All Turkey's Eve

artwork by My Mom

Logged into myfitnesspal 19 days in a row. Worked out today, worked out Monday. Tonight I felt the slickness of the slippery slope under my feet and I'm writing to shake it off because I LIKE HOW THIS FEELS AND I HAVE A PLAN DAMNIT.

So today...I had cottage cheese and coffee breakfast, cucumber salad and half a chicken for lunch ( I dipped some pieces in sweet and sour sauce; it was Thai takeout at work), but then my happy hour wings weren't enough for a satisfying dinner. So instead of a cobb salad I ordered a cute lil' tureen of French Onion; that relatively carby soup involving croutons. Hmph. Later on (and 4-5 glasses of Cab later) I made a little keto plate at home of a piece of leftover bacon, a chunk of Danish Blue Cheese and about 12 blackberries. I am now no longer hungry and because myfitnesspal awards me #allthecalories for my workouts it says I'm under my calorie goal. Ha to that, but also yay for not going off into the holiday weekend abyss.

What's the plan damnit, then? My plan is to have a nice Thanksgiving with the family and take down a plate of all the things for dinner but stay very low carb for breakfast, snacks, and all other meals. I'll probably bring some 90% dark chocolate along with me, but other than that my in-laws always have a good assortment of whole foods I can eat on keto -and in fact they encourage the low carb thing which is great. It's really all about me.

In NSV news, before happy hour tonight I tried on a 'bottom drawer of shame' pair of jeans and wouldn't you know it- they fit. The last two 2.5 weeks of working out and eating like a person with self esteem is starting to pay off. There are still almost 5 weeks left in the year and I'm looking forward to getting into more of my wardrobe, and I really can't wait to see my kneecaps, shoulders, and ankles come back from hiding. 

I guess another reason I'm writing is just to say that every day counts. Every one of these last 19 days, even the Saturday I ate 3338 calories, meant something. Each day logged contributed to me feeling better about myself tonight, fitting into those jeans earlier, and getting me to this point where I'm blogging twice in a week and feeling very optimistic again.

Finally, I feel so hugely thankful for your eyeballs on this screen and for the encouragement. Happy Thanksgiving and enjoy your weekends!

13 Days back on! or '2015 is Still a Thing'

Welcome to what it feels like to have a legit 13 day streak on MyFitnessPal coupled with 8 workouts in as many days. The year 2015, friends, has not been my best- but it's going to end well.

Quick recap: Summer ended, and then the eating of any and everything continued. Visits from family, a wedding, a trip to Vegas, a couple work trips, and not much in the way of low carbing or weight loss. The occasional weekend cruiser bike ride was about all I did to improve my health.

I stopped reading your blogs, I stopped visiting the reddit keto pages, I just drove to and from work and snacked and bought ice cream and..yeah. The things we do.

Meanwhile, however, something's been bubbling up inside me. Finally, on Saturday Nov 7th, I said fuck this, I'm not only going fully back on Very Low Carb, I'm also boldly putting on my sneakers and going to the stupid gym in stupid Torrance four miles from my house which is conveniently located next to a Hometown Buffet. I've had a work-sponsored membership to a perfectly good gym with multiple locations for months now and I just now got my shit together and got my key fob activated. So, yeah, that first Saturday I did the elliptical and the recumbent bike while listening to some Skrillex, Tame Impala, and some early-2000s hip hop and felt, well, good.

Then, a few days later, I went to the gym which is- get this- in the SAME BUILDING where I work. AND MY WORK PAYS FOR MY MEMBERSHIP.  When I realized it had a few 'LA types' but basically it was just regular people working out who could care less about what anyone else looked like, I decided to go back almost every day after work. It's become, like, a thing, and I like it. Why haven't I gone before? Probably a few parts fear/embarrassment but mostly just...laziness and complacency. I don't want that anymore.

What I've yet to do is get back on the scale. My size 24 jeans still fit, and after almost two weeks 'back' I'm feeling like I'm de-puffing again- in fact I know I am, but I just didn't want to weigh myself. I want to get all the way though November like a boss- becoming a weirdo after-work gym rat, eating all the proteins and the fats, and even blogging a bit. I hope you all give me a chance to make up for the nonsensical fits and starts of the past year; I swear I'm destined to be a success story and I'm not giving up.