06/24/2013 @ 06:19pm (PDT)

So much for healthy!

 

One of the guys from work frequently brings in bread and other items from local stores that is about to be past its expiration date.  They have to take it off the shelves and he belongs to one of a few local co-op type groups that collects and donates this food.  After he gets some for his family and the local donation, he brings some for us at work – I haven’t bought bread since I’ve been here thanks to him!

 

Anyway…

 

Today he brings in these awesome looking granola rounds.  They are about the size of a Little Debbie Oatmeal Cream Pie (told you I was fat!) and look good.  They LOOK healthy – Oats, almonds, raisins, things like that.  All the good, healthy things, right?

 

WRONG!

 

For this little “healthy” snack, there are 427 calories, 24 grams of fat, 5 grams dietary fiber, and only 9 grams of protein.

 

Just for a little comparison, an Oatmeal Crème Pie is 430 calories, 21 grams of fat, 1 gram dietary fiber, and 3 grams of protein.

 

So much for healthy!

 

Now, I’m not a big “clean” eater, but I do eat a lot cleanER than I have been. 

 

Every morning I have a juice – I end up drinking half of it for breakfast, half of it for lunch.  I’m not 100% sure how to accurately calculate juice calories, so I just based it on the fruits and veggies.  My juice has JUST over 400 calories in it – If I take all the veggies and fruits and add them up, it comes to 416 calories.  I ESTIMATE just the juice is about 300 calories.

 

What this means:

 

This “snack” is more than I eat for breakfast AND lunch EVERY DAY.  My “snack” is typically 10oz of grapes and later in the day, I have some veggie straws.  Those TOGETHER total 230 – And that’s for TWO snacks. 

 

This is just one snack.

 

People assume because they see “clean”, “protein”, “granola”, etc that it means they are healthy.  Don’t go by what is SUPPOSEDLY healthy – Read the labels and know what they mean.

 

SIDE NOTE: I recently had Subway for dinner and the local chain is now selling “gluten free” brownies.  I, of course, didn’t read the label and decided it must be healthy because it was gluten free.  Nope: 350 calories and 16 grams of fat.  That’s more calories than a 6” Sweet Onion Teryaki sub (without cheese) and less fat than an ENTIRE 12” Sweet Onion Teryaki sub (without cheese).  Needless to say, I’ll be reading my labels.

 

I’m not perfect, but considering I try REALLY hard to stay under 35 grams of fat a day, this “snack” is more of a meal to me, and I guarantee it won’t fill me up.  If I want a higher-calorie, more filling “snack”, I think I’ll stick with my cup of Greek Yogurt with a bit of almond butter in it – It tastes as close to cookie dough as healthy can get and is SUPER filling.

 

Just thought I’d share my findings…

06/22/2013 @ 3:32pm (PDT)

Another note shared on FB:

 

Well...FINALLY got my lazy butt out of bed and did my workout. Still wasn't able to walk at 2.5mph much, but did get over a mile in.

 

Six days of working out, three hours total, over six miles, over 700 calories. Not too shabby!!!

 

Still have a long way to go but DAMN good considering the first time I did this, I could barely walk a 1/2 mile in in a half an hour and I was too sore after two or three days of working out.

 

If i can keep it up another week, I'm going to aim for working out for 40 minutes a day and also aim for walking more at 2.5mph. I'm also STILL determined to work out when I wake up in the morning, but I can't quite get out of bed to do all that yet. I'll get there! :)

 

I'm still in the market for a heart rate monitor to see how much I'm ACTUALLY burning during my workouts - I have a feeling the calorie counter on the treadmill is not completely accurate.

On the diet front, I'm doing AWESOME! Have gone over a bit on calories twice this week - Once by 250, once by only 30 - But considering the limit I have is 1700, I'm not kicking myself TOO hard. With the exception of Subway, we are still NO fast food. With the exception of my BBQ straws and a frozen meal every now and then, we're also eating a LOT cleanER than we have been. The juicing is AWESOME. I'm so glad I decided to do it 7 days a week - It'll help me keep on track on the weekends, which is where I struggle the most.

 

We ARE going to be a bit bad tonight, but that's also why I've pushed myself so far this week. (No no, we're not going CRAZY and having a whole day - Those days are done. Just a cheat "MEAL". There's too many good places to try around here NOT to have one.

 

Still staying of the scale at LEAST until next week. MAY try to convince Jeff to take some measurements so I can see how I'm doing there, but, I can tell from Also when I first started, I would fit into my workout clothes but they were SUPER tight. I put them on today and they are LOOSE. I can SEE progress, even if that stupid scale doesn't tell me what I want to hear.

 

Thank you thank you thank you all for continuing to be my biggest cheerleaders, even when I don't do as good as I should. I am committed to making a LIFESTYLE change, but it's going to take a while and I will fail at times. I'm still REALLY working on learning to like exercise (because I freaking hate it) and REALLY learning that it's okay to have a "treat", but it needs to be SMALL.

 

I'll DEFINITELY get there.

06/19/2013 @ 07:03pm (PDT)

Well…It’s been almost three weeks since my last update but THANKFULLY I have some GOOD NEWS this time!!! 

 

This was a post I made on FB on June 19 at 7:03pm:

 

So...It's taking a bit of bravery to share this because I'm ashamed of where I started, but you're all my friends and super supportive and I'm proud of how far I've come, so I'll share:

 

When I first started working out on the treadmill in April (the first time), I struggled to walk just 20 minutes at 1.5mph. It took me almost 45 minutes (if not more) to walk a mile and I RARELY walked that long - I usually did a half a mile. I NEVER walked faster than 2.0mph and I was "running" at 3.0mph

 

Now, my third time around trying the treadmill workout, I seem to be sticking with it fairly well: Today, I walked 1.12 miles in my half an hour - That's an average of 2.24mph!!!!

 

This is the farthest distance I have walked in the shortest amount of time since starting. To top it all off, I walked at 2.5mph FOR TWENTY MINUTES.

 

Now...Granted...I about died from an asthma attack afterwards, but WHILE I was doing it, I was fine. :)

 

This is my record, but putting it in perspective, ALL week I've been walking at about an average of JUST under 2mph - That's a 1/2 mile

 

I've still got a long way to go and I'm still "slow", but I'm making progress and that is ALL that matters to me.

 

Thank you all for the continued love and support!