Hey!!! Want A Souvenir???

HOW INCREDIBLY COOL IS THIS BADGE FOR MY CHALLENGE??????????????????????
I LOVE IT I LOVE IT I LOVE IT I LOVE IT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

My super terrific blogger friend Tina at Fat Girl Dives In, listed on my blogroll, made this for me!!!!!  I just gave her a couple of vague ideas of what I wanted and Voila!!!  SHE ROCKS!!!  Tina is sooooooo incredibly busy with her home business.....she's a graphic artist, in case you couldn't tell.....and yet she still took time out to do this for me, so that anyone who wants to participate in the challenge can right click on it, save it to your computer, and display it on your own blog!!!  I just asked her about it yesterday, at a moment's notice, and she came through for me!  Thank you so very much Tina....I love your work...I couldn't be happier with this badge.  You just made my day!!!!
******************************************************************************

So what's this challenge all about???


I weighed in at 241.0 this morning.  I'm up 5.8 lbs. from last week.

I've decided I'm doing my very first weight loss challenge.  I've normally avoided doing these things because we all know how bad Tammy sucks in the consistency department.  I never stick with them long enough to finish them, I'm terrible at following rules, and I'm just plain forgetful....can't rememeber to go the person's blog and post my weigh-in, even if I'm doing great!!

I have a couple of different motivating factors for doing this.  It's mainly for myself, but I'd love for anyone that's interested in giving themselves a kick in the pants to join in with me.  It's always more fun when you know you're not going it alone!! 

It's the beginning of April, right?  Well....when I started my blog last June, my goal month for losing ALL of my weight was April.  I even wrote a post way back when entitled "April's Butterfly".  I've had that in the back of my head for the last couple of days and it's really been irritating the crap out of me.  Seriously.  I'm so angry with myself.  This is my first motivating factor to GET MY FAT A$$ MOVING DOWN THAT SCALE!!!!!

The second motivating factor is Zaa at Zaababy-The Incredible Shrinking Woman, listed last on my blogroll.  Why Zaa when there's so MANY excellent bloggers out there that just inspire me to bits???  Well I'll tell you.  It's simple, really.  Zaa and I started blogging within just a couple of weeks of each other, and when we first started, we both chose Sean at The Daily Diary of a Winning Loser as one of our biggest weight loss mentors...someone with a proven track record to show us how to tackle this monumental task of defeating Morbid Obesity.  We both started out at 1500 cals/day and doing a little exercise.  I've since upped my calorie goals to 1800/day because I joined a gym last September and have been working out pretty steadily ever since.  I really do think you need to eat a few more calories if you're going to be pushing yourself on the exercise. 

I love Zaa, and she has no idea I'm posting this.  She has no idea that she's one of just a couple of reasons I'm doing this challenge.  You see, she's ALWAYS inspired me through her posts.  She is such a POSITIVE person, no matter what's going on in her life.  I've followed her for a long time and she's gone through some really difficult things....pets dying, family members dying, money troubles, personal health issues...she's written about a lot.  One thing that has stood out to me about her though, which is totally opposite from me, is that her life circumstances NEVER affect her eating.  She keeps it totally separate.  She eats 1500 calories a day no matter what, and she exercises.  Period.  And what does she have to show for that? 

Zaa posted pics of herself for the first time ever this week.  She never even had a "before" photo on her blog until this week.  She posted "before" photos, and "progress" photos the other day.  This incredibly motivating and inspiring blogger has lost 90 lbs. so far.  NINETY POUNDS.  I've lost between 30-40, depending on which week it is, and we started virtually at the same time.  I know other people have lost this much or more...I know several of you that have.  But I've got a thorn in my a$$ about Zaa in particular because we basically started at the same time.  I remember her posting on my blog very early on about how grateful she was to have found Sean.  In fact, she mentions him in almost every one of her posts, lol.  She's truly appreciative for finding the road to freedom, as am I. 

Please understand....there are no ill feelings towards Zaa.  Not a single one!!!  I'm IN LOVE with her progress...and the thorn in my a$$ is a GOOD thing....a POSITIVE thing....it's the VERY thing that's going to propel me out of the 230's and 240's and land me smack dab in the middle of the 220's by the time my weight loss challenge is over at the end of the month.  Zaa writes the most exuberant posts every single time....full of NSV's and lists of things she couldn't do before at over 300+ pounds, that she's doing with ease now.  She makes me laugh out loud when she excitedly posts things like, "I jumped over a mud puddle today!!  Me!!  I actually JUMPED!!"  or another favorite is how she can RUN up the stairs in her house now, where before she struggled with every step, labored breathing, walking so hard her kids could hear her coming.  Now she loves to gingerly run up the stairs and quietly SURPRISE her kids in their rooms when she gets to the top JUST because she CAN!!!  She reminds us in her posts of the little things that I quickly forget and take for granted.  I love that.  Every little thing that we can do now that we couldn't do at our heaviest is an absolute blessing and one to be thankful for.  We should never forget how far we've come.  Zaa never forgets, and this makes her one of my favorite bloggers, and my inspiration for this weight loss challenge.

On to the challenge....and mine's a bit different than yours.  I'll tell you about mine first:

I've posted tons of food pics on here before, but I've never posted EVERYTHING I eat on here for one reason.  I'm not a clean eater.  A lot of you are.  I guess I didn't want to give anyone a heart attack when they saw what all I eat, lol.  I don't know.  But I've never done it, and that's going to change this month.  This is the BIGGEST accountability factor I can think of.  I'm going to show the entire world (or whoever's watching) every single calorie that goes in my mouth, every day, for 4 solid weeks.  No exceptions.  If I eat out...I'm taking pics.  If I binge...I'm taking pics.  I'm seriously thinking though that knowing I have to take pics will be a big help in staving off a binge, lol.  Besides, I haven't had one of those in a pretty good while, so hopefully that won't even factor in.  But knowing I have to take a pic of every single bite is going to make me dilligent in counting every single calorie and not just "wing it" like I've been known to do.  It will also cause me to curb the restaurant eating, because of the sodium issues I've got with that.  That's the biggest part of my gain this week.  I know that 4 days this week were not over 1800 and 3 of them were.  Those 3 weren't horrendous, or off the charts...but they were restaurant meals....2 lunches with my sister Amy, and 1 dinner out with Shane and Billie...all later in the week....thus the huge gain this week.  I won't say I'm not going to eat out ANY during the month, but I'm sure going to curb it.

I'm not counting carbs, proteins, fat, fiber, etc.  I never do, because I'm not interested in that.  My diet is not that refined yet.  My 2 main concerns are calorie counting and sodium control.  My calories will not exceed 1800 but will go no lower than 1500.  I'm not going to do anything stupid or crazy or drastic to lose my weight.  I'm going to keep it realistic for me.  I like food way too much to eat any less than 1500. 

My hardest time during this challenge is going to be the 2 weeks I have to deal with my cycle and my PCOS.  Yes, I only have 2 good weeks out of a month and I know this going in.  If you see pics of a little too much chocolate during those weeks....or something a little too salty...I don't care.  That's not my concern...I'm only concerned with staying within my calories. 

My goal weight is 225 lbs. by April 30th.  This challenge is beginning and ending on a Friday.  Dwayne and I leave for Panama City Beach for a week on Saturday, May 1st.  I want to be 225 lbs. when I hit the highway headed for the beach. 

For anyone who wants to join with me.....I only have a couple of rules.  The first one is that your goal MUST be to lose 10 lbs.  It doesn't matter if you've never lost that much before in a month, because we're going to do the same thing together, in that we're going to push aside the past, what we've done or haven't done before.  We're going to push aside the reasons, excuses, rationalizations, justifications, circumstances, etc. and we're JUST GOING TO DO IT.  Don't tell yourself you can't.  Tell yourself you CAN and you WILL.
If you lose 9.8 lbs...AWESOME!!!  But in order to win the challenge, it has to be 10 lbs.  That's the # that will make you the proud owner of a beach souvenir.  And it doesn't matter how many winners we have...I will award a prize to each one...whether it's 1, 5, 10...whatever.  The prize will be a souvenir from my beach trip to Panama City, which I will mail to you as soon as I get back in town.  It might be super cheezy, super cute, ultra cool....who knows....I haven't gotten to the souvenir shops yet!!!  But it'll be fun...and of course the bigger prize is the pride and accomplishment you'll feel for YOURSELF for proving that yes, you CAN lose this weight!

The only other rule is that you pop over here every Friday, when I do my weigh-in post, and leave me a comment telling me how much you weigh.  It doesn't matter what your normal weigh day is...this is totally separate.  For this challenge, your starting weight will be whatever you weigh TODAY, and then leave me a comment every Friday for the rest of the month telling me your progress if you're going to see the challenge through to the end.  If you don't read this post til Saturday and want to join in, then tell me your starting weight tomorrow.  I'll write the names and weights down so I can keep up with it weekly.  After I get your final weigh-ins on Friday, April 30th, I'll tally everything...determine the winners....and then do a 2nd post on Friday announcing the winners!!!!

As far as what else I'll be doing to reach my own personal goal is to drink at least (4) 32 oz glasses of water a day, and continue to exercise 5 days a week as I've been doing.  If something comes up and I can't get to the gym all 5 days, then I'll make an adjustment and either go to my local park and walk around their trail, or I'll walk up and down the street in front of my house!  My sister's already clocked it and it's 1.5 miles from my house to the end of the road, so there and back is 3 miles.  No matter what, I'll get my exercise in 5 days/week.

As far as the challenge goes for all of you....I don't care how you do it.  Do what makes you happy.  Do what inspires you...what motivates you.  Just do it.  Push all the crap aside that gets in the way and make this your #1 priority for the month of April.  Believe that you are worth it...that you deserve it...and anticipate the feeling of accomplishment you're sure to have when you get it done.  You don't have to post pics of your food, or mention it on your blog, or link anything back to me....heck, you don't even have to exercise if your metabolism is that freaking awesome, lol (although I may hate you for that...totally kidding).  :)

Reaching my goal of 225 is going to put me out of the dreaded 230's and 240's that I've been toying with for 6 ridiculous months.  It's also going to put me a mere 26 lbs. away from Onederland....a place that I truly cannot remember the last time I visited.  I know I was like 234 or 237....something like that, in my senior year in high school.  I don't remember my weight before that.  Onederland is a dream for me.  It's a dream that I am going to MAKE come true. 

Many thanks to Zaa for being the motivation I needed, even though she has no idea she is, lol.  Many thanks to my best friend Pam at The Rest of the Journey, for encouraging me to start my blog in the first place.  Many thanks to Sean for starting out as my mentor, and over these last several months, turning into a cherished friend.  And many thanks to all of my fellow bloggers who care enough to pop over and visit with me...leaving your wonderful comments, and who continually inspire me with their own blogs. 

So this is it.  This is my Beach Challenge and I hope you'll join me.  I'll be back later tonight with pics of all my food for the day and a report on my water intake and exercise.  Make it a FABULOUS day friends!!! :)