I have to admit the holidays were not the best time for me.  Cookies, buckeyes, fudge, and candy can all come in bite size forms and are more than tempting.  They are the defeat of me.  Speaking of food I noticed that I can eat a little more than a cup at a time.  That’s kinda nice.

So my only issue lately is that I need to be getting in more protein.  As of late I haven’t been eating enough of it lately.  Which isn’t a good thing.  Sometimes, I do get a little weak when I feel don’t get in what I’m supposed to eat.  And lately I’ve been bad at eating.  I need to work more on eating what I should be, not just what’s easy to put on a plate. Something I probably should do is just cook up a bunch of chicken and have it on hand for lunch wraps and such.  Or I could just make a HUGE pile of my chicken salad…. mmm  that sounds much better.  If it wasnt for the snow my trimmer butt would be a Kroger in a heartbeat getting the goods for that.  As it stands I still have to head over there sometime today anyhow, I’m making beef carnitas and need some meat and such for that.

Okay, I know this sounds so odd because I am trying to lose weight but I am recently obsessed with cooking.  I am really getting into it like a mad monkey goes for a pile of banana cream pie.  I stalk recipe books, blogs, and cooking websites.  My mouth waters at the ideas of what I can make, when I can make it, and how it will taste.  Its kinda like too many dishes not enough time.  By the time I find out dish that I like another pops up that I want to do.

Enough of my crazy cooking talk.  I’m out.  I have to email a recipe to a friend.  HA!

I need to get back on track and cut back on my carb intake again.  Also, started going to the gym.  Met with a personal trainer friday.  She kicked my ass from here to Memphis.  And I loved it!  My arms hurt, my thighs burn and I am excited to do it again.  I also started E Mealz, from mealtimemakeover.com.  Okay!  This is awesome!  Its for everyone not just people trying to lose weight, its for people wanting to save money.  Sorry, kinda excited about it.  As I was saying, you sign up for it, its about $5 a month.  You pick your meal plan, I did low carb for two people.  They have other meal plans, for kroger and a family, walmart, weight watcher, low fat, all kinds!  They check out the deals at the grocery store and see whats on sale, and then make up the meals.  You get the meal plan once a week for 5 meals plus the grocery list and the recipes for the meals.  I had chuck roast, curry chicken, jambalaya, salmon, and beef stroganoff.  I bought all the stuff for the meal and the side dishes that go with it for $50!!  And its soo GOOODDDD!  The curry chicken was awesome!  Having a meal plan for me that is low carb and tastes good really helps.

Anyhow, Gotta run passing out soup for Soup and Socks.  Also, totally random and off the subject, Adam Lambert is weird looking.

But I have to say my sheer moment of bliss came when I went to the store to finally give in and buy a new pair of jeans that didn’t keep falling down.  I walked in and the nice salegal asked what I was looking for.  I told her just jeans.  Do you know what size you are, she asked.  Not really, losing weight.  Hmm well you look like a size 22.  That did it for me.  As soon as the 22 left her lips I hugged her.  Literally.  Kinda startled her.  Told her my last pair of jeans was a 28 and my last pair of khakis was a 30 so a 22 was like telling me I won an emmy.  I don’t know how I’m going to react once I am no longer a plus size.  Probably get a billboard on 75 and advertise my skinny self.  Another awesome thing happened that shopping day.  I bought a winter coat.  It was a size 18/20.  That’s right folks, smaller on top, arent we all?  Hips.  They never shrink.  Anyhow back to the coat.  Wanna guess the size of my last winter coat?  WRONG!  My last winter coat was a size 30.  I don’t feel like a HUGE monster wearing a blanket that zips in this coat.  I feel like you can actually see a somewhat figure!

The down side to all this glorious weight loss, and yes there is a down side.  Is that some of my mentality hasn’t changed.  It’s happened so fast.  Its hard to not still think that I am as large as I was.  I can see the changes and I can feel them its just that I’ve always been larger.  The chubby one.  Even when I was a healthy weight for me I was still larger than my friends.  I have always felt  fat.  And of course fat relates to unattractive.  While this whole journey isn’t to boost my self esteem.  Totally not.  But that is a side effect of this.  I’m happy.  I think I look better but still, there are times when I can’t shake the mental 101 lbs that I’ve lost physically.

Its like when a thrifty person comes into a windfall of money. They aren’t going to start suddenly stop cutting coupons just because they have a bigger bank account.  Nor are they going to buy a million dollar yatch.  That’s not how they think.  That’s kinda what I am feeling.  Being thin is not how I think.  I’ve always have been proud of my curves and supported larger actresses and models for making being bigger not such a bad thing.  I know I will still support them even after I’m no longer a plus size but will it look condescending to someone who doesn’t know that I used to be large?  I don’t know.   Its all new and changing quickly.

Oh well.  The other thing that’s gonna change is my workouts.  I haven’t been able to go swimming due to weather but that’s ok.  I am ready to go to the gym.  I need to start working on toning and building muscle.  Now that I am at a weight where it won’t be so uncomfortable for me to do all those strange and torture looking machines I’m pretty excited.  Even looking into getting a personal trainer every month or so to make sure I am on the right track.  The biggest complication is getting someone to watch Gideon while I work out.  Be praying about that for me.  I really want to do it, but it won’t happen if he cries like someone is poking him in the eye for an hour.  And yes, he can and has cried like that for that long.  Kids got skill.

Now down to catching you up on why I’ve been behind in posting, oh ad give you a weight update.  I’m sure you want to know that too.  Here it is!  Ladies and Gentlemen I am officially less than 300LBS!!  I weigh a lovely 297 LBS!!!!  I cannot remember the last time I weighed less than 300.  Seriously, for my wedding 4 years ago I was 355.  And now I am 297!  HOLY CRAP!  I looked at a picture of me taken while I was on vacation last week and one from my honeymoon and I barely recognized me.  I couldn’t believe it.  I’ve seen the change on me daily but seeing it in pictures was startling.  I can’t believe that was me.  It makes me see how much my body has changed, and not just my face looking slimmer.

Other things are changing too.  My hair is thinning.  I knew it could happen.  I never knew how much it would affect me.  I have realized that I am vain.  I love me hair.  Being a bigger person there aren’t too many aspects about your body that you are too proud of.  Everything sags, flabs, or bulges.  Your arms aren’t supposed to shake when you wave, your thighs shouldn’t rub, your butt shouldn’t jiggle.   But mine do.  So one of my best features that I took pride in was and is my hair.  I love changing it. Doing different things with it.  Most people get tattoos, I dye my hair blue.  Two reasons for that, one hair dye is not permanent and two if I were to get a tattoo of a butterfly it would end up looking like a condor in no time on me.

So I’m losing my hair.  I am trying to not get emotional about it but its hard.  I mean I’m losing it because of a choice that I made not because I had to get chemo.  I feel petty that I am get emotional over it.  My mom lost her hair when she underwent chemo, and I can only imagine how heart broken she felt.  I don’t  feel like I have a right to get upset about my hair thinning when it is a direct result of a choice that I made.  Others like my mom didn’t and don’t have a choice.  So then I feel stupid for getting upset.  Maybe I am over thinking things an being overly sensitive.  Anyhow…

I met with a lady that does hair weaves today to see what I could do to help cover up the thinning hair.  I know, I know… hair weaves?  Well, I can get them and it would help.  I’m scheduled to get them this weekend.  Needless to say I am very nervous about this.  What if it looks HORRIBLE?  What if I don’t like it?  What if it doesn’t help?  I’m excited about it too.  Maybe it will help and look GREAT.  Maybe when I run my fingers through my hair I won’t pull out loads of my hair.

When I see you all out and about I get asked “how are you feeling?”  For the most part I feel great!  I have more energy.  I can do things like I used to do, my favorites being that I am really able to get down and play with my son without getting uncomfortable because of my girth.  I need to watch what I eat and drink.  If I do not drink enough I can tell when I am dehydrated.  And if I am not eating properly I do get a little faint.  On vacation there were a couple days where it was really hard to eat properly.  Mainly, finding something that wasn’t covered in breading and fried.  I’ve discovered that fried foods just don’t set as well as I would like them too.  Plus they don’t taste as good as I remembered.  Anyhow, on the days that I didn’t get to eat so well I tried to make up for it by eating some protein bars but I still felt very weak and faint.  Once I was able to start eating and drinking better it wasn’t an issue.  I’m really starting to read my body and its cues.  All in all, I feel great!

I promise next time I won’t leave you hanging for so long.  I’ve got some thoughts pinging around in my mind that I need to get out.  Not quite sure how to express it though.  You might just read a rant that makes no sense what so ever but hey, its my blog.

Until next time…

Now the moment you all have been waiting for…. I weigh now 315 LBS!!  I AM DOWN 70 LBS!  Can you freaking believe it?!?!?  I can’t!  Though I should.  Its just crazy to think that.  The other thing is I am down 70 and still not below 300.  That kinda sucks but I’ll be there soon.  And even sooner I’ll be down 100!  Holy COW!

With all this weight loss things have really been changing on my body.  For those of you who don’t want to know TMI I advise you skip this paragraph.  Ok, now that only 2 people are still reading this I can continue.  I can see that parts of my body is getting smaller.   My thighs.  When I sit I can see where the girth is missing.  My arms look thinner too.  My face looks thinner now.  I can see and feel my collarbones.  The one things that I noticed has changes are my breasts.  They are smaller as in the bra size but they still feel big.  Make sense?  Okay.  I got new bras because the old ones weren’t fitting right but when I look in the mirror they are still BAM there.  Like in your face there.  Not that I’m complaining I was just expecting them to decrease in size also.  I also had to get new underwear.   It wasn’t something that I would expect to have to buy.  But it makes sense that you would need to.  What prompted that?  While grocery shopping my unders kept falling down.  Not a great feeling.  The only thing holding them up, the crotch in my pants.  Worst feeling ever!  Don’t worry folks, I found an isolated corner and hiked them up and then hightailed it home.  My wedding ring is getting bigger now too!  That’s another thing I didn’t even think about, like my fingers will shrink?  What?  But they are and thats pretty cool.

Welcome back my not so brave readers.  Its okay, you didn’t miss much.

The other thing that’s been new and odd is my taste has changed.  Things that I liked to eat before are not tasting the same or as good as before.  Things are too sweet, too heavy, too rich, too creamy.  It reminds me of when I quit smoking and the first puff of a cigarette I had years later.  The memory of the taste was so much better than the actual taste.  I went to Chili’s and ordered one of my favorite things, chicken fingers and honey mustard.  I could only do one finger.  It was too greasy, too fried.  It just didn’t taste as good as I remembered.  We went to Friendly’s a bit ago and I ordered the no sugar added ice cream and no sugar added hot fudge.  One of those wasn’t no sugar added.  It made me so sick.  It tasted good, a little too sweet for me, sad.  But still after a minute I felt sick to my stomach and had to lay down I felt so bad.  It literally made me nauseated.

I’m learning more and more each day how and what to eat.   What will give me energy and what won’t make me sick.  There are some things that I get excited to eat, like a good chicken Caesar salad.  And some things I just know won’t work so well, any kind of beans.  I shop for food different.  Fresher, low carb, high protein foods seem to really get my attention.  I can’t get enough fish.  Oh and found a SERIOUSLY awesome seafood store called Oceanwide Seafood.  Love it!  I’m starting to go out of my way (as in away from the grocery store) to buying from farmer’s markets like Garver, and meat markets like Zink’s.  Basically, since I can only eat so much I want whatever I eat to be the best.  So fresh, in season, and well marbled is my motto.  I also am looking at each nutrition label on everything I buy.  I can only have so many carbs a day and I need to get in LOADS of  protein, which makes me really look at what I am eating.  String cheese is a Godsend.

But anyhow!  I am down 70!!!  I am rocking this out!  I’ll be back in a month or sooner, if I have a melt down.  You never know.  :)

This past week or so has been Rough!  Gideon, my adorable 1 year old son, was diagnosed with Cerebral Palsy.  My emotions ran the gambit.  There was not one that I did not feel.  The two major ones were disappointment and guilt.

I am ashamed to admit that I was very disappointed in God.  I questioned Him.  After all that Gideon and I have been through I was so upset about it.  I felt God wasn’t being “fair”.  Stupid I know.  Even then I knew I was being stupid.  I just couldn’t shake the feeling.  After time I got over it, but still it was my first reaction.

As for my guilt, it was one that crept back into my thoughts.  I thought I had gotten over being guilty that I can’t have a baby.  But I was wrong.  I felt horribly guilty that I couldn’t give my husband a perfect child.  If I had just been able to get pregnant than my husband wouldn’t have to go through all of this.  Then I just felt even worse because I was making Gideon out to be less than what he is.  Gideon is perfect.  Just because he has issues doesn’t change that.  I felt like a terrible wife and mother.

During all these emotions my first reaction was to eat.  It amazed me how quickly my mind went to comforting myself with food.  I’ve known that I’ve been an emotional eater, you don’t get to be as big as I am without that.  I just didn’t see how much I depended on it.  Lucky for me I really can’t eat still so I was forced to be comforted elsewhere.

Since my “go to” was blocked I went to God, like I should have done in the first place.  It was a struggle though.  I almost felt stranded.  With food, its something I can control.  I can control what I eat, how much, when, and where.  With my son’s CP I can’t control that.  God reminded me that I’m never in control.  Its sad you know, we think that we can control things in our life.  Where we work, who we marry, where we live all these are choices we make, things we think that we control the outcome.  Boy are we wrong.  If you were to tell me 4 years ago that I would be living in the Middletown area and have an adopted child and being a stay at home mom I would have asked what you were smoking.

God plans everything for us.   God gave my perfect son.  He was made for us just as much as we were made for him.  God had Gideon picked out for me before I was even born.  God knows that I can handle a child with CP.  And what’s even more He knows that Gideon will be a light for Him!

I need to remember that daily.  I need to remember that He has it all figured out.  Not one step I take He doesn’t know.  Not one breathe I take He hasn’t given me.  Why wouldn’t He give Gideon all He needs?  I have to trust that the Creator has control.  I have to rest in my Father for my comfort, not in food.

Now there are two things.  One good and one bad.  I’ll start with the bad.  And when I say bad I mean sucks.  So my scale here at home is not so accurate.  For that I am bummed.  When I weighed in today at the doctor’s office I weighed in at 333 lbs.  I was a little upset.  Kinda sucked.  But oh well.  I still am losing loads.  The doctor and the dietitian are both really excited about my weight lose and think that I have done a great job!

The good news is NO MORE PUREED FOOD!!  I CAN HAVE NORMAL FOOD AGAIN!!  What was my first act of normalcy?  Red Robin’s Whiskey River Chicken Roll Up.  So freaking good!!  Oh and I had two fries.  No I couldn’t eat it all.  I have a few bites with the wrap then had to take the meat out.  The rest got packed up and was my afternoon snack and my dinner later.  My taste buds are still celebrating!

So, still losing.  Just not as much as I thought but that’s okay.  I am wearing clothes that I haven’t worn before.  I am feeling great and have loads of energy.  Getting a wicked tan.  And according to my husband, I don’t snore anymore.

I am down to 329 lbs.  The best part of this is I had to go buy new pants.  They wouldn’t stay up on their own anymore.  And my weight loss has showed up at the store!!  I have gone from a size 30 on the bottom and a 28 on top to a 24 on bottom and a 22 on top!  I can barely believe it!  I almost cried in the dressing room.  I cannot remember the last time I was a 24 anything!  Seriously!

I am so freaking excited!  I even got a pair of those leggings thingys.  You girls know what I am talking about, you wear them under a short dress or super long shirt.  I got a sleeveless shirt!  Most of you have never seen me without sleeves.  There is a reason for that. My arms look like hams, but with all this weight loss and feeling good about myself I am excited to show it off!

I am down 52 lbs!  Lost 10 from last week.  For a grand total weight of 333 lbs!  I wore a shirt yesterday that I have NEVER been able to button and it looked freaking fabulous!  Even slightly too big!

I’ve been rocking the food with applesauce, yogurt, chicken salad, tuna salad, and crab cakes (well chopped up).  And of course Skyline is my go to food.  It seriously is the easiest thing for me to eat.  Weird huh?

The hardest part is getting in 8 cups of water a day.  I just get so full so easy.  And when I get to full it gets really uncomfortable.  Getting to know when my stomach is full is hard.  I’m so used to being able to eat a cup of soup, but I can’t anymore.  At least not right now.  I can only take 1/4- 1/2 cup.

The biggest challenge is that I don’t get hungry so I don’t think I have to eat.  I have to try and remind myself to eat all the time.  Even when I don’t feel like it.  When I don’t eat I can tell that I am drained of energy.  So I need to eat.  I need to remember to eat.

Well folks. More next week.  Or less… of me that is.. hee hee.

I eat barely 1/4- 1/2 cup of food at a time.  I need to eat at least 60 grams of protein a day.  That’s kinda hard when you only eat a little bit of food at a time.  Though I have found that cottage cheese has loads more protein in it than I thought, and tuna is a good one for me to eat as well.

So here’s the really strange thing.  I have to learn to take smaller bites.  My tool to help me? My son’s baby spoon.  That’s right folks.  I use a baby spoon.  It has helped too.  I have to do smaller bites, and eat my meal within 20-30 minutes. I can’t eat fast though.  Now that is something totally foreign to me.  Growing up with so many older brothers it was eat fast or you don’t eat.  (Cause no food left on the table)

I’m working on it all.  Learning.  And seriously losing weight.