An update and travel...

First the update on the changes this week, as I already said "he was right and I was wrong" and as much as I hate that, you can't argue with success. I lost 5 lbs between Monday and Saturday this week. Whether that was all from the changes in eating/working out, whether it was fluid, whether it was alien intervention, I really don't care. Things are at least moving forward again and not stuck in neutral or worse yet going backwards.

I have actually made friends with the food issue and no longer feel so overfull with every meal. The working out less (particularly decreasing the swimming) is getting a little easier, but I still feel like I am doing too little and need to work on shaking that mind set. That is a goal for this week. I need to get these things engrained before I am on my own soon.

Which leads to my next thought, travel and maintaining forward progress. I have been very lucky that since the early part of this year I have had great control over my life travel wise, I have been able to do short trips and do a lot of my work from home, that is about to change. I am heading into a really rough 8-12 week period travel wise. I have two personal trips (one of which is overseas to Israel), a conference, and a large number of business trips.

I am trying very hard to convince myself this is a test and a good thing, if I can only maintain this success when I am home, then what good is it, but I have to admit I am nervous and over reacting. My images in my head of coming out of this 50 lbs heavier just won't go away.

The first trip is personal, not worried about this one as far as going backwards. It is 4 days, and the people I am visiting are good friends who know where I am at and who have put more thought into making sure I will be ok than I have. I love you guys (and promise after the visit to post your names *smile* but you know who you are). We have already talked about food, about exercise and I know its going to all be ok. Having not seen them in a long time is another fear, but that will be another post.

The other personal trip I am so excited about I wouldn't miss it for the world. I am going home to my beloved Israel to see very good friends and to celebrate my 40th b'day. I can truly say this is the first birthday in my life I have looked forward to celebrating (I usually hide from b'day's, not the getting older, just the fuss people make). Overall I think this will be a really healthy trip, the food in Israel is so fresh and so amazingly healthy. I worry a little about enough calories (since when I am there I eat mostly chicken and veggies). Exercise will be easy, the hotel has a great facility overlooking the sea and I plan to walk the beach a lot. I do worry about this long a trip. It is the longest I have gone without my trainer since I started with him. But this isn't a trip I would pass up even if it meant gaining 50 lbs.

Then comes business travel, this is the part that is giving me nightmares. If you have never traveled for work it is nothing like pleasure travel where you control your life. This travel is going to throw off my sleep, my food and my exercise drastically. Most of my meetings are 2 days long, which means flying in late the night before, spending 2 days in meetings and taking another late night flight to the next place. In between it is food on the run and meals provided by the client. Some hotels have facilities where I can at least get on a treadmill, but that is not always the case. Food wise, while I can sometimes find a hotel with a small fridge, when you arrive late at night and are only there for a short period grocery shopping isn't always do able or practical.

People around me, who don't travel for work, don't quite get this scene. Heck I never got it before I lived it. They tell me not to think about it, not to worry about it, that it isn't that hard. I wish I knew how to better explain it or to do what they want from me and to be able to turn off my fears. But I truly worry if I will be sitting here in May talking about how far backwards I've gone. And personally I am hoping the fact that it DOES scare me is what keeps that from happening.

There are a lot of people who want me to stop over thinking and worrying about these trips, but as much as I see their side, I think sometimes that if I had to pick over analyzing or not caring (yes Kaye, all or nothing I know *smile*) I would rather be who I am. Because for me a greater risk is falling into complacency and not seeing I am in trouble til I have already done the damage. It is what has gone on with eating. I should have been more freaked I wasn't getting enough calories and I wasn't, til it was a problem.

So for now I am where I am on all this, I am nervous and scared. I am worried of losing control of my environment, I'm worried of not being able to do for myself the things I need to to maintain forward progress, I am worried about the major amounts of April when I won't be working with my trainer!