My son’s school, Hamilton Township High School, raises a lot of money for this function. When I walked yesterday morning I saw 2 high school girls leave for school dressed in the style of the 1950s. They were wearing pink T-shirts, black skirts and pink bobby socks. They had pony tails on the top of their head tied with large pink ribbons. That high school donates a lot of money to that event and they win the competition every year. It is the largest event for giving back to the community.

The part of this event that has really escalated its popularity in this town was the death of a well known news anchor, Heather Pick, who lost her life to breast cancer at less than 40 years of age. On her last television appearance she was wearing a pink wig. The year following her death, Heather’s Team was started. For a fee, you could join the team and you get a T-shirt and a pink wig. In the weeks leading up to the race, one of the well known Salon’s in town will cut and style your pink wig for free.

People wear these wigs to work in the weeks leading up to the race. One of the most memorable incidents was a landscaping company’s employees wearing their pink wigs while they were mowing and manicuring yards. These wigs can be seen all over town.

In the past year, Heather Pick, was joined by Stephanie Spielman. She was the wife of football player Chris Spielman. Together over the eleven years that Stepanie battled cancer, Stephanie and Chris raised more than 7 million dollars for cancer research. I believe most of it was donated to James Cancer Center, a cancer facility located on the campus of the Ohio State University. Stephanie lost her battle with breast cancer in the past year. This year the pink wigs were worn by Heather and Stepanie’s Team. The Race for the Cure was run by more than 50,000 people in the city of Columbus and many of these people are survivors.

There is not enough to keep me busy and the environment I work in does not help. I sit in an area where there is always food. And when they are not serving lunch, there are the baskets and bowls of candy that are around the office. I have a personal trainer and I mentioned that my job was an issue and the first thing that came to her mind was stress. It is not stress that is the problem. It is boredom. Although there has been a lot of downsizing in my company, I do not make the big bucks so they probably will not make any changes in my department.

I consider the problem I have to be with food completely, because I am active. I walk several miles each week. I see a personal trainer and I took an exercise class last night that kicked my ass. I liked it though. The first half hour was very intense. The send half hour, although it worked you out, it was all done from a mat and it was very therapeutic. I really enjoyed that part of it and I plan on continuing with this class.

I have heard people say that it is hard to concentrate on changing more than one major thing in your life at a time and I am inclined to agree. I also have my share of debt, but I have put plans in place for repayment of everything. Now it is just a matter of seeing it through. By the end of the year my car will be paid for as well as many of my credit cards.

My biggest struggle at this time is managing my eating when I am bored, which seems to be a good part of the day. I try to plan things to do, but sometimes I am not very successful at sticking with the plan. The bad thing is my binge food of choice is sugar and it does affect my sugar level. It makes me irritable and affects my concentration. It is pretty much a vicious cycle. Once I get started, the cravings kick in and it is possible for me to consume a lot of calories in one day. My goal for the day is to not have any candy.

It has been no secret that I have struggled with my weight for many years. My goal for 2010 is a weight loss of 35 pounds. But in order to accomplish this, I need a plan. I am going to try to eat 5 fruits and vegetable each day and drink more water. Hopefully, these things will make me feel fuller so that I do not eat things that will sabotage my efforts. I am hoping that if I write about this goal, it will hold me more accountable.

I feel my place of employment is one thing that presents problems to my efforts and I am not sure how to deal with it. One problem is things are really slow and it easy to have idle time. But the bigger problem is the amount of food that is always around in the office. I have never seen a place that has so much candy and whatever. There is always food around and I am the kind of person that does not manage this well. When it is not there, I won’t seek it out. But when it is there, I will not say no either.

I feel that if I had more to occupy my time, I would not be as distracted by all of this excess food. But I know this is not the answer. If I had more to do, I would probably blame it on something else. Exercise is something that I do regularly, but I would like to increase the amount of exercise that I do. Time is an issue here. But if I could eat a reasonable amount of calories, the amount of exercise that I get each week would be more than adequate for weight loss.

I always say losing weight is about 3 things…a sensible diet, regular exercise and managing your relationship with food and the last one is kicking my ass right now.

I struggle certain times of the day and I have the most success when I am not faced with the situation. The candy that I eat in the afternoon when I am at work, I do not look for or miss when I am not at work. But what do I do to avoid eating the candy in the afternoon when I am at work? The fact that I am somewhat bored at the time of the day does not help.

I think rather than setting weight loss goals in the form of pounds, I will set them as changes in my lifestyle, such as; eliminating the afternoon candy from my diet and adding more vegetables to my diet. I know that if I make healthy choices, the weight loss will follow. It seems the more you obsess over something the hard it is to achieve that goal. If you take small steps towards getting to the finish line, you will be there before you know it.

At this point, I just want to get 10 pounds off and I am going to do that by cutting out sweets during the day (this will be my biggest challenge) and adding a 20-30 minute walk in the evening. I am not going to put a time limit on this goal. I think that will set me up for failure by putting a time limit on this goal.

This diet seems to have so many good things going for it that I would not discount it because it appears to be difficult to follow. The experts say you should take from it what works for you and leave the rest. Even if you cannot give up meat or germinate seeds every night, if you can add more fruits and vegetables to your diet you are going to see a lot of health benefits.

Live foods will give you an increased amount of energy and eating more of them will help keep you satisfied and away from the less healthy foods. I have started reading a book written by Carol Alt that is about the way she has tailored the raw food diet to fit her lifestyle. She does eat meat, although most raw foodists do not and many of them are vegan.

It seems that getting used to this food plan would take a lot of work, especially if you are going to follow it strictly. You will have to get used to shopping differently and preparing your meals in a different way.

The short time that I followed the first phase of the Fat Smash Diet was the best I had felt in a long time. This diet is mostly fruits and vegetables. You do not eat any meat for the first 9 days. The only problem I had was lightheadedness after a half hour of walking. I usually walk 45-60 minutes per day and I don’t think I was eating enough calories to sustain that amount of exercise.

What does the raw diet consist of? You can customize it to meet your needs. If you can add more fruits and vegetables to your diet and slowly begin eliminating of limiting less healthy foods, you are well on your way to living a more healthy life.

Try to learn about yourself and make your life better. Try to figure what triggers you to eat when you are not hungry and deal with these situations. If you are successful at getting the weight of quickly, chances are you will not keep it off and that will not be the last time you will be trying to lose that weight. I never have understood trying to attain goals that are out of reach. You may not be able to lose 40 pounds before the big event, but why not aim for 20 pounds and set an attainable for goal for the other 20 after the event. Nothing motivates me more than reaching a goal.

With that being said, I am going to set a goal of losing 15 pounds before my son’s graduation. The date is May 26 and that leaves me with about 10 weeks. That is a sensible 1.5 pounds per week and should be attainable as long as I stay focused and don’t let emotional eating or eating out of boredom get in the way. I will try to post regularly about my progress.

Their is nothing wrong with quick weight loss diets as long as you go into it with your eyes open. If you have ever seen the TV show “The Biggest Loser” you know that weight can be lost quickly, but they spend several hours a day working out and their workouts are not for the faint of heart.

For me the biggest part of losing weight is mental. I know what contains excess fat, sugar and calories. But my mind wants it more than my body needs it. Something tells me I am not in that boat alone.

I have made some decisions about where I want to go with my weight loss program. I have been at a stand still for a while and have even gained five pounds that I am struggling to get rid of. I have reviewed several diets and I believe the Fat Smash Diet is something that could work for me. The thing I am most apprehensive about is the first phase. I keep telling myself that is only for nine days, but it is a cleansing phase and that means that is no meat or fish allowed (or much of anything else for that matter). The other challenge will be not drinking any soda.

I have looked the plan over carefully and I think I can find enough to eat to keep me satisfied for nine days. I would like to get 20 pounds off in the next three months (that is when my son graduates from high school). It should be doable if I follow the plan. You would think I can get 20 pounds off in 3 months, since most of the miracle diets tell me I can lose 30 pounds in 30 days. LOL.

I am having problems with my hip and I am not sure if it is from my weight or from the way I sometimes hold my laptop when I am working. I suspect that both things may play a part in the problem. I plan on starting tomorrow. I will keep you posted.