Yesterday was a day from H- E - Double toothpicks

Man... if a day could be classified as BAD in every way, that would be yesterday, April 21st, 2014. From not sleeping well, to having one son being grumpy and out of sorts all day to the other being a typical annoying teen to me not eat well and "on plan" like I planned to.

I'm not going to detail everything, but it is completely obvious that how well I do with eating (and exercising) is directly correlated to my mood and my well-being. I was so COMPLETELY frazzled yesterday that I told my husband I needed a stiff drink. It was that terribly bad.

My autistic son (and I hate to label him as autistic as then everyone goes and thinks Rain Man) is VERY high functioning and most of the time he's a pretty happy kid, but when he has a bad day? So does EVERYONE else. And we're not just talking about a little bit bad either, but full out fits and refusals, etc. It's purely awful when he has a bad day.

Then, I know today, my hormones were probably raging as my period started out of the blue this morning and it is out of the blue. This peri menopause has me always guessing as to when my period will come. It didn't come for 4 months and now it came 19-20 days after the last one! I tend to get moody/emotional the day before and so... it was a great mix and how did I self-medicate? I used food.

Now, I didn't go SUPER crazy, but I did eat about 1000 more calories than I should and all of those calories were simple carbs - quick sugar fixes... a drug to my body for sure. There was NO stopping myself from eating more yesterday. I tried.

This morning I knew when I woke up that it was going to be OK. I knew I would be on plan. Something was different even though I hadn't heard a peep from anyone or stepped a foot out of bed. Something in my head was different - clearer.

And, so far so good. Now let's see if cake baking will be easy to keep the munching demons at bay.
Today is my younger son's birthday. Yep, an Earth Day baby!

And with that note - remember every day is earth day and every day you should try to think about ways to reduce, reuse and recycle.  The new three Rs.

A few more realizations - none of them feel good, but will lead to good

While I am on track and feeling good, I am also trying to sort out how and why I got derailed. I'm trying to keep my mind in a positive mind-set which isn't that hard as I'm an optimist by nature, but I did discover a couple of things that were bummers.

First, yesterday I got to thinking about where my weight loss start was last time and where it is this time. I know my all time high was 275, but I had dropped and gained, but held stead at 265 for several years (a set point). Well, I thought I had STARTED at 265 last time. No.... I had totally forgotten that I had lost ten pounds and kept it off for a year after we moved from Virginia to Maryland. My journey had started last time at 255 pounds - not the 265 I had thought.

Which means, I had regained ALL but 14 pounds over an 18 month time period!

The weight fell off the first time for the first few months. It's not falling off this time. It's coming off yes, but it's much, much slower.

That is sort of tied to realization #2. I was just lamenting my new weight loss pattern on a weight loss forum. The last time I was losing weight my weight loss followed my menstrual cycle. I would gain as ovulation neared, and lose for about a week a few days following ovulation. Same pattern month after month without fail.

Well, I'm full in perimenopause now and my cycles are irregular. I have had maybe four cycles in the last year. And my weight loss is less predictable. And it's way, way, way slower. Wish I would have been more in the know that perimenopause tends to be one of the most difficult times to lose weight as the hormones are all over the place. And, with my hormones all over the place, it could have been a contributing factor to my depression.

I had several whammies - perimenopause - can cause depression. Seasonal Affect Disorder - causes seasonal depression. I stopped taking my thyroid medicine in the late summer/early fall - low thyroid function can cause depression. AND, I was dealing with a lot of injuries which kept me from the gym more often that I liked, and since exercise is a mood lifter, THAT was leading me to have more unhappiness too.

And for awhile, actually, there was a fifth contributing factor, I was gaining or was stuck at the same weight while eating 1500 calories a day - and I was still hungry. If I didn't exercise, I was stuck. And that was extremely frustrating. I was having a hard time wrapping my head around the fact that I would face a lifetime of hunger at 1500 calories. If I ate more, I gained. That entire year after my initial weight loss was a slow struggle, but still going slightly up... and then I just "lost it" and gave in temporarily.  The saying of, "more food doesn't taste as good as thin feels" left me. Food definitely tasted better than thin felt for many, many months as I used it as my only comfort.

And then the sixth contributing factor - seeing my husband's disappointment in me. Seeing how our relationship changed (and is still changed). I don't like to disappoint people, especially people I love. So, seeing he had lost his faith in me. Seeing he was disappointed in me and not attracted to me hurt a lot too... which also added to the depression.

So, I am getting a better understanding of why I went into a deep depression - it wasn't unexplainable. I get it now.

And, now I'm beginning to understand why losing weight the last couple of years has been especially difficult - I'm dealing with menopause stuff at the same time and this time tends to be the roughest time for weight loss (which makes sense as when do most women gain weight? During menopause!)

With the new information, I know more what to look for and how to keep my head in a better place. Knowledge is power. If this weight loss is super slow, it's super slow. It's not a race. It's about making it lifelong. if it takes me twice as long as last time, it does. It says nothing about me or my value as a person. It's about getting healthier forever.

Where has my waist gone?

I used to have a very nice hour-shaped figure. Even when I was fat, I had the right proportions. I just called it a 12 hour glass versus an hour glass.  But now that I'm 43? Where has the shape gone?

My measurements as of January 5th were this:

Bust: 41
Waist: 35
Hip: 43

That is only a 6 inch difference between bust and waist and almost all that difference is in boob size as I have large breasts.

The hip measurement is the lower hip, so across the buttocks. And it is only an 8 inch difference. I look pretty straight when I look at myself in the mirror.

When I got to my thinnest weight so far on this journey (around 165), my measurements were:

Bust: 39.5
Waist: 30.5
Hip: 40.5

Almost a 10" difference.

So, see where I gained most of the weight this fall/winter? I gained it mostly in the gut. Waist went up 4.5 inches while the bust went up 1.5 and hips went up 2.5.

Now that I'm losing again, I can tell I'm losing the spare tire (again), but even when it goes down, it's still not as sharp of a waistline that I had as a teen.

When I was 15, my measurements were 35-24-36. My body was still growing after that point and I never took measurements later - or don't remember them, so who knows what they were as a fully developed teen. But you can see there was a much bigger difference in waist to hip way back then.

Last year too I tried on a skirt that for some reason I still have from HS. I was the same weight that I was in HS when I wore that skirt, however, I wasn't even close to being able to close it at the waist! My waist is much, much bigger than when I was a teen, even when I was fitter at 42!

WHY??? I see it. I have eyes. Most older women have no waist. Especially those that are overweight, but why is that? I know it has to do with menopause, but I wanted to know more.

Well, I was just stumbling across some articles. This one sums it up fairly well: http://www.livestrong.com/article/165644-why-does-your-waist-thicken-at-menopause/

All things menopause are against me! I wonder how much worse it will get as I go from perimenopause to menopause?

Being fit will help, but I don't think it can stop it. I can keep things from getting too saggy and loose by building muscle, but I can't change my hormone levels!

Now I'm wondering if a under 30 inch waist is attainable and if it is attainable, will I be able to keep it that way? I guess I can only try, right?

Amazed at how the scale can just hold still

Today is day 50,000 that the scale has read between 189.4 and 189.8. Ok, it's only day 13, but 13 days to be bouncing around the same half pound feels like 50,000 days. If my body is following it's usually ovulation rule (which I cannot rely on any more as I'm in perimenopause), it will be another 4-5 days of no losses and probably gains.

Now, if I really think about it, I'm lucky to not have seen any substantial gains as my body gears up for ovulation (which by calendar should be Monday - not that my body follows a calendar any more) as that means I must be working hard and eating right, I should see a gain Sunday and Monday for sure though if I do ovulate as I always spike up temporarily.

But, when I look at my eating and my exercise for the past 14 days, I should see a loss according to the gizmo I wear (and by past history of what it takes to lose).

Here is what my gizmo has to say for the last 14 days including today which is still blank. That only means my totals will look even better at the end of the day. I might update this chart this evening to reflect that. (remember to click on them to make them full size).

I didn't copy page four as all that shows is my weight change over the course of those 14 days and of which you would find nothing as I didn't record the minute up and down movements on the scale.

So, according to my gizmo, which doesn't even record accurately what I do for movement, I should have lost 3.2 pounds. And, it undercounts my activities. It doesn't count strength training almost at all (the low days you see on the chart were all strength days except the two Sundays where I don't work out). And it also only counts step aerobics as a moderate exercise, not vigorous. I've done that 5 times in the last two weeks and it is rigorous exercise. I didn't wear my heart rate monitor while doing it, but during the heart rate checks, where we actually slow down to be able to do the checks, the checks were both over 150. So, my heat was going up into the 155-160 range - that is vigorous for me! Last night, for example, it gave me only 5 minutes of vigorous activity when I actually was in the aerobic zone for at least 26 minutes (as I was watching the clock) - that does not count any warm-up or cool-down time. 

So, basically, I probably truly lost MORE than 3 pounds in the last two weeks, but the scale still says I haven't lost anything -yet. Man, even when it does show the losses on the scale eventually, it takes a lot to lose 4 pounds and is so easy to gain them!

All I can do for now though is to speculate and hope that it will show a 3-4 pound loss in a few days. Ugh... so hard to see the same weight on the scale day after day when you are working so hard on losing!