America's newest diet plan

You've heard it a million times on weight loss commercials. "I've tried every diet and nothing worked....UNTIL I tried (fill in the blank). So, I got to thinking of some of the diets I have tried and what are my thoughts and progress with each.

Let's see, the first thing I tried was the big Susan Powter diet. Remember her? The bald lady who yelled, "STOP THE INSANITY". Her thoughts on dieting was that fat made you fat. So cut out the fat and you will lose the fat. So bascially that was high-carb low fat foods. Well, lets assess my progress. Considering I had problems with my body making too much insulin, eating a lot of carbs was TOTALLY opposite of what I should have been doing. That diet actually made me fatter.

So how about The Cabbage Soup Diet? That is a regimented diet that you make this vat of cabbage soup that you can eat all you want. Then you have certain days where you only eat fruit, then vegetables one day and my favorite day was the day you ate up to 8 banannas and up to 8 glasses of skim milk. It lasts for 7 days. I lost about 15 lbs. that week. But as soon as you eat normal.....you gain it back. Plus for some (not mentioning names) it causes gas that just happens to smell like a big pot of cabbage soup cooking. YUK!

So the most success I had was on the Atkins Diet. High fat, low carb. I was on it for a total of about 6 months. I lost about 55 lbs. When I first went on this, my husband and I laughed that it would never work. This was as I polished off a steak one night as big as my head. But, to my surprise the weight came off quickly. I did find it very hard to live like that forever. I REALLY missed fruit and bread. Also, you barely ever poop on this diet and you never "pass gas". If you do let one go you know you've eaten too many carbs somewhere. It is crazy. I am not sure a diet can be good for you that messes with your body's "natural functions" that way.

So after years of trying to figure out what works, I have the revelation you've all been waiting for! The only diet that works is the EAT LESS AND WORK OUT MORE diet. Sorry guys, sad but true. You have to learn to go to bed hungry and wake up early to sweat your butt off. It amazes me that everytime I turn the T.V. on it is some horrible statistic on the Today Show about how fat America is...followed of course by that skinny Giada cooking up some pasta.

So since America is not getting the message, I am making up a new plan. Since the airports have installed those scanners that pretty much show you naked, I have been mortified by the idea of flying. I mean really? (and on a side-note, spanx isn't gonna help hide anything in the scanner, so don't kid yourself) We should just install those at restaurants and grocery stores and put them on a big screen. PEOPLE, I WOULD NEVER BUY FOOD AGAIN!!! We would all be home growing gardens and canning. We would be so much healthier. Fear of being seen naked is a great motivator to lose weight, don't ya think?

My dreams of gold

I love to ask my daugher what she wants to be when she grows up. I like to hear her child-like answers. It takes me back to a time when my brother told my parents he wanted to be a homo. True story. Of course they panicked wondering what this meant. Only to find out he really wanted to be a hobo. He had a little bit of a speech issue!

So I have been thinking back on some of my early aspirations. And I realized one of my first I can remember involved gold. No people not like the Olympics, I had far more important things than merely winning a gold medal. I wanted to be a.....SOLID GOLD DANCER!!! I used to fling myself around on the living room floor and spin and pretend I was dancing to the Top 10 of the week. I pretty much realized that dream would never happen, because the show got cancelled and I was definately didn't have a dancers body. Not because of weight alone, my legs are just too short.

So thinking back about this wonderful goal in life, I decided to pull up some old Solid Gold videos on Youtube. First of all I was a bit shocked. I mean this was a few decade ago and these girls were doing some nasty moves in very little clothing. I didn't remember it that way. I really thought that being a dancer on that show was a classy gig. I mean forget broadway. What kind of professional dancer wouldn't want a chance to throw themselves on the floor and dance to Private Eyes by Hall and Oates? And remember when the music would stop they would put stop and pose and look at the camera? LOVED IT. So another dream lost (sigh). But ah, the memories of that show make me smile.

On a running note, this weeks training has been brutal. This could be due to the fact that my legs are really sore and I am in desperate need of a new sports bra. But, as any well disciplined athlete, I push though!!

Learning new things

If you are easily offended and do not find bodily functions amusing, do not proceed! That is my disclaimer on this blog!

I am a firm believer that I learn something new everyday. Sometimes it is life-changing, sometimes it is worthless information that makes me smile and think wow, I never knew.

Ok, I will give you an example that will make me appear a little silly and maybe not very smart, but oh well, I have been honest with this blog so here goes. I always thought a Chest of Drawers was actually Chester Drawers. I mean really, I thought someone named Chester invented them.

Anyway, this next little tid-bit has caused me hours of thinking WHAT?!!! I share this now with you, only to enlighten you, maybe shock you and let you in on the crazy things that go on in my mind and I believe I AM NOT THE ONLY ONE!!!

I recently heard through a family member that a long-time friend had run a marathon. Now, I know, you are wondering why am I talking about a marathon, I am only training for a 5K but the information she revealed has caused me to lay awake at night and ponder. So she said there are 3B's to running a marathon. They are blisters, (get it) bloody nipples (from friction, get it) and BROWN PANTS!!! Thats right. When you gotta go, you just go. I have heard of people peeing on a race and throwing water on themselves but never a NUMBER TWO?

Here is where my mind goes. First of all, I cannot even do "that" in a public restroom. And I may be mistaken, but I believe my intestines know this. They have been warned they are not allowed to move anywhere but home. And they cooperate with me. So, I for the life of me cannot figure out how I could possible do that running down the road. Especially with people all around. I was picturing myself, with a "spotter", you know like the ones that help the people lift weights to make sure they don't drop them? Well, I would be running along and look at my spotter who would be riding a bike along side and put up the big peace sign meaning #2 in this case. They would hop off their bike and get a magazine and beginning running backwards in front of me so I could read a bit. I mean I got to relax a little. I know there are other people out their who prefer this.

Then I wonder, after I had done the deed would it make me run faster? I mean to get away from the smell, or would it just make the people behind me run faster. And what about the other marathon runners that know this happens? Do they have codewords to let you know, I've had to go, move on by me. What about chaffing and rash people? Then, what if you won the race and win a trophy or something? Do you stand at a podium with a pile in your pants or do you go change in a port a potty nearby?

I gotta admit, when ya gotta go, ya gotta go, but these are some dedicated marathon runners and I salute all you who have been brave enough to do this. I can guarantee, when I do run a 5K, it is these thoughts of the dedicated runners that will keep me focused and on pace.

Chubby girl paranoia

I am a recovering tanning bed addict. I used to go 30 minutes a day in a bed and 15 in a booth in the same day, almost every day of the week. As I've aged I began to worry about skin cancer more and wasn't liking what all that tanning was doing to my skin. I do still go to the tanning bed on average about 10 times a year.

In a quest to still get that healthy glow, I have turned to self-tanners. I have used almost all of them. I have had great results with some and not so great results with others. Last year I tried a new one. While entering a movie theater with my husband, I looked down and said what do you think of this color on my legs? He didn't even hesitate with his answer, "It is the color of the rind of muenster cheese". Wow, that wasn't the look I was going for.

So this year, I decided to try the "tanning towel". Yep, I made my first purchase from the old Home Shopping Network. I took the package out and read the same old standard application techniques...loofah, wash your hands after use...then I noticed something toward the bottom. It said tanning towels come in half body or full body in classic or plus. Plus? do they mean like plus size? I didn't see this information on the order form. I only got the classic. So, are they telling me when I open them up they will be tissue size?

Really? Do we have to say plus size? Couldn't they just say small, medium and large? I just feel as a "larger" women we could pick better wording. Plus what? Like plus a hundred lbs? I don't know, maybe it is just me. It could be worse, I mean they could use words like jumbo, or super size.


Well, after ranting for two days about plus size tanning towels, I pulled up the website. Classic is for fair skin...PLUS is for medium to darker skin tones!!! This is what I like to call "chubby girl paranoia". As soon as I see the word plus, I automatically assume it means "plus size". I just kept picturing the plus to mean bath towel size. And, I am happy to say, I was able to get my whole body done with one....however, my application technique needs a little tweeking.
By he way, my running this week was EXTREMELY difficult. I felt like I was running through mud and only did 50 minutes of total jogging this week. Currently, I work out six days a week. I take Sundays off. On Mon-Wed-Fri, I do a whole hour with 20-30 of that being jogging. On Tues, Thur and Saturday, I do at least 30-45 minutes,with 30 minutes being stair stepping on the wii with the step up. So, my legs are really taking a beating. I think that is why it has been so difficult this week. I will continue with this schedule until my legs fall off or it gets easy before I will increase my jogging. Thats all for now!!

The jig is up!!

So, you know the commercial about smoking? You know the one that pops up on a black screen with sayings like..."you wanted to quit when you got married"..."you wanted to quit before you turned 35"..."you wanted to quit before your first child" January 1, 2007, 2008 and so on.



Well, this is basically how I have lived my life with weight. I wanted to lose it before I got to high school. I wanted to lose it before Senior prom. I wanted to lose it before I graduated high school. I wanted to lose it before I graduated college. I wanted to lose it before my wedding...before my second wedding....before my 3rd (ok, that is another story for another time)

But you get the picture. Oh, I almost forgot...I wanted to lose it before EVERY vacation.



So, I remember when my daughter was born, I said to my husband, "I need to lose this weight before she is old enough to realize I'm fat."



First it started with a drawing of me a couple of days ago. It was a fat snowman looking picture. When I questioned her about it she replied, "mama, you do kind of look like a snowman". If that wasn't enough, it had another big ball in front of the middle ball. Assuming the was an extention of my already largely portrayed belly, I braced myself and asked, "what is this?" "it is a potato". Still not sure what that means, but I am not asking for anymore explanations about that.



The next day after my workout, I threw off my shirt because I was trying to cool down. I was walking around the house in my sports bra and running shorts. She looks at me and says in an accusatory voice, "mama, have you been eating a lot of junk today". "No, I haven't even eaten breakfast, why"? Now I knew I shouldn't have asked, but curiosity got the best of me. She just pointed at my permanent rubber duck and said, "your belly"!!



GUESS WHAT PEOPLE??? The jig is up. I've been found out by a 3 year old...maybe I will lose it by the time she goes to school......



On a side note, I did bump up my jogging 10 minutes today. So that is 30 minutes. I was praying to Jesus at about 15 minutes in because I feared my legs were going to break like toothpicks if I continued, but once I hit 20 minutes and 1 second, I realized I had jogged longer than I had before and it got easier, the last 5 minutes were almost dare I say?... a piece of cake.

A better name for this blog may be The morbidly obese jogger, but The Chubby Runner sounded so much nicer. Let me introduce myself. My name is Sally and I have been overweight since the day I entered puberty.

So after years of exercising and dieting I am ready to hit 40 this year and guess what? Still fat. After watching several episodes of Dr. Oz and watching people get in the truth tube to find out how unhealthy they are, I realized most of them were smaller than me.

While I know my weight is very unhealthy, I am still able to move and do a lot of things that people probably think I can't. That is when I decided to set a goal for myself. Which is quite simply to run a 5K by the time I hit 40 in October of this year.

Now a 5k isn't really that much....BUT, according to Dr Oz, I should be bed ridden having people bring me 2 dozen eggs and 3 lbs of bacon, with a loaf of toast! Let me say, being fat sucks. It has ruined tons of things in my life. But there are worse things. Do I want to lose the weight once and for all? YES! So, 3 weeks ago I began jogging. Currently, I only jog with my Wii Fit, which I know is way different than on the road or sidewalk. But it is a start. Give me a break, by Dr's calculations, I am morbidly obese....or maybe Super morbidly obese.

So currently, I am up to 20 minutes of jogging. I am not quite ready to jog outside yet. Because it is cold. And quite frankly, I don't want people to see a fat girl jogging. I mean it may offend them. My husband, who also struggles with weight, began running a couple of years ago. He informed me that when he runs outside (which he prefers) people drive by and yell mean things. "Like run fatty run". Seriously? I bet these are the same people who as little kids on the playground used to call me fat and pig and oink at me. I mean do you really ever grow out of being rude and mean? Maybe. But let me say, if you see this fat girl out running, I am trying to change my life and become healthy.