After our introduction on Monday, Dan focused on fully integrating me into the Body Solutions family. We took my measurements and weighed me (ugh!). Before I climbed on the scale, Dan asked me if I wanted to know my number. "Uh, no, or else I'll obsess about it." But true to my female form, I changed my mind as soon as I stepped off the scale. Dan replied, "This number is what happened yesterday. Let's talk about what we can do today!" He gets a gold star for that answer.
We did a cardio assessment to determine my heart-rate-zone -- my new magic number. Once my goal was identified, our new focus was adjusting my exercise to stay within that zone for the allotted time. Nikki became my treadmill neighbor and within no time, we inclined and increased ourselves into our respective target zones. Between my breathy chatting and Nikki's honest & refreshing dieting stories, I'd achieved and surpassed my workout goal.
Nikki & I went up front to discuss grocery shopping with Dan -- if I'm going to be serious about this; I needed healthier food in the house, stat! The best piece of advice Dan gave me was to plan out every meal and use the plan as a grocery list ~ which means, if potato chips are not budgeted into the diet plan, there wasn't a reason to go down that aisle, right? Oh, it sounds so logical.
It sounds -- and felt -- weird, but I had to go online and research foods. I couldn't "think" of anything healthy I wanted to eat, so I needed sparks. With my trusty plan, I walked into Kroger & gave myself a pep talk: "You can do this, Che!" This dude started looking at me like I was crazy…probably because I said that out loud.
If Kroger had a map, the bakery section would have been marked with a big red X: "Temptation Here!" It takes Olympic style willpower for me to say no to cannoli's, so I put on my ipod to distract me from the sound of them calling my name. Fruits and veggies were easy to pick up -- they were easily planned. The struggled lied in the carbs. Is there such thing as a high fiber, low carb, low-calorie bread and more importantly, could I find one before I was overwhelmed by the call of the nearby bagels?
The bagels were playing hardball and I was feeling weak, so I walked away. Honestly I covered extra mileage in the store because I ended up walking away from the bread two times. In the frozen food section, also known as "Lean Cuisine and Veggies Central", I barely avoided a head-on cart collision with another woman. As angrily she passed me, I noticed she had "deli flats" in her cart. Those seemed like exactly what I was looking for. I hesitantly headed back to the bread section, and passed the potato chip aisle yet again without putting anything salty into my cart. (Yea, me!) I searched for the "Deli Flats" and was pleasantly surprised to find they were exactly what I needed!
At the checkout, the woman in front of me had a bag of popcorn, a bag of potato chips and some glue. She looked at me loading the conveyor belt and commented on how "good and healthy" I was being. Then she put down the bag of potato chips and said she didn't need them. I smiled for her and me.
Diet high: "7 Grain Deli Flats" have 100 calories per serving and 5 grams of fiber.
Diet low: It was really hard convincing that bag of BBQ potato chips that it didn't need to come home with me.