3 Day Refresh - Day 3 and 4

Hello from Day 2 post refresh!!!

Yesterday got away from me so I am posting a day late!

Day 3 - It was easier than the previous days, but hard at the end of the day. Being so close to the finish and yet not being finished. I was feeling an awesome allergy attack come on that morning, so I refrained from exercise except the regular scheduled kid chasing, house cleaning and teaching that evening. I did great in the morning without coffee, and for the first time, I actually thought the taste of shakeology was good! I would even stretch it to say delicious!

I have not be a fan of the taste of Shakeology. However, I am a sweet tooth kind of person and I always forget, it's not really a dessert! But I've grown to really enjoy it now. (I'm currently drinking their new cafe latte flavor and really enjoy it!) Through the 3 day refresh I was drinking the chocolate vegan. I didn't mind it at all. My husband was not a fan. However, I prefer it over the regular chocolate shakeology.

So day 3 went well, I stuck to the plan, I didn't have any carb cheats. Then at the end of the day, I was talking to my husband on his way home from work and I say "I want pizza" as a vent. He says "I've had a bad day. I'm okay with that." " well needless to say, we both caved and had pizza that night". I'm done with feeling guilty about my cheat meals. Guilt leads to stress, and stress leads to weight gain. So I just accept that I love food, and I love the taste of unhealthy foods. Just need to have them a lot less and in moderation!

However, I weighted myself before I consumed the delicious slice of heaven and as it turns out, I lost a total of 3lbs on the 3 day refresh. I understand that it may not seem like much but for where I am at on my weight loss journey, any loss is a win for me! Since I have hit my plateau, It has been incredibly difficult to lose anything. I've stuck with programs, changed them up and my eating is 90% better than it was even 6 months ago when I hit the plateau. I indulge on rare occasions (date nights, vacations, mom nights out) but these are not regular events. I work out daily, and by work out I mean I sweat a waterfall coming down my face, and continue to challenge myself with new workouts.

The 3 day refresh was one of them.

Review: Will I buy 3 day refresh again?  - Likely not. Unless I gain a lot of my weight back, I don't feel that I needed to spend the $50+ dollars for the shakes and fiber sweep. I feel like if I wanted to cleanse myself like that again, I would use the knowledge I got from it (3 shakes a days as meals, no caffeine, dairy, carbs. Add a fiber drink like psyllium husk, eat fruit, veggie and healthy fats and stick to it). Also, I have a hard time, as most people do, being completely restricted. Even for 24 hrs. Obviously, I added a few things off the menu and maybe my results could have been bigger. But in the grand scheme of it all, 3 days will not give you permanent weight loss. What I did get out of it was more than "results".

What I did get out of the program is getting my head back in the healthy eating game. Which leads me to day 4.

Day 4 or Day 1 post refresh: on day 3 I was thinking "Im going to make myself a REAL breakfast tomorrow. Eggs with spinach and mushrooms and its gonna be amazing!" Well I woke up and decided, I wanted to make better choices as I have been, but even better. So I stuck to my shakeology, happily had a salad for lunch. I am just in a better state of what foods are good for my end result. I am back into being motivated and staying on track! Woo hoo!! Even today, post refresh day 5, I went and enjoyed a cup of coffee. 5 min later, I got the jitters. FROM COFFEE!!!DRIP COFFEE!! I've never been one to feel the effects of coffee. Now I do!

On Monday I will be starting Master's Hammer and Chisel. Now that I've completed 21 Day Fix and 21 Day Fix extreme, I'm ready for a new workout! I will still be doing Bikini Body Guide 2.0 as well because I do believe an hour workout will help me out! We will see where it takes me!

3 Day Refresh - Day 2

Ok Day 2 has come and gone. Whew!!

Definitely Day 2 has been the hardest. Day 1, it was a hard adjustment but I was still excited about it.

Day 2, most of the day I was thinking... omg.... one more day of this!?

Day 3 (today) - I've woken up feeling sick with a cold or allergies which I don't think is related to this program. But will discuss that tomorrow.

So Day 2, I spent most of the day home trying to avoid eating out and sticking to the plan. I didn't exercise at all which is unusual for me. I took Elyse to school, Alistair to a playdate at the park, picked Elyse up, and did household work (cleaning, laundry, more cleaning, cooking, tutoring Elyse, more cleaning)

Side note: the more your kids are home, the more your house becomes a disaster.

This kept me pretty busy and it was actually really nice to slow down for a day, pay attention to the kids and the house and put working out and getting errands done aside. It was amazing. It was like being a new mom again when you are basically stuck at home because you're exhausted and you're just trying to get through the day with your child and the easiest (in a life that isn't easy at all) thing is to stay home, on the couch, ready to care for your child at any moment. Except, now I have 2 and they are kids and can cover my 3100 sq ft house floor with toys in 30min.

Anyways, I was tired, but not as tired as day 1, and I wasn't hungry, but I wanted something to crunch/snack on. So again, I went to my pita chips mid afternoon, and may have snuck in a few stale pieces of chex cereal that my kids left out. But all in all, I would say I was about 90% stuck to the program. I had all their shakes and no coffee, and drank my water, etc.

As of today, I have lost a total of 1.7 lbs. So, likely its water weight, but at least the scale is going in the right direction!!!

3 Day Refresh Day 1

I didn't post yesterday because I felt like I needed to get through the whole day before I could give my review!

So Day 1: Started out with  8oz of water which I warmed and added lemon juice to. Then on to Vegan Chocolate Shakeology and half a banana. I assume I was suppose to blend them together, but that sounded like more work. 

After taking a 3 mile walk with the kids I had a tea break and drank my fiber sweep. Tea was good, fiber sweep, not so much. I chugged than down as fast as possible.

After some time at the playground we went home for lunch. Lunch was their Vanilla Shake with the other half of the banana, 10 baby carrots and hummus. The shake was also not very tasty :(

After a grooling afternoon of chasing the kids around the house and trying to stay awake, it was finally dinner. Dinner was another gross shake and instead of going with one of the recipes in the book, I had a cup of carrot and ginger bisque. It did the job. 

Although I was about 98% sticking to the plan, I had a mid afternoon freakout about how sluggish I was feeling and has a few pita chips to mentally get me through the rest of my day. As a sahm, I feel like I have to have my guard up 24/7 and I also have to teach a Body Back and Fit4Baby class in the evening. I was a little embarrassed to say,  I still showed up to class tired and likely not in the best shape. 

I do feel that the sluggish feeling came more from the caffeine withdrawal than the food. Also, being on any kind of "cleanse" is a bit of a mental game for me. I binge eat the night before, then through the entire "cleanse" all I can think about is everything I can't have! It's almost worse! 

All in all, day one went by much more successfully than expected. When I got home from teaching all I wanted was to eat and was able to refrain.  I am not as hungry as I thought I would be today, but I am becoming a hermit because I don't want to leave the house and be tempted to make a bad decision. It's only 3 days! I can do this! I did not wake up feeling any thinner or lose a lot of weight (lost a pound) and that was a little discouraging with all the effort I've put in to NOT eat things. But thats okay!

Its nearing the end of day 2, and I'm in the same boat as yesterday. Tired, and all I can think about is a Togo's hot pastrami sandwich. Thankfully washington doesn't have a Togo's for me to go to, but I look forward to having one in July (which feels so far away) Hopefully I will have better results on the scale or with how I feel tomorrow!

Beachbody is now in my life

Most of my current journey revolves around a few things. My family and my own fitness goals. So these are the posts you will see from me!

You might think, "what about a job or career?" well, my family's wellness is my "job" in a sense and instead of focusing on a money making job, I am going to be better about embracing my young children while they are still young and I have the blessed opportunity to stay home with them. That being said, I do make a small income with falls in line with my fitness goals as an instructor.

As a fitness instructor, I do like to walk the talk and trainers need trainers too!!! I have had a life long struggle with my weight and body imagine, as I assume lots of people my age have had as well. Dieting was something I just ruled out as a possibility for the magority of my life. I would not consider changing my eating habits to have a better body, because, well, I love food and it's apart of my life!

I'm going to fast forward this story a little since we all know how I joined Fit4Mom's Body Back, lost the baby weight, gained it back with Starbucks and lost it again last fall. Before I re-lost the weight,  and I was struggling with losing weight but was having trouble with motivation. My friend Courtney recommended that I tried 21 Day Fix. As far as I got with that was ordering the program from amazon and reading the program. I still couldn't find the motivation and time to start the program. She had had amazing success from the program and I wish I had started then.... but I didn't. It was all too overwhelming with being a sahm with 2 jobs and training for a marathon at the time. (reasonable right??)

Well, when I started weight watchers last fall, I started an at-home workout program called Bikini Body Guide (not to be confused with Bikini Body Mommy, they are different programs, both great!). The biggest struggle with BBG was that it was at home. No one there to push me or to tell me to start the timer and just workout. But I got it in my mind "if you start a program, you can't complain about it unless you give it a real chance". Not that I wanted to complain, but I wanted to just start my healthy lifestyle again!

I finally finished that program mid-march. I lost a total of 20lbs with the help of Weight watchers. But I like to shake things up and the thing that BBG helped me with is getting comfortable with working out at home. I can still watch my kids and workout and not have to wait for cole to be home, or take them to a gym day care! (plus it made me stronger than I've ever been and was able to hold a 6 min plank afterwards and do 18 up and downs' on each arm in a row, and 40 push ups in a min......not to brag :) )

But, I like change. I like changing things up and learning new things. So I was cleaning out my cookbook cupboard and stumbled on 21 Day Fix(21DF) that I had ordered a year ago! I texted Courtney, she hooked me up with her coach and the next day I was apart of a challenge group! Since my 20lbs weight loss from BBG, I gain and lose the same 6lbs. So with 21DF, I lost those 6lbs. Then gained them back in the maintenance week because of holidays, then did 21DF extreme and lost 3lbs, and it was a hard program!!! However, with both programs, I had lost inches all over my body and gained in my legs where I could feel my muscles growing! So for me, these are wonderful results!!!

It's getting me away from the scale and helping me focus more on strength goals! I've really enjoyed the short workouts and sweat so much from them. So now I am about to finish my 3rd round and decided to become a coach. I feel as though these workouts have really made me stronger!! Which is helping me FINALLY get to my point. Beachbody is now apart of my life. I drink shakeology, and I press play to one of their workouts every single day. (except on vacations) I ordered another program called The Master's Hammer and Chisel and also 3 Day Refresh. Since 3 day refresh doesn't recommend a hard workout, I am going to restart Hammer and Chisel next monday. I will be starting 3 day refresh tomorrow and will post a review of day one!!!

I will report back about how its going tomorrow!!!

Lastly, I know I jump around a lot with things I'm "in to". But it's good to have hobbies and learn new things! I can't promise my journey with beachbody will be forever. In fact, I can with certainty say it won't be(unless I'm crazy successful at it) but it's working for me right now and as Autumn says "you're only promised today".

Update since the last post.....

Why hello there!!!

I completely forgot about this blog, and stumbled across it yesterday. I read through most of it and it really reminded me of so much I forgot about! Mostly parenting stuff, and how I clearly had more thoughts back then.

Now, I feel like a robot a little. Wake up, get Elyse ready for school, Alistair for stroller strides, feed them breakfast, drop her off, go to stroller strides, come home, do at home workout, pick up Elyse, make lunch, clean kitchen, put alistair for a nap, get stuff done around the house (or nap with alistair) make dinner, clean up dinner, go teach class/or go to mixxedfit/or sit with Cole and try to get some peace and quiet, help cole put the kids down. Over and over like its groundhogs day!

Its been over a year since i've posted, (looks like about a year and a half) and I'm still doing the same things! Still working on creating my happy and healthy body. Continuing to push myself with new programs. Since the last post, I've continued running quite a few more races including a full marathon and 2 disney half marathons.

Elyse is going to be in kindergarten this fall and Alistair will be going to preschool!! Yes, after 5 years, I will finally get 4hrs a week to myself. I love love love being a stay at home mom now. I've finally learned to enjoy and embrace it more. It was a very long road there, and still sometimes when in social situations (which is rare) I get awkward about saying I stay home as my job. But I've really started to take a lot more pride in it. More often now when I say I stay home with two young kids, the response is more positive. For example: "oh you have one of the toughest and yet the most unappreciated job in the world." I prefer this response over "oooooohhhhhh......." or "must be nice to be home all the time"

Anyways, still at it with the weight loss thing. I gained a little back last year when I started working part time at Starbucks. I was working only when Cole was home since my wages were less than an hourly babysitter. It was becoming too much stress and no time as a family. After 7 months, I had to quit and remember that my main priority was my family and not any kind of career. I was a barista, so it wasn't a career job anyways, but it was fun and challenging. Also, you got one piece of food per shift and as many drinks as you wanted per shift. Lets just say all the chocolate croissants and double smoked bacon sandwiches, mixed with tons of milk and sugar did not bode well. I gained 15lbs in those 7 months working there. I was also training for a full  marathon at the time, so it really shows how having those bad foods a couple days a week can really effect you over time even with a lot of exercise.

So I spent the fall and winter of 2015 all the way to now watching what I ate and exercising a lot. I joined weight watchers and started(and finished) Bikini Body Guide. Combo helped me lose all the weight. Now I'm back to trying to get down lower on the scale (or inches) from here. Again.

Also, since then I have become a certified instructor for Fit4mom. I am certified to teach Stroller Strides, Stroller Barre, Fit4Baby, Body Back and to run a Fit4mom running club. Currently I was teaching Body Back as well as Stroller Strides and Stroller Barre last year, but right now I am only teaching Body Back which I love teaching.

I doubt I will be able to regularly post since my life is pretty much the same with the kids and their schedules now. But maybe i'll surprise everyone and actually do it :)

Seattle Rock N Roll Half Maraton

It's the tuesday after the Rock N Roll 1/2 Marathon in Seattle. I am finally feeling back to normal as far as soreness goes. I will be attempting my first short run since. 2 miles today. I want to start back up, but very slowly. 

So the RnR, it was awesome. The course was a challenge but in the end, my end time was 2:20:06 and I am very very proud of my time. I was expecting to get about 2:42 so shaving 24 min off my time is a huge accomplishment for me. Also, it was my first half marathon. I feel like all my training and all the time I spent training was completely worth it and really paid off. I ran with my running buddy (Amanda) and it felt like the run went by very quickly. We talked, we ran, we people watched and it made the time go by faster than music or podcasts. We even continued to challenge each other. When one of us was going slower, the other one would keep the other going. It was perfect!! (although the Gu station was gross)

It was a beautiful day and I couldn't have asked for a better first 1/2 marathon. I feel so happy about having accomplished something I never ever thought I would in my lifetime. Cole and I also felt the need to continue to challenge ourselves and signed up the the RnR Marathon next year. Oh yea, not the 1/2, it will be a full 26.2 miles. whew!!! so hopefully the training goes well!!!

What's next!? Amanda and I have entered as a group into the Nike Women's 1/2 marathon in San Francsico. It is a very popular race so people are selected by random draw. We find out this week if we are picked. We really are hoping to be picked! It's the day after my 30th birthday and would be an awesome way to celebrate my 30th! If we don't get picked for that, we still want to do a 1/2 marathon. So we are toying with the idea of doing the RnR LA or the Long Beach 1/2 Marathon. I'm currently leaning toward the RnR LA because I would get an extra medal for running 2 RnRs in one year, and then Cole could do Tough Mudder that same weekend. But the Long Beach one seems much flatter. So we will see!!!

Last time I blogged, I had lost 22.6 pounds since January 2014. As of today, I have lost 34lbs. I am more than half way. I am looking to lose another 14lbs, but it will take some time. I hope to keep it up!!

Spring is here!

I know, I have been absolutely HORRIBLE at updating my blog and I should do it more often(I say this every year, almost every post!haha) It's been 2 months (almost) since my last post, so its about time :)

What can I really say though. My main focus these last two months is getting my weight down and under control. I have been really dedicated to the cause (FINALLY!) and since Christmas I have lost a total of 22.9lbs! Woo hoo!! I am a numbers and results person. My motivation is seeing the improvement. When I don't, I lose all motivation. It's addicting too. Although I am happy I've lost as much as I have, am still not even half way to my goal of what I want to lose. But I am close to half way!

Some may say to me "why do you want to lose so much weight?". Well, for one, I never lost the weight from when I got pregnant with Elyse and just gained MORE when I was pregnant with Alistair, and then didn't lose that either. I was at the biggest I had ever been and I wasn't carrying a child. I was avoiding seeing people and going to parties. I even went to a party of people I hadn't seen since befoore pregnancy and the look on their faces was a little surprising. Although I know it wasn't intentional and not meant to hurt my feelings but it made me realize, I am huge. I am not only bigger than ever, I hate how I look. 

I was avoiding cameras and people. It don't want to be a mom that doesn't take photos with my kids. I don't want to think "my looks are fading" or my "best years are behind me". I want to be the size or close to the size I was when I first moved to Seattle. I was a happy, confident person. I was comfortable with how I looked. So thats my goal. 

How am I doing this? The first thing I did was buy a fitbit. I have worn my fitbit flex every single day since the day I got it. It was one of the best investments for my weight loss. It made me realize how inactive I am/was. I was aiming to hit a goal of 10,000 steps a day. I got one back in August of 2013. Still to this day, it is hard for me to meet that goal, but I am trying harder to get there than I first did.

Then I joined stroller strides. This was a decent workout that I could do without dropping my kids at daycare. Unfortunately, the franchise I was at closed at the end of October 2013. So then I tried Barre class, and that was AWESOME!! the workout was sooo hard, but it was really expensive, so that didn't last long. Finally, I signed up for the Jingle Bell 5k in Dec. I ran it and it felt so rewarding since I am a self-proclaimed "non-runner".  Then someone new was buying the Renton Stroller Strides so I went to a "meet and greet" she was having. There she mentioned how she how she was going to teach the Body Back Program.

So I decided to sign up for Body back over stroller strides. Best decision ever. Body back really made me realize how much improvement I needed and that I could do it. On top of that, as I mentioned before, I am training for a few runs. I did a 5k in early march and beat my last time by abound 10 min. MY next run is the Seahawks 12k in April which I have been training for. Next I have the Run like a Mother 5k which I hope to beat my last time.  Then Bay to Breakers in May, but I heard you can't really run because it's so crowded. Then lastly, I signed both Cole and I up for the Rock n Roll half Marathon on June 21st. So that is what I will be training for after the 12k. whew!! its going to be hard but I can do this!!!

So with the training and Body Back (I signed up for another session) I work out 5-6 days a week. On top of that, I use Myfitness Pal app to track my calories. This has been a big contributor to my weight in my opinion. I start every morning with a cup of water water and half a lemon squeezed, I cut out caffine, but I still drink decaf drinks, and count my calories for the rest of the day. Also my fitbit connects to the MFP app and the more steps I get the more calories I can eat. I log or scan all my food. I also have my food journal open so others can see it. It keeps me honest and more accountable. I also have given up desserts for lent and hope to continue to cut out desserts. Not completely because, what kind of life is a life without desserts?!

 But before all of this, the first thing I do is weight myself, every morning. I look forward to it, and I spend my day making better choices so that the next day when I get on the scale the number changes for the better :) 

It is a fitbit scale so it also syncs to the MFP app which shows me how much I lost which is great!

Anyways, hopefully what I am doing continues to work and I can get to my goal weight someday!!