Count Your Blessings

We've all heard this phrase before...Count your blessings. This past week it has been a phrase that I cannot seem to forget.  I have seen it on the bottom of a few emails over the past week and those emails have come from the Parish Director at my church.  The reasons for his emails were sad.  One of our Deacons fell and hit his head so our Parish Director wanted to email us to keep us up to date on his condition.  For days his family was with him in the hospital praying for him.  Tuesday night, I attended his funeral.  It was a beautiful mass but still very sad to think that he was living a normal life just the week before and a simple accident ended all of that.  I take comfort in the fact that he was a good man, leading a godly life.  I feel sorry for his wife who had her life forever changed in an instant.

This made me want to do just as our Parish Director recommended, to count my blessings.  I know that this may not be my normal blog so I hope you are not disappointed.

1. I am blessed with good health. Although I may be watching what I eat, not always happy with my body and working hard to exercise, I am a healthy woman and am thankful for that.  It's time that I remember how blessed I am to be so healthy and stop worrying so much about my body image.

2. I am blessed with a wonderful husband.  Bryan has loved me through every endeavor I have encountered, from teaching, to going to school, to eating healthier and making more time for exercise.  He has loved me no matter what size I have been and many times, more than I love myself.

3. I am blessed with 5 beautiful children. I live a busy life with those children and want to cherish every moment.  Yes, time to take care of myself may be hard to find in that busy life, but I wouldn't have it any other way. I need to be reminded of this when I am complaining that I don't have enough time.

4. I am blessed with a wonderful extended family from my parents to my aunts and uncles, to my cousins and in-laws.  Each one of them has their own individual and wonderful talents that make my life that much better.

5. I am blessed with a roof over my head.  No matter how tiny or how beat up my house is, there are too many people in the world who don't have a house at all.  I have it very, very good.

6. I am blessed with plenty to eat each and every day.  There are children and adults all over the world who don't know when and where they will have their next meal.  I have food in abundance, (sometimes too much in abundance).

7. I am blessed with a wonderful church community.  I love going to my church. I love seeing the people there.  I love worshiping God there.

8. I am blessed with good friends.  It doesn't matter how many friends I have, I just know that they are good ones that always have my back.

9. I am blessed with 4 loving and helpful children who love Jesus.  They want to help me with their little brother and love him with all of their hearts.

10. I am blessed with stuff.  That's the best way for me to describe it.  I have plenty of stuff around me that I could probably live without but have to make life that much more pleasurable.  Frankly, I need to learn to live with less of it.

11. I am blessed with many talents.  I am not going to list them because that would just seem, well, weird.  I know that God has given me many talents to share in this world and I am thankful for them and want to share them freely more often.

12. I am blessed with this blog.  It has served as a place where I can air my grievances, help others, keep things in perspective, keep in touch with people and now tell everyone just how blessed I am.

13. I am blessed with a great, big God who has made all of this and more possible in my life.  I cannot imagine his love for me and all His children.

I didn't realize that counting my blessings could be so hard.  I could go on and on about how blessed I am so I don't think that I can truly count my blessings because I just have too many of them to count.  Counting my blessings has truly made me realize just how good I have it and how little I have to want or complain about.

I am very blessed and will try to remember that better when writing to you and living my life in the future.

Have a blessed day,

Corinna

"O give thanks to the Lord, for he is good; his steadfast love endures forever! Let Israel say, 'His steadfast love endures forever.' Let the house of Aaron say, 'His steadfast love endures forever.' Let those who fear the Lord say, 'His steadfast love endures forever.'" -Psalm 118:1-4

Time to Try New Methods

I have a health coach that calls me once a month.  This health coach is provided to me by our health insurance for no cost and I have found it very helpful since I started utilizing the program a few months ago.  My health coach, Kim, and I make goals each month.  She then calls me at my scheduled time and we discuss my progress with those goals.

One goal that we have set since my first call was to handle weekends better.  Weekends have always been my tough part of my week.  I have always struggled on handling them correctly. Weekends were tough for me when I lost the weight back in 2007 and still are a struggle in 2013.  As I was thinking about Kim's upcoming call a month ago I decided that I was going to change my goal a bit. Our specific goal for me was that I would track every weekend.  I decided that I was tired of trying to achieve that goal.  I wondered if it were possible for me to lose these last pounds and keep them off without tracking on the weekends.  I was tired of having a goal that I would rarely achieve.  After a weekend of no tracking I would just feel guilty about the weekends and beat myself up as I started my week.  I decided that it was time to rethink my plan.  I wanted a plan that I could feel successful and lose the weight at the same time.  I decided to try a new experiment.

I knew that this experiment could result in failure but I thought it was worth the risk. I have tracked successfully for weekends from time to time but I don't think I've ever done it successfully for an extended period of time.  Since adding Sammy to our family and managing Bryan's switch in jobs a year and half ago, weekends have become crazier than ever.  One thing that I have always loved about Weight Watchers is that it can be flexible to different people's lives.  I wanted to make my program more flexible so it would fit my life.

These are the changes I made:

1. I started exercising 5 days a week (Monday through Friday) instead of 4 days a week (any days I chose that week).  I started exercising 1 hour per day instead of 45 minutes.  I knew that I was eating more over the weekends than my body needed so I needed to work a little harder on my exercising to burn those extra calories.  To me, working a little harder on my exercises during the week was worth the freedom to eat a bit more over the weekend.

2. I upped my minimum daily PointsPlus target.  I really thought about why I eat so much on the weekends.  One of the reasons was that I was just plain hungry.  I would stick to my daily points target all week but it just wasn't enough to keep me satisfied. I decided to add a few PointsPlus values each day to see what would happen.

3. I stopped tracking on the weekends.  I know that makes no sense.  After all, the goal that Kim and I set for me was to track on weekends.  That focus made me realize that I needed a change.  On 2 days every weekend I have stopped tracking.  On those 2 days I follow the Simply Filling Technique from the WW program.  I pay attention to my hunger signals, eat Filling Foods and treat myself with a limited amount of non-Filling foods.

This is working for me.  I have now lost weight for 3 weeks in a row.  I haven't lost weight 3 weeks in a row in a very long time.  With my weight loss from today I am now at the lowest weight I have been at since November.  I lost my "holiday weight."  Now I am ready to lose the rest of the baby weight.

I am really liking my new method.  It's giving me the freedom that I want on the weekends, enough food to keep me satisfied day after day, lots of exercise (my body is more toned than I have been since I had Sammy) and the structure that I need to lose those last pounds.

My health coach and I made a new goal at our last phone call.  I am now willing to admit that I am not happy keeping these last few pounds on my body. I want them gone and it's time to stop ignoring it for fear of hurting my ego.   My new goal is to finally get off those last pounds of baby weight.  Sammy is going to be 2 in June and as he begins to leave his babyhood behind I would like to leave his pregnancy weight behind too.

Making these new changes took a leap of faith and courage.  I had to be willing to fail and make changes along the way.  One mistake I made one week was that I gave myself a 3-day-weekend of no tracking.  I gained that week.  Every week that I have gave myself a no-tracking-2-day-weekend has resulted in a loss.  I will still have to reevaluate along the way but I love my new flexibility and my new, lighter self.

Have a good day,
Corinna

"The Rock, his work is perfect, and all his ways are just. A faithful God, without deceit, just and upright is he;" -Deuteronomy 32:4

Chocolate Covered Pretzels

Yesterday was an interesting eating day and that's putting it mildly.  My day started as normal.  I was up early with Samuel and getting the kids up to start their school day. As soon as everyone was up I told them to start breakfast while I did my exercises. I normally have 2 bananas before my workout but did not because it was Friday.  I go to WW to weigh in on Fridays and never eat or drink anything before I go so I know that my weigh-ins are consistent compared to last week.

After my workout I got ready and left for my WW meeting.  It was a great weigh-in. I lost 1.2 pounds.  It was a nice feeling because I lost .8 last week so that has added up to 2 pounds that I had gained back over the past few months.  I have just a little bit more to go to have all of the holiday weight off. I'm a little disappointed that it took me so long to get my act together but at least I didn't give up.

After my encouraging meeting I went grocery shopping. I am very good about shopping only from my list.  I had my list and I just had a few odds and ends that I needed.  My first mistake on this shopping trip was that I went to the store hungry.  Usually I bring 2 bananas to my meeting and eat them while listening to the meeting but we were out of bananas at home and didn't see anything else in the kitchen that I wanted to bring.  This made me very hungry by the time I was at the grocery store.  I was mood for a treat.  It was a new week and the start to the weekend. I eat most of my treats on the weekends these days.

My first cue to being in trouble should have been that everything looked good.  The first thing I saw was chips and I wanted to buy all of them.  I rarely even eat chips. If I am going to have a treat, my first choice is never chips.  I kept that in mind and passed up the chips.  Then I saw trail mix.  I am a sucker for trail mix.  If it includes chocolate, I'm in.  Trail mix is one of those foods that sounds healthy but eaten in large quantities can be very high in fat and calories.  I passed on the trail mix knowing my passed experiences with large quantities.  Then I saw the chocolate covered pretzels.  That was it!  That was going to be my treat today.  I barely hesitated as I put it in my cart.  It was not a single serving bag but it wasn't huge either so I figured if I ate the whole bag I wouldn't do too much damage.

As I shopped I found myself back in the aisle with the pretzels and trail mix again.  I compared them carefully so I could be sure I was picking the right treat.  The trail mix bag had more servings and more calories per serving so I decided that the chocolate covered pretzels were the right choice.  I finished my shopping without any other impulse purchases. I filled my cart with non-fat yogurt, string cheese, fresh fruits, vegetables and fish.  It all looked so healthy - except for the chocolate covered pretzels.

I packed it all up in the car and brought my pretzels to the front seat.  I was out by myself.  The kids were safe at home. I was hungry and in a peaceful car. I broke open the bag and started eating them happily as I drove to my next destination.  I had a couple more stops to make while I munched on my pretzels.  As I got close the end of the bag I realized that I was no longer hungry and really should stop eating. I peeked into the bag and saw that it was nearly empty.  "Ah, why save just a serving in the bag? I may as well just finish it off," I thought to myself.  So I did.  I will admit that I enjoyed the pretzels. It had been a week since I had eaten any such treat and I felt that it probably wouldn't be that costly of a treat.  After all, pretzels are a low-fat food.

When I got home I went on the computer to track my pretzels.  I saved the bag so I could get it exact.  Although I had looked at the bag in the store I didn't look carefully enough. I had eaten all of my points for the day except for 3.  It was not even noon yet and I had 3 measly points left in my day.  I had eaten one food all day.  That's crazy........but that's the situation I put myself in to have that treat - too much of that treat.  They were good.  I savored those chocolate covered pretzels but I could have eaten half of the bag and still have been satisfied.

That gave me a decision to make.  Was I going to go over my points for the day or just eat 3 more points for the day.  It's hard to eat lunch, snacks and dinner all on 3 points.  In fact, it's almost impossible in my point of view.  I decided to see what the day would bring me.  As it was lunch time and the kids were eating I asked myself if I was going to eat too.  The answer was no.  I wasn't hungry at all.  Apparently I had already eaten lunch - a bag of chocolate covered pretzels.   It was then snack time for the kids and I asked myself if I was going to eat a snack too.  The answer was again, no.  I still wasn't hungry. In fact I felt like I had a bowling ball in my stomach.  Hmmmmmm......could it be too many chocolate covered pretzels?

It was now dinner time.  I fed the kids and was slightly hungry but still had that bad feeling in my stomach.  I knew that my body needed something that some nutritional value to it.  I was on my way out the door to a meeting at church and grabbed an apple, orange, mini peppers and carrots.  This would my nutrition for the day. The poor feeling in my stomach was starting to subside so I ate my mini pepper and carrots on the way to church.  They were delicious, filling and my body felt good.  After my meeting, I ate my orange and left the apple for Bryan.  Somehow I ended the day without going over my points.

It was a lesson learned.  I'm sure I'll eat chocolate covered pretzels again but next time my stomach will thank me if I eat only half of the bag.

Have a great day,
Corinna

"By contrast, the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. There is no law against such things. And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires." -Galatians 5:22-25

When Time is On Your Side...or Not

I often find myself trying to decide what to do with my "spare" time.  I consider spare time the time when there is nothing scheduled on my calendar and I have access to the dishes or laundry that continually haunt me.

Today, I found myself with some spare time. I dropped my son, Josiah, off at hip hop class and had 50 minutes to burn. I have a couple of different things that I normally do with this 50 minutes of freedom.  One thing that I regularly do is sit in my car and clip coupons.  The other thing that I find myself doing is a quick run to the grocery store when we are in need of just a few things.  It's not enough time to do a full grocery shopping trip but if we just need a little fruit, veggies, fruit or cheese I will stop at Aldi's.

This morning I was running a bit late on my day so I only got to exercise for 30 minutes instead of my usual 60 minutes.  I started thinking of how I could make it up.  I remembered that my mom said she was thinking of starting a routine of walking at the mall.  That mall happens to be close to Josiah's dance class so when she happened to call me this afternoon I asked her if she wanted to meet at the mall.

As the day continued I thought about the fact that I really needed to do an Aldi's run for fresh fruit but I had already committed to my mom.  I could always change our plans but I wanted to walk.  I find myself with these choices regularly.  What do I do with my time?  What choices should I make for myself, my healthy, my family and their health. I'm happy with the choice I made today.  I got in a great walk with my mom.  We got to chat without interruption. I got some exercise.  How can I go wrong with that?

I'm so glad she called me and we made the plans early in the afternoon so I didn't have the time to second guess myself and clip coupons or run to Aldi's.  I still found time for Aldi's after dance and all is well (Strawberries were $1.19 and blackberries were $.99).

Have a great day,

Corinna

"For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven; a time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up what is planted; a time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up; a time to weep and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance; a time to throw away stones, and a time to gather stones together; a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing; a time to seek, and a time to lose..."-Ecclesiastes 3:1-6

Every Healthy Step Makes a Difference

Wow, has it been a long time!  I really try to blog as often as I find time but time has eluded me these days.  It also hasn't helped that my new computer crashed over a week ago.  Yes, the new computer I just purchased less than two months ago crashed.  Thankfully, it was all under warranty so I hopefully I will have a fabulous, working computer in just a few days and then I will just fight time when keeping up with my blog again.  Right now, I've taken my son's school computer to catch up with you while he takes a lunch break.

My journey is as exciting and as boring as every - it all depends on the day, hour and minute.  Over the past couple of weeks I have made a few changes in my healthy lifestyle. One of them is something that I rarely speak of with you.  In fact I think it's an important part of weight loss and a healthy lifestyle but often gets missed. I have changed my vitamins.  Exciting stuff, hey?!

I have taken a multi-vitamin for many years - 15 years to be exact.  When I became pregnant for the first time 15 years ago my doctor told me to start taking prenatal vitamins.  Prenatal vitamins are very similar to most women's multivitamins except for a few small differences - one of them being the amount of folic acid.  Being new to the mom circuit 15 years ago made me take my vitamins religiously.  After I got through Jason's pregnancy and life got busy I still tried to take my vitamins knowing that I was probably going to have more kids (ha, that was an understatement). I knew that taking a multivitamin was important during pregnancy but it was just as important before pregnancy and in the very early stages of pregnancy when many moms don't even know they are pregnant.  Therefore, I still took prenatal vitamins as often as I remembered or felt like it. I was never very good about remembering them each and every day but I always had them on hand just in case.

Over the years I have continued to take prenatal vitamins or multivitamins to help with my healthy life as well as keeping any possible additions to my family healthy too. I have run into a couple of problems though.  One is that I often forget.  I have tried many methods over the years to remember but many of them have failed.  The other problem is that they often make me sick.  I have been known to take a vitamin and then be very sick to my stomach 15 minutes later.  This makes my memory worse because taking a vitamin that makes me sick is that last thing that I want to remember to do.

When I was pregnant with Samuel my doctor did the normal tests when I was about 6 months along.  That afternoon the nurse called me and told me that my doctor wanted me to start taking iron pills because my iron levels were too low.  I sheepishly admitted that I had not been taking my prenatal vitamins more than once a week.  My nurse chuckled and said that she would tell my doctor and that she would recommend that I take my prenatal vitamins every day until my next appointment when I could talk to my doctor about any additional iron if needed.  I was kindly scolded by my doctor at my next appointment.  I took my vitamin daily from there on.  I cushioned it between 2 snacks and that helped me keep it down. After Sammy was born I went back to my bad habits again.

A couple of weeks ago I threw away all of my multivitamins.  I decided that I really needed to take them but should not dread the process.  I went to the store and bought myself some chewable vitamins and was thrilled to find out that I could keep them them down with no problems.  I have to spend a little more money on chewables than I did the others and that's painful for my frugal self, but now I am taking them regularly and feel good about it.  One of the Weight Watchers Good Health Guidelines is to take a multi-vitamin daily and after all of these years, I can finally say that I am doing it right.

Is there something that you know you should do but dread it?  What can you change that will help the process go more smoothly?

Have a great day,
Corinna

"O come, let us sing to the Lord; let us make a joyful noise to the rock of our salvation! Let us come into his presence with thanksgiving; let us make a joyful noise to him with songs of praise!" -Psalm 95:1-2