My Nutrisystem Journey

🖤  Get well soon Tommy ! #teamrivs #RageOn 🖤 "If your WHY is not big enough,  your EXCUSES will be . " Today is day 759 of Nutrisystem. Today was a day for tough love, so this quote is fitting. It was nearly 11 am when I woke up and the minute I saw that I knew my day was in trouble. First of all, sleeping that late means I won't be able to sleep tonight. It was also quite cold - another trouble spot. Hibernation mode kicks in and all I wanted to do was sit on the couch with my blanket and watch tv. I had a bit of a digestive upset, which was probably those darn jalapenos I had yesterday ! My left ankle was a little sore too, which made no sense since I haven't been on the treadmill since Friday. Excuses not to work out were piling up by the minute. My "why" seemed so tiny in the face of all that. The internal dialogue started. One more day without exercise won't matter. You'll get back on schedule tomorrow. It's cold. You don't feel good. ...

  🖤  Get well soon Tommy ! #teamrivs #RageOn 🖤 "Now and then it's good to pause  in  our  pursuit of happiness and  just  be happy . " ~ Guillaume Apollinaire ~ Today is day 758 of Nutrisystem. This is the perfect quote for today since it was a casino day with my mom. There was no worrying about Nutrisystem or exercise. I pretty much take Saturday's off unless I'm at home. We spent the afternoon and evening at Turning Stone Casino. I spent about $40 on the slots but dinner and a stop at Opals for coffee, a cookie and a box of chocolates for mom were on the casino .. so I feel like I'm pretty even. With my credit card debt paid I'm a little more conscious of where I spend my money and I'm determined to give less of it to the casino - so I spent a lot of time walking. So today was definitely a day to pause and just be happy. Every day spent with my mom is a gift and I treasure every minute. All week I am laser focused on what I eat and what exercise I ...

  🖤  Get well soon Tommy ! #teamrivs #RageOn 🖤 "Growth is about you. Don't set a  goal for anyone else. If it's not  going  to actually get you something  you  want, remember that you can  walk  away. That time and energy might  be better spent on figuring  out  what your goals actually are . " ~ Jane Scudder ~ Today is day 757 of Nutrisystem. Goals, goals, goals. And growth. Some days I just want to forget about goals and growth and just live a "normal" life. Other days I think about what new goals I could set for myself. How else can I grow ? I haven't really come up with any new goals. Let's face it, goals are hard. Growth is hard ! For years I set goals but never really put in any work toward achieving them. As a result I didn't meet any of them and quickly abandoned them. Paying off my credit card debt is the first measurable goal I've ever stuck with and actually completed. It might have taken 2 years but I did it. Phys...

  🖤  Get well soon Tommy ! #teamrivs #RageOn 🖤 "You don't have to have it all  figured out to move forward...  Just take the next step . "  Today is day 756 of Nutrisystem. The next step. Well, for me the next step will be maintenance. Once I've lost all 154 pounds it will be up to me to maintain the loss. This is a huge responsibility and I won't lie - it weighs on my mind. I'm at the lowest weight of my adult life and I want to stay here. I don't ever want to be fat again but I don't yet have enough confidence in myself to be sure I will maintain it. I'm not even at my goal weight and I'm already worrying about gaining the weight back.  Maybe that's a good thing ? I do think it's part of the reason I'm kind of in a holding pattern when it comes to the scale. The avoidant part of my personality figures I don't have to worry about maintenance until I reach my goal .. so there's no hurry. Today the scale moved closer to whe...

  🖤  Get well soon Tommy ! #teamrivs #RageOn 🖤 "Acknowledging the good that you  already have in your life is the  foundation for all abundance . "  ~ Eckhart Tolle ~  Today is day 755 of Nutrisystem. I talk often about all the good in my life today but it wasn't always that way. For years I lived with abuse, financial woes and more. I very often felt like I was running headlong downhill, unable to stop. Life was exhausting and it's the reason I am so grateful for all that I have now, including relative calm. During those years I couldn't control so much in my life and as a result anytime something came along that I could control I tended to go overboard with it. I grabbed hold and hung on for dear life. Today I'm conscious of that tendency and I do my best to keep it in check. I was thinking about it this morning as I played a game on my phone before work. I wrote about competition a few weeks back and it pertained to this game. I play it just for fun a...

🖤  Get well soon Tommy ! #teamrivs #RageOn 🖤 "You just stay the course, and do  what it is that you do, and grow  while you're doing it. Eventually it  will either come full circle or at  least you'll go to bed at night happy . "  ~ Jon Bon Jovi ~  Today is day 754 of Nutrisystem. I don't usually pay attention to anything most "celebrities" have to say since we don't really live in the same world, but this one sounded pretty sincere. JBJ is known to be pretty down to earth and he does a lot of good with what he has worked hard to attain. This is where I am today. I'm staying the course and doing what is necessary to reach my goal weight. Am I growing ? I don't know .. hard to say. Maybe I'm more self aware, does that equal growth ? I know that a lot of the trials in my life were the result of poor decisions I made. My weight was certainly no ones fault but my own. Maybe I've grown in that I place less blame elsewhere or on others. I...

  🖤  Get well soon Tommy ! #teamrivs #RageOn 🖤 "Doubt kills more dreams  than  failure ever will . "  ~ Suzy Kassem ~   Today is day 753 of Nutrisystem. Doubt definitely kills a lot of dreams because we are so sure we will fail that we don't even try. At least I do. Or did. Sometimes. Ok, most of the time. Let's face it - I still let doubt get in my way. Too often I am so sure I will fail and if I get up the courage to try, most of the time I am successful. The problem is I let every failure send me back to the starting line, instead of just trying again from where I am. Right now I'm avoiding the scale because I know I gained a couple pounds during Christmas. For all I know I've already lost those pounds but I'm afraid the scale will do nothing but add more doubt to my ability to reach my goal, so I avoid it. Part of my problem is I keep trying to put a timeframe on reaching my goal weight. It's a lot of unnecessary pressure because there is no hurr...

🖤  Get well soon Tommy ! #teamrivs #RageOn 🖤 "Sunday is the perfect day to refuel  your soul and to be grateful for each  and every one of your blessings . "   Today is day 752 of Nutrisystem. This quote brought a wry smile to my lips today, because the old me refueled her soul with FOOD while feeling sorry for myself and lamenting my unblessed life. Fast forward a couple of years and things have changed. A lot of what changed in my life was circumstance and had nothing to do with any heroic action on my part. Those are the true blessings ! I didn't take up the challenge to change my life until December 29, 2018 when I hit submit to order my first Nutrisystem shipment. Only then did things start changing that I could take credit for. That's part of the reason I am so determined to reach my goal weight. So much was given to me that I feel like I really need to work hard for this one accomplishment ! Breakfast was a 2.1 ounce 160 calorie cherry cheese roll and a 5.3 ...

  🖤  Get well soon Tommy ! #teamrivs #RageOn 🖤 "Sometimes a break from your  routine is the very thing you need . "   Today is day 751 of Nutrisystem. A break from my routine never used to bother me because I was used to a life filled with chaos, which meant I had no routine. I just stumbled from disaster to disaster. Now that life is calm(er) a break in my routine tends to let that old anxiety creep back in. I'm always afraid I won't get back to the routine, in this case exercise. My back is still sore today and the offending muscles feel like one big knotted charlie horse. What I wouldn't give for a professional massage right now ! If I sit too long it takes a few minutes to get completely upright. Once I'm up and moving it's a lot better but I've still got a ways to go before I'm 100%. I plan to be back on the treadmill and Total Gym tomorrow even if I have to continue with the reduced speed. Moving at any speed is better than sitting on the c...

  🖤  Get well soon Tommy ! #teamrivs #RageOn 🖤 "No storm can take the sun away.  The sun is always shining. You just  need to take a walk on the clouds . "   Today is day 750 of Nutrisystem. I woke up to a back that is feeling better but not 100% quite yet. Still, this went a long way towards starting the day off right ! If you haven't noticed, I tend to be impatient in some areas of my life and this is one of them. I don't have time to be sick or injured. I have goals to accomplish and every time I hit an obstacle I get even more frustrated. The problem with that is being frustrated doesn't help resolve the issue. In fact, it doesn't help at all. It makes more sense to just accept what is going on and do what you can until you can get back on the road. One day without exercise is not the end of the world. I probably could have forced myself onto the treadmill at a super slow speed yesterday but would that have been the right thing to do ? I think the day of...

🖤  Get well soon Tommy ! #teamrivs #RageOn 🖤 "You may suffer setbacks  disappointments or unfair situations;  but if you'll keep moving forward,  they won't be permanent . "  ~ Joel Osteen ~  Today is day 749 of Nutrisystem. I was awake at about 5:40 today but I stayed in bed with the heating pad since there was no way I could work out. Just walking around the house is pretty painful so a slow walk on the treadmill wasn't going to be any less painful. I took an 800 mg Ibuprofen and I might as well have taken nothing, as it did nothing. As the quote goes, this isn't permanent so I'm going to do my best to be patient and give my body the time it needs to heal. I had to do the same thing when I injured my ankle and I survived. I'm trying not to fall into the "poor me" abyss but so many people have much bigger problems to deal with. Problem is I'm bored ! You can only watch so much tv and play so many online games. What really stinks is I h...