A month, exactly – eek! Sorry!

I was doing better, losing a teensy bit of weight – and then Halloween happened. As usual, I went to New Orleans with my best friends, and yeah...several bags of candy and Cafe du Monde happened. So yeah. I'm back to where I was, still maintaining.

And I'd kind of resolved to try to just maintain now through the holidays. It was this time last year that I kinda fell off the wagon – I had real sugar! I had white bread! I had fried foods! – because, hey, it's Thanksgiving, hey, it's Christmas. And those aren't just one day a month, oh no, everybody has to celebrate at least one other time, whether it's with friends or folks at work. So yeah. It's hard to eat healthfully when you can't really plan your menu as carefuly as you typically do, and it's hard to eat healthfully when you kind of... have to eat someone else's food so you won't be considered rude? Hey, this is the South, after all.

But I'm still going to Zumba, still taking clogging lessons, still trying to hit the gym as much as possible and avoid the obviously terrible things for me.

It's work in progress.

Speaking of that, I read this column yesterday and it had a huge impact on me. If you want to lose weight, or you have lost weight, it's a must-read.

Some of her views are a bit defeatist for me, but then again, if she's yo-yo dieted for a while now, I can understand how she believes weight loss is most likely not permanent.

But she makes an important point that really hit home with me. She said before, when she was obese, her weight made her invisible. Now that she's a size 12, she said, people feel they can comment about her body to her – folks will tell her she's fat, etc.

AMEN TO THIS.

This has been one thing that's really shocked me since I went from a size 16 to a size 10: people talk to me about my body all the time. They never did before. It was almost taboo, you could tell. If someone had to say something about what I was wearing, etc., they'd sugarcoat it or say something quickly and move on.

Now, it's almost a daily thing. Most people – even if I see them every single day – say something nice. And that's nice to hear. But my pet peeve is when people tell me I'm "wasting away" or "getting skinny!" when I've basically stayed within 10 pounds of my current weight for much of 2012.

And there are, of course, the rare person who's like, HA, you're still overweight. So yeah, even if you have a nice comment or a not-so-nice comment about your body... people are still talking about your body.

If I thought I was self-concious before, man, I really am now. That's something I didn't expect.

So, here I am, still where I was, weight-wise, and about to go into the holidays.

I'm thankful that I've been able to come as far as I have. I'm thankful for those who've been kind and encouraged me. I'm thankful for the yummy – and sometimes healthy, sometimes not – food I'm going to have in the next two months.

But I hope I can keep my momentum up. This path sure ain't easy. Wish me luck.

Sometimes, it's easy to forget why I even started on this whole weight loss journey to begin with.

Making healthy choices, going to the gym, reading nutrition labels – all of that's come second-nature now that more than a year has passed. But the last few months still haven't been exactly stellar, as I've maintained for several months and still have 20 pounds to go before my doctor will say I'm finally "healthy." (I must admit, it didn't help that I found the most perfect cookie recipe ever to exist a few months ago, and my friends request them on the regular. How can I say no to those?)

But I got good news this past week. Each year we have health screenings at work, and you have to pass four big tests: you must abstain from smoking/using nicotine, your cholesterol must be good, you have to have good blood pressure and your BMI must be 28.5 or below.

I don't smoke, I have yet to get my cholesterol results back (but it was good last year, so here's hoping) and my blood pressure was good.

Even better – my BMI was right at 28.

I've never gotten that achievement on these tests; in fact, I've never been told I'm below a 30. Granted, I'm not out of the woods: the handy-dandy sheet the nurse gave me said there are three levels of BMI: "not much risk," "caution needed" and "danger! you are at risk!" and right now I'm right at "caution needed." Hey, it's better than where I was two years ago – closer to 40 – and better than the 30 I got last year.

Assuming my cholesterol comes back fine, I'll have passed all four tests. Huzzah!

I've always heard you're not supposed to read at the gym. The reason being, if your eyes stay glued to the page, your body probably isn't moving enough.

Wellllll... maybe.

I have never really read at the gym until the last few weeks, and I'm kind of digging it.

In between the one or two Zumba classes I can make it to, I'm stuck using the regular gym equipment for my workouts, and I've been beyond bored with them.

Nothing has worked. I've tried intervals, different music, etc.

So finally I decided I'd bring in my Nook – last resort. And, lo and behold, I stayed on the elliptical for 30 minutes. Stayed on the treadmill for 30 minutes. I wasn't bored or rolling my eyes before I even hit the five-minute mark.

And I feel like I'm getting a good work out. My mind isn't wandering or wondering when my 30 or 45 minutes or whatever is up.

I'm adding in a bit of circuit or strength machines to this, so my nose isn't stuck in the Nook the entire time I'm at the gym. But it is helping me keep my million-miles-an-hour mind busy while my body is working out, and I really needed that.

Just finished up one book the other night and started on the next. More on those at the Scene Now blog soon.

Also, here's another fun way I'm (about to start) working out: clogging.

I took clogging lessons for more than 10 years, and during my teens, my dance group, the Bonnie Todd Cloggers, danced just about everywhere. If you lived in North Mississippi between, basically, 1993-2001, you probably saw us perform at festivals, fairs, parades or other events.

It's been more than 10 years since I took a clogging class, and a little less since I performed anywhere. But this Thursday I'm going to my first clogging class with a new teacher. I'm excited. With my weird and busy schedule, I'm hoping I can keep up the pace. I'm in much better shape than I was in high school (when clogging was my only source of a workout), so I'm hoping I can hold my own.

At the same time, I also completely tore up one of my knees clogging, and it still gives me pain. Here's hoping I can whip it back in shape in time to dance at a Christmas parade or two this winter!

So, did I ever learn to become a morning person?

Have I lost any more weight?

Bahahahahahaha.

Nope.

Yeah. I tried waking up in the mornings but my body was having none of that. I am a night owl, through and through.

And have I lost any more weight? Actually, I've gained about 5 pounds. Thanks to lots of Elvis events – which equals many late nights for me – I didn't work out almost at all last week, and I ate when I could, so I ate poorly. I was surprised how quickly I fell back into old habits.

So, I gained. I'm trying to be better this week – way more Greek yogurt, way less fried stuff.

I'm trying to get my metabolism going, because it's basically not. I haven't been sleeping well – late nights early mornings x nightmares = no good sleep for Sheena – so I know that's part of the problem, too.

But I think I sort of needed to hit this restart button on things, and try – yet again, and hopefully successfully this time – to get rid of these last 20 pounds.