Shock to the system! or two....

Two shocks to the system lately!

First of all, two weeks ago when I was  agonizing over what I should do about not losing additional weight (no, I am not done with this topic yet, bear with me kids), I decided I needed to NOT be a quitter and finish what I had started.  One thing I had to figure out was why my weight loss had stalled- the answer was obvious, since I continue to get in a minimum of 300 calories of exercise virtually every day, it was my food.

After some soul searching and a discussion or two ( and an out and out double dog dare ya) (ahem, youknowwhoyouare) I "discovered" that the coffee I was drinking and drinking and drinking had a minimum of 90 calories in it because of the  yummy wonderful peppermint mocha coffee creamer, and consequently  I have given up virtually all coffee for the next 5 weeks. GULP!  I already have cut it back to 1 cup or less.  As I get closer to December, I am weaning myself off of it completely.  IT IS KILLING ME PEOPLE!!!  Anyway, if you multiply out the 4 cups of coffee per day and the 90 calories, plus the careless chocolate eating, handfuls of chips, crackers and all that other stuff that got me into trouble in the first place, you have a girl on maintenance when she really just wants to lose a tiny bit more.  THIS is a major shock to the system!  Of course after the first week it isn't so bad.  My body quickly adjusted to less caffeine and I feel great, actually.  After Jan 1, I will return to drinking coffee, I will just be ultra aware of how it can affect me!  I will stick with one cup, and if I have a second at some point, it will have to be black.  So now that it is "out there" my friends can keep me to it and NOT offer me any!  :)

Second shock to the system:

I was at yet another meeting at school Wednesday, but this one was low stress as we were working on our school website, and I needed to figure out how to get a pic from my phone to a website so I could download said pic onto my Weebly page.  I have Photobucket, which is not my favorite site, but decided that it might work for his application.  So I pull out the phone (ha, who am I kidding, I picked up the phone from its place right by my computer) and opened up photo bucket which I haven't used for quite a while, like since last spring, and there right smack in the middle of my screen is this picture of me.  And it was quite a sight:

The screenshot of what I saw

The photo in question

Even though I have seen this pic quite often, it hasn't been for a few months and it was shocking.  I must have gasped as everyone at my table looked at me and asked what was wrong.  I showed my phone to them and they were astonished.  2 of them had never known me like that, and the rest said that they didn't think I looked like that at all!  It was nice to hear that, but pictures don't lie. Well, maybe they do, as they flatten and alter things slightly and don't get me started on "photoshopping" but this was not touched.  I teared up a little, and was told to be proud, be happy.  That wasn't the underlying issue though. I am not sure exactly how to explain the feeling of shame, relief, joy and astonishment that went through me.  It was lightening fast and very powerful.

I did make a before and after photo series that I will be posting here and there when I hit my goal, but I am going to put one of them right here as I don't want the above pic to be the lasting image from this post!

I am sort of over it now.  Kind of.  Well, maybe not, I can hardly stand looking at these. And that is a good thing, as I am not going back.  Ever

Until next time, be a joy giver!