The Little Engine That's Still Trying

Today marks the beginning of week 8 of the Weight-loss Challenge. There's good news and bad news, but definitely more good than bad. The bad news is that yesterday I did not go to the kickboxing class I was so excited about. I thought that I was going to be alone on Fathers' Day, but my husband finished his commitments early and was home all day with me. I couldn't resist having a leisurely Sunday snuggle with my hubby instead of going boxing at 10am. I also couldn't resist my pillow and the air conditioning. Apparently I hadn't thought the Sunday morning exercise thing through too clearly. That's the bad news. The good news is everything else!

I had a great weekend. I spent Saturday downtown with my mom and, even though she was still critical of my temporarily blond hair, she kept telling me how much of a difference she notices in my body. She said that my hips are getting smaller and smaller, which is great, because that's where most of my fat lives. Sunday I got to be showered with compliments again (ah-such a life), this time by my husband. We were hugging and he kept running his hands up and down my sides, saying how small my waist is getting and that I'm getting my nice curves back. I weigh more than I did a year or two ago, but I'm getting excited about my figure again, even in the 190s. Strength training makes such a difference. I found some measurements from 2 years ago and although I was 20 pounds lighter, my arms were an inch bigger and my thighs were two inches bigger. (My waist was smaller, but I'm working on that now.)

The fact that I still managed to lose weight last week despite falling off the exercise wagon was great, but I don't want to push my luck. Accordingly, I went to my workout this morning. My regular trainer is on vacation this week, so we have a substitute. She's a girl close to my age who teaches a lot of the Tuesday/Thursday groups. I've mentioned here before that I am very attached to my workout group members and I don't really like working out with other groups. Apparently the same thing applies to trainers. This girl is very nice, but she's also very petite and perky, which is not the best thing for me at 8am on a Monday morning. I'm not looking for a drill sergeant, but every time she chirped, "You're doing great! Way to go!" all I could hear in my head was "Shut up. Shut up. Please shut up!" It's not her fault, I am just the epitome of not being a morning person. Ask my mom, aka "Suzy Sunshine." Chipperness in the morning makes me want to throw things. Jeff, please come back from vacation soon!

More good news: the powers that be have decided to extend the weight loss program for an additional 12 weeks for the top 50 participants. I think I'm around number 25, so it looks like I'll be getting another three months of training. The second round will be ending in mid-October. That will be great because I'll have guidance/hand-holding/training through the season change. Hopefully after a total of 24 weeks of training I will have such good habits that I won't succumb to the temptation to start eating and sleeping more in the Fall. If I continue losing my average of 1.5 pounds per week, I could lose another 24 pounds by then. That would put me in the low 170s which has been my average weight since 1993. Ideally I'd lose more than that, but with these smaller thighs I've been building, I'm sure 170 will look much better than I remember.

That's all folks. I have Ceramics tonight. Hopefully I will get out before 11pm, unlike last week. In case I haven't mentioned it, Accounting is much more fun than Ceramics.