Perricone MD Giveaway! |The Makeup Divas Beauty Blog

Perricone MD Giveaway! |The Makeup Divas Beauty Blog

i need this so i will never look old!

New Host

Ok so here's the deal. I love blogging and will continue doing it. But I originally created this template with my friend, who was the main author and so I cannot make any changes to this template and I prefer a really simple host like wordpress to advance my blogging skills. So I've created a new blog that will chronicle my daily life/fitness journey with a lot more pictures and diary style entries.

The blog is called "Foodie getting Fit"
and the url is :
http://foodiegettingfit.wordpress.com/

So I would really really appreciate it SO much if you guys commented on that blog and I'll continue to stop by yours and comment. I love having you guys witness my journeys and you move me daily :D

If only for today

It's a glorious day and wonderful day to embrace the body that Mother Earth/God/The Universe/Science has given you. YOu should treat it right even if it's just for today, nourishing it with fruits, vegetables and filling foods that you enjoy and that give you a sensual experience, exiting your olfactory senses, pleasuring your taste buds and stimulating your eyes with their colors/textures/patterns. Feel beautiful, if only for today. Stand straight with your eyes meeting everybody's gaze proudly. DO not hide behind big clothes or layers of skin. Just stand proud and tall. If you believe you are beautiful, everyone else will too. And in case you don't believe that you are beautiful, remember that I do. I think you have beautiful hair that catches rays of sunlight. It hink you have beautiful eyes that see into eveybody elses and can see the pleasures of this world. I think you have a beautiful nose that can smell just about anything. I think your mouth is full and pink and is the opening for your thoughts and feelings to come through in the form of voice. I think your arms are strong and can pick up a crying child, lay a hand on someone who needs support and help you reach far beyond your immediate grasp. They are not too flabby today. They are capable. I think your chest is not too big or too small. It is perfect to lie down on. It is perfect to hold your heart, lungs and ribs in. It is perfect to feed a hungry child. It is perfect to provide a place for someone to lie their crying head. It is perfect for you. Your stomach is not too big. It is so capable and readily digests anything you put inside. Even if it has extra layers of skin, it is your core, and it holds you up. It is beautiful for being there to hold you up, when no one else can't. it keeps you upright and walking tall. It is the complement to your back and anchors your spine. I think your legs are absolutely gorgeous and muscular and beautiful and capable and infinite in their abilites to take you further and further across this world. They connect your head to your feet. They allow you to kick, jump, bounch, sit, stand and crawl. They have been there with you from the beginning and ever since you learnt how to use them, they have been yoru companion throughout this journey. They do not need to be thinner or more toned, JUST FOR TODAY. they are perfect. If only for today. So remember. YOu are perfect. If only just for today. Although believing this everyday will hopefully help you believe it too. I love you. Sincerely: Your body. Your heart. The part of you that wants to believe that you are truly worth it and you deserve it.

Weight: 163.4lbs
breakfast: 1 nectarine, 1 bowl kashi h2h cereal with 1% milk, 1 cup tea
snack:
lunch:
snack:
dinner:

Renewed

Last week I made a whole set of changes in my life that ultimately I think will benefit me in terms of my energy levels, happiness and productivity in terms of my MCATs studying. I cut back on my volunteering hours (I only volunteer Monday mornings, Tuesdays and Fridays) and have only been working two-three days during the week.

In terms of weight loss--I haven't lost and I haven't gained. This week's weight reading was 163.4lbs, which is the same as it has been these past two weeks. Anyways I do have a renewed sense of determination in terms of getting to where I've always wanted to be in terms of my health and fitness goals. I believe that to ultimately get to your weight loss goals, you have a graph that looks as follows:
There is not a steady or linear downward graph, but rather a graph with plateaus and even in some cases small gains along the way. And I am in one of those plateaus. It's like the phase change diagram for water, where water stays between each phase (be it water, ice or steam) for a range of temperatures before it switches to a whole new phase. I am stuck in this 161-164lb phase and will have to make renewed efforts to get the graph to start moving down again. Which brings me to one of my goals that I shall seriously implement these upcoming months:

Operation: BECOME an ATHLETE.


I love Serena Williams body. It's curvaceous but yet so strong and meaty and muscular. She looks like an amazonian woman, with thick thighs and strong arms. She doesn't by any means look skinny or weak. She looks capable. Everything I want to be in terms of an athlete.

Too often, I have shied away from certain exercises/sabotaged my efforts believing that my unathletic ability was tied into the idea that I would be the fat out-of-shape girl for the rest of my life. Me-an athlete?! The idea was laughable. But I know that I am my biggest hurdle. I can be whomever I want, and athlete is certainly included within my repertoire. I am incredibly strong and have a lot of mental discipline when I want to be in focus. I have the legs, the stamina and the cardiovascular system all built into making this happen. And I don't believe for a second that I couldn't just spend 10-15 minutes a day making this happen. The key to making this goal happen is consistency and self-belief that I CAN DO IT. And so this is my goal for the year, and for the rest of my life. I would like to be able to run 2miles at a time without that number seeming daunting. I want to do triathlons and races (5Ks and 10Ks alike) and become IN-SHAPE. And that's what I want to do more than anything. Use my body as the capable, able instrument it is. This morning I woke up at 6:50am, got on the treadmil by 7:15 and ran until 7:30. Now I know for many of you this is laughable, but I RAN. without stopping. For over 1 mile. Like 1.25 miles. Which is more than I've done in a year and the endurance is what I need to harvest more than anything. The speed will come. It's endurance I need to grow.

In other things, I need to start doing MCATs tests. I have been studying the material and it is just not helping me. I am a results-based learner and I need to do exams and improve my score to actually feel like I'm learning. So that's what I'm going to start doing.

I have been doing self-sabotaging things and will stop those immediately. I have to go back to timed eating--not calorie counting restrictively, but eating things every 3 or so hours to make sure I don't binge and don't let myself get too hungry. I am eating tons of veggies and fruits and LOVING IT.

I am SOO EXCITED THAT SPRING IS HERE. I love summer and spring and any time I can breathe outside without seeing physical condensation.
Here' s a view outside my window. It's absolutely beautiful to wake up to this every morning:

P.s. Thanks for the comments on the pictures I posted. You guys sure know how to make this blogging thing worth it :D

I put away my scale

That's how I felt better. By putting away my scale I got back my mental sanity. To some degree, of course. but i'm feeling much better, much more rational and much more in control of myself. I might not weigh in this week because I need the mental break from that plastic piece of work. Anyways, here are some pictures of me and my boo!

Sorry for the blurriness---i got the pictures via ichat, because his camera couldn't transfer them to my computer. But you get an idea:

Why?

Why do I do this to myself. These past two weeks I have been drowning myself emotionally in foods and making terrible food choices regardless of the consequences. I'll have two good days and then a day like yesterday where I eat 3000+ calories and UNDO any healthy steps I've taken in the first place. I have been feeling overwhelmed and exhausted and just making bad food choices as a result. I need to wise up and go back to calorie counting because clearly this whole intuitive eating is backfiring in my face when I became emotionally strapped and need some sort of outlet. I want to feel good about my eating habits.

I think I'm going to food journal and for the next two days drink around 2-3L of water just to cleanse out whatever shit I put in yesterday. I'll update this post later but I just needed to vent a little bit to calm myself down and get out of this straitjacket of frustration.

Eats:
2 slices toast with 2 slices fat free cheese (90+50=140)
Medium nonfat latte (146 calories via Peet's Coffee website)

Pictures

Food yesterday was pretty good. In the past two days I've lost 1lb of the weight on Sunday,so that's not too bad. I'm hoping to lose like 2 or 3 of those 4lbs. It'll come off slowly but surely. I think my body needs to be slowly moved into the 150s and I jolted the system by moving it there in around 2 weeks. I was 161.8, then 160.8 and then 159.4 so that was too much weight loss in three weeks. I'm currently at 162.4lbs and so I'll try to get it slowly down to 161lbs this next sunday and then spend 2 or 3 weeks trying to get it down to 159lbs. That's how my body works. Slow and unassuming in its weight loss.

Now onto pics of me and the man for his glorious week here:


EDIT blogger is not letting me upload pictures due to an "internal error" so I'll try again later.

It's only tuesday and I feel MUCH MUCH better

I'm feeling more in control and more mindful about what I'm putting into my body> plus I'm not feeling so overwhelmed about where life is going and how I'm going to deal with these bumps in the road.
I've adopted a "fake it, til' you make it" attitude in regards to so many things in my life. in terms of weight loss, I'm faking being a skinny person who doesn't have food issues in the hopes that it'll turn into a reality. In terms of studying/jobs, I'll fake being the smart, put-together pre-medical student who is ambitious,driven and self-assured until I get all the way to becoming a doctor. I am not as self-confident or self-assured as I look and this fake it attitude will definitely help me get there. In terms of relationship I try to be so secure, honest, trusting and self-assured. Most of my doubts in a relationship relate to me: am i pretty enough, will he love me enough, do i interest him enough---I know on a concious level that I am pretty enough, he does love me and I do interest him but on a subconcious level related to that fat girl in the last couple posts I showed, I believe I'm not good enough or worth it. So I try to fake being these things and within that act, grows a reality that I am those things.

So I'll post pictures of my boyfriend's trip when I get home but for now, this is my update.

A new week to start

So I weighed in yesterday to see a 4lb gain. That's when I put the scale away. I had in one week derailed so many of my newly aquired healthy lifestyle behaviors; let me explain. I started body-checking (every time I passed a mirror, I would life up my shirt and examine my belly). I would weigh myself 2-3 or even 4x a day to see how my weight fluctuated. I started developing food-phobia where I didn't trust myself to make the right decision and so I would choose the wrong foods just as self-sabotaging behavior. I also began to question my own beauty based on the weight of the day. So I put the scale away. And I spent half an hour naked yesterday just trying to show some body love. And I ate what I wanted yesterday keeping an eye on veggies/portions/fruits. And I feel 1000000x better.

My duty to my body and to myself is to get my body to where it needs to be without being bogged down by some of these UNhealthy behaviors. And so I will not half-ass it this week. I won't make up excuses or use my emotional mental state instead of hunger cues to make food judgements. I won't doubt my own ability to eat well---I've done it before. I'll incorporate some walks (which I actuallY DID do this week) and I'll stop doing silly things like body-checking. Here's to a new week and a refreshing start.

The War between Me, Myself and I

I am in a reciprocal body war where my body has jacked me up to weights I haven't seen in a month or so and I am sabotaging myself by binging. It's like a "screw you" attitude that clearly will not work in either my body or my favor. I am treating us as two separate units because my body's not cooperating. That's wrong in and of itself. We're one unit but I'm treating us as two. I need to show some self-love and move past this.

I realized some things about this week: My body and I are both shit-scared of being at 159lbs. Why? The pressure gets put on to keep going. And its' a number that I on some subconscious level think I cannot maintain. When I know the opposite is true: I like being in the 150s. But last summer the same thing happened: I hit 159 for a DAY and then my body started creeping up in the opposite direction. Well IT WILL NOT HAPPEN TODAY. I am declaring it to the world. This will NOT happen. This canNOT happen. The number I saw today: 163.8lbs. Why? Because I over-indulged in cookies yesterday. That will not happen. If i want a cookie, I damn well will have a cookie but just one. There is no "screw today" mentality. There is the only "nourish my mind, body, and soul" mentality. I cannot do what I did last summer and self-sabotage until I'm at 170lbs again. I need to get past this hurdle that is 159lbs. I need to be securely wrapped in the blanket of the 150s.

I even have started developing Food phobia. This whole idea that I cannot trust myself around food. That should NOT be happening. I will eat fruits but balk at the idea of salads? I need to allow myself to indulge in good healthy foods. I need to be ok with the entity that is my temple. But I also need to make an effort to pick veggies over breads and fruits over cookies. I do not want to calorie count. I want to trust my body's natural cues. But I even have been ignoring those. I have been stuffing myself and feeling disgusting as a result.

This war ends today. Right now. I am communicating with you. I am sending a plea to my body: Please work with me. Help me overcome this anxiety. Help me genuinely move past these hurdles and confront myself in an honest but gentle manner. Allow me to make small mistakes, not small mistakes that turn into big problems. Help me move into the 150s.

This is wha I used to look like when I was at my heaviest and most vulnerable; and this is how I see myself sometimes and do not understand when people call me attractive or beautiful or when good-looking guys show interest in me: (and this is without the braces or glasses)


I do not want to go back there again. I need to take control of my eating. I will post my food journal for the day:
B: smoothie: 1 cup vanilla soymilk, 1/2 banana, 5-8 strawberries, 1 cup blueberries.

Weight Updates

Sunday's Weight: 159.4
Monday's Weight: 162.6
Tuesday's Weight: 164lbs
Wednesday's Weight: 162.8lbs

So hopefully within the next week or so I'll be back to below 159lbs. It looks like my body is holding on for its dear life to the 160s and I have to slowly move it down with healthy eating/exercise.

Down Down Down

So after I wrote my post on Sunday, my morale came crashing down. I ended up binging yesterday majorly, and gained "5 pounds". These are in quotations because I clearly did NOT gain 5lbs, as that would be pretty impossible and impressive within the span of 2 days. I want to move past the binge (and have done really well today in that regard) but I do want to list reasons why I think that binge happened and what I can do in the future to prevent it:

1. I self-sabotage: I tend to have certain body points at which I freak out and believe I don't deserve to be at that particularly weight/this weight challenges my inner view about how I should look (the whole I am a fat girl mentality kicks in) and I tend to eat and eat and eat until my body reaches that weight again. I am MUCH more cognizant of this fact than I ever was before and I am trying to move past these set points. 159 is a scary number in some regards because it is a new decade and a new BMI classification. I recognize these feelings and am trying to move past them. Hopefullly when I see 159 the next time I'll be careful not to self-sabotage
2. I just got off an emotional high: After my boyfriend left on sunday I just felt somewhat dejected and sad. I mean here i had had 6 days of so much fun, love, nourishment and contentment and getting off of that train was a hard pill to swallow. So I swallowed other things...and a lot of other things. and then some more things. And here I am-->post-food binge, post-emotional binge. Now it's time to learn how to cope with those feelings without the aid of food.
3. Work is hard. And long hours plus little sleep makes kuddy a tired tired girl who craves sugar. And that's what I indulged in.
4. I want summer. My name Kudret means nature in Urdu (the language of Pakistan) and I feel a certain connectedness in nature and summer specifically that mediates my moods. Well when it's cold, I'm cranky and when it's sunny I feel soooo happy! Because we're in between seasons, the weather is sunny/cold/sunny/cold which is exhausting my emotions.

Now excuses are over. The binge has been over for 24 hours now and here's how my day went:

I came home early from work because my mom (my ride) was jetlagged and needed to go home and so I had to go home too. I then proceeded to sleep 3 or 4 hours (side-effects of the binge?) and woke up much more refrshed and contented. I just came back from an hour long walk (4 miles) and am about to hop into the shower. I have work at the GAP tonight from 6-10 and then I"ll go to sleep happy. I normally restrict my eating after a binge but I've been trying to eat intuitively and haven't done anything out of the ordinary> Just trying to get the extra fruits/veggies/water to flush out the salt and give a better glow to my skin. I feel 1000000x better because I have analyzed it, diagnosed the causes and dealt with the symptoms. We'll see what my weight is officially on friday but hopefully these type of cleanse was needed by my body. Now off to shower, then work. Then I"ll stop by all of your blogs :D

10 lbs!!! One of the best weeks ever.

So this has been an epic and amazing week in terms of my general contentment and all the pieces in my life falling into a pretty seamless puzzle. I mean things are still as hectic and uncertain as ever, but my dad and my brothers love my boyfriend. And I had an amazingly fantastic week just enjoying my boyfriend and how much my friends/family respect him as a person. My man and I spent time in Rhode Island and all around MA. I just am so happy to be his and him to be mine. I'll post pictures when he sends me them (since my mom had my camera) and you'll see some good times we had. In the mean time, here is a weight related update:

I weighed in today at 159.4lbs!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I didn't even try that hard; by that I mean that I ate intuitively and tried to cover the main food groups each day. But I still went out to eat and had dessert. I didn't focus on food too much nor hate on my body. For the most part, my beautiful body did for me what I needed it to do and I tried to treat it well as well. My boyfriend made me feel absolutely gorgeous and I truly felt comfortable in my skin.

I promised that I would post progress pics when I reached this bench mark (-10lbs!), as well as measurement stats...So without further ado:

The pictures:
before: 1/9/09 after: 1/15/2009

(click to enlarge)

I definitely do see a subtle difference in the bodies, with my newer body being leaner and more toned. I do not see HUGE differences, because I think my midriff is always relatively lean but the body looks more vertical if that makes more sense: like toned and defined and less "hanging out". I took a couple more pictures so that you guys see what my body is like now:


So there you have it in terms of pictures. you get almost a 360 degree view of what I look like stripped down to my bra and shorts (hehe).

Here are the changes in measurement as well:
1/9/09 3/15/09
waist 28.5 waist:27.75
bust: 39.5 bust: 36.5
under bust 32.5 underbust: 30.5
stomach 33 stomach: 30.25
hips 38 hips: 37
butt 41 butt: 40
r. thigh 25 rthigh:24.5
l thigh 24.75 lthigh: 24.25

So I definitely have lost inches all around and I am proud of my body for adapting so naturally. I've lost about 10lbs in around 2 months and I'm so proud of that achievement. I am ALL FOR slow slow weight loss and just want my body to settle in a happy range where I can do what I'm doing now. I'm blessed with a relatively fast metabolism and true love of food, so I can't complain. I have my boyfriend for tonight and tomorrow he leaves. I then wait for a couple months before i get to see him on his birthday in May. It's a long time but I feel so good about us, that I'm not too worried. I love the weather outside and am happy that spring is finally settling down. I hope everyone is having the same success that I have and I promise to just be in and relish this moment!! Hugs.

He's COMING!!!

Thanks for all the compliments ladies! You really do know how to make a girl feel beautiful :D

THE BOYFRIEND IS COMING IN 1.5 HOURS. Can you tell I'm excited?!?! hahaha. I'm sooo psyched. It's been 3 months too long and I need a dose of him. I love him and have missed him so much. This week is both parts stressful and exciting because my guy is meeting all the other guys in my life (dad, brothers, cousins etc.). So I anticipate some awkwardness, but hopefully just goodness in general. We're planning on meeting friends, chilling out and doing lots of restaurant-ing~ So in all honesty, weight wise I don't anticipate any big loss or small loss. I'll take the status quo. I'm between 160.8 and 161.5 and I'm pretty happy in this range for now. I feel beautiful and healthy and feel like I can indulge a little bit while staying in this range. In terms of long term goals I would like to be around 10lbs down from where I am now. I'll be able to maintain that weight and still retain the general curviness that is me.

I took off the next three days off from all my work jobs to just spend time with him exclusively. Of course by exclusively I mean with my brothers and friends. But it's still perfect for me. I just can't wait to touch him in person. I'm excited for cuddling and holding hands and skin to skin contact. Can you tell how excited I am by all the gushing I'm doing?! God I'm making myself gag :D
haha. So that's the update. I'm doing well eating wise and just staying active in my day-to day lifestyle. The weather is SLOOOOWLY getting warmer to around the 40s an 50s. I can't wait for spring to kick in with full force. It snowed yesterday and that was no fun. I'm ready to breakup with winter and have a full fledged affair with spring. I would even consider cheating on spring with summer :D I'm a summer baby and thrive in all things associated with hot weather. I love humidity too. I'm a weirdo like that. And rain is my favorite weather in the summer. When I was born it was raining and it's rained for the past 5 or 6 birthdays so I truly feel like rain in my little present. Haha. Chessy much? I think I should stop writing before I make myself throwup. Haha. But I can't help it. Love is in the air and so is spring. Hope everyone can feel as happy as I do at this moment! :D

Post Coming Soon

I took this picture today while playing with makeup. Whenever i start to feel sad, I play with makeup and it makes me feel better. yes I'm a dork.

I think I'm addicted to the internet ;(

I spend WAAAY TOO MUCH TIME on my computer> I watch shows, read celebrity gossip, facebook my friends constantly, read headlines etc. etc. etc. I spend hours and hours online just stationary in one place. Instead of moving and enjoying life and having stories of my own to tell, i spend hours vicariously living through others. So I'm testing myself by only allowing 1 hour of internet this entire weekend. I promise I'll look into your blogs on monday, but for now I don' t like how this computer is slowly taking over my life, and I'm losing the life itself I have. SO I'm off to get dressed, and take a nice long walk and get my life back! I'll check in on Monday!

Oh 150s...I can just smell you!!

Weigh In: 160.8.
Loss for the week: -1.0lb

SOOO CLOSE to the 150s!! When I get down below 160, I'll take progress pics and report measurement stats for the 10lb benchmark.

Mind Games

Does anyone else hate the frackin' mind games the scale plays a few days before your perioD?? My weigh in is tomorrow but as of now, I'm up 0.6lbs. I know THAT'S NOT TRUE and that it's hormonal changes. Ughh. I should be thanking my body right now for making sure that I've got enough water in me to prevent any kind of anemia.

Dear body,
I'm sorry I'm yelling at you. you are beautifully made and fuction seamlessly. You look damn good naked and that number is just that: A NUMBER. So I should stop freaking out. You are doing a fine ass job keeping me alive as my body prepares to lose some blood. (sorry for the graphics). But in reality there are weak moments where I'm like UGHH WHY DO I WEIGH MORE when I eat less. And I know this is an illusion. and you're testing me. and I'm testing you too. I love you. Let's make up. I don't wanna start my day angry at you. I think you're pretty pretty awesome. Thanks for the hourglass figure. Now if you could do me a favor and manage to shed 2lbs by tonight that would be a bonus. But if you think that's a vital 2lbs to your functioning for the upcoming days, then by all means keep it. And I'll figure a way to deal.
Let's not go to bed mad.
Kud

PMS-ing....

Ok so yesterday I had a PMS binge. It happens almost every month and is generally an indicator of when my period will come. After my binge, I expect the flo to show (rhymes!) around 24-48 hours post-binge. I ate around 2700 or 2800 calories yesterday. About 1000 calories above my general daily intake. I used to feel guilty. Now I don't. Why? Because this is my body's way of letting me know that my period is coming. I fully embrace the idea that you can communicate with your body and allow it to tell you the good, the bad and the ugly. This qualifies under one of the communications with my body that I could ignore and go on my way. But honestly, what difference do those extra 1000 calories make in the long run? Sure these women's magazines will tell you that eating one extra apple, or one small bag of chips a day will cumulate in a 20lb gain or something crazy like that, over the period of 10 years. They operate on a mode of food fear. You should fear food and avoid going beyond x-amount of calories to reach this "x-weight" which THEY call your happy weight regardless of whether or not your body really wants to be there. I don't operate that way. I believe that each person's body has its own genetic code for a happy weight range and allows environmental factors to shift that range a few pounds (or tens of pounds in desperate cases like starvation or malnutrition) up or down. So I want my body to tell me that range. And if that requires my body engaging in a pre-menstrual binge, then so be it. It literally has hapened every month for the past couple years. ANd in all honesty those weight effects that result post-binge go away as soon as my period is over. I think its just fat stores that my body uses for the extra energy. I really crave meats and iron-containing foods. I also eat extra carbs but not too many. I just think it's natural and healthy and so I will not feel guilty for it! I think that my body will make up for it through the course of the week. This morning I didn't want anythiing heavy and was craving fruits: so i made a smoothie with some strawberries, blueberries and milk. I also want to walk a few miles just to get some brisk exercise in my day. It's this kind of negotiating with your body or "communicating" that helps us maintain healthy figures and sane minds. It's like you're married to your body. If your body wants to buy the 56" plasma television then you tell it that it must cut back somewhere else, like on the season tickets to the red sox games of the year. Similarly if my body wants to eat an extra 1000 calories then it also will probably crave lower calorie foods throughout the week. So now I'm going to step off of my soap box and remind you all to JUST COMMUNICATE with your bodies.

I'm still alive. Sorry for taking such a big writing hiatus

So I put this picture up to start my post because I AM SOOOOOO EXCITED that my man is going to be right next to me in a week. Next tuesday on the 10th, I will be picking him up at the airport. He'll be mine in the flesh for five glorious days. I just cannot articulate how anxious I am for this week to go by. The thing is that we've been apart for only 3 months. But during these three months, he's had to deal with the grief of losing both his grandparents and being the rock for his grieving mother. On top of that, he's been dealing with the economy and how that's impacting his financing of college. And it's been tough for our relationship, partly because I have to be his rock and I've never done that before. We've been going out for around 9 months but it feels like longer. It's the most adult relationship I've had and the most fulfilling. I need to stop writing or I'll vomit reading my own gushing ;D haha This picture was taken last year, during the summer...

Ok onto the present: I got a snow day today!! We got 15+ inches of snow and it was crazy to be driving in this weather. My cousin tried to drive to work in the morning and his car got stuck. It took lots of shoveling and a snow blower to be able to move his car. Of course he did end of going to work, but that's because he's crazy....After all, he is related to ME. *laughter ensues*. So I took a sick day on friday (being sick--more on that next paragraph) and had a snow day today. I did work saturday and sunday at the gap for 7 or 8 hours each day, but I got two days completely off which hasn't happened in a while. I spent the day in my pajamas, and felt super relaxed and happy. I saw the movie The Producers with Nathan Lane and Mathew Broderick which I'd never seen before. It was super funny and my father and I enjoyed it immensely. So tomorrow is back to work, but this week will be MUCH better than the last due to the past days taken off and the future impending arrival of my beloved.

In other health news:
1. I have an Afghanistan sized pimple on my chin and the urge to eat ALL DAY LONG....what could this signify. THINK. where have you felt these emotions before....when does your usually clear face become a topographic map of the middle east?? Oh right...AROUND YOUR PERIOD. So all hands on deck. Or rather all tampons: Make yourself available and all white pants...remove yourself from my sight.
2. I am not as sick anymore. i think "Me, only Better" had it right--I was pushing myself too hard. And I need to take more days to rest. Everyone is telling me this. I just am somewhat of a workaholic: once I get into the scheme of things, I thrive on the adrenaline rush of too much work. I need to scale back. Plus I didn't get a flu shot this year. And considering I spend ALL day long taking care of babies-children who are suffering from the flu, I am highly susceptible. So I got my exposure, and hopefully can move forward from the disease.

Now on my new eating way: It's going super well. I am eating soooo many veggies and fruits. I feel healthy and nourished and my general health (besides the obvious virus) has improved. I am no longer counting calories. I am seeing numbers that are in the 160.X range. So if my official weight is around 160, I'll be taking new measurements and posting progress photos. I haven't been this low since June and it's rocking my world. :D
So there's the update for now. I'll try to be less of a ghost in the blogging world....Lots of love, hugs and kissies.

Quick WI Post

I have a sore throat and slept most of yesterday with a virus and low grade fever.
So I weighed in today:
161.8lbs. Which is -0.6lbs. I'll take anything that's not a gain. I worked today and work tomorrow a full full day. So I'll post something more in detail tomorrow. Just thought to update my weigh-in info. Will check in in the morning!

Patterns and Exhaustion

Thanks for stopping by and commenting on my blog guys!! It really meant a lot to me and having all those people take the time to just weigh in (pun intended :D ) was really gratifying.

So here's what's going on in my life: I'm exhausted. I haven't really had a day off since...like two weeks ago. I work two jobs and there hasn't been a day when I haven't been working one, the other or both. Which is fine in general: emotionally I'm super happy and grateful to have this situation in this current economic state. There have been a couple things that have been coming out of this exhaustion. Last night I feel asleep around 6 or 7pm. And to top that off, I had a hard time getting out of bed at 7:45am this morning! I was still tired and sleepy and just plain ol' exhausted. The other thing is that for the past couple nights I have been fighting the urge to binge. Now the binge urge happens a couple times in my life for non-emotional reasons. One is when I'm really tired, or sleepy or sleep-deprived. That's when I want to eat and eat and eat to stay awake and I guess up my sugar levels. The other time is when I'm hormonally imbalanced. So I know I'm exhausted and that's accounting for one of the urges. The other could be that I am hormonally imbalanced since I stopped birth control this month and that is manifesting itself in this urge. Now I'm happy enough to say that I haven't binged the way I used to. But I have eaten extra snacks at night that probably put me over my food stuff by around 500 calories. I've probably been eating between 2000 and 2500 calories these past couple of days. And so I might have to stringently calorie count or something to make sure that I can reign it back in...So not fun! But necessary.

In other news: I have a pattern with my weight loss. Or at least it's what's happened for the past couple weeks. Here's the deal-io: The day after my weigh in, I'll see a 1lb loss, which is out of the blue. It normally is like a "preview" for the following week's weigh in. So that day I eat really well. The next day (a Sunday), my weight will climb up for NO reason to a higher weight than the Friday weigh in. That day I'll get frustrated and eat a little more than I should. The next day my weight falls back to that Saturday weight (plus or minus 1/2 a pound). So then the next 3 or 4 days my weight does what it wants depending on how I eat. It's bizarre that my weight climbs up that high on Sunday but it's happened these past few weeks. So just a heads up: tracking your weight daily makes patterns visible and takes away some of the emotional glorification we give our scales. Don't let the scale mess with your mind! You ARE MORE THAN A NUMBER or a pattern. Haha. Ok that's what I have so far.

Help me stop eating a lot!!!I need to be less snacky! I'm going to plan on my potential day:
9am: 1 odwalla bar, 1 cup tea
12pm: 1 salad with one HUGE glass of water
3pm: 1 banana, some strawberries, 1 cheese
6pm/9pm: dinner tba

Breakfast and such!

I decided to show you the way my eating has changed these past two months from calories (which I kind of estimate most days) to nutritional eating and holistic eating: i.e. eating that is good for my mind and my body and makes me feel good, fresh, clean , energized and alive! So I'm going to outline my breakfast components and why I chose what I chose...

Today's breakfast:
My fruit/produce bowl contained:
1. lots of blueberries and strawberries: My mom and dad bought this whole box of berries from Costco, and I am IN-LOVE!! I especially love eating berries because it gives me dreams of spring and summer when it's 28 degrees Fahrenheit outside, and they're sweet and plump and juicy and stain your teeth which is sooo much fun!
2. One half of a banana: This shows how far I've come. Last night I wanted dessert but I made a deal with myself that if I ate 1/2 a banana and still wanted something sweet and carby like that, I could. But I acknowledged that I had more need for fruit and my body could better process it than some refined carb, and I give myself the leeway to eat something else should this not have satisfied that. Well I ate 1/2 a banana, put the other half in the fridge and went to sleep. Just like that. There was no stress eating, no self sabotaging or anything like that. And this morning I decided to eat the other 1/2.
3. 1 red bell pepper: This is also another thing I added to make sure my body got the nutrients I needed. I know that I will be working today from 11-4 or maybe 4-8, so I knew that I wanted to make sure I got at least 1 cup of veggies before work, so that I didn't have to stress out that much during the day and my body could utilize those vitamins to generate the energy and health I need to sustain myself throughout the day.
So that's the fruit/veggie bowl: I make sure that I get at least 2 cups of fruits/veggies throughout the day, regardless of what else I eat because I think that eating those fruits/veggies make me feel whole, alive, beautiful, healthy, sustained, satisfied and nourished. Which is the way I DESERVE TO FEEL!!!! Sorry, just thought I should shout that out from the table tops.

Other stuff I ate:
-3 slices of whole wheat sandwich bread (tiny slices, each one around 45 cals) with some Smart Balance butter: Bread and butter is one of my favorite breakfasts and so I definitely make sure I get to have that once a week, probably on saturday since I breakfast in bed that day (most other days it's grabbing a larabar or odwalla bar and eating it in the car). I always do whole wheat now, and actually have grown to dislike the taste of white bread. I like smart balance because it's made with olive oil yet still retains the ooey gooey butter taste :D
-1 cup tea with two teaspons dehydrated milk and 2 teaspoons sugar: I used to take splenda becaues that's what we have in abundance around the house, with my mom being diabetic but I have stopped because a. I'm NOT diabetic and b. sugar satisfies me more than artificial sweetner. Plus my body knows what to do with fructose, and glucose but not necessarily with artificial ingredients; I'm trying to make the digestive process as easy as possible for my body, and as smooth as necessary for my colon. Haha.

In other news: I am REALLY REALLY happy. I love being busy and I thrive on activity. I am sooooo complete when I am in the pediatric ward, looking after sick children and bringing them joy and laughter. Food nourishes my body but this nourishes my soul. I Feel so complete. and so loved. and so needed. It's completely rewarding and stills you in the moment. And time then flies because you are not watching the clock. I will look forward to going back to school, but taking that semester off is probably the best decision I've ever made. I wanted to go back so badly after two weeks at home and actually had a fighting call with my dean who said he saw me last semester, saw the light was gone and didn't want me to come back in that state. I fought him saying I could do it and I would get better. But I'm so glad he made me stay put and find this work to do. Because he gave me the gift of time for growth, healing and LIVING. I like working at the Gap because I get to see how people live and you'd be surprised by how much people open up to complete strangers who are helping them find clothes. Shopping (esp. jeans shopping) is a REALLY emotional experience for many women, so I'm glad I'm there to help them walk through it and feel like their body is beautiful and made perfectly regardless of clothes fitting/not fitting. So that's my update for the day. I'll check in tomorrow perhaps. I'm on a roll :D

Happy but SUPER BUSY

Hey ya'll

Official Weigh in: 162.4lbs!!
Loss: 1lb!!! WOOH WOOH.
That's more than what I've lost the past 3 or 4 weeks, so I'm glad that my body's going down in the increments that I see more drastically. I definitely see this 8lb loss and feel it with my clothes. So I have NO idea what the 20lbs will look like. In tops I'm wearing sizes S and M, and for pants I am now an official size 8. I wonder if I"ll ever fit a size 6, because I pretty much ruled that out for my body. Who knows?! The world is my ocean and my body is my oyster (does that even make sense?!?! Kud SHUT UP NOW! haha)

I'm craaaazy busy! I work at the hospital (commute included) from 8-5, then go to the gap and work from 6-10. THis happened both yesterday, today and will occur Monday. I also work Saturday from 11-4 (and maybe 4-8) and then Sunday 3-7pm. Just on my feet ALL DAY every day! So i'm soo busy that normally I fit in healthy eating, but because my job is sooo active, I normally cannot fit in any formal exercise. I'm ok with that, because i think I'm moving, the way my body was designed to be moving. I also have to be chipper and perky all day, first working with sick kids and then customers. When I come home, I am a miss cranky pants. NOT a good look. haha.

Well I have to get dressed because I have to be out of the house by 7am. I'll try to squeeze in another post and stop by all of your blogs this weekend. HAve a fun friday!!!

Grumpy!

Somehow last night, I went from being happy and ok, to grumpy and insecure. I do not know what caused this, or why suddenly I wanted to binge so badly. And I did. I gave in. But I do not feel too too bad about my binge because it could have been much worse. And often while fighting in these feelings and this intense desire to eat, I end up eating a lot more because I have imposing restrictions on myself that I try to fight afterwards.

I'm here writing in to be accountable. To say, "it's ok, kudret". You'll be fine. You overate last night, but to put it into perspective: that was one meal out of three. One day out of 7. and One week out of the 10-15 weeks you have in the BlB2 challenge. So you'll be fine. And if today, you keep your meals reasonably sized. Drink tons and tons of water. Improve your mood a little bit. Give thanks and try to be nice to everyone around you. Move a little extra today. And perhaps go for a long walk in the evening, it'll be ALL GOOD. And you'll feel good> And your body will thank you as well. So thank your body for digesting everything you put in it, and you now owe it a walk and some good eating and lots of water. It deserves it, and so do you.

Monday Update

Alright, so Aunty Flo has officially LEFT THE BUILDING!!! Gone!! Whoohoo!!! 3 weeks was FAR TOO LONG for her to stay on my couch and I'm glad she finally has left.

With that news, I am proud to say that my new range shall hence be from 162-163lbs. Some how the slow weight loss has sped up just a tiny bit, enough to shake me out of the 164lb rut. This is enough to motivate me and re-energize me to embrace this whole slow weight loss thing

Slow weight loss is awesome because it gives my body a chance to adjust to the weight and instead of forcing my body to shift its equlibrium (which it definitely will resist) I'll do super slow weight loss that my body won't notice too much until it becomes a much bigger loss and does stick. Awesome right? Trick my body into shifiting its equilibrium super super small amounts, until a new equilibrium that is 15 or even 20lbs less, is finally reached. I hope all of you all are doing well in your weight loss journeys. Go A-team!

I'll update on tuesday with stuff about my weekend and how the week is unfolding!!

Official Weigh-In # I can't remember...

Weight this morning: 163.4lbs!!!

So that's a loss of -0.6lbs. Haha, slllooooooooooow and steady weight loss for sure. In the past three weeks I've lost 1.4lbs, but hey slow weight loss is easier to hold off. Right?! I'll do what I'm doing and see what happens next week. I know this is tMI but I still have my period 3 weeks later, so I'm going to see if that lets up and the weight goes down more dramatically...Pants are fitting better and I feel slimmer. So I'll just do what I'm doing.

Lots of love all around blog land!

It's Thursday!! Two days away from a 3-day weekend!!

Whoohoo. Time for another bubbly post a'la Kud!

Thanks for ALL your sweet/kind/inspiring comments yesterday. It made me feel loved and respected and I totally appreciate the time you guys take out of your God-knows-how-busy days to read what I write and give some commentary. Thanks so much. It inspires me to wake up the next day and write a quick post on the positives in my life:

So basic updates/yays in my life:
1. I think I'm going to go off of the pill. It's been 3 weeks that I've had my period and it's getting heavier which is NOT NORMAL at all and I do not want to go higher up in my dosage of hormones so I'm going to go off of it and see what happens.
2. I woke up this morning and did wii-fit yoga. I decided I wanted to get a nice stretch in the morning and what better sets your day of right than 15 minutes of yoga on Fernando (my wii fit board). Me and Fernando had a good ol' time if yaknowwhati'msayin'.....haha. Could I be any greasier?!
3. I'm off to work with kids who are sick and it involves me playing, doing arts and crafts, holding sick infants and helping out the parents with traumatized siblings. I love doing what I do and today should be no different.
4. I am listening to a Billie Holliday song and drinking tea, which is the ultimate soothing ritual in the morning, showing myself some self-love and luxury during these difficult times
5. I'm going on a friend-date with one of my best friends tomorrow who also is not celebrating V-day with a man (sadly my man is in pittsburgh, and she's single) so we're dating eachother friday night---We're doing a double feature of girl flicks, starting off with He's just not that into you and moving onto Confessions of a Shopaholic
6. I'm going to a Sitaar concert with my parents on V-day, going to get my ethnic on :D
7. I'm going to Bowdoin to visit my little Bro (he's 19, haha) at College, on Sunday and get to see his college for the first time and spend some quality family time
8. MONDAY'S A HOLIDAY!!!!

Ok, that' s it. I hope some of this positive energy flies off of the screen and rubs off on you. Be happy! Regardless of your body size, or perhaps dare I say it...Because of it!, feel happy that you're healthy, walking, seeing, tasting, smelling and touching person with your intact being. And even if you're injured/ill, be sure to remember that you're alive, enjoying the air that everyone else is breathing and just take a second to remember all the positives in your life. Ok, I'm signing out now. I'll stop by your blogs when I get home in the afternoon. Adios!

Re-evaluations

So I am stuck. I am between the weight of 164 and 165lbs and I have been stuck between these two numbers for the past 2-3 weeks. Now I am NOT going to give up or call it a day. Although yesterday out of frustration I binged. I don't know why, but sometimes I eat a lot so that my weight will creep out of that zone and I'll be remotivated. Does anyone relate to what I'm talking about?? Like this morning I saw 166lbs and I was like "oh oh, must get right back on the boat" and felt a renewed sense of motivation. Last night I dreamt that I was writing a post for this blog. So this morning I woke up and knew I had to write a post because I got a sign from my subconcious that the time was NOW.

I have been re-evaluating the way I see my weight loss. I will not see it as the ends-all be all. Since I have been working in a hospital full-time, I am surrounded by medical jargon and disease talk ALL THE TIME. So I have started applying that sort of talk to my own life. So if I see my unhealthiness as a physical condition or manifestation fo bad health, then I will treat it with the same care that I treat any other diseases that find their way in my life.

So let's frame it this way:
I am diagnosed with "unhealthy living-ness" which is a chronic medical condition in that I do not use food as nutrition only and often use food as a coping mechanism, binging and eat far beyond what I need to to deal with problems in my life.

Now I want to treat this unhealthy life style with some care and treatment plans. By making it an objective thing rather than a personal thing, you are prevented from being mean to yourself and saying "i am so fat and ugly" or "i should be disgusted with myself". This is a problem going on in your body and sure you have control over it, but did you necessarily cause it or are you entirely responsible for it?? There have been countless biological studies showing that sugar is more addictive than heroin and people show varying ranges of addiction to sugar. Also, we should not be punished for choosing food as a coping mechanism; it is around all the time, and we SHOULD enjoy food with our families, during celebrations, as a culture. The problem comes into play when we enjoy food in vast quantities secretly, in our car or in our bedroom and keep "hidden stashes" for coping. It's a problem when we come home and consume 3000 calories, trying to hide it from everyone we know. It's a problem when we get into binge mode and take food from our roommate without her knowing, because WE JUST HAD TO HAVE IT. I've been there, and the way I was thinking was definitely not normal in that moment. And I was ignoring all my bodily cues to get that food into my body. So unhealthy life style is the condition

Treatment Options: So I am trying to couter the unhealthy lifestyle with a "healthy lifestyle". What is a healthy lifestyle? Well the main focus is the nourishment of my body. I want to feed it with foods I like and foods I want (Obviously!). A healthy lifestyle means I can indulge in what I want and still listen to my food cues to make sure I don't binge or overdo it. I want to be one of those people who gets physical exercise in every day in some form or the other. EVEN IN WINTER! I want to go to a party and not have any freakouts about what foods they're serving. I dont' want to self-sabotage or be unhappy with my body. I want to self-love completely and unconditionally. I want to wake up and take off my clothes, stretch and love what I see. That's the treatment I need to do and the results I want to see. Medications include good food, physical activity and LOTS OF SELF-LOVE.
Side-effects for all those medications should include: more toned muscles, better stamina both in and out of the sack ( haha!), weight loss (this is a side-effect, not a main result because my focus is on the lifestyle itself) and better skin.

Things I need to note as being counter-effective to the healthy lifestyle/symptoms of the condition:
1. I have had my period for 2 or 3 weeks now and so my hormones still have not regulated yet.
2. I have stopped tracking and I think that maybe necessary to achieve the weight-loss I need at least for the time being
3. I haven't exercised in 2 weeks because I work every day and every weekend doing two jobs. I need to squeeze this in, even for 10-20 mins/day

That's what I have so far. I will address each of these concerns and try to track again too!

Ughh NO TIME

I literally have NO TIME to write the post that is reflecting my latest thoughts on fitness/health> I will TRY to make time tonight.

I work every day 9-5 and then work on weekends for the GAP. I commute 2 hrs/day and so there is a 6am wakeup call and a 9pm-ish bedtime. still trying to get it together. WIll post later tonight.

Official Weigh In #4

Longer post forthcoming.

Quick update:

This week's weigh in puts me at 164.0lbs. So that's a loss of -0.4lbs. REALLY slow but steady loss. I think it would have been greater but 2 things:
1. my period is still going on.
2. SuperBOWL SUNDAY I ate tons and tons of food. And it took like 3 days to completely wash out that junk. So that probably cost some of that loss.

I'll write a longer post later (either tomorrow or sunday) about the good things I learned/did this week.

FOOD Fest

Ate tooo much last night at the party, but steps were taken immediately to rectify that situation--starting with the two-three glasses of water I chugged before sleeping.

Today I ate salad for lunch, and some soup for dinner. I have also done a Wii workout (and the wii showed me at a 1.1lb gain, which isn't too bad--considering).

So hopefully by Friday, my weigh in day, things will be back in style. Overall, I really enjoyed the superbowl and had tons of fun with my family. My team, the steelers won and it was A FUN FUN game to watch!! The two families, my family and my uncle's family were on opposite sides and so there was tons of screaming both at the tv and at eachother. It was MARVELOUS, if I do say so myself :D

I wouldn't trade last night for anything---even if less eating might have felt better this morning :D Oh well, new day, new way. Haha. that's what I always say. See I rhyme now.

Good night!!

HAPPY DAY

WOOOOOH!!
Things that are making me happy today:

1. I woke up happy with my body. It's beautiful. It's healthy. It does SOO many amazing things for me. And I haven't weighed this low since the summer.

2. The WIi fit. me and my parents did it yesterday and we woke up and did it first thing in the morning. And I'm sore. Which is weird and sort of awesome. i love that doing a video game can bring me to that point. Today my Wii fit age was 27. Yesterday was 31, so I am improving. Hopefully by the summer time, I can actually be my own age. :D

3. THE BOYFRIEND IS COMING!!!! My boyfriend is coming to boston from pittsburgh in March. For 5 days!! Admittedly the semi-stinky thing will be that I'll be working until 3pm everyday. But my little brother has spring break and will be able to pick him up and hang out with him during the day time. And my friends offered up their couch for him to sleep on, and they live at BC. (My dad's still getting used to the idea that I have "boyfriends" in my life, and so I'm springing the man on him SLOWLY. haha)

4. I'm going to a superbowl party tonight!! With my one of my very best friends. It's at my cousins' house. So it should be great.

5. I just had my favorite breakfast ever!! Bread with butter.

6. I have you guys!! Thanks for being there and making me work harder and understand myself better. You guys are a GREAT support system and each have SOO much to offer. I thank you all.

That's it for now. Will post more stuff tomorrow, with perhaps some p ics from the partay.

Official Weigh In: 164.4lbs

Ok so there was another loss this week of about -0.6lbs. Yay! Wanna know the weird thing; I got my period today. That's like after 10-12 days. I got my period again. I started my birth control again this month after a month hiatus, and my cycle got all messed up. This ALWAYS happens. The pill has the opposite effect on me. I am THE most regular person in the world without additional hormonal regulation. I can predict when my cycle will come within a 48 hr period, due to how symptomatic I am. But as soon as I got on the pill, my cycle when out of whack. And I don't know what to do in terms of that. I do NOT want my period every 2 weeks. And i have period weight gain, which always makes me cranky even though I know it's water retention. My mom is trying to make me promise that I'll get off of birth control because she says it's unnatural for my body, can cause vein erythrothrombosis(blood clotting in my veins) and infertility. but here's the deal: I am sexually active and I plan on being so for the next 7-10 years, without having kids. And so the birth control is great at preventing that. ON the other hand, do I want to be artificially convincing my body that it's pregnant, thus irregulatinig my hormones?? The debate continues on that front.

In other news, I got a WII FIT for my dad last night. It was his bday on the 29th and my mom had been asking for the game for the LONGEST time for her bday. So I bought them the game and we were playign it ALL morning. IT even got my mom to get on the treadmill, and my dad to workout his usual 4/7 days. My own Wii fit age was 31, even though i'm 20. SO I NEED to work on that. But I did every single frickin' activity and boy I feel it. I know that's weird considering it's a video game and tons of reviews I read said it wasn't a real workout. But I am telling you here, I felt the workout. And I did all the activities and thought this was a great step forward for the video-gaming technologoy, in terms of creating activities that still get kids and adults to actively move and play. My mom and I love it, and she says we should do it every morning before work. Hehe.

So that's the update for now. I'm pretty relaxed this weekend. Just going to catch up on my MCATs studying. I WILL be going to a superbowl party at my cousins' house in NH. I personally do not really have a SUPER vested interest in football (I'm more a baseball girl myself) but I do go to school in Pittsburgh and shall root for the Stealers to get my New England family and friends SUPER riled up. HAHa. I will be checking on all of your blogs to see how you're doing. Have a fun weekend!

Sorry bout the posting

Sorry there hasn't been much posting this week. There will be a post to make up for it tomorrow! Stay tuned :D

Some pictures of me playing dress up while I gather my thoughts to create a coherent blog post for tomorrow

Happy Monday!!

Today is probably THE most dreaded day of the week. And I'm sorry to all the bloggers who had to wake up BRIGHT and early to go to work. I woke up at 7am, but found out that I didn't have to go in for my work orientation until later in the day and so I will be heading out sometime in the next hour or so. I got to lie in bed for another 2-3 hrs. Which is A-ok for me. I had a late night; I was up chatting with my man on ichat from 12am-4:30am and so that was the draining part. I'm surprised I'm sooo awake with only 3 hrs of sleep. But the thing is that my bedroom has no curtains and the room floods with light in the early morning so one could not sleep past a certain hour if one was sensitive to brightness.

On other notes, the weight loss is going amazingly. I unfortunately have the tendency to lose the weight and then gain it back. To give you a brief chronicle of my battles with weight:
1997: gained 30-40lbs over 1 summer that I came to America to visit my father.
2003: lost 30lbs and got down to around 139lbs
2004: got back up to 155lbs
Summer of 2005: got down to 142lbs
Winter of 2005: got upto 164lbs
Spring of the year 2006: down to 152lbs
Summer of 2006: 160lbs
and then spring of 2007: Freshman year: 167lbs
And then i've stayed between 158lbs and 170lbs since then. I firmly believe that I have grown around 1 inch in the last 3 or so years, and going on birth control this summer pushed me up to the high side of 160. With this weight loss challenge, and for the rest of my life, I want to get down to 150-153lbs. I'll be super happy there and that's a weight I think I can maintain for the long-term. But I'm nervous of maintanence. I think it is the point at which blogging will really be useful. Because as you can see, I've gone up and down in weight for the past 6 years, going as low as 139 and as high as 173lbs. If I get to around 150lbs, that will be in the middle of my range and It'll be not too skinny, nor too fat for my body type. I think I'll look lean, athletic and generously curvy.

I weighed in today between the range of 162.6-163.6. The scale would not stick to one number. But that IS lower than what i weighed during the weekend and I haven't seen those numbers since last summer. I CANNOT wait to see the 15- again. And it puts me around 10-12lbs away from my goal weight. Which is really satisfying for me to learn. Once I get to my goal weight, i will spend the next year blogging my food habits and really really focusing on excercise. I want to tone up ALL over without losing the curves. I will probably focus on dance for cardio and strength training to toning. I had a pretty good weekend. I just caught up on my rest and procrastinated on much needed MCAT studying. That's what I have to makeup. If I do 2 chapters a day in my book for this week, I should be caught up. But bad kud for not doing it on time. I think i'm 5 chapters behind. Sheesh. I better get off my booty, head into the shower and get going on my day. I hope monday goes well for everyone else too!

Today's eats:
Brekkie: 1 pb& j sandwich with tea=270 cals
12pm/3pm: 1 serving rice (200), 1 potato cutlet (150), 1 serving beef (200), 1/2 serving ice cream (85cals), 1 cup herbal tea (0)=635cals
6pm/9pm:

Quick check in

I will write more later, but here's a quick post of the food journal:

9am/12pm: 1 cup tea (100), 1 piece cheese (50 cals), 1 serving rice (200 cals), 1 serving curry (200), 1 chicken kebab (100), 1 potato cutlet (150 cals)=800 cals

3pm: 1 cup tea (100), 1 strawberry fiber 1 bar (140)=240 cals

Oops I need to do it again

I need to do better tracking today so I'm officially doing it again. Yesterday didn't go as well as planned. I ended up lounging with fam/friends watching a Bollywood mvie and we broke out the plantain chips and cookies of which I had too many. But I probablly only went around 500-600 calories over my daily, meaning I consumed around 2200 cals. Which isn't as bad as I've done before. Plus it's accounted for, so I'm going to move on. And I'm giving myself kudos (haha giving Kud kudos) for working out yesterday and feeling it today in my legs. Whoopee!

Anytime I feel bad about what I ate, I remember that it was a special day getting to spend hours upon hours with some of my favorite ppl and I remember that if any of those people were not here today, I'd give any number of thousands of calories to recreate the moments of love and fun I had with them. A bit morbid, but it does put things into perspective. Why spend time griping about the fact that I overate when I had a lovely time with my family and that is the most important gift we're given in this life. Ok cheesy now?

Moving on, today I have work until maybe 3 or 4. Then I plan on parking my cute butt on a coffee shop stool and studying it off, until I've completed maybe 3-4 chapters of the Kaplan MCATs book.

Food planning will resume as usual:
9am: same as yesterday =270 calories
3pm: 1 serving rice (200cals), spinach/potatos (150cals), chicken (150 cals), one piece cheese (50cal), 1 serving blueberries (50 cals), 1.5 biscuits (120cals)=720 cals
5pm: 1 strawberry fiber one bar (140cals), 1 apple fiber one bar (130cals), 1 cup of tea(80 cals)=350 calories
9pm: 2 small chicken kebabs (200 cals), 2tbsp Sabra hummus (50 cals), 1 small cheese piece (50 cals)=300 cals

Physical activity:

Biggest Loser blog Challenge A-Team Official Weigh In #2

Today's Weight: 165lbs!! That makes it a loss of -1.6lbs, which is exciting. WOOHOO.

I think there was a false sense of dip after my period, where my weight got down to 163.8lbs. hopefully I'll officially be there next wee, but I am losing in my hopeful range of 1-2lbs/week which makes me feel infinitely more comfortable with losing weight. I know people want big results fast, but I take comfort in a slower pace of weight loss, due to the fact that this needs to be a lifestyle I can maintain, for well...LIFE. So the slower I lose weight, the better adjusted my eating and exercise will be and the more long-term this body adaptation is. In the meantime when I feel discouraged or lost, I'll return to the last post I wrote termed Insecurity which helps me put into perspective how I should feel about my body.

I am having this weird eating thing--When I eat, my stomach gets full REALLY quickly. And most of the time I know I haven't eaten that much. Like today I made myself a small PB&J sandwich with a cup of tea. And my stomach got full to the point of slight nausea. It was totally weird. Now this week I did start my birth control after skipping a month, so I think maybe that's giving me pregnancy symptoms?? But that's just a guess. I just know that my stomach capacity has SHRUNK. Which is a blessing and a curse.

I think I'm going to go and track my eating this week and focus super hard on trying to do some real strength-training and do my favorite cardio more--DANCING! I didn't track last week and still managed to produce a loss. But I will track somewhat liberally because this upcoming week I"ll probably start working my two jobs and need to figure out where to fit food and everything in my schedule. And tracking/meal planning will be key to ease into the SUPER busy lifestyle.

Song of the day: Addiction by Kanye West ft. Jay Z

So onto FOOD:
9am: 2 slices light bread (90cals), 1 tbsp pb (90 cals), 1 tbsp sugar free jelly (10cals), 1 cup tea with milk and sugar (~80 cals)= 270 calories

12pm/3pm: 1 naan (247 cals), 2 tbsp hummus (60 cals), 1 serving spinach/potatos (~150cals), 1 oatmeal cookie (200 cals)= 660cals
6pm:
9pm:

Insecurity

This post's a long one.

Some days we just wake up insecure. We feel like our bodies aren't built right or we beat ourselves up for how we treat them. We feel inadequate and constantly compare our bodies to airbrushed versions of women who barely eat, workout upon tens of hours a day and are paid to look a certain way, given the most expensive trainers, food, clothes etc. I also sometimes compare myself to my boyfriend's ex-girlfriends, who were models, pageant winners and video girls. And he constantly tells me that those girls had the wrapping but not the actual present inside them. They were "gassed up" constantly demanding certain things because they truly believed they deserved those things based on the way they looked. I'm not like that. I had a truly awkward period wiht bushy hair, braces, psoriases on 70% of my body, chubbiness and hairness all in one person. I had to develop a personality to make up for those "vices" as I saw them, although now looking back at those pictures I see an adorable little pakistani girl. I think men like me because I have a sexiness to me but I also am goofy, cute and not afraid to laugh at myself. I have one of the silliest AND most vulgar senses of humor. I am both a combination of femininity and feminist indignation. I think I'm pretty intelligent though not the brightest crayon of the bunch by any measure. I work hard and I do everything with the passion I feel to the depths of my core. My friends have said I am the friendliest person they know and I talk to complete strangers like I've known them for years. But often I forget who I am and view the word through the lens fo that cute but deeply insecure chubby girl. I didn't have a boyfriend until I was 17, and didn't think I was pretty until that point. I was the girl dancing by myself in the corner at middle school dances. I was the one the cute boys laughed at. There was this boy who used to bully me. Of course the whole thing was ironic when on Prom, he came up to me and asked me if I remembered him and then proceeded to hit on me. But nevertheless, I sometimes forget all my good qualities and look at myself as the world saw me at that point in my life.

today was one of those days. I woke up and got on the scale and saw maybe a 1lb gain that for some reason plunged me into guilt over the way I looked. And when I get insecure, I start thinking of women who are prettier than me and better looking than me. And I dwell on my flaws. And those are the moments I need to sit down and journal> which is why I am blogging now. This is more for me than for anyone else. And I'm sorry if it consists of a lot of rambling.

I grew up with two parents who are SOO IN LOVE WITH EACHOTHER and still sneak off to do "hanky panky" all the time. And I've never seen them exchange gifts with eachother. Because they taught me that the true meat of a relationship, the true sustainability on a relationship does not come from the fluffy declarations of love or grand gestures of passion, but rather the continuing trust in one's partner and the belief that one will do everything possible to make sure the relationship can move forward. My dad and mom love eachother unconditionally and they had a long distance marriage for 5 years, with my mom living in pakistan and my dad in the US for my growing up years, 6-11. They kept things spicy to be sure, but they taught me that valentines day, anniversaries and birthdays mean little in the grand scheme of things. And looks should not be in the top 10 list of things you love about your partner, or the things that make your relationship work. Sure looks attract you to the person, and youth is something that socieety places SO MUCH emphasis on these days, but you should love your partner because they are a part of you and you a part of them after X number of years of being together.

And there are days I forget that. And I think for some reason that I don't deserve my boyfriend or even the best versions of myself because I look a certain way. And I get jealous of the things I remember my boyfriend telling me he did for his last girlfriends. Along with being a molecular biology major with aspirations of becoming a patent lawyer, he's an artist and he has written quite a few poems or given artistic gestures of love. And he's told me time and time again, that those things were wasted on those women who didn't have the same beauty in my soul that I do. He says that he wishes I was his first girlfriend and that we were eachothers' firsts and lasts. And I nkow him to be honest and true. And I trust him completely. I know I could send him into a room full of naked women and he'd be thinking of me. And it's funny. When he sees beautiful women, he tells me how so and so has my eyes, or my hips or my waists. For him, I am the beautiful woman I have never seen myself to be previously.

When I get down on myself like this, you know what I do. It sounds silly and crazy. but I take off all myclothes. I take off my makeup. I strip myself down to the God-given body I was blessed with. And I look at myself. Truly look at myself and enjoy what I see. I almost look at myself the way I would look at paintings of naked women. I force myself to see it for what it is. Beautiful. Capable. Willing to do anything for me. Healthy. But most importantly IT IS MINE. that's the important thing to realize. I will never have hips or thighs as small as Jennifer ANistons. I will always be extraordinarily curvy. My hair will always be dark brown and my eyes will always match my hair color. I will always have thick dark eyebrows. And a straight nose. And a round face. And my hips and breasts will always be big. But that's the beauty. I am a customized human being. God didn't just pick some generic model and change up the colors of the features. I was designed with a specificity in mind. And I am the compilation of the past and present. I am my grandmother's cheeks, my aunts face shape, my mother's eyes and my father's skin color. I am a visible record of my family's existence on this earth. And I am proof of me. I am a visible version of the soul that lies within. I know this is getting abstract, but I am trying to say that the things I see as imperfections are the experiences, emotions, feelings and passions of the soul known as kud that burns with passion, within.

So I feel much better now. And I'm going to workout. And I'm going to spend some time wiht my family. And I'm going to watch Lost. And I'm going to talk to my boyfriend and make him feel as loved as he makes me feel. And I'm going to love myself. And go to sleep, thanking my body for being MY body.

Here are some of my favorite lyrics from an India Arie song called Video:

Sometimes I shave my legs and sometimes I don't
Sometimes I comb my hair and sometimes I won't
Depend on how the wind blows I might even paint my toes
It really just depends on whatever feels good in my soul

I'm not the average girl from your video
and I ain't built like a supermodel
But, I learned to love myself unconditionally
Because I am a queen
I'm not the average girl from your video
My worth is not determined by the price of my clothes
No matter what I'm wearing I will always be the india arie

When I look in the mirror and the only one there is me
Every freckle on my face is where it's supposed to be
And I know our creator didn't make no mistakes on me
My feet, my thighs, my lips, my eyes; I'm lovin' what I see

Am I less of a lady if I don't wear pantyhose?
My mama said a lady ain't what she wears but, what she knows
But, I've drawn a conclusion, it's all an illusion, confusion's the name of the
game
A misconception, a vast deception
Something's gotta change
but,Don't be offended this is all my opinion
ain't nothing that I'm sayin law
This is a true confession of a life learned lesson I was sent here to share with
y'all
So get in where you fit in go on and shine
Clear your mind, now's the time
Put your salt on the shelf
Go on and love yourself
'Cuz everything's gonna be all right

Keep your fancy drinks and your expensive minks
I don't need that to have a good time
Keep your expensive car and your caviar
All I need is my guitar
Keep your Kristal and your pistol
I'd rather have a pretty piece of crystal
Don't need your silicone I prefer my own
What God gave me is just fine

Hello Mr. President Barack OBama!!

Happy Inauguration DAY!!!! I hope everyone emerges from the day safe, in one piece, alive and happy. I hope Obama's inauguration is accepted by all and there is just heightened security all over DC to protect the tens of thousands of people attending beyond Obama. My own lil bro (18yrold) is there right now attending Inaugural Balls etc. There's a part of me that's jealous wishing i could be there to celebrate but I know the majority of me is relieved to say the least because I'm avoiding the crowds and craziness.

WEight-wise: 163.8lbs. There's a part of me that is of course SO happy to see the weight come down this fast, but there is a realistic part of me that's wondering why it's coming off so fast and wondering about the sustainability of it all. I am not starving. Nor am I cuting out carbs/protein/fats. I eat when I'm hungry. And I eat as nutritiously as possible. So i expect to lose weight. But I don't want to average more than 2lbs per week and right now I'm averaging around 2.5-3lbs. Part of it is that I have some sort of stomach thing. My tummy has been making funny noises and my bowel movements are not as healthy as I'd like them to be. Sorry for the TMI.....

I've got to drive far this morning to my hospital to get my TB test and get all the health stuff screened. I'm slightly nervous because this is the first time I'm driving like 50 miles by myself, with highways etc. to a location I've never been to on my own. I know it's silly but I got my license in March last year. And being at college, I never got to drive the car until I came home once in a blue moon. So I still am an inexperienced driver but can drive well enough. Hopefully being home will push me to drive all the time (which i do lately) and just become comfortable with driving.

I also am working at the Gap again today during the day and perhaps during the night. I know that always leaves me tired because you're on your feet walking around, moving for 4 hrs straight. And well that's burning more calories than me sitting on my booty doing nada. So onward and forward. I hope everyone's having a good day and starts their morning off right ;D

Happy MLK day!!

1 more day until a new presidency begins and we begin a new chapter as Americans. WOOHOOOO. I am so happy that we have a president in the white house who is making so much headway in the racial dept. I only worry that we will slack off in our continued efforts to narrow the inequality gap between whites and other people of color, because we have a president who is an example of how far blacks have come in this country. The truth for me is that this is a big deal but I also recognize that this hasn't done everything in terms of briding that inequality and I hope this only empowers more young people to work harder to bring the standard of living and treatment of people of color, closer to the privilege that comes in our society with being white.

Ok rant over. Sorry for that political tangent.

Anyways I am weighing LESS. Now that Aunty Flo is slowly moving out of the building, my body is going back to its more normal functioning. and with that, the weighing in is getting more fun :D But my scale wasn' cooperating with me today and I stepped on it liek 10 times to get a number that came up twice to report as my official weigh in. But each time I stepped on, I got something different, ranging from 163.2lbs-164.6lbs. I do know that it never went above 165lbs and that's awesome. My goal this week is to weigh in anywhere from 163-165lbs. within that range. And I'll be happy. Because in all honesty I dont' want to lose weight TOOO fast so that it's not sustainable.

I just got my workout in. Well I'm not sure how much I worked out but I ended up super sweaty and had to change the clothes I just wore. ughh. I shoveled our driveway. Which is an EXCELLENT workout. For those of you who don't feel like going to the gym, make the little things count. For example you can dance around in your house (that' s my favorite workout), wash teh dishes, scrub the floors, shovel your driveway or just do squats/lunges etc. around your kitchen. I definitely believe that a workout does NOT have to be within the confines of a gym. And since at this point in my life I can't afford a gym membership, you can be sure that I'll be working out all OVER the place.

So today the plan was for me to study MCATs all day and then go to work (at the Gap) from 6-10pm. Now I found out my mom invited some folks over for an early dinner at 4pm, and I'm betting she'll need help around the house doing stuff. So I'm not sure how much I"ll actually be able to study. Which is annoying!!! It means more work during the week. but since I'm not starting my full time volunteering at the hospital untiil around 2 weeks from now, due to TB testing, I'll have time.

Sorry if this post sounds sort of rambling-ish. I'll attempt to post my foods at some point during the day.
Adios!

My outfit

Look at how excited I look :D

Ok just to show you how I would dress for a slightly formal family function:

Here are some pictures:

This is what my makeup looked like


Here are a couple pics of the clothes:

My best model pose! haha--> I think Tyra would be disappointed for me not looking fierce enough :D




I think what makes the outfit special are the shoes and shawl, so here is a picture of my shawl close up:


And these are my F-Me pumps. Whenever I wear them, I feel SUPER SASSY. And I strut my hips and pretend I'm in a music video in my own head. I turn on my Alicia, Keyshia and whatever -isha I can. Hehe