Sunday Exercise Roundup

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It seems that the only really interesting thing I’ve been doing lately is exercising. 🙂 Hubby and I have been exercising almost every day for the past five weeks. Here was the run down for last week:

Sunday
Week 5, Day 1 of the One Hundred Push ups program. I can’t do full push ups, so I’ve been doing girls push ups for this program.
Running – Week 1, Day 1 of the Couch to 5K program. Not too difficult, but feeling it. First time running in awhile. I can tell I’ve trained before, but it’s still hard.

Monday
Week 5, Day 1 of the Two Hundred Sit ups program.

Tuesday
Week 5, Day 2 of the One Hundred Push ups program.
Running – Week 1, Day 2 of the Couch to 5K program.

Wednesday
Week 5, Day 2 of the Two Hundred Sit ups program. I almost died during this training day. I don’t know why it was so hard today. I barely finished the workout and I was crying during the last set.

Thursday
Week 5, Day 3 of the One Hundred Push ups program. I have to say, I was really pushing out these push ups. On my last set, I did 40 of them without stopping. I’ve never done so many in my life!
Running – Week 1, Day 3 of the Couch to 5K program.

Sabbath
Rest Day

I weighed myself on New Years – 187.2 pounds. This is my heaviest weight ever. Since New Years, I have tried to get involved in various exercise plans, portioned eating, etc. But I kept failing. My weight would go down 3 or 4 pounds and then go back up to where I started. Thankfully, I never exceeded 187.2 pounds.

For the past 6 weeks, hubby and I have been actively following the 200 sit ups and 100 push up plans. Unfortunately, that’s not enough exercise to lose weight. Last week, I decided it was time to run again. In one week, I lost 3.8 pounds. I’m praying it’s not a fluke. But as noted above, I exercised 5 days last week. I’ve been drinking lots of water, exercising, and attempting portion control. It looks like it might be paying off.

My goal is to lose 40 pounds and run a 5K without stopping for a walk break. I know I can accomplish my goals. I just need to stick with the plan. Lots of water, adequate rest, plenty of exercise, and eating fewer calories than I burn. I can do this.

For I can do everything through Christ, who gives me strength
(Philippians 4:13, NLT)

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Diet Update

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I’m having motivation issues with my dieting and exercise. My challenges are in different areas than normal, though. In the past, I would get derailed by not exercising, by eating a bunch of dessert, or not reducing portions.

This time around, I’m still watching my portions. I still measure most of my food and estimate portions on the rest of it. I’m still logging my food into Nutridiary and eating less calories than I burn every day. However, I’m not doing well at eating a vegan diet (mac&cheese – yum!). I’m allowing myself fattier meals, but the portions are much smaller than they used to be. I’ve learned what a serving size is! One serving is a lot smaller than I thought. 🙂 And I’m only eating one non-optimal meal a day or every other day, instead of all the time.

I’ve only had three days this year where I’ve allowed myself dessert! Once, it was a cupcake made like pineapple upside-down cake. The other two days, I finished a couple slices of vegan chocolate cake. That’s it! I’m avoiding all the dessert I used to eat – ice cream, candy bars, and especially ColdStone. I’m staying away from that place.

It’s my exercise that’s slipping. I was motivated to work out daily to the Jillian Michael’s 30 Day Shred DVD. I worked out for 7 sessions and then quit. I’m still exercising, but it’s no where near as intensive as the DVD. Most days, I’m walking. Hubby and I are walking to all of our errands instead of driving. I’m averaging 2 miles a day.

Is that enough? Can I still lose weight by moderating my portions, even though I’m not eating optimally? Can I still lose weight by walking instead of doing a higher cardio exercise? I guess I’ll find out when I step on the scale this Sunday.

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Today has been a fairly productive day. I’ve completed three loads of laundry and have one more in the dryer. I’ve applied for a couple freelance jobs. I caught up on all the dishes and put away most of the stuff that was on the table. And now I have bread dough rising!

I’m probably about half done getting the apartment back into pre-vacation shape. I still need to scrub both bathrooms, sweep the kitchen, and finish picking up our computer and living room areas. I can’t wait to have the apartment looking nice again. It was really clean and tidy before I left for Wyoming.

The diet/fitness goals are going as well as they can, considering it’s only the 6th of January. I’ve exercised every day except Sabbath (my one day off). I’ve also entered all of my food into nutridiary so I can analyze my calories. So far so good! I hope the scale will be friendly on Sunday and reflect some of the positive changes made this week.

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Goals: Physical

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I’m going to spend the next day or so thinking about and writing out my 2009 goals. I love new years resolutions. I love reflecting on last year’s goals and seeing how I can improve this year.

Last year’s diet/fitness goals:
• Exercise regularly. Find a form of exercise that I enjoy and stick with it long enough to reap the benefits.
• Eat a balanced diet. My diet this past year has gone from one extreme to the other. I need to find a balance and stick with it.
• Train for and run a 5k. I’ve been saying this for over a year now. This year, I’m actually going to do it.

How’d I do? Well… I was better at exercising regularly. I trained for and ran/walked three 5k’s. I still haven’t run the entire distance, but I ran about 2.5 miles of my last one (Thanksgiving day). Balanced diet? HA! I still fluctuate from one extreme to the other. Raw vegan for awhile, vegan for awhile, vegetarian for awhile… the only part that’s healthy is the raw vegan, as I can still eat pretty unhealthy on a vegan or vegetarian diet.

This year’s diet/fitness goals:
• Exercise at least 5 days a week.
• Eat a low fat, vegan diet. Achieve 80/10/10.
• Finish training for a 5k and run the entire distance. Increase race distance to 10k by the end of 2009.
• Drink my daily requirements of water!

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Work – one hour at a time

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I have a part time contract job. It’s not exactly fun, though it is interesting work. It’s kind of tedious and repetitive, and due to the nature of the work, I can’t listen to the radio! My plan of setting the timer for an hour is working really well for this project.

So far today, I’ve spent two complete hours (with a half hour break between the two) on my current project. Because it’s working so well, I’m almost done with the current assignment and should finish it up this afternoon. Then I’ll have to wait to receive my next assignment.

I exercised this morning! I’ve been lacking motivation to exercise as it’s so cold outside (for my Arizona blood, at least). Yesterday, hubby and I ran all the way to and from Blockbuster so we could return a movie (2 miles round trip). Today, I rode 8.5 miles on the exercise bike. My legs are sore!

Hubby is working a lot of hours this week as he’ll be missing four days of work for our Christmas vacation and doesn’t yet have enough vacation time to cover it all. He left early this morning and will be returning late tonight and this will probably be the norm for the next two weeks. Though I’m disappointed that I won’t be seeing him much during the week, I have to praise the Lord that we will be missing very little (if any) of his paycheck at the end of the month. God provides!

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