Katie: Week 55 Coping with a New Year

ehhh...

Current weight (Week 55): 136 pounds
Last week's weight (Week 51): 130 pounds
Total weight loss: 34 pounds

Sigh.

I ate too much during the holidays.  Too much eating and not enough exercising.  Though, to my credit, I did go running once and to the gym once while on vacation.  And I have tried to go on walks as often as I can since we've been back from vacation.  But it's harder right now than it used to be.

My excuses/ struggles in not progressing in my weight loss goals as much as I'd like are three fold.

1. It's very cold outside.  
2. My daughter throws tantrums nearly ever time I go on a walk.
3. I still want all the goodies.

The first two problems are connected.  While I'm certainly not excited to go out and run or go on a walk in the frigid weather we've been having (since about the middle of December) I'm still willing to do it.  And once I get out and get going I don't really mind it so much.  So if it were just up to me I may skip a few days here and there, but I think I'd still be pretty good about getting out and getting some healthy exercise.

Unfortunately, it's not just up to me.  As a stay at home mom, my life is inseparably connected to my daughter, now almost 1 1/2 years old.  And she has developed two likes/ dislikes that have recently made it nearly impossible for me to enjoy outside walks.  First of all, she's officially started walking.  And with that new-found independence has come a dislike for being strapped into the stroller.  She does okay for a while, but after a certain amount of time she just screams when I don't let her out and walk.  This combined with her utter refusal to keep a hat or mittens on has made outside walks in the frigid cold an impossibility for me for the time being.  It used to be a somewhat manageable problem.  But with the temperature below freezing every single day, I just can't keep her outside without a hat and mittens on.  We have a great little snow suit for her and I've done my best to bundle her up, but she screams when anything covers up her hands or head and she screams when they get cold.  Agh.  So for now I've decided to surrender.  At least until the weather gets warmer or until she'll tolerate things to keep her warm, I've consigned myself to inside walks only.  Needless to say, we've been doing a lot of mall walking.  And it's good, but it's just not quite the same, you know?  Doesn't quite burn calories the same way as walking up and down hills and walking longer distances.  That being said, there are some definite perks to walking indoors, especially at a place like the mall.  Most especially, we can stop and go back to the car whenever we want and there's easy access to public restrooms.  Both of these are major pluses when your walking partner (i.e. my walking partner) is 8 1/2 months pregnant.  :)

As for the third problem, the eating too much.  Gah.  I don't know.  I know I've been eating a lot less at home than I was when we were on vacation.  And I'm glad about that.  But I'm still hooked on the little things--cookies and milk or a little bowl of ice cream at night.  And I don't feel ready to give it up.  I think mostly that's because I feel like I have to do all or nothing.  And I don't want to go completely without sweets.  I think it's a struggle I'll be working on for a long time.  It's hard.

Anyway, I'm not progressing as quickly as I'd like to be right now.  But I haven't given up.  I'm going pretty slow at the moment, but I am still going.  And, at least for now, I'm proud of that.