Lea's "Let's Get Healthy!" Accountability Thread

[KanuTGL]

That sounds great, Nathalie! And Kasei!

My progress to getting to my goals has been going pretty terribly unfortunately, but I'm cutting down portion sizes and trying to calculate a little more closely how much I actually need to eat. So that's something, at least xP

[Azerane]

Love reading about how great you guys are all going, keep it up

Ugh, I've been avoiding this thread though. It's not just about eating bad food though, I've been in a really bad place mentally for the past three weeks, and I'm really struggling to get out of it. Had a lot of stress with work, money, dealing with living on my own and pat being away and feeling disconnected, needing to get a new car etc and I basically just shut down. For two weeks I got between 3-5 hours sleep a night, so my eating/cooking/food planning suffered. My exercise has suffered because my sprained ankle is only just healing up (3 week old injury now) and I've pretty much been incapable of just dealing with anything housework related, after getting 3-5 hours sleep, getting up at 5am, working for 7 hours then coming home.

I think the breaking point was finding out I needed to get another car last week. Everything else felt impossible to do, but then getting worse news kinda made those other impossible things seem a bit do-able despite the extra stress. So I've been trying to improve. The needing to get another car has made me have to work out how much money I have and realise that I can't buy food every day at work. So in the space of 6 days I had two iced coffees (instead of one a day) and I've been taking a vegemite and cheese sandwich to work instead of buying subway or a sausage roll. So there are improvements. At the start of it all I was pretty much binge eating on chocolate, then when I wasn't sleeping I just stopped having meals (except breakfast). And now I've actually started making basic meals again, cleaned out the fridge, trying to plan ahead a bit more.

It's hard, because I'm still really stressed, and really sleep deprived and feeling like everything is crashing down around me. But I just have to keep going, even though it's incredibly hard. I'm already sick of looking at cars online, and test driving cars etc, but it has to be done. I didn't want to get a loan, because I could technically just scrape enough money together to get a half decent car. But Pat suggested I should get a loan just so that I have money there still if I need it. Which isn't a bad idea, but the thought of getting a loan stresses me out more I think I'm just pretty breakable at the moment, haha.

So yeah... that's me right now On the plus side, I have dinner planned for tomorrow night, which is good. I haven't weighed myself, because I'm sure I put on weight at the beginning of all this with all the chocolate I was eating. Fortunately I've cut that down too.

Sorry about the venting, it just helps sometimes I think. Plus I thought it I posted it, it might help me improve.

[Kasei]

Vent away! That's what we're here for....especially if you don't really have that many other people in life to vent to. This is the "get healthy" not "loose weight" thread for a reason. Mental health is also uber important. <3

Have you tried making yourself a schedule/calendar? I had a lot of those same problems adjusting to getting organized so that I could be independant financially and just in general. Finding time to cook large amounts of food and freeze it to eat later is something that has been a big adjustment for me, but has saved me LOADS of money. I basically just buy those little 1-serving tupperware containers and portion out my rice/veggies/pasta etc into those then grab a couple from the freezer to mix and match every day at work. I have basically gotten to the point where the only money I spend on food is at the grocery store....and it all started with getting a dry erase calendar and scheduling out my week. Looking ahead and figuring out where I had the most time to do what. Cleaning is a whole other beast, however. Let me know when you figure that one out...because I still basically clean only about once a month. xD Life is just too busy and there's too much I want to do to waste time cleaning! I try to just make as little mess as possible and sort of clean up as I go, so that helps. Then I just have to do the big stuff like the bathroom and vaccum once a month instead of everything at once. Which is super overwhelming.

Hang in there Az. <3 Let us know how things are going, I hope everything starts looking up soon. Sounds like you're already making some good steps in the right direction. We're rooting for you!

[nathalie]

I made a huge sin 2 days ago, haha, was across the border in town, I had a McDonalds coupon, it was spaghetti night at my place, and I don't like that, so I took 2 Big Macs with the coupon

I cannot get my eyes open on this subject *sigh*.
I keep whining I'm too big (well, "fat" in my own words), but nothing is an eye-opener for me

[Azerane]

Vent away! That's what we're here for....especially if you don't really have that many other people in life to vent to. This is the "get healthy" not "loose weight" thread for a reason. Mental health is also uber important. <3

Have you tried making yourself a schedule/calendar? I had a lot of those same problems adjusting to getting organized so that I could be independant financially and just in general. Finding time to cook large amounts of food and freeze it to eat later is something that has been a big adjustment for me, but has saved me LOADS of money. I basically just buy those little 1-serving tupperware containers and portion out my rice/veggies/pasta etc into those then grab a couple from the freezer to mix and match every day at work. I have basically gotten to the point where the only money I spend on food is at the grocery store....and it all started with getting a dry erase calendar and scheduling out my week. Looking ahead and figuring out where I had the most time to do what. Cleaning is a whole other beast, however. Let me know when you figure that one out...because I still basically clean only about once a month. xD Life is just too busy and there's too much I want to do to waste time cleaning! I try to just make as little mess as possible and sort of clean up as I go, so that helps. Then I just have to do the big stuff like the bathroom and vaccum once a month instead of everything at once. Which is super overwhelming.

Hang in there Az. <3 Let us know how things are going, I hope everything starts looking up soon. Sounds like you're already making some good steps in the right direction. We're rooting for you!

Will write more later, just wanted to say thanks

I made a huge sin 2 days ago, haha, was across the border in town, I had a McDonalds coupon, it was spaghetti night at my place, and I don't like that, so I took 2 Big Macs with the coupon

I cannot get my eyes open on this subject *sigh*.
I keep whining I'm too big (well, "fat" in my own words), but nothing is an eye-opener for me

It's hard to find the eye-openers I think. And they are different for everybody. It was either some aspects of physics or chemistry that made no sense to me for two years of high school, then one day it was explained to me be a different teacher, and in 5 minutes it made complete sense. You've been doing very well though

[KanuTGL]

I got myself a measuring tape today to be able to properly get my measurements, because all my trousers are becoming way too tight and I want to know what size I actually am. The numbers were a lot worse than I thought, hah.

I'm gonna try harder from now on to be more active, but it's so difficult to find the time for it :/ I'm either at campus working (sitting by a computer) or at home (sitting by my computer) or too tired to do anything at all So finding even one hour every other day to use for a bit of exercise is really hard. Blah!

[Azerane]

Sorry about needing to vent again, but aside from talking to Pat (who gets enough of me being upset etc ) I don't really know where else to vent. Plus if I can get myself to post here more often, I feel like it may help lead to better habits. I apologise in advance for the following paragraph, it's a bit all over the place and disjointed.

This month has just been really hard. In addition to already worrying about money, and the fact that I need to get a new car (which I still haven't done) I filled up my car the other day to find it had a fuel leak. So the next day, I was forking out $400 that I didn't really have on a car that I'm not even going to keep... *sigh* However, at Pat's suggestion, I did bite the bullet and headed off to my bank to get a small loan for a car. Realised I just couldn't really afford one otherwise. So that in itself was somewhat stressful, though at the same time a relief to know that I have the money for a car now and don't have to worry so much about where my next meal is coming from and if I'll be able to afford my bills. All of the issues with Pat were a pretty big obstacle this month too, very draining, disheartening and confusing all at once. Things have very much improved, but it's not gone, if that makes sense. He just got himself a job, which is a huge deal and means we can really start saving for the whole moving to be together thing. Sorry, I'm kind of getting side-tracked, just trying to fill in the gaps for you all. I think what's hard also at the moment is I'm really losing/have lost my passion for my work. I used to find it a challenge, and now after being behind on work for three weeks (which is completely not my fault since they took me off my job for two days to cover something else but didn't cover me and my work load has been so huge I haven't had time to catch up) I initially felt swamped and stressed about it, to only then realise that I just don't care. I think if I can catch up, I'll be fine, but until then it's sort of "Why am I doing this?" I almost miss menial service jobs where once you leave work, everything's over until you start fresh the next day. If I leave work, I just have to pick up where I left off the next time I get there. Makes it pretty hard to get out of bed sometimes.

I've had to be a little better with house related things the last week or so since I have an inspection this coming Tuesday. I'm not really ready, and I'm not going to be, but I don't really care, haha. As long as it's mostly tidy and nothing is gross it'll be fine. Though I haven't been able to get out the stain in the carpet that she complained about last time. It's because it's not a stain though, it's just scuff wear from the chair legs, but it's quite dark, so that sucks. In regards to eating habits, it's been pretty terrible. With everything that happened with Pat and I, I wasn't even having proper meals or eating much at all, then if I did eat it was chocolate or junk food. In fact, I'm eating chocolate right now, lol. Currently, I literally just crave food constantly. Like if I'm not 100% occupied with something, I feel like I have to be eating, and it's been really hard. In the past week I've gotten a tiny bit better, cooked some meals again, and I've been fantastic at taking lunch to work instead of spending money on food, which is a plus. Also, I've been eating fruit. That may not sound like a big deal, but I hadn't bought fruit in many months, so to have actually eaten some again is a huge deal for me.

Generally I think what most of what my stuff boils down to, is stress from money and stress from living on my own. Despite the fact that I'm not at all a social person, and I love having lots of time to myself, I find it very difficult to simply manage everything on my own, and I think that occurring when Pat left became kind of a double struggle for me. I'm not miserable, haha, but 'm definitely struggling. It's times like this when I am infinitely glad to have a pet, Bandit really is my little saving grace right now, he's the reason I have to get out of bed every day, and he makes me smile (even if he's currently shedding enough fur for about 1000 rabbits!) For the most part I've been sleeping better, I think it simply got to a point where I was so exhausted that my body just kind of reset itself in that regard, but I would still love to sleep for a week straight.

Anyway... sorry that ramble got kinda long, I'll finish it off with some dot-point positives below:

-Pat has a job which means saving more money for VISA and living together
-I have a loan so I can actually afford to get a different car
-Going to look at several cars tomorrow morning, and I have a good feeling about it
-Have been really good with taking my lunch to work, which means saving lots of money
-I have my niece's birthday party tomorrow, 2 years old! Fun times!
-House inspection next Tuesday, a little stressful, but it means that from Monday afternoon, the house should be clean
-I've been doing sit-ups! Not many, but I have been doing them, and that's way better than the not doing them that was happening before!
-Oh and also, I finally put my Christmas Tree away... that was like a major thorn in my side/brain/everything. Middle of Feb and I still had the tree up.
-On Sunday it will be 9 years since Pat and I decided to become "boyfriend and girlfriend"
-On Monday it will be 1 year that I've owned Bandit <3

Oh and Kasei, I had thought about making a schedule for myself for cleaning in the past, but it's once again one of those things that I just never got around to drawing up

Kanu, you're braver than I, measuring yourself. Still, if you know what you are, you can more easily track your progress, which is good. It's hard to turn the negatives into positives, but we have to Maybe try not to think of the exercise as a whole hour task. I started by simply saying to myself, you know what... I have 30 seconds or spare time, let's see how many sit-ups I can do. And that's it. It may not be a lot, but you have to start somewhere. I used to do crouching exercises while brushing my teeth, lol, I should start doing them again.

[cleargreenwater]

Bringing your lunch to work every day is awesome! Really a deceptively huge thing, and SO DIFFICULT, omg. I try, and I'm good for the first maybe 3 days, but by Thursday I'm bumming

As for stuff to do, I completely shamelessly admit that I keep a dry-erase board. If I didn't write everything down in a sort of "life command center" at the base of my stairs, my mind would always be racing and things would get lost in the shuffle while I was obsessing elsewhere. Sure, maybe it makes me look mildly remedial having a list and two different calendars (one for appointments like doctors and programs/meetings/obligations, and one for household tasks like garbage days and when certain bills are due,) but everything is written down and not having to remember any of it so I can concentrate on important stuff is invaluable.

Anyway, I'm getting back on board with this health thing a little bit. The pre-hypertension/warning signs of high blood pressure that changing one of my medications fixed has been creeping back in, which means it really isn't just the medication and something I really need to think about a little bit now. At least the resting/bottom number is still normal, its just the top one that's borderline.

So I'm gonna try to make a point to not add any additional salt to things. I'm not going to go nuts with it, I know I can't maintain any kind of restricted diet and frankly I'm just not interested in changing how any cooking I eat is prepared or in fussing over it. But I figure not putting any extra salt on is a good basic across the board change to make, and see what that does for it.

[nathalie]

I've never used salt anyways on my food. Neither does my mom, and I got my cooking from her, lol.
I only put pepper on meat. I don't do salt on meat, fries, potatoes, soup, nothing.

[Sharifu]

Oh Bec, you poor thing. Everything you have been going through sounds majorly stressful. Honestly I think you deserve that chocolate...

I haven't really been doing so well lately, I haven't been exercising or even checked my weight since I moved to California over a month and a half ago. I keep thinking I'll get back into exercising and eating less sweets, but it's been hard, to try to motivate myself to actually start exercising.

[KanuTGL]

Haha, yes, I agree with Audra; treat yourself to that chocolate, Azzy =P And keep check of all the positive things At uni last month we did this exercise called "The Joy Report" (to be part of a branding assignment) where we had to write down all the good things that happened to us every day for a week. Only positives, no negatives at all. I noticed after the week was over that I remembered the good things I'd written down, but I could barely recall any of those daily negative annoyances. So I've carried on keeping a diary of all the daily positives, big and small, and I honestly think that it's helping me stay in a good mood right now despite the huge pressure I'm under from all the assignments I have to do.

And, CGW, I think that seems like a very useful way to stay organised! I like lists that you can erase things from when you've done them. It feels great And I hope less salt will make a difference for you too, good luck with it :3

As for my progress here, I had a doctor's appointment the other day where they measured my height and weight and I don't actually weigh as much as I thought I did, haha. I've really not done well on the whole "cut down on the sweets" thing for the last couple of weeks, but I am cutting down my portion sizes and making a point of going for at least 40+ minute walks daily on the weekends. The exercise during the weekdays hasn't been going so well this week, but at least I'm thinking about it, which is better than it was before... Baby steps, but at least it's going somewhere xP

[lionloversam]

For the most part my weight has been steady.

Personally, I have found that eating less salt gets easier after the first few days. I have cut salt back before and should start on it again. But, some salt is needed in the diet. Just not the over abundance that is in the Standard American Diet.

[Kasei]

Man, I have been terrible about posting here lately. e_e; Sorry about that guys, life just ran away with me a bit. I stay too busy, I think.

I've been doing pretty good as far as my goals. Drinking more water, haven't really had sugar since New Years, though I have made some minor exceptions for celebrations/birthdatys/etc. The thing is, I'm not SNACKING on deserts/sweets throughout the week, I'm not craving them. And when I do have something sweet at a birthday dinner or something, I don't go back for seconds. I'm learning that that is a big part of my problem--OVERindulging. I have kind of tried to make a mental rule with all my foods, not just sweets, that one serving is enough. The only exceptions to that would be when I'm out eating at a buffet or something...but even then, I limit myself to two plates max. And no deserts unless it's fruit/something natural. I really have only had sweets this past week, up until now it's been zero since the beginning of 2014, so I think I'm doing good. It's not really showing on the scale as I still weigh in consistently at 159, but I feel/look better, I think. So that's what matters.

Also, this week being Spring Break and all, I have been jogging each morning. Not far, just a mile or so, but just the act of getting my heart rate up is beneficial...and even though I detest running with a firey passion, I know from experience that it is the quickest way to burn fat and look/feel better. So I'm sucking it up and just doing it. I refuse to run more than I feel like running and often will just walk and sprint occassionally to get my heart rate up. And that's fine.

To be honest, the only reason I am REALLY running isn't for health, it's becuae I'm going to be a bridesmaid in a wedding on April 12th and I just ordered the dress today...the only size they had it available in is a size I can just barely fit into...so in an effort to not look like a pig in plastic wrap in every photo that I'm sure my friend will have hanging on her wall forever, I am sucking it up and just going to do something active each day. Whether it's a mile jog or a 15 minute workout video at home. I have to do *something.* So I need some accountability on this, since working out for the sake of working out is one of my least favorite things to do. xD Feel free to e-mail/PM me and ask me how it's going. Going to try to make it a point to come here more often and post, especially now that it's warming up and I am about to get outside and be active more easily.

[Azerane]

You can do it Kasei, that's certainly a worthwhile goal to be going for, pity the dress simply wasn't available in a better size, but I suppose it's one of those "this unfortunate thing happened for this good reason" kind of thing, where it's now gotten you more active. So glad to hear that you're doing so well with the non-eating of sweets etc. I have not only failed, but gotten worse in that department.

I went for a hike two days ago, I expected it to be really hard since I haven't actually walked/hiked since before I sprained my ankle in early January. But my friend and I decided to catch up and go for a walk with her dog, so we hiked 4.5km, including up the mega hill which didn't kill my legs, only took a short stop 3/4 of the way up to allow my lungs to stop burning, haha. But I'm really surprised at how well my body handled it. Given that when I started walking that hike middle-ish of last year, I could barely make it halfway up the hill before dying. So the fact that I haven't walked in months and made it 3/4 of the way up is a huge deal. Still, I'm destroying my body with chocolate, and that really needs to stop.

I have a friend coming to visit for a week at the end of next week, she eats fruit for breakfast (the nutcase), so hopefully some of her good habits will rub off on me. Reminds me that I really need to get this house tidied up... man I hate housework

[nathalie]

So ... it's been a while ... how's everyone doing on this subject?

[Azerane]

I'm buying less chocolate than I was previously, that has to count for something. Eating healthy dinner meals relatively regularly. Haven't weighed myself though :P

[nathalie]

I haven't really been doing something different.
I'm still very much an emotional eater.
Someone at work brings lots of candy and cookies every 2 weeks, but for the past 2 weeks I'm not on that floor anymore 3 days a week, so I guess that's helping that issue a lot more.
I am now a little under 82kg, and in march I was still close to 85kg, so I guess its good.

Though, I'd like to start using my Wii fit more again, and give it another try to not find comfort in food.

Going home on Friday, hoping that if I take my guitar back with me, I can use that as distraction.

[Azerane]

Does packing boxes for moving count as exercising? It sure feels like it because I get so drained afterwards I will weigh myself at some point this week before I pack the scales!

[KanuTGL]

Ugh, I haven't been doing well at all I do think about my goals a lot, but acting on them is a different matter entirely... When I'm at home I try to go for regular walks of at least 30 - 45 minutes and I was actually taking them nearly every day for a while in May/June. I believe having so much to think about at the time helped, hah; walks really helps me clear my head. But now I've been at my parents' for the summer and I've been incredibly lazy... xP Once I get back home I'm gonna pick up the walks again for sure and maybe give that "sweets only on weekends" thing a try once more. We'll see how that goes... xD

[King Simba]

Just come home from my first session at the gym. I got a month's free membership so I thought it'd be good to join and make some good use of it. Started off by doing some rowing and using the treadmills, then did the "body pump" class which basically involves a lot of weight lifting and press ups. I built up a right sweat, but that's the whole point, right? Going to do the "spinning" class tomorrow, which involves exercise bikes. I'm aching all over now though, so even typing this message is painful for me.