The Tracy Anderson program didn’t really seem to work for me last summer. I haven’t given up on the Tracy Anderson, but I think she’s far more advanced than what I’m ready for. So I’ve been working on starting smaller. Sure, I would love to work out an hour a day, 6 days a week, high-intensity interval training, etc etc. But I’m starting at zero. The exercise I have gotten over the past several years has been negligible at best. I am weak. (Physically, not mentally?) I need to build up my strength and endurance if my workouts aren’t going to just make me wish I was dead the whole time. I want everything to be more effective. I want that “metabolism” thing I hear people talk about but have never experienced myself!

I’ve been starting with 20 minute workouts. An hour seems like foreverrrrr, but 20 minutes? That’s nothing at all. I can totally do that. I did walking on the treadmill for the first month or so. I have since moved on to the elliptical. I try to go 6 days a week, but I think that only actually happened 1 week, lol. So the goal is “more days of the week than not.” So, at least 4. After the first several weeks, I decided to add weight training. Since I am so weak from years of inactivity, it was a smart step. Can’t expect my workouts to be much good if I’m not very strong. So the goal is 4 days of cardio and 3 days of weights (with Saturday being the day I do both, Sunday no workouts). MWFSa cardio, TThSa weights. Again, doesn’t often happen that way, so if I can even do MWF cardio and TTh weights, I still consider it a win.

Any progress is a win. I try to remember that.

I do my workouts in the mornings before work. Yes, getting up earlier than I “have to” suxxxxxxxx. But when I tried to do evening workouts, they never happened. I’d find excuses. I’m too tired from being at work all day. I’ll do it tomorrow. I have plans. It’s much easier to find excuses when you have a whole day to think them up! And dreading a workout all day is also no fun. But when I get up and do it right away in the morning, I don’t have time to think up excuses. I don’t have time to dread it. Allegedly, I have kickstarted my energy and metabolism for the day. I do feel more “awake” if I’ve worked out in the morning than when I haven’t.

Been working on my eating too. If there’s any truth to “80% nutrition, 20% exercise” rule of losing weight, I can’t forget food. I’m watching calories with myfitnesspal. My goal right now is to stay under 1600 calories a day. Seems like a lot, even to me, but when I had lower calorie goals I never stayed within them. And it is disheartening. It is demotivating to feel like you’re constantly failing. So I upped the calories to a more reasonable goal, with the intention of lowering that number as I make progress. (If I make progress?)

Added a lot more fruit into my diet. Before, I’d have almost none. Now I’m trying to have my snacks and desserts be almost exclusively fruits. Strawberries, apples, grapes, and clementines are my favorites. I try to alternate them week by week. As I get sick of eating one kind, I swap it out for another. Lots of Kashi GoLean bars for snacks as well. I’ve been having Greek yogurt as breakfast for years, but I’ve added granola with lots of fiber now. I’ve been eating a lot of Lean Cuisines for lunch and dinner. Which feels like cheating the whole “eating clean” if I’m consuming frozen dinners, but they still feel like a step in the right direction. They make counting the calories significantly easier. They make portion control easier. Right now, I need easy. If I get discouraged, I could derail this whole thing. Which is what always happens.

Also been using Tumblr for “fitspiration”. I started my own “fitblr”, Reluctant Fitness. Mostly I just repost things I find motivating (I love before-and-afters), and some mocking of the bullshit motivational stuff (sweat is not your fat crying, you idiot). And other things that I find motivating on a realistic level. Getting fit fucking sucks, yo. Let’s not paint it up like it doesn’t.

I’m doing well, overall, I suppose. Besides siphoning all my money into my new Malifaux obsession and feeling the financial crunch, that is.  Work is going pretty well. I went through a rough patch due to some changes, but I think we’ve worked it out now. I’m not thrilled about being at the office until 7pm most nights, but I guess it could always be worse. I am adaptable.

My weight loss has pretty much ceased, lol. I will be working (again) on trying to find the motivation and willpower and watch what I eat a bit better than I have been. I think calorie consumption is something I will be able to have better control of and consistency with than trying to scratch out time and energy to exercise with any regularity. Both are ideal, yes. But I’ll do what I can. I’m trying to relax about the whole thing since it was really just stressing me out and making me angry with myself no matter what I was eating or not eating and all that. Which just makes a girl want to shove more garbage into her mouth! Anytime in the past that I’ve sort of lost any weight was when I said “fuck it” and just tried to eat things in moderation and not beat myself up over everything.

I don’t think I’ve worked out for like 3 weeks now. Work stress and long hours I think is what started the descent of motivation. My diet went pretty badly last week when I drove from Virginia to Minnesota (the drives especially, 20 hours!—but thankfully the junk food made me sick so I’m still not craving it!). I’m only about half back on the diet wagon. For the most part since the beginning I’ve been good with eating sensibly and keeping around 1200 calories a day. With the exception of last week.

I’m getting better about eating and trying to get back to the 1200 a day. But it’s been a struggle. Must keep the bad food out of the house! Resist the restaurants! Make sure I get plenty to eat for breakfast (turkey bacon and blueberries or Greek yogurt) so I’m not hungry. Kashi Go Lean bars have been my meal substitute of choice. I usually have my breakfast and then space out 3 Kashi bars during the day then have a dinner of some baked chicken and salad or something like that.

I just can’t seem to get back to the exercise though! Just the thought makes me want to take a nap. But I suppose that’s what willpower and whatnot are for. Where does one get some willpower? Target? I think it would help me if I watched the Metamorphosis intro again to get me motivated. I had lost 15 lbs in just a few weeks! Thankfully I’ve only gained 3 back. But still, that’s not good. I can do it! Ugh. Get back into it, Ang!

What’s this about? I’m doing the Tracy Anderson Metamorphosis (Omnicentric) program. Check out the Tracy Anderson tag to read more about my journey.

Falling off the wagon in this case just means I haven’t worked out in about 3 days. I was doing fine with the diet until last night when a very evil boyfriend made cookies. I plan on having a “cheat meal” today (not recommended in the plan). So I haven’t fallen too far. Things at work should quiet down again this coming week, so that should help me regain focus.

So far I’m down 10 total lbs in about 2 weeks since this began!

What’s this about? I’m doing the Tracy Anderson Metamorphosis (Omnicentric) program. Check out the Tracy Anderson tag to read more about my journey.

I had purchased the program through a Gilt sale, so I got not only the DVDs and program info, I also got the exercise mat and 3 lbs weights all in one (discounted) package. Which is great, since they’ve all proven to be necessary. The red thing on the side there is my gardener’s kneepad (maybe $10 from Target?) for the exercises that have me on one knee. I also got a few other Tracy Anderson DVDs in the past from a Gilt sale, so I totally recommend signing up if you want to keep a look out for a deal on her products. They’re not cheap! Of course, you can also order it from Tracy’s website. To bring the price of it into perspective (maybe), you are getting 10 different work-outs. So figure out how much 10 regular exercise DVDs would cost and it’s probably comparable.

The program has another introductory pamphlet not shown here, but what’s shown are the most important day-to-day things:

To the right of the hand weights is the Workout Tracker. Every day, you check off that you did both the cardio and the transform DVDs (or either one or none, if you didn’t). There’s also a line to put in your weight every day. (If you’re opposed to daily weigh-ins, I’m sure you can just fill that in every 10 or 30 days or whatever.) The Tracker is also handy because it shows you when it’s the 7th “rest day” of the week so you don’t have to try to remember, and it tells you when it’s been 10 days (time for a new transform DVD). And it’s easier to remember when it’s 30 days and time to take new pictures. What’s also nice about the Tracker is that you write in the date—so if for some reason you get thrown off schedule for a few days or weeks or what have you, in theory you can just start up where you left off.

On the back of it is where you track your measurements of your bust, arm, waist, hips, and thigh every 10 days. The program comes with a cute little tape measure just for that. I also added my body fat percentage because I have a scale (had to buy a scale! $40) that can do that. It’s not a measurement that is meant to be tracked in this program, but it’s a number I know will change the most for me, and it’s honestly the best benchmark of progress for actual fat loss. I gain muscle easily, so I know that can skew my weight numbers.

Below the hand weights is the Dynamic Eating Plan. I keep that stuck on the fridge, open to the page of meals for my current week. That way I can see at a glance how much of each thing I should eat (generally ranges from 4-10 ounces). And if I’m making something, I can easily see the recipe. So far I’m digging about half the food. The stuff I’m not into, I’m trying to replace with healthy options. You will need a juicer and a food processor. Those were 2 things I was unaware of when I bought the program, so I had to buy them on Amazon (about $160 total for both) before I could start. The first week’s food are all entirely made in the juicer or food processor, so you need those before you start. And since getting a food processor, I’m so into it! I highly recommend one whether doing the program or not. For the first week of food, I spent about $130 at the grocery store.

Last, not certainly not least, beside the kneepad are the DVDs. Included in there is 1 dance cardio DVD (with a video introduction from Tracy, which is nice), and 3 “Transform” DVDs. Each of those 3 DVDs has 3 muscular structure workouts (so, a total of 9), which you alternate every 10 days for 90s days. The nice thing I’m noticing so far is that the 9 transform workouts do not appear to be, like, starting with Beginner and working up to Advanced. They seem to be pretty steady in intensity and working different muscles, so you can likely cycle back through them when done with the program. That’s my plan, anyway!

Sadly, none of this is very cheap. I know cost is something that slowed me down or prevented me from doing programs like this in the past, so I wanted to give a heads up if someone is thinking about this to save up some money! 

The breakdown:

• The program (from her website): $89.97
• Mat and weights (from her website, likely cheaper on Amazon): about $50
• Scale: $20-50
• Juicer and food processor: about $160
• First week of food: about $130

What’s this about? I’m doing the Tracy Anderson Metamorphosis (Omnicentric) program. Check out the Tracy Anderson tag to read more about my journey.

I vacillate between feeling positive and like “I can totally do this!” to “why the hell am I putting myself through this?” I think mostly it’s the first one. But that second thought does cross my mind a few times a day.

I’ve had some trouble sticking to the diet perfectly. What I’m trying to do, since I find some items disgusting now that I’ve tried it, is replace that meal with something even simpler. So instead of the sweet potato and corn pudding and the carrot and parsnip puree, I’m eating just a handful of baby carrots. After the first or second time of eating the salsa gazpacho, I started feeling the gag reflex, but it was much easier when I tried eating it with 5 blue corn tortilla chips (lol). That made it much more enjoyable. I didn’t get the full gazpacho serving, but I felt like it was good that I got some of the nutrients.

The only time I’ve swayed from the diet was last night I was stuck at work late and ran out of the food I had packed and didn’t want to go into starvation mode, so I ended up eating a 12″ tuna salad sub from Subway. Well, I had half, then the other half about 2 hours later. So it wasn’t all at once. But it was just the tuna salad on the wheat bread with lettuce, pickles, and black olives. No cheese or sauce. According to MyFitnessPal, that sub was still well within my calorie goal! Which is encouraging. It also made me think that I can maybe come up my own meals that I find more palatable but are still really healthy. But I want to try sticking to the first week’s diet as much as possible! Mostly to see if I could do it. And for the most part, I have. Thankfully there’s a new set of meal plans every week.

On the plus side, I am pretty good with consuming the power drink (the kale is a bit overpowering, but the apple helps), and I love the blueberry applesauce, the protein soup (just chicken and veggie soup), and of course the chocolate (and prune lol) pudding. Since I had that sub yesterday, I skipped the protein soup and pudding because my calorie consumption was sufficient by then.

The dance cardio I am getting slightly better at. I’m not a dancer and with how heavy I am, it’s really hard to be bouncing around that much for 30 minutes straight. But instead of feeling too discouraged, I’m trying to remind myself that I’m starting at level 0 and I need to work up to being as bounce-around-hyper as little Tracy who has been doing this all every day for years and years. Every day, I can do a little more of what Tracy’s doing in the DVD, but it’s far from great, lol. And I still reach a point where my body just doesn’t want to do the bouncey dancing, and then I do this (very sexy!) high-knees skippy jog from one end of the room to the other, just to keep moving and keep my heart rate up. That seems to help and then I can go back to the dance stuff after a few minutes. My goal is to just keep moving for that entire 30 minutes.

The “muscular structure”/”transform” DVD is half easy for me, and half super hard. It changes every 10 days, so I’m curious as to what the next one will be. The one I’m on now, I’m digging the arm and ab work, but the lower body stuff is a nightmare. And not because I have a hard time with the actual exercise, it’s because for ALL of it, I have to be on one knee. And my knees don’t take kindly to that kind of abuse. In addition to the workout mat, I also have a gardener’s kneepad thing, which helps significantly (I highly recommend if you are in the same boat as me), but I still reach a point where my knee is like “NO MORE!” That’s another thing I hope improves as I lose some of this weight and am putting less pressure on them.

On to the results! I’ve only just begun the fifth day of the program, and I am already down 7 lbs and 2% body fat! That’s not nothin’. I’m hoping I can keep up that pace. What’s nice about the cardio and transform DVDs is that there doesn’t seem to be a change in levels of exercise, so I could keep rotating through them even after the 90-day program. Which is what I’m planning to do.

I just want to reiterate either how great this program is and/or how motivated I am to make it work. I’ve never been able to lose weight. I did a kickboxing weight-loss program a few times (at 10 weeks each time), years ago, and I got stronger and healthier, but I never really lost any weight. Like my clothing size never went down or anything. I’ve done low-carb, I’ve done no-carb, I’ve done vegetarian, I’ve done vegan, I’ve done raw. Nothing works. Actually the one time it sort of “worked” and I went down a size is when I went on a “fuck-it” diet. Basically after all the trying of different diets and nothing working and just stressing myself out about every little bit of food, I had enough and said “fuck it”. And ate whatever I wanted, whenever I wanted it. In moderation. Of course it wasn’t perfect and I didn’t have any change beyond one size.

So if this program works… I will be shocked. But I’m quite determined to make it work. I’m hoping the difficulties become less and less as time goes on.

What’s this about? I’m doing the Tracy Anderson Metamorphosis (Omnicentric) program. Check out the Tracy Anderson tag to read more about my journey.

Looking forward to my chocolate and prune pudding before bed! Looks like a 1300 calorie day. Plus 30 minutes of dance cardio, 30 minutes of the muscle structure exercises, and about 15 minutes of active swimming (with about an hour of just floating in the pool, lolol). Day 1: success!

I’m on the MyFitnessPal if anyone wants to be a buddy.

What’s this about? I’m doing the Tracy Anderson Metamorphosis (Omnicentric) program. Check out the Tracy Anderson tag to read more about my journey.

I’m 5’5″.
Starting weight: 228 lbs
Body fat: 37%

Bust: 47.25″
Arm: 14.5″
Waist: 44.75″
Hips: 50″
Thigh: 27.5″

Here goes nothin’…

The program consists of a diet plan, cardio DVD, and “Transform” (muscle work) DVDs, the last of which changes every 10 days. I have some other DVDs from Tracy Anderson and the exercise was pretty fun. I liked her backstory that she had a really hard time losing any weight, as I’m in the same boat. Anything that “worked” worked for about 10 lbs and then nothin’. Diet, exercise, all of it. So I figured I’ll give this a try. I don’t have high hopes, because I know the disappointment of nothing working. But I’m going to dedicate myself to it! It’s only 90 days.

As of the first day, measurements taken, photos taken (to be shown only if there’s a significant change by the end!), weight and body fat calculated. Half my food for the first week (at least the first few days of the first week) is made. I do weight every day, and photos and measurements every 10 days. It doesn’t say to get the body fat percentage, but I got a new scale that does that, so I figure why not keep track of it. I think that’s the number I’m going to see change the most.

Exercise will be 30 minutes of dance cardio DVD and 30 minutes of a muscle working DVD, 6 days a week. The muscle workout changes every 10 days. Hopefully we can still go swimming a few days a week and stuff as well.

The food for the first week is weird. Like it’s all puréed. One of them is a carrot and parsnip purée (literally all the ingredients) and it makes me wonder if I can’t just eat some carrots instead. Why’s it gotta be baby food style? The power drink that I was most afraid of (kale, spinach, beets, and apple JUICED) is palatable, thankfully. Other than feeling like a baby with all this mush food, I think I’ll survive.

…she said the first day of hell began!

Here’s the thing: they can get married. They choose not to and can just as easily reverse their choice and go down to the courthouse and get married. There’s nothing stopping them. Same-sex couples can’t. They don’t have that choice.

Hooray for being an ally and wanting to take a stand. That’s all well and good. But if that’s all they’re doing, they’re really not doing anything. It’s about as useless as praying for someone. It’s a way to do nothing and still think you’re helping. The statement of not getting married until everyone can get married sounds more like a way for someone to feel smug and sound superior. When really, the gesture amounts to nothing in the grand scheme of things. A hetero couple’s choice not to get married affects no one but themselves. Just the fact that they choose not to get married does nothing to help same-sex couples. They’re just using the cause to shine a light on themselves. 

I doubt same-sex couples want hetero couples to stop getting married. They just want the same right to get married. So instead of taking the easy road and just saying you won’t get married until everyone can, do something real to help same-sex couples get equal rights.

And stop congratulating yourself on being such a bold martyr for the cause. It’s not about you.

I don’t get it.

Bonfires are fun. Cooking yum-yums over a fire in the woods or on a lake. Hanging out with friends. But come bedtime, I want a bed and walls and heat or air-conditioning and no fucking bugs. And no, an RV will not suffice. Fuck camping.