Active Rest Day

Yesterday was kind of an off beat day. I am right in the middle of dealing with insurance crap after someone hit my parked van and I was hunting for car seats. I went to pick my son up from kindergarten and then immediately went to Wal-Mart. I thought I would just be in and out and grab 3 car seats and be done (the time I pick my son up at is usually when I'm supposed to have my mid-morning snack).

So I get to Wal-Mart and virtually all their seats are sold out due to their spring selection coming in. So shopping took up a huge chunk of my day.

I missed my mid-morning snack as a result, came home and made lunch -- I was so hungry I felt sick to my stomach. I have to learn to be more prepared on the go and have snacks in my van. For lunch I quickly made up some tuna and had a tuna sandwich on whole wheat bread and an apple.

Shortly after that it was off to shop again. By the time I made it back home after yet another failed attempted to pick up all my car seats it was just after 4pm so I almost missed my afternoon snack, I felt so sick again as my body is used to eating now and being frazzled and upset with the unsuccessful shopping trip I grabbed the first thing I could in my pantry: Crispy Mini's. Not the worst thing in the world, and I ate about a half a bag (so roughly 200cal snack -- not great but not going to sweat about it).

Friday's are always date night in my house which consists of Sushi after kids go to bed and a movie with the hubs. I have to say for the first time in years eating sushi was not as appealing as it used to be. I used to crave this stuff so bad! It didn't taste as good as I remembered and certainly didn't sit well with me. I couldn't even finish it (which is a first) and afterwards I felt sick and I immediately got a headache. This was a change in my body I was NOT expecting. I'm not really sure how to handle this in the future. I never expected my body to reject "treating" myself. I guess it's a good thing though because I definitely won't crave it after how I felt afterwards.

My water intake for yesterday and today hasn't been that great. Need to try super hard to get more water in. My friend told me she read about an effective weight loss technique during a plateau which is to drink your body weight in ounces for a week. So that would mean I would have to consume roughly 7 L of water a day for a week. Yeah talk about IMPOSSIBLE! Even half that amount would be challenging, course I am on the heavier side so maybe some of you reading this can work it out for yourself and try it if you are finding you are at a plateau.

So I guess that brings us to today... I have been finding the aftermath of treading myself is I feel sluggish and lethargic the next day. Water consumption has been at an all time low today -- not even sure I got through one of my waters, tisk tisk.

After finally finding the third and final car seat today we came home and sort of chilled out on the couch. I got a text from my workout buddy asking if we could workout "right now" as she has a date night tonight herself. I was so not wanting to. Like really really REALLY not wanting to, but I got up and got ready and headed over to her place.

She had a workout from bodyrock on her computer -- a quick 12 minute workout which was day 2 of this 30 day challenge, each day getting progressively harder. So again the same as I've done before, 30 sec exercises with 10 sec breaks. I barely broke a sweat. I am definitely getting really strong. Something like that before would have really intimidated me, now it's a piece of cake, hence the "active rest day" it was more like a rest day today but instead of sitting on the couch the entire day we actually did some form of exercise.

On top of that we did our AB challenge too:

• 65 crunches
• 33 leg raises
• 42 second plank

Okay, can I just say how impressed I am with myself? It has been almost 3 weeks since I started this journey and the workout we did plus this AB challenge didn't really phase me. Thursday when we did the 50 crunches/50 leg raises I barely made it. I had such a burn in my abs it was insane. Today I did even more crunches and I didn't feel that burning in my abs till about 42 crunches in; for the leg raises I was able to do more of them consecutively, still challenging but less so. I am absolutely blown away by the plank though. I recall not so long ago blogging about how I was barely able to do a 20 sec plank, I did a 42 sec plank tonight and I could have gone even longer. I wasn't really struggling that much.

Joelene measured me today -- nothing that we are keeping record of or anything but just out of curiosity since it is visible that I am losing. I lost 3/4" off my waist (in 2 weeks!) and 1 full inch off my hips (IN TWO WEEKS!) AMAZING!!
I was so discouraged on Friday morning, I weighed myself on the scale and broke down into tears (which is mainly why Joelene wanted to measure me quickly to show me that I am losing weight just not on the scale) I texted her that I didn't understand this whole weight loss process, how I am eating so clean and working out so hard and drinking my water and yet it isn't reflecting on the scale, not only that but I gained a pound back on Friday. I was so sad. However when you are building muscle you are losing inches and it will look different on the scale because muscle weighs heavier then fat.

I'm not going to lie, I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror and noticed my gut was smaller and thought to myself "hey hey there! now that is a good looking chick!" LOL
I know that exercise will always be apart of my life, I can't just work that hard to get to the size I want and stop and eat the crap again. I like the way exercise makes me feel. I have more energy, it's a great stress release, I feel healthier and I have way more confidence. Anyone who knows me knows that I have a low self esteem so for me to say "I look good" is leaps and bounds ahead from when I started. I can even make it up a flight of stairs without being out of breath or breaking a sweat.

Change is good, just gotta keep on keeping on and I am so happy that I know I lost a whole inch in two weeks, it is very encouraging. The pounds will come off. I can't be this # forever if I am shrinking.

Tomorrow Joelene is planning a brutal workout for us since Friday was our rest day, and today was an active rest day its time to make it hurt so good, lol.

Keep you posted!