March 23, 2004

Wow, I maintained this week! Which is good because TOM was here and I was expecting a gain from my “monthly visitor”. The gym is working out good. I went 3 times last week and I’m switching the eating around. I’m finding that the smaller mini meals are keeping me full. Every 3 hours, I’m eating something. Today I had a shake for breakfast, a yogurt for a snack, pasta for lunch and an apple, string cheese for a snack, yogurt and a high fiber muffin for another snack, then for dinner I had an eggbeaters omelet with veggies and lite cheese, 1 cup of cottage cheese, and a salad with some dressing. I know I need to increase my fruits but I don’t have any in the house right now. The closest thing to fruit is either some canned fruit or a can of warm ruby red grapefruit juice (well, I just got up and delivered that to the fridge so it will be cold in the morning).

I bought another MP3 player. My original one was in the stolen jeep so I found the same one on half.com for $69.00 while the same one was going for $114 at amazon. Can you say that I am a bargain hunter? I ordered it last Wednesday and I got it on Monday! Is that fabulous or what? Chris had some music on his computer so he downloaded some stuff for me today so I had something to listen to while I was at the gym. So I had some Metallica, New Order, Depche Mode and some NIN to listen to. It got me in the zone and it kept me working good. I found a good article in Fitness Magazine on how to “walk away the pounds” for six weeks so I think I’m going to try that program. I’ll let you know how it goes and if it works. I don’t know if I will go as extreme as it is stating I should but I will do what is safe. I’m getting a tad more confident at the gym. I just keep my head held high and I focus on my work out. There are too many youngins’ in there. It would be nice to see some older people in there. I wasn’t able to hit curves last night or tonight due to my work schedule. I’m hoping that Thursday I will be able to go because I have a late night visit tomorrow which will have me home around 7 where I will hit the gym at 7:30.

The weekend was nice, Chris and I went to Frakenmuth, MI. He’s never been there for the chicken. It amazes me that he’s only eaten at the Bavarian Inn for the German food. When you got to Frakenmuth, you’re supposed to go for the chicken. Luckily, he was flexible enough to try Zehnders out. I had a really nice time. On the way back we stopped at Birch Run Outlet Mall to look for some bargains. Unfortunately, I found no bargains for myself (well expect for the crackers at that darn pepperidge farm store!) Though, Chris did find a pair of shoes for himself. I tried on some items at north face but the pants hung on me funny. Oh well. That just keeps money in my pocket book.

Speaking of money, in about 3 - 4 months my financial aid will be paid off. Yes, I Kellie have paid almost the $17000 that I borrowed from financial aid for grad school and it’s going to be paid off! Finally things are going well for me financially. It’s just taken me 3 years for me to do that. I paid off the credit cards 2.5 years ago. I have to say one good thing about Shawn is that he got me off the credit card kick. The only debt I will have will be my Jeep and hopefully that will be paid off in another 3 years. We’ll see. I’m out of my house kick. I’m tired of looking at junkers for $115000 so I’m just going to pack my money away and save it. Now that the finacial aid will be gone in a few months, I can do some aggressive saving. Now that feels good!

Well that’s it for me tonight. I’ve finished downloading some Johnny Cash for my MP3 player so I’m off to bed, take care all-Kellie

March 19, 2004

It always drives me nutts when I don’t journal on here but it’s been hectic lately. I’ve been a bad social worker that I allowed my work to infiltrate my personal life. Otherwise known as job spill over. Don’t get me wrong, I love my job but lately I have been completely overwhelmed and I’ve felt as if I have been sucked into the gray mass of mental health problems. Finally, I’m slowing down. I just can’t keep this pace going because it began to really affect me. So this week, I slowed down...and you know what? It felt damn good. They are in the second round of interviews at work so when the new therapist gets things should settle down around there. In the past, I’ve done pretty well at separating my work life from my home life, it just got a little carried away there for the past month or two. Things just haven’t been balanced in my life. I just got a little overwhelmed and when that happens I usually retreat...and that’s what I’ve been doing in the last month.

Despite the stress and being overwhelmed, I haven’t gained a single pound...nor have I lost something. I decided last week that I cannot continue to do what I have been doing, I needed to make a change. So, I joined a real gym last week. You know, one with eleptical machines, treadmills, free weights, cybex machines, etc. I needed to step my workout up a little bit because I think Curves lost it’s effects. Though, I’m not going to quit Curves because that is a social outlet for me. So this is what I have been doing. MWF are my Cardio (tread/ele) and lift days, T/TH/SAT are my Cardio days with Curves (2x around). I’m still using WW points but I’m eating 6 times per day. 1st meal is a slimfast shake, snack is a fruit roll up or a yogurt, lunch is a sandwich or pasta or something like that with some fruit, 2nd snack is a CLIF bar, dinner is a piece of chicken,or fish, or beef plus a veggie, or cottage cheese, salad with 1 thbsp of dressing, with a mocha Starbucks bar. So far so good.

Okay, getting back to the gym part, well that was something. I’ve been completing about returning to the gym for sometime but I ran into a gal that used to go to Curves about two weeks ago and mentioned that I was thinking about it and she really encouraged me to do so. So, then I began to think...where should I go? I have this coworker named Wendi and she worked over at a gym near Curves and she raves about it so I decided to try it out. Okay so I give the gym a call and set up an appointment. I get there and he is the “co-owner of the gym”. The guy is a super arrogant dick head. He kept on stressing that ‘Oh, I could have you down 30 pounds in one mont’ so I’m like “Uh, I did that a long time ago and you know what happened? I got fat. I don’t want to be a yo-yo dieter so I’m sticking to weight watchers and having a new workout plan” and then the guy states “but I really think your problem is nutrition and not the execerise so much, I could get you on some supplements and...” finally I said, “Look here, I plan on doing this for the rest of my life, I’m NOT looking for quick fixes, I’m looking for long term” so finally he got the point. Okay, so I signed up. Then I got that nauseaous feeling and I had to get the hell out of the place. I paniced so I got the hell out of there. I was feeling guilty about the Curves because I love Curves but it’s not doing anything like it did before, I felt scared because the people at the gym are all really young and it sent me back to those early college days where I was insercure, and then I felt overwhelmed because I was out of my comfort zone. So I told myself it was okay to feel that way but I made a promise to myself that I would go back there the next day. I did, and it went okay. They give out 2 free personal training sessions so luckily, I got to do the training session with another person and she was a woman, thank goodness! She listened to my goals and was down to earth. She stated that carbs are okay but you want to keep it simple. Eat breads before 2 pm and after 2 focus on the protein. If I want pasta, eat it during lunch. She stated that staying with WW is fine but since I’m working out she wants me to increase my points to at least 26 per day and I have to eat 6 mini meals a day. In her opinion why I haven’t lost is that I haven’t changed anything in the past so I’ll try it. On my lift days, I’m trying the free weights plus a couple of leg machines. So I will keep you all updated on my success. I’m hoping this is going to help out so I can finally hit my goal of 145 on my scale or where my body is nice and firm/toned instead of it being soft and goey.

I will be taking two vacations in the next three months. Next month over Easter, I’m going to be taking a trip to KY!!! Yeah!!! I’m just going down to visit the folks. Then I’m leaving for Maine with Chris over labor day weekend. We will be travelling through Canada and staying in Montreal for the night (hey Anji, you want to meet up with us???) And then we will proceed over to New Hampshire? Then we will proceed to Maine and stay at Acadia for a couple of nights and then come home via the US side. I went to Maine when I was 16. It was like the last family vacation that my family took. It was awesome, so I’m looking forward to spending this time with Chris. We’re thinking about the Canadian route because of the holiday. Lets just say, those vacations are not getting here soon enough.

Chris and I are doing good. For the first time in our relationship I had to jump his @ss about something. This guy at his work quit so Chris is now on that guys route and unfortunately he has to overnight in Detroit twice a week (the good thing is that he is earning some flight hours that can make him more pleasing to the airlines). Anyways, for two weeks he kept on stressing that last Friday he would be home at 9:30 pm...so 9:30 pases, 10:00, 11:00, finally at 12:00 am he gets home. I was kind of pissed because he kept stressing that he would be home early and then he gets in the door and I’m like “Look, I was worried, you could have called” then I spouted off our number and he was like “I’m sorry, I’m sorry” so that was our first tiff. Not bad in nine months. I think I was on a roll that night because then I went off about the porn stuff I stumbled accross in his history. I’m like “hey Chris, do you know how to clear that history because I don’t want to see that crap”. Yup, it was bad. It’s like I don’t understand that aspect of him and unfortunately, he is not visiting you know the mainstream sites. There was some bdsm. I’ve tried to talk to him about that stuff but it’s somewhere he won’t go. Total denial, then I’m in total denial. I understand that people look at porn but what he is doing is sneaky and not upfront and it drives me freaking crazy. There’s always a thorn poking in that rose. Damn it, why did it have to be my rose?

I’ve missed you all! Well, that’s it for me tonight, take care all- Kellie

My Vistors Since March 19, 2004