Really, we're both winners

[caption id="attachment_472384" align="aligncenter" width="575" caption="Hey, who are those hotties? Oh yeah ... it's us!"][/caption]

Cue the music: "Weeee are the champions, my friiiennnnnds …"

And we'll keep on fighting to end?

Well, yes and no.

For me and Alan, this "fight" is over. I won our competition.

This morning, I was down 5 pounds from last week, bringing my weight loss in this competition to 28 pounds.

That also brings my total weight loss since last March to 52 pounds!

Alan went to a rip-roaring bachelor party and wedding in Phoenix over the weekend. He says he stayed on mainly a liquid diet all weekend, consuming about a month's worth of beer.

Yet somehow he stayed the same weight — 185 — with a total loss of 20 pounds since we started this rivalry Jan. 3. He was just 1 pound from winning. (Awww.)

He does look amazing.

Which is why I declare us both champions (though I still get the prize … hey, what's my prize?).

That fight 'til the end? It will go on — individually.

Alan says he wants to lose 15 more pounds, and I need to lose another 100.

Yes, really.

I have motivation. I am RUNNING the 5K Warrior Dash in July and, lord willing, the 10 Mile Crim in August.

On Sunday, I walked the 5K in Bay City. I'm proud to announce that my time was nearly 4 minutes faster than when I walked the 5K last August in Flint.

They're small steps, but they're adding up … to the tune of 52 pounds so far.

So Alan owes me … something. Especially beyond the doughnuts he had waiting on my desk at work this morning.

Any suggestions?

Standstills and jiggly bits

Holy weight loss standstill, Batman.

Despite the fact I finished nearly 3,000 calories under my weekly budget, my weight stayed exactly the same.

Here's looking at you, female cycle and water retention.

Alan lost 2.

That means I still have 5 to lose to win the competition, and he has 3.

I am really looking forward to a breakthrough this week. I will be working out all week to prepare for a 5K walk before the Bay City St. Patrick's Day parade on Sunday.

Alan, on the other hand, is leaving the state at the end of the week for a bachelor party and wedding.

I'm hoping it gives me the edge.

And edge I need. After I get through this 5K walk, I'm going to start training in earnest for this summer.

If you remember, I am doing the Warrior Dash in July, and then I plan to do the Crim. Yes, 10 miles. I'd like to sign up for the run so that I can run as much of it as I am able.

I've got a long few months ahead of me.

This morning during my 3 miles on the treadmill, I did something I've never done: I jogged the last quarter mile.

Oh my freakin' jiggly bits.

I FELT like I was going to die. However, I did not.

It's a teeny tiny start, but it's a start.

Have a good week.

In the homestretch

What a difference a week makes.

I feel like a completely different person from the whiner who posted here last week, and am grateful that all members of my family are on the mend after a week of illness.

As for weight loss, Alan and I are coming down to the wire, and we're still neck and neck (and any other cliches you'd like to insert here).

I stayed the same this week, keeping my weight loss since Jan. 3 at 23 pounds.

Alan lost 1 pound, bringing his total loss to 16 pounds.

Our competition is whoever loses 10 percent of our weight first wins. I have 5 pounds to go (for this competition), and so does Alan.

Neck and neck.

(And that also means if you know math, you know how much I weighed in January. Yikes. Forget it immediately or I'll keeeeel you.)

I must kick it back up a notch. I've done great with my food lately but have slacked off on exercise.

Tomorrow morning: Back to the gym.

Mom Card revoked

I'm writing this from the kitchen table. Usually I'd be on the couch, but this corner of the kitchen is really the only place in the house that doesn't make me want to cry right now.

Wow. I am such a baby who probably needs to turn in her Mom Card. But seriously.

The house, which I had shockingly kept in some bit of order lately, is again turned upside down in an amazingly symbolic homage to the health of my family for the past week.

It all started when my husband came down with the worst cough I've ever heard. He missed a few days of work last week and was finally diagnosed with bronchitis over the weekend. A steroid shot and inhaler have helped, but he still sounds bad.

By the end of last week, we got a call from daycare that our 2-year-old had barfed all over his favorite shirt: Popeye. Disaster on many levels. He has had violent diarrhea that continues even today, which comes with … all moms chime in here … violent diaper rash. Lovely.

By Sunday, I was down. I got my child's vomiting and diarrhea, but instead of my husband's chest cold, I got something new to the mix: a head cold. So in addition to running back and forth to the toilet for four days, I've felt like my head and face have been constantly squeezed in a vise.

My husband (whom I can not thank enough for taking care of us all while we've been sick) has returned to work and continued to heal, and my son appeared to be doing well except for the poops … until yesterday.

Yet another trip to MedExpress revealed yet another ear infection. Oh fun.

That calls for another antibiotic, which almost always leads to more violent diarrhea, which leads to … all moms chime in here … more violent diaper rash.

We got our son to sleep at a decent hour last night, only for him to wake up and want to lie on the couch with Daddy. He felt so bad, what do you do? You let him hang out on the couch.

What happened next can only be described as a Power Puke that left little untouched with mostly red juice, soaking our couch cushions, blankets, pillow and the 2-year-old himself. So at midnight, we were throwing the kid into the bathtub, blankets into the washer and we were deep cleaning couch cushions.

Good times.

That pretty much catches you up on why I didn't have a weigh-in report on Monday. My weight-loss pal Alan weighed, and he said he stayed the same — even after walking 10 miles the day before.

I also drug myself onto the scale Monday after one of those bathroom runs, and even after I was Poopy McPukesAlot, I had lost 1 pound.

I don't care. Not this week.

I just want us all to be well. I have such a greater appreciation for anyone who deals with a chronically ill child or family member after this past week. I couldn't handle it. I am weak.

And I am sitting in the corner of my kitchen trying to actually get some work done for a very understanding employer, wishing I was well enough to rejoin society, trying not to think about the condition of the house or the pain in my head, trying not look at the couch cushion that is still drying and trying not to cry.

It's not working so well.