Days 6-8 - catching up!

Wow - it has been a whirlwind of lessons learned and putting new best practices into place. Sunday was a road trip day. We were traveling from Santa Cruz to San Luis Obispo (about a 3.5 hour drive) for a family event. I knew from our road trip 3 weeks ago that I am not a very good passenger on these longer trips. I always have to be doing something. Eating, drinking, texting, fb'ing...etc. This time, I was prepared. I packed our handy-dandy travel cooler/picnic basket - have you seen these? They are awesome - courtesy of Veronica for introducing me to them!

Anyhow, that morning I filled it with yogurt, grapes, bannan's, banana chips, hummus and whole-grain crackers. Oh yes, and my carrots. Carrots have quickly become my mainstay. Love, love, love carrots. I think they are quite possibly, the perfect food.

The daytrip was a success by all measures. I even got home in time to flip on "my stories" - True Blood! We did eat some fast food but I think I made better decisisons than I would have in the past and I have to credit my wonderful husband for reminding me of how sick chili cheese fries have made me in the past. I worked through that and managed to avoid making myself really really ill.

Monday - back to the gym. I was a little butt dragging yesterday afternoon. Don't know why - just get that feeling sometime. I didn't want to do the Zumba class that was so miserable last week so I just headed upstairs to the machines with no real idea or destination in mind. Treadmills have been hard for me in the past but they were mostly free so I headed there and was examining my options as far as trainings or free time. I find that again, I need some sort of direction for my workouts. I saw that they have a 5k loop option. Perfect - I thought, I can try that and see how far I get. Which reminds me - I've really really got to work on revising my gym music playlist. Some of that crap has GOT to go! But I tell you - Beyonce's "Put a ring on it" is the one one song that can absolutely everytime, make me run! Love that song! Before I knew it, 1 mile was gone. Running is boring - I'll admit that but when you can tune out everything around you and sort of center yourself around your running pattern, something else just takes over. Very interesting. Soon, my future sister in law came along and we chatted for a bit about her upcoming wedding. When they moved on to another machine, I was able to zone back into my music and get my tread back on.

Before I knew it, the treadmill had stopped and flashed "good workout". I stood there for awhile wondering "WTH? Did I break it"? Was it revolting against me? Thats when it dawned on my that I was done with the 5k loop! I was kind of shocked at the same time of being relieved that it was over. LOL. I didn't run the whole thing - I mostly walked it with intermints of running. But I'm proud that I was able to finish the thing! Really freakin proud actually. Sense of accomplishment is really really rewarding.

Moving on to the other part of my journey - food and weightloss. I feel stronger this week. I have zero idea what the scale is going to say tomororw and I almost don't care. I'm not sure I'm going to put up another loss but something in my mind has shifted - this is more than losing weight, its about becoming a new person, making changes that are going to last forever and changing a midset. I enjoy going to the gym and working out, I enjoy eating better foods that don't make me sick half the night and then wondering why. I enjoy making better choices for my family food wise. Its all very much a life learning experience.

I've learned 2 things food wise this week:

1) Its okay not to eat it. If its gross, too many points or just looks unappealing? Its totally okay to say no. Today? I got a gorgeous chef salad from the cafe. When I get to eating it, I find that the turkey is kind of nasty. Before my journey started? I would have thought "you paid good money for this salad - you better get your money's worth". Now? I'm not that concerned with the money aspect of it. I figure that my healthy and body is more important than saving a buck. I'm done with that. I'm not going to make myself suffer to appease somebody else's ideas.

2) Food tastes SOOO much better when you work for it! LOL. After my lunch walks - I'm simply enjoying my food more. I've always loved food, good food, bad food - I'd eat it all. But damn if I don't appreciate food more these days!

I would be lying to myself I didn't say that I was looking foward to my weigh-in tomorrow and yeah, I hope that I have something material wise/number wise to show for my hard work this week but thats not what I'm going to hang my hat on. I'm banking on buying a new pair of jeans this weekend - YES!! as my daughter has recently learned to do - fist pump & knee jerk and all.