Updates and a restart

After my last post I officially ran one mile on the treadmill.  So much for trying the whole 5k with a run/walk combo, but I had only a half hour, so I was happy I at least did the mile.

The next night, my husband and I went out to the lake.  We live near Presque Isle State Park and it has to be one of my favorite spots.  I love the lake.  Below is a rough map of the park.

There are biking and walking/running trails that go around the whole peninsula right on the lake.  Since the distances are painted on the sidewalks, I like walking there because I know how far we’ve gone.  I decided to walk four miles with my husband and daughter in her stroller.  After Mile 1, my daughter, Gianna, started to get fussy, so my husband sat at a picnic table to feed her while I kept going.

When I hit my intended marker, I turned around to head back to find them and the car.  I saw them coming towards me when I had about 1.25 miles left to the car… and then I heard Gianna crying.  My husband said she cried from the moment I left them.  I pulled her out of the stroller and walked .25 miles with her in my arms.  Then I decided we just needed to get back to the car and home (since it was getting dark).  So, I loaded her in and started to run.  I ran probably the majority of the last mile back to the car with her in the stroller.  It’s not a jogging stroller, but it was really light weight and easy to push on the sidewalks.

We made it back to the car and I was glad to get a really good workout in.  I thought the walk wouldn’t be enough for me, but the added run certainly was!

A few days later I attempted 1.5 miles on the treadmill and did well.

Unfortunately, my eating has been off again.  My sister came home for a visit, so the weekend was filled with spending time with family and lots of eating and snacking.  But, today is a new day.  I’m already in for a bowl of oatmeal and a banana, so that’s a pretty good start.  Hope your weekend was good as well.  I’ll try and start posting some photos to liven things up around here.

First 5K

I had lunch with a good friend (who is also a marathon runner, has a degree in exercise science and fitness and personal trainer) who also just had a little baby boy.  Even though she tried to continue running during pregnancy, she didn’t log the amount of miles she was used to.  She told me she’s back to running about 2 miles and starting to slowly work upward.  I was also surprised to hear that while she used to be able to bang out push ups, crunches, sit ups, etc. she now can barely do one sit up.  I was amazed to hear how much muscle tone she’d lost!

She told me about a fun 5K for women in our area.  She said it’s not competitive at all and most women alternate between walking and running.  She was going to run it as her first one after having the baby and suggested it would be a good jumping off point for me too.

The date?  October 1!  This means I have barely three weeks to train for this thing, but I’m going to do it anyway.

I tried running on the treadmill about a week or so ago and did pretty well.   I started with the usual 2 minute runs with 3 minute walks for about an hour and held my own.  Tonight I’m going to just “see what I can do” as far as running the 5K.  My treadmill has a setting for one, so I figure I’ll run at a pretty easy pace.

I know running in this race so soon I’ll probably walk some of it, but I’m okay with that.  It will be fun to try and see what I can do and knowing I’m doing this will boost me to work out regularly.

By the way, doing Weight Watcher’s last week I’m down 3.2 pounds and totally excited!

My Inspiration

The sweet little picture above is my little girl, Gianna.  I say often she’s the sweetest thing I’ve ever known and I mean that.  Because I love her so much, I never want her to struggle with her weight the way I have.

If you’ve read my About Me tab you’ll know that I’ve struggled with my weight on and off.  When I was in high school I worked out and ate right.  I wasn’t the thinnest one out there, but I maintained a healthy weight.  It wasn’t until college and meeting my husband that I’ve “let myself go” so to speak and gained the weight.

Because I know what it’s like to be heavy and uncomfortable in my clothes my hope is to never let Baby G (as we call her) know that feeling.  If I can instill health into her at a young age, my hope is that she will carry that throughout life and be able to go back to that when she needs to.  If I teach her to eat apples instead of cookies for snacks, maybe she’ll avoid some of the terrible habits I have picked up.  I know that no matter what  I teach her, she’ll choose her own way, but if I lay a good foundation, I hope she’ll appreciate that later in life.

I know it’s going to be hard, but my hope is for her not scream for McDonald’s when we see those yellow arches, whine and beg in the store for a box of cookies, etc., etc.  If these are things of moderation, I want her to approach them as such.  It won’t always be easy.  I’ll tell ya right now, when we’re in the mood for a quick meal, McDonald’s, Wendy’s, Dairy Queen (to name a few) are where my husband and I are at.

So, this will all start with me.  I have to teach not only her but my husband as well about healthy eating.  If you think that’s tough, my husband LOVES fast food and soda… and he’s got a great metabolism that he can eat it almost every day for lunch and not gain an ounce.  Totally not like me.  I hope Baby G got her daddy’s metabolism and not her mommy’s.

If you’re a mom that has been through this, I’d love to hear your comments about this subject.  Please e-mail me if you have tips or tricks to keep kids healthy and loving it!

Welcome to Creating New

I’m going to post a proper About Me soon, but for now I’ll pretty much reiterate what’s already in my profile.

I’ve always had trouble maintaining a healthy weight.  When I was younger (middle-high school) I had little trouble.  My friends worked out and ate healthy so I did to.  We ate regular meals at home and desert was minimal and optional.  I rarely had soda, always ate salads in restaurants and ran or walked regularly.  I love fitness videos and even worked out in my parents basement with free weights and a jump rope before prom to lose about 5 pounds.  And it always worked!  I stayed fit and healthy all through high school.  You couldn’t label me as the skinniest one there and, like most girls, I was uncomfortable with my weight and felt I needed to lose more, but I was pretty happy.

I attribute most of my gaining of weight to when I met my husband.  Prior to him, I always maintained a healthy weight, not for myself, but to be attractive.  When we started dating and getting serious, I started to adopt his eating habits.  We would eat out several times a week and I would “splurge” by getting whatever I wanted off the menu without caring how many calories the meal contained.  He always liked us to share a desert, and I was happy with that too.  Then the soda started.  My husband can drink 5 sodas a day without caring, so I started too though not quite to that extent.  We were busy all the time seeing movies, hanging out, etc. so exercise took a back seat.

When we got married I didn’t work at first and basically sat around all day eating.  I gained pretty heavily.  Then I landed a job at the insurance company I currently work for.  I worked evenings while he worked days, so when I would get out of work at 8:00 or 9:00 p.m. I stopped at Wendy’s ALMOST EVERY DAY and, again, the weight piled on.

It’s been several years since all that and I decided I better lose the weight.  I called a friend from high school who is a personal trainer and marathon runner and she got me on a running plan which I loved.  I’ll never forgot on my birthday running 4 miles… in a row… without stopping.  I felt so accomplished.  Then my nursing school (where I was a full-time student) picked up and my schedule was crazy and fitness, again, went out the window.  I continued to lose weight through diet and exercise when I could fit it in.

When I got pregnant, I wanted to eat so healthy for my little growing bean, and I did a pretty good job.  When we hit the last few weeks of my pregnancy I found out she was on the small side, so I thought that meant  I could eat bigger and better because she needed to gain weight.  Enter ice cream every night, pizza twice a week, etc.  After having her, I continued to eat this way.  As of right now, she’ll be 8 weeks tomorrow and I just stepped on the scale and it read 3 pounds heavier than when I weighed in a few days ago.  I hate this scale because I don’t think it’s accurate, but STILL… 3 POUNDS.  To make matters worse, my husband is joining me on this journey (after trying on 3 pairs of pants yesterday to find one that fit) and he witnessed my weight… in numbers.  Embarressing!

So, here we go!  I’m hoping to start running again or at least working out 5 days a week.  I don’t care if it’s 5 fitness videos from Exercise on Demand.  I’m going to count Weight Watchers Points because that’s always worked for me in the past.  I’m not attending meetings, but I have all the materials from years past so I’m going at it alone.

I want to do this for myself but also to set a good example to my little girl, Gianna.  As a female, I know she’ll struggle with insecurity and “am I pretty enough” and all that most of us girls went through at some point.  I want her not to worry about her weight though in the ways I did.  I want to be healthy for her so she will be healthy for herself as well.  I want to adopt healthy practices so they aren’t difficult for her but a way of life.

So, today I’m Creating New!