By the way...that picture was me in June. I had made a personal goal to run in the Strawberry Run. I started running by doing the Couch Potato to 5K training from coolrunning.com in May.

So I signed Roy and I up for the race in June. It's an annual thing for the Marysville Strawberry Festival. I was excited. We were up to running almost a mile a day so I was confident.

Well, sometimes life throws lemons at you and if they don't knock you unconcious, you make lemonade. First off the directions weren't clear so we were late starting. (We had gone to the 5K start line, but the registration was on the other side of town.) We got our numbers, zipped to the starting line, and this family runs up to us.

"Where is the race?"

"It starts right here, but we're late. You can still run, though."

"Okay cool, can our kids run with you?"

"Umm...sure."

Okay, no problem really...we didn't mind a bit. We like kids. We're teachers, for crying out loud. But don't you find it a little strange that someone would run up to total strangers and say "Hey total strangers, can we leave our kids in your hands for a race?"

Yeah, I thought so too.

So we take off. Roy ran ahead with the two girls, about 8 and 9 or 10 or so. I was behind with a little boy about 6 who ran around the block, turned the corner, then stopped. He was having nothing of this running thing. He also wouldn't talk to me. So I spent this race saying, "Come on! You can do it! Look at how fast you're [walking] running! Let's go! Wheee!"

He'd run for about 30 yards, then slow to a walk. Run. Walk. Walk. Walk. Whine. Run. Walk.

I came in last. Dead last. Laster than last. Last of all.

We turned the corner and saw the finish line and then he had a burst of speed. His family was cheering him on so I let him run ahead, Roy let the girls run ahead, and they all "won" over us.

It was great. I really was only interested in just running the race. I had to laugh and take a picture of my stunning 20 minute time. Hee hee.

I dont' run as much any more. I really like the elliptical because I can do it with my eyes closed and concentrate on the book I'm listening to. But when I do I'm up to about 2.75 miles at a time on the treadmill. It feels great to be able to do that. My next goal is to run a 5K. There is one next weekend, but unfortnately I'm busy. Maybe this spring when it's warmer.

Time to pay rent!

This is what I tell myself when I'm reluctant to work out. I mean don't get me wrong, most days I love working out. I find it exhiliarating and honestly do enjoy it. There are days, though. We all have those days. Those days when our bodies try to lull us into staying home, parked in front of the TV, growing roots into the Barca Lounger. These are the days when I have to remind myself why I'm doing this.

My analogy of "rent" came from a comment a friend made. T, another WWer who has been very successful said to me one day, "Don't you feel like exercise is the rent we have to pay to keep our bodies?"

Yeah! That totally makes sense!

I used to pay very little in the way of rent. I lived in a run down body. It was a little...okay, a lot...flabby around the edges. The paint was peeling, the plumbing didn't work very well, it wasn't overly attractive (although I tried to keep it looking as nice as I could). It was liveable. It was what you might term, "A nice fixer-upper opportunity."

Now I've upscaled to a much nicer house (body). The exterior still needs a little work, but wow what a difference! It's much more energy efficient. It looks a lot sleeker under a good coat of paint. The plumbing works great...but it costs!

Is it worth the cost? Oh yeah! It is so worth it! I love feeling good every day. I find I need a lot less sleep. I wake up energized where I used to drag out of bed. I never thought of myself as having any medical maladies, but I realize now that I no longer have heartburn or stomach problems, my legs don't ache at the end of the day, my back never hurts after being on my feet all day. All that stuff seems to have miraculously disappeared. very cool.

So every day I pay rent in two installments; morning and afternoon. I expect I’ll always do at least one workout a day, although I really do enjoy two. Yes, I have mornings when I want to snuggle down deeper under my comforter and turn off the alarm, but then I tell myself, “Self! You are not going to want to get out of bed any more in half an hour, and that certainly won’t make any difference in your sleep, so get yer butt out of this bed!”

I find that two workouts a day really “bookends” my day nicely. My morning workout revs me up for the day. I used to drag into work and my students knew to just sort of lay low for the first half hour or so until I was awake. I was a cranky cricket!

My afternoon workout gives me time to de-stress from my day. If I was pissed at someone at work (never a student, but sometimes colleagues or administration) it’s gone by the time I leave the gym.

Speaking of cranky cricket, that is one thing that even my husband will agree, has been an amazing side-benefit of exercise. My moods are much more even and regulated. I tend to be a reactor. Okay, and overreactor. I’m like a flash fire. I get mad, I blow up, I burn out, I’m fine.

That really doesn’t happen that much any more. No, I’m serious. I find myself coming up to a situation that might have caused me to blow my top in my prior-couch potato life. I look at it, start to steam, then think, “Oh well…” It’s like natural Xanex! It’s GREAT!

Signing out!

Christmas is coming and this year is the first time I can't sing, "Christmas is coming and Tory's already fat...please put a penny in the old man's hat."

My husband used to hate it when I sang that.

Anyhow, I'm going to see my family at Christmas. Right now there is a little issue, but hopefully it will resolve itself. I'm sure it will. I have faith.

The interesting thing is, no one has seen me since April. Most of them don't even know I've lost weight. If you go to my website you will see...it is ever so slightly noticeable that I've dropped 90 pounds.

I last visited in April. I was so excited. I wanted them all to notice. No one said one word. I had lost 30 pounds and no one said, "Wow, you look like you've lost weight!"

I was kind of bummed.

I decided to just wait and not tell anyone until I saw them again, which will be December 22. I fully expect that when my brother, Craig, comes to pick me up at the airport, he will literally walk right past me.

I think as we lose weight we are so focused on it that, naturally, we feel like the entire world should stop and take notice. I'm sure it's that way with most life changes. When I was first losing I could NOT wait for someone to say, "Wow, you've lost weight. You look great."

Now, of course, I get that all time. In fact sometimes it almost gets a little overwhelming. Don't get me wrong. I appreciate it. I think it is really kind of people to take notice and comment. However, I have had a few comments that have kind of made me stop and say, "Ummmm...thanks?" Here is a smattering of those comments:

• Wow Tory, you look so good! You don't even look like yourself! Isn't it just great???
  • Well yes, it is great. I really would hate to look like me. Heavens no!
• Oh wow! You look so pretty! Don't you just feel pretty? Doesn't it feel good to actually feel pretty?
  • Yes because no fat person would ever feel pretty. Thank God I'm not the visual abomination I used to be!!
• You know, you're almost as skinny as I am now!
  • Said by someone who was clearly a good 25 pounds heavier, in a catty voice, as if all along this whole thing was some sort of contest.

Lately too I've been getting a lot of "Are you sure you're not getting TOO thin?" comments. I'm 132 pounds (and up, I've been geting these comments since 145). I'm not going to be blown away by a breeze yet! Again, I appreciate the concern but part of me wants to say, "How is what I am doing with my body any of your business?"

But of course people always make it their business, don't they? I mean we all do. It isn't like it's everyone BUT me. We notice when someone puts on weight. We notice when they take it off. (Although I would NEVER comment on the weight gain, nor what I might consider to be too large a loss.) It's like somehow society feels that every woman's body is just theirs for the nitpicking.

She's put on some weight, hasn't she?

Wow, she's getting entirely too thin!

Oh that dress is NOT attractive on her at all!

Hello! It's called shampoo, sweetie. Look into it!

So this morning when she looked in the mirror was she intentionally going for the First Street Hooker look?

I've also found that some people take my personal decision to get healthy and lose weight as some sort of commentary on their health. Like I care! I mean yes, I care if someone that means something to me is overweight and unhealthy...but most of the time I don't think about it. I try not to judge people based on such meaningless measures. I get a lot of, "Well I really should do something about my weight too"s coupled with a guilty look.

Honestly, you come to it in your own time. It's like quitting anything that is harming you...drinking, smoking, drugs...no one can make you do it and be successful. You've got to want it for yourself and the time has to be right. For me it wasn't right for over 15 years. I mean I say to myself, "Why didn't you do this ten years ago?" and I realize...ten years ago I was in too much a state of turmoil to even consider it. (I had just started teaching, Roy was student teaching and then subbing, I was still going to school at night because I was hired to teach Business Education and had a Health Education endorsement. Weight loss was the furthest thing from my mind at the time.) I really applaud people who can concentrate on their health in times of adversity. I'm hoping that this all becomes such habit that when those times come, it won't even be an issue.

Signing off for now.

Man I'm tired today. Last night I decided, oh about 10 p.m., to set up a web site. Not just a site on Tripod or something, but my own site on my own server so that meant:

• Learning how to allow my router to pass web traffic.
• Registering the domain name www.msteechur.com
• Setting up Apache webserver
• Spending a lot of time swearing at Apache webserver
• Uninstalling Apache webserver
• Installing Abyss webserver

After that it worked like a charm. I think I'll change to Apache eventually but I just didn't want to mess with it last night. Of course once I had the server up I had to have a site on it. So I decided to learn Front Page. Pretty easy to use...set up a site and finally headed off to bed about 2:00. I'm quite proud of my site, though. I took the current site from here and modified it substantially to move it to www.msteechur.com. As of right now it's not working yet because the web has to update the DNS servers of the world...but hopefully by the time anyone reads this (if anyone reads this), it will be working.

I'm doubly proud of myself because too spite going to be about 2:00, I still got up at 5:45 and worked out at Curves. I actually, for the first time in a long time, turned the alarm off and was going to sleep another 45 minutes. Then I realized that I would actually be more awake and lucid if I just got my butt out of bed and worked out. I was right. That 45 minutes wouldn't have amounted to much. I also worked out after school at the YMCA. I generally do the following workout every day:

• 30 minutes on the elliptical, which is now only TWO points since I am down to 132 (although I burn 378 calories, so what's up with that WW online journal??).
• 20 minutes of weights. I alternate between arms and legs. One point.
• 20 minutes of Fitball and stretching. The Fitball is REALLY cool! I just ordered one for home because it REALLY works those abs. On the fitball I do:
  • 50 situps sitting on the ball
  • 50 side lunges (25 on each side)
  • 25 situps with legs on ball
  • 25 pelvic thrusts (I always feel kinda naughty doing this one)
  • I also try to do at least 25 reverse situps. I'm telling you, the abs are screaming after that.

So my daily workouts consist of 30 minutes of circuit training in the morning and about an hour of cardio, weights, and abs in the afternoon. Hmm, maybe I should keep a daily workout journal on here. I don't know. That's kind of boring. I do put it into my online journal at WW. Have to say, people if you are reading this...get yer butt to the gym and WORK OUT! First of all, it feels great. No, really. Seriously. It does. Yes. Trust me. Look into my eyes. I have honest eyes. My honest eyes are telling you that it does feel great. Second of all, want to rev up that metabolism? Get that booty moving! I'm lucky. I've have had very even weight losses. I'm sure a lot of that is due to daily workouts since March. Third of all, let's face it ladies and gentlemen. When you live for 15 years in a large body your skin feels the need to compensate by stretching WAYYYY out. So when you then lose that weight your skin is looking like a cheap pair of stretch pants from K-Mart. It just is NOT the same. Exercising will help firm up the muscles under the skin, pulling it in tighter and giving it a nicer, smoother lay. It is frustrating to be able to squeeze into a size four or six but still have this layer of loose skin that hangs over your waist band. Exercise helps firm that way up. When I first started to see a real loss I was afraid I'd end up needing surgery. Now I think that within a year my body will look much better than it does now. I'll never have a Victoria's Secret Model body, but it's still better than what it was. So those are my pearls of wisdom, random thoughts, mental meanderings for the day. Enjoy! I'm off to bed!

I do happen to have a website with pictures of my weight loss (if you didn't get here from there). It is My Weight Loss Journey. I have all sorts of wonderful insights on that page. Well, okay. Maybe not. But there are pictures of me, my husband, and my dogs...oh, and Santa!

Oh man...here I am on a Sunday afternoon and I've been thinking about this "blog" thing. I mean it sounds interesting, but who gives a rip what I have to say? Probably no one, which will mean my life is empty, meaningless, and deviod of true friendship.

Okay, maybe not. Actually, I find that some people are miraculously interested. Right now my focus in life, well my main focus, okay ONE of my main focii is weight loss.

You see up until just recently I was always a chunky monkey. Now I know some people will read this and my validity rating will go right there into la toilette. How silly we are, as a society, that we base the value of a person on what they look like. I mean I can gift wrap a turd, but inside it's still a turd. I can roll a diamond in mud, but the value doesn't decrease...does it?

So here's what happened. About a year ago, maybe a little more, I went to visit my family who lives in California. I was looking through my mother's scrapbooks. I thought my pictures all looked slightly distorted and then it hit me...they were all thinner than I really am. Whoa Nellie! What the hell? My mother had made me thinner so that I would, what...appear better than I am? Be more attractive? Have more value?

Can you say ouch?

I knew that you could.

So I was pissed, which is to be expected. Somehow I've always felt that parents should love, value, and respect their children the way that they are. I mean it isn't like I'm luring small children into my den and eating their livers! I was fat. Just plain fat. I was still smart, funny, sensitive, kind (usually), and driven. I didn't confront my mother (we simply do not confront in my family. It just isn't done. It's a Quixotic dance with no meaning if we even consider it. I went home a combination of hurt and anger. From home I did email, but again on the sly...not confrontational, and I basically said, "I am fat. I will probably always be fat. Anyone who does not accept me the way I am does not have a place in my life."

She didn't get it. She never does. That's part of what I love about her.

Then I started getting all introspective. I'm that way. I overthink things. I started thinking, "Yeah, that's a nice sentiment my dear, but do you mean it? Do you accept yourself the way that you are?

Damn me!

I was right. I'm always right.

I didn't.

Blah.

So then I decided that if I was going to demand that of others, I damn well better demand it of myself. I said to myself, "Self, you've got to learn to value you as a package...not just your brain, your sense of humor, your ability to charm the paint off the wall...the whole enchilada!"

So I went on this year of self discovery thing. I know it sounds all 1970s encounter group and shit, but that's what I did. I am just so in touch with myself!

And about the end of last year, I was there. I was cool with me. I had come to the actual understanding that my weight did not detract one whit from who I was.

So I'm all thinking I'm good, home free. I'm reading the NAFAA pages, prominently displaying the book, "Fat?So!" (which is a GREAT book, I must say), sashaying my round little behind all over town feeling good. One day I'm saying my daily affirmations (we've moved into the 80s therapy fads now) and from out of nowhere I hear a voice.

"So if you love yourself so much, what's up with this body?"

"What? Who? Huh?"

"I'm just saying, if you really value yourself, why are you heading towards an early grave by treating your body like crap?"

It was my inner child. Now I hadn't heard much from her since that ACOA class I'd stumbled into years ago, when she told me, "You know what? This class is a load of crap. So you grew up with an alcoholic? So what? Show me one interesting person who didn't grow up with some adversity? Get over yourself."

"What do you want? I thought I left you at the community college chatting with the undergrads?"

"Well I think that it's all noble and great and stuff that you love yourself. I mean seriously, that's a very good thing." She says to me, looking at me slyly. "But you know what? There is more to life than self acceptance. What about actual feeling good and being healthy? That's a really important thing too."

"Shut up. Here, have a cookie."

A few days later I'm minding my own business, she pops up again.

"You know, obesity can lead to heart disease, high blood pressure, stroke, some forms of cancer, and early death." She quipped.

"Shut up."

"Of course you might not die. Maybe you'll just live on and on so ill that you'll barely be able to enjoy things in life. Maybe Medicare will buy you one of those motorized scooters and there you'll be, so heavy you can't walk across a parking lot, looking hot in your bright pink workout jacket (as if you'd ever work out) zipping through the mall."

"Bite me. Here, have some chocolate."

A few days later.

"Remember that husband that you want to grow old with? He's probably looking at the same thing. Didn't his grandfather die of a heart attack at the age of 42? Scary stuff!"

"Lalalalalalalala...I'm not listening to you!"

"Did you know that 90-95% of adult diabetes is Type II which is directly related to obesity in adults?"

"How did you get so smart all of a sudden?" I barked.

"Well, you're the one who wanted that Masters degree."

So damn sam, there you have it. She was right. I couldn't continue to ignore the facts.

The Facts
• I was overweight, approximately 225-230 pounds.
• I was not getting any younger.
• I was healthy, but was starting to feel some of the effects of being overweight.
• If I truly wanted to live a long, healthy, satisfying life I couldn't keep ignoring that part of my person.

So I looked around. I knew a fad diet wouldn't work. I was a Health Ed major in college and had read enough research on fad diets to know that they were never the answer. I had a friend who had recently lost a great deal of weight on Weight Watchers. l poked around online and found The Weight Watchers Website.

On February 2, 2002, I joined WW online. I didn't want to do meetings. I just didn't feel comfortable sharing my fatitude with the world (as if they couldn't see). I also didn't want to add something to my already busy life that would mean I'd have to be somewhere weekly at a certain time. I figured I'd try the online version for three months and if it wasn't working for me, I'd join meetings.

My husband decided to do this whole thing with me. I plan the meals, he eats what I eat plus a little more to compensate for his larger size.

As of today, I have lost (drumroll please) 90 pounds and he has lost (drumroll again please) 67 pounds.

Give me a "Waaa"

Give me a "Hoo!"

WAAAHOOO! Together we've lost more than a me!

I am now two pounds from goal, I think. (More on that later.) So here you go! That's one aspect of my life. More exciting details to follow!