Me, Social?

A while ago I'd been feeling like my life was getting a little monotonous. I could have worked on some projects around the house or done some cleaning and organizing but my motivation to do anything had been majorly lacking. Sometimes I forget how much spending time with friends and family can improve my state of mind. Thankfully this past month my social calendar has been pretty full and it has helped to elevate my boredom and also make me a little more productive when I do have free time.

My activities this month included a trial Dungeons and Dragons night with some work friends (it was everyone's first time playing and was pretty fun! It's ok you can make fun of me), a visit downtown to check out some cool art and have dinner with Brian and his parents, I had a girls afternoon with lunch and a movie (Crimson Peak) this past Sunday, and this upcoming weekend Brian and I are having our Lansing friends and their vizsla over to do fun Halloweeny things. Along with working every third weekend it sounds like I had a very full month but surprisingly it doesn't feel overwhelming or like I have no time for myself which is how I sometimes feel when I have a lot of social engagements scheduled. 

Love Bit #2 Wella Bars!

1. 

Wella Bars are my latest Costco discovery.  I love finding new foods to try and I love the convenience of bars so I decided to pick these up the last time I was browsing the refrigerated section at Costco.  I've been wanting to find something to replace my Quest Bar addiction since Quest Bars are pretty expensive and I've been eating them so often they aren't as special as they used to be. Wella Bars are organic and made primarily of peanut butter or almond butter. They are creamy with slightly crunchy bits and taste like nut butter that has been sweetened and concentrated into a bar form. There are three different varieties in each box and I think my favorite are the Powerful Peanut bars, but I really enjoy them all.  While the bars aren't super cheap (I believe a box is around $17) they are cheaper than Quest Bars and I don't have to buy them online which is nice.  Wella Bars are delicious and different and they are my new favorite thing to eat during my early morning commute into work.

Health Diary Week Two

My second week of my health journey went pretty well. I feel like I'm doing a little better with remembering my goals and I had a few days of feeling really happy and positive which is always a nice change from PMS week.  I find when I slip up the happy days can be hard to come.  Just one more thing remember when reaching for the candy bowl for the fourteenth time. 

Day eight (10/19/15)
Movement: Another rest day
Food: Unsatisfied
G tea: Yes
Meditation: No
Notes: I had to work two hours overtime today so I just felt like I needed to chill with my family. Looking back I think I would have felt much better had I meditated and worked out. :/

Day nine
Movement: Nope
Food: Nope
G tea: Nope
Meditation: Nope
Notes: Also forgot to make tea for tomorrow. Moving on!

Day ten
Movement: Leg day
Food: Satisfied
G tea: No, see yesterday.
Meditation: Yes and I love it, why don't I do this every day???
Notes: Feeling much happier tonight than yesterday, that's for sure! 

Love Bit #1 October!

Love bits are mini posts about random things I love at the moment. A love bit might be something I am grateful for or something exciting or new or edible or cool, just something that brings a bit of joy or amusement to my life. A lot of people post about their favorite things on a weekly or monthly basis but I'm not going to hold myself to any set schedule, I'd rather feel free to post whenever the sharing urge strikes. 

My love bit of the moment is October! October is one of my favorite months because I love when the leaves start changing color and the temperatures get a little cooler. I look forward to going on fall walks and runs every year and this year I've had more excuses than ever to get outside and burn some energy with our puppy Zuzu.  Walks in the park with the 50 foot leash are our favorite and when the scenery is beautiful it's even more enjoyable. I get such a feeling of awe when sunlight causes the leaves of a tree to appear as if they are glowing.  It's the same feeling I get when I see a beautiful sunset or a massive fireworks display, it's captivating and I feel like I could stare for hours!

 

Health Diary Week One

This was my first week tracking my level of satisfaction with what I ate each day.  It's the first small change I am making towards improving my health and wellness.


Day one (Monday, Oct 12, 2015)
Movement: 4.3 mile run/walk (mostly walk)
Food: Satisfied!
G tea (green tea): Yes!
Meditation: Yes!
Notes: Had a normal breakfast and lunch at work and for dinner ate a bunch of munchie randoms-not exactly healthy but I didn't over eat so it is a win for day one!

Day two (10/13)
Movement: Rest day
Food: Not very satisfied
G tea: Yes!
Meditation: No :(
Notes: My dinner was basically Costco samples and half a wheel of Brie. Probably not the most nutritious. Went to bed trying not to hate myself.

Day three (10/14)
Movement: Easy 45 minute yoga and 15 minute walk.
Food: Satisfied.
G tea: Yes.
Meditation: Yes.
Notes: So grateful for a new day and a new opportunity to try again. I need to remind myself to think about how I feel when I make good choices as opposed to poor ones. 

Fat Fat Fat!

I've spent a lot of my life feeling fat. I’ve never been fat. The heaviest I've ever been was in college when I gained 25 pounds bringing my weight to 155, still just within the normal BMI range. I think it was a gradual thing, my obsession with body image and weight. It probably started around junior high and continued on until, well, pretty recently if I’m being honest.

In high school I knew multiple people who were anorexic or bulimic including a close friend, and I'm sure that along with typical magazines and media increased my obsession with how I saw myself-fat. I found a kind of funny but sad journal entry I wrote while on vacation with my family many years ago. Sisters can be brutal. :)

If you can't read it, it says (grammatical errors included because it's comical):

Sometimes I hate Skye so much. She can be such a brat! She and I were kinda fighting and she said something like "Your getting a little big around your waist" It really hurt my feelings cause it's true. So I've decided to go on a diet. Try to eat healthy foods NO CANDY unless its to take out a bad taste (medicine) in my mouth. And not a lot of other foods like snacks. Plus whenever I can I'll go to the YMCA and work out in my room w/ waits and streaching in the basement. If it doesn't work maybe I'll eat diet pills or something.

Anything to show Skye how wrong she is (or will be). 

And I'll stop biting my fingers & stuff and try not to complain at all.  

Maybe I'll even start running w/ Kara if I can work up to it. 

My Gentle Weight Loss Plan

One of the main reasons I wanted to create this blog was to discuss my feelings and experiences with health and wellness and so here is where I will start. I would like to get on track with my physical being and make it back to my "happy weight", a number that would require me to lose a few pounds. Somewhere between five and ten to be non-exact. Although I am currently within the healthy BMI range, there have been many a binge day in the past year to get to this point. Lately my feelings towards food have become pretty unhealthy. I've been mindlessly eating, sometimes from insatiable hunger other times from boredom and habit but regardless of the cause the effect is always uncomfortable fullness, endless guilt and obsessive thoughts. I am trying to find my way to a healthy state of mind, something I probably haven't had since middle school.

I've tried fitness and diet programs in the past but never been able to stick to them. Even the idea of being on a program feels restrictive and so this time I'm going to try a more gentle approach. I'm not going to jump into this weight loss thing restricting calories or cutting whole food groups out of my diet. I'm going to do this in the most humane and enjoyable way possible-hopefully it will be possible...

I've learned the more you remove from your diet the more you can never eat again-or if you do you might experience some undesirable symptoms like headaches, intestinal distress or guilt.
I believe even the smallest changes can make a big impact and so here is my plan. (Please know I am not a nutrition or fitness expert I am simply taking what I have learned from past experiences to create this plan. I've never done this before and I'm sure I will make changes and possibly mistakes along the way. I'm not telling anyone to follow this plan, I'm simply sharing the process for my own good.)
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THE PLAN (for now)

For the first few weeks I'm going to focus on simply tracking my satisfaction level concerning my food choices for the day. I will also include my workout of the day just to show a bigger picture.

A daily entry will look like this:

Day one
Movement: Yoga for 60 minutes
Food: Satisfied.
Notes: Ate mindfully and felt content with my choices at the end of the day.

I will also be including two side goals I have been trying to meet every day. The first is drinking one cup of green tea and the second is meditating for at least ten minutes. I've only been about 50% successful up until now so I will be tracking this as well. 


Looking at the big picture and remembering I am going to be documenting my satisfaction level at the end of the day might make a difference in the food decisions I make. If it doesn't work and my unsatisfied days outweigh my satisfied then I will make another small change.

No weight loss journey is complete without a few "before" pictures. As much as I'm not looking forward to posting these I think it's important and honest and so I will be brave and hope this motivates me to achieve an improved after picture.  


Height: 5'6"
Weight: 141 lbs

The hearts are to remind me how important it is to love myself as I am in this moment. There is nothing wrong with my body. It is healthy and injury free. It can walk and run and swim and breathe and get me through work so I can help pay the bills and see and hear and learn and love. My goal is to lose a little weight and get back on track. However, if getting back on track just means I no longer feel lethargic and depressed and guilty and regretful from lack control around food, I will consider this experiment a success. Even if I don't lose a pound!

*Edited and blurred photo because there is more to life and health than how we look! (January, 2016)

Welcome!

I'm Faith and I'm so happy to have you here!

I want to let you know where my mind was when creating this blog. I was originally going to name it "Filthy Healthy Faith' and have you all come along on my journey to health and wellness, but I realized this would limit what I want to share with the world and make this blog too one dimensional for my taste. So I altered the name a bit to describe what this blog is really going to be about: my journey to being filthy happy. This will of course encompass topics like fitness and healthy living but will also touch on other areas of my life, like what I'm going through currently or my opinion on certain topics or experiences that are important to me or bring me happiness.

"Filthy Happy" to me means having an overabundance of joy, positive energy, and contentment in life. It's something I will continue to work on and strive for my entire life and this blog is going to be my creative outlet and a way to bring more happiness, satisfaction and accountability into my life. I want this blog to be honest and personal and also fun at times and not too serious. I am far from perfect and perfection is never going to be something I am trying to achieve, but continuing to grow as a human being and getting the most out of life is, in my opinion, a very respectable mission.


Onward!







Full disclosure: I can get easily overwhelmed when I take on a project such as this, so if I feel any inkling of anxiety or pressure to work on this blog I am going to immediately stop until I can find pleasure in working on it again. I know growth isn't possible if you don't put yourself out there and push through challenging times but just trust me when I say you don't want me walking around with no sleep, cystic acne and stomach problems. I'm creating this blog for the world but also for me and if it's not serving me than I cannot serve the world. Also this website is a work in progress so please excuse the mess, I just really wanted to start writing!