Week 2 Day 1

1 week weigh in = -2.8 pounds (that is .8 more than my goal of 2 pounds a week)

Now for the honest part. I ate pizza, chocolate, soup, and had a beer or two with my husband. I also worked out once. I try to moderate the unhealthy food though and instead of drinking a beer every night, I saved it for one night. I also cooked healthy food like asparagus soup.

I am planning a surprise my little pony party for E. We had a 4 day weekend due to "snow" days (more like ice days). Then K got sick, we sat at urgent care, and she has severe strep and is not allowed at school until Friday. Lucky her. I also did the heart hustle at my daughters school to try and earn them these little charms they get to put on necklaces for PE. They really love those charms.

We started Spring Madness with my team this week and so far it has been great. I have girls truly getting out of their comfort zone. It's amazing to see people set these goals and then you see them just attacking. You know they have a future and you know they are going somewhere with what they are doing. There may be an excuse along the way but those are far and few. I also adore the ones that set weight goals. Getting texts about 5 pounds lost or even 1 pound makes me teary eyed. Sometimes it's the 1 pound difference that spirals into something amazing like a 5k or a new pair of jeans. I love helping people reach their goals.

My focus this week is to get in 3/4 workouts, take the gallon challenge everyday, and focus on healthier eating. This week will also be a beer free week! I am excited to see what the results will be from that.

This morning I started reading my "For Women Only" book. I just couldn't stop myself from opening the book that will help me understand my husband more. Transparency? From the issues we have had in the past I have taken on this controlling nature that I can't stand. Relinquishing though is harder because I want to know that everything will be taken care of. I guess at some point I stopped feeling that way and I have consumed and stressed myself. I really am trying to work on his needs. I know I am not the wife that I want to be and my goal is to focus on our relationship. R is my best friend and I would never want him to feel otherwise. I want him to be excited to come home. I am not a "leave it to beaver" kind of wife but I would love smiles on everyone's faces when they come home!

Another thing is my bible study. I want to focus more on that daily and what I get from it. Starting my day off with a little guidance always does wonders for me.

Today's verse is Psalm 28:7...The Lord is my strength and my shield..my hear leaps for joy, and with my song I praise him. The daily reflection talks about fitness and moving towards joy. Find something that excites you and makes you happy doing it. If you hate cardio with every fiber of your being...don't do it. You might love swimming. Do swimming. I love running, but I also want to see if there is something out there that overwhelms me with joy. I like riding bikes and oddly I love the stairclimber! I want to try some classes and go from there. Stay tuned for those shenanigans.

Here's some clips from this past week!

Beginning Week 1

This week has been a relief.

It was the first week of my just picking up shifts. That means I am not the first server to work and I am not leaving at 4 or 5 in the afternoon and trying to do all of my errands. It has been beautiful and amazing. I have been able to read, practice yoga, clean, grocery shop in peace, plan a surprise birthday party, go to a ladies event, work on myself, do my bible study, and work on my advocare business.

Let's start with my weight. All in all, I have gained close to 40 pounds. Things happen. I wouldn't call gaining weight back after a huge loss a failure. I would call it a setback. You only fail if you quit and I am no quitter. TRUTH: I LOVE FOOD. I also HATE having a bum hip that takes away the very thing that gave me sanity (running). What does those two things combined mean? It mean's that I am slightly crazy and due to me losing my sanity I emotionally eat. I am not the only one right? The first step to beating your addiction is admitting that you have a problem.

Hi my name is Leanne Hood and I am addicted to food, except anything healthy in nature. It must be fried, sweet, or covered in cheese....okay it can be a processed carb as well.

Now onto the saving myself from complete destruction.

Where to start. Well I knew on my "second time around" journey that I wanted to strengthen my relationship with the man upstairs. I convinced my husband that The Daniel Plan was the best way to do that, so I bought the book, journal, and cookbook. I knew that I there was something inside of me not whole and that is why I struggle the way I do.

I weighed and did my measurements, I set goals for myself (small and large), I set up rewards that were doable for me, and I read my daily reflection.

My Goals.
1. Lose 34 pounds by my 10 year anniversary. (that is 17 weeks with an average of 2 pounds lost a week)

2. Pin gold by my 10 year anniversary (and be knocking on 3-star gold's door). This means that I can be a stay at home mom with absolutely no financial worries. I get to spend the summer with my kids!

3. I want to workout at least 4 times a week and one of those times I want my kids involved. They love yoga so that may be the best way to get a family workout in.

4. Tithe. I had a sermon completely reach my heart 3 weeks ago and we have been tithing ever since. All of our bills have been paid and amazing things keep happening for us. God truly blesses you when you live by his word.

5. Journal and do my bible study every single day.

The Daniel Plan has a score sheet so you can analyze where you are in life and how you feel about those 5 key aspects. My scores were all pretty close except fitness. My biggest passion has now become the thing I am most unhappy about. My focus is now on fitness and my spiritual relationship.

I know in my journey (as before when I quit drinking) that I will lose friends. I am completely and utterly okay with that. That only means that those people will not help me in the direction that I am going, and lets face it...I am going in an amazing direction. (how can I not?)

I already look back and tear up at my day 1 reflection. The question, How do I feel?
I wrote, " I feel out of breath, not pretty and not sexy in anyway shape or form. I feel fat, and depressed because I can't wear any of my beautiful clothes. I feel like I am an awful example to my children.

WOW...
How far I have come in just 5 short days. Now let me flip all of what I had wrote into the positive way I now see things. I gave up focusing on myself to focus on others and my children. They love that I make the lunches, they can count on me to be at school events, that I look for the undies and random toys. E loves that I pick up all of her messes while I am telling her to pick up her mess. K loves that I scratch her back or rub her feet while we sit and all watch Jessie, Girl meets world, or Dual Survival together. My husband thinks I am gorgeous and EVERY stretch mark I own I know was because I was so TERRIFIED of losing K. I know that suffering miscarriages made me hold my tummy while I slept and in my mind made me be completely sedentary while I made the " I am pregnant so I will enjoy all foods" card. I gained 80 pounds of pure warmth and cushion for her to survive. I did, at the time, the only thing I knew to do to keep her safe. I LOVE my stretch marks.  love my eyes because they speak truth. I love my hair because it is thick and strong. I love my legs because all though out of breath I can lift my 70 pound daughter when she is sick or sad and carry her up the stairs to bed. My pretty clothes hanging up are now my inspiration. I have a clean slate to start over.

Things can be ugly, negative and messy if you let it, but you should truly look at all the beautiful things your brain, heart, and body can accomplish or has accomplished.

You can start your journey any day of the week. Mine started on a Wednesday.

Weigh in is in 2 days!!

Parenting

I am sitting here doing research while reading and I have discovered that sometimes what people say they want they don't actually want. They don't have purpose and the purpose they think that have they don't truly have motivation for. I have been there many times. Some people don't want out of their circumstances. They love their lives exactly the way it is and there is nothing about it that they would change. They have reached "life perfection" if you will.

Sadly, I have not reached "perfection" yet. I don't really care what car I drive  (okay maybe I do) or what clothes I wear. I don't care about my shoes (okay I care about my shoes a little bit) or my purse (Is a tote bag considered a purse?). What I do care about is my kids and traveling. I want my kids, husband, and myself to see every part of the world that our hearts desire. I want them to see disney, mountains, oceans, islands, glaciers, and wildlife. I want them to meet people from all walks of life so in their grownup life they are well rounded individuals with open minds. I want them to see all the beauty that god created for them to see. I want to raise them. I don't want daycare's, grandparents, or television raising my children. It's hard researching and seeing how much parents are away from their children. It means they have little impact on how their lives turn out as adults. Literally, parents have everything working against them.

Ideas pressed upon their children by teachers and other children. Drugs, sex, and violence thrust upon every television network. Children developing mommy or daddy issues due to them being absent. It's crazy the little things that have a physiological effect on our children.

Side note: a personal pet peeve of mine is when a parent rants about how they work 80 hours a week, they are asleep before their children wake up, and they don't get home until their kids are asleep....and yet the little time they have on the weekend they spend with their friends out drinking instead of making an impression on the young minds staring at them for acceptance and love. WHY???? Are you friends really that important to you? I get date nights, but every weekend? You are creating a pattern for your children. They need you. Stick around for a little bit and I bet your child can blow your mind with all that they have learned in your absence.

I am completely getting off on a tangent here....

The point is that I have not reached that life perfection that I have been seeking. I haven't become a stay at home mom and I haven't traveled the world with my family, but I can proudly say I am closer than I was a year ago, a month ago, or even a day ago. I am constantly moving forward, researching, and developing ideas.

The question I ask to others are...Are you happy? Are you stuck or pressing forward? Are you getting to be the person or the parent you always thought you would be? Are you achieving/reaching your purpose?

The Real Reason

Two years ago my marriage and life was falling apart. The only thing I could possibly control was my body. I knew that I had pushed myself before and I knew I could do it again. In this determination to brutalize myself, I got down to my lowest weight ever in the history of my memory. Yes, I know at some point I was a size 8 in high school, but I can't even remember where I put my car keys 20 minutes ago so just go with me on this.

I started going to marriage counseling and focusing on what was wrong internally with me. What on earth does that mean? It means I quit working out after my half marathon. My hip was shot, I was exhausted, and honestly I just love food that is really terrible to/for the human body.

Gradually, I became happier. I was laughing, not drinking, playing with my kids, planning vacations, and I was kicking "the struggle's" BUTT. The friends worth having absolutely stuck by my side and never let me feel that my decision to become "a whole person" was an inconvenience to them.

Here's the tough part....

In that quest to become whole I ate a TON of amazing food. I mean smothered in butter and spices. Cajun food. Tex-Mex food. Burgers. Pizza. New restaurants. Old restaurants. It didn't matter, if there was food than I was there. If you have kept up with my story you have now discovered that not only did I quit my quest for 6pack abs but I also put on a few pounds. 34.6 to be exact. I would love to say it is not all my fault because I had some hormone issues and vitamin issues, but I knew that the bulk of my weight gain was all me. I decide.

So what now? Where do I go from here? How do I start again? Well the husband and I are on a mission. That is another post, but I got back on the supplements that were made to help me achieve my goals. I started researching. I started preparing.

So now that you know the reason that I have to start completely over, are you ready to hear and see the answer to my problem?

My Dream and My Future

What do I want to do with my life?

Help people who were just like me 6 years ago. Having miscarriages and being a high risk pregnancy is a super tough thing. I knew so badly that I wanted to be a mother that I would have done anything. That includes sitting on the couch with minimal activity for fear that I would jiggle my little love bundle out of me. Oh wait....that is exactly what happened. Yep, I gained a whooping 80 pounds with my first pregnancy. I wasn't even worried about it because I just knew I would lose 20 pounds in the hospital. Whoever spoon fed me that lie..I am looking for you. The stress of being a new mom, not eating, not sleeping, and breastfeeding helped me lose about 40 pounds. After, it was all determination to quit wearing maternity pants that got me through to another 20 pound loss. Before I knew it I was pregnant again. This time I gained another whooping 60 ish pounds. At this point I was so ashamed of my body that I had a nervous breakdown outside of an old navy in Sherman, Texas. I was mortified to run outside for fear that someone would point and laugh. I didn't want to go to a gym because I felt I didn't belong there. Thank God for an amazing and supportive husband who went out and bought me a treadmill and let me accumulate enough equipment to workout at home. I started researching how to work certain body parts and how to eat healthy. Magazines and DVD's piled up from all of the things I wanted to try and eventually I realized that I had a passion developing.

Fast forward...short version...I became a personal trainer, let my certification go due to me providing services for free, started running half marathons, did my first triathlon, acquired a hip injury, went back to school with a major in business, kept waitressing, foreclosed on our house, moved to the country, lost weight, put on weight, started my Advocare journey, worked on my marriage, and finally worked on me. The working on me thing is still a work in progress.

Now, I have been working on what I truly want to do. Free or not. My mission is to help every single mom out there with the same struggles. I believe that there should be a place or a person that soon to be moms, pregnant women, or mom's who just had a baby can go to for information, seminars, fitness classes, and I also think it would be awesome to have a place that fully catered to the new mom. I dream about it most nights. I didn't have a place like that. I didn't have someone that could teach me how to make baby food, that could teach me how to alleviate back pain while pregnant, and I didn't have someone helping me to remain fit during pregnancy so I could bounce back after pregnancy. Information was minimal.

What steps am I taking? Currently I am studying my little heart out. After the first of the year I will be getting my PT certification, group certification, and pre/post natal certification. As that is occurring I will start building awareness. I have set up all of my social media sites except twitter and I will continue to build my webpage..(which I have to research as well because I have no idea how to build a webpage).

I can't wait to show people what I have been working on.

blah sauce/ day 17 of challenge

I got up this morning just the way I promised myself I would. Positive. My husband let me sleep in which I must say was wonderful. I put some cute curls in my hair and watched some spongebob with my baby girl. I was chipper when I got in the car to go to work. I kept my positive outlook all day at work. I ate well and kept drinking my water. I was sooo proud of myself....until I got the message that my daughters tball had been canceled. I hadn't brought my gym bag because I thought I wouldn't have time to go to the gym. I was mad at myself for not being prepared. I made pretty good money so even when I left work I felt that I had achieved my goal for the day when it came to work. When I got home I jumped out of the car and LEFT my phone there. That's right...I left my phone. My daughter had a friend over for a play date and I immediately jumped in on the action. We played baseball and rode 4 wheelers. I again was reaching my goal of steering away from technology when I was home. I was sweating and starting to get ready to workout when my dear father in law invited us for dinner. I knew that I would not make a good decision wherever we went and like a DA I went anyways. I wont say what I ate but lets just say it did not fall in my 100% category of my goals. If I was keeping score at this point I would be 1/1. Then I got home. I knew that the only thing I had left was to workout. I seriously started. I made it halfway through my first round and said...nope. My legs and arms hurt like something fierce and my body was saying...no was jose. I am making excuses at this point. I could have pushed through, but I didn't. So lets make that one win and two fails. I did manage to put in my advocare order and make a few bucks. I will count that as a win. Now for some cuddle time. Good night all.

Writing down my priorities/goals

Goals are simple. Making them is simple. Implementing them and following through is the hard part. I keep adding to my list of things that I am doing and all I wanted was simple. My ultimate goal was to spend the summer getting the body that I've  always dreamed of, paying off all our debt (with the exception of the car), and saving money to completely pay for my school summer and fall. My goals have not started off great because I included May in that equation. Ray gets paid tomorrow and we will finally be done catching up from our trip to DC. I hate how everything worked out money wise, but I had so much fun in DC and would not change anything. That being said I feel like I have been so busy that my priorities have been in the wrong place.

The lights of my life are K and E. Their smile makes everything seem faded and distant. On my worst day I can come home and hear the girls call my name with excitement...at that very moment my heart melts. They don't care how much money I make right now. They don't care about my personal achievements right now. They don't care about my cloths or if my hair is blonde or brown. All they want is my time. The list in my life should go....Family, work, working out...then all the other random stuff I will call fillers. I know some of my friends will be like "F you, I am no filler", but until you have kids and a man that adores your every move, you will never understand what I mean by that statement. I love my friends I don't want anyone to misconstrue that, but friends should never be at the top of anyone's priority list. Church is entwined in all of my priorities so I don't want anyone trying to throw that in my face. I am really trying to be a better person not just for myself but for K and E.

Where does a person start with goals? For me it is making that list of priorities and going from there.

1. Family- My marriage is better then it has ever been. I used to resent Ray for everything that had gone wrong instead of accepting, learning, and moving on. Until you learn forgiveness you have nothing in your life. You cannot change/control the things that have already happened. What you can do Is change how you react to them and how your future will be effected. If I chose to stay mad at Ray then I chose to be mad??? Who wants to be mad?? My goal with my marriage is to try and remember to forgive the little things because that is exactly what they are...little things. Tomorrow is undetermined and I need to quit living like I know what is going to happen. That's god's job. Another goal is to be less connected. Put my phone up when I get home. My kids deserve all of me. Not part of me. Right now sometimes when they talk I don't hear them. I am missing things. I am missing the most important part of my life due to technology. They are only little like this for a short time. What have I been thinking?? Oh yeah...my friends have been at the top of my list. All they want to do is color, play pretend, watch spongebob, paint nails, and jump on the trampoline with me. Starting tomorrow....When I get home I am disconnecting. Anyone who really needs me knows how to get ahold of me if it is important. When it is bedtime I will respond to texts. My girls deserve all of my time, and so does my amazing husband.

2. Work- I am lucky to have the job I have and I love it. I get off when I need, I have amazing managers that are more like friends (but I still respect them as authoritative figures). I have the opportunity to make insane money if I want. I get to be home with my family at night and I only work part time and make as much as some of my friends working full time. I want to be more appreciative and take the stupid people in stride. For instance people who stiff you on 50.00 tickets. It would be one thing if they vocalized dissatisfaction, but to tell me I did an amazing job and leave me nothing is a slap in the face. Instead of having an immediate rage out...I should ask myself.. Maybe they didn't expect their bill to be that much and they didn't have enough, maybe one person paid and someone else was supposed to leave the tip and didn't, maybe they don't know I make 2.13 an hour and they assume I make minimum wage. Sometimes it is not about my service and I need to not take it personal. It happens.  For every bad tipper I have a good one. Maybe not in the same night, but it all evens out. If I keep a smile on my face and stay positive good things will happen. So that is my goal for work. Be positive.

3. Working out- I have never put 100% ever. I cheat on my diet, make excuses, or just flat out get lazy and quit doing it. I make the mistake on relying on others to help motivate me. I have people that do motivate me but I don't need to base what I do around if they do something or not. If they eat something bad that does not give me the opportunity to do bad. I want to fully focus on my workouts. Go to the gym and out right kill it. I want to commit to short term goals. Day by day. I have been doing the day by day thing and for the past 4 days I have gone to the gym and destroyed my body parts. Tomorrow will be day 5, but my food and thought process will be more deliberate. I have 7 days left on my challenge and it will be the best 7 days ever!

My other goals will stay the same...
-I want to pay off my husbands birthday gift
-I want to save up enough money to pay for my school so I don't have to do payments and make things harder
-I want my Advocare business to turn into something amazing and I want that to happen while I am working on my body just so people can see what the products are capable of.
-I want to find a balance and reconnect with my friends. (I miss my friend TW)
-I want to engrave in my brain that I cannot please everyone, and those that love me will stick around because I am about to do some amazing things.
-I want my bachelors degree. I am never going to win the lottery so I need to make things happen.

Kudos- One of my goals has been to be a better role model. K and E are running their first 5k Saturday and K asked me today if she could get on a plane and do a race like mommy. I am doing my job as a parent if I am motivating her to be healthy and active. K told me today she wants to play sports and E told me she wants to tumble and do cheerleading like on TV. They also started doing horse lessons again. In love with those two little girls and their ambitions and I am so glad they have parents that encourage and love to watch them grow. When they tell me they want to do something I go out of my way to make it happen. I know some say I am spoiling them but I feel like I am giving them the world. I am giving the options to find out what they like and don't like.

So now.....My goal instead of Nike San Francisco....Its Disney Princess where the girls can both run and get medals. It is all about them. Time to do my devotional...Good night!! I will let you know how tomorrow goes :)