Day 10   Weight: 231.6    Attitude: pretty good to super alright

There’s really no reason to be all sarcastic about it.  I have found my perfect fitness app and maybe you haven’t.  That isn’t a reason to get all crabby and aggressive.  “Why do you love Noom so much?” you may ask (or you may not, either because you’re still annoyed at me or you aren’t even reading this).  There are three reasons I love Noom.  First, it’s incredibly witty and geeky, just like me.  Second, it’s very easy to use to track exercise, count steps, track meals and snacks, get recipes, get workout ideas, and connect with your coach, and this old dog needs easy tech.  Third, I like the name.  It’s just fun, right?  Noom.  NOOM.  Trust me.  It gets funnier the more you say it.

A big thing Noom is helping me change as I embark on this life of health and fitness (IT’s NOT A DIET), is to set small, attainable goals.  In the past when I’ve jumped back into the healthy eating and workout scene, I’ve tried to go all out with my exercise (imagine Shaun T Beachbody workouts daily and restricting myself to only 1,200 daily calories).  I was very athletic in my younger days, and part of me always believes I can just pick right back up where I left off the last time.  This is crap thinking.  I’m not only older, I’m heavier, and I get tired and injured more easily these days.  Trying to do Beachbody extreme workouts even a few times a week was just setting me up to fail.  Even as I started out with this new “small goals” mindset, I quickly became frustrated that I wasn’t getting in 10,000 steps a day.  My coach stomped out that unreasonable expectation.  How could I expect to go from 120 steps daily to 10,000 overnight?  Instead, we agreed that I would start at 3,000 and increase my step goal my 200 steps everyday I hit my goal.  I have been taking the stairs, parking further away from my destination, and walking the dogs most days, and I have already increased my steps to between 4,000 and 5,000 daily.  I feel great having hit my goal, and that makes me want to continue.  Hey!  This small goal thing isn’t bad!

Another thing the psychology of Noom is teaching me, is that it is motivating to make a clear plan and document it.  Doing those two things can help you keep your commitments to yourself, which is something I sometimes struggle with.  A friend/co-worker turned me on the the Potterhead Running Club on FB (we are fellow geeks in many fandoms, not just HP), and I’ve joined and signed up for a virtual 5K!  The money goes to charity, but I also get a virtual event bib to “wear” and a cool medal for finishing.  I am someone who is easily excited by tiny things, and you can bet your wand I will run more than three miles to get a HP-themed medal.  I often tell my bosses that they could keep me quite motivated with a nice sticker chart on my door.  I also love being  graded, so it shouldn’t surprise anyone that I’m a Ravenclaw (soar, Eagles!).

The final thing I’m really working on this first month of the rest of my life is PLANNING.  Especially when it comes to eating.  We are a family of lazies, and take-out will be ordered anytime we do not have a meal plan and the appropriate ingredients on hand.  My clever hubby found an awesome app called Paprika that allows you to easily download recipes from any website and then use them to create a calendar or a shopping list.  We have a set time on Sunday that we plan the week’s meals, and then I use my Panda Planner (I should be getting a lot of advertising money here, people) to plan out all my snacks for the week.  I’m just as happy to eat an apple with a little nut butter as I am to have a cookie, so eating healthy is not too hard if I’m just prepared.  Not buying ice cream is the other important trick I’ve learned.  If there’s chocolate of any kind in the house, the DF will find and consume it.

That’s it for me.  Next installment will be coming to you from the beautiful Rockies, where we are heading this weekend.  I wonder if my pedometer will track my skiing?