Grateful

Tonight, I feel my life couldn't be more perfect than it is right now. I mean, there are still things I want, but I'm so grateful for what I have.

I have the most beautiful and sexy life partner, a rewarding and fulfilling career, I lovely home which is keeping me safe from this wild weather and includes a most excellent housemate and awesome cute pets, I live in a lovely town with nice clean air and plenty of green yet is close enough to the city for nights out, I'm studying three (!) courses which I'm absolutely passionate about and severely enjoy studying which I can study at work and just relax when I get home, and I'm going to Bali in three weeks for what is sure to be a fantastic holiday with thoughts on India for NYE. What else? Hmm...

Lots of things.

Oh yeh, my family is pretty awesome. I got a good one in the lucky dip of life. I have enough money right now to do things including building a second house (although slowly) and I feel relatively liberated from the grip of consumerism.

 A major break through for me today was 1) I felt appreciated by my superiors at work which made me feel validated as a professional in my field (this never happens, except for my direct supervisor however we are really good friends) and 2) I've decided I don't NEED to be on a diet. And about an hour after that I decided that I still CHOOSE to do a workout tomorrow and to continue focusing on my nutrition. I choose to eat healthy because that's what fit and healthy people like me do. I have decided that I am already pretty darn fit and healthy. I mean, I can run 9kms. I don't always have time to do it but I've done it (well, technically run 4.5 and walked/run the last 4.5) almost every week with other workout sessions in between. It's not every day, but I think I can sustainably manage three times a week for life.

My diet looks pretty good even though I originally got upset about today because I ate about 100g of chocolate and about 100g of lollies, but apart from that it was all veges and herbal tea and muesli and almond milk. So maybe my clothes fit a little tighter right now, but I still look toned, tight, and healthy and I remain in my healthy BMI. Don't get me wrong - I still want to shed some of this weight, but I've decided I'm not going to kill myself to do it, put my life on hold until I get there, or hate myself for how I look right now. I am loving the 12wbt though.

The biweekly videos from Mish are inspirational, I'm loving the vege meals provided by her nutritionist, and I even do the set workouts with a smile on my face. What I can't or don't want to do includes waking up early from my fatigue break to workout when I'm absolutely stuffed, working out every day at all costs even when I feel my energy is low, spend a whole Sunday cooking in advance for the week, and going hungry worrying about if it's time for my snack. What I'm resisting right now but am willing to continue working on is: counting and recording calorie intake, staying away from soft drink (including diet soft drinks) and saving my alcohol calories to once or twice a week wines with dinner, being more organized and doing just one weekly grocery shop (howevere I'm finding even though I'm supposedly buying for "one" that im actually ending up with a large excess of food in my fridge each week, so I'll just buy 3 or 4 days work once and week and go from there).

 So, is that too much information?

Under pressure

Wow - what a weekend. Been at the BFs again. Got spoiled by him a lot. We also picked up a baby miniature donkey to foster for a while on his farm. So cute.

I'm back on the 12wbt bandwagon. I'm glad to say that missing last week didn't have any majorly negative effects.

This week - I'm at work all week until Sunday night. I will be: working out in the back room, cooking up a storm, studying for next weeks exams, and preparing my house after work for my parents who are coming to stay next week.

Today, I made a nice berry smoothie for myself and my housemate for breaky and a nice Thai pumpkin soup for myself and my workmate for lunch.

Oooh - exciting news. My blood pressure is down to 115 (systolic) now! Yay! Hibiscus tea must be working. I had a massive weekend (alcohol+++) and am feeling under pressure with these exams and my parents coming to stay, and I was nervous to have my BP read again, and I haven't been taking the three cups of hibiscus tea per day like they did in the study, but still I'm so glad to be "normal" again.

Meh

So, today I'm back at work. So far I've revised my revision from yesterday and I will be continuing to look at my CM Literacy stuff and Foundations stuff.

I also have to cook my 12wbt food and so a workout, although my motivation for this is low despite me reading my "Commitment" that I wrote to myself in the pre-season.

I'm also trying to sort out my application to IUHS that I've sort of put on the back-burner for a bit but now I need to get stuck into it.

I'm also dealing with buyers remorse after a stupid internet impulse purchase last night, but oh well. I'll have to suck it up.

PS I have a new label "med school". Before I was just using "study" but now I need the new label to differentiate between TCM school, the Masters, Western med school, and all the other things I'm doing.

FT4

TCM school today. Got up early and did the Michelle Bridges toning DVD for 30 mins only (I slept in until 7m), got my new bronze Polar FT4 delivered by courier at 8.30am, started school at 10am, handed in my last essay for the semester at 2pm, got the last of my groceries as per the 12wbt shopping list at the Fitzroy Coles at 3pm, home with no work, no homework, minimal housework, and feeling ridiculously relaxed by 5pm. Having a nice cup of chamomile tea while figuring out my new watch.

Tonight on the menu - I need to attempt to cook tempeh for the first time in my life, on a nice bed of mash sweet potato (yum! - good for the Spleen in TCM) and baby spinach (another fav of mine). I have frozen cauliflower and chickpea curry for school tomorrow (and a second batch for the BF), except this time I'll take my own cutlery as there were about 100 knives and no forks or spoons in the school's dining area today.

I might:

• have a bath
• watch a movie
• prepare my workout gear for tomorrow
• do some laundry

I have exams to prepare for and some biochem to look at but I refuse to do any study at home these days. I do it all at school or at work. It's amazing how much I get done these days....

I can hear the biochem calling me but I must resist!

Pharmacognosy

I just learnt a new word - "pharmacognosy". I'm not sure how to pronounce it yet, but it may be what I've been looking for. I'm going to start teaching myself some basic plant medicines and post them on my Lotus Jewel Health website which I've neglected during this exam period at TCM school.
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In other news, I feel slightly more positive today about my workout and nutrition. I ate 200cal too many yesterday, but I had forgotten about the link to the Snacks page the 12wbt program provided and I ended up eating chocolate because I didn't know what else to eat. Two tiny Timeouts and I was over. Apart from that, everything went on-track.

I did this mornings workout after breakfast which helped somewhat.
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I've pretty much finished my Chinese Literacy assignment for Thursday. It feels weird to be reading and writing in Chinese but I kind of like how the characters are pictures of the description of the word. Reading pinyin (Chinese words written in Roman alphabet) is fairly easy with a few pronunciation exceptions.

Then, I only have two exams to cram prepare for.
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I still haven't done my application for transfer to IUHS. I feel so lazy about not doing that. But I think I'll still put it off until after exams.

First day of 12wbt

Today is the first day of the 12wbt. Already I've run into some obstacles and hiccups. I was going to rant about them here but I'm feeling a bit down and I think it would only perpetuate my mood.

I'll give a brief overview:
Interrupted sleep+++
Slept in
No money to get all of the groceries
No food weighing scales at work
Didn't print the Intermediate workout and only had the 1/2 marathon one (which wasn't going to work today)
Did my workout not knowing what exactly I was supposed to be doing and go frustrated without having a goal

I did 40mins cardio and I've just checked I only need to do some ad stuff and I've done the Beginners group workout for today. So that is ok. I'll do Intermediate tomorrow.

I did my measurements last night before bed and I have a lovely "before" photo to take tonight.

I feel very supported by my BF but not so much by a few of my friends.

Yep, low mood today so I'll leave it here for now.



Starting weight (14/05/12): 67kg (BMI 24.6)
Current weight: 66.0kg

Goal weight 1: 65kg

Goal weight 2: 63kg

Goal weight 3: 61kg

Goal weight 4: 59kg

End goal weight: 57kg (BMI 20.9)

Ultimate goal weight: 54kg (BMI 19.8)

Early workout

So I got rudely awoken by my pager at 05:09 this morning. Doh. My alarm clock is one of those where the light gradually comes on before the alarm so you wake up "more naturally". I think it works. I set the light for 30 mins before. It's starts fairly dim then gets more intense. Then my alarm is birds chirping. There's other sounds but to me they all sound like night-time of going to sleep sounds like rain falling, waves crashing etc. Going to bed at 9:30pm also helps a lot too. So anyway I was partly starting to wake up anyway.

As I was up already and partly dressed before we got cancelled, I figured I'd come to work and do my workout really super-early. I ran 1km intervals then 1km flay-out run on the treadmill (I hate the treadmill). I had to do the 1km run for the 12wbt fitness test. You're not supposed to do it on a tready but I didn't have any other options as I'm back at work and it's dark before and after work and my town has an unsafe level of lighting (broken ankle material) and I don't have a head-torch yet. Oh yeh and I don't get lunch breaks like regular people as I'm a paramedic. So I had to make a judgement call on that one, I'll do it on the road on my first day off in sunlight.

Now I'm off to study my work CPGs before starting on my Chinese Literacy and Terminology assignment.

Things to do today

I just got back from the BF's. I took the train back which took about 4.5hours. I trundled my suitcase down the road home, but I got to go past my favourite foal and Shetland pony that are currently living on an acre spare block in the town. They are so friendly. I love to feed them the long green grass they can't reach over the fence.

My dog is currently naked after he busted out of his collar like the Incredible Hulk busting out of shackles. I, the BF, the dog, and the BF's dog were all at the end of our 4.5km run on Monday when they went silly and the dog decided he needed to go and chase some poor innocent sheep. He will be nude until tomorrow. I was going to oder him a reflective collar from eBay but now I think he needs a strong chain.
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I almost finished my History essay on the train so I just have to do that today and hand it in tomorrow at TCM school.

Today, I also have to do my fitness test for the 12wbt. This is what is (roughly) involved;

• 1km run time trial
• pushups - as many as possible
• sit-ups - different levels of difficulty
• "wall-sit" (holding the squat position against a wall for as long as possible
• flexibility test

Then Michelle gives you ranges and if you, for example, do 21-35 pushups then you're in the Intermediate  Group. Participants are divided into Beginner, Intermediate, and Advanced (and then there's the Lean and Strong group for those who don't actually want to lose weight).

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Other things on my to-do list today: get uniforms ready for working week, get workout gear ready for week, get grocery shopping list from 12wbt (it's released tomorrow - perfect timing as I'm in Melbourne where the "good" groceries are), and finish this history essay.

Week 1 down

One week down of eating healthy and exercising without counting calories or anything like that. Just generally getting my body prepared for the 12wbt beginning in about a week. I only lost 400g for what I thought was a good effort and therefore had a meltdown in my closet. I've eaten so friggin clean except Saturday night and exercised every day except Sunday. I guess I'll have to step it up. A lot. I'm willing to burn 600kcal a day as per the 12wbt so I've ordered my new heart rate monitor watch which counts calories burnt during exercise. If you don't have one that does that, here's a formula I found (for females)

((-20.4022+(0.4472xHR)-(0.1263xW)+(0.074xA))/4.184)x60xT
HR = average heart rate as beats per minute
W = weight in kilograms
A = age in years
T = time of exercise duration in minutes

Today my Michelle Bridges workout DVDs arrived so I have more options for working out at home and different to the Tracy Anderson ones I've been doing for the past few years.


Starting weight (14/05/12): 67kg (BMI 24.6)

Current weight: 66.6kg

Goal weight 1: 65kg

Goal weight 2: 63kg

Goal weight 3: 61kg

Goal weight 4: 59kg

End goal weight: 57kg (BMI 20.9)

Ultimate goal weight: 54kg (BMI 19.8)

Daily digest

It's quite difficult to design a house with one container already configured. I've tried so many different configurations and the best one I've come up with has as removing half an already plastered wall and tearing up carpet from one small room. Also, I'm having trouble fitting in a walk-in wardrobe in the master bedroom.

My BF said I didn't need a walk-in wardrobe and that I needed to let go of my ego. Damn I taught him too well. I understand in the beginning we will have limited space, but I'm designing our dream home here and my dream home have a walk-in wardrobe, even if it's my ego's dream.

Last night I was too dead tired to do any workout and I ran out of time. This morning I got up late at 6.30am and did a 30min workout on the Wii but it said I only burnt 100kCal. It was fun though. My BMR (Basal Metabolic Rate) is 1440kCal, and if I have a sedentary day I would burn incidentally 1630kCal. I believe you need to be in a 500kCal deficit per day to lose 0.5kg/week. I think the 12wbt diet is around 1200kCal/day, meaning technically I would need to burn an extra 70kCal/day to lose 0.5kg per week (<30mins on the Wii), and 570kCal/day to lose 1kg per week. that's a massive difference. So, yeh, the 12wbt diet plus30mins of Wii a day = 0.5kg per week, or run for an hour a day would be -1kg/week.

Edit: Ok I just read the 12wbt forum and apparently I need to aim to burn 600kCal per day, so I guess I better get used to running as 3 hours on the Wii is a bit time consuming!

Anyway, I have to write my oral presentation for TCM history class so I better get cracking.

The Michelle Bridges 12-Week Body Transformation

So I've signed up to do the Michelle Bridges 12-Week Body Transformation program (www.12wbt.com).

Four weeks of preseason started this week and our first task was to list all our regular excuses and to provide solutions for them all. I have it printed out stuck right under my alarm clock! I also helps that I have a bikini-clad trip to Bali in 9 weeks. It's also my 34th birthday (it looks way older to see it written down) a week after the 12wbt round ends, so that's good motivation too. And then of course Summer starts again. And I promised myself if I deferred this year of med school that I would use the extra free time to get my fitness (and budget) sorted out. I have to be true to my own word to myself otherwise it will be so demoralising.

I put on 10kg in a rapid 3 months when I met my new BF last year. I guess love is a powerful drug. I was also under incredible stress at med school and financially too, working too much and not getting enough sleep, and I also started on Implanon (I had that removed 2 weeks ago) so there's a few confounding factors. One positive thing I learnt was I still think I look attractive even after increasing by nearly 20% of my body weight. I don't have to be afraid of ugly fatness which means I'm wanting to lose weight to go towards something, not running away from something I'm terrified of happening. I just hat show tight my clothes are right now and if I'm going to buy a new wardrobe full of clothes, they will be size 8s or 10s, not 12s and 14s.

Even though the round starts in 4 weeks, I will begin exercising and eating healthy now anyway. Today was my first day of exercise in forever. I have today off (first "day" off in 7 days but working night shift tonight), the sun was out and the weather forecast said it might rain later. I was lying in bed thinking, oh no my ego's gonna start talking any minute so I just got up and out of bed and got organised. Even though my wardrobe is organised, I really need to lay out my workout gear the night before. At least my shoelaces on my runners were undone unlike usual.

The dog was happy and we only had one incident involving an alpaca and now I have rope burn on my hand and a mildly sprained ankle. He behaves better when running as opposed to walking so that's even more motivation for me to keep the pace up. We ran about 50% and walked about 50%. We ran to nearly the first corner, so next time will be making it to the corner.

We just did the smaller 2.5km loop but it's good to be back. On the run I was thinking about doing some resistance training but then I came home and got on the computer and now that idea's completely gone. I'll also have to set up the workout space again so I can get straight into it. Also, I don't have any groceries which really sucks as I'm so hungry.

So I'll be using this preseason time to do the 12wbt tasks but also to get my routine in place so I can start the actual round in full swing. The routine I mean is the laying out of workout clothes the day before, checking the weather forecast, getting the DVD player back in the front lounge room where there's space to workout, and getting over my dread of treadmills. Also, of planning and shopping for groceries with meal plans and planning my "free" meal for the week. Also, my glass of red at night needs to be replaced with herbal teas.

I'll be labelling my posts about my journey on the Michelle Bridges 12 Week Body Transformation as "12wbt" so if you're just here to read about that aspect of my life and not all the other random musings about ego and boring detail about studying biochemistry, then on the side of the screen there's a pull-out tab and just choose labels and then 12wbt.

So, I will be posting my weights here which is embarrassing but it's to remain accountable and I will post them every Sunday until the end of the round on Sunday the 26th of August.

Current weight: 67kg (BMI 24.6)
Goal weight 1: 65kg
Goal weight 2: 63kg
Goal weight 3: 61kg
Goal weight 4: 59kg
End goal weight: 57kg (BMI 20.9)
Ultimate goal weight: 54kg (BMI 19.8)

Wish me luck!