Forgive me LoseIt, I have sinned...

I would like to think that something is wrong with my metabolism. That somehow, genetically, I have been created to collect fat and not disperse it. But this past week I started to take inventory of my intake versus my out take. And guess what? I eat too much.

I started to use the application for the IPhone, Loseit. I am able to track all my calories, make friends on the LoseIt forum and see how they are doing. In other words, we have our own confessional where we can confess our sins (when we indulge) or our praise reports (when we eat within budget). It is my first day with friends so I can't tell you how it is going. But I can tell you it is scary. For someone that struggles with eating, letting someone see how I am doing is like airing your dirty laundry for everyone to see.

While taking inventory, I discovered that I eat about 300 calories too much per day to lose weight. And this is when I am trying to be good. I have my LoseIt set up to lose 1.5 pounds per week. So I am allowed 1888 calories per day. If that is all I take in and don't work out then I will, in theory, lose 1.5 pounds per week. However, since I am going over about 300 per day (on average) I realize I am just maintaining....unless I start to work out.

I didn't do much last week after my calf injury. It was an excuse and not a reason. I could have done other things but I CHOSE to do nothing. I know that . There, it is out there. I CHOSE to do nothing. I can't blame painting my daughters room or too many things to do. I CHOSE not to take the time.

But I am a data person and this LoseIt gives me data and it is encouraging to know that if I eat like I have been and add biking or running, I will lose weight. Oh and there is one more thing. I can't stop at Donalds Donuts after church and eat four donuts and a bacon/egg croissant. I didn't eat them all at once but we brought them home and I ate them all day long. Four donuts are 1389 calories! That is crazy! and so not worth it. But now I know. And knowing is half the battle...go Joe! (sorry..unless you ever watched GI Joe, the cartoon, you have no reference for GI Joe).

Did you know there is a show called Biggest Loser?

Well, I knew. Well I knew there was a show on some channel at some time about fluffy people losing weight. That is all I knew about the show. Every once and a while, when flipping through channels, I would catch a sound byte. And then move on. I didn't know who these people were and since I didn't watch for long, I had no emotional connection to them.

Well last Sunday I was trying to record a show on HGTV on my DVR and I couldn't. Apparently, I had no disk space. Say what? The only thing I record on a regular basis is Glee. So I went to my DVR and noticed that somehow, someway, I was recording the whole season of Biggest Loser. I erased Week 14 and then I decided...well I will watch one show.

Four days later, I am hooked. I am inspired and I want everyone of them to win on Biggest Loser. I felt connected to them...except for Melissa. I didn't start watching until mid season...when Lance went home. I didn't realize Melissa had been a contestant, I just knew she was his wife. It was something in her mannerisms with him that I got a weird feeling about her...I saw darkness. Well, next show when she comes back and I am introduced to her for the first time....I was right.

Anyway, it has inspired me. Some are more fluffy than I am...and some were but now are a heck of alot lighter. So I can do this...but the food is killing me and I know it. I acknowledge it. So now I watch the show and at commercial breaks instead of fast forwarding on the DVR I grabbed my step stool for my kitchen and I did steps. And every once and a while during my day, I would do some more. Well last night, I did it and I did something wrong. I felt a tear in my calf. Thank goodness it is not too bad. It is still sore but no where as sore as it was yesterday.

So this week I will let it heal and just do upper body work outs. Oh and by the way... I erased week 14 and now I wish I hadn't because now I don't know what happened.

Dear God, I don't feel like running.

I didn't want to run this morning. I was tired. My alarm went off, I hit the snooze button and just started to stare at the wall. All these thoughts were going through my head. "Why do I have to get up? It is probably too hot. Do I have anything to wear? What if I do it in the evening? Is that a spider on the wall?" The music started to blare again so I hit the snooze button again and continued to contemplate running. "I know, I will run tomorrow. I am really tired, running while I am this tired is pointless...I won't get anything out of it. I should spend time in prayer each morning and not running....God, why did you give me such a slow metabolism? Father God, I am asking for favor in this situation. Please just miraculously make the fat disappear. If you can part the Red Sea, you can part my flab. I am claiming it now. When I step out of this bed, I will be thin and I will tell everyone how awesome you are and it will be done for Your Glory. Hallelujah Amen!

Music begins to blare again. I run my arms down my sides across my hips and thighs...nope, still flabby. Let's face it...if God removed my flab, I would celebrate with a huge wonderful Coconut Cake. I love coconut cake. I can eat a whole one in one day by myself. And God knows it. And if he changed my metabolism or miraculously removed my flab, I would just do more harm than good by celebrating with food. So I get up and run.

It was not eventful. I did it on the treadmill and I took some advice from an article from Active.com 4 Ways to Make Your Treadmill Workouts Fun. I put the TV on HGTV, strapped on my Nike+ and my HRM and started the treadmill. During the show I put the treadmill on incline of 5. During the commercials, I dropped down to an incline of 2. It was not fun but it was different and challenging. When you live in flat Seabrook, any bit of incline feels like Mount Everest. I am not kidding. If you want to do hill work around here, you have to run parking garages, run the Kemah Bridge, or travel to central Texas and find some real hills. We are so use to flat runs that a local running club hosts the Toughest 10K in Texas which is a course that loops the bridge twice. Yeah, I won't be doing that anytime soon.

Wisdom from Sue Sylvester

Yes, you got that right, Sue Sylvester. If you are a fan of Glee, you will know who I mean. If you aren't, what are you waiting for? Sue is the Cheerios (cheerleaders) head coach. She is self-centered, shallow and very goal driven and she will run over anyone and everyone to get to her goal. But as crazy as it may sound, during her fits of selfish narrow mindedness, she has these amazing moments of wisdom. Last week, the Olivia Newton-John episode, was one of those times. She was in the midst of being laughed at by other teachers and for once in her life she felt weak and less than. Have you ever felt that way? I have and recently. Well, Sue decided the cure for her ill feelings was to help others. That the best cure for her own problems was to focus on other's problems.

And isn't that the truth? When you start helping others you in fact help yourself? All of a sudden your problems take the back seat and no longer keep you from reaching your full potential. So yesterday, while I ran, I realized that for all my praying for wanting to be quiet and not blog or share (I really spent too much time on the computer) that I was cutting off my life line...you guys. I love sharing with you. I love telling you about my runs and how I hated it or loved it. I love the comments that pick me up or make me laugh. I love sharing about new products that I love or ones that I hate. I love sharing my life with you guys. And according to Sue, that is not a bad thing.

So I am back because I need it. I need that sense of community. I need you. (Ok, now I am beginning to sound like an AA meeting.) I'll sit down now.

So what have I been doing? Running and biking. It has been a few weeks since I ran but I have started riding my bike a few times a week. My husband prefers to bike and we did this great Bible Study, His Needs Her Needs, and one week our subject was recreational activities. We were to rate over 200 activities between 5 and -5. 5 being love it. -5 being hate it. We are trying things that we both love. So we bought a nice camera (photography) and we got our bikes out of the garage. We love riding to the water and back.

I realized that my month of biking helped me with my running. When I ran yesterday, I was amazed at how strong my legs felt. Riding the bike really worked out my thighs and that helps my running. I have to admit that I was leery about running yesterday. I started with my 5 minute warm up. When I started to run, I told myself I would just run one minute. When I hit that minute, I added two more minutes, then five then twenty and before you know it, I ran the whole time. I was so amazed at myself. And I no longer felt bad for not running for weeks and only biking.

On a side note, towards the end of my run, I see my husband coming towards me on his bike and he is not wearing his helmet. Apparently when he arrived at the house from work and couldn't find me he panicked. He searched the house several times to make sure I wasn't dead and then took off on the bike to make sure I wasn't kidnapped. He took off so fast that he didn't take time to put on his helmet. His reason for panic?.... I left my IPhone at home and I NEVER leave home without my phone. Silly man.

I know you want me...blah blah blah

Thank goodness for flat Seabrook. My lack of running on a consistent basis isn't as bad when you run in flat Seabrook. You see, the only elevation or hill work that I get is the one up my driveway, 14 feet. That is the elevation of my home from the street.

Because I had to recreate my playlist, I decided to change it up a bit and discovered I have some new songs that I love to play while running. So apparently my daughter listens to this guy Pitbull. Now I don't like the lyrics nor the attitude but the beat is amazing. If you are a new runner or like me, trying to get your running feet wet again, their song I know you want me. I found myself singing, if that is what you can call it, the words to the song. "you know you want me, you know I want you." and so on. Thank goodness half of it is in Spanish because I would probably turn it off. But I don't so I just run to the beat of the music and sing what I can. Go ahead, down load it. I dare you.

It finally feels like Spring and the Psycho Dog

Can you believe it!?!? It was 67 degrees yesterday and low humidity. So I went for a run outside: Good idea. I took Reba, my dog with me: Bad Idea.

It has been quite a while since I ran outside, so I wanted to take her because she really picks up my pace. Well, she must have short term memory because every little noise, person, car, piece of paper flying in the air just freaked her out. So she ran fast alright but in every direction. Sometimes I was being pulled forward. Sometimes I was being pulled backwards and sometimes I was being pulled sideways. It just depended where she believed she saw something scary. And then for some reason, right before we hit the midpoint, she freaked out and ran all the way home, while dragging me behind her.

Freaky dog. She remembers I use to take her for runs. It is quite funny to watch her. As soon as she sees me grab some of my running attire she starts jumping up and down and running to the hook on the door where I keep her leash. And by running attire I mean, running bra or shorts or heartrate monitor or Ipod. How she can tell my running bra from my regular bra, I have no idea. But she does. So she jumps up and down and anything that resembles a leash or collar, like my headband, she tries to put her head through it. But as soon as we get outside, she goes crazy. It is like she forgets what it is like to be outside and everything spooks her. And as soon as she sees the house, she bolts for the front door to get back inside. I think that is the only time I hit a 10 minute mile, on the way to the front door from the end of our street.

The good news is that my neighbors must think I run a 10 minute mile the whole time. When I leave the house she bolts towards the trails and I am dragged at a 10 minute mile, then she bolts to get to the front door when we get back. They don't see all the struggles I have with her while on the trails.

On a side note: A few weeks ago or maybe a month or two, I had to restore my computer. In the process, I had to restore my Itunes. When I sync my IPhone, everything seems fine but I have not synced my Ipod with my Nike plus on it. My fear is that my Nike plus will not sync. So I am going to sync right now. If my little person doesn't update, pray for my sanity because I hate losing runs. If she updates: well then no prayers needed. :)

Hello 200s!

I wish it was eventful. That as soon as I hit 200 miles on my Nike+ that bells and whistles started chiming or confetti was falling all around me but no, it didn't happen. We have an issue with a cat peeing where she shouldn't be peeing. She has decided the corner, where the TM stands, is the perfect spot to do her business. Thankfully, my husband was gracious enough to clean it up and do his best to keep her from peeing there again.

In any case, it is too cold and rainy for me to run outside. so I am stuck on the dreadmill. I don't like the dreadmill. When I was a teenager, I played varsity soccer. I loved soccer. I loved chasing the ball, passing it to other players and I think my favorite year was the one that I played goalie. Well, it was until I let every ball get pass me during a game, even the one that seems to crawl across the line...even I thought I was an idiot that day. Anyway, I digress. Well during the off season they required the soccer players to run track. Yeah, I wasn't going to do that. I saw no point to running around a track. Why run around a track to end up where you started? It just seemed inefficient. And I am all about efficiency aka I am lazy.

So you can imagine my struggle with standing in the same place for over 30 minutes, exerting all this effort and not moving one inch. Are you feeling me now? Fortunately, when I do it on my treadmill in the morning, I get to watch Holmes on Homes on HGTV. No volume required for this show. He walks around, knocking down wall, painting, rewiring and wahla new room. HMMMM yeah that is probably the only benefit.

I have started posting to the Weight Watchers HeavyWeight Runners thread in the Fitness Getting Started Forum. I didn't realize how much I missed it until I started posting to it again. It had died out some time in November and when it died so did my desire to run. But with new life in the thread, came new life in my running. I reallythink I need community. What is that saying from the 80's or 90's, "It takes a village?" Yeah that is me. It takes a village to keep this runner running.

It is so wonderful to see new people discovering their running legs. and all their trepidation about running so many minutes or in public. I have so been there. If you read my early posts, I ran on the treadmill because I was scared of the outside world Now I love the outside and struggle with the treadmill. I don't get nervous around other runners, I feel a since of community with them. Once you get into a rhythm of running on certain days and certain times, you will begin to recognize the faces of those who run at the same time. Now I am not saying you become like close family...more like distant cousins who smile and maybe say hi.