i need a distraction

so these are the days i worry about the most. the days that i have nothing to do and britt is gone. these are the days in the past i would order a pizza and sit on the couch and watch tv for...lets estimate...9 hours. for real. it is even worse these days since i cant sleep past 8am any more due to my work schedule. so to occupy myself i thought it would be fun to total up the calorie and fat totals from some of my old favorite fast food meals.

first up, the aforementioned (great word) pizza. i always went with the papa john's works...grand total: 2,800 cal/112 grams of fat. yummy.

how about some of that fast food i use to love so much?

not only did i get fast food quite often, but when i got it i got WAY too much. these were some of my most common orders:

burger king:

whopper value meal with large fry and large coke PLUS two double cheeseburgers...total...any guess? 3140 cal and 169 grams of fat. disgusting.

micky d's:

angus delux value meal...again with large fry and large coke...and two double cheeseburgers: 2340 cal and 102 fat grams.

windy's: (some of you will get that)

1/2lb double with cheese with the frys and coke and two delux bacon cheeseburgers: 3020 cal and 146 fat.

wow...so not worth it. DISGUSTING!! never again, and to be honest, i dont even miss it...that much.

week one results...let's get this over with

i want to get this out of the way this morning cause i've been kinda nervous about stepping back on that scale. i have not yet weighed myself and will do so shortly. but before i do that i need a favor from you.

please call you congressman and demand that there is a law stating there needs to be a warning label on the packaging of fiber bars. seriously, you can get into some trouble if you eat too many. not cool.

ok, here we go.

starting weight: 375

current weight: 364.8

woah. more than i thought. great start. let's keep it going.

Brittany Weigh In Results Week 1

Hey Everyone,

Weighed myself this morning:

Starting Weight: 238

Current Weight: 234.6

Difference of: 3.4lbs

Awesome start for me!

12/29/2010 Brittany

Hello again,

Updating quickly on my promise of more exercise. I just completed my first day of Jillian's 30 Day Shred. The video was decent, minus the ending when Jillian says "You are well on your way to being shredded!" I don't know if I completely understanding what shredded means...I thought the term was shed...not shred. Regardless...

It's a 20 minute work out video with three levels. You begin with Level 1 and work your way up to Level 3. Each 20 minute workout (regardless of level) goes through 3 rotations of: 3 minutes of strength, 2 minutes of cardio, and 1 minute of abs. A brief warm-up and cool-down are included in the 20 minutes. I like that it switches exercises every 30 seconds to a minute. The moves (at least on Level 1) are easy to follow along with and don't require a lot of balance or flexibility. You are suppose to use a set of weights, but the only sets we have are 15 and 25 lbs...to much weight for me but not my strong husband! Instead, I used soup cans, until I get a chance to go out and buy a smaller set of weights for myself.

I feel pretty good after completing the video, not tired and my muscles feel decent as well. I will update tomorrow morning before class and let you know what getting out of bed was like.

I plan to stay with this video program at least for the 30 days. It's only 20 minutes and I plan to get up before work and do it. I tried to find a calorie burning converter for the video but was unsuccessful. The information I did find made it seem like I am burning between 150-250 calories with each workout. Multiple that by 7 and I am burning between 1,050 - 1, 750 calories each week. Not a ton, but it's better than zero.

Weigh in results tomorrow!

-Brittany B

1/28/2010 Brittany

Hello all,

Just a quick little update. So far the dieting has been going pretty well, it's the finding time to exercise that is holding me back. I just cannot get up at 5am and workout before work and if I workout before heading to bed I'm awake for like 2 hours trying to calm my adrenalin. This is definitely something I will need to work on.

Pete and I have been working on going for walks, but the bitter cold has hindered that goal as well. We actually did walk on Tuesday afternoon, but only made it once around our complex (maybe like 1/2 a mile). My eyes were watering so bad from the cold that I couldn't see and Pete's ears were almost purple.

Another thing I find myself struggling with is eating enough veggies. I really don't like a lot of veggies, and the ones I do like (peas, carrots, corn) are packed with starch. I am a fruit girl. The only time I enjoy eating veggies is when they are covered in cheddar cheese sauce, drenched in butter or mixed in with my fried rice from Hunan 1. God, I love Hunan 1! If anyone has any suggestions on ways to eat vegetables and enjoy it, let me know...hit me up with some recipes maybe.

As for my other goals, I have been doing ok. My one diet soda a week was fulfilled this afternoon. I used to drink at least 1 soda a day (diet or regular) and since giving that up about 2 months ago, I feel great. I have more energy and I just feel better. Water with a lemon is now my drink of choice. I think it might be the processed garbage the weighs you down (no pun intended). Pete and I have been eating and drinking more organic and I can notice a difference in how I feel too. For starters, we drink organic milk or soy milk, buy unprocessed meat, and buy organic fruits and veggies.

My goal of one sweet per week remains unmet due to my baking of lemon bars (bad idea!) and purchase of Tinker Bell fruit snacks (another bad idea!). I actually gave the fruit snacks to a kid I work with. Made his day and mine, knowing that I won't be temped by their presence in our pantry. So next week, I will work the hardest on this goal, and get a good workout in.

Saturday morning will be my weigh in. Watch for the results.

-Brittany B

i think titles are useless

hey there guys

alright, i should be the last person to be giving diet tips, but when ever i find something that helps me out i will share it.

did you know that in a 16 oz cup of black coffee there are...wait for it...5 calories. 5 CALORIES!!! i just burned 6 calories reaching for the shift key to make that capitalized. how great is that? so this week i have been drinking coffee when i have a bad greasy burger craving, and there have been plenty of them. and drinking this much coffee is nice cause you feel like you can run through a wall and people leave you alone cause your breath can melt steel.

it has been over a week since i have had fast food and i can only compare it to someone trying to stop smoking. it sucks. i have been grumpy at work and irritable with people...but it has been getting easier. they say that the longer you go with out something the less and less you crave it. as i stated before i used to eat a LOT of fast food. i would say that on average i would get fast food AT LEAST three times a week, sometimes as many as five or six times a week.

it's too damn cold to go for walks this week so i have not been able to do that but i can feel in only a few short days and limited workouts that i feel healthier and stronger.

favorite work out song today: how you like me now by the heavy. if you didn't see these guys on letterman go on youtube and watch it, they were so good that dave had them play it twice.

alright, i have to go work out and get my hair cut on this beautiful day off. i'll weigh in on saturday and post what it is. i may not post again till then unless something comes up or i get board in class tonight.

have a good one,

pete

Hey Hey

Hey everyone,

This is Brittany (Britt), Pete's wife. I am so excited to be starting this blog with my husband. We are newly married, as of October 24, 2009, and I would love for us to start our marriage off healthy. So, with inspiration from my new sister-in-law, Jenn, we have decided to follow suit and create a blog that documents our journey to lighter, healthier people.

Like Pete stated, this blog is to help us create some accountability for ourselves. We are both overweight, and as embarrassing as it I will disclose my current weight to you now.

I currently weigh 238lbs. Yikers! Though this is not the heaviest I've been (after graduation from High School I was pushing 275), it is not were I want to be. I think I hide my weight well, but the scale doesn't hide it. I also think I suffer from "distorted body image". I don't feel like I weigh almost 240lbs, but sometimes I look at pictures of myself and I think "holy crap, look at my double chin!" And, I don't "feel" fat. It's hard to explain, but I think that might be a reason why I am sometimes shocked when I see pictures of myself. Anyway, I need to make some major changes in my life to get to where I want to be.

As for a goal weight, I don't really have one. One of my goals is to get below 200lbs, and once that weight is gone, it will never come back again! Don't worry, I am not settling for 195, but once I get below 200 I will set more of a goal weight. For right now, 1-2 lbs per week until I get below 200 is my plan.

My lifestyle is currently very hectic, so I plan to make slow changes, since a routine is hard to come by. I will start by cutting calories, unnecessary snacking and sweets. I plan to eat about 1,700 calories a day and start with 2-3 workouts per week. Once May comes around (after graduation) I will begin a more normal life and hopefully settle into more of a routine.

Other random things that I will do to help me lose weight are:

-no eating after 8pm

-one soda per week (diet only)

-max of 15 minutes on Facebook per day and

-only 1-2 sweets per week (I have a major sweet tooth)

Again, Pete and I are so excited to start this blog. Losing weight is something we want to do for ourselves and each other. We would like to have a family someday and we want to be a healthy, active one. So, please comment and help support us in our goal!

-Brittany B

Hello

before i tell you a little bit about myself and my wife, can i just tell you how pumped i am that there is spell check up in this mutha.

This blog will be created my myself, pete, and my beautiful wife, brittany. i'm not too sure how this will work or how often we will have time to update it, but i think it is important to have some kind of accountability for what we are tyring to do. today pete is writing, but i'm sure britt will contribute as well. you will be able to tell when britt is writing because it will make much more sense and not be the ramblings of an overweight lunatic. maybe that should have been the title of this blog

a while ago my wife and i decided to lose weight, like so many people i am grossly over weight and need to make a change in my life. i know that i will cheat and not do the work if i have no accountability, and my wife loves me too much to be hard on my about my weight. i know that i am not healthy and i want a long happy life with my wife and someday with my kids. i have for so long said that i will start "tomorrow", so that's where the title comes from. I am so sick of "tomorrow" so it is now "today".

so i want to come clean about a few things right off the top and make a few confessions and put myself out there. and as we go along i'm sure i will disclose more about myself.

~i have tried to eat a dozen Krispy Kream donughts without anyone knowing and ditched the evidence in a gas station garbage can.

~i am so out of shape that i vomited in the sink after doing a 20 min work out video. 20 min of a level one (whatever that means) work out video. that's sad.

~i can't believe that i am going to admit this for everyone to see...but my current weight, right now, on 1/23/2010 at 1:08pm is...375lbs. wow, i know, i didn't think it would be that high either.

i am not the counting calories kind of guy, so don't expect to see that kind of thing. i am more of a short term goals kind of guy which, hopefully, will lead to bigger goals and a healthy lifestyle. what you can expect from me, is a weekly weigh in and post. i want to put myself out there, i want to have accountability to someone, or something...even if it is to a blog that no one reads.

so this week my goal is to not eat ANY fast food. this is pretty big for me. i love fast food but it has to go. also, i want to use the work out area at our complex at least 3 times this week and go for more walks with britt...that one will be easy. so i think that is a good start.

work out song of the day: Lover, You Should've Come Over by Jeff Buckly...or Jamie Cullum...it's so hard for me to decide between the two.

my work out songs are very different from most peoples, i hate going into gyms and they have some death metal blasting from the sound system...so annoying.