Sometimes, it’s okay to be broken.

This weekend was challenging. Food was a huge temptation and I was worried that what I ate would further my rut and push me pack towards my starting weight; I ate anyways, and I ate, and ate. I gave into every temptation. I didn’t feel guilty, or did I? I really don’t know, all I know was that I ate. I ate food I don’t even let myself think about. I ate food I haven’t eaten in years. Now I feel guilty. Still, this weekend I didn’t care, all I cared about was the eating. I know how I got to my top weight and this weekend I put myself on the road back to that weight.

 

I ate cheeseburgers from In-N-Out (yes, burger(s); if it wasn’t enough to have a burger Saturday, I had one Sunday as well). I ate French fries, so covered in ketchup that they were red, not golden. I ate chips. I ate red velvet cake. I ate cookies. I drank starbucks. I ate Chick-fil-a, with extra sauce. I ate dip. I ate bread. I ate toast, with butter. I ate chicken strips. I ate frozen dinners. I drank diet soda, upon diet soda. I would have eaten more. I wanted to eat more.

As I look at that list, I’m disgusted. It makes me sick to see what I put in my body. But I broke. I had no willpower. I didn’t make better choice. I didn’t make choices at all, I just ate.

 

I could have continued today, but I didn’t, today I ran. I ran hard, I ran fast, I pushed myself, vowing to burn every calorie I let myself scarf down this weekend. I also didn’t eat, I punished myself, told the fat girl inside me that I ate enough calories this weekend and that I didn’t deserve a breakfast, or lunch, even if it was healthy. I am fat, I don’t deserve that food.

 

I know it isn’t healthy, but sometimes we break. Sometimes we are glutens for punishment.  I know I will be better tomorrow, but today, today I can be broken. I can let that skinny voice in my head, the one that tells me not to eat, the one that makes me afraid of food, I can let her have today. Tomorrow I’ll regain control.

 

I feel like I am always spiraling from one extreme to the other. I give into the fat girl; I give into the skinny girl, when am I going to give into myself? I know it isn’t healthy, or good, but honestly how many of you can say you are perfect with your diet? How many can say they don’t fail once in a while.

 

This weekend I was broken. It’s okay to break.

The biggest thing is, I could have eaten horrible today. I could have said “what is one more bad day”. I could have taken the path back to my heaviest weight, but I didn’t. Today I ran. Today I will pick up the pieces and gain control.

 

I had a better post for today, but I felt compelled to share my defeat. I can be so guarded sometimes. I fear the judgment. I only want to share the good, but if I share the good, I need to share the bad. This weekend was the bad.

So this post is a  total bummer. I did have fun this weekend though, I’ll post more about that later. For now I’ll leave you with a few photos :

Oh, why yes that is a 5D MK iii around my neck. & Yes, I do still have both my kidneys.

I’ll post more about my amazing new camera later.

New jobs, and weight-loss, and logos, oh my!

I don’t know how many of you actually follow my running/weight journey, but if you do, you may have noticed as of late (like the past week and a half) that my updates have been sparse. My weight has been on a little roller coaster lately. I swear I’m still trying to lose weight, but life has picked up and my wagon is starting to go a bit slow!

I reached -20 two weeks ago, and then gained 4 back because I was ecstatic about the loss that I felt like I earned the extra calories! I also have not had the motivation to run lately so I’m not hiring the calories that I was. Since gaining the 4 pounds back, I have dropped 3 and am at a 19 pound loss.
Here is a picture of me on st Patrick’s day, this was about 18 pounds down.

I also got a new job –extremely stressful– and I’m trying to learn to eat health and workout around my new job. I just have to keep reminding myself, if I really want it I will do it! My goal now is 15 pounds by my Colorado trip( 7 weeks,yay!!!!)

Like I said I haven’t been running, which isn’t good since I have the OC 1/2 marathon in a little over a month. I know I will be able to finish, but I won’t PR if I don’t get my butt into gear.

Like I mentioned above, I got a new job, today was day 3 of actual on site work. I work at a middle school in an after school program. It’s pretty stressful because the kids are middle school and there is no shortage of attitude! I was hand-picked for this site which gives me a bit of confidence, but the attitudes are really bad and they stress me to the max. I am the type of person who demands respect, and when I have a 12-year-old calling me a slut or other various bad name, I get pretty offended. The main thing with these kids, is you can’t let it get to you or they will eat you alive.  I just have to keep reminding myself, that its great experience for my future job. My boss told me that if I can work this site, then I can work anywhere, so I’m trucking along. The first week is the hardest because all of the kids are testing me, I have 4 boys who are taking that testing to the limit. Luckily next week is spring break and no program( thankfully) I feel like I already need this break. :/

Well I’m extremely tired– I swear a 4.5 hour shift with middle schoolers is like a normal 8 hour shift– so I shall be heading to bed. :/ yawwwn night

For those of you who notice this post was actually posted in the morning, see how tired I was, I couldn’t even hit post! lol We’ll I’m off to the gym. Going to run a few miles before Daisy and I swim.

P.S. I got two new logos for my photography business. I can’t decide what one I like best, help?

If you like my logos I got them from Swept Away Graphics, Michelle was awesome to work with! She was fast, provided quality work and was very accommodating with request. I would go to her again in a heart beat!

So the question for you… Which do you like better? I was thinking the circle for my fine art, the swirl for my portrait, ya or nay? Let me know your thoughts.

 

P.S.S

I’m not making any promises, but if you like my photography, check back tomorrow. There might be a surprise! Mums the word for now!

Joys of owning a Corgi

I just had the most amazing weekend this week, and you want to know why? It’s because I did nothing!!! Greg and I completely took the time to revamp after quite a busy schedule we have been having these past few weeks.

Greg has been working a lot lately and I mean A LOT, A LOT! Our weekdays are jam-packed between work, school, puppies, work, homework and trying to squeeze in runs and couple time! We barely get time to see each other now and days!

The weekend started by seeing the midnight showing of Hunger Games –great movie, go see it! Then we spent Friday night relaxing and catching up on TV. We were both tired from staying up the previous night. Man are we getting old!

Then on Saturday Greg and went to mile square park for a run! It was much needed, I have fallen way behind on my 1/2 marathon training and my weight loss has really slowed as well. All things considered, my run was decent. I did 4 miles and kept a 12:54 pace. All of my miles were under 13:25 too, no more 14 minute miles for me! A few weeks ago I was bummed about my 13 minute mile times, but I have to rememebr just 4 months ago, I was running high 14 minute mile times. I’m progressing and that is good!Normally mile 2 kills me and I end up doing it in 13 minutes and then mile 3 in 14 minutes, so I can really see improvement. This was also an ‘easy’ run and I could have done another few miles when I finished, so I know I could have pushed myself harder as well. At this point, I’m hopefully for the OC 1/2 marathon and a sub 3 hour time.

On Saturday we also took Sheldon to petsmart! He loved all of the attention he was getting–he is quite a ham that way! A bunch of people stopped us to ask 1) what kind of dog is that?–I guess not a lot of people have seen corgis and 2) tell us–him rather– how cute he is. It was fun. We ended up buying him a new leash and collar, his harness wasn’t working out to well.

Yeah, I know. My corgi is pretty hardcore.

Then on Sunday we took both Sheldon and Guinness to the dog park! I don’t know if I have ever shared this before or not, but I am actually terrified of dogs. I was mauled when I was 4 and ever since, I have been terrified of big or aggressive dogs. This is one of the reasons I can’t adopt or rescue, any sign of aggression and I tense up. Anyway on Sunday’s at the Huntington Beach dog park, they have a corgi meet up. I LOVE corgis so I really wanted to go. I was pretty much terrified the entire time, but since they have a little dog section it was manageable. It was so fun to watch all of the other corgis play! Sheldon was a hit as well, two people who actually follow his blog came up to take a picture of him. (Yeah, my dog is kind of a big deal..) Sheldon was very shy and stuck to me the whole time and Guinness actually growled at the other dogs, but towards the end they became a little more adventurous. I can’t wait to take them next week!

Oh, there was also a swing, so this picture was a must! Doesn’t he look like he is smiling! Oh the joys of owning a corgi!

Hunger Games

Never have I felt so compelled to be a fictional character and not be them at the same time. If you have not heard of it–get out of that rock your under– the hunger games is an action packed trilogy that has a little bit of everything.

I am in awe of the character Suzanne Collins was able to create in katnis. She is brave, independent, strong, and just awesome. I don’t want to ruin the story for anyone, but it is a story that really captivates you and draws you in emotionally. I felt anger, frustration, love, envy, admiration among many other emotions.

Additionally the movie was just as gripping. Normally I am a person who tends to like movie adaptations of my favorite books; however I like them as their own entity. This movie was so well directed,cast, clothed, written and produced that it was really a companion to the book. Key points were hit, details were there and the emotion was just as real as I remember reading. Now I didn’t feel the anger for katnis that I did during the peeta scenes as I did in the book, but I still think those scenes were so well done (by all involved) that the overall idea was there. I was pleased with this adaptation, it might be one of the best book to movie adaptations since Harry potter and the sourceres stone. and by best I mean that it stays as true to the book, in way of plot, emotion and visual as possible. Right now I am one happy fan and I can’t wait to go see the movie for a second time.

Until next time, may the odds be ever in your favor.

Guinness Cupcakes

As you all may know st Patrick’s day started as…

Kidding no history lesson, this was one of the first st Patrick’s days that I have celebrated in a long time!

It all started with a TB test reading, extremely exciting I know! It was for my new job! (yes finally a job! It is only part time substitution position, but hey it’s something!)

Then I came home and cooked dinner, I made bangers and mash and for dessert I made Guinness chocolate cupcakes with baileys cream cheese frosting. I mean oh my gosh they were good!!! I may have put a bit too much alcohol in the cupcakes (is there such a thing?) but they were still amazing! I am actually not a big chocolate fan, which is why I thought making them was a good idea, you know I wouldn’t eat too much… But no they were so good a non chocolate lover like me still devoured them!

Nom, Nom, Nom.

After dinner we went to see 21 jump street, it was way better than I though and super funny. There want too much of s plot but it was still good. I laughter and thought it was worth the $9.50.

We went home and watched American pie after, since Greg had never seen it, I also had another cupcake or two :/ oh well this is why I weigh in on Wednesdays…

It was a great st Patrick’s day & I’m even sober enough to write this up!

Oh and to clarify I used:

                                            <—- This Guinness      Not this one—>

2 miles and some abstract art

I didn’t have a scheduled run today–or did I? Unlike most runners, I, for the most part, don’t schedule my runs, with the exception of Saturday long runs. I try to stick to running this day or that day, but as long as I get 3 runs in a week, I am good. Normally however I never run after my long run day, but today I just felt like going. Since the clocks went forward it was colder when I got up and much more inviting to run in.

So naturally with the atmosphere inviting me to run, I laid in bed, 10 minutes later I got my butt up and forced myself out the door. I had the goal of not walking at all during my short 2 mile run and to monitor my pace. The only problem is I have such a hard time gageing my pace. I still tried though, I slowed my mile time to 12:00 minute pace which felt slow! My second mile I slowed to a 13:00 pace–not intentional. I tried to pick it up, but I ended up walking for 30 seconds– out of want not need! I finished the second mile and still had .15 miles to my house so I sprinted and that folks was my run! terribly exciting wasn’t it!? But it’s a Sunday what do you expect?

 

After my run Greg came over and we headed down to CSULB to spend some time at the Japanese gardens. First we needed food though, and stopped at Denny’s. Denny’s has this new fit fare food and I really wanted to try the chicken avocado sandwich, against my better judgment I got fries instead of the veggies as the side; however, since the sandwich was not the greatest I was happy with my choice. It was very bland and just ehh. I would have been happier with a Subway sandwich and it would have been a lot cheaper too! After brunch we headed to CSULB and went to the gardens. I wasn’t thrilled, I have never been to a Japanese garden before, but I was just expecting more I guess. It was very tiny and very crowded and not much to take pictures of. There were also a lot of photographer there who were holding sessions, which normally doesn’t bother me but there were a few who lacked any sense of etiquette and were all together quite rude! I had high hopes of taking some cool pictures but I ended up only getting a few.

This is a little different than my normal shot. I like it though.

As always these photos are for purchase on my smugmug site. Contact me for more information.

Tonight is also Sunday Funday! Both Michelle’s came over and we just hung out. I ate too much. Like way too much. We also made plans to visit LACMA Friday . Greg has to visit for school so we are making a day out of it! Can’t wait. Since we will be so close to Sprinkles… I am thinking I might have to run 6 miles Friday morning and enjoy a cupcake!

Interval run, you are my friend

I failed this week! I am supposed to run at least 3 times per week and I failed. I am telling myself it is okay since I had a 12 mile run on Sunday, but I know really it’s not.  My times lately have discouraged me so much that I just needed a break. I did however have a ‘long’ run scheduled today with Daisy, so I had to get up and do that. I love running with Daisy, although she is a bit faster than me, because it makes me get up and go running! I guess that is what best friends are for, to kick your butt into shape! I also tend to run SOOO much better when I run with her, which is why I am so excited that she is doing 3 of my next 4 races with me! (hopefully I can talk her into some more).

 

We were planning to go to mile square, but I really dislike running there, so we headed to Huntington Beach and ran along the coast. We did an easy 5.5 miles and kept a decent pace (The pace was a hell of a lot better than normal). After jogging the first mile, we did ¼ mile intervals of walking and jogging. Intervals are seriously my best friend, I love them! Overall we were consistent with our times, which I am happy about. It was a much better pace than the past two weeks which gives me motivation for this coming week.

 

This week at my weekly weight-in I was also down 1 pound. I find this really exciting because I have not been using sparkpeople lately. I have been trying to eat healthy on my own and make the right choices and as my weight shows, it is working. While it is only one pound, I am happy with a slow one pound loss, because it means that it is not fluctuation, it is actual weight loss. My mini-goal right now is to lose 15 pounds before Greg and I take our Colorado trip in May. (Yay, were exploring the world-ish). Then my goal from there is to maintain my weight in Colorado and keep it off for my trip to Ohio the following week. (Yay, I get to see my brother for the first time since Jr. high!!!!).  I think maintaining—or even losing—in Colorado is possible, because we will be doing a 5K at the Cheyenne zoo and most of the activities we have planned are active type things. I also plan to run while I am there, so we’ll see what happens with that.

 

After the run Greg and I had a few errands to run. Our point and shoot camera broke so we took it into Best Buy. Since I bought it when I worked there, I added on the warranty (The warranties are pretty cheap for employees). I am hoping that they are just going to replace it rather than fix it—Fingers crossed! I have my eye on the Canon SX230 HS. I really like that one and I think it will be the perfect camera for everyday use. In other camera news, the 5D mk iii was announced. If I could sell my 50D for more than 900ish I would probably buy it. I am taking donations though, so if you want to give me money towards the “Theresa wants this freakin’ awesome camera” Foundation, I won’t turn you away.

I mean look at today’s running data…

 

 

 

They are pretty much forcing me to buy the 5D!

Oh, and if you are actually interested in the run data:

 

So it’s St. Patrick ’s Day next weekend, have any plans? I don’t, despite being Irish; we don’t really celebrate the day. It’s a day when a bunch of people walk around and mock our accent, claim they are ‘100% Irish”, get drunk, and promote a stereotype about us. It’s more of an annoyance; I might go drink though Oh, and if you do go out all of that ‘traditional Irish food’ you are eating, it’s not really typical Irish food. Most likely it is a fake knock off, or we don’t even eat it at all.

Sunday long run

I am beginning to think that my improved pace I was seeing all week two-weeks ago was a fluke. I had another crappy run today. I started off strong at an 11 minute mile but then I had a 13, 14, 15 minute mile. I really don’t know what has gotten into me. I even ate before my run today! I think this week I am going to focus on interval runs because those tend to produce my fastest runs. My goal for the OC 1/2 marathon is to jog ( 12ish min/mile pace) the first 5 miles and then walk/jog 1/4 mile intervals. I hope in the 2 months I have left to train I can do this. I thought it was very possible two weeks ago, but now, I’m slightly doubting it :/ I really want to break 3 hours.

This was just 1/2 of my run. My long run is from Huntington pier to Newport pier and back. Its 12 miles. I ended up waiting for Greg at the pier and we just walked back. Yeah it was that kind of run  :/ It was 11.45 miles and I did burn 1299 calories, wooohoo!

Here is an update of my weight loss progress. The left photo is last month and the right photo was taken tonight and 15 pounds down.

Right now this is my working goal. This was a year ago and 25  pounds lighter.

Yeah, I gained all my weight within a year. From April to August I gained 40 pounds & now.

I also have more good news on the weight loss front. Yesterday I was out of clean jeans so I decided to try on one of my ‘big’ small jeans. They are from my freshman year of college and haven’t fit in a while. So I was extatic when I tried them on yesterday and not only did they button, but there wasn’t anything hanging over!!! Can’t wait for the rest of my old jeans to fit

Well that is today.

See you later this week. Hopefully I will have better running times. I am thinking of adding yoga and swimming to change it up a bit.

Today I don’t feel like doing anything….lalalala

I really didn’t feel like doing anything other than laying in bed all day. I woke up at 6:30 to let the puppies out and then tried to get them to sleep for another hour… they were not having it! I did manage to drift in and our of sleep for about another hour and then I laid in bed procrastinating my run and playing with my iphone. I was almost 100% I was going to skip my run today, I was kind of sore and very tired… But I came to my senses and realized that if I skip today, then my next run will be that much easier to skip, and today was only 3 miles, I can do 3 miles!

I got my butt up, got dressed, got my Garmin set and started to run. At about 1/4 of a mile I was good, nice pace wasn’t to sore or tired, then 3/4 of a mile came and I was hating life. I finished a mile in 11:41 about a minute slower than my normal one mile time. I then preceded to walk almost the whole 2nd mile… I made up for it with a jog at mile 3 and finished 3.3 miles in 43 minutes.  Really crappy!!!! It is so much better than not running at all, but still I’m really annoyed with the time. I could have pushed myself harder.I also didn’t eat before the run, so maybe that has something to do with the time. I did have a yummy double fiber muffin with peanut-butter spread and a banana after the run though I love peanut-butter in the morning!

Now that I have my run out of the way, I kind of feel like going back to bed. I’m more sore now than I was this morning. I only have pain on my right leg, which is weird, I don’t know if I pushed myself to hard this weekend (with the hill runs) or if I just need to stretch more. I’m also working on uploading pictures right now but my upload speed (according to speedtest.net) is .09 MB/s when each picture is about 6.5-7.5 MB and  I have roughly 100 more pictures to upload. You can do the math… it’s going to be a long day at the computer. At least there is some homework that I have been neglecting. One tip, I do not recommend going back to school and taking 5 online classes the semester after you graduate.

Is it lunch time yet? Running–even painfully slow–makes me super hungry!

What’s a post without a picture of a Corgi?

These past two weeks have been kind of a bummer for me. My weight has only dropped a pound the past two weeks-Im not going to lie is frackin’ pisses me off. I know it’s my fault, I haven’t been tracking my food as good as normal and I know I have been taking a few bites from Greg’s plates lately. I have been doing good with exercise– I have run or gone to the gym at least 3 times per week and have burnt 2000+ calories each week. Now if I could be as good with my diet everything would be golden! That’s my mini goal this week. I plan to make all my meals, eat 1300-1400 calories per day, eat balanced meals and snacks, and count every calories.

On to today, today me and my Sunday crew went on a hike at Irvine park. While it was fun, I was disappointed in my time. I wasn’t banking on it being a high calorie burn workout, since we were just planing to exercise together nothing big, but it is disappointing only going 4.75 miles in 1:40 when I did 7.3 miles in 1:39 earlier this week. I just kept thinking of the calories I could be burning! However it was all worthwhile since I got to spend a day with my best friends

Michell, myself, and Daisy

This photo my friends was taken with an Iphone

Michelle, James, Myself, and Greg (I just realized we matched)

This my friends was taken with a droid

The lesson= Iphone pwns.

After our hike and going home to change and clean up we headed to Chipotle for dinner (See, I told you my diet has been sucking!). Then we went home and watched the Oscars, I’m actually really made about the results, I mean Harry Potter should have won something! I think I had more fun playing with the puppies than actually watching the Oscars, I mean what is cuter than a corgi?

Here is said corgi, he looks like he is playing Airplane Ah, I love him to pieces!!!

Oh, my amazing boyfriend also picked me up a little piece of jewelry… Nope not a ring, a Garmin 305! I love using it when I run it is amazing!!! I can’t wait to keep playing with it. I plan to run intervals tomorrow using the pace thingy on it. It beeps if I go to fast or too slow, GREAT FOR TRAINING. I tend to start off too fast and burn out, but hopefully I’ll do better with this! I was previously using Nike + and while it was okay, it was not the most accurate, it also doesn’t have the pace features that the Garmin has and the calorie could was WAY off. I guess that is all for me.

Remember to check out my photography website Theresabridgetphotography.com