Tonight my mom and I will be going to the Fife pool to do some water aerobics. My mom and sister-in-law have done a couple weeks-long sessions already and really like it. They both have felt results from it, and I'm hoping for the same. If I like it I'll continue to go twice a week, either on Tuesdays and Thursdays or Mondays and Wednesdays. (And if I need to I'm allowed to mix-and-match if my work schedule doesn't allow me to go on Tuesday or Thursday.) The class is from 1900-2000, so as long as I'm working an 8-hour shift, I'll be able to make it (I start work at 2300 for an 8-hour night shift). The same is true for when I'm on day shift, I'll be able to make it if I work only 8 hours that day, since I get off work at 1930 for a 12-hour shift.

I'm trying to make better choices when it comes to food, but I find myself feeling hungrier than normal now. I'm thinking it has something to do with being more active, which has increased my metabolism a bit, so now I'm burning the food I eat a little faster. Plus, eating less can do that to a person. :) I got salmon for a late lunch at the Olive Garden the other night and I was starving about 2 hours later. I only ate half of it for "lunch" and then about 3 hours later I made some brown rice and had the rest. Later that night (I worked an 8-hour shift) I had an apple when I felt hungry and it filled me up. To be honest, I'm not good about reaching for a fruit or vegetable for a snack. Cookies or chips sound so much more appealing to me. But I felt so much better after eating an apple.

Last night at work my snacks included an avocado and an apple. I was only at work for 4-hours, because we had very few patients and a lot of nurses. So I ate the apple just before leaving to go home, because I didn't want to feel hungry and think about going to some drive-thru for a snack. Instead I air popped some popcorn and drizzled it with melted butter.

I will not starve myself or deprive myself of things I enjoy. A few summers ago I got really into losing weight, and I was so strict on myself that I would feel deprived. I was doing Weight Watchers (without the meetings) and would save up points so that I could have things I wanted like ice cream or popcorn or whatever. To the point where if you looked at what I was eating during the day, I had very little nutrition so that I could have a treat or two at the end of the night. I felt myself starting to develop an eating disorder, and that scared me to death so I stopped watching what I was eating. I never puked, tried to make myself puke, nor thought about making myself puke, but I was binge eating. Not to an extreme, I did not eat my weight in chips. But I felt that if I continued on that path, I might have gone there.

I moved in with Jamaal a little bit after my realization, and he has not really helped me with my eating. He has no problems with eating fast food on a daily basis. He could eat pizza daily. And unfortunately these things are easier than cooking. They make less dishes, and so are more appealing to me. Plus they taste good. We haven't ordered pizza in a while now, I think he might have gotten tired of it finally. I've been tired of it for a long time now, but would go along with it because I either had nothing else available to make, or didn't have a lot of energy to make what I had planned to make.

I'm on a mission to make better choices for us. I'm not going to cut out fast food entirely. It's okay once every couple weeks. But I'm going to make an attempt at cooking more wholesome meals for us. I've gotten into a rut of relying on bagged frozen meals, as they are easy and quick. Some of them aren't awful nutrition wise, but I feel the quality isn't as good.

And so I conclude this post...it kind of took a turn that I wasn't really planning on doing...