I may be just feeling down this morning. Pup is sick, lack of sleep, sore all over, stressed out from work. But as I reflect on when I started this journey back in October of last year (with a 3 day a week bootcamp) and look at the scale this morning, I can’t help but feel disgusted.

I struggled this morning on whether I should have gone on my morning jog, thinking that eh, it’s not really going to make a difference. I lost an inch or two over all, some half points on hips, waist and thighs. The scales haven’t given me glowing praise over weight lost (6 lbs for 6 months of work). And while it’s nice to be able to wear those “loose” size 6 jeans, some days it feels like I’m trapped in a girdle and can’t breathe or walk right

Within those little achievements lie the truths we hide from ourselves.

“The scale doesn’t lie.” Sure, it can be miscalibrated, but in the end, that’s my weight on the dial or meter, and the number tells me how hard I’ve worked or effort I’ve put in. Which is to say, very little. I’d be seeing better improvement if I would only control my portion sizes!

“A few inches here and there.” Ok, it’s really time to just cut out the unhealthy fats and sugars. Time to move up a band color and push my strength training to the next level. And hey, why not do a few pushups and crunches in the evening to quiet down those hunger pangs?

“Loose size 6 jeans?” Am I kidding myself. There’s a pair of “real” size 6 jeans hanging in the closet that I kill myself just trying to walk around in. Put that on and any illusions I have are gone. Seriously, I need to put 110% into this.

For a 5’2″ 40-yr-old gal like me, is 120lbs even achievable? Am I compromising too much if I went with 125, 130 or 135?

Time to break out the motivational quotes…

 “Our doubts are traitors, and make us lose the good we oft might win, by fearing to attempt.” – William Shakespeare

 “We learn wisdom from failure much more than success. We often discover what we will do, by finding out what we will not do.” -Samuel Smiles

 “Our greatest glory consist not in never falling, but in rising every time we fall.” -Oliver Goldsmith

  “It is the want of diligence, rather than the want of means, that causes most failures.” -Alfred Mercier

 “Every ceiling, when reached, becomes a floor, upon which one walks as a matter of course and prescriptive right.” -Aldous Huxley

 “The virtue lies in the struggle, not in the prize.” -Richard Monckton Milnes

 “It is not enough to take steps which may some day lead to a goal; each step must be itself a goal and a step likewise.” -Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

 “Who aims at excellence will be above mediocrity; who aims at mediocrity will be far short of it.” -Burmese Saying

 “Some men give up their designs when they have almost reached the goal; while others, on the contrary, obtain a victory by exerting, at the last moment, more vigorous efforts than before.” -Polybius

 “In everything the ends well defined are the secret of durable success.” -Victor Cousins

 “When you come to the end of your rope, tie a knot and hang on.” -Franklin D. Roosevelt

 “Life is not about how fast you run or how high you climb but how well you bounce.” -Vivian Komori

 “There is no victory at bargain basement prices.” -Dwight Eisenhower

 “Don’t let the fear of the time it will take to accomplish something stand in the way of your doing it.  The time will pass anyway; we might just as well put that passing time to the best possible use.” -Earl Nightingale

 “Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.” – Winston Churchill

I’m sure there are plenty more I can add to this…but these will have to do for now. 

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Welcome to week 11 of my Peak Body Transformation subscription. I’m now working out 5:15a to 6:00a, an hour earlier than my previous session. Technically it’s supposed to be an alumni class, but we still have several newbies enrolled in this class.

Ever since the time change, it’s been dark going to and from class. And unfortunately, that’s also deterred me from my morning jogs and dog walks. This of course puts a time crunch on me, making me late for work. I was hoping to reverse this 10-wk trend, but looks like I need a hard reboot to get my schedule aligned correctly. Hope to get this all worked out soon; I dislike exercising after work and I can already tell the mosquitoes will be populous this year.

My scale broke this morning. It finally had enough of my too-frequent weigh ins and croaked. This prompted an early morning trip to Walmart to pick up a new scale. I took home a Healthometer which is a body fat meter and scale. It also calculates BMI, hydration level, and daily caloric intake and stores measurements for up to 4 user profiles. Lastly, it allows users to set a goal weight and calculates in weeks how long it will take to reach. (FYI, it told me that to reach my goal weight of 130lbs, it would take 18 weeks at roughly 1600 DCI.)

Since I had long suspected that my previous Sharper Image digital scale was inaccurate, I was glad to see that this new Healthometer was closer in measurement to the scale at the gym and at the doctor’s office. It read my body fat % consistent with the Omron body fat meter used by my gym. Though I’m sad to see that I am once again over 145 (and once heavier than I thought I was), at least I will be more comfortable knowing my true weight from now on. Now how long will this scale last?

So my little MFP ticker will need some recalibration. Goodbye, 144; hello, 147 (again).

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This is the last cardio day for my 10 week (6 days a week) stint at Peak Body Transformation. Tomorrow, I go in and take measurements and tests to see exactly where I go from here.

Actually, I went ahead and signed up for another 3 month stint at $74 a month so that should take me all the way to May, in time for beach weather!  

I have definitely seen some improvement in my overall strength and endurance, and the waistline has definitely trimmed down an inch perhaps. We’ll see what the tape says tomorrow. I’ve been wearing size 6 jeans for the last couple of weeks, and it doesn’t chafe or constrict like it used to when the muffin top was my bane. Lucky me! 

Lately, I’m been staring at 143-144 lbs on the scale. I think that road trip to East Texas tipped me out of the 145 doldrums and now here I am. Is a 142 somewhere in my near future? I’ve been cutting out the morning jogs recently, drinking coffee in the morning, and feeding the food monster at dinner time (this part isn’t new). So I suspect I’ll be frozen in this range for another 2 weeks unless I force the issue somehow. 

Silly me, I’ve got those Groupons to a Brazilian steakhouse and Korean BBQ that I still have to consume. Discipline is such a harsh master. And Yelp asked me to be an Elite again this year. Hmmm….

Those ab twists are still killer, and I’d like to find some method to end that lower back pain. I just need to get back on the wagon and do some evening strength exercises and leave out the cardio so I can reasonably achieve some restful sleep. I’d love to do the Bodyrock thing some more, but I might just need to reserve that for Sundays.

So here’s to 10 weeks down (about 8 lbs gone) and another 12 weeks to go. I’d love to head out to the Texas beaches this summer and finally wear that bikini that’s been hanging in my closet for a couple years…so let’s see where ambition takes me. 

(PS I’m thinking about getting a weight bench.) 

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I have a dilemma. Going on 9 weeks, I’ve been working out 6 days a week at Peak Body Transformation. I’m not taking home the $1000 grand prize, but I have seen some changes. I just don’t know if it was worth the $139 Groupon price I paid. I guess I was expecting to get at least below 140 lbs by now…but I discovered that I don’t have the food discipline to get there fast enough.

Ok so what do I do after the 10 weeks is over? Do I sign up for another 10 week stint at PBT at what I assume is 2x the initial price I paid? Will it be worth it? The one great thing that I had at PBT was that I was “compelled” to attend class every single day, making every penny count. I’m still dragging my arse out of bed every morning and making the short drive to the gym. I’m worried if I lose this schedule, I’ll fall off the wagon and lose any gains I’ve made so far. 

I’d love to try a regular gym, but I don’t know that I have the nerve to go there by myself and do the work. I think I’m too much of a lemming to find the individual incentive to work out on my own. I would rather be told what to do than come up with personal routines–and I’m sure my apprehension stems from my insecurity about working out solo. There’s something strangely competitive about working out as a group, even though the group doesn’t even know you’re there.

I kinda like the internet workouts like Bodyrock.tv, but I’m finding it difficult to squeeze it into my current schedule right now. My home space isn’t really suited for hosting the exercises I’ve seen in there–too cramped, too uncomfortable.

I’m not keen on spending some crazy $$$ on another 10 weeks of PBT…I wonder if there are any other alternatives out there. 

The warm days of spring loom ahead; I’m already dreading outdoor exercises for fear of raging allergies and stinging pests–I hate mosquitoes! I also prefer to breathe in cold air instead of hot, a good argument for moving to a northern climate. I’m already missing the cool winter workouts I’ve been enjoying…hot weather is just ahead.

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Today I’ve completed 8 weeks of Peak Body Transformation with 2 more weeks to go. Looking back over the past 2 months I’m somewhat disappointed that my overall progress has been snail-slow. While I admit some (half) inches have been lost on this journey, the scales haven’t moved terribly much…I guess I was expecting earth-shattering results. After all, I’ve been working out consistently 6-7 days a week and to be rewarded with a 6 lb deficit…well it’s anti-climactic.

To be sure, I’ve observed very noticeable gains in fitness. Holding a plank as long as a minute or two was something I would never have accomplished back in October when I started my very first bootcamp. I was also slacking off during that first bootcamp–going at my own pace, so to speak–but nowadays I’m able to reasonably keep up with sustained exercise over 45-50 minutes long. 

I’m dragging my arse out of bed every morning at 5:30am…something I would NEVER have done before my journey to fitness. Back in those days, I’d hit snooze on the alarm and sleep until I was about 30-60 mins late to work. (Of  course, I’m late 1-2 hours to work nowadays, but at least I have a more compelling reason than just oversleeping.)

Bands training at PBT has progressed to green, though I’m still using the newbie yellow bands now and then when some stubborn muscle groups are getting a workout. Today, I was informed that we should be trying those red bands for squats, but with the squat-and-lunge heavy workout, I was just glad I could keep near-perfect form on those green bands.

Just this week we’ve been doing some crazy ab twists and bicycle crunches in class that have caused me some dire back pain…I thought these things were supposed to exercise my abs, but for whatever reason my lower back was screaming in pain. Normally, I can do regular ab crunches without setting off any alarms, but lately, the lower back has been bothering me…to the point that it aches when I sleep at night. Trainer indicated it may take another 3 months before those muscles stop complaining.

But I’m still getting that morning jog in there…well, I call it interval jogging. After the first 2-3 minutes, I try to sustain a heart rate in the 150s. I wish I could push my limits and sustain the 160s, but at that point, I’m wheezing and my limbs stop cooperating with me. Jog, walk, jog, walk…I try jogging to my next reasonable landmark whenever I can, even going as far as downloading an interval timer app to my phone. One of these days I’ll jog 10-15 minutes non-stop. But I see that in the far future. I was never a big runner to begin with.

So now we come to the topic that I have to be a little grumpy about: diet. Lately, I’ve been getting annoyed reading about folks who are complaining they can’t make their calorie requirement, that they’re finding it challenging just to get to 1200. Really? I just canNOT empathize with these people. I’m still a foodie at heart, and I don’t see myself losing interest in food to the point of losing all sense of taste and flavor. So I don’t get it–I don’t get how these peeps can rant about not being able to eat. Are they too busy to make time for food? Are they just eating some terrible food? Are they on drugs? Are they sick, too stressed? Have they lost their marbles?

I don’t think I’ll ever ditch my hearty appetite for good food. Which is probably why this journey will be a long one. 

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