Hot & Steamy, White & Creamy

Ever wanted something hot, that melted in your mouth, and made you jump up and beg for white creamy... wait a minute, I am talking about cookies and milk.

Well, as I journey toward my goal weight, I realized to be successful all temptation must be removed including fresh from the oven chocolate chip cookies served with ice cold milk. So its time for a refridgerator makeover.

Yep, that's kale, carrots, apples, cabbage, lettuce, ginger, nectarines, pineapples, onions, garlic, and "cute"cumbers. I guess if I get a craving in the middle of the nite those carrots will have to do. I mean they seem big enough to get the job done - right? 

Ya heavy baby...

I am watching the show “Heavy” as I write this. This is my second episode today. The first detailed the 90 – 110 pound weight loss of two women. From the very beginning, these women were inspiring, working hard with the trainers to be successful. The next episode details a man and woman, Travis and Lindy. Both complained about everything the trainers asked them to do. Watching them made me realize how a bad attitude can hinder me from being successful on my own weight loss journey. 

After a few minutes of their complaining I decided to cook dinner for my family – chicken, rice, and Brussel sprouts.  My son reports that Travis has dropped out of the weight loss program while I am in the kitchen. I tell him to turn the TV off. I really don’t feel like seeing someone fail at something as important as getting healthy. It only reminds me of all my own failed attempts to get the weight off.

So here I am finishing the post after dinner and a 45 minute walk on the treadmill.

Breakfast

Denny’s –  ½ of a Moon Over My Hammy, an egg fried hard and to drink- ice water. Hey the hubby wanted to eat out today and have some family time.

Lunch

Slept right through it…

Dunch – Dinner/Lunch at 3:00 p.m.

3 Chicken breast tender, Brussels sprouts, rice

Dinner

Kidney beans with ground turkey meat (and a little bit of pork for flavor!)

While on the journey, I have also committed to drinking almost a gallon of water. Today I have drank almost 100 ounces, so I am almost there.

Weight – 214

Getting it all together

Well, its 1:55 a.m. in the morning and I am up talking to you. As I stated before, I ended up in the ER on Sunday because  my blood pressure skyrocketed. Now, I am sitting at my dining room table, trying to figure out how to get it all together.

I know there is a better way to live my life. There are so many areas where I can improve - managing my finances, being a better mother, being a better person in general, but for now my focus has to be my health. I can no longer afford to ignore the signs that my health is rapidly declining. So here is are my highly embarrassing stats.

weight     -  215.10 lbs
waist       -  43 3/4 inches
hips         -  46 inches
bust         -  44 inches
arms        -  14 inches
thighs      -   27 inches

What's the plan you ask -  I am going to hook my gelatinous areas up to a vacuum machine and suck out all the fat!  Just kidding - I am going to juice, eat right, exercise, and take vitamin supplements. I know the first idea sounded better.

ER!

Sorry, I haven't written in a few days, but I was not feeling too well. Unfortunately, I ended up in the emergency room on Sunday after allowing my stress/ blood pressure to rise to 230/92. As I was being carted away on a stretcher while my kids looked on in fear, I realized that I needed to focus my efforts on getting healthy. While I wanted this blog to be a general source of inspiration, I know it will also chronicle my weight loss and a return to a healthy lifestyle. I will be linking to videos from my YouTube channel of the same name -Superwoman's mantra. Feel free to join me there as well.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VhLdRa0ipfk&feature=channel_video_title

Bedtime Blues ends with Eyes Wide Shut





Have you ever lain in your parent’s bed as kid? Wasn’t there this overwhelming since of comfort that almost instantly lulled you to sleep?

My 4 year old has refused to sleep in her crib since she was one.  Yes, I have been lectured about my daughter sleeping in everyone else’s bed but her own by every “super” mom that I know. I have also had some not-so-super mom’s point their condescending fingers at me. But, listen, I tried I really tried… and this is what happened.

Once upon a time, I placed my daughter in her crib at her usual bedtime.  My husband had set the crib to the lowest setting to prevent her from climbing out earlier that week. We sang, read stories, prayed, kissed, hugged, and then bid our little angel farewell till morning. As my husband settled in on the couch to watch a movie, we heard a question call. You know, when your kid calls you with just enough of a high pitch inflection to let you know that they are a bit confused by your behavior – ma-ma? da-da? She then began to chant our names. At this point one of us would usually go get her, but we stood firm on our decision to let her stay in the crib. Then it got tricky, she went from a whining chant to full blown crying – screaming tears and all. This went on for about 15 minutes and then it got quiet. We were getting ready to celebrate when we heard a suspicious thud.

There was our toddler, lying face down in the beige colored carpet, wind totally knocked out of her. As I ran to her aid, I cursed myself for listening to my pediatrician, who told me to let her cry. I frantically picked her up, checking every nook, cranny, and cavity for injury. She wasn’t crying, just staring at me. I think she was in shock that she was able to get out of a crib since her head barely reached the top rail.

In that moment, I felt like the worst mom ever. I kept looking at her, checking her, and beating myself up about it. I know she is a climber. She has been climbing on everything since before she could walk. Why did I think she would not find a way to climb out of a crib when she could climb a 4 ft. bar stool? A doctor’s visit confirmed what my husband tried to assure me of that night, she was fine.

After that, the crib was broken down in a toddler bed. But, she still wouldn’t sleep in it, though we tried on many occasions over the past three years to convince her she should. As you may have guessed she simply used her new found freedom to climb into other people’s beds. Her favorite spot, after my husband kicked her out of our bed, became her oldest brother’s room down the hall. She would climb into his bed at night and then put him in a choke hold so he couldn’t leave her by herself. And that is where I find her every morning… sleep wrestling with her brother in a headlock position.

Well, make a long story short, I purchased new mattresses for everyone, including my daughter over the past several months. I even purchased her a Disney princess toddler bed. But she would cry every time I put her in the room until… I placed my old queen sized bed in her room and voila; she laid in her bed without shedding a single tear. She asked lots of questions first, then we sang, read stories, prayed, kissed, hugged, and I bid her farewell till morning. She rolled over hugged her pink and purple Pillow Pet and went to sleep.

Ah-ha, it’s the bed!

*Lexington Platform Bed from Boston Bed

Curse the Keebler Elf!



from kellogs.com



I was doing sooo good! I mean I was really on a roll. I had lost 8 pounds juicing vegetables... beets, carrots, cucumbers, and kale. I even tried putting the kale in a blender, but it ended up looking like something that belongs in an 8 month old's pamper and was promptly emptied into the garbage disposal.

But I got busy school shopping with the kids, skipped breakfast, then lunch, and by the time I went to the grocery store to buy, I mean get the stuff to make, no, no... let's be honest, buy dinner, those chocolate covered graham cracker cookies were calling me. T-I-N-A, tiiiinnnnaaaa - tina come eat me, tina come eat me! They called louder as I tried to escape to the detergent aisle. Perhaps a whiff of bleach will kill my cravings. As I rounded my shopping trip in freezer section, the kids eyed the ice-cream with longing desire. And what goes better with ice-cream than cookies.

I had to buy it. I couldn't let them eat their ice-cream without cookies. Four for you, four for you, two for you, and the rest for me. Mathematically, since I am almost three times their age (9 times the age of my youngest), I should get that many more cookies... right?

Daddy will do it!



 My daughter has an unyielding faith in her father. The other day a rather large spider was on the back porch. As a grown woman who is almost 1000% percent larger than creepy crawling intruder, I quickly ran in the house screaming like the kid from Home Alone. But my daughter, took a peak out the sliding glass door that I had slammed shut at the little spider and then looked up at me. In the cutest voice with her hands gesturing for me to calm down, she said “Don’t worry mom, Daddy will fix it.” 

For the rest of the day I watched her completely ignore the spider as she walked past it to go outside and play. She could care less that it was spinning a web in the corner of the screened patio.  When her father awoke, she pointed it out to him and watched as he smashed it to oblivion. She then turned to me and said “see mom, daddy took care of it.” Then she quickly went back to playing.

At first glance, one may think that my daughter simply trusts her dad because he is father. But this is not true. She trusts him because he has been consistently reliable – in other words he earned her trust. You can set your watch by his schedule. We all know when he is going to arrive home and leave for work each day. We know that he is the defender of our home from all things creepy crawly like spiders and ants…. And against the big things like robbers, murderers, and monsters that hide under the bed.

Some believe that faith and trust is blind, but I beg to differ. I know that I can trust my husband because he has proven himself over and over again. I am an advocate of people improving themselves and turning over a new leaf. Change can happen. But it must come from a fully made up mind and loads of self-discipline. What a person does with the least, he will do with “the much.” When establishing trust it is best to start small and observe a person’s commitment to their word.

Has someone ever told you to trust them, but has a track record of failure? How did you handle this? Who do you trust?

Tell me whatcha want...

Tell me whatcha want, whatcha really, really want…

I have this song playing in my head tell me whatcha want, whatcha really, really want.  Thinking about what I want to do next. The prospect of doing something new excites me more than most people. I have been home for the past four years nurturing my daughter and now she is begging to go to school. I picture her clanging jail bars with her big girl cup hollering let me out of here. She is ready to be free of the long handed arms of maternal law.

I have always enjoyed writing. In fact at the tender age of 11 I submitted my work to Hallmark and American Greetings, hoping to prove my writing skills for the greeting card market. Though I did not hear from Hallmark, American Greetings admitted that I had talent, but returned my samples as they were not fit for their audience. I was crushed. I continued to write, but never submitted my work to anyone except my English teacher.  I allowed fear of rejection make me stop submitting my work.

As I write this I realize that we superwomen (and men for that matter) sometimes allow fear to control us and rob us of future success. Has the fear of rejection made you stop, give up on your dreams, or sit quietly in the corner ignoring your purpose? So tell me whatcha want, whatcha really, really want (in the comments section of this blog).  And both of us can stand together believing that you can achieve it.

I am Superwoman

When I first began blogging almost a year ago, I did so with the mindset that Superwoman was dead. That the idea of such a person or woman did not exist and that I was giving up the idea of ever achieving the status deserving of such a title. But I have since had a change of heart. Perhaps I was inspired by Alicia Keys melodic voice telling me that I perhaps had achieved the illusive status already.  Either way, I understand that superwoman is not perfect, but she is the woman of steel by simply being her self. As long as the sun rises, she is renewed with a sort of dunamis power.

There will be days of kryptonite. Days when she is tired, hurt, and frustated. Days when circumstances or situations get the best of her. Days when she too bleeds like a mortal. But that does not change who she is. The fact the kryptonite can affect her proves she is Superwoman. For kryptonite does not affect mortals like it does superbeings. Superwoman doesn't beat herself up because she is suspectible to pieces of her home planet. She does not blame herself for the things (or people) that make her weak. She understands that is part of her make-up and always will be. Thus, she must attempt to avoid kryptonite or like her male counterpart, wear a suit of lead on the occasion that she knows she will encounter the element.

So much like the woman of steel portrayed in the comic books, I have learned to accept my status as a Superwoman and you should too.