Hot By Thirty

Oh yeah, I'm supposed to be posting here...

Did I say I'd be posting daily? Oops.

My apologies, Hot By Thirty participants. I am just crazy tired. Is it funny that it only occurred to me now, late-ish on a Friday night, that I am crazy tired? I mean, I am allowed to be tired what with the new baby and all, but I think I had no idea. It's not that Molly keeps me up all night long, or that I'm chasing Jack around all day, or that I am working so hard- but Molly does keep me up sometimes and Jack requires a bit of chasing and yesterday I cleaned my entire kitchen and maybe things just add up. I want a morning to sleep in, I want an afternoon to not have to think about how to discipline a 17-month-old. I want my TiFaux working again. I want a fruity cocktail.

That said, I am feeling awesome about this weight loss thing. Not just awesome. WAY awesome. I haven't miraculously dropped all the pounds or anything, but I am consistently losing weight and I am doing so without obsessing about it every day all day long. Somehow I've slipped into my old low-carb eating pattern. Even better, I've been exercising. I can now finish my [low intensity] [20 minute] routine on the treadmill without stopping. I can't tell you how awesome that makes me feel. I may have been a quasi-athlete in high school, but besides walking around my neighborhood lake every once in a while, I haven't exercised SINCE high school. It appears to be having an effect on the quest for hot by thirty, but it's also making me feel GOOD. Who'da thunk!? I guess what they say is true.

There's still not a lot in my closet that fits me, but I sort of can't believe how nonchalant I feel about that. I was so unhappy after I had Jack. (Only about weight loss, I should add. I was blissfully happy - annoyingly so for other new parents! - about everything else.) It was miserable having to buy clothes two sizes larger than I'd ever worn in my life. I hated how I looked and I felt helpless to do anything about it. This time is so different. I haven't sat on my butt waiting to fit into my old jeans. I'm working on it, and feeling proud of myself in the process. It's so... UNLIKE ME.

That said, I couldn't get the speakers to work on my laptop for a while this afternoon and HELL if I was going to run on a treadmill without the benefit of Hulu.com. Thankfully I got them working and the sweat was dutifully generated.

I'll be back for sure on Monday, for the two week weigh in.

Days 5 and 6

Day 5: I kicked butt. I stayed away from the fridge and I used the treadmill again. I did the same routine I tried the day before and it was a hundred zillion times easier. I RAN SOME MORE. I still couldn't run through the whole thing, but since I honestly don't remember the last time I attempted jogging I am feeling like Woman Of Steel.

Day 6: Went to two birthday parties and only screwed up carb-wise at the second one, where I succumbed the the siren call of a brownie sundae. It was small, but still. Totally intended to do the treadmill again, except there was a POWER OUTAGE during nap time and all sorts of things in my house need electricity, like treadmills and computers. So I was prevented from posting too. Boo.

Now we are home from the second birthday party and I was debating with myself the whole way home about doing the 20 minute program on the treadmill. I finally decided I'd do it when we realized that the power outage fried our TiFaux machine and people, I am not jogging if I don't have a television inches away from my face. So. FOILED AGAIN.

But tomorrow, I shall prevail.

A wash- Day Four

Until Phillip returned from the grocery store 20 minutes ago there was no food in our house. None!

Okay. No food that we wanted to eat. That's usually what we mean by "no food", right?

So I had Cheerios for breakfast. Not exactly allowed in the low carb universe, but I look at it this way: it's better than a cinnamon roll. Right? And not eating breakfast usually means I eat way too much later on.

I behaved at lunchtime and had grand plans to do as well for dinner, but, erm, it didn't turn out so well. I went over to a friend's house in the afternoon (Jack: infinitely cheerier when surrounded by people) and she invited me to stay for dinner. Which was going to be pizza. And birthday cake. And I DID think about this, I really did. Pizza! Birthday cake! Totally not allowed when you are low carbing or on ANY diet for that matter. But it was her daughter's birthday! And there was no food in our house! And I wouldn't have to make dinner! Or occupy my kid until bedtime!

So I stayed. Phillip took the bus to their house. I had most of a slice of pizza for dinner (I say "most" because my hungry little monster rang her bell) and salad. SALAD! But you BET I ate a piece of birthday cake. This is amazing cake, internet. So amazing I am not allowed to have the recipe. It's a FAMILY SECRET. Whatever. As long as they periodically feed me this cake I'm not going to complain.

Not so great on the eating front, then. BUT! I got my butt on the treadmill today. It took me a while to figure out how to swing it (I thought I could bring Molly downstairs in the bouncy seat, but she is not sleeping in the bouncy seat even though all you parents of refluxers say the bouncy seat is The Solution. Harrumph.) Eventually I decided to leave her upstairs in the pack 'n play (the treadmill is in the office on the ground floor) and just listen for her. That's right. LISTEN. With my supersonic can hear the slightest whisper over the airplane engine hum of a treadmill ears. Actually I just hopped off during every commercial in Project Runway (for the love of GOD Project Runway judges! If you can't decide who should be auf'ed maybe we need NEW JUDGES. Like me! Who would make the OBVIOUS CHOICE and send Kenley to Antarctica to dress the penguins in fifties chic and SPARE THE VIEWERS THE PAIN. Kenley: Totally blatant proof that PR is FIXED.) to listen for Molly at the bottom of the stairs. The afternoon sleep is Molly's most reliable sleep, so I figured I was safe. And I was.

Except for the fact that I totally overestimated my ability to do anything requiring physical exertion and I am going to PAY tomorrow. I know it. My legs are not going to want to get out of bed AT ALL. And this is after doing only the second to lowest programmed session, for TWENTY MINUTES. I am the sorriest treadmiller you have ever seen. No longer will I roll my eyes at those sobbing melodramatic Biggest Losers again. People, I RAN. I RAN. And not by choice either, because not running meant falling off my treadmill in a most embarrassing display of Totally Not Coordinated Whatsoever.

(Also? Sometimes I get all hyperboleish and say I feel like I'm 90 years old or whatever. But today, when I was attempting to jog, I truly and honestly felt old. Or, at least, oldER. Things just didn't... work right. Yes, there's a lot of extra weight on me, but wow, I didn't know it would feel like THAT. Ick.)

I have no idea if my twenty minutes of exercise had any effect on my inhalation of birthday cake but I will go ahead and call this day a wash anyway.

Phillip went out and bought me things to eat, so tomorrow should go a little better. I might even get back on the treadmill again. I still haven't seen this week's Gossip Girl!