Sunday, May 30, 2004

126.5 this morning, my lowest weight since I was 18. Pretty amazing.

But now I'm confused. Much too much of my body is still fat. I don't need someone to measure my body fat to let me know this...it's obvious. But this is about where I want to be staying. I think that 125 would be a good weight for me to stay at and look the way I want to look.

So what do I do now in terms of exercise? Do I continue on the path I'm on (30 mins cardio/5 days a week, 30 mins weights/3 days a week, 1.5-3 hours yoga/week)? Or do I change it up somehow. I'm really interested in continuing with the weights, and I think they're going to help me a lot. So many people keep telling me that weight-lifting is the key to changing fat to muscle that I have to believe it. And besides, I want giant muscles on my upper body!

Talking last night about perfect bodies. Michelle Rodriguez in Girlfight. That's what I'm going for. Someday I'll make it.

Been realizing for the past couple days that my eating habits, though infinitely better than they used to be, can still use some serious tweaking. So I'm going to start being better about logging my food into FitDay. No more avoiding putting in what I ate because I know it's not going to look the way I want it to. And I'm going to work on eating more of what I know I need to be eating. And I NEED MORE PROTEIN!!!! I never have enough. On the days when I've done my weights I am starving for the rest of the day until I put enough protein in. That's definitely my body telling me something and I should make sure I listen to it.

So...

More weights.
More veggies.
More fruit.
Fewer carbs.

And I have to make sure, every single time I go to eat something that I know is on the "not so good for me" list, that I have fully processed what it is that I'm about to do. The problem I have is that I often notice I'm eating something only when I'm halfway done with it. So I have to pay attention and fully weigh whether or not it's what I want to be eating. Think about the long run, not just the immediate craving.

Oh yeah. Me and my yoga buddies are going to the intermediate class today. 2 hours of yoga-filled fun. I'm kind of nervous about it because it's going to be much harder than anything I've done so far. But I'm hoping like hell that it's going to be a blast. I'll keep you informed!

Friday, May 28, 2004

Yesterday I was talking to my ex-boyfriend and telling him all about my exercise schedule. He thinks I'm completely nuts. But when I mentioned that I had started lifting, he asked me if I could do any push-ups yet. I, of course, hadn't even thought about doing push-ups. But his mentioning it made me start thinking, so I asked him to hold on and got down on the ground.

I did two push-ups! Not the silly girly ones, because I can do a bunch of those, but the nice old regular push-ups. Two!

I'm sure that to most people this sounds piddling, but to me this is huge. Truth be told, I'm not sure I've ever in my entire life been able to do one before. And there I did two! Amazing.

Sunday, May 23, 2004

So I had this amazing realization last night (while I was asleep, actually) and I feel it could be a life-changing realization, so I feel the need to post it here.

Life just keeps on getting better. I mean, I know that it keeps on getting harder and that's definitely a part of it. And I know that it's something you have to decide for yourself, but it can be true. Life really can just keep on getting better.

What a complete joy to realize.

Wednesday, May 19, 2004

Well, something has finally changed in my routine enough that my weight is dropping. I keep on trying to remember that it isn't the number that matters, that I should instead be concentrating on what my body can do. But that is hard. I've been working on this for so long now that it's hard not to get excited about every little thing.

I have changed my mind on this subject though. For a while I thought my goal weight was going to be 115, but now I think that's a mistake. I really don't want to be thin anymore. Now I'm much more interested in being strong. So I'm going to keep my goal weight at 120, knowing full well that I may never make it there and instead will probably hover around 125 or so. This morning I weighed 127.5.

Yesterday went to my usual Tuesday night yoga class. My quads were aching because of running/lifting and I knew it was going to be a hard class. And, well, it was. But more than anything else it was hard because I was hungry and very dehydrated. I've definitely been slacking on the water thing...that's something I really need to work on. Super important.

Anyways. I'm off to the gym for running/lifting. I'm quite righteously sore right now, so this is pretty much going to suck ass. But I've got to do it. Just because the numbers are dropping doesn't mean I can slack off. That's what always happens at this point for me. Not this time. This time I'm still going to take everything as seriously as I have been. Go me!

Monday, May 17, 2004

Well, the semester is over (thank god), so now I can spend all my time working on my body. Or at least, all my time until classes start up again.

Today I ran .66 miles, which is farther than my last farthest. Go me! While I was running I came up with an idea. I'm going to combine running and weights into one day, and then do the elliptical on the others. So it would go a little something like this...

Monday: running as far as I can (which will hopefully increase with time), weight training, maybe yoga
Tuesday: elliptical, yoga
Wednesday: running, weight training, maybe yoga
Thursday: elliptical, maybe yoga
Friday: running, weight training
Saturday/Sunday: elliptical

Ideally I'd like to be doing yoga 3 times/week, but that's generally not possible. I always go once a week and most weeks I go twice. My worry is that in my quest for strength and larger muscles, I will lose my flexibility. And I'm really loving all the newfound flexibility that has come from yoga.

So that's my plan. Seem good?

Saturday, May 15, 2004

chest: 35
waist: 29.5
hips: 38.5
thigh: 23
calf: 14
upper arm: 11
lower arm: 9.5

Ok, so that's me, in a series of numbers. I'm 5.3 ... I weigh approximately 130 lbs ... and the measurements are the things I want to change.

J asked me the other day what it is that I'm going for in this entire process. My answer was simple ... I want the sight of myself in a mirror to match the vision of myself in my head. Because right now it doesn't. Right now I am disappointed every single time I see myself in a mirror because I don't think that I should look this way. I just want to match my own idea of how I should look.

Friday, May 14, 2004

My mom sent me this poem and I love it so much that I want to include it here.



The Modernist Impulse
On My Birthday

Has it ever been absent, this desire
for every moment to stand in relief,
the unending row of them set
like solitaires into what passes,
burnished to unbearable depths?

The park here is going green and all at once
its expanse is a moment of its own great making,
a flare in the midst of so much shattered.
The trees are certain their time has come.

I have never once been able to say yes,
now, this is the instant in which
I should begin to live again,
in which this love is the only love
worth having, the richest of all possible shining arts
to hold forth: Here,
I was here and I knew it.

In this neighborhood the slate
sidewalk piles up on itself all winter,
as it has for hundreds of winters,
cracked by the cold and heaving
into crazed shelter for the dirt below.

I roll back the stone from my life.
Oh my near-miss, return to me
now when I need you most. Come
and tell me that ages pass, that effort
is rewarded at the very least after we die.
I loved you as well as this sweet green park
coming into focus across the street,
all in delicate arrogance.

-- Melanie Rehak

Thursday, May 13, 2004

I weighed myself this morning. I know, I know, I'm not supposed to. But I was curious and curiosity killed the Margaret. I was at 130.5, which is actually significantly lower than it was the last time I weighed myself. Well, not significantly... but maybe like 3 pounds, which is pretty damn good.

I think the best sign I've had recently that what I'm doing is working is that I've got cheekbones again! I had forgotten that I've got great bone structure because my fat just takes on fat so easily. But here are my beautiful cheekbones once again jutting out of my face. For me, this is about as cool as it gets.

And last night I went to yoga again with J, to the beginner's class. The teacher for Wednesdays is really a very good beginner's teacher. She takes everything slowly, spends a lot of time with the class stopped, explaining what's going on, etc. She's definitely the best teacher they've got for beginners, although not for anyone above the beginner's level. And man, oh, man... I hadn't really realized how far my practice has come until last night. Her class was SOOOO easy. I didn't have a hard time with anything that we did... it all comes so naturally now! What a fantastic feeling.

Talking to A the other night definitely made me think a lot about what I'm doing. She said, "As someone who's already fucked up, take some advice from me and stop thinking about the number NOW before it's too late." So now I really have to concentrate on what my body can do instead of what the number is. It's hard. You do get tied to the idea of being a certain weight, and it's difficult to let that go. I would still like to be 115, but even more than that I'd like to be strong enough that I can do all the things I want to do without it ever troubling me. In the choice between strong and thin... I'm going with strong.

Oh, and I finally figured out how to include comments in this blog. So if anybody has anything they'd like to comment on, please feel free. I'm sure I'd appreciate whatever you want to tell me. And thanks for reading.

Wednesday, May 12, 2004

I had, last night, what was quite possibly the best yoga practice of my life. You wanna know why? I think it's because of the weight lifting, honestly. I am stronger than I used to be and I can actually feel it. My legs still protest when holding warrior poses for a long time, but my arms no longer mind all the high to low pushups. I could actually feel the changes occurring in my body. And all this on a day when I had done my weight-lifting and was already sore. Fantastic!

Also, had the pleasure of spending some time talking to A about her body issues. I remember so well what it was like for me in high school, dealing with my own body issues. At 100 lbs I still looked in the mirror and all I saw was lumps everywhere. I remember describing to someone what my body looked like to me in the mirror and having them tell me I was nuts. I guess to me being thin enough has always meant that your thighs don't touch when you walk. And even at 100 lbs my thighs still touched when I walked. A says it's because I have small hips and that's just to be expected. But see, I always thought that for my frame I actually have "child-bearing" hips. So why did they still touch? Will they always? Is there anything I can do?

Because that really would be it for me. If I could get myself to a place where my thighs don't touch, where I don't have to worry about wearing a skirt on really hot days (because my sweaty thighs rub together so much that I end up with a rash), then I could be satisfied. Will it ever happen?

Sunday, May 09, 2004

I'm feeling very AAAARRGH right now. I don't understand why I'm not losing more quickly. It seems that on the schedule I'm keeping right now, the pounds should be melting off. On average I've been doing about 150 minutes of cardio (elliptical), 60 minutes of weight training, and 3 hours of yoga per week. Doesn't that seem like something should be changing? But it isn't. Instead the scale is staying exactly where it has been forever now, if not even a little bit higher.

But the truth is that I'm feeling fantastic these days, and that really is the most important part, right?

See, I know that the problem is my food intake. I'm just really shitty at moderating the amount of food I take in. I mean no, that's not true. I almost never eat over 1500 calories per day. The part that I have a problem with is making it 1500 calories worth of good food. On the days when I eat the way I think I should, with tons of vegetables and fruits, then I end up ridiculously under where I should be, like at around 1000 calories. And everyone knows that's not good.

I don't know. It's just so much to think about all the time ... am I getting enough calories or too many calories, plenty of vegetables, vitamins, protein, calcium, etc. It's hard. It's a lot to think about.

Anyways. I'm off to the gym. See y'all later.

Wednesday, May 05, 2004

Yoga, yoga, yoga, yoga...

So J decided that he's finally going to get his ass in gear and start doing the yoga he should be doing. So we went together on Monday. He did a seriously kick-ass job ... spent most of his time in child's pose, which is just what he should have done. Didn't push himself too much, but enough to make himself nicely sore. Very good job.

Last night my Tuesday night yoga buddy and I went to our normal class. It was really hard. Spent the last five minutes of class in frog's pose ... enough time that we skipped over the entire pigeon thing (sad because it's one of my favorite stretches). But a very good class all around.

And then today J tells me that he wants to go again tonight. He says that he's going to take Gregor's advice and try to have his first 10 classes be as close together as possible. So I'm going again tonight and then maybe even again tomorrow.

Good lord. Seems like an awful lot of yoga. And the problem that I'm having is that I should still be going to the gym and doing that shit, but it's so hard to do when there's this unbelievable amount of soreness going on. But the truth is that I'm more interested in supporting J going to yoga than I am in nursing my soreness. And honestly, it's not like it's going to do anything bad to me either. Can only be good for both of us.

Monday, May 03, 2004

And what a waste of my fucking time that was. Aargh. It was just like everything else in America ... driven by money. The trainer spent 45 minutes teaching me how to do a self-massaging technique and then the last 15 minutes were spent discussing what we will do in the future, when I come back and pay him $75/session. What? Who is he kidding? Did he miss the part where I'm a starving student? Isn't it enough that I'm paying for the freakin' gym membership? At this point I'm spending massive quantities of money on making myself better already (gym, yoga, therapy) and the last thing I need is one more financial obligation.

So anyways, I'm totally disappointed. Total bummer.
I have an appointment today with a personal trainer! Everyone gets one free visit when they join the gym, and I just never used mine, so I made an appointment for today! I'm excited because now I'll have someone who can actually teach me how to properly use the weights. Very exciting. And I can explain to him my goals and maybe he'll be able to give me some good tips to help me on my way.

Also, yesterday J and I spent a lot of time talking about food and what it is we need to work on. For the most part we really just need to work on having our evening meal together and having it be filled with vegetables. I'm pretty good with the veggies part, but he's shitty about it. And neither one of us is at all good at eating on a regular basis. We both tend much more towards the "oh my god I'm so hungry I could die so now is probably a good time to eat." Not the smartest way to go about it. So, hopefully that'll do some good. It will definitely make it easier for me if he's taking it a little more seriously.

You know how pregnant women don't really have stretch marks until the baby is gone and then the skin can kind of hang there with the after-effects of the stretching? Well, it's happening to my thighs. I'm obviously doing something right because I'm starting to notice all the stretch marks all of my legs and hips. And I'm finding it horrible to think about how much I've hurt my body over the course of my life. First, by being totally anorexic and never eating and then by eating everything in sight. I have screwed up my body and completely screwed up my metabolism. And now, in the process of deciding that I really want to get into shape, I have to deal with all the stupid shit that I put myself through before this. But at least now I'm actually ready for it now, right?

It's not a diet ... it's a change in lifestyle.