Greetings, SteemFAM!

The past two weeks have FLOWN by!

It's time for another update on the FITNESSCHALLENGE I joined just over a month ago. @phelimint is running the challenge. You can find his most recent update post HERE. Feel free to join! There are still two months left!

You can also view my Starting Stats and see embarrassing pictures of me HERE, and my first Update Post HERE, and finally a relatively lengthy backstory of my health history HERE. Don't worry, it's still pretty funny. 😀

Time for the UPDATE!

I've been successfully tracking my water intake, food intake, and exercise.

With the holidays happening the last two weeks, I've admittedly not done as well as I could have.😏

Let's start with my exercise calendar first. You'll notice I've added a sad panda emoji to days I didn't do ANYTHING. I feel this was the most appropriate emoji I could find. 🐼 I didn't exercise AT ALL during Christmas weekend. There was a LOT going on... Then I was feeling a bit poopy, nothing serious, just the earliest beginnings of a sickness. I rested, took oregano oil (and some other things) and am feeling much better.😊

I've also, in the last few days, INCREASED the distance I take the dogs for a walk. I'd been going 1/2 a mile with each of them, totaling 1 mile for me. I'm now going 3/4 of a mile, totaling a mile and a half for me. I've also sped up a little. My time on the walks is about 5 minutes faster than it was at the beginning of the month. So that's cool. 😁

And I JUST started with some strength training. Nothing serious, just a few little weights, but mostly just using my own body. I found out that I CANNOT do a pull-up. Not even one. It was a little sad. I totally thought it would be hard, but I would be able to do it. Nopers. 😏

Here's the chart!

💦 Water 💧Water 💧Water💦

I'm mostly tracking this as a reminder to just drink more. We live at about 8000 feet above sea level in a high mountain desert. This means I gotta drink even MORE than you folks residing over a mile and a half below me. 😉 I don't really drink anything except for water and coffee (of course). I also love juice, but only drink a few ounces at a time.

During Christmas, as mentioned, I didn't keep very good track of things. And you'll see AFTER Christmas where it looks like I barely drank anything. And it's true, I was sleeping a LOT those days. Luckily, I'm back to it now.

Water Tracker%2FMeasurement Log end of december.png

🥓Food. 🍳Sustenance. 🥑Nourishment.🌮

I'm still not doing really great on this. I AM paying attention to the amounts of processed and/or sugary products I'm intaking. And actually, I did pretty well over the holidays saying 'no' to sweets. I didn't even feel like I was depriving myself, more like an inner voice was saying, "Bi*ch, you know you don't REALLY want that". And she was right. She's a smart one.😏

I'm only going to include last week's food tracker. It's pretty boring stuff and a little embarrassing. As far as nourishment goes, I need definite improvement. Besides, who's reading what I eat every day anyway? However, if you WANT to see it, I did do it, and am pretty transparent. So just ask. 😀

If you happened to closely scrutinize the above charts you may already know what I've lost.

In case ya didn't, here are the stats:

Total Weight Lost: 4 lbs
No this is not impressive. BUT! What IS impressive is that I didn't gain anything BACK. Even with the last couple of weeks being rough, I still maintained everything. 😍
Total Inches Lost: 8.5 inches

Holy cow! I literally just added this up now and can't believe it! I mean, I suppose I do feel slimmer and tighter... but dang! This is the TOTAL inches lost in the 7 measured areas. So average, I've lost about an inch everywhere that counts. 😉

I'm pretty happy about this.

💖Overall feelings💖

I'm super proud that it's been over 4 weeks and I'm still going. I'm also excited that I'm FEELING better. It's become almost a habit at this point. I do still find my lazy side wanting to do nothing, but am able to overcome her and get up anyway.

My legs still rub together😏, but I can actually feel the muscles in my legs working. I also am much more focused on all muscles, including my core, when walking the dogs now. I even do little side bends while walking sometimes. Gotta get rid of them love handles. 😉

I'm excited to have added strength training back in. My arms and legs are WEAK. That whole can't do a push-up thing is just sad. I'll get there. 😀

I still mostly believe that the reason this is working is YOU. 😍

I really don't want to let YOU down. Each and every one of you that reads this and comments with words of encouragement. Without this, I'd probably just give up again. But maybe not. 🤔I DO feel like a LOT has changed for me in the last year. The Steemit Family being the biggest and best change.😍

So, I know I say this often, but don't think I mean it any less.