Tuesday Results for Week 16

Last week I sent around a neatly tied scroll inviting my children and hubby to our end of the year school party....complete with an rsvp number for my cell phone.  It completely freaked them out.  I had to answer about 5000 questions...What kind of party?  A what? What does rsvp mean?  Mom this is your phone number on the rsvp, right?  It was funny.  Once in a while it's fun to drive your children crazy.  Really I think it's only fair.

For our celebration of the end of school we grilled, ate, and played a game that had us all in stitches.  We played the family version of the newlywed game.  Four teams of us guessing how our partners would answer questions about favorite things etc.  It really turned out to be way more fun than I imagined; I love it when that happens.  I love having a big family, and a special night like last night is magic.

Below is my week 16 in review.  The weight loss was not stellar by any means.  I have a plan for that.  I am excited about June.  Within a day or two I plan to blog about my summer kickoff to work off my next 40 pounds.

WEEK 16 RESULTS


Fasting Blood Sugar for 5/24/11 through 5/30/11
83
77
86
84
87
91
94

Morning Blood Pressure for 5/24/11 through 5/30/11
98/62
92/55
103/64
102/65
96/64
85/55
95/63

Dreaded Scale Numbers for 5/25/11 through 5/31/11
-0
-0
-0
-0
-0
-0.5
-0.5
So minus 1 pound. My total loss so far is minus 42 pounds. I am really okay with that.  I felt like I had a very healthy eating week, and I hope that means this next week will be more!  If every week starts getting this slow, I will not be okay with that.

Exercise for 5/24/11 through 5/30/11
4 miles/ 50.42 min. outside walking interval and lower body workout
3 miles/ 40 min. elliptical and upper body workout
none...worked on VBS decorating at church
4 miles/ 46.17 min. outside walking interval and lower body workout
LAZY....REST DAY
Rest day.
3.2 miles/ 39.24 min. outside walking interval..HOT outside!

Update on The Little Rose Jacket (TLRJ)

Go big or go home must have been my motto when I bought TLRJ.  It caught my eye while Christmas shopping in December of 2009.  I thought it was the tangible inspiration I needed to lose the weight in 1010.  Before I knew it 2011 was rolling in and I weighed at least ten more pounds than what I weighed when I bought TLRJ.  I dusted it off and decided 2011 will be the year that I wear TLRJ.

Naturally when dreaming big and pulling out smaller clothes to check out what fits last week, my eyes went to TLRJ.  I wasn't delusional enough to think it would fit, but since I was nearing the halfway mark in my weight loss journey I wanted to document how it fits (or doesn't fit) in pictures.  Note to self: clean the mirror in the boys bathroom before snapping photos in it! Below are a few pictures complete with measuring tape to see how many inches I will need to work off before the LRJ buttons.

That tape measure says it is around five inches until TLRJ buttons.  Like I said...go big or go home!  It really is only a PM (petite medium), and that should be in the right size range once I am at my goal weight.  It looks a little impossible in these photos, but that makes me even more determined to fit into in before 2012.

Below is my LRJ model Lizzie, and also freshly turned senior in high school.  I asked her to model it to show what it should look like, and of course it is a little big on her.

So there is the update on my progress toward my LRJ.  This fall or winter I hope to GO BIG and GO OUT in my LITTLE ROSE JACKET and some skinny jeans!

Amazing

I read this article here about the winners of The Biggest Loser.  The winner lost 129 pounds in 8 months.  Two of the others in this article lost 120 pounds and 116 pounds in eight months.  Amazing.  That is an average of around 16, 15, and 14 pounds a month for eight long months.  How do they do that?  I know they have training, help, and work out for hours every day.  I know my Jillian exercise dvd kills me, so I imagine her workout in person is incredible.  BUT WOW!! They lose some of those pounds on their own at home too.  Even if they did them all at the camp I still say WOW!!   They also look fantastic; no loose skin or any sign they were ever 129 pounds bigger.

I would like a dose of their determination and consistency!  It really makes me question all the popular advice out there saying slow weight loss is the best way to go.  I know some of the past winners of The Biggest Loser gained weight back, but a lot of slow losers (myself included) also gain weight back.  I confess I did not watch the show this season, but I am impressed with their achievements! What do you think? Slow and steady weight loss or fast and furious weight loss? Do you think it's possible to accomplish what they did without trainers, time, and of course that monetary reward?  I don't think I could lose 14 or more pounds a month consistently for the next four months, but it is inspiring to know those people did it for eight months!

Maybe a Little More of This

What does a six year old do on a chilly spring evening while his older sisters are practicing soccer?

He finds a plastic disposable glove and fills it with cold water of course.

He then slowly and innocently walks toward his soccer playing sisters.

Maybe a little more of this and a little less sitting on my behind in front of the computer, and I might not have to count calories!

Tuesday Tabulations

 Bananas and berries with cream for two.  Cold, refreshing, and serotonin producing.

I want to say that my thoughts and prayers are with the people suffering from the horrific tornado damage.  My heart is sad for them, and I cannot begin to imagine what they are going through.

Today I made it to the the official halfway mark: minus 41 pounds.  I predicted I'd get too dramatic about it, and had myself prepared for a slight depression facing the daunting task of losing another 41 pounds.  It didn't happen (I thought).  I was so happy to reach that halfway point, and I really felt like losing 41 pounds makes it that much more possible to do it again.  I'd like to order a 41 pound loss again please.  I was pretty chipper about the entire thing UNTIL......I got the grand idea I should take some pictures at this halfway juncture.  I thought it would be good to compare them with my at goal pictures some dreamy day.  UGH.  My perspective is so off.  I thought I looked way better,  I thought everything looked way better...my hair, face, double chin, arms, tummy, and behind.  Even my legs that aren't really fat (those sticks that carry my heavy apple around) are about the color of a cotton ball.  Lovely.  These pictures started to depress me.  I mean really, I lose 41 pounds and look like this?  I cannot imagine what I looked like before.

These pictures are enough to make me have a little big pity party, which of course could include some chocolate.  NOPE.  It is what it is.  I am going to be thankful that I have a healthy body.  A body that can walk, jog, lift weights, chase after my children, and hug on my man.  I am going to accept these photos, publish them for accountability, and embrace them as motivation to press on and lose the next 41 pounds.  It really isn't easy putting them on here.  That in itself is silly since everyone that knows me knows I look like this.  I'm the only one not in on the secret.  Maybe a little more reality and a lot less denial and I would not need to lose 82 pounds!  So behold the awful pictures below.  Motivational pictures: Don't do as I did, and I will continue to do better!

WEEK 15 RESULTS

Fasting Blood Sugar for 5/17/11 through 5/23/11

88

87

86

84

83

82

88

Morning Blood Pressure for 5/17/11 through 5/23/11

104/68

91/51

95/59

96/63

107/63

94/68

101/63

Dreaded Scale Numbers for 5/18/11 through 5/24/11

-0

-0

-0.5

-0.5

-0.5

-0.5

-0.5

So a total of minus 2.5 pounds this week bringing my total loss to minus 41 pounds.  Halfway to goal. 

Exercise for 5/17/11 through 5/23/11

3.0 miles/ 35.40 minutes elliptical/ upper body workout

4.0 miles/ 49.38 minutes outside walk interval/ lower body workout

4.0 miles/ 47.12 minutes outside walk interval/ upper body workout

2.0 miles/ 27.35 minutes (neck hurting)/ lower body workout

4.0 miles/ 51.26 minutes (neck hurting so slower)

Rest day.

4.0 miles/48.51 minutes outside walk interval/upper body workout

I have two herniated disks in my neck that act up once in a while. When they start to bother me, I try to do what I can to prevent them from going into a major problem which is extremely painful.  I had to slow my jogging a little.  I hope I don't have to stop jogging, because I am starting to enjoy what little bit of it I do.

Below is my journal for this week.  It seems like these weeks are flying!  

My Cholesterol: The Rest of the Story

Back in April I wrote this post about My Shockingly Great News .  I was in the middle of my eleventh week of healthy eating and I had sporadically taken a quick cholesterol blood test at The Little Clinic.  My parents were visiting from Illinois, and I had abstained from all the gigantic amounts of food goodies they had brought with them.  I walked out of The Little Clinic ecstatic and patting my back for not eating all of those treats.  The results they gave me told me my cholesterol had dropped from 278 at the doctors last fall down to 184.  I was so happy.  I followed the advice of the nurse at the clinic to schedule an appointment with my doctor to get a more thorough blood test; one that would tell me the complete breakdown of all the numbers.

I went into the nurse at my doctors office the next week and was about the perkiest I'd ever been giving blood.  I couldn't wait to get those results and see all the fantastically lower numbers.  Imagine my shock three days later when the nurse called on the Friday before Easter and started her conversation with,"These numbers do not look good."  I wanted to stop her right there and say...."whoa...what? Do you have the right person?"  I didn't open my mouth because I honestly couldn't believe what I was hearing.  My overall cholesterol was 230.  That wasn't as bad as my LDL and HDL.  My good cholesterol HDL was only 35 and it should be over 40.  My bad LDL cholesterol was 168 and it should be under 130.  My triglycerides were 135 which was, thank goodness, good.  They should be under 150.  My vitamin D level had gone up from 27 to 50; it was in the normal range.

I was so sad.  Really sad.  Now if the only results I had ever heard were those I might have been okay.  My overall cholesterol did drop from 278 down to 230.  That is 48 points lower in just 10 weeks of healthy eating.  They did not run the other numbers last fall, so I did not have a comparison for them.  However, hearing the seriousness of how bad those numbers still are in the nurse's voice combined with the fact that I thought my cholesterol was 184 really whacked me out.  More on that in a second.

I also noticed one more thing on my blood tests.  They ordered a hepatic function panel A also.  What was that all about?  Did bad cholesterol mean my liver was shot?  Did I have a liver disease they weren't telling me about?  I had to call back to find out.  Apparently, without asking me, it was routine to check my liver levels because they needed a baseline for the cholesterol medicine they were going to prescribe for me.  We agreed to disagree, and give me until this fall to see if I can knock those numbers into the healthy zone without medicine.

Back to whacked out me.  I hung up the phone , and announced we were going out to dinner.  My collage daughter was home for Easter, so we all loaded up and headed to Whole Foods.  It was fun and healthy, but the partay continued on to Sweet Cici's frozen yogurt.  Those bad numbers given to me by the nurse that flunked her bedside manners 101 class should have shaken me into reality and kept me on the straight and narrow.  I was just so sad, and we all know what emotional eaters do when they are sad.  I buried   my sorrows in a little Sweet Cici's.  The next morning the scale was up 1 pound.  Now a little sadder and in the mood to bake and celebrate I nibbled all day long preparing the Easter feast.  Sunday morning I woke up another 1.5 pounds up.  I was on a roll now for Easter and enjoyed a huge lunch and leftovers all evening long.  Monday morning I woke up 2 more pounds higher on the scale.  4.5 pounds I gained over Easter weekend.  I think it might have gone differently if that call had come after Easter.  I'm not blaming anyone else though.  No matter what the good or bad news, I have to control my emotional eating monster.    I continued that week to put on another pound and a half before I got a grip by Thursday and the pounds started to come back off SLOWLY.

I didn't really get a consistent grip and stop eating refined sugar until Thursday, May 5th.  So that little short weekend break turned into 13 days of eating sugar, trying to get a grip, failing to get a grip, wondering if I'd ever again get a grip, praying this wasn't the new trend that would make me regain all my weight as usual, and basically scaring myself to death.  Whew.  I don't want to ever do that again, but history tells me there is a strong chance I might.  I need to be prepared for dealing with it better. I need skills for dealing with my brain and emotional eating; good thing I rechecked out the brain doctors dieting book ; I hope to finish it this week.

Anywho, that is the sorry synopsis of how my cholesterol numbers are sadly not as good as I thought they were.  I hope that once I am in a healthy BMI range they will be better.  I am also trying to talk myself into a couple things: Maybe a 21 day cleanse to start the summer with a bang the beginning of June, and adding in a day or two of vegan eating every week.  I am thinking that maybe the more plant based eating I can do the better my cholesterol will be.  I would love to work up to several vegan days a week, but right now I will try starting with one.  Below is my Sunday lunch.  This would be a perfectly delicious vegan meal minus the chicken on the left.  I need more days minus the chicken (but oh chicken how I like you).

40 POUNDS DOWN

Forty pounds down this morning, and do you know how I celebrated?  Think big but not too big.  I bought these big old things and tried them out today.

I know, you can take the girl out of the eighties, but you can't take the eighties out of the girl.  I splurged on a new set of rollers since the clips to my old ones long ago grew legs and walked upstairs. What goes upstairs (teenager haven) usually stays upstairs.

It all goes together for me.  The more weight I put on the less I worried about my hair.  It was stressful enough just hoping my Sunday pants would still zip every week.  The bigger I got the more I just wanted to slip into church and back out without being seen.  It didn't seem like curling my hair would help my puffy face look any better, so when my curler clips went MIA I didn't replace them.

While I am on this subject of letting myself go, another thing I didn't focus on was clothes.  Hardly anything fit, and I refused to buy bigger and bigger sizes, so I wore the same things all the time.  I was also stuffed uncomfortably into them since I thought refusing to buy bigger clothes meant I wasn't that bigger size.  Talk about denial.  Anyway, I am really seeing this now because I am wearing different things all the time.  Almost every other day now one of my children ask me if what I'm wearing is new or they ask why I am "dressed up."  Most of the "new" things they don't remember are clothes from four years ago that I am getting back into.  So I say "NO,  IT'S JUST AN OLD SHIRT" or "THIS OLD SHIRT ISN'T DRESSING UP."  And it isn't dressing up really, but they are just so used to me dressing really really down in my two or three shirts I wore continually that they are surprised.  I hate it that I was such a bad example the last four years, but I see the influence it had, and am determined to do better!

Anyway, as life goes I walked outside with my bouncy hair wilting immediately in the spitting rain.  Before it started pouring I had my favorite budding eleven year old photographer Peter snap a couple shots of me minus 40 pounds.  Mr Aidan would not be left out.

I had a little bounce in my step (even if it was missing from my hair) today wearing my loose skirt and knowing I am just one more pound away from my halfway mark.

The choir sang a song in church today titled, "It is Finished."  There is a line in the song that says, "These were battles of my own making."  I thought of my weight gain and the battle I made for myself.  Then the song says, "I didn't know that the war had been won, Oh but then I heard the King of the Ages, Had fought all the battles for me,  AND THAT VICTORY WAS MINE FOR THE CLAIMING, And now praise His name, I AM FREE."   It makes me teary typing it.  I realized right then that He has already won this for me.  I don't have to wonder or worry if this next 42 pounds is coming off.  In His power and name I AM FREE!!!  They are coming off, and I am excited about experiencing the journey!

Do We Have to be HUNGRY to Lose Weight?

The television advertising payed off as usual.  My two youngest boys begged us for two weeks to go to the nearby May fair, and we succumbed.  We loaded up our bottom three children and enjoyed a night full of somewhat lame rides, monkeys riding dogs in the Banana Derby, gigantic camels, and the ever present smells of fried carnival food.
While I walked around for several hours taking pictures of my monkeys in a barrel...and they were preforming their monkey tricks like hiding while I tried to get the picture....,

my youngest partaking in his first driver's ed lesson,

or his train engineering lesson,

I began to get HUNGRY.  The nasty carnival smells were everywhere.  For a while I was actually to busy running after my fast as lightening children and snapping some more of these pictures below to worry about that HUNGER.

That last picture reminds me of why I love it that my fair job is photo support.  I don't miss the days of peer pressure and rides that made my stomach do flips.  I know some of you like my brother and sister-in-law beg your children to ride with you, but I like my feet flat on the ground and my stomach appreciates me for that.

Anyway, I was HUNGRY.  Nothing I saw walking by me looked even enticing except for maybe the gigantic mound of fried in oil potato chips.  Oh I do love a potato anyway everyday....fried, mashed, baked, chipped.  That is why I slightly resemble Mrs. Potato Head...especially from the profile.   I was HUNGRY; hadn't had a bite since lunch around two'o clock.  My mind started to try a few of those mind games on me like..."go ahead....just today....one fair event won't matter...".  I kept putting off those ideas and finally the night came to an end.

We had a little bit of a drive home, and stopped for some fast food for the HUNGRY family to eat in the car.
There were some healthy options, and like I said I was HUNGRY.  I opted out though because it was almost nine o'clock, and I so wanted to see a good result on the dreaded scale in the morning.  I was HUNGRY for my scale number to go down more than I was HUNGRY for food.

So YES, I AM HUNGRY.
 I am HUNGRY for the weight to come off.
I am HUNGRY to wear cute clothes in smaller sizes.
I am HUNGRY to feel more energetic and full of life.
I am HUNGRY to be a good example for my family, and make them proud.
I am HUNGRY to walk in success instead of daily defeat.
I am HUNGRY to hold my head high in public instead of shamefully worrying about my weight.
I am HUNGRY to strengthen my physical, mental, and spiritual muscles.
I am HUNGRY to lower my cholesterol levels.
I am HUNGRY to win this battle and live normally.
I am HUNGRY for victory!!!

I have real stomach HUNGER sometimes, and I do think living with that is part of this process.  I am trying to turn those hunger pains into notices that remind me what I am truly hungry for.  They remind me that my losing weight process is working, and what it is working toward.  When I am HUNGRY I want to yell," YES, I AM HUNGRY, AND I AM HUNGRY FOR ____________________!"

I woke up this morning and I stepped on the scale hoping for those good results I dreamed of last night.  Well, as the dreaded scale can be, I was only down 1/2 a pound.  Yep, minus 0.5.  I wasn't discouraged at all though, because I was empowered by right choices and victory the day before.  I went to bed last night peacefully in success and woke up still confirmed in that reality.  Even the dreaded scale could not take that wonderful feeling away.

How about you? Are you hungry, and what are you hungry for?

Tuesday Update on TUESDAY

This weekend my hubby and I enjoyed some berries and cream for two.  Some of my kiddoes indulged also, but I won't even go into their picky requests......no blueberries please, just the red ones mom with the blueberries, all with cream, just a little cream, no cream,  please just cream on top, and the winner...please just cream.  That last one is a small clone of mine.  My hubby and I aren't picky thank goodness; just give us all the berries we can have swimming in all the cream we are allowed and an extra squirt.  The berries didn't last long sadly, but the cream is still taunting me from the fridge.  I can't hear you cream, I can't hear you.

I'm trying to enjoy the weight loss journey so I don't drive myself crazy. I don't want to make it to my goal some day only to be so frustrated about the process that I return to overeating and watch those numbers fly right back up the scale. Been there; done that.  After reading some of Dr. Daniel G. Amen's book about healthy brains, I am now incorporating his advice for my brain type to eat foods that produce serotonin.  Serotonin is not in food, but certain foods cause the brain to produce serotonin (if I understand this correctly).  Some of the foods he recommends that do this are: bananas, cottage cheese, brown rice, herbal teas, mackerel, salmon, sunflower seeds, swiss cheese, and turkey.  It may be my overactive imagination, but I already feel a little calmer and more satisfied.

One thing I am doing it adding cottage cheese to our berry smoothies.  I was  trying to get some protein into my hubby's smoothie.  We actually really like the cottage cheese.  It gives the smoothie such a thick creamy texture making it almost like a milkshake.  I still like my brown rice protein, but now we have another protein option.  Below are our berry smoothies which contain the following ingredients: 2 cups berries, 1 1/2 cups sugar free coconut milk, 1/2 avocado, spinach, 1/2 cup ice, 1 teaspoon agave, 1 cup fat free cottage cheese, 1 teaspoon cinnamon, and 4 teaspoons Benefiber. Those ingredients make 2 smoothies.

WEEK 14 RESULTS--Have mercy; I did travel this week!


Fasting Blood Sugar For 5/10/11 through 5/16/11
93
99
103
86
83
84
93

Morning Blood Pressure for 5/10/11 through 5/16/11
104/61
101/64
85/46
103/55
101/68
93/61
105/64

Dreaded Scale Numbers for 5/11/11 through 5/17/11
No scale at motel.
+0.5
-0.5
-1
-0
-0
-0.5
So a total loss of -1 1/2 pounds this week bringing my total loss to 38 1/2 pounds.  I am getting close to 40 and when I get to 41 I will be halfway.  I am not happy with my blood sugar and pressure numbers.  It seems like I almost have to eat way under my calorie allotment to keep them low.  I am going to have to figure out this area.

Exercise for 5/10/11 through 5/16/11
Hotel Dreadmill 2.1 miles/ 30.20 min/ lower body workout
No exercise/ traveling
4 miles/ 49.55 min. outside interval walking/ upper body workout
3.2 miles/ 39.10 min. outside interval walking/ lower body workout
4.0 miles/ 49.58 min. outside interval walking/ upper body workout
Rest day.
4.0 miles/ 46 min elliptical/ lower body workout

I really do like the interval cardio workouts.  They are slowly making me faster and stronger.  Today I had a little workout buddy for my weight training time.  This child NEVER stops talking, and I love it that today we spent time chatting and exercising together.  Below is a copy of this weeks healthy living record book.  I still really like seeing the whole week at a glance together.

Apple or Pear

What shape are you?  I am such an apple.  Apple, apple, apple.  I feel like my stomach is never going to go away, and my legs do not look like they go with my body.  Frankly I feel a little sorry for them having to tote around this apple all day long.  One thing I have never thought about until today is the faces of apples and pears.  My face gains weight big time when I pack on the pounds.  I began thinking of some of my overweight pear friends wondering if their faces balloon out as much as mine does.  Really when I get to my regular weight, my face will look like a different person.  Of course I am dreaming that it will look like a twenty year old person but realism is not my strong suit.  Any of you apples or pears want to comment on whether your face changes much when you gain weight?

News flash: I just checked with the indisputable Wikipedia site and found out there are four female body shapes: Apple, Banana, Pear, Hourglass.  Okay, if I were taking a standardized test I think I could pick out which item does not belong in that list.  Really? I can hear the ladies at the gym...Oh I'm an apple. Honey I'm a pear. Well sweet darling I love being a banana. Not me losers....I'm a an HOURGLASS.   Really? We have three fruits and an HOURGLASS??? I am showing my lack of knowledge here, but I had no idea there even was a banana.  Sorry banana and HOURGLASS for not including your photos in the top; I'll make it up to you at the end.  According to the Wikipedia page only the apple and the banana shapes tend to put weight on in the face.  I would love to hear what your shape is, and if you gain weight in the face.

I am off to take my apple to the kitchen to see how the game of Apples to Apples is going.

Just to be fair; I do not want to leave out you hourglasses and bananas.  In all seriousness, I am very thankful for healthy bodies and the variety of shapes that God gave all of us!

Fellow Blogger's Inspiration

After our two baseball games this morning, I found myself wandering around Costco thinking about two questions I read on blogs this week.  The first question at The Diet Naked Blog was "Can you diet successfully without being obsessed with your diet?"  I just keep thinking about my answer, and decided to write my open response here.

I'd like to think that I can diet and lose weight without making it my entire focus, but just two days ago my husband said it seemed like I worked out all the time.  I thought about that, and I really am not working out more than 60 to 90 minutes 4 to 6 times a week.  Why does it seem like it's all the time to my family?  Really why does it seem like it's all the time to me?  Could it be that I put on my workout clothes, talk about my workout coming, finally workout, talk about the workout I did, and discuss for several minutes hours how I need to get a shower because of my workout.  It's a big focus; A BIG FOCUS.  And the food end of the diet deal is an even bigger focus.  I talk about the breakfast smoothie. I experiment with the smoothie. I blog about the smoothie. I read books on healthy eating. I tell my family about the latest and greatest things I just read about healthy eating ideas, and then of course I talk about them here.  I plan, cut, wash, grill, chop, and prepare in new and exciting ways healthy foods.  And of course forbid it that I every get off track and off plan because then everyone around me suffers with my explanations, excuses, and depression.

So NO, I cannot seem to eat healthy, exercise, and lose weight without making it a major focus.  MAJOR.  Part of me hates that I have to put so much time, energy and focus into the healthy battle, but then really I wouldn't be here needing to do this if I could handle food without the extreme focus.  I need to face the facts that I am an emotional eater, and I am seriously addicted to sugar.  Those are two serious facts that I have spent a lot of my life joking about and sweeping under the rug.  I spent the last several years telling myself it wasn't really that important, but I was lying to myself.  My borderline diabetic state and cholesterol numbers show that.  (Update on my Cholesterol...the rest of the story... later this week.)  I am emotionally and physically addicted to food, and for me it takes an incredible amount of focus to fight my way out of those addictions.  I hope for the day that a healthy lifestyle is just the norm and I do not need to devote so much thought, time, and energy toward it, but to get to that day, right now requires a lot of attention.

This is a battle. It is a worthy and important battle.  I can't spend my time wishing it wasn't my battle, or regretting "letting myself go" until I collided with this situation.  It is what it is.  Now I am climbing out of my pit of self-destruction, and that takes a lot of everything: planning, time, focus, failure, trying again, prayer, sweat, tears, and work.  While I am climbing up and out I am learning so much every step of the journey.  I cannot hurry it, but I need that total focus during it to stay strong, learn, and continue.  So my final answer to her question is Nope.  I am obsessed with this dieting thing, but I am trying to tone down my outward obsessed self.  I don't want to arrive at the top of the pit and find out I drove everyone crazy around me.

The other question I encountered was at Shrinking Sisters.  One of the sisters is frustrated because she is doing everything right and still the scale is not moving downward.  Oh the dreaded scale. I can relate to this one! I don't really have a clue for this but it sure has me thinking.  It just doesn't seem like all that scientific factual calories in and out stuff always comes through completely.  We, me included, are always happy to imagine that there are some people who just seem to be able to eat extra and never gain weight.  It doesn't bother me if their numbers don't work out.  It does become a nightmare when those same numbers don't work correctly for those of us cutting our calories and increasing our exercise.  The older I get, the fewer calories I need and the more calories I have to cut to lose weight.  I also cannot seem to cheat at all or my weight rebounds quickly.  At this age sometimes I think I need a few less calories than what the scientists say I do.  It does all seem like a mystery when my body finally decides to give up those pounds.  Well partly a mystery because one thing is for sure: if I eat an entire cheesecake I will pack on the pounds!

I enjoy reading you fellow bloggers out there in blogger land!  Thanks for making me laugh and think!  I leave you with my handsome hubby coaching my youngest son's tball team, and three of my daughters heading out for dinner.

He made it: first base!  Below a little sister love minus one working sister.