Weight woes, and makeup.

I have been sick lately. I spent most of last week sick actually, and just recently feeling healthy again. I did virtually nothing while I was sick, just lay in bed and be sick. I lost 3 lbs while I was sick, but because it was sickness weight-loss I gained it all back immediately. I was all the way down to 204 lbs, but gained back up to 207. We went shopping last Saturday and my husband and children insisted we eat out. We went to pizza hut and I ended up gaining some weight from that too.

I was really down the beginning of this week when I weighted myself. Instead of losing 2 lbs last week, I ended up gaining one from being sick and eating carbs. That put me back up to 208, though I have went up another 2 lbs since then. I feel horrible because I blew my diet and I am pretty ashamed of myself. I had been doing so well, but gave in to what my family wanted. I wasn't too happy with my husband for not backing me up and supporting me in my efforts to lose weight. He had promised to support me and not do anything to sabotage my efforts, so I was pretty hurt that he didn't keep that promise to me. In order to make up for last week I would have had to lose 7 lbs this week, which didn't happen. I am not happy about this set back and it has made it really hard to stay motivated.

Because I have been so depressed about my weight-loss, I have been trying to focus on other things instead. A friend of mine will be getting married this spring, so I have been doing some research into different makeup products to try. My makeup collection is pretty old, and I need to replace a lot of it anyway, but this gives me another excuse to buy a couple of things. I need just about all kinds of makeup, but right now I am looking for a really good mascara, eye liner, nude lipstick, pink lip gloss, and a good foundation (hopefully one that photographs well). I have a few products I would like to try, but still need to find a few more to try. I have tried out a couple things, and like them, but haven't found anything truly amazing yet (granted I am only shopping drug store makeup).

I saw a gel nail kit at Walmart that piqued my interest. It is called SensatioNails, and comes with everything needed to do soak-off gel nails at home (even the led lamp). It was barely under $50 at Walmart, so I didn't get it. I seriously thought about it though. I was hoping to pick it up at CVS a couple days later, but they didn't carry it. I just signed up for a CVS card and their beauty rewards program. I figured if I am going to be buying makeup, I may as well watch for good deals and get things while they are cheaper.

Anyway, about the SensatioNails again, I am planning on buying the kit. I was going to wait a couple weeks to pick it up, but I will go ahead and get it now. Most husbands get flowers to apologize when they have been being a jerk, mine always used to get me food (I wouldn't have gotten so fat if he would have just behaved and didn't buy Ben & Jerry's so often, lol). Since I am trying to lose weight, there is a no more "treats" rule. So far this month he has gotten me a pair of boots (half off, but still), some makeup, and I do believe he will be buying the SensatioNails kit after today's fiasco (really don't feel like getting into that right now, so no further details). I do think I will have him pick me up another bottle of color when he does buy the kit. The kit comes in either a wine red color or a scarlet red (orange-ish hue to it) and last time Walmart was sold out of the wine red color. I am not so sure I would wear the scarlet red color, as I don't wear bright reds but maybe twice a year. I am not very impressed with the color selection right now, so I am hoping they add more soon. If they have the light pink available I may have him get that, or the taupe color. Once I actually get it and use it I will post pictures of my manicure and report on how it was to use. I really hope it works well and have high hopes for it. I need to finally visit Sally Beauty and see what they have available for gel shellacs and what brands they sell. I don't really want to buy gel colors online, but I will if that is the best place to get them (so I am really hoping Sally has a good selection).

As a last bit of news before I quit for the night, I have started using the Bio Oil regularly. I have used the derma roller twice this week and the oil twice every day this week as well. It is nice to have silky soft skin, but I care more about the scars and whether they diminish or not over the next few months. I am a bit concerned about how fast the Bio Oil is being used up. I am not sure I want to spend $15 for a bottle every week, but I do really want to get rid of (or at least lessen) my scars and stretch marks. If nothing else, the Bio Oil does a fantastic job at making skin feel soft and silky. Hopefully I can stick with my routine and not fall off the wagon yet again.

Next week had better be a good week. I will be changing my diet some and incorporating some "diet" products. We'll see how it all goes. Anyways, that's it for now. I think a cup of something warm and a good book sound pretty good to wind down before bed. Maybe I'll finish "A Clash of Kings" tonight so I can start the third book before the second season of "Game of Thrones" starts in April. I really like "Good Calories, Bad Calories" but I'm not sure I want to use my brain that much right now, lol I have over 50 books queued up that I need to get working on, it's not like there is any shortage of something to read. I think tonight is a "Song of Ice and Fire" kind of night though, so "A Clash of Kings" it is :)

Weight loss update.

My mood is bad still, but at least I am having some success with weight loss. I didn't lose any weight between the 9th and 10th, but when I weighed myself today I had almost lost 2 lbs since yesterday. So this week is currently sitting at 2.8 lbs lost which puts me at a milestone (albeit a small one). So far I have lost 8.4 lbs this month and I am now at 209.2 lbs (under 210!!!!).

I am pleased with my weight loss. I am worried about how much my losing will slow in the couple weeks. I figured I would need to lose about 2 lbs each week to reach my goal on time. I won't try to get pregnant this July unless I am at 170 lbs or less. I doubt I will gain as much weight this time around if I stay away from sugar and simple carbs. I am scared about being at my goal weight in time. I know that I won't make it if I allow myself even one high carb meal as that would throw me off my weight loss track for a couple weeks.

I am looking forward to having some vegetables again once this week is up. I haven't really been craving anything, but some bell peppers have seen sounding kinda nice these past couple days. I was thinking that a meatloaf and some sauteed vegetables would be good. We will be really tight on money this weekend, so shopping for groceries will be interesting. I hate shopping when the food budget is so small. I would like to get a few different meats one of these weeks. Sam's Club has frozen salmon burgers that look very yummy. It would be nice to make pulled pork or a pot roast. We have been eating mostly hot dogs, sausage, eggs and spam and I really want some higher quality meats before much longer.

Regardless of everything else going on, I am happy to be losing weight and getting closer to my goal everyday :)

Whacked out mood and other issues.

I had my Mirena IUD removed on the 4th and it was nothing like I was expecting. The procedure itself went much better than I had anticipated, in fact I barely felt it when it was removed and the whole appointment went quickly. My hormones hit hard the next day though, and I've been pretty miserable ever since.

The 5th was one of the worst days for me. I was so out of control and full of rage. It was a very odd experience and not pleasant at all. I am usually pretty quiet and reserved and polite. That day I was just full of rage and had an extremely difficult time keeping from biting people's heads off. Every time someone walked by me I felt like screaming and swearing at them. I felt like I wasn't in control of myself at all and the emotion of rage and anger was very scary in how strong and uncontrollable it was.

The days since the 5th have not been full of rage, but I've been experiencing wild out of control emotions all the same. Today for example I am experiencing sadness and despair so powerful that I don't even feel like living (by that I mean doing anything required during my normal day. Suicide hasn't really entered my mind, given I don't think I could get up the energy or motivation to even try it). I have felt like I've been on am emotional roller coaster this whole time. I have not had a good day since the 4th, with my best day being only "okay."

Besides the emotional roller coaster I've been experiencing, I did have physical pain to go along with it. I was expecting a horribly heavy mensuration, but that hasn't been the case. The first several days I did experience some pretty intense cramping and back pain and one day I had trouble feeling like I was going to vomit. The cramping is mostly over with now and the hormonal lower back pain isn't so bad except in the evenings. The bleeding hasn't been bad at all, constant and light.

I was really hoping I would start feeling better once I had the Mirena removed, so I am kinda bummed out by my whacked out hormones. I am hoping that my body is just getting things back to normal and working out all the kinks. I am not sure if I could handle this barrage of mood swings every month. I am pretty sure my family couldn't handle it. I have had two migraines since having the IUD removed, so I think that is doing a little better.

I have been really stressing out about the future. I know that it is normal for life to not go as planned, but I am super stressed out about not having a plan anyway. My husband and I sat down and did a budget sheet up a couple nights ago. We are hoping to more closely follow Dave Ramsey's plan for eliminating debt and planning for retirement this year. His website provides free budget worksheets which have been a great help to us for a couple years now. I highly recommend his approach to money management as it actually works in real life situations. It was nice to get a budget done, but at the same time it really stressed me out. There was too much going back and taking away from areas in order to get other needs met as well. We are going to try to give more this year, though we will only be able to donate 6% so it won't be a true tithe of 10%. My husband was upset about this as it is something that is important to him, but so is feeding the pets and clothing the children.

Something else that is stressful is not knowing what is going on with my husband's job. At the end of the job he will either be let go, or promoted and moved to a different job site (which could be anywhere in the world). The really bad thing about this is that the job will be done with in the spring of 2013, which will be when our third baby will be born if all goes well and we are successful in conceiving around June or July of this year.

If he loses his job he is confident there are several companies that would hire him locally, but they probably wouldn't have the potential for advancement that his current job could offer. If he is kept on with his current job and given a promotion, we would have to think about moving. Moving who knows where with a newborn would be very hard, and there is a good chance his salary would not be enough to support our family in a different city. The children and I would most likely end up staying here while he moved to the job site (in this case the company would pay his room and board and transportation, he would only need to furnish food and personal items). This scenario would work financially, but for him to move to a different area for approximately 2-4 years while visiting us maybe 3-4 times per year would be very hard. The new baby basically wouldn't have a father, and I would be a single mother of three young children. This doesn't sound nice at all to me, but if he does stay with the company this is the most likely scenario...which scares the crud out of me. If he stays with the company there is good room to grow and be promoted and end up with a very nice salary, but he would always be moving every few years. The moving could be great for our family when the kids are older, but it would be very hard while they are young.

The whole deal with the job situation has been very stressful. There are some repairs and modifications that need done to our home within the next couple years. I would like to finish the basement before the new baby (assuming everything works out of course) turns 2 years old. The baby's room would be in the basement (our bedroom is down there, is partially why) and the main area needs finished as well so it can be our school room and be next to the baby's room. There is a lot of work to be done down there. We need to do some foundation repair and level the floors as well as plumbing and putting in larger windows, so it isn't just all cosmetic work. We need to do quite a bit of work to the house in order to accommodate another child and make this a more functional area for us to live. Right now we only use the main level of our house because of the basement not being finished, so even though our house is approximately 1800 square feet we are only able to use 900 of it. I want to have a dedicated school area for sure, as that would make it much nicer for non school hours and to help separate school time from non school time. The kids would really like having a space just for school as well as it would help give it a bit more seriousness and make it feel special for them.

My weight loss has been going okay so far. I lost 5 lbs the first week and 1 lb so far this week. Being so depressed has been making it really hard as I want to run back to my comfort foods but know that would blow the diet. It has been really hard to find comfort here lately. I can't use the food anymore, and the things I try to do to cope get interrupted. My husband is no help, as comforting me doesn't seem to be important to him. I don't mind the diet and the foods I've been eating, but they don't give the high that sugar does. I got through many years by relying on sweets to comfort me when there was no other source of comfort, that's how I got to be so overweight. I am glad I am losing weight, but sometimes it doesn't seem worth it when I have to give up the biggest source of comfort that I had. I have been trying to read more to cope, and it helps some but not enough. Watching T.V. doesn't really help, knitting isn't even helping right now. I would really like to go on a date with my husband, but he would have to bother to plan something, find babysitting, find the time to go, and come up with the money to do it. If I planned everything I would just end up resenting him that he couldn't be bothered to do it, yet again.

I am really hoping my mood evens out soon. Something has to change or I feel like I may just go crazy. Here's hoping tomorrow is a less moody day.

Diet update.

The diet is going really well so far. I was having trouble with cravings for carbs yesterday, but I managed to get through it okay. I was feeling pretty rough the first day and yesterday because of carb withdrawal (no, I am not making that up, it is a real thing and often referred to by most people as the Atkins flu). I feel like a new person today though. I wasn't hungry when I woke up and I actually feel like I have some energy today.

I have done really well with sticking to my eating plans. I did cheat once last night. I was having a craving for carbs (mainly pizza) and was feeling hungry even after eating supper and having a snack. I cheated by having a second can of pop. It isn't a big deal, and I thought it was a better choice than to break and eat more or something that I shouldn't. It has been easy eating mostly meat and eggs. We have been having quiche mostly. We went shopping for food yesterday since my husband had the day off from work. We picked up hotdogs (I like the Baker's and Chef's brand from Sam's Club the best as they have no added sugar, 0 carbs, and they are 100% beef and taste really good) sausage, bacon, cheese, jerky, sliced ham and turkey, and a couple other food item for the kids. I was impressed that for as much as we bought that it wasn't really very expensive.

I have lost some weight already. It is probably just water weight that I am losing at this point, but any weight lost is great as far as I am concerned. I lost 2 lbs the first day and 1 lb yesterday. For only 3 lbs lost I can sure tell a difference. My jeans are fitting noticeably looser than they were a couple days ago, and I just feel a bit lighter. I feel like going and doing something, which I haven't felt that way for several months (basically once I started allowing evil carbs back into my diet). It is a bit of a shame really because this isn't a good time to go do things outside. I need to be doing school with the kids (on lunch right now). I also noticed it was easier to get up this morning, even though I stayed up really late last night.

All is good so far and I am excited to see how much weight I loose by the end of this week. Heck, I am excited to see how quickly I can get down to size 12 jeans again, or how quickly I can reach my goal of 150 lbs!

First weigh in of 2012.

I weighed myself this morning at 217.6 lbs. That is down some from yesterday, but much higher than I would be if I had watched my diet over the holidays. I didn't eat any sugar over the holidays, but I was eating more starches than I should have and there were quite a few sugar alcohols.

My plan is to limit my food choices pretty severely for the first two weeks. I want to kick start my weight loss and get my body used to burning fat for fuel. For the first two weeks I will be eating only meat and some dairy. That includes all meats, eggs, cheese in limited quantities, and one serving of heavy cream per day. I plan to limit my sweetener use to no more than three servings per day. One can of pop (sweetened with splenda) and one cup of coffee per day. The pop will get counted as one of my servings of sweetener. I will allow some condiments, but only sugar free or reduced sugar and in small amounts. I will be drinking mostly water and hope to get my water intake up. I will also continue taking my current vitamins and supplements.

After the two weeks are over I plan to start introducing small amounts of non-starchy vegetables. I hope to keep Atkins shakes and bars out of my diet for the most part. I have found in the past that they are hard to limit and they can stall weight loss for me. I don't plan on eating any fruit until I am at or very near my goal, and then only berries.

Exercise isn't going to even enter the picture for quite a while. I don't believe exercise promotes weight loss but that it actually can interfere. Exercising builds strength and muscle and needs extra nutrition to support it, and that is not what I am after right now. I may start exercising lightly to build strength in my back and legs before I try to get pregnant, but I'm not concerned with it right now.

I will adjust my eating plan if I encounter any problems with it, but I don't see that happening. I am really excited to see how much I lose during the first couple weeks. I haven't decided if I will be posting weekly updates, or just stick to the monthly weigh in. I will be weighing myself at least once a week unless it becomes obsessive than I'll have to lock the scale away somewhere. That's all for now. I am busy trying to get as much knitting done as I can before we return to school on Tuesday.

New Year's Resolutions.

It is that time of year again when my head swims with hopes for the new year. I have a lot of hopes for 2012 and plenty of goals.

     1. Lose weight - this goal is very important to me. I lost a lot of weight this last year, but it wasn't enough to get me where I want to be. For my height my ideal weight is approximately 150 lbs. I would really like to reach that weight this year and feel pretty good about being able to do so.

     2. Buy a car - I have not had my own car since getting married over 8 years ago. The car that we are currently using is working okay, but I wouldn't consider it to be "reliable." It is very important to me to have reliable transportation of my own. I have never been able to just go visit family and friends because of not having my own car. I home school so it would be nice to take the kids on field trips or trips to visit family. We don't go visiting as is because of my husband's work hours and me not having a car. Plus if we have another baby it is extremely important to me to be able to have reliable transportation for our family (and for me to be able to go somewhere without relying totally on my husband.

     3. Have a third baby - This is something I've wanted for a few years now. I can't afford to wait until I am in my 30's because of my high risk factor. Our finances haven't been good enough and my health hasn't been good enough previously. There have also been some rather serious issues in our marriage that has provided obstacles for having a baby. If I have a good used car and am healthy then this will probably be the best year to have another baby. I figure that if I can manage to lose about 2 lbs a week I will be able to think about getting pregnant in June or July. I have also figured that this would put the birth of the baby after the tax return for next year. The tax return wouldn't cover all the expenses, (a cesarean was in the ball park of $10,000 last I knew) but it would really help. There would still be a lot of preparing that would need to be done, like creating a nursery space. I won't need to be buying too many toys or baby equipment since I didn't use most of that stuff the last two times. Besides the birth costs our only real expenses with a baby would be a new car seat and Dr visits. Diapers depend on whether we go disposable like previously or if we use cloth.

     4. Start designing knitwear - This is something I've been thinking about on and off this past year. I think 2012 would be a good time to get into designing. My ultimate goal would be to create patterns for knitwear that I could sell for a small profit (perhaps to feed my knitting obsession). I have noticed that I have a very hard time finding patterns for wearable clothes that are more on the simple and causal side while still being interesting and stylish. I have also noticed that many patterns I find and love are pretty hard to actually acquire. Every time I find a pattern I love on Ravelry.com it is something that is out of print, requires the purchase of a $15+ book, or isn't even available in this country. I don't hope to ever get published in anything, but it would be cool if I could learn enough about designing patterns to create nice clothing for my family and maybe make enough money to buy some yarn on the side. I'm not sure where I will be able to take this, but I still want to dabble and try my hand at it.

     5. Start dressing nicer - I have not been very fashionably dressed for a long time. After getting married we didn't have the money for clothes, then I had babies and got fat, money issues continued, depression got in the way and I just gave up somewhere along the way. I don't expect to have heaps of cash for going shopping this next year, but I do hope to make more of an effort to dress more modernly. I do many things to keep my depression at bay, including knitting. I hope to be able to knit some nice things to update my wardrobe. I don't mind wearing cheap clothes and really don't care about the brand at all so long as it fits and looks okay. I hope to be able to cheaply acquire a few outfits that I can mix and match and complement my knitted items.

     6. Have more "me" time - Time to myself isn't really something I've had much of. My life is all about being a home educator and mother for my children and being a house wife. I have had very little time to myself since getting married and it is something I am really in need of. I hope to get more chances to take a relaxing bath or go shopping by myself. It would be great if my husband would take the children out of the house so I could take a nap or do something in peace and quiet. Right now the only alone time I get is after the kids go to bed at night, and that just isn't much of a break. I am really hoping that if all goes well and I do get pregnant after June 2012 that I will have time to rest and relax some. I have had hard pregnancies in the past, and my husband has promised to step up more this third time and really help me have time to take care of myself.

     7. Better intimacy in the marriage - As is, I don't really get time with my husband. He works long hours and by the end of the day we are both exhausted. I am not talking about physical intimacy so much as emotional. We don't really talk to each other anymore, and when we do it is about the budget, parenting, or other busy stuff. We don't talk about our marriage or what is emotionally important to us. I hate the distance and would like to make more time to just be together. We were initially drawn together because of how easily we got a long and how easy it was to talk to each other, but that has been lost over the years of stress, conflict, and work load. It would be nice to have some intimacy back again.

There are many things that I hope to improve or change during this next year, but those are the big ones.

This year for weight loss I will try to stick to weight updates on the 1st of every month as well as what I have been doing well or poor on and what I'm doing differently. I did finally decide to order a scale, which arrived today. I weighed myself and was pretty dismayed at the number that came up. I had expected I had gained some weight over the holidays. I thought I was probably around 205-210 because my clothes aren't really fitting any differently. Oh heck no! I weighed in at 219 lbs!!!!!! I am not happy about that as it adds more time to my weight loss and will effect when I can start trying for a baby. This means I will have about 69 lbs to lose or 11.5 lbs each month. It is doable, but doesn't leave me much wiggle room.

I will do my official first weigh in of the year tomorrow. I hope to go over my eating plan some and what I plan to do regarding my diet and how to control bad food choices.

I have been reading in "Good Calories, Bad Calories" again tonight. I needed to give my hands a break from knitting and seeing as how tomorrow is the New Year it seemed appropriate. I am over 50% done with the book and running into very interesting stuff. I just read a section talking about the similarities between fasting and a low-carb diet. They both affect the metabolism the same way. If you are fasting after a couple days the hunger goes away and your body pulls the needed energy from your fat and muscle. If on a low-carb diet your body does the same thing only instead of pulling all the energy from your body it is using what you are eating and there is no hunger just like when fasting. You can go from fasting to eating low carb and suffer no ill effects and your metabolism doesn't suffer. If you are eating 800 calories per day in fat and protein you won't be hungry or tired, but if you add 400 calories of vegetables and fruit (or any carbs) to it so you are eating 1200 calories per day you will become hungry (ravenously so) and tired and experience mood changes. There are some very interesting points made and some very compelling evidence. It agrees with my personal experience, but it is interesting to have it validated through scientific research even if it hasn't been paid any attention in the medical community. I remember how terrible I felt on a low fat/low calorie diet and how much better I felt on a low-carb/high/fat and unrestricted calorie diet.

My latest worries.

I am uneasy right now. I have had a Mirena IUD (also called an IUC) for a little over 5 years. I thought it worked good and I was happy with the light (although sometimes long or random) periods and being able to not worry about remembering to take a pill every day. I think now that having that chunk of plastic inside of me was a huge mistake.

I started doing research online about the removal process for the Mirena. I wanted to know how much pain and bother was involved. I honestly never expected to run across so much negativity surrounding the device. I wasn't really aware of all the side effects before I got the Mirena. My Dr told me it was lower doses of hormones than a pill and that it was highly convenient. The pamphlet I got didn't really say anything about side effects besides that in very rare cases some women have developed PID. No where did I see anything about all the other stuff.

One of the things I am most concerned with is the effect it has on mood. Supposedly (I read about it, but didn't go research it myself) in Canada they recommend women with any history of depression not use Mirena. I never heard anything about this, and I have a history of constant low grade depression that can become dangerous (suicidal) when/if it gets really bad. Several people in my family have a history of depression. If I would have know that was one of the common side effects I never would have used it. I have had unshakable depression this whole time, but never thought it could be because of my birth control. I have also had very common migraines this whole time as well. By common I am talking about an average of 5 days a week, every week, for 5 years. Headaches and migraines are another side effect that seems to affect a lot of women who use the Mirena. The whole thing is scary and worrisome. I have an appointment on the 4th to have it removed.

My husband and I would like to have another child, but there are so many things that need to be done first. First of all I need to lose weight. I nearly died during both previous births, so I would like to be as healthy as possible for next time. We need to get a new vehicle (a very reliable one and so that both of us have transportation), which is what this tax return is supposed to go towards. We want to get the most reliable used vehicle we can for our money (that will hold three children) with the tax return. We would need to get the basement in better order. There is a bedroom down there that we were working (slowly) on converting into a school room, but that may end up as a nursery instead. Then of course we would need to have the money to pay for the pregnancy and delivery.

We were thinking that I would work on losing the weight this year, we would get the car this year, then we would try to get pregnant so the baby would be born after next tax return so we could pay the hospital bills. If we are going to have another baby, I really don't want to wait very long. I don't want to have the increased risks that come with age. If we haven't had another baby by the time I am 30, I will forget about the whole thing because the risks would just be too high for me (seeing as how I am already considered high risk).

I have been thinking about my New Years resolutions. I have thought of a few, but I need to actually make a list. I really hope this is the last time I will be writing "lose weight" on there. Seems like my resolutions are always the same. This year there won't be much of a celebration for New Years. My husband will be working that night, so maybe we will try to celebrate earlier or the next day. We don't usually do much for the holiday, being such homebodies, but this will be the first time he hasn't been home for it. Maybe me and the girls will find something fun to do together.

I am not really looking forward to this week ending. I have been enjoying the Christmas break. The girls are ready to start school again, but I'm not so sure I am. It has been nice to have a break and get to do other things and have time to relax. We have been doing some reading during holiday break. I think my mother is right and I need to just give up on the reading part of school being so analytical. We are not reading the "read alouds" as part of school anymore, but have been reading them before bedtime. I don't look up the questions anymore, but just sit and talk about it with them instead. I guess if we read it apart from school and they don't see me look up the questions, then it is fun and not "boring and horrid school books." I really don't understand them sometimes. They really enjoy working out of workbooks and lesson books, but they don't like listening to me read to them during school. I don't see the difference, but if somehow the books being bedtime stories makes it more fun, than so be it. So long as they are listening and thinking about the stories, I'm happy.

I have written plenty for now. I do need to get to work on my knitting. I will post again once I have made my New Years resolution list and/or decided what to do about buying a scale.