how to make your boobs look better in one easy step

okay, so at the gym on sunday, my BNGS friend (heretofore known as K) and i used weight machines. now... last time i was doing regular strength training i was using free weights (with my brother-trainer, BK) (try to keep up), but K only uses machines. so we used machines.

25 pounds felt so light on a chest fly! like nothing! i mentally patted myself on the back for retaining some muscle. the past two days, though? it hurts to fucking breath. it hurts and it's scary. my chest is tight just because my muscles are tight, but it feels like a panic attack. and you know what will make you panic for real? not being able to take a deep breath.

so i'm stretching. and drinking water. and taking advil. and going back to the gym on monday for a date with the arc trainer and 20 pounds on the fly machine. because today? my boobs look UH-MAZING. oh, yes. over-training my chest lifted, separated and enlarged the girls. LOVE. IT. not that i'm going to keep over-training. but training, for sure.

AND i paid for my spinning class today, but it doesn't start until my birthday week, so that won't get me toward my increasingly unrealistic looking goal of being at goal my my 27th (barf.) birthday.

AND my eating has been perfect for, erm, well, it's PLANNED to be perfect for two days. once i do today's eating.

my scale has not been terribly encouraging, but some of that must be the over-training, right?

brevity

i've been being so brief here lately because i can barely type-- i'm using only my left hand for the next few weeks until my tendinitis improves.

my weekend weight finally dropped off today, so i'm 153.8. i can't wait to FEEL 149. i feel ginormous lately. and i want to eat my feelings. but i don't.

hubs hit a new low today: 239.6. he's less than 20# from goal... in just four months. makes me feel huge. dunno why. maybe because i weigh almost the same while he's lost 66 pounds??

off to the dentist monday for some fillings. $250. why do i even have dental? and then two more at a later date.

i feel like i'm falling apart.

i didn't earn this

i went to bed early last night so i could get up early and hit the track. i did that thing where i made sure i was thinking about waking up at 5:30 while i fell asleep. at 5:15 i woke up, and then i fell back asleep and had this incredibly vivid dream that i (not we) adopted a newborn. i woke up a LEETLE stressed... at 6:15.

balls.

i overate last night, too. not a ton, two or three hundred calories of sweets and tortilla chips. my husband went out. i wonder if that's boredom eating, lonesome eating or sneak eating?

and today i'm down to 152.2. if i hit 152.0 tomorrow, i'm going to adjust to 151.6 for monday so i don't look at the weekend as a freebie.

TODAY:

• actually stay in my calorie range
• drink a boatload of water
• that's it cause i have plans tonight and a very early morning

steady

last night was not ideal in a lot of ways, and i'm up .2 pounds today. no big. except, now it's thursday and i'm trying to lose like 1.5 pounds by monday?

today, despite a long-planned pizza dinner, is back-on-track day with careful eating, exercise and water drinking. and going out to buy ice cream cause it's the last night of the 2 for $5 edy's slow-churned sale!

so... i haven't mapped out my foods and such but i'm going to do that now and hope that in my mild hang-over this morning, i planned a somewhat balanced diet.

emotional

i'm having a rough time at work. i'm the entirety of my company and it's just not really working out for me. that vacation? i went in for a couple hours last monday. i haven't taken a full week off in four years. that was my honeymoon and i called in every day to the temp.

anyway. i begin to wonder if i'll ever be able to have it under control, or ever be happy at a job, if i can manage grad school, if grad school is a waste of money, if i'm really better suited to sahm-hood... i get anxious. and depressed. and occasionally i eat.

but i'm pulling through. is okay.

still hope

up to 152.4 today! not cool, body. not cool, self, who ordered the mu shu vegetables.

anyway. onward and downward. tonight i'll have a baked panko-crusted chicken cutlet, a small serving of pasta and salad, salad, salad. tomorrow i'll bring a veggie tray to the barbecue. sunday and monday will be all about produce, hydration and exercise.

btw, can i say this? i'm super-happy for all my newly engaged friends (we're at that age and there are four weddings brewing, plus one or two more engagements on the horizon), but... mildly jealous? i dunno, man, getting married asap was important five years ago because ooh, we were sooo in loooooove (still are!) but it would have been nice to be, like, a fully formed adult at the time. and thinner.

anywho. 150.4? eeep. but i've got 4 days.

holding out

i'm still on track. it's been a hell of a week, but i'm still on track. except i didn't do weights last night.

(151.2 today.)

tonight, we're having a regular dinner at home-- grilled pork chops and sugar snap peas-- and i'm baking a chocolate cheesecake with peanut butter cookie crust for my husband's birthday. tomorrow we're going out with his dad and stepmom. we're hoping for japanese, or else i have to check out bertucci's. friday is the birthday dinner with my parents and brothers: panko crusted, baked chicken parm and the cheesecake. cheesecake disposal plan is to cut the leftovers in half, sending half home with my brothers and slicing & freezing the other half. saturday is our friends' barbecue, to which i'm bringing veggies & greek yogurt ranch dip.

anyway. still plugging along.

150.4... 150.4... 150.4...

the incident

what do you get when a stress-out girl doesn't eat enough lunch then gets home to find her camera returned unfixed, no, we're just not gonna do it, thanks for buying the service plan though! and her stressed out husband goes out after a calorie-dense dinner and she sits down to watch a fluffy rom-com* alone?

an incident involving peanut butter chips. 1/4 cup of them. four servings. 320 calories worth.

they were calories i had to work with, but... damn. i could have done so much more with them. oh well, right?

i'm not sure where i stand food-wise today. i packed pb & j for lunch, breakfast was the usual (turkey bacon and toast) plus raspberries. i have an apple and a kiwi for snacks plus a fruit-leather type bar thing. i'll try to ensure there's a veggie on my pizza tonight.

exercise-wise, i'm planning on walking with the mister AFTER dark because, DAMN but it's 95* again! i'm also going to do the lower body & abs parts of my body-weight resistance circuit. but... my boob/armpit region is still KILLING me from the addition of push-ups on tuesday. so what do i do? skip them? i dunno. undecided.

weight today was 152.8, which is great. i'm practically jumping for joy.

i'm really ticked about this graduation party we have to go to on saturday. we offered to take my husband's grandmother's cousin (whom we've never met) to doctor's appointments once in a while. it's a long, sad story of her nephew demanding that she pay him hundreds of dollars to do things like deposit her social security check and pick up her prescriptions. now, when the offer was made it was strictly for doctor's appointments and understood that they would be in her area and all on one day/infrequent. she lives and hour away. so on saturday? we are driving there, picking her up, driving back, going to this godforsaken EIGHTH GRADE graduation party, driving her home and then coming home. that makes this 4.5 hour party and 8 hour (plus) time commitment for us. and the food is not likely to be healthy.



*TiMER doesn't suck as bad at it ought to... possibly because of my undying devotion to emma caulfield, possibly because desmond harrington is on dexter, possibly because i'm really good at suspending my disbelief and once you get past the INCREDIBLY STUPID and totally implausible set up, it's quite a charming little love story. and sisterhood didn't conquer all, though it was touch-and-go for a minute there.

and for my next trick...

i cannot explain my weight today: 153. well. did wishing make it so? did... i dunno, a lack of sodium? three liters of water? was it that i had a beer and 1/3 of a brownie instead of my usual light ice cream? was it the (AWESOME) body weight-resistance workout i did? the walk? was it that i had a salad for lunch?

so, 153. that's good news.

i don't feel much better (in my head) but... well, working out with my husband is pretty therapeutic. shopping for my tropical vacation is, too. i'm beginning to fear christmas because... what if she comes? i don't want her to ruin my family christmas! but that's not fair, i know, because MY family, whom she hasn't seen at christmas in four years, they're her family, too. i suppose even I'M her family. but, in a way i can't really articulate, she's not mine.

we're still dealing with leftover ingredients from fathers' day, so dinner tonight is going to be frozen pierogies topped with bacon and carmelized onions. healthy, no? but don't worry, my work-food (snacks & lunch) is an apple, a kiwifruit, 6 oz. of cucumber slices, 6 oz. of baby carrots and 6 oz. of green pepper with 1/4 cup of hummus. for breakfast i had complete protein bread (toasted) with butter, 2 slices of turkey bacon and raspberries.

i think there are a couple new plans in town:

1. tuesdays & thursdays i'll be doing my body weight-resistance workout comprised of wall sits (3 @ 1:00 for now), bridges (3 @ 1:00), "jumpies" which probably have a serious name like... squat jumps or something (3 sets of 15), sit-ups (3 sets of 25) and push-ups (just added back into my routine, so 3 sets of 10). saturdays i'll do my full, serious, weight training workout.
2. each week i will make a weight loss goal. it will be based on my weight at the beginning of that week with a eye to long-term goals. every ounce i lose or gain does not warrant a re-evaluation of the plan.

anyway, i appear to have reached my goal for this week (153) here on DAY TWO, so... i have no idea what that means. the over-arching goal right now is to be sub-150 by july 13th.

this weekend i have a graduation party to attend and i'm bringing gum. i don't think i can/will eat anything served there. so i just won't.

bonus post: i had so much happiness

lately, i have been happy. i mean outright JOYFUL. that's not usual. usual is... barely not depressed. usual is plugging along. but recently things have been really great in my life, not particular things, though a vacation coming up is a thrill and omfg grad school is wonderful news, things-- no, I-- have just been good.

i am not good now.

dealing with my sister, on my own turf, rolling over and playing nice makes me violently angry. and hurt and lonely and... depressed. for REAL depressed, like i've spent so many years.

i still have there wherewithal to be apologetic about to (to my husband). i know that things like food and cutting aren't "coping" options, but shopping, smoking and drinking to excess still sound good. no, exercise does not seem helpful. i am fearful of where this will take me and how long it will last.

i need to not be in this space.

not gonna make it

when i leave for vacation in three weeks, i hope to weigh 150.0 of less. 145.0 is... no longer viable. so. yeah. 154.6. that's... ugly.

okay, so, regroup. for next week: 153.0. that's... ugh. that's higher than i've been lately, but i'm not willing to assume it will magically go away. whatever.

today is fruit-heavy with fresh, organic raspberries from my daddy's garden (about a pint of them... at least), an apple and a kiwifruit. i'm having a giant salad with "mexican cheese blend," light sour cream and salsa for lunch. dinner is going to be a fritatta with green peppers and onions. mmmmm. i'll do a full weight circuit and a walk with my husband. and drink a ton of water.

and tomorrow will be better.

sisterhood conquers all

lately, it seems like the theme of every movie i watch ends up being sisterhood conquers all. like, as long as you've got your sister, it'll be okay. with the occasional variation re: your mother.

i gotta get something off my chest:

i do not love my sister. i do not like her and i would not be missing anything if i never saw or heard from (or OF) her again. "sister" means... basically jack shit to me. i would probably give her a kidney, but only because my brothers all enjoy contact sports and my parents would resent me forever if i didn't. and they would have to promise to keep us in SEPARATE recovery rooms. seriously. and i'd like to be out before we get into the or.

as a result, i am in a baaaaaaaaaaaaaad place. i was forced, yesterday, to interact with the bitch. in my f'ing HOME, no less. so i did what anybody would do (the same as what i did at my baby brother's graduation party two weeks ago.) i got rip, roaring drunk and pretended she was any other girl i don't like and made EXTRA nice.

today, frankly, i feel terrible. not hung over, thanks to the four hours i spent lying awake between 1 and 5 wishing i could get cool enough to sleep and biding my time drinking water. depressed. anxious. miserable and angry that no one-- NO ONE-- seems to care that i don't want her in my life. today, i want to run far, far away and never come back.

debbie downer what?

my weight is also up. 154.2 is two pounds up from last week's low and 2.4 up from where i'd hoped to be tomorrow. i didn't walk over the weekend, or lift. i ate crap and had two of what passes for a binge in my life: once when my husband went out on saturday i ate ice cream out of the carton and several slices of toast with butter and last night after eating a delightful and satisfying linner (lunch/dinner), i made-- and practically INHALED-- a bacon & cheddar sandwich.

oh, and internet? i bought a pack of smokes. i've consumed 6 of them. and it took LOTS of willpower (with a side of exhaustion) to not smoke one this morning when my husband was in the shower.

look. i've been down this road before. and you know what? i'm NOT going to run away and never come back. and xyz event (weight loss, moving, grad school, a baby) is not going to make everything magically better. when i come out of this, as i most likely will, i will wish i'd soldiered on. so i am.

we have no leftover sandwiches (!!) from the party, but we have leftover veggies and hummus and various leftover ingredients (bacon, cheese, chopped onions, caramelized onions). so, i'm eating veggies and hummus and cheese for lunch a couple days. yum! and i'll walk tonight and lift and walk tomorrow. i think we're having omelets for dinner, or maybe a fritatta. i've got peppers and onions to get rid of and about 15 eggs.

maybe tomorrow my body will reward me for bouncing back. maybe not. i guess we'll see.

japanese food

mister man and i are getting japanese food tonight. i. can't. wait.

have i told you i feel like the world's pickiest eater? i do. i'm weird about flavors and textures. i don't eat whole wide categories of foods: seafood, melon, baby things, things with their faces still attached. so, when we go for japanese, i get... hibachi veggie fried rice. healthy, right? and, no, before you ask, i don't even like the vegetable sushi. sushi skeeves me. so, fried rice and spring rolls for me.

there was a time when we ate out three or more times a week. in a two week cycle we'd have pizza twice, chinese food twice, japanese once (it's more expensive), thai once (i like it less) and maybe wawa sandwiches once or twice. now, it's a planned indulgence. it's celebratory, actually. wednesday was our five year--gag-- date-a-versary. my husband and i met on june 11, 2005 and by the 16th, we were inseparable. so, now, when i've set up my whole week to support a dinner out? god, i'm nervous. what if i bloat? what if my guesstimates are very badly wrong (i've used ck numbers for foods from large, chain pan-asian restaurants) and i'm going over by a zillion calories? what if... what if...

i had a little bounce back today to 152.6. it's weird... i thought... well, i thought i'd be thinner at this weight. that's all. i'm still holding on to hope for 151.8 by monday.

tomorrow will be fine. good, actually, since we'll be busy little bees getting ready for our big fathers' day lunch. but sunday? fraught. my fil, smil, gmil, parents, brothers, sister, her partner and her mother are coming. wtf? i'm so intensely stressed. my sister has not been to my apartment since 2006. her partner has NEVER been and seriously, the mother? i think i met once. i'm positively stunned that they're coming AND that my sister had the nerve to add a plus one. my apartment doesn't really seat 13. or, you know, 6. this is going to be super-stressful. PLUS i'll need to work out the nutrition for all of my homemade food. gah. i'm so overwhelmed.

151.8. totally doable, right??

my wobbly bits

(152.6 today, for my reference. and yours, you know, if you give a crap.)

the 150s is where i said, way back in 2006/2007, that i would be happy. i'd still be overweight, but i'd be normal for me. and that's true. or, at least, it would be if my 26-year-old body was the same as my 16-year-old body. ummmm, but it's not.

my 16-year-old body was relatively smooth, proportionate and, frankly, still a little babyfat (ie: the boobs were bigger & higher but fairly shapeless-- more fat that BREAST). now? sigh. i'm pretty lumpy.

(btw, i have sent my camera off for repairs and it should be fixed in two weeks. i'm sorry that we'll be WAY OFF from -75 pounds by the time i give you a photo post again. we're already at about -83!)

so, here i am, in the LOW one-fifties, no less, and i'm not happy yet. so this is why i'm pushing for the last 15-20 pounds:

1. my upper arms are disproportionately fat. i would be cool with always covering my thighs and tummy if i could bare arms, as it were. but they basically look freakishly large. this is new to this version of my body.
2. inner thigh clearance. there is none. those suckers still straight-up RUB! what the hell?
3. that little over-the-naval pooch. i didn't have it until i weighed about 210 pounds, and it still hasn't gone away.
   
4. knee fat. we talked about it at christmas, and i've lost nearly 20 pounds since then. but it's still there, mocking my desire to wear high boots and high hemlines.
   

and that's it! i wanted to try for a reason #5, but i realized, hey, no need to SEEK OUT neurosis!

so, that's that. i'm happy with... my trunk. my butt. my loooong neck and longer torso. even my thighs up to the little inner-thigh fat pocket.

today is my last spinning class for the summer, unless i decide to spend a fortune to take classes a la carte at a fancy spin studio nearby. i'll miss it so much. BUT! the man of the house has VOLUNTEERED to take up running with me again after puerto rico!! i haven't wogged since my bad-idea visit to the track 3 days post-op. now it's been 10 weeks-- long enough to have finished the program!-- and i've not been back. in the mean time, walking & weights. and 151.8. 151.8. 151.8...

le sigh, as the say on the interwebs

well, yesterday...sucked. i left my lunch (and veg snacks) at home AND was wearing super cute but not especially friendly shoes PLUS we're being strict budgeters lately, so i had this long, boring struggle with myself over what to get for lunch and settled on what i THOUGHT was a moderately healthy and moderately cheap lunch. it really was a short walk, so that at least worked out.

of course, it was cheapish, but only about a dollar or two less than i could have spent on an ACTUALLY healthy lunch. anyway, boring, boring, boring... chinese food. i guess i should have known that "sauteed" means dripping in brown sauce.

and so, i've gained.

i don't even know what to do right now. this bloat weight SHOULD be falling off, but it's not. today, i'm having a hard-core fiber day (for my usual problem) and grabbing a light frap for, uh, good measure. the weekend is going to be very, very much dedicated to fitness and... i don't know. i don't know what's going on.

not again!

156.4. that, after spinning last night.

i have to say, i feel like a giant hypocrite. in the past few weeks i've been all "you have to be consistent" and "you can't expect a continuous, steady loss" and cheerleader-bullshit to my husband. and the last couple days, i've wanted to crawl back in bed and cry when i got off the scale.

i zipped past these numbers last week. i want NEW numbers. i want to see the little changes, the LAST little changes, start.

i'm having my usual issue in the digestion department. is it fair to blame that? cause i am.

(frustration)

ah. mah. gah. 156.6? really?? why, body, why?

i ate right. i drank my waters. i walked. i lifted. i started cleaning up the mess i made last week (this doesn't aid my weight loss in any way but i feel like it should). the only think i can think of is... i've been low on fiber. really low. and, well, you know how that goes.

today's food is:

• a clif zbar (choco-chip) because i'm out of real breakfast food
• a kiwi
• an extra small banana
• a cup of tortellini salad
• 15 grape tomatoes
• 15 baby carrots
• grilled chicken
• snow peas
• 1/2 cup sliced peaches
  
• 1/2 cup edy's slow-churned is under consideration
• and the workout is... SPINNING

i intend to eat my kiwi skin, too, because even though i can't figure out how MUCH fiber it has to count in my daily totals, i know it has SOME.

i feel... crummy. i want to see my weight keep going down! i want to see the 140s this summer and the 130s by fall. i want... i want to be done.

losing friends and alienating people

last night, just before we left for spinning, i gave e a pair of jeans (which i tried to wear yesterday and could barely keep up-- good, expensive jeans that have been worn maybe 20 times) and a pair of yoga capris (the uniform of e's life).

"no, becklette!" she said, a little more harshly and shrilly than i'm used to, "i do not want you to give me one more single piece of clothing that is too big for you! i don't want them!"

it's not an issue of me dumping my old clothes on her. i'm careful to only offer her clothes in good condition. and i don't mind if she doesn't like/want something. the issue is that my friend is jealous and angry that i've lost weight and she hasn't. (actually, she has, but not as much. to be fair, she hasn't be at it as long, either.)

later, in a fb convo with another friend, my skinniest skinny friend, one with whom i've always been able to discuss the minutia of my relationships with food, the scale and my mother, my friend said, "i hope you're not too skinny to be my friend anymore-- that would be sad." ummmm, wow. and ouch.

i know this happens. i know that the dirty looks from the other girls in one group will get worse until, eventually, they get over it. (they can't exclude me, it's a guy-run group.) i know my mother's and sister's jealousy will continue to be palpable. i don't want that, but... eh. i don't want to stay fat MORE.

i'll start grad school in the fall, and a new job in my field not too long after that. i'll make new friends. but i have a long history of inadvertently alienating people, and i can see it's happening now. i can't keep friends.

...

154.2 today. 2/5 of a pound to go for mondays goal of 153.8.

and there's that

156.4. i've officially lost 79.6 pounds. think i can manage to *lose* half a pound this weekend??

i could have done better... weight trained at all this week. gotten more than 3 cardio workouts in. not had a mini-binge/pity party last night. but i didn't. and even if i had, losing another 1.4 pounds would not have made david's bridal carry more boleros in store, or their pink clutch match my dress or... any number of things that would have helped me go into this event more confidently.

i am wearing a size 10 sheath dress and it looks pretty good. i will be able to walk and dance in my favorite shoes. i have gum to chew and seltzer to drink. this is gonna be a good party.

good morning campers!

so. okay. where the fuck are we??

let's start with me, and then you can feel free to chime in. but you probably won't. 24 followers and many hits a day, but nobody says a damn thing. anyway. me.

• tmi, but, oh, so true. i am bleeding slightly worse than a normal period. but... i don't have my period yet. as far as i know. i'm in a lot of pain, too. this sucks monkey balls.
• tmi some more: i'm constipated because, um, moving, you know, THEM, puts painful pressure on the general region that's bleeding. yes, even if i take something to help.
• that's the last tmi.
  
• i haven't heard the all-clear from my doctor yet. today is a week. this means... it's still remotely possible that i have cancer.
  
• my husband is on a (medically aided) (as in, with medicine) diet and has lost 14 pounds in 6 days. FOURTEEN. can everybody spell jealous? at this rate, which, i expect, will slow down, but STILL, if it doesn't, he will reach his goal weight in about 35 days. motherfucker.
  
• him being on a diet means WE'RE not snacking at night, except for the 1/3 of a cup of ice cream we each have. you read that right: less than a serving. LESS.
• which is awesome for me because i might actually be down to 160 by next weigh in.
• oh, yeah, totally not gonna be 140 for The Wedding, new goal: 155.
• that's 1.25 pounds a week.
  
• doable. even if i can't workout as hard.
  
• also means no way am i going to be 135 in july when i *hope* we'll be going on a fabulous, all-inclusive caribbean vacation. new goal: 145.
• that's 1.5ish pounds a week.
• doable, if i work out.
• new timeline for 135 (or end, in any event): mid-september when we go to mil's for a last pre-grad school hurrah.
• that's about another 1.25 pounds per week.
• OKAY. and. i did my fafsa. (yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay)
• that's about it.

what's new with you?


(ps-- of course i'm all kinds of anxious for no good reason today. that's always why i do bullet posts.)