Day 3 is in the books! Day 4 has begun!

Day 3 of the reboot was a good day, I tried a new recipe but I also had an "ah ha" moment that left me really disappointed in myself. I think it was just what I need though to give myself a kick in the butt! Let me talk about my workout first and then I'll tell y'all about the ah ha moment.


Yesterday was leg day which meant Lower Fix for all of us 21 Day Fixers! It's probably the day that I have the most love & hate for. It's definitely a day that can't be missed if you want to work on your legs but it's also one of the hardest workouts and you definitely feel the burn. After 14 months of doing Lower Fix every single Wednesday I can finally say I got through the entire 30 minutes and only had to stop during round 2 of the Sumo Squats...which by the way are another one of the devils spawn, at least I'm convinced they are. I pushed through though and let me tell y'all, I'm feeling it today! My butt and legs are super sore and my calves were so tense (I'm not sure that's the right word to use) last night that I thought for sure I was going to get a cramp during the night, but I didn't. There's nothing quite like a Charlie-horse in your calf at 2 in the morning! I think Autumn hits every muscle group that you have in your leg and you feel it in places you didn't even know were there. It's a killer workout and I made it through!


I also tried a new recipe last night that I'll share in a different post but three comments that I want to make about it 1) it was yummy 2) I think whoever developed the recipe (I found it online) overestimated the serving size because I could only eat what they considered 1/2 a serving before I was stuffed and the hubby managed 3/4 of a serving before he was done 3) this recipe was the cause of the "ah ha" moment. Anyway, I'll hopefully post that this afternoon. I did take some pictures and I've literally been trying to upload them to the recipe post since last night and for whatever reason my internet hates me and they're still trying to upload over 12 hours later! So, I sincerely apologize for the lack of pictures on my blog, I'm really trying to figure out what's going on so just bare with me please.


On to the "ah ha" moment story! In the past, I logged my caloric intake religiously with MFP (My Fitness Pal) to make sure I was getting enough food and also to keep track of my workouts and of course my weight. If you don't have an account with them, I highly recommend it, you can use their website to log stuff if you're like me and don't have access to your phone during the day or you can use their mobile app. It's a wonderful tool to have at your fingertips! Back to the regularly scheduled program, I hopped on last night after trying out my new recipe for dinner and thought for sure that I would be at my goal for the day. Boy was I wrong! I was completely shocked to see that when I entered my recipe, using the specific ingredients that I used and told it how many servings the recipe made the calories were nowhere near what I thought they would be. I am in the lowest bracket on the 21 DF meal plan so my intake should be between 1200 & 1499 calories, but after I had logged all of my meals during the day plus dinner last night I was at a whopping 737 calories. I was so confused, I knew what I had eaten during the day and I hadn't skipped but one yellow container so I didn't think it should be that low. I started looking at stuff and realized that since I had only eaten 1/2 of a portion of dinner last night and was too full after that to eat the other green container that was scheduled for dinner, that meant I was short 1-1/2 green, 1-1/2 yellow, 1 orange, 1/2 red, 1/2 purple, and 1/2 blue. That is a lot of food missing! I immediately text my coach who is a good friend of mine from childhood and had her look at things with me. After just a few minutes, the "ah ha" moment happened, it was like a slap in the face, just the slap that I needed to get my butt back in gear.


I haven't been eating enough for a while, this probably explains, at least partially, not only the lack of weight loss but the gain that I've had going on. I was almost always completely skipping out on my yellow containers because I wasn't focused on eating carbs. Guess what people, carbs are important though, your body needs them for energy & you need energy to get through your workouts!!! I've been screwing myself over by not making sure I got those carbs in! The true slap in the face happened when I realized there were other containers I was skimping out on sometimes, mostly without realizing it. I thought to myself, "Ashley, they didn't come up with these containers and figure out how many you needed to eat each day just for the hell of it. They told you which containers you need to eat because that's what your body needs for 1) a balanced diet & 2) to burn off fat...DUH"! I was beyond frustrated with myself. I'm not even going to lie, I almost cried. I decided that I would look at my meal plan, figure out how to spread ALL of my containers out throughout the day in order to make sure I could get them all in and learn from this revelation and move on, grow from it. So that was my "ah ha" moment story from yesterday!


I'm not going to lie y'all, sometimes this journey sucks, it's not easy at all, it's downright hard sometimes. There are days when I just want to say screw it and open a Coke and drink in all of that sugary goodness, but then I look up at the pictures of my kids sitting on my desk and I remember my why. I remember that I want to set a good example for them, I want to teach them how to eat healthy & that it's important to stay active. That's what keeps me going. Learn my mistakes and grow from them. Remember, it's important to eat enough when you're trying to lose weight because your body needs fuel in order to burn the fat. Also, take pride in the non-scale victories more often...sometimes they're even better than what you see on the scale!