Workin' out

I've been working out regularly for a few months now.  I joined the local Crossfit.  I'm both loving it and feeling frustrated most days. 
I haven't been seeing much change in the scale.  I lost about 10 pounds right off, but that has stalled.  BUT... I have been getting compliments.  People say my face looks thinner.  One man told me he could really see a difference in my arms (and I don't see this person very often, so that was pretty telling to me).  And a woman at my office told me my *butt* looks good!  Wow! 
Those are all little victories that make me smile.  But what really makes me feel good are the non-scale victories that make me stop in my tracks and say "how long have I been able to do THAT?".  For instance, I skipped down the steps at the school the other day.  Straight down, without holding the rail.  Usually it's early when I'm there and I'm not all warmed up for the day and I haven't had my coffee yet so I move like an elderly lady.  I turn my body sideways to go down the steps and hold onto the railing with a fear of slipping (they are a little steep).  Now I just go straight down the middle and bounce all the way! 
Yesterday I walked up a flight of stairs without losing my breath.  I just walked right up!  I was tempted to go to the elevator, but chided myself for that. "It's only one flight of stairs, not 6!" And it was easy!
And today I am wearing a pair of pants I avoided all summer because they didn't fit. 

So the scale isn't moving.  I know that muscle weighs more than fat. I'm replacing one for the other.  It's frustrating to not be losing weight.  It would be nice to see a change in the scale, but I'm seeing other changes that, surprisingly, mean more to me.  They are harder to measure.  But they are real. 

Well!! Where do I start?!! I don't even know where to begin! I won't get it all out in this post because there is just way too much and I don't have a lot of time. I know I have never had a lot of time in the past, but I have even less time now and that is saying something!! I have been promising Krista that I would post for a while now and yesterday she sent me a message that made me realise that I just need to make time because it helps people. Even if it only helps one person then it is worth it and makes me soooo happy! So for now I will give you a brief rundown of my last 8 months as looking back I realised I have not blogged since January! I also have a lot of Krista's posts to catch up on and I will be doing that over the next few days - I feel very out of touch with how she is going and that makes me sad. Thank goodness for Facebook or I wouldn't know anything that was going on over the other side of the world!! So.......here goes! I hope you are ready, because it is a wild ride lol!! January 2013 I made the decision to resign as a foster carer. My daughter was going to be turning 18 in July and leaving to go overseas at the end of the year for at least 12 months and I felt that it was time for us to spend some time together on our own without the pressures of having other children to care for. I also felt that I have come to a point in my life where I have earnt the right and the need to be selfish for a while. This is MY time. I have wasted a lot of years of my life hiding from the world and it is time for me to try and get some of them back. I realised that I wasn't going to be able to do that whilst trying to care for other children. I will never regret being a foster carer. It was a very challenging but rewarding time of my life and I am so glad that I did it, but it is time for me to focus on my daughter and myself. February 2013 My daughter and I moved from Brisbane to the Gold Coast. For the previous 5 years we had lived in Brisbane and commuted to the Gold Coast every day for work, school, etc. It took us an hour to drive each way every day. We now live 5 - 20 mins away from everything and has made our life a whole lot easier and given me more time. Unfortunately, my life has changed so much it is still not enough lol!! March 2013 This was a HUGE month for me!! On 23/3/13 I finally cracked it!! I had been trying for a very long time and unfortunately, since discovering FUN, my weight loss has slowed down a lot lol!! The last little bit seems to be the hardest, but after trying and trying, I finally made it to my next goal......100kg lost! To be exact, I weighed in at 69.7kg that day and had lost 100.5kg. And just in time for one of the most awesome days of my life to date. On the 27/3/13 I was flown to Sydney by The Biggest Loser Club Australia for a glamour makeover & photo shoot! There were 4 other lovely ladies who have lost various amounts of weight and all have wonderful stories and experiences of their journeys. It was so wonderful to meet them and share with them and it reminds me all the time that there are so many of us out there who have the same struggle every day. I felt so very special that day! They made me feel so very beautiful and I remember struggling not to cry when the lady was doing my makeup for the photo shoot, because it didn't look like me in the mirror. It looked like a totally different person & she was beautiful! I will never forget that day and so many good things have come out of it since. I feel so very blessed and lucky to have been able to be a part of it! April 2013 April was also a very exciting month for me! My daughter and I went to Sydney for the Royal Sydney Easter Show and when we came home I went to Japan with my mum to visit my Japanese sister that we hadn't seen for about 17 years. Then when I came home, The Biggest Loser Club had arranged for an Australian current affairs show called Today Tonight to do a story on me, so they came to my house and filmed it and what an experience it was! So very exciting! If you google "Shari Ware" (yes....I can be googled! That's another exciting thing lol!!) you will find a whole host of things about me, including what was shown on tv. Sooooo amazing!! May 2013 The next amazing and exciting thing happened in May. That's Life Magazine contacted me through The Biggest Loser Club to do a story on me and they printed it in one of their May editions. So TV & a magazine! I never ever imagined anything so exciting could happen to me!! June 2013 I turned 38 and felt fitter and healthier than I did at 18!! Life is wonderful and is only going to get better!! July 2013 My beautiful baby girl turned 18 on Wednesday the 10th of July and I took her out clubbing for the first time on the Thursday night. We had a ball and she was told she had a "Hot Mama" who couldn't be old enough to have an 18 year old daughter! Hilarious but really really wonderful to hear, especially when I think about where I have come from! On the Saturday night we had her 18th birthday party which ended with a ride in a Pink Stretch Hummer into the nightclubs to go clubbing again. It was an awesome night and my daughter said she had the best 18th. How could she fail with a mother like me?!! Haha! Later in July we travelled to Adelaide to visit family, then over to Melbourne to visit more family and I took my daughter to the snow for the first time. We went tobogganing (something even I had never done before) and had an absolute ball! These are all things I would never have even tried at 170/180kgs! August 2013 On August 17th, my mum and I travelled to Bangkok, Thailand and on the 18th I had my first surgery to remove my excess skin. Something I had been trying to organise for over a year and finally got there! I had been training very hard in the lead up to my surgery, as I was having 2 lots of surgery 1 week apart. On Sunday the 18th of August I had the excess skin on my arms removed and my breasts lifted and augmented. Then one week later on the 25th of August I had my body lift which involved the surgeon cutting me right around my entire body, lifting up, pulling down, cutting out excess skin and stitching me back together. I was also supposed to get my legs done, but the surgeon thought it was too risky after what my body had just been through, so instead I got veneers on my teeth and now have a smile that is much much nicer! September 2013 I came home from Thailand and have continued to heal. I had to travel to Darwin to see my sick brother and then to Cairns for some family things. I was able to start exercising again and just started walking to begin with and felt so much better just being able to do something. I never thought there would be a day when I missed exercise. I still don't like it, but I don't like what was happening to my body without it!! And it makes me feel so fit and strong and as if I can do anything....because I can!! October 2013 This is going to be such an exciting month as well! I am going on TV again! It will be live this time, so I am very very nervous. It is one of our morning shows and I still can't believe this is all happening to me! I will tell you more later, because I don't want to jinx it haha! Well that's all for now folks! That took me quite a while and now I am running late, but I am sooo glad that I have finally gotten back here. I promise I will do better with my blogging and I hope it helps someone even just a little bit. This is a never ending battle. I don't think that I am that different to a lot of people out there, and I can tell you that this is a battle that I wage every single day. This is something I will have to work on for the rest of my life and I just have to remember that. Take care everyone and remember, WE CAN DO ANYTHING!!!! Shari