Sometimes Impalement Really Is the Answer

So I've mentioned in a previous post that my husband is a chef. This is good and bad. The good thing is that when I print off a fabulous new recipe to try, he whips it up without batting an eye and it turns out perfectly. He's also quick to whip me up an omelet or other healthy low-carb something or other if he hears the I'm-about-to-cheat phrase of, "I'm starving." He also watches me like a hawk when it comes to eating regularly. One of the benefits of doing a healthy low-carb diet is that I'm not hungry very often and when I'm hungry enough to say, "I'm starving" it's usually been several hours since my last meal (this happens most often after a long night of work). It's not unusual for him to ask me when I ate last, several times a day. This is all wonderful, but marriage to a chef has some serious drawbacks. The obvious is that he's a chef and has only made one dish, in thirteen years, that I didn't like. He's very creative too and often will come home with a take out box of one of his "inventions" and say, "You've got to taste this!" I hate to hurt his feelings but lately I've been having to say, "No honey. Not even one bite." We've talked about it a bit and I pretty much told him that while I adore his cooking, it's not healthy for me. At least not his usual cooking. So he's promised not to bring anything too tempting home. Which brings me to a really important point. When you're in a relationship and trying to lose weight and get healthy, it is IMPERATIVE that your partner be supportive. Without that support you will most certainly feel like your journey is that much longer, lonelier, and more difficult. I feel very blessed that my husband was so open to helping me because I know others who have faced loads of resistance from their partners.  Usually this resistance is fear of change on the part of the partner, but in some cases it's just that the partner is an ass. I have, however, devised an almost foolproof was to tell the difference. If it's a case of fear of change, as you become more fabulous and healthy, the fear of change will usually become pride in your accomplishments. If it's a case of being an ass, as you become more fabulous and healthy, the desire to impale them on the nearest pointy object will increase proportionally.

I'm Not Gone

Been awhile huh? Lol. Sorry, but it's been busy for me and finding the time to blog has had to be worked into the schedule along with the rest of my crazy life. My Anniversary weekend was SO AWESOME. We had such a blast at the Creation Museum. Then we got back and I had to work the next two days. On a quiet night at work I can find time to blog but Monday and Tuesday were anything but quiet. Those days are always big surgery days and as you can imagine, post-op patients are very needy. I have been humming along though. The weather here has been rainy and cold but I love the fall weather and the cold gives me an excuse to wear my new Creation Museum hoodie. I have done really well with packing my lunch...until tonight! I still need to work on my water intake. It's not a matter of a lack of good water, the water/ice machines dispenses purified water, it's just a matter of breaking my addiction to soda. I have a serious addiction to diet soda.  I don't even think it's the caffeine. I think I'm addicted to the chemicals in the soda. I can stop drinking caffeine and aside from a mild headache have no problems.If I try to give up the diet soda though...I'm a raging beast. This alone is enough to tell me that I absolutely must get rid of the soda, but it's going to be tricky. I have to try a step down method. I'm replacing the diet soda with water a little bit at a time. I'm hoping to be off it completely in a year. On a lovely lighter note (pun intended), I went to the uniform store to buy new uniform pants and the cashier made me feel so great. I bought two pair of pants and when I went to checkout, she told me I'd pick up the wrong size. I told her that I usually bought my pants a size or two big because I liked them loose and comfy. She said, "A size or two is one thing but these are WAY too big for you." It made me smile because they were only two sizes bigger than my starting pant size. Yay me!!

The Voices Told Me To

I need a vacation. I'm not sure what the heck is going on but this last week has just sucked! My patients have all been (literally) crazy and there is a reason I am NOT a psych nurse. I. Don't. Do. Crazy. Well, let me amend that. I like the ones that are so crazy they wear tinfoil hats to protect their brains from alien mind control waves, or truly believe they are the Queen of Sheba, or they stay huddled in a corner because the voices tell them too. I like them because I know they REALLY need my help. The kind of crazy I can't handle is the drug-seeking, IV drug abusing, belligerent and verbally abusive to the staff kind of crazy. They usually have some real reason to be there, but they don't want to listen  to us or try to get better. They just want us to wait on them and give them drugs. I'm not stereotyping IV drug abusers either. I've had many patients who were former abusers and they were great patients. I didn't get in this buisness to push drugs. I'm a healer. It's who I was born to be. It's all I've ever wanted to be. I'm the shoulder to cry on and the one who gives hugs when there's nothing anyone can say to make it better. It's really rough when I try to help and it goes in one ear and out the other. HOWEVER, in spite of this lousy week I have been strong in the face of temptation (and not just my video), and I even got a work out or two in. Hallelujah!

I will be taking a mini-vacation this weekend. It's my anniversary on Sunday so my husband booked a romance package at the Ashley Quarters Hotel in Florence, KY and we will be sans ninos for two days and one night. We will also be visiting the Creation Museum, which we've wanted to do for SO long now. I am super excited. Not to worry, I will not be going crazy with the food stuffs. I will have a little bit of a treat on our actual anniversary, but since we will have spent the day walking for miles around the museum (literally, it's HUGE and there are botanical gardens with mile long paths) it won't be too terrible. Also, the hotel has a fitness center and I've packed workout gear.

Something to Snicker at

When you're working on losing weight, life can be tough. All you think about is your weight, your chosen diet plan, and your workouts.  I was driving to pick up my husband from work tonight and one of my favorite songs came on. As I was listening to it, the idea for a video came into my head and I just started giggling. Never is there a time in your life that you need something to snicker at than when you're walking the "thin" line. Feel free to link, share, steal, or just plain groan at my FIRST ever YouTube video.

Pictures

Today is awesome. Yes it is. For starters I was able to get some decent sleep, which can really make a difference in how the day goes. Then my husband and I went out to lunch. (I, ahem, sleep til noon on my days off.) I had a wonderful low carb lunch and then went to tan.

This is my favorite bed. It's an Ergoline and it's huge(!) which means lots of space even for my ginormous butt.

And before anyone goes and gets all preachy on me about the sins of tanning, stop. I started tanning because a couple of months ago my doctor ran a bunch of blood tests and found a couple of major issues, one of which was a serious Vitamin D deficiency. I work nights and even though I try to get outside on my days off, apparently I don't expose enough skin (seriously...would you want to see me expose more skin? No, you wouldn't). After talking for a few minutes about the other stuff - vitamin B12 deficiency and hypothyroidism - he suggested that visiting the tanning bed a couple days a week would be a good way for me to get my Vitamin D. "Don't go crazy and try to get super dark because then you're in skin cancer country," were his exact words. Then he told me that my vitamin deficiencies are contributing to my anxiety and seasonal affective disorder. He also told me, and this was VERY interesting, that obesity causes most of the Vitamin D deficiency in developed nations because Vitamin D is a fat soluble vitamin and fat cells like to suck it out of the bloodstream and store it where it cannot be utilized by the body. Interesting. So my husband and I talked about it and he drove me to the tanning salon where they hooked me up with a package and now I'm two shades darker and my vitamin levels are up. Win-win. I'm still having trouble remembering to take my thyroid medicine and my vitamins so my husband told me today that he's buying me a pill organizer (yes, like the older folks use) to help me remember to take my pills. I protested that since I only take a thyroid pill and vitamins, I don't need an "organizer." He made his point by explaining it wasn't for organization, just a visual reminder to take them and also a way to let me know if I've actually taken something already as I have a tendency to ask myself (out loud) if I've taken my pills today. Okay honey, you win, I'll use the old folks way.

After lunch my husband agreed to take some "Before" pictures of me since I got my awesome new digital camera and for whatever reason that is infinitely easier for him to work than the camera on my phone. So here they are! (And this is quite the step for me, posting them into the blogosphere, as I am very self-conscious about my looks.)

So this is me. Wt 304. Ht 5'5".

This shirt is a 24/26 and these jeans are size 26T because I like my jeans long.

Baby got back.

I hate how you can't tell that I have high cheekbones because my face is so round now. But I smile just the same because I'm happy about the journey I'm on and where it's taking me.

Rough Patch

So it's been a rough patch the last couple of days. Life. Work. Everything. My eating has been fine but I haven't been able to work out and that's been bumming me out. I hear people complain all the time about how they don't have time to work out and usually they're full of crap. I normally have plenty of time to work out. I work twelve hour shifts at the hospital so I only work three days a week. I also work nights so I have the treadmill all to myself and the free weights all to myself. My office is my workout room and I don't worry about waking anyone because once I close the door the noise is pretty much gone. I don't work out on the days I work because anyone who works twelve hour shifts will tell you that on work days you go to work, you go home, you sleep. That's pretty much it. Well this last few days has been hell at work. In the last two nights I've had to: call security to remove a visitor who was threatening a patient, call family to come in at two in the morning because a patient was completely off their rocker and throwing a fit, deal with the constant whining of two drug abusers who kept calling out for their pain medicine five minutes after I'd just given it to them, and help work a Code. At home I've been dealing with end of soccer season tournaments and two boys who absolutely refuse to do their chores and a husband who is coming down with what I had. I am confident that the next few days will be better. For now I will breathe and go make dinner.

What Doesn't Kill You

I am all better! Well, okay, I'm still fat...but I'm totally over my (killer) cold! I swear that nurses can survive Ebola, Dengue Fever, and even the Plague but the common cold has taken out most of my unit. Now life can get back to normal. I hate being sick. Absolutely loathe it. I've never liked being told I can't do something and when I'm sick I feel like my body is telling me I can't do ANYTHING. Super frustrating. So now that I'm all better I will be hitting the treadmill tonight. I'm looking forward to it and that is proof right there that being sick does something evil to my head. I've been thinking that there has got to be a good training program for walking that will help me to work toward my goal of running again. I know that I can't run until I lose a certain amount of weight (on orders from my orthopedics doc who has been treating me since I was eighteen), but I would like to be working on my pace and endurance nonetheless. It has to be flexible since my schedule is kind of wonky and I don't work out on days when I work (not at this point in my journey anyway), but since I only work three days a week, it shouldn't be too difficult to find one.

My guys showing their love for boobies before the Crew game on Sunday. This picture amazes me because my husband is 6'6" and my boys are only 11 and 8 years old. I gave birth to giants.

DC tried to play dirty but my boys won just the same.

My Crew

Oh and I got a new camera! Yay! Now I don't have to take all my pictures with my phone. I still prefer my 35mm SLR for "real" photography, but it's nice to have a digital for my everyday point and shoot stuff.

Soapbox and Sniffles

I wish I could blog about how much better I feel and how I've been able to workout the last two days but...I'm still sick. I did, however, eat much better for the past two days. I honestly feel that I must blame the Crew game for my not feeling better. Sitting out in the cold (freezing!) air for three hours while jumping up and down yelling at the refs and cheering my team to victory (2-1), seemed to be a bit too much for my system to take. When I got home I crashed. Then I had to get up and try to stay up so I could sleep in the morning (I work 7p -7a) and my body was like WTH woman! On the bright side, I got a call that I won the drawing for the Crew game jersey! They're going to mail it to me since I live two hours away. Anyway I AM starting to feel a bit better, and that's even with a crazy busy night at work. I am also proud to report that I am doing great with avoiding the snacks at work. I've been bringing my own snacks to work and keeping a box of tea in my locker so I don't feel tempted to ruin everything. It is hard, but I am determined to lose the weight. I hate being fat. The thing I hate the most is that, as a nurse, people don't take me seriously. Never mind that I was a fit and athletic firefighter and EMT. Never mind that I played soccer all through school and started running cross country at ten years old. Nope. The fact that I'm fat now is all anybody sees. If I offer someone advice on weight lifting or running, their eyes roll. If I counsel someone on their diet, I get the "Uh-huh, you should take your own advice," look. I wish I could carry around pictures of me from thirteen years ago so when they gave me the looks of disbelief I could shove the photos in their overly critical, judgmental faces and say, "See! You jackass! I wasn't always this way so wipe that stupid look off your face!" The hardest part of being fat isn't the before part. It isn't the after part. It's the during part. It's the part where you've been working out, eating right and you're losing weight, but it's only a couple of pounds a week and it's not really noticeable to anyone yet. You're feeling good about yourself and thinking, "Hell yeah. I can do this. This is going so great." Then you get smacked in the face by one of those judgmental asshats. Maybe you're treating yourself to a mani/pedi because you reached your fifteen pound loss goal. You're in the salon and really enjoying yourself. Then some chick gives you the once over followed by one of those many looks, and all of a sudden your great day is gone. Some random stranger who doesn't have the sense God gave a hamster decides they know all about you just because you're overweight/obese. It would be so easy to say you should just shrug it off and not let them get you down, but we all know how that goes. I wish I could wave a wand over each of these people and let them be fat for a few days. Maybe then they'd get their head out of their ass and have a little compassion. Don't get me wrong. There is a difference between being compassionate and accepting a bunch of excuses. I don't tolerate excuses. I know why I'm fat and I know how I'm getting to be not fat. I also know that I am not omniscient and because of that I don't look at people and cast judgement. Take a good look at yourself. We all have something that someone else considers a flaw.

I Wave my Geek Flag

This post will contain very little about my weight loss progress because I am (still) sick and haven't been able to work out for the past week. As far as my diet, well I'm sick and I am terrible about eating healthy when I feel like crap. I just don't. I haven't gone off the deep end or anything. I didn't binge. I did, however, indulge in the home made bread and chili that my chef husband made me yesterday. (Yes he really is a chef and yes it is extremely difficult to lose weight with a chef for a husband. But he really tries to help.) For right now I am focused on resting and getting better because I have a Crew game tomorrow and I don't want to feel like crap for it. The Columbus Crew is our very own major league soccer (football) team here in Ohio. They are a decent team and I'm taking the boys to see them play D.C. United tomorrow. I'm expecting a win since D.C. has been not having a good season. Anyhoo, I expect I'll feel decent tomorrow because I basically slept today and took Dayquil. The one thing I am doing is dyeing my hair back to my natural color. Turns out my husband isn't fond of the chestnut color even though I used to dye my hair that color back in school. I quote, "I used to like it but I think blonde is more sophisticated and you are nothing if not sophisticated." *blink, blink* When the hell did I become sophisticated? Perhaps I am sophisticated in certain situations but on the whole, not so much. So I think I will share just a bit about myself to make up for having nothing exciting weight-loss wise to report.

• I have mentioned I am a nurse, and I am. I have my bachelors in nursing which I actually just got in December of 2010. Before becoming a nurse I was (in order) an EMT/Firefighter, a Medical Assistant, and an Allergy/ENT nurse. Then I worked as a phlebotomist in a very busy ER for almost three years. I hated my job as a phlebotomist but I enjoyed being back in the emergency setting. I work as an Orthopedic/Trauma nurse now but my goal is to eventually get back to the ER. It's my passion. In about five years I will be going to medical school and I would like to be an Orthopedic/Trauma surgeon who works mainly in the ER. Yes, you may ask me medical questions and I will try my best to answer them however, I am not a doctor so my answers are based on my experience and the extent of my training. 
• I am a knitter, a hand-spinner (with two spinning wheels), and I dye my own yarn/fiber. It is very relaxing. I think it is nothing like yoga and I hate it when people call it the "new yoga." 
• I make my own soap. I enjoy the technical aspect of soap making but moreover I LOVE stuff that smells good and isn't full of preservatives and chemicals. I do not sell my soap but I do give it away all the time. (I will never be able to use it all. Ever.)
• I play the flute. Really well. I played all through school and I absolutely love the damn thing. 
• I am a music whore. I listen to (almost) everything. I don't have a favorite band but among my top are: Breaking Benjamin, Disturbed, Skillet, Three Days Grace, Linkin Park, Creed, Lady Antebellum, Daughtry, and The Band Perry. I love classical and rock the most. I do listen to rap but only Eminem and what I like to call rock/rap (like Hollywood Undead).
• I minored in photography in college. No I am not a professional photographer, but I'm not far off. I also prefer 35mm film to digital. I love working in the darkroom and the creative process that takes place there. 
• I love pit bulls. I have one named Shylo and she is the Best Dog EVER. Pit bulls have a very bad rap and I am all about educating the public on these awesome dogs. 
• I love tattoos. LOVE. THEM. I have to put mine in easily covered places because of my profession but I do have a small rose on my thumb that I love. I am a firm believer that tattoos should be art and not graffiti. Think before you ink is my motto. And go to a reputable artist dammit, it's f--king permanent. 
• I am a very compassionate person but I have ZERO bullshit tolerance. I do not accept flimsy excuses. For anything. The truth may hurt but I think if more people heard it more often, we'd get things straightened out faster. 
• I am not a big tv watcher but I love movies. I have never watched Survivor, Big Brother or any other ridiculous reality tv show. I have watched the Biggest Loser and I liked it but I don't mind if I miss it. I do watch Chopped, and Hell's Kitchen with my husband on the nights I'm off if it's on. I really enjoyed the first three seasons of Sons of Anarchy but I usually work Tuesdays nights so I tend to watch the whole season on dvd after it's over.

So that's a bit about me. Not too bad I hope. At least you know a bit about who I am instead of just another fat chick losing weight.

My thumb tattoo. Yes, those are my real nails. I'm not allowed to have acrylics in the hospital.