So I Got Into A Fight Last Night

It was an epic battle, really. There was bloodshed, there was drama... there was me and

MY RESISTANCE BAND!

Yep, my first exercise equipment FAIL/INJURY! To preface this story, i was not using proper form as shown in my Turbo Fire DVD. My lower body band has gone missing, so I substituted my resistance band, hooked the hard plastic handle onto my shoe, and pulled on the other end of the cord about halfway up to do a row with a leg stretch. After one rep, the plastic handle flew off the shoe... into my face.

Yep, I was ambushed!

The damage could have been worse I suppose, it hit me square in the cheekbone. Thank goodness it wasn't my eye or my mouth, I guess if it had to hit somewhere that was it. But my first instinct was to grab a frozen Vitatop muffin and put it on my face. Then I realized once I got to the bathroom, I'm bleeding. Awesome. Me and blood don't get along. Only a tiny cut, looked worse than it really was. Took care of that with some gauze and antiseptic gel and put a band aid on it.

I LOOK LIKE THE RAPPER NELLY!!!!!!!

Then I go back to icing my war wound. It didn't hurt a ton, but I was trying to make sure I didn't end up with a black eye. After a phone call later in the evening to the guy I'm seeing (i love saying that...) who told me exactly what to do (involving ibuprofen, a ice pack or bag of peas, more antiseptic and sleep), I felt better. So I went to bed, waking up quite a bit from the anxiety of the whole thing. And then I stumbled into the bathroom at 7am. And my fears were confirmed.

I HAVE A BLACK EYE!

Or at least half of one, it's purple under my eye but only on the side near my nose. Lovely... makeup, concealer, more antiseptic (ditched the Nelly bandaid), and some eyeliner and I look decent but still... I HAVE A SHINER!  The guys at work are greatly amused, and by default said I should lie and say I was in the bar fight. As you all saw, my Halloween costume is a sexy sailor girl. I'm now gonna have to be a sexy sailor girl... who got in a bar fight at the bar on base or something... hahaha.

So in short, please follow the proper form and equipment recommendations when doing workout videos. Otherwise you will end up with a shiner. I detail my ordeal as a lesson to you all to respect the exercise band, and it won't punch you in the face :)

Some Birthday Reflections

Thinking back to my  birthday a year ago, I was still in school, still 215 lbs (although I probably had lost a couple pounds by then from stress and walking up The Slope every day), and I was still trying to find myself. I actually spent my birthday with my professor in Office Hours trying to finish a homework assignment... hahahaha. Such a typical engineer....I was fortunate to have a job offer locked in for the job I'm in now, but I had a long way to go still before graduation in December and starting life as a big kid... haha. And losing weight really wasn't on my mind, at all.

 My birthday today couldn't be any different. First off,  I hit my 155 minigoal, right on the nose at 155.0 lbs. ON TIME! WHOOT! Never done that with a minigoal before, they've all been a month late... haha. I'm really actually truly happy with myself, my lifestyle, my job, my social life, everything! Well, maybe not the state of my closet where half my clothes don't fi.... but that's a good problem to have :) 

I think the biggest change is my confidence. In general, I really am a confident person, in things that I believe in. I always was confident in my intelligence, so school was one of my strong points. And I was confident in my ability to sell myself in interviews, getting a job really wasn't too much of an issue. But then there was how I presented myself with people socially. I would get kinda shy, especially around guys. I just didn't believe in myself that someone else would find me attractive.  I never really committed to a relationship, mainly because I didn't think anyone would be interested. 

But now I think I'm finally confident.  FINALLY! It only took 24 years... haha. And I've realized that guys are more drawn to that than how I look. I mea, it doesn't hurt that I look better now.... hehe... but still. I'm convinced of it, and that's what's important! I'm not even where I want to be yet. I could stop now and be happy. But I want to be a healthy weight, and I've NEVER been a healthy weight in my life. And I'd love to be able to stand next to my size 4 sister and look the same size. And I'll get there.

I also made a committment yesterday to become a Beachbody Coach! I'm very excited, and I've already been sharing my love of Turbo Fire with everyone on here. Might as well make it a formal arrangement :) If anyone has questions or is interested in my becoming your Coach (you can sign up for a free membership under me), let me know! I'm awaiting my first Shakeology delivery next week.

And finally, thanks to all the people on MFP who have helped me. This is not a one woman job, I would never give up because I want to be an example to everyone on here that it can be done by ANYONE. It just takes some dedication, a good workout plan, and a healthy obsession... literally!

(241) Days of Sara

Things Happen When You Least Expect It!

That seems to be the theme of the week for me. I admit, I'm a compulsive planner. I need to have everything mapped out in life. My food, my exercise, my errands, my closet, my apartment, my career, EVERYTHING. I need a game plan. I feel out of control without one. I live off of To-Do Lists and post it notes (seriously, I've been single-handedly supporting in the Post-It Note industry since high school). And this week, no amount of planning could have had the results that I've had.

First off, the reason we're all here... weight loss/getting healthy. The past week has been great in terms of eating right and staying way below my sodium every day. I've been around 1200 calories and it's really working for me (I'm hitting my 25% protein and fiber goals just about every day so it's a satisfying 1200 calories).  The result? I've gone from 160.2 lbs on Friday the 1st (just about 2 weeks ago) to 155.8 lbs this morning! 4.2 lbs in 2 weeks? WHATT??? I've been keeping up with exercise, but I'm making sure not to go too intense since I'm eating less. I don't want to fatigue myself. But that's probably the best 2 weeks I've had since I started and had quite a bit more weight to lose. My happy scale told me my BMI was 27.5 this morning, which is halfway between healthy and overweight! 15.8 lbs from my initial goal! FIFTEEN!! I never thought I'd see the day. I started really going for this in February at 200 lbs, unhappy, and in a COMPLETELY new environment with work starting and moving to Virginia. I took the drastic change as a chance to reinvent myself. Everything else was changing, why not my unhealthy habits?

The second unexpect thing that happened was that I finally met someone :) I went on the booze cruise last Saturday with the intention of making some new friends that I could go to happy hour or bars or something with, since I don't have a lot of friends in the area. And I did! I met 2 girls that live in my town and we're planning happy hour at some point. But, within the first 30 seconds , I met a guy (I kid you not, I walked up to the dock and found the two girls and him). And things really clicked. THAT I wasn't expecting! It was only my first event! I'm really excited with where things are going, but I don't want to get to ahead of myself yet :) I'm taking it a week at a time, we have plans for my birthday on Friday of next week. 

So basically this week has taught me to let the universe take over sometimes. I'm not a religious person, and I generally don't believe in fate, destiny, etc. I've always believed that you make your own path. But this week just reminded me that things really do happen for a reason. One of my favorite movies is 500 Days of Summer, and this whole week just reminds me of the message of that movie (I won't spoil it for anyone, but DEFINITELY go rent it or something!). So, for now I'm just gonna keep doing what I'm doing and see where it takes me. It's been working so far in everything that I do for the past 241 days (yep, I counted how many days since I made this change). A few course corrections along the way. My birthday should be an amazing one, between the date and being on track to hit my minigoal of 155. As long as the family wedding I'm going to this weekend doesn't derail any progress (I'm gonna be very careful).

And an update from the last blog, here's ME in my Halloween costume instead of some tiny model with implants. Personally, i think I look better ;)

Just When I Thought I Had It All Figured Out

After 8 months, I had weight loss down to a science. I knew what helped with keeping the weight loss going, I knew what made me plateau and stall (ALCOHOL in excess... haha). I had my menu down perfectly, not a bit of junk food in my house (except that one bag of Dove caramel chocolates... a rare treat). I busted my plateau that lasted all of August just by doing what I've been doing, with adding some extra cardio in and cutting back on the drinking. I've been doing Chalean Extreme and Turbo Fire and LOVING it, and the muscles that I've found in my arms and legs (abs, you're next!).

And then the last few days have shaken things up. I haven't been losing weight very fast in the past couple months, I average a pound a week. I was very content with that, as I'm only 20 pounds from my goal of a healthy weight. But this week... not even this week, the last 4 days, I've gone from 160.1 lbs to 158.7 lbs! That's 1.4 lbs in 4 days... what?????

So I looked at my food diary... what's different than my usual? I'm exercising the same, aside from switching my running/walking to outside instead of a treadmill. However, my sodium has been low... much lower. That was the one thing I had trouble keeping under every day. But the past week I've been doing much better. And my calories were lower, closer to 1200-1350 than 1300-1500 that I had been eating. And I wasn't starving or anything, in fact I've been much better with my protein. And the weight has been falling off... whoa!

So, maybe I just needed to shake things up a bit, kick start things again. My body fat percentage is down to 32.3%, which is over a percent in a month and within the 21-33% that is healthy (I'm shooting for 28%). I'm going to focus on keeping that sodium number down. It'll mean eating out less and relying less on what's in my freezer (or at least shopping smarter to fill the freezer), but seeing the results makes the effort worth it. I'm gonna keep up with running outside as well, at least til I'm too freezing and it's dark at night (the path I run on is not lit). But I'm really excited that things are picking up! I was kinda bummed about hitting my 160 lb mini goal a month late, but now I might make up for it by hitting 155 by my birthday on Oct 22nd. And I've ordered my Halloween costume, a pin-up girl!!! I'm really excited about it. Here's a picture below, I think it's the perfect look for me and I don't need a wig since my hair really is long, curly and red! I'll be spending Halloween weekend in California (Palo Alto at Stanford with two of my best guy friends) so I wanted a fabulous costume. 3.3 more lbs to go until my mini goal! And 2 weeks to go... let's do it! I want to be completely fit and fabulous for my 24th birthday!