4 Unforseen Challenges I'm Facing...

I would say in the last 3 months I've felt a major lack of motivation towards losing weight even though I still have about 55lbs left to lose. It's shown itself in a bunch of different ways:

1) I could care less to measure myself or set goals, something I would literally anticipate so much that I'd write it down in my planner!
2) I spend SO much less time reading about health & weight loss (whether via blog, article, or magazine).
3) My fervor for working out has waned.
4) I really have no desire to try new foods or healthy recipes.

Luckily, by God's grace and the fact that so much of my healthy lifestyle has just become habit, it hasn't really stopped my weight loss or me from working out altogether- I'm currently down 112lbs and am weighing in at 240lbs, it's just that things have been feeling SO different.

Tonight, after dragging myself out the door to the most intense (and rewarding) spin class yet followed by a quick HIIT session at home, I finally decided that I needed to get to the bottom of this weird apathetic feeling towards continuing to be a bad a** at weight loss like I've always been. And again, by God's grace I feel like He (God) clued me in a little bit as to why I'm struggling right now and what I can do to change (fyi- If you haven't invited God into your weight loss journey, you really should start thinking about it- b/c He cares) and really it's all about some unforseen challenges that I never could have predicted or prepared for at the beginning stages of my weight loss b/c the challenges were different then; so here's what I realized tonight:

1) Unforseen Challenge: I lost a lot of my drive, focus, and motivation after I lost 100lbs. For over a year losing 100lbs was the one HUGE goal that I was working towards and had never even come close to attaining before, and although I knew I would still need to lose more weight after hitting a 100lb loss, I really had never given much thought or put any desire towards what my true long term goal really is. The Bible says, "without vision the people perish;" and I can definitely see that is what happened in my case. After I lost 100lbs, I kind of have been feeling directionless. I am the kind of person that needs a goal, needs to have a picture in my head (a vision) of what it is that I'm sacrificing for and working out so hard for, and I really haven't had that. Solution: I'm still not sure what my exact goal end # is (and I'm okay with that), but my goal is to be at 199lbs on December 31st b/c I want to end 2011 being completely out of the 200's- something that even now I can hardly imagine. So, that's my goal- I know it won't be easy to lose 41lbs in 5 months but I know what my best is and I believe my best is good enough to do that!

2) Unforseen Challenge: While I can't believe I haven't shared the whole long/hilarious/ridiculous story with ya'll yet, a little over 2 months ago I visited a chiropractor (just for kicks) who told me that I had some major issues with the alignment in my neck, which then caused me to not only pass out in the office but also to later throw up b/c I was so overwhelmed, and he advised me that jogging probably wasn't the best thing for me unless I was planning to get adjusted every week. For me this news was a little bit of a blow as most of you know running a 5K was kind of like my dream and I had slowly begun the C25K program and had gotten up to running for about 2minutes straight (a major accomplishment for this girl!), and so I followed his advice and decided to stop (until further notice I guess as I'm not seeing him due to $$$). Anyways, I realized tonight that one of the biggest motivating factors for me on this journey has always been when I've been able to prove to myself that I am capable of doing things I just thought were impossible- being able to see visible improvements in what I can physically do. I loved being able to go from wanting to die after jogging for 30 seconds to being able to jog for 2 minutes- it kept my fire burning, kept me encouraged by the progress. Now, my workouts consist of 2-3 spin classes per week and HIIT every other day so besides how much weight I'm able to use during HIIT, there's really not much opportunity for me to see improvement or do something new, which I believe is part of the reason I'm not feeling super motivated to workout. Solution: Well, I think it's obvious that I need to give myself opportunity to see improvements. How to do that? Eh, not really sure. Any ideas? Maybe I should consider starting to jog again? Hmmm...I'll need to think more about this one.

3) Unforseen Challenge: I really undersestimated how easy it is for me to put all of this (everything that goes along with my weight loss journey) on the back burner if I don't keep it constantly in front of me- I guess the saying "out of site, out of mind" really is true! I remember when I first began this journey (and this blog), I was astonished at how imperative it was that I always kept reading blogs or magazines or something so that I could be held accountable and be reminded of what it was that I needed to be doing. Well, since I honestly haven't been reading or writing in my own blog or doing any research on healthy recipes or anything related to weight loss, I have become disinterested with it (go figure!). Solution: I can't deny that weight loss is by no means the most important thing in my life- in fact, it's probably #4 at the highest, but that doesn't mean that I can let it fall to #20. I know the value in reading blogs & blogging and learning new things and it only makes sense to stick with what works- and this has worked for me. So, I'm gonna visit helpful blogs (hopefully that means yours!) once a week as well as post at least once a week- that's what is realistic for me right now and I still see it as helpful.

4) Unforseen Challenge: I don't remember the last time I weighed 240lbs. I mean, maybe...my freshman year of highschool (that's 10 years ago fyi!), but even then I don't really remember what life was like or what I felt like at that point. Basically what I'm saying is that I'm at the smallest I can ever really remember being at which presents 2 problems: #1) The only thing that ever even made me begin to lose weight at 352lbs was b/c doing basic everyday life things was becoming challenging, obviously not a problem I face as much anymore, and #2) I'm having a hard time envisioning what I would even look like at 180ish pounds (what I'm guessing my goal weight will be- remember I'm 5'10''!) So it's really been a challenge to keep pushing myself to desiring and working for lower and lower #'s when I guess I'm already impressed with where I am (twisted eh?). Solution: I need to start getting pictures in my mind of things that I want- and now they get to be a bit more lavish then fitting in an airplane seat, now it's one day shopping for jeans in the "normal size" section or being completely out of size 20 anything pants. I need to start dreaming again.

It really does intrigue me how the "challenges" of this journey have changed over time. At the beginning my biggest challenges were getting over my fears, self- control, and believing that I could actually have a certain life, now they are much more about perserverance and truly finishing what I've started.

My hope is that maybe someone who is at a similar place in their journey will be able to identify with one of these challenges and not feel so bad about the apathy but instead learn from it and adjust b/c the truth is- I really do care about finishing this strong, I really do know that I'm not at my best and deserve to get to where I want to go, and I do know that I'm strong enough to do it!

Hope my ramblings have benefited someone :) Any unforseen challenges that you've encountered that you care to share?

And because I feel like no post is complete without a pic, here's one of me and two of my dear friends at the drive in last weekend (loved Cars 2!)