Make Your Choice

I get asked all the time, How? How did you do it? How do you stay motivated? What keeps you going?

Honestly, it is not something I think about too often. On a daily basis I seem to go through the motions of living my life. I have made lifestyle changes over the past 2 years that have left me able to maintain my weight loss and a certain level of fitness.

Obviously, I struggle. The world is full of temptation, stress, emotions, all things that might cause a person to back slide. My schedule as a single mom can be crazy, finding time to workout is sometimes impossible. Then there is the nutrition aspect of things. Finding time to cook, grocery shop, etc it can be tough.

Does that sound familiar?

The reality is, we always have a choice.

You have a CHOICE.

I say this to people often and sometimes I wonder if they really realize what I am talking about or not.

The truth is we all have a choice.

We can choose to make better decisions for ourselves and our health. We can choose to make a commitment to getting healthy and living a full happy life. We choose, and you know what is most important?

You have to make sure that you realize YOU are worth making the right choice. You deserve to be healthy. You deserve to wake up smiling and happy every single day. If running makes you happy, then make time to do it. If it is going to the gym and working out, then do it. Find something healthy that makes you happy and make the choice for yourself to make time for it every single week.

Eating healthy, living healthy, exercising, they are all choices. No one is going to sit in front of you on a day to day basis and say go do this, eat this. You have to be the person to decide for yourself and make the choice to do it. Once you realize that you are worth the right choices, and you deserve it, you will be unstoppable.

And the best part is, you will be making healthy choices without even flinching, without even debating the bad ones. You will wake up one day and realize that over time you have changes your life style and that the choices you make for your healthy are the right ones. And the best part is?

They make you happy.

My Fitness Pal Review and What I am Working On

I have had an on going battle lately with maintaining my goal weight. Really, it was just me being lazy and not wanting to measure things and stay strict. It is hard. Well no, it is not hard, more of just work. Work. And more work.

So my weight has hovered right around 160-164 pounds. Not terrible. Goal weight is 157 pounds. Racing weight is 155 pounds. Really after Hyannis I let myself relax a bit. I worked hard all winter to get to 155 and maintain that. But my body likes to be at 160. It is a happy weight for me. If I want to stay at 160 I do not have to measure my chicken, I do not have to limit my fruit to 2 servings a day. I can have a soy latte from time to time.

But now racing is here again and I am looking to get back to 155 in time for the Vermont Marathon on May 27. I want to go for time one more time before I register for Boston over the summer. If I could get my time lower than 3:31 I would just have that much more cushion :) SO I will strive for this in the next coming weeks.

I met with a trainer at my YMCA and she suggested I calorie count and test that out. She likes Weight Watchers and respects it but she also says that my body is fighting. Fighting to maintain a certain weight so that I have fuel for long runs. But I want to fight against it. She also says I am not built to distance run. I am muscular, I can put on muscle easily and to run you have an easier time being lean.

So what did I do, I told her kindly I will keep distance running as long as my body goes for it and I will enjoy myself :) But I will also try this calorie counting thing. It scared me a bit. I spent the last 2 years counting points. If I go into a store I know the value of most foods. Counting points is easy for me, I get it. I am comfortable with it. This whole calorie counting thing, I was intimidated by it.

Luckily, I have a few friends who already calorie count. They use My Fitness Pal. Basically it is a free, yes FREE application for your smart phone and online portal for you to weigh in, track calories and even create recipes! I immediately was less intimidated by the entire calorie counting process when I started using it.

I love how it breaks down calories and shows you what exactly you are eating nutrition wise, I can monitor my fat, sugars, carbs, everything all on one page. I like that because I am trying to get my body fat percent from a 25 to a sub 20 and this will help me make sure I am doing low fat. Also it helps me monitor my vitamins and even calcium! As someone who has celiac disease and a dairy intolerance I have to work to make sure I am getting an adequate amount of calcium in my daily nutrition and this helps me a lot.

There is a scanner, so you can scan a barcode of the item you want to track too. I like this. So far I have not scanned one item that is not in their huge data base. Also they have a community and you can add your friends and help keep them on track. I like that feature, because who does not like some healthy competition between friends ;) You track your daily calories and exercise all in one spot and it really helps you see the basic side of weight loss.

Calories in and calories out. It is that simple. If you find the balance that works for your body you will lose weight. I really feel that the My Fitness Pal app helps do just this.

So I will be tracking my calories for the next few weeks and update on here when I can. Hopefully I get back to my racing weight soon :) Well not hopefully, I know I will because I am a fighter, and that is what we do!

My Support Team!

So after the Boston Marathon and all its glorious wonders my awesome family took me out to dinner!!!

I promised I would share pictures in my last post :)

It got me thinking about my journey so far, the entire last 2 years and how much they mean to me.

This little girl is the one who made me open my eyes to everything that I was doing wrong (health wise) in my life.

 She makes me strong. I fight for her. If anyone had told me 3 years ago while I was waddling around waiting to give birth to her that I would be so inspired by the love for her to go out and lose 120 pounds and start running, I would have called them crazy. But looking at that baby so long ago, I realized something, that I wanted to be the best Mom for her and to do that, I had to get healthy and make better choices. Because taking 7 medications a day and being morbidly obese was not the way to ensure I would be there for every single one of her milestones :)

Now she gets excited when I go to run. She encourages me even. And She loves those shiny medals :)

What party would be complete without gluten and dairy free cupcakes? ;)

I feel so blessed. I have a wonderful support team behind me and I am so grateful for all of them!!!!!!!!!!

Without them I know I would not be as strong and it would be hard to be a fighter. If ever there is a day when I think about quitting I just think about them and remember they will be waiting for me at the finish line, or for that phone call, hearing how I finished the race and finished strong. I never want to let them down :)