That too passed

Well. Yesterday I was all "wah wah wah, my bra is tight, my weight isn't falling away according to my schedule..." and today I'm in a great place. I hate to say that stepping on the scale this morning contributed, as I hadn't weighed in about 6 days, and while my exercise has been dead-on, consistent, invigorating and ever improving, my eating continues to hit occasional snags. For example, the York Peppermint Patty and 10 Ghiradelli milk chocolate and caramels squares I ate last night. Oh, and a napkin full of way too salty sour cream and onion chips that I wouldn't have eaten if they weren't in the house. Duh!

But more than just my weight, I talked to the trainer when I went to work out yesterday. I told her I WAS NOT in the mood for cardio and strength training, and she said, "well, just work out anyway and your mood will improve." AMEN to that. I had a particularly good work out yesterday, especially with weights. When I started this stuff in mid June, she had me using 7 1/2 lb dumbells for upper body and torso moves. When she picked them up the first time, totally overlooking the 2.5 lb ones, I told her my upper body strength was ittybitty pitiful. She said, well this will help. She gave me the first move to do, and when I tried it, my entire body between my xiphoid process and upper neck was quivering like warm jello. When I mentioned the quivering, she said, "that's GOOD! (smile smile) That means the muscles are really responding! (more happy smile smile)"

So imagine my delight when yesterday I was able to do the same moves with 12.5 lb weights!! That's improvement. And I swear I can make a muscle, like I used to try and do when I was 6 and saw the boys doing it...flexing the arm with a tight fist and feeling the non-existent bulge of my bicep. Only now, I can feel the muscle, but I can also see it. Never. Before. Has this happened. I love weights! I'm ready to enter a body building training program, given the results I'm seeing after such a short time. I have a long way to go with this to be sure. I'm blessed with a very soft body all over. Some of that is not going to change at my tender age of 55 11/12s. But a lot of it can change, and I never would have guessed it possible. This really rocks, and I feel a new surge of committment to stay the course.

Oh!!! And I got a nice email from Jennette Fulda, the aforementioned Pasta Queen blogger to whom I sent a comment yesterday after one of her old posts regarding her first mini-(half) marathon. She actually wrote back a brif thanks and made a specific reference to what I'd written. I swear, this gal is wonderful, funny, lovely, down-to-earth, and real as they come. I hope to meet her someday. Her blog has helped me immeasurably already with my lifestyle change underway presently. Her positivity (is that really a word? if not, the meaning is nonetheless clear) and honesty are totally inspiring and have absolutely improved my outlook on my self, my body, and my lifelong at-times adversarial love affair with food and the eating thereof!

Can't wait to get to the gym later!