I’m a Numbers Girl

Ever since we bought that romantic treadmill back on Valentine’s Day, I’ve been focused on making it a priority on nearly every day of the week. I’m a numbers person. I like having something to measure when it comes to following my progress and seeing results. For me, that means the number on the scale is something that has always mattered to me. I’ve never been the kind of person who just went on how my clothes fit or measuring of inches on every area of my body. My weight is my guide. It’s what keeps me focused and motivated. A few weeks ago I set a finish line goal for myself, with a smaller, more immediate goal as well. I’m a firm believer in setting small goals to see progress along the way to a bigger, long distance goal. It absolutely sets us up to succeed rather than fail. I decided that losing twenty pounds by August, when I’ll be attending BlogHer, was definitely attainable without forcing myself into too rigid a routine, which might get me discouraged and fall back into bad habits. My shorter goal was to lose five pounds by the time we leave for Walt Disney World in OMG-LESS-THAN-TWO-WEEKS. I’m so excited to say that I’ve already met that goal. I was seriously pumped when I stepped on the scale to see that I had succeeded, and having met my interim goal two weeks early was truly motivating. I’m on track to meet that August goal and maybe just maybe I’ll even surpass that goal since in reality I could stand to lose a few more than twenty pounds. I decided on that number because I knew it was realistic because some days I just won’t exercise and other days I’ll eat an ice cream cone and need to get on the treadmill or hit the pavement more than once in the same day. I’m very much against diets. I believe the word diet, when used as a verb, means deprivation and restriction, which can so often lead to binging and in some cases, failure. I think it has to be an all around lifestyle shift where I eat healthy most of the time and exercise regularly, but maybe a little extra when I’ve indulged a little. This is another example of why I like numbers and and the display on my treadmill that tells me how far I’ve trekked, the number of calories I’ve burned, and the speed at which I did it all.  I would much rather require myself to be more physically active than give up food that I love. It also doesn’t hurt when it becomes obvious that my thirteen year old is paying attention and actually comments on how much smaller I look. He’s a very sweet boy, but I’m kind of worried that he might also need to see an eye doctor.