Yep, it is very true, when I don't get enough sleep, it is much, much harder to make good decisions about food or anything for that matter. I tend to want to spend more money when I'm tired (I didn't yesterday). And I don't care as much about what I eat when I'm overly tired. And that almost derailed me yesterday.
I was totally experiencing PMS cravings yesterday. For me it's always been salt. I just need salt! Of course, my husband says, "Well, if you are bloating and holding water, then the last thing you should have is salt." Well, sure, tell that to a body that drools over anything that looks salty and makes your mind crave anything salty. Couple that with being overly tired and it's hard to resist the calling of salt.
Yesterday the craving was for bacon. Yum, bacon! We even have the no nitrate and other funny business bacon. It tastes so good! I have a pack in the refrigerator. I wanted it so much, I decided that I would make it. Not a few pieces, but the whole darn thing. Yep, I wanted to eat the whole package of bacon. I had only eaten a protein shake and an apple at that point, so I went to the refrigerator to make the bacon. I looked at the calorie count - 800 for the entire package. That's not too bad. I could eat that and still have room for supper. Yes, I got that close to making it and eating it. Then I decided, "No, that is so stupid. You don't need bacon. Maybe you're just thirsty and there are other things to satisfy the salt need ." So, I poured myself a big glass of iced tea and added lime juice and then I went to the pantry and grabbed a couple pieces of teryaki beef jerky. Now that stuff is full of sodium too and not the healthiest thing in the world, but it was world's better than eating an entire package of bacon (and I would have done it too). So, instead of 800 calories and a bajillion grams of sodium. I had about 100 calories and a 'moderate' amount of salt. That was a huge success!
In other things, I was tired from my efforts in the garage yesterday and lack of sleep, of course, but I was also very unexcited about going out in the heat at all. I had to water my garden because we've had no rain for ages and this heat is drying them out like mad and in that 45 minutes I was puttering outside at 10 am, I got soaked in sweat. I really did have to hang my clothes up to dry after that. I came in and saw at 10:45 am it was already 91 degrees and felt like 99 degrees. Just awful!
In the late afternoon after school and snacks, I went to the pool with the little guy. That's the only good thing about summer heat - the pool. Especially this pool as it's not heated.
And then, I still needed to work out. I had to talk myself into it, but I knew I would feel better. I decided to do Kathy Smith's Step workout (can you tell I like step routines?). Step gets the heart rate going without having to put stress on the joints and without complex, fast moves. I love that!
Anyway, I decided I would do at least two sections after the warm-up (the beginner and intermediate sections) and if I was up for it and not too tired, the advanced section. I ended up doing all three and it felt great. For the first time in this video, I did the propulsion (jumping). There's none of that in the beginner section a wee bit in the intermediate section and quite a bit in the advanced section.
When I first did this video a couple months ago, I could only do the beginner and intermediate sections with very little propulsion and my heart rate skyrocketed. Then I was able to do all three sections, but no propulsion in the advanced section. And now I can do all three sections with the propulsion and my heart rate doesn't go as high as it used to. Still a good workout and still on the lowest step, but I can definitely see marked progress and that feels great!
I can and do chart my progress with my heart rate monitor and I also see my resting heart rate often with checking my blood pressure and it's been interesting to watch that number go lower and lower. When I started in January, my resting heart rate was 85 beats per minutes. Very quickly it dropped to 75 and not long after that to 65. I've been watching it slowly drop the last couple months little by little some more. Last night while waiting for the video to cue up, it was 53. FIFTY-THREE. Wow! My heart is getting stronger and healthier and so quickly! When I exercise it shoots up. I'm noticing I can maintain higher numbers now too. Anything over 145 used to feel like I was going to die. Now that number is around 155 to feel I'm going to die. And my recovery is fairly quick too. Within 10 minutes of exercising, it was down to 80 beats per minute. It's amazing what the body can do!
That's about it for me. Getting ready for the weekend!
Stats for 6/10/11:
Beginning weight: 255.6 Now: 201.8 (no change from yesterday - almost 54 pounds lost)
Exercise total hours in 2011: 183
Total miles walked/biked in 2011: 483/1000
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