I don't know why I'm so bad at this...

I'm an updating failure lately.

I got down to -48lbs... then we went to Walla Walla and ate copious amounts of yummy food... now I'm -46lbs. lol Oh well. The strawberry shake was totally worth it at this point.

I think I just don't update because I don't have anything interesting to say. Just working, counting my calories, and taking care of Lucy. *shrug* I've also been in this weird cleaning mood lately. This is really abnormal for me.

Well, it's official...

188.8! I've been that weight for a couple days now so I can tell people! I can't record a weight until the end of the week because it messes up my program, but yay! I also squeezed into my size 14 jeans. They were inappropriately tight, but dangit! they buttoned and zipped! I couldn't sit or eat in them, but like Kim said, "You burn more calories standing up?" hehe!! I won't actually wear them, I was just playing with clothes.

Cute baby pic of the day:


Aww!

Aaaand I'm back!

HARRO!

I got back from almost 2 weeks in southeast Idaho visiting my sister, brother in law, and NEPHEW! Little Kyson is the cutest thing ever, and I'm not just saying that because I'm biased. Seriously. Look!


It's almost 5am and I should really go to bed. I've been fighting sleep (and intermittently napping) all night because I work tonight. I'm hoping to find out if i got the full time position or not... if not, I need to know ASAP so I can start looking for another part time job. Being an adult with financial responsibilities sucks.

No new interesting weight loss news to report. I broke 190 but I don't have an accurate weight for the 2 weeks I was gone. I might know more this evening when I wake up and can get an empty, naked weight on my own scale. What? Don't lie. You weigh naked on an empty stomach after peeing/pooping on a daily basis. I need to be full time or get another job to help pay for training sessions I want. I need muscle!

Ok... I promise to update more now that I'm home!

Um, hello JUNIOR section!

HOLY MOLY! Brian and I were shopping at Sears (I agreed to go look at TVs, then got sidetracked by dresses...)when I tried on this adorable Land's End dress. It was super cute! However... it was too big. I was like ugh, it has to be altered and blah. I finally gave in and tried on the smaller size after telling Brian "ok fine. I'll try the 14. Worst case scenerio it's too small and I'll be depressed." ... a few minutes later (after I finally found the stupid zipper) "YOU'VE GOT TO BE KIDDING ME! IT FITS!" I was so shocked! ANd it was probably the first time Brian has seen me in a non-bridesmaid dress since our wedding. It was cute, but it was more expensive than I wanted to spend on a dress that (hopefully) won't fit for long, so I put it back.

Fast foward to today...

This new found dress size had me kiiiind of excited and wanting a dress. I wandered around the mall trying on different dresses... and I found an adorable sheath dress with a wide black belt at Maurices! Bonus: It's a LOT less expensive than the Land's End dress and it's a size... gasp... 13/14!!!!



I had to cut off my head because it was funny looking and my feet because my mismatched white socks really took away from the dress. haha

I want this dress and some black heels. I think Stacy and Clinton would approve, don't you? hehe

I wonder if I'll be able to walk tomorrow...

Tonight was my first real 50 minute strength training session at the gym. Wow. WOWOWOW. It's funny how you never realize how terribly weak you are. I can rock out on a cardio machine for an hour and survive... but 50 minutes of squat rows, lunges, step up/bicep curl, squat to press, super man, planks, hamstring curls... Really, she didn't push me harder than I was ok with and we took a minute break here and there to get water, get my RPE down, etc. I'm super excited to keep doing this and have it get EASIER. Wait, then she'll find new stuff for me to do. AHH! I still heart her though. I want her butt.

Nutrition wise... this has been a baaad week. I had a few surplus days, ate a lot of cake, dropped my diuretic dose in half, aaand gained a pound. I'm trying not to get too down about it because I figured out the source of my binging and my body will adjust to the diuretic dose. It'll come back off, especially if I keep getting my hiney kicked...

I took a Trauma Nurse Core Course (TNCC) class at work this week. When I first found out I was taking it, I have to admit I thought it was dumb. Why do I need this? It's for ER nurses who deal with trauma! By the time they get to me, the injuries are identified (for the most part) and interventions have been started! But... I REALLY enjoyed the class. I learned a lot and even if I never work in an ER, there's a good chance I'll happen upon an accident situation at some point in my life and I feel better prepared for that. It also kind of changes the way I approach my patients, not just trauma patients. The skills are great to have, I didn't pay for it, and I got paid to go! And I passed. =) Speaking of random certifications... I have to renew my chemo provider cert soon and I'm not sure if I want to. On the one hand, I like having it and I don't REALLY want to take the 2 day class again if I get back into oncology. On the other hand, I don't use it anymore. I'm rusty! And if I keep it... there's a good chance I'll randomly get called into work to give chemo. Ugh. Decisions decisions.

Update on the makeup drama: I LOOOOOVED Youngblood! I went to the mall last weekend after church and told the super nice girl at Beauty Works my plight with makeup. She spent time going over the line, color matching me, putting foundation and setting powder on my face (and teaching me how), and said "ok now wear it for the day to see how it feels, wash it off tonight and see how your face does, and if you like it come back and get it. If you don't like it, no money spent!" How nice of her! I'm going to get it eventually. I maaay have a hookup so it's not so expensive, but I will keep that detail on the down-low. =) And I feel like since she was so helpful I need to go buy SOMETHING from her, even if it's just an eyeliner or some brushes.

Anyway, wish me luck on this coming week! I'm trying for a better weight loss, more gym time, and less high calorie/carb/fat/sugary foods!

Trainer, makeup, oh my!

Wow... long time no post. My weight loss has sucked lately. I decreased my diuretic dose so it could be water, but my deficits have been low too. It's just been an off couple weeks.

I had my first appointment with the trainer at the gym. I actually really liked her. She does figure competitions, rides a Harley, and is hilarious. It makes working out with her fun. Our first session was mostly talking about goals and doing assessments. Apparently, according to my squat assessment, my IT bands are super tight. She showed me some foam rolling self massaging moves and some stretches. Today I am SUPER sore. My upper body hurts from supporting myself during the stretches, my abs hurt from stablizing my middle, and my IT bands hurt from having the crap massaged out of them. Seriously, the sides of my legs feel bruised. HURTS. SO. GOOD. Today I didn't want to go to the gym so I walked around the mall for a while. A while being 2 or 3 hours. I didn't really buy anything, but I did burn some calories!

While on my mall walk, I decided to break down and check out MAC makeup. I know so many people that absolutely love it, so I figured what the hey. Uh... I'm too pale for MAC. Seriously. She tried the lightest shade in all of their formulas and none of them were light enough. IIIII feel really caucasian today. At least I know I'm not the only one! I think I'll give YoungBlood a try. It's more expensive than most things I use, but I figure for the rare occasions I wear makeup, it'll last a while. Well, maybe if I liked the way makeup felt I'd wear it more often. Hmm..

Anyway. I'm off work for about a week, then I have two days of trauma class and then a couple days of work. They called me to work today from 3pm to 7pm, but I didn't get the message until almost 4 (when I finally woke up... don't judge). Maybe tomorrow I'll keep my phone on incase they call me. $$ is good.

It's Friday and I'm so exciting that I'm going to unload the dishwasher, do some stretches, and do some makeup research. I know you wish your lives were as eventful as mine.... Just kidding.

Goal Weight? PSH!

I don't have a weight goal. Everytime I tell someone this, they look at me like i have 2 heads. Why?! How do you not have a goal?! I have my first meeting with a trainer at my new gym next week and I'm curious to hear her response. I DO have goals, but a goal weight just isn't one of them. Let me explain...

The lowest weight I remember being was 170lbs. Obviously, I should weigh less than this at a towering 5'4". I have no idea what I look or (more importantly) FEEL like at a lower weight.

I have PCOS. Last year in 6 months off birth control and trying to conceive, I didn't ovulate at all. In order to have half a chance at getting pregnant on my own, I need to lose weight. So, my first goal is to regulate my PCOS. Decrease my insulin resistance, decrease testosterone, and maybe! ovulate on my own like a normal female. So my first goal can't be measured on a scale. Blood work is the only marker here (I have an appointment with a new OB/GYN at the end of the month and this goal will be discussed in length!).

I'm exercising and watching what I eat to be healthier. Lower my cholesterol, my diabetes risk, etc. I want to FEEL good. I want all my labwork to show a normal, healthy 25 year old!

I want to change my habits in order to teach my kids healthy habits... instead of the fabulously destructive habits I was taught growing up by my mom. Yes, I love her, but her habits were crash dieting (and putting me on crash diets at 7), diet pills, etc. Where did these get her? Diabetes, high blood pressure, hyperlipidemia, etc etc etc. I want to be able to teach my kids that food is a fuel, not a treat or a sin... and that exercise is fun! Not a terrible embarassing chore they make you do in PE.

Also... I want to reduce my risk of injury at work. Nurses have a great risk of back injury at work and I really don't want that. If I'm stronger, leaner, and in general better condition, I'm less likely to have a debilitating injury. In better shape also equals better endurance which equals longer compression time during CPR.

At this point, I'm sure you're asking yourself "then why do you even weigh yourself?" Because when I get to my goal feeling, I want to know what weight that is. THAT will be my idea goal weight and the weight I want to maintain. Also, weight loss is the path to my goals, so it just goes hand in hand. Seeing that I'm 1 or 2 lbs closer in any given week keeps me going and let's me know that I'll get there. Wherever there is.

Anyway, that is my rant about my lack of goal weight. I have many goals but a weight isn't one of them. I'll let you know when I reach my goal feeling and what I happen to weigh at that point.

Sometimes, it's just good to hear.

I had my 3 month evaluation this morning (yeah, i've worked there for almost 6. We're on the ball). Apparently I don't suck as much as I thought. I've had major confidence issues in this job... more than any other job I've had. But this morning I found out that several of the charge nurses I've worked with said they feel I'm doing very well and I ask really good questions. They also said they feel more comfortable giving me sicker (not THE sickest) patients than some people who have been there longer. She really didn't have anything negative to say except my 2 sick calls. It just felt good to hear that from someone in charge.

I'm still losing weight, but this week has been kind of a funk. I haven't worked out at all. I'm still having deficits every day so I shouldn't GAIN weight, but I'm not sure my loss will be that great. I measured Friday though and I AM losing inches. My size smaller jeans look wonderful, btw. =)

Back to work... I think I need another part time job. We've been really low on patients for about a month now and I've gotten asked to be on call or stay home pretty much everytime I'm scheduled to work. There's also been twice where I've had a mandatory low census, meaning I HAVE to stay home even if I don't want to. We rotate that and I can only have 5 in a year, but I've already had 2 in like 2 weeks. Really, if I could afford to work less I would. But at 24hrs a week, when you call me off for a shift it's half of my week! A quarter of my paycheck! I'm glad Brian is back to work and I'm sure we can "get by" even with me getting called off, but we want to GET AHEAD, not just GET BY. I'm going to see about cross training in a different department so I have the option of more hours, but I'm also considering another part time job. hmm...

Anyway. I hope we have more nice days on my days off. I have an appointment to check out a gym on Thursday and I want to take Lucy for a walk at some point. I have all these great aspirations for my days off but I always just end up sleeping during the day then it's dark. I'm going to try to switch my sleep around sooner during this stretch off so maybe I can enjoy my days off!!!

Peace out, blog friends.

Puppies make me cry.

The Daily Puppy just made me cry. It was a little dark red Golden Retriever puppy named... Molly. She looked JUST like my old Molly!!! =(

The Canadian women's figure skater keeps making me cry too.

I think I'm just super tired. AAAAND I'm off for another night of work. I'm curious to see what my weight loss in the next few days ends up being. I've only been eating around 1400 calories and burning close to 3000. On days I work I have a hard time getting all my calories and I burn a lot more than my days off, even when I work out. We shall see... I entered a weight today so whatever I lose I don't get to log yet, but that's ok. Tomorrow I'll measure. Stay tuned! =)

Oh for the love...

You know you're really tired when you put brown sugar in the bowl prepared for oatmeal... then promptly pour milk into the bowl instead of the empty cup next to it.

and I have to tell you how many times I had to fix "bowl" because I typed "bowel" instead. I should've just left it and made you think I was pouring milk into the bowel. mwahaha

On that note, after my Zyrtec and melatonin, I'm going to bed. Ugh. Night shift is poopy.

There's nothing I can put here that will describe the amount of random I'm about to spew...

Prepare yourself for a very random blog.

I'm down to 193.2 now! Woot woot! That's 10lbs lost since starting my Bodybugg adventure and about 40lbs lost in the last year. I'm also down a size (YAY for new jeans that fit!). I've really been wanting sugar though. Cadbury Creme Eggs seem to be my empty carb of choice. I haven't had a lot of sugar in a while and I haven't really missed it, but the last few days I've wanted something sweet. Chocolate Cheerios are my new find and they completely rock my world right now. I've been putting away clothes too... losing weight has made me find a whole new wardrobe. When I was bigger, I didn't buy many clothes because I didn't want to wear anything other than jeans and a sweatshirt. Now, I have this entire closet of clothes and most of them fit! Now, I just have to remember they're there and actually wear them... Oh! And according to the scale that does the body fat % (yes, I know it's likely not accurate, but I can still use it as a guide to know if it's going down). I'm down almost a full %! Woohoo! I feel like I've made lots of strides this week in the weight loss category... especially jumped some mental hurdles (which are certainly the hardest). Another measure that something is going down? My wedding ring is super loose! It's not dangerously loose yet, so I'm not rushing to get it sized. Probably in another month or so it will be time.

We went to church on Sunday. We haven't been to church in a long time and I think it was something I was craving. I met a wonderful woman on the BodyBugg facebook page who happens to live in my area. Her husband is a youth pastor at the church we went to and they invited us to check it out. It's an Assembly of God which is similar to the Foursquare churches that I grew up in. I really liked it. I feel renewed and closer to God which is something I've needed for a while. I hope we can keep going! I think I met a new friend as well. We're close in age, both on a weight loss journey, and are kinda close in weight (she weighs a little less than I do and she certainly works out more than I do!). Anyway, I feel like we clicked and she's someone I could end up being good friends with. She's also great motivation!

I go back to work tonight (Wednesday). After my last 4 days "on" where I was actually on call, I haven't been at work in a really long time it feels like. I have 3 on and a couple off. Next month I'm scheduled to take the Trauma Nurse course which will be super interesting. I'm still not sure I want to stay in this area of nursing but it's alright for now. I keep leaning towards labor and delivery though, which is weird. Oh well... I guess we'll see where I end up!

It's 1:45 AM and I think I'm ready for a short nap. I got up around 4:30pm so it's about that time. =) My schedule is so screwed up. Someday I might be normal again, but not as long as I'm working in a hospital!

Old habits die hard...

Let me preface this by saying that until now, I've tried to keep temptations out of my house. I haven't made cookies. I haven't made cake... simply because I knew I wasn't at a point where I could resist or just have a little bit here and there. I used to wake up from a sleep and eat something, usually something sweet. It's not good to consume 500 of your daily calories BEFORE your even awake. I was also a pretty decent binger.

Last night, my wonderful husband made brownies. The good kind. The soft, triple chocolate kind that are 180 calories each (and you can't eat only one). Ok. Fine. No big deal Cindy. You can handle this! You are stronger than the brownies!

Unless you're half asleep!...

That's right. Last night we worked out around midnight. I had a protein shake, took a shower, had some oatmeal. I went to bed around 3:30-4am. I woke up at 7:30 am... got up to get a drink of water... and there they were. Staring at me on the stove. The brownies. I swear, when you're not fully awake, they smell more heavenly. However, before my brain could process what I was about to do, I ate. 3 of them. Do I remember what they tasted like? Of course not. Do I fully remember eating them? Not really. Ugh.

Apparently I'm not ready to have temptations in my house. I gave half to my sister and my husband is taking the rest with him on his road trip to our home town (I'm staying home). I will stick with the Skinny Cows and 100 calorie pudding cups.

Cindy (the brownie's bitch)

Self sabatoge...

Why do we sabatoge ourselves? I think this happens a lot when it comes to weight loss.

I worked out last night, met my burn for the day, and was feeling good. When I woke up this afternoon (ok, 5pm) and weighed myself, I was down 0.7 lbs from Friday. So what do I do tonight? Eat alfredo with pasta and chicken.. and garlic cheese bread. Then I just felt crappy so I laid down (since I'm on call again), which means my burn for yesterday is very little. My little BodyBugg graph is essentially flat. GRRR.

Puppy of the Day...

I'd just like to say... who else loves my puppy of the day box down in the corner?! I love looking at the cute random puppies every day! I have my OWN cute (and very random) puppy, but somewhere along the line she grew up. The great thing about dogs (vs kids) is that no matter how old dogs get, they still need you. That and the whole not talking back thing. Don't get me wrong, I want to have kids some day, but right now I think my dog is the best kid in the world. =)

This is Lucy and her cow. She loves her cow so much she chewed off his ears, horns, and tail.

Call.

I ended up getting called in at 0330 and I felt like crap. It wasn't bad though. I burned 1100 calories in 4 hours running my tail off trying to keep someone alive. I had a lot of help from my co workers (great crew on this weekend, btw) and I didn't feel freaked out and overwhelmed like I have in the past. Progress? I suppose. My charge was like "I LOVE these patients and I can't wait until you do too!" It felt good that she has enough confidence in me that someday I WILL like those patients.

It's 0910 and I've taken Benadryl 50mg and Melatonin 3mg. I will be taking Sudafed 60mg as well. aaaand goodnight. =) I did this combo yesterday and I was able to get 4 solid hours of sleep breathing through my nose. It was SWEET!

Cold cold go away!

I've been sick since Wednesday and I'm sick of this already. It's just that annoying head cold, but I spend most of my day unable to breathe without sounding like Darth Vader (thanks husband) and my sinuses are killing me. I'm supposed to work my 4 days on (12hr shifts) this weekend but they called to put me on call tonight. Now let's all pray I don't get called in! I don't mind being on call, but then the idea of "what will they call me in for?!" pops into my head. Will I get a trauma? A cardiac arrest? A young OD? Or something easier like a diabetic ketoacidosis or a vented something or another? It's the fear of the unknown.

In other news, I'm on this weight loss journey and so far it's been good. I've revamped the eating habits (I can't eat fatty or super processed things anymore without getting ill) and I've been steadily losing. We just started doing measurements this week too, so hopefully I'll see some losses there as well. This week I only lost 0.8 lbs. My goal was 1.5lbs so the BodyBugg program told me I didn't meet my goals. My over all goal is ahead of progress though. I blame being sick. I spent several days VERY sedentary and eating high sodium things like soup. My burn was only like 1900 calories so my deficit was low. Back on track next week!

Goals for next week:
Workout more than twice.
Increase the protein.
Decrease the carbs.
Get those stupid Skinny Cow things out of my house so I stop eating them several times a day!
Did I mention workout more than twice? Because I really need to do that.

Alright, I'm going to go throw away my pile of Kleenexes and love my dog.

Cindy

And it begins...

I've resisted starting a blog for some time now. Mostly because I don't think I'm interesting enough and no one will care about my day to day ramblings. However, I need a place to put these ramblings because the little corner of my head is full. I'm really bad about coming up with clever things if nothing interesting has happened, so you've been warned.

Cindy