Lace em up...

Lace em up...

Sunday, November 06, 2016

Reflection, Halloween and good food...

My week (October 30 - November 5) in pictures from Instagram,,,


October 30th...


The best thing about heavy macro days? Coffee. I stopped drinking coffee when I started taking pre-workout about a month ago. The caffeine in that made my craving for coffee go away. Today is my rest day but I feel guilty resting because I dropped a workout day on Friday due to illness. So I did 7 instead of 8 workouts this past week. I'm going to take my rest day regardless because I'm still not feeling 100% and fuelling up and giving my aching muscles a break will do me good. It all starts again tomorrow!

My body has definitely changed over the past couple of months. I'm getting stronger and leaner. With my body changes comes looser skin. I get emails via my blog all the time from those just beginning their journey about how scared they are of loose skin. I embrace my loose skin because it means that my goal of dropping body fat is working. And if faced with the health problems morbid obesity brings with it, I'll take loose skin any day. I will get skin removal surgery once I've gotten as lean as I want. I've seen the results of some premature tummy tucks and the outcome is never good if more fat can be lost. And I need to get my weight down for opponent match-up re: boxing.

Although I've known for a couple weeks, I haven't shared till now. I didn't make the fight team for the Fight to End Cancer again this year. Disappointing yes. The end of my boxing career? No. The woman who was supposed to be matched with me backed out. The other women I could have been matched with by age were not in my weight class. I'm too heavy. And I know Jennifer and Virgil (Directors of FTEC) would never ask me to drop weight (because of my journey thus far), but they could have.

I completely understand the rules of boxing and regardless of how I look to others, I've got lots of fat to drop. Ask my macro coach! He sees my progress pics. So I need to drop some pounds by the new year so Brodie can hopefully match me for a boxing event this spring. I'm committed to moving forward and I know Shaun will be able to get me there. So let's goooooooo MacFitness...


October 30th...


Busy day today. Went to Value Village to get a costume for the boy. He's going to be a zombie so I bought a dress shirt, suit jacket and pants that would all be shredded and stained. And I can report that fake blood looks just like real blood and stains the exact same way. It's even sticky. I'm not convinced that Dollarama isn't selling vials of real blood.

The house has been decorated and the pumpkins carved. And my guard rat did not scare the squirrels away. They still made off with my pumpkin's eyeball. This one made out better than the one on my step. He's got no teeth. I roasted all the pumpkin seeds and bbq'd a shit load of chicken breast. Heavy macro days are not easy to eat through. The carb and fat is simple enough, but protein increases too. I drank the last 25g. Only left 1g of fat. That was no simple feat. All my laundry is done and I'm headed to bed. Alarm is set for 4am. I have to be home from the gym and showered before Julien even gets up. I need to make him look all ghoulish for school tomorrow. Zombie clothing is done. Make-up will be the fun part.


October 31st...


Another Halloween is in the books. Today started out super early. I was up and out the door by 430am. Would have been an awesome early morning gym start if I remembered my gym doesn't open till 5am on Monday (then closes at 11pm on Friday). So I sat in the parking lot for 15 minutes. It was all good though. I had a good workout and was back home, fed, showered and dressed by 8am. I had to get my zombie ready for school.

Then I had 2 appointments in Toronto. After finishing up with my clients, I headed home a bit early so I could eat before the trick or treaters came around. Julien went out with a friend's family and I gave out the candy. After I finished my dinner, I was left with 7g of carb. What's a girl to do? Have a roll of Rockets, that's what! My fave candy, my only Halloween treat and exactly 7g of carb! The only macros I left today was 2g of fat.

Today was one of reflection as I looked back on my relationship with the woman who had a tremendous impact on my life. I lost my birth mother 4 years ago today. I can't believe it's been that long already. She was in my life briefly, but left her memories of our shared moments in my heart. That picture is from April 2010 and was the first time we had been together since I was an infant. I think of her often and cherish the time I had with her, even though it ended much too abruptly. And I thank her. I thank her for making the decision she did for me, as hard as that was for her. My successes in life are due to the choices she made for me. She remains always in my heart.


November 1st...


An interesting comparison photo. There's only a couple pounds difference in these pics. I know exactly what I weighed in the photo on the left because I took it around the time I was on the Marilyn Denis show (April 2015) and in one of the candid shots they took of me at my home, I stepped on my bathroom scale. I'm only a couple pounds less in the photo on the right but I'm much leaner.

The left photo was before Tony and strength training. I only did cardio back then. I still do cardio, but only a fraction of how much I used to do. I showed this pic to Tony this morning and he said, "you are chubby in that before pic". Funny thing is, I thought I looked good. And I did in comparison to the 300+ pound me. But I also know the reason I've a wrinkly tummy now is because I've lost abdominal fat. Seeing these kinds of changes in my body is exciting for me. And don't tell me that weight lifting makes you bulky. False!!!!! In other news. I trapped 230 and squatted 125 this morning. Both are PR's for me.


November 4th...


It's been a while. I'm alive and kicking following a very crazy and hectic week. I can report that on Tuesday and Thursday my macros were completely fucked up. I was just in situations I wasn't expecting where I didn't have a lot of food options. That's real life for you. I did manage to stay within my caloric goal, just not my macro goals. I also managed the gym very early everyday. But the same craziness kept me from Brodie this week.

Everything has calmed down and I am back to regularly scheduled programming next week. Well, actually today. But next week I see Brodie again. I've missed him so. Do you know how much stress and anxiety is released just by punching someone?

I like the outtake on the right. I'm beginning to notice progress in my legs. My legs and back actually. I've still got a lot of work ahead of me, but when I notice changes and people in my life comment on the changes, that's motivating for me. And I still can't believe I've the guts to wear leggings in public without a long sweater or shirt. I wouldn't have done that a couple years ago even though I was roughly the same weight I am now. Off to indulge in some retail therapy. Only downside is it's food. So nothing really fun. But food is life. Happy Friday everyone.


November 5th...


I did not want to go to the gym this morning. But you know what the best workouts are? The ones we think we don't want to do. Turns out that after I got myself out of the house, I ended up having an awesome training session. I always say, getting out the door is the biggest challenge. That is 100% true. And I got to eat all the food when I got home. Something to look forward to is the food after working hard.

Exciting times ahead. I'm going to drop 10 pounds of fat by the New Year. Coach said it was doable, so we're gonna do it. All in the name of boxing of course. I get asked often how I stay motivated to keep the weight off. To be completely honest, this is the most difficult component of weight loss. But I keep making goals for myself and that keeps me focused and driven.

My first fitness goal was set in March 2012. I weighed 230 pounds and I wanted to be able to run 5k. Once I met that goal, my distance got further and my times got shorter. Now here I am 4.5 years later setting new goals. Because I have to. My options are few. Either I keep moving forward, or I start going backwards. And it gets harder. You have to keep pushing yourself or your body gets used to what it knows. And going backwards is not an option for me. I've invested way too much into my health. I refuse to regain. Y'all know how frugal I am. No way am I wasting away my investment! Happy Saturday. Make good choices today!!!


November 5th...


Today was a wonderful eating day. When I got back from the gym I was famished. So I ate a cup of egg whites, an avocado (which was perfectly ripe and made me so incredibly happy), red cabbage and a grilled chicken breast (11c/32f/57p). I had a late breakfast so I called it brunch.

I did get an afternoon snack though. I saw someone post it on the private MacFitness Facebook page. It's a rice cake with a tablespoon of natural peanut butter, banana slices and 15g of chocolate chips (25c/11f/5p). What a delicious indulgence. I just may have to do that again tomorrow.

And dinner was spaghetti squash with an Alfredo sauce made from a roux that I stirred up with olive oil, a tbsp of flour and 1%milk. I added mushrooms, grape tomatoes and grilled chicken. I sprinkled a tbsp of parmesan cheese on top (35c/21f/88p). It was sooooo good. I'm a bit obsessed with spaghetti squash right now. Love it. And of course I drank all the water with lemon like I do everyday.

I'm thinking of wine, but don't think I'll indulge tomorrow. It is my heavy macro day but I feel like having something bready. Probably a wrap from Harvey's. It's time to fall back folks. Gym time in the am and I've no excuses not to be there when it opens seeing that I get an extra hour of sleep.

Until next week...