WEIGH-IN #3

I'm the same - 296... would like to blame it on the *molasses* excuse (see post below), but it's simply the result of some mindless and unhealthy eating this past week. I really do have to work on a) being more planned in my eating and b) working through my self-sabotaging. If ONLY I was as good at eating well as I am at sabotaging - I'm sure I could win the saboteur olympics if there was such a thing!

I'm thinking that this week every time I want to eat junk, I will first take a full length picture of myself and see if I still feel I *deserve* that cookie or whatever. And if this doesn't work, then I will get naked for said picture. Hard to deny reality with the bumps and lumps staring at me!!

WEIGH-IN #2

So I've stayed at 296. My digital scale registers my weight sometimes, but not all the time, so I'm going to hold off on switching to that one as my official weigh-in scale til next week.

30 pounds in 4 weeks feels great, but I also know that my weight loss will slow down like molasses from now on, and I need to make sure that this fact doesn't ruin my mental and emotional outlook!

oh happy happy day...

So today I weighed in at 296...AND, I actually registered on my digital scale (the one that only goes to 300) at 299! So, I'm hoping to be able to use that one from now on. I'll have to eat (pardon the pun) the 3 pound difference, but whatever - it feels good to be on my way!

1st OFFICIAL WEIGH-IN

and I lost another pound :) Not quite as incredible as my first 3 weeks, but I had one of those *gotta eat all my favorite junk because I'm starting in earnest on Thursday* kinda weeks. And then I forgot to weigh myself on Thursday. hmmmmm *forgot* - how convenient!

Trying to navigate the gong show that is my house. My parents have left and my husband goes back to work tomorrow, so I'll be officially on my own with 3 people under the age of 4! ACK!

I had to post this picture

I glanced at it on hide those cookies' blog and it took me a few seconds to register what he's doing with that cookie dough. Have to laugh but I also find it sad..... the fat girl's version of crack!

2 weeks post-partum.....

and I'm down 27 pounds so far. WOOHOO!! Thank you breastfeeding and not being able to drive and so have no way to get out and buy crap food on my own!!

This is as per my old analog scale. I still dont register on my digital scale as it only goes up to 300 pounds, and if I remember correctly, when I first bought it, there was a 7 pound difference between it and my old analog scale. I'm hoping I will be able to use the digital as of next Thursday. In which case I wont really show a loss, but oh well. I think it's probably more accurate than my old ancient one and I like to see those decimals. Nothing like seeing you've lost 2.1 pounds..... soooooo much better than just 2 :)

1 week post-partum....

...and I've lost 16 pounds.... that's almost 9 pounds of baby and about 5 pounds of *stuff* :) ... which leaves about 2 pounds of fat lost. woohoo ;)

I'm not TRYING to lose weight... have been eating really well as my support team (hubby and parents) have been feeding me yummy (but not always the healthiest) meals.

I'm still in quite a lot of pain as my incision hasn't healed well.... cant walk well and so I'm feeling a tad sorry for myself and chocolate makes me feel better :) Fortunately, since I'm unable to get out on my own, I dont have access to a lot of it, so it's been minimal.

I'll see what happens at my 2 week mark on Thursday, and then it's only a week til I get *serious*!! I had hoped to be closer to 300 by Sept 4th, but oh well.

What I've been doing well is no pop and no fast food, both of which I craved in my last month of pregnancy and are major trigger foods. This week I'm trying to cut back on the sugar and the chocolate and make sure I'm eating lots of fruits and veggies.

Over and out

So I had a baby......!

Well hello there to the maybe 2 people who still visit this blog :)

Just a little update......

I had my baby! A very sweet baby boy whom we named Evan David. Came into this world on Thursday, August 14th at 9:04am via a planned c-section. He weighed 8 pounds 11 ounces, which is a big baby by most standards, but a pip-squeak by ours! My daughter was 10 pounds and my first son was 9 pounds, 14 ounces. However my daughter was born a whole month before Evan (she was overdue), so I'm sure he woulda pudged up if given the chance :)

I gained a LOT of weight with this pregnancy. Exactly what I was afraid of, but what's done is done. At my last weigh-in a week before I gave birth, I weighed in at 326 pounds - 5 pounds more than I was on the day my first son was born. I dont know what I weighed on the actual day, but I will be weighing myself this Thursday at the one week post-partum to see where I'm at. With my first baby, I lost 25 pounds that first week, so that would be nice, but I'm not holding my breath... the weight didn't come off as fast with my 2nd!

I THINK that at the time I found out I was pregnant, I weighed about 283 pounds. My plan was to gain hardly anything - to try not to go over 290, but that plan was shot to hell in the first 2 months! My embarrassment at my lack of control over my food intake and the amount I was gaining led me to not feel worthy of posting here. I had nothing to say except how disappointed I was feeling, so I avoided writing on this little blog of mine like the plague. However I made myself HAVE to come here everyday in order to link to the blogs of all the people who inspire me (this probably means you), so that I couldn't totally avoid being accountable, and I knew I'd return after I gave birth with a 'second wind'.

My plan is to start back at the weight loss *thing* on Thursday, September 4th. That gives me time to recover from my surgery, let my hormones get back to normal, get into the swing of things looking after 3 kids, and gaining back some control over my emotions, anxieties and stress levels (I find it usually takes about 6 weeks to get through the fog that a new baby creates in your life). I am breastfeeding which helps with weight loss, but not if you eat crap, and so I will need much more than that to lose the weight I want to lose.

My other update is that we are moving across the country to Ottawa. My husband has accepted a job there and we are really excited to move. We already have an offer in on a house there, but it's contingent on selling our house here by the 25th. The market here in Vancouver is ridiculously slow and frustrating, and after 3 weeks our house remains unsold. 3 weeks isn't that long, but it IS when you only have a month to sell your house!

So... I have a lot on my plate. Trying to sell house (which means keeping house clean at ALL times in case someone wants to see it - try THAT with 2 kids.... and hey, now try that with 2 kids and a newborn and see how relaxed you feel!), buying a house, planning the packing and move, oh yeah and having a baby... it all adds up to a whole lotta stuff to deal with. I'm just trying to go with the flow and deal with things one day at a time and will be gearing up to getting back into the swing of things weightloss-wise in about 2 and half weeks, making little changes from now until then so that I dont sabotage myself with my usual mantra of *I'm going to change EVERYTHING about how I eat as of the 4th*!

Thanks to everyone who left little notes of support and to just say 'hi' over the last 8 months. I'm really sorry I've been MIA on YOUR blogs. I hope you're all doing well :)

Back from my 2 month sabatical from blogland!

Hello people..... people?? Are any of you still out there?! Wouldn't blame ya if you weren't - I've been MIA for so long.

Not sure why I took that time off... I think the pregnancy thing threw me for a loop and trying to switch to just being healthy and not trying to lose weight was disconcerting for me. I think I am very disappointed not to be thinner with this 3rd pregnancy... and I'm extremely concerned about gaining as much weight as I did with my first 2. You'd think these two things alone would help me keep on a healthy path, but oh no.... I jumped in and went for the complete opposite!

Anyway, time to lay it all out on the line and be honest.

I have gained weight. I am now 292 pounds. Scares the living crap out of me... as the 300 mark is looming right there. I'm not even sure if my scale goes over 300 pounds!! I picture me one day standing on it and it falling apart or sounding an alarm or something.....

Let me be perfectly clear... I am under no illusion that my weight gain is justified because I'm pregnant. At the moment the baby weighs about 1 1/2 ounces, so any fantasies about gaining baby weight are just that. Truth is my eating has been out of control. TOTALLY out of control. I can attribute a few stressful triggers for this, but I take responsibility for everytime I shoveled the food in, and I know I'm the only one who chose to eat when and how I did.

But just to make myself feel better, I'll list my stressors, as it will also catch you up on what's been going on..

Hubby's been away for almost 5 weeks of the last 8. And unfortunately bingeing has been the name of the game. BLAH. I just couldn't seem to get it together and climb out of the rut. I think I have now, but we shall see.

We are waiting to hear about 2 job opportunities that would see us moving. One across the world and one across the country. We'd prefer to stay in Canada, but that opportunity's not in the bag whereas the Israel one is... but it's taking them a long time to get the paperwork together and come up with the offer (5 months so far!!), and in the meantime the other opportunity has come up. To say the least, for a control freak like me, it's been a very stressfull year so far and I really really really just want to know what we're going to be doing. There's a million things to do if and when we do move, and the listmaker in me is chomping at the bit, but I refuse to start expending energy on planning when we don't know what's going to happen. I think I'm more anxious about the whole thing than I'm willing to admit - ESPECIALLY about moving to Israel.

In my 12th week, I came down with a pregnancy-related rash called PUPPP. It's probably the worst skin condition I've ever experienced and I could have HAPPILY itched myself to death. I think I would choose chronic pain over being so itchy 24-7.... it's a rare condition that occurs in about 1% of pregnancies and usually only occurs in the 3rd trimester, covers the WHOLE body - except the face - and it's SO bad that women often asked to be induced early just to get rid of it. Oh yeah, the only cure is to give birth and LUCKY LUCKY me gets it with 25 weeks to go!! Anyway, with my doctor only offering me me drugs to help control the itching - which included antihistamine everyday and doubling up on it at night so that I could sleep AND steroid cream (this for a woman who refused to take even ONE pill during either of her first 2 pregnancies), I was less than impressed and just a little distraught. To the point that my husband worriedly asked if I was considering terminating the pregnancy!!! Hadn't even entered my mind, but that gives you an idea of what agony I was in :( Anyway, I am happy to say that I found the solution (at least it worked for me) by reading anything and everything I could find on the subject online. And I kept reading about Dandelion root and how it had helped some women with PUPPP actually cure it and that it is safe to take while pregnant. I started taking it and it instantly helped. And I am glad to say that the rash has almost disappeared as has the itching. YAY!!! Can't tell you how stressed out I was about it and how distressing it was... thinking of being THAT uncomfortable for so long, and being VERY pregnant in the summer and not being able to wear short sleeves or shorts... especially if we're in Israel!! Trust me it was HIDEOUS. On an interesting side note, 70% of women who get it have boys... and one hypothesis is that because male fetal DNA has been found in biopsies of the rash, that my body is having an allergic reaction to that male DNA.... hmmmmmmm

Anyway, those are the 3 stressors that have CONTRIBUTED to my bad eating habits.... but I have done my best the last few days to curtail them and to get myself under control again. I have high hopes to stay under 300.... SUCH a scary number.

So that's it in a nutshell.... along with all the craziness that comes with having 2 young kids and oh yeah, I keep forgetting I'm pregnant!! I think I've been feeling more tired lately, but I'm not sure :)

Thanks to all my supporters out there - I've really appreciated your little nudges and I hope to be a bit more consistent going forward :)

STILL BORED

nuf said :) sorry guys... I plan to get back on track with everything soon!

I'm bored with myself

Let me explain... I'm just so darn bored of hearing myself talk about (in my head of course) what I want to do, what I'm going to do, writing the same old lists over and over, telling my husband what my *plan* is so that he wont bug me....and then never following through fully... sure, I've achieved some results, but most of it was half-assed and I'd still hang on to old habits, but hide them, so that they don't *count*. What a crock.

Anyway, I just completed a 2-week crap-eating regime of olympic proportions. I was out of control a lot of it....totally aware, and telling myself it was OK because as of January 1st, 2008 at the magical hour of midnight, I was miraculously going to say goodbye to my bad eating habits and couch potato-ness and become the poster child of health and hotness.

Uh huh. I knew I was bullshitting myself, but I ate anyway. And I gained 5 pounds. SOO not surprised, but SOO disappointed in myself.

In true list maniac form, I made a list of things I want to accomplish this year, and then I tucked it away and made a new list of things I want to achieve for the month of January. One month seems more attainable than a whole year, and being pregnant - things get a little wonky with the weight loss thing anyway, so I'm sticking to just trying to incorporate some healthy habits into my daily living. And since I feel that if they are *out there* in blogland, I will feel more accountable to them, here are my goals for January 2008. Ahem:

1) Bed by 11:30: This is a huge one for me... I've spent the last 6 months going to be past 1am - and this has not been condusive to feeling energized and motivated to do any form of exercise the next day - especially when one is woken up at 6:30am by 2 kidlets.

2) Daily exercise: I dont care what this is - it could be a walk to the park with the kids (and trust me the heart rate does NOT get into the fat-burning zone with a 3 year old in tow!!) or just leg lifts on the floor. I need to quiet the fat lazy girl and just do it. I truly believe the more energy you expend, the more energy you have.

3) NO bingeing or sneaking food. Critical.

4) 2 litres of water minimum a day. I'm close to this anyway, but dont keep close track and it's even more important now that there's someone else sucking me dry of H2O :)

5) Make realistic lists and follow through on them. Most evenings I make a list of things I want to accomplish the next day, and to my credit they'd be totally doable if I didn't have 2 kids, nap times to work around, 3 meals to make, cleaning and errands to run during a day. It's sadly comical how I still haven't learned my lesson on this one.

6) Eat a healthy diet. 'Nuf said.

7) Personal care: Trying to fit a shower, putting on a little make up, doing my hair, filing my nails, brushing my teeth, wearing clothes I feel good in instead of sweats and an old t-shirt.....well, instead of getting only some of those in, I'd like to make ALL of them a priority. I've fallen into the trap a lot of moms fall into, but it's no excuse... I wanna be a HOT MOM not a frumpy mummy!!

So that's it. I'm following the lead of some fellow bloggers and am putting stickers on my calendar to commemorate each day I follow my 7 cute little guidelines. I hope I can develop some good habits and then sustain them past the month of January...

So happy new fresh year everyone..... have loved reading all your new year posts and as usual don't know what I'd do without your awesome inspiration :)