Dukan – Day 194 – Well, now, that’s better!

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Wednesday was a PV day.

Daily weight loss: 0.9 lb/0.44 kg
Total weight loss: 72.8 lb/33.11 kg

Well, that has me feeling a little bit better! I was beginning to think that I was going to be in a plateau for a week or two. Phew!

For those following the visa saga… it looks like I’ve been granted a 30 day extension. I will get final word next Wednesday, and that’s good enough to get my 2 ladies to their due dates. Everyone is very relieved and a little less stressed 🙂

Breakfast: 2 tea eggs, coffee, lots of water
Lunch: 3 slices of ham and a tea egg, lots more water
Dinner: Stir fry steak chunks with zucchini and onion
Snack: FF (Fat Free) Greek yogurt with flax seed meal and splenda

I did 30 minutes of yoga and 25 minutes of bowling, both on the wii. It was pouring down rain last night and I didn’t want to get soaked while running… hopefully it’ll be drier tonight!

Dinner recipe:
Sauteed 1/2 a red onion and 1/2 a zucchini in 1 tsp sesame oil (ran out of olive oil 3 days ago, none to be found in the little shops, will get some on my trip to Shanghai tomorrow). I added Italian seasoning, ground garlic and cumin. I sauteed for 2 minutes.

Sautee onions and zucchini for 2 mins. in 1 tsp of oil

I then placed those to the side and stir fried steak chunks for 5 minutes, about 2 1/2 minutes each side. I didn’t add any more oil, I did shake on a little Italian seasoning.

I then tossed the veggies back in, simmered together for 2 minutes and done!

Fast, simple, tasty and Dukan Friendly!

Total time to prepare: less than 15 minutes!

I hope you all are having a good Leap Day!

Ciao!

Quote of the day: Goals are the fuel in the furnace of achievement ~ Brian Tracy

Final word: RIP Davy Jones… you were the silly Monkee 😀

Dukan – Day 193 – Peace On Earth, Begins With Birth

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Tuesday was a PP Day.

Daily Weight Loss: 0
Total Weight Loss: 72 lb/32.71 kg

This is Day 3 of my weight being the same 😦 I didn’t have the chance to write a Dukan Blog on Monday morning, but it was the same that morning, as well. Funny thing, it is happening to a fellow blogger, Mel. We are both eating what we’re suppose to, and frankly, my carb consumption is below even Dukan standards… so what gives?

Breakfast: 2 Tea Eggs
Lunch: 1 Tea Egg and 3 ham slices
Dinner: Pork chunks and onion cooked in dark soy sauce with soy and wasabi to dip in… yum!
I did C25K for 30 minutes, plus added 10 extra minutes of walking at the end
Snack: FF Greek yogurt with bran and splenda

Here’s dinner:

The dark soy sauce smells so yummy!


The wasabi and soy dipping sauce - divine!

Now for the part about birth 😀 Earlier today (and your night time in the States) I was chatting with my friend Miri who is also a midwife. I was telling her about a PowerPoint I was given 3 hours to develop today (I banged it out and it’s top quality, btw) and she shared a 7 minute birth video with me. Watching her midwife this woman, completely hands off and listening to her voice, it was like watching myself. My comment to her, after this gorgeous water birth was, “isn’t it sad for the momma’s and babies that don’t get to experience gentle birth like that”… It left me a bit melancholy.
Peace on Earth, Begins With Birth… being “with woman”, the meaning of midwife, during her pregnancy and labor and birth, is an honor. Honoring a birth with peacefulness can transform a woman into a powerful mother who knows that she alone birthed her baby… with HER strength, HER perseverance, HER power. Midwifing a woman with peace allows the baby to be born into quiet sacredness… to open and breathe in a peaceful setting, where there isn’t fear at the first moment of life… that is the kind of births we should be empowering women to have. Thank you, Miri, for being that kind of midwife.

Peace on Earth, does indeed, Begin With Birth.

My beautiful daughter Tiffany, her amazing husband Joey, and their children Sydnie and Shane at the birth of Sofia… May 17, 2008… born on her great-grandma’s birthday.

Ciao!

You Deserve Love

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So, I’ve had a crap day at work… LOL. I know, not my usual optimism, but I really have had a crap day at work. It has to do with yesterday’s post in regard to being “someone else’s world”. The good news is tomorrow I see if I can get an extension on my visa, so it’s not an issue of going out of town.

So, what am I doing this evening? I’ve had a lovely dinner, a cup of tea and I have all of the lights out and the candles burning all over my flat. I have love songs on… the last, one of my favorites; Joe Cocker singing just to me, “You Are So Beautiful”. And I’m loving it. And loving MYSELF and remembering that I deserve My love and attention 🙂 I’ll do this until 8:00 p.m., then I’m going to love myself even more by going out and running!

Dukan – Day 192 – Completing Things

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Monday was a PP day.

Daily Weight Loss: 0.2 lb/0.10 kg
Total Weight Loss: 72 lb/32.71 kg

I finally completed something that I had been working on since DECEMBER. Seriously. I had pretty much given up, but decided with the encouragement of a fellow blogger, Dukaner and runner, Mel, that I could do it. So the past week I’ve worked hard on Couch to 5K Week 4 Day 1. And I’ve pushed myself, and been out of breath, but just couldn’t do it… until last night. I just zoned out and started. And didn’t look at my iPhone once to see where I was… I just kept going and when she said, “One minute left”, I just about burst into tears 🙂 Small accomplishments, once at a time, .4 lbs here, .2 lbs there, it’s all towards improvement. Week 4 Day 2… here I come. And if it takes me a month to complete you, I’m going to keep trying until I do!

Breakfast: 2 tea eggs
Lunch: 1 tea egg, 3 slices ham
Dinner: Chicken breast sauteed with onions in curry and cumin
Snack: FF Greek yogurt with flaxseed meal and splenda
Water: 2.5 liters throughout the day

Ciao!

Quote… later… gotta get ready for work or I’ll be late 🙂

You May Be the World

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We often forget this in our lives. As a midwife in the States, I was on call 24/7/365, as you are when you are an independent midwife. One of the benefits to moving to Abu Dhabi was shift work. I worked 14 12-hour days a month. Bliss.

I am now in an administrative position at a hospital in China. However, I have a handful of patients and this quote popped out at me today because of a sticky situation I’m in. Two of my amazing women are due March 8 & March 12th and I HAVE TO DO A BORDER RUN… no later than March 10th! And you might say, “well priority says you do your border run”… but this isn’t what is best for my two ladies that are depending on me being at their birth, protecting them from an 80% c/section rate, and providing them with the compassion they’ve come to appreciate. And I, of course, want to be there for them.

Needless to say, we’re going to see if I can get an extension on my visa tomorrow, that will give me a month more to have to worry about it, which would be IDEAL… putting that out to the universe 😀

So, this is a reminder that we may just think we’re “someone” in this world, but we may mean the world to someone else!

The Sunshine Award

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Words cannot even express how humble I feel by being nominated for the Sunshine Award by Olive. Olive is a brilliant writer and can her blog can be found here http://olivetwist.wordpress.com. I found her site recently and work myself through a couple of posts an evening. Her writing is from the heart and I love that!

As part of accepting the nomination I am required to post the answers to the following questions 🙂

Favorite colors: Purple and Green (ironically those are also Olive’s favorite colors!!)

Favorite Animal: Cat

Favorite Number: 13

Favorite Non-Alcoholic Beverage: Skinny Cafe Latte

Prefer Facebook or Twitter? FACEBOOK

My passion: Lowering infant and maternal mortality through education

Prefer getting or giving presents: GIVING

Favorite Pattern: Circles

Favorite Day of the Week: Pajama Day 😀

Favorite flower: Gerbera Daisy

And now the hard part… choosing 10 bloggers to pass this on to. Oh My! I read SO many amazing blogs! This is a real tough one for me… I didn’t like to have to pick teams on dodge ball!

http://wwangel.wordpress.com/ Mel keeps me motivated to get out and run.. and she has an adorable dog to boot!

http://charlottesdukandiet.com/ Charlotte is the first Dukan blog I followed… I love reading her quippy posts and her honesty about struggling to stay on this program!

http://dukandiet-journey.blogspot.com/ Moonday’s Philosophy is permanently attached to my fridge!

http://soniadukandiet.blogspot.com/ Sonia has done an amazing job on the Dukan diet!

http://dukandietress.blogspot.com/ I also follow this amazing blogger who has great advise about Dukan and her success!

http://thechunkygoddess.com
Cyn tells it like it is… I’m new to her blog, but loving it! She says what we’d all like to say, but are afraid to say it… LOL

http://lipomachia.wordpress.com
She has some fabulous recipe ideas on her site… her Mega-Power omelet is amazing!

http://apetcher.wordpress.com/ Have Bag, Will Travel
Lots of great travel writing and PICTURES here!! I have just started to enjoy this blog and I’m glad I stumbled upon it!

http://thesandytongue.wordpress.com – Warning, some may find his stuff offensive… I find it raw, funny and he speaks his truth!

http://hapacouple.blogspot.com/ And although they haven’t posted in a couple of weeks, this blog has some of the best Dukan friendly recipes on it. The pictures, descriptions and instructions make cooking delicious Dukan foods easy!

Olive… again, thanks!

Today… Give Up

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Let Today Be

I referred to myself today as still being in the “fat girl” mindset. Even though I see this newly emerging woman in the mirror, I still have the mentality of the fat girl I used to be. I put on a T-shirt this morning and questioned if it was too form fitting. After turning around in the mirror a few times I realized I don’t have the fat hanging over the sides of my bra anymore, and as my friend Velina said, my back has really thinned out! When the heck did that happen?

One of my favorite readers talked yesterday about being self conscious wearing clothes that “fit”… I think this is part of that mentality that we hold on to. If we wear looser clothing, no one will notice how fat we’ve become. I am wearing clothes that fit and I know when there has been a slight change in my weight, based on how they fit. It makes sense to wear clothes that not only “fit”, but look and feel good to wear.

I vow that today I give up who I’ve been! And love who I’m becoming ♥

Dukan – Day 190 – Awesome evening walk

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Saturday was a PP day.

Daily Weight Loss: 0.4 lb/0.20 kg
Total Weight Loss: 71.7 lb/32.61 kg

Truly… the water makes all the difference in the world! I got in 2.5 liters of the stuff and I lost. Went into work 90 minutes later than usual, which was nice because I got a couple of loads of laundry done and the linens changed on my bed… left the house feeling as if it was fresher!

Breakfast: 2 tea eggs and 500 mL water.
Lunch: 2 tea eggs and 3 thin slices of ham and 500 mL water.
Snack: 1 tea egg (listen… I had my cholesterol checked and it’s lower than ever!!! LOL) and by the time it was 4 p.m. I had completed another 700+ mL water.

After work, I walked 2.6 kms (1.5 miles) to the MySweet cafe for coffee with Velina. I had 2. Which amped me up BIG TIME. On the way home I speed walked, with the Black Eyed Peas “I’ve Gotta Feelin'” blasting over and over and over in my head set for 61 minutes. I did just under 5 kms (according to my pedometer it was 3.03 miles). Not bad for a walk. The pedo says I averaged just over 3 miles per hour. I didn’t slow down for a second, and my pulse rate was 132 when I arrived home…. It felt great!

Dinner: Curried pork stir fry with onions and 300 mL water.
Snack: FF Greek yogurt with bran and splenda and a cup of tea.

Lovely day, I feel accomplished and happy. I hope everyone has a fab weekend! I’m off on Sunday… YAY!

Ciao!

Quote of the Day: Happiness is not something ready made. It comes from your own actions.
~ Dalai Lama
Take Action!!! ~ Sandi B.

I Make Small Steps

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“I make small steps daily toward the vision for my life. You may not notice the change now, but over time it will be undeniable” ~ Marc Payan

April 2011 AND December 2011

When you start out dieting, especially when you’ve dealt with obesity for most of your adult life, you don’t envision yourself at your goal weight, or close to your goal weight. I started out in August because of a lunch meeting with a former classmate and a picture of me at my 30th class reunion, from behind. Not a glimpse you get very often. I had pretty much “accepted” myself, as is. I could not have been more wrong. A series of events occurred while I was home in August that showed me how wrong it was to “accept” me for who I was… who I had become was obese, sluggish, out of breath and not healthy. My lunch meeting with John Geraghty was an eye opener. He set me straight on the fact that it’s not OK to accept yourself as unhealthy. THANK YOU, JOHN!!! What I loved about our meeting is that John LISTENS, and he listened to me and let me reason myself into reality. I took notes, I bought the books he recommended and I took what he told me to heart and brain.
Then the reunion and the picture from behind… of my BIG behind. And then THE BOOK. My friend Lucy encouraged me to buy the Dukan Diet book in Abu Dhabi, and I did, and I threw it in my luggage and IGNORED it for my entire time at home. Then I saw the picture of my big behind and put the book in my carry on. I read the book on the flight from Miami to London EVERY.SINGLE.WORD. And then I read it AGAIN on the flight from London to Abu Dhabi… it was like a light bulb went off!
Then I started doubting myself… was I setting myself up for failure? Then my brain kicked in and said, “um yeah… HEART FAILURE!”… So I did it… starting August 20, 2011… and took small steps… one step at a time, one day at a time… and it took a while to notice the changes… but now…
THEY ARE UNDENIABLE 🙂

Dukan – Day 189 – Shanghai with Kitty

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Friday was a PV day.

Daily Weight Loss: +0.9 lb/+0.40 kg… a gain 😦
Total Weight Loss: 71.3 lb/32.41 kg

So here I was up early on my day off to go to Shanghai. My friend Lucy shipped some boxes here and I needed to go clear them with Customs. I know, I know, I’m a glutton for punishment!

Driver here right on time at 730 a.m…. grabbed a couple tea eggs and then off to pick up Kitty. Kitty is my personal assistant (at work) and accompanies me to deal with paperwork because I have little patience to deal with stupid people (read: people who don’t want to do their job) and she keeps me out of jail 🙂 So here we are in the taxi, bright and early…

Hangzhou Taxi

It took us 45 minutes to get to the train station across twon here in Hangzhou (I might add that this is 3 minutes longer that it takes to get to Shanghai on the train 190 kms away!). Purchased tickets, got coffee and jumped on the train, as it was boarding when we purchased the tickets! Here we are in our 1st class seats. First class costs $5.71 more than 2nd class… worth every penny!

Kitty and Sandi

It took 42 minutes at 304 kph to get to Shanghai… I read my novel “The Wire In the Blood” by Val McDermid while Kitty napped… the girl can nap anywhere, at any time, it’s amazing!

Subway to our first destination and because Kitty is so amazingly efficient we got there without getting lost and she had all the paperwork ready, it was forthwith stamped (the Chinese stamp everything 457 times!!!) and money was exchanged and then we were cleared to go to customs.

But it was lunch time, so on to the subway to go to my favorite hamburger joint, The Blue Frog … woo hoo 2 times in 1 week! What a lucky girl I am. The server actually asked if I wanted what I had on Sunday and repeated it verbatim… am I really in China?!? I was pretty darn impressed, and yes, I wanted exactly what I had on Sunday 🙂

Lunch at the Blue Frog

Kitty had a HUGE burger, which she deconstructed and ate with a fork and knife. She also tried ketchup for the first time… and liked it… poor girl is getting Americanized by me.

After lunch a quick stop off at the City Shop grocery to pick up fat free yogurt (can’t get it in Hangzhou anywhere, and the City Shop online delivery warehouse didn’t have any last week. I got 10!

Then off to the customs office where the lady didn’t want to do her job (no big surprise) and as I wound up to start running my mouth, my sweet, naive, soft-spoken Kitty says, “I’ve got this” and lays into the lady, with a sweet smile on her face, but an angry voice and the lady did her job. We were in and out of the Customs office in under 30 minutes.

Back to the train station by way of 3 different Lines and train headed back by 436 p.m… The sad part, it took 1 hour and 17 minutes to get to my flat from the train station.

Dinner was stir-fried steak chunks with onions, squash and garlic stems.

I’ll tell you where the 0.9 lbs came from… I had NO WATER, at all. I had 1 cup of coffee in the morning, 1 latte in the train station in the morning, 2 diet cokes with lunch (something I rarely drink anymore, and don’t miss to be honest), a latte at the Shanghai train station, and 2 cups of yellow label tea at home. NO WATER… it makes a huge difference. And I noticed my urine was concentrated last night… hmmm, do you think that could be from drinking no water!?!? 😀 I also didn’t get in my yogurt and bran. I had no appetite for it last night.

Exercise… Kitty and I walked up and down every single stair there was in the subway system. We didn’t take the escalators, even with my back pack full of yogurt and a few other groceries, I climbed the stairs. It felt great and accomplished… Kitty, ever the trooper, went along with it, but told me on the train that her legs were tired. Bless.

All in all a good day. Here’s one last pic… a family sculpture in Shanghai that we passed, and as my driver Jerry reminds me FAMILY = Father And Mother, I Love You… pretty cool, huh?

FAMILY

Ciao!

Quote of the day: “You don’t always get what you wish for, you always get what you work for”