Checking in!

Surprise!! This is a checking in post with GOOD news! I'm **finally** on track with both eating and exercise. I'm down close to 8 pounds and feeling better about things :) Yay! Right now, i'm just restricting calories and moving more. I've been using www.myfitnesspal.com to track my calories and it gives me 1400 calories per day, if I don't exercise. It seems like so little, and I'm hungry, but it does motivate me to exercise so I can eat a little more.

Although I haven't been commenting too much, I've been reading blogs like crazy and everyone is SO inspiring. You guys are all doing so well. Those of you that are struggling are so inspirational to me, too, because you have such strength of spirit. That's what it's all about!

For workouts, I'v begun a half marathon training schedule. It's a little crazy, but for the first time in my adult life, I RAN a whole mile. A whole mile! I'm up to a mile and a half now. It's a painfully slow pace, but i'm proud of myself nonetheless. I had a little setback in that my pedometer was telling me that I'd run farther than I had, so I THOUGHT i'd done better. I THOUGHT I'd run a 12 minute mile and already run 2 miles without stopping, but that's not the case. When I realized my pedometer was off, I ran last night and tracked it on mapmyrun.com, and, turns out I've been running under 2 miles and between a 13-15 minute mile. At first, I was so bummed out. Honestly, I thought about quitting the training program because I'm too fat and too slow at this point. But, quitting is not an option! I know that's a crappy pace, but you know what? I'm ok with that. I'm still making progress. When I started, I could run 2 minutes before stopping...now..I can run 22 minutes without stopping. Progress! Maybe I won't make next year's Disney Princess Half Marathon...maybe I'll have to run a later one, but that's ok. I'll run one.

So, what's new with all of you? I'm curious as to how many calories you shoot for a day, for those of you restricting calories? Each calculator I use gives me a different value!