Alright, so for the update of all updates...

Since my last blog post...

1. I have not lost a single pound... it's quite the contrary. 
2. I have finally graduated college. (...after much ado about nothing)
3. I am very happily settled in a relationship of nearly a year and a half. 
4. I am living in Dallas, Texas. The experience has been educational... that's all I can say. 
5. I am supremely happy that I am not married or with child. In no way do I need a rodent/parasite, or a demanding piece of paper with rules. 
6. I currently have 3 tattoos. 
7. I currently have 0 friends in Dallas. 
8. I currently have 10+ books to read. 
9. I currently have a 22 pound fur child kitty. His name is Fat Max. We agree on... nothing.
10. The "Red Egg" is still running like a champ, and I plan to drive her until the end of time. (dents and all)

And last but not least... 

As a 23 year old, I never thought I would reach a point in my life where I valued the quiet Saturday evenings.

Being young is a very difficult thing. No one trusts you, you have no credibility, and most of us were completely misinformed. I wish I would have had a high school teacher sit me down and say "Heather, life (college, relationships, money, working, etc.) is extremely hard. You will be poor, most people will never go out of their way to help you with your "problems", and you are merely a drop in the ocean, sweet cheeks". 

I also wish they would have said enjoy your skinny body while you have it. The freshman 15 is no joke... 

But, they didn't and I have learned the hard way... I have become an adult thing.

I hope everyone had a wonderful and magical Christmas. 

Cheater Cheater

Today I got on the scale and it said I was 147.

GRANTED... all scales are a little different and I probably need to stick to one specific scale to keep track, but... When I was at my grandmas house last Tuesday I got on her scale and it said 160 even. The last time I got on the scale I was on today it said 157... TODAY IT SAID 147!!!!!!!!!

If it is true I am in the 140's :) 140's IS PROGRESS AND I AM SO EXCITED!

All I have done is lower my calorie intake each day, and I'm trying to stay as busy as possible. Like I said in my previous post working out is a different post for a different day. I'm not quite there yet to getting myself in work out mode. I have to unfortunately build up my energy for that crap.

Cheating:

I have made a pact with myself to keep track of all the times I have cheated and to mark them down.

1. I had a medium orange Hi-C from Mcdonalds

on Friday.

2. I ate a crap ton of sunflower seeds and a few chips after 11pm on Wednesday.

3. I had a few chunks of potatoes (6) today covered in butter and deliciousness for lunch today.

Can't think of anything else. Not too bad for my first week!

Food I miss:

I miss Mayonnaise, ice cream, hamburger meat, potatoes, and candy....... and chips..... and.... OK I'll stop now.

If she can do it so can I!!!!!!!!!!!

What now?

So I have admitted that I hate the extra weight I have added to my body, so the next step is...

what am I going to do about it?

FEAR NOT PEOPLE... I HAVE A FREAKING PLAN!

Today's post entails... The most obvious changes with my diet and eating habits. Working out will be a another post for another day.

I'm going to preface my plan by letting everyone know I am one of those weird people that absolutely loves healthy food and I love eating vegetables and I don't really like sweets that much so I do have a bit of an advantage over the average human being. I also thoroughly enjoy drinking water all the time, and would rather throw up than eat a piece of chocolate cake with frosting and candy shit on top.

Alright now that everyone knows I'm a weirdo... lets move on.

Step 1:

NO MORE FAST FOOD... unless I'm starving and can't get home.

So, I'm a college kid and I literally will leave my house at 7:15 am and not get home until after 10 pm some days because I have to go to school, work, and then go workout... so sometimes... fast food will be ok.

The day I decided to get started on my health kick I went to Barnes and Noble and picked up the book above. You would be completely astounded to see some of the stuff in this book. This is my new eating out bible. Just because something looks healthy and you think it should be healthy doesn't mean it is... AT ALL.

What I have learned...

If you are at a restaurant and torn between a few choices, if you have a smart phone, pull up the nutrition stats on the different items to help you choose which one will be best for you. ALSO... If you have the choice for sides... always pick vegetables. POTATOES DO NOT COUNT PEOPLE... Just by switching to vegetables you could save hundreds of calories. Don't forget noodles, rice, potatoes, and many other things are usually covered in butters, cheese, and oil. I love butter, cheese, and oil. Paula Dean might be my real mom. But I'm gonna pick vegtables because obviously my rear has had too much of the good stuff.

Another thing, beware of "magical" food words. Resturants alot of times try to make things sound healthier than they are. Terms like"guiltless" and "low-carb" doesn't mean it isn't packed with a crap ton of fat grams and calories.

Wraps... they are not healthier. Face it... We all want to believe they are... THEY ARE NOT HEALTHIER.

Chicken... just because it is chicken does NOT mean it is healthier. A salad covered in breaded deep fried chicken is delicious, but not healthy. Chicken sandwiches are NOT healthy either. Put a hitch in your giddy up and get the hell away from the damn fryer and breading.

Step 2:

Sound the alarm, do a raid, and get the crap out of your house.

I'm poor. I don't have the money to go do everything I want, and letting go of food is hard for me. Making myself get the unhealthy food out of my cabinets and fridge was not easy or fun. Bye sour cream, beer, cream cheese, and midnight ramen noodles... and everything else I love.

I went and spent 55$ at Reasor's for enough food to last me about 2 weeks, and I'm going to eat it all. Fruit, vegetables, healthy snacks, and no ice cream now fills my kitchen.

Step 3:

Just say no to certain things you know are bad. It sucks but do it. MAN UP.

I love Dr. Pepper.

I love alcohol.

I love really sweet tea.

I love alfredo sauce.

I love mashed potatoes.

I love chips.

Time to put a stop to those glorious things. I can sometimes, but until I am to my goal weight and size I am going to try and say no. It's going to freaking suck.

I'm switching to mildly sweet tea because it has antioxidants, and I unfortunately need caffeine sometimes (all the time).

Bye bye junk food.

Step 4:

Make an eating schedule. Try to stick to it. DON'T EAT LATE AT NIGHT... PERIOD!

Here's my current plan...

-Start my morning by drinking a glass of water before I do anything. Even if it is a small one, drinking a glass of water is never a bad way to start off your day.

-Eat something for breakfast. If I have to stop at McDonalds and get an Egg McMuffin, I'm going to eat SOMETHING for breakfast.

-I love nothing more than going to Taco Bell and getting a chicken burrito at 12:32 am. It's gotta stop. That's all there is. I need to drink water to fill myself up, and go to bed.

...... And that's my current eating plan. I'm gonna break it, I'm going to hate it, and I'm going to push the limits on most of it... but I'm going to loose some weight dangit. I'm tired of looking in the mirror and remembering what my abs used to look like. I want to see my ab friends sometime soon!

If anyone has any better suggestions let me know... also... I think I've already lost a pound :)

Admitting it...

Alright... I'll just go ahead and admit it... Not because it is the New Year and time to start on that trail... Not because I want a bikini body by May... OH NO it's because of a horrible picture that makes me look like I have like 12 chins that was taken on Christmas...

REAL TALK:

I have gained weight.

No matter where it came from, or why it is there... I have gained about 35 pounds since high school graduation in May of 2007.

Weight timeline...

• 2007 Senior in HIGH SCHOOL- 120lbs


• 2008 Freshman in College-130lbs


• 2009 Sophomore in College-135lbs-140lbs


• 2010 Junior in College-130lbs (WENT ON A MAJOR WORKOUT KICK, looked awesome!


• 2011 Senior in College-145lbs


• 2012 Senior in College year 2-155lbs (right now)

This is unacceptable... At this rate I will be 200lbs before I know it and I know for a fact this whole freaking Christmas break I have done nothing but eat and not taken one step towards my gym. So here is my challenge to myself and anyone else who wants to join me...

1. I want feel comfortable in a bikini by the time Trevor gets out of the army...


2. I want to get my awesome thighs back.


3. I want to eat at home more!!!!


4. I want to stop NEEDING fast food when I get drunk!


5. I want to feel comfortable in my clothes again and stop hiding my body.


6. I want to get in a better workout routine.

AND LAST BUT NOT LEAST... I want to be there for anyone else trying to do the same thing I am... Trying to better themselves and trying to feel like a new person in a better shell.

So once again... I'm going to do this... I have a nutrition graduate walking me through it, and I'm also open to help anyone else in any way. If you need to call me in the middle of the night to stop the ice cream scoop PICK UP THE PHONE... TXT ME... SMOKE SIGNALS... whatever... lets do this...

It's game on.

Time to get back to this hottie body :)

So hey...

My Uncle definitely started a new company, it's the best most advanced way to get a spray in bedliner. I've seen it first hand and it is awesome... if you want to check it out click below to see their website.

WOULD BE A GREAT CHRISTMAS PRESENT FOR THE MAN IN YOUR LIFE :)

Comes in any color, and it also has a lifetime guarantee!

http://hkwcoatings.com/tulsa-bed-liners/

Facebook

http://www.facebook.com/VortexByHKW?ref=ts

very unusual behavior going on...

I am on an organization/clean, get-on-the-ball, to do list.... war path.

1. I cleaned my shower while I was in it.
2. I definitely skipped my nap to separate, put away, and hang up my laundry.
3. I have 6 mini news assignments due before the 2nd, I have done 3 just sitting at work.
4. I'm actually writing a blog post that I have been wanting to do for awhile :)

I know I have crap to do right now and I am getting it done.

GO ME!

how on the ball I am...

School?

I have a list I made weeks ago of all the things I need to get done before the end of the year. It currently has 14 things marked off, and 15 things left. I'm enjoying marking the tasks off. It's also helping me work ahead. Tuesday I will be able to mark off 5 things. I have two different 8 page papers due this week and was actually doing parts of them on the plane to Seattle!

Christmas?

Yeah I got everyone's gifts already figured out and I am definitely not spending very much money at all. I also gave my mom a list of stuff that I wanted. It was all practical crap. Yes, I said practical.

Pinterest?

OK OK here's my breaking point... I'm keeping it to a minimum of 1-10 hours a week :)

.....leave me alone I'm addicted.

Organization?

I'm also on an organization kick. Trying to tell myself to let go of certain clothes is really difficult. Facing the fact I wont be a 4 again is not fun at all. We all do it, "I'll loose weight someday and be able to wear that again no problem"... I'm a curvy 8 now. Just gotta deal with it. Need to bite the bullet and just get rid of some crap to make room in my closet.

OH and check these out!

It's just PVC pipe placed on top of each other super glued together. Great for shoes, and purses and all kinds of stuff. I want one or maybe four of these. So awesome!

Recognize this? It's a card cataloger from a library! How awesome would something like this be for arts and crafts stuff? I definitely found one that someone in my family has and I have definitely started begging for it. Such a cool cool piece!

ALL YOU LAZY BUMS LIKE ME OUT THERE...

GET UP AND DO SOMETHING PRODUCTIVE!!!

Trevor

OK so I studied, passed the test, and I'm now moving on to my topic at hand...

The man-friend-boy-person... my long distance relationship...

Trevor

So if you have followed my blog for the past year and a half, you will know I have talked about my boyfriends on here before... About how great they are, about the break up, about our relationship, basically the whole story... But I guarantee you no one has heard a story like this one.

On November 9th 2009 I became friends with a guy on facebook I had never met named Trevor. I had heard the world about him from his two best friends that I was very close with at NOC. They were all friends growing up and since I was around them all the time in the dorms, I heard about Trevor pretty frequently. I still am trying to figure out why I friended him, but I did for some reason. It will make sense why in the end.

At the time I was going to Missouri Southern, 20 year old, super dooper single and having the time of my life at my new school. Trevor on the other hand was under much different circumstances. He is a soldier in the U.S Army, when we met online he was deployed in Baghdad, Iraq.

I don't know what clicked inside my head when I started talking to him but we both became very close, very fast. He was funny, definitely attractive and kept my attention for hours on end. A huge sense of concern grew out of our conversations, and I made an effort every day to talk to him and make sure he was safe. There were nights I would stay up until 3 or 4 in the morning to just see if he would come chat with me. When he wouldn't show up I would worry like crazy and message him to contact me so I knew he was OK. I started caring on a deeper level. My friends all knew about Trevor, he was a household name at my apartment. When he would sign on I would get so excited and giddy and it was like he was my online boyfriend.

OK so there's that term, online boyfriend... yes that makes me sound completely crazy, but I wasn't I promise! It wasn't like some weird eHarmony thing where you meet guys you wanna date/marry/hook-up with and all that crap... it was real. I knew he was a real person because I knew his friends, and also the fact new pictures were popping up every couple of weeks from his time in Iraq. Trevor was the real deal. He wasn't an old man in Milwaukee with no teeth being a predator.

Well as time went on, because time always goes on, Trevor was still gone and I was still a single party girl in college. During the time when Trevor and I were talking so much I had talked to a couple of guys but I never really bit the hook on a relationship. Something always kinda held me back , part of me now thinks it was Trevor. I did however eventually meet someone and I did get into a relationship. Trevor and I still talked off and on, but his work schedule changed so we weren't able to talk as much as we both would've wanted. With the arrival of spring Ibecame very busy with my new boyfriends baseball schedule, and prom season at my office... we both just kind of lost touch.

That boyfriend was Jean-Francois, the french guy. JF was one of those really great boyfriends at first... your worst nightmare by the end type things. He drained me of my ability to care and we all know where that went. One thing I do appreciate about our relationship though was my ability to maintain a long distance relationship. As awful as JF and I were to each other at certain points, I learned alot about relationships from that one.

The next boyfriend taught me everything I don't want in a relationship, all the way down to knowing the exact words and phrases that push me all the way over the edge. I have had times in my life where I have been raging mad about different things and from as far back as I can remember there are only 2 people who can push me over the edge... My father and Jeremy Armbrister. I had never thrown anything at another person in my life, until he came along. Most abusive relationship I have ever been in.

So here I am... July 9, 2011 (Two days after Jeremy and I broke up for good) sitting at home checking my facebook and a message pops up in my facebook inbox... and it's Trevor. We had chatted off and on for a year and a half, but this was the first time in a few months... and there he was... in all his glory... with "hi loser" sitting in my inbox. The second I saw the message I text him on my phone and we started talking about everything going on in our lives. We text all that day and all night and he even called me and we had the greatest drunk conversation ever.

Something clicked that day... we both were so happy to be talking and to be back in each others lives. The talking and the txting continued on and it got to the point of, OK are we going to do this or not? So I used some flight credits and flew to Seattle to meet him a month and 2 days after we started talking again. It was the most exciting, scary, wonderful day of my life.

1. 
   
   I am not a person who packs in advance... I was packed 3 days early.


2. 
   
   I rarely get nervous, I get adrenaline rushes and go... I was so nervous I couldn't breathe.


3. 
   
   I don't usually care what I look like... I couldn't sleep on the plane, it would mess up my perfectly curled hair.

When I got there... I was having such a had time breathing that when I called Trevor to find him he was actually concerned about if I was OK and just told me to breathe it would all be perfect. He was right. After he finally found me, I ran up to him and just threw my arms around him and stayed there for a long time. I was shaking, I was so scared, but he didn't care he just hugged me tighter. He was perfect. I'll never forget the way he looked standing there, what he was wearing, all of it.

.BEST.FEELING.EVER.

The rest is really history... we went to one of his friends houses for a cookout, we went to the beach, a Mariners game, visited Pikes Market Place, went all over downtown Seattle... had a blast. It was so much fun, but we could have sat and watched movies all weekend and I wouldn't have cared... just wanted to be right there with him, my boyfriend. The one I never thought would really become reality, but here it is real as ever.

I guess it just goes to say... dreams really can come true.

My dreams came true this time. I have been blessed with the best gift God or anyone could have given me.