Day by day, soon the change will come.

I have wanted to write this post since Monday, but yesterday was a bitter IF day for me and I just couldn’t get the tone right. Through two virtual strangers, I had the rough realization that sometimes you can do everything right and use the biggest, baddest guns that exist to fight your battles and still lose. I have to believe we will eventually win or I will go crazy, so seeing things turn out like they did for these two was a bit of a challenge to that faith.

Oddly, a small bit of restoration in this faith came from the most unlikely of sources: the Duggars. An odd choice for an infertile, 19 Kids and Counting has long been one of my guilty pleasures. TLC re-aired the episode of the loss of their 20th child before the season premiere and something about hearing Michelle Duggar say “the Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away” really struck me. I am not at all what you would call uber-religious. I have a rough time with some of the doctrines of the Christian faith and consider myself more spiritual than anything…but something about the teary voice of a mother immediately grieving such a loss gave me contemplative pause. I feel slightly ridiculous even writing this, but it also kind of seemed like something worth sharing; so there it is.

Anyway, I digress, so….Monday. After work on Monday I headed to the gym for the first “real” run in a long time, probably 3-4 months. Thinking I might need some help regaining my running fitness I started on Week 3, Day 1 of Couch to 5k. This was a decent place to start as it’s not killing me to do it but it’s also not a cake walk. Three quarters of the way through my run Avicii’s Silhouettes came on. I initially kind of wavered on even putting it on the playlist. It’s an electronic song, so it’s got a decent beat but it’s not your traditional meathead, eff yeah! running playlist fare. Surprisingly, it turns out it was just what I needed. The lyrics are absolutely perfect for someone on any kind of journey, but seemed especially fitting for me in both the weight loss and after yesterday, infertility arenas. I need to remember this when I am burnt out on calorie counting or feeling too lazy for the gym or having a rough day. Change will come, I just have to help it happen.

Press play, fast forward
Non stop we have the beaten path before us
It was all there, in plain sight
Come on people, we have all seen the sunshine
We will never get back to
To the old school
To the old grounds, it’s all about the new found
We are the newborn, the one who wanna bounce
(We are the future and were here to stay)

We’ve come a long way since that day
And we will never look back, at the faded silhouette
[3x]

We’ve come a long way since that day
And when you never look back
At the faded silhouette
x 2

(never look [2x])
Yeah it faded to you

Straight ahead on the pathway before us
Day by day, soon the change will come
Don’t you know we took big step forward
Just either way
We’re gonna pull the trigger
And we’re gonna give up to
To the old school
To the old grounds
Its’ all about the new found
We are the new born
The world knows all about us

We’ve come a long way since that day
And we will never look back, at the faded silhouette
[3x]

We’ve come a long way since that day
And we will never look back
(never look [2x])

Weighing In

I have decided to make Monday the accountability day for weight loss for no real reason other than I posted about losing weight last Monday. 🙂

The details:

• Weight loss goal #1 – 25 lbs lost (goal set 8/13)
• Progress to date: 2 lbs lost
• Pounds to go: 23
• Overall weight loss goal: 50lbs
• Pounds to go: 48

This week was so-so on the food front and abysmal on the workout front. I did very well with breakfast, lunch and most dinners Mon-Fri. The wheels came off sightly during the weekend. Even so, I was mindful of not absolutely letting go…I made better choices but when tequila/sangria are involved, the pretense of really sticking to that 500 cal or less goal fades away. I did not hit the gym once. I knew at the beginning of the week that this was likely just due to the sheer volume of plans I had made for myself. I was not home until after 9pm Mon-Fri either due to social or work related plans, which is totally an excuse but one I can deal with. Since this first week was mainly about getting myself used to eating smaller meals I am allowing myself to be okay with this but it can not happen two weeks in a row.

All of that being said the goals for this week are pretty simple:

• Stick to a calorie intake of 1200-1300 on days when I do not workout, adjust for calories burned during workouts on days that I do.
• Get in some form of workout at least four times this week.
• Dinner out limited to three times max this week.

Before I fell apart diet/weight loss/exercise-wise earlier this year I was running 3-4miles at least twice a week. I want to get that back so I have decided to go back to the basics and re-start Couch to 5k. Depending upon how it goes the first week I will likely modify the plan to increase running times more quickly. We are having uncharacteristically “cooler” August weather in Texas this week, as in 90 degree highs instead of 105, so I plan to take the runs outside. Randall is joining my gym this week and he will be starting his workouts as well, so it should be a good week in the Ford House.