Successes

Today marks the 45th day in a row that I have logged my food and exercise with MyFitnessPal.  :)

I have spent my summer creating healthy habits.  I started by taking Bessie out to the trail and making bike riding a habit.  Today I logged my 424th mile!!!

Secondly, I got back into the habit of tracking my food.  I started with the Weight Watchers app that I was paying for and eventually switched over to the *FREE* MyFitnessPal app.  There are so many things I LOVE about MyFitnessPal!  I will try to list them here.

• I love how quickly I can add foods.  I need not even type in the complete name and it comes up in the database.  If I eat the same thing from a previous day, I can easily copy my entry from a prior day.  
• I love the scan function!  This was something I was super excited WW had on their app, but with WW it only worked for some products.  On MyFitnessPal I have only had ONE TIME when the scanner did not work.  I find that AMAZING!
• I love that I can have friends who share a similar journey to health!  My friends encourage me by either liking my posts or making positive comments.  This has really helped me continue my journey.
• I also love that MyFitnessPal posts our successes. When I see that my friend has burned x amount of calories by completing some activity, it motivates me to keep up!
• At the end of the day, when I hit the button that says "complete today's food diary", it tells me if I ate every day like today how much I would weigh in 5 weeks.  This motivates me like you wouldn't believe!!!
• I also love that I can see the percentage of fats, carbs, and protein I am eating.
• I love that I can look at a week, month or even a year of staying within my calorie budget.  I can even see the amount of calories I spent each day.  This app is AMAZING!!!!

I am also starting to do other forms of exercise...trying out more DVDs in my basement.  :)  I still have plenty left to try, but I am proud that I am working on this.

Riding with Bessie has given me an endurance I didn't know was possible!  I jogged an entire mile last week!!!  Without stopping!!!

Today's weigh in revealed that since May 31st, 2014 I have lost 17.2 pounds!!  I am about 1/3 of the way to goal.  Feeling good about this!  :)

I'm a LOSER! :)

I feel good about the title of this post!!  While not everyone would like to be called a LOSER, when we are talking weight loss...I always hope to be a LOSER!! :)

At the beginning of this summer I decided to make a change.  I started by riding my mountain bike on the trail.  Interestingly, my beautician was the one who asked, "What is your goal?"  Until that point, I didn't realize that I didn't have one.  Soon after that haircut, I decided I wanted to ride "Bessie Bicicleta" 300 miles this summer.  When I met that goal at the end of July, I decided I wanted to log 400 miles by the first day of school (August 18th).  I am currently at 368.  I will be riding quite a bit this week!  :)

The second thing I started this week was logging my food.  At first I logged with my Weight Watchers online account, but somewhere in the middle of the summer I decided to buy a fitbit and log with My Fitness Pal instead.  The cost of the fitbit was $73 (I am a bargain shopper--found it cheap on ebay), but My Fitness Pal is free.  I was paying $20 a month for my ActiveLink subscription and WW online combined.  In just a few months, my fitbit will have paid for itself!  :)

I really like the My Fitness Pal app!  It has a HUGE database and a scanner that scans everything.  My favorite thing is that at the end of the day when you hit the button saying that your entry is complete, it tells you how much you will weigh if every day is the same for the next 5 weeks.  One time (when I had had a rough week) it told me I would be 191 (this is after I had lost some and was in the early 180's).  That really made me kick it back into gear!  :)  Last night it said I would weigh 169.5!  I liked that one!

I also really like the fitbit app.  Mine wirelessly connects with blue tooth to my phone.  This means that I can just pull up the app to see all my stats!  A feature I really like on this app is how it compares you to your friends.  I push myself to be the first or 2nd every week.  :)

So...back to the title.  Why am I a loser?  Well....because I have lost 14 pounds since May!!!  As much as I want to set a deadline for me to hit my goal, I know that in doing so, that can really hurt my chances of actually reaching my goal.  So....for now I am content with making process goals (exercise daily, earn at least 10,000 steps a day, and track my food in MyFitnessPal).

Are you a LOSER too?  What is your story?  :)