For Me For Life

These 10 days have flown by. There is so much going on in my life, I barely have time to pause and take a breath. My “morning” sickness hits at night and really, the best choice is to just get Abel to bed and then head to bed myself.

My parents came for a visit this weekend and my eating has simply not been very good. I’m not snacking a ton (except for a few Halloween treats today ), so that’s good, but my meals haven’t been the healthiest. I’m not getting in enough fruits and veggies and not drinking as much water as I should. I have to pay more attention to this. Really, isn’t pregnancy the time to really concentrate on putting the healthies possible things in your mouth?

There will be improvements because all of the celebrations/family visits/busy-ness seems to be slowing down. I vow to get in those fruits and veggies! I’m still wearing my regular pants, but I am definitely rounder and they won’t last much longer. I pulled out some 18s earlier this week to just have breathing room…I like my pants like that! I’m determined to get through my first trimester without having to put on maternity pants…my 18s will help me do this!

Why does size 18 seem so much bigger than size 16? I was so psyched when I fit into 16s at the start of this school year!

I don’t go to the doctor until the Tuesday before Thanksgiving. I won’t have an ultrasound until 16 or 18 weeks. They’ll listen for a heartbeat. Until I get an all clear and through the first trimester, I can’t help but to have the worries.  Plus, I’m pretty confident they won’t find a heartbeat due to all the extra skin and padding from my first pregnancy!  YUCKO!  I’m feeling great though and proud of all I’m doing, and that’s really important.  I just need to make sure I keep the exercise up and eating well!  That’s the KEY to all of this!

I’m keeping up on your blogs and trying to comment as much as possible.  My days are just so full.  It seems that everyone is doing a great job though!!!  Cheers to a fantastic end of the week!

So, after my not so good 24 hours (that was followed by a great 6 hours and a not so great hour) I feel like I’ve bounced back.  We spent the weekend eating well….for the most part.  We went to Potbelly’s for lunch yesterday.  While dieting, I always either get a salad or the turkey sandwich for 7 points.  From what I understand, you’re supposed to kind of stay away from deli meat while pregnant.  If it’s heated, that’s better, but to be honest, I really don’t eat it much anyways.  SO, I got the chicken salad and baked chips.  The chicken salad is high in calories due to the mayo, but I’m not stressing too much over it that.   On to the little things…

Here’s what I’ve noticed during this pregnancy as I’m trying SO HARD to make it a much less weight-gain than the last.

1)  When we go out to eat, I order water.  I’m a Diet Coke drinker.  I love Diet Coke and have basically been drinking it as my sole drink since I was about 12.  While pregnant, I have a couple of caffeine free ones a day. When you eat out, caffeine free isn’t really an option.  You can get Sprite, or root beer, or lemonade….but those are all loaded with calories.  Last pregnancy, I would always get one of those to satisfy that love for soda.  This one, I’m sucking it up and just drinking the water!

2)  When I got out to get a sandwich or something for lunch (like Potbelly’s on Sat.) I get baked chips with it.  I treated my last pregnancy as a free pass to eat Doritos (um, yeah, I like those just about as much as Diet Coke and don’t get me started on how I think Diet Coke and Doritos are the one of the world’s best combinations…right up there with peanut butter and chocolate!) or any other “real” chip.  This pregnancy….NO!

3)  I’m exercising.  It’s hard.  Really hard…but I walked 4 times this week.  3 miles each time.  And it seemed like it took forever to get those 3 miles as I feel I’m walking with all my energy. However, I’m always SO GLAD I did it. This is way better than the absolute no movement that accompanied my last pregnancy.  It helps that I have a one year old who I want to get outside, but at the same time, I’m just more motivated.

My last pregnancy, I spotted through my whole first trimester.  It was the hardest 12 weeks of my life and made me want to be very still and not disrupt anything that was supposed to be going on.  This one, I’m just trying to be more healthy, focusing on the positive, and not worry so much.  First trimester worrying is excruciating for me!

Finally, this weekend, I kind of popped a little bit.  We were all at Toys R Us shopping for Abel’s birthday on Sat. and my hubby looked at me and said, “Wow…you have a little pooch!”  And it really is there.  I can still fit into my pants, but they are snug.  I’m not even 7 weeks yet….I’ve heard you grow faster your subsequent pregnancies, but this is nuts! I pulled out the maternity pants from last fall and some were way too big, others fit fine.  I’m going to have to make a couple of purchases (ok fine, it’ll end up being a bunch of purchases!), but during this in between time, I also have a few pairs of pants in 18s and 20s from while I was losing weight.  As much as I wanted to be a ravishing 140 pounds before I got pregnant again, I guess it’s not so bad as I actually have some clothes that will fit!

Ok, enough babbling for now.  I tried posting on some new blogs tonight.  There are just so many out there!  But everyone is just working so hard.  Cheers to a wonderful week!

Geez…I don’t know what happened, but snacks showed up in the teachers lounge yesterday and I completely let myself go.  This was followed up with Chinese (and not healthy Chinese) for dinner last night and 2 donuts this morning.  Are you freaking kidding me?  This is not how I eat anymore!  Starting right this minute, I am done! Pregnancy IS NOT A FREE PASS!!!  Especially for someone like me who gains weight very very easily!

I’m having an issue with snacks.  I needed something a little more heartier for a snack earlier this week and got some pretzels from the store.  Before pregnancy, I snacked on fruit or popcorn, but that hasn’t sounded hearty enough.  Pretzels fill me up, but there is no longevity to them.  I think I might pop a big batch of popcorn on the stovetop in olive oil to have at school to snack on.  That sounds a little bit more Core and healthy.

I also ran out of eggs and milk at home and just haven’t been to the store to replenish.  Like my first pregnancy, I’m suffering from night sickness….not morning sickness.  It gets really bad and if I don’t go to sleep right away I’m just miserable!

 The irony of this all is (and I might have written about this before) that I have gotten at least 5 comments this week about how skinny I’m looking.  This is awesome…but as I start to grow with baby, I’m not going to look so skinny anymore…especially if I continue to keep eating the way I’ve been eating!  SO, I just had a reality check with myself, and this will be my turning point!  Thanks for listening!

I wish I took pictures of my food to entice some of you more.  However, this soup I made tonight was positively amazing, so easy to make, and totally Core.  I adapted it from Rachael Ray.  It was so so so good.  You must try it and feel super healthy, comforted and happy at the end of your fall/winter night! Here goes:

Chicken Noodle Soup - Italian Style

• 1 T. olive oil
• 3 celery ribs chopped
• 2 medium carrots, chopped (I used a couple of handfuls of baby carrots)
• 1 large onion, chopped
• 3 cloves of garlic, minced
• 1 bay leaf
• salt and ground pepper
• 2 quarts chicken stock (broth works fine too!)
• 1/2 pound whole wheat penne pasta
• 1 pound chicken tenders (or breasts) cut into bite-six pieces
• 1 can tomato sauce
• 1 can kidney beans rinsed
• 1 can white beans (cannelini, great northern, whatever) rinsed

Place a large soup pot over medium-high heat and add the olive oil.  Add celery, onion, carrots, garlic and bay leaf and season with salt and pepper.  Cook for about 2-3 minutes.  Add chicken stock.  Bring to a boil, add the penne pasta and cook according to package directions (I cooked mine about 8 minutes).  Add the chicken during the last 4-5 minutes of cooking.  Add the tomato sauce and beans to heat through, about 3-4 minutes.  Simmer until you serve.

I continue to be actually kind of proud of my eating choices.  They are truly so much better than they were the last time I was pregnant.  I think maybe I’ve had dessert more times than I would probably if I were officially dieting…but it still feels like a great deal of moderation is taking place.  Here are a couple of victories:

1)  This weekend we went to Chipotle.  I LOVE Chipotle and all things that are caloric about it.  While counting points I always get the Burrito Bowl with pinto or black beans, no cheese and no sour cream.  This weekend, I MADE THAT CHOICE!!!  I DID NOT get the chicken soft tacos with cheese and sour cream and I DID NOT get the barbacoa tacos.  I made a great choice and felt so good about it afterwards!

2) Another time (too much eating out this weekend!) we went to Applebees.  I was thisclose to getting the shrimp and teriyaki skewers on the WW menu, but instead opted for the blackened chicken salad with Ranch dressing on the side.  I forgot to ask for no cheese, but figured the calcium wasn’t going to kill me in the end.  So, not only did I pass up sandwiches and fries, I chose a salad AND I didn’t finish it!  That’s right people, I stopped eating when I was full.  It was a true miracle! :)

So those are kind of my updates.  My week last week was insane.  I’m in charge at our school when the principal is gone (I call myself the VIP when she’s out :)) and she was gone twice last week.  That meant two subs and a loss of all my prep time.  Then, we had company over the weekend.  It felt like craziness!  I already feel like this week will be better because I can just do my job of teaching…at the same time, I like busy weeks because it makes everything feel like it’s going quickly and I like that…except on the weekends!

All else is well.  I’m weighing myself once a week.  I gained a pound last week…probably would have gained it no matter what…and haven’t been amazing in the walking department, but again, I’m not feeling all yucky and full and bloated (at least not yet!)  I get nauseous every now and then, but it is easily subsided with a cracker or something.  And my boobs…man do they hurt!  Sometimes not at all, other times literal sharp shooting pains.  I’ll be glad when that ends with the first trimester…at least it did last time!

So I’m slowly reading all your blogs and posting whenever I can.  It really sounds like everyone is doing a great job! Cheers everyone!

Ok, so days 1-4 after finding out I was pregnant seemed to go quite well.  I tried to just continue to eat as I had been, but didn’t stress out when I picked a brat over a veggie burger for the BBQ we had on Sat. night.  If I were focusing on the dieting aspect, I definitely would have chosen the veggie burger though!  Generally, I feel like I ate as I would have on a regular weekend…and that’s really what I’m going for here as I embark on the next several months of baby-baking!  I took two 3 mile walks and a short bikeride with the babe over the weekend… I’m going to keep trying to post menus….and keep up  my fitness page….I really want to inspire others to eat well even when they are pregnant.  More than anything, I’d be doing it for myself and my awesome growing family! 

I can’t thank you all enough for your incredible words of encouragement as I announced my positive test on Thursday. I am so so so excited about all of this!  Nervous, but so so so excited!  Menu later!  Cheers!

It’s true…it actually happened!  For hubby and I it’s all about perfect timing and I guess we had it this month!  I just found out yesterday, so it’s very new and I’m still just letting it all sink in.  I’m so excited I want to tell the world…but we’ll wait awhile and just let the three of us enjoy it.  Abel will be 20 months when the new one is born…that’ll make for an interesting house!  But as I’ve said before, I’m weary about being pregnant past 35 (I know there are many who get pregnant after 35… I’m just not a big fan of doctors and tests and everything that goes along with all of that…it just gets worse after 35!) and having the option to have 3 kids would be great.

SO, the newest challenge of the century will be to gain only what I truly need to gain while pregnant.  I am 10 pounds away from previous pre-pregnancy weight.  I’m only slightly bummed about that….but at 190 and 5′5″, I was still pretty far away from a healthy weight.  So, the new idea is to continue to stick mostly to Core foods, make sure I get in all my milk, fruits, veggies, and water, walk and lift light weights, and just plug through this thing…be healthy!  I’ve got a seriously growing family to think about!

I’m so excited you guys….I could barely sleep last night thinking about all that could potentially be happening to us in the next year.  Hubby is hoping to finish writing his dissertation and find a job… which means selling our house, me finding a job, us finding a new house….IT’S EXCITING!  I’m not overwhelmed…just ready for it all to happen…which is why I had such a hard time sleeping last night!

So I’m still going to blog…because I want to make a point that healthy eating does not stop at pregnancy.  I hope I can motivate others to do the same.  Lord knows I needed that in my last pregnancy!

Cheers to a great day everyone!