Body-for-LIFE Check-In: Week 7

Well, I’ve made it past the 6-week mark in my 12-week Body-for-LIFE challenge, and I’m finally starting to see results. Although I have only broken the 180-lb. barrier for one day (and then promptly went back up to 181), I think I’ve gone down one dress size, because all my pants are too big. This, to me, is more important than the weight loss (although I still want to lose at least 5 more pounds by the time this challenge is over!), because I know I’m building muscle as I’m losing fat — and muscle weighs more than fat.

The program I’m on has me alternating strength days with cardio days, and for my cardio days, I’ve been going to Exercise TV on Comcast On Demand for some workouts that really kick my butt. Almost every TV workout I’ve tried does more than just get my heart rate up and start me sweating, because most of the workout shows build strength training in with cardio “for maximum calorie burn,” or that’s what they keep telling me as I sweat buckets onto my yoga mat.

Because I’ve been trying to mix up my workouts (so my body doesn’t get used to the same thing every other day), I’ve been looking through the various shows on On Demand, and since I have a captive audience, I thought I’d review some of them here. I’ll write each On Demand category as a separate post so you can more easily find and read them.

As for my eating habits, I still need some work. I’ve been getting better; I signed up with eDiets.com to to tailor a meal plan for me, but I haven’t actually started following the meal plan. Sigh. A huge part of this is because I’m out so much, especially around dinner time, and I just haven’t gotten in the habit of bringing dinner with me. I also had some slip-ups last week because I went to a fancy restaurant for a friend’s birthday (and drank lots of wine), and then an opening night party for Butterfly, and then went out a few times after rehearsal with some friends. It’s the going out part that really wreaks havoc on my caloric intake…but I don’t want to be antisocial, and eating is a part of my social life.

Ah well…I’m still learning, and it is a process.