Seriously, I wonder. If I update this constantly, surely it will shame me into sticking to things.

Assuming I don't lie. I mean, really, I could totally lie. But I'm going to {eventually} be posting pictures of myself. If I say I'm still doing x and post pics of me that look the same or worse after going on about my progress, I imagine that would be a bit suspicious, eh? Also assuming I actually continue writing. Right now, it's all fresh and new and exciting. A blog! Weight loss! New ideas! A bright future! No more fatness! But how long will that continue? Will my ADHD rear its ugly head {like it's already threatening to do.. I swear, I am so easily distracted} Will I skip a day or two and think "Oh, I'll just pick it up again after _____" and forget about it until later when the post holiday fat gain guilts me into stepping on a scale to survey the damage?

I hope not. Help me keep the dust off this journal. Blog. Whatever.

So where was I...?

Oh, yes. Exercise.

So with my birthday looming and my weight creeping {up}, I decided to forgo the usual birthday gifts and asked for an elliptical.  I chose that particular machine because A) it was cheaper than most and B) it had a weight limit of 300lbs, which I was embarrassingly close to. {Ok, maybe it was the other way around. It was certainly the cheapest I could find with decent reviews that had a weight limit of 300lbs...} That, and a knee brace. {old knee injury, not improved by my excessive weight. Didn't want to cause any major or irreparable damage and such}. S was against the whole thing. Not because he wasn't encouraging me. It's not like he wants me to stay fat. He just thinks that 99.99999% of exercise equipment is destined to become expensive dust collectors and space taker-uppers. Which, you know, was also a concern of mine, that's why I went for the cheapest option I could find that would work for me. I may have mentioned that I'm flighty. {sounds better than flaky} and who the hell knows if I'll stick to it. So minimum investment possible is the way to go for me.

It arrived. S put it together for me. I tentatively took a few minutes "spin". Holy crap, talk about feeling the burn. I checked to make sure it was on the lowest setting. Yep. Fml. But I did it. I mean, only like.. one episode of Parks and Recreation worth.. with frequent breaks for water.. and to catch my breath.. and to exclaim "Wow, this is hard!" while resting on the handle bars, lazily ellipticalling backwards... but I did it!!! By the end of the first session, I was quite literally dripping with sweat. 

And I kept doing it. And I got better. I had a solid week of doing it and it got easier. I improved. It almost became easy!*

THEN, of course something happened. My mom came to town {sort of} and I had to drive about 50 miles away to stay with her. I hadn't seen her in years. Hell, she hadn't even met two of my kids. So no way was I passing that up {we had a wonderful time, btw!}. Of course, my exercise went out the window for those days.. and I went crazy with food.. and the night I came home, I didn't exercise because I was so exhausted... but I'm starting again tomorrow night. I'd do it tonight but I have a weird OCD thing about starting things on Mondays. {Honestly, not even making excuses, I really do hahah} I'm actually looking forward to it! Who knew. My body loved exercising. I have no idea if I lost a single pound**, but who the hell cares? I felt better than I'd felt in years.

KANDI'S NOTES:
Exercise. Even if it hurts while you're doing it, afterward your body is going to feel great.


*this is an outright lie. 
**I really need a new scale. We recently moved and I may have lost the scale. Sigh.

As I stated previously, I started off chunky. That's what you called it when you were talking about a kid. Chunky. Except I wasn't chunky, I was fat. Though I appreciated everyone trying to spare my fragile little girl feelings. 

After I had my first kid {S}, I ballooned. I have absolutely no idea what my weight was post birth, I imagine I blocked it out of my mind. It was big. After my second {D}.. then third {A#1}.. same thing. 

Between my third and fourth {C}, however, I lost a lot of weight. I achieved this by going to college, rarely eating, walking everywhere {no car} practically 24-7 classes and smoking a gazillion cigarettes. Clearly not the healthiest means to an end. I wasn't even trying to lose weight, it just happened naturally. Ok, well as naturally as possible for someone with the above habits for a year. I was down to what my supposed-to-be "ideal weight", 175. It was groovy. 

Then, I had C. Honestly, the whole pregnancy with C, I didn't gain an ounce. I lost a bunch, but didn't gain a thing. It was after I had him that things went down hill. All those cravings I never had whilst pregnant with him reared their ugly head and I put on all the weight I should have gained with him. Only after him. While breastfeeding. {You know, that thing that's supposed to help you lose weight. Yeah. Right.} Of course, it all snowballed until I was topping the scales post-birth of my 7th {R} at 286. Two. Hundred. Eighty. Six. Pounds. At 32. I was disgusted. Seriously so grossed out and disappointed with myself. My husband, bless him, loved me fat as much as he loved me thin. But I didn't love me. Seriously, I hated looking at myself in the mirror. So I decided to have a go at dropping some of this extra poundage.

My husband {S} had been on this diet he'd heard of from a friend who'd been extremely successful and lost a bunch of weight. Basically involved almost zero carb consumption. Which sounded like an awful lot of misery to my baking ears. {Bakers ears? I'm not actually a baker, but I love baking. I don't know how to word that, exactly. You get the point.} But I couldn't ignore what I was seeing. He dropped 30 pounds in about 3 or 4 months. Insane, right? Especially considering he's quite.. uhh.. sedentary. Seriously, he doesn't move unless he has to. Whereas I'm up chasing kids around all damn day. 

So I bit the bullet. I tried the diet.

And I lost 30 pounds in about 8 weeks. Seriously. I did amazingly well on the diet. But then we had company over.. and holidays... and I said to myself "Oh, I'll start it again after the In Laws leave" then "Oh, just after this next holiday" then "fuck it, forget about it". Just like that, all of my ambition. Gone. 

I didn't even SORT OF stay on it. I just jumped right back into carbs like I'd never left. Which is ridiculous, because honestly, I took to having no carbs like a fish in water. Or whatever that saying is. I felt AMAZING after the first couple of days {detox was a little piece of hell}. I had more energy and was more pleasant. I was more focused and happier than I'd been in ages. Yet I gave all that up for some Thanksgiving stuffing and Christmas cookies.

My desire to lose this weight {that I'd almost completely regained at the point of a week before writing this. Enjoy that sentence, there} was as strong as ever, but my motivation was gone. Completely disappeared. I had the perfect recipe for dropping pounds. Fat melting away like butter on a Southern California sidewalk. Yet I had absolutely no desire to start it up again. What the hell was {is} wrong with me?!?!

So months after this, my birthday looms closer in the distance. 275 pounds and 33. And I shrunk 2 inches over the course of 10 years. So my "ideal weight" is now 155. Nice. Further and further away from the light at the end of the tunnel.

I realize something about myself. I love food. I don't stick to diets because I hate them. I want to eat what I want to eat and that's all that I will eat. I'll stick to a diet for a couple of months, no problem, but I get bored with it. Especially if I've hit some sort of plateau. Which, admittedly, I had with the carb free thing. If only I'd added exercise...

And then it hit me. Exercise. That was the ticket. I looked into a gym membership, but.. well.. let's face it. I would never go. Ever. No, maybe I'd go once, then I'd be so embarrassed seeing all the fit people exercising that I'd leave at the quickest opportunity, never to return. That, plus.. well.. I have a lot of kids. Who the hell has the time to go to the gym with 87458947894 kids? Not me. If I have time to go to the gym, I'd rather be sleeping {currently lucky if I get 4 hours a night. 4 interrupted hours} So.. what were my options? 

An exercise machine. {and on that note, I've got to go take care of the brood, so I'll save the rest of the catching up for the next post or two}

KANDI'S NOTES
Carbs taste great and should be avoided at all costs.
I fail at avoiding carbs. 
I love carbs.
I'm fat.