Day 16: Seeing Progress

Hello day 16! Woke up today feeling really lean so I decided to step on the scale. 146.2 pounds. YAY! I have been bloated for the last five days, so it feels good to see abs this morning!

This morning’s workout was Chisel Agility. I won’t lie, this is my least favorite workout of the program so far – not because it is a bad workout, but because I REALLY miss lifting weights. This is the only workout in the program that uses no equipment. Thankfully, this time around, I knew what to expect so I could prepare myself for a high impact cardio workout. I found myself wanting to quit about halfway through the workout. This is the downside of at home workouts – you have to be self-motivated. When you are in a group fitness class, if you stop or walk out early, everyone sees you. When you are at home though, no one knows. If you shut off the workout 5 minutes early, no one knows. If you decide to lay on the couch while your least favorite move finishes up, no one knows. I am guilty of doing both of those in the past! Right when I wanted to quit, Autumn said something that really resignation with me. She said, this workout is really hard, but you know what else is hard? Living life in a body you don’t like.

How true is that?! One of my favorite quotes is, “Being fat is hard, losing weight is hard, maintaining weight is hard. Choose YOUR hard”. It is all hard. Before I ever gained my weight, I used to think that being overweight was taking the easy way out. They didn’t have to workout, they could eat whatever they wanted, etc. But, once I became overweight, I realized how wrong I was. I would argue that being overweight is harder than losing weight and harder than maintaining weight. It is really freaking hard to live in a body that you hate, to look in the mirror and not even recognize yourself, to lose your breath walking up a flight of stairs, to rip your jeans because you gained weight, to not be able to find clothes that fit, to be self-conscious, etc. That right there is harder than any workout. A workout is hard for 30-60 minutes or so. Living in a body you hate? Well, that is hard every second of every day. Personally, I will gladly sacrifice those 30-60 minutes a day to live my life in a body I love.

When Autumn said that this morning, it gave me the energy to crush the rest of my workout. The remaining 15 minutes in the workout was worth it to be because I was reminded what I was working towards. I never want to be 215 pound Jess ever again. I was feeling so good after my workout that I decided I wanted my husband to take some progress pictures for me. I have a love/hate relationship with progress pictures. I look in the mirror each day and this sounds so conceited, but I am literally in awe of my body. I may not have six pack abs, but for me, I am in the best shape of my life right now and it blows me away. I see abs, my obliques are getting more toned by the day, my shoulders are getting rounder and my legs are getting tighter. The problem is, I don’t feel like the camera reflects what I see in the mirror. Maybe I have a skewed self-image of myself or something, but I just feel like my progress looks way more impressive when I look in the mirror than when I take a picture.

When I looked at the pictures my husband took and compared them to my before pictures, I won’t lie, I was bummed. I thought my progress would have shown way more than it did. Someone on my Facebook page quickly reminded me that this progress is only two weeks. The changes I am seeing ARE significant for that short of time. I need to be patient with myself. This program isn’t 16 days long, it is 60. If I am feeling this good after 16 days, I have to think about how incredible I am going to feel after 60 days. So, rather than getting down on myself, I am celebrating how incredible I feel and all the little changes that I can see.

I am starting to stress a bit about this upcoming weekend – Christmas Eve, Christmas and then another Christmas celebration two days later. What does this mean? Three days of temptation within a four day period. Food Addicted Jess says – INDULGE! ENJOY! WHO CARES! And In Control Jess says, GIIIIIRL, you have worked WAY TOO HARD to go nuts this weekend! I am sure you all think I am nuts, but these are the internal conversations I have been having with myself all week. I am sure most of you are thinking I should treat myself because a cheat meal won’t kill me. But, if you read my blog yesterday, then you will know that I really struggle with having a little bit of something. I am usually all or nothing. If I go off plan, I don’t just kind of go off plan – I go WAY off plan. I don’t trust myself to have a little. I wish I could, but I have been down this road one too many times before and the outcome is always the same.

I don’t plan on bringing my own food to these get togethers, but I do plan on staying as on plan as I can by finding out the menu ahead of time. That way, I can plan on which containers I need to save for dinner. I will not be sitting at Christmas dinner with my containers and measuring out everything I eat. But, I will be watching my portions the best I can. Once I know what dinner is, I can then plan my day around that to make sure I am not going over too much on anything. All I know is, I need to be really careful so I can stay on track. My husband and I made an agreement that we would not be going out to eat while we are off work until the new year. I am so thankful I have his support and he is willing to do this program with me!

I feel way too good to over indulge right now. I haven’t felt this lean in my entire life and I am not about to let a Holiday ruin that for me! It is possible to celebrate a holiday without gorging myself with food!

Chisel Agility