A few bad days doesn't mean failure

I have to admit, I had plenty of time to blog over the weekend, but I didn't want to blog over the weekend because I was eating poorly and I didn't want to admit it. I binged a bit on Saturday and felt bad about myself. And I didn't start to spiral, per se, but I did get into the whole, "Well, you may as well call today a wash," type of feeling. Today, however, I had personal training with my new personal trainer, Jack. And I was a bit nervous because I hadn't been to the gym since last Wednesday given my crazy work schedule - Thursday was late stay (until 6:30), Friday was later stay (until 11pm), and I worked Sunday and Monday (the holiday that most everyone else gets off). Sooo, yes, I could have gone to the gym Saturday, but I was all: I want the afternoon and evening to be with my friends and my morning to catch up with life at home (i.e., cleaning, balancing my budgets, etc).

Anywho, I digress. I met with my personal trainer today and I was nervous because of the lack of working out. I know it hadn't been a full week, but I was all, "Oh, shit. I'm going to be super out of shape and he's going to notice and judge me." And then you know what? I rocked my workout. I got in a good 28 minutes of elliptical before my session and then I rocked my session. Jack had to remind me to take breaks because he told me I was being too much of a machine. But, I wanted to keep the energy up and keep my heart rate up, so I kept on going. We focused on back, triceps, and something else (probably biceps given the way my arms are feeling). I'm probably going to be all jiggly armed tomorrow, which might be a bad thing given the fact that I have 6 surgeries...

Anywho, the eats today were decent. The trough (which is where the residents get free lunch) was legitimately all carbs. I grabbed some veggie lasagna (one scoop) and then one scoop of mac and cheese (which was SO GREASY) and filled the rest of my plate with salad. I ate a pear as well and then was treated to a yogurt by a co-resident when I complained that I was still hungry.

Tomorrow is going to be a fasting day, which should be relatively easy with my back-to-back surgeries. I'm thinking I may also fast on Thursday and Friday because my sweet tooth has been majorly flaring and a nice food reset may be in order. We'll see.

Today's breakfast

Today's dinner

The Memorial Day weekend team

Sunday night reading by the lake

I love being so close to the water!

That's all for now. No weigh-in this week - I'm on my period and I didn't want to face the scale after my overeating this weekend. I'll do a weigh-in next Monday!

What do you do when you've had a bad eating day or meal? How do you convince yourself to hop back on the wagon?

Living my life rather than letting it pass on by

One of the things I stopped doing in medical school was living my life. When I wasn't tied to my books, I felt as though I should have been and punished myself by not letting myself do things I really enjoyed, by not being healthy, and by not treating myself with respect. I'm going to try really hard not to do the same thing in residency. Yes, my job is important. Yes, the health of all my patients really matters to me. And yes, I want to do my absolute best all the time. But I don't want to lose myself again. I don't want to stop living life. I don't want to skip the gym because I feel I haven't earned it. I don't want to say no to social times with friends because I should be studying. In all honesty, an hour is not going to make or break me. And that's something I kinda reminded myself in fourth year (when we had a lot more free time). And that's also why I'm hoping I can sustain my blog this year.

Anywho, one of the reasons I didn't blog last night is because some co-workers went out to grab dinner and drinks later in the evening and of course, I had to go. But, I went after I worked out with my new personal trainer. I'm kinda skeptical about this trainer. Having worked out with a personal trainer before, I felt like the intensity was much lower than what I was expecting. That being said, Troy explained that yesterday was kind of a baseline check  for him to see what I can do. He seems like a good guy and I was very honest with him. I told him I would be using him as an additional source of accountability because I will lose weight and work hard if someone's keeping track with me, but I have a harder time/won't do it if I'm just doing it on my own. We're going to do weigh-ins and measurements and all that jazz, but he says he only likes to do that once a month. I personally think that once a week weigh-ins are better because it keeps me better motivated if the scale doesn't change in a week. He says that if I have a bad weigh-in he wouldn't want it to affect me. But we'll see. I might be able to wear him down. When I worked out with Mark, I used to have a 3 pound a week goal. I think that's pretty reasonable, but I think Troy is intending me to go a bit slower. We'll see. I have no problem telling him he needs to push me harder.

Other than that, things are pretty okay. Today was my second fasting day. It was a lot harder than it was on Monday because I sat idle during a lot of the day given that I was on triage when we had our PA (physician's assistant) who handles a majority of triage. I worked on my knot tying and chatted with the med students and other residents. I also did some circumcisions and made some calls I'd been meaning to make that I hadn't had the time to make up until this point. I did as much as possible to stay busy because you definitely feel the hunger more when you're not doing anything. I know it'll get easier because I used to fast in Uganda all the time - going home for lunch was too much of a pain in the ass. So, it was breakfast around 8 a.m. and dinner around 9:30 a.m. with some mango juice for lunch (which doesn't exactly count). Today, however, I had my typical breakfast and then had a buttload of shrimp for dinner since I was really hungry. I also opted out of the gym since we didn't get out until a little after 6 and I wanted to eat ASAP. I also wanted a chill night at home since I haven't had one of those in a while. I watched America's Got Talent and I'm going to head to bed soon, I think.

Two photos for you:

Breakfast (not pictured: yogurt protein smoothie)

Dinner

Thanks for the yummy dessert recipes! I'm thinking I'll try baking something this weekend after I hit up Eastern Market (a massive farmer's market in Detroit). Now, does anyone have a low cal dinner recipe they'd recommend? It would majorly help with my fasting dinners that should be about 300 calories max.

Tender moments

Sleeping with a sprained ankle is not exactly pleasant. I took some ibuprofen (800 mg) right before bed so as to alleviate the worst of the pain. But I woke up a couple times with some pain every time I moved (I move a lot in my sleep). And when I finally did get up, my ankle was still pretty painful, so I opted out of my morning gym trip and decided to not hit the gym the first day post-sprain. Boo. But the pain is much more manageable today. I only took ibuprofen once and was able to walk normally. Sure, there were some tender moments, but it really wasn't too bad. I did wear the damn air cast, but I'm glad I opted out of the crutches because there was really no need. 

Anywho, I stayed under my calorie goal for the day. My normal goal range is 1,690 - 2,040 calories (SparkPeople calculated it for me based on my weight loss goals and my workout skillz), but I thought it'd be wise to keep it on the lower end without being crazy. Now I just have to go back to the gym and do as much upper body and left leg stuff as I can. I really think that the elliptical is out, but I'm going to give it the old college try tomorrow.

Umm, yeah. That's about it. I spent most of the day half ass studying. I need to get my shit back together come tomorrow given that my exam is in a week. Fuuuuuuck. Must know all the things.

Photos of literally everything I ate today:

Breakfast

Morning snack

Lunch, part 1

Lunch, part 2

Afternoon protein smoothie since I was still hungry

Zucchini pizzas - must try this again with thinner zucchini slices

Dinner, part 2: still hungry edition

Evening snack

Dessert

Last snack of the night

Today's numbers

Today's positive: Uhh, not breaking my foot yesterday? How about trying a new recipe (zucchini pizzas) that I'll have to try again because the zucchini:pizza ratio was >>>1, which was inappropriate.

Waking up on the wrong side of the bed

I definitely woke up on the wrong side of the bed this morning. Though I'm not sure there's a right side when you get less than 5 hours of sleep, but I was a grouch all day. I don't think I was mean to anyone, but I wasn't my usual bubbly self at work. And I really didn't care.

After work, I wasn't even going to try to go to the gym because apparently there's such a thing as thundersnow and it was proving to be one hell of a bitch of a storm. The roads were awful and I got stuck going up my driveway, which really frustrates me because my landlord has been doing a pretty poor job of keeping up with the snow this winter. I've never gotten stuck in my parking lot or the driveway before this year and it's happened to me 5 or 6 times this year. So, I got home in a piss poor mood and nearly ate everything in sight (mostly cuz I was also hungry), but instead I made myself two glasses of crystal light and munched on a serving size of pretzels and started working on some write-ups. Then, when I was calmed down and more rational about serving sizes, I made myself some dinner.

So you needn't read between the lines: I didn't work out today. I told myself I could do some Wii Just Dance, but it was 9:30 when I realized I should start getting ready for bed and I just didn't feel up to it. Don't judge me. I'll get my exercise in. I'm not about to ask you guys to help hold me accountable and then just not work out. But I probably won't get my first gym visit in until Wednesday the way this week is looking schedule-wise. You've been warned. Please don't shame me until Wednesday.

Food for today:

Breakfast

French toast juice

Breakfast for dinner

I grew up using cinnamon and sugar for my french toast, not syrup

Evening snack

Tomorrow's lunch: ham and cheese sandwich with fruit

Tomorrow's morning snack

Not pictured were the four brownies I ate today. I know, I know. But it was one of the medical student's birthdays and his mom brought them in. The good thing is that really, I feel as though I only ate 2 because they were so small, but I would have survived had I eaten just one. I know that now. Hindsight is always 20/20. Blah, blah. Stop judging.

Here's to a better tomorrow!