Days 7 and 8 Week 1...check

Well, I have completed one week of my new program, lifestyle, insanity, not quite sure what to call all of this other than different.

Let's start with the good news first: 3 days of cardiovascular activity

                                                        4.5lbs lost

Let me back track a little bit.  I started working with Patrick in late September of 2011.  At that time I was working 8 hr shifts and its pretty hard work.  Because Patrick cannot move on his own and had less head control then, it was a lot of lifting and turning and just finding yourself in awkward positions.  Because I'm short its sometimes a little bit more of a reach for me and I was doing a lot more movement than I had been.  As the weeks went on, I noticed that I was very gradually losing wt.  But it wasn't healthy.  I was so tired when I got home I fell asleep without eating.  For those of you who are nurses out there, it was kind of like going back to work on the floor...at 53.  I also have another part time job as a hospice nurse on an inpatient unit.  I work nights and that job is also like going back to floor nursing.  Anyway, I was losing wt but I was not healthy.  From Oct 1 to April 1I had lost 12 lbs.  So  a grand total of 16.5 pounds and now I'm getting healthier.

I skipped writing yesterday because it was another REALLY hard day.  I was at my parents house, which I believe I've mentioned before is like a robotic trigger to eat.  Its kind of amazing how when you change your habits even for a week, you become a little bit more mindful of your eating triggers and emotions.  Which in some ways is very annoying.  Its so much easier to just cope automatically and grossly unfair there is anything wrong or unhealthy about that.  So long day at my folks and I forgot to bring anything good for me to eat.  Followed by grocery shopping for our Easter dinner.  Really, never, ever go to the grocery store when you are craving the least little morsel of food and you have just spent a crazy afternoon with your parents.  I got home once again cranky and whining.  Does not make for good reading.  I was much to bitchy for any meaningful insights.

Ok, back to more good things.  I mentioned that a reader had suggested the website www.ishausa.org/shakriya/  to follow a guided meditation.  I did the meditation last night and this morning and its a very simple, short meditation which is perfect for me. It truly helps to carry on through the day without chips, sugar, popcorn, drugs, alcohol or diet coke.  I highly recommend it.

The second good thing I discovered is that it really does help to have healthy choices THAT YOU LIKE, around your house, other people's houses, your car, the el...wherever.  I have heard that for years but I am finally desperate and/or committed (a little early to use the C word) enough to have actually followed through.  All I can say is thank god for precut celery and carrot sticks with hummus.

This morning I got up and walked for 30 minutes and it was a pretty brisk walk.  Unfortunately the wind was also a bit brisk which got me to thinking Race Day, August 26, may be a little windy here in the Windy City and for the first time it dawned on me that the weather could be less than ideal in the humidity capitol of the Midwest.  I'm not going to think about that now.  Much too early. Baby steps...like trying not to be dangerously resentful of the mothers and their strollers and their clamoring, jumping, 3-6 year olds who were sharing the track with me.  First of all, the track is for serious athletes.  Second of all, if I had two in a stroller and two hanging off my legs on Easter morning, I'd be at home with a bloody mary in a Mommy size sippy cup directing "hot" and "cold" basket hunting until then fell over from exhaustion or a chocolate induced coma.

On to my folks house to make Easter lunch/dinner.  Really just a meal they could eat sometime during the day.  I really am not a good cook and yesterday in preparing for the meal, I was reading the cooking instructions for the ham.  I bought the ham at Whole Foods because the ones at Trader Joes were huge. I was at Whole Foods anyway looking for the elusive leek and noticed they had the perfect size little ham.  Anyway, I'm reading the directions and they say 7-8 minutes per pound.  I immediately realize there is a math equation involved here and look to see how many pounds.  4.52lbs.  Remember that number. I then happened to notice the price for the first time...$36!!!!! For a ham I could hold in the palm of my hand!  You would think because the farmer does not have to pay for the hormones, antibiotics and genetically engineered little piglets that the price would be less.  And they don't have to pay for cages.  That pig better have been sleeping on a velvet pillow or at least be a distance relation to Charlotte.

Anyway, I was far from perfect today.  Despite bringing healthy food, I did have one diet coke and a cinnamon bun.  Oddly, I don't feel bad about that.  I know how this day could have gone and how it has gone in the past and I feel pretty OK about today.  I'm either slightly evolved or once again honoring the Harte family tradition of denial. 

For just today, don't share which you think it is.