Comin' clean

If you've been following along, you know that it's been a very busy and stressful summer for us. When we were in Martha's Vineyard and The Hamptons, we went so overboard on food every single day, it wasn't funny.  I was under so much stress before we left with work stuff and was up until 2 am almost every night then back at it at 7-7:30 am.  It made for me indulging in a big can of  "eff it" on the food, water and exercise front while we were gone.  As you know, that doesn't make for a very good combo and when your "fat jeans" by the end of vacation aren't roomy anymore, you know you're in trouble. We never weigh in after vacations anymore for a minimum of a week or two because mentally we just are not able to handle it.  Usually, after a week or two of going back to normal with our routine, we can feel the sodium bloat going away, the endurance very slowly starts to creep back up and things start to fit better.

When we got home this time, we had a love letter waiting on us from our homeowner's association telling us we needed to paint our patio fence.  Well, our fence post was in horrible condition and I thought if I was going to repaint the fence then I wanted to bite the bullet and get that horrid fence post replaced before hand.  I mean, look at it!

So began our one-month ordeal of getting jerked around for a month by a contractor regarding this project as well as getting our bathroom remodel underway.  It's not something we wanted to do but a hairline crack in the sink had been put off for going on two years and since it was our only bathroom we knew if it split in half, we'd be screwed.

Since we decided not to weigh in, we wanted to let our clothes and the way we felt be our guide...something we'd never done before.  But we both felt so uncomfortable in our own skin and clothes that we'd know if any weight was being lost.  The first two weeks were a wake-up call as our endurance was in the toilet.  Almost 3 weeks of not exercising will do that to you.  We made a crucial mistake and didn't track our food.  We thought we'd give the whole "intuitive eating" thing a try and honestly, I think we did fine with that.  We've been eating the same crap for years so we're pretty in tune with what we're putting in our mouths.  The thing is, I'm very susceptible to bloat from sodium.  It doesn't phase him but I have always planned my meals to stay under 2000mg and even then I get very nervous and try to stay closer to 1500-1700mg if I can.  I don't have high blood pressure or anything but my mom has it and since I do hold water when I eat more of it, I have no desire to poke the bear.  Water was pure crap and you guys know that has always been an Achilles heel for me.  I just cannot force it down no more what tricks I try and when I'm stressed out, it goes down even further.

When we decided to take on the bathroom remodel ourselves, that came at the same time deadline wise that we had to have our fence done.  Between two coats of priming and two coats of paint in the choking summer heat, the paint was literally mixed with our blood, sweat, and tears.  Well, those three days of standing on the uneven ground in crappy shoes and crappy Croc flip flops royally screwed my legs to the point of hobbling.  I had to go get a massage and some serious adjusting done from the chiro to help even that out.  Right after the fence was done on Thursday, I think, by Saturday we jumped into the bathroom and so began a trend of "food justification."

"The Mr laid the floor all by himself...f**k contractors...let's go to a fancy dinner with all the fixins!"

"We removed the toilet and vanity, hung "shiplap" and a new chair rail that looked better than anything we've ever had and caulked the hell outta that thing...let's celebrate at another fancy restaurant."

Okay, so we may have only done that twice, maybe three times but then you throw Saturdays on that and they were so far out of control that by the end of the day, we felt like crap and full.  You know when you wake up full the next day, you are outta control.  This is where people would tell us to cut out Saturday high cal days, well just saying it puts both of us in a panic and immediately makes me crave everything.  We know ourselves well enough to know that we're not all or nothing people.  If you give me nothing, I will eat it all and do it out of spite.  We require moderation but we need to find a moderation level coupled with doing the things we know we're supposed to do like tracking and water and such.  We did that for the first time last weekend and it felt good to have a modicum of control back.  We've been tracking the past two weeks and I definitely feel more in control than I have in a long time.

That doesn't change the fact that I have 11 lbs more on me than I had before vacation.  Yeah.  (I did have it down to 9 lbs but gained two back for no reason and it stuck last week.  You can bet Middle Fingers was my song of choice those days.)

I've been using my workout "sucker pants" as my guide to how bad off I likely still am shape-wise because they've been rolling off my middle tire as I work out which didn't happen before we left.  I noticed the past two workouts that it hasn't rolled and that was from Friday when they did so I'm hoping that's a good sign and not just that the elastic band threw up the white flag and said "deuces" before tapping out.

We have never let ourselves get this out of control for so long and we're paying for it.  We have two months before another vacation and we have made it mandatory for us to exercise every day.  We did that when we went to Virginia and were very successful because we exercised daily without fail and we indulged about half the time there.  A week after our return, we only had 3 extra pounds.  I would like that to be the case again but I'd like it to be back to or as close as back to the weight I was before we left.  To ensure that, I'll be making batches of chili like I did before.  Maybe a couple of breakfasts and meals like my lower cal meatloaf and mashed potatoes so we're still getting stuff that feels like a treat but would be way less than going out.  Because we've been here before, we won't have that need to try every single restaurant in town and will only go back to the places we know for sure are worth deducting from the calorie bank.  We're hoping to paddle quite a few days as well which always burns a ton of calories but on paddle days, I still want to do a 20 minute HIIT or strength session too.

We're finally getting our head back in the game which both feels good and feels shameful because we've only hurt ourselves.  But we did still exercise six days a week since we've been back and we've eaten our usual stuff so I guess that's something to be proud of but I'll be more proud when my shirt doesn't hike up my gut or my sucker pants stay in place instead of heading south.

How do you get back on track when you haven't been mentally in the game?

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