WW Weekly Recap: Weeks 17 & 18

I am officially late, again, with my weekly update. Last week, I was so far behind I decided to not even post one and instead combine it with this week’s update. Then I got sick ("The sickness! It’s happening!") and here I am almost through another week and no update posted. But better late than never right?

Last week I talked about giving myself daily, weekly and monthly goals to help get me through the next four weeks, in this post. Of course, come day 2 I found myself sick and so there were three days spent in bed doing nothing but coughing, sneezing and sleeping. I am starting to feel better but still a bit zombie like. Yesterday I had a deep cleaning done at the dentist which required a Valium and Novocain and I am still a bit groggy from that. And my mouth hurts. So yeah, this week has been a bit of a suckfest.

I did however, manage to start tracking again yesterday and even though I haven’t worked out this week (if it’s in the chest, you better rest- that’s the rule of thumb I follow) and  my step count has been abysmal,  I have definitely done really great with the sleep part. I am averaging a solid 10+ hours a night. And when I was home from work, at least another 6 hours during the day. Yeah, being awake is definitely the toughest part of working while sick.

Anywho, I can’t help it when things like this happen. I just have to ride it out and make the best of it. I know that when I am feeling better things will get back on track. Right now, I am just focused on my health. That comes first, always. The scale- well, it will always be there.

Soooo, back to the whole point of this post- my weekly weigh ins. I managed to see two small losses these past two weeks:

On 11/7 I weighed in at 169.0 which was a loss of 0.8 and then on 11/14 I weighed in at 168.2 for another loss of 0.8. Still hanging out below 170 but not yet back to where I was at the end of September. BUT, I really can’t complain the numbers are still trending downward and I am still quite confident I am making good choices and supporting a healthy lifestyle, when not sick, and that is really what matters most.

For next week, my goal is to get back to working on my daily/weekly/monthly goals and hopefully get some energy back. Why does it seem to take FOREVER to get over a cold? I am soooo over it! ;)

Love and hugs,

Dacia

xoxoxox 

It's the 4 Week Countdown!

I’m leaving in 4 weeks for my honeymoon. We’ll be spending 2 weeks in Cabo. It’s going to be amazeballs. When we get back we will be heading out again to spend the rest of the holiday with E’s family so we will pretty much be gone for three weeks. I can’t believe it, it is going to be the absolute best way to close out the most amazing year!

But I am nervous, though. Not gonna lie. I am worried that I am sliding into the vacation mindset already and I still have a month before it is here. I need to switch back into weight loss mode. I need to keep paying attention to my choices, I need to bring back mindfulness into my life.

So I decided I needed a challenge – something to help keep me motivated and moving these next four weeks. I really wanted to do Brooke’s Skinny Snowman Challenge but since I will be out of the country for a big chunk of it (during which I will be completely disconnected from social media) I thought it better to come up with something I can start right now. Even if it is just me participating.

However, I am still using Brooke as my inspiration for this challenge since I am going to steal use her Goal Digger chart to track my goals. You can download your own copy here of the free printable. The way Brooke set it up is you have daily, weekly, and monthly goals. This is perfect for me to help bring back that focus to weight loss during the holiday/end of semester/about to vacation madness.

My month (well, four weeks actually) will start tomorrow, Saturday, November 14^th and run through Friday, December 11^th- the day before we leave for Cabo. Perfect timing, right?

My goals for these next four weeks are:

Daily

Track every day- WW and MFP

Hit step goal – determined by Garmin, based on average movement

At least 7 hours sleep a night

Follow meal plan for the day

Weekly

Workout 5 times/week (minimum 30 minutes)

Drinkend ONLY (no beer except on the weekend- exception being Thanksgiving)

80/20 with meals (limited to 4 meals out a week)

Write weekly WW post for accountability

Monthly

Lose 5 pounds

Follow HM training plan (starts 11/23)

Attend 2 yoga and/or fitness classes

Ok, so now I am all set with my goals. I know I can bring back some focus and mindfulness if I just make the choices that will help me to achieve these goals. I think this is exactly what I need for the next four weeks- recommitting to myself; my journey and my health.

Want to join me? Let me know in the comments if you will be participating too. J

Love and hugs,

Dacia

xoxoxoxox

Serendipity...Sort Of

I’ve been getting hit in the face lately with a lot of truth bombs. It’s that whole serendipity thing, but not in a fortuitous way. The universe is speaking to me and it is telling me I’m not fooling anyone.

The other night I read (in the most random crime short story from the 90’s) a passage where the author, talking about drug addiction, wrote:

"Sometimes a man quits trusting his strengths and starts trusting his weaknesses. His weaknesses are more apt to be dependable"

Yeah, that blew my mind.

Then I was reading this post from Andie Mitchell over at CanYou Stay for Dinner and she was talking about goals and making big changes that are impactful and when I got to this part:

"Sometimes when we feel stuck, any movement feels good. And while it’s true that doing something is better than nothing, we can trick ourselves into thinking we’re making progress when we aren’t doing anything meaningful. When we’re just doing the minimum and checking the small projects off of our To Do lists every day, at a certain point we have to stop and ask ourselves, Am I growing? Am I moving toward my goals…or am I just getting by?"

I was floored.

TRUTH! 

SO. MUCH. TRUTH.

And it felt like a roundhouse kick to the head.

I always am talking about small changes, something being better than nothing. Heck, I love the whole idea of #wycwyc (what you can, when you can) because it works into my self-proclaimed crazy, busy life. But is it helping me?

I mean it has to be. Something is always better than nothing, right? 

But...

Am I growing?

Am I progressing?

Am I moving towards my goals?  

Jeez, some days I don’t know.

I know that on any given day I can look over the choices I have made and find those that could have been better and those that could have been worse. I mean, hell I preach constantly about balance and 80/20 and never engaging in extreme behaviors. But it’s a fine line, right, between balance and complacency? And I have to stop for a minute and ask myself - am I coasting?

Am I trying to fool myself into believing I am doing enough?

Or worse yet…

Am I starting to trust my weaknesses more so than my strengths?

That’s so easy to do.

So how do I know? I mean seriously though, how can I honestly know I am taking meaningful actions in my life that are helping me reach my goals? 

Am I just following the path of least resistance?

Maybe it shouldn’t be this easy

Or should it?

I wish I knew. 

Love and hugs,

Dacia

xoxoxox

Pizza...and Other Thoughts

Here is a random compilations of thoughts...in case you have nothing better to do with your time ;)

I want to eat pizza. Like all the time. I feel like I have an around the clock pizza craving and when I see pictures of pizza (vegan or not) on IG or FB the craving gets like a million times worse. That being said- I went to Mellow Mushroom on Sunday and didn’t order pizza (I order the tempeh hoagie) so that tells you about the weirdness happening in my body-mind food disconnect. I think it is because I had the world’s best pizza when I was out in Austin and now anything else I try will pale in comparison and make me sad.

BEST PIZZA EVER!!!

This recipe looks pretty legit though. I need to test it out some time:

Vegan Margherita Pizza

I want another dog. This is the ongoing battle of me wanting ALL the animals and Erick being a normal human that thinks we don’t need a full-on farm on our 0.10 acre of land. But in all seriousness, yes I do one day hope to have enough land so I can take in some farm animals and/or shelter animals that need love. But that day is not today. Not until we move out of the HOA and possibly not until we retire. But I do want a second dog, this was never a secret. I think dogs need friends. Plus I think each human should have their own dog. Gordie is Erick’s dog. They are best friends. And I am all alone. No, I’m not bitter that Gordie was supposed to be me dog but chose Erick instead. 

Ok, maybe I am a little bit.

Gordie needs a brother or sister, don't you think? 

I can’t believe our honeymoon is so soon! We decided to take our honeymoon during the time the university is closed so we can completely disconnect for a few weeks. I mean, yeah it is only early November and we aren’t leaving for another 38 days (who’s counting) but still. With everything going on between work, school, holidays and life events that time will fly by and in the blink of an eye we will be in Cabo J I CANNOT WAIT!!!!!

I dressed up as Princess Leia for Halloween and it scared the crap out of me. This year Erick and I finally decided to dress up for Halloween and we settled on Han Solo and Princess Leia. I went with the not very authentic (I would call her the quasi-slutty looking) Leia costume because someone preferred that over the more traditional, robe like Leia costume. Not pointing any fingers but I will tell you his name rhythms with Shmerick. ;)

Anywho, it took every ounce of courage and confidence to wear that costume. It was skin tight and sheer (double whammy) and I swear you could see every freckle and mark on my body but aside from that I knew that no matter where we went people would look/stare at me. And I am just not used to that. It made me feel really nervous and at times I just wanted to hide behind something or someone. Thankfully, we ended up just at a bar watching football so I was able to relax and not let my anxiety get the worst of me. Next year I want to wear a funny costume like the Spartan cheerleaders or Wayne & Garth – which were my first choices.

We are spending Thanksgiving camping. Well, not the day itself but the weekend after. We are spending Thanksgiving with Erick’s mom but then the next day we will be leaving to go camping for the weekend. I am so super looking forward to this. I grew up going camping and just think it is just the perfect way to relax and recharge. Erick has never camped. Like ever. Which is crazy to me. So I am excited that we will be able to experience this together. We used some Amazon gift cards we got as wedding gifts plus some of the cash and bought a tent. We splurged on one that is compatible with our Honda Element in the hopes that we will make camping a regular event in our lives. (S/N- up until this point I had no idea that there was such a thing as a tent for an SUV, did you? Sure seems like it will be useful though). We are bringing Gordie too and plan on doing lots of hiking and lots of marshmallow roasting.

Other than that (and yes, I still want pizza) there isn’t much else going on. Just the normal life stuff.

How are you? What's new in your world?

Love and hugs,

Dacia

xoxoxoxo

WW Weekly Recap: Week 16

Week 16

Yeah, I had to go back and count. I had no idea what week last week was/this week is but now I do.

I can’t believe it has almost been 4 months since I re-joined WW. Even with the post ACL/antibiotics/injury/wedding mayhem gain I am still over 10 pounds down from where I started. I am 12.2 pounds down to be exact. I will call that a win!

Oh, sorry- horse before the cart. I am at a total of 12.2 lbs down because I gained a whopping 0.4 lbs this week. LOL. Yeah, we’ll just call that ‘staying the same’. And for a week of very little activity and eating so/so I am 1000000% ok with ‘staying the same’.

I would like to get back into losing again but really, I just want to get back into my healthy habits that keep me sane. I am pretty good with meal planning/cooking/packing lunches – even during the crazy busy times. Yeah, sometimes I eat out more than I would prefer and sometimes I drink more than I should but those are not my norm. The norm is still packing breakfast and lunch M-F, eating dinner at home S-Th and then some meals out on the weekend and this week is no different. Smoothies for breakfast, apples and bananas for morning snacks, soup for lunches, edamame for afternoon snack and some awesome meals planned from JL Goes Vegan’s pressure cooker cookbook. Oh and can’t forget, dark chocolate and tea at night.

This week I am looking to get in some more activity though. I plan on getting in two runs during the week (plus I have a HM on Sunday), two days of Cize and then a long bike ride on Saturday- if the weather cooperates. I also brought one of my bikes to work with me to keep in my office. This way I can go for rides during my lunch break and even to/from meetings. Hopefully I can get into the habit of getting a few daytime rides in every week.

I also am still balancing school, work, and life also which means it can’t always be about my training schedule or my preferred meal options. I need to make sure I still have time for schoolwork, self-care and relationship care <<< that’s a thing right? I mean, it should be even if no one actually calls it that.

I decided though that I want to get back into the habit of posting weekly goals with my update. I like the added focus to my plans but also I like being able to tailor them around the weekly events in my life. Monthly goals, sometimes, are just too long to plan for. A week at a time tends to be much more my speed. So here they are, some goals for week 17:

Monday 11/2 through Sunday 11/8

100,000 steps 

Track every day

30 minutes of movement 5 days/week

Some form of self-care (reading, bubble bath, stretching/meditation) at least twice

Finish homework before the weekend

Stick to Sunday-Friday meal plan

Ok, that’s about all I have for today. I will definitely be checking in with you next week for an update and it will hopefully include a happy recounting of my half marathon J

Love and hugs,

Dacia

xoxoxox