Nerves....

Woke up this morning to an unbelieveable 172.8 on the scale.

After weeks of nearing the 180 mark again and entertaining thoughts of seeking (and booking!) outside help, whaddya know, I'm back down again.

Well, I'm tired of the fluctuations, and I'm meeting with the bodybuilders (ack!) in 2hrs. If anything, I loves me a good challenge, and I love that my body has become my project. If I can change this, I can do anything!

Wow.

Has it really been 2 YEARS?

Time flies when you have a baby....who knew they grew up so fast? One minute you're ready to pop at 42 wks of pregnancy + 100 extra pounds, next thing y'know, 2 yr

s has gone by in the sheer blink of an eye, and you're chasin' after a naked toddler who is giggling as she runs away from you when it's time for a splish splash. !!!

Lovin' every minute of it!

I don't suppose anyone is still, or will ever again, stumble across my little piece of cyber space, and I'm ok with that - this is a way for me to hold myself accountable in my relentless struggle to lose weight and get happy with myself again.

I went back to work, full time, last year - April 13/09, at an astounding 213lbs (after having lost a bit of weight in the last few months of my mat leave). I remember having to go in a week or 2 early to find new uniform pieces, as my sz

4-6 pants could barely cover one thigh, let alone my whole arse.

My "boss" helped me dig through piles of uni pieces, and I recall her pulling out a sz 20 pair of pants. "Oh you don't need a pair THAT big," she said as she tossed them aside. I secretly took note of where they landed, and after she left the room, having helped me find the sz 12 I said I was looking for, I snatched up the sz 20 pants and sheepishly went into the back office to try them on.

To my horror, they fit.

Perfectly.

Well that was just over a year ago, and hard work and perseverance paid off - I went down to 167, and a roomy sz 10 pant. But since August, I'd been hovering at the 170 mark. Couldn't bust too far away from that, and it was driving me nuts.

At the beginning of last month, I thought I'd figure out a way to change it up - the woman at GNC suggested a 30-day cleanse, said it would DEFINITELY he

lp me break through the plateau. I got suckered into it and she made the easy sale.

But 30 days later, my weight didn't go down. It certainly didn't stay the same, either.

It had gone UP.

I started feeling helpless and frantic - why now was everything spinning out of control? Why am I GAINING weight?

The scale could not give me a consistent number more than twice in a row if I continued to step on it in succession.

Frustration set in.

I realize now that I can't do this on my own anymore. I need help.

So tomorrow, I'm meeting with 2 fitness gurus from contestprep.ca.

I will record my body comp as they lay it out to me.

Nervous, yes. Excited, yes. Skeptical....yes.

We shall see how this goes....ideally, I would like to aim for a photography shoot, to celebrate my hard work and show off my new body. But I have to commit like I've never committed before. This isn't just about sculpting a new body, there's also money involved here.

Lots of it.

I can't let my bank account down!

Wish me luck!

Before I sign out for the night, here is a pic of me and my girl in LA back in February. I can't believe she's already 28 months old now!

Eh

Well, I suppose I should be elated over the ONE lb I lost this WI, so that's ok....but with all the stress of house-hunting and such, I'm craving crap like crazy! (Holy alliteration, Batman!)

I didn't get ANY APs in yesterday OR today - we have an agent coming down tonite to check out our digs to see how to price it, and baby's been a complete snugglebug - which normally, I LOVE, but I can't put her down to get anything done!

Except bake a crust for a chocolate pudding dessert for my hubby.

Scratch that....for ME. (He's not home for another hour, what he doesn't know about, he won't miss!)

Speaking of which, the graham crust is done baking. Ok, so I made it HEALTHY with l/f margarine 'n stuff....whatever, I don't even really care today!

Before I go retrieve said crust from the oven (which I should do asap before this house burns down and we can't sell it for carp!), here's a pic of my baby I took this morning! We got her a tray for her Bumbo seat, and she kept pushing all her toys off of it! Soooo cute!!!

Someone switched the mirrors in my house...

So last weekend was my daughter's baptism - with out-of-town guests, lots of visiting ensued, my poor girl's schedule was out of whack - and so was my eating.

Are you KIDDING me? A big celebration with Ukrainians, of COURSE I had to serve perogies, meatballs, etc., but I also balanced it out with a veggie platter.

The latter remained untouched.

A house full of Ukrainians and a veggie platter? It was a nice thought with good intentions! And then with all those leftovers, well, they weren't going to eat themselves!, so needless to say I didn't even BOTHER weighing in on Tuesday! Strictly guesstimated what the scale might have said. I probably wasn't too far off.

And then, as if feeling all doughy like a perogy myself wasn't bad enough, I had "the moment".

I KNOW I put on 100lbs with my pregnancy. I KNOW I look nothing like how I did this time last year. But even with my sz 18 pants and my XXL top that I had specifically purchased to wear for Maddy's christening, I thought I looked pretty good when I stood in front of the full-length mirror in my bedroom as I was leaving for the church. I thought I was doing a good job of sucking in (of course, you can't suck in flabby stomach skin and ginormous porn-boobs!). I thought I looked pretty good for just having had a baby 3 months ago.

So I went to the church with confidence, hell, I even allowed people to take my picture.

Big mistake......and yet, a big awakening.

They sent me the pics from Maddy's baptism a couple of days later.

I gasped. I can't recall having been that mortified/horrified in years.

Who was that huge beached whale holding my daughter? My god, is that really ME?

NOT AT ALL what I saw in that mirror before I left the house. I had no idea how I REALLY look. I realize now that someone has swapped mirrors in my house with those in a circus' House of Mirrors. They gave me the extra-lengthening, uber-slimming mirror.

Well, I will be deceived no longer.

This really is the dawn of a new awakening. (Is that an Oprah book?!) A new me is on the horizon. I had a cosmetic procedure done yesterday. I'm going for a manicure/pedicure. I'm getting my hair done.....and most importantly, I'm following WW to a tee.

I have to keep reminding myself that it took me 9 months to put the weight on, and it won't come off overnight.

But I will keep the circus mirror regardless - no matter how deceiving it is, it's still nice to see what I can look like, eventually. Gives me something to work towards.

FINALLY

The scale moves in my favour!

It's only down 1 lb, but it's down nonetheless! WOOHOO!

Hopefully it's the beginning of a trend.....

Feelin' pretty good today, my baby slept through the night! So I'm kinda rested today - it's 1:30pm, and I've already got my 4 APs in! I may do more, depends on how the day plays out. Got some cleaning to do, some banana bread to bake - HEY, can anyone tell me how the oil/applesauce swap works? Is it a one to one ratio? Or do I still need some oil?

Well, I'm off to get the rest of my day going! Baby's napping in her cradle swing (a MUST HAVE for any new parent!), we'll see how much I can tackle today!

12 weeks til SUMMER?

Cripes, I've got some work to do!

Today I feel pretty good - tomorrow's WI (and incidentally, my baby girl turns 13 weeks old!), and even though I'm pretty convinced it'll be another repeat of the past couple of months (read: NO CHANGE ON THE SCALE), I think it's gonna be ok.

Of course, I'm saying that now because it isn't even 1pm yet and I've already earned 6 APS, and have eaten pretty healthfully. Lots of sabotaging can happen between now and WI!

God, I really have to stop with that pessimism!

But seriously, knowing that summer's literally 3 months away, and I'm back to work in a year, and knowing that my baby girl's growing so fast that soon she'll be walking and I'll need the energy to keep up with her, my whole mindset is changing, and I'm feeling pretty good about things.

Ok, so I did the treadmill, the elliptical, stretches and weights, and life is grand! (Wow, I really have an awesome baby! I'm only able to do this b/c she's napping!) It's almost time for Degrassi: The Next Generation (god, I'm pathetic!), so I'm gonna go get my lunch ready and prepare to wake her up for her bum change and her lunch.

But before I go, here's some video I took of her the other day (speaking of feeding)...I really DO feed my daughter, but you'd never know it by the looks of this!

I really am lucky - great husband, beautiful daughter, wonderful friends and family - life is good, I'm the luckiest girl ever!

Yo-yo's are supposed to be FUN!

Well, not when it comes to the scale, that's for sure!

I thought it'd be super easy, that I'd just watch the pounds melt away after Maddy was born - NOT SO! I thought breastfeeding was supposed to help deplete the massive amount of extra weight I put on. AS IF!

Of course she's totally worth it, I just didn't think I'd have this much of a struggle!

The good news is, I have a fabulously supportive husband who's helped to set up our home gym so that I have easy access to all my equipment without having to struggle to take it out or put it away when I'm finished - now, it's all right there, right in front for me to use...as they're intended, not just as clothes hangers anymore!! HA!

And now that Maddy almost kinda has a routine, I can almost count on being active everyday while she naps. It's just been lately, she's too much of a snugglebug and I can't seem to put her down for her regular naps, and our schedules get thrown for a loop and I'm super tired! She's just hitting another growth spurt, I know this too shall pass...in fact, now that she's in her cradle swing (Mommy's TRYING to get her to have her afternoon nap), I should really be taking advantage of this time...ok, here I go!

:)

But before I sign off for today (again, sorry for the hiatus), Madds and I had such fun this morning, I had to pull the camera out - seriously, how cute is my little girl?!!! 12 weeks old already.... such a little lady...