Long time, no blog! I know, I know… but I have good reasons! XD Let’s just say that my professional writing career has made significant strides in the last month.  Plus I learned to knit. XD More on the proffi writing very soon, but for now, I thought I’d kick off the New Year — which looks like it will be epic! — with a review of 2011.

My main takeaway from 2011? I took up fitness and exercise and I STUCK TO IT ALL YEAR. This is, by far, one of the greatest accomplishment I’ve had in a single year in… forever? It’s huge, y’all. From January to May, it was running consistently, and since May, it’s been Slimmons three times a week. Vacations and life bumps like getting sick have taken me away from Slimmons for small periods of time, but I always went back (do you know how hard it is to drag yourself back to 45 minutes of high-impact cardio after a ten day vacay?). I am super proud of myself!

I also gained a LOT of body confidence in 2011, in large part due to exercise, but also because of this blog. I don’t know why or how, but I’ve… deprogrammed myself from a lifetime of fat shame, body hate and food guilt. I mean, not *completely*, but I simply have no patience for it anymore. Yeah, it means I don’t monitor my eating as closely as before (ie: I don’t “diet” b/c I’m not trying to “lose weight”), as fitness, health and NOT dieting has become my focus, but my newfound sanity about my body has made my eating a lot better. I don’t HAVE to dive into a box of cookies because they’re not forbidden… and I can have one or two and walk away. It’s lovely.

And friends! I’ve made so many friends! Honestly, part of the reason I’ve been terrible about blogging is that I get Heidi, Patty, Alyssa and Laura all to myself in real life, and talk about bloggy topics ad naseum in person and then forget to blog them. Whoops!

So what’s ahead in 2012? My primary goal has nothing to do with health/fitness or my weight, and is already underway — career success in 2012! But relative to The Curvy Nerd? I’d like to continue my fitness routine, and then step it up. My body is now used to Richard three times a week, and I think I need to add a day (I love some of the other classes at Slimmons but the sked is the thing!), or another activity (maybe running again), in order to challenge my body more. I’ve seen a lot of positive physical changes in my arms, legs and torso… but my hips and stomach are persistently the same. Sigh.

I’m not setting a weight specific goal right *now* but that doesn’t mean I won’t later in the year. I know that sounds odd, or like a cheat. But every single year I’ve set a goal tied to a number, wouldn’t achieve it and would be so bummed out, that it wouldn’t matter if I did accomplish other things (like fitness). This year I’d rather not do that.

Well, I don’t want to set a WEIGHT number goal. I do have a clothing size number goal in mind: I’d like to kiss size 16 ANYTHING goodbye (I’m a 14/16) and make serious headway to getting into a size 12. This translates to losing at least 6 inches in my hips (since I’m a 16 down below exclusively!), so my “stepping up my fitness goal” becomes key. Obviously some weight loss will come with that. But I’m not going to say “I will lose 30 pounds!” and then beat myself up/have other people judge if I don’t get there. The thing about clothing size goals, is you can lose 10 lbs but exercise like a mofo and lose far more inches than your weight loss may reflect. Or, you can lose 30 lbs but not do ANY toning and achieve the same thing. I’d rather focus on fitness and toning to achieve body goals in 2012.

ALSO: I need to blog more. Seriously.

Enough about me! What are YOUR goals for 2012? Are they weight based? Fitness? Career? Something else?

It may have been obvious to many of you, due to the lack of “weekly weigh in” posts, but I have been on a mini-break of sorts. I wrote about hitting my first plateau, and for the first few weeks, it really bugged me. I didn’t want to go to Weight Watchers because I knew the needle wouldn’t move. Then I had legit conflicts. Then I made a semi-conscious choice to get through this plateau with my sanity intact — I went on a “diet” mini-break. I didn’t stop eating healthy, and I didn’t stop weighing myself (at home)… but I stopped tracking religiously, I stopped going to Weight Watchers meetings, and I stopped being so hard on myself.

And it’s been really good for me. I’m “back on the wagon” as of one week ago (though I was never really off), and yes, I was all sneaky and didn’t write about any of this previously. On the one hand, who wants to say “hey guys, I”m not going to Weight Watchers!” but also it was a wee bit of an experiment. And while I was confident in myself and in my decision, I didn’t want to announce to the universe that a plateau mini break is Something To Do, have it not go well and then be seen as giving shit advice. Not everyone can take a “mini-break,” as it is the first step to quitting. It might have been for me in the past. But not this time.

Sometimes, especially when our progress slows down — or just when it’s the height of summer and there’s a lot going on — you need to take a break from being Super Awesome At Everything. Since weeks of being rigorous didn’t move the scale one iota and didn’t promise to do so for at least a few weeks, I decided to take a break from my food/number and focus on fitness for the month of July. My goal was to go to Slimmons three times a week, plus add in one other workout each week, and to get a good cardio burn each time. What’s a great plateau buster? Increasing your exercise. But I needed to get good at the exercise.

I didn’t track my food and had some consecutive days of crazy (Thai food truck, I love you), but I kept one half of my mind on what I was eating. The goal was to maintain and work on fitness — not backslide and gain weight (it’s not a plateau if you gain lol).

I also had to reevaluate Weight Watchers, and how it has been working for me. Finding the right day/time/meeting & transport to and from said meeting has been tricky. I live in Los Angeles without a car, which is a-ok most of the time, but when the ONLY meeting time I can get to with my work/bus schedule means getting up mega early on Saturday or Sunday — or choosing between a meeting and physical activity… Weight Watchers kept losing. Plus, the bus to get there is creepy. I’m generally pretty unflappable, but JEEZE, the 212 is a creepy ass bus on Saturday mornings. (and the bus driver is always so grumpy – and once drove right past me! Lame.)

I’d never seriously considered Weight Watchers online, because I didn’t think I could stay accountable, and I didn’t have a decent scale. I use my analog scale to give me a general idea of where my weight is, but it’s usually 2-3 pounds off from the Weight Watchers scale, and involves a lot of guess work. (plus, my cat uses it as a toy. Pretty sure that throws the calibration off) During my mini-break, I considered it — if I had a quality scale, one I decided couldn’t lie to me – and I couldn’t ignore – could doing all the Weight Watcher’s stuff I’m doing anyway work, with my weighing myself in at home each week?

I decided that it could. I’m not giving up on meetings, but I did get a good scale (more on that later), and I’m going to use it, going forward, to accurately and honestly track my weight, regardless of whether I go to a meeting. My mini-break is over, my weight stayed exactly the same (yay?) and now I’m ready to bust through this plateau.

And just as a disclaimer: this doesn’t work for everyone! But taking a “break” was right for me at the moment, as I was discovering a place of zen about my body and my “number.” Funnily enough, during this time, several people tried to call me out for not losing much weight. It didn’t phase me, because, deep down, I knew what I was doing was right.

Onward and downwards (on the scale)!

When I started this blog and this journey, my goals were pretty nebulous. My main goal was, you know, actually doing this.

Now I’m doing it! I’ve reached a bit of a milestone, in fact: I have filled up one entire WW booklet, with no sign of quitting or tapering off! I get a new book next week! I think it’s time to set some goals

1. Reach 180 by the end of 2011/Q1 2012. Total weight loss goal: 53.8 pounds. 38.8 lbs to go.
2. Get my body fat percentage into the healthy range for women. I am double-checking with my old trainer what mine was a year ago. I was in the overweight range — I think 35%?
3. Lose inches in my hips & waist. 4-5 inches in my hips & 4-5 inches in my waist would make me a “true”/standard 14 and/or 12.
4. Run a mile without stopping.
5. Go down 1-2 cup sizes. I miss my C cup (real or not, ha).

I have some rigid, calendar-type motivation — a wedding in September! I’m not setting a specific weight or size for it, but I want to keep working at the pace I’ve been going, and look slamming in whatever dress I get! And it’s going to be a colorful dress. With cleavage. I may even wear heels! Egads!

Goals feel more real once we write them down, right? Anyone out there have goals they want to hit in 2011, or ones they’ve met and want to share?