ok.
2. To be able to buy clothes that look nice. Right now, nothing is available in my size.

Short Term:

1. To work out at least 15 minutes a day, 4 times a week.

I realised that the last time I exercised, I went for the 1 hr work out. I managed, but I was dog tired that day, and had no motivation to go the next day. I also realised that it's stupid to go from no exercise to 1hr exercise, the body really can't handle it.

So now I'm going to push for at least 15 minutes. Hopefully I'll be a little regular with that. Actually, not hopefully, I'd better be regular with that. That and the cooking/eating healthy thing.

One Week Later

So, one week is now up, let's see how I did. I've been eating better, cooking and stuff. In the past week, only 1 meal was eaten in a restaurant, but 2 meals consisted of delivered food. There were also home made veggies at these meals, so I feel a little less guilty.

On the exercise front, I've done very badly. Only one day of exercise. The plan was to exercise today, but it's 7:20 p.m. and I still have about half an hour's worth of work left. So it's very unlikely that I'll go to a gym today. Will aim for tomorrow morning.

Any and all tips on how to get to exercise will be greatly appreciated!

The Next Day

Last night was not pleasant. I had planned to go exercise, but had to wait to speak to someone at work, so got delayed. I made it home and planned to eat healthy, sleep early and go to the gym in the morning.

I got home and had a fight with my husband over something. It's something that's important to me, but something he doesn't care about at all. To me, waste is a sin. To him, if you have it, you can waste it. I actually said 'I can't be married to you'. I promised myself that I would not threaten to leave, ever. When we were just seeing each other, there were times when I would threaten, but consciously avoided it after a point.

So... I still cooked, and ate healthy. I also slept fairly well. I wanted to go to the gym, but couldn't get up early. So that's one down.

Let's see if today's better.

The Why

I've tried formal exercise. In September 2007, I joined a gym and got a personal trainer for a while. It worked because that girl was waiting for me, I got to the gym. It was for about one month, and I was beginning to lose weight. Then the training stopped and I became less regular. The membership contiues (and it wasn't cheap to begin with) but my attendance is nearer zero than one.

I understand now that I need to lose weight. It is a physical need. I cannot carry around this extra weight but I'm still lazy. I decided that I should start a blog to ... I guess remind myself about why. Also, I understand that motivation is key. It appears that the simplest for of motivation is to get a personal trainer. That way I have someone to meet and cannot bunk/change the proposed exercise time as I feel like. Also, all information on motivation says that I should find some :)

I figure at this point, that I'm going to see for 1 month if I can do this on my own. If I can't, I'm going to get a trainer. There's no point spending money on a gym if I'm not going. So spending more money on a trainer is actually converting bad money to good.

My Long Term Goals are:

1. To lose the extra weight.

Hmm... interesting. Seems like my only need to exercise is to lose weight. Bad idea what? But then I'm lazy by nature, so thinking about running 5km, half marathon, etc - hold absolutely no fascination. Looking good for my wedding - too late.

I think the key is to feel good about myself. So

2. Feel good about my body.

Now that that's done, we move on to the shorter term stuff.

Today, 17th April 2008 is the beginning. I give myself one month to do the following:

1. Go to the gym 3 days a week minimum;
2. Prepare meals at home 3 days of the week;
3. Take lunch to work 2 days of the week.

I notice that there are no weight-loss indicators, but I think this is a good start. I'm also going to take a 'Fat' picture and put it up here. Since nobody else sees the blog, it should be fine.

I'm going to post every day about whether I went to the gym, what I ate and how I feel. The feel part will relate to energy and alertness more than emotional states as I get guilty easily and defensive more easily.

At present nobody else knows about this, as I don't handle pressure from others very well.

Wish me luck!

The Grand Beginning

I've started this blog (whether it gets readership or not) to document my weight loss program. I refuse to call it a 'plan' as I'm afraid that that is what it will remain.

I've thought of myself as Fat all my life. When I was a child, I had a stomach. So the rest of me was normal, but I always had a paunch. In my teen years, I was very conscious of my stomach (even though I actually looked pretty good). There were other reasons that I was conscious in my teen years, but that is fodder for a different blog. So when I entered university, I was convinced I was fat, I did stuff (like targetted exercise) to reduce particular areas. They worked, they didn't work... so I continued to feel fat. In reality, I was reasonably fit, just not toned in certain areas (like stomach).

When I finished university, I rapidly gained weight. Apparently I was getting a lot of exercise during university that I didn't even realise. In retrospect it appears that my body image has always been 'fat'. So I didn't even realise for a while that I had gained weight. Then it became a bit obvious - everybody told me that I'd become fatter. Around the same time I met my husband. Our typical dates involved eating out - and eating well. I understand that it's not a blame game. But clearly, if our interests were in exercise, I'd have gotten fitter. I was also living on my own. I tolerated my own cooking, but my husband was less than excited. Which meant eating out more.

In mid-2004, I went to Singapore to do a Masters. It was a one year program and the food available locally was not very appealing. Also, I didn't have much money. So I started cooking. Also, I was a student so had to use public transport. This meant walking to bus stops, walking from bus stops etc. It also meant that I had free time. I stayed in an apartment complex which had a pool - a nice, big, pool. My flatmates were enthusiastic about swimming. One is Chinese, the other Vietnamese - so no paunch at all. In three months, I was better - toned and lighter. Overall healthier. I moved at some point, but continued to eat at home and to exercise - not gym type exercise but walking and swimming.

I came back in mid-2005 and planned to continue that way. I got a job and managed to cook and pack lunch. Exercise was much less, but at least my intake was mostly healthy. For a variety of reasons, I gained weight during the winter of 2005. I realised this in early 2006 and did a bit of exercise - mainly swimming, and lost some weight as well. It actually worked as long as I was cooking.

Then I stopped cooking. I also started working harder, staying in office later. So started eating snacks in the office and getting back too late to cook. I gained weight steadily in 2006 and changed jobs towards the end of 2006. I thought that with less of a commute, I'd have more time for a lot of stuff.

Clearly, motivation was lacking. The commute is much less, but then I started getting up later than before. Also, my husband came to live with me in mid 2007, so cooking for 2 began. The downside of this is that one dish rarely lasts for more than one meal. Also, the effort isn't as appreciated as I'd like - so I do it less often. I tried to recruit him into cooking - but he didn't appreciate that at all.

So here I am. It's April 2008 and I weigh about 74 kilos. I'm 5'7" tall. I'm officially 8 kilos overweight. Bordering on obese. I want to have children, but I think I have PCOD - my periods are irregular.

I had very similar issues when I went to Singapore - overweight with irregular periods. But in that year, it all improved. Now it's all back to 2004 levels.

Once more - I am 5'7" tall and weigh 74 kilos. I want to lose weight steadily and maintainably.

In my mind, I know that the correct way to do this is to eat sensibly and to exercise. I know that eating sensibly involves me cooking, or eating fresh fruits and vegetables in larger quantities than I do at present. I know that I must exercise for at least half an hour, at lest 3 times a week.

How do I move from the knowing to the doing?