Sunday, July 6, 2008

Day 11

7/6/08
Day 11

Breakfast

1 slice Whole Wheat bread--90 Calories
1 tbsp Peanut Butter--90 Calories
1 small Banana--90 Calories

Total--270 Calories

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Lunch

1 slice Whole Wheat bread--90 Calories
5 slices Carl Budding Honey Ham--43 Calories
1/2 slice Cheddar Cheese--55 Calories
1 tsp Mustard--5 Calories
Red Lettuce--0 Calories
3 oz Baby Carrots--35 Calories
1/2 Granny Smith Apple--36 Calories

Total--264 Calories

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Dinner

1 Totally Tuna Sandwich from Jimmy Johns--502 Calories
Diet Coke--0 Calories

Total--502

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Snack

1 Vanilla Ice Cream Cone from McDonalds--150 Calories

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Daily Total--1186 Calories

Friday, July 4, 2008

The Land of the Free and the Home of the Brave

7/4/08-Day 9

Happy 4th of July!!!!

The 4th of July is BY FAR my favorite holiday! It always has been, it's kinda deal in my family. I decided that I wouldn't actually count my calories today, just keep an eye on my portion sizes and eat sensible things. I probably didn't do nearly as bad as I'm thinking I did. Probably about 1500 calories would be my guess, which all in all, isn't bad!

I am completely exhausted though. Spent the whole day with Lisa! We went to a cookout at my "second family's" home, you know, the people who aren't your actual family but you grew up with and they're your second family. Anyways...we went there this afternoon and got nice and tan in the gorgeous, perfectg 74 degree weather! Then we went to the Prime Outlet Mall to go to Vitamin World because we heard that if you take B Vitamins the mosquito's won't bite you because to them you'll smell bad. It actually worked! Then we went to my Aunt Linda's house where my entire family was, along with some of the extended family, which is always nice! And after we had the cookout there, we were finally off to the fireworks!

I absolutely LOVE the fireworks!

So now it's off to beddy-bye because I have to work at 7:15 in the morning...but only until noon, so that's nice. :)

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Oh, say can you see
by the dawn's early light
what so proudly we hailed
at the twilight's last gleaming?
Whose broad stripes and bright stars
thru the perilous fight,
o'er the ramparts we watched
were so gallantly streaming?
And the rocket's red glare,
the bombs bursting in air,
gave proof through the night
that our flag was still there.
Oh, say does that star-spangled banner yet wave
o'er the land of the free and the home of the brave?

Thursday, July 3, 2008

7/3/08-Day 8

Breakfast

1 slice Whole Wheat bread--120 Calories
1 Tbsp Peanut Butter--81

Total--201

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Lunch

1 slice Whole Wheat bread--120 Calories
5 slices Carl Budding Honey Ham--43 Calories
1/2 slice Cheddar Cheese--55 Calories
1 teaspoon Dijon Mustard--5 Calories
7 Baby Carrots--18 Calories
1/2 cup canned Peaches--55 Calories
1 White Chocolate Rasperry Yogurt--100 Calories

Total--396

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Oops...didn't mean to have that many calories for lunch...

6/30/08-Day 5

This is an email I wrote to Gary Rudd about this whole weight loss thing...

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Hi Gary!

Yesterday was my first day in with the teaching because I've been in the nursery. Ironically enough, if there is such a thing serving a God like ours, God's been really uprooting a massive thing in my life.

About three months ago I was praising and thanking God for all the changes he's made and is continuing to make in the finance area of my life. I was saying how great it is even though it's been a somewhat grueling process. Then I said, "I'm excited to see what you're going to uproot in me next! What ARE you planning for the next season of my life?" Even as I said it, I was sorta saying in my head "SHUT UP!" hahaha And of course, because he's faithful and just and because He's committed to me and my maturing, He just sorta said it.

He told me that He is jealous for my attention and that I've been giving it to something else. That I claim that He's the Lover of my soul and my all in all, but I've been having an affair with food. He told me that He loves me and He will work through it with me and that He simply wants me to run to Him first. I just sort of sat that wide eyed. How could I have not seen this coming? After all, He was right. When I'm happy, I don't praise him first, I eat. When I'm sad, I don't run to him first, I eat. When I'm lonely, confused, excited, thrilled with life, when I'm anything, I don't go first to Him, I go to food.

Now...this is HUGE for me. I cried my eyes out for about a week. I had been having a love affair with someone other than my Husband. How could I have been so blind? I was wretched. It took me a while to come to grips with this. Every time I felt Him coming near to love and comfort me, I pulled away a little thinking things like, "How? Why do you still love me the same? I've given myself to another?" It was a big deal and I didn't deal with it very well for a while. I found myself doing the same things, I was so ashamed, so I was eating. I was embarassed, so I was eating. I was upset with myself, annoyed at my pride, so I was eating.

A few weeks ago a light sort of went off in my head. He asked me why I keep condemning myself for things he's already forgotten. Yeah, He got me on that one! So I started trying to eat better. I still hadn't told ANYONE anything about any of this because I felt so ashamed, stupid and prideful. Last week I decided that this is ridiculous and not a biblical way of dealing with anything! I went and saw my doctor. I told him that I need to loose weight and I need help. He "prescribed" me a 1200 calorie a day diet and an hour of exercise every day. I told him that was a little steep, wasn't it? I mean what happened to 1/2 hour three times a week??? He said that if I'm really serious, this is what I needed to do, and that as my doctor he's telling me that this is what I NEED to do. He then went over all the health issues that would happen if I stayed where I'm at. He was actually SUPER encouraging!

So when I went home, I right away told Luke & Heather about it. I was still kind of embarassed about it, but once I said it they were SO supportive of me and started telling me how they've noticed it and have been praying for me in it already! Well after that, I've been telling everyone! Even all my coworkers know!

It's only Day 5, but I know it's different this time around. I feel completely graced in this. My view and motivation are different. I'm not trying to "look good" or "get healthy" per se, I just want to glorify God in EVERY area of my life. Even the ones that can seem subtle. I feel like my love affair with the Lord is in the begining stages again, the giddy goofiness of first love! Every day I feel stronger. I know that there will be rough spots, but I know who I'm going to run to this time! I feel in control, well, as in control as a heart submitted can feel! I am ruling and reigning over my body, and it feels great. And when I say it feels great, I don't mean just physically, although it does feel good in my body too, but it just feels great in my soul.

Love,
Sarah

6/29/08-Day 4

Breakfast

1 slice Whole Wheat Bread--100 Calories
1 Tbsp Peanut Butter--81 Calories1 small Banana--90 Calories

Total--271

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Lunch

1 Hamburger Bun--110 Calories
4 oz Hamburger--191 Calories
1/2 cup Carrots--25 Calories
1 Tbsp Salsa--4 Calories
1 Cup Watermelon--46 Calories

Total--376

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Snack

1 Grande Americano--15 Calories
4 pumps Caramel Syrup--20 Calories
2 tbsp Nonfat Milk--22 Calories

Total--57 Calories

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Dinner

6 inch Sweet Onion Teryaki Chicken sub on Whole Wheat bread--370 Calories
1 packet Apple Slices--35 Calories

Total--405 Calories

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Other

1 can Vernor's Ginger Ale--150 Calories

Daily Total--1259 Calories


All in all, not a bad day! Especially considering that I went to a cookout with lots of delicious and forbidden things to eat!

6/28/08-Day 3

Breakfast

3/4 cup Honey Nut Cheerios w/ 1/2 cup Skim Milk--150 Calories
1 small (6 in.) Banana--90 Calories

Total--240 Calories

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Breakfast was a bit of a joke. Have you ever actually measured out the serving size of cereal as posted on the box??? I hadn't either, and let me tell you, it's not much AT ALL. I could actually feel my eyes bulging from my head. I double checked the measuring cup, maybe I'd used the wrong one? Nope. 3/4 a cup of cereal and my bowl wasn't even a quarter full! Absolutely ridiculous!!! I should maybe look into buying smaller bowls...

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Well, it's 11:16am. Luke and Heather just left with the boys to go to the mall and on a picnic. I'm already thinking things like, "Nobody but me knows about that pack of Reese's Pieces I have in my room...I think I might have a package of Mini Charleston Chews too". Man, I knew it would be rough on days off, not being distracted by work and all, but ALREADY??? I'm sore from going out with the girls line dancing last night, I have a headache from that disgusting light beer I had, and I definitely don't feel like doing an hour of exercise right now...oh man...

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Lunch

1 slice Whole Wheat Bread--100 Calories
1/4 cup Tuna--60 calories
1 tsp. Mayo--25 Calories
1 tsp. Dijon Mustard--15 Calories
1/2 cup Applesauce w/ Cinnamon--50 Calories
1/2 cup peaches in light syrup--50 Calories
1 Weight Watchers Strawberry Yogurt--100 Calories

Total--400 Calories

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Snack

27 Goldfish Crackers--70 Calories
10 Grapes--30 Calories

Total--100 Calories

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Dinner

1 Red Bell Pepper--43 Calories
1 cup Orzo Pasta--176 Calories
1/4 cup canned Tomatoes--22 Calories
1 Tablespoon Parmesan Cheese--11 Calories
1 Teaspoon Olive Oil--40 Calories

Total--292

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Snack

1/2 cup plain air popped Popcorn--15 Calories

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Total For Day 3--1047 Calories

Exercise--1 hour of gardening, which I used as a trick to get exersize when I really didn't want to "exercise" (digging up weeds, hand tilling the dirt, planting lettuce, water all plants in yard)


All in all, Day 3 was huge success! Especially considering that I was home all day, part of it alone, and the other part with Lisa, who kept saying things like, "I could REALLY go for McDonalds right now" and "Man, I'd REALLY like some candy right now". The most annoying part of it to me wasn't that she was saying those things, but that she regularly eats those things and is still super small. I'm talking size small shirts and size 4/6 pants. WHY?!?!?!?! So not fair...

6/27/08-Day 2

Email from Luke

RE: Stay Strong!

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how's it going? -Luke

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Good! I wasn't too hungry before my lunch, I mean, I WAS hungry but not like yesterday. And it helped that my lunch was at 11 instead of 12. An old coworker from Seiko, who I go to lunch with occasionally, emailed me to see if I wanted to go to The Wurst. I told her I couldn't and about the diet, so then she said what about Subway? So we went to Subway. I got a nutritional information thing and had a really good sub on wheat bread for only 400 calories! And they have apple slices and low-fat yogurt there too, so I got those instead of chips and a soda. And I brought my water bottle. I'm impressed! AND I HAVEN'T HAD ONE COOKIE!!!!

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lol, no cookie, eh? okay, so, just the sandwich was 400 calories? so then you add in the apple and yogurt, that's over 400 calories. so that's over a third of your calories for the day, right?

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So far today I've had 772 calories. That leaves 428 .

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Yay! A nice dinner!

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I've already been thinking about dinner. I'm going to have 1 sweet potato baked, 1 cup of green beans steamed, and ½ a chicken breast on the grill. I'll use 2 teaspoons of butter, one on the potato and one on the beans. I'm going out tonight for Shirley Grogan's birthday! She's invited a bunch of girls all out to the Sundance Saloon in Waukegan to go line dancing! HAHAHA I'm really excited though! So if I eat that for dinner, I can have two bottles of light beer and my total calorie count will be 1240 for the day. And I'm counting dancing as my exercise! YAY!!!

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Cool!!! Sounds like fun! :) When you get hungry and your stomach's growling, tell your stomach that she better quit whining and SHUT UP. Tell her that she'll get her food when you say she'll get her food!

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lol

6/26/08-Day 1

Below are emails exchanged between my good friend Molly and my brother Luke. Let's start with Molly...

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anything interesting going on over there? -Molly

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Well let's see...I went to the doctor yesterday to talk about weight loss. Now I'm supposed to exercise one hour every day and he put me on a 1200 calorie a day "diet". Print outs with menus and everything...so we'll see how that goes. -Sarah

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thats really cool, Sarah. Do you have anyone to help you with it?

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Well, my Luke and Heather...they've been wanting to ride their bikes, so we're going to start every night. They'll alternate and I'll go every time. And I told all my coworkers to keep me accountable at work. Friday's will be especially hard, at least this week, because every Friday we make cookies and it smells up the place SO GOOD!!!!!!! But no cookies for me anymore! And only black coffee! Which I used to only drink black coffee and then when I quit smoking I had to add creamer and sugar, so back to black for me! I'm starving...All I had for breakfast was a piece of whole wheat toast with a tablespoon of peanut butter and HALF a banana, I can't even have a whole banana!!! LOL, it's good though. I just hate feeling hungry, so it's going to be an adjustment. Luke told me that he feels hungry pretty much all the time, oh man, I don't know how he does that! I got to work at 7:45 and by 8:20 my stomach was already growling!!!

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I always an more embarassed by the sound my stomach makes then the feeling of being hungry. I kinda like feeling hungry. You can do it Sarah, let me know if you want to work out together!

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Okay! An hour every day seems fairly extreme to me. The doctor said I need to do AT LEAST an hour 5 days a week, but he's telling me every day so I'll hopefully hit the 5 days mark, hahahaha. He knows me well! He said I can break it up too, so on my lunch after I eat, or maybe even before, I'm going to go for a 15 minute walk. I meant to go for 15 minutes this morning too, but that didn't happen. Tonight I'm going to do the rest. I figure if I can do 15 before work, 15 on lunch and 30 at night, that doesn't seem impossible! So walk, walk, ride a bike. That's the plan...right after I get my bike from Julia's house, lol

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you should walk to work...

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Yeah right...that's so far! Besides, it's on Green Bay Road! Although I suppose I could take Pershing...but then I'd be all sweaty and gross...

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thats why you leave extra early so that you can clean up a bit at work!

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Sick man...I'll have to think about that one. I'll at least have to wait until my stamina get's built up...

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Oh man...lunch was rough...I was actually starting to feel pretty lightheaded when I FINALLY got to go eat my Unwich. I ate that thing like I've never had food before! It was gone so fast. As I sat back in my chair to enjoy the "ahhh" feeling of being full...MY FREAKING STOMACH GROWLED SUPER LOUD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! That was really hard...sitting there STARVING like that after I had just inhaled a "sandwich". So I decided I DEFINITELY needed to go get an apple, maybe some carrots too. I drove past your work, debated calling, but decided I needed food more than I needed to talk to you, lol. Pick n Save up on 18th has a fruit bar! Who knew?!??! So I filled up a container with watermelon, cantaloupe, pineapple and strawberries, I'm guessing it was about 2 cups of fruit. As I drove back to work I ate like a mad woman! I only ate about 1 cup though, the rest I'm saving for my "snack" about 3:30 or so. When I got back to the office I still had about 15 minutes left on my break. So, I decided to get in ¼ of my exercise time. I ran up and down the back stairwell until I could hardly breathe and then I walked laps in the lower level (which is empty except for training rooms, but nobody was training). Now I feel like I could go for a nap...hahaha...maybe another cup of black coffee???

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Sarah I think you should keep a diary of your weight loss experience. Write just like you wrote to me and then publish it! You would sells billions of it. Make it like a devotional book. One little "Sarah" excerpt a day.

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I've actually thought about that! It'd be super easy on my laptop every night before bed, just write a little excerpt. Hahaha!!!!! Tonight I'm going to be measuring body parts, like my waist, hips, bust, thighs, upper arms, neck...I definitely think that journaling about it will be good and tracking everything will help too. So in one month when I feel like nothings changing I can measure again and say "NOT TRUE! I LOST ___ INCHES!!!"

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you go girl!

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And now on to Luke's...

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Just thought I'd give you an update...I measured the peanut butter I put on my whole wheat bread this morning, only 1 tablespoon, and I only had half a banana instead of a whole one. I got to work at 7:45 and by 8:20 my stomach was growling already, oh man! I've already had 32oz of water and two very small cups of black coffee.

I already feel super proud of myself because last week was my coworkers birthday and she's been on vacation until today, so today my boss is buying everyone lunch from wherever she wanted to eat. She picked Jimmy John's. I'm still going to eat from there, but I'm getting the Unwich, which is a sandwich with no bread, it's a lettuce wrap thing. I got baked turkey, no mayo, Dijon mustard instead and ALL the veggies. My lunch is at noon...I tell you what I've never been so excited to eat a lettuce wrap!!!!! Did I mention I'M STARVING?!?!?!?!?! No chips or anything either, I'm thinking of going to the store and getting an apple or something, we'll see.

I'm doing it! And I told all my coworkers about it so that they can keep me accountable too. Every Friday we bake cookies for our customers here and the place smells so dang good and I usually eat a ton of them, so tomorrow will be kind of hard I think, but I've already told them all to keep me away from the cookies! And I told them if the see me putting cream or sugar in my coffee to tell me to stop it and drink it black. They're all excited for me and I think I'm actually motivating some of them to think about what they eat! -Sarah

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That's great Sarah! I know the feeling hungry thing stinks, but just think about how when you're hungry and there's no food in your stomach, your body draws from the fat deposits in itself, so you get skinnier! I'm hungry right now too. All I've eaten so far today is a SMALL bowl of cereal, about 6 oz. of grape juice, a 12 oz cup of coffee, and water. YOU CAN DO IT! And yeah, STAY AWAY FROM THOSE DAMN COOKIES!!!!!!!!!!!!! -Luke

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These two seriously email me every day at work to see how I'm doing. And I'm so grateful for it!!!

Wednesday, July 2, 2008

The Day Before The Begining

On 6/25/08 I went to see my family doctor. He'd been on me for years telling me I need to loose weight and/or I need to maintain it once it was lost. So when I strolled into his office and told him I was there because I need help, you could almost see the shock run down his face! He "prescribed" me a 1200 calorie a day diet and gave me 2 weeks worth of sample menus, breakfast, lunch, snack and dinner. He also "prescribed" me an hour of exercise every day. I responded with, "Every day??? Isn't that a little excessive??? What happened to 1/2 an hour 3 times a week??" He said that if I was serious I needed to do an hour a day. He also said that as my doctor this wasn't a suggestion, it was an "order". Hmm... He then took my blood to make sure I'm not diabetic or have high cholesterol or the like, which reminds me...I need to call him and get the results. Although if it was bad, I'm sure I'd have heard by now, right?

The Back Story

I haven't always been fat. I had a normal and very active childhood. After quite a few crushing, back to back life changing events, I packed on the pounds. I caught myself though before it got too out of hand, and lost about 60lbs and was back to 130lbs. A few years later I regained the weight, plus some for a grand total of 210lbs. Again, I lost the majority of it and got back to 150lbs. Well...needless to say, I've found it all plus some once more. My peak weight is 258lbs, and I've been like that for approximately 3 years now. I should probably mention that I'm 5'4", so that means my "ideal" weight range is 125-140. So...I'd like to get back to the norm! I need to loose 119lbs to hit the high end of the ideal range, so I figure why not just round it up to 120? After all, what's one more pound when you've already got such a huge goal?

So why's it different this time around? I mean, after gaining so much weight for the third time one might wonder why even bother trying to loose it again. Well, it IS different this time. I've decided that it's ridiculous for food to run my life. I would much rather be in control, thank you very much! So I'm taking it back. All of it. I'm going to discipline this body, beat it, if you will, until it becomes my slave and does what I ask. Harsh words, but all true!