Wow it's been forever since I've blogged

It seems like forever since I've posted anything. I kind of has been. I've missed venting. I've had a bad couple of weeks. Let's recap. Thursday before Christmas I was on my way to my very first Fit Club with Beachbody. As I was sitting at a stop light waiting patiently for the red light to turn green, I was rear-ended. At first I was fine. No pain, no issues, nothing. I ended up not making to Fit Club. The next day I worked out and felt okay. Then my husband and I decided to grab a sandwich for lunch, I got so sick almost immediately after eating it. I began to get dizzy, nausious, and extremely tired. I knew something wasn't right with me. I went to see my chiropractor the week after new years. Come to find out, I had a bad place between my shoulder blades. When I say bad, I don't know the technical term for it, when he pushed on my upper back to adjust it, I had a horrible sharp pain shoot down my left arm which made it tingle. Not good at all. After that, I went down hill quick. I felt very tired, sick to my stomach, just not good. I didn't do anything for the rest of that day. It was horrible. I was miserable. I tried working out the next day but got sick immediately after I worked out. That's when I realized, I was not going to be able to do anything until I started feeling better. So I haven't felt like doing ANYTHING for 2 weeks. I became very depressed. I was horrible. I felt unable to control myself. I was very emotional, I would get sick after eating certain foods, I would get fatigued quickly, horrible. I had absolutely no control of any of these symptoms. I just basically stopped everything. I was miserable. I felt horrible inside and out. So this is why I haven't posted in a while.

Finally the past couple of days I've noticed I'm feeling better. I find myself not getting sick anymore, I'm getting my energy back, I'm actually mentally preparing for working out when the kids go back to school on Tuesday, I'm able to concentrate better and stay focused better. If anyone ever hits me again, I think I might just have to crawl in a corner and stay there. I don't ever want to experience anything like this again. I haven't felt this bad since being pregnant or maybe after giving birth to our twins.

After this experience, I've decided it's time to get really serious about my body. I HAVE to make some changes. I'm sick and tired of feeling so bad about how I look. I'm sick of having such a low self esteem. My husband even notices it and hates it. I get sick when I look in the mirror. I know it can't be as bad as what I see, but I'm the one that has to see it. I have to fix this. So I am going to take my measurements and some new pictures of myself Tuesday morning before I workout and post everything. I'm hoping by putting myself out there and posting my progress, I will hold myself more accountable and if anyone is really following this, they will help hold me accountable. I want to see some big changes in the next 30 days. That means I have to count my calories, watch my water intake, eat clean & lean and workout according to my calendar. I'm also going to post my calendar on here so I know what I'm supposed to be doing and when. I'm also going to post my goals and deadline. I must make some serious changes. If I'm going to help other people change their lives, I have to start with my own. I'd like to invite others to join me. I want to start a challenge group. If I could find some people who want to get fit and healthy, we could do it together. I'd love to share this journey with somone.

Wow, it's amazing how much better I feel just laying everything out there. Even if I'm the only one who ever reads this. Getting this stuff off my chest really does feel better. So now that's it's 10:00 I'm off to bed. Tuesday is coming. I'm actually getting excited. Wish me luck :)

New day.. try again

Since yesterday was SOO crazy, hectic and a total disaster with my calorie count, I decided to start over today. Today the kids went back to school, YAY.. not only for me, but they were excited as well. I love that my kids love to go to school. Great feeling. Got up and made waffles again, this time using bisquick. Perfect. Everyone was happy. Dropped the kids off at school and came back to try to get things back in order here at home. Our house is still a pretty bad disaster. My plans for today were, make shakeology, clean up kitchen, workout, get laundry started, pick up kids rooms, get living room organized again. Great plans right? Yep, if they had all went as well as I had planned them in my head. First rule of Chalene's from her book PUSH, write down your goals/plans for the day. Make written to do lists. First catastraphe was breakfast again. I have been talking to some fellow, local coachs through Beachbody trying to get some help with my nutrition & fitness. I'm really trying to get out of this "stuck" issue I'm having with my weight. I'm also trying to get some energy built back up so I can do my workouts the way I need to do them. I was advised to incrase my calorie intake to 15-1800 a day making sure to get 3-400 calories in a every meal (3 full meals a day). That meant I had to add something to Shakeology to get it up to at least 300. I don't like PB. I don't like the smell or taste. But it's loaded in healthy fats, carbs, protein & calories, so I needed to try it. I really didn't think I would be able to taste is with everything else I put in it. I figured the chocolate is so strong in it, the pb taste would disapate. So I mixed my usual ingredients: 1 1/4 cup milk, 1 egg yolk, 1 cup of water, about 3 tbspn of honey & this time 1 tbspn of pb; through it all in a mixer and tasted it. Not bad, I can handle this. I got about half way through my shakeology and started to feel full. Normally when I feel full, I stop and put the rest in the frig. This time, knowing I was trying to get more calories in my meals, I forced msyelf to finish the entire 12 oz of shakeology. OH GOODNESS UGH!!!! That was not smart. I was SOOOOOOOOO sick. I felt like I was going to puke. I was totally miserable. I had to lay down and be really really still. Even breathing made me nausious. Oh I've never been that full. I will never do that again. Next time, I will stop, let my gut settle and then drink more after some has settled. HUGE HUGE mistake. It took me about an hour and a half to finally feel better. But by that time, I was feeling weak and shaky. I think part of that was from my sugar level, and part because of my gut being empty again. But, because of what my stomach had just gone through, I wasn't quite to excited to put food back on it. So I slowly and carefully ate some grapes and granola with a full glass of water. Finally I began to regain my appetite and had lunch. Wow what a learning experience that was. The idea for me is to get at least 300 calories at every meal with a total of 15-1800 calories a day. I need to get most of my lean protein and healthy carbs from morning until about 4:00, then nothing but fruits, veggies & lean protein from 4:00 until 9:00. The idea behind that is my body needs most of it's fuel in the morning and afternoon to burn off fat and give me energy to get through my workouts. I have to have the majority of my protein and carbs before my workout so I can push through them and have the energy to burn a goal of 300+ calories each workout. That gives me a deficit of 500 calories a day. Depending on what workout I choose will depend on how many calories I burn, which will depend on how many calories I eat. Which is why planning my day is crutcial. There are those days where my workout time and plans change, so I have to change my food needs along with that. I just have to stop eating carbs at 4:00 so my body doesn't get more than it can burn. After that, my body won't be able to burn the rest off and that's how you get fat. On the flip side, I have to have enough calories to fuel my body to do what I need for it to do. So, I didn't get a workout in today due to how I felt and messing up my morning. I guess tomorrow will be another retake. I'm just glad I'm feeling better.

Dear diary.... I need to vent

WOW... These last 2 days seem like such a whirlwind. I thought I was going to loose my mind, I thought I already had, honestly I think I did. I absolutely LOVE my kids and couldn't imagine life without them, I would never want to go back, but there are some days I just need a break. I need "me" time. That's usually my workout times, but with 3 boys running all over the place, in and out, neighbor kids running behind them, freezing outside where no one wants to stay outside cabin fever sets in and every one looses control. The last 2 days were complete craziness. Breakfast was a total disaster yesterday. I attempted to use my brand new waffle maker for breakfast for the very first time yesterday. DISASTER. The recipe I used called for Baking "Powder" where I used baking "soda".. HUGE mistake. So we didn't get breakfast made until 10:30. Three kids running around starving, the kitchen looking like a bakery gone wrong, not a good combo. So I used a backup and just threw together bisquick. Even though it wasn't my first choice of making homemade waffle, it worked and it was better than frozen. The kids loved them. Then it took me more than an hour to clean up the kitchen from that mess. While I was busy fixing that disaster, I had our 3 boys, Kellyn, a nieghbor kid and some of Sean's friends running in and out and all around our house. UGH!!!! There were toys, cards, games, books, you name it in every single room of our house. Chaos. Worse than that, the kids were whinny because they wanted to go outside and play but they kept getting cold. So our front door ended up being like a swinging door, up, close, up, close, up, close.. I didn't think our heat would ever stop coming on. This lasted ALL DAY!! Luckly for me, I think Michael felt bad for me. I got to get out last night and go to fit club. Ahhhhhh... very nice. Good workout, good people, adult conversations, very good end to a crazy chaotic day.

However, because of my morning and most of the day being so hectic and chaotic, I didn't do good about keeping up with my calories and keeping up with my body signals of sugar lows. So, since I didn't get to eat breakfast until 10:30, after I made everyone else their waffle, I missed my hunger signals for lunch. About 12:00 I began to feel really weak, tired, sluggish. By then it was too late to stop it. I crashed hard. I began to feel dizzy & fuzzy in my head. I couldn't think, I found myself walking in circles. It's hard to keep up with 5 kids when you can't think. I didn't really feel hungry, but I knew something was right, so I made myself sit down and eat a granola square & some grapes with glass of water. All of the sudden I began to actually want lunch, crazy how that works. I made baked chicken and greenbeans, I'm kinda on a kick right now. I felt totally re-energized after lunch. But because of the day I had, not keeping up with my calories and not watching what I was eating, I didn't do well getting enough calories in. So today was a redo... next post.

Bedtime

I was getting ready for bed about an hour ago but began to get hungry. I decided to take my own advice and drink a big o'l glass of water to help get rid of that "hunger" feeling. Then I remembered the last time I had looked at my caloric intake, I was way under what I was supposed to be. I think I was around 9??, where I'm supposed to be at least 1571. Oh man, as much I hate to eat after 9:00, I knew I had to put something in my gutt. If I don't, I will feel weak tomorrow and my body will not do well. So, knowing what time of night it was, the best thing I could eat is lean protein. At least by eating that, I will burn some calories while I'm sleeping. I was out of my turkey, so I decided the next best thing my granola, grapes & some water. So I went to town, I just finished 1 and half granola bars each of 130 calories. About a half cup of grapes and 2 cups of water. So now my calories are close and my water is closer. So win win on both sides. I wouldn't have gotten my total water in take if I hadn't made myself eat. Even if no one ever reads this blog or these posts. Even if I never touch a single life with these comments, suggestions, ideas and tricks, at least I feel good knowing I'm keeping myself accountable. I had not been keeping up with my water or calorie intake and dealing with this fatigue & weak issue a lot lately. I'm really feel I'm at least helping myself be more accountable and maybe changing my own life with these posts. I'm going to total my caloric intake and my water on the previous post. I still think I'm a little low on the calories, but not as bad as I was going to be. I'm trying to stay between 1200-1571. That will allow me to stay energized for my workouts, gives me room to play and "cheat", but also allows me to loose weight. I sure hope I'm in as much control of my diet tomorrow as I was today. Today was a really good day of control.

updated calorie and water count

As of 7:28 p.m. my calorie count is 984 and I have added 2 more glasses of water.

As of 10:56 p.m. (UGH! I hate waiting this late) my total calorie count for the day is 1335 and my total water intake is 120 oz. I am very pleased. :) I just hope tomorrow reflects this.

After workout & dinner

As I posted immediately after my workout I was feeling really weak. I knew I needed to get some protein in my system and replinish some of what was depleated to regain my strength. Usually I would recommend a protein shake or a recovery drink. At this time I can not afford anything extra, so I'm having to do with what I have. I just needed to find some protein to replenish my body. I wasn't hungry, but I knew I had to put something in my system. After drinking a full glass of water, I decided to eat a raw carrot. About mid way through I already started feeling better, wow that was quick. So I grabbed a few slices of my deli sliced turkey and more water. Now I'm back, feeling much better.

For dinner I made roast, potatoes & carrots. Well I don't eat potatoes, if I do it is in very small portions. Starches like potatoes, bread & pastas cause my sugar to spike then drop really quick, which then causes me to feel really sick afterwards. Knowing how my body reacts to it, I just choose to stay away from them. So I stuck with roast and carrots. Very good dinner. For a "sweet" fix, I had some granola. Hopefully my food choices tonight will reflect tomorrow and I will have energy tomorrow.

Workout

Today's workout was ChaLEAN Ext. Lean circuit 1. Lesson for today, never do something that intense with kids around. I got through it, but barely. I wasn't able to focus so I didn't push as well as I could've and should've. That was a hard workout. I burned 272.49 calories. If I have some time and energy left, I'd like to also get in a core/ab workout. But I guess I'll have to see how the rest of my day goes. Right now, I am weak. I need to re-energize myself. I'm going to drink another glass of water and get some protein in my system.

Calorie count

My daily caloric intake is supposed to be 1571 with a defecit of 808. This allows me to loose .23 lbs a day. So far today I'm at a calorie intake of 523, 1:42 p.m. And I've had 24 oz of water.

Lunch time

As I was busy downloading some pictures off my digital camera onto my computer, which I don't do enough, I began to feel weak and kind of tired. My first thought was, great here I go again, it's hitting me again. Just when I was feeling good and getting ready to get some house work done, fatigue is going to knock me down. So I began to ask myself my questions, almost like you would a new born baby as to why he/she/they are crying. When is the last time I ate? Did I eat the right kinds of foods? Have I eaten enough? Have I drank enough water? That's when it dawned on me, you goof it's lunch time. I was having so much fun looking at our recent pictures, I didn't realize it was just after 12:00. So I go into the kitchen to see what I could put together that was on my list i.e. high lean protein, healthy carbs, fruit/veggy, water. So I chose to make lemon peppered chicken with a side of greenbeans (I LOVE greenbeans, don't ask me why but I could honestly eat them right out of the can. Who knows?) and ofcourse a class of water. While I prepared that and stuck it in the oven, I realized it would take around 20 minutes to cook the chicken. I needed something to hold me over. When my sugar level gets too far down, I get tired & shaky, after I eat it takes several minutes sometimes even up to 30 minutes to get back up. So I really have to watch and make sure I don't ignore these signs. I hate crashing and then not feeling good for another 30 minutes while my food is being processed by my system. While my chicken was cooking I decided to dig into my home made granola, loaded in healthy carbs, protein, fats, nuts & seeds. It gives me a good quick kick of energy the natural way. Plus it takes like a chocolate granola bar you would buy at the store, just healthier and better for your body. My lunch was outstanding, that lemon does a wonder for plain old chicken breast. Everything was great. Now I feel re-energized. I'm really having a great day. I would love to get a workout in, maybe I can sneak something in real quick before the boys interrupt me. I know that's part of my lack of focus on my workouts. I don't do well working out with the kids running around. I'm always having to stop the video to break up a fight or check on them. Once I start, I just want to go through it all and focus on what I'm doing. Great day. Let's see if I can keep it this way :).

A new day

So this morning I had my usual Shakeology breakfast, which I took a picture of to show. It is like drinking a salad, but SO much better tasting. The way I make mine, it literally tastes like a chocolate milk. Even better than any fast food could serve, and SO much better for you. Your entire fruit & vegetable serving for one day is all in one packet of Shakeology, amazing. Anyway, for the average person Shakeology is enough. But as you have discovered from my previous posts, for me, it's not. Due to my hormone levels I have to add some herbs and vitamins to my daily regimen. I've also taken a picture of these vitamins. Basically what it boils down to is Vitamin D3 (any where between 15-20,000iu a day).

Vitamin D prevents osteoporosis, depression, prostate cancer, breast cancer, and even effects diabetes and obesity. Vitamin D is perhaps the single most underrated nutrient in the world of nutrition

Learn more: http://www.naturalnews.com/003069.html#ixzz1iJyRdBqR
Kelp which helps support and healthy thyroid and can help regrow hair. I lost tons of hair when I was pregnant, each time. The first time it grew back quick nisely. The 2nd time, again those gosh darn hormone levels, it didn't grow back. The top of my head is very thin. So I did some research and found that Kelp had been proven to regrow and stop hair loss. Very nice. Don Quai & Femalite are 2 hormone herbs that work and compliment each other. It's like having a headache and taking one motrin. The one take the edge off the pain but doesn't quite totally get rid of it, so you add another one. Same situation. Last, Cocoa Well True Energy with AdaptoStress3. During the normal time of the month I don't need this, but when my hormone cycle begins, this relieves the stress, tension, anxiety I feel and gives me energy. So there you have it, there's my morning ritual. As good as all of this is, there are days where even all of this just doesn't work. That's when I turn to my next possible problem, either my diet or lack of calories needed. If I'm still having trouble going or I find myself crashing, I have to look at my food choices. The questions I ask myself are: am I getting enough calories? Did I eat enough high lean protein? Those are pretty easy to answer and pretty easy solutions. I also try to get at least 80 oz of water every day. Every time I crash or feel fatigued, even if I'm not hungry, I try to make myself eat a snack of some type of protein. That's my morning so far, let's see how the rest of the day goes :). I hope this finds everyone well.

Today

So today I started out horrible, crapy, tired, bloated just plain sick feeling. I know what part of it is, I always start feeling fatigue symptoms first associated with my PMDD. I always start feeling fatigued about the 18-20 of every month. The one good part about this, at least I know when's it's going to hit and what it is when it hits. Before the past year I would just lay around every day all day. I'm trying something new. I've been advised during this cycle to try high lean protein, veggies, fruits & LOTS of water. So today every time I felt like just giving up and laying around, I'd grab me some granola (homemade), some grapes, a glass of water and begin to snack. Amazingly, I would feel better. The next time around I realized it was lunch. So again, I had baked chicken & green beans with a glass of water. Okay, I'm doing okay. Then I got busy and forgot to eat, so I began to crash HARD. I remembered my goal, eat, eat, eat, HIGH PROTEIN. So I grabbed some lean deli sliced turkey meat out of the frig, some romain lettuce and some provolone cheese, oh and some more grapes. Woohoo, now I feel it. Much better. Oh, then I just was craving something sweet so I grabbed some more granola. The other part of this learning experience with my diet is keeping up with my calories. I recently learned I have to have at least 1500 calories a day to keep myself going if I want to workout. Anything less than 1200 and I feel drained. So keep that in mind if you are trying to get a good workout in. Go on to www.thedailyplate.com and join the site for free. It will walk you through everything you need to know about what your weight should be, how many calories you should eat plus it has an amazing calorie food counter. All you have to do is search for what you've eaten and you can add it to your plate. It also teaches you how to count calories from something you have made from scratch, VERY COOL. I am also a Beachbody member, so I get a lot of my nutrition guidance from that site as well.. www.beachbody.com. So even though I figured out how to get out of my really bad lows, I never could get enough mental or physical energy to workout. Maybe tomorrow. I hate not feeling like working out. I absolutely LOVE my workouts. I feel so much better when I workout, but there was just not enough energy for me today. Off to bed for tonight. Let's see how tomorrow goes.

From the beginning

As far back as I can remember I have struggled with my weight. I look back at my baby pictures and see I was always a chubby baby. Yeah, it's cute as a baby, but that wears off quick. I finally got rid of my "baby" fat once I got in about middle school. I became very active, playing sports, riding my bike, and just every day playing outside. My parents had an inground pool put in our yard around my pre-teen years which kept me very active. However, I was still unhappy with how I looked. I always wanted to hide, so I did under my clothes. I always wore black, hung out with people who wouldn't judge me and who would be my friend because of my personality not what I looked liked. My closest "real" friends I gained was the best part. Not to mention I was a Christian and believed staying close to God would strengthen me, HE did.

I didn't really care until I got married, obviously. Then I really started to care. I maintained my weight pretty well. I stayed active and was more careful about what I ate. Then our first son was born. I did so good, I didn't gain much weight and rejoined the gym shortly after he was born. I felt good about what I was doing. I began to really enjoy exercising and what it did for my body inside & out.

I continued down this road until I became pregnant again. This time I had it in my mind I was going to do the same thing I did before. But, this time would be completely different. SOOOO different in fact. More different than my mind or body (inside & out) could ever imagine. No one could ever prepare me for what was about to happen to me or our entire family. We were going to have twins. AAAAAAHHHH!!!! WHAT! I about had a nervous break down and I thought my husband would pass out right there in the room. I cried hysterically. I knew how hard one was, how am I going to take care of 2 babies at one time. UGH! My life was about to flip in so many ways, I had no idea.

The biggest problem my body faced internally was my hormone levels. A woman's hormone levels are suppose begin to return back to "normal" within 6 weeks after giving birth. Even with nursing your body should know how to get back to some normality. My body got thrown so out of wack, my hormones levels lost their way and NEVER returned to where they were. I was diagnosed with PMDD (Premenstrual dysphoric disorder). Check out this website to read more http://www.naturalnews.com/023555_symptoms_PMS_premenstrual_syndrome.html.

So, this is what I have dealt with since 2006. My levels go absolutely hay wire causing all of these affects, see the list of symptoms on the posted website, which then cause me to be uncontrollable. I am mentally & physically worthless about 2-3 weeks out of every month. So if you do the math correctly you will see I only get 1-2 weeks a month that I am my "real" self, happy, energetic, full of life and ready to tackle the world. Those other weeks, I am unable to function. I am the most miserable person, at least that's what I feel at that moment, in the world.

Part of creating this blog is to share these issues with others who may be going through the same problems. By sharing this information, maybe we can help each other find "natural" ways to conquer this and find what works for us. I am sick and tired of feeling like this. I will say, one thing that has helped me enormously is exercising, eating a healthy diet & adding Shakeology to my diet. My diet now consists of high, lean protein, only good carbs (nuts, seeds etc.), very very few starches & LOTS of water. With these changes, I have added about 2-3 weeks to my healthy time during the monthly. This is HUGE for someone going through what I have gone through.

Now another part of this blog is to share EVERYTHING with who ever chooses to read these. You will see I have still not found the ultimate  permanent "FIX". I have some amazingly, great, high energetic days where I can get all sorts of things checked off my list and get one sometimes two workouts in. Then there are days like yesterday where I can't do anything. It's so much more than just physical. It wears me down mentally. It can and does cause depression. You feel worthless and out of control. I take high levels of Vit. D3 to control those feelings. If I didn't take my Vit. D3, I would probably have to be committed right now. There again, there are those days it doesn't matter what I do or what I take, I just have to do nothing.

I really hope there others out there who will read this, follow me along my journey & maybe throw out some of their ideas. I'm creating this to become my daily journal. One to help me keep track of what works and doesn't work, how I feel each day when I try certain things, but also to help others through their journey. If I can change one persons life by sharing my struggling, this will all be worth it. So may God bless who ever gets to read this and chooses to follow me. My prayer is that who ever God choices to find this blog, follow it and my family, will get what they need out of it. :)

About me

First off let me start by telling a little about myself. I am a 35 year old wife and mother of 3 fantastic, healthy, smart & energized little boys. Our boys are 10 & 5, for those who didn't catch on to that, the 5 year olds are ID twins. My husband and I have been happily married for almost 12 years now. I am the most blessed woman on the face of this earth. My kids and husband are my life, without them I would be very lonely and sad. My number ONE priority is God and my faith. As long as I have HIM first in my life, every decision I make and put HIM in my kids life, everything else will fall into place correctly. He makes everything else right and good. As chaotic, hectic, stressful & busy as our lives are, I still feel as though we are all very blessed. We've gone through hard times but always get through them and end up being stronger and learning lifes lessons at the end. I can honestly say, when bad times have come our way, afterwards I can look back and be thankful for going through those times because of what wonderful learning experiences come out of them.
Now to the "why" I have started this. I have a facebook page, and yes I'm sure I could go through that to do this, but I just didn't feel like I could be as honest on there as I feel like I can be on here. I am going to use this as my diary. I want to share my life's struggles and ups with those who can either help me or I can help. Every day I deal with some type of an amazing accomplishment or victory I want to share with someone; or I deal with some stressful situation or struggle of type type I'd like to share with someone. Yes, I have some wonderful family and friends I could and do share these times with. But no matter how much I share, there are just those thing/times I deal with something and no one has ever dealt with it or knows how to get me through it. So I decided I would start this blog and hope someone else out there either can get some advice from what I'm doing or I can get some advice from what they have done. I'm hoping to find someone out there who I can share my times with who can relate to me. I believe in paying it forward. I want to touch every life possible and hopefully get some feedback to help myself in the mean time.