Resolutions:Fitness

So this year I've made several resolutions to finally get in shape. After 4 babies I'm extremely out of shape and have been for several years. I'm finally at the point where I feel completely disgusted every time I see a picture of myself and have to do something about it.

I'm no longer nursing and we're done having children, which means my body is fully mine once again, so this is a perfect time to get in shape. Even more than getting in shape though, is I'm sick and tired of ALWAYS being tired, and I know becoming healthier will bring a ton more energy!

I've found in the past that I can stick to a new diet or workout regime for about 4 days...and then on day 5 some sort of food temptation kicks in or I don't workout that day, etc. I've realized I lack discipline in this area because I don't have any sort of accountability partner outside of myself (and it's very easy to make excuses to justify cheating on a diet when you only have to convince yourself!).

Because I want this year to be the last year I make these resolutions, I've made some major changes to my new weight loss plan...and I'm posting them publicly here to help force myself to stay on task and be held accountable for the goals I've set forth. I'm very skeptical about all of those before & after commercials on TV, so I realized the only way to convince myself is to do it myself. And recording my progress here will be a great motivator.

But for now, here's where I'm currently at and what plan I've started to reach my fitness goals.

The Beginning/Goals:
1. Starting weight: 152 lbs.

I realize that may not seem like a big deal to some, but for a woman my height it's really bad, in fact on many weight scales it's considered obese. I'm 5'3" and all the info. I can find says that a healthy weight for my height is between 115-120. I'd love to weigh 120, so that means my goal is to lose 32 lbs.

I'm not concerned with how long it's going to take me to lose the weight, so I'm not setting a time limit, because I don't want to try any weight loss methods that will backfire and result in me gaining more weight, and I don't want to feel frustrated or depressed by not making a certain target date. Ideally I'd like to reach my goal weight asap, but I didn't put all this weight on overnight...it took years to develop...so only taking several months to lose will be fast enough.

2. Goal: I want to gain a ton more energy.

I almost never take any medication, largely in part because I can't swallow pills...never have been able to. In fact, the only way I can ever swallow a pill is if I hide it inside a bite of food...which I realize is completely ridiculous, because it's something much larger to swallow than just a pill, but nevertheless I still can't do it any other way.

But yesterday I was in the store and happened to walk passed the vitamin aisle and saw this:

I started to pick up the One a Day Women's vitamins, but then found these on the shelf specifically targeted for more energy. These horse pills are so enormous I have to cut them in half and swallow them in 2 separate bites, but if they increase my energy levels then it's worth it.

3. Goal: I want to tone all over.

After 4 babies I have a lot of stretched out, flabby stomach skin that needs to be firmed up. And the size of my arms looks enormous, so I definitely want to slim them down and pretty much tone all over my body. I don't want to bulk up and look like a body builder, I just want to slim down and have a healthy, lean look.

4. Goal: 1.5 mile run.

The 1.5 mile run is a very common, nationwide measure of fitness. It's used in the military and in general to measure overall fitness. I tried to time myself running on my treadmill for 1.5 miles for the very first time last week, and managed to get through it with a combination of walking/running in 19:00 minutes. A very healthy goal time for women is to run this distance in 13:00 minutes, so my goal is to run 1.5 miles in 13:00 minutes.

5. Goal: run in a race.

After working really hard to obtain my fitness goals, I think it would be really cool to be in shape enough to run in some sort of race. Eventually I'd love to work my way up to running in a half or full marathon, but that's way too aggressive to begin with...I need a much shorter race to use as a starting point.

This area has tons of different races throughout the year. So the one I've decided to enter is a small 5k run, which is exactly 3.1 miles. The race is on Sept. 26th, 2009, so I have plenty of time to realistically meet my fitness goals and be in excellent shape by the time this race happens.

So a quick recap of my fitness goals:
1. Lose 32 lbs. - reach goal weight of 120 lbs.
2. Gain a ton more energy.
3. Tone all over.
4. Run 1.5 miles in 13:00 minutes.
5. Run in 5k (3.1 miles) race this year on Sept. 26th.

Now that I've established my goals, here's what I'm doing to achieve them:

1. Counting Calories: 1,200 per day.

I'm keeping a spreadsheet journal of everything I eat and eating no more than 1,200 calories per day. I'm not restricting any foods from my diet, because I don't want to feel deprived and end up binging on mounds of chocolate, etc. So I can eat whatever I want...just as long as at the end of the day my total calories adds up to 1,200.

2. Drinking Tons of Water.

Drinking water really helps you feel much more full throughout the day without adding on the pounds, so I'm trying to drink a minimum of 96 oz. of water each day. That sounds like a lot, but it really isn't. I've been using the large 32 oz. sports bottles, so this much water only means filling up a large sports bottle 3 times per day.

3. Exercise.

I get bored easy with workout routines, so I'm leaving this task as full of variety as I can, but I'm trying to workout for a minimum of 1 hour 5 days per week...if not more, but some days I just don't have more time than an hour to set aside.

I've been converting my living room into a fitness area. I have a large treadmill and elliptical bike and lots of floor space to do all kinds of different workout videos.

I start with the treadmill to work on cardio and get my heart rate up. But I leave the exact details of my workouts to whatever I feel like doing that day, so sometimes I'll work on my treadmill and then go to my elliptical bike, or other days I'll do an exercise video...whatever I'm in the mood for, just as long as I'm doing something.

4. Visualizing my goals in a tangible way.

I want to give myself plenty of encouragement through this long weight loss process, and I want to understand exactly how significant my progress is, so I've decided to measure my progress as compared to sacks of sugar. This is a very visual way of identifying with exactly how much weight I want to lose...and looking at my goals that means I want to lose slightly more than six 5lb. bags of sugar!


Looking at these bags and thinking of how difficult it would be to carry all of them around with me all day long is unbelievable! They seem so heavy...so it's no wonder I have no energy, because I'm so tired from carrying around all this weight all the time!

I'm going to evaluate my progress on a weekly basis and keep using this visual reminder of bags of sugar to really emphasize the big changes I'm making. I'll keep a post in my sidebar to keep you up to date on how many bags of sugar I've lost.

5. Another visible motivator: the "before" shots.

I seriously cannot believe what I'm about to do! But I know I won't be completely serious about my goals unless I add this and totally humiliate myself by sharing this publicly...yes, I'm about to post the most awful, most disgusting "before" photos of myself!

The only way I can manage to get through viewing these photos is by convincing myself that I will no longer look like this:

My stomach sticks out further than my breasts and the width of my arms is enormous!

The love handles in this shot completely disgust me!

Ugh! I can't believe I'm actually posting these photos! But I'm extremley serious about changing my life, so there they are.

So, where am I so far?

Well, I started these goals as New Year's resolutions on Jan. 1st...and since then I haven't been very consistent with exercise and have cheated on my diet a few times. Which is why I'm trying to re-motivate myself by blogging about this journey. And despite my lack of discipline so far, I've still managed to see some great results!

Current weight: 147 lbs. - I've lost 5 pounds, or 1 sugar sack!

1.5 mile run: If I really push myself I can run it in 17:30 minutes. That's 1 1/2 minutes lower than my starting run time of 19:00 minutes.

So imagine how great my progress would be if I actually followed all my goals listed here? That's what I'm going to try really hard to do, and now that I've said all this on my blog I'm hoping this public announcement will help keep me more accountable and motivated.

Wish me luck! And maybe I'll help encourage any of you also wanting to get in shape.