Need to be kept accountable to help meet goals

[scorch]

Hi everyone.

So as some of you know I suffer from depression and anxiety.  I'm trying to live my life to the fullest, but as anyone who has a mental illness knows, it can sometimes be very difficult to get your butt into gear and do what needs doing,

I am often overcome by feelings of worthlessness and that I am a failure.  I know that these feelings are lying to me, I AM precious and beautiful and worth so much!  I HAVE accomplished many things and will continue to do... but you know, the feelings can still drag you down sometimes.

Anywho... I've been talking to my husband (who is remarkably understanding and patient with my erratic behavior/mood swings) and we've decided to set some goals for us to aim for, so that we can reach our MEGA GOAL which is to undergo IVF treatment and hopefully start a family.

I have PCOS which is a genetic disorder that means it is incredibly difficult to have children.  It also has about a zillion other side effects including high risk of depression, higher risk of diabetes plus plenty of physical effects all which make me feel like a hideous freak who is hardly a woman at all. We've been trying to have kids for 5 years now, but all treatments have come to naught.  We will have to undergo IVF, but it is a long process that costs heaps of money... and we just don't have the funds.  This kind of set us both back and over the last year or so we've been sitting stagnant on the kid's issue and it's been negatively affecting our marriage.

So the other night we decided enough was enough.  We have to get serious about having kids, which means working towards our MEGA GOAL. 

We're going to attack this on two fronts.  First, my husband is trying to pick up some extra work as a security guard as well as his normal day job.  Any money he makes from that is going straight into a special 'baby making' bank account.  He's also been putting aside a little each week for the last couple of years, but now we're hoping to boost that.  I am also putting a little from my wage into the account too.  It's already a struggle for us financially, but we'll make it work because this is something we really want.

The second part of our goal is for me to lose a whole lot of weight so that I'll be in prime fitness when we can finally undergo treatment.  I have to lose about 40kg.  I know that sounds like a lot, but I'm really heavy even though I look like I weigh a lot less  (thank goodness!)

This is where you guys come in.  Because of my depression, I struggle to start things.  It's hard to get out of bed in the morning, so it's really hard to summon the energy to hop on the treadmill and do a workout. 

I've got a home setup of a cheapo treadmill and a rowing/cycling machine, so I've got easy access to equipment and no excuses.  

So it it's not too much trouble, will someone touch base with me once or twice a week to keep me accountable and make sure I'm actually exercising and eating healthily?   Does anyone else need to lose weight and want me to help keep you accountable and on track?  Is there a whole bunch of us that want to get healthier and we could all keep each other accountable?

I hope that some people will think this is a good idea.  When we share the load we can go further than we ever could on our own.

[Neil_1]

Dear Scorch.

I'm on the case!  🙂

Firstly though, I am bowing to you and your hubby for the planning of this, the effort that you're both going to go to, in order to achieve this MEGA goal.  I hope others can come here and word better what I tried ... for some reason I just couldn't get out exactly what I was trying to say, so I ran with what I produced above.

Ok Scorch ... do you have an exercise plan set up yet?

Have you started?  (oh oh, and we don't need to know any weights involved here;  you've stated approx how much you want to lose and so, we can just use that figure as a benchmark and from that, we can count down from there).

I do LOVE the fact that you've mentioned doing your exercise first thing of a morning, as that is the most beneficial time of the day to be ridding one's unwanted body weight.

Big tick to you for exercising;   enormous tick to you for the healthy eating aspect as well.  It's nigh on impossible to lose weight if you don't factor in those two conditions.

Water Scorch.  Do you drink it?  The body needs it and it's also highly beneficial with helping to reduce body fat.

Green Tea - if you like it, then BRILLIANT - because it obviously uses lots of water as well, but is also a great diuretic.

Asparagus - as above with the comment about green tea, except you don't mix it with water.  Steamed is usually a great way to have them or just even fresh.  If you don't like them, then no worries.  If you haven't tried them, then give them a go.

Carbs - try not to take in the bad carbs - which are like your pastas (any kinds of pastas aren't generally good for reducing weight - and the bad thing about them, is that they are usually consumed of an evening and then what happens?  We sit down and then go to bed).  Breads of most descriptions aren't that flash ... but I guess if you do want them, definitely avoid your white bread varieties.  Basmati rice is good, but try to avoid just your stock standard normal white rice.

Sugars.  Not sure how you like your coffee, but if you can, please cut out sugars from your coffee as well.

Look Scorch, I've given a bit of info there to get through ... but I'll be here with you all the way through this.

I'm so pleased you've made this start.

ps:  any other forum members who feel like they want to jump on board, and you want to let myself and Scorch know that'd be brilliant.  And I believe EVEN BETTER for Scorch cause if there's even just "one" other, it'll be good to have a 'companion' throughout this journey.

Way to go Scorch ...

Kind regards

Neil

[Jo3]

Hi Scorch

THANK GOD NEIL IS HERE!!!  I knew Neil would reply LOL

Scorch I feel for you but give you credit because you are so brave, you are strong and you will get there.  I understand what it's like to want a child and not being able to fall pregnant.  It took us 5 years before I fell pregnant after seeing a naturopath and reflexologist. I can only imagine the heartache you and your husband are going through.

Now for the good news !!! - This is great Scorch - you are on the right track with exercise, saving extra money for the IVF and having a positive outlook.

Listen to Neil - he is amazing with his exercise suggestions and advice.  As I am typing this I am dressed in gym gear but nowhere to go.  There is no motivation to go down the beach for a walk.  BUT now after reading your post - I am heading down the beach for a walk. It is the best time to go in the mornings.

I am excited for you to start your journey and I pray and hope that one day you will have a beautiful healthy baby.  

Let us know how you go with your exercise and eating plan.  Good luck, wishing you all the very best.

Jo xxx

ps. off to the beach for my morning walk thanks to you Scorch & Neil !!!

[scorch]

Hi Neil.  Words can't express how thankful I am for your reply 🙂  I was feeling really nervous asking for help, so the support and enthusiasm you and Jo have both shown is encouraging. 

I do have an exercise plan, but I would welcome any input. 

What I have done is print off a chart listing my starting weight, several goal weights and then my ultimate goal weight.  I have tried to lose large amounts of weight in the past only to be so overwhelmed by the long way still to go that I give up and feel like a failure.  So this time I'm going to aim for several short goals and give myself a small reward every time I reach one.

eg:  when I reach weight goal #1 - I get a 20 minute massage from the hubby.  (this one happens when I lose 6kg from my current weight)  I have 7 goals, including my ultimate goal which we have decided to celebrate by having a romantic weekend getaway. 

My plan is to exercise for at least an hour each day for 5 days in the week.  I have a treadmill and a rowing/cycling machine, so I thought I could do something like 20 minutes walking, 30 minutes cycling, 10 minutes rowing.I thought I would exercise Mon, Tues, Wed, Fri, Sat. Thursdays I have training for my volunteering role in an emergency service, so I don't want to be too tired for that.  And I'd like a day off each week so I thought Sundays could be my lazy days.

I tried to start this plan a couple of weeks ago, but I'd only been doing it for 4 days when the fires came by our house and threw me right off track.  It's only this week that things have settled down enough for me to get back into a routine.  But now I'm just finding it sooooo hard to get into 😞  I've only exercised one day this whole week, and even then I didn't go the whole hour.  I had lost 2 kg in that first week, but I've been eating crap food since the fires and I've put 1 kg back on.

That's it for the exercise side of things.  Now I'll address the healthy eating side.

I love healthy food, but find it really difficult to physically prepare it.  Damn you depression!  Making me feel so lethargic and unimportant that all I want to do is lie down, curled into a ball.  Blergh!  Because of this I often go for the easy option which is take away, or buy something frozen I can just heat in the microwave.  I think this is my biggest problem, the food I eat. 

To help get into good habits (and also to improve our communication) my hubby and I have started a policy of eating dinner together at the table between 6-7pm.  We used to just eat our meals in front of the tv whenever time we felt hungry.  We've only had this policy in effect for a few days now, but so far so good.

Now to address the foods you stated:

water -  I don't drink enough.  some days I'm really good and will carry a water bottle with me, those days I'll finish the water bottle twice.  Other days I might only have a glass or two.

green tea -  this is one of my favourites.  I don't like normal tea, but I do enjoy green tea with a twist of lemon.  I don't drink it often though, so I think I will try to have a cup every morning.  Regarding teas, are herbal teas any good for you?  I really enjoy ginger and lemon tea, is this doing me any good?

Asparagus -  sorry Neil.... I hate asparagus!  lol.  I just can't stomach it.

Carbs - this is where I fall down.  I eat a lot of things like pasta and potato.  They are the staples of my hubby's cooking, and he's a really good cook.  How much pasta a week is a good amount?  Or should I cut it out all together?  Rice I am good with, I always use basmati.

Sugar - I love my coffee with no milk, no sugar and strong enough to dissolve a spoon.   I am a sucker for chocolate and lollies though.  Although, if they are not in the house I should be ok, so maybe I'll do a clean out and send any sugary treats to my mother.

Ok so I've rattled on for ages.  I am sorry about that!  Thanks again for being there for me and helping me get healthy.  I really appreciate it!!!  I do hope we get some more forum members on board, that way we can all help keep each other strong.

[scorch]

Jo,

The words you wrote brought me to tears, but in a good way.  So often people just don't understand the grief that is a constant part of your life when you can't conceive.  It follows me around - and not just the physical reminders that come with my medical condition, but something more.  It's like I'm haunted by the ghost of something that has never been and might never eventuate. It's so hard to explain, but I know that you understand and that is great comfort to me.  So, from the bottom of my heart, thank you for understanding.  And I'm really really really glad that you were able to fall pregnant after 5 years of trying 🙂 

The other thing about your post, this is the part that made me grin, was that you decided to go for your morning walk.  That's awesome 🙂  Sometimes all we need is a nudge, I know I do, and hopefully we can all be here to nudge each other when we need it.

Tell me, how was your walk this morning?  I'm very jealous that you live near a beach.  I'm totally land locked, but I love water so much.  Not so much to swim in, but to look at and run my hands and feet through.  I grew up with a clear little creek running along the back of my farm.  We used to watch the platypus play and fish for rainbow trout.  Do you enjoy living near the beach?

[Jo3]

Hey Scorch

I am glad I can help you.  Yes my morning walk, well I took my 21 yr old son and dog with me.  We chatted and walked (my son and me, not the dog)!!!

Living near the beach has been a great thing for me as when I am really down I can go down and sit and just walk in the water, feel the sand or look at the mountains surrounding the bay.  We live about 5 min drive or 15 min walk to the beach.  When the kids were little I would take them down the beach after school; cheap entertainment during the holidays.  Now they are older my husband and I just go.

So thanks for the nudge to get me going this morning.  I am going to walk again tonight with my husband and I will go again tomorrow morning.

I hope you had a nice day too.

Jo

[Neil_1]

Hi Scorch,

Well you beat me to it ... because I was going to suggest in my next post to you, to create yourself mini-goals along the way.  Little ones that are achievable ... and maybe even put them on your fridge.  For a couple of reasons - if you're ever feeling like you want to 'snack' on something that you perhaps shouldn't, you can see your list AND also for the very same reason, that it's there and you can see it often.  And as you go along on this journey, when you do tick off these little goals, it will give you a very positive and excellent feeling of satisfaction to see the little goals ticked off.

You enjoy green tea ... Scorch, that's brilliant ... yes, so drink as much of it as you like.

Here's something that I do with regard to my food and I have to do it this way, otherwise, it just wouldn't work.  On the weekend when it's grocery shopping time, we buy up bulk for the particular kind of meat that I'm eating.  At the moment it's chicken, so I buy up big and then cook however many meals worth I can get from the amount I've bought;  but it's usually between the 14-16 container worth.

I get chicken breast and cut it into thin-ish strips;   add some chicken salt, some italian herbs and a little splash of soy;  obviously the soy first, otherwise it'd wash the other two things off.  Then I place them under the griller;  I've found this a pretty easy way;   and a minute or two later, turn them and a minute or so later, they're done and continue the process.  Once all cooked, I cut them up into small pieces.  I then get my kitchen scales out and with my chinese containers, I then measure out (usually around 170g) per serving - but that can vary depending who you're portioning for.  At the same time or earlier, I also steam up a whole stack of green beans (you can add in other vegies that you like) and also steam up a fair stack of sweet potato.  Then place beans and sweet potato in containers.  And then freeze them, and get a couple out the night before, the next day.  If that makes sense.

Sure it takes a while, but once it's done, you've got plenty of meals to last for a while and no need to worry about meals in that regard for a while.

Sorry about the longness of yet another epic from me.

I'll come back soon with some more tips.

Cheers

Neil

Next will be to focus in on your exercise regime, which sounds very good to what you've described already.

[scorch]

Jo, it sounds like you had an absolutely lovely walk with your son.  That's great 🙂

It sounds like you live in a beautiful place.

Did you end up going for another walk with your husband?

[Neil_1]

Hi Scorch

How’s it going?   Your friendly on-line PT here.  🙂 I’ll apologise first up just in case this ends up being a “Neil-like” massive post.

Also with regard to little goals … ‘if’ you don’t achieve one or more of them in the timeframe that you have picked, don’t beat yourself up about that.  Just get back onto the exercises, diet, etc and keep on focussing on the prize, the goal. 

Little setbacks will happen, it’s important to recognise this and by knowing that they will happen from time to time will assist you greatly for when they do happen.  The worst thing to happen from this is if you don’t say meet your goal when you thought you would and it can be a human response to then say, “Bugga it … stuff this, it’s too hard, I’m not going to do this anymore”.  But we’ve gotta be the opposite of that.  “Ok, I didn’t quite reach my target as yet … but that’s cool … I know I’m on the right track;  I know I’m doing the right things – I’ll just continue down this track that I’m going on and it WILL happen”. I can speak more about the above if you’d like me to, but I’ll move on for now.

I LOVE that you’ve drawn up all your goals and also a reward system along the way – may I suggest another reward for you in achieving your ultimate goal?   Before you go away with hubby, why not pop along to your favourite dress shop and get yourself a lovely new outfit to take with you on that ‘weekend getaway’?

 Your exercise plan – brilliant brilliant brilliant.  🙂  

Treadie – 20 minutes walking – work into it – nice and easy to start with and you’ll know what is easy for you – and then as you warm into it, start to increase the speed;  it’s all about raising your heart rate to be working just that little bit harder – which in turn will begin to switch on your metabolism as well.  It’s a beautiful thing is the human body.  There’s also the option for increasing the incline as well.  So play around with that.  I’ve got more to add with regard to the treadie, but I’ll save that for a week or so’s time when your fitness is getting a little more increased.

Again with cycling, there’s many different ways to approach this … by varying obviously your speed that your going by the pedalling that you’re doing, to making the resistance tougher and again, in a week or so, I’ll come back to see what other options we can add in here.

Rowing, I think is possibly one of the best cardio / fat loss options you can do … firstly it targets almost all body parts.  I won’t name all the body parts, but if you think about it, you can break it down to see just how many body parts are used with this.  It’s an awesome piece of equipment.  And guess what, yes, I have some really testing kinds of torture (whoops, I mean fun workouts) that you can do as the weeks roll by and your fitness increases.

And the thing is Scorch, with all of the above, your fitness will steadily improve all the time.  Having said that, the body is very smart and clever.  As in, if you just do the same old thing day in day out, your body will know this and it then only does what it has to do.  So what we need to do then when your body is fine with what you’ve been doing, it’s then time to raise the bar, raise the intensity to take the body to the next level.  With this, this is how we increase our fitness and also increase our metabolism at the same time.

Volunteering in an emergency service … way to go Scorch what a fantastic thing to do.  🙂   And I dare say you won’t be sitting down and playing cards doing something like that, so you’ll be up and about. And that’s the key with exercise (dear everyone, not just Scorch) – it’s about being able to move around and keep the body as active as we can. 

I know so well that it can be hellishly difficult as for a lot of us, bed just sounds like the best option there is available – I’m at work today, but holy smoke, I was so close to going back to bed and not getting up. Again sorry for rabbiting on so much, but this is one thing that I do know quite a bit about and am also heaps passionate about it, both for myself but also it gives me a massive thrill if I’m able to help others with their personal quests.

And you know I’ll be back again here, you can count on it.

Yours in movement

Neil

[scorch]

Hi Neil,

So I tried to reply to you twice on Friday, but I think gremlins must have got in the lines because nothing went through.

So let's try again!

Firstly, you got my mouth watering with your chicken recipe!  I am definitely going to give it a shot.  yuuuummmm!

Also, thanks for the hint on preparing meals in advance and freezing them.  I think this will really help me cut down on the bad food I eat.  When I can't be bothered cooking after a day at work all I need to do is heat up a healthy meal.  Much better than popping out to grab some takeaway.

On to exercise, I'm glad you like my plan.  I didn't realise the body only does what it has to do and will adjust if I only do the same thing, so I will play about with the resistance and speed on the machines and try to keep it different.

Volunteering is one of my favourite things to do.  It keeps me very active, there's a lot of carrying and walking and heavy equipment... so hopefully the fitter I get the more stamina I'll have to fulfill my duties.

And now for the bad news.  I injured my back last week so I've had about 4 days of hobbling like an old woman - I've not been able to exercise at all and have pretty much been bed-ridden.  I'm at work today though, so we'll see how it goes.  I hope that I'll be better soon so that I can keep working on getting fit and healthy.

I'll keep you updated.

-Scorch