Hot By Thirty

Not going back

It's Sunday night. The Grind starts tomorrow, and I'm anxious about weighing in. I haven't weighed myself in a few days, and the only reason I stop weighing myself for a few days is when I suspect I've gained weight and I don't want to deal. I haven't been thinking about what I eat, I haven't been exercising. It's been at least 3 weeks since I did a Shred and I am dreading having to suffer that level of Sore all over again. I've been off schedule and sick and not at home and [fill in excuse] and I'm guessing I've probably got a bit more than 8 pounds to work off to reach my next goal. DRAMATIC SIGH.

If you follow the other blog you know I've been a teensy bit obsessed with organizing my house. Today I was going through some photo albums and scrapbooks in the bookcase downstairs, trying to decide which ones I'd take upstairs to live in the new bookcase. I was looking at a half-finished scrapbook (the last one I ever attempted, ANOTHER DRAMATIC SIGH) from my first trip to the Midwest. Phillip's brother lives in Ohio and we flew out to see them, before driving down to Alabama for my little brother's wedding. This was one year after we'd been married- the summer of 2004.

One of the pictures I managed to rubber cement to an actual page was of Phillip and me sitting on a bench outside. I remember that day. I'd had my hair cut at my sister-in-law's salon and they styled it afterwards- the longest my hair has ever held a curl. I remember feeling so pretty, and I was wearing a red tank top and a black skirt and I was out seeing a movie with my husband on our first big vacation and everything was right in the world.

Except, when I saw that picture, I thought, "That was me?"

Of course it was me. At least 30 pounds heavier. I have no idea how much I weighed back then- I wasn't paying attention. I knew I wasn't thin, but I don't think I realized I looked like THAT. Maybe I did see the picture and didn't think it was a big deal, and it's only now, from my 30 pounds lighter perspective, that I find it embarrassing.

Ooh, this post is veering off into Being The Fat White Wife In The Teeny Asian Family post, but it's past my bedtime and I don't have time for those neuroses. Suffice to say that this year, when we meet up with the inlaws in Vegas in August, I have no intention of coming home with Fat Pictures. That's a whole MONTH past Thirty, so THERE WILL BE HOTNESS.

ETA  Starting weight: 158.5. That's a half pound more than I predicted last week, which isn't bad since the only form of exercise I've had in a while is helping my mother push a piano six feet across the living room. 8.5 pounds to my next goal. New progress sidebar on the left. Here we go!

Enough already

This is just to say that Monday? We are back on.

After a month or so of Hemming and Hawing over goals and focus and wanting to do things the right way but still caring mostly about what size I wear, I've decided to chuck it all and go back to what works. Which is picking a number and fixating on it. I KNOW I KNOW I KNOW that is an Unhealthy Perspective and all that, but the truth is that I still have weight to lose and all this rainbow and unicorn stuff about "Running a 5k!" and "Feeling good about myself!" is just not doing it. I already feel good about myself. And the 5k thing, well, we can talk about that. (Maybe. Can I watch TV?)

And since the whole Being Vague About The Numbers thing was really starting to grate on me a while back (seriously, that's too much adding and subtracting for an English major) I'm just going to come out and say: Hello Internet, I weigh 158 pounds. I think. It's been a few days since I stepped on the scale.

My pre-pregnancy weight was 163. Stomach flu kicked me down a bit farther and I didn't gain all of it back. Stomach flu also seriously interrupted my treadmill/30DS routine, so much that I haven't even attempted the Shred since getting sick. (And am now trembling at the thought of Jillian. Although did you think she was extra super nice this week on the Biggest Loser? Like perhaps she felt like a shmuck the week before? Maybe she DOES CARE?) I've stuck a few runs in here and there, but today, for example, Molly started howling 15 minutes after I started. It doesn't always work.

Monday is the day I get going again. Monday because 1) Monday is my old weigh in day and helped keep me accountable over the weekends and 2) we're spending the weekend with my parents and that means Treats Everywhere and naptimes spent catching up on my library stack. Monday is the day I get my butt back in gear, Monday is the day I start to fixate on 150. That's 8 pounds away, and a number that I last saw in junior high. 150 is totally realistic, totally doable, totally within my power and I CAN DO IT. Monday starts a new progress sidebar on Hot By Thirty. See you then!

I should probably just start a new category called PANTS

When I dragged myself down to the treadmill this afternoon I saw a box propped up against my door. (Note: my front door is made of glass. It's like a big empty picture frame. For, uh, four years now I've been meaning to buy a shade. Oops!) I figured it was some sort of Electronic Equipment, the kind of thing my husband purchases online while I am half asleep, but NO. It was a package! For me! From Elizabeth! Containing seven [SEVEN!] cds full of Songs To Run To!

Elizabeth wrote a very inspiring post on how to start running. That combined with the series of running posts I found here (and wow, am I late to that party!) kind of kicked my butt into gear exercise-wise, but I STILL have yet to try running outside. [Hangs head in shame.] That one day I said I was going to do it... yeah, that didn't happen. I'm SKEERED!

But now I have running music, which is good because I have very little in the way of Running Music and even if I had a lot, the administrative garbage I have to wade through to load anything onto my iPod is discouragement in and of itself. (Something about not sharing iTunes, networked computers, different iPods, legality BLAH BLAH BLAH.)

You know what else I have? RUNNING PANTS.

Oh yes. I took myself on a therapeutic run to Target this evening (and I am NOT JOKING about the therapeutic). There were necessities on my list, yes, but when Phillip took Molly out of my arms and clucked sympathetically, saying, "Take as long as you want!" you BET I was going to take as long as I wanted. I've been through the housewares/clothes clearance racks a time or two lately and tonight decided that I'd sniff through the work out section. You know. Just see what kind of moisture-wicking spandexed kind of life I could be leading.

Apparently it is hot pink. Which is fine by me, you know, but not with spaghetti straps or teeny tiny skort thingies. YEAH RIGHT. I'm not hot YET, Target. I examined every rack of yoga pantsish things, but found nothing that looked right. But when I wandered into the unmentionables section there were a million more racks of work out pants and I struck gold.

I should note that I have a few pairs of yoga pants/work out pants already. I have real yoga pants, but they're all too long for me so the hems are ripped or otherwise ruined, the waists are either too big or stretched out, and when I try to run in them they fall down. I have a pair of stretchy Reebok capris my mom gave me when I told her I was taking yoga many moons ago, but those are actually too big now. And my super soft cropped pants from Lucy are torn and worn out. Because I [hangs head in shame AGAIN] wear these things every single day. I mean, sometimes I put on real pants (and I always put on real pants when I go out, SNIFF) but to wear around the house? Do baths and lunch and diapers and stories? Pants a step up from "pajama" will do.

Which is how I justified buying three pairs (THREE. PAIRS.) of yoga/work out pants at Target tonight. I only meant to buy something I could wear on the treadmill, but all three pairs fit in the dressing room and I thought: MIGHT AS WELL UPDATE THE UNIFORM. I bought a pair of tight stretchy capris with a white racing stripe on the sides, a pair of gray sweats that end at my knees (I'm thinking I'll wear those if I ever get the you know whats to run outside this spring/summer) and a pair of PETITE yoga pants that I wouldn't be embarrassed to wear to a friend's house on a playdate. Who knew they made PETITE! (I am not petite, by the way, but juuuust short enough so that regular pants are always an inch too long.)

I have heard that Lululemon makes To Die For Yoga Pants, pants that negate getting oneself a butt lift (which: how?) but I've also heard you have to take out a second mortgage to buy a pair. So it's Target me for me. I'm thrilled. I swear, it's like I bought myself a new wardrobe. (BECAUSE I DID.)

I ran a little more today and I'm relieved to note that a week of stomach flu has not put me back at the beginning. (Although I'm pretty scared to Shred. Sigh.) And I spent half an hour on the phone cursing The Baby Weight with a friend. This would be the same friend who was horrified at her Nine Months Pregnant Weight without realizing I was a full 25 pounds ABOVE that weight and NOT PREGNANT. So, you know, my sympathy is limited. But she's also the friend who hissed, "BETRAYAL!" when I told her I'd started Chubby Girl Slow Jogging. We talked a while about starting from scratch. You know- figuring out what to eat and how to be active when you haven't done either of those things well in a long time. Or ever. I relayed the Gospel of Jillian Michaels, we discussed jogging strollers, shoes, back pain, milk supply, all that stuff. And it felt awesome to be the one who's already doing it, you know?

(Okay, sort of. Elizabeth also sent me a giant bag of jellybeans and COME ON IT WAS A PRESENT.)

Keepin' on keepin' on

Anyone still here? This site has really taken a hit from my self-imposed Internet Fast. My other website takes precedent most days, even though I think of something to post here nearly every day.

Okay, here are the stats:

I exercised last on Saturday. Not YESTERDAY, a WEEK from yesterday.

Jack got sick on Monday. I got sick on Tuesday. Phillip got sick today. I didn't start feeling like myself until yesterday afternoon.

My attempts to stay low-carby made me feel worse. So I've been living on dry Cheerios and bananas. One night I ate plain white rice for dinner. I had some graham crackers. A pizza crust. This week of Carbo Loading lends further evidence to my [own!] [personal!] [not at all scientific!] theory that carbs are not my friend. I can't have just one graham cracker, you know what I'm saying?

And I have gained 2.5 pounds back from the seven I lost overnight.

Today I'm back into my old eating habits and I just forced myself into a half hour on the treadmill. It was surprisingly easier than I thought it was going to be. But the next time I Shred I think I will probably die. And I 'd been doing it so consistently the two weeks before I got sick! BLAST.

The confusion I have from my What Do I Do Now post still stands. I do need to switch my mindset to a place where I'm focused on, say, fitness goals and not a number on the scale. But since I still CARE about that number and would dearly like to see it shrink, switching my mindset hasn't exactly worked. And I'm a lot more motivated to drop a pants size than I am to run a 5k.

So let's not think about it! That's the default strategy, anyway. Let's talk SHOPPING!

I packed up 7 or 8 pairs of Too Big Pants last night and dumped them in the plastic storage bin with my maternity clothes. My Too Big Pants include fat pants from before I was ever pregnant, transition pants I bought after both kids and a few pairs of pants that fit until just recently, and I'm tired of hiking up the saggy posterior region. Aaaand I don't have much left over. I have two pairs of jeans that fit. I am not really the kind of girl who needs 14 pairs of jeans (and if I did I'd probably wear the same two over and over anyway), and you'd think that a stay at home mom doesn't need more than two pairs of anything anyway. But AU CONTRAIRE- a stay at home mom is constantly being dirtied by her children and is always behind on the laundry. I NEED MORE THAN TWO PAIRS.

I also surveyed my summer stuff when I was putting away the Too Big Pants. Ugh. A lot of it is the right size, a lot of it I still like, but a lot of it is Work Appropriate stuff I'll never wear, or just, you know, OLD. I WANNA GO SHOPPING.

Which brings me to a very important question. So far HB30 has been focused on weight loss. Eye on the prize, all that. But "skinny" does not a hot girl make. What else do I need? This morning when I was getting ready for church I realized that I need to replace, in no particular order: shampoo, conditioner, moisturizer, mascara, blush, my favorite shade of eyeshadow, and this "brightening" powder that I love. And by replace I mean the containers are EMPTY. I'm thinking I need to cash the tax refund and head to Sephora.

I'm also thinking about what I want to do for my birthday and, at this point, the festivities most likely include (but are certainly not limited to!) Dressing Up And Going To Dinner. Which means 1) a dress 2) hair I like 3) makeup that is not expired 4) shoes with heels 5) a bag and 6) some fun bling. I know for a lot of people that adds up to Average Saturday Night, but I don't think I need to explain to you people that I DON'T GET OUT MUCH. And when I do get out I am wearing one of my two pairs of jeans, a t-shirt, a pair of Privos and the red down vest I've been wearing everywhere because I hate all my coats.

What is YOUR 30th (or hypothetical 30th!) birthday plan? What will constitute the hotness?

My storied running past

I have about 400 things I want to say about running. Thoughts on your comments, thoughts on other posts I've read, thoughts on thoughts I've had since I wrote last, ETCETERA ETCETERA. But first I thought I'd tell you about one of the most humiliating moments of my life thus far, because I think it will tell you where I'm coming from with the running thing.

It starts like this: I ran cross country my sophomore year of high school.

(You: DROPPING DEAD OF SHOCK.)

I suppose "ran" is putting it a bit forcefully. Let's amend that to: I was on the cross country team my sophomore year of high school. I was by no means a worthwhile addition to the cross country team, but I went to the practices and I went to the meets and, two or three times, I actually ran in the races. (Again: "ran" is not quite the appropriate word.)

I was new in school. Lots of people were new. This Air Force base in northern Italy was doubling in size due to some sort of nearbyish ethnic strife that I, quite honestly, was oblivious to. There were so many Americans sent to this corner of the world that the town quickly ran out of housing. People were living in pensiones, smaller temporary apartments, until houses opened up. My family, being too large and not high ranking enough to quickly get into a regular house, lived in a pensione for about six months. It was a two story house- one family on the top floor (ours) and another American family on the bottom floor.

Carlos, the oldest child in the family underneath us, was, for a long time, the only friend I had. He was a good looking and friendly guy, a year above me in school. I'm not sure we would have been friends except for the fact that we were the only Americans we knew in our town. You weren't allowed to drive here, even if you were 16 and had a stateside license. You couldn't drive until you were 18. And with so many people living so far away from the base (I knew people who lived closer to Austria) there wasn't much of a social life outside of school. Unless, of course, you played sports. EVERYONE played sports. This was my problem- I didn't catch on to this phenomenon until it was too late. If you didn't play sports you had to go home on the regular buses as soon as school was over. If you played sports, you stayed after school for practice and then took an "activity bus" home.

I was too insecure, introverted and intimidated to join a sports team. I wanted to play basketball (I'd played the year before at my old school, even though my new school had totally mercy-ruled my old school in the regional tournament the year before and I was TERRIFIED), but basketball was a winter sport. The fall sports were volleyball and cross country and I 1) had never played volleyball in my life and 2) had no idea what cross country was. So I intended to sit it out and be my fearful lame no-friends self until basketball rolled around and hopefully some of those girls would take pity on me and be my friends.

But Carlos was on the cross country team and he thought I should join. "We run!" he said. "That's all there is to it! You don't have to know anything, you just have to run!"

"How far?" I asked.

"5k."

"Five what?"

"About three miles," he said. And I choked on my Fanta and blew him off. I mean, COME ON.

I was bored, though. And sad. I didn't like this new place. Carlos thought I needed something to do. "Join the cross country team!" he kept saying. "We need more girls. We could really use you."

I kept laughing at him until he told me that if I joined the cross country team I could go on trips to places like Milan and Rome and Naples. Well. WHY DIDN'T HE SAY SO?

So I joined the cross country team, way after the deadline for participating in fall sports, even though the coach, a Mr. Wickkiser, clearly understood that I was not a runner, not even close. I now wonder if I filled out the team so that the other girls' scores would count in the races? Maybe I did fulfill a purpose!

The girls on the volleyball team were incredulous. I'd gotten to know a few of them, and later they would become My Friends, the girls on the basketball team. Some of them were real athletes. We traveled with them and I watched their matches while I sat in the gym stretching for the cross country meet. As I watched those volleyball games I knew I'd made a mistake. I could have learned to play volleyball. It actually looked super duper fun. I might have had FRIENDS had I joined the volleyball team. I should have just sucked it up and been brave and tried out. Instead I was stuck on the cross country team. RUNNING.

And OH. MY. GOD. I was a sucky runner. I am certain Mr. Wickkiser spent a lot of time coaching the other kids, who were actual runners and good ones, but with me he adopted defeated sighs and half-hearted smiles. I remember running inside on a treadmill when it was raining, but mostly I remember running on an endless trail through corn fields right outside the base. We were told to start here and end there and no one was around to see what you were doing in the middle. I ran a little bit, sure, but I didn't know what the hell I was doing. I got tired. I walked. I didn't know when or how to push myself. I didn't care. I knew I had no business on a RUNNING team. After a while I decided that the way I would get through this horrid season of cross country would be fulfill the Cheerleader Role for the other girls and live up to my Not A Runner status. No one expected anything of me, so I didn't expect it from myself.

I think I only ran two races. The last race was the big one, with all the schools. Usually no one was around to watch the cross country team, but we traveled with the volleyball teams and this was regionals. EVERYONE would be there.

Including my best friend from sixth grade. We'd gone to the same school in Sicily, and when that base closed, she moved elsewhere in Italy and I'd moved to the island in the Atlantic. I was excited to see her, even though we didn't keep in touch anymore, and she'd become some kind of Sports Star, as tall skinny girls are wont to do. She was on another school's volleyball team and I was looking forward to catching up with her after all this silly athletic stuff was over.

So then I was running my race. Thank God there was another girl just as slow as me, and we kept each other company for most of the race. We shrugged at each other when the girl who eventually won lapped us. And I wasn't too crushed when my new running friend pulled out ahead of me in the last few minutes, but that meant I came in last. LAST. At the huge giant cross country race, watched by all the cool volleyball players and my sports star former best friend. Not only was I last, I was really last. I think I've blocked out how long it was between first place and last place because it was THAT BAD.

The worst part was that my former best friend didn't even really look at me. We didn't hang out after that. And she never wanted to talk to me later in the year either, when our basketball teams would face off. I used to think she was ashamed to be seen with The Girl Who Was Last. I have different ideas about that now, but at the time I was mortified. Humiliated. Never ever ever going to act like I could run three miles ever again. 

Mr. Wickkiser gave me his relieved blessing when I informed him I would be playing volleyball the next year. I'd made a few friends during basketball season and I knew how things worked. And would you believe I was good at volleyball? I wasn't tall enough to spike or fast enough to set, but I always got the ball over the net and I loved going to practice. I had the best time, and I didn't forget to root for the girls on the cross country team. I'd hang out at the finish line after my match and think, "My God these girls are INSANE. Three miles! Ridiculous! I will never ever be the kind of person who can do that."

A few days ago, before the stomach flu hit, I ran two and a half miles on my treadmill. And I was ready to keep going if Molly hadn't woken up from her nap. It's a silly high school story, a much more dramatic impact in my memories than hammered out on a blog, but the fact remains: I never thought I'd run one mile on my own, because I wanted to, much less three. And I'm almost there.