The Snowball Effect

Babyfriend and I have the same taste in shoe color.

About a month ago, inspired by my buddy Helen, I decided to join a team weight loss thing --although mine is at my fancy gym. I hadn't been there in months and months, and I wanted to try going again but I didn't know how to start. The promotion is 90-Day Challenge from August 3 to November 3. There is an optional weekly weigh-in (or just weigh in at the beginning and end), and the option to sign up for an extra 10,000-Steps-A-Day Challenge, which I did. There's huge prizes for the winner (it's a nationwide contest since it's a nationwide gym), but the biggest enticement for me was Try It Tuesdays. Every Tuesday there is a free class, sometimes about food but most of it are sample classes in TRX, yoga, pilates, treadmill/cardio, etc. Here was my perfect opportunity to get into a gym routine AND to try exercises I never would on my own! The timing was not good initially -- I was headed for vacation, but I had to go for it.

So I did.

I weighed in, took a godawful "before" picture in a sports bra and shorts (I kind of hope I don't win just so I never have to show anyone that picture) and promptly left town.

Had a super-awesome vacation (which I will post pics of soon). But I was proud of myself there -- I didn't just shut down the whole Getting Skinny project because I was out of town. I tracked my food and drink every day, and I made smart choices and ate tons of fresh, local-grown fruits and veggies, and I tried hard to get as many steps as I could. I even went to a WW meeting during the week!

And laid on the beach for a day.

I felt great about it, and I met all my goals. I made the 10K target 4 out of 7 days, I lost a pound and a half, and I had an awesome, awesome vacation with my husband and friends (and Abby).

Then it was back to work, where I was promptly felled by the flu. The one day I stayed home sick, my Fitbit counted 1,054 steps for the WHOLE DAY. From bed to bathroom to kitchen to bed, hahaha. Luckily it cleared up after a couple of days.

This week is my first full week without vacation or sickness -- and my husband went out of town with his brother for the week. So while it is not quite "back to normal" it's darned close.

As I am sure you are all worried, I am here to say that Abby and I are managing okay in my husband's absence. I went out to the Try It Tuesday class (a lesson about and *at* the grocery store, which..okay, actually I did learn that just as I use real butter and full-fat cheese I should probably eat more low-fat and regular yogurt too; I bought some lemon flavored Noosa to try) and put her back in the crate after our post-work dog park trip, so she was off her nightly routine and didn't realize that Hubby wasn't there and wasn't coming home until pretty late that night. I am sure there will be more pouting by the door tonight. She just lays next to it, and sadly rings the bells with one slow swipe of her paw. Chime, chime, where's Daddy? Chime, chime...I couldn't take it and took her upstairs to bed early. She was fine after that.

As for me, the cleaning ladies came yesterday, so I am doing my best to keep the house as spotless and unrumpled as when they left. The couch is still neatly stacked with pillows, half the bed is still made, and the kitchen counters are still empty. I'm going to see how long I can keep that up, just because I am a weirdo.

Not to jinx anything, but now that all my vacations are over and I am back to my regular work-a-day routines, my commitment to the 90-day challenge is starting to produce results. I've hit the 10K-step mark 5 days in a row, and for two of those I managed to get to the gym and figured out how to work the dumb treadmill.

I think I found a good way to get myself to do it -- if I don't make my 10K steps by 7pm, then I have to go to the gym and treadmill until they are done. If I can get my 10K in, I get a night off. So far the carrot/stick approach is working -- I'm a lot more conscious of how much I am moving/not moving during the day at the hospital, and I try to take Abby out for a long time and long walks in the park or around the neighborhood. If that fails, then I am getting in the habit of just popping over the gym and getting some sweat going.

Next Tuesday is a TRX class, which fills me with both dread and curiosity; there are only a couple of genuine fatties like me doing this challenge, so I feel pretty awkward and noticeable at the trial classes, but I am really grateful for the opportunity to just go and try out these things without having to commit to any of them. Yet. I'd love to find a couple of exercises from this that I can enjoy going forward. Once the challenge is over, the 10K thing won't be the main goal, and my hope is by then the habit of going to the gym several nights a week will be set, so mixing up my exercise routines and trying things other than walking will be the next adventure.

All in all, I am pretty happy with the way this is snowballing; I know myself, and incremental change that builds from one success at a time is how I change my habits best. I look back at myself a year ago -- I was hobbled from still-undiagnosed foot pain. I could barely get up the stairs! Then came the blessed appointment at the ortho, and a long, long winter of twice-a-week physical therapy, and then starting to take Abby to the dog park daily this spring, and then getting my Fitbit...and now I am finally at the point where walking 4-5 miles in a day doesn't cripple me for the rest of the week. Hell, I am starting to look forward to next week with Hubby's return so I can go to the gym even if I do make my steps! From my viewpoint of a year ago, it feels pretty damned miraculous that I got this far at all.

The competitive side of me is a little upset, I will admit. I've been watching the leaderboards for both challenges, and most of the people started out making their goals right on the first day. One person has already lost 11 pounds in three weeks! (I hate that person.) I have eased myself into it, because that's how I incorporate things into my habits. It's tough to see myself in the back of the pack on the scoreboard (the only people below me have already clearly dropped out) but I keep reminding myself that I just need to keep doing it.

Tortoise and the hare, tortoise and the hare.

Even if I don't win a prize, I definitely will have won.

The best selfie I have yet to take.