Ups and downs

This weekend I was at a game festival and I had a lot of fun and lots of new experiences. What I didn't have lots of, though, is candy, and I'm SO proud of myself for that! I go to this festival almost every year, and foodwise I did a great job compared to other years. One year I lived almost entirely on cheez doodles (they sold supersize ones and I'm a sucker for those cheesy devils). My goal for this year was to maintain my weight throughout the weekend (I knew better than to hope for a weight loss!), and I'm happy to report that my weight today is the same as it was on Friday. :)

How did I do it? I think it came down to planning. I planned my main meals in advance and brought a chicken pasta salad with me the first day. Since I wasn't staying at home, I had to settle for the less than healthy warm food they sold. Mainly hamburger and toasts, not the most healthy things to eat. But I did bring diet bars as alternatives to smaller meals. I wish the stores would sell more dinner stuff that can be eaten cold, then I could have avoided the worst calorie traps alltogether.

Another accomplishment was that even though I was sleep deprived and tired to the bone when the festivities ended, I did manage to squeeze in a level 3 session none the less. It was HARD though, my legs felt like jelly, I had to take lots of breaks and I was totally beat afterwards. But it's the effort that counts, right? 

On the down side, even though I've been really good this last month, I'm only down 0.4 kg and that bugs me. I have a body media fit that tells me how much calories I use throughout the day, and I log all my food. For this, I've calculated that I should be down 2 kg, which is a much more respectable number.

It feels really unfair when you've put in so much hard work yet you're not rewarded. Yes, I know that I'm probably healthier now than I was a month ago. And more fit. But still, no matter how important those things are, I still want that scale to move! I yearn to see myself getting closer and closer to my dream body. Right now all my goals feel unattainable and that's never good. I can keep going a while longer on faith that things will turn around, but each week the scale refuses to budge it gets a little harder to keep going.

The worst part is that I feel like I'm doing good, so I'm not sure what to do differently. Maybe add some more cardio? I'm planning to start C25K soon, hopefully that will shake my body up from its routine. Until the scale starts to cooperate again, I'll just have to focus on the positive things I HAVE achieved. After all, the habits I'm learning now are for life, so there's no quitting!

Level 3 and golf

When I look back at my post from a couple of days ago, where I naively thought that the golf class would be a couple of days of resting (from the 30DS), I have to laugh. My body has been aching all over throughout this weekend! Even though my golfing experience didn't include any cardio, I wouldn't call it resting either. I've been using muscles I didn't know existed, but I had a lot of fun. For a while, anyways, until we got to the actual game.

Turns out, I suck at golf. That wasn't a problem when we were all practicing by ourselves, but by the time we were trying out our newfound abilities in the field, it was also pretty obvious that I suck at losing, too. I HATE feeling so inferior! It just brings forth so many (not so) deeply buried feelings of self loathing. I know I have to start working through my perfectionism and other problems before they overwhelm me, and before they turn into binge eating, lethargy and weight gain. I've been there before, and I'm certainly not going back there now that I'm slowly but steadily losing weight and getting a grip.

On a more positive note, I did level 3 of the 30 day shred for the very first time today, and I MADE IT ALL THE WAY THROUGH! :D (thankfully, that helped a little with my sore self esteem). It is hard, and I had to take breaks and do some modifications, but I didn't have the same feeling of wanting to die as I had when I first completed level 2. I don't know if that's because I was more mentally prepared this time around, or if level 2 was so hard for me because of all the planking, and I've gotten (somewhat) used to that.

Whatever the reason, I'm super happy with myself for completing, and for actually doing it today. Because I was sore all over from golfing, I nearly skipped the workout alltogether. However, I know I'll have little time for shredding this week, and so I had to do it when I had the time, ready or not. I'm very proud of that decision, because it's not that long ago that I would have used any excuse to avoid exercising. It just shows that I HAVE come a long way, and I AM improving, although I still have a long way to go.

Now, I'm trying to focus on my accomplishments and not on my failures. And I've also decided to keep on golfing. It would be so easy to quit, but then I wouldn't get to see the improvements I can make. And golfing is a good way to get some light exercise. So I'm going to face my demons and keep on going!