The Chinese Food Incident...

It's funny I've read more than one recent post on food cravings and eating way more than normal during the TOTM and I sit here raising my hand in a guilty as charged manner..I'll tell you why..

I consider myself to be a good band rule follower meaning no drinking with meals, eating my protein first, cutting out the excess sugar and liquid calories...ya da ya da ya da but there is always that week ( sometimes week and half) where my brain takes a detour and goes into this " OMG we need to eat that and that and ooo some of that too !!" Meaning way MORE than my allotted portion. Yesterday was such a day and it happend to be that hormonal bitch that lives in my brain chose chinese food of all things !! that of couse meant a load of healthy band friendly food like...
- a cup of house special fried rice
- 4 jumbo sized crispy ( meaning FRIED) shrimp in red sauce
- 4 FRIED pork dumplings
- 3 strips of honey roast pork

Did you notice the " Fried" theme as the common denominator in all of that ?? C'mon really Jacquie ?? But wait it gets better...guess what I had for lunch today..yep Chinese food left overs, although I did control my portions better but still it's the same crap....GD hormones !!!

I cant beleive that I'm actually hoping the (.) comes soon so i can get back to normal and get my restriction back...and stop crying at those GD commercials about the polar bears and the melting ice cap !!!

BTW of course my visa into Onderland has been temporarily suspended..I'm telling you freaking hormones..i cant imagine what would men do if they had to deal with them !! LOL

Week # 2..a smashing success !!

First of..extend your left arm up..bend it behind your back..now pat yourself proudly for a great job done this week. You ladies continue to show everyone just how determination can overcome anything !! A combined group loss the equivalent of a helathy 8 yr old 58 lbs !! AWSOME !! If I didnt get your weights in on time this week please send both of them to me to include in next weeks posting.

I wanted to give an EXTRA SPECIAL WOO HOO to Jen who also reached the much coveted 199 this weekend. Now that's a woman on a mission !! Make sure you check her out if you don't stalk her already ( LOL!).

Just remember always that YOU GALS ROCK !!!!

"ONDERFUL" news !! & my 1st Vlog

Hola People,
I bit long and alot of ramble..but just so EXCITED !! Doing the HAPPY DANCE !!!

Pound for Pound Challenge..Join me

I know many of you watch the biggest loser so you may have heard of this and may have even signed up ! But I wanted to get the word out there of a wonderful challange being sponsored by The Biggest Loser..The Pound for Pound Challange. This is a challange that not only does wonders for ourselves but it also allows us to help others as well. It's easy to sign up and pledge a weight loss..up to 50 lbs and for every pound pledged and loss 14 cents will be donated to your local food bank feeding the hungry in your community.

With all the focus on helping those less fortunate and realizing how truly fortunate we are and sometimes how truly selfish we are ( Which I am TOTALLY guilty of!!) This is a great way to do something for those that go hungry everyday in our own backyards. It sometimes is so easy to forget that there are hundreds of children whose only meal sometimes comes from their school lunch.. yeah in America of all places..the land where many of us dont bat an eye about spending $5 for a chai latte ( GUILTY AS CHARGED and totally ashamed of myself!!)

So I am pledging to work my butt of not only for me...for a change..but to help others that dont have the luxury of chossing to eat less ...will you join me ??

Please visit the Pound for Pound challenge website for information on how to register ( it's free) and sign up for your local food bank.

Week # 1 and 41 lbs gone for good !!

Now that's a what I call starting off on the right foot !!!... Week # 1 and we've melted off 41 lbs already ladies !! That is freaking amazing. I say let's all continue to challange ourselves and set a goal to lose 300 lbs by challange end. That means that we are all responsible for a 2.5 lb loss per week...WE CAN DO IT !! The scales have no idea what is coming there way !! ( Insert battle cry here!!)

Beating some sense into your scale..

So you've excercised like a crazy woman...you've been meticulous about what you've been eating..got all your protein in and your water and you proudly step on the scale expecting a reward and then BAM..the scale betrays you yet again !!! I know most of us..if not all have one time or another wanted to do some serious harm to that wonderous piece of technology that's suppose to spit back the number we want to see !! Unfortunately there are times were our dear scales have a different agenda then we do. A dietician that I consult with from time to time has previsouly suggested a "shock and awe" approach when the scale just doesnt seem to move. Her approach is just change something dramatically on it for a couple of days and it should get it going again.
I found this article which has some really good tips on beating plateau's..hope it helps !

Beating the Weight-Loss Plateau
FEBRUARY 11, 2008 send this article to a friendprint this article

You have a strict diet you’ve been following for six months. You exercise 6 days a week for 45 minutes. To date, you have lost 20 pounds, but for some reason, you cannot lose any more. You have not stopped exercising, and you are stricter about your diet than ever, convinced that you must be eating something different that is preventing further weight loss. So what do you do?

The weight loss plateau is one of the most frustrating things to deal with when losing weight. The simple truth is that your body has stopped responding to your diet and exercise routine and has reached a plateau. There are several ways to deal with this problem, but the general idea is that you have to vary your routine to give your body something it isn’t used to. Variety can be done with your diet or your exercise routine, and once your body realizes something different is taking place, that weight will start to drop once again. With a constant diet plan, once the weight comes off and nothing changes with your diet, the body goes into storage mode because it senses it is not getting as much food. With an exercise routine, your body may stop responding to the same exercises day in and day out and your body will stop building muscle. Following are five diet strategies and five exercise strategies that will help you beat that plateau and lose the rest of that weight!

Diet Strategies:

1) Increase your caloric intake slightly to provide more fuel for your body to burn.

2) Drink more water to help stabilize your metabolism.

3) Add more protein and fiber to your diet to help your body’s metabolic functions.

4) Eat more frequent, smaller meals so your body’s metabolism can stay constant and burn more calories.

5) Vary one of your snacks; instead of eating a carbohydrate as a snack, eat a protein.

Exercise Strategies:

1) Add strength training to your exercise routine. Strength training builds more lean body mass, which leads to higher metabolism.

2) Vary your exercise routine. If you usually do 30 minutes on a treadmill, do 30 minutes on a stationary bike instead. Or, you can vary your routine by day. If you usually do a bike 5 days a week, do the treadmill three days a week and a stair machine two days a week.

3) Decrease your exercise time, and increase your exercise intensity. Instead of running on the treadmill for 30 minutes, do 20 minutes at a higher speed.

4) Increase the frequency of your exercising. If you are working out three days a week, add a fourth day.

5) Play a sport, rollerblade, skateboard, or just incorporate something different into your routine. Most sports you play will target different muscle groups than exercising alone does.

Weight loss plateaus are no doubt extremely frustrating, but using one or more of the above strategies should pull you out of your slump and put you back on track to achieve your target weight!

A prayer for the people of haiti..

Gen had posted this beautiful prayer on her blog and I just wanted to post it here as well and ask all who are reading this to take a minute to disconnect yourself from all of our materialistic surroundings and say this prayer with me. It matters not what your beliefs are or whether you haven't prayed in years or go to church on a frequent basis the haitian people are suffering the unimaginable who who knows what the loss of life is like. To think of children sleeping next to the bodies of their parents or mothers and fathers cradling the lifeless bodies of their babies is something that I cant even begin to grasp!! So take this second, open your hearts and say this with me..

O Lord, hear us

Our voices join the mournful songs and prayers

rising above the ruins of the Haitian capital, Port-au-Prince


O Lord, we believe
That you hear the cries of the trapped and the injured

You cradle the dead and the dying

You feel the pain of the grief-stricken and the searching


O Lord, we ask you
To pour comfort on your children who sorrow and sigh

Calm all panic and despair

Strengthen the weary hands of rescuers and medical workers

O Lord, forgive us
and hasten our response to the poverty and greed

that render so many helpless in the face of disaster


In Jesus' name
Amen

Thank you !!!!!!!!

Me too..I have an NSV !!

So I got such wonderful comments about the hair that I decided to make it permanent !! tomorrow I am getting the brazilian keratin straightening done and I am so excited !! I know the hair is just part of it but I cant help walking around feeling so damn sexy !! Seriously I cant remember when I felt this good about myself and you know what.... I like it...I like it ALOT !! and so does the hubby ( I know I know..TMI !! LMAO !!!)
I also cant believe that it's been 5 months and how much my life has radically changed in such a short time. I remember not wanting to read the post on LBT about how the band didn't work for this person and how they didn't lose any weight or how they had to have it removed because they were vomiting all the time because they couldn't stop eating..etc etc. I was sooo afraid that I wasn't going to be able to do this and that I was doomed forever to be the unhappy fat girl who couldn't breath after going up a flight of stairs. But yet here I am , feeling like a million bucks literally !! I am not the thinnest Ive been but I know that I am the healthiest I've ever been and the most assertive and confident about myself than ever before. My body is changing every month and yes the smaller sizes are a HELL of a reward and a make me do my happy bootie shake dance in the mirror, but I think to me the biggest reward I've gotten and the best NSV so far is that I found myself again..I found the happy Jacquie again and this time she's here to stay !!!

Let the losing begin....

WOW ! What a great turn out for this second challenge !! I am soooo excited to see how this will play out. We have a total of 15 losers all bidding for the gold. For those of you who would like to join our clan of losers there is still time since week # 2 weight ins aren t due till sunday but please get them in by tomorrow morning.
This time around we have such a wonderfully diverse group from all parts of the country ( as far as i can tell) so to try to accommodate time zone differences please just get your weights in to me by 10 pm your time and I will update and post the results monday evening. Also because we have such a wide range of weights it was suggested by several of the participants that we calculate based on percentage of weight loss instead of actual number. This will be calculated in the following manner:

(starting weight)- (current weight)
_________________________________ X 100 = % of weight loss
(Starting weight)

If no one has any objections to this than we will go with that. If you do please feel free to comment, and we will go with majority rule. So at the end of the challenge on March 1st the winner will be the loser with the biggest % of weight loss.

Here is the list of all the LOVEly losers. I will try to link their blogs to the spreadsheet later this week.

So here we go girls...let's show the scale who's the boss !!!

Jacquie 202.4
Karen 273.6
Jenny S 216.5
Heidi 280
Linda 219.8
Nicole W 289.2
Colls 237
Concrete Rose 184.4
Gen 196.2
Kay Vee 261.4
Southern Girl 199.4
Nicole H 185.2
Kristen W 207.5
Nawlinz Lady 186.5
Jen 205.6

My own superhero

I AM MY OWN SUPERHERO !!...It started as a joke between the hubby and myself but the more I thought about it afterwards it made sense. Why the hell not ?? Dont superhero's go out and save the day ? Don't they perform acts of heroism and save those desperately in need?? Dont they face monsters and demons ?? Well I think in this journey I've accomplished all of that !! ( And I know you guys understand that this isnt self indulgence!!)
The way I see it we are all our own superheroes !! Most of us prior to this transformation sat there day after day just eating ourselves to death. Desperate for a solution to the health and emotional problems and desperate for a breath of fresh air ( for me it was literal with my asthma) from the constant digging ourseleves into a bigger hole. Low and behold we all made a decision and into the OR walked in one girl and out walked a superhero !! One who was gonna take this fight all the way and use all of her powers to beat this thing. The girl who walked out was going to stand firm against the hunger demons and to the cookie, soda etc etc monster and chase them away that is the work of a superhero..and I AM MY OWN SUPERHERO !!

So here comes the funny part..I figured that every superhero should have a theme song and to me it totally ties in with the other motivating tidbits that we've been doing with the word or phrase for the year...right? So I decided on a song that not only gets my pumping at the gym but that describes the superhero that has replaced that sad and desperate lonely girl that use to live in my mirror !! Because the girl that lives in my mirror now..man is SHE A SEXY CHICK !! click the highlighted title to see the video

Great and weird NSV, plus my "mental" restriction

First of it was butt cold here this morning !!! I had a painful laugh this morning when I looked at the forecast and it was actually warmer in SE Alaska (30 deg) then it was here this morning.. I was like are you serious !!??? So on went the thermals ( did I mention how much I hate the thermals!! ARRGH!) and off to work I went.
At the train station my company offers a shuttle service, and they usually have 2 shuttle buses running. Today we got 1 bus and a van. Now I have a history with this van !! For the longest time due to my weight I would cringe every time I saw this van because I knew that it represented a very uncomfortable and embarrassing experience. Just getting in and out of the tight rows was a total embarrassing pain. So imagine my immediate annoyance at seeing the van this morning!! Well in I went and OMG! it was a total non-issue !!! I comfortably went right in and sat in the middle of the middle row and felt totally comfortable..I had such a great smile that I think the driver thought I was flirting with him ( LOL!!) High five for me !!!
Later during lunch time I went to the gym as usual and was taking a new step class with the same aerobics instructor that does my thursday Step & Sculpt class. I don't know if it's a combination of the new hair with the more recent changes, but afterward she comes up to me and says " you did great today...is this your first time taking step?" I looked at her perplexed and said "Debbie, I been taking your other class for months !" She totally dropped her jaw and apologized and said that she hardly recognized me and that I was looking so amazing !! It was a rather awkward NSV for me, because I was so pleased that someone else had noticed my changes but not ready for the not being recognized. I know that this has happened to other bandsters and I guess its one of those side effects of a new me....not that I'm complaining !!

I guess these challenges are paying off after all !!

So about the mental restriction. I think ( knock on wood) that I'm at my ideal fill level and have actually moved my next fill appt till the 25th from this friday. ( Hey Jen BTW when is your next appt ?). I know I've had restriction for awhile but mentally it is still a struggle for me to grasp just how much of a restriction I have. Lately I've been serving myself the same portions and not finishing them, and I've been eating a little too fast with some foods ( lean ham, chicken and plantains) and have had some recent PB episodes. Dinner today was fine but only ate 3/4 cup of what I put on the plate. Just wondering if anyone else is having a "mental" issue with getting the restriction ??

Okay Ladies...here we go it's the LOVE TO LOVE MYSELF loser challenge !!

The response that I got for a new challange was excellent and I am soooo excited that I've got some many great losers
to do this with so here it is lady challange # 2 the " LOVE TO LOVE MYSELF" Losers challange. Gen has very graciously offered to host the prize for this challange...THANKS GEN !! Make sure to check out her blog and how awesome she is rocking by clicking on the link here

Okay so here are the challenge rules:

1. Challenge starts this SUNDAY Jan 11th. and ends SUNDAY FEB 28th.
2. Weight in days are SUNDAYS, please make sure to email me (mrscutecuban@gmail.com) your weeks weight by 8 pm SUNDAY night so that I can post your numbers for the week.
3. Please include a picture of you on the scale, on the FIRST and LAST week of the weight in's. PLEASE NOTE the painted toe clause...your scale pics might be posted so prepare the toes accordingly ( LOL).
4. The challenge prize will go to the biggest loser meaning the person who loses the most weight from challenge week # 1

Gen had a wonderful concept for this to be a LOVE TO LOVE ME challenge. I think that this is incredibly appropriate and a great start to this magical year. I think that it is a concept that might be foreign to many of us. I know that I had forgotten how to love myself. I was content just blending into the background where i could hide from the real world, the mirrors, the camera, social parties and situations because I was just so damn ashamed that I had let myself get to the point where I was at...Well that it the case NO LONGER !!! I have already learned that I got what it takes ! That I got the power and that I am in control and that I WILL LOVE MYSELF..ALL OF ME !!

One of the girls from the previous challenge ( She will remain anonymous) had emailed me and confessed that she felt that she really wasn't an inspiration with her loss and I want to completely DISAGREE !! She was and is a complete inspiration to many. An inspiration to those ladies and gents out there who are sitting on the couch right now, wondering how they can get there life back. She is an inspiration to that person thinking that there is no solution and that this is how it will always be from now on, so I minus will just accept it and my answer is NO !! You got up off the couch, got the courage and took a dramatic step and made the decision to say it's my time !!!

And the final results are in...

First of I want to thank all these incredible women that took this challange with me and it is because of them that it was a great success !! Yes, this band is great and wonderful and a god send with the kit and caboodle attached but the real magic happens when you meet a great group of people who accept you, understand you and are there for your every ran, rave, dissapointment and victory. You guys are the reason this works and you guys are the reason that 2010 will be a historical year for many many people who had lost all hope. So give yourselves a great big hug because you are the reason we all are the biggest losers !!!

I had commented with last weeks results that I was not counting myself in for the running of the challenge winner. I have received so much already that just having the group of you is more than I thought I was going to get from this whole journey, so the winner of the gift certificate for this first FFC biggest loser challenge is...... LINDA !!! With a total weight loss of 18.1 lbs in 10 weeks !!! Congratulations Linda you did GREAT !!! Make sure to send me an email so that I can get your gift certificate out to you soon !! I realized something when I was putting together the final numbers that as a group we did something completely spectacular....adding up all the pounds shredded during these 10 weeks, we as a group loss a combined 103.7 lbs !!!! That is just freaking amazing...ladies take a bow you did a phenomenal job !!!!

So that being said anyone up for a Valentines day challenge ?? If you'd like to participate please email me mrscutecuban@gmail.com and if I get a good response I'll post the details. Or if you have any ideas for another type of challenge please let me know I am always up for a healthy dose of competition to get my butt moving !!!

My reflections for a new year

First off..HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYONE !! as I sit here writing this post from my new favorite toy...It turns out that Santa dressed up as my hubby and left me a new iMAC !!! YAY !! Santa said that it was because I had been such a good girl this year and that he was so proud of me for being so strong and determined in getting to my goals !!! THANKYOU SANTA I LOVE YOU !!!

I've been reading a lot of your blogs and it seems like we all have the same sentiments in mind. The one that I found that really rung a bell with me was how most of us are refusing to set new years resolutions because they have left such bad tastes in our mouths years past. So I will also not set a resolution but I will set a path to the goals that I WILL achieve this year.

i had previously posted on how I was choosing ALLOW as my "spirit" word for the year and it that frame of mind my main goal for this coming year will be " To ALLOW myself to be beautiful" . It's funny how the physical word affects the mental and the spirit, so what I mean by allowing myself to be beautiful is to finally convince myself that the girl that was bound and shackled for so long inside this physical prison can stand up, dust herself off and smile. That she can run free, with no worries about what others are saying or what others are thinking because she's strong and confident and knows it !! This year I want to be beautiful in my natural way with no need for material things to tuck, or cover or aid, but I want to be beautiful by finally feeling comfortable in my own skin and being able to smile knowing that I am beautiful just the way I am !!

2009 for me will most certainly go down in the books as a memorable year. Because it was in 2009 that I discovered that I could do the impossible, that I could take back control of my life and that I could save my own life !! I started the year feeling fearful and hopeless not knowing what was gonna happen or how much more I would sink into my pit of dispair. I hated looking in the mirror, I never allowed myself to smile, I was always depressed and unhappy and bringing down my relationships with it. But most of all I was headed for a life of diabetes, PCOS and a slew of other medical complications. But I learned how to say NO to all the outside factors that I was allowing to control my life and to say IT"S MY TURN !! and I did some pretty marvelous things:
* I changed my eating habits and realized all the crap that I was putting into my body
* I realized that just because it's there doesn't mean that I have to eat it
* I took my first steps on an elliptical and realized..this is fun !! Whoever thought I would enjoy sweating?
* I realized that I have the power to make these changes...and that I always did
* I lost 60 LBS !!!!! My god that's like 3 toddlers !!!
* I lost 3 pants sizes and finally need to wear a belt and added some extra holes at the other end for a change
* I can wear heels again, because I finally found my ankles
* Mirrors are no longer an agent of the devil...I kinda of like looking at myself now ( LOL)
* Discovered this wonderful concept called...flexibility WOW !!
* Realized that it was possible to bend over and tie my shoes without almost passing out
* Looked down one day and holy sugar saw that I have toes..( and that they needed a pedicure!)

All in all I really can't wait to see what else I can accomplish in 2010...maybe Onderland...BRING IT IT"S ON !!!!

HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYONE !!!