Daily Shape - No excuses

At my 6 week post-partum appointment, I had lost 32 of the 40 lbs that I gained during pregnancy.  I figure 8 of that was baby, another 10 comprised of various fluids, and the rest a nice side effect to breast feeding. While on leave, I was thinking that I would take the little one on walks every day, or do exercise videos while he was napping.  Ha!  Not so much.  I did get in some solid walks with another mommy friend here and there, but I would hardly say that my exercise was consistent.  I even suspended my gym membership because there was no point trying to figure out when I may be able to go and they won't take Owen at the gym kids club until he's 6 months.

Cuisaid Bath Scale (courtesy of Amazon.com)
It's pretty fancy looking!

Now, nearly 5 months after giving birth, I think this is the longest that I have gone without consistently working out for years.  Even while I was pregnant, I was in the pool three times and a week and doing pilates once a week, right up until a few days before I went into labor.  Seeing as I was so good for so long, I've somewhat given myself a pass, but it is time to get back on the workout horse (so to speak).  Granted, I'm still nursing the baby, which burns a ton of calories and allows me to pig out all day without much concern.  In fact, eating too little will hinder my milk production and we don't want that.  Eventually, he will wean and I will find myself actually having to pay attention to what I eat.  Until then, caution is thrown to the wind - feed me, I'm hungry. 

Next up is to get back into consistent exercise.  I'm lucky that I still have a lot of the strength retained from prior to pregnancy so have a good foundation.  I've enrolled in mommy and me yoga, which I'm enjoying a lot more than I thought I would.  I used to find yoga horrifyingly boring, but I don't know if it can be boring when you are trying to simultaneously entertain a baby, or when another baby who happens to have learned to crawl comes racing across the room and wraps themselves around your ankle.  Holding Warrior II pose with a rattle in one hand to keep baby's attention, Chair pose with a wriggling 14lb (or so) weight in your arms, or Downward-Facing Dog while blowing raspberries at the little face below yours, is a multi-tasking challenge all of it's own.  In fact, I think it deserves bonus yoga points.  Seeing as that's only once a week though, I plan to get up a half hour early (yikes) to do Jillian Michael's 30 Day Shred on weekday mornings.  As much as I kind of want to punch that woman in the face for being annoying, it's a 30 minute workout that I can do at home which seems to get great reviews.  Let's see how that goes.  

My new bathroom scale arrived this week.  I never would have thought I'd be excited about the arrival of a scale that would sit in the bathroom and taunt me on a daily basis, but I am!  As of yesterday morning, I have officially lost 47lbs.  That's 7lbs past my pre-pregnancy weight and a great start to keep the motivation going.

I'm telling you all this because it's now out in the open and, having told the world, that makes me accountable.  Going to be doing all my measurements and whatnot this weekend so I can get a fresh start next week.  Watch this space!

Daily Shape - Measuring up!

Almost exactly one year ago, I was inspired to embark upon a journey to get my ass in shape.  I'd paid no attention to my doctor's warning that 28 is the magic age upon which many women suddenly realize their body is changing, adopting a slower metabolism and generally holding onto the bits (read fat) that is totally unwanted.  I've always had curves (mostly boobs, very little butt); however, I ended up being the heaviest I've ever been.  So, on my 30 birthday last year, I signed up at a new gym, signed up for personal training, and started actually going to the gym 4 times a week.  Impressive right?!

Well, one year on, I'm 20 lbs lighter, a pant size smaller, and I've shed about 6% body fat.  I'm back to the weight and size I was about 5-7 years ago.  This is half way to my final goal.  Don't get me wrong, I'm really proud of what I've accomplished so far but husband (who is the master of making one acknowledge unwanted truths) spent a good portion of last night getting me to admit to myself that it's just not been happening fast enough.  I'm trying not to resent him completely for the fact that he can lose 20 lbs in a third of the time that I can while sitting on the couch - stupid male metabolisms.  I've never been one to lose weight quickly and would probably be classified as an endomorph body type.  Yes, that's the one that likes to hang on to fat (yay me!)  I've reset my goals and my new plan is to lose the other 20 lbs that I would like to get rid of over the next 4 months.

How do I plan on doing this?  I'm still formulating my master plan but here's what I've come up with so far.

- Start logging my daily calorie intake.  I was doing this for a couple of months when I first started on this journey last year.  I burn approximately 2,300 calories daily just being alive, so eating no more than 2,000 calories a day will keep me on track.  If you're interested in doing this, I suggest a free membership over at fitday.com.  It's a super easy way to keep a food journal, track your weight goals, calorie intake and general activity levels.  Plus there are cool looking pie charts.  The example here is what I've eaten so far today. 

- Come up with a workout master plan!  I'm a member with LA Fitness and see a personal trainer at that gym once a week.  I went online and looked at the classes (free to members) available at each of the 3 locations close to me.  I now have a little class calendar printed with all of the classes that would fit my schedule on it.  Tonight I think I'll be checking out the latin dance class.  I'll also be continuing to swim once or twice a week - which has been great for exercise and muscle tone, but not necessarily great for weight loss.  I will definitely be attending the Aqua Aerobics classes more frequently too.  It's not just for elderly people you know!

- Food is going to be a fun one.  For those of you that have been reading for a little bit, I love food.  I don't have an unhealthy relationship with it, but it's tasty and I enjoy that.  Husband and I very rarely eat pre-processed foods, which means we've got a lot more control over what goes in it, and we cut down on a lot of unnecessary sodium and high-fructose corn syrup.  Based on my body type though, I need to eat a lower-carb diet and tweak my evening meals to accommodate that.  So, today I looked up some healthy recipes that we'll be trying to hopefully jump start (shake up, freak out) my metabolism.

As I walked the mile and a half round trip to the bank on my lunch break today, in the blazing sun without my sunglasses (because I'm an idiot), I could already feel a sense of accomplishment.  I could also feel an increased concern for returning to the office with sweat stains, but that's a discussion for another time.  Either way, I'm in it for the long haul now, and I'm bringing you along for the ride!