GoWear Fit versus the BodyBugg

I’ve had my GoWear Fit for less than twenty-four hours and I’m already blissfully impressed with this gadget of goodness. I’m sure I will come have those ‘I wish it had…’ or ‘I wish it did…’ moments, but for now, I stand thoroughly chuffed.

First of all, it was incredibly easy to set up. I pulled up the website, entered some information, popped the USB cable into the device (yes, it’s Mac compatible!) and let ‘er rip. The website said it normally takes up to three hours to charge, but it took half that.

Once the armband was charged, I synced my display watch (which can also be clipped to your clothing if you choose) in under ten seconds. I fully expected to run into a bout of utter annoyance when it came time to get the show on the road, but it was quick and easy. I couldn’t ask for a nicer set-up.

As far as the information-side is concerned, I was asked a series of questions which included the usual age, height, and goal weight and then some. I was given the choice between using their BMR calculations or entering the number of calories I average per day. Since I’ve been tracking my caloric intake and I’m pretty happy with my current routine, I decided to take that route. I eat roughly 1500 calories per day (M-Th = 1,400, F = 1600, Sa = 1,700, & Su = 1,500 comes out to be 1485 per day + overages).

Using this number (or the number it comes up with if you choose), it calculates the amount of calories I need to burn in order to lose 2lbs a week (2lbs is the max it lets you enter in terms of weekly weight-loss). In order to lose two pounds a week, I will need to burn 2,500 calories per day. It’s 10:30am and I’ve already burned 1,189 calories between sleeping, getting up this morning, and heading to work, so I’m thinking I might need to bump the cals up after all. I will use the rest of the week to see how I’m doing and adjust accordingly.

Anyhow! The device determines what you need to do to achieve your deficit goals. In order to burn 2,500 calories, I need to complete 30 minutes of moderate activity (who knew walking to and from the bus stop to work provide me with 25 minutes worth of moderate exercise?!), 30 minutes of vigorous activity (e.g. running), and 5000 steps. I can alter these goals by decreasing one type of activity level and increasing another, but I’m going to leave it for now.

Any time you reach a goal, the display beeps and tells you which goal you have achieved. During my workout yesterday, I achieved both the ’step’ and ‘moderate activity’ goals. A sense of accomplishment washed over me.

I really like the idea of knowing my real BMR and how my body reacts to different types of activities. I’ve fallen into this mindset that the only type of exercise that counts is exercise that happens on a machine. Now that Spring is here and Summer is around the corner, I hope to be much more active outside. I’m interested to see how different types of ‘normal’ activities contribute to my calorie deficit so I can exit this mindset, enjoy the outdoors much more, and not ‘over do it’.

I’ve wanted a BodyBugg for a while, but could not bring myself to drop $350 on it. When I saw an advertisement for the GoWear (yes, I actually clicked an advertisement!) and saw that it was $100 cheaper, I decided to do some research. It seems like the BodyBugg and the GoWear Fit are almost (if not totally) identical. I’m thinking BodyMedia (which is the company that makes the GoWear Fit) licensed their product to Apex which in turn dubbed it the BodyBugg and licensed it to 24hour Fitness which scored a contract with the Biggest Loser. Not 100% sure, but the specifics are pretty much identical. Click here to compare the tech specs.

The GoWear Fit also tracks your sleep patterns which may provide insight when it comes to levels of activity and caloric intake. It’s an interesting feature that the BodyBugg lacks. The display watch doesn’t show this information, but I’m sure I will be presented with it once I upload my data.

After all is said and done, the GoWear Fit and BodyBugg cost about the same (the $249 price does not include the 6-month subscription to their website/activity manager which is an extra $41 for a total of $290 — roughly $68 cheaper than the Bugg). It might be worth mentioning that GoWear Fit’s monthly subscription fee (needed to access the ‘activity manager’ via their website) is a bit cheaper as compared to the Bugg’s.

So far, I give this puppy an A.

More updates to come as I learn more about it!

Super Awesomeness

I just spent forty-five minutes of my hour lunch perched upon a dark-colored slab step and I could not be happier (or redder thanks to Mr. Sun). I ate my chicken stir-fry and read my book and watched mothers with their babies and toddlers crisscross the lush green grass.

I have always wanted to venture out into the gardens and eat my lunch, but never have I done so in the 2.5 years I’ve been working here. Why? Complete and utter resistance due to my prevailing weight-problem. Yep. I was ‘that girl’ — the girl that would rather shy away from a public gathering place and/or event even if it meant missing out on something I really wanted to do. Never again!!

And to think, I am 78lbs away from my true ‘goal weight’ and I already feel this effing good. Bow-chicka-bow-wow.

Quick

Quickly checking in during my lunch-break. Blew off 75% of freelance this weekend to enjoy the nice weather. Stressed, but not to the max. Light at the end of the tunnel is becoming brighter.

Only lost .5lb this week. That brings my monthly total to 4.5lbs. What a ridiculous number! I’ve been averaging 10lbs per month. WTF.

Possible reasons for lack of loss:

- Too much pizza and/or sushi. I had pizza six times and sushi four times this month. Although I have stayed within my limits for the most part, it’s probably not a great idea to indulge so incredibly often. Will reduce this number by at least 50%.

- Change in exercise routine. I’ve started to train for my 5K which has left me with longer (and possibly more intense) workouts four times a week. I also plan to workout on two of my three of my ‘days off’.

- STRESS, STRESS, STRESS

I purchased a GoWear Fit this morning. It’s basically the same as the BodyBugg with slight differences (mainly in the web-based calorie tracking software), but it was $100 cheaper for the band, the display, and a 12-month subscription to their website.

I am waiting for The Girl to cut me off financially, but I had to. I need to know how my body is reacting to this 5K training and I need to know how many calories I am burning each day so that I can tailor my eating appropriately. Something is not adding up and I need to know what it is. IMMEDIATELY.

Hope everyone is well.

Blue 40

What happens when you eat a single slice of birthday cake lathered with blue food coloring? Your poop turns green — and I mean greeeeeeen. Like… I-climbed-in-the-bowl-and-colored-it-with-a-sharpie-marker green.

Not that you needed to know, but it nearly sent me into a panic. Nothing like a little Google to soothe the soul.

Jillian Michaels WIN!

If it’s Tuesday, you can place your bets that I am listening to Jillian’s podcast over @ KFI. Today is no different! Howeverrrrrrr, little did I know that today’s show packed a small surprise: Jillian read and answered my question over the air.

Excuse my fan-girl tendencies, but, I’m excited! I received an answer to my question and I couldn’t be happier (plus, she called me cute which is pretty neat-o since I am cute).

For anyone else whose skin might smell like ammonia after a workout, don’t worry. Just up your carbs and you should be fine. If the problem persists, it’s not a big deal. It’s just a symptom of how your body breaks down and converts protein. You’re not going to die.

Good to know.

If you don’t listen to this woman, you should start.

Treadmills & Moolah

Wheeeewwwww. I failed to mention that I bought a treadmill. Yes, a tread-fucking-mill. I know, I know. 90% of people who purchase treadmills end up using them as clothing racks, but c’mon! I have a 5K to train for.

I will be honest with you. I’ve always wanted to be a runner. Even when I was playing softball for three teams and hockey for two, I could barely run. My softball coach said I ran like I was ‘carrying a piano on [my] back’. Gee, thanks! He was right, though. Endurance was not my strong point (after all, I was first and foremost a hockey player where endurance is most certainly not the name of the game).

The Girl has been incredibly supportive by not batting an eye at all of these weight-loss goodies — whether big or small. I’ve been wanting a treadmill for a while, but put it on the back burner when she lost her job in October (even though she basically makes more than me on unemployment… shit!). She fell into a job less than a month ago and didn’t mind a single ounce when I approached her about the possibly purchasing a treadmill. ‘Do what you need to do to get where you need to go,’ is what she said to me. Such goodness right there.

So far, I’ve probably spent about $1,200 on this journey and I think it’s money well spent, especially since my purchases have been spread out and mostly smaller — two pieces of exercise equipment (the elliptical is a purchase The Girl made last year following her back surgery), two books, one video game, two sets of workout DVDs, new running shoes, and a five-week cardio class. I use EVERYTHING and the results cannot be ignored. HELLO FORTY-ONE LBS!

Anyhow, back to running. The YMCA is located five minutes to my immediate left and although I’ve contemplated joining, I’ve decided not to. I toured it two years ago and it was drab, busy, and ridiculously spendy ($100 to join + $60/mo). I tried to take advantage of their outdoor track (which surrounds a luscious field), but it’s always packed with lacrosse players, soccer players, and/or runners. I absolutely cannot roll up there jiggling in-front of people. Hell. NO!

Treadmill it is.

I completed my first workout a few minutes ago and it was refreshing! I walked/ran in two minute intervals for thirty minutes. I covered 1.9 miles and didn’t collapse a lung in the process. Never in my wildest dreams did I think using the elliptical for the past few months would increase my stamina and improve my endurance THIS much. I can RUN AND BREATHE (albeit for two minutes @ 4.2 when alternating walking @ 3.4). The days where I could barely WALK AND BREATHE are far, far behind me.

As an individual that weighs a whopping 230 pounds, I am happy with a sixteen-minute mile. I hope to get that time down to twelve within the next few weeks, and even better from there. 5K, you stand zero chance.

Easter Blur

What a busy/crazy/draining week. I’ve had zero time to my name and zero opportunity to post. I guess that’s what happens when your great aunt aunt passes away, you’re lost in Freelance Land, you decide to go bowling at 2am on a Friday evening, and then bar hopping on Saturday. Must catch up.

Unfortunately, I didn’t lose any weight this week, but! I didn’t gain, so that’s great. I managed to consume a lot of pizza without exercising very much (a mere 1.9 hours for the entire week!). I’ve posted losses every week for thirteen weeks except for two — definitely not something I’m going to cry about. I just need to get back on track — and I will.

Easter was a complete disaster food-wise:

1:30pm-5pm:
- 2 slices tomato, 1slice mozzarella, 1 slice onion
- 1 hamburger
- 1 wheat hamburger bun (lite)
- 1 hot dog (fat-free)
- 3 mini turkey sausages
- 4 steak-tips
- 1/2 cup potato salad
- 1 slice vanilla cake (Happy Birthday, dad!)
- 15 Hershey Kisses (caramel/coconut!)

7:00pm
- 1 canoli

10:00pm
- 2 cheese sticks (lite)
- 1/2 slice chocolate cake (Happy Birthday, dad!)

For someone who isn’t going to eat meat, I sure did fill my yearly quota. Mmm. Antibiotics and hormones. YOU TASTED FIIIINE (except for the hot dog — bad judgment call x 10), but I need to spread these indulges out and stick to grain-fed/organic meats.

Hope everyone had a pleasant Easter!

The 40-lb Mark

Woo! I finally hit the 40-pound mark this week! Actually, I did one better than that — 41 pounds gone, gone, gone.  I cannot begin to describe how ridiculously insane it feels to:

1. Have lost 41lbs
2. Have lost 41lbs without killing myself in the process

For the first time in a long time, I feel centered. I feel grounded. I feel (somewhat) sane. I feel empowered. I feel alive. And I think I felt myself slipping into a size 20 jean last night with ease.

Yeah. I just admitted my jean size and I’m getting a kick out of it. A size 20 is nothing to brag about, but it’s definitely a step up from refusing to try on jeans larger than size 24 and instead, resorting to men’s jeans.

Yeah. I just admitted that I have been wearing men’s jeans for as long as I can remember and I’m getting a kick out of it. When I started gaining weight as a senior in high school (seven years ago), I began wearing men’s jeans. Why? Why would any female in her right mind pour herself into shapeless jeans tailored for the male population? I’ll tell you why: flawed logic.

As I continued to gain weight, it was harder to find jeans that fit. Actually, it was hard to find anything that fit when you would sooner tie a noose than to go into ‘that fat lady store’ (you know what store I am talking about). I out-grew the women sizes at Old Navy and decided that my only option (yes, ONLY) was to try on men’s jeans. They fit and that was that.

Fast forward to last fall when Old Navy stopped carrying the ‘extra loose’ fitting jeans I clung to with fervor and desperation. What does a girl do when the only store she will ever buy jeans from stops carrying the only style of men’s jeans she can actually fit into? Well, the answer is certainly not ‘lose weight’ because that would be too hard, too taxing, and I would end up failing anyway. Obviously.

Instead of addressing the issue, I pulled up Old Navy’s website to see if they offered extended sizes in digital format. Sure enough, they did. I ordered a size up in a different style and camped out by the mailbox.

Sure enough it came. And sure enough the pants didn’t fit. This time, they were too big. Suddenly, I had acquired a new respect for Goldilocks. What the effing eff? I kept the pants and wore them anyway. After all, I couldn’t stand myself at this point so why the eff would I care what I looked like? It seemed completely pointless to care at all. And care I did not.

As time went on, I became very protective of my remaining jeans (ocelots had nothing on this newly endangered species). Every time I wore them, I knew I was one step closer to a life of poorly fitting men’s fucking jeans. This made me miserable.

If you haven’t noticed by now, flawed logic is a very real, very damaging symptom of Fatorexia (you know, when you’re so totally obese but you’ve somehow managed to convince yourself that you’re ‘not that fat’…). Flawed logic is a ‘nice way’ of saying that you’ve lost all of your marbles and have replaced them with a hunger for small comforts that completely reek of insanity. Wearing men’s jeans falls into that category. I would rather wear a size 42 in men’s than a 20-something in women’s because in my mind, it meant I was off the hook when it came to pant size. In my mind, I made numbers and sizes meaningless by changing the rules.

In addition to wearing men’s jeans, I’ve also been known to wear sandals and/or crocs all year round. Yes. All year-round. In Boston. Why would I do something so foolish? Simple: flawed logic (a product of acute Fatorexia, of course).

Wearing sandals and/or crocs caused the bottoms of my pant-legs to ‘bow out’ due to the way they sat on the shoe. The ‘bow’ was important. It counter-balanced the width of my hips (think: pear on steroids). When I looked down, everything looked a little more symmetrical, a little more even, and a little more acceptable. Even in the winter.

Two years ago, I was caught in a snowstorm while wearing crocs. I was at work and it began to snow mid-afternoon. By the time my doctor’s appointment rolled around, there was at least six inches of snow on the ground. What’s a girl to do?! Simple: I had a few plastic grocery bags kickin’ it in my desk drawer. I took my socks off, tied a bag around each foot, put my socks on, slipped my feet into my shoes and walked a few blocks to the doctor’s office. By the time I was out of there, FOUR MORE INCHES OF SNOW HAD FALLEN (@ a rate of two inches per hour). The Girl had driven into the city to accompany me (the appointment = an informational seminar) which turned out to be a huge disaster. We were stuck in the middle of Back Bay for two hours in traffic that didn’t seem to move at all. In fact, we sat at the same corner for an hour without moving an inch.

We eventually made it home. Sort of. As we were turning onto our street, our car got stuck in the snow (at least fourteen inches deep at this point). I had spent the last two hours of my life hyperventilating about the possibility of being stuck in the middle of the road somewhere in mother effing crocs and it happens fifty feet from the house. OH, THE IRONY. My feet were cold and wet, but someone needed to push the car through fourteen inches of snow. Hey! How about the fat girl with frostbite? Sounds good.

Luckily, Bostonians are known for snow excursions (as in, ‘Oh, the weather man said we’re supposed to get a foot of snow. Let’s go to the movies!’) and drinking iced coffee when the wind chill is thirty below. Naturally, there was no shortage of passerbys. A few members of the audience were kind enough to assist me in turning water into wine and we eventually freed the car.

To this day, I still have panic attacks when I’m in the car during a snowstorm (although I did manage to wear boots this past winter at all times). I can’t seem to shake the feeling of creating such a massive handicap when it came to survival due to my weight. This ‘handicap’ is an issue that has been plaguing me for years and years. As I’ve said before, it’s hard to feel like you can stand on your own two feet when you can’t even see them.

Anyhow. Back to my original point: I’m wearing a size 20 jean and I feel fucking fantastic. For once in my life, I’m not a size 20. I just happen to wear a size 20. My Old Navy days are over.

Change is beautiful!

Ah, Push It

I just signed up for the 3.5 mile Corporate Challenge at work. Yes, it’s a RACE. Not only will I have to bust ass, I will have to do it in-front of people I work with (double the embarrassment, double the fun!). June 25th will be D-Day. Mark it on your calendars.

Gotta keep pushin’ if I want to keep seeing results!