Raewyn Shrinking

NOOOPPPEEE

2012-04-03T23:20:00.000-04:00

I hate the juice fast. I cannot stress this enough. I give mad props to anyone who can do this for more than a day. I started yesterday off really well. I made a big batch of juice with apples, lots of kale and lemon. I drank half and took the other half out with me. Two hours later I was starving. Like tummy rumbling so loud that people were giving me weird looks. By the time I got home and made more juice I was ready to kill the next person that crossed me. I made another big juice for lunch using kale, spinach, apples and carrots. I really didn't feel any better after drinking it. I felt vaguely hungry, still cranky and more than anything really nauseous. It was like motion sickness and super bitchy had a date. We ran errands and while were out my head started to ache. I tried drinking a bunch of water and a little more juice but I felt worse almost by the minute.

I'll tough out a lot of things. I've been eating 1200 calories every day since January with 3 free days the whole time. I've been rock climbing with a broken toe jammed into tiny little rock climbing shoes after a 4 mile hike. I suffered quietly through Borat twice. I couldn't hand the juice fast. I have the least sunny personality you can imagine when I get low blood sugar. From the safety of my less than soundproof car I yelled sarcastically at a pedestrian crossing properly with the light in the crosswalk. On my five minute drive home I flipped off no less than 2 people. (They totally deserved it.) I think the lesson here for me is that I need to stick to what's been working. I haven't plateaued on my current plan and it's a comfortable lifestyle change, not a diet. If I feel hungry and crappy all day I KNOW I won't stick with it. Also for the sake of my marriage I probably shouldn't keep going on something that makes me a super bitch.

So I had solid food last night. I made my all time favorite healthy dinner: 1 cup of brown rice seasoned with rice vinegar, grilled tilapia with spicy miso teriyaki glaze and baby bok choy sauteed and tossed with gyoza dipping sauce. It packs a TON of flavor and a huge meal for just 400 calories. Today I'm back on my normal diet and much happier. I had a kashi granola bar for breakfast, juice for a snack and ate a large green salad for lunch. We had steamed dumplings for dinner and I'm FULL. I definitely won't shed 7 pounds in a week but I can live with that. I feel badly that I told you I would do this and couldn't really keep going.

To apologize, below is a video of my dog, Gwen, munching on her second favorite treat: the carrot. Her first favorite is anything meaty flavored which she knows collectively as "bacon." I had to shoot this 3 times with 3 different carrots because my brother and husband were playing mario kart in the background and kept swearing really loud and super dirty. So enjoy! I went to great lengths to bring it to you!

And I would just like to add that, if by some strange chance, the pedestrian I yelled at today sees this I just want to say "I'm Sorry."

Stay strong!

Raewyn

Are you juicing?

2012-04-01T17:55:00.001-04:00

No, not that kind of juicing.

My brother, my mom and I all watched Fat Sick and Nearly Dead on Netflix last week. Talk about motivation to get healthy. I HIGHLY suggest you watch it. For those of you that haven't seen or heard of it yet, it is a documentary made by an Australian. He was so overweight that he developed an auto-immune disease that basically gives him hives all over his body and had to take a shocking amount of medication. In an effort to lose weight and get healthy he goes on a 60 day juice fast and travels across America talking to people about their outlook on food, weight management and vegetables.

About halfway through watching it I was already on Amazon ordering a juicer. We bought a Breville compact model that was on sale for about $100. It's incredible! The whole idea behind having the juicer is that you can make juice with no sugar or preservatives that is so fresh it still contains all of its nutritional goodness. V8 can't even come close to how good this is.

Kale and carrots have been our power veggies so far. They are both incredibly cheap and can be purchased in bulk. The flavors also blend exceptionally well with other veggies and fuits. Kale is known for being incredible healthy (even though its a real bitch to eat.) It contains high amounts of beta carotene, vitamin K, vitamin C, Lutein, and a fair amount of B6 (good for energy levels) and calcium. It also contain zeaxanthin, which may help reduce your risk for age related eye disorders, and sulforaphane, which has anti-cancer properties. According to wikipedia: "kale is also a source of indole-3-carbinol, a chemical which boosts DNA repair in cells and appears to block the growth of cancer cells." Woohoo!!! Just one cup of chopped kale contains 206% of your daily Vitamin A and 134% of your daily Vitamin C which can prevent scurvy. Suck on that pirates!

Carrots are okay. I eat them when I'm starving and don't want to blow all my calories and get stuck with a cup of fat free popcorn for dinner. But I never loved carrots until now. They always taste kind of bitter and I feel like a rabbit eating them. That being said, they are AWESOME in juice. My husband and I juice two or three oranges and an apple with 8 big carrots. You lose all of the bitterness and gain all the sweet sweet benefits. Carrots are high in vitamin A, carotenes and flavonoid compounds that can help prevent skin, lung and oral cancers. They also contain a good amount of vitamin C, folic acid, Vitamin B6 and healthy levels of copper, calcium, manganese, potassium and phosphorus.

I love mixing carrots into my fruit juice and kale with other veggies and apples. The only downside to juicing them together is that it somehow tastes kind of banana-y. For those of you who don't know me well, I have a SEVERE banana allergy and even the smell of them makes me nervous.

We haven't done an all juice fast, mostly because my brother and I work out way too much to not have any protein. But I got paid today so starting tomorrow I'm going to try a one week juice fast. On days that I skate/ work out hard I'm going to add protein powder to one of my juices. Don't judge me, I'm just kind of nervous about my body going after my muscles as a protein source. I'll watch my weight closely and see how I do this week. My cousin's husband pushed me through our weight loss competition and lost 7 pounds in the final week doing the juice fast and working out.

The juicer is our new toy and it's really fun to use. We kind of fight over who gets to juice and who has to clean the damn thing out. There is a screen filter inside that catches all the little bits of pulp and you REALLY have to scrub it. Below is a video of our new juicer. Be warned, this thing goes. It actually makes a mini hurricane in the middle and will push the plunger up out of the shoot if you aren't careful.

Yikes! So that's what this week is all about! I'm setting up a weight loss spread sheet on google docs that will be open to anyone wanting to jump in. Just leave a comment and email me for an invite. There's no cash prize this time, just the benefits of being healthier, looking and feeling better. Also, I'm going to a wedding this summer and want to get a new dress 2 or 3 sizes smaller.

Stay Strong!

Raewyn

Let it go

2012-04-01T09:53:00.000-04:00

So I had my second skating lesson yesterday. We learned how to safely drop to our knees, two at a time and one at a time. Easy. Then we went on to pivoting backwards and jumping on our toes to stop quickly. Not so easy. With lots of falling I learned the pivot/ toe stop. We had a former figure skater in our class who was actually more help than the instructor. Then we were supposed to learn how to turn backwards and keep skating. NOT EASY AT ALL. I spent the better part of an hour falling repeatedly on my ass. And hips. And face. Basically all of me was involved in a painful landing at least twice. But finally, I worked out one very shaky turn, skated backwards for about 4 seconds, then collided with a wall. All while rolling at about a mile per hour. Normally for Derby, this happens at full speed but you don't hit a wall. You intentionally knock another chick to the ground. Like this:

I left my lesson feeling pissed off at myself for not doing better. Frustrated at my slow progress and angry for letting myself get so overweight. As one classmate pointed out, I'm basically trying to skate with weights strapped to me. I was so cranky with myself that I didn't stop and think about what I'd done right. In my second lesson (my fifth time on skates as a grown ass woman) I worked out a really cool looking backwards stop. I can skate comfortably going forwards. I can do crossovers pretty smoothly. I can skate backwards (slowly.) I taught myself a regular toe stop and can do it with either foot.

I let myself get so focused and frustrated about the one thing that I haven't really gotten yet and that's not fair. Not to myself and not to my poor husband who listened to me whine. Yes, learning to skate is hard work. What did I expect. OF COURSE IT'S HARD! That's what makes it worth it. I burned 1600 calories in my 2.5 hours of skating. That's more than I normally eat in a day! That's amazing! I still have a lot of weight to lose but doing this twice a week really gets me ahead. I already lost a pound this week and I'm not weighing in until Thursday.

It's easy to zero in on the bad things. Maybe you had a crappy day. Maybe you cheated on your diet and had a bunch of cheetos. But maybe you also had yogurt and fruit for breakfast. Maybe you took the stairs instead of the elevator. Maybe you didn't. The important thing is you still can. This week try something new to challenge yourself. If it's harder to do it's probably more worthwhile.

Stay Strong!

Raewyn

Roller Skating!!!!

2012-03-30T19:33:00.003-04:00

Hello All!

I told you I've been roller skating lately. This summer I'm going to try out for roller derby even though I haven't been skating since like 5th grade. While skating I burn 730 calories and hour and work up a real sweat. Seriously, check it out. There are roller skating rinks all over the place and usually have cheap admission on week nights. If you're like me and have not been skating in more than a decade look for a rink that offers lessons. I'm taking lessons every Saturday morning. I can go forwards at speed pretty well and have started doing cross overs. For anyone who doesn't know, when you go around turns you can gain more speed by crossing your outside foot in front of your inside foot and pushing out.

Like this!!! Although I don't look nearly as awesome doing it. Yet.

There are also roller derby teams forming like crazy all over the country. It's officially made a comeback as a legitimate sport. It's mostly flat track instead of banked and isn't the gruesome WWF style fighting of old. There are co-ed and all female teams in just about any city with a skating rink. Almost all are non-profit and volunteer run. Check out Whip It starring Ellen Paige/ directed by Drew Barrymore.

If skating isn't your cup of tea go for a walk outside while the weather is nice. Take the dog or throw your cat/ ferret/ guinea pig in a harness and enjoy the spring air.

Stay Strong!

Raewyn

Thirty Eight Down - One Hundred To Go

2012-03-30T18:48:00.000-04:00

Welcome to my blog! This is my journey from fatty to healthy. I'm not a fitness expert, a nutritionist or a weight loss guru. I'm a pastry cook with a serious genetic leaning towards being overweight. Not a good combo. I've been significantly overweight for more than a decade. Probably more than half my life. That sucks.
Last year I was in the hospital for fifteen days total. I had appendicitis, an abscess afterwards and then pneumonia. When I first went in for appendicitis I weighed approximately 280 pounds. Please, for the love of God, don't tell anyone! Complications following surgery put me on SERIOUS antibiotics and pretty much destroyed my immune system. I ended up having a cold for 2 months straight which turned into pneumonia and landed me in the hospital for a third time. This picture was taken about a week before I got pneumonia. That's me in the HUGE blue shirt.

I was released just before New Years Eve and immediately declared 2012 the year of Raewyn. As soon as I started feeling better I put myself on a strict diet and started exercising. I joined my extended family's weight loss competition and immediately started shedding pounds. In a few weeks I started feeling better. My clothes got looser and I had more energy. I started Zumba at my local gym, took up roller skating and instead of sitting around while watching TV I started doing squats, lunges, planks and leg lifts. It makes me feel a lot less fat while watching Dancing with the Stars.

Between January 1st and March 28th I went from 268 pounds to 230. At my height I still have about a hundred pounds to go but I have a great start and I've acquired a lot of knowledge about getting healthy. I now realize that everything I put (or don't put) in my body makes me who I am. Self control is not something you are born with. It's something you learn, just like nutrition and exercise habits. Everyone is different, but this is what works for me:

I eat 1200-1400 calories per day. I count calories on my iPhone using the My Fitness Pal App.
I exercise every day even if it's only going for a walk.
I never eat the calories that I burn while working out.
At least twice a week I try to push myself to do something harder like zumba or skating (Not running. I hate running. My husband can do as much wacky barefoot running as he wants. I'm out.)
I use a support system. This is HUGE! For me this includes my mother, father and extended family. My cousin's husband and I were neck and neck the whole weight loss competition and without him I probably wouldn't have lost half the weight I did. We weigh in every week and I know that I'll feel like crap if I haven't kept up.
I remind myself daily that if I do slip up on anything I can fix it tomorrow. Eating a couple chips in a moment of weakness does not blow my diet. It does not blow my week. It just means I need to do better tomorrow.

Below are a few of my before and current pictures. I don't want to believe in after pictures. I'm not on a diet for a couple months. I'm eating and working for towards a healthier body. That won't end even when I get down to the weight I want. So here you go: Fat Raewyn and Slightly Improved Raewyn. Obviously that's my dog. I'm finally starting to see results in my face (and, oddly enough, especially in my calves.) I need to track down a recent picture of me standing regularly. Forgive me.

Me last fall before my appendicitis approximately at my heaviest weight.

Me earlier this week about 50 pounds lighter.

So there you are! My cheekbones are coming back, my dog loves me more and I feel great. We are continuing our weight loss competition on weightlosswars.com. If you want to join us please email me. A strong support system is the best motivation I have found. I hereby promise to post on this blog at least a couple of times every week and let you know about everything that helps me so I can, in turn, help you.

Stay Strong!

Raewyn