A Pledge to Myself

I'm feeling really good about my "get healthier" goals to start this year.  Before you start thinking how cliche it sounds to make a resolution to eat healthy and workout (we all know it flops come February) let me break it down. It's not a resolution, I detest the word.  Each year I've been making small changes to my lifestyle in order to be healthier overall and I've stuck with each one.  It may seem more effective to just dive headfirst into a major lifestyle change, but I know myself all to well and if I do anything drastic I will resent it and ultimately fail (and the reason most others fall off the wagon too).  Last year was simply to incorporate more veggies in my nearly veggie-less meat fueled diet and the year before that was to cut out fast food.  I love veggies now and the thought of chowing a greasy fast food burger makes me cringe (fries and onion rings are still yummy but I stay away).  However, I still won't eat a salad, or at least not happily.  For some reason I still view salads as something to tide you over till actual tastier food comes and I can't break myself of that.  Salad, we will never be friends.

Anyway this year I want to step it up and do two things to get healthier.  Que dramatic music.  I figure since I've been doing well with past lifestyle choices I can handle two, I'm not a wussie.  I want to end my love affair with bad carbs.  Over the past years, when life got busy, I often resorted to stuffing my face with carb loaded quick foods or skipping altogether and then overeating later (totally negating all the good veggies I was eating and making me pack on pounds anyway).  It is possible to eat healthier when in a hurry (cucumber turkey wrap anyone?) and teaches me to better manage my time and plan ahead.  Of course this doesn't mean I will never eat a bad carb again.  Let's face it, if I can't ever eat another piece of pizza or buffalo chicken wings again, I may as well halt this now.  It just means coming up with healthier options and over time I'll think twice before giving into my junk food desires just like I did with eating fast food.  Thank God I cut the fast food two years back or I'd be even heavier!

A candid shot from our wedding day, I was 21

My other get healthy goal is to workout again.  I jumped right in and was very good about losing all the baby weight after having Kaylie...four years ago.  I stopped after I had gotten a real bad bout of the flu that hung on for super long and I never really started again and then gained all the weight back.  I made excuses that I was too tired from the demands of motherhood and then thought I could get by with calling my daily chores "exercising".  Well the excuses end now.  I'm getting too flabby and I don't have the energy I feel a 26 (soon to be 27 next week) year old should.  I used to wish I was thinner when I was 21, but now I wish I was as thin as when I was 21.  This will be the hardest for me because I haaaaaate exercising.  However, if I keep it quick and make it as integral to my day as brushing my teeth, I'll do it.  So with that in mind, I've been spending 15 minutes each day, excluding weekends, upon waking doing a quick workout.  I alternate what I work on, today was arms, and guess what, I feel better!  I'm not as tired throughout the day and it helps having Kaylie workout and do Pilates with me, she loves it!  Why did I wait so long?

Me with Kaylie, age 26 and 40 lbs heavier, eep!  Did I just admit that?

Why am I sharing this with you?  I'm hoping with the fact that I'm making my intentions public I'll be even more inclined to keep with it.  I wouldn't want to be a bad example to you!  I'll share with you along the way as I progress and it will help me too seeing that my choices are making a difference.  I don't have any set weight goals or desire to even be "skinny".  I simply want to feel more comfortable in my own skin and be more healthy overall.  Do you have any goals to make yourself healthier?  What are you doing to ensure that it lasts?