“If I can just get back down to my college weight, I’ll be happy.”
“As soon as I lose these last five pounds, I’ll be satisfied.”
“Sound familiar? Sure, we all have an idea of what we think our “healthy” bodyweight should be, but sometimes, the weight we have in mind isn’t exactly a weight that’s healthy. In fact, most of the expectations we have about that silly number on the scale are downright unrealistic.
I have news for you… there is nomagic number. Your body doesn’t have some special number in mind that it thinks the scale should read.
The first step towards your goal is to step off the scale.
In your mind, you might think that weighing 125 pounds when you’re 5′10″ is healthy and attainable, but you’re only going to torture yourself trying to reach that goal, and you’ll become increasingly frustrated that you aren’t able to get to that number. Even if you do reach it, it’ll be difficult, if not impossible, to maintain long-term.” ~ Nicole Snell
Read more….
Today I’m heading back to the Ashley Centre to have botox injected into my armpits to stop me from sweating.
I’ll be back later this afternoon to post an update after I’ve had the procedure done.
UPDATE: I arrived to the clinic an hour early so that my doctor could apply numbing gel and because I don’t like needles or pain very much they gave me valium and panadiene forte. Gosh they look after you at this clinic, as long as you’re comfortable they’re happy to accommodate your every need. Then she iced the arm pit for extra numbing assurance and injected fifty units into it. It stung a little but it was over and done within a couple of minutes at the most. The same thing happened for the second armpit. That’s it! It was pretty painless and simple. Within the next week the effects of the botox will block my nerve signals going to the sweat glands therefore I won’t sweat or have odour for at least 9-12 months. I’ll let you know how I go as time progresses.
I’ve noticed this week by committing myself to a daily plan that things are actually happening. *surprise surprise* By having and more importantly using my daily checklist I’m finding that each day I’m not only achieving set tasks but I’m finding it easier to do. So for 21 days I’ll continue to do this by which time it’ll become a habit and I will no longer require my checklist.
Oh and before I forget again, for those that have emailed me I’ve got your emails but due to my very tight schedule these days I don’t have any spare time during the week to reply to them all. Instead I’ll be replying to them on the weekends and have prioritised them in date order as they cam in. Beki of course yours is first on the list because you’ve been so patient and waited the longest, I hope you will forgive me. Also while I’m on the subject I’m cutting back on time spent reading or commenting on blogs during the week and will spend more time again on the weekend. I’ve had to be brutal with my time management schedule as I’m sure you can all appreciate when you have health and fitness goals to achieve. If you remember my previous post Spring Cleaning My Life I talked about this very subject. Some times in life you have to make tough decisions and you may not like it, but unfortunately that’s life. And if some people get their noses out of joint well that’s their problem, not mine. I’m not here to please everyone all of the time because that will leave no time for myself. I suffered and lost so much last year that I have earnt my right to be more selfish so I can grieve and heal. Some people already have had issues with this about me and in all honesty, I couldn’t care less. As far as I’m concerned if they think that then they’re nothing more than an oxygen thief.
Getting organised, prioritising tasks, sorting out time management and determining what I have to do to achieve my health and fitness goals this year had to become my #1 priority. The internet can literally consume all of our time if we allowed it and it had come to a point where I had to make some of those tough decisions. I could read blogs all day if I wanted too but that’s not going to help me achieve my goals. So what to do? When I moved my blog over to my own website of which I now pay for it also became about money so my time had to be spent more wisely. In my blogroll I only included blogs that were linked back to me but were also current and updated regularly. Having every link from every person who visits my blog or who’s blog I would read wasn’t really beneficial to me. It’s not because I no longer liked them or reading their blog but because I had to draw the line in the sand somewhere. I did the same with my google reader, I only kept links to websites that are useful resources that I would use to assist me on a motivational, health or fitness level. Facebook on the other hand did it for me kind of, my account was hacked into earlier this year and even I couldn’t logon for a couple of days. Facebook administrators were at a loss as to how this had happened and unfortunately 200-300 family and friends were deleted from my list. You would be amazed at some of the reactions I got after this. One message came through using a number of explicit profanities and telling me what they thought of me as they had obviously made the assumption I did it deliberately and they took it personally. I mean, are you kidding me? This person was a friend from my past of whom I hadn’t kept in contact with until we re-connected on facebook and this is how they respond, the hacker did me a favour. I then decided to only keep family and friends who I contact regularly as anymore than that would again take up valuable time that I could spend else where.
Rae and I have spoken about how on the surface we may to appear to be travelling along well but under the surface it’s a different story. So when we’re faced with unpleasant situations in life it’s not only draining on us is also quite upsetting. I know for myself I still have to sort through and finalise all the personal effects belonging to my Mum. I can’t just do it when I have some spare time because it’s an emotional thing. I may feel strong enough now but I have to consider how far it’s going to set me back after having done it. Dad on the other hand still has an unmarked grave of which I have no say or even input into and then there’s the coroners decision so that there’s a death certificate in order to finalise his estate. And let’s not forget the daily constant reminders I have to live with that both of my parents are now dead which is my driving force for wanting to move up north to Brisbane, fingers crossed.
So there you have it life is what it is, nothing more nothing less.
Can you believe it, it’s been a month already since my surgery and I’m happy to report that I’m doing great! Given there’s still a lot of sore spots and a lot of numb spots but my healing is coming along in leaps and bounds. Every day I’m still feeling and seeing improvements and that’s all I can expect at this stage of the game. As you can see by the photos today my arm compression bandages are gone! * woo hoo* One down and one to go. I’m well on my way to retuning to my normal existence and I can’t wait!
Monday I had my first lympahtic massage with my myotherapist. At first I was some what hesitant due to the soreness and numbness but she knew my pain threshold and I felt so much better after it. I’ll be having these once a week for four weeks to further help with my healing. I’m also taking bromelain to help with the scar tissue and swelling. Yet another natural product to help me along my way.
What else, ah yes. I had my first exfoliating shower this week, or should I say shedding shower. LOL!! I haven’t exfoliated or moisturised since having my surgery and anyone who knows me knows how much I look after my skin because I’m not born with naturally healthy skin. So I physically shed whilst in the shower, it was like when you can rub your skin of when you get sun burnt. Only problem was I couldn’t get it all off, it just kept on flaking off. Even after my shower I tried using my body brush and again it kept coming off. In the end I gave up and applied moisturiser which felt so good after all that time. After no caring for my skin like I’m accustomed too and wearing a compression garment 24/7 I think it’s going to take some time for my skin to return back to normal. But at least I can shower, wash, exfoliate and moisturise now so I’m not complaining.
As I mentioned yesterday here’s my daily checklist:
Yesterday was another good day only I missed my afternoon snack due to my nutrient timings so I marked it M = Missed. This is actually quite a good little tool for me and will help me stay focused and create another positive change in my life. I’ve also started wearing my heart rate monitor again, it isn’t 100% comfortable but like everything else I’ll get used to it until it is comfortable. I’ve started recording again my daily calories consumed, my daily calories burnt, my kgs and body fat %. Things are starting to happen for me and my body and I couldn’t be happier at the moment. Life is good ladies.
This week I will hit all of my health and fitness goals and I won’t settle for anything less . I’m focused, I mean really focused. I’m disappointed in myself for not doing what I know needs to be done. So much so that I’m motivated like I’ve never been before and nothing is going to stand in my way of achieving this week’s goals. I thought long and hard about what happened last week and what could’ve contributed to it’s undesirable outcome. It’s no wonder I hit the proverbial wall. There were a combination of things that contributed. Firstly I didn’t get enough sleep, secondly I didn’t eat enough calories, thirdly I didn’t drink enough water and last was my lack of self-discipline with time management. You reap what you sew and that’s exactly what happened.
“If I want different, I have to do different” — Lia Halsall. So I’ve already made the appropriate changes to my office hours, hubby’s aware also so if by chance I don’t adhere to them he’ll step in and sort the situation out quick smart. Then yesterday I created myself a small checklist covering the things I have to on a daily basis. Here’s what it looks like:
That way I can tick off things as I go which will keep me more focused. Unfortunately yesterday I totally forgot about my post-training shake in the afternoon so I marked it with F = Forgot. I’m not perfect and I don’t live in a perfect world so I am flexible in that life happens and you can’t always control everything. It was an honest mistake but more importantly I learnt from it and today it won’t happen becuase of this reason so it’s all good. I’ll be posting my daily checklist up each day so as well as keeping myself accountable you can too if you want.
Well folks, it’s time to go.
Lia xxx
“If you don’t know where you are going,
you will probably end up somewhere else.”
~Lawrence J. Peter
