Speaking Tonight and other important thoughts

My husband, Jeff, is in the hospital.  He had a mass removed from his thigh yesterday and it turned out to be malignant.  We are waiting for results from pathology which will take 5 to 10 days.  Meanwhile Jeff is recovering from the surgery and will hopefully be home tomorrow (Friday) or Saturday.  His treatment will include radiation to the leg area where the mass was removed.  Any other treatment plan will depend on the results of the pathology report and tests which they are running to determine if and where the cancer may have spread.  On the positive side, his surgery went really well and his recovery is progressing faster than expected.  He is up and walking with a cane.  Physical Therapy had him on the stairs and so far his pain is very low.

As you can imagine, with the unexpected diagnoses,  my stress levels are a little higher than usual :)

I am going to fight against the stress and worry and try to continue to take care of myself and "work the plan" in the midst of the battle.

It is time for my monthly update so here goes...

The plan is still working and I continue to make slow steady progress towards my goals.

Tonight I give my testimony and tell my weight loss story to a group of women at a T.O.P.S. meeting.  Janene McDaniels invited me to share months ago and tonight is the scheduled date.  I refuse to let Satan win this battle and silence what God has put on my heart to share!  I have been organizing my thoughts and blogging them.  It is heavy on Jesus and I pray I can be a testimony to His greatness and not my willpower.

Katie has joined me at FitClick in daily updates and food & exercise logging.  I love "meeting" Katie there and hope I am helping her as she is helping me.  It is almost like playing a game as we rack up fitclick "points" and encourage each other's progress :)

I bought a couple new pairs of pants since my last update and also new bras (lol!).  When I went shopping I went to my favorite store, Avenue.  It is a plus store and I have shopped at plus stores and "women's" departments for over 20 years.  Well, I tried on their smallest size, and it was too big!  I had a bittersweet feeling of sadness/joy as I left the store and headed to the misses department of Kohl's.

I purchased a body fat monitor.  It is similar to the one that Curves uses at my monthly weigh and measure.  As I get closer to my weight loss goals I am keeping a close watch on my body fat % (not to be confused with bmi) to make sure that the majority of my weight loss is fat and not lean mass.  When I started at Curves they measured my BF% at 44% - "Poor".  Today it is 32% - "Fair" just a point below "Poor".  "Very Good" for my age would be 22-26%.  This is another long term goal I would like to achieve.

Weight loss status...

Started June 3       268.0 lbs 39.58 bmi "obese"
Today   March 18   185.8 lbs 27.44 bmi "overweight"

82.2 lbs down!
(less than 17 lbs from goal #2)

GOALS REVIEW (updated)...
1st goal (lose 65lbs) 203 lbs 29.98 bmi "overweight" ACHIEVED Jan 17, 2010
2nd goal (lose 99lbs) 169 lbs 24.96 bmi "healthy" by July 2010
3rd goal (lose 111 lbs) 157 lbs 23.18 bmi (qualify for the 100 lb Club at Curves)
4th goal (lose 121lbs) 147 lbs 21.71 bmi by Dec 2010

These are my PLANS/GUIDELINES (just some tweaks to the existing list)...

1. Never Skip Breakfast! (well-balanced & trying for 1/3 of my daily calories before noon)
2. take good nutritional supplements every day
3. eat 5-9 servings of fruits and veggies per day
4. eat at least 25 g of fiber per day
5. continue Curves 3 times per week
6. Water only when out to eat... and minimum of 64 oz water each day
7. Daily monitoring myself with Fitclick.com (maintaining a healthy calorie deficit)
8. no eating after 7:00pm (with a few exceptions)

MY STORY - PART 3: Having a Plan and the Tools to carry it out...

As my thinking became healthier, a desire grew within me to start making healthy changes in my life.  Before I even had any specific goals, I just wanted to start living better and making daily choices that were more in line with the new beliefs that were replacing my old (unhealthy) beliefs.  A desire was growing in me to start some sort of exercising.  This was crazy, because never before in my life could I say that exercise was something I desired to do!  I also had an overall desire to start making changes in my eating.

I didn’t want to make huge changes that I would do for a day or two or maybe even a week and then give up.  I wanted to make small incremental changes that I could live with and that fit my personality.  I needed to understand myself and learn what factors tend to help me succeed at a task.  What things tend to get me off track?  What are my strengths and weaknesses?  What are my default eating patterns?  My list goes something like this…

· I am task oriented.  To-do lists are my friend (when I am disciplined enough to make them)
· I need accountability.  What gets checked gets done.
· I love games and challenges and tend to be competitive.
· I have an “all-or-nothing” personality and tend to see things in black and white.
· I view eating as a social activity and when alone I tend to skip meals or practice mindless eating or eat without a good plan.
· When eating in social environments I tend to overeat, especially if served family style/buffet.
· I love spending time alone and sometimes resist spending time with others.  But time spent with friends really energizes me.
· I love to work on computers and like to use them to simplify and organize my daily tasks.
· I enjoy Facebook and email and other forms of online communication.

This list could go on and on but you get the idea.

I knew instinctively that I would ultimately fail in the long run if I made changes that didn’t work with my personality, take into account my weaknesses and that I could not live with “for the rest of my life.”  As I set up small changes and new guidelines for myself, I would ask myself the question, “can you do this for the rest of your life?”  If the answer was, “no” then I needed to evaluate it again.

I asked my husband if I could join Curves.  My thinking was it was 3 times a week, for about 30 minutes.  That fit in with my personality and I thought it might be just the structured kind of exercise program that I could stay committed to.  He looked at me like I was crazy (we are not the exercising types) and told me that we couldn’t afford it.  I agreed and went on thinking of what other kind of exercise plan would work for me.

Meanwhile, a Healthy Lifestyles support group was starting up at my church that would use Yahoo! Groups to share goals, tips and encouragement.  I decided that it could offer some of the accountability I needed so I joined on June 3, 2009.  This was my opening report:
...

---

As I begin to emerge from a grieving process (that has actually been going on longer than I knew) I see that I need more balance in my life that includes looking out for my physical well being.

One of my issues is "unplanned" fasts because life just gets too busy to stop and eat. Then I end up eating too much when food becomes "available." Long term changes involve eating at closer intervals and learning better portion control. This actually sounds really hard to me... small, more frequent meals?... not how I think about food at all.

I don't want to "crash and burn" so I am starting slow and plan to add more changes to my habits as we progress...

1. Eliminate beverages at restaurants... water only. and more water throughout the day.

2. Long walk (2-3 times a week). I Plan on starting this with my kids when school lets out (June 15).

3. 5 servings of fruits/veggies each day (replacing other choices). Using this discipline to begin to change the way I think about frequency and portions.

---

...
On that day I started to keep an online food journal.

On my birthday (6/11), my husband surprised me with a 2-month gift certificate to Curves.  He said that if I didn’t miss any workouts for 2 months, we could talk about signing me up for a full year membership.  Well, I didn’t miss any and I did sign up for the year.

By June 14th this was my “plan”…
1. Eat 5 servings of fruits and veggies per day
2. Try Curves for the next 2 months and maybe longer after I see how it goes
3. Walk with the kids 1 or 2 times per week all summer
4. Drink water only when out to eat... and more water throughout the day
5. Keep daily food journal and weight log

At this point I started to define my goals.  My start weight was 268 lbs.  “obese”  I determined that for my height 203 lbs is my upper end of “overweight” and 169 lbs is my upper end of “normal weight.”  I made achieving Overweight and Normal weight my long-term goals but not my real focus.  I really wanted to focus on the daily plan and my short-term successes and not get bogged down with how far I had to go.

By August I added another item to my plan: “no eating after 7:00 pm.”  And because the kids were back in school and Curves was working out wonderfully, I dropped the walking.

Every month since then I have reported my progress to my church accountability group and evaluated my plan.  What is working?  What isn’t working?  What have I learned that can help make my plan better?  The list changes a little bit each month.

On January 17th I weighed in at 203 lbs and achieved my first “long-term” goal of dropping my BMI designation from “Obese” to “Overweight.”

This is my current “plan”…
1. Never Skip Breakfast! (Have a good portion of your daily calories here)
2. Take good nutritional supplements every day
3. Eat 5-9 servings of fruits and veggies per day
4. Eat at least 25 grams of fiber per day
5. Continue Curves at least 3 times per week
6. Water only when out to eat... and minimum of 64 oz water each day
7. Maintain daily food journal and weight log (keep a healthy calorie deficit)
8. No eating after 7:00pm (with a few exceptions)

Today I weighed in at 186 lbs and I’m 17 lbs away from my 2nd long-term goal of dropping my BMI into the “Normal” range.

MY STORY - PART 2: Success Starts in the Mind!

I was not ready or able to begin making healthy changes in my life until I started to understand how my thinking was effecting my behavior, my attitude and my choices.  What do you believe about yourself, your abilities, your future, your limitations?  These beliefs create your reality.  Even if you have a belief that is incorrect, that belief will still determine your behavior... probably in ways that are unhealthy.  The process of discovering what you really believe may not be easy.  Many of our beliefs are subconscious, developed over our lifetimes because of our experiences.

When my mother died I began a grieving process that was inevitably one of the healthiest experiences of my life.  Nine months after her death I began to emerge from the depression with new insight into myself and a desire to start making changes.  All of the credit is due to Jesus Christ.  My relationship with Him sustained me and challenged me through the entire process and continues to.

Here are just 3 of the beliefs that I had to confess to (and be truly honest with myself about them) so that I could be free to make effective changes in my behavior...
---------------------------
UNHEALTHY BELIEF:  Everyone around me is dying... I am losing everyone.  Death for me is imminent too.
SOURCE:  Grief & depression from the losses of my family members overwhelmed me with a subconscious dread and a nagging feeling of futility.
DISCOVERY:  Allowing all the stages of the grieving process to complete gave me insight into this.
WHAT GOD SAYS:  My life is in His hands.  Only He knows the measure of my days.  He gives me his power and protection daily.  I need to give Him my best everyday.
---------------------------
UNHEALTHY BELIEF:  I believe being fat is safe.  I am safe from unwanted male attention/abuse if I shield myself behind layers of body fat.
SOURCE:  Experienced sexual abuse as a child; assault as a college student; plus other life experiences.
DISCOVERY:  While listening to the testimony of Mandisa at a Women of Faith event.  I was stirred in my soul with the realization that some of the issues she was sharing were mine as well.
WHAT GOD SAYS:  The LORD is my protection and shield.  Placing any other thing into God's role is idolatry.  (I was making my body or body "shape" my god by relying on it for protection)
---------------------------
UNHEALTHY BELIEF:  I don't have the willpower or the desire to stick to any healthy changes for very long.  Plus I am way too far gone.  Even if I loose 50 pounds, I'll still be obese!
SOURCE:  Seeing others try and fail.  Laziness.  Fear of failure.
DISCOVERY:  I believed this consciously and would even say it out loud as well and in my "self talk."  The discovery was more in realizing what God thinks of this attitude.
WHAT GOD SAYS:  The fruit of the Spirit is love:  joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness and self-control.  If the Spirit of God is living in me, then I have access to all these qualities everyday and at every meal :)  Through Christ is the self-control to handle food cravings.  Through Christ is the faithfulness to keep up with an exercise regimen.  Through Christ is the patience to persist (with joy) through the slow process... even it takes months or years!
---------------------------
I had and I am sure that I still have many more unhealthy and untrue beliefs.  Discovering them and learning how to free myself from them is an ongoing process.

Even as I was becoming aware of and dealing with these issues of the mind, God was starting to provide me with tools that I have used to help me to begin to reach my goals.  That is the subject of my next entry :)

MY STORY - PART 1: Living with Loss - it's ok

Yesterday would have been my brother's 44th birthday.  He was killed by an "incompetent" driver going the wrong way on an expressway 6 years ago.  The accident left his wife a widow and her and their 3 children injured (the oldest son was paralyzed from the waist down, the rest recovered from bruises and broken bones).  The loss, sorrow, grief, devastation... it was almost unbearable.

For my parents, I don't think they ever really recovered from the shock.  Don't get me wrong... we went on and we coped, with strength from God and our church family, but they were wounded people and it made them different (maybe in some ways better... you know how adversity can develop our character?).

Three years after the accident, my father died suddenly.  He was 75 years old and his body was tired but he was still vital and working and his death was a shock to me and the whole family.  My mother's health had been failing because of long term effects of cancer treatment she had in the 1970's.  So for a year after my father died, I was my mom's partner and helper, with her finances, doctor visits... everything.  She was an intensely independent woman, keeping a job for as long as possible and running most of her own errands but as her body failed her, she relied more and more on me and others.  For the last few months of her life, she sought out doctors to try some "heroic" measures to repair damage the radiation had left in her body but in the end she was too weak and the damage was overwhelming.  She died just short of 68 yrs old; 13 months after her husband.

With the loss of my parents I felt the loss of my brother over and over again.  Without my brother who shared the most memories with me of our parents and their legacy, I became very grateful for my husband, mother-in-law, sister-in-law, children, nieces, nephews, friends... everyone who held me up and loved me and shared in my loss.  These people where gifts from God and His provision for me through it all.

My grieving process took on new intensity after my mother died.  For 4 years I was "strong" for my parents and kept my mind busy with concern for them, being the dutiful daughter and supporting them.  As I managed the dwindling details of my parent's affairs I found more mental time and energy to see my needs for true grieving and taking stock of my life and my future. 

What in the world does any of this have to do with nutrition or exercise?  Well, this part of the story of my life led to the keys to the mental breakthrough that allowed me to have the success that I am experiencing in my physical body.  Nine months after my mother's death I hit a point of emotional and intellectual readiness that I have never experienced before.

I needed to write this down today.  My head is swirling with emotions.  Obviously some sad, lonely and bittersweet emotions that you have when you take stock of your losses.  But other emotions too.  Hopeful. Excitement.  Anticipation.  Joy.  Knowing that God has brought me through... and He will bring me through the next chapter and beyond.  In a conversation with a friend today, we put it this way:  Only in Christ Jesus can you find amazing joy in the midst of devastating sorrow.