Holy. Shit.

Yeah, I know.  Curse central.  :)

So, my girl Jill (not Michaels) and I have been kind of been collaborating on this weight loss thing.  She's trying to drop the lbs, I'm trying to drop the lbs...it's a natural progression that we would try to drop the lbs together.  We spend a whole lot of time chatting about recipes and myfitnesspal and working our buns off (literally and figuratively).  So, at the end of this past week, we were talking about how you can tell you've lost some weight.  The thing about losing weight by eating well and working out together is that sometimes it's hard to know for sure that you've lost weight.  The scale doesn't always show your success when there's a workout involved.  Thank goodness for the growing muscles, but the frustration of not seeing the numbers go down can be a bit irritating.

You have to learn to trust what the 'ol body is telling you in these kinds of instances.  You have to look at how your posture has improved from all the locust yoga poses you've been doing.  Notice how you don't need lotion/water/butter to get a ring off your finger.  See how an over sized sweater you've always loved just looks frumpy now.  Flex those biceps and show off the triceps that you didn't even know existed.  Feel how your jeans are filling out, instead of bagging on your non-existent ass directly out of the dryer.  The very hot, clothes-shrinking dryer.

One of the most startling things for me has been really seeing the number of notches I've put into my belt.  I haven't worn a belt for as long as I can remember.  The plain truth is that pants were always too tight to warrant a belt.  Never had a need for it.  ...aaaaand, no one except the plus-size stores sold the belts I'd need to be wearing.  Man, that sounds just sad to say it out loud.  Anyway.  After I lost my first maybe 10lbs, I bought myself my first belt.  I wasn't ready to trade in my now-too-large pants for a smaller model.  The most logical thing for me to do was get a belt.  The only belt I found that I liked well enough to spring for was a brown leather number from Old Navy - on clearance and in a size that was too big.  So, I had my in-laws bring over a leather punch that they had, and popped three new holes in the belt.  I figured that two of them would be too small for a while, cut off the end that I wasn't going to use, and called it a day.

Some people save a pair of their gynormous pants so they can shimmy into one leg once they've hit their goal. Some people take a million pictures along the way.  Me?  I've got that belt.  And that shirt that I still can't wear.  I decided when I punched the fourth hole in that belt that I would hold onto it and use it as my guide.  As my giant pants leg to shimmy into.  I have visions of me needing to loop it halfway around myself again someday.  I see it tied instead of looped.  I can't wait.

I've punched four more holes in that belt.

Back to the beginning of the post.  I was telling Jill about the belt, and showed her last night.  I love positive reactions, and she gave me one!  It's pretty nice to be reminded every once and a while that you're doing something good.  Thanks Jill!!

Oh, and in case you were wondering - the number of inches between the original hole I used (for the record, it was the SMALLEST of the original three!!) and the one I'm currently using (the smallest of the remaining!) is five and a half inches.  FIVE AND A HALF INCHES!  How dang crazy is that?!

Anything exciting to share, my five or six readers?  :)  How do you keep track of your losses?