A New Year, A New Me?

At the end of December you hear a lot of people start saying things like " A New Year, A New Me!".
 

But here I am thinking another year has gone by and things are still the same! 

No matter how dedicated I think I am going to be, I always fall short of reaching the goals that I set at the beginning of the year. 

Two years ago I started this journey, and I am still at the starting line. I get so frustrated with myself! I wanted my 30's to be the best years. I will be 32 in March and I am still so far away from where I wanted to be by now. This blog was suppose to help hold me accountable but I found myself running away from it in shame. I wanted to be an inspiration to others and yet I was failing. 

2017 started 3 weeks ago. For the first time in my adult life I did not set any goals for myself. I thought it would be best not to set myself up for disappointment. 

Fast forward to today and so many changes have been taking place in my life. The biggest change, and the one that has had a cascading effect, has been coming to an understanding of what it means to have a healthy life. 

As a Christian woman, I have come to the realization that a Healthy Life is not possible without Jesus. Because being healthy is so much more than a number on a scale or a size on a hanger. Sure people can be "physically" healthy but what is physical health without spiritual health?

How many of us have prayed to God just asking him "Please change me? Help me to _________"?
I am constantly praying this. And nothing ever changes and I get frustrated with my life and the way things are. Recently I did an internet search for "change from the inside out" and I came across a sermon series by Pastor Tom Pennington on the website The Word Unleashed. I had never heard of him, or his ministry, but I know that I know the Spirit led me to Pastor Pennington's site.

The name of the series? "REAL CHANGE FROM THE INSIDE OUT" ! And the cover image? A BUTTERFLY!!! I could not believe it! Well I could but it was still just a little confirmation knowing that The Lord was leading me. (If you are reading my blog for the first time, please check out my previous posts with the label "butterfly" to understand why this was a big deal for me.) As I listened to the message, the one thought I had was "YES! I am ready to change and lose weight". Quickly I realized that weight loss was not going to be my main, nor only, focus. Over the next 3 hours I listened to this message and my heart was being convicted and encouraged simultaneously. It was like my heart and my brain were meeting for the first time on this issue and many others. I know that may seem silly, but it is very true.

There are so many areas of my life, some I wasn't aware of, that need a change. I am not sure what 2017 has in store. I have no control over the future, and I can't change the past. But right here in this moment I can choose to make choices that will have a positive impact. I can put out the effort and start doing things (or stopping things) that will lead to a real change in my life.

A new year?
 Yes.

A new me?
I am already changing with help from my Savior.

God Bless.

P.C.O.S.

It is time to start taking things seriously. About a month ago, I was diagnosed with PCOS. I won't go into too much detail about the disorder but I will post a link for those who are interested.

WEBMD-PCOS 

MAYO CLINIC- PCOS

OFFICE ON WOMEN'S HEALTH

Basically it causes hormonal imbalance, metabolic problems, insulin resistance, infertility, difficulty losing weight and/or easily gaining weight, cysts on ovaries,and the list goes on and on. There is no cure but is treatable.

I have struggled with many of the symptoms since my pre-teens, and the term has been thrown around from age 16-21 but no doctor I have had has taken it seriously. Until now! And I am so thankful to finally have found a doctor who is being proactive and has finally given me the answers to so many of the questions and problems I have been going through over the last 20 years. I feel really old saying that..lol.

The biggest change I have had to make is in regards to my diet and exercise. Which comes back to the very heart of why I started this blog 2 years ago. The biggest difference between then and now, is knowing that my body is not "NORMAL" and there are some things that simply will not work for me.

I have been researching nutrition for 2 years now and you'd think that I would have lost a bunch of weight. But I have not, in fact what little I do seem to lose I put back on plus an extra 10. But now that I know that I have PCOS, I have been doing research into how to treat my symptoms with diet and exercise. I have to learn and figure out how to fuel my body appropriately. I have to find a way to take all the research I have and make it work for me. It seems like an impossible task. Until next time...

Good Health & God Bless!

 
 

You can't hide from reality

It is 3:30 am and needless to say I can not sleep. As I look back through my past posts I can hear the knocks of depression banging loudly. Self- hate and shame have once again taken root. My chest hurts and it is difficult to breathe as I rack my brain around why I keep falling into old patterns. 

God has been doing great things in my life and yet I find myself having a hard time accepting them because I feel so much self-hatred. 

I've learned that the first step in any healing process is to start with the truth. So here I am accepting the truth that I am officially heavier than I have ever been in my life. 305 pounds. I look in the mirror and I hate who I see. I want to know why I struggle with food!? It should be so simple as eat this not that, but I am screaming it is not! I've been trying so hard to overcome this battle but I can never seem to win. I've tried many strategies and they end up failing. I am terrified! 

For tonight, I am holding on to hope. 

Time To Get Selfish

Is there anyone out there like me who seems to get some control of order and then before you know it all chaos breaks out? Over the past few days it seems as if I am barely getting from one day to the next. So this morning I woke up trying to inventory my priorities. And easily I can see where I have gone wrong.

One thing that I have realized is that I have taken focus of God and myself and have been worrying about all these other things. Excuses started to creep there way back into my mindset and self-pitty along with it. Because I have lost my focus everything around me has suffered because of it. So it is time for me to get selfish. I know that seems wrong, but I believe there is such a thing as being selfish in a Godly manner. Here is my reasoning:

As a woman, especially one that is also a wife and a mother, we have many hats that we wear on a daily basis. We are maids, cooks, nurses, teachers, financial advisors, personal assistants, and the list goes on and on. With all these responsibilities it easy to forget to take care of ourselves. But there is danger in that. How are we suppose to accomplish all these tasks when we get emotionally, physically, mentally, and, most importantly, spiritually out of balance? The answer is we can't and that is when we start to see the CHAOS building around us and filling our homes.

We need to shift our mindsets from not wanting to be selfish to wanting to be healthy and energized to take on our day. So how do we do this? I am by no means an expert on this subject but I believe we can accomplish this as follows:

• DAILY COMMUNION WITH GOD (SPIRITUAL): We do this by reading His word, praying, and spending time in worship with the Father. 

• ARMOR OF GOD (SPIRITUAL): Ladies, our homes are our battlefields! Our bodies and minds are our battlefields! We can't go into battle if we are not dressed for it. It leaves us vulnerable to attacks. That is not to say that we won't be attacked, but that we are ready for attacks.

• DIET & EXERCISE (PHYSICAL): We need to be healthy! Again how are we suppose to accomplish our daily tasks and run around after our husbands and kids if we are sick and tired all the time? It is not a quick fix but a life long journey. Find out what works best for you and give it your all trusting in the Lord to guide you.

• ALONE TIME (EMOTIONAL & MENTAL): We need some time alone to do what we love even if we are not alone and choose to hang out with the girls! There are times when we just need a moment to ourselves without hearing little voices screaming for juice and snacks. 

I know that is not an extensive list, but it is where I am going to start. Which leads into how we fit this into our daily lives. I have been learning that 16 hours a day is plenty of time if we are smart managers of our time. 

Here is a simple way of doing this: On a piece of paper write out your day in 1 hour blocks from the time you wake up to the time you go to bed. Take an inventory of a full day of activities and pencil them into the blocks. At the end of the day tally up how you are spending your time. Do you have several hours of TV time? How about Computer? What about games and time on your smartphone? Are you spending way more time than necessary cleaning, especially on messes that little ones and husbands could be helping with? Now I understand that there are many women who work full-time either inside or outside of the home, but that is when tasks need to be truly shared by the entire household. Call a family meeting and start taking back your time. The enemy wants us to believe we have no time, and we need to stop giving ourselves over to this belief. 

I pray that this week we would all take the time to get a little more selfish and be better stewards of our time. 

God Bless us all on our journeys to better health!

24 Hours

How does time seem to get away from me like this? Since my last post on April 27th I have been very busy, and I realize I need to set an alarm on my schedule to make sure that I am getting on here to post. This may be a little lengthy of a post, and I am sure at some point you may even wonder what any of what I am saying has to do with my weight loss, but I promise it does.

"She watches over the affairs of her households and does not eat the bread of idleness." 

Proverbs 31:27

When I read this verse, I knew I had been guilty of eating the bread of idleness.  My body, my mind, my spirit, my home, my husband, and my son all have been suffering the consequences of idleness. I wasn't making time to care for myself physically and spiritually. My home was in total CHAOS. My relationship with my husband was becoming strained because I felt he did not help enough around the house. And I just could not keep up with the little hurricane that is my son!

About 3 weeks ago I realized that not matter how much I was working on my weight loss I struggled because of the mess in the other areas of my life. I was working against myself. I felt guilty for the way my home and family was beginning to look while I focused on losing weight. Please don't get me wrong. It is so very important for us mom's to make sure we are taking care of ourselves, but we need to find a healthy balance for all we need to accomplish. I knew I needed to get myself on a schedule. Even if I didn't stick to it 100% it would be my guideline. What surprised me the most wasn't that 16 hours wasn't enough time, but that it was more than enough time.

How you say? Well I am so glad you asked! The first thing I did was write down all the areas of my life that I know I need to focus on a daily basis:

MYSELF: Care Routines, Spiritual Walk, Healthy & Active Lifestyle
HUSBAND: Quality Time, Duties As His Wife,
SON: Quality Time, Well-Being
HOME: cleaning, laundry, etc

Next I made a schedule in 1 hour blocks from the time I wake up to the time I go to bed. I am trying to establish new habits so I knew that things needed to be simple and effective.

I decided that first thing in the morning I need to start my day in The Lord's presence. I spend time in prayer, getting my "daily bread" in Proverbs and "water for my spirit" in Psalms. I allocated 30 minutes for this and I have found that it is the best 30 minutes of my day!

By this time Moose is now awake and now I need to care for him. I created a routine for him to follow in the morning and I know that from 9:30am - 10:30am I have to focus on getting him cared for. However, during his breakfast I take those 10 minutes to fit in my first walking routine.

At 10:30 AM, Daddy is now up and it he takes over doing care routines with the moose. I start breakfast and start on household routines, which brings me to my next big problem area.

MY HOUSE! Ugh- can I just say how much I hate cleaning! I have tried looking online for routines and what not, but nothing that I found ever fit what I was looking for and they clearly did not have a moose loose in their home! Then I came across this little tidbit: 

" DON'T WORRY ABOUT OTHER PEOPLE'S STANDARDS. DECIDE WHAT CLEAN MEANS TO YOU AND KEEP HOUSE ACCORDINGLY!" ~ Emilie Barnes 

So that is exactly what I did! I set my own standards and created a Cleaning Task Schedule to fit our home perfectly! What amazing advice! Since I have put that motto into my cleaning routine let me just say that my house has become a lot cleaner, more manageable,  and comfortable. Living up to someone else's standards does so much more harm than good. I have also taken focus and frustration off of the messes that the moose makes and put more effort into having him clean up his own messes! I also decided to try making cleaning a game (Jury is still out on that concept) and race the timer. While I will never see cleaning as a game or fun, I do know that I was allocating way too much time on cleaning tasks when most required 5 minutes or less! So I still set my timer because I work better and more efficiently in time crunches! Crazy I know! 

And with all those other duties and tasks out of the way,  I have more than enough time to devote quality time and attention on the two people I love most in this world. Not to mention plenty of 10 minutes to spare throughout my day to workout and get healthy with ZERO guilt!

And speaking of getting healthy:

My weight loss is starting to pick up momentum again. I am learning to make the days count and not focus on the "shoulda-woulda-coulda's". I officially hit the 40 pound milestone this past Sunday on Mother's Day.

So Today I pray that not one of us would partake in the bread of idleness. That we would ask God daily for the strength to accomplish the tasks that are set out before us. That we would honor God in all that we do and His name alone would be glorified!

God Bless Us All On Our Journey To Being Healthy!

Counting The Days

Not making the days count. That has been my biggest problem since my birthday. I have finally gotten to a place where I am back into a workout routine. My eating habits have still been a roller coaster, but I am taking it one day at a time. In fact, I am trying to focus specifically on two things:

"ONE CHOICE ; ONE DAY ; ONE POUND AT A TIME" 

&

"MAKE THE DAYS COUNT, DON'T COUNT THE DAYS" 

This past week I set a goal of 1.5 pounds, and I am happy to say that I met that goal with a 1.8 pound loss! Now I just need to gain momentum and keep on losing.

I've realized that I have not turned to God much in the past month, and have been trying to face my struggles on my own. But the truth is that I NEED HIM! I can not do this without him!

God Bless!

Another one bites the dust

Another pound that is.

Let me begin by saying that when you give it your very best during your workout and you follow your eating plan precisely, it is a little discouraging when you step on the scale and see a negative of 1 pound or less.

With all the fad diets, supplements, and television shows that promise or show huge weight loss numbers on a weekly basis, we tend to go through a roller coaster of emotions when we don't see those big numbers on our scales, especially if you know that you know that you gave it your very best 100% each day.

I refused to allow myself to get down about my 1 pound loss. That's because, on Sunday, I went to Old Navy with my mom and on a whim tried on a pair of size 20 jeans. 7 YEARS, it has been 7 years since I have been able to get my booty into a pair of Old Navy jeans!

Ladies (and gentlemen), we can NOT rely on just the scale. I am learning that our bodies go through so many changes on a daily basis and to use only a scale we can fall into the pit of "weight loss despair" if it is where we focus.

I decided to research how to effectively monitor weight loss and I will definitely be adding the following to my monitoring routine:

1) The Scale: I weigh-in every Monday morning after waking up.

2) Tape Measure: Use a tape measure to show loss of inches. I measure every 30 days, but I am sure it could be done on a weekly or bi-weekly basis.

3) Pair of Jeans/Shirts: Clothes don't lie (well when they are on the hanger at the store I believe they do). Based on if they are too snug or too loose I will know where I am at and what I need to do!

4) Physical Fitness Level:P Take the time during a workout to make a mental note about where you are physically at when it comes to exercise and then start a journal to keep track.

5) Body Fat Monitor: I know that those little machines where you place your hands to check body fat are not 100% accurate, but if you are losing body fat it should show it and that is all that really matters to me.

6) Emotions & Energy: How am I feeling? Am I tired? etc etc etc. I am just going to use :)    :(   :/ in my journal for emotions and use a scale of 1-5 for energy tracking.

7) Progress Pictures: Shriek! Take pictures weekly, bi-weekly, monthly and line them up from beginning to end. Wear the same form fitting outfit each time.

I am sure there are many other's but this is a good start for me. Not relying solely on the scale should help for those days like today when the scale does not effectively show my hard work.

** Just read that if you have been losing fat, but gaining muscle you could have a 2 pound gain. That is reassuring to know. **

Any-hoo, don't allow the fail scale (lol) to dictate how you feel. Find another method and ask God to help you not focus on the numbers.

God Bless us all on our journey to having healthy bodies and minds.

ADVISORY

Please understand that I am not claiming to be a medical professional, nor am I trying to tell someone else what they should be doing. The above information is what I personally have gathered from other sources and my own experiences. I use the above as a guideline on my own personal journey and hope to inspire others to make a change that will better their health and life. Please contact your physician if you are seriously considering making a healthy lifestyle change and you desire to lose weight. Thank you.