I had Mexican for dinner tonight and I didn't do too hot. The chips definitly won. However, I hardly ate any of my fajitas, so I brought a lot of leftovers home.

I did eat an on points lunch and woke up too late for breakfast. I did break down and buy a bag of dove chocolate hearts. They are so yummy. I had 4 today. That is 4 points because they are 1 points each. I think and I hope I will not be able to eat too many at one time of them. I just had 3 sugar cookies with some milk.

Tomorrow I am going to Chattanooga to visit my best DMB friend. I haven't seen her since Red Rocks, so I am excited to see her. I am sure we will go out, hopefully to Mud Pie and I plan on getting a salad. No ifs ands or buts about it.

I didn't go to the gym today, I won't be going tomorrow, and I won't be going on Wednesday. I have decided that I am going to pay the $25 deposit for a key to the workout room at the apartment complex. This means I can workout on the weekends or on the evenings without going into the gym at work.

Hopefully I will see a difference on the scale on Tuesday.

I turned down pizza yesterday! Ah yeah! My professor bought pizza for the class, but I had already eaten a yummy turkey wrap on a whole weat tortilla

I did have pizza for lunch, but that was planned. I should have gotten the salad though because it looked soooo much better.

The weekend should be interesting food wise. I will probably go out to eat 2 or 3 times. gah.

But here comes a 3 day weekend!

So I can already tell that work related eating is going to be my biggest challange. I made it to the gym this morning doing 30 minutes of weights and 60 minutes of cardio. I ate my breakfast of Kashi Cereal (half a serving 1 point) and SF apple sauce (1 Point). I brought a bannana, but due to meeting I didn't have time to eat it. So I packed my lunch. Really it was a hodge podge (sp?) of items. Broccoli, 2 corn tortillias, 2 slices ham and 2 slices turkey, and a laughing cow semisoft cheese and the red rhine (Let me tell you, they are yum and they are only 1 point!). They remind me of amazing lunches we would get in Paris at the grocery and eat them with baguettes. mmmmm. Ok, well any way I was pursuaded by my fellow co-workers to go out to lunch at the on campus cafe. Gah. My options were pizza, burgers, pre-made salad, or mexican. I don't like their pizza. I could have gone for the grilled chicken sandwich, but I really didn't want fries. I thought about the pre-made salad, but it was almost $6 for a little salad and they had no FF dressing. So I settled on the mexican. I got a chicken taco salad with no shell and no chips. I can do with out the shell, but the chips part is huge. I love chips. I can almost eat a whole bag. Were not talking regular grocery size, were talking Sam's or Costco size bag. So I get the salad with sour cream and guac. I can't do without those just yet. All in all I felt I did pretty well except for the cookie. Ahh the cookie...these are not your regular cookies these are "Love Cookies" as Miss Shelly the lady who makes them calls them. The flavors are amazing. triple chocolate chunk, regular chocolate chip, toffee pecan, etc. So I am hooked on these damn things. When I paid for my lunch I resisted, but after my lunch I caved. I had a chocolate chip cookie.

One thing I am proud of is all my co-workers comented on how good my salad looked while they ate their burgers and fries and tortilla chips. I think next time I will be able to resist the cookie.

Wow, I just wrote a lot about my food intake. No wonder I have a problem with food =)

So I weighed in today at 212. That would be 91 pounds down. Phatgirl is logging in from a Panera of all places because I don't have internet hooked up at the apartment yet. So instead of doing my reading for my international business grad school class, I am at Panera surfing the net.

Breakfast consisted of no sugar added applesauce and a Kashi bar. Lunch was my leftover chicken parmesan and spaghetti with added green beans from Carraba's. I had a small hot chocolate with skim milk, peppermint flavor, and whipped cream for a snacky snack. I also had 2 points of TLC Crackers. I went to the grocery store before some dinner and bought lots of yummies. Some things I got were:

12 Lean Cuisines. Yes, 12. They were 50% off and if you bought 12 you got 5 dollars off your total bill.
Bannanas
Apples
Frozen green bean
Frozen broccoli
Frozen peppers
Egg Beaters
Corn tortillas
Refried beans
Salsa
SF popsicles
Kashi Cereal (I can't remember what kind)
Cheerios
Sunflower seeds
Coleslaw
Frozen potato wedges

and I think that's about it.

Those are just a few of the staples of my diet.

I came home and poured some cabbage in a bowl and added 2 points worth of chicken and a few toasted sunflower seeds and some balsamic vinegar. Yum! All for about 3-4 points. However I was still feeling a little hungry so off to Panera with the roomate. I got chicken noodle soup and I ate the baguette. I don't really by bread to keep at the house, so I guess it is ok if I eat it occasionally.

Since everyone is doing before and after pictures I might as well too. I will try to do that this weekend too.

I hope everyone has had a wonderful on point day! =)

So here it is 2 years and 4 days to the date that I started my journey. I weighed a lot and I was in major denial. I would look at fat people and compare myself to them. I would tell myself things like “I didn’t look that fat.” and “I can carry more weight because I am taller.” Man I had myself fooled. When I went home over the Christmas holiday I looked through my pictures of my year in Europe. That year and the summer before it were the experiences young adults dream about. The summer of 2002 took me to 21 Dave Matthews Band shows, Bonnaroo, and countless friends and memories made. There is one experience from that summer when I was at Bonnaroo when I met my Dutch friend Esther. We were talking about something and she pointed out my stretch marks on my arms. I have no clue what we were talking about; I just know I was embarrassed. (Esther if you are reading this, I love you because you were the only one willing to point out the obvious! I wish a lot more of my friends would do that!) Anyway, for some reason that comment still wasn’t motivation to get my butt in gear. I ended the summer and head off to Italy for 8 months. While in Italy I didn’t really lose that much weight I just did a lot more walking. Anyway, I was looking at the pictures from those 8 months and I was disgusted at how fat I looked. I looked awful. It was just really painful for me to look at the pictures when I was at home.

When I look back and think about what made me decided to lead a healthier life by losing weight I couldn’t pin points it. Wait. Yes I can. It was when I got on the scale and it read 303. It is when the pants I liked, but were really too big started fitting right. Yes. It’s all coming back to me now.

So here I am 2 years later and at least 80 lbs lighter. Part of me is frustrated that I didn’t lose the weight quicker. I look at so many of the “success” stories in magazines like People, Weight Watchers, etc and I am just astonished at the people who have lost more than a hundred pounds in 2 years. Really I am jealous. I want to be thin and I want it now. Don’t even get me started on Star Jones!

So now with almost 1/3 of my weight gone you think I would be happier. I am not really sure I am at this moment. Sure I am healthier, but it seems like now I am constantly obsessed with food and exercise. I journal in spurts, but when I do it is obsessive. I can’t just go to the gym once a week. I must go every-single-day. (Since I have started going to the gym number of exercise pants I have worn out the crotch in: 3. Does this happen to skinny people too?)

I was reading through one of my previous posts about over eating at the cafeteria on campus. I went there today and I overate. I decided right now I am not going to go there anymore. There is no possible way I can go there and not overeat. And to be honest, the food isn’t that great. Sure I will be missing out on socializing every so often, but it’s not worth it to treat my body that way.

For dinner tonight I had my leftover Chicken pad thai. I probably could have picked a healthier dinner considering my lunch though. I went to the gym for the first time in a week and a half. I have been very busy packing and moving to my new place with a 5 minute commute to work and the gym! I did some light weights for 35 minutes and cardio for 40.

Tomorrow is the weigh in day. It will be the 2 year weigh in!

Hopefully this weekend I will have some time to update this site.

I am back after a 3 month absence! Tomorrow is my weigh in day so I will post the results tomorrow to let you all know where I am in my journey.