One minor problem with Low-carb

Well, I discovered that low-carb weight loss does have its downside: muscle cramps. I vaguely remember having them the last time I did really low carb and I know that they pass, but it was still annoying to have cramps last night when I didn't get home 'til after midnight and had to be back up at 6:30AM to come to work. *shrug* I remember the cramps not being so bad on the South Beach Diet, so that may be where I head after Christmas. I'm only doing the really low until Christmas to jump start the weight loss. I'm hoping, if this week is any indication, to have about 20 pounds off by then. Yes, I'm aware that's FAST, but I am also aware that right now a lot of it is fluid and that I'll be adding carbohydrates back in slow increments to slow it down to a healthier 2-ish pounds/week. I'll need the carbs for when I start exercising. For now, heavy house cleaning is my exercise. But, the house definitely needs it, so, win-win.

Going well, I think

I'm actually doing quite well with the low carb. I'm detoxing, so I've got a bit of a headache, but it'll pass soon. I'm glad I already gave myself the deadline of Christmas so that I have something definite to look forward to. What my results are by then will determine if I stay relatively low-carb (stay away from starchy veggies & rice, but add fruit and liquid milk back in) or if I feel comfortable enough to switch back to WW Flex. I'm honestly thinking that I want to stay relatively low carb until after my yearly Ob/Gyn exam in March so that I can get somewhere close to what I weighed when I was there last. I've only got about 30# to do that, so it will really depend on my results over the next 3 weeks or so. Since Monday AM, I've gone from 275.2 to 272.6, so I'd say that I'll have decent results. I know that a lot of what I'm carrying around is excess fluid because carbs make me retain fluid like sodium does to other people.

Anyway, that's the news that's fit to print right now. I'm still not up to exercising, but I'm really hoping my body will cooperate and be up to it in January. *crosses fingers*

December Decisions

Since I'm not able to exercise a whole lot, I've decided to do a semi-low-carb diet until Christmas. No, it's not the healthiest program for the long term but it will help me to detox from the sugar I've been pretty much mainlining. :-) It will also kick start my weight loss again so that I can switch back to WW after Christmas and feel better about it.

Hopefully by then, I'll be cleared to go back to exercising, at least a bit. It's driving me crazy. Again, who would notice. :-)

Still coughing

I'm glad that my doctor warned me that I could be coughing like this for a month or more. I'd have thought he was over-exaggerating if he hadn't written the narcotic cough syrup for a refill. If I'm still coughing like this at the end of the cough syrup/capsules, I'll go in and see him again and see if we need to do anything else. Since I can't really exercise with this crap still attacking my lungs, I've decided that I'm going to try to take advantage of the time and clean house. At least I can sit and rest when I need to. It just sucks that my cough syrup is making me nauseated. Oh, well. Such are the joys of hydrocodone, right?

Back to your regularly scheduled blog reading. Eventually, I hope that this blog will actually get back to talking about wellness with regards to diet and exercise. I will direct your attention to the weight loss ticker on the left hand side of your screen, however. Astute viewers will notice the downward trend. Guess the Wellbutrin is helping.

Who'da thunk it?

Not me, that's for sure. The upper respiratory ick is NOT bronchitis, as I suspected. Neither is it simply an "upper (or lower) respiratory infection" or anything else run-of-the-mill. For these purposes, I'm even considering pneumonia as run-of-the-mill because I'd almost suspected it to be the case. Nopey. Nothing so simple for me.

Whooping Cough.

The -hell-?

Turns out that that lovely DPT vaccine we get as littles does, in fact, wear off. That's why we're supposed to get tetnus boosters. Someone forgot to mention to me, though, that there might be a pertussis booster. Oops. So, yeah, I'm going to talk to my doc when I go back about getting that done. *le sigh*

I've also gained 50 pounds since my last visit. We both thought it might not be the worst idea to go back on the Wellbutrin. I did some mental gymnastics and realized that I started gaining weight back when I went off of it. So, if all it does is keep my depression at bay enough to keep me from emotionally eating, it'll be worth the $5/month - especially since the extended release (read one pill/day) is now available as a generic. If I don't have to try to remember it 2X/day, I'll be OK.

Anyway, back to the cough. I'm on an antibiotic (3 days only, thank goodness) and 2 different types of cough medicine - one of which is a narcotic. So, at least I'm able to get some sleep now without coughing my head off. Of course, lying in bed listening to my lungs wheeze isn't my most favorite pastime, but I'll get over it. :-) So, yeah, no exercise for me for another week or so, at least. Not til it's out of my chest completely. At least I'm not running a fever now. The scary bit is that I never really did... Oh, well. That's what I get for thinking that a fever=contagious.

Sorry to any I may have inadvertently infected. :-(

Well, poo!

Sadly, my grandiose (I heart that word) plans to start back to exercising this week have been derailed by some sort of upper respiratory infection. *le sigh* I'm pondering the logistics of a doctor visit (leave early today & schlepp there and back on the bus, have the husband bring me in the AM and then to work, or have him come get me from work), but rest assured I will be going. I'm tired of coughing and feeling like crapdoodle. Iffin' I need an antibiotic, I'd rather go and get it over with so I can feel better soonest. YKWIM?

I'm sure that there are people out in the world who are clasping their chests screaming "It's the big one, Elizabeth!" over the fact that I'm actually going to the doc of my own accord and only 4 days into an illness. I really -am- trying to get better about taking care of myself. Really.

The plan tonight is to make it through work, go home, eat soup and go to bed.

Hope everyone else is doing better than I am right now. TTFN.

Darn it! Darn it! Darn it!

I'm so mad at myself right now. If that were productive, I'd let it continue, but it isn't. I've been binging on Halloween candy, and that has left me UP 5-ish pounds from last week. I've also not been light with the salt shaker, so I know that part of it is water retention. I can make all the excuses that I want to, but it comes down to the fact that I am fat and out of shape and I cannot seem to find the switch in my head that will help me eat what I need to be eating to most efficiently and effectively fuel my body. There are people who just naturally eat what they are supposed to, exercise the right amount, and stay naturally their ideal weight. Let's take a moment to define some terms, shall we?

Supposed to: In reference to eating, this means the fuel that runs the body at it's optimum levels, while helping it maintain its ideal weight (see "ideal weight").

Right amount: In reference to exercise, this means the amount needed to maintain healthy body systems, particularly cardiovascular and muscular systems.

Ideal weight: The number on a measuring device (i.e. scale) which reflects a body's healthy state. The healthy state means normal blood test results including blood glucose, cholesterol, triglycerides, and insulin, as well as all body functions happening at a normal level.

I don't give a rat's skinny behind whether I ever look like a supermodel. I never will, I'm about 6 inches too short, for one thing. :-) I want my body to be able to function and do what I ask it to do while having the energy with which to do it. Right now, sitting upright or standing for even 10-15 minutes requires superhuman effort. I am carrying around WAAAAAY too much extra mass, and it needs to go away. I'd be lying if I said I didn't care about appearance at all. I do. But I want to look my best, not some media-driven ideal.

So, how do I flip the switch in my head? I guess the first step would be to find out if I have that switch to begin with. Do I care enough about myself and my health to want to devote the time and energy it will take to shed over 100 pounds? If not, can I borrow someone else's give a shit? I know that there are other people who care enough about me and my health, so maybe I can borrow some caring about it from them if I don't have enough. If I find that I do have enough (or have borrowed some), do I have enough stamina to see the course? Will simply getting back onto Weight Watchers and getting back into the gym be enough? Do I have enough internal fortitude to get through this, or do I need help? If I need help, what form should it take? Is it as simple as finding the money to go to WW meetings once a week? Or do I need something more like accupuncture, hypnosis, or therapy? Or do I need something even more, like surgery? These are the questions I'm wrestling with. I know there are no easy answers. If acheiving and maintaining a healthy weight were easy, we wouldn't be the fattest country on the planet.

First step, though, is that I've declared a moritorium on Halloween candy. We will have no more in the house, thankyouverymuch. Second step, I took my AM walk break this morning. Even if I feel up to doing nothing else, I will do that. It showed me just how badly out of shape I've allowed myself to become. Third step, I did my WW Points quiz to find out how many Points I should have per day, and I will start counting Points again. I'll see if adding exercise and starting to count Points again will be enough for me to start seeing the scale's number move in the downward direction. If I'm not losing at all by doing that by the end of the year, I'll talk with the doc about it, and see what he recommends.

I'm still mad at myself, but it's easing off some.

After some consideration...

I spent some time talking with the husband last night since he actually had the evening and I could actually talk to him face-to-face rather than by text like we normally have to do. He and I both agree that it's probably better on my "we don't likes change, precious" psyche to not try to do too much all at once. He also thinks, and I agree, that being off gluten first will help my muscles feel better enough that I'll feel up to exercising. I know from personal experience that I'm much more inclined to follow a reducing diet if I'm exercising because I know how much work goes into burning off each and every one of those pesky kCals and I hate to have hard work go to waste. :-) So, step 1: get back to where my diet is cleanly gluten (or at least wheat) free. I'm giving myself 2 weeks for step 1. So, if I'm not making some sort of mention that I've started exercising or have given some actual reason that I'm not by November 10, start nagging at me, OK? That means you, inner trainer! If I'm feeling up to exercise before then, I'm gonna start. In fact, I prolly ought to at least start taking my AM walk breaks, even though it's cold out there! Still, "they" say that you burn more calories exercising in the cold. Who knows if that's true, but I'm willing to accept the possibility. :-)

On or before 11/10/2008, I will start exercising again. I'd dearly love to be up to doing the half marathon I'd planned for myself in March 2009, and I'm gonna try to be there... walking, of course. If not, I'm at least going to attempt the 5K that goes along with the Knoxville Marathon. I should at least be up for 3.1 miles, even if I'm not up for 13.1. Monday, 10 November, I will do my official WW re-start weigh-in. That will tell me how many Points I'm allowed per day. For full accountability, and it really disgusts me to put this out for anyone and their beloved second cousin to read, but... My weight on Monday, 27 October was 272.6#. Blech! Many people who know me stare at me in disbelief (Gods love 'em) when I say that, but believe me, I'm feeling every tenth of a pound. Of course, when I weighed today (only my weights on Monday "count"), it was 268.8, so I guess this gluten-free thing is the way to go. *snerk* Still. Blech. But, ya gotta start somewhere, right? To add to the accountability, I put a weightloss ticker on this blog. It's to the left of the text. Cute kitties, huh?

Okay, what now?

I'm really going to try to keep all of my whining about diet, exercise, health, etc, over here and off of LJ because no one really seems to shive a git, honestly. I don't know who is going to be reading this and I really don't care. I'm not sure that there's anyone I know who isn't concerned about their health and/or weight, so my posts won't come as any shock or suprise. All that being said, I need someplace - even the relative anonymity of the internet - to be accountable.

If you go back in this blog, you'll see I've had ups and downs with my weight and health. Right now, I'm mostly having downs. For some reason, I decided to ditch the one thing that had gotten me to feeling the best I had in 15 years: a gluten-free diet. I'm honestly not sure why I just up and decided to say screw it, but I did. I think the biggest part was because I was just tired of having to double or triple the time I spent grocery shopping simply to read the gorram ingredient lables. Yeah, I know that I could save that by not eating anything that comes in a box, but who has the time to cook -everything- from scratch? Who has that kind of money? I know I don't. I do have a set rotation of meals that are at least wheat-free, and I try to stick to them as much as I can, but there comes a time when you are restricting what you eat - whether for health, weightloss, or religious reasons - when you get fed up. I guess that if I'd been raised in a Kosher household, where that's all I'd ever known, I wouldn't miss pork. Not that I'm keeping Kosher. I certainly appreciate the health reasons behind the dietary laws, but I'm about as tref as they come. :-) I also don't need to add yet another set of restrictions to my life.

I think that my problem comes when I try to combine eating gluten free AND within a reducing diet framework. Perhaps what I need to do for the time being is concentrate on ONE set of restrictions. In other words, since I feel so crappy when I'm eating wheat, maybe I should just concentrate on just cutting the wheat/gluten out for now and not worry so much about the kCal/fat/&c in what I'm eating. I think that would help me feel better enough that I could have the energy to exercise and also to actually care about counting Points or carbs or kCal. I'm hoping that, as it did the last time, just the act of getting back on the gluten-free diet should help me lose some weight, especially if I don't use it as a license to eat whatever the hell I want to, so long as it doesn't have gluten in it. :-) I guess what I need to do now is to decide how long I want to just concentrate on doing GF. Is a solid week long enough? Should I shoot for two? As long as a month? I dunno. I'll ponder that.