If you would have told me........

I don't mean to sound like a broken record, but I truly am shocked at myself.  If you would have told me a few months ago, that I was going to get with the program, change my ways and lose weight, I would have told you you were full of it.   Today, I'm 42.6 lbs. gone and to top it off, I won a weight loss competition I was a part of at work!  Seriously; lazy, chubby, unmotivated ME won a weight loss competition!  I don't mean I won by a hair, I won by 66% like holy cow!  To be honest, I didn't over exert myself, I just followed my WW program.  I lost 16 lbs. in 8 weeks.  That really is astonishing to me.  

What am I going to do with my "pot of gold" you ask? Many people thought I should buy new clothes.  New clothes are short lived for me now because I don't intend to stay in one size for very long.  I want something that will help me with my journey in addition to last longer than a few weeks like a new piece of clothing.  Maybe a Coach purse?  Nah, I don't need those and they won't help me on my journey.  But a new bluetooth headset will! I always am bothered by the cord of my current earbuds when I'm walking.  And last week, when I was at a sales conference, I used a treadmill in the gym at the hotel and was afraid of jerking my phone off the treadmill because the cord to my earbuds was too short.  So, now the quest begins for bluetooth earbuds.  I'm open to suggestions if you have any.  

I did not blog last week because I was busy at our annual sales conference.  Always a good time to see people I only see once a year.  This year, it was really fun because people kept asking me where the rest of me was.  I'll be honest, I loved it!  That is one of the things I am enjoying about this journey.  People are calling me skinny.....seriously?  Me?  C'mon now!  Their kind words and recognition are truly motivational to me and what helps me keep plugging away.  

When I was away last week, I was concerned about my eating.  The last weigh in for the competition was the morning I came back to the office from the meeting.  Are you kidding me?  I have an opportunity for all you can eat 3 times a day and to eat at a nice restaurant downtown, and I have to behave?  So I prepared and went in with a gameplan.

My first game plan was pack my snacks that I usually consume daily.  My first daily item was my Weight Watchers oatmeal.  Easy to travel and delicious!  I took a few apples and my handy dandy 16 slice apple slicer.  I also took a portioned out bag of Special K chips for each day and an extra one in case I got the late night munchies.  Cheerios you say? I had a bag with me at all times in case I got the munchies.  Popcorn was also my friend.  I took a few brown paper bags and a few portioned bags of popcorn kernels, hoping and praying I would have access to a mircrowave.  Along those lines, I made a new discovery (thanks to one of my colleagues who travels often) - Ziplock steamer bags.  Put a sweet potato in one of these bad boys and nuke it for 7 minutes - pure deliciousness!  So I took 3 sweet potatoes in steamer bags as well.  Special K brownies and Weight Watcher peanut butter mini bars were also part of my arsenal. I knew there was going to be dessert lurking around and wanted to be prepared as I could be.  

Coffee was another dilemma.  My current coffee regimen is fat free half n half along with sugar free coffee syrups.  Yes, I have these items at work and utilize them at least once a day if not more often.  At home too!  I couldn't take those things with me easily so I took it up on the advice of a WW leader I spoke with to use the Weight Watchers smoothie mixes as Coffee Creamer.  I should have tried that before I actually wanted to do it.  Not so much for me however, I only put half of one in a cup of coffee and well, it wasn't tasty enough for me.  So coffee was consumed with skim milk and lots of Splenda.

For breakfast and lunch, I mostly ate my own food because there wasn't much I could have that was served.  I made the best choices I could combined with the food arsenal I took with me and it ended up being a successful week.  I should have drank more water last week for sure.  But my steps were out of this world!  One day I had over 22,000!  For a gal that has a goal of 10,000/day that hasn't been achieving that goal lately, That was awesome!  I'm very proud of how I handled the food last week.  In the past, it would have been a free for all and I would have gorged myself.  Instead, I prepared, planned and was a success.  That doesn't happen often in my life and I'm so grateful it did last week.

Those of you stopping by for the first time, thank you so much for doing so.  Those of you that are coming for a visit again, I'm so glad you stopped by.  I am going to work hard at trying to post more about my daily routine with Weight Watchers as well as my journey of school, momhood and just life in general.  I hope what I write inspires someone.  If that's you, fantastic.  If not, that's ok too.  Keep stopping by, you never know what will be the next topic on my front porch.