Back to 50 - bittersweet

I'm finally back to 50 pounds down from my highest weight. I'm super proud because I've lost 30 pounds since checking in at Fitness Ridge on 9/25. But it's also bittersweet because I lost 65 pounds last year and gained most of it back in the first half of this year. So I'm losing what I already had lost last year. But oh well, can't dwell on that! Gotta stay focused on the long term goal - which is still 75 pounds away BUT if I stay on track, I will hit my goal on my birthday next year. Maybe, just maybe, if I end up moving back to Chicago next year, some people won't recognize me. :) Maybe, just maybe, New Orleans is time away for me to focus on me.

I'm super duper excited that next Thursday I'll get to make my first trip back to see my friends and family!!!! Seems like just yesterday I left them, but I've been here now for 2 1/2 months. I'm trying so hard to get so see everyone because my trip is pretty short. AND I want to make sure not to lose track of my health goals so I'm really going to try to work out while I'm there and not eat horribly. It's going to be an interesting balancing act cuz a girls gotta get her drink on one of those nights! :) If you're reading, can't wait to see you all. The countdown is ON!!

Shame on you, US. Really.

I've been meaning to post this for awhile....these photos are from Us magazine a month or two ago. They make me so upset! I can't believe that a national well-known magazine got away with this. I don't mean to be up on a soap box, but really? These are the role models we have for women and young girls in this country? They should be ashamed.

Look at this picture of Kelly Ripa. She is so obviously emaciated. Here's what the tag says - "I try to do a variety of exercises," a CUT Kelley Ripa tells Us.

I know I'm not the healthiest person in the world, but I sure don't think this is a healthy ideal.

It gets better. Later in the magazine, they talk about the "struggle" celebs go through to keep their FAB figures. In case you can't read the text, I typed it out below.

Elizabeth Hurley - The former model, 45, who once said she went to bed hungry to stay slim, also has a spartan start to her day. "I swear by almost nothing for breakfast," she tweeted August 24. "Mugs of hot water!"

Amanda Seyfried - The Dear John star, 24, sticks to raw food to maintain her shape - not that she likes it. It's "sort of awful," she has complained. "Yesterday for lunch? Spinach...and some seeds."

Kristin Bauer - What sucks more than vampires? For True Blood star Bauer, 36, her diet. "The other day I realized as long as I'm in this business, I'm going to be hungry," she admitted.

Julianne Moore - Her secrets to a movie-ready body: a "boring diet of, essentially, yogurt and breakfast cereal and granola bars," the actress, 49, has said. "I hate dieting...I'm hungry all the time."

Man (or woman) down!

So I've been doing pretty well since I got home from Fitness Ridge. I'm down just over 20 pounds since checking into the resort on 9/25. But when I stepped on the scale this morning, it said that I lost nothing over the past week. Not too worried about it because I don't think I have the best scale and I know I was good with eating and working out in the past week. But this weekend I'm not doing anything much physically. At work on Friday night I passed out. It was so weird and embarrassing and has never happened to me before. I know I had eaten enough, so it wasn't that. I hit my head pretty hard a couple times on the cabinet behind me. So I've got a few bumps and bruises and I'm still not feeling great. I don't want to push it by working out, so I'm spending my day off today on the couch. Trying to fit the doctor in sometime tomorrow on my lunch break. I just want to check everything out and make sure all is good.

But I do feel like I have changed my lifestyle. I'm actually bored by sitting on the couch today and want to get out and do something. Before, I would be more than happy to sit on the couch and eat bad all day. I think twice (or more) about what I eat and the eating out is getting a little bit easier. Although, since I'm in a new city by myself, it's somewhat easier in a way because I don't go out too often and I have the time to work out. I know what it's like to have someone (in the same city) to push you to do your best and it's great. But I also know what it's like to have negative health influences and the only one of those here is myself at times!

I was looking at the Fitness Ridge Facebook page today and I really, reallllly want to book my next trip. Some of the people I was there with are going back next September. But that's going to be pretty bad timing for me. And I'm nervous about using a week of my time off for FR when I could use it to travel and see my friends/family. But who knows, I'm sure I'll get in there at some point! :)

OOOOPS!

My bad - I totally forgot to put my results on the last post! I lost a total of 14 pounds in two weeks (which was actually I guess 12 days when you think about it). I don't have the sheet but I think between the chest, stomach and hips I lost about 8 inches or so. I've been home for a full 24 hours now and I have slacked a bit on the working out, but I've been full force getting everything organized. I went grocery shopping and tomorrow I'll be making yummy meals for the work week - honey mustard pretzel coated chicken fingers, sante fe cheesy chicken stirfry, stuffed chicken cordon bleu and exploding chicken taquitos. Apparently I was on a chicken kick?? I didn't even realize that they were all chicken dishes until just now! They are all hungry girl recipes. For anyone that doesn't know hungry girl - go to hungrygirl.com and sign up for a free daily email. You'll love it, I promise. And they have cookbooks with all delicious healthy meals....I loooooove me some hungry girl. :)

I haven't worked out, but I bought a new DVD that hopefully I can do in my small living room. And I bought a swim cap (I know I'm an old lady) so I can do laps in the pool on the roof of my complex (stop laughing about the swim cap, the water is really chloriney). AND tomorrow I go for a trial kickboxing class at a martial arts place...can't WAIT! Well, I think that's it! Just wanted to update with my results :) Night!

Last Biggest Loser Blog!

My bad, forgot to blog yesterday....was too busy trying to pack in the dark so I didn't wake up my roommate. Yep, I'm going home a day early...sitting in the airport now waiting for my flight home. Here are the highlights from yesterday and today:

Woke up at 5:30 yesterday and did kickboxing. LOVE IT! Still. Then finally got to go on the Camelback hike (after a yummy breakfast). I've been wanting to go there since I got to the resort. I was beginning to think we weren't going to go! The hike was great because it's a little bit of everything. You go through sand, you climb lava rocks, you climb big, tall rocks and you get a great view. Our poor little hiking group dwindled down to 3 people by yesterday after starting with about 10. Lots of injuries or people preferring to walk on pavement. How could you not want to hike through the mountains and prefer to be on pavement??? I could hike all day - as long as we got breaks! :) Here are some pics:

In the vortex - a big hole that usually you can climb down into but the rain hasn't dried up yet so we couldn't go in. But you can stand at the top and take cool shadow pics. That's me in the middle with my 2 fellow hikers and 2 guides. We tried to think of something cool to spell out and tried to spell LOSER but it looked ridiculous. Apparently we are not very bendy. ;)

Looking down to the 2 other hikers while I climbed up the camel's back. They didn't want to go up! The view from the top was amazing, as always.

Me and Lauren at the top of camelback. WOOOOT!

Then we walked over to what they call the dinosaur back. You can see it in this pic, although it's hard to see.

When we got over there, we hiked around the whole thing. The entire time we hiked around the dinosaur back, this little chipmunk or squirrel was at the tip top of one of the rocks watching us.

Last hike together! This is when we got back to the resort after the hike...with our guides Kendall and Lauren (the absolute best and 6 months pregnant!!!)

After the hike I was supposed to go to a class but I missed for the first time. I ended up on the phone and computer changing my flight and shuttle to the airport so I'd get home a day earlier and have another day to myself. Then we had lunch (I had scrambled eggs because the sloppy joe was definitely not what you would consider sloppy joe. We joked that maybe it was sloppy jack, sloppy joe's little brother). After lunch I did a zumba class (I suck) and two pool classes that got way too competitive! I thought I was gonna get myself in trouble with some of the people that were being giant jerks at one point. Anywho, then we had dinner (I had cereal because I tried the salmon and it was too fishy for miss picky) and we just hung out talking. It was nice to sit around and meet some new people or get to know existing people a little more. We don't have too much time for that normally since we go to bed earlier than 90 year olds. I wish I had taken the time to get to know a few people a little better. :( But the whole experience was well worth it. I can't wait to get home and go grocery shopping, cook and figure out my detailed plan to stay on track. Thanks for reading, everyone!!

Day Eleven - Thursday

The rain is over, the rain is over! This means we went back to real hikes today with real views and real rock climbing....wooooooot!!

It sounds like everyone was feeling a little lame-o this morning....probably from all the dreary weather we've been having. So when I got to the gym late (at 6:45) not a single soul was there and no one had been there yet because the lights were off! A few people were in an aerobics class, but not too many people stirring early today! We had breakfast (I opted for cereal) and we got the good news about the hike. My knee was again hurting (not much improvement from the acupuncturist) so I was a little nervous about hiking but I'm nearing the end of my stay so I sucked it up and went. It was a gorgeous hike....it was rough on my knee but totally worth it.

The menu:

See that mountain and the tiny spec on the top right? There is a rock there called the piano rock. We were up there :)

The view from "up there"

The butterfly rock

After the hike, we had Stretch class...always love that! Then of course, we had lunch. I looooved the mushroom soup. Surprised, aren't ya? Miss Picky loved the mushroom soup. After lunch we had to go back to the world of lectures (for those of us who are leaving this week). It wasn't too bad, it was really about how we are going to adjust when we get home and trying to plan for our new lifestyle. Then we had treading class - you should join us at home for treading Thursdays by the way!! I'll be doing it every Thursday when I get home. So easy - pick a cardio machine, warm up. Push yourself your hardest for 5 mins and then cool down for 5 mins. Do the same for 4 mins-3 mins-2 mins-1 min and then another 1 min and you're done! So easy and great for your heartbeat. Then we had a pool class (in the SUN - yay!) and then we were supposed to do a ball class but I stayed in the pool for another class. Felt better on the knee after hiking and doing treading. For dinner we had stuffed peppers (below, I did not like) and a vanilla pie with strawberries in it (ok). Now time for Grey's!

The stuffed peppers

Zee pie

Out evening lecturer (isn't she the tiniest thing on earth???)

Day TEN - Wednesday

"I wasn't make to break." That was part of the very last song they played in the gym today. Well I didn't break, but some things are hurtin'! Yesterday I was having pretty bad pain in my knee, but it was something I could work through. Today when I got out of bed, the pain was a lot worse. It's a sharp pain, which I learned today is probably indicative of a muscle tear. Hopefully that's not the case because that means pain for the end of the week and a trip to the doctor when I get home. So anyway, I hit the yogalates class at 6am. Again, I had trouble doing the yoga move that are hard on the knees. Then we had breakfast - it was DELICIOUS!!

After breakfast, they announce which hike you're doing for the day. I had decided that if it was a pavement hike, I wasn't going because of my knee. Then they announced that our group was doing....STOP SIGN again. That sealed the deal - I wasn't going. It would be way too hard because at least the last half is straight uphill on pavement. So lucky me, I got to spend two hours in the gym this morning. Then we were supposed to have a pool class but big surprise, it was canceled again due to the weather so we got to do - even more cardio in the gym!! WHOOHOOO (sarcasm). Hehehe obviously my attitude sucks today! :)

Then we had lunch - beet soup and BBQ chicken pizza. Soup was icky and the pizza was OK. Sorry, no pics...forgot my camera. Then at 2:30 we had......drumroll......POOL CLASS!!! The rain let up long enough for us to get our class in, but it was freezing. Still, I was glad to not be in the GYM anymore! Then we had my fave - kickboxing class. They totally got a bunch of video shots of me in that class. We'll see how that turns out! And finally we had mountain class. (Pick a machine, increase every 3 minutes 12 times until you're at the top of the mountain.) I did the bike, but was def having trouble with the knee. After, we had dinner - a cafe salad which was more like a taco salad with a soft tortilla. That was yummy. Again, forgot the camera. And finally, after dinner I had my acupuncture appointment (see pic below!) My friend Ann had it yesterday and said it helped her knees. So here's to hoping! Catch you tomorrow...

Day Nine - Tuesday

Today was ehhhh. It's still raining like crazy with insane lightning and some flooding. It's making me a little depressed! Or maybe I feel depressed because it makes us have to spend more time in the gym!! Hope the rest of the week is nicer. Oh, the temperature also dropped by about 40 degrees. Whereas it was 100+ last week, this week it is in the 60s at most so far. Boo. Anywho, here's how today went (sorry, my only pics are of food cuz there was nothing else to take pics of!):

Woke up at 5:30am, hit the gym at 6am (cardio). Breakfast and then the hike. PS breakfast was delicious - the english muffin was so tasty and we got almond butter to spread on top. Due to the horrible weather, they had to change our hike. We got this lame hike on pavement that was full of GIANT hills and valleys. We walked about 7 miles and I got blisters on my feet because I wore my hiking boots (scared to get my gym shoes wet, but it didn't even rain on us!). It was pretty difficult. When we came back, our group had pool class. It was FA-REE-ZING! The pool is heated but your shoulders, head, etc are always out of the water so it is cold. And when I say heated, that doesn't mean warm. But the rain held out on us for this class. All afternoon pool classes were canceled (including our afternoon class). After pool, we had lunch. The soup was ehhh and the pita was delish.

Then we had our 3 afternoon classes - a cardio class that kicks your butt, a "total toning" class that works everything with weights, a weight bar and a stepper, and a circuit class that was added because pool was canceled (yay). I ended up walking out of the toning class. I couldn't do a lot of the moves due to my knees hurting. Then I ended up getting really frustrated with the instructor because unlike the other trainers, she didn't make me feel like it was OK to do a modification or not do something. I started getting really down and frustrated so I walked out and went into the gym and did the treadmill. Oh well. Other than dinner, that was pretty much it for us today. For those who are interested, I did wear my calorie-counting watch and chest strap today to see how many calories we actually burn. Looks like I burned about 4000 calories between 5:30am and 5:30pm. So maybe 5000 or so for an entire day. :)

Day Eight - Monday (again)

There's no nice way to say it. We got our asses handed to us this afternoon. Although I think Ann and I chose to kick our own asses for part of it. And as my Uncle Mike said, there's less of my ass to kick this week. :) So I have a new roomie - Laura from Seattle. She's super nice but she brought the rain with her! We have had horrible thunderstorms all day (this is part of why we got our asses kicked). Here's how it went:

We got up at 5:30am and did the OPTIONAL yogalates class. I think it's great because it gets you stretched out before you have to go on the hike. Then we went to breakfast. Breakfast was the frittata which looked wayyyy too heavy to be digesting during a 2 hour+ hike. I opted for cereal again. Here's some pics:

Da maaaa-nuu:

Da frittata

Da cereal (it's good, I promise)

Then we went on our hike. We got a new group this week and I think we kept up pretty well with each other. But then we saw that they're changing our group for the rest of the week so who knows. The hike was through what they call a wash. There's some sort of lake and then there is a damn and locks that hold all the water out. But at this time of year, there's not even enough water in the lake to let water through the damn. So we got to walk through this area that basically is a type of river when there is water in it. Hard to describe. Plus it had rained all night at morning so it was wet and sandy and slippery (the only time of the day it didn't rain was during our hike, what luck!) Here's some photos:

This is what the terrain was like some of the time:

Through the wash...

Hiking through "slots" in the walls

Ann pushing apart the rocks!

Some of our group that climbed to the top of a big rock. Not sure what that one girl is doing :)

When we got back from the hike, we had Stretch class (always awesome after a hike) and then lunch. Lunch was chili with cornbread and was PERFECT since it was cold and rainy out.

After lunch, Ann and I didn't have to go to the lectures so we decided to hit the gym. It was nice - no one else was in there and we did ALL of the circuit machines and also did some cardio. This is where we may have been overachievers because then the storms got worse and they canceled the pool classes. Pool is 1-2 times per day and is important because it's still a great workout, but it is much easier on your joints. Since pool was canceled, they gave us 2 of the hardest cardio class back to back after we had a Core class that kicked our butts. Yeah, we had to do the same class TWICE in a row - and by the way, it includes pushing yourself over the top on cardio AND doing the circuit (which we had already done that day once before). By 5:15pm when everything ended, we were dead to the world. But it felt A-W-E-S-O-M-E. I feel way better than last week, much stronger. I can't wait to kill myself again every day this week and get the most out of this week that I can! Have a great week, everyone.

Day Seven - Sunday

And on the seventh day, she rested. Today was "going home day" for Stacy, Ashley and Kim. But luckily we met our new Chicago friend, Ann, so we will be struggling through the next week together. It was tough to see my girls leave. :( I think it's hard because I don't know when I'm going to see any of them again. Hopefully soon enough! So there's not much to tell today - the girls left and we were supposed to hang around and no nothing today so that's pretty much what I did. I watched the Sox game, floated around the pool on a float for awhile, hung out with Ann and now I'm watching the Bears. Sorry it's not more exciting! OH! I should tell you the girls' results after their weigh-in. I'm not sure how much they'd like me to share so I'll just say that one lost 6 lbs, one lost 8 lbs and one lost 9 lbs (one week). Way to go, girlies!! Here's some pics from the day.

All the food was OK today :)

Last group pic before the girls left:

Here they go.... :(

One final goodbye...

Annnnnnd they're gone :( booohooohoooo.

Day Six - Saturday

Last chance workout!!!! OK, so no one screamed that at us today but it was our last day of the week for working out. Today started with breakfast - it was a granola cereal that I thought was really yummy, especially with a sliced up banana in it.

Then we had an option - hike for 2 1/2 hours or do cardio for 2 1/2 hours. It was suggested to do the cardio if you think thats what you'll do at home. But since I have another week here, I figured I'd do the hike and get some scenery - the long cardio can wait til next weekend. No one in our group of friends did the cardio, we all opted for the hike. The hike was a push for me, but there wasn't any climbing or much incline so it wasn't as tough as any of the other hikes. The guide said I went about 7 miles (everyone went at their own pace). When we got back from the hike, we were supposed to choose between a pool class (pool volleyball) or another cardio class. Kim and I made our own option and took a bike ride. I haven't ridden a bike in sooooo long, I was scared! But it was like they say, it came back naturally and we rode for about 50 minutes through the beautiful area surrounding the resort. Here's some pics of Kim on the bike and of Stacy and Kim and Ann in the pool slackin' off.

After that we were D-O-N-E with working out for the week. YEEEEHAAAAAW! We had lunch after that - the soup was good but I didn't like the wrap. I ate the tortilla and the pieces of chicken. After that we had about a 5-hour break! Stacy and Kim went shopping at a place down the road. I started watching a movie but fell asleep for a bit. We hung out for a bit after that until it was time for dinner. It was nice to actually get dressed in normal clothes and put on some makeup because after dinner we had the graduation ceremony for Kim, Stacy and Ashley! Dinner was a tamale and it was SOOO good. Everyone loved it. Then they showed us a video - if I hadn't already mentioned it, there is a videographer here and he films us. It's not very often but he gets little clips of all of us in the classes and the pool and sticks them together into a great video. Very entertaining. You'll have to visit me in New Orleans to see it :) Orrr I guess you could see Stacy, Kim or Ashley's. After dinner we did a little shopping in the gift shop here and took some pics. We also got t-shirts that say I SURVIVED THE BIGGEST LOSER RESORT AT FITNESS RIDGE. Wooot!! Here's a pic of dinner and some pics of us. Oh, PS there was some sort of big sand storm here - the last pic is me being VERY SCARED of the tumbleweed and sand blowing through our hallways. :)

Day Five - Friday

We were cave dwellers today! Another great hike with great views. And it was especially great for our group of 4 girls because everyone made it the whole way - that was great.

Breakfast was a parfait. I got there later than everyone else and they all said they hated it. Tons of substitutions in the dining room today. I had eggs again, which was fine because it was one of the higher calorie breakfasts for the parfait. Sorry, no pic of the parfait or the eggies.

Then we had our hike - it was called Boy Scout Cave. Here are some pics. :)

Kim at one of our resting points after climbing up some really steep rocks:

The inside of the cave. Inside there was an opening that had lots of sunlight coming through:

The hiking group for the day:

Looking out of the cave:

After the hike we had Stretch class - love it, especially after a hike. Then we had lunch, which was parsnip soup (OK) and a caesar salad (pretty good).

After lunch we had lecture and those of us staying til next week had a separate lecture. There were only about 15 of us in the room. We had to go around and say what our biggest accomplishment was for the week. A lot of people got pretty emotional about what they've gone through. The staff told us that it was normal to cry at least once a week and that many people cry every day. They said if you haven't cried, don't be afraid to let it out! I thought "Crap, I haven't cried yet, muster up some tears!" I know I will be sad on Sunday when the other 3 girls leave. It was so nice to see them and I'm getting reminded of the fact that I'll be going home alone and to my lonely lil' apartment. It was a little weird to move somewhere and live there for 3 short weeks and work for less than that before going on a 2-week vacation. I'm sure I'll be fine, but that has definitely been weighing on my mind a bit. :( I'm glad we met a friend here, Ann, and she is from Chicago too! She is staying one more week so we'l get to hang out next week.

After that, we had 3 classes (cardio circuit, kickboxing and a pool class). The days are going by much faster, but everything is still very tough! After the classes we had dinner (BBQ turkey burger which I didn't like (sense a theme?) but everyone else seemed to). Then we had NO LECTURE after dinner - awesome! They set up a movie for us on a screen outside. We went there for a bit but them moved over to one of the little pool cabana areas to chitchat. That's about it! Tomorrow we'll be hiking again and then the 3 other girls will go through their graduation ceremony. Hope everyone's having a good weekend - have some drinks for me! :)