Running.

After a couple years of doing Beachbody workouts only, I started running 2 weeks ago using the Couch to 5K program. My friend, Wan, is doing it also so that is encouraging me to keep it up. I did it once before right after I had Diego and I think I quit around week 6. Running has just never ever been my thing. When I ran the mile in high school P.E., I was always in the chatty group of girls at the end who just walked the entire way and often came back well into next period.

So yeah - this is a stretch for me. I completed day 1 of week 3 today (total of 9 weeks) and I'm struggling. I don't like running at all because, well...I suck. There is no other way of putting it. I suck and I don't like sucking (that's what she said.) ;) I am slow as hell and I'm constantly struggling to catch my breathe, even after a short 1 minute run. Straight up hyperventilating.

This weekend, I toyed with the idea of quitting again. I was planning on starting another round of Insanity today or maybe a full round of ChaLean Extreme...something, anything...as long as it was in my comfort zone.

See - that is the problem. I'm super uncomfortable with running. Not only is it physically challenging, I have to leave my house to go running, I have to think about my safety, I have to keep going even when I don't want to. But, I keep reminding myself that in order to grow, you have to get out of your comfort zone and do something scary. This is my scary something.

From this point forward, I'm going to take some advice from my mentor & role model (whether she knows it or not!), Chalene Johnson. She stresses positive self-talk. She taught me that I am the coach of my own team...my team of 1. If a coach said to his team, "You guys suck! You will never do better! You have no chance of winning," they would definitely lose. Up until now, I've been talking to myself in that negative tone. I'm constantly telling myself that I'm so much slower than everyone else I know, that I'm not in as good of shape as I thought, etc etc.

Today - I stop that BS. I will finish this program and it's not gonna kill me. I will be stronger & more fit at the end of it...and I'm excited.

So - my current workout schedule is Couch to 5K 3 days/week, and weight training with ChaLean Extreme on the days I don't run. These 9 weeks will bring me right up to our Hawaiian vacation and I'm hoping to be able to wear a bikini on that trip...instead of a tankini. We'll see how it goes!

And since I don't have a picture for this post, I googled for running images and this is what came up. I'd say this program is my own personal bull.

Awesome truck shirts!

Ok - back to trucking for a second.

I received an email from Ricky of Tasty Chomps a few weeks ago. He wrote to tell me about these awesome shirts he & his friend designed. You know, even though I've given up the truck scene, I think I want one of these! Check them out.

Cool, huh? Visit their online store to get your own. :)

My story

A picture is worth a thousand words, right?

Well, here are 1,000 more!

This health journey has been a bit long & very difficult, but extremely rewarding. Sometimes it's hard to see my own progress when I look in the mirror because I am my own worst critic. We all are, right? Even I have to admit that putting those pictures side by side yesterday kind of blew me away. Sure - my body has changed but you know what's changed the most? My self-worth. I think you can see that in the photos.

The picture on the left was taken in December of 2008. I was 185 pounds and Diego was a little over a year old. It was "baby weight", I would tell myself. "It will come off. Diego is only 1." Now, there absolutely is something VERY REAL about baby weight. A lot of that has to do with self-sacrifice. When our babies are small, they demand a lot of us physically and emotionally. It takes a toll on our bodies and our spirits...and that's OK. It's natural. It's motherhood.

What's NOT ok is losing ourselves, and that is exactly what happened to me. I became the excuse girl. You know the her:

"But I'm SO tired."

"The baby is most important. I'll work on me later."

"The baby woke up twice last night and I couldn't get up early to workout.""I had a rough day at work today. All I want is pizza and beer."

"Mmmm...Del Taco."

Yep, that was me. Exhausted, negative, chasing food trucks, stuffing my face, unhappy, unhealthy, LOST.

Of course through all this, my dear husband did not say a word about my weight gain or about my negativity. He loved me through and through. To this day, he is my biggest supporter and my best friend on the planet. In the Spring of 2009, he asked me to buy him P90X for Fathers Day. I had no clue what it was but I googled it and bought it off the Beachbody website.

We started P90X together and he was hard core, always the most disciplined of us two. I went back to being excuse girl:

"If I work out more than 3 times/week, I get too sore.""I'll join you every other day."

"But the baby!!! We will wake the baby!"

I literally sat on the couch eating spaghetti (hey, it was whole wheat!) while my hubby did his workouts. On the days that I would actually join him, I would post about my workouts on Facebook and I started getting some replies from people who had done P90X before. One of those people ended up changing my life. My friend from high school youth group, Arlene Paraiso, reached out and offered to coach me through my fitness journey.

Now, my willingness to accept the coaching wasn't immediate. In fact, it took much longer than it should have...about 6 months actually! (Sorry, Arlene). But Arlene never left my side. EVER. She continued to support me and ask me how my workouts were going. Eventually, I was ready for the change. You see, I was SO scared of failure. Up to this day, I had failed at every single physical thing I tried (like the time I finally was passed the ball during a 5th grade basketball game and I scored for the other team....um, yeah.) Arlene continued to encourage me, despite my resistance.

I made the decision to stop P90X and I bought Slim in 6. I thought to myself "Baby steps. You gotta start somewhere." Well - Slim in 6 is more like a toddler step! It's easier than P90X but it's still an amazing workout. I ended up losing 14 inches on that program but more importantly than that, it gave me back my self-worth. I committed to waking up early every morning at 5am to workout. It was hard, guys. Really hard. During this time, Diego was having a lot of health issues and he would wake up throwing up often. I would work out with the baby monitor next to me and when I'd hear him wake up crying or throwing up, I would hit pause, run upstairs, clean him up, drop him off with daddy and finish the workout. Now emotionally, guys, that was REALLY hard. But, I had to do it. I had to get healthy...I had to put me first.

So there I was. Done with Slim in 6, 14 inches smaller and ready for the next challenge. I dabbled a bit in P90X again and tried the 30 Day Shred by Jillian Michaels. Neither kept me motivated. I yo-yo'd a bit until I found TurboFire the summer of 2010. That program CHANGED MY FRIGGIN' LIFE!! The music, the choreography, Chalene. All of it kept me coming back for more every single day...for 90 days. 30 pounds lighter, I felt like I was on top of the world. At this point, Diego was older and knew I was working out everyday. Sometimes, when I didn't get a chance to workout in the early mornings, I had to do it after work. Diego would "spot me" when I did my sit ups, or he would jump around the room with me...or he would hang on me. LOL. It was not easy when he was awake, but I was determined. And let me tell you, kids are the best accountability partners! If Diego hasn't seen me workout in a while, he will point it out. :) Gotta love that kid!

It was not the weight loss that kept me going. It was the way I felt after my workouts that kept me coming back for more. I learned that I needed that time for me in order to be a more patient mom, a more loving wife, a more focused employee, a better friend. That hour of working out changed my outlook on my day and made me a better person. All of a sudden, that hour was non-negotiable.

I sit here today 40 pounds lighter, a gazillion inches smaller and a MUCH more fulfilled human being. Physically, I'm now able to do all the P90X workouts, as well as Insanity & hours upon hours of Turbo. I've learned that my priority in my life isn't my son & my husband...as I had originally thought. My priority is more specific than that. It is to be a happy & fulfilled person so that I can be a happy mom for my son, a positive wife for my husband, an inspiration to my friends & family. It's so important to me to SHARE this way of life with people...because really, it is the only way to truly live this life to the fullest.

I share this with you because it is important to realize that working out is much more than vanity. It is about finding yourself & FIXING what it is that made you unhealthy in the first place. If you do not fix it, you will go back to being unhealthy. Guaranteed. Weight loss, health, nutrition...a lot of it is emotional. Find yourself, learn about yourself, make yourself a priority and the rest will fall into place. I promise.

You only get one shot at life and I intend to give my shot everything I've got.

Saying goodbye to The Truck Chaser

With so much social media consuming my day, it's hard to find time to blog. And, well, I always wonder if people really care what I have to say. I started this thing as a food truck blog a while back and I'll admit, I haven't been to a food truck in a long while. A lot of that has to do with my workplace moving from Downtown LA to Pasadena. When I worked in DTLA, trucks were everywhere at lunchtime. In fact, towards the end of my time in DTLA, 4 of them parked right across the street at the 7+Fig center. I went about 3 times/week.

Things are different now. I work from home, which is nice, and my job is much more demanding than it used to be. I don't usually have time for a lunch break, let alone the time to stand in an hour line with a bunch of hipsters for a sandwich. I've also really been trying to watch what I eat and, well, most food trucks are not easy on the waistline, that's for sure.

So...do you still care what I have to talk about, even if it's not about food trucks? I imagine most of you follow this blog because you want to see the photos of the yummy food emerging from the trucks roaming Los Angeles, but I just don't have it in me anymore. Actually, today my life is more about fitness, eating healthy and being a busy working mom. Quite the opposite of the Truck Chaser you met a few years ago, no?

I've held off on this blog because I felt like I hadn't really grown into my online persona, if you will. I started out as The Truck Chaser and now I'm a fitness freak?? Sounds a little Dr Jeckyl and Mr Hyde if you ask me. But, you know what? I've changed. I'm a new person...completely different in so many ways. So I'm just going to be myself. That's probably the best plan.

My posts may not be filled with beautiful pictures (like they ever were!) or perfectly crafted sentences...but I hope you'll stick around regardless. :)

The Weekly Itch (no not that kind of itch...)

I am kind of a closet partier. If a week goes by and I haven't gone out with friends, out to dinner with my family, something, ANYTHING, I go a bit crazy. I'm a very social person yet I'm kind of shy around new people. Yep, I'm a little weird.

One thing that I love doing is working out with other people. My workouts are usually at 5am in my living room, all by myself. Day to day, that's the only way I can stay consistent with my workouts, but on Saturdays I turn it into one big fiesta!

Every Saturday, my hubby & I put on a Fit Club in Pasadena where we pop in a Beachbody DVD and all sweat it out together. We usually pick the program once everyone is there so that we make sure we choose something that is on everyone's fitness level. In the past, we've done P90X, TurboFire, Rev Abs, and just this past weekend we did Hip Hop Abs. OMG, I was dying of laughter the whole time. It was a lot of fun and a nice chance of pace to my normal routine.

We are a fun group! See!

You should come! Email me for the deets (link on the right column). It's absolutely free and we have babysitting available for $10 per child. And, after class, sometimes we go for some of these:

Psst! Nom Nom Truck is coming to 7th & Fig today. I will be partaking in the gluttony. :)

Insane return!

Hi guys!

It's been a while since I've posted anything in here. It's mostly because I haven't made the time, and when I do have a second, I feel like I don't have any pictures worthy of adding to the 'ol blog. And we all know that blog posts are more fun with pictures.

Also, as most of you who follow me on Twitter know, I've been on a workout kick for a while now and I haven't been eating at many food trucks lately. It's a shame because they park right across the street from my office at 7th & Fig every Mon-Wed. This would have been a dream to me about a year ago, but now it's a bit of a nightmare. Sometimes I cave...and I'll be sure to post about those. I gotta remember to take pictures. I've sort of lost my truck chaser mojo.

But - it's a good thing because my waistline is on a major shrinkage kick!! Unfortunately, the scale isn't moving but I feel stronger & healthier. I'm currently doing INSANITY and it is majorly kicking my ass. I'm still in awe every time I finish a workout without dying. So far so good though. I'm on week 3 and feeling great.

I've also been trying to eat healthier. 6 meals/day, each meal containing a carb, protein & fat. I've been trying to get away from the mentality that I should have 3 real meals (breakfast, lunch & dinner) with snacks in between. That's how I used to do my 6 meals/day. Now, I'm trying to make each of my meals the same size. I seriously notice a big difference when I eat this way. I feel lighter, less bloated and just better overall.

Anyway - I just wanted to post a little something to get this thing kicking again. Here's a picture for good measure.

Meeting Tony Horton from P90X :) SO COOL!

WINNER!!

We have a winner (2 actually)!

Congratulations to Type1RockStar! She commented:

I love turbo ANYTHING and zumba! Being fit is totally my new years res!

I am a fellow Turbo junkie (Chalene Johnson 4 ever) and also enjoy shaking my tail feather at Zumba class. I will send you an email to find out which Sweaty Band you would like...

...and you know, I changed my mind about only giving away one. I have about 5 of these at home and I'd much rather you guys are able to try out such a great product.

So Winner #2 is Lydia! Congrats, Lyd! She commented:

Fave form of exercise is totally weight lifting! It's changed my body, and my life! :)

I've seen your muscles, girl! Don't no one want to mess with you!

I hope you both love them. I will let Type1RockStar have the first choice since her number came up first, then Lyddy will get the one she doesn't choose. Fair?

For those of you wondering where "OMG They Don't Slip!" came from...it's Sweaty Bands' slogan...and it's dead on. They don't! Hop on over to their website and check out all their cute bands. You will not be disappointed.

Yay, that was fun!