Fitness Friday: Week Three

Three weeks in! Here’s the breakdown for the week:

Successes

• I’m still steering clear of caffeine for the most part. Over the last week, I had one can of diet soda and one 20 oz. bottle of diet soda (consumed over two days!) This is a giant improvement over the 3+ bottles I used to have every day.
• I drank a full gallon of the H2Orange every day this week. And learned that I don’t love the cherry pomegranate Crystal Light.
• I added two exercise sessions. I walked about a mile with the boys once this week and a mile and a half by myself yesterday. I’ve also been trying to get more steps in at the office (taking the long way around or tagging along if someone needs to run an errand). And I’m sitting on my exercise ball at my desk at home (that’s for the core or something, right?).
• I know this wasn’t one of my goals for weight loss, but not buying breakfast or as big a lunch every day is saving me a lot of money! Bonus!
• I only ate when I was hungry!
• Weight…I lost 3.4 pounds this week! That means I’ve hit the 10 pounds lost since March 26th! That is also 21 pounds lost since my heaviest last August. Doing the happy dance!
• Inches…I lost 5.75 inches this week. The biggest change was in my abs, which I expected because my, umm, lady friend left today. I was happy to see the first change in my bicep, though, as that’s always the last place to lose for me.
  

Challenges

• Y’all. Easter chocolate? The Devil. I did have four pieces of chocolate candy this week. It was fun size, but I knew I shouldn’t have it, but did. Not beating myself up about it, but it’s been a challenge to resist the kids’ candy.
• I am not hungry at dinner time any more. This isn’t bad for my body, but I miss eating with my kids. So it makes me want to eat when I’m not hungry. I still sit with them at the table while they eat, but it feels not the same.

Lessons

This week’s lesson in my program was about Sugar (aka, the Devil’s tool). I knew we (Americans) ate a lot of sugar, and I knew that it was bad for you…but I hadn’t really looked at the numbers before. It’s estimated that Americans eat 200 pounds of sugar per person, each year. In 1948 we ate 15 pounds of sugar per person, per year. I’m fairly sure I’m responsible for at least 70% of the daily allotment of the people who don’t eat sugar. I’m also noticing how much sugar is in processed/packaged foods. I feel dumb for not noticing the impact before now. A couple of the stats that freaked me out the most were: (1) the caloric density of one slice of shortening-iced birthday cake with a scoop of ice cream is the same as 1/2 pound of cooked pot roast, (2) one slice of pecan pie has the same caloric density as four English muffins, and (3) one package of peanut M&Ms has the same caloric density as 6 large peaches.

These lessons are important because of the awareness. I can’t pretend not to know these things any more.

So, how did your week go?

Previous weeks…

Week Two

Week One

I’m Fat, But That’s Changing