Went to the Movie Today

I took my son to the movie today since he had no school. It was right around my lunch time and I just knew I had to be smart so I didn't mess up.

I am proud to say that I packed a tuna sandwich and a bag of 100 calorie Smart Pop popcorn and smuggled them into the theater in my purse. Since I ate the tuna sandwich first, I was satisfied with the small helping of popcorn. Had I not prepared myself, I would have had at least a medium butter popcorn and a big box of chocolate candy.

So, if I do say so myself.... I done good!

Oh yeah! We went to see The Water Horse. Both my 9 year old son and his 45 year old mother enjoyed it so I give it 2 thumbs up!

Week 2 Weigh In

This morning was weigh in time and ... drum roll please.... we are down 7.2 lbs this week as a team! Bringing our 2 week total to 18.8 lbs!

• Tim - lost 4 lbs
• Robbi - lost 3.2 lbs

I have to admit. I was a little disappointed with the 3 lb loss for me, but then I thought about it. I had a great week. I didn't feel deprived. I actually enjoyed the food I ate and savored the flavors more than I usually do. Plus, I thought about the contestants on Biggest Loser on TV and how they work their butts off all week long exercising and sometimes they don't have 3 lbs weeks. So, I got over myself and chose to be happy about my loss!

I have a tendency to want to reward myself when I have a good weigh in week. I remember when I went to Weight Watchers with my Mom and cousin we would always go pig out on weigh in night. Afterall, it didn't count because the week was over and the new week didn't begin until the next morning! No wonder we never succeeded for very long! So today, I thought perhaps I'd eat a lunch that was a little more than I should. I managed to stick to ordering something decent though when I ate out with a friend. Then I had to go to the drug store. I thought, surely I deserve some candy, cookies, some chips or something! But, I'm proud to say, I thought about it and made a choice not to eat something like that... no matter how good it sounded! I came home and popped myself a 100 calorie bag of popcorn instead. A MUCH better choice!

I know I can do this.... ONE choice, ONE day, ONE pound at a time!

I hope you had a successful week too!

God Bless!
~ Robbin

First Place

Tonight my husband and I added another aspect to our weight loss effort. A new class just started at our church called "First Place" so we decided to go to it. It's a Christ-centered health program for men and women of all ages. Using a support system that incorporates Bible study, Scripture, prayer and balanced eating and exercise plans First Place provides the opportunity to change your life, not only physically but spiritually and emotionally.

Being Christians, it only makes sense to look to God for help in this area of our life too. I look forward to sharing this study with my husband and adding another way for us to support and encourage each other. Plus, there are several other women in the class that I know and we can encourage each other as well.

I chose not to get on the scale there though. I figured with my husband and I weighing at home and sharing that with each other, there was no reason for me to get on the scale there too. Also, I just didn't want anyone there to know how much I weighed. Besides, that would be a night time weigh fully clothed and my "official" weigh in is on Tuesday mornings as bare as I can get!

To Be Fat Like Me

So here it is Sunday, and if I do say so myself, I am pretty happy with myself this week. I've made good choices for the most part and although I've been tempted many times, I have avoided giving in to it. Well, except for last night.... when I remembered the chocolate chip cookie in a tin that Santa had left me in my stocking. I ate it. I'm not going to lie. It was good! I counted the calories in my day though and although it wasn't a good choice, it didn't kill my calorie intake for the day.

Although today isn't the "official" weigh in day, I did step on the scales and I was happy with what I saw. We'll see what carries through to Tuesday and I'll let you know then.

I find that watching the food network isn't a good idea right now so I've tried not to watch too much of that. I do get inspiration from watching shows like Biggest Loser reruns, National Body Challenge, etc... so I watch those when I can. Last night I also was up real late and I watched 2 fat movies on Lifetime; "To Be Fat Like Me" and "Queen Sized". Both dealt with issues that I relate to because I grew up the fat kid in school and grew up into the fat adult. Although I've had a couple of times that I've lost weight and not been obese.... and it was in those times that I truly realized how differently I was treated as a fat person. I hate that more than I hate the fat.

Do you know it's possible to be 300+ lbs and be invisible? I've noticed that when I'm fat, salespeople, bartenders, etc. can't see me standing there waiting to be waited on. If they do see me and actually acknowledge me, it's not with a smile. However, if you're not fat, they actually smile at you and jump at the chance to help you. What's up with that? Why can I stand at a counter and no one "see" me until someone else walks up beside me and then I get waited on after they are acknowledged?

Do you know that adapting to the change of how people treat you after you've lost weight is a huge issue? Something you might want to start thinking about and preparing yourself for now.

Anyway, let's not close with that downer! I've had a great week as far as my eating goes. But, I've been so sedentary and tired... not a good thing. I have a doctor's appointment tomorrow and I"ll be talking to her about how I've been and what I might do to help my tiredness.

I hope everyone had a great week and I look forward to reporting my weight on Tuesday. I'm trying to get my husband to actually write something for this blog but I haven't had any luck so far. Maybe soon!?

Official Weigh In Day

Since we started our Biggest Loser Challenge on Jan 2nd, today (the 8th) was official weigh-in day for us.
The results....

• Tim - Lost 7 lbs
• Robbin - Lost 4.6 lbs

That's a good week in our book! Granted, I would have loved to see more gone, BUT, I am happy with the loss. This was without much exercise at all ... but I plan for that to be better next week! I'm really proud of Tim, although I knew he would lose more than me - he's a man afterall!

PLUS - we did better than most of the teams this week! Were those some low weight losses or WHAT?!

I hope you had a great week too! Share your losses as comments below!

Walking

Yesterday was a good day food & exercise wise. I was proud of all the choices I made. When my son was at Karate, instead of sitting there on my big fat butt just watching, I decided I'd do some walking. So, I'm at a little strip mall area and the Karate place is near one end. Looking at the strip mall, I'm thinking it's at least 1/4 mile from one end to the other so I take off walking the sidewalk in front of all the businesses. There are TWO things I discovered while I walked:

1. It's not 1/4 mile long - only 1/10! It sure looked and felt longer! :) So, of course, I had to make several laps in order to even get 1/2 mile logged.
2. In that little strip mall, there is a BBQ restaurant, Sub Shop, Chinese restaurant, Japanese restaurant, Pizza parlor, Indian restaurant & a Seafood restaurant.... Oh yeah, and not too far away right there in the same parking lot is the Outback restaurant!!!

Here I am, trying to do something healthy, and the whole time I'm walking I'm smelling this menagerie of delicious aromas wafting from all these restaurant's kitchens! I trudged along though and didn't let it tempt me. I have decided though that as much as walking while my son was in Karate is a good idea, that location is not a good idea because sooner or later I would give in to the temptation and eat a pizza or something!

So, I was thinking - why do gyms have to charge so darn much for memberships? What about those of us that just want to hop on a treadmill for 30 mins or so a few times a week? So, after having that conversation with my friend over breakfast this morning (1 egg & 1 pc dry wheat toast) I got home and found a special offer in my mailbox that a local gym is offering. It was just the deal I was looking for so I couldn't pass it up - so, I joined the gym with a full 2 year membership for only $200! The only stipulation is that I can't come on Mondays or Tuesdays. I can handle that! Plus, it's women only - and I like that too.

So things are looking good right now. I'm feeling good about what I'm doing and where I'm heading and even though my husband and I don't work out together (he has free gym at work), I fully intend to get busy at the gym. (Now, ask me next month how that's going!!)

Busted!

I waited until my husband went to bed last night and I ate some M&M's that were left over from Christmas. Truth is, I've hit them everyday this week - just not eating near as much as I normally would. However.... he apparently heard the bag rustling and came out and made me 'fess up to what I was eating! I'm glad he busted me. He gave me a mini lecture and asked me what role I wanted him to play in this endeavor. He wanted to know whether I wanted him to give me a hard time or just let it go.

The fact is, there is one thing we have always done well together... and that is eat and enable each other. We've always brought something "good" home for each other when we wanted to bring a smile to each others faces. It's really sad sometimes. I think it's time we enable each other to eat right and exercise.

Today was a good day as far as food choices go. I am very happy with the choices I've made so far. Thought late night is toughest for me. I have some fruit ready for then though. I am not feeling 100% though and I don't know whether it's because I'm not eating as much or if I'm a little sick or maybe a little of both. I just feel very weak and chilled, so I spent half of the day asleep (on and off) on the couch. I need to start making a point to take my vitamins daily rather than sporadically. I also take B-12 shots and it's time for that too - so maybe that will help some.

Tim has had a good food day too. He's in heaven right now watching his team playing in the Playoffs - GO JAGUARS! He talks more to the TV during one game more than he talks to me in a week I think!

Oh yeah, Tim and I were both independently curious this morning and we both weighed for the first time since we started. Our weigh in day is supposed to be Biggest Loser show day. Anyway - we were both pleased with what we saw so far. He has lost 6, I have lost 4. We'll take it!

Wedding Anniversary

Today is our 11th wedding anniversary. Of course, we decided to go out and eat to celebrate our anniversary. The delima was, were we going to be good or were we going to enjoy the dinner? We ended up at Outback and I had Alice Springs Chicken with steamed veggies. Tim had Chicken, rice, veggies and salad. Both were much better choices than we would usually make. I was pleased with my choice and it was REALLY good. I honestly don't think I have enjoyed a dinner there before as much... even the veggies (which I normally don't eat!) were delicious! It's amazing what happens to the taste buds and brains after they are deprived of sweets & carbs for a very short time. Now, if I could only remember how good that dinner tasted when I want to make a poor choice I'll be doing good.

On the exercise front, so far I've done nothing today. Even my pedometer is wondering what's going on because I've logged so few steps, I'm embarrassed to tell you what they are. We are aiming for the 10,000 steps but I haven't come close yet. Tim is at 4,429 today. I work at home, so unless I go somewhere or exercise, my steps are ridiculous. Being that we live in Florida and the fact that it's COLD right now (I know - cold to me is probably shorts weather to you Northerners reading this!) I haven't been walking the past few days. To be honest, I'd rather walk in 100 degree temps than walk in 30 deg temps. I despise the cold! I'm going to do some crunches, stretches, jumping jacks & push-ups here in a few minutes though. Gotta get my husband motivated to do it as well.

Okay - so here we go!

Today marks the first real day of our diets. Overall I did pretty well with my food choices. The biggest error I made (that I always make) is that I didn't eat breakfast. Then I got busy and didn't eat lunch. Then the next thing you know, it's 3:00 in the afternoon and I'm ready to eat whatever I can find. I ended up at the drive through of Taco Bell and ate 1/2 of a chicken quesadilla.... 260 calories. Once my son got home it was off to Karate so we were out at dinner time too and ate at Woody's. I am proud of the choice I made there though. I had a tossed salad with light dressing and a small smoked chicken thigh. Later in the evening I ended up eating the other half of the quesadilla and a little Chex mix. I know that was a bad idea.... but I promised I was going to be honest here so I'm telling. Overall though - not a horrible day.

When we got home, I told my husband we were going to do some exercises. We ended up not really doing them together though like I would have liked. I gave myself a small goal - 3 push-ups, 5 sit-ups and 10 jumping jacks to start with. The push ups were as tough as I expected. I ended up doing 10 crunches instead of full sit ups and then what came next, really surprised me. I thought the 10 jumping jacks were going to be easy, they weren't though. In my mind, they were going to be a breeze. In reality - I couldn't get my feet up off the ground... literally. But I did the 10 as best as I could while my 9 year old son watched, counted and laughed just a little. He's my self-appointed personal trainer. Once I was done with that little bit of aerobic exercise, I did some exercises with my elastic band thingy. Just some bicep and tricep stuff. Again, I was surprised a how easy my left arm wanted to give out. It felt good though to work my muscles.

You see... inside... I'm a closet, wannabe, weight lifting, running, biking, athlete!! I hope the athlete finds it's way out. I figure, if my older sister can get addicted to going to the gym and working out as well as running everyday after being sedentary til she was about 45.... so can I! Wish me luck!

Day 1 for this Biggest Loser Couple!

It's January 1, 2008 and my husband and I have decided to join in on the Biggest Loser Million Pound Match-Up. We have watched Biggest Loser since the first show and every week we sit here and watch it while eating Dibs ice cream bon-bons or eating something else equally as fattening. We sit around and joke about how we eat while we watch - all the while wishing we would really get serious about losing weight.

Tonight, just before the show we put on clothing as equally as revealing and embarrassing as what they make them wear on TV. You know, tight shorts and sport bras for women.... showing every roll, bulge and stretch mark. How embarrassing! Well, I only had to do it in front of my husband while he took a photo, but that was hard enough. Then he put on a pair of shorts and I took his photo.

The question is now... do we put them online and share them with whoever finds us here or do we keep them private? For now - private because he doesn't even know I've started this blog yet... and I'm not so sure he'll go for it.

Also, as hard as this is to write, I will log our beginning weights....

Tim - 261
Robbin - 341

Yeah, as you can see, I am quite a bit bigger than him. I have always been very overweight. However, Tim hasn't. When I met him in 1994, he weight 185. He never had an excess pound on him until he met me. So I kinda feel responsible.

We didn't actually START the diet today - the official start date is tomorrow, Jan 2nd, 2008. They are also doing a Biggest Loser contest where he works too, so he's going to be being watched by more people than just me.

I'm hoping we can motivate each other to eat right rather than enable each other to eat wrong ... as we most often do. I am also hoping we can motivate each other to start exercising together. I watch what they do on TV and know that I would be a big sissy and never make it past day one with Jillian. Sometimes I can feel their pain and think they are just going to keel over and die the way they work out! I don't have the time or resources to workout like that anyway - but I do plan to start a walking regimen, do sit ups, push ups and jumping jacks to start. Then we'll see where it goes from there.

Stay tuned to learn more about each of us and how we got where we are today and how we do as we work towards a more happy and healthy life together!

We'd love to hear from you - especially if you're joining in the Biggest Loser challenge. Leave us a comment and we'll be sure and respond!

Biggest Loser - Million Pound Match-Up

MSN and NBC’s “The Biggest Loser” Team Up to Launch “The Biggest Loser” Million Pound Match-Up

Starting today, Americans will have the opportunity to team up and compete in a nationwide effort to lose over 1 million pounds.

REDMOND, Wash. — Jan. 1, 2008

Who:

MSN Health & Fitness and NBC’s “The Biggest Loser” today announced “The Biggest Loser” Million Pound Match-Up, a challenge to America to lose 1 million pounds during the course of the show “The Biggest Loser: Couples.”

What:

From Jan. 1 to March 11, 2008, Americans will have the opportunity to register with a workout partner on BiggestLoser.msn.com and compete in “The Biggest Loser” Million Pound Match-Up, inspired by NBC’s “The Biggest Loser: Couples.” Participants will be able to test their fitness knowledge and receive expert fitness advice from “The Biggest Loser” trainers Bob Harper and Jillian Michaels as well as from MSN Health & Fitness experts, and will have the chance to win daily prizes. Using Windows Live Spaces, participants can document their weight loss journey, connect with other participants in their area and help support each other in a virtual community. The top five teams will win a trip to Los Angeles for NBC’s “The Biggest Loser: Couples” finale, and the winning team will get a luxury fitness trip for two and a personal trainer for a year.

Why:

To help inspire and motivate Americans, MSN Health & Fitness is teaming up with NBC’s “The Biggest Loser” to launch “The Biggest Loser” Million Pound Match-Up to help provide a setting where Americans can join with a partner to lose weight and have fun while they do it.

Where:

Participants can visit http://biggestloser.msn.com to review full rules and details and sign up for the sweepstakes. Representatives of MSN and “The Biggest Loser” will be touring five cities— Chicago, Houston, Miami, Wichita, Kan., and Mesa, Ariz. — to help raise awareness of obesity in the United States, promote the sweepstakes and encourage Americans to participate.

About MSN and Windows Live

MSN attracts more than 465 million unique users worldwide per month. With localized versions available globally in 42 markets and 21 languages, MSN is a world leader in delivering compelling programmed content experiences to consumers and online advertising opportunities to businesses worldwide. Windows Live, a set of personal Internet services and software, is designed to bring together in one place all the relationships, information and interests people care about most, with enhanced safety and security features across their PC, devices and the Web. MSN and Windows Live are offered alongside each other as complementary services. Some Windows Live services entered an early beta phase on Nov. 1, 2005; these and future beta updates can be found at http://ideas.live.com. Windows Live is available at http://www.live.com. MSN is located on the Web at http://www.msn.com. MSN worldwide sites are located at http://www.msn.com/worldwide.ashx.

About Microsoft

Founded in 1975, Microsoft (Nasdaq “MSFT”) is the worldwide leader in software, services and solutions that help people and businesses realize their full potential.

Note to editors: If you are interested in viewing additional information on Microsoft, please visit the Microsoft Web page at http://www.microsoft.com/presspass on Microsoft’s corporate information pages. Web links, telephone numbers and titles were correct at time of publication, but may since have changed. For additional assistance, journalists and analysts may contact Microsoft’s Rapid Response Team or other appropriate contacts listed at http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/contactpr.mspx.