I'm back!

Hey guys! I'm back! Long time no see. I switched google accounts and haven't posted for a very long time. Mainly because my current blog is in one google account and this blog was in the other. A marriage has been performed and we are joined once again!

Just to bring you up to date, the battle with weight and fitness goes on. Up and down and . . . wait, no just up. It's more than frustrating. I have a feeling my problem is my hormones. I'm all over the place. I've taken some tests and will start with bioidenticle hormone treatment. I'm very excited and everyone I've talked to who uses them, swears by them. I'll keep you posted.

You see, if I just had more energy, I'd be able to work out more. I wake up in the mornings feeling like I've just run a marathon. I'm exhausted all the time, and I mean really exhausted. My poor kids feel so put out, because mom never wants to do anything fun.

My appointment with the doc is on the 17th so I'll let you know how it goes. So far, I work out as often as I can and then lay on my bed the rest of the day. (pretty much) --not conducive to great writing. It's been a real push to write at all. Mainly because I'm so tired all the time. I'm at the end of my current ms and only have about ten thousand words to go, so let me tell ya, I need to feel better so I can finish this dang thing, and become rich and famous!

So that's my life in a nutshell. I'll keep posting and let you know of my progress.

My Update

I'm going to start off this post with some fun news - I've lost fifteen pounds. Woohoo! Now, with that important piece of information out of the way, I can proceed with the rest of my update.

As you know, on June 13th I had a doctor appointment and was put on a very limited diet. I have been living it almost faithfully. I say "almost" because about once a week, I do falter, and end up grabbing a sandwich or something like that. I'm also not weaned off caffeine yet, although that is my next big goal. Until I'm off that, I'm not really being compliant with the diet. But it has been over six weeks since I've had chocolate (or dessert at all, for that matter) pasta, rice, or other grains, and I am seeing changes in my body. Even though the weight loss so far is fairly small, the shape of my body is changing. I can feel it in the way my stomach hangs on my body. (Yes, it hangs - we're keeping it real, right?)

Weighing in at my doctor's office was a bit mortifying. My first day of this new lifestyle, my bathroom scale said I weighed 290. Whoa - okay, that wasn't delightful. But then when I got to the doctor's, and got on his very accurate, scary, frightening scale, it added ten pounds. That's right - I started this out at 300. I didn't think I'd gotten that heavy. Wake up for Tristi!! But according to his scale, I'm now 284.5, so yeah, fifteen pounds, and we're backing away from that frightening number that starts with a 3.

Now, I've been down this path before. Huh. A lot. I've lost weight, gained weight, lost weight ... this blog was started during one of those well-meaning fits of losing weight, but then I lost the momentum. This time is different. This time, I can't lose the momentum.

In addition to the food allergies, I've got some health problems. I'm not going to go into them all here, because that's depressing and all that stuff, but also because it would take a long time, but the upshot is that I have to take care of myself or my life expectancy isn't that great. My doctor put it bluntly when he said, "You won't get to see your grandkids." Up until now, I've been skating along, feeling like the golden child, not really affected by anything. These last few months, though ... my knee gave out at the LDStorymakers Writers Conference. I was having to walk a distance between my hotel room and the conference rooms, and I was flat-out exhausted. There are other health factors we've recently discovered that added to that, but the weight was killing my knee, and it plain gave out. I'm tired of all this. I'm tired of weight-related problems, things I can't do - I don't enjoy driving our small car anymore because it's too hard for me to get in and out of. I drive the minivan exclusively now, and it makes me mad that I'm limited in which vehicle I take because of the size of my body. I find that completely wrong.

What it has all come down to, though, is my kids. They are all candidates for diabetes and heart attacks - they got all the bad genes from me and from my husband, and they have problems assimilating sugar. So we're all doing this really limited diet together - no carbs. None. No grain, no fruit, no nothing. We're eating vegetables (but not corn or peas - too high on the glycemic index) lean meats, nuts and seeds, and a limited amount of certain dairy products. We're seeing huge changes in our health, for the whole family. But it has been a challenge.

My biggest challenge right now is that I need to concentrate on making food in advance. This week, I pretty much starved myself to death because there wasn't anything readily available that I wanted to eat, I went too long without eating, and I got sick. I've got to break that habit. My kids will cook up eggs or whatever when they're hungry, and they're fine, but you know, there are just times when I don't want an egg, and I need to be more creative, and I haven't been. This is a way in which I need to be a better guardian of my own health.

I'm going to start checking in more and letting you know how I'm doing. I need further accountability. (Like the doctor's scary scale isn't enough ... ) But right now, here's my report:

1. I'm eating mostly clean. I have had some Wendy's over the last two days - starving, as I mentioned, and didn't prepare, so I need to reset the brain to cook in advance - but for the most part, I'm eating very, very well.

2. No desserts and no chocolate since the start of this diet. Yes, that means I've had no gummy peach rings, no chocolate-covered cinnamon bears, none of my old favorites.

3. I'm now drinking about 16 oz. of Coke - at least, that's what I had today. That's down from about 1 1/2 liters a day. Progress. Progress.

4. I'm not currently exercising. My workload has gotten super, super heavy lately, and what with signing books at Costco, etc, my schedule is more packed than it logically can be. I have plans to reintroduce exercise to my life next week.

5. My water consumption is about 3/4 what it should be, but again, progress.

So ... that's what's up in my world. I'm seeing good changes, I'm making good changes, and I'm very proud of myself. And that's what's important - proud of myself without making excuses. It's a good feeling.

Hey Mama Welcome to the 60's!

So the whole only weighing yourself once a month has been pretty easy this last three weeks since the battery in my scale died. I had a kind of bad 4th of July week in which I had a Pepsi at the Real Soccer Game, a handful of Red Vines on the boat, and an Oreo cookie here and there. Needless to say I wasn't looking forward to getting a new battery after that! But I was still a lot less than I had been and I needed a new swimsuit. My cute step mother-in-law, who is not much older than me, and has divine taste in clothes told me to come over and look through her old ones as she had about 10 extra ones. So I went and found a cute tankini that I looked good in (for the first time in years I was excited to see myself in a swimsuit.
Since the swimsuit experience had gone well I decided to use their scale to check my weight, because I knew from experience it was right on par with my scale. And I had to step on three times just to make sure....I'm in the 60's for the first time in years. I weighed in tonight, fully clothed and in the late afternoon mind you, at 165 so I have lost a total of 34 pounds since February!!! I am so excited. I couldn't help but think of the Hairspray song "Hey Mama Welcome to the 60's". Sixteen more pounds to go to hit that 50 pound mark I was hoping for. Here is hoping the next month goes as well as the last!