100 pounds to lose
Things have been puttering right along here at the casa de Shrinking Kelly. I finally got a new job at the end of March and I’m really enjoying it for the most part.
I’m just an admin assistant, but they met the salary that I was at on my last job so that was unexpected and nice. It’s mostly stress free and I really enjoy the people that I work with.
I’m not sure I ever touched on how stressful my last job was. My office manager back then was a total headcase. Like, no joke, she needed to be on medication for her mental illnesses. She would scream and yell and throw things on the daily and you never knew what you were in for when you showed up at work.
It really ignited my PTSD from my childhood in the worst way possible and for about the last year or two it REALLY messed with my mental well-being.
Having said that, this job has NONE of that and it is so freeing. To come home from work and not bring major emotional damage with me is just so amazing I can’t even put it into words.
It did however, take me a little bit to get back into the swing of things as far as actually putting on clothes and leaving my house. 🤣🤣
The first two weeks I was completely exhausted and could barely function when not at work, but that eventually sorted itself out and I seem to have found my groove.
I wasn’t sure I was going to be able to maintain my level of exercise once I started working again. In fact, I told myself that I would keep at it for a week or two and then move it down to a more “reasonable” level.
Since I lost my job at the end of November, I’ve been managing to get in at least an hour of cardio most every day. Let’s face it, I had nothing better to do at the time and it was really helping with the mental stress I had at being stuck at home 24/7 for four months.
It was that very reason that I wanted to continue it for at least the first week or two of the new job. I knew that I would be nervous and that working out in that capacity would leave me clear headed and less anxious about the new position.
I’ve never been a morning person. Like, ever. It has always been a major struggle for me to get up and get going in the morning, be it school or work. If given my druthers I would sleep until early afternoon and then stay up all night. Lather, rinse, repeat.
That just simply isn’t an option in the real world, so I would settle for sleeping until the last possible second before getting up and doing the bare minimum (shower, brush my teeth and get dressed) before getting in the car and heading to work. No make up, no time to gather my thoughts and certainly no exercise.
With the new job, I just didn’t give myself any other alternative. It helped that I don’t have to be to the new job until nine whereas my old job I had to be there at 7:30, but I just didn’t let myself slide at all. I woke up every morning at 5:30 and was working out by six. No excuses.
After a couple of weeks, I realized that I hadn’t died from lack of sleep and actually enjoyed going to bed early for the most part. Once I reached that understanding with myself, it was fairly easy to just keep going and now it is just habit.
I even incorporate it on weekends too if I have to be somewhere, I just do the backwards math of when I would have to get up in order to be able to get my workout in and then set my alarm. There is no question (a couple of minor exceptions being 5:00 AM departures for whatever reason – mostly travel related) in my mind and therefore I just do it.
There is no way that I would be able to have done any of this if it weren’t for losing my job, so when they say that everything happens for a reason, there is a certain amount of truth to that.
With this level of exercise, I’ve been able to take off and keep off almost 45 pounds since my old job closed its doors without killing myself with super restricted calories. That’s a total of almost 70 pounds since starting this weight loss reboot back in January of 2021 (with 5 months off in the middle there somewhere).
Don’t get me wrong, I do keep myself in a calorie deficit for the most part, but nowhere near as restrictive as I used to be in the past. I don’t really feel deprived at all and I enjoy eating my maintenance calories on the weekends to allow for the big calorie items I might be craving. It’s a formula that *knocks wood* is working so far and I’m thrilled.
It no longer feels like a diet and it finally feels like a lifestyle.
Welp, it’s been a minute since I wrote in here.
Things have been going along swimmingly. If you follow my youtube channel, you will know that the last two weeks I had fairly large losses for me, and that made me happy.
I have been exercising regularly and that has made a huge difference. I started with Walk Away the Pounds DVD’s but in the last week and a half, switched to the treadmill – which we just got back up and running.
I’ve been doing really well on it. The last couple of days of last week and this past Monday, I managed to do 2 miles a day. Pretty cool.
Cut to Tuesday morning. All is well, I shower and drive to work. I get to work and sit down at my desk and something … doesn’t feel right. I have felt this sensation before, many years ago. It kind of feels like my thigh bone has somehow disconnected a bit from my hip bone.
It was familiar and uncomfortable but not yet painful. However, as the day wore on it went downhill rapidly. By 12:30 I was unable to sit in that office chair any longer and came home to lay on ice in bed. I called my current chiropractor but she was unable to get me in until Wednesday at 11:15 AM.
I rested all evening and it just kept getting worse. The pain would travel from my hip to my outer thigh, to the back of my thigh to my inner thigh. Sitting down on the toilet was UNBEARABLE.
I managed to get some sleep and it was the same if not worse the next morning.
The one and only other time this happened to me, it happened over the course of a couple of days not suddenly like this one. And my chiro at the time (sadly, now retired) was able to give my leg a swift pull when I least expected it and the leg popped back into place. I remember it feeling better instantly.
This time, not so much. The onset of the worst of the pain happened in hours and and my new chiro didn’t quite know what to do other than make some adjustments even after I told her what happened last time.
A bit of a backstory–
–Last October my husband and I drove to Vegas for a socially distanced trip to renew our vows for our 20 year anniversary.
I wasn’t in Vegas more than fifteen minutes when I fell down an escalator. See, I’m afraid of heights and escalators are bad for me on a good day when they are going down. My husband has to stand in front of me and I have to hold onto the railings for dear life. Well, we were trying to check into the hotel and we couldn’t find an elevator to get down the one floor to the registration desk. There was however an escalator. My husband and I both had two suitcases and a backpack on, so I would have to get on the escalator while it was moving with both suitcases and not be able to hold onto the railings. I’m cringing now five months later, just typing this.
You can see where this is going right? As soon as I stepped on with the luggage I went cross eyed from panic and immediately fell onto my left hip. I’m not a small woman and when I fall, I fall hard. This was no exception.
A wonderful man saw me eat it and followed me onto the escalator to grab one of my suitcases and help me up. My husband was on the other side begging me to get up before we got to the end of the escalator as I was wearing a dress and there was no way he could lift me up before the escalator ate my clothing.
I laid there wide eyed, clutching both suitcases handles in sheer panic for what felt like fifteen minutes but it was just a matter of seconds. I finally pulled myself up and made it to the end with no further incidences.
I was not unscathed however.
Long story short, I had a GIANT hematoma on my left hip that lasted about …well, it is still there, but now it’s really tiny, but the worst of it lasted like, three months. It was the size of a grapefruit.
I was sure that I had broken something (would never admit that to the hubs and ruin the trip) so even after we got back, I refused to go to the doctor because I didn’t want to know if something was critically wrong with me (that is how my brain works). I didn’t go to the chiro even though I knew every part of my hips and spine were out of alignment, because I was scared that if I HAD broken something, her messing around might make it worse. Eventually the pain got better (months later) and I just wanted to forget about it.
Back to the present —
— My chiro told me yesterday that by her calculations, I had really thrown my body out of whack in the fall, but since I never got it checked and I wasn’t really that active, my body just adjusted and got used to the body being out of alignment. However, my recent foray into exercising and more importantly walking on the treadmill had made my body revolt and say: “ENOUGH!”
So, that is what happened to my right hip … or something like that.
As soon as she laid me down on the table she took one look at my back and said: “Oh wow.” before she even touched anything. And I have a pretty large layer of fat over my bones that isn’t easy to see through. She said my pelvis was so far pushed to the back on my right side that if she put a marble on my back it would roll immediately to the left and fall to the floor.
She adjusted me a lot and told me to give it 48 hours.
I came straight home from the appt and laid on ice.
It was even MORE painful last night but I knew that it would be as I had just been put back into place after being out for five months.
This morning it felt a bit better so I went into work, but left by 10:30 because sitting in that office chair was unbearable again. Also, I didn’t want to screw up all the work that she had done the day before.
I got up and got something to eat a few minutes ago (3:00PM) and it is feeling a LOT better. Still sore and noticeable, and sitting on the toilet still hurts a lot, but much better.
The reason I tell y’all this story is to explain that I am fully expecting to gain on my weigh in Saturday. I haven’t been able to exercise since Monday and being stuck in the house on “bedrest” has made me want to eat the world out of boredom. I’ve been doing kind of okay keeping the eating in check, but there has been an increase in snacking … Not gonna lie. Also, I haven’t been drinking much water because sitting on the toilet hurts so bad. So I will not only be gaining weight, but also water. 😒
I guess I’m okay with the gain. It’s not like I could do anything about the fact that my body rejected my idea of getting fit (at least at this point, five months ago would be a different story).
I will not be as hesitant to go see my chiro from here on out though if something happens, because I am NOT happy about getting sidelined from exercise just as I was getting to love it again.
Well, January is in the books and what a crazy one it was.
The good news is that I was disciplined enough to drop ten pounds from my frame in that month. Not bad for going into January just hoping to make better decisions about my food choices.
That got me thinking about actually setting goals for the month of February and hopefully all the months to follow. It certainly couldn’t hurt right?
Drink more water
This one is cut and dried. I used to drink a ton of water at work and hardly any at home. Lately I find myself not even drinking much at work. I know that this is mostly due to the fact that I have to remove my mask in order to drink it, but I really need to suck it up and just chug instead of sip when I do lower my mask.
Eat less processed snacks
I do pretty well at this while at work because I only allow myself to bring fruits and other non processed things. When I’m home it’s another story. I guess I feel it is kind of a reward for getting through the workday. They aren’t really bad for me or high calorie, but I’d like to eat less processed things and this is really the main place I’m lacking on that part.
Work out three times a week minimum
Ultimately, I would like to do more, but since I am just starting up again I’m going to take it easy on myself for a little bit. However, this is tied into my next goal.
On non exercise nights, dedicate a half an hour to cleaning
This is less about weight loss and more about me not sitting on my butt as soon as I get home. It’s also kind of a punishment mentality, but I feel it will work for me if I enforce it. “Which would you rather do tonight, work out or clean?” Most nights the answer will be neither…well, if I’m honest ALL nights, but I need to not give myself an out by saying: “Oh, I’ve had a really rough day and I just want to relax.” I need to make myself get this into a habit. It needs to be one or the other. Also, my house really needs cleaning.
I guess that is about all I have for now. I want to start slow if I want to achieve any of them. Eventually I hope to continue these and build more, but this feels safe for now.
I will check in with a video at the end of the month to see how well I have done.
As documented in my previous entries about my weight history, I’ve always struggled with my weight. I don’t think I actively started dieting until I was in my teens, but I always had big dreams of losing the weight no matter what age I was.
I find the older I get, the more my reasons for wanting to lose weight have changed.
When I was younger, it was for the obvious reason. I wanted to look better. Plain and simple, no doubt about it.
It started to shift as I slowly approached my late 20’s. I remember being put on high blood pressure medicine when I was 27 years old and being horrified. Blood pressure medicine was for OLD people! I was still young and vibrant damn it! Never mind that I couldn’t walk my dog to the end of my block without my lower back seizing up and me having to sit down and rest.
Young and vibrant in my mind, but my body was rapidly becoming that of a senior citizen.
In doing some research I recall reading somewhere that reducing your weight by a mere 10% could help lower your blood pressure. I think that was when I started to slowly make better decisions.
After dropping about 100 lbs I no longer had to take the BP meds. That was a great bonus, as was being able to walk great distances with no pain. But let’s face it, I looked amazing compared to my highest weight. It mostly all came down to looks.
As the years have gone by and I have yo-yoed back and forth in my weight, my looks have usually been a trigger to start the process all over again. I’ll see a picture someone took without my knowledge and be horrified at how I look.
This time it wasn’t about looks. Don’t get me wrong, that will be a wonderful side benefit! However, as I approach my late 40’s at an alarmingly fast rate, my health is more of a concern than anything else.
I’m tired of having no energy. I’m tired of being winded walking a short distance. I’m tired of my joints constantly aching. I’m tired of worrying about my health. And I’m tired of being tired.
I know that my everyday aches and pains would be greatly reduced if I lighten the load on my body. Carrying around this much weight was still painful in my younger years, but it is nothing compared to what I’m feeling 20+ years later.
My blood pressure is high again and I don’t want to be put on meds. My cholesterol was quite high on my last blood test and I don’t want to be put on a statin. My ankles now swell in the evening from sitting all day at work…that never happened when I was active and slimmer.Â
I know it sounds completely stupid to say this, but I don’t like taking up more space than I used to. Granted it isn’t as much as I did when I was at my heaviest, but it is I feel it for sure. The pandemic has really prevented me from seeing how bad it is as I can’t go to a restaurant and sit in a booth to see how bad the table cuts into my gut. And I haven’t been on a plane in over a year so I don’t know if I need an extender for the seat belt, but chances are probably pretty good that I do.
I remember one of my proudest NSV (non scale victories) was when I could buckle the seat belt on a plane with no assistance. It was always so embarrassing to have to ring the flight attendant and ask for one. At one point I was so large that I didn’t even have to ask, once I was seated a well meaning FA approached me and silently handed one to me with a smile. While I was grateful not to have to ask, I was mortified that she just eyeballed me and was like: “Yeah, that fatty needs an extender, I’m going to save her the trouble of asking and just bring her one.” I’m sure she was really nice but she really could not have won in the scenario I concocted in my head that day.
A couple of days ago at work, I had to crawl under my desk to plug in my new Bluetooth speaker and it was a pretty tight fit. Like, I wasn’t even sure I was going to be able to get back out. Not cool.
So yeah, while I will take any cosmetic benefits from the weight loss, I am much more looking forward to the health related ones.
It’s funny how actively doing something to improve myself makes me feel so much happier.
It’s no secret I’ve been in a slump. A funk. A serious risk of falling into another pit of depression, and it seems like I just crawled out of one not that long ago.
Last week we attempted to start Keto again on my husbands insistence, he loves keto. Me, not so much. I’m not sure why, but for some reason, my body just hates low carb now. It’s so weird because I used to do so well on it. I lost 80 pounds on it many many years ago and felt and looked great!
Over the years however, I have seemed to develop an electrolyte imbalance and doing low carb or keto makes it so much worse. Within days I start getting heart palpitations and those are no fun.
Also, I have diverticulitis and because of the foods we eat on low carb I inevitably wind up with some serious bouts of gastritis…also no fun.
So I finally sat down with The Hubs last week and had a frank discussion about how I just cannot do low carb any longer. He was not pleased but he understood that I wouldn’t ask him to do a diet that hurt him, so he shouldn’t do that to me either. He begrudgingly agreed to go on the diet that I chose…so what exactly is that diet?
Well, it’s kinda like I was doing before in 2017-18 when I lost 40 lbs. Basically it is making better decisions. We will be incorporating more carbs but less processed foods. So more fruits and veggies, more chicken than beef and using portion control. I know! What a concept!!!
He’s skeptical but pleased as the last two nights I have cooked dinner.
He still doesn’t quite understand it, as tonight when he cooked dinner he made the omelet I asked for but also made some fried brown rice cooked with pork belly to pair it with. I waited until he wasn’t looking and swapped the fried rice with some canned green beans. A girl’s gotta do what a girl’s gotta do! Also, I saved the fried rice for this weekend when I will have more calories to spare. It’s not off limits, but I had eaten most of my calories already and wasn’t prepared for the rice when he offered it.
Anyhoo, to get back to the original topic, I had basically been a lump for the last year…probably longer if I were to really think about it. I had given up on myself. It didn’t start that way, I’m sure.
I do remember when the pandemic hit and we started our first shelter in place here in California, that I treated it a lot like a snow day. When I was growing up in Maine and there was a big snowstorm brewing, my mom and I would take a trip to the store and get all kinds of comfort and junk food to get us through the next few days that we would be snowed in.
This was the mentality that I went into the shut down with in March. Only instead of it only being a few days it went on for months and months. And somewhere along the way, I lost the ability to care about what I was eating and how much weight I was gaining.Â
In addition to that, the whole pandemic thing really messed with my head. I was never actually allowed to shelter in place as my work deemed themselves essential and so I had to go into work every day and I was very paranoid as I felt everyone else should have been too.Â
Since my husband has per-existing conditions, I put him on lock down and so I was the one to do any of the essential going outside things. He started working from home and I did all the essential errands in addition to going into work five days a week.
All of this took it’s toll on us in different ways. My husband was craving socialization when I got home and I was up to my ears in it and only wanted to be left alone.
So all of this in addition to constant fighting back and forth on social media on whether COVID was a hoax or not, really put me in a bad spot mentally. I’m an empath and this and then the political state of the world was almost quite literally making me crazy.
To add more fuel to the fire (literally) we had to evacuate our house in August due to wildfires (thankfully, only for five or six days and our house was not harmed) and my mother passed away that same week (her illness had started in May and I wasn’t able to get to her during any of this due to the pandemic as she lived in Maine and was under strict lock down in her facility).
I pretty much stopped any activity and ate my feelings for the better part of the year.
I’ve been trying to reach a balance and claw my way out of the depths of depression that I was in and I feel like in the last couple of months I’ve done a pretty decent job. As well as can be expected I suppose.
This week when I started actively planning my new diet and following through with it, I felt a weight lift. That constant nagging in the back of my head that I was slowly killing myself, started to lighten up. I feel like at least I am now trying to help myself and that is a pretty good feeling. Especially after not having that for so long. I told myself that I was just doing what I had to to get by, but I was being lazy and had basically just given up.
That was a very long winded way to say that I’m feeling really good this week and I attribute it mostly to the fact that I am starting to take care of myself again. It feels really nice and I’m excited to once again be on a weight loss journey.
