Week 52 | Thursday
Weight: 178.0 (after breakfast)
Calories: 1,606

Daily Sodium Intake - 3,021 mg
Daily Cholesterol Intake - 126 mg
Daily Fiber Intake - 29 grams

Fat: 54
Carbs: 246
Protein: 47

Notes: Billy, you're completely right. As much as I hate to say it, you're right. You know, I was thinking about how much I've gained (it's actually 18 because I got down to 162 at one point) in this short of time and it made me sick. You know that rotten feeling you get in the pit of your stomach when you find out you just screwed up royally at work or you just found out something awful? Yeah, it's that feeling.

I'm gaining my focus back. I can't honestly say that I'm 150% motivated and I've got my drive back, because I don't. It's been non-stop stress for the past 36 hours and I'm going on about an hour of sleep since yesterday morning. (I'm not making excuses, I swear!) It's just been a rough week, but despite that, I'm getTING my drive back. I'm going to hit the gym tomorrow (with a free personal training session...woohoo!). I'm still planning on doing 75 pushups today. I'm getting there. This weight's going to fly off. I've already dropped 3 pounds in a day. It's amazing what clean eating will do for ya!

Week 52 | Wednesday
Weight: 181.4 (ouch)
Calories: 1,460

Daily Sodium Intake - 1,946 mg
Daily Cholesterol Intake - 173 mg
Daily Fiber Intake - 27 grams

Fat: 64
Carbs: 157
Protein: 57

Week 51 | Friday

Strength Training: None

Cardio: Elliptical
1:00 Warmup, L3
20:00 HIIT
30s at L19, 90s at L1

Notes: It had to be a joke. Had to be. I walk into the fitness center, I'm pumped to do my HIIT workout, and I see the TV on. Commercials. I'm thinking, "Cool, I've got a distraction today." I jump on the elliptical and get started, and as one commercial about food ends, another food commercial airs. Then another. Then the program came back on: Rachael Ray's 30-Minute Meals. Then I saw the nifty little "Food Network" logo at the bottom of the screen.

Nice.

Seriously, what were they thinking? If it was to "be funny," it wasn't...not only because it's been thought of at least a million times and has lost its humor, but because I was the butt of the joke, dammit.

Other than that, I had a good workout.

Week 51 | Thursday
Weight: 177.6

Strength Training: None

Cardio: Treadmill
3 mi at 6.2-6.5mph

Notes: Ugh, I'm so mad! I went to the fitness center to do 8 miles again, but this time, I only left with three. And even then, it wasn't all running (I probably stopped for .2 miles total). I felt sick to my stomach, so I had to stop a couple times to avoid vomiting. I had to make toffee/peppermint bark again today for my family, and I sampled it about an hour prior to running. Hmmm, probably NOT the best idea, huh?

I'll do HIIT again tomorrow and shoot for 8 miles - again - on Saturday.

Week 51 | Wednesday
Weight: 176.6

Strength Training: None

Cardio: Elliptical
20:00 HIIT
30s high-intensity, 90s active rest

Notes: I couldn't find a cool elliptical pic, so I found this cartoon instead. It actually reminds me of a certain person who I'm not too fond of (some of you know who I'm talking about. Hint: Marie from Everybody Loves Raymond). For the sake of anonymity, we'll call her Jezebel. Anyway, Jezebel had surgery a few years ago to put a band around her stomach because she's obese. Before I rant, I'll say that in some cases, bands or gastric bypass is an essential step in saving lives. That said, I believe a lot of people see it as the easy way out and do it so they don't have to endure the hard work of losing weight. She's one of the latter. What's worse is that she boasts about all the weight she lost as if she worked hard to lose it! When we went back out to Michigan, our weight loss was substantial since the last time people saw us. So Kevin and I were getting comments left and right about how good we looked because of the weight we'd lost. Any time Jezebel was within earshot, she'd pipe up and talk about her damn band and how she'd lost so much weight. Actually, conversations that week went a lot like this...

Anyway, I get so irritated with people like that who don't do a thing except get full and take full credit for their weight loss. The thing that's even worse is that she has no clue about calories in/calories out and she doesn't care. She eats apple pie for breakfast and she can't many fruits or vegetables because her stomach can't handle them! How screwed up is that?

Ok, done ranting. I started this post to say that I worked out again today. I'm getting back into the groove...before 2008. :)

I'm a Fatass.
I could hardly stomach admitting this to myself, much less to all of you guys, but I stepped on the scale the other day (clothes on) and the number staring back at me? 176.0. Yep. I'm a fatass. I have absolutely no one to blame but myself. I've been letting the stress of our "vacation" get the best of me and have used food and drink as a comfort. That's not to say that Kevin's not a comfort, but he's just as stressed out by all of this as I am...there are only so many times I can vent to him before he wants to dive head-first into a pizza. Mmmm, pizza!

Anyway, the only vacation about our vacation was heading to Detroit for a get-together with some of FAT (I had a blast, btw, and it was great meeting all of you!!), catching a Pistons game, then having a fairly big meeting the following day. Nothing stressful there.

So yeah. Food and drinks have been "coming to the rescue." Not cool! Meeting Rob, Kristen and Melissa has certainly refueled my motivation. Then reading about Melissa and Rob running in these crazy Michigan temps is enough to light the fire under anyone's butt! I'm excited to get back into our "normal" routine and get back into old habits. Old - good - habits.

Week 49 | Sunday
Weight: 170.2
Calories: 0
Fat: 0/48
Carbs: 0/183
Protein: 0/73
Fiber: 0/25

Strength Training: None

Cardio: Stairs (HIIT)
~22:00, 10 sets

Notes: That was brutal. But I didn't slow down, I didn't hesitate. I just kept going. I also could've stopped at 9 sets because that put me at 20 minutes, but I did one more to prove I could.

As crazy at it is, though, I'm looking forward to running eight miles.