Sunday, June 21, 2009

Weight Loss

I am happy to report that my official WI for today put me down 5 pounds, 14 pounds from goal. I am more or less on track with respect to my goal to lose one pound per week, as of January 1st. Back in the 140s. It feels good!

Tuesday, June 9, 2009

Unproductive, Rainy Day

In spite of my best intentions, I didn't tackle my to do list at all today.

After yesterday's euphoric feeling, for some reason, today felt a bit like a letdown. Perhaps the fact that it was raining almost all day had something to do with it. Because I had no errands outside the house, I was able to stay home, and managed to get some extra sleep this morning. The morning stiffness was relieved some with OTC meds and a nice, warm bath.

I even found it difficult to force myself out the door to Aikido practice tonight, a rare event. I think the weather made me just want to hunker down and cocoon somewhere. I'd better start to be more productive though, since the forecast is for rain and/or overcast days for the rest of the week, or at least until the weekend.

Procrastination won't get things done. However, some days, my body gets to decide how much and what I tackle that day. It's possible that my body needed that extra rest, but I don't think that's the whole reason why I didn't get a lot done.

I did, however, manage to prepare a healthy meal of brown rice, grilled chicken and Greek salad, so that's a positive. I also changed my weigh-in day to Sunday, after reviewing my Weight Commander analysis of my daily weigh-ins. Sunday is the day that I lost weight consistently, over the last 12 weeks. I guess time will determine whether or not it makes a difference. It all might be wishful thinking on my part too.

Today is day 2 of my attempt to avoid all artificial sweeteners. I'm managing to use Stevia and real sugar, but I miss the sweeteners, especially in diet drinks. I don't think I drink a lot compared to most people, but I'll give this a week to determine whether or not the inflammation and joint/muscle pain is improved at all. It certainly can't hurt to try it anyway.

I told the Sensei (Randy) that I'll be at tomorrow's noon practice, so I'd better head for bed.

Monday, June 8, 2009

Retirement!

I gave my formal notice of intention to take medical retirement on Friday, June 5th. Because today is a "work day", I find that it feels very freeing, in spite of already having been off on long-term disability for years, to know that that part of my life is more-or-less settled. There are still lots of "i"s to dot and "t"s to cross, naturally, but the hard decisions have already been made.

Today, I let myself just go with the flow, enjoying the significance of this day, and the feelings that it evokes.

Tomorrow, I will settle down to tackle other things on my to-do list.