Slow and Steady

Mandy:

Sorry I haven't updated in awhile, things have been busy. I'm happy to report that I am still on track with my running and I haven't missed a day yet. Thankfully, the weather has cooperated thus far and I haven't had any rain or storms to interrupt. Last week I lost another 1.2 pounds, which brings my total lost to 4 pounds in two weeks, not too bad. I'm of the opinion that starting out slow gets my body used to the new routine and then I can build on more as my body gets stronger. I'm still working on setting up a strength training program (well my wonderful husband is drafting it out for me so I'm very thankful for that!! Thanks Hun!!!) so that should be ready to begin this coming week.

I've fallen off the wagon a little bit with the eating this week so I'm going to jump back on and be sure that I'm tracking that a little better because it holds me accountable and I find that I eat less when I'm writing it all down. I'm also going to work on a master schedule for this upcoming week for workouts because I foresee it possibly being a tough week just due to the fact that we have A LOT going on, so no excuses here, planning is key!

It's all mental

Ryan:
I was going to write about injury this week, but I decided to hold that off for a week because a more appropriate prelude presented itself tonight. I had a tough day of workouts: mile intervals early this morning, and lifting arms & back this afternoon. Add to that a cloudy, super-humid day and you have the recipe for lethargy; by about 5:45, I was on the fence whether I wanted to go swim laps or take the night off. And I almost did, until one thought popped into my head.

"It's all mental."

I had to say it a few times over to the pool, and I know it's a pretty cliche epiphany, but it was like a bolt of lightning that snapped me out of my torpor. It's all mental.

Now, that's not to say that I didn't have a pretty low energy level. I'm saying that our energy level, our motivation, our ability to simply get up and go is nearly all psychological, based on drive and willpower. Despite the fact that I was fatigued, nothing physical was keeping me from heading out: I had gas in the car, no broken limbs or crippling disease; I was conscious and able. It's just at that moment, I (nearly) allowed myself to ignore all of those things for any number of other excuses as to why I'm not able.

Even when I got to the pool, as I'm "relearning" how to swim distance, it was a matter of mental toughness to push out a few extra crawl lengths before switching to breaststroke (I was a fairly competent swimmer in my youth, but I haven't swam laps in nearly 13 years and my aqua-stamina is pretty poor). I was able to do 3 blocks of 100 yards crawl this session, compared to 1 last Friday; some of that is improved conditioning, most of it was just deciding to do it.

If there's anything that will keep me going through the remaining 8.5 weeks, it's remembering that it's all mental--the fatigue, the soreness, the pseudo-injuries, the lethargy or apathy. In our lives, we tend to construct an enormous amount of artificial barriers: not enough time, too tired, don't know how, sore, injured, self-conscious, and so forth. But the only true barriers to acting is if you're captive, comatose, or compost.

Next week, I'll go into one of those mental barriers, pain (in the form of injury) and how I forge on despite having (not suffering from...) plantar fasciitis, runners knee, and a strained shoulder.

Pass the Cheese, Please

Mandy:

I started the food log this week and I've learned a few things about my eating.

1. I love cheese! I probably eat 2-3 servings of cheese on a daily basis, mostly for snacks with crackers or an apple. It's contributing to quite a few grams of fat and calories so I'm going to have to work on cutting down on my cheese intake. I know it's protein but I need some high protein, low fat alternatives....maybe low fat cottage cheese can replace my beloved cheese.
2. No more chips! I love just one small little helping of chips with my sandwich at lunch but after totaling my fat intake on the day I had chips for lunch I've decided that once in a blue moon chips will be allowed. One serving has 10 grams of fat, though the calories aren't sky high, I definitely don't need 10 grams of fat in one component of my lunch. I'm going to look into some alternative lower fat chips but in the end I'll be saving those for my "off" days.
3. I eat less! I've found myself thinking about having a snack because I'm bored and I've decided to find something else to do because I don't feel like "writing it down" on the food log. Keeping a food log definitely makes you think about what you are eating and makes you question whether or not you are really hungry or if your food of choice is nutritionally a "good" one.
4. I stress eat! Yesterday I had quite a few snacks and I attribute that to the fact that I was stressed. I wasn't hungry but found myself in the kitchen looking for food. At one point I just said, "screw it, I'm going to have another granola bar." Not because I was hungry but because I was stressed that all I heard all day long were babies crying and being fussy. This isn't a new discovery, I've always known that I was a stress eater. I did even try to replace exercise with eating but the baby cried, rather screamed through our whole walk, but it's definitely something that I'm going to need to work on.

I'm going to keep up with the food log because it's a really great tool for monitoring different aspects of my eating and later this week I'll be writing an update on how my goals are going.

Week 1, Check

Mandy:
After week 1 I am still totally on the wagon, yay!!! At our weekly Sunday morning weigh in I had lost 3.8 pounds which was 2.68%, so technically if you round that percentage up, Ryan and I lost the same percentage of weight. If you ask him though I was "kicked off" this week because he lost .02% more than me :) I'll give him this weeks "Biggest Loser" title though because he worked his butt off, WAY TO GO RY!!!!!!!

So, as for my attempt at losing those 3.8 pounds I pretty much monitored my food, wasn't quite into starting the food log yet, and then ran my 6 miles, three days of 2 miles each. I did consistently run faster than my 12:10 goal that Runner's World set so rather than redoing the plan I'm just going to adjust the times.

Goals for this week:

• Start food log- just because I'm curious and Ryan did already set up the Excel spreadsheet so I'm going to jump on board.
• Complete my three running workouts, this week I run Tue/Thur/Sun and Tue and Thur are 2 milers and Sun is my 3 miler
• Add in some extra cardio workouts
  
• Add in some strength training workouts- two 30 minute sessions, one targeting lower body and the other targeting upper

Onward to Week 2!!!!

Week one done!

Ryan: Well, it's the end of week one, and I'm only the slightest worse for wear. At the weekly "weigh-in" (cue Allison Sweeney...), I came in at 187.6. That's a 5.2 pound loss, or 2.7%. I'm going to attribute a majority of that to fluid balancing, as I've been sweating a lot and eating only a moderate amount of salt. Mandy says I look thinner too, which again I attribute to fluid, as well as not being all bloated from sucking down a smorgasbord of food all day. I'm sure I lost a real pound in there somewhere.

As I expected, though, life really got in the way of consistently eating, watching portions, etc. Between the anniversary dinner and some friends' birthday picnic, I had a couple of heavy eatin' days. Hopefully, the other days balanced them out and I was able to work enough off.

One thing that I think I've gotten solidified in my head is that there are still 9 weeks to go--I'm actually content being patient and working through the goal. This perspective, though, has the unintended benefit of reminding me to go in relative moderation: my biggest hurdle this week will be the achy runner's knee I developed about 2/3 through last week's bike session. I am the kind of moron who really believes that if I'm not limping, it's fine, but I have a nagging thought in my head of the cartilage in my knee being shaved off like deli meat (and the heel spurs from my PF...). So, it does help a little to remember that I can't lay myself up just a week into it. RICE, RICE, baby!

Upcoming workouts for this week: running (mile repeats at the track...), swimming on Friday, maybe Wednesday too, and some easy biking depending on the knee. And TWTh on the cage, and perhaps some yoga/tai chi, too.

I Need to Ramp it Up

Mandy:
As you can see Ryan is doing awesome and well I'm just doing okay, well maybe even less than okay. I'm eating a blizzard from Dairy Queen right now and had On the Border for dinner, so maybe failing miserably is a better term. Actually, realistically I'm not doing that bad because I have a few firm beliefs that I think are important for sticking to a plan.

• Allow yourself one day per week to eat things that are normally indulgences or high in fat/calories so that you don't get frustrated and have cravings that make you want to throw the whole plan out the window. Today was one of those days. I planned dinner with a friend and knew that it was going to be a high calorie evening. I'm not the type of girl who sits with my calorie book at the restaurant and obsesses about what I'm going to order. I eat in moderation and leave food on my plate when I'm full. Enjoying my meals is very important to me.
• If you know you are going to have an event to attend that will be high in calories/fat then tailor your other meals accordingly. I so wanted to eat a snack this afternoon when I was out and about but I didn't because it was just about time for dinner. I didn't want to add in extra calories before dinner when it was just a half hour away. Instead I drank water to get hydrated and curb my hunger. You do have to be careful though to not overeat if you are going to wait. I also had a lower calorie breakfast/lunch so that my dinner and dessert wouldn't totally ruin my week.

Things I'm going to work on:

1. I am going to get a bit more diligent in figuring out the nutritional value of my food and put together some breakfast/lunch/dinner menus that I can choose from so I can just prepare a meal knowing exactly what the nutritional value is and then keep reusing it each week.
2. Cross train! Right now my 5K training program only has me running 3 days per week. I want to add in 1 extra day of running and then 2 days of walking. I also want to work in at least 3, thirty minute weight training sessions.
3. Be consistent with my running. So far I've two days this week and my mile time is supposed to be an easy pace of 12:10. I have run too fast every mile, which isn't necessarily bad, but I would like to be more consistent. I want my miles to all be around the same time rather than one fast and then one slower. I run again on Sunday and I'm shooting for both miles to be around 11:30.
4. Plan my upcoming week. I'm the type of person who works best if my workouts are written in my daily planner and scheduled into my week. I'm going to take time to plan out my exercise for this upcoming week so that I can visually fit in my three runs, cross training and weight training.

4 days and I fell off the wagon.

Ryan: Well, not really, more like the wagon broke down. It was the first case of life getting in the way of the plan. Thursday was the first day in the routine where I didn't have a 2-a-day workout. On most days, I'd run or cardio in the morning, lift midday, and then (eventually...not there yet) yoga/tai chi or something health promoting in the evening. Thursday, I only ran in the morning and did not lift, and that really has an effect on the nutrition schedule.

Adding to that is the fact that Thursday was our 4 year anniversary and I was cooking a pretty hearty gourmet meal, wine included. So, not only was the routine disrupted, it was very possible that we'd be eating a high-calorie meal on only one workout. Plus, it's hard to grill gourmet on a warm summer's night without a tasty Samuel Adams Summer Ale to cool you off.

Fortunately, the calorie count fell within the average dataset...amazingly (though I fear that I'm underestimating wildly). And I think this speaks volumes to the value of measuring food and calorie counting...despite what all of those fitness experts say about calorie counting being useless or tedious.

Here's my method, and it only takes a couple of tools:

1. A digital kitchen scale. Invaluable. I keep a bowl on it, zero it out, and before anything goes in or on, I jot down the weight.
2. Measuring spoons: 1 tablespoon and 1 teaspoon, for adding dry ingredients like flax, wheat germ, sugar, etc.
3. Measuring cups: a 1/2 cup and a 1 cup, plus a 1+ cup liquid measuring cup.
4. A spreadsheet software program to record and do the math.
   

So, using just those 4 tools and looking things up on Calorieking.com, I'm capable of figuring out exactly what I'm eating at any moment. Now, bear in mind that I'm not "calorie counting". I'm simply measuring out what I want to eat so that I can calculate the nutritional value (fat/carbs/protein) and calories in it [although, this does have the side effect of realizing how much you're consuming and may lead you to cut back].

One additional thing that makes this easy is establishing a food routine. I tend to eat the same quantities of the same foods, so recording amounts/values is as easy as a cut and paste. If you absolutely must eat something different each day, this will be exponentially harder, but in a given week, you will probably use the same ingredients (likely in the same amounts, too).

Example: I'm pretty routine for breakfast. I usually have a bowl of Special K with 2-4 oz of assorted berries (whatever we have available, 1 oz of each kind); 1 cup skim milk; 1 cup carrot juice; 2 eggs (either scrambled with cheese or soft-boiled on a sandwich thin bun) and 2 oz of half-and-half (my vice) in the coffee. All I have to do every morning is cut-and-paste the info I already looked up and I know what my breakfast is worth.

Now, if you cook recipes or meals without nutritional information included, you can still calculate the calories from each individual ingredient, and dividing by portion size (nutritional values don't significantly change with cooking).

So, doing that for the past week, and knowing that if I snack, I need to record that too (and look it up!), I've been able to have daily calorie consumption of 2100-2400 calories. Now, I'm a believer in the scientific/mathematical side of nutrition, so I used an online calculator to figure out my approximate basal metabolic rate (the calories my body needs simply to live and nothing else) to be ~1900 calories. Figure I burn ~300 calories lifting, anywhere from 300-600 calories on running/cardio, and who knows how many other calories chasing kids and living life. And there is easily my calorie deficit...

So, I'm not terribly concerned with celebrating my anniversary with a glass of wine and some sour cream sauce over cornbread stuffed chicken. As long as I'm diligent about keeping track of portions, it'll even out over the long run.