3 weeks!

Ahh the only good thing about Monday's are looking at the scale to see how much weight I have lost! Is it sad that's the only good thing about Mondays?

I lost 2 pounds this week! I weighed myself on Friday, and had lost 2 pounds, and I did it so I could stay motivated to not overeat or cheat. And it worked!!! I'm super excited that I didnt gain any weight. Now I have 3 more pounds to go before I lose my first 10!! So this week I'm going to take a look at how many calories I need to be eating and do some adjustments to my diet, and I'm also going to work out every day. I want to lose these 3 pounds!! I'm ready to have gotten rid of my first 10 pounds in a month! I will be well on my way to my 21 pound goal of April 7, which is my first 10%!

Get your own graph at skinnyr  

I'm going to look at Sparkspeople, and also My Fitness Pal on my iphone. I can do weight watchers, I'm keeping the account for the recipies, but I really want to keep a cap on what I'm eating, rather than getting allowances for any mistakes I make. I need to be held accountable. Its also going to be difficult because of the Super Bowl! I'm going to a party and I know I'm going to be tempted to eat things I shouldnt.

I know they are having chicken and hambugers. So I'm going to plan to eat the chicken, and I think I'm going to bring a veggie tray, that way I know I'll have food to eat while I'm there. I'm also going to stay away from sweets for game day. And I can fill my plate, and still feel good about what I'm eating. Maybe I'll bring some cheese too! Love me some cheese. I've been eating cheese lately, I know it's high in fat, but it keeps me full longer, some cheese with some cherry tomatoes and a few pita chips make an amazingly good snack. I also found these dole fruit cups, usually I'm all about fresh fruit, but these fruit cups have granola in them and keep me full from my afternoon snack all the way to dinner, which includes my workout and cooking dinner, the most active part of my day. I think once I get a chance, I'll do my own granola and do a fruit cup of my own, but these are awesome. Mix in the granola, nuke it in the microwave for 30 seconds and its a nice warm snack for a cold winter day!

Okay- on my lunch break today I looked at my Fitness Pal, and it told me that I could only have 1400ish calories, and that's just not enough for me. I don't know what this thing is thinking, I looked at Sparkpeople and they recommended more around 2200 calories, which seems more in line with what I'm comfortable with. I have absolutely no intention of starving myself. If I do that, then I'm sabotaging myself, because if I'm hungry I'm going to go and snack on whatever I can find. 

I have a couple of pictures today, the first is a picture of me I took on my phone after I worked out I think my eyes look weird, but its cook to see what I look like a week later, just in the face! 

My second picture is leftovers, I've recently taken a liking to leftovers. I've always loved leftover tacos, but to be more frugal- we saved 80 bucks this month because we didn't eat out!- I've been taking leftovers to lunch at work. I don't have to go out to eat, and I don't have to leave work. 30 minutes isn't very long for lunch and I just don't have time to go get something and eat it. Today I had Lentil and Beef soup/stew. It was good, and we got to use some of the 10 zucchinis that my grandma got for us! 

If leftovers looked this good, everyone would want to eat them! One of them is my new favorite bean taco. Yum! I want the protein, but not the fat that you get with the beef, plus if you put beans with something, you can make it last longer and it will keep you full.

I'm going to post what I ate today- even though I keep a journal, just so you have an idea of what I eat during the day:

Breakfast 6:15- 1/2 bagel, 4oz activia, 1 banana

Snack 9:00- 1 serving pita chips, 1 cup cherry tomatoes, 1 babybell

Lunch 12:00- Beef and Lintel soup- 1 1/4 cup, 1 serving vanilla wafers, 1 cup baby carrots

Snack 2:30- dole fruit cup with granola

Dinner 6:00- 2 beef tacos, 1 bean taco all with little big of cheese, tomatoes and lettuce

                      1 weight watchers ice-cream toffee bar and 1/4 c of  beans

Snack 9:00- 1/2 serving multigrain pita chips, 5 cherry tomatoes and 1 babybell

I had 2- 16oz of fruity tea, and about 4-16oz bottles of water at work and 4-12oz glasses of water at home. 

I feel like a slacker for not having posted since Tasty Tuesday!!

I so didn't want to exercise today. I have been just laying around all day, but 20 minutes of Zumba is always fun and so I did it anyway. I worked up a sweat and was totally out of breath, but I did it! AND the program let me bump up to 20 minute intermediate instead of beginner!! That's totally exciting!

So a while back I mentioned a post I read on another blog about determination. And the blogger posted about the difference between determination and motivation. I've always worked under the motivation concept. I'm motivated to fit in a wedding dress for example, so I loose weight. I'm motivated to be skinny. Today during my lazy Sunday I was watching netflix and came across this tv show named Ruby, about this woman who was 500 pounds and was told that if she didn't lose the weight, she would die.

What an awful thought. To think that you could die because of the weight that is on your body. And so this tv show showed my that I have to be damned determined to lose this weight! I can't let that happen to me, I can't continue to be this size. I have a whole life to live, and so many things that I want to do, and I can't because I'm overweight. No I'm not her size, but yes, I have a long way to go. She kept talking about how all she could see in the mirror wasn't what she has already lost, but what she still had to lose. Well I'm going to remember how much I have lost and always keep that in mind.

Another thing that I think is wonderful about this show is that Ruby is beautiful on the inside and the out. It's so important to remember that you can have an amazing body, but you can be a total bitch.

I'm going to watch some more of the show, and tomorrow I'm going to weigh in. Friday I had lost 2 more pounds, and I weighed myself to give me motivation to stay good during the weekend. ALSO, I started writing down everything I've been eating. Hope that this helps. I think it will. I need all the accountability I can have!

See ya tomorrow for weigh in!

Tasty Tuesday- Taco Style

So another week has gone by! I've been blogging for a week! (that was really yesterday, but today was the day I noticed)

I want to make this short and sweet, so I have a couple of things to say.

1. I feel awesome, I am just getting to the point where I have a ton more energy because of the food change and because of working out. And getting a solid 7 hours of sleep. I have been going to bed at 11 every night.

2.5. I Zumba-ed again tonight!!

2. I was throwing pots tonight and I cut my finger. it was really stupid and I'm not sure what I cut my finger on, it was enough like a paper cut, but I couldn't keep going with all that mud. So I improvised because I had 2 more batts (plastic things that I throw on) and I wanted to throw all of them. I only have 6 so far, but when I need more after using them, I just cut my new pot, mug, etc off the bat and clean it and reuse. If that made any sense. So back to my story. I cut my finger, and tried to clean it the best I could and I had to keep going to I have an apron in my studio and a machete and I took the machete and cut the end of the tie on my apron and tied it around my finger. And then I threw two more pots!

Okay so tonight for Tasty Tuesday I'm going to tell you my favorite recipe of all time. And sadly I don't have exact measurements for the spices, so I'm going to just guess and you can add the spices to your own liking.

Taco Tuesday

2 pounds of ground beef
1 can of tomato sauce
1 tbsp cumin
1 tbsp oregano
1 tsp garlic powder
1 tsp onion powder
Pinch of cyanne powder
Salt and Pepper to taste
1 can of water

Taco fixings-
Lettuce
Tomato
We do a can of black beans and then all the same taco spices with it
we do corn taco shells because it only has so much room
cheese

brown the beef- drain off the fat
Add the tomato sauce and all the spices and the water- it will look very watery- you will cook until all the liquid is cooked out maybe 15-20 minutes depending on how hot you have it, I usually put the burner on medium or medium low. It gets all that flavor in there! Remember to add more seasonings as you see fit. Again I LOVE cumin, so I always go a little crazy with it.

Assemble tacos and eat!

This will do way more than the 10 crunchy tacos that come in the package. I usually say 2-3 tacos a person, so 10-7ish servings. Not bad for 20 bucks!

Vegetarian Style: And if you want you can make this a vegetarian dish by just heating up 1 can of black beans with the juices and adding all the same spices to it. Cook for about 15 minutes. And put in the taco shells with the fixings. SOO good, sometimes I have a beef taco and a bean taco.

Enjoy!

Weigh in Day!

Huzzah!!!! 2 more pounds!!

I did this awesome graph at skinnyr.com, you should do one too!


Get your own graph at skinnyr

Today was a good day, back to work back to eating right, not that the weekend was horrible, but it was great.

I did 45 minutes of Zumba today! And I made an AMAZING salad that I saw on Pinterest- only with what we had- trying to save money so it was a pantry night.

This is a bonus recipe:

Lettuce 1/2 a bag
Cuscus- I used 1 box
Garbanzo beans- 1/2 a can
Yellow Apple- small
Carrots- handful of baby
I used a low fat Raspberry Walnut vinaigrette but you can use whatever- probably better with a sweetish vinaigrette.

Cook cuscus, chop all the stuff up except the beans and just mix and add together. Very filling and vegetarian friendly!

I'm not a vegetarian, but I like some of the vegetarian recipes.

So Corey and I took pictures today. I hate the way I look which makes me want to lose weight even more. I CANT look like this any more.

NO MORE ICKY-NESS! I am going to punch my fat in the face- figuratively- because literally would probably hurt!

You can see our wedding picture in the background!

He doesn't look happy at all about this. 

Bleh. This so gross! 

This is the last time we'll ever look like this. Onward to a healthy life!

Weekends Hurt

I meant to post before today, but you know weekends are hard to find time to post. Why is it harder to find time when I have more of it?

So today I would like to tell you about my Weekend Problems, yes it deserves to be capitalized like that. 

I have always had the problem of sticking to my gumption during weekends, because I'm home all day and I have the chance to eat anything I want. The thing that sabotages me the most is all this food at my house. On weekdays I plan everything that passes my lips. I bring enough food to work to last me through my meals. But on the weekends I have the hardest time.

Maybe I need to start planning meals on the weekends too. My biggest weakness is going to the movies and wanting popcorn. Gad, I love popcorn. I love it with those flavors that you can find at some movie theaters. I especially love it with butter, but I've been saying no to that for a while now. 

And you would think that I have two perfect days to workout that I would utilize them, well I don't. I used to love to sleep in, but one of the side effects of getting up at 6 am on weekdays is that I can't sleep in. New sleeping in = 8:45. Old sleeping in = 12:00. Oh well, thats probably a good thing anyway.

While I may not have planned and eaten the meals I wanted to this weekend I did work out. I did Zumba! Which is really fun if you enjoy dancing, which I do! I took a pic of myself afterwards, your just going to have a headshot because I don't have a full length mirror, which is probably something I need to get so I can take better pictures of my body as I go. 

I also didn't post this weekend because I've been playing with my new iPhone 4s! So exciting to finally have one of these things. 

Yesterday my brother's came over and we cleaned the rest of my pottery studio. SOOOO excited to finally have that done. I'm going to go out there right now so I can take a picture to post here. I wish I had a before and after pic of this place, which is the shed in our backyard. But honestly, you don't want to see what it looked like. And we spent HOURS cleaning and chunking all of the shit in it. 

Before my parents divorced my dad tried to do himself in, with a tiller and the shed and some carbon monoxide poisoning. It didn't work, he chickened out before it did him in, but when he left my mom didn't want to touch the place because it had all of his stuff in it. 

When I wanted to start throwing pots, we needed a place to do it, and the most likely was the shed, so we cleaned out 13 years of dirt, dust, small animal poop and all kinds of crazy shit. And now I have my studio. I still need a wedging table, but that's another project for another weekend. 

This is from my iPhone! I love all my photo apps! This is a pic of my wheel. Its not on the bricks yet because we had to move it so that we could clean the other side of the room.

Same picture no app though and you can see more of the room. Those boxes on the right are all of my clay. Last weekend we went and bought 500 pounds. You would think that it's a lot, but its not that much. 

This is the back wall with some of my pottery and shelving. 

Needless to say I'm super excited about this! The funny thing is that it's colder in the room for some reason. It's 52 outside and like 42 inside. Weird. Turned the heater on so I can go work later. 

Tomorrow is weigh in day. I'm gonna take a pic of myself. So I can show some progress as the weeks go by! I'm hoping for another 3 pounds! 

Things to Ponder

For my blog today I was thinking about how there are so many things that we all share. For example:

 

I was looking at a picture that my cousin took during a marriage retreat this past weekend. Everyone is smiling and look happy. There were several overweight men and women. And I got to thinking that there are so many personal battles that we feel comfortable sharing with others. Our personal feelings about past events, our problems in our relationships with other people. Problems with our marriages. We all feel like there are things in our lives that we can share with other people.

 

But being overweight isnt like that. Its not like I can go over to an overweight woman who is my friend and commiserate about how fat I feel today, or how big my thighs are getting. Or if she can tell if my double chin is getting bigger. Where as I can go to a married friend and we can talk about how our husbands are driving us nuts, how much sex we have, the problems we have in our relationships. And our married friends agree and sympathize.

 

What people dont realize is the way overweight people feel is the biggest secret in the world. You can't hide it. You can't do anything but feel like people judge you. For whatever reason you eat too much. Going and talking to someone about how overweight you are sometimes just makes you feel worse. Everyone is their own worst critic and no one likes to have their flaws pointed out and it takes a very strong person to voice their own flaws to themselves, much less someone else.

 

Eating can be such a private thing. Especially for people who are overweight. Who wants to eat and be judged for what they eat? Some times I feel its almost like hording. For some people they eat when they are upset or depressed. Being overweight is depressing, and that just makes them eat more, which fuels the fire and the cycle continues. Other times people eat when they are bored (like me) and have a problem stopping. Some people binge eat and that is another very private thing. You dont want people to know that you do this because it's something that makes the eater feel ashamed.

 

I think it all boils down to feeling ashamed of your body and ashamed of what you eat. I KNOW that I shouldnt eat too much or eat when I'm bored. But it's almost an unstoppable force.

 

I read a blog about this lady who had bought 2 cheese burgers and planned to eat them both, but when she got home her sister asked if she could have one, and she was so angry at her sister. Is this something that you feel? I know in the past that I've felt this way, I have felt so possessive of food. I would hate being asked at school by friends for some of my food. And when I said no, they would always wonder why. I really have no insights as to why people feel like this, but I know that I've felt this way and it shouldnt be this way. You should eat to fuel your body. Its not about who has more. I know I've been out to dinner with my husband and we've ordered the same dish and his looked like there was more. And I always wondered why would they give him more? Is it because I'm overweight? Or am I the only one that can see there is more on that plate? Why does it bother me so much?

 

I feel like we should all be more open, if we where maybe it would lead us all to making better food decisions. Knowing that someone has your back when it comes to food, and life style changes (notice I didnt say diets because I dont believe in diets) is one of the most amazing things in the world. Having someone to hold you accountable, to talk to about problems, to share ideas, work out sessions, food, or crazy days is something that I think gives you confidence and gives you the support system that you need to lose weight and be healthy. Why do you think Weight Watchers has meeings? Because you are out in the open talking about everything I just mentioned. You need that.

 

People and friends who are trying to lose weight, you arent alone! And if you ever want someone to talk to about your thighs, or double chin or how you have problems with food, I want to say that I will be there to listen and be an encourager and part of your support system. Mine is invaluable to me.

One of the blogs that I like to keep up with is Runs for Cookies. This lady has an incredible story and has lost a gob of weight and looks fantastic. I love what she wrote the other day about determination vs motivation. I think it defiantly puts in perspective for me what I need to focus on. Head over there to read the blog! Runs for Cookies

 

Hard Day

Today was rough. So I started my new job 2 weeks ago, but we are having to deal with billing and people are calling in bitching about their bills all day.

Needless to say, it is stressful.

So with all of that I've been hungry all day. I hate feeling hungry. I ate my normal breakfast, yogurt, half a bagel and a banana. Then around 9 I got hungry so I ate my vanilla wafers and carrots, which made me nauseous. I dont really know what made me feel bad, but it was weird I was feeling icky but still starving.

Lunch filled me up, and that was a good thing. But by the time dinner rolled around I was super hungry again and we had pancakes and turkey sausage, and it never made me feel satisfied. So I ate the rest of the popcorn chips and pita chips. I know I shouldn't have. It was bad, I just ate it. And now I feel very full and very gross.

I'm going to go to bed early tonight. My coworkers told me that tomorrow wasnt going to get any better, it would only get worse. I was really proud of myself because I only wanted to cry twice in frustration today. Thats good right?

I have no picture for today that has anything to do with my day. So I'm going to post a picture that makes me happy. It is a picture of me this past May in Mexico. I'm ready for it to be warm and I'm ready to wear a cute bathing suit because I'm going to look amazing with my healthy body and adorable swim suit! Viva La Mexico!

Tasty Tuesday!

Today was good, I was off of work for MLK day yesterday and so it was nice to be back at work, it totally keeps me accountable in what I'm eating and when. Is it sad to say that my day revolves around my snacks and my lunch? Mainly because I am trying so hard not to over eat. Plus, the thing about eating small meals though the day is that, when it's time to eat, my body is like EAT NOW! And so I do absolutely have to eat every 2.5-3 hours.

The day started out very nice, kinda muggy and by the time I got out to go for a walk with Corey, it was SO COLD! I was in work out shorts and a sweater. About half way through the walk, I was warm from my boobs up, but my belly down was so cold! Either way it felt great to get out and walk. I always dread it, all day long I think about how I dont want to do it, but when I finally get out there, I always enjoy myself. It's even better doing this with Corey, its a good time for us to just chat about our days, even though we do see each other every day, its nice just to get some one on one time when it's not a date night.

So I'm going to do something fun today, I'm going to institute Tasty Tuesday's, mainly because I forgot to take a picture of us walking, so I'm going to take a picture of my healthy dinner. In an effort to eat healthier and to save money we have stopped eating out (this past weekend was a total abnormality-something I'll have to save till later to talk about because I'm interrupting what I wanted to say). And so I am cooking almost every night, which is awesome because 1. it saves money 2. gives us stuff to eat later for lunches, and 3. is very tasty and we know exactly what we are eating.

Tonight is a very good winter food, and is awesome for all the vegetarians out there, because there is no meat, although I did use chicken stock, but you can replace that with veggie stock. (courtesy of Weight Watchers, which I've since butchered and made better)

Recipe: Spicy Black Bean Soup

Ingredients:

2 tsp olive oil
1 large onion- chopped
3 cloves of garlic- minced
4 cans of black beans
2 cans of corn- drain juice
1 giant can of rotel
2 cans of chicken broth (or veggie!)
2 Tbsp cumin ( I LOVE cumin so I did 4)
2 Tbsp oregano
1 tsp of red pepper flakes (or whatever spicy spice you have handy)
.5 cyan pepper
2 bay leaves
.5 tsp salt
.5 tsp pepper

In a giant pot heat up oil, cook onions and garlic about 2 minutes. Add 3 cans of beans, both cans of corn (juice drained off unless you want a sweet taste), the giant can of rotel and the chicken/veggie broth.

Stir in cumin, oregano, red pepper flakes, cyan pepper, bay leaves, salt and pepper.

In a blender blend the last can of beans until smooth, you may have to add some of the broth to get it to blend. (Side note- if you want this to be smooth you can blend all of it, but I like mine chunky, so blend as many or as little cans of beans that you want)

Cook for about 30 minutes on low- partly covered, you want it to simmer and the flavor to develop. You dont want all the liquid to boil out. Make sure that if you blended a lot of the beans, that you will need to keep coming back to stir it because the bean bits like to sink to the bottom

Serve with cilantro or some cheese. Corey loves cheese with it. We did ours tonight with a side of corn bread.

Enjoy the soup, and just remember that you can do more or less spicy, just do it to your own taste, most of the time I dont remember to measure anything.

Happy Eating and Happy Tasty Tuesday!

I've tried to do this...

I've tried to do this before. I've tried blogs to chronicle my weight loss. And just like all the blogs the weight loss eventually grinds to a halt. I get where I want to be for a little or I just cant keep up with the blog or the weight loss.

I debated not doing this online, I wasnt going to do it here, just keep a journal of what I was doing on my own. But I thought about all the blogs that I read about women who do lose the weight and the blogs that have helped me and inspired me and I thought that maybe I could help someone while helping myself. 

I've tried to lose the weight before. Before I got married I lost about 50ish pounds and I looked amazing in my wedding dress! But after I got married I lost my momentum and my goal, I didnt have a dress to fit into anymore and it was so easy to eat out while on campus at school. 

I've since graduated (YAY!) and gained all the weight back (NOT YAY). This wasnt part of a New Year's resolution or anything. I'm just absolutely sick being fat. I'm sick of not being able to button my jeans or always worrying about not having anything to wear. 

When I started this last week I weighed 279 pounds. That totally sucks. At most I've weighed 285, thank God I haven't gained back to 285... that would be totally depressing. And so I weighed in today and I was at 276!! 3 pounds is awesome! And an extra pound my goal for the week was 2. So that's freakin' awesome! 

I think something that has really helped me this week wasn't necessarily working out, I'm still trying to fit that into my schedual. I just started a new job, my first post graduation, and the best thing about it is that I eat little meals though the day. My lunch break is the same time every day and I'm able to drink as much water I want, and not have to worry about having to pee in the middle of a 3 hour class. 

But more about my goals and what I want to lose (weight duh...). The high point of my height bracket for weight is 160, the low is 120 and mid is 140. I want to weigh 125. The last time I weighed 125 was when I blew past it years ago, I've never weighed this is my adult life. So for the people who dont care to do the math that's 154 pounds. That's a lot to lose. But I'm going to do it. 

Beyond being smaller, I just want to be healthy. My husband and I want to have babies, and the best thing I can do for my future baby is to be at a healthy weight. I want to give my baby the best possible start I can, and I dont want a lot of complications because I'm overweight. 

I'm so proud of myself for my first week of weight loss! I couldn't be more happy. My main goal this week is to work out 3 times. And I'm going to leave you with a picture that is totally depressing to me, but I thought I would share it because it just breaks my heart. This is a picture of me and my aunt and my little cousin. 

It breaks my heart because he is so adorable. I'll never get this moment back and I'll always be fat in it. His adorable helmet will always have me in the background looking huge. If this isnt a reason to lose weight I dont know what is. I never want to feel so embarrassed that I have to untag myself in pictures on Facebook. I hate it. I'm ready for a new and healthy me. 

My Favorite Things

Here is a list of some of my favorite things, things that I couldn't go without while losing weight!

Shakeology

I totally LOVE Shakeology, it is the best way to start my day and I can't imagine a morning without it! It tastes great and it fills me up until my next snack/meal. I suggest everyone buy some. It's the easiest and most important meal of the day!

Turbo Fire

The workouts I get from Turbo Fire are the best I have had in my life. I totally love the way I feel afterwards. If you want to become addicted to anything in life, its exercise! These are good for everyone. They have a low intensity person to follow if you are scared you are going to hurt yourself (like me), or you're just not up to being able to go all out. These workouts get better every time, and I have more endurance and my body is changing everyday!

My Fitness Pal for iPhone 


I track what I eat everyday. I use My Fitness Pal, an app on my iPhone that will let me scan barcodes, make my own recipes, and lets me know when I have eaten all my calories for the day. It's always right there because I keep my phone with me all the time, its simple and only takes a few minutes. They even have an website for people who don't have smart phones. It is essential that you track your food!! So I make it as easy as possible!

This is Why You Are Fat, and How to get Thin Forever

Don't let the title fool you, this book is full of wonderful information about food, and how to change what you eat to have a healthy body!

Rachel's Recipes

Here you can find a complete list of all my recipes that I have posted so far! Enjoy!

Tasty Tuesday: Spicy Black Bean Soup

Tasty Tuesday: Beef Tacos

Spinach Artichoke Dip

Tasty Tuesday: Shepherd's Pie

Tasty Tuesday: BLT Club and Oven Fried Green Beans

Crock Pot Chicken Tacos

Sugar Free Oatmeal Cookies

Tasty Tuesday: Baked Couscous 

Tasty Tuesday: Veggie Chips

Sugar Free Blueberry Cheesecake Pie

Tasty Tuesday: Spinach Lasagna Rolls

Sugar Free Date Bread

Baked Egg Rolls

Chocolate Silk Pie

Roasted Cauliflower and Aged White Cheddar Soup

Madras Soup

Marble Top Low Fat Cheesecake

About Me

My name is Rachel Spencer, and this blog is about my goal to lose weight. When I first started trying to lose weight I weighed 285 pounds! It sounds like a lot... and it was.

I'm 26 and I have been married for two years! I don't have any kids, just 3 cats and a dog. I am currently in graduate school at Louisiana Tech, working on my MFA in Photography. Its time consuming and very stressful, but I am excited about the next two and a half years.

I love to read, cook, eat, watch TV, play with my dog and go to movies with my husband.

Back in May of 2008 my mom and I decided to go on Weight Watchers. I lost 20 maybe 30 pounds but it all came back. And if you have any experience with this yourself, you have probably done this as well.

Then I got engaged, and I went dress shopping, and I realized that I didn't like the way I looked. So like so many brides to be, I bought the dress a size smaller and lost weight to fit into it. Which is totally unhealthy and something I never should have done. I lost 40ish pounds. But it all eventually came back except for maybe 6 pounds or so. I never broke 280 again.

So that leads me to where I am today. Currently I am slowing working my way down to 125 pounds. I often fall off the band wagon and I did when I started grad school, but after my first quarter I'm determined to lose this weight. It literally weighs me down. I threw my back out in the beginning of the fall, and I know if I had been working out that I wouldnt have had it happen.

Around march I had started losing weight by doing Beachbody's Turbo Fire and drinking Shakeology. I had joined a challenge group but it eventually fell apart, and so after losing around 30 pounds I just got too busy and just stopped. I gained about 20 back and now I'm back at it. Like I said before, I keep restarting, when I first started I was 285, then I lost more and ended up staying around 279 for a while, and now I've been at 266 for a while, so I'm slowly losing it, gaining and losing but not gaining it all the way.

I have a ton more weight to go... but I'm committed to doing this. I write a blog just to help keep myself accountable, and also just for a place to talk about all this stuff. Its amazing how much better I feel when I can just talk about what's going on. It's one of my fitness goals to keep this blog, because it really does keep me on track.

Before I started losing weight, back in college

2008 when I lost weight

Bridal pictures where I lost weight! This is one of my favorites! I want to look like that again!

These are shots of when I lost the pounds on Turbo Fire this summer

The one of the far right is 10 pounds, then 20 then 30. All in three months!

This is me now!