Here We Go

Stomach Virus = Over

JBerg's Body = Flabby

Recommitting Hardcore = Right This Minute


It's been a great 24 hour of actually eating healthy, lean, nutrient rich food. It's a great change from the 1 yougurt cup and 1/2 cup of macaroni and cheese I consumed both Sunday and Monday.

I didn't workout yesterday. I probably could have started a work out, however, I doubt I could have finished one. My engery levels aren't what they were. So instead of over doing it and pushing myself too far, I focused on eating healthy, staying hydrated and giving myself a chance to rest and regulate.

Tonight, I'm doing a nice cardio workout. The weights come back out tomorrow :)

I'm ready to feel healthy and strong and lean again.
I'm ready to enjoy a morning run and take pride in the fact that I did everything I could to keep my body healthy.
I ready to get back in action.

Today's Game Plan:

Breakfast: Green Monster (6:15ish)
Snack: Carrotts and 2% Cheese Stick (10ish)
Lunch: Pork Tenderloin in a Flat Out Wrap with a laughing cow cheese and peach salsa. Salad with 1 point dressing (12:30ish)
Snack: Greek Yogurt (4ish)
Dinner: Chicken Stir Fry with Brown Rice and Veggies (6:30ish)
Workout: I am planning on doing a straight cardio video but I may end up doing something with weights. We'll see how I feel toward the end of the day.

I am happy to be back on the right track. I am ready to do this.
I have so many important things to look forward to. I need to be healthy and fit for them.

Someday

Someday:

• Mr. Berg and I won't have to worry about money nearly as much as we do right this very minutes
• I'll have a oven that locks like it should.... the oven can't self clean without the lock working... booo
• The cleaning lady will come twice a month instead of once a month
• I won't obsess over my grocery list and the cost of every stinking thing
• My basil plant won't look half dead.... maybe it's getting too much sun? too much water? maybe I just can't grow basil?
• I'll live on the lake with my husband and my dogs and my cat
• We'll actually get a dog
• I'll have children and the things I worry about now will seem so small compared to what I worry about for them
• I will feel like I have it all together
• Mr. Berg will actually be home to celebrate my birthday with me
• I will remember to clean out my car, that thing is disgusting
• I'll have a kitchen with two ovens and a gas range.... oh how I wish :)
• I won't dread flying to Boston for Thanksgiving
• Organization will return to the office Mr. Berg and I are supposed to share
• There will be time enough for everything that needs to be done
• I might embrace the size of my chest

For Now

• I am thankful for all of the blessings in my life
• I surround myself with all the people that make me happy
• I take pleasure in the small things, even a clean kitchen
• I smile at the sunshine
• I try to do as much right as I can every day
• There is just enough of what we need for the moment
• I remind myself that some day the hard stuff will soften and fade
• I look forward to the little things

Confession

Today has been a better day.
A much, much better day.

My headache is gone. I'm not stark raving mad. My mind isn't going in 101 different directions. I feel like I have my energy back and "." is gone.

I'm actually looking forward to my workout tonight.

I ate a very healthy breakfast, had a nice snack of pear and cheese and I ate my very fresh tasting southwest grilled chicken salad.

And then I ate a little package of Cadburry Mini Eggs. FOR 6 FREAKING POINTS.

Yeah, once again, self sabatoge much?

But you know what? That was the best damn 6 points I had all day.


Now if you'll excuse me, I need to go work out for the next 4 hours :)

Stuck

I'm stuck ya'll.

Stuck at 138 pounds.
Aparently, my body really likes it there. For the past three weeks, I've been somewhere between 137.9-138.7.

For Real? Why 138?

That's three pounds away from my goal weight. And quiet honestly, a whole smaller pants size.
I'm frustrated beyond belief.

I tried switching things up. Instead of a garden burger on a whole wheat English muffin with veggies and a salad for lunch, I went with grilled chicken on top of a salad.

I stuck to more veggie snacks and more fruit with a low fat piece of cheese.

I've upped my water consumption and lessened my diet pepsi intake (which is really a miracle in it self).

I've increased my workouts and carefully tracked my points.
I now measure and weight my food with not only measuring cups (as before), I'm now even using a food scale.

I'm trying. And what am I getting?

NADA.

Scales Say: 138.2.

If the damn thing hadn't cost $30 it be out the window right now.

Any ideas?
Bueller?
Hello?

I didn't fall off the face of the earth.... yet......

This has been my week, so far:

Monday

• Credit card numbers got stolen- where used in "massage parlors" in China.... nothing shady about that
• New receptionist starts at Family Owned Inc.
• Chaos ensues at Management Meeting and into the morning
• Valued Employee breaks company property
• Same employee fails random drug test/breath alcohol screen, following broke property (employee isn't so valuable anymore)
• JBerg's day goes to shit

Tuesday

• Early Morning Meeting
• Meet Runs Lates, No Lunch for JBerg
• Rental Showing Appoint Results in No Show, still No Lunch for JBerg
• Arrive at office to find desk covered in junk, still No Lunch for JBerg
• Clear Desk, Assemble To Do List
• Lunch (finally) while reading emails and watching time
• New Employee Orientation for New Young Kid
• Rehire Orientations for 3 Employees
• Paperwork that following 4 Orientations
• Run to Bank
• Run to Volunteer Program
• Stay late to say thank yous
• Home
• Discover Dinner sucks (note to self- store left over chicken and picatta sauce in separate containers, otherwise you get rubber chicken. Rubber chicken is gross)
• Console husband on rough day.
• Die on sofa while watching Biggest Loser

Wednesday

• Attend meeting where more chaos ensues
• Make new to-do list. Including everything on yesterday's to-do list since lord knows you haven't seen your to do-do list since you wrote it yesterday.
• Interview potential new hire
• Decide 5 minute into interview you don't like potential new hire
• Change your mind 10 minutes later
• Frantically plow through to do list
•  Realize to-do list isn't so miserable
• Talk to 78 people, add to-do items
• Change your mind, to-do list = still miserable.
• Pray car doesn't run out of gas on the way to gas station
• Realize if car runs out of gas, there will be no lunch for J-Berg.

Today my biggest goal is to eat lunch.

I'll be back tomorrow, hopefully not as stressed.

Fit February

So far, I've started off on the right foot this 1st day of February.

Yesterday I stayed on point. I had a great 50 minute workout with TF Hardcore Fusion. I made an awesome chicken stroganoff in the crock pot that I served over whole wheat egg noodles with a side of green beans.

This morning I took my measurements.... I know, I said I was going to do that last month. I forgot.
I tracked my measurements on the WW website. I have no idea if I measured the exact right places. I figure, as long as I'm consistent, I should see the changes.

I have several goals for February:

Tracking
I've been lax on tracking lately. I do well on the week days. Then the weekends come and it's a food free for all around here.
I'd like make a point to track 6 days a week for the next four weeks.

Whole Foods
There has been entirely too much snacking going on in the house of Berg. By snacking I mean prepackaged, over processed foods. Frozen pizzas, cookies, candy, etc.
I've never been one to stress on whole, real foods. Over the years I've taken a very practical approach to what I will and won't buy. I don't stress out over buying pre-shredded cheese or using a boxed cake mix.
However, when it comes to snacks, I ate a lot of what I shouldn't.
So, this month, unless it's preplanned or a real emergency, this girl is eating whole, fresh, home prepared food.

Cheat Days
I'm not so great when it comes to cheat days. Cheat days go from one day to one and a half days to entire weekends.
That's got to stop.
Cheat days will be preplanned and carefully followed.

This month's preplanned cheat days are:
February 6th- Dinner Only (On Superbowl Sunday, Mama and I go out for dinner)
February 12th- Breakfast Only (Valentine's Day Brunch with the besties)
February 19th- Lunch and Dinner Only (we'll be down south, this will be a huge challenge)

That is three days out of 28. Not bad at all.

It is my hope that sticking to my plan faithfully that I'll see some great results this month.
Wish me luck

Victory, Professionalism and the Cat with Pink Eye

Raise your hand if you had a whacked out Monday?

{raises hand, looks around for others raising their hand ala 3rd grade style}

I spent most of Monday running. Running around the office, running a cat to the vet on the other side of town, running back to work with a cat in his carrier in the backseat to deal with an emergency, running to lunch and back, running, running, running.

The fun part of my day began 10 minutes after picking Bob up from the house to take him to the vet. We were in route when my cell phone rang. It was my partner in crime, breaking the bad news that an employee had failed their drug test.

Have you ever tried to have a very sensitive, important business conversation in your car while your cat is screaming bloody murder... yeah, you can just throw professionalism out the window when that happens.

Thankfully, partner in crime has kids (which I assume is more complex then having cats) and thought the entire conversation complete with screeches and meows was hysterical.

After speaking to her, I had to break the sad news to Mr. President. Again, complete with pissed off Bob in the background making a mockery of my professional demeanor.

I arrive at the vet's office in one piece, early and crossing my fingers they can take my early so I can high tail in back to the office.

As it turns out, Bob did in fact scratch his eye and the inside of his upper eye lid. That little shit doesn't do anything half- assed. His vet was very, very, nice and took a good look at everything and prescribed an antibiotic, steroid laced eye gel.  The poor guy, he looks like he stuck his head in the Vaseline jar.
My appointment had been scheduled at 4pm, I arrived at 3:30pm and was out the door complete with gel and screaming cat at 4:02pm.

4:25pm I arrive at work, again in once piece but covered in eye gel and white cat fur. Again, all professionalism is out the window. Bob is sitting in his crate in my car in the parking lot.
(Don't get your panties in a wad, it wasn't cold outside and he slept the entire time)

I suspend bad employee. Organized my ducks into rows for the next day and leave.

5:15pm I arrive home, an hour later then anticipated.

The old J-Berg would have said "screw it" to her work out and found her sweats.

The new and improved (skinny jean wearing) J-Berg changed into her workout gear and found a workout video and went to town.

An amazing victory for me.

This morning Bob is doing well. The swelling is done and he doesn't look as much like a pirate as he did the night before.

I also hope eye cream isn't poisonous because Sophie keeps trying to lick it off Bob's face. Have you ever seen two cats fight over eye gel? If not, you're welcome to visit my house.

Not Going to Sweat It

I stood on the scale this morning and was highly displeased at the number I saw. I'm up .2 pounds.

To be honest, I saw the number, tried to go to the bathroom again and then stood on the scale again. Surely, I thought, this is a mistake.

Nope, same number.

Augghghghgh.......

Not Happy, J-Berg is NOT happy.

So unhappy was I that I almost didn't track my weight this morning when I logged onto WW. I didn't earn my 5% lost star, I didn't earn happy remarks from the automated WW messaged. Instead, I got this familiar line "Are you surprised at what you found?"

NO..... obviously I ate too much this weekend, thank you very much, I already knew that. Dumb computer.....grumble, grumble, grumble.

After I got to work I became slightly more sensible about the whole ordeal.

Yes, I am up .2.
.2, REALLY?

.2 is like nothing. .2 is a glass of water, a couple of baby carrots..... .2 is a decent trip to bathroom if you know what I mean!?

So... .2, I'm not going to sweat you. Well, I will sweat you later tonight when I work out. But figuratively, no, I am not going to sweat you.

You suck, don't get me wrong. But honestly, all you are is .2.

My mini goal this week is to drop 1.2. I'm going to kick that pesky .2 to the curb and take another pound down with it.

I don't have a lot of challenges this week to over come.
I'm going out to lunch with my Mom today. However, it's too a Pan.era.Bre.ad. I can handle that. I already got on the website and worked out my meal plan for today. I'm well within my points. So, I just won't have that glass of wine tonight.

Tomorrow night Mr. Berg and I are taking my Mom out for dinner. I already checked out the restaurant menu. I picked out a point friendly, healthy with lots of veggies meal.

We are having friends over for dinner Saturday. I'm making a very point friendly dinner.

I have workouts schedule, I have a plan, I have healthy foods to eat and the reminder of the .2 on the scale to keep me going.

I will beat you .2. You better run......



However, I should also acknowledge how I feel without my armour on.....
I'm pretty darn upset I gained. I truly wasn't expecting it. Truth be told, I was worse the week before... this week, with the occasional min pumpkin candy aside, I did a lot better. Or, at least I thought I did.

So yes, I will be beating myself up over this for a good part of today. But I have to keep reminding myself, it's only .2. It is not the end of the world. Just as long as I don't keep moving up on the scale, just as long as I don't revert to bad habits, I will be fine.

.2 is .2. It's only as big of a deal as I make it.
And it all honesty, it could have been so much worse.

And Another Thing....

Yesterday I started my new workout challenge. Technically, it was supposed to start today. However, I have a really busy day tomorrow and won't be able to work out. So I switched around a workout and a day of rest so I could "make it work" for this week. Thus, instead of two days of rest in a row, I have one towards the begining of the week and one at the end.
I'm really excited for this challenge. I like knowing I can check days off of the calender and that there is so much variety in the workouts. Plus, I won't have to think about what video I want to workout to, it's already been planned for me.
There is also a lot of flexibility. If I need to switch around a cardio video and a sculpting video I can do that too.

I'm hoping to stop beating myself up about this weekend around lunch time. I know in my heart and in my "normal" head that I didn't really screw up badly. I just had a little extra. Extra that I earned based on my workouts and healthy eating every other day of the week. However, the damn little voice won't shut the eff up. Seriously, if I knew how to stab that little effer, I've have shanked him by now.

I Haz Plan

When it comes to working out, I am very willy nilly. Nine days out of ten if I say I'm going to work out, I do. It just depends on exactly what it is that I'm doing. Sometimes I take it easy, sometimes I go hardcore crazy person. Some weeks it's lots of cardio, some weeks it's all strength training and don't get my started on the yoga kick I was recently on.

And last year around this time I spent an entire week eating cookies and thinking about working out rather then actually doing it. But, I did put on my workout clothes and my tennis shoes... so I at least tried.

Effing soft batch, effing oreos....

Anyway.....
For a girl that craves structure, my work out habits are all over the map.

I decided that was a bad idea. Is it, really? I couldn't tell you.
But girlfriend has to have a plan, so I printed one out.

Yes, I got on the Firm website and printed out one of their workout rotations.
I picked one I liked best. Why do I like this one best?

1. Lots of Cardio (I think at this point cardio is what I need to focus most on)
{1.5 Don't worry, there is strength training in there too. I do care about my future bone density needs}
2. I don't have to work out on weekends.....  I probably will anyway, but the plan says I don't have to if I don't want to.
3. It's 5 weeks long, that takes me right up to Thanksgiving.

So basically, that's long enough to keep me motivated until Turkey Time and that's all I need for right now.
I really, really want to wear my skinny jeans to Thanksgiving. Remember my skinny jeans, the jeans I keep putting on and saying "well, they almost fit".

Almost fitting in my head means, they look great from behind but when I turn around you realize there's a muffin top where a muffin shouldn't be and the zipper doesn't exactly reach the top like it's supposed to. Instead you can see a pinky tip sized peak of my undies. Yup, totally sexy, right?!
Right?

Hello?

Anyway, between counting points and jumping around in my basement like a woman on a mission, my hope it to hop on the plane on November 23rd in my cutest of skinny jeans. Otherwise, I have to wear the pair with the hole in the crotch....

I don't want that for myself.

Neither should you.