Candy is the Death of Me

OMG, I swear, this holiday is going to be the death of me!  I just can't seem to avoid the candy!  It's everywhere!  Seriously. 
Everywhere.  They should change the name to Candypalooza.  Every day this week some patient or other had a big pumpkin full of candy.  Why do people think that sick people need candy?  Is is going to make them better?  I know! " It's the miracle cure!  Eat candy and be well!" (said very sarcastically by me)  So I guess the patients all felt the need to share with me!  It's hard enough for me to avoid candy on my own, let alone when people are shoving it into my face!  So...I caved.  And I ate some.  Well, not just some, but a ton.  Every person that offered me some I said "Sure!  Love some! Thanks!" or "Oooooo, butterfingers are my favorite!" or "I love me some Reese's Peanut Butter Cups!"  What the heck was I thinking!!  I probably would have put myself into a sugar coma if  I had eaten another piece yesterday!  So far today I have had NONE!  I have a couple of giant bags too, to hand out to Trick-or-Treaters.  I'm taking the kids out tonight too, so that counts as exercise, right?  I recently discovered a new inspiration last weekend.  My sister-in-law has lost 55 lbs since last year.  We went walking together last Thurs and it was nice to have someone to talk to as I walked.  I would've jogged with her, but I didn't have my jogging shoes on.  And that is important.  I don't want to hurt my feet.  So...the world would be a much skinnier place without candy...me included!  :)

New Direction

Hi! Guess what?  I have some news for you, my loyal readers!  As some of you know, I love being creative.  I got some of it from my mother, and the rest is my own.  I'm also cheap. :)  I was thinking the other day about the last thing I got for myself that was 100% new, and I couldn't for the life of me remember.  I shop all the time, really all the time. Almost every day.  Whether it be online or thrifting, I am in a constant state of shopping.  The reason I can do this, is because I am cheap.  I can't justify buying myself new clothes for outrageous prices, when after you wash it it looks just like a used item.  The price difference is astounding.  I can get a whole outfit at the Goodwill for $11.  That's jeans a shirt and a pair of shoes.  Tell me where else you can do that?  Nowhere.  Back on track though....I can't justify decorating my house with new expensive stuff either, so I have turned to making stuff, or re purposing stuff!  It is awesome.  So, I've decided to add all the fun stuff I make to my blog here and hope you all enjoy it as much as I do.  And I hope you all become inspired!  :D

Gondola Overload and Chocolate Theives

I swear to goodness sake that Avanti's Gondolas were created to be the death of me!  If you didn't know it is Respiratory Care Week.  This is a week(sad that we only get a week, while nurses get a month) where we celebrate being Respiratory Therapists and all of the home care companies bring in lunch and goodies for us all week.  So, yesterday it was Avanti's.  I did so well at dinnertime. I had some salad and about half a gondola.  It was more than I needed, but since they are my favorite, I splurged.  I was full, but I figured that since I still had half of my shift to go I would work some of it off.  So far so good right?  Nope...when I got back down to the department at 10:00 pm, I ate another half!  At that point I was so full that I was uncomfortable!  I immediately regretted it!   I almost wanted to try and make myself hurl, but that would make me bulemic.  And I know better than that.  :)  So I suffered through a too full tummy.  It was terrible, and I know I never want to do it again, but I also know that at some point I probably will.  Oh well.  C'est la vie!  Last Friday I put a Milky Way into my mailbox because I didn't want to eat it then, but I knew I would want it later. So I get back to work last night and someone had stolen it!  The nerve of some people!  My favorite candy bar, and I had the restraint not to eat it.

Stupid Jackass!  I hope karma gets them!  I put a note on my
mailbox too, it said" Whoever stole my Milky Way out of my mailbox is a jackass.  I'm pissed.  Keep your hands off my shit!"  I hope it makes them feel bad.  But it probably won't.  And the people I work with wonder why I don't want to hang out with them.  Some of them suck!  I know what you're thinking, It's only a candy bar!  But you should know not to mess with a fat girl and her food!  It's like murder! lol  On another note,  I'm going to start walk/running with my sister-in-law on Thurs(my day off this week). She's lost 55 lbs and is an inspiration to me right now!  Still struggling with this food war, but it's a lifestyle change so it doesn't happen overnight!  Thanks for reading!

Kiss and Be Scared



This is where I wanted to go

Hi again, I can't believe it's been a week since I blogged!  Not much of consequence has happened in the last week, so I guess you didn't miss anything. HA!  So my DH isn't feeling the love right now.  He erupted on Thursday and spewed all his feelings at me very angrily.  I was really at a loss.  He basically told me in a 30 or so minute rant that he didn't feel loved by me anymore.  Hhhhmmmm...  I asked him what I needed to do to help him feel loved, and he wouldn't tell me.  He says that it has been happening for about a year and a half, which is exactly as long as I've had my "new" job.  But of course this doesn't have anything to with my job, he rants.  After much discussion and a text message answered at 6 am but my DD, things have hopefully been resolved.  For now.  We decided that we need to spend more time together without the kids, as a way for us to connect better.  So last night we went to the Bartonville Insane Asylum Haunted House.  He was terrified even before we got there.  He has a huge fear of ghosts.  He says he used to see them all the time when he was younger.  I told him he would be fine, and I was, of course, right.  It was really fun.  Not only did we get to spend 3 hours together in line waiting to get it...I actually screamed a few times.  Not in terror, but because something jumped out at me!    The lead up was pretty creepy too, they told the story of A. Bookbinder.  He is one of the only patients 

This is where we got to go

to have a name on his grave.  It's very creepy.  Too bad some stupid jackass answered his phone at that part, and was a royal ass the whole rest of the time.

Haunted Cemetery

The building we got to tour was at one time the TB ward.  Upward of 4000 people were reported to have died in there.  WOW! No wonder it's haunted!  Did you know that being scared ever once in a while is good for you?  It gets the heart racing and gives it a little exercise, so it can keep running smoothly for a long time.  So this time of year is great for your heart!  At about 1 am, after the haunted infirmary we took the hay rack ride to the old cemetery.  I totally didn't know that it was open to the public, I really want to go back some afternoon and find the grave of A. Bookbinder.  And take some of my own pictures.  These are ones I borrowed off the internet, and I know mine would be tons better!  I did manage to take a bunch with my camera phone while on the hay rack, and sadly they were all black, except this one.  Let me know what you see, and remember being scared is good for you.  As long as it's not all the time.  :D

Where does the fat go?

Has anyone ever wondered where the fat goes when you lose it?  I have, so I thought I'd do some research about it just because I'm curious.  I read an article that says that you can lose as much weight as you want, but you will still remain in the same shape.  For example, if you are pear shaped, or apple shaped(like me) you will always be that shape, just a skinner version.  Boohoo, I was hoping to gain a bigger butt! Just kidding, I know I'm stuck with the back-crack I was born with.  So anyway, back to where the fat goes...

Did you know that average weight people can have between 10 and 30 billion fat cells?  And that overweight people can have upward of 100 million?  The sad part is that you cannot get rid of these, except with liposuction.  The good news is that they can be shrunk.  That is part of how they work.  As you eat less and exercise to lose weight, your body needs more fuel, so it burns the stored energy inside your fat cell.  Pretty cool huh? 

This article also says that big belly(again, like me) is worse than big butt.  Again, wishing I had a big butt here.

Though it could potentially be too big.  Ya know.  

Anyway...they say the harm caused by a big belly far outweighs the harm caused by a big butt. Belly fat gets in the way of your abdominal organs and is metabolically active.  Which means that it disrupts the way your body runs normally.  So if you're like me and have a big belly you should get rid of it! Now! Your health is in jeopardy!  (Whew, had to get my Mr. Obvious comment out of the way. ) After your body metabolizes the fat stores it literally melts away, leaving water and CO2.  You pee or sweat out the water and breathe out the excess CO2.  Voila! This is where the fat goes! 

If you're more curious as to the biochemical aspect of it you can read this article here.   It's funny, because with all my education on how to lose weight, and eat better I never actually knew exactly where the fat went.  I knew it went away, but I didn't know how or where.  So, I learned something new today, and hope you did too!

Someday my belly will be this small, maybe a little jiggly still, but that's ok.

Barbie Lipo

I just discovered this great new project.  It's called Healthy is the New Skinny.  I LOVE this.  It is exactly what I'm trying to do with my life.  I'm going to have to start following this to see what they are up to.  You should too.  But I wanted to share this picture with you.  This is the photo that caught my attention and made me read this article.  This is a beautiful model, and this photo of her and her doll shows what she would have to get taken off to look like Barbie.  It's very powerful(for me), and I hope someday my daughter. Go check it out, and learn some good stuff! The site is chock full!

10 stories to the Top



The steps up to the Arch

Max sees the baby elephant.

We took a bit of a family vacay this weekend.  It was nice to get away, but the pile of laundry that awaited me was catastrophic!  I knew that while on this trip that I would eat worse than usual, and boy was I right.  Our hotel had free continental breakfast, with a belgian waffle maker(my favorite) sooooo, I had waaaayyy too many waffles.  But with all the walking we did, I'm sure I worked them off.  We went to the Arch and the zoo, and on Monday we went to Cahokia Mounds(had to put a little education in there for the kidlets).  The Arch was fun, as usual.  I went when I was a kid, and rode up in the elevator with my family.  I loved it, the elevators are little round-ish pods with 5 seats.  As they rise into the air they have to stay up-right, so they click and level up every so often.  This is a really cool piece of engineering.  Anyway, back to me, as I grew up I got a touch of claustriphobia and fear of elevators.  The closer we got to the elevator, the more freaked out I became.  I was literally almost having a panic attack...but I had to stay strong for the kids.  I knew if I showed my fear, Reilly would not get on.  Well, I made it all the way up!  It's only a 4 minute ride, and there is air circulation and light, so it really wasn't that bad.  It was more funny to watch the kids faces as it clicked and turned!  The views were amazing.  DH was freaked out and kept holding on to the baby like he thought he was going to fall out!  The next day was the zoo...tons of walking, all over the zoo.  We saw it all in one day.  The baby elephant was out, and the penguins, and giraffes.  Max noticed the elephants and got really excited.  It was a great family weekend, but I'm glad to be home.  My running is not going along as planned.  My brother gave up trying to motivate me I guess, so now it's up to me to motivate me. (We all know how well that goes.)  Oh well, I still have a year to go right?  So, I did well on my uphill trek, to the top of Monks Mound.  I had to rest halfway up, but I made it, and wasn't sweating that bad at the top.  The view of St Louis was amazing.  It was like the Arch was looking back at us.  We wandered around the top for a bit, then we made our way back down.  It was really neat to think of living on top of this man made hill. I wonder if the chief ever had to walk down the steps, or was everything always brought to him?  Very interesting and historical.  I actually considered going for a run after work tonight, but nope, it has to rain!  Well, the kids get up early so I'm off to bed!  Thanks for reading, and keep trying to live a healthy life!

The view from the top of Monks Mound, 10 stories up.

Another 5 Bite the Dust



This is the 5 lbs I lost! Gross!

 I guess all my hard work is paying off, just not as fast as I want it to obviously. lol  But seriously, I'v lost another 5 lbs! Really!  I work at a hospital, and we have a program the is called Lifestyle Coaching.  It is for our insurance(to keep it cheap! HA).  Well, the also have a program called Team Lean.  This is a weight loss initiative that puts people in teams of 4 and the team that loses the most weight wins!  I don't think my team is going to win, well, because not everyone is doing their best, but it looks good for the lifestyle coach, huh?  So anyway, I weighed in today and had lost 5 lbs! WOOHOO! Very exciting for me.  I actually got off the scale and did a little dance!  I felt silly, but happy too! It is real motivation to see that stuff.  The girl at the weigh-in actually asked me what my secret was.  I couldn't think of a thing to say besides, "For the first time in my life I actually pay attention to what I eat."  Duh, I forgot to put in the running too, but since it is still kind of sporadic I guess I don't think about it.  It was exactly what I needed to see and hear today.  It really made my day.  Even after all the dumb stuff I stress ate this week.  It isn't an excuse to still do it, but I can say it didn't completely de-rail me!  I never thought it was possible for me to actually lose weight while actually trying.  I've never actually tried for an extended period of time in my whole life.  This is fierce!!  I am a competitor, and I will do this!  Keep me in your thoughts!  :D

no,no,no...

No Eating Allowed Here

I am so on the downward spiral.  I feel like I'm just not motivated anymore.  I don't want to run, or eat right or anything.  I just see food and eat it.  It's very depressing.  I hope I haven't gained any of the weight back that I lost.  That would be a complete failure.  I feel very defeated right now.  It is so hard to eat right when my house is full of crap.  He actually told me that he was happy the way he is.  I'm repeating myself I know, but I just can't believe that is actually true.  I have all these things at my disposal, but when I get home at night it is too late to go running, and before I go to work there is just too much stuff to do.  My house is never clean, the laundry is never done, there is too much, too much, too much...  I even fell on my way into work yesterday.  I couldn't find my green crocs, and I had stepped in dog crap in the pink ones, so I wore some older shoes in to work.  I was walking along, minding my own business and splat...right on my face.  I fell right out of my shoes.  I turned to look and they were sitting there like that was where I had left them.  It was surreal.  Now my knee and wrists kill, and I'm sore everywhere.  I'm so very frustrated...and now the sink is leaking.  It really feels like I will never get ahead.  I have the best intentions, then I get stressed and my coping mechanisms are eating and shopping.  Which are the the two things that I do not need to do anymore.  Maybe I will begin again tomorrow.  I'm not even going to tell you what I've been eating...it would probably appall you.  It does me.  :(   Here's to de-cluttering and de-stressing my life.  Let's hope it works...