My Journey: Positive Outlook For 2013

Mandy, I would do a little research online. There are a lot of websites that can give you a good idea of the calories burned giving your age, weight, gender, and the kind of exercise you did. Usually I rely on things like that rather than the monitor on any exercise machine I might use.
 
Cory - I've checked a few of those online calculators and none of them are the same. For the most part though, the numbers are closer to my watch than to the treadmill so I guess I'll go with my watch for now.

I did some Tae bo tonight and burned 815 calories (again, according to the watch). I had to do some jogging in place during some of it again because I just couldn't get my body to co-operate. I gave it my all though. I have some sore muscles that I had no clue I even had! I guess that's a good thing. :)
 
This morning's weigh in was 211.4lb!!! That's 6.4lb lost since joining this forum a few weeks ago! I am over the moon excited this morning!! :)
 
Hey Mandy ~ Awesome progress so far! I cannot wait til I have lost that much! I am slow rolling, but I look forward to the months to come!

I am glad to see that you kept up with exercise! It is great that you keep moving when the moves get a little hard. I have to do that as well!

Have a great week!
 
Well, I think you were probably more active than I was before trying to lose weight. I was pretty much a couch potato so my body's probably just adjusting to being more active. I'm loving it though, especially seeing the hard work paying off! I hope you have a great week too. :)

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I'm having a great day today. Started with a packet of strawberries & cream oatmeal for breakfast. About an hour later I had some fresh strawberries and cool whip which I followed up with a granny smith apple a couple of hours later. Lunch was a big garden salad with grilled chicken breast. Afternoon snack was a single serving of 15 four cheese triscuit thin crips (oh my lord are they delicious!!). I'll be heading home shortly and will either be doing taebo again or the treadmill. Either one will be for the full hour and for dinner I'm having some chicken wings for a change. If I decide to go for a desert afterwards it'll be more strawberries and cool whip. Can't get enough of that right now. LOL
 
Workout done. I ended up doing Tae bo for an hour. My handy dandy hrm watch says I burned 882 calories. What a workout it was! I'm getting better with some of the moves, but still have a lot of practicing to do.

An interesting (and exciting to me) thing happened when I was done and stretching. I realized that I can stand up and bend over at the waist to touch my toes without having to bend my legs. I don't even remember ever being able to do that! I don't know if it's that my flexibility that's improving or that my gut is going away, but either way it was pretty awesome to be able to do it. :)

Now it's game time. Hockey is on so I'll be glued to the tube for the next 3 hours. :)
 
MandyH said:
An interesting (and exciting to me) thing happened when I was done and stretching. I realized that I can stand up and bend over at the waist to touch my toes without having to bend my legs. I don't even remember ever being able to do that! I don't know if it's that my flexibility that's improving or that my gut is going away, but either way it was pretty awesome to be able to do it. :)
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Fantastic! See? This is one of those immeasurables. We keep looking at the scale to tell us we're doing well, but there are often FAR more and FAR better ways to see if we're on track. Great job, Mandy!
 
I've been noticing the same thing, Mandy. I bent over today at work and notied a difference.
 
Don, it is really cool to see other subtle changes especially when you're not liking what the scale says. Just gives you extra motivation in knowing that your body IS changing!

Cory, isn't it an awesome feeling? Kind of like a sense of accomplishment. :)

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I had a really good day for food intake today. I'm finding that eating more often throughout the day is helpful and better than trying to hold out for larger meals. I've been eating pretty much all healthy foods; oatmeal, fruits, veggies, grain crackers when I need a snack, lean proteins, lots of water, etc. I think I'll be able to keep up with this part of the lifestyle change no problem. My workout went great too. I decided to take a break from tae bo today and did the treadmill for a change. I walked for an hour at 3mph, 20 minutes at a 6% incline, 10 minutes a 5%, and the rest of the time was either working my way up to the 6% or down. The treadmill says I burned an even 500 calories, but my hrm watch says 910. HUGE jump I know! I'm more inclined to believe the watch since the treadmill takes none of my personal info, but my watch at least takes my age.

I keep stressing over this though. Do any of you have an accurate calorie burner online so I can double check my numbers? I still feel that my watch is too high. For now I'm taking the average which comes out to 705. Any help to try to get an accurate number would be VERY helpful though! :)

Hope you're all having a great night!
 
I stepped on the scale this morning to the see the same exact weight for the 3rd day straight. I knew I wouldn't see a drastic drop or anything, but it's discouraging to see that number staying the same. I've been busting my butt harder this week doing a combo of tae bo and the treadmill. I've been eating MUCH healthier too, but according to the number on the scale I have not lost anything. Now I know it's not right to rely solely on the scale so I'm not at all in panic mode. I know that muscle weighs more than fat so I'm hoping that's the explanation (gaining more muscle during my workouts outweighing the weight lost). Just wishing to see a lower number is all.

I just got a mini workout in at work too. LOL I haven't dusted my office for months so I said the heck with it and I started dusting. I had several heavy boxes that needed to be moved too. I broke a little bit of sweat during the process. I'm not counting this as part of my workout though, just an additional bonus to help me on my mission. This afternoon... it's Taebo! :)

I still need to find an accurate online calculator to figure out a more accurate number on calories burned. I think my hrm watch may be giving me too high of a number. Any suggestions?
 
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Hey, Mandy. I know you're not wringing your hands or anything, but hang in there. I know it's discouraging. I am 100% sure, though, that you are doing your body some REAL good right now. You're feeling better, feeling healthier and you ARE losing weight in the big picture, right?

Keep fighting the good fight and I'll watch to see in the coming days as you post your weight losses and the other immeasurables that you're noticing. :)
 
Thanks Don, yes I'm also 100% sure I'm doing my body good. How could I not be by all the exercising and healthy eating? It's just that I'm a very impatient person and was hoping to see the numbers getting lower and lower. I think it's because I'm so close to getting out of the 200's. It's been years, probably a couple of decades, since I was that low! I'm going to keep at it. I know it's working. :)
 
Had a good tae bo workout this afternoon. I feel I'm improving on some moves while others I feel there's no hope for me. LOL I'm still trying though. I'd hate to see what I actually look like doing them though. My watch said 797 calories burned.

After I was done my stomach was growling pretty badly so I had some sharp cheese and pepperoni slices... skipped the crackers that I used to do. Feeling much better now. Tonight I'm having a chicken sandwich with tomato slices. Yum! :)
 
I know what you mean as far as improving with moves. I've gotten loads better with some of the steps at zumba....but then there are some that make me look like a retarded whale, flailing around.

Good job with the exercise lately. I bet that watch is a big motivator. If I saw I'd burned almost 800 calories like that, I'd be pretty pumped.
 
MandyH said:
I still need to find an accurate online calculator to figure out a more accurate number on calories burned. I think my hrm watch may be giving me too high of a number. Any suggestions?
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Have you considered looking up the MET values for your exercise to cross reference with your HRM ?
 
Trusylver said:
Have you considered looking up the MET values for your exercise to cross reference with your HRM ?
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I think I looked in MET values a while back, but ended up confusing myself to no end. I can try it again though to see if I can make sense of it.
 
Hey Mandy!

I've been thinking about getting some kind of watch/app to track my calories burned when I workout. I think it would be VERY motivating to see the number climb during the workout. You have inspired me to look into it even more now!

Hope you are having a wonderful, health-filled day!

~Camila~
 
Grrrrrrr.... day 4 of weight in at 211.4lb. I wish that darn number would go down. Kind of starting to feel like I'm busting my butt for nothing. Granted, I'm glad it's not going up instead! That would be far worst.

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Camilla, the watch is definitely a good motivator. I just don't know how accurate it is. I bought the cheapest one at WalMart which was $30. I think the numbers may be too high, but it's still fun to see what it shows. The only downside is that you have to put your index finger on it frequently so it can read your heart rate. That part takes maybe 3-5 seconds so you can't check it during the really vigorous side of the exercises.
 
Hi Mandy! Thanks so much for visiting me. I am in the same boat as you are, I'm the exact weight I was 5 or so days ago, going to the gym daily and eating super clean, it does get discouraging, but I'm determined to make it though at least 3 months hopefully this is an endurance thing...you are doing great, hang in there, the scale will move. Have you taken measurements? Sometimes I shrink even though the scale does not move.
 
Thanks, I have not taken measurements. I have the tape measure, just haven't used it yet. Maybe tonight I'll remember to do it.

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I don't know why, but today I'm feeling kind of bloated. Not to post TMI here, but it's not my "time" so that's not why. I haven't eaten anything out of the norm. Maybe it's just water that my body is holding for some reason. I'm not sure.

Today's my rest day so I'm taking it easy. I have to do groceries so I might splurge on a bigger dinner than I've had lately. I'm thinking of a pastrami sub. Got a little craving for it. It's been many, many months since I've had that. :)
 
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