The Year of Action: My Health Plan for 2009

I sat down and nailed out all of the particulars. I feel good about my plan. I think it is a good lifestyle plan. My only hesitation and caution is I don't want to fall deeply into "diet mentality" and perfectionism. I'm hoping to avoid those triggers by setting realistic weight loss goals as well as only weighing myself on the first Saturday of each month.

I'm calling this year The Year of Action because last year was The Year of Inaction where I took my love of avoidance to the extreme. I'm exhausted from all that avoiding. It wears me out. At least with action or hard work, I can feel good about accomplishing something at the end of the day rather than the nonstop feeling of pressure and unease because I spent so much time avoiding.

So, here's the plan in all of its detailed glory:


The Year of Action

What is my health plan?

After months and years of indecision, I’ve decided. I’m going to follow the 6WBMO plan with my modifications. I’m going to exercise 6 times a week? (or at minimum 4 times a week) either to a DVD, at my parent’s house, at the gym or outside. I’m going to record my weight and my waist measurements, but they are not the signs of progress. My signs of progress are whether I’m eating and exercising well, how my clothes fit, what my energy is like and what my mood is. The weight loss is simply a by product of healthy living.

My spiritual and emotional health has to be intact as well. I’m going to study the scriptures and pray each day.

Short-term goals:
For two months to keep my exercise and eating goals, so when I go in for my blood tests with the doctor on March 6th these stats will be improved

1. Exercised at least 4 times a week
2. Stayed away from dairy, wheat and sugar in a modified allergy diet.
3. As I progress with this diet, see if I can also cut out corn and oats as they are on my food intolerance list
4. Ingest brown rice and red potatoes only a few times a week instead of every day.
5. Improve my HDL levels to a normal, healthy level
6. Normal glucose response—in healthy glucose levels so out of insulin resistance.
7. Improve my Vitamin D levels to normal range

Long-term goals:

1. Lose 200 lbs. in the next 20 months
2. Maintain a healthy weight (within a 5-10 pound range) for five years

Eating plan:

1. Eat 5-6 times a day following 6WBMO plan
a. 2 oz. lean protein with each meal
b. 1-2 cups of veggies 2-3 times a day
c. ½ cup fruit 3 times a day
d. ½ cup carbs 2-3 times a day
e. Fats: good oils, raw nuts and seeds, avocados
f. Almond milk and almond cheese
g. Low salt, fresh, whole foods, cooked at home
h. 1 small piece of great dark chocolate daily, but only may be savored
i. Drink 100-150 oz. of water a day (4-5 bottles, 32 oz. size)

2. Foods I will seek out:
a. Lean proteins: turkey, chicken, fish, eggs, grass-fed beef (periodically)
b. Good carbs: yams, squashes, red potatoes, brown rice, spelt, rye, (caution on corn and oats—need to temporarily cut these out for food intolerances)
c. All veggies: spinach, onions, garlic, all greens, broccoli,
d. Lots of fruit, especially apples, all kinds of berries, kiwi, peaches, pears, nectarines,

3. Foods that make me sick, tired, bloated, fat, depressed and overweight
a. Sugar and sugary sweets, treats and desserts
b. Processed foods: chips, candy, crackers, breads, pastries, cookies,
c. Fast food: burgers, fries, sandwiches, chips, soda,
d. Wheat
e. Dairy

4. Foods that I eventually have to eliminate for a few weeks for my food allergy elimination diet
a. Corn, oats
b. Citrus


Exercise plan:

1. Exercise 4-6 times a week
2. Walking at least 3 times a week
3. Pilates DVD and yoga DVD another 2-3 times a week
4. Possibly rebounding (little trampoline)
5. Strength training 2 times a week
6. Stretching and flexibility 2 times a week
7. Exercise in the morning, first thing

Stats:

1. Measure days of exercise as well as time spent
2. Record food in online diary
3. Weigh once a month at beginning of month
4. Measure waist, hips, breasts at beginning of month
   
   

Why I'm Thinking about Maintenance

It may seem funny initially to contemplate maintaining a healthy lifestyle and healthy weight when I'm just starting to lose a bunch of weight, but I believe it is essential. At least it has felt essential this time around.

I've lost weight before. I've lost a lot of weight before. I've lost a lot of weight several times before. What I haven't yet done is maintain that healthier weight.

That is where I am at in this health journey now. I want maintenance. I want to live a healthy lfie despite trouble, turmoil or a busy life. I want to do life differently than I have been doing it.

I heard a while ago that it takes five years of maintenance for a weight loss goal to stick forever with a person. I want my five years. I want to lose this weight and I want five years of living healthy that then turns in to 10, 15, 20, 30, 40, and 50 years of healthy living. I want it to stick.

When I started regaining so much weight, so quickly a few years ago, I realized there was a lot more to losing weight and living healthy than just hitting some magic number on a scale. A lot more. What I determined at that point was that I wanted to learn that lot. If I was going to be successful at this goal of losing weight, I was going to have to consider maintenance now. Not when I reached some number on a scale, but now.

So, I've been searching for people who have lost 100 pounds or more and maintained that weight loss for five years. I've found a few. But in reality, most people who lose massive amounts of weight regain some or all of it within five years. Not all, mind you. I think part of the problem is we make such a big, big deal out of losing weight and achieiving a new body that we forget that to tell the stories of people who have continued living healthy lives for decades after. The initial weight loss gets all the headlines. It has all the sizzle and the sparkle of a new body, new clothes, new love, and new life.

For this reason, I find this recent post by DietGirl to be so incredibly valuable. Shauna Reid, the blogger at dietgirl.org spent four or five years losing 175 lbs. She's now in to her third year of maintaining that weight loss. What she has to say about maintenance in this post makes more sense to me than ANYTHING I've heard anyone else say about maintenance before. Shauna says that she lived on euphoria alone the first year after her weight loss. The second year was hard. She'd written a book about her weight loss and was flooded with feedback about what an inspiration she was when she was cycling through bouts of eating junk food and little exercise. She says:

There were times when I could have cheerfully burned my book. I bugged the heck out of myself with my optimism and irritating self acceptance. I was just plain jealous of Book Shauna, to be honest. I could barely believe that was me who'd lost all that weight and stuck at it for so many years. How did I start wanting change more than chocolate? That determined girl seemed like a stranger and I worried I'd never find her again.

Shauna, you took the words right out of my mouth. I've worried for three years that I'd never find the girl who lost 105 lbs. a few years ago. The excitement. The expectation. The clarity of thought. I've been waiting for her to show up again and get me through the weight loss so I can move into maintenance.

Maintenance seems to be a story about choosing to do all the hard things involved in weight loss--eating right, exercising, confronting emotions, changing bad habits, making difficult decisions--without all the press. There is no big parade for maintaining a healthy weight for three years or four years or even twenty. The big build up, the great goal seems to be about losing the weight. Then you lose a whole bunch of weight, you celebrate your achievement and then life gets hard again. You have to choose either to keep going with your healthy lifestyle or abandon it. And I abandoned my healthy lifestyle.

I gave it up for many reasons, but I think the real clincher is something called the diet mentality. I invested myself heavily in that mentality. It includes things like: obsessing about the scale, perfectionism in eating and exercising, all-or-nothing outlook, beating myself up for eating anything off plan and focusing on that one perfect moment when the scale finally reads my magic number. That kind of thinking took me to a dangerous place emotionally that exploded in my face 14 months after I began changing my health.

Physically I felt better than I had felt in a long, long time. Emotionally though I was a basket case. When my explosion occurred, I begain eating everything in sight almost immediately. If I had not been so caught up in the diet mentality, I might have had the ability to stay with the emotions I was experiencing and allow myself the psychic space to freak out little bit. But because of the perfectionism--all or nothing--mentality that is inherent in this screwed-up thinking, I didn't pick myself up the next day and acknowledge that while I had eaten three pieces of cake, four sandwiches, and any cookie I could get my hands on the day before, it was okay. I was okay. I didn't know how to deal with that place of terror. Or my way of dealing with it was to EAT. And eat I did. Over and over and over again. Anything I could get my hands on. All the time.

I hit a brick wall and exploded emotionally and I did what I had done for a long, long time before. I ate. I soothed myself with food. I ate to forget that I was hurting. I ate to hide from my failure. I ate to mask the pain. I ate because I didn't realize that I didn't have to beat myself up for making a mistake.

If I could go back now, with everything that I've learned over the last few years, I would like to try handling that emotional explosion this way:

STOP. Stop. Quiet yourself. Sit somewhere. Acknowledge your pain. Feel it. Name it. Feel it again. Eat if you want. Don't eat. Run. Play. Dance. Sing. Mourn. Scream. Hurt. But stop and feel. Allow for gray. My health, my future, my plan seemed so black and white. I did not know how to acknowledge what I wanted while at the same time acknowledge that it might not turn out that way and to BE OKAY. I did not account for contingencies. Who wants to really? But when they come, I want a better way. I know now what gorging and gorging and eating nonstop will do to me. I know now where it will take me. I want to choose a different way. Not a perfect way. Not the only way. But experiment. Try a different way to handle the hurt that is seeping out you.

If I could redo that emotional explosion now, I would approach myself with gentleness. With kindness. With hope that things can change. With hard work no matter what. With space for the unknown to occur without me losing myself. I would hold my hand. Be a friend. And acknowledge that things might be really tough for a while.

That's why I want to think about maintenance now. I have to change my emotional lifestyle if I'm ever going to succeed at my physically healthy lifestyle. They go hand in hand.

Weigh In: January 9, 2009

Weight: 335 pounds

Waist: 52 inches

Honestly, I'm a bit shocked that I weigh 335 pounds. With all the eating I did over Christmas break, I assumed I would have gained more weight. I guess though I've been losing weight slowly since last spring. I don't have any hard data to back me up but I'm pretty sure I weighed about 355 pounds when we went to Denmark in May 2008. I'm also pretty sure that I lost about 10 pounds from all the walking--and from eating a great breakfast every day. I've slowly been going down the scale since then. And I mean slowly. Because I've gone back up the scale as well. I just haven't yo-yo'd with quite the rapidity or the poundage that I've experienced in the past. 

I think it is a good thing to be 335 pounds today. 

RECIPE: Spinach Turkey Burger

This is a simple, easy, hearty, healthy turkey burger recipe that is a regular feature on my menu now. I just discovered it a couple of months ago and the first time I made the recipe, I said, "Wow!" Often I'm underwhelmed by a recipe or overwhelmed by the intricacies of the instructions, but this recipe is straightforward and simple. I love those kind of recipes.

Typically, I find myself at the grocery store stocking up for the week and unless I have my menus for the week mapped out I will return home having forgotten one essential ingredient for some recipe. This recipe is so easy though, I doubt I will forget anything.

My version is a variation on this recipe from SparksPeople.com. There is something just right about the combination of red onion, garlic and spinach. Enjoy!

Spinach Turkey Burger

• 2 teaspoons grapeseed oil, 1 turn of the pan
• 2 teaspoons extra-virgin olive oil, plus some for drizzling
• 1 clove of garlic, crushed
• 1 red onion, chopped
• 1 box or bag, 5 ounces, fresh spinach
• 1 teaspoon dried oregano, lightly crushed in the palm
• 8-10 thin slices mozzarella cheese (I use almond mozzarella)
• 1 1/3 pounds ground turkey breast,
• 1 tablespoon grill seasoning (recommended: Montreal Salt-Free Steak Seasoning by McCormick)

Heat a large nonstick skillet over medium heat. To one side, add a little grapeseed oil, add the chopped garlic and chopped red onion and cook 5 minutes. Transfer the onions and garlic to a bowl to cool. Return pan to heat. Add grapeseed oil to pan and then add fresh spinach without stems. Cook over medium heat until spinach wilts about 3-5 minutes. Add the spinach to the bowl with cool onions and garlic and season with 1 teaspoon of oregano. Add in ground turkey, grill seasoning and a drizzle of extra-virgin olive oil. Mix and form into 8 small to medium patties, 1-inch thick. Raise heat on pan to medium-high. Add patties and cook 6 min on each side. Or you can grill on an indoor grill for 5 minutes. Add mozzarella slices to top of patties and melt them for 1-2 minutes.

Makes 8 small burgers.

Note: The original recipe said to cook the onions and garlic in extra-virgin olive oil over medium heat, but extra-virgin olive oil is not made for sauteeing things at high heat, so I use grapeseed oil to sautee the onions, garlic and spinach. Still adds a great flavor but grapeseed oil can withstand the higher temperatures. You could use an olive oil made for high heat temperatures, but you might want to try grapeseed oil and see if you like it too.

101 Reasons I Want to be Healthy

1. I don't want to carry around 200 lbs. for the rest of my life.

2. My lower back is really beginning to hurt.

3. My joints are beginning to hurt.

4. I don't want to be old and fat (just like I never wanted to be young and fat.)

5. I no longer need it. It doesn't serve me in whatever way it used to.

6. I want to be more active.

7. I want to physically be able to handle my own house and my own yard.

8. I want to get better gas mileage--less weight equals better gas mileage.

9. I want to have babies. Lots and lots of babies.

10. I want to get married. Not that I can't at this weight, but it will be much more likely if I can lose the weight.

11. I want to develop all sides of my personality--namely all of my feminine wiles.

12. I admire Elana at elanaspantry.com. If she has to eat like this and can do it so well than I can do it too.

13. I'm tired of this challenge.

14. I want to look smokin' hot in a bikini one day.

15. I want perky breasts.

16. I want to uncover my fine, fine, fine, thin body.

17. I don't want to be the fattest girl in the room any more.

18. I don't want my weight to be the first thing people notice about me.

19. I'm tired of hearing what a "pretty face" I have or what a "great personality."

20. I want to uncover the flat belly that I've always wished for.

21. I want to quit buying clothes at Lane Bryants. FOREVER.

22. I want to buy clothes at regular stores without a second thought.

23. I want to go down the slip 'n' slide at the church party on the July 24th weekend each year.

24. I want to hike the mountain peak near my house.

25. I want to have the stamina to endure at least 18 holes of golf becasue I've never played 18 holes of golf before and so many people in my family are obsessed with this sport. What is that all about?

26. I want to travel without a second thought, meaning I can go to as many art museums and sights as I want to without worrying about my feet hurting.

27. I want my feet to STOP hurting.

28. I want all sunglasses to fit me--because my face is too wide normally.

29. I want to buy cute bras.

30. I want to make more money.

31. I want to quit allowing this challenge to hold me back.

32. I want to go swimming without thinking about it.

33. I want a lovely, open lap to hold lots of babies on.

34. I want to love what I eat every day and know it is good for me.

35. I want to keep talking about food and health but I want to quit talking about my weight.

36. I want my life to feel right again. Part of that comes with my health improving.

37. I don't want little kids to ask me why I have such a big belly any more.

38. I want to do whatever I dream of physically without the limitation of obesity.

39. I want to kiss lots of boys. Or at least kiss one boy lots and lots of times.

40. I want to move on with this challenge.

41. I want my friends to not only love my insides but also to love my outsides.

42. I want to heal this wound.

43. I want to go waterskiing.

44. I want to try snowboarding.

45. I want to do yoga often.

46. I want to do Pilates often as well.

47. I want to dance beautifully.

48. I want to jump on a trampoline without worrying about breaking it.

49. I want to ride a horse without my weight being a problem.

50. I want to go snowskiing.

51. I want to run and jump and play with my nieces and nephews.

52. I want to run a marathon.

53. I want to build a strong, healthy, beautiful body.

54. I want my body to have a chance after all these years.

55. I want to be my personal best.

56. I want to rid myself of my morning kleenex-and-mucus habit.

57. I want beautiful skin that isn't marred by a bright red flush.

58. I want to heal from PCOS.

59. I want to get rid of extra body hair.

60. I want to grow better hair on my head--that happens when I'm eating better.

61. I want to stop the greasy, nasty hair thing that happens to me if I don't wash my hair every day. I think my diet will affect that.

62. I want to join a running group or fitness group with friends.

63. I want to climb ladders without worry.

64. I want to buy pretty clothes and look my best in them.

65. I want to dress with flair to highlight the best parts of my body and minimize the other areas.

66. I want to reach out to old friends and welcome new friends without allowing my weight to hold me back.

67. I want to travel without worrying about seat belt extensions in cars or airplanes.

68. I want to be the best me I can be. The most beautiful, the brightest, the happiest me I can be. I don't think I've reached my personal best.

69. I want to be pregnant.

70. I want to get my master's degree and write a book without allowing my weight and all its attendants worries, complaints and diseases to stop me from achieving those goals.

71. I want to be beautiful. Really, really beautiful.

72. I want to heal from metabolic syndrome.

73. I want to quit breaking things inadvertently because of my size.

74. I want to live up to ALL of my hopes and dreams.

75. I want to finally put to rest this one great on-going challenge in my life.

76. I want to rest from this labor for a time. Or at least not have it consume my every thought, my every free moment, my every secret wish.

77. I want people to set me up on blind dates.

78. I want to date.

79. I want to be me without this attendant trial.

80. I want to have closure on too many years of waiting for my dreams to come true.

81. I want to live up to my own ideals.

82. I want the energy to live up to those ideals.

83. I want the stamina to encourage those ideals to live and breathe in my life.

84. I don't want to be the fat cousin, fat sister, fat daughter or fat friend any more.

85. I want to be a pretty mom and a pretty wife.

86. I want to run and play with my children.

87. I want to birth healthy, beautiful children.

88. I want to never again "wait until next year" when any holiday or major event occurs, hoping against hope that once and for all I will handle this elephant of a problem in my life and be able to participate the way I want in every situation.

89. I want to have a wedding day with all of my loved ones around me.

90. I want to be a beautiful bride.

91. I want to marry a man who loves me--all of me and loves who I've become.

92. I want to spend the rest of my life looking in the eyes of my best friend.

93. I want to marshal my courage, my strength, my stamina and my hope to live my dreams.

94. I want to be admired.

95. I want to fulfill my destiny.

96. I want to live without any more regrets.

97. I want to do my best. In every aspect of my life.

98. I want something better than I have right now.

99. I don't want to miss my windows of opportunity.

100. I want to hear the voice of God. And see his light shining in my children's eyes.

101. I want my mind and heart and soul and body to be at peace and to be one. I want pure, unadulterated joy to be living in this body, in this place, in this time. No more waiting.

The Acid Test

Last Monday, I was out of it emotionally. Slow, indecisive, unable to get myself moving. I had taken a couple of weeks off of work because I got hit by a particularly bad stint of depression, something I've had on and off for oh, I don't know, most of my life. I'd been dropping emotionally for several months but not in the way I usually drop, or at least that is what it seemed at the time. This drop was more physical than emotional if that makes any sense. Physically this is how I felt. 

• I did not want to move. Ever. Again. 
• I could not decide what to wear, when to get ready, even when to go in to work. Every decision felt monumental, far-reaching, and completely overwhelming. This I knew was not normal. Major indecisiveness plagues me in this place. All I can see is an interminable number of days stretching out ahead of me with more and more and more decisions to make. This makes me want to curl into a fetal position and moan continuously. 
• My very head felt heavy and dark. Like too much was going on in there and I needed someone to prop my eyelids open for me to be able to see.  

This feeling is not a feeling of health. I know that intellectually in that moment, but it is so hard to believe. So hard to comprehend. You get so conditioned, so habituated to feeling miserable and terrible and unhappy and full of loathing day after day after day that it is hard to comprehend that you ever felt any differently. That the world every looked brighter. That this is not normal. 

It is so hard to believe. 

When I realized how low I was feeling, how out of it, how in the dumps, I started to wonder if I should go on medication again. I thought about going to my doctor. I thought about doing anything and everything to make myself feel better. Even for just a moment. 

That is when I remembered a book I had called The Mood Cure. I love this book. As I reread the book, I suddenly remembered that one of the supplements recommended in the book--amino acids--were some of the same supplements my doctor had given me a while ago and I had not been taking them. I had been feeling fine. But I had forgotten that she told me to take them again if I noticed a dip in my mood. 

Let's just say that I had noticed a dip in my mood. More like a deep, gaping maw of a hole. Or a valley carved out of the guttural innards of a sky-touching mountain. Yes, I had finally with all of my deeply aware perceptions noticed the pumping hemorrhaging of my soul. 

So, I went immediately to my cupboard and took two of the amino acids. And then I went back to my book with my skepticism fully engaged as well as my heavy, heavy eyes, my indecision, and my utter inability to move. 

And then I woke up. 

Within a half an hour, my indecision lapsed, my eyes fully opened, and I moved. All seemingly simple, simple things. And all often easily brushed aside. But when you've been living on the planet of How-Will-I-Survive-the-Next-Hour, those are monumental, heroic, unbelievable feats of power and wonder. 

It was in a word a miracle. 

One that has not left me yet. One that I will continue to test today, tomorrow, and the day after that. 

It has become my acid test. 

The Unfinished Business

I've got something stuck in my throat. It is way down deep inside my gut, throbbing and beating and clutching my bowels. I'm afraid it won't let go this thing inside of me that is eating the heart out of my life. 

I will not let it win. 

I will face it. Look at it. And hold its gaze until it reveals its secrets or until it melts away in shame. 

This is my life. I am the captain of my soul. The leader of my todays. The chooser of my destiny. At least in the ways that God allows to me. 

But my is life rocky, unkept, and out of balance. And I will not inhabit this place I've been living any longer. 

I will lose 200 pounds. 

I will exercise nearly every day. 

I will eat well. 

I will center myself spiritually every day. 

I will exude energy, health and stamina. 

I will marry and have children. 

I will live the life I've been meant to live. Out from under this shadow. Out from under its paralyzing grip on my life. Out from under its tyranny. 

And I will not look back in sorrow. I will live in today. Enjoy this life. And welcome the future. 

This is MY life. And I claim it.