Resolution 5: Take Vitamins

Take vitamins, twice daily

My daily vitamins, as they sit on the kitchen counter top

Truth be told, most adults know that taking at least a daily multi-vitamin is a good idea to keep a body fully nourished. I know it, and I am by far not one of the most healthy of adults in the world (if I was, I wouldn't have this blog). At their most basic, vitamins can ensure that any gaps in a person's diet get filled in, at least for the most part (check out this Harvard article for specifics). Not long ago, I consistently remembered to take vitamins each day. But, somehow I let life get a bit busy and I started forgetting to take them each day. A few absentminded moments in a row and...BAM...it was out of my routine. This week's resolution focuses on weaving those small little pills back in to my daily routine.


The vitamins I have settled on are manufactured by Melaleuca, a wellness company that I have purchased from since I was in high school. Their vitamins have a few components which I truly appreciate:

The label on my box of Vitality 4, Melaleuca vitamins for women

1. They create unique blends of vitamins for differing genders, ages, and pregnant women
2. The blend of vitamins I take, Vitality 4 for women, covers all of the needed basics and then some for a woman my age
3. The research used to craft their products is always up-to-date and innovative
4. They have a pre-packaged option (see image above) that makes it simple for a busy person such as myself to grab all needed vitamins quickly as I run out the door each morning (this packaging comes in an AM and a PM pack--when taken at two different times of day, the nutrients are better able to be absorbed successfully into the body)
5. When running low, I order them online and they are delivered to my door: no Target run needed

There are many other positives to Melaleuca's vitamins, but these five are what keep me coming back time and time again.

In the past, taking vitamins have never been an issue during the school week. I grab an AM pouch and swallow the contents with breakfast, and I toss the PM pouch in with my packed lunch: when I sit down during my open hour to each my lunch, it's hard to forget to take something when it is sitting there at the bottom of my lunch bag staring up at me. The tricky part for me comes with the weekend. Weekends are filled with variety--without eating breakfast and lunch at set times and locations, it becomes harder to remember to open a pouch of vitamins. This has been my failing moment in the past. To help me power through this time, I have set my phone to remind me twice a day to take my vitamins. It is my hope that this will keep this goal at the forefront of my mind. 

Resolution 4: Hydrate + Track Calories + Get Active--Part 2

Drink 6, or more, serving of water each day

Without a doubt, I kicked this goal out of the park this week. I seem to have successfully woven drinking water into my daily routine: most mornings at school I help myself to a Vitamin Water Zero, I drink water with my lunch, I have stocked my shelves with Klarbrunn water (personally, I like the Black Cherry), when I workout I guzzle 3 or 4 servings, and when out to eat I order a club soda if I am running short on my intake of water for the day. 


Delightfully, my water intake does seem to be making a difference in my overall health. First of all, water fills me up, which allows me to be sure that when I feel hungry I not simply dehydrated. This also helps to keep me from snacking absentmindedly. Secondly, my skin feels softer and not as dried out as it was just a month ago. I can not be certain that this is related to my increasing my water intake, but my gut tells me that it is. 

Track my calorie intake

My calorie report for this week, as it appears on my Lose It! tracker

This is another goal that I rocked this week. Thanks to the Lose It! website and NookColor App, it was quite simple to track my calories each day. Only one day did I go significantly over my daily allowance: Monday we had an unexpected snow day, and I found myself at Buffalo Wild Wings with friends. Four and a half hours at BWW lead to some poor caloric choices, but I recovered well because the remainder of the week I was at or below my calorie limit each day...until today that is. Today I ended 50 calories over my recommended amount (again, I found myself at BWW and this time I simply underestimated how many calories each boneless wing contained). 

When I first started tracking calories a few weeks ago, I would often find myself hungry at the end of the day. This is no longer the case. Thankfully, it seems as if my body is adapting the the reduced quantity calories I am consuming each day. Certainly, I am motivated to continue this endeavor--I have begun losing over a pound a week since I started tracking each consumed calorie!

Raise my heart rate for a minimum of 200 minutes a week

This, I have to admit, is my largest accomplishment this week. This week I successfully fit in four workouts (real workouts--jogging on the treadmill, playing Wii fit, dancing to Just Dance). Overall, I put in 180 minutes with true workouts; when combined with this week's shoveling from earlier in the week, I reached a total of 220 minutes during which I raised my heart rate for an extended period of time.

My calories burned while exercising this week, as recorded on Lose It!

The reason I am so proud of myself with this particular goal: I was crazy busy this week. For instance, on Wednesday I worked from 7:00 AM until 5:30 PM, and when I got home (exhausted from teaching all day and the two hour meeting that followed) I slipped on some jogging pants, a t-shirt, and tennis shoes, and hopped on the treadmill for 45 minutes. Motivated by an episode of True Blood, I was able to power through despite how tired I already was. I followed up my workout with a shower, dinner with Scott and our friend Jen, and then a much needed 8 hours of sleep. Then, I did it all again the next day, with only slight alterations. 

It is my hope that I can, someday soon, find a routine with these workouts. Unfortunately, with Speech season in full force and my serving on the REA negotiations team, I don't think a routine is in my near future. 

I'm only a few days away from completing my first month of resolutions!

Resolution 4: Hydrate + Track Calories + Get Active

Drink 6, or more, servings of water each day

Track my calorie intake

Raise my heart rate for a minimum of 200 minutes a week

As you may have already noticed, based on the resolutions and post-title above, my goal this week is to combine (without fail) all of my resolutions thus far. 

To help me with this week's resolution, I have found an app and website that I believe will help me achieve success. Lose It! is a free website that also syncs with its Nook Color app (also free), both of which I started using yesterday (when I upgraded my original Nook to my new Nook Color). Lose It! tracks weight loss, food intake, and exercise--there is also a feature that allows me to see graphs of my results as I begin to reach my set goals. So far, I find the app to be extremely easy to use, as well as the layout to be appealing to the eye. The website is a bit less simple to navigate, mainly because it has more features to confuse a first time user; however, I believe that with repeated use I will become more comfortable with the site's ins and outs.

Today I have used this new site/app religiously--plugging in each food I have eaten (I have consumed 1,978 calories today), each calorie burning activity I have done (I burned 235 calories shoveling this morning), and learning how many calories I could still take in today (should I feel hungry, I have 235 calories remaining). Now, going in to my busy work week, I will really be able to test the ease of use of this tool. 

Resolution 3: Get Active, Part 2

It is the final day of my getting active resolution, and this is the first of the resolutions where I did not achieve my goal to its fullest. I was successful in that I was active three out of seven days, as well as in the sense that if I were to average out my minutes of being active by seven, I average 34 minutes of being active each day despite the fact that in four of the past seven days I made no attempt to break a sweat. 


In an ideal world, I would have found some time to workout. I mean, actually workout. Take a walk, go for a jog, put in Wii Dance 2 and shake it for a while... Yet, with my busy life, I simply can't seem to find the time to workout. It is for this reason that all of my moments of activity this week came from non-working out types of activities. For instance, on Sunday I cleaned--that was my "workout." It was legit; I did break quite a sweat as I took down the Christmas tree, carried boxes filled with decorations into the storage space downstairs, Swiffered every Swifferable surface, made three beds, and completed a few loads of laundry. But, it wasn't a workout. Nor was my activity today--shoveling snow for 55 minutes. Sure, I burned enough calories that I had to peal away layers as I pushed the snow off the driveway, but it was not a "workout" either. Not in the true sense of word, at least not in my mind.


Someday soon, in a not so distant resolution, I will expect myself to actually workout. To set aside time in each day to do something healthy for myself--something healthy that doesn't also serve another purpose (a clean house or a driveway I can get my car over). I know there will soon come a time when I set aside time in my week to only work on strengthening my core or to simply improve my VO₂ max. Until then, I'll just keep taking steps in the right direction.

Resolution 3: Get Active

Raise my heart rate 30 minutes or more each day.

It has been awhile since I worked out regularly. That is really the crux of it. Sure, I can list the excuses, each of them legitimate: I work 60-70 hours a week, the negotiations team on which I serve has been logging a lot of hours recently to secure a teaching contract, speech season just began and it is all consuming in many ways, there is a enormously long list of books I need and/or really want to read, many evenings there are some truly fabulous television shows that need watching... But, what it really comes down to is that I need to stop telling myself, "You work so hard, Heather--you deserve some time to sit down and relax/watch TV/read a book" and get off my butt. 

Despite the fact that it's true (I DO work hard. I DO deserve an opportunity to relax), I need to carve time out of each of my busy days and break a sweat. For many reasons, I hate working out. For one, I hate the tickling sensation that sweat creates when it rolls down my forehead and the middle of my back. Secondly, I detest the smell of myself after I have completed level 1 of Jillian Michaels' 30 Day Shred or an hour jog on the treadmill. Additionally, I dislike how I have sneak into my day yet another shower, further drying out my skin and wasting water. Mainly, however, I loath the exhaustion I feel once I am done. I realize that there is supposedly a "runner's high" that most feel after an intense workout, but for those who suffer from Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS) as I do, "fatigue may worsen with physical or mental activity." Nevertheless, even if I do find myself no more energized than before I began, I recognize that raising my heart rate--burning calories--is key to staying healthy. 

According to many sources, including the Harvard School of Public Health, an adult needs 150 minutes of physical activity a week. Therefore, if I get my heart rate up for 30 minutes a day, every day, I will actually come out ahead by 6o minutes. That said, I will not declare that I will "workout" each day--at least not the way as most would define the word. Rather, my focus this week is to simply get active. For this reason, I am counting the 2 1/2 hours I spent cleaning today toward my 30 minutes or more per day of being active: I most defiantly got my heart beating today while I took down the Christmas tree, carried storage boxes up and down the stairs, made three beds, and did a few loads of laundry. In fact, the calorie burning calculator on Self Magazines' website claims that my cleaning today resulted in my burning 840 calories! By focusing on being active, rather than on working out per say, I am confident that I will better be able to find time in each of my busy days to be healthier. 

Over the course of this week, I will track three things: (1) what activity(s) I did, (2) the amount of time I spent being active, and (3) my total calories burned. 

Resolution 2: Track Calories, Part 2

Average calorie intake this week: 1478

Today is the final day of my week in which I meticulously tracked calories. When looking only at my results, it would be easy to deem my calorie intake a true success: the goal I had set for myself was to stay at (or slightly under) 1800 calories a day, which is the total recommended by the Mayo Clinic for my weight, age, gender, and activity level, and I came in an average of 300 calories under that recommendation. If anything, a critic may say I averaged too few calories per day, on average, since eating too few calories a day can stall one's metabolism. 

Despite my apparent success, when looking closer at my past week, it is quickly noticed that my "success" isn't all it appears to be at first glance.  First of all, on Monday morning I awoke with slight nausea--a few hours later it had turned into my becoming intensely ill. While home from work Monday and Tuesday, with what I presume to have been Norovirus (Olmstead County has been struggling with the scourge of the virus for weeks), I took in very few calories: 640 calories on Monday and 980 calories on Tuesday. (In fact, I lost 6.4 pounds in two days, but it is not a weight loss method I would recommend to anyone.) When averaging my calorie consumption for only the days I felt well, my average equates to 1746--still a solid success in my book!

I found tracking calories to be complicated at first, primarily because Scott and I rarely eat prepackaged foods. When food comes in a box or a bag, calorie tracking is simple--just check the label. When a meal is cooked at home, the calories in each ingredient has to be tallied, totaled, and averaged out by the servings created. When living a busy life like mine, this is a time consuming process that was simply too much for me. Rather, what I ended up doing was searching on the internet for a similar dish and calling it close enough, rounding up whenever I felt unsure of the results I had found. Additionally, when going out to eat, it is not hard to find a calorie count online for a meal when sitting down to eat at a chain restaurant. However, Scott and I prefer to spend our dollars at locally owned establishments, but Newt's and Whistle Binkie's do not list their calories for each entree, making my resolution a bit more tricky to stick to. Again, I simply visited my buddy Google, and searched for a similar item, tracking the calories I found in my online search. 

Nonetheless, as complicated as it may have been to track my calories at times, being aware that I had to write down each thing I ingested made me think twice about snacking when I was bored rather than truly hungry. For that reason alone, I plan to continue my calorie awareness over in the weeks to come.

Resolution 2: Track Calories

Track calorie intake: always remain aware of what I consume each day.

With one successful resolution week under my belt, I have set my second resolution. This week, in addition to maintaining my previous goal of drinking 6 or more 8oz. servings of water, I will be tracking my calorie intake. My primary reasoning for setting this goal is not so much to stay under a set total of daily calories (although, I do have a total in mind in which I will aim to stay under), but rather to always remain aware of what it is I consume each day. 

On a typical day (especially when I am bored, stressed, or busy), I snack without really paying attention to the specifics of what I am eating. Often I choose snacks that are healthy, but serving size is critical for them to remain that way; however, when I am bored I pay little attention to the quantity of food I am taking in unless I measure it out ahead of time. Likewise, when I am stressed, I crave sweets and unconsciously give in to these cravings. Commonly, I can control these hankerings for sugar by simply not keeping sweets around home or in my classroom, but when I find myself in a situation where sweets are simply sitting out, such as at a union meeting or during lunch at work, I will almost always help myself. Certainly, one of my largest challenges with food, is my busy schedule. When running from a day of teaching to a session of negotiations, or from coaching speech team to a haircut, I stop quickly to grab a bite while on the go. McDonalds or Arbys, always conveniently located, routinely get my business. These three issues keep me from really focusing on what I am taking in, which is why this week I resolve to write down all I ingest each day. 


Paying close attention to the food I take in is one the first steps to establishing a more healthy lifestyle for myself. Years ago, when I tried Weight Watchers, tracking my food intake was one of the first skills I learned--albeit, the process WW uses is much different than simply keeping a list of foods and the calories in each. Additionally, this past summer, the Livstrong website posted a story about the importance of tracking food intake for weight loss as well as weight maintenance. In fact, seemingly, remaining always aware of the number of calories (among other things) that one is taking in is one of the most fundamental rules of living a healthy life. For that reason, this resolution for week 2 is a critical one for me. 

Resolution 1: Hydrate, Part 2

Today is day six of my hydration resolution, and I have to admit this was a hard week for even such a simple goal. Today was my shortest work day, weighing in at only 10.5 working hours: Tuesday was the hardest, weighing in at 13.5 working hours from start to finish. (Neither total factors in the planning and grading I did from home on those days.) Having such a full work week, right after a week and a half of winter break, was tricky with my hydration goal because it meant it was harder to stay caffeinated. Therefore, it's hard to assess whether the exhaustion I have been feeling recently is from working hard for more hours in a row than I had been accustomed to over the previous week's vacation, or from my lessened caffeine intake.


Despite the challenge of my hectic schedule, I was able to successfully drink my six servings a day without fail. Albeit, there were a few days when I was drinking my final serving later in the day than I would have preferred. Part of what made my water drinking quite palatable was that I discovered that I enjoy Vitamin Water's Zero Mega-C, which is flavored to taste like grape-raspberry. The drink's crisp, subtle sweetness is not the same as that which I crave with Diet Coke and Coke Zero, but nonetheless I find it refreshing and a nice way to break up the redundancy of drinking plain water all day. Plus, one bottle is 20oz, fulfilling 2.5 of my 6 daily servings. Additionally, I have also found that club soda is a delightful option when out at a restaurant: ordering something other than a water feels more natural to me, not to mention that the carbonation is a characteristic I commonly crave.


The increased intake of water has helped me to feel fuller, enabling me to minimize my snacking during the workday, which is when I typically snack most frequently. For this reason alone, I am inspired to continue doing my best to maintain this goal as I go in to the coming weeks.

Resolution 1: Hydrate

Drink 6 or more, 8 oz., servings of water each day. 

My Sigg waterbottle (filled with water)

I set this goal for myself yesterday, and I intentionally started with a goal that I knew I could achieve. However, just because it is a simple goal doesn't mean that it isn't something I need to work on.


Over the past few years of teaching, I have developed a love for caffeine. For most teachers, (well, for most adults), a caffeine addiction rears its angry head in the form of a cup or two of coffee each morning, but my palate has always found coffee too bitter on the tongue followed by a lingering sterile aftertaste. Therefore, my caffeine craving has always been filled by diet soda, preferably Coke Zero. No matter the time of day (even at 7:00 AM), I find the sweet effervescence of a diet soda will always hit the spot. At first, this was an addiction that I controlled, drinking only a few cans of diet soda a day, if any at all; but in recent years I find that on stressful days I easily consume more than 4 or even 5 cans of diet soda each day, and on days when I go soda-free I have a headache by mid-day.


One might argue that diet soda is calorie free, and therefore not that big a deal as far as one's health is concerned (I know this because it used to be my justification as well). Yet, diet soda is not free of unhealthiness simply because it lacks calories. Almost all diet sodas, and particularly the ones I enjoy, contain aspartame: this sugar-free sweetener is linked to tooth decay, cravings of more sweet things, and even cancer.  Additionally, if I am always drinking soda then I am not drinking water, which is what best hydrates the body.


Of course, most experts suggest 8 servings of water a day, but I am only requiring myself to drink 6 each day. This is because I am only allowing water to count (juice, tea, milk, and even soda will not count toward my daily total), despite the fact that many experts claim that although water is the best, other non-alcoholic liquids can count toward one's total.


Seeing as how I don't enjoy water as a drink, I am pretty happy with my success thus far. Yesterday, I had choked down my 6 servings by 8:00 PM, and today I have already consumed my daily requirement. Now, only 5 more days to go.