Roxanne's Update: What Fitness Looks Like

One of the hard things with culture is the fact that it is constantly trying to tell you who you are or how you should look. In the North American culture that I live in it tells me that to be considered to be beautiful, healthy and in shape then I must be supremely thin with long lean muscles, but at the same time I need to be carefree - able to eat what I wish with the guys and to step out on any whim looking stunning - - - "Easy. Breezy. Beautiful Cover Girl" right? Everyday I am told over and over that if I want to be accepted or loved then I must lose 100 lbs. If I want to be happy and if I want to be happy with myself then I need to emulate these beautiful models that we see in advertising and other forms of media.
Maybe we have been lied to on what we need to be?
Perhaps it is time for a new definition of healthy? Of being fit?
Now please note that with this being said I am not saying that I don't need to lose weight. I understand that there are health reasons for why I do need to lose some of the fat deposits covering my body, and I am still working on that area of my life.
But maybe I don't need to be as hard on myself as I have been in the past when I'm not dropping a pound a day.
Perhaps there are other better ways of judging the changes in my body?
Did you realise that today was the fourth day of doing the 30 Day Shred DVD? And did you realise that I can now to most of the ab and strength work without a second thought? (Although my knee gives me hassels on some of the moves.) Now it's only the cardio I struggle with. But I'd like to see you do 2 minutes of cardio while carrying an extra hundred pounds, and I know that if I'm dilligent then this too will get easier. And do you realise that yesterday I walked a combined amount of approximately 10 km?
See I'm changing.
And although the scale today again stubbornly read 222.0 lbs I know that my body is a different make up then it was a year ago. I know I am stronger and fitter and have more energy. I know I am healthier, and although the scale is not agreeing, I know I am much closer to reaching my goal.
And it is because of this that I am not giving up.
And maybe this is a more accurate representation of what fitness looks like. A progression toward a goal of health, not a picture which culture constantly shows me. . . .
-Roxanne

Roxanne: Ugly Betty (Or a post on transformation)

Well folks. Sorry for the lack of posts lately. I have recently moved home from college where I have a lack of internet, so at this moment I am sitting in a Starbucks across from my sister Allysin as we both try to catch up on our online world and the billions of notifications that several days away seems to entail.
The truth to be told, I am uncertain as to what week I'm on right now, but this I know - that if I were a more driven and dedicated person, then I should be running a 5K by now - or at least a whole mile. But, I am not. I am only a normal young adult with a small amount of motivation, but I think the important part is that I keep trying. And now as I think about it I realize that I could never be happy returning to my completely sedentry life. I like being active. Sure I wish I was more so. I wish I was one of those people who were born with a hyperactive metabolism and a passion for movement, but I wasn't, and now I am choosing to teach myself a love for it. In the words of a value campaign that I have come to respect:

Everytime I make a wise desicion, or get up and excercise or play sports with my family or go for a walk to think I am changing who I am, and sometimes it's not easy. Sometimes you wonder if maybe you should just stay the way you were. Perhaps you will never change so it is better to stay where you are. Change is scary.
But change is also good.
In the weeks just prior to finishing school for the year I began watching the ABC TV series Ugly Betty. So before I came home I bought the final three seasons and spent my first four days of my break watching them.
Was I completely happy with the way things ended?
No, not really.
I really wish they had tied off the loose ends better that would have given it a "happier" ending. I wish that Betty & Daniel would have kissed.
But all that is beside the point.
Ugly Betty actually taught me a lot about change and fear, about insecuirity and working beyond what you think you can do.
The TV show follows Betty who is considered "ugly" by the fashion industry in which she works. Slowly you see the shy, unconfident girl that she was change and transform. She steps into herself and begins to live up to her potential. She doesn't lose who she is, but she grows and transforms.
In one of the episodes of the final season Betty researches bug jewllery. In it she visits a designer with a love for bugs and especially butterflies. The designers has Betty watch a butterfly come out of the cacoon. During the conversation Betty is sad that the caterpillar is lost, and the designer reassures her that the caterpillar is not lost, it's still inside that butterfly - it's just that the butterfly has now become what it was supposed to be. At one point the designer states, "It's gotta be scary to change into a whole new thing."

This is where I feel I am now.
It's almost as though by actually following through with this and losing all the weight I intend to that I will become a whole new thing.
A whole new person.
And that scares me just a bit.
This new person can no longer use her weight as the excuse for why certain people don't like her, or as to why she doesn't have a boyfriend yet.
This new person will need to be disciplined and can no longer justify her bad choices with excuses.
This new person will be someone different then who I have been in the past.

But at the same time I can't keep being who I used to be.
Scared.
Unsure.
Doubtful
Excuse filled.
I'm already different, but I'm not quite fully transformed.
But - I'm headed that way.
In the words of a tweet I read the other day "Sometimes you have to step outside the person you have been" -@herewecollide
I hope I really do transform in the next few months because I am ready for something different.
For a different fight.
I'll keep you posted.
-Roxanne (@RoxyWiedemann or #2012fresh)

Home for the Summer! - Allysin's new entry

WELL HELLO EVERYONE!

So it's been a long time since I've wrote... Which usually means I haven't been doing all my running. Which is true, things got really busy between quitting my job (to come home for summer), major papers, exams, and moving back home, all of this kind of paid a toll on my working out and running. So that means I really need to step up my game now.

It kinda sucks not having run for the past couple weeks because that means that starting up again is going to feel like starting over! UGHHH no fun, but completely possible. And now that I'm home I do not have the comfort of using a treadmill anymore. And for those of you who don't know, I live in the country on these nice hilly roads... So running is going to be sooooo much fun (sarcasm). Nah I'm just having a negative attitude and I need to change that. Unfortunately the weather is not exactly in my favor. This past weekend we had SNOW! it was a SNOWSTORM at the end of APRIL! (That doesn't usually happen) and then it's been rainy and just gross out. But I'm praying for some nice weather that will help motivate me to go outside and run.

If you guys have any encouragement or motivational things to say to me, now would be a good times to say it haha.

I hope you guys are all doing better with your goals than I have been the past two weeks.
infinite x's and o's
- A

Roxanne - Week 13 Update

Hey Everyone!
I hope you had a fantastic Easter weekend :) Here is my weekly update:
Longest Run: 2min 30seconds. - Truthfully I think in the past and even now it's my mind that keeps me from running longer. I get bored and mentally think I'm tired, but I'm still breathing, so I should be able to push longer. I'm hoping that running outside during the summer will help me with this.
Time Run During A Workout: 4 min. 30 sec. during a 20 min workout
Distance Walked/Run This Week: 1.02 miles + generic walking outside to stores and friend's houses
Total Weight Lost: 16lbs
Last Week's Weight: 221.0lbs
Weight Loss: 2lbs
Current Weight: 219.0lbs
Goal: 200lbs by May 20th

So you may be wondering how I picked the date May 20th as my first goal date.
The reason I picked this date is due to the fact that on that day I will be standing in my good friend Brittany's wedding. This wedding is not the only reason I want to lose weight, obviously my current weight is a detriment to my health, self-esteem and relationship development and would need to be lost either way. However, this wedding did give me a fairly significant marking point and this is why I picked it.
And I'm really glad that I've lost the 16lbs and 3 inches that I have managed to lose up until this point.
But this weekend brought me news that makes my weight loss even more important.
My friend Brittany emailed me and informed me that the order for our bridesmaids dresses had never been processed, and they had never called to inform her. Instead with only just over a month left before the wedding Brittany had called them to figure out why we hadn't recieved our dresses yet. And this is a huge bummer because they were gorgeous dresses. And with ordering them I was gaurenteed that it would fit as I had sent in all of my measurements.
So now with the time crunch and the lack of my bridesmaid dresses, my best friend is now having to buy them in store and bring them with her when she flies in 6 days before her wedding.
I won't get my dress until 6 days before her wedding.
Now all you thin girls out there may be reading and thinking - what the heck is wrong with that?
When you're overweight you get used to things not fitting. So you often don't have the cutest clothes, and I tend to dread dress shopping as dress sizes tend to be smaller than other sizes. So now I'm absolutely paranoid that my dress won't fit when she brings it which would be awful.
So I'm going to be working extra hard to lose weight. Cutting out as much junk food as possible and excercising as much as I can motivate myself to. If I can actually meet my goal of 200lbs by this wedding I would probably be one happy, happy person.
Wish me luck!
-Rox - @RoxyWiedemann #2012fresh

The dress we were supposed to wear except in coral . . .

Roxanne - "Oh Jill, you're killin me . . ."

Today I was at my friend Katie's house and thus participated for the first time ever in the Jilian Michael's 30 Day Shred, and man is it good.
Sure I am totally exhausted,
My arms hurt,
My thighs hurt,
I had that weird thing where I almost fainted again . . . BUT, I actually feel accomplished, and I feel like I actually had a really great workout.
Jill herself struggled with weight issues as well before becoming the fitness guru that she is today.
So - if you're working out at home, grab some hand weights and try the 30 Day Shred. My friends say that it actually really works and you can really see a difference in a short amount of time.
And with this wedding coming up in May, that's just what I need, so you may hear more about Jilian in my future posts :)
Keep taking steps - it's worth it!
-Rox #2012fresh @RoxyWiedemann

Roxanne - Back to Running :)

So today I finally ran again.
And I absolutely loved every second of it.
Man I love the feeling of moving my body.
I guess somedays I just forget. . . .

This is what I want to do to celebrate my birthday this year :)

Roxanne - Week 12 Update - The day I discovered breakfast :)

Hey Everyone.

So, here's my update for the week . . .
Longest Run: Umm. . . Non-existant. Oops.
Time Run During A Workout: See above
Distance walked/run this week:  3 miles
Total Weight Loss: 14lbs
Last Week's weight: 222lbs
Weight Loss: 1lb
Current Weight: 221.0lbs
Goal: 200lbs by MAy 20th, 2012

Okay so as you can see by the stats the end of the year crunch is catching up with me. Last week and this week are my two major paper weeks, however, by Thursday all of my major papers will be completed and then one fairly normal week - one week of exams then a couple weeks of glorious freedom at home before starting my job at the camp for the summer.
However, with my running stats being low, and weight stats still plateaued between 220 and 222lbs my life stats are high. This past week I started eating breakfast everyday, and quite seriously - it has changed my life!!
I have so much more energy, and I don't get crazy cravings to eat in the evenings (although I somedays do - but it's more out of habit than desire now.) I don't need sugar the way that I used too. And on top of all that I eat a lot more calories in a day now that I eat breakfast, but it doesn't seem to effect my weight the way it used to. At the beginning of the week when I first began eating breakfast I was a bit concerned because I was gaining weight, but in return I gained so much energy. But I knew that losing weight is part of my end goal, and I couldn't put that in jeopardy. So I told God about my conundrum - the fact that I loved the energy, but that I couldn't continue eating breakfast if I couldn't lose weight doing so.
And voila!. Not that I'm losing weight at an incrdible rate, but I can eat breakfast and lose small increments of weight. And the best thing is that this system is maintainable :)
My friend Chris explaained to me that the reason I now have so much energy is due to the fact that eating breakfast in the morning is what starts your metabolism for the day. . . I think that at the beginning it just took a couple days for my metabolism to speed up to compensate for this new routine - as until this past week I haven't consistently eating breakfast since I was like 11.
Anyway, that was my lesson for the week.
My goal for this week is to work on not snacking in the evenings and see what happens.
All the best this week friends!
Sorting out my life one step at a time.
-Roxanne <3