Dukan – Days 243 & 244 – Eight months in!

Posted on April 20, 2012 by flamidwyfe

Wednesday was a PV day and Thursday was a PP day 🙂

Daily Weight Loss: 1.5 pounds/0.70 kgs (2 days)
Total Weight Loss: 87.8 pounds/39.91 kgs/6.27 stone

Wednesday was a work day. And after work I had dinner with friends at The Vineyard. It’s run by an American guy named Reuben from Boston. Weds. night is game night, and if you play a game you get 10% off! We played UNO… I won 😀

Breakfast: 2 tea eggs
Lunch: 1 tea egg and tin of tuna
Dinner: Philly cheese steak and a side salad

Wednesday was an off night from running, so I walked 5 kms instead.

Thursday was my hospital’s spring walk. I’m going to do a completely separate blog on my adventures with lots of pictures.

Breakfast: 2 tea eggs
Lunch: In a small village, pork, tofu and chicken… I didn’t have the rice that was placed directly on front of me!

Dinner: Stir fried pork curry with onions and garlic cloves. I also dipped it in some kick ass hot sauce that I bought on the field trip! Hot as all get out, but yum!!

Exercise: 3.47 km cave hike, up and down & 4.75 km mountain hike, that was pretty challenging… Here’s how we got down from the top of the mountain… The Flying Squirrel…

Fun day… Just 1 kg exactly to be at Dr. Dukan’s True Weight!!! ONE KILOGRAM! That’s 2.2 pounds. It’s really crazy to think that I’ve nearly lost 90 pounds in 8 months! I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again… THIS DIET WORKS! IF YOU FOLLOW IT TO THE LETTER, IT REALLY WORKS!

I’m off to bed… I’ll post all about cave hiking, mountain hiking and wishes coming true n about 10 hours 🙂

Ciao!

Stop Quitting!

Posted on April 20, 2012 by flamidwyfe

I posted this a few months ago. And while I put together today’s blog, I thought I’d share it again 🙂

No truer words than these. There have been days during this journey where it would have been WAY easier to throw in the towel, but instead I stuck it out and persevered. The only good thing I ever quit, was smoking cigarettes… Quitting Dukan? Ain’t gonna happen…

Stop quitting!

Dukan – Changes

Posted on April 17, 2012 by flamidwyfe

So yesterday, Kitty my Super Duper Personal Assistant, commented that my “bottom” looked very nice in my new jeans… so of course, we had to take a picture 😀 First the picture of my big behind that made me really think about how badly I needed to take control of my health…

Seriously???? UGH!

For those of you who don’t know… I’m the one with my back to the camera with the purple sweater “hiding” my big bottom!

Here’s the pic that Kitty took… I think there’s a bit of a difference… LOL

Yeah... that's my backside 🙂

Kitty also mentioned that you could see all my tattoos through the shirt I was wearing, she’s so observant!

I was down 200grams/0.7 lbs… but still up from my low weight last week… not stressing over it… well, maybe a little!

I’ll do a running update when I can figure out how to do it… Brett told me, but I can’t find the saved notes… LOL

Ciao!

Travel – Stuck at the Airport… Writin’ A Blog

Posted on April 15, 2012 by flamidwyfe

Well, I’m sitting at the Guangzhou, China airport waiting on a delayed flight with a migraine, yippee! So I thought, what the heck… Write your blog 🙂

Weight, up 200 grams from the other day. Did 2 pure protein days in a row, hoping for the best tomorrow.

Taught classes to moms & dads to be on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday. Also taught staff development classes those 3 days.

Then an early morning train to Hong Kong on Friday morning. Busy day, I specifically went to see Troy the travel guy, to book tickets for my mom to go to North Carolina and me to go home for 2 weeks in June. I got my tickets, didn’t get my mom’s (mom I’ll Skype ya tomorrow!).

I also got some shopping in on Friday and Saturday. I also did the 90 minute KYA Ashtanga yoga class with Miranda at Yoga Mālā. I did a few modified poses due to the inability to bend the left knee more than 90 degrees without pain, but only a few… It was an awesome class.

Saturday morning up at the crack of dawn and lounged in bed. Then went out for a run…. A LONG RUN!

Did you know that 6.54 miles is over 10.5 kms? I ran 75% of this… I ran the first 5.42 kms without stopping, then I speed walked and then I did a 5 minute stretch and meditation and then ran a bit more, then when I got into traffic I just speed walked… Too hard to run on the crowded sidewalks.
According to RunKeeper the elevation I climbed was 2300+ feet!

Here are pics from some of my run… The first 2+ kms were UPHILL on the street…

I even recorded some of it… You can see that here: Sandi street running in Hong Kong

Then I found Bowen Road which is a 4 km path specifically for pedestrians!

And this is what bliss looks like after figuring out you’ve done gone more than 10kms!

I also treated myself to a foot massage both days… I deserve it 🙂

So, that’s my update… THANK YOU TO ALL OF YOU WHO VOTED FOR CELESTE IN THE LAST COUPLE DAYS AND A HUMONGOUS THANKS TO THOSE BLOGGERS WHO REPOSTED IT. My family thanks you with our WHOLE heart! You can vote daily until May 13. I will be putting a little box on the right side of my blog, once I’m back home and have my lap top 🙂

Ciao!

Dukan – Day 236 Epic Fail day

Posted on April 12, 2012 by flamidwyfe

Wednesday started out as a PP day.

Daily weight GAIN: 0.7 lb/0.3 kg
Total weight loss: 85.8 lb/39.91 kg

Oh, where to start… I’m probably being WAY harder on myself than I should!

Breakfast in my room: 2 boiled eggs
Lunch: A beautiful bowl of chicken and veggies, lovely presentation, but maybe 1 ounce of thinly sliced chicken, which being a PP day meant all I could have…

Those slivery, garlic looking things are from the lotus plant. I only ate the chicken.

I then taught a 90 minute child birth Ed class and a 60 minute staff development class. This pic is from the staff development class. The little old bitty with the word ‘LOVE’ over her head ~~wouldn’t shut her pie hole~~ , errr, wouldn’t let me get a word in edge wise when talking about water birth… I asked her, “exactly how many water births have YOU conducted” she said, “none and I will never”. I said, “that’s, OK because the patients prefer midwives to do their deliveries”… She didn’t speak another word 😀
I can always tell by body language who is there to learn… The midwives took pics of every slide and 2 of them recorded it. They asked questions for nearly 40 minutes afterwards!

I want to give a shout out to my amazing daughter, Tiffany LeAnn and her hubby, Joey. I use their very intimate pictures from Jose’s birth (with their permission) in my presentations. The 2nd PowerPoint I use is just pics from their birth with the song “I Can Only Imagine” playing. They may not know the words, but the music does its wonder and brings tears to most people’s eyes. Joey and Tiffany… You are contributing tremendously in educating the women and midwives of China in normal birth and water birth… Thank you SO much for allowing me to teach through your experience!

And then my epic fail… OK, epic is an exaggeration… LOL, but it felt epic! We went for Arabic food. Just being in the restaurant made me miss Abu Dhabi… I swear sometimes I miss Abu Dhabi more than home in the States! I’m actually tearing up as I write this… Anyway, the place is run by 2 Arabs a Lebanese guy and a Syrian guy and it was DAMN GOOD ARABIC FOOD!!! My intent was to only eat the Mixed Grill and extra Chicken Shish Taouk, but also had the Lamb Kofta smothered in a sesame sauce and fattoush and hummus. Too much food, but no wheat or sugar… BUT, the Tabbouleh was to DIE FOR… Seems innocuous, but their is bulgur in Tabbouleh. And Bulgur is a wheat product and wheat is like friggin’ HEROIN to me. Not to mention it makes my tummy bloat and hurt and causes lower GI stuff!
Here’s a pic of the dinner… It was glorious, alhamdilallah! Notice the star of the show is the ~~heroin~~ Tabbouleh.

So, I’m feeling groovy, happy, speaking Arabic with Mohammed our waiter, getting winks from the Syrian co-owner who sends over a heavenly tea pot of yummy mint tea, when it happens… He sends over THE DESSERT PLATE… Nope, not gonna do it, not gonna rmrmrmmaamrm… Sigh, sorry, had chocolate in my mouth… What was I saying?!? EPIC FAIL… And MOONDAY Continue reading →

Dukan – Day 235 & 236 – Guangzhou

Posted on April 11, 2012 by flamidwyfe

Monday was a PP day and Tuesday was a PV day 🙂

Monday:
Daily weight loss: 0.7 lb/0.3 kg
Total weight loss: 86.5 lb/39.31 kg

Tuesday: No weight change

So Monday was a busy day… Worked at my hospital in Hangzhou in the morning, then Vivien, Kitty and I went to The Vineyard to watch the Geelong Cats play (Australian Football, ROCKS!!!) and then when the game was over I headed to the airport for an evening flight to Guangzhou. I’m here for a week doing staff development (water birth, normal birth, international standards training and JCIA) and I’m doing parents-to-be classes, as well. I can’t tell you how much I LOVE teaching about birth and health & safety and infection control!

Monday food:
Breakfast: 2 tea eggs
lunch: tin of tuna
Snack: 1 tea egg
Dinner: at the airport Steak

I’m staying in the hospital and this is my room…

Pretty posh and nicer than a hotel! The hospital cook is making me food to order, although I needed to inform him this morning to lay off the MSG…I got all red and broke out in hives and had numb lips after dinner last night 😦

Yesterday (Tuesday) was a lot of fun. I got up early to search for tea eggs from a street vendor. When I returned the cook sent up eggs.. Lol.
I then did rounds with the doctors and went for a walk to the Carrefour (a French grocery store that I used to shop at in Abu Dhabi)… found Greek yogurt, yay!
On the way back, I noticed the fountain in front of the hospital… NO WORDS…

Lunch in the board room with all the hospital big wigs… I had steamed fish with ginger and steamed broccoli raub… Yum!

At 3 o’clock I did my first parent Ed class and was warmly welcomed!

Lots of great questions from the audience about normal birth and water birth and I did a demonstration with the birth pool. Lots of fun!

Dinner brought to my room was beef with carrots (I didn’t eat the carrots) and a side of very yummy steamed regular broccoli.

I then went out for a run. Finished C25K Week 7 Day 1… Challenging with the ton of people meandering… Slow run given the circumstances, but a run no less… Kind of felt in training for the zombie run I’m doing with Miriam and Connie in November! Dodging people, cars, trucks and bikes!

A quick shower and I finished the night off with a pot of fat free Greek yogurt with bran and Splenda.

I hope everyone is having a good week!

Ciao!

Parting shot… From my room’s balcony… I love rooftop gardens… Anyone see the cat?

Dukan – Day 233 – Easter

Posted on April 9, 2012 by flamidwyfe

Sunday was a PP day 🙂

Daily weight loss: 0.2 lb/0.2 kg
Total weight loss: 85.8 lb/39.01 kg

Back to my normal weight loss 🙂 Still plugging along. I had the morning off for church and had a great time. A few things to note… people think that China is an atheistic country, when in fact, most people here are religious. The largest percentage being Buddhist. It is estimated that there are over 50 million Christians in China. And I have to say the church was rockin’ Easter Sunday morning. And yes, it’s a REAL church with a big ole cross on the top of it… just across the street from the Buddhist temple 🙂

The music was gospel with a bit of reggae and blues... totally awesome!!!

The really awesome thing about attending church outside of my home country is the diversity of the fellow church goers… you don’t see that so much in churches in the U.S…. it was the same in Al Ain… people from all over the world in church with you… it makes it so much more fun!

The kids group... rockin' the house at Easter services.

I then walked 2 miles to the bus stop for Bus 900 to take the 1 hour and 18 minute ride to work. Wasn’t too bad… I love people watching.

I then had another marketing event to ~~live through~~ smile through 🙂 Steve, Romina and I got up and sang “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star”… the crowd loved it and the kids sang it in Mandarin… pretty cool.

I then went home and got another run in… I’m really trying HARD not to overdo it, but I love it so much! I can’t explain it better than that… took my time, worked on pacing, since I am now running for longer periods without stopping… I think I’m doing pretty well…

http://www.runkeeper.com

Breakfast: One baby bell low fat cheese roundy thingy, 2 tea eggs
Lunch: 1 tea egg, tin of tuna
Afternoon snack: 1 tea egg
Dinner: Stir fry pork loin with onions and garlic cloves… yum

Exercise:
1 mile walk to and from work
2 mile walk to the bus stop
2.98 mile/4.79 kms Run

I hope everyone had a nice Easter Sunday or Passover weekend!

Ciao!

Parting shot… PJ’s AND high heels in the tea egg line this morning!

PJ's and High heels at 651 a.m.

Dukan – Day 232 Cruisin’ Along

Posted on April 8, 2012 by flamidwyfe

Saturday was a PV day 🙂

Daily weight loss: 0.4 lb/0.2 kg
Total weight loss: 85.6 lb/38.91 kg

Just cruisin’ along at the end here. Had a marketing event in the evening and I’ll load up the pics from that at the end.

Breakfast: 2 Tea eggs
Lunch: Leftovers from night before
Afternoon snack: 1 Tea egg
Dinner: steak fajitas without the fajitas at the Mexican restaurant. Yum.

Exercise: Walked the mile to and from work and then ran later in the night.

Left knee holding up well, I’m very pleased 😀
It feels good to be out there running again two nights in a row.

I hope everyone has a lovely Easter/Passover weekend!

Ciao!

They are huge on marketing events here. This is the final celebration weekend of the MONTH celebration of being open one year.

Dukan – Day 231

Posted on April 7, 2012 by flamidwyfe

Friday was a PP Day 🙂

Daily weight loss: 1.1 lb/0.50 kg
Total weight loss: 85.2 lb/38.71 kg
I’ve lost 1/3 of my weight since August! 33.40% to be exact.
I’m in the 160’s!!! And have 4.84 lbs to go until I reach Dr. Dukan’s True weight and 14.84 lbs to go to reach my goal.

The full moon last night was gorgeous:

Breakfast: 2 tea eggs and bacon
Lunch: tuna
Dinner: stir fry steak with onions and garlic

Exercise: I RAN and I was FINE : D

No pain in the knee while running!

I hope everyone is having a good Easter weekend!

Ciao!

Dukan – Day 230 – Tummy Tuck consult

Posted on April 6, 2012 by flamidwyfe

Thursday was a PV day because of travel 🙂

Daily weight loss: 1.5 lbs/0.70 kg I HAVE NO IDEA WHY I LOST THIS MUCH, but I ain’t complaining… More on that in a bit.
Total weight loss: 84.1 lb/38.21 kg AND SIX STONE (for my Brit friends) SIX!!
I have 5.94 pounds to reach Dr. Dukan’s True Weight for me… Which in August, when I faced losing 90 pounds, I thought impossible… WELL IT’S NOT! 😀
I have 15.94 pounds to reach what I think I should weight (155)… Which will be exactly 100 pounds less than I weighed on August 20, 2012… You do the math.

With all the weight loss, there are some extra bits here and there, although its not as bad as I thought it would be for someone my age (48). So Kitty (my Personal Assistant) and I traveled 4 hours by train to Wenzhou for a plastic surgery consult. Here we are at the train station…

Here’s Kitty ~~drooling~~ sleeping on my shoulder… The girl can sleep 23 hours a day and anywhere! It’s amazing…

First, I want to say that my hospital is paying for my surgery. My hospital and the hospital in Wenzhou are owned by the same company… My hospital is paying for it to (ready for this??) “make me more marketable”… Me? I was going to pay for it at some point, so it I’m good with that, LOL.

My requests:
1. Full abdomioplasty
2. Liposuction the (now teeny) bit of fat on my back
3. Liposuction above knees, inside knees, back of thighs and calves

My bosses request (the CEO):
1. Laser resurfacing of hands and face

The consult went well. The surgeon is 31 and has done 10 full abdomioplasty ops. He will be supervised and assisted by someone with 20 years experience. As crazy as it sounds, I like this guy. He was honest about his age and experience. He looks 14 🙂 Kitty said we should ask for a better doctor… Lol… I love that girl!

When he examined my abdomen he told me there was hardly any fat to lipo from there… You can imagine how that made me feel! He also said he would not do all of the above requests by me at the same time because of the risk of hypovolemia from too much liposuction (all the tummy fat is in my legs, lol!) I tried to goad him into it and he flat refused… I like that about him, as well.

So, what I’m getting done on April 30th:
1. Full abdomioplasty
2. Liposuction above knee and inside of knee
3. Liposuction the teeny bit of fat on back
And MAYBE (depending on fat loss and blood loss) a bit from the back of my thigh, he will decide at the time

The rest will be done later… I really hate my calves 😦 But I get the risks.

What I got done yesterday:
Round 1 of laser resurfacing of face and hands and lower arms.
The premise behind the laser resurfacing is to activate collagen below the skin. I’m going to post a close up pic of my face and tell you this… MY FACE LOOKS LIKE THIS FROM 25 YEARS of SMOKING… I haven’t smoked in nearly 7 years, and my face still looks like this…
MESSAGE: DON’T SMOKE and if you do… QUIT!

Now that I look at it, I really need to do something about those eyebrows!!!

Getting lasered was interesting… It heats up your skin, they use some gadget to check your skin temp, apparently 41C is optimal… Very little discomfort.

And then the 4 hour train ride back. Long day, worth it!

About the weight loss this week… I’ve been very surprised because I haven’t run. I haven’t even walked at night. I’ve walked the 1 mile to work and the 1 mile home from work, but that’s been it. I have gotten tons of water and my bran in… So I’m waiting for the rug to be pulled out from under me!

I’m going on a test run tonight… Will be cautious and not stupid. It’s dry and 70 and perfect. My knee doesn’t hurt when I walk, just when I try to sit… Bizarre! I’m using a compression brace on it and will continue to do so. I did some light weights at the gym this afternoon (3 reps of 15 at just 20 pounds) and that seemed fine, as long as I don’t bend it more than 90 degrees.

So, that’s my update. I hope everyone is having a fabulous week!

Ciao!