Hey Fisky Face-- thanks so much for the picture of sweet little Emma yesterday!  Like I said, way better than candy!  I just love seeing her!!  I showed Seth the picture and said, "I just love her so much!" and Seth was so sweet!  He said, "Me too!!  Only a few more weeks, babes."  He loves her like crazy too, I don't know why that makes me so happy, but it really does.

So some more good news: once again, I ate like a completely normal, healthy person again yesterday.  YES!!  I am ridiculously proud of myself.  Also, I lost some major weight overnight... I was 164 lbs this morning.  I'd like to be thrilled about losing 4 lbs, but I know most of that weight is because I got SUPER sick when I went running last night.  I was having a totally kick ass 30-20-10 run and I had gone just under 30 minutes when my stomach started to feel bad.  I was almost a mile from home and I kid you not, I almost didn't make it.  My stomach hurt less if I walked, but walking was getting me home so much slower so I ended up running/walking for like 11 minutes until I finally made it home and made a mad dash toward the bathroom.  My stomach was FURIOUS, which I just don't understand.  No doubt about it, I have IBS for sure and it has been so touchy lately, which sucks because I've been eating so well.  I've been eating fruits and veggies and whole grains and really minimizing sugar.  I completely cut out yogurt two weeks ago because I thought maybe the dairy proteins, not just the lactose, were upsetting my stomach and it seemed to be helping, but last night's disaster would suggest otherwise.  So I think that unless I go before dinner and my stomach is feeling completely and totally fine I'm going to have to stick with the elliptical for a while.  Just safer that way.

Anyway, I read something kind of interesting on a blog I read this morning that I thought you might be interested in:

In the keynote, BJ provided the designers with a list of implications (~17:50), but from my perspective, the interesting takeaways for us non-designers are:

• Go with your current level of motivation. Artificially “amping” motivation is difficult.
• Trust that tiny habits and/or baby steps will lead towards longer-term change, in part because success leads to success.
• If you have a choice, take an action that will help structure your behavior. For example, prepare lunches on the weekend so that it’s easy to take a healthy lunch with you to work.

Ultimately, what this really says to me that if you ever feel like you’re struggling with your efforts, the best thing you can do is anything, even a tiny little something, in the right direction. It sounds like it’s the behavioral version of “fake it til you make it.” May be worth a try!

(http://weightmaven.org/2012/06/06/facilitating-behavior-change/)

The blogger is a woman who writes about weight, food, and health based on her own personal experiences and lots of interesting research.  What she said about success leading to success rang particularly true for me right now... I definitely feel like eating well makes eating well again easier, and seeing weight loss on the scale motivates me to continue.  However, I think the converse is also true and I think that sometimes I get a case of the "eff its" as I heard it put once (only she really dropped an f-bomb, I cleaned it up seeing as how this is a family blog) where I consider something a failure and then throw my hands in the air, give up, and continue with negative behaviors.  I like the idea that doing even just a small little thing can get you back on track.  Ok, I ate some candy, I'm going to go for a walk.  Or something.  Just a nice little idea.  Also, in the rest of the blog she talks a little more about the idea of going with your current level of motivation, which I thought was interesting.  For example, if you're feeling really pumped, go get some exercise or prepare a healthy meal... whereas if you feel like your motivation is low, doing something simple can help, like drink a glass of water or eat a veggie snack or send a picture of your baby to your sister.  You know :)

In other news, the epidemiology department is getting fancy new ergonomic chairs so that had a bunch to get rid of and we got to choose from their hand-me-downs.  I'm excited because I just got a new chair.  I think technically my old one was nicer because it was more adjustable, but this one has a really nice straight back that I'm hoping will keep me from slouching so much.  I slouch like a maniac at work and I know it's really bad for me.  It's only been about 45 minutes in this chair, but I haven't slouched at all yet, so that's good.  Maybe it'll also help me from getting so many pants creases on my belly-- I do hate those.  What a silly thing, but it does bug me!

I hope you had a good day yesterday and another one today!  How was the massage last night?  I hope you feel like a million bucks!  I love you so much!

Cho