This morning the scale reading toggled between 221.2 and 222. In utter disbelief I must've stepped on at least five or six times to make sure that I wasn't just seeing things, but it was to no avail. The reading stayed the same and I was suddenly faced with an all-too-familiar decision: get angry, curse the scale and throw in the towel all together or keep moving forward in spite of this setback. I've chosen the latter.

I won't say that I didn't feel angry or disappointed after this morning's weigh in because I did. I really did. With the exception of not being able to work out so far this week I've done everything else right by following my diet plan and getting my water in. How that merits a 4.4-pound gain in two days is beyond me. I seriously don't get it.

But, I'm moving ahead. I refuse to allow this momentary setback to stall my progress. Over the past thirty days I've lost a solid 4.6 pounds which, at the very least, is more than what I lost in March. So I'm getting there. It's proving to be more difficult than what I originally anticipated, but that's okay. Turning back is not an option for me. I'm up for the challenge and I know that if I keep striving towards my goals, I will reach them.

It's time to look ahead to May. And in my case, May stands for exercise. I don't care whether it's walking, jogging, Turbo Jam, Tae Bo or any other form of exercise. The point is that for one hour, four days a week I need to be doing something.

I'm also taking down my numeric goals list because it's just not working for me. According to the initial goal chart I set out for myself, I should be 200 pounds by now. Constantly being reminded of the goals I haven't been able to reach isn't doing me any favors, so I choose to focus on goals that I can control, based on the effort that I put into reaching them.

Tuesday

1. This is a three-day work week for us since we're off Thursday and Friday for Labor Day. I am so excited about having a few days off from work. As far as I'm aware this is the last national holiday we'll have for a good while, so I intend to make the most out of it.

2. It looks like May is going to be another intense month full of activities, particularly on the weekends. After the youth retreat I was selfishly looking forward to having a quiet, relaxing few days just to spend with Chechu, but since then those plans have changed. Two of my American girlfriends will be coming down to spend this Friday-Sunday with us here in Almería, and I'm looking forward to spending time with them. Surely going to the beach will be among the main weekend highlights :)

3. I'm really have no direction as to where this post is going this morning (hence the random, numbered paragraphs). I'm not exactly sure about how I feel or what to feel. There are a few family issues that are somewhat up in the air right now, but rather than stressing out about it all, I'm leaving it in God's hands. I know that He has control over all things, and since nothing is impossible for Him, a way will definitely be made.

4. As of today I've gotten in a measely 5.82 hours of exercise this month. Hmm.. We ended up getting home late after prayer last night and I didn't have time to exercise then either. My goodness, does this have to change for May. This afternoon is really the only chance I'll have at getting a workout in since I have a bunch of errands to take care of tonight after work. I haven't exercised since last Thursday, so I hope to be able to get in a 20-minute workout at least.

5. Tomorrow is the last day of April and, consequently, the big WI. I didn't get on the scale this morning, so I'll just plan to face the music tomorrow. At this point I'm not that worried about it all. It'll be great if I can be in the 215's by then but if not, I'm certainly not going to beat myself up over it. Thankfully progress has been made this month and I know there's no turning back for me. This is one area of my life that I have to get together.

6. I need to update my goals for May. I need to plan my exercise schedule. I'll get to work on that for tomorrow.

Menu for today:

B:
1 slice wheat toast, 1 slice cured ham
coffee w/ skim milk

S1: none

L:
pasta w/ garlic tomato/tuna sauce
Vegetable salad w/ olive oil & balsamic vinegar

S2:
Fruit of some kind

D:
vegetable mix
slice FF white cheese
1 slice wheat toast
LF Yogurt

-0.8

Diet-wise, I had a really good weekend- quite a contrast to how I did during the women's retreat I attended in March. On top of the fact that the food wasn't that great at the campsite where we were, I was just really focused on not letting the weekend throw a wrench in my plans to meet my 215 goal by Wednesday.

If I splurged at all it was yesterday after getting home from the retreat. I had a small slice of meat lasagna and red wine with my husband which was actually quite filling. Later that evening we went out to our favorite tapas bar for dinner. Steak and homemade fries were involved, albeit in small quantities. Our original plan was to go for ice cream afterward, but strangely enough neither of us (particularly me) wanted any after we ate. So we ended up going straight home instead.

I got on the scale this morning just to see where I was after the weekend, and I'm down to 217.6! Another 'new' low and just 2.4 pounds shy of my goal. At this point I'm just thrilled with the new motivation that I now have to continue with losing weight and getting healthy. I've had my emotional ups and downs this month, but in spite of that I've managed to eek out a 9.2 loss thus far, which ain't all that bad. I feel confident going into May, and I know that I can reach my goals if I just stay focused!

Retreat in review

So this weekend was a lot of fun. The main theme of the retreat was centered precisely around my reason for attending in the first place-- standing in unity as a church, staying in fellowship with each other and allowing God's love to flow through us. During our devotionals on on Saturday and Sunday morning we read through some attributes and qualities that the Bible ascribes to this amazing love as I like to call it. We read through 1 Coritinthians 13, a pretty well-known passage that defines what love is and isn't:

Love is patient, love is kind.
It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud.
It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs.
Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth.
It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.
Love never fails

I've known this passage by heart for years. But what I love about reading the Bible is how God constantly reveals new things to us, even in reading verses that we can mechanically recite from memory. In reading this passage about love I was reminded that above all things, God is love. So these qualities are actually His qualities which flow through us when we allow Him into our hearts. Consequently, we are to treat those around us with this same kind of love.

Sure, it all sounds easy in theory, but I've missed the mark so many times. As of lately I've complained, been less than patient and, try as I might, sometimes it's tough not to remember all the stuff that others have done or said to me in the past. But this weekend I wiped the proverbial slate clean. I have a new motivation to be a reflection of this love to those around me.

Blessing in disguise

Cold-wise, I'm feeling much better this morning. I'm still on the cold medication and it's working slowly but surely. Hopefully by Sunday I'll be all cleared up.

Last night I didn't leave work until after 9pm. Yeah, I was pretty irritated about it. Mostly because I had to cancel my tutoring session with Jen since we obviously weren't going to have enough time to get through everything before Chechu came to pick me up. Thankfully she said that she understands the new topic they're studying in class pretty well (modal verbs) so the fact that we missed our session yesterday wasn't exactly crucial. We've rearranged to meet next Tuesday evening to review for her quiz the following day.

I got home by 9:30 and sat on my couch for a while, debating whether or not to take advantage of the extra hour I had to myself to workout. I finally decided to go through with it, and I am so glad that I did. I was able to complete the entire Turbo Jam workout, and I ended up gloriously drenched in sweat. I felt so good about myself afterwards- not just in the physical sense but mentally as well. That was exactly the motivational boost that I needed, and I'm so glad that I took advantage of my extra time productively. I got on the scale this morning and I've reached a new low! 218.4!! I'm not sure if I can attribute that to my workout last night or to TOM's exit. Or both. Either way, I'm thrilled with the results. I'm 3.4 pounds away from my goal for next Wednesday. It's a stretch, but I'm sure that with some extra hard work this weekend I'll be able to pull it off.

I've been thinking a lot about my exercise dilemma over the past couple days. One of the biggest pieces of advice I've received has been to build my exercise schedule around what works best for me, rather than setting unrealistic goals for myself and failing miserably at each attempt.

A-ha moment.

For as much as I'd love to be a morning person, I'm just not. That's who I am, and I have to accept it. Getting up early for me has always been a challenge, and barring a miracle it probably always will be. So, in light of that, I need to schedule my workouts either during my afternoon break or in the evenings after work. I'm quite positive that I'll have better results with this plan.

I'm off to the youth retreat this evening, and I'm pretty excited about it. We leave directly after work to head up to Granada, and we'll be back at some point Sunday afternoon. Even though I know I'll have a great time, I miss Chechu already! Hopefully we'll leave earlier on Sunday and that way he and I will have the entire afternoon to spend together and catch up :)

Have a great weekend, all!

Crap

So I'm feeling slightly overwhelmed this morning.

I d0n't feel well at all. Yesterday afternoon at work I started feeling progressively worse as the hours dragged on. By the time I made it to church for Bible study I had a pretty bad headache and a ton of sinus pressure. I'm still feeling the same way this morning despite taking this "Stop Cold" medicine my husband bought from the pharmacy. I'm not sure if what I'm feeling is actually cold-related or if it's allergies. Either way, I feel like crap.

On top of feeling sick I've got a ton of work to do for a change. Lots of research to do, companies to call, emails to write and pending quotes to finalize. I'm not complaining in the least about this because I'm thankful for the work that I do have. I just wish I felt better so that I could feel like I was getting things done more efficiently.

This weekend is the annual youth retreat at our church. I haven't mentioned this before because my original intention was not to go in the first place. Chechu isn't going to be able to attend since he's the only worship team member who can sing and play an instrument, and therefore he's been asked to lead worship during both Saturday and Sunday services so as to allow the rest of the musicians to go to the retreat. I wholly admit that a big chunk of my motive for skipping out on this event was to be able to spend time with my husband and keep him company over the weekend. Or, to put it frankly, if he wasn't gonna go, I wasn't gonna go either.

I feel like as of lately I've had quite a lackluster attitude about participating in church events. The other week it was the concert in Jaén that I felt pushed into attending, even though I ended up having a great time. I honestly don't know why I've been feeling this way, but I do know that it needs to change. After praying about it all I really felt led to attend the retreat even though I didn't really want to. On top of the fact that this week the pastors have really been encouraging all of us to make the extra effort to attend, I'm going to go just to counter this funk I've been in. I know that in doing so I'll be blessed. Surely we'll all have an amazing time together!

I'm not sure if I'll ever be a morning exerciser and that stresses me out too. Obviously feeling under the weather was my excuse for not rolling out of bed at 7am today, but in general I just can't seem to shake the grogginess. I could understand the difficulty in getting up at 5 every morning to work out, but 7am really isn't that bad. I should be able to handle that. So I'm kind of at a loss for words about this whole thing. I'd like to think that I'll work out this afternoon during my break but I just don't know if that will be possible. I suppose I'll just have to make time.

On a more positive note, I have the best husband ever. I got home late last night after Bible study only to find him in the kitchen making dinner and lunch for today. In spite of my offers to help he insisted on me taking some medicine and going straight to bed. The poor thing was up until almost 2am cooking, cleaning and ironing. What an amazing guy ;)

Good morning!

I'm determined to have a positive, productive Wednesday, and it's already started off on a good note. My boss just stepped into my office to see how I was doing. He said I've been looking kind of down lately and he wanted to make sure that I was doing all right. I thanked him for asking about me and said that I'm doing well- just a tad bit tired and I've got a little sore throat going on right now, but other than that I'm great. I totally wasn't expecting that this morning. Ever since we've started working on all these new projects he and I have barely spoken to each other. Needless to say, it's nice to know that he thought of me and stepped in just to see how I was.

After posting my big idea about not getting on the scale until the end of the month (just seven glorious days away!) I did hop on this morning just to see where I was. In my defense, I hadn't weighed myself since Saturday and I was quite pleased to see that I'm only up 0.4 lbs- certainly not the 264598 gain I was expecting to see with how bloated I've been feeling lately. So I'm happy to say that there is hope between me and my goal for this month.

Contrary to my original plan however, I didn't go through with working out last night. I got through the first five minutes of the warm up, but my cramps were too much for me to continue. Plus I just really wasn't in the mood, and that seemed to make the cramps worse.
That sounds like such a whiny excuse.

I think my workout dilemma would be solved if I could just get out of bed in the morning to exercise and get it out of the way. As of lately I've been putting it off until the evenings after work and that has proven to be very inconsistant. Normally I'll set my workout time for 8:15PM but, given the previous track record of leaving the office late, I'm usually still here by that time. In those instances, when I do get home I'm already irritated that I didn't leave work on time and that I have to re-arrange my evening schedule to fit a workout in. That generally translates to less motivation for exercise. This gets even more complicated on days like today when I have church or other activities to attend in the evenings and, consequently, less time to squeeze in a workout.

In short, I really need to aim for morning workouts. This is the only time frame during the day that I can control 100%, not to mention the fact that in doing so I'm getting my workout in before the workday actually begins. That will free up more time for me in the evenings and, on the whole, I'll just feel a lot better. The hardest part of this whole thing of course is not hitting the snooze button when the alarm goes off at 7am.

So, for all you morning exercisers out there, any suggestions? Please? :)

The no-update update

I didn't get on the scale this morning because, frankly, it was too early and I wasn't in the mood to see what it had to say. Even though I had a good day yesterday (with exercise and all!) I feel like a balloon today. I've got annoying cramps and this dull lower back pain. I though birth control was supposed to make all this go away!

April has been a rough month emotionally. I've had some ups and downs. I've fallen off the wagon once or twice, lured by chocolate and ice cream. The important thing is that I didn't stay off track though, and staying consistent with keeping track of my eating and exercise has really helped.

I feel like May is going to be a breakthrough month for me and I'm excited for it to get here. It's starting to get really warm outside, and I've had enough of the exercise dvd's. I'm ready to get my butt out on the pavement and start jogging. Originally my goal was to start jogging once I got down to 200, but I see no point in waiting for that. Next month I'm going to get myself some running gear and get moving. I've got big plans for May!

Nevertheless, April isn't over yet. Even though I cancelled my weigh-in for today, I'm still staying completely on track. There's roughly one week left in this month and I will make the most of it:

1. I'm not going to weigh myself again until next Wednesday, April 30th. I've been stepping on the scale almost daily since the start of the month and I'm not certain that being this conscious of my weight is helping it go down.

2. Between now and the end of this weight loss journey I've got a pretty good bit of weight to lose. But, for the next eight days I'm just focusing on my goal of 215 to reach by next Wednesday.

3. EXERCISE. Daily.

4. Staying on plan and not letting a minor craving throw my day off.

I plan to squeeze in a workout this afternoon, cramps and all, before I come back to work. I just really need to focus on this goal. I need to make this happen.

Blog Award

On Saturday morning I woke up to this spiffy blog award given to me by the lovely and inspiring Cat. Thanks, girl. I feel very honored that you thought of me.

I'm passing this award on to Alli, Ready to Shrink and Briy, all of whom are quite inspiring themselves. Thanks for the encouragement, girls.

7 Random things...

I was all prepared to tag myself to play along with this game, but I've since been officially tagged by Briy! Yay!

So here goes nothin':


Rules of the game:
1. Link to the person who tagged you.
2. Post the rules on your blog.
3. Share seven random and/or weird facts about yourself on your blog.
4. Tag seven random people at the end of your post, and include links to their blogs.
5. Leave a comment on their blogs so that they know they have been tagged.



1). I have four older brothers and sisters (2 and 2), one of which happens to be my identical twin, Marissa, who's two minutes older than me. We've grown up living the stereotypical twin lives that consisted mainly in doing everything together. We wore the same outfits. We've worked at the same jobs starting at 16 and going all the way through college. We got our driver's licenses on the same day. We've got matching BA and MA degrees from the same universities. We even dated identical twins once! At one point in our lives, our circle of friends consisted of "just the two of us." (we even dedicated that song to ourselves!) There were people who criticized us for being so close because, as they said, the day we had to separate from each other we'd be heartbroken. That day came last year when I moved to Spain, and I'd say it's one of the hardest things I've had to go through. But, in spite of the difficulty, I see how much richer our lives are now that we have embraced our individuality. Riss now lives and works in LA, and will be getting married this year (close enough, right??!). I am SOO excited about all that she's got going on in her life right now!!

2). I like to think that my husband Chechu (his real name is Jesús) and I have a story-book romance. In 2005 Marissa and I chose to study abroad in Spain (Granada) for a semester prior to beginning our graduate studies in California. One of the first things we did to prepare for our trip was finding a church in Granada, which took no time at all. (we both like to say that we knew where we'd be going to church before we knew where we were going to live!) On February 20th we walked into our new church for the first time. I saw Chechu on stage, playing the guitar and singing his heart out to God. That's when it hit me, and I knew that he was the man I'd marry. After a 2-year long-distance relationship and many trips back and forth between the US-Spain on both our parts, we got married last October here in Spain. My immediate family made the trip over, and Marissa was the star interpreter since the ceremony was officiated in Spanish.

3). I've stumbled across several career paths that I've been seriously interested in pursuing: A) Veterinarian B) Concert musician (I play saxophone) and C) Ventriloquist. (My sister and I to this day put on "shows" with our stuffed animals!). Since I love Spanish so much, I decided on Translation and Interpretation, and that's what stuck.

4). My nickname is Nan. Apparently "Marianna" was too much for my sister to pronounce when we were little, and all she got out of that big long name was Nan. And man, did it stick. No one in my family calls me by my full name- in fact, I'm sure that I've got a few relatives who don't even know what my actual first name is.

5). I love naming things: animals, cars, utensils, furniture, etc. According to my husband I'm pretty good at it too. Our car's name is Gustavo. There's a white-haired stray kitty who can constantly be seen roaming around our complex, and I call him Moses.
And then there's Nacho, a Joan Miró painting that resembles a dragon. Check him out!



6). I am a soul food junkie. Even though I was born in PA, my family roots are from the South. Mom's side is from Virginia, Dad hails from New Orleans. That means loads of collard greens, candied sweet potatoes, chicken, ribs, made-from-scratch macaroni and cheese and Dad's all-star gumbo.

7). I'm not a big shopping fan. I get burned out easily going to malls or shopping centers if I A) don't have a clear idea of what I'm looking for or B) if I haven't mentally prepared myself to go in the first place.


I'm almost positive that I'm the last person to do this, but I tag anyone who wants to play along!

Insert Foot Here

Ironically enough, I had some punctuality issues of my own yesterday.

1. Rocío and I agreed to set the time for our GOE back at 4pm on Wednesday. However, there was a misunderstanding on my part as to the actual start time for this week. I had understood that she'd be picking up one of the ladies who's been coming regularly at 4:30 like she'd been doing, and then from there the two of them would come back to the church for our study. She told me to be at the church by 4 to wait for them, which didn't make any sense to me. So rather than showing up at 4 to waste a half hour sitting by myself, I rolled in at about 4:15. To my surprise Rocio was already there waiting for me, and was pretty irritated herself about my tardiness. Before going out to evangelize she prayed for the meeting, and also started praying against apathy and indifference. So that obviously struck a personal chord with me, and I got more irritated. As we walked outside I apologized (between clenched teeth) for the obvious misunderstanding. We briefly talked about it all, and then agreed to move on. I was still pretty pissed though. And I'm sure that shone perfectly through my stellar 'tude the whole time.
2. Our weekly Bible study is on Wednesday evenings at 9PM. Last night after work I ran back home, and by 8:15 I was back in the Turbo Jam saddle again. I knew I was going to be late to the Bible Study if I stayed and exercised, but I didn't care. After all, I'm not the one with the time issues, right? And besides, I thought, the meeting would start late like it usually does every week. So I kicked and punched away for 35 minutes, stopping the workout early to grab a quick shower before heading out the door. I got to the church by 9:30, just in time to catch a couple worship songs before beginning the Bible study. To my surprise, one of the first things discussed during the study was the issue of punctuality and our responsibly carrying out the tasks which we've been assigned within the church.

The tone wasn't accusatory by any means, but it still stung. And it woke me up to the reality that I'd been sporting a pretty stank, I-don't-give-a-crap attitude all week. I've been moody, irritable, quick to fly off the handle and the general tune I've had to sing over the past several days has been none other than complain, complain, complain. About everything.

After talking about this with Chechu last night, I finally stumbled on what's been bothering me all week: I have PMS. For most women that won't sound like big news but in my case, given that I usually don't suffer from the phsycological aspects brought about by PMS, I was finally able to put a name to my problem. After starting birth control at the end of last year, I see how my body has been going through some minor changes, particularly with more frequent-than-usual bouts of moodiness and sensitivity before my period.

At least now I've been able to recognize this new pattern for what it is, and being aware of this (theoretically) should help me control my emotions more instead of allowing them to drag me all over the place. I called Rocío this morning to apologize for how I acted yesterday, and she graciously understood. On the whole, I feel better about how this week is ending-- much better than how it started, that's for sure.

Positive

My 30-second rant: PUNCTUALITY

I have the greatest Mom in the world. But to put it mildly she's not the most punctual person. I suppose that growing up with that has turned me into the exact opposite-- having an overly-sensitive concept of time. Living in Spain has tested me in this area on more than one occasion. Last night was a prime example.

I ended up leaving work last night well after 8:30PM for no good reason other than the fact that my boss was chatting it up with a co-worker about a couple operations they're doing now. Apparently there's an unwritten rule that as long as the boss is here we all have to leave the office together, even if that means twiddling your thumbs until he's done rambling. When 8:38 rolled around and we were finally walking out the door I swear you could have seen the smoke billowing from off the top of my head. I couldn't even look my boss in the face to say goodnight to him, and I barely eeked out an "adios" to Christina before bolting down the sidewalk to head home.

If this were a one-time occurrence, you wouldn't hear a peep out of me. If it happened once or twice a week with a prior announcement, no problemo. Better yet, if I actually had a reason to stay later than usual, to catch up on work or whatever, I certainly wouldn't be dedicating this much time to write about it. It just irritates me to no end feeling like other people are wasting my time. That isn't just a work thing. It's a Spain thing. People here love love love love love love love love love love love to TALK. Talk about nothing. And that talk about nothing can last an hour or more if no one steps in. Granted, I got home last night just a half-hour later than what I normally would have had I left the office on time. Other than working out I didn't have any big plans made that I missed out on. But that was my half-hour during which I could have done productive things or just sat on my couch watching TV had I so desired.
I guess I can just chalk this whole issue up to my American "you're-infringing-on-my-time" mentality. And since I'm the one who decided to move to here it's up to me to adapt, and I'm fine with that. It's just taking a bit longer than I anticipated :P

That was definitely more than 30 seconds!

I have to add that last night, in all my furor, I finally broke through my exercise barrier. I actually wanted to exercise in order to let off some steam, so I grabbed my Turbo Jam CD and turned on. I actually surprised myself with the initial energy I had. I was nailing my punches and my kicks were higher than they've been in a long time, hehe.. Surely I was a sight to see! Unfortunately after blasting through the first few sets I burned out after 25 minutes, drenched in sweat.

I will be back for more today!

HYC update

1. I've lost 0.8 pounds this week, putting me at 219.6! I'm so happy to finally see a number below 220. Since I began weighing myself in February I think the lowest I had gotten down to was 218, so I'm ear-marking that as my next mini-goal. I feel confident that if I can just stick to this faithfully between now and the end of the month I'll surely reach a solid 215.


2. I didn't meet my exercise goals for this week, as I only worked out two days. I am really struggling with this. I find it so difficult to wake up early in the morning to exercise, just like I find it difficult to come home after work and do it then. I suppose getting started is never easy no matter how much one tries to plan. There's always an excuse to put it off another day. So for this week, my goal is to just get excited about exercise again. I have to break through this barrier! Does anyone have any suggestions?


3. I think the "cheat weekends" are definitely going to have to be put on the back burner at this point. It'd be one thing if we could actually stick to having just one off-plan meal, but since we struggle to keep it at that we'll be better off staying on plan for the entire week. In spite of my weird cravings that come up every now and then, staying on track during the work week isn't as much of a challenge anymore. The weekends, however, are my weak point. My goal for this coming Saturday and Sunday is to stick with the plan and see where that gets me next Tuesday.

Here's to a great day all!

Oh Monday..

I can't believe how fast weekends fly by. As I was writing my posts last Friday I could just blink and see myself back here at my desk on Monday morning. And here I am, ready to face a brand new week.

As expected, Saturday and Sunday were non-stop. We woke up super early on Saturday to meet the other young adults at the church by 7am to organize the carpooling plans. After a minor, yet costly fender-bender we began the drive up to Jaén. I was admittedly in a sour mood for almost half the ride there-- I was tired, but mostly I was angry about the accident we had, which, with a little more care, could have been completely avoided. Thankfully no one was hurt.
After a much-needed trip to the bathroom when we finally arrived in Linares I felt a lot better. The concert was actually a day-long event with different activities during the morning hours, lunch and then the concert was held afterwards. It was quite a big event with teens and young adults from different churches in attendance from all over Andalucía- those of us from Almería and Granada and others coming from Córdoba, Cádiz, Málaga, Sevilla and Jaén. Needless to say I ended up having a great time there, after all the prior headaches.

Yesterday afternoon we drove up to Granada for church with Charo. We had dinner (and dessert) afterwards, and ended up arriving back home around 1:30am.

So I'm a bit tired this morning, needless to say.

No exercise this weekend, and eating wasn't that great either. Our "cheat meal" turned into another cheat weekend, which neither of us are thrilled about. Weekends are so tough for me. After a full five days of staying on track I feel like I deserve at least a meal to eat what I want. While that sounds reasonable, it never turns out that way in my case. One meal leads to more snacking, and then just blowing it all together. In retrospect, however, things could have been a lot worse in terms of my food choice. Yes, I snacked on cookies and honey-roasted peanuts. Yes, I indulged last night, savoring a white chocolate/strawberry cheesecake ice cream bar. But it was all controlled, and I didn't go overboard once in spite of the intense cravings I had last week. Progress is progress, and I'll take it as it comes!

So here's to a brand new week. Tomorrow is my weigh-in, and I'm really hoping to see a number below 220. Between now and the end of the month my goal is to reach a solid 215. April is half over, as hard as that is to believe, and I really need to focus to reach this goal.

Just Two hours..

...between me and the WEEKEND!

Some random thoughts on this windy afternoon:

1. My co-worker has taken the rest of the afternoon off and her absences usually keep the boss at bay. For María and me, this means we get to leave the office tonight ON TIME!!!
2. I'm feeling a million times better right now than what I did this morning.
3. I spoke with my Mom before leaving for lunch. It felt good to have the chance to just talk- this time about her, how she's feeling and how I can be of help. She's supposed to be sending us pictures of Aunt Bertie to prepare a slide show presentation and a program for her memorial service. It feels weird talking about my aunt as if she were already gone, but since her passing is inevitable, it's necessary to plan for it. At this point, I'm just less anxious knowing that Chechu and I will be able to lessen some of the load for my Mom in planning and preparing the funeral. Marissa is going to speak with her supervisor about taking some days off to fly back home, and that has allowed me to breathe a huge sigh of relief, knowing that my Mom isn't going to have to go through all this by herself.
4. I made these awesome lemon-peppered fish fillets for lunch today just like how my Mama makes them, minus the bread crumbs and greasy goodness. Got rave reviews from the husband too :)
5. I get to talk to my Sissy tonight after work!
6. I'm starting to look forward to this concert tomorrow. I have a feeling that we'll have a great time after all.
7. We've decided on Sunday as our "cheat-meal" day. I'm still not entirely certain on what lunch will entail, but I have a sneaking suspicion that we'll be a lot less indulgent this time around since both of us are looking to see lower numbers on the scale.
8. It's been an intense, intense week of cravings, and I've managed to get through it without cheating once. I'd say that counts for a Non-Scale Victory.
9. I feel stronger and more agile. I'm building up my determination to plow through this weight loss and never look back.
10. I've spent about an hour on this post. There's no sign of the boss, and that means that I'm just a mere 60 minutes from the weekend!

Have a great one, you guys!

As of about two weeks ago I started coming into work at 9am instead of 10am like I had been since starting here. Inititally I thought it was going to be tough to adapt to the extra hour, but on the contrary I find myself to be so much more productive with an earlier start. Now I wake up to have breakfast with my husband every morning, and I usually have time to squeeze in a chore or two before heading out the door myself.

I'm so glad it's Friday. This week, to my delight, has actually gone by quite fast. I'm anxious for 8pm to finally get here, even though I know that this weekend is going to fly by. Tomorrow is going to be a long day for sure, as we'll be driving up to Jaén, one of the northernmost provinces in Andalucía, for the young adult Christian music concert I mentioned a while back. The concert will be held in the city of Linares, which is about a 3-hour drive from Almería. Since there are a number of us who will be attending, the original plan was to hire a bus. But for whatever reason, that idea has been shot down and we'll be carpooling instead. Chechu has offered to take the truck, and I'm really not excited about the idea of him driving six hours to Linares and back in one day. Obviously I'd help with the driving if I could, but since I'm just now learning to drive stick shift I'm not exactly the best candidate to be out on the highway. I suppose that'll be my next big project- getting my Spanish driving license together since US licenses aren't acknowledged here.

So I'm hoping that another driver will be able to accompany us on the trip tomorrow. Aside from that issue, when I was at Fátima's yesterday her son (who is helping to set up all the audio/visual equipment for the concert) informed us that the tent where the concert was going to be held has been damaged due to bad weather and now the idea is to have the concert in a 200m hall somewhere that only has a holding capacity of 150 people. Apparently there'll be an estimated 300 people attending, which obviously poses a big problem. So, needless to say, I'm praying that everything will be worked out. To be completely honest I was never that excited about going to this concert to begin with, and the fact that all these issues have come up at the last minute has dwindled my excitement down to 0.

Last Sunday my Mom informed us that our great aunt isn't doing well. She was diagnosed with Alzheimer's about 6 years ago, and given the degenerative nature of the disease she's now bed-ridden and completely unable to communicate. Over the past year she's been at a nursing home close to where my Mom lives up until about a month or so ago when my Mom decided to bring her home. Last Sunday my Mom got in touch with us to let us know that Aunt Bertie had taken a turn for the worse. According to everyone she's nearing the end of her days, and at this point it's just a matter of time before she passes on. At this point, I'm mostly concerned for my Mom and how she's handling all of this. For her, Aunt Bertie has been more of a mother than an aunt, and it's got to be devastatingly tough to have to come to terms with the passing of a loved one that close to you. I feel bad that my sister and I are so far away from home right now, and that neither of us are able to be there right now to share the load. All I can really do is pray and leave things in God's hands.

Diet-wise, things are continuing to go well. No workout yesterday though, hopefully I'll be able to squeeze one in today.

I Miss Too

The lovely Alli has inspired me to post a similar "I Miss" list to remind myself of what I had when I was thinner and why I'm so ready to get it back. It's crazy to think that this will be my third time losing a significant amount of weight:

• (1)When I started highschool at 14 I weighed over 200 pounds. During my freshman year I lost between 40-45 pounds and I maintained that more or less through my senior year. I was about 160 when I graduated.
• The college years. Starting weight: 160ish. By the end of my junior year I had ballooned back up to about 220-225.
• (2)My academic year abroad in the DR (2001-2002). I've briefly mentioned some of the huge challenges I faced weight-wise during my stay in Santo Domingo. I was 21 at the time, it was my first time traveling abroad and I was scared as hell. Thankfully my sister shared the experience with me and to make a long story short, we went through a lot that year. I arrived there at about 230 pounds. Nine months later I was down to 150.
• (3)Post-undergrad years to the present. After coming back home from the DR I gained back all of the weight I had lost over the course of a year. That showed me that during my time abroad, I really didn't make it a point to learn new eating and exercise habits and let them sink into my normal routine. I was totally out of my comfort zone and I desperately needed to lose weight in order to have basic, everyday things (like not being charged double for public transportation because I took up a seat and a half). I let all of that propel me into an obsession with weight loss. While that did yield quick results, it didn't solve my issues with food. I was only placing a band-aid over my problems instead of learning a healthy lifestyle.

So that leads me to where I am today. Over the past 5 years I've more or less stayed in the 200s, reaching my highest weight of 240 during my first year of grad school. This time around I'm learning to manage food and embrace a healthy lifestyle. In doing so, the weight will come off. I'm not interested in quick fixes; I want long-term results, and I never want to see these numbers again.

My goal weight is 150 pounds. I have a bigger frame, and I think any weight smaller than that would make me look sickly. I've always found curvier women to be so much more beautiful than super skinny girls, and150 pounds on my frame looks good- slender with all the curves my husband loves and pleads with me not to lose. (Side note: My husband and I primarily speak in Spanish, and he is currently learning English. He's improved by leaps and bounds since we first met, and from time to time we go over American slang and cultural expressions. Okay, and maybe a few bad words here and there. Anyway, last weekend we happened to come across Sir Mix-Alot's video of "Baby Got Back" on YouTube, which he thought was great, lol! So now he goes around the house singing "I...Like...Big.. ButtsAndICanNotLie" in his cute Spanish accent. The man cracks me up!)

So this is my motivation:

1. Having more self-confidence.
2. Going shopping to buy the clothes that I like in the styles that I want. Not just buying whatever fits.
3. Being able to walk long distances without getting irritation rashes on my inner thighs from too much friction.
4. Sitting in public places confidently (restaurants, airplanes, buses) without worrying that I'm taking up too much space.
5. NO HEALTH ISSUES
6. No muffin top
7. Seeing my jaw line in side-profile shots
8. Looking younger
9. Feeling good about losing weight and inspiring others to reach their goals
10. Moving around with more agility and feeling like I can take on the world.

Fantasy meals

Things at work are going a lot better this morning. When I arrived I made it a point to make myself busy following up on some other tasks that I had pending from earlier in the week. Last night after Bible study I was talking with one of the guys who's been looking for work since he arrived in Spain last summer. He and his wife were married roughly a month before Chechu and me, and with the exception of finding a couple odd jobs here and there, he hasn't come across anything else. It's exasperating enough to have to look for work being single, but when you have a family to look after it makes everything ten times worse. He and his wife are contemplating moving back to London sooner than anticipated so that he'll be able to find work. After listening to his story I felt really grateful for the job that I have, even with its imperfections. While I'll definitely keep my eyes open for new opportunities, I no longer have one foot out the door as was the case yesterday.

I'm not sure why Wednesdays have become so stressful anymore. Due to last-minute schedule changes I wasn't able to attend the GOE with Rocío yesterday afternoon either. When we started together in January our meetings were set to begin at 4pm, giving us about 30-45 minutes to evangelize and/or meet with women who decided to come to the meeting. Generally if someone wants to attend we try to adapt our meeting schedule to theirs, and that's been the case as of lately. So now instead of meeting at 4, we generally start at 4:30 or a little after, which puts a huge strain on my schedule because I have to be back at work by 5pm. The fact that punctuality isn't exactly a cultural norm here coupled with the reality that meetings are usually prolonged because some of the women have questions or want to pray about certain issues leaves me totally stressed out because I can't be late getting back to work. So yesterday when Rocío called to find out if she could pick me up at 4:30 and from there go to the church to hold our meeting, I told her that I wasn't going to be able to go because it had gotten too late. She sounded kind of disappointed, but there was really nothing I could do about the situation.
So tonight I'm going to talk with Fátima, one of the church leaders, about it since she was the one who asked me to participate in this GOE with Rocío. I feel really bad about how the situation has panned out because I do want to participate. I just get stressed out with the scheduling/no-concept-of-time issues, and that inhibits me from putting my all into the meetings because I'm constantly worried that I'll be late. So I hope to get some encouraging words. Obviously with the GOE starting at 4:30 my schedule doesn't permit me to attend. But hopefully she can tell me about some other opportunities where I can get involved.

I'm still having craving issues. It got so bad yesterday afternoon that I found myself perusing Coldstone's, Applebee's and Chili's websites and creating fantasy meals- you know, like the fantasy video games people are so into nowadays. Except my action heroes were buffalo wings, a monterey-jack superburger, french fries and a big bowl of "Cookie Doughn't You Want Some" ice cream from Coldstone. Talk. About. TORTURE!
As expected, I got home last night after 11pm and begrudgingly ate my cup of garlic spinach and hard-boiled egg. Not horrible, but definitely not a fantasy meal.

I'm feeling better today, craving-wise. I hope to be able to get a workout in this afternoon during my break because that's really the only time I'll have. We'll see how it goes.

It's almost FRIDAY y'all!! :o)

Work drama

So thankfully I was able to stay on plan last night without any issues. I left work at 8pm on the nose, and immediately went straight home to work out before I could give it a second thought. It went pretty well- I did about 40 minutes of the workout and next time around I plan to get through the whole thing. I'm not sure if I'll have time to work out today or not since Wednesdays are the busiest for me. It'll most likely be 11pm or so when I get home tonight, and it'd be pretty unrealistic of me to think of working out at that hour. So, in short, barring a drastic change in schedule I'll be counting today as an off day. Cool.

In spite of my sporadic bouts of lunacy with chocolate cravings, I feel really good on this diet. It's an easy plan, I'm getting in a crap-load of fruits, vegetables and water every day, and on the whole I just feel much healthier. It's also a huge help that my husband and I are doing this together. I struggle when I have to diet on my own, and now that Chechu and I are on the same page things are going so much more smoothly. We're both losing weight and we're looking forward to seeing great results by the end of the month. For myself, a realistic goal between now and then would be 215, constituting an 11-pound loss for the month. Not to shabby, eh? I think I should be more than capable of losing a solid 5 pounds over the next three weeks.

In other news, I'm prayerfully considering a new job. My feelings about being here change sporadically, and that speaks to me of instability. Working here has made me realize that no job is perfect, but I'm really not happy where I am.

Granted, the job has definitely been a huge blessing to both me and Chechu. Last summer, after less than a month of looking for work, I sent in my application here and was hired the very next day. At the time I didn't have any of my paperwork in order to work in Spain, but my boss took me in anyway and has since been faithful in paying me my salary and everything else I've been due. But now that I've got all of my permits together, he doesn't seem to want to move. After running around like a mad woman this week to get my social security documents squared away, I contacted the company's Human Resources director to let her know that I had everything ready to be filed in the system as a "hire." She abruptly told me that she had to speak with Avelino first to go over the stipulations of my contract, etc. Fine. Immediately after speaking with her (Monday) I told Avelino that he'd have to contact her in order to file my paperwork as a company hire, and he said he'd be on it this week. So this morning when he got to the office he mentioned to Cristina that he'd be going past HR today to drop off some other documents. After their conversation I conveniently reminded him about my paperwork and asked if he wanted me to prepare copies of everything to take to HR when he went. So then the man snaps back at me with "I have to take your paperwork to HR?" Then he said that he'd speak to the director about my contract, but I'd have to go there myself to submit the paperwork. What. The. $!(·"%&)/?? That totally caught me off guard, especially since I'm an employee and as far as I know most company directors are responsible for filing their employees' documents with HR. I felt really hurt by how he responded to me, as if to say he truly could give a crap about me, the lowly immigrant.

So at this point, for as absent-minded as Avelino is, I don't know if my paperwork will ever be filed. And frankly, I'm not that interested in sticking around here any longer to find out. This afternoon I plan to send in my resume to a few language academies and translation agencies that I've come across, and all I can do is trust that whatever God has for me I'll have.

Slow day

Thankfully it's been a calm Tuesday- calm enough for two posts today! In theory I have just under an hour and a half left here in the office, and I'm praying that Avelino doesn't stop by at the last minute like he's been doing lately. That usually means overtime.

Now that we leave work an hour earlier, I have more personal time in the evenings to get things done at home. Tonight I have the following on my agenda:

1. TaeBo Basic Training @ 8:15
2. Call Sis
3. Housework: hang laundry out to dry, iron, make beds, wash dishes, make dinner for tonight and lunch for Thursday (since I won't have much time tomorrow)

After all that I plan to take a soothing, hot bath and hopefully catch a movie with Chechu if there's time. I soooooooo love our apartment. There's something about the lighting we have set up in there that makes it so relaxing in the evenings.

Diet-wise, things have continued to go well today but it's been hard nonetheless. I'm not sure what it is about cloudy, overcast days that tempt me to jump, er, plunge off the wagon. This morning I was still hungry after my mid-morning snack. I started thinking about all the food places I would visit if we were in the States right now-- Dairy Queen, Coldstone, STARBUCKS... Those thoughts led to contemplating how great it would be to go to the supermarket tonight after work (the one conveniently located down the street from our house) and just buy massive amounts of chocolate, pastries and ice cream. No DQ, Coldstone or Starbucks by any means, but a close fourth-place nonetheless. That treat run would have of course implied hurriedly eating it all at home and discarding the evidence before hubby could catch me red-handed. That sounds insane as I read it in print, but those thoughts (when they do creep up) are very real. That totally sounds like a person with an eating disorder. Do I have an eating disorder??

...As I ponder that, I'm very thankful that over the course of the afternoon my visions of sabotage have pretty much dissipated. I didn't go off the deep end at lunch and I certainly am heading straight home after work. I'm enjoying a low-fat strawberry yogurt cup for my evening snack instead of a pint of Hagen Daas, and I feel pretty good about that.

I'm also thankful that Chechu and I are doing this together. He's so encouraging and so disciplined when it comes to dieting. He's not an "enabler," he's not capricious and he doesn't give in to my "c'mon it's just one cookie (etc)" lines. He keeps me honest and that's what I need in this stage in the game.

HYC update

Hard to believe it's Tuesday already-- it feels like the past few weeks have just flown by. All in all things have been progressing quite well, in spite of my lack of free time to document it all. Work has been picking up a lot as of lately, which is a good thing for sure. After my mini-breakdown last week I've been feeling a lot better about work in general, and moreso now that I've finally gotten my social security paperwork in order after having to make a second trip to the Social Security office in Almería yesterday.

This past weekend went well, nothing too exciting though. On Saturday Chechu and I had our respective tutoring sessions in Almería, after which we ran a few errands downtown and then headed back to our side of town to do a little grocery shopping. I was surprised to see quite a number of people at the beach that afternoon. In about a month and a half, the weather will definitely be hot enough to get in the water. I can't wait!!

Saturday evening after church we went out with some of the other young adults to our usual hang-out spot: the food court at the mall. Chechu and I ended up ordering hamburgers from BK and split a small order of fries. Not too bad considering what it could have been, but a cheat nonetheless. Originally our plan was to have our once-a-week non-diet meal on Sunday during lunch, but we ended up splurging a little on Saturday as well.

Sunday was pretty low-key for me, at least at the outset. Chechu had to be in Almería for church to lead worship and at the last minute I decided to stay home. I felt like I needed the extra time to sleep in a little and catch up on some cleaning and other work around the house. Chechu got back by 3pm and we had our non-diet lunch: pork loin fillets, refried beans (healthy version), rice, salad and mixed veggies. I actually filled up on the salad and mixed veggies. I had two small pork fillets and some beans. I didn't eat any of the rice. For dessert we split a white chocolate/strawberry cheesecake ice cream bar (amazing).

On Sunday evening after taking a nap we went to walk for about an hour along the boardwalk, which was nice. I ended up buying ice cream afterwards though-- a pint of BJ's chocolate chip cookie dough, which Chechu and I split while we watched movies.

On Monday morning I definitely noticed a difference in how I felt after eating so heavily on Sunday night. All during last week as we were following the diet, I felt so much lighter after each meal, instead of that weighted-down feeling I always had before after eating lots of meat and carbs. Chechu has noticed the same feeling as well.

So this leads me to my Healthy You Challenge update for the week. I've lost 6.4 pounds!! I'm really excited about that- it's the first considerable loss that I've had since I started in February. I was on track with my exercise goals this week as well, working out 4 days. I mostly did a lot of walking. I'm also excited for Chechu- he's lost 3.8 pounds this week!

This is what I'd like to accomplish over the next seven days:

1). Have only one "cheat meal" this week. We will be out of town on Saturday to attend a young adult Christian music concert in Linares. Both of us have discussed the need to plan our meals for that day, considering that we'll either have to bring food from home or eat out. We haven't decided on either at this point, but we'll get it together over the course of the week.

2). Exercise four days this week. Last week I did a lot of walking, and in most cases it was because I had to- running errands here and there. This week I want to focus on scheduling exercise into my day. Ideally, that would mean getting up at 7am every morning to work out before Chechu has to leave for work. I'd like to try for that at least once this week and on the remaining days work out in the evenings.

3). Journal more

Happy Tuesday all!

What a difference a day makes

Yesterday started off rough. For no good reason I arrived at the office in another one of those "living abroad kind of sucks" attitudes that tend to creep up on me from time to time. I got to work and was informed that I have to jump through some additional bureaucratic hoops in order to get my social security card and have access to the worker benefits I'm entitled to. In all honesty it's not that big of a deal I guess- I just have to go to the Social Security office, fill out a form and turn it in with my green card (it's actually green, hehe). With that I'll be assigned a temporary SS card until the actual one comes in the mail. Not a big deal by any means, but given my mood yesterday morning I could only see it as yet another hassle.

After finding all that out, my other co-worker made a comment about how untidy our office was. Cristina isn't a fan of cleaning at all, and while I do enjoy keeping up with my chores at home, I tend to check all that at the door when I walk in to work. Since I don't dirty the office with cigarrette ashes or paper clippings like others do, I've never taken on an active role in keeping it neat and clean. In addition to that, I've always distanced myself from the office too, and the feeling of not belonging 100% has lead to my passive attitude towards it.
That started to change yesterday. María's remark was the straw that broke the camel's back, and I broke down. I was angry about everything that had happened that morning, mainly the negative attitude that I couldn't seem to shake. After seeing how upset I was, she got upset thinking that her comment was what made me cry. She insisted on cleaning my portion of the office so that I could sit down, relax and pull myself together. So what was initially a tense moment turned into a bonding/therapy session between the three of us. Two days ago I was certain that María didn't like me, and yesterday she was totally supportive and encouraging. She apologized for her harsh tone that comes out from time to time and I've learned to accept her personality. I've always been on good terms with Cristina, and I think María and I have turned over a new leaf in our relationship as well.

Today marks day three of the diet, and things are progressing wonderfully! I've been weighing myself daily since Tuesday just to follow the results, and I'm currently down to 221.2!! That's over five pounds in two days! I'm positive it's all water weight anyway, since I had fallen way out of the normal weight range that I've been in over the past several months. But nonetheless, seeing that drop is incredibly motivating, and I hope to lose a few more pounds before my official weigh in next Tuesday.

Admittedly I've been doing minimal exercise this week thus far. But something is better than nothing at all, right? On Tuesday night I did about 15 minutes of TaeBo, and yesterday I did about 20 minutes of brisk walking. While brief, these workouts have merited a star on my calendar, and I hope to add another one today. My goal is to exercise four days a week.

I'm looking forward to this weekend. On Sunday we have the entire day to ourselves, and I'm excited about spending an full, carefree day with my husband.

New month, new plan, new goals

Happy April 1st!

A new month feels like such a new beginning: a fresh, clean calendar full of endless possibilities; a blank canvas, if you will, and I hold the paintbrush. Depending on my willingness to work, I can and will accomplish a lot during these next thirty days.

Today marks "Day One" for Chechu and me. We've put ourselves on a doctor-ordered low-calorie/low-cholesterol diet as of today. This was decided on Saturday afternoon when we got the diet after going to Almeria for Chechu's tutoring session with one of the boys from church. Originally we set our start date for March 31, but since we weren't able to make it to the grocery store until yesterday to stock up on all the food we'd need, we decided to push the date back until today. I actually am glad that we chose to begin a day later. There's just something motivational about starting a new month off on the right foot.

Needless to say, knowing that we'd be beginning our new diet this week, I ate h o r r i b l y from Saturday night all through Monday. There was pizza, strawberry cheesecake ice cream, ham and cheese croissants and an insane amount of chocolate (among other things). I'll admit that some of the indulgences I hid and ate in secret so that Chechu wouldn't see me. I feel kind of embarrassed writing that down because it shows that even in front of my own husband I feel ashamed to expose that side of my eating habits. "Last-chance eating" has been a part of my yo-yo dieting experience since it all started many moons ago, and that's a concept that Chechu just doesn't get. To him it's a huge contradiction to b & m one minute about wanting to lose weight and then going out for pizza and ice cream the next. While he's so obviously right, I suppose that if L-C-E cycle were that easy to correct, most of us wouldn't be in the predicament we're trying to get out of.

So anyway, I'm not at all surprised with the horrid 226.8 reading I got this morning on the scale. Yep, that's up +3.8 since the last time I weighed myself. Under other circumstances I'd be down in the dumps about that, but I feel really good about this weight loss plan we're on. Today has been very positive thus far, and I'm certainly looking forward to continue.

Here's what I've eaten thus far:

B: 1 slice wheat toast w/ grated tomato, garlic, 1tsp. olive oil

Coffee w/ skim milk, no sugar

S: Banana

L: 2c. tomato pasta w/ tuna, large veggie salad w/ FF ranch

S: Mandarin orange

D: (after work) 1c. mixed vegetables, 1 slice FF white cheese, kiwi

Exercise at home tonight after work. More to come with my specific goals for April..