Ideal body

I've been thinking a lot lately about goals. I never imagined I'd be a size six, but still I'm dissatisfied with my body. Much more so than I was at size sixteen. Objectively I look pretty fit, but there are still parts that are squishy and I still don't have much visible definition in my arms. I'm not sure what to do now, though. It seems almost disordered to want to be a size four?

Skwigg is a fitness blogger I love and she just had a great post about her changing definition of an ideal body.

C's weigh-in: 135 - goal!

Woohoo! It took a freaking year to get here and I really didn't think it was possible for me to be this weight again.

I've been wondering about the right way to keep going, though. It seems like lately I've been working harder for less results. I decided I'm going to let weight watchers switch me to maintenance. I have a hard time making myself eat more than the daily points target and this causes a really unhealthy cycle of starving and then going off points for a day or two and binging. Apparently being on maintenance switches my daily points target from 19 to 23, which, seriously? I'm pretty sure I'll keep losing weight at 23 points/day and hopefully it'll help ease me in to a more healthy way of eating over the long haul.

I'm also wondering how long to keep paying for weight watchers. I mean, it worked for me and I'm grateful. But, am I going to keep counting points forever? I guess if that's what it takes to keep the weight off I might be ok with that. Have any of you tried a free site like sparkpeople?

G's Weigh-In: 153.6

Wow, I'm super proud of you C! And I just realized that I didn't post my weigh-in last week: 153.6. So I'm almost back to the lowest point I hit in the summer, which I think was 152.9. Good times. I did pretty well on the weekend (even foregoing chocolate banana pancakes in favour of a poached egg at brunch on Sunday). I also ran a 4M race and finished in 38:30: better than my goal of 40:00 but not quite at my secret goal of 38:00.

The bad news is, I kind of fudged up my knee running so I'm skipping the gym tonight in favour of RICE (rest, ice, compression, elevation). And I'm not even going to snack to make myself feel better.

P.S. I also hate when Weight Watchers doesn't throw me a party when I lose a pound. Bastards.

P.P.S. WW's Hearty Turkey Chili recipe rules my world.

Wintertime... And the Eatin' is Clean

OK, let's talk about Clean Eating, the magazine, the philosophy, what have you.

The truth is, I love sugar. Well, I love baked goods, and I've found they're just so much more delicious when they're made of some combination of flour, butter, and sugar. And optionally, chocolate. That said, I've been trying this clean eating business, I'd guess about 50% of what I've eaten the past 4 weeks, and I really like it. And I'm going to try my damndest to increase that percentage while still counting points like nobody's business.

About the magazine, one caveat: Use Weight Watchers' Recipe Builder (WW) or another nutrition site to figure out the nutrition information for any of the recipes in there. I swear they haven't tested them all, or did so half-assedly, because some are just plain wrong. I'll post a few errors I discovered later when I have the magazine in front of me, but for now just take my word for it.

Here's my clean menu for today:

Breakfast: Mouth-Watering Oatmeal (5 POINTS) (+ a few blueberries)

Early Lunch (pre-gym): 1 scoop protein powder + 1 c skim milk (4 POINTS)

Late Lunch (post-gym): Weight Watchers' Hearty Turkey Chili + 1/4 avocado (6 POINTS)

Dinner: NY Times' Pureed Carrot Soup* + 1/2 T flax seed meal + 1 tsp olive oil (3 POINTS)

That leaves me 2 POINTS for hot chocolate before bed. Perfect.

*I modified this recipe slightly:
- 1 tsp butter (instead of 1 T)
- 1 tsp olive oil (instead of 1 T)
- sub brown short-grain rice for the arborio
When I Recipe-Buildered it, it came out to 1 POINT per 200g - I usually eat 300-400g in a serving.

P.S. I'm still hovering at 155. Will post after weigh-in tomorrow. My goal is 144 by March 1 - tough with Super Bowls and Valentines' Days and birthday brunches and baby showers and all that, but not impossible.

THANK GOD

I am thankful for the 140s blog, for real. I'm declaring Hotbody December and it starts today and right now I'm home from work and procrastinating going to the gym, but I'm going to go, I swear! I'm going to spend the next four weeks doing Turbulence Training for Abs in the hopes that I won't be embarrassed when we spend New Year's Eve in LA and I'm expected to wear a swimsuit for part or all of the proceedings.

Also, I'm on track to get to the 140s in the next week or two, which is also good times. Yay us!

New goal

I saw a personal trainer yesterday afternoon to do a fitness assessment. I explained to her that I'd lost a lot of weight and I wanted to figure out what my goal should be based on my body fat percentage. She was very complimentary. She insisted that I didn't need to lose any more weight. She said my legs are toned, my stomach is flat, and I look great. Then she got out the calipers and filled in the chart. And then she said "Huh. Usually I'm really good at guessing what this will be." My body fat percentage is 26%. This seems be a common theme, I'm fatter than I look.

A while ago I was digging through some paperwork and found a fitness assessment from 10 years ago. I was about the same weight but back then my body fat percentage was 29%. I remember that personal trainer was surprised, too.

So, here's my new goal. If my body fat percentage is 26% and I'm 140 pounds that means I have 103.6 pounds that isn't fat. If I want to be 20% body fat then .2x = x - 103.6 and I should weigh 129.5. That's pretty close to what Self magazine thought was my happy weight. I guess a good timeframe would be to try to get to that weight before we go to California in January, a pound/week seems to be realistic.

I also just bought a digital caliper which is what the trainer used yesterday. I have a Tanita scale which is supposed to measure body fat but it's been telling me I'm 32-33% fat every day since I started losing weight. It's possible I'm about to go very OCD with this.

Arm Envy

So I didn't click the link to discover my Happy Weight. I think it was because I anticipated complications measuring my wrist given my unwillingness to get off the couch on this balmy Friday evening on the right side of the long weekend.

On goals - hmmmm.

WW Goal:
I set my WW goal at 153. This way I can get under there for 6 weeks and become a Lifer. I never bothered with Liferhood in the past but for some reason it sounds good to me now - Going, but not paying. Yes.

140s Goal:
I can't remember getting as low as 145 so this is probably the right place to start. It is right around my theoretical 10% goal for WW and if I did measure my wrist I'm sure it would be my Happy Weight, give or take a pound. This would put me around Size 8 as well. I like 8. It is out of the double digits. Similar to G, 6 just seems unreal for now.

Squishyness Goal:
Because I used to be over 200 lbs, I seem to have a squishyness problem. I climb at the gym and have pretty good upper body strength, yet there is still some flab and (ewww!) excess skin. I also have this on my tummy and the top part of my butt / lower part of my back. It seems like while exercising more lately is causing me to get smaller (I can feel it in my clothes too!) it is accentuating the squishyness. I think my skin can't keep up. So somehow (over time) my goal is for the squishyness to go away. I think it can but it just happens gradually.

I am about ready (for real!) to quit my job. This could bode very well for the 140s and squishyness goals. AND for my participation on the blog!!!

xo

d

Happy Weight

I just had way too much fun figuring out how to measure my wrist at work. Fun with office supplies!

Wrist - 5.5". Height - 5'4.5". It thinks my happy weight is 128.5.

My rough goal is 135 pounds, my plan is to get into the 130's and then find a personal trainer to measure my body fat percentage. I think the 21-24% body fat range should be my goal.

When I started this back in February I was a size 16, now the size 10 clothes are getting loose. I'm guessing 10 more pounds would put me a least into a size 8, maybe a 6. I bought a bunch of size 12 clothes several months ago that now literally fall off, so I'm holding out for a while before I go on another clothes buying spree.

I'm planning to exercise 6 mornings/week for the rest of my life, alternating weight training with cardio. I think my "happy weight" is going to be whatever I can maintain at that level of exercise while eating good food. I'm trying to learn to hold out for the truly good food instead of eating kid birthday cake and work pizza and whatever else is in in front of me. I'm trying to pay attention to portion control. It's easier for me to go to extremes than to find moderation, I'm scared of maintenance.

Happy Weight

In my internetting this week, I stumbled across Self magazine's Happy Weight calculator. I measured my wrist (6.25") and plugged in some numbers and came up with 144.3, which sounds exactly right! So that's my current goal. Handily that's also my WW 10% goal, so I can reevaluate once I get there.

I told Candace last week that I'm happy to be a size 10 but come to think of it, size 8 would be pretty sweet too. I'm pretty sure size 6 isn't going to happen in this decade.

What are your weight or size goals?

I've also been thinking about buying clothes. It's too soon yet - my current wardrobe just fits *better* right now, it isn't too big. But I'm planning to splurge on a pair of Richie jeans once I get to 144.

In other news, I'm PMSing and just ate a bowl of ice cream for dinner (measured, of course, and tracked, and it didn't put my over my POINTS for today). I'm not expecting grand things at my weigh-in tomorrow but whatever.

PS: HBJ has been a resounding success! Tomorrow's my last day of the beginner series of Turbulence Training, and I've received several compliments on the current state of my arms (not quite hot yet but getting there). Go team 140s!