Day 598: The Mirror

 

                                                                                             🖤  Get well soon Tommy ! #teamrivs #RageOn 🖤

“When I look back on my life, I see pain,

 mistakes and heartache. When I look in

 the mirror, I see strength, learned lessons,

 and pride in myself.” 

                        

It's Day 598 of Nutrisystem. I have always had a tendency to focus on the negatives in my life but it's something I'm trying to change. I'm not happy to be back at 168 pounds but I have to remember this reflects a loss of 136 pounds over the past 597 days. That's a pretty big accomplishment ! I'm not perfect and I've had plenty of hills and valleys on this journey. It's not easy to change a lifetime of bad habits and you're going to regress every now and then. Knowing that, I am more aware and able to lead myself back before allowing too much damage. The new scale seems to be more reliable because I can step on it 3 times and get the same weight every time. Once I reach my goal weight I do intend to try and lose a few extra pounds so that I have a little room to breathe. My overall life goal is to remain at 150 or less. No matter who you are your weight is going to fluctuate by a couple pounds here and there but 150 is going to be my sticking point. Exceeding that number will never be acceptable. Right now I'm still taking things one day at a time and today was a good day. Every good day is a step towards that 150 pound goal. I really want to see a weight loss next week on the new scale and I'm not sure what I will do if there isn't one. I can't exercise any more than I already am and I'm not exceeding my calories more than once a week. I can't worry about it today. Today was nothing but positives and tomorrow I will focus on 24 new hours.

Breakfast was a 2 ounce 180 calorie cinnamon roll and a 5.3 ounce 80 calorie Light & Fit key lime yogurt. Morning snack was a 120 calorie chocolate shake with peanut butter powder. Lunch was a 2 ounce 220 calorie white cheddar mac & cheese. You add about 6 ounces of water to this item so the cooked weight is closer to 8 ounces. It's a "lunch in a cup" type of item that has been hanging around in the kitchen for a while. I also had a chef salad. Afternoon snack was a 1.24 ounce 190 calorie Nature Valley roasted nut crunch bar. Dinner was an 8 ounce 220 calorie ravioli with meat sauce. Evening snack was a 2.2 ounce 140 calorie lemon zest cake. Total calories for the day are 1150 and I got 64 ounces of water in.

Tommy Rivs condition hasn't changed. He remains heavily sedated and dependent on a ventilator and ECMO. The machines are at their lowest settings but they are still necessary. Sometimes I wish we could fast forward this story but then I think about the fact that the outcome is unknown. A happy ending is not guaranteed. Whenever I'm watching a movie where the outcome could go either way I will often Google the movie to see how it ends. If I don't like the ending I typically change the channel. Tommy is different. I can't change the channel. So we wait and we pray for the best possible outcome.

I slept in until almost 10 today and set a deadline to be on the treadmill by noon. I was looking at about 132 minutes of treadmill time plus the 18 minute used for warming up and cooling down - so 140 minutes total. I will be glad when I've finished the August iFit challenges. First workout of the day was a tough 50 minutes in Ushuaia, Argentina with iFit trainer Chris Clark. The incline hit 10% about 17 minutes in and pretty much stayed there until the end. The pace ranged from 1.8 to 3.8 mph but I had to make a lot of adjustments to that. My pace ranged from 2 to 3.8 mph but I couldn't sustain 3.8 for long. Once the incline started going up I had to reduce the speed. Still, I pushed myself as fast as I could go depending on the incline and worked up quite a sweat. Workout #2 was another tough hike. This time it was 43 minutes in Waipio, Hawaii with iFit trainer Jonnie Gale. The programmed speed was a jog for about the first 17 minutes so I set my speed at 3 mph, dropping to 2.7 when the incline popped up to 10%. At the 19 minute mark the incline went to 10% and stayed there until the end. I set my pace at 2.4 mph, which was hard, but I stuck it out to the end. There was no shortage of sweat during this one ! Workout #3 was a 39 minute hike in Iceland with iFit trainer Hannah Eden. This one had plenty of 10% incline too. I had to reduce the speed since it was designed for jogging but I made it as challenging as I could. My pace ranged from 2 to 3.2 mph. I logged 132 minutes, 5.9 miles and 863 calories. After dinner I took on Level 3 of the Total Gym. I did better than I thought I would ! The only upper body exercise I had trouble with was the one armed pulls and I knew those were going to be hard. All in all I'm pretty happy with the work I put in today. Fitbit says I did almost over 18,000 steps so it was a full day !

It continues to amaze me how good I feel after a tough workout. The incline challenges are showing me that I haven't been pushing myself enough. I've been slacking off with slower paced workouts that are well below my abilities. So part of "starting over" means pushing harder. For a long time I bypassed workouts I knew I couldn't do because altering the programmed speed or incline felt like "cheating". In reality I was just cheating myself out of the ability to experience other trainers, other exotic locales and most importantly, the opportunity to push myself to work a little bit harder. You can't progress in fitness if you don't keep raising the bar, even if it's just a tiny fraction higher. That being said, I'll be glad when all 32 incline workouts are done ! As of today I've completed 20 so I only have 12 to go.

Last night I was tempted to graze a little bit before bed but I fought it off and took myself off to bed. Weekends are tough because I tend to stay up later and the urge to snack wakes up on those late nights. I also eat less veggies if I'm out all day and those veggies help keep you feeling full ! I did take raw carrots with me to snack on yesterday and that kept me from overindulging in chips and pretzels while I was out but who wants raw carrots at midnight ? This is why I can't have any tempting items in the house. Some days my willpower is just not as strong as it should be so avoiding temptation is best.

On that note I am taking this tired body to the shower and then it's time for bed !

Today was another beautiful summer day. Temps were in the high 80's and we had blue skies and sunshine all day. In between workouts I enjoyed the fresh air out on the front porch.