Well, that didn’t take long…

I suppose I could chalk it up to my depression winding itself back up to full-force beginning last Thursday, but it could also be because I’m impatient and fickle – but I’m already getting sick-of/finding it hard to stay on track with the Female Body Breakthrough routine. I was feeling really good about it after about 5 workouts, but Mike’s birthday weekend and the debacle with the not eating/doing the workout/drinking a lot/not sleeping enough (ie: REALLY POOR RECOVERY PERIOD CHOICES) really, really threw me off track. I did one workout last week, tried to do a run a couple days later (which was pretty pitiful), and then basically was just like, “I need a do-over.”

So my do-over on Week 3 was supposed to start yesterday (Monday), but between emotionally/mentally feeling like I wanted to crawl under a rock and possibly die combined with dreading having to spend a freaking hour exercising while still getting all my other household chores done and meeting a friend for coffee as they prepare to leave the state for 4 months… I’m totally pulling the “give-up” card and letting you know it didn't happen. And on top of that, I’m feeling like I don’t really want to do it anymore anyway. Which is kind of bizarre seeing as a) it kicks my butt and burns a ton of calories, and b) I get pretty fast results.

Self-sabotage, anyone?

Maybe. But the fact of the matter is: I’m bored right now. I’m bored with it. I want something I can do in 30-40 minutes, not something that takes me an hour. Where I am in my life right now, I just don’t have an hour to give 3-4 days a week. And while that makes me a little sad, it’s just a very harsh reality. I’ve talked so much about this recently – but I don’t think I’m willing to make the personal sacrifice at this time. When I'm feeling more "up", I can get positive about it and pull through and make it happen, but these depressive episodes make me realize maybe part of the reason I get depressed to begin with it by piling too much on my plate on a daily basis - and that includes an hour-long workout I don't actually have time for. While I hate, hate, hate that that means it’s just going to be that much longer until I reach my ideal body aesthetic, obviously I’m willing to wait or not as focused/wanting that ideal aesthetic, anyway.

There seems to be a recurring theme in all facets of my life, and this particular facet is not exception, and that theme is: There has to be more than this.

There’s got to be something better than shelling out fucking $600/month for a CrossFit box membership, there’s got to be something better than running 5 miles every day and starving yourself, there’s got to be something better than sacrificing recovery-necessary sleep in the mornings or family-time in the evenings to spend an hour doing something you don’t absolutely enjoy.

You don’t have to love it every day. Nobody does. But you need to love it most days. I think that’s a pre-requisite for making it stick.

…the more I write this the more I realize this definitely is depression fueled and I should probably just force myself to do the damn 60 minute workout, but NO! I don’t want to! I demand a better and more convenient workout that I really, truly love!! Where is that?! What if I can’t find it?! EVER?! What if I can never become that person that is willing to make those sacrifices for health and a totally rockin’ bod?!

Does this come from my perpetual and tricksy self-hate spiral? Do I really need to change all these things about myself and my life in order to be happy? Is it possible for me to just find happiness in where and who I am? Oh god, just thinking that to myself right now makes me want to anxiety throw-up… to imagine being stuck doing what I do now everyday for another 30 years… NOPE! NOPE NOPE NOPE!

Okay, sorry for that slightly insane digression... So, my goal is to find a shorter and yet equally intense strength training workout to start doing. And it needs to happen right now. Because I need to start, like, yesterday. Because I haven't done purposeful exercise since last Wednesday. 

Any suggestions would be welcome as long as it is strength based and not a DVD, as I have no attention span for DVD workouts these days. The search begins!

Intuitve Eating = Winning

• Whole wheat English muffin w/ organic butter and strawberry spread, 2 sausage patties, coffee w/ a little bit of sugar and organic half-and-half
• Almonds w/ a banana
• Leftover spinach feta “cheesy bread” w/ mixed greens salad (greens, carrots, Caesar dressing)
• A few pretzels
• Baked ziti (full-fat mozzarella and ricotta, whole grain pasta, tomato basil sauce) w/ mixed greens salad (same as above), homemade garlic bread using fresh Italian bread, a glass of whole milk
• Post-workout fruit smoothie w/ vanilla protein powder, frozen strawberries
• Homemade brownie w/ small scoop of cookies and cream ice cream
• Lots of water throughout the day

^This is what I ate Monday. I didn’t log any of those food items into my calorie tracker. It killed me a little bit not to log any of those food items into my calorie tracker… to the point where I did the math in my head at one point while catching up on some tv. And then I realize that’s kind of crazy. Why does it matter?! It doesn’t matter. Because I’ve been doing this for so long that I know how to do just fine, how to stay within my goals/limits. I know what all those food values are. I know what a serving size is/looks like. But that’s not the point – the point is to stop obsessing about those values, and to eat if I’m hungry, to eat quality food when I’m hungry (most of the time), and to eat the type of food I’m hungry for (protein or carb, fruit or veggie, whatever).

Somewhat surprisingly, I found it much easier to make more whole food choices throughout the day instead of immediately going for the taquitos in my freezer, or the leftover birthday cake in the Tupperware on top of the fridge. While I obviously had some dessert at the end of the day, it was a small portion.

I don’t eat terrible things all the time. This is something else I need to remind myself. If I’m eating 5-6 times a day, averaging anywhere from 2000-2500 calories, and 500 of those calories come from “junk”, I’m still doing pretty well. I’m doing a lot better than most.

Tuesday was also a good food day. I had a homemade full-fat greek yogurt strawberry/blueberry/granola parfait-type-dealie for breakfast, some apples w/ raw almonds for a snack, Qdoba bowl for lunch w/ black beans/chicken/veggies/salsa/sour cream/cheese and guacamole and a glass of water (where I normally would have gone for the soda), and a repeat of Monday’s ziti dinner. As a nightcap, I had a tall vanilla rooibus latte while visiting with a friend. I felt a little hungry right around bedtime, but drank some water and was able to sleep just fine.

Wednesday was a bit different. While I enjoyed healthy breakfast and snack,  lunch ended up at Taco Bell when I was really just hungry for a salad or something from home, and then I botched dinner by trying to fit in a run after work and ended up eating those frozen taquitos mentioned above (actually they’re southwest eggrolls, but what’s the diff, right? Junk is junk) following by half of a small blizzard from Dairy Queen. There was a quick milk/protein powder shake somewhere in there, as well. Overall, not a good food day.

But I learned something: over the last few days I’ve found it much easier to identify proper hunger and fullness cues. Normally I would have just pounded that blizzard because ICE CREAM DELICIOUS! But I no longer felt hungry halfway through, so I stopped. I did the same thing with my lunch over the last couple days - ate about two-thirds or three-fourths of my meal, no longer felt hungry, and just left the rest.

I’m recognizing better what type of food I’m actually hungry for, recognizing and acknowledging my feelings of “this was a poor food choice” (my exact words to my husband at Taco Bell on Weds lol) and sort of storing that in my mind for the future (ie: if you’re hungry for a salad with maybe some lunch meat or chicken and you eat a Taco Bell crunchwrap instead, it’s probably not going to be as satisfying or make you feel as good), and recognizing when I’m no longer hungry much easier. But most importantly: I’m no longer going through the day constantly wondering, “What and when will I eat next?” or feeling hungry all the time. I’ve been really good this week about always having healthy and filling snacks with me at work and making sure I’m stocked at home, as well. If I get hungry in between big meals, I eat those snacks. Sometimes it’s a lot, sometimes just a couple bites. 

So, yay! That's all well and good and working out better than expected and all that jazz... however, I completely dropped the ball on Female Body Breakthrough this week. While I've been "active", getting my 10,000 steps in (or within just a few hundred of 10k), yoga, runs, walks, etc. - FBB workouts have fallen to the wayside. I think I really did a number on my body last Saturday by eating next-to-nothing, working out hard, and then drinking a lot of beer and staying up pretty late. Monday's workout was really difficult and I was really lacking energy and focus. I didn't really push myself because I just couldn't, and took longer rests between circuits than I normally would. Tuesday I did some restorative yoga, which felt pretty good, but it was also much more difficult than it normally would be. I was also having some lower back issues which I think were/are stemming from lack of abdominal focus/over-arching during squats and that was definitely effecting my yoga poses. As I said above, Wednesday I attempted to run after work. I had both kids with me, which was fine though slightly distracting, but the actual "run" part was really hard, and honestly I mostly just walked at a decent clip most of the time. Even that wore me out! I tried to do just a quick round of circuits (not FBB) when I got home, just trying to keep somewhat on-schedule for strength.. but I just couldn't. My legs were NOT cooperating. I had so much muscle fatigue. So Thursday night, even though I felt INCREDIBLY guilty about it, I decided to for-real rest - no yoga, no running, just normal walking around during the day, etc. While I'm not entirely sure I'll have the chance to fit my regular FBB workout in tonight, due to the fact that I'm going out to enjoy some live music (YAY!!!), I definitely plan on getting something in on Saturday whether that be FBB, a run, or maybe both depending on how I'm feeling. It's supposed to be nice weather this weekend before another polar vortex comes through Monday night and starts ruining everything. It's almost MARCH! Can't we be done with this crap already?! ...I digress. 

My plan is to restart Week 3 of FBB on Monday to make sure I get those 3 workouts in and hopefully the "metabolic circuits" next Saturday or Sunday. But I'm really not stressing myself on the metabolic extras right now since I'm trying to fit some runs in to hopefully be somewhat prepped for the 5k in April.

This week has been much better in terms of sleep and taking proper "wind down" time before lights out, although I've slacked a bit on housework. My mood hasn't been quite as stable as I would have liked and I've had some pretty terrible mini breakdowns which have mostly been spurned by my demon spawn children. Having an autism-spectrum/gifted/hyper-sensitive 8 year old who lacks general common sense in all things, and a toddler in the most turbulent throes of the Terrible Twos who is so goddamn smart I don't even know what I'm going to do with him, makes me feel like running away to Fiji, faking my death or some other equally hyperbolic yet appropriate escape. AHHH!!! why couldn't my children just be AVERAGE?! This is NOT NOT NOT a humblebrag -- this is a very serious, difficult thing that makes me constantly question whether or not I am cut out to be a mother and worry about if my subpar parenting will lead to my terrifyingly brilliant children becoming terrifyingly brilliant axe-murderers. Plus some general mom/wife feelings of being under-appreciated and over-worked. But, then, who doesn't feel that way? I'm trying to acknowledge and move forward without saying to myself, "These are stupid feelings that only stupid people feel and you should stop being stupid" and then shoving them all down to just having them rear larger, uglier heads later. Heads that will bite me in the ass. 

So yeah. That's what's up.

Making Peace

After about a week (well, another week in an on-and-off string of many) of being incredibly frustrated with feeling like I work my butt off, burn all these calories, try to (mostly) make better food choices, eat ALL THE PROTEIN, feel like I’m starving all the time despite eating 2000-2300 calories/day regardless if those are junk food calories or whole food calories, and seeing little fluctuation on the scale (aside from UP), and no progress in inches lost in the places I most want/need to see it (ie: belly/hips), I finally had a revelation yesterday: I’m fucking done.

And what that really means is not, “I’m giving up on trying to be healthy/fit completely and am just gonna be lazy and sedentary and eat all the junky faux foods and be a big fat American.” What it means is, I’m done tracking and macro counting and logging and obsessing and feeling disappointed in myself for not being able to maintain an appropriate starvation level while maintaining an appropriately high activity level. I feel like what is supposed to be appropriate is not appropriate for me. Something is not working and the added stress of constantly wondering/worrying if I’m “doing it right” on top of the normal stress in my life definitely isn’t helping.

As a young woman, I was always able to maintain my (must lower) weight with regular light exercise and eating mostly at home and eating what I was hungry for when I was hungry for it… sometimes that meant ice cream for breakfast and eggs and bacon for dinner.

I’m committed to my exercise routine right now. I’m enjoying the FBB program and got my 3 workouts in this week. While I’ve gotten lazy on the rest-day yoga and weekend runs (kind of hard to run with a foot of snow on the ground), I’ve got the strength training down and I believe that’s the most important.

I know I’ve experimented with more intuitive eating in the past, but it usually only lasts a couple weeks because I all of sudden start freaking out that I’m eating too many carbs or not enough protein or because I start getting paranoid about gaining weight back, even though I’m not… but what’s funny about that is, I’m pretty sure I eat LESS overall calories when I’m not tracking and get plenty of protein, etc. Go figure.

Throughout yesterday and today and my consideration of this “no fucks to give about tracking food” idea, I’ve also thought about giving up my FitBit for a couple weeks. I’m obsessed with it and the stats it provides me with… especially the sleep tracking, lately. Part of me thinks it might be beneficial to stick it in my sock drawer for a couple weeks or a month, but the other part of me isn’t ready for that just yet. Perhaps when spring temperatures arrive I’ll give it a shot, just because I’m more active in the warmer months to begin with. I’ve had the Flex for about 9 months, and have had some sort of fitness tracking device attached to my person since December of 2012. As all of you regular readers know, I’ve also had a weight plateau since about the same time. I’m not saying one has anything to do with the other, but I do need to consider that perhaps my fancy fitness tracker isn’t really boosting my fitness or activity level and therefore just provides me with more information to obsess and worry and stress over. So much technology complicating everything!

I really wish life were just a little simpler in all aspects. There is a Fleet Foxes song that I love called “Helplessness Blues”, and the bridge of the song says, “If I had an orchard I’d work till I’m raw, if I had an orchard I’d work till I’m sore.” Sometimes I really wish I had grown up on a farm or something similar, that I had something to put physical and mental labor into, to produce something worth producing. To take pride in the things I accomplish on a daily basis. To do something that makes getting up at dawn and going to bed at dark feel worthwhile enough that you don’t worry about what you’re “giving up” by being early to bed and early to rise.

I’m sorry, I went off on a bit of a tangent there.

So, basically it all boils down to: I’m going to stop logging food. Possibly permanently. I will still be logging my workouts just because that data feeds to my FitBit and helps keep those stats more accurate. I’ll also still be hanging out on MyFitnessPal. I enjoy poking around in the forums every now and then, as well as keeping up with my MFP friends and real-life friends who also use MFP. I can still continue to support others’ journeys as I navigate the bumps in the road of my own.

I’ll now be eating more at home, I’ll be eating what I want when I’m hungry for it. I refuse to feel guilty. I refuse to worry about my protein or carb intake or how many/how little calories I’m eating. All the macro information for every food on the planet is burned into my brain, anyway. I know what “costs” my body what. Moving forward I’m going to continue to focus on planning meals and buying more local and/or organic produce/meats/dairy for better quality food.

It’s time to focus on my future, on lifestyle changes I can really live with, on accepting where I am now both physically and mentally, loving myself and my body, loving myself enough to improve. It’s time to really think about all those things on my “Future Self” list and start putting them into action. It’s time to quit worrying so much about what other people think of what I’m eating/how I’m exercising and just do what works best for me and keeps me healthy.

Can't Come Up With Subject Title, But Read It Anyway!

Well, it started a little bit weekend before last and perpetuated through more of last week than I intended (or would even like to admit). I made excuses saying that the socialization time was important (which it was) and I was still keeping up with my chores (sort of... laundry, yes, mostly - cooking fell almost completely to the wayside). I was still working out. In fact, part of what was waylaying my responsible bedtime was the fact that my workout has been taking me a full hour, making it so that I'm getting a late start on anything I'm trying to do on a weeknight.

I digress... so yes, excuses excuses and then some more excuses. Then Friday rolled around and I was so excited for the weekend, so happy to FINALLY leave work (45 minutes later than normal), and to get home and have some friends over for drinks and games... and then my husband ended up on working 3 hours late, my children transformed into demon spawn, and I had a couple beers before my eldest was in bed for the night. Within an hour of both kids being in bed, I was a little tipsy and then decided I was on a mission to get a little drunk and enjoy my Friday night since I was at home and didn't have to drive anywhere. This turned into staying up until 2am at which point I started falling asleep in the middle of the game and promptly went to bed.

Funny thing about going to bed at 2am when it's your turn to get up with your kids the following morning... IT DOESN'T WORK OUT SO GREAT AND MAKES YOU FEEL LIKE CRAP.

I was completely disappointed in myself as this was the first thing I wrote on my "who I want to be" list over a week ago - "The person I want to be does not stay up until 2am drinking/socializing if it's her turn to get up with her children in the morning. Or at all." So much for that, eh?!

I tried dozing on the couch while the boys played, but they have such a love-hate relationship that I ended up refereeing most of the morning... finally at 10am my husband came downstairs and tapped me out to go take a nap. I slept 3 hours. I wasted almost my entire day. Saturday morning is cleaning time, not taking-a-nap time. I didn't get all the vacuuming done I normally do, but at least I got some laundry going, cleaned up the kitchen, and got the tile swept up in prep for some mopping. The day was over before it even began, and I skipped my workout completely because I was so tired, but also because I was feeling completely depressed. I was/am completely disappointed in myself for acting so irresponsible about sleep knowing full-well this would push me into a low place for the next few days, doing nothing except perpetuate my tendency toward bad habits. Vicious cycle.

I did slightly better with bedtime Saturday night, but was still very tired Sunday and opted for a nap in place of a workout, which may have no been the better choice. Now I'm struggling to settled back into my "asleep before midnight" place, and am starting to battle that inner-monologue of, "You just can't do it. Just accept that being sleep-deprived and depressed is who you are." Which is completely untrue.

It's so upsetting to feel myself slipping back into this bad head-space, and so that is depressing me, too. I'm definitely trying to stay positive and try not to let the frustration/anger/sadness/apathy pull me too deeply into the "why bother?" place, but I also know that I need to get on top of this sleep thing and cut back the beer/wine intake over the next couple weeks in order to help me stay level.

Moving on to other subjects...

I restarted Female Body Breakthrough last week (which I will now refer to as FBB - also, I think I probably already mentioned this at some point.. whoops), and while I didn't get the third workout in on Saturday thanks to my late-night antics wiping me out, I did jump right back to it Monday evening like a champ. The moves are already getting easier for me, and I think I can add a little bit heavier weight beginning next week. I'm not rushing myself with the weight during this first "phase", though, because I feel like I've done that with other programs in the past and really ended up sacrificing proper form and therefore wasn't building strength like I wanted to. Anyways. The workouts are hard as hell, but feel totally awesome. At first they were taking me a bit longer to get through, but now that I've got the warm-up down without needing to check the book a million times, I've been able to shave about 8-10 minutes off the total workout time.

I'm really enjoying things this go 'round, even though it's obviously early in the program. I'm not making any promises to you or even really to myself that I'll finish the full 16 weeks, because I feel like I jinx and self-sabotage the moment I start saying things like, "I'm definitely doing ALL THE THINGS ALL THE TIME this time!" -- so, we'll just leave it at: I'm enjoying myself much more this time around, I'm loving how the workouts are making me feel, and at this moment I'm feeling positive about being able to stick with it for a bit.

Future Self Starting Now

After years of feeling like I’m constantly failing at “being an adult”, and going through various stages of deciding maybe nobody really becomes a Grown-Up, I finally decided to sit down and write out what being an adult means to me; what the grown-up version of me is like. This all stems out of a lifestyle-change writing exercise one of the Fit Bloggers I follow posted – she asked all her followers to visualize how the “fit” versions of themselves behaved and to write all that down and then just start doing those things. To behave as if they already were the person they wanted to become. I thought it was an excellent idea at the time I saw it, and believe I actually mentioned it here. 

I tweaked the exercise a little bit for my own purposes, and this is what became of it:

The woman I want to be:

• Spends lots of time with her husband and children, but understands that friendships, extended family relationships, and time for herself are also important.
• Says "no" to social outings if she's feeling run-down, overwhelmed, or just not up for it - without guilt.
• Avoids spending too much time around toxic people and/or in toxic environments.
• Gets 7-8 hours of sleep every night in order to maintain a good mood and to avoid depressive episodes and high anxiety.
• Does some form of exercise every day and is more active throughout the day, in general.
• Puts wholesome foods in her body both to fuel her active lifestyle and fuel her mental stability, but doesn't feel guilty for indulging in the foods and drinks she loves in moderation.
• Cooks a healthy meal for her family almost daily, but knows that sometimes life happens and doesn’t feel guilty for the occasional meal of mac’n’cheese or chicken nuggets.
• Doesn’t stay up drinking/socializing until 2am if she knows it’s her turn to wake up with the kids the next morning (or at all).
• Doesn’t drink heavily and drive. Ever.
• Doesn’t smoke regularly (or at all).
• Works hard and works well even if she doesn’t always like or enjoy her job, but makes sure not to burn herself out to the point of leading to depressive episodes and Sunday night anxiety.
• Doesn’t feel guilty for taking time away from work if she’s sick or for requesting vacation time.
• Always strives to improve her quality of life and isn't afraid to make the tough decisions in order to maintain healthy balances between work/home/friends/family.
• Is smart with her money and practices good spending/saving habits.

While several of these things I scrolled out right away, others came a little more slowly and after much thought. After completing the list several days ago, I've continued to read over it almost daily to be sure these are all things that I really want and not just what I think I should be doing. I ended up removing a couple items and adding others over the first couple days, but I believe this list honestly represents the person I want to be. I've already begun taking a lot of the steps toward this version of myself. So far, so good. 

Overcoming Myself

Last week I began drafting the following post:

"Well, if I said it once I've said it a thousand times: 2 weeks into regular exercise and a slightly better diet, and I am feeling about 100 times more positive about life. It's like I can see my depression chillin' just slightly behind me, waiting for me to acknowledge it - but I haven't felt the need to invite it to curl up in my lap and consume me. I'm just like, ‘Oh, hey, what's up Depression? Yeah, I can still see/feel the stress and sadness in my life... but I don't need to dive into it right now. 'Cause EXERCISE, MO' FO'!!’ 

Or something like that.

 I’ve been spending more time with my husband, reading more, watching less TV, cooking more regularly, drinking alcohol only a couple times a week, and smoking only occasionally. I am definitely concerned at how long this will all last, as I feel like every January thru March looks like this, and then April and warmer weather roll around and it puts me into “party” mode – wanting to stay up, socialize ALL THE TIME, drink! With drinking comes smoking! And by October I’m right back where I started. I keep repeating to myself that it doesn’t have to be a cycle, that this can be a real and lasting lifestyle change. It’s all up to me. It’s my choice.
 Hey, maybe this is just a manic phase. That's entirely possible, too. But I'm going to attribute this upswing to the outdoor runs I’ve managed to sneak in on the two (yes, only two) days that it was in the upper 40’s here – plus the other 3-4 days a week I’ve been either lifting weights or doing some yoga. That's right. I’ve worked out 4-5 days a week for the last 2 weeks. I’m also especially proud of myself because I managed to keep up with all this exercise even after a 48-hour bout of sickness AND have worked around social plans. Since the weather has turned bitter cold again, I’m hoping to get up to the local rec center on the weekends to knock out some runs on the treadmill. 

To hopefully help myself stay on track, I’m registering for my first 5k which will be just 2 days before my 30^th birthday!”

I was feeling incredibly upbeat, energetic, I was doing better at work, I was motivated in all areas of life, etc. I had an appointment with my counselor and was feeling like I didn’t even need to be there because things were awesome and I had figured out what my problem was and I just needed to be smart about exercising and eating better.

Then the weekend came… and went, and I realized the secret might not be exercise or eating right (although these things are obviously important in a million other ways and are contributing factors, I’m sure) – but for me, the Big Secret is probably sleep. All the sleep. All the time.

I had been going to bed between 10 and 11pm almost every night the last couple weeks. It was so much easier to get up with my children at 6:30am when I wasn’t staying up until 1 or 2am. (You can just call me Captain Obvious.) But the biggest proof that it might be sleep more than anything else was this most recent weekend, where I got significantly less sleep than I’d been getting (think those or 1 or 2am bedtimes of the recent past). It sent me into a tailspin. I may or may not have cried myself to sleep Monday night. (Hint: I totally did.) I started feeling overwhelmed with job-work, housework, and Mom Duty, I started in on myself for not doing a “real” workout even though I did 30 minutes of yoga and had run 2.25 miles the day before, I started flipping out about having to work the next day, etc, etc. At first I thought to myself, “See? This was just a manic phase – you’re not really better.” I was crying because I it was like, oh no – I’m going to be miserable every day again and I don’t think I can live like that. I’m so tired of being miserable. I’ve been so much happier. I don’t want to be like this. Then I started to realize how little sleep I got over the weekend and how busy I had been and how active I had been… and I realized, oh shit. I’ve exhausted myself and this is now my emotional response. I’m not sinking back into a depression that I have no control over – I have absolute control in this moment, in this situation, to just get more sleep.

The good news? I can generally make sure that I get the amount of sleep that I need in order to keep my depression in check. The bad news? This means a pretty significant adjustment of my social-life. It means if we go out for a drink on a Friday or Saturday night, I probably won’t be staying out much past that 11:30/midnight threshold. And you definitely won’t be seeing as many random weeknights of being up/out until or past midnight. This may put a little bit of a damper on my interaction with some of my friends – but maintaining my mental health is way more important to me right now than late-night socialization. There may come a time in the not-so-distant future where my work/life balance will be a bit better and less stressful and I can once again survive and function perfectly well with a later bedtime – but that time ain’t now, unfortunately.

So, now that I figured out that crazy puzzle – let’s move on to this 5K thing… and this turning 30 thing.

The fact that I’m about to be 30 is hitting me a little harder than I ever thought it would. Hey, but what better gift to give myself than a healthier lifestyle? And hopefully focusing on that will keep my thoughts away from, “What have you done with your life? What are you doing with your life currently? YOU COULD BE SO MUCH BETTER!”

Man, my inner-monologue is such an ass.

So, I signed up for a 5K since I all of a sudden fell in love with running at the end of last summer after being someone who hated running for most of my life. I never understood how my dad found solace on his runs until 5 months ago. It’s like a safe-place for me now. Maybe that’s part of getting older?  But it’s not just running, it’s all my workouts. I’m really thankful for that. It makes it a lot easier to continue motivating to get the exercise done, to get the workout in, to make it all fit into my full life.

I’m regularly running about 2 - 2.5 miles when it’s been warm enough to get out, and lately I’ve been averaging about a 15/min mile including a walking warm-up and cool-down (and some walking in the middle to catch my breath!). That would put me at about 45 minutes, give or take, for a 5K (3.2 miles). My goal is to come in a little under that. Maybe 40 minutes? I’m not trying to win anything, I’m doing this for me. I may hate it. Who knows?! It’s only a $30 registration fee and it’s something I want to try, so I’m going for it. I’m hoping by the end of this month it’ll warm up enough that I can get out 2 or 3 times a week and build up my endurance/speed before the race on April 13^th.

Okay, so now that I’ve figured out the best way for me to fight the funk, and I’ve rediscovered my love and motivation for exercise, I guess it’s time to post some pictures which I am very unhappy with. I may have only gained 4-5 lbs over the last couple months, but it looks like almost all of that was fat. Super.

January 12th, 2014 - 194lbs

Really super attractive, right? NOT! Oh man, I am so unhappy with these that I almost don't want them on here... but how can I see my progress if I don't have an accurate depiction of where I'm starting? I'm always bummed that I don't have better photos from my start in January of 2012 - so here we go.

Since 1/13/14 I’ve been doing a mix of things. I’m regularly doing yoga 2-3 times a week, and I’ve been sort of modifying the Starting Strength program and goofing off with lifting, and throwing in some random dancing around in between sets, etc. Many of you who are friends with me on Facebook see this come through from MyFitnessPal as “some lifting, some jumping around, some stretching” – and that’s basically all it’s been.

The last few days (which also could be attributed to not-enough-sleep), I’ve been feeling really down about my 14-month long plateau/fluctuation from 189 – 194lbs. I’ve eaten at all kinds of different calorie levels throughout the last 14 months, from 1600-1800/day to 2400-2600/day. My diet has also varied from primarily at-home cooking, eating “whole” foods to eating more processed/restaurant foods and back again. I’ve tried several different exercise/lifting programs. No loss, no substantial gain. My body composition has changed quite a bit, but not as much as I would have liked and my estimated body fat percentage is still a good 8-10% higher than where I want it. Basically this all boils down to the fact that I’ve been lax in my commitment to weight and fat loss. I’ve been unwilling to cut out my favorite foods and I’ve been hesitant and sometimes flat-out unwilling to really push myself during exercise. On the former, I’m still unwilling to completely eliminate my favorite foods – which is not to say I couldn’t stand to cut back further on some of the junk I like to indulge in, I absolutely can and should. However, I do solidly believe that the bigger problem is the latter – the unwillingness to put in the hardest work no matter how uncomfortable it is. I feel like this is changing for me, though. I feel like over the last week or so especially, I’ve been much more willing to push myself and challenge myself – to tell myself, “You CAN knock out those last two reps”, “You CAN run all the way to the mailbox at the top of the hill”, instead of “I’m just so tired/out of breath/uncomfortable, it’s okay if I stop here.”

It might sound stupid, but I’ve also taken to pumping myself up before I exercise – saying to myself that I’ve got this, that it’s gonna be awesome and feel great, that I’m strong and can get it done, etc, etc. Sometimes out loud! My husband enjoys that… and by “enjoys” I mean “enjoys making fun of me”. But I don’t care! It seems to work!

Another change: the last few months I’ve been keeping a fitness journal. I keep a notebook with me while I’m lifting and record all my weights, reps, sets, etc. along with how I’m feeling physically and emotionally. I also write in here whenever I go for a run or do some yoga and record how those made me feel. I’ll try to record if I’m running on too little sleep, or was feeling particularly hungry or had a lack of appetite, etc. This is where I record my measurements every couple weeks. All the things! Pretty much the only thing health and fitness related that doesn’t get written in this notebook is my food journaling, which I obviously do on MyFitnessPal.

Okay, so since I got all down on myself about lack of body changes and feeling stuck, I decided to revisit “The Female Body Breakthrough” by Rachel Cosgrove. Some of you may remember when I started this program back in 2012… twice. I never finished it, and I can’t promise or guarantee that it’ll get finished this time, as it’s entirely possible that I’ll get bored and move on to something else in order to maintain my motivation to keep up with regular exercise.

I restarted the program last night after spending the last several days obsessively trying to figure out what I was “doing right” the last time I had a decent run of steady weight loss. The two times over the last couple years that I had significant drops were when I was goofing around with FBB. Why not give it another shot and actually push myself and put some real effort in this time? So I did the first “base phase” workout last night and HOLY CRAP! My fitness level has increased EXPONENTIALLY since the last time I did this. It made me feel so good that I could do every move without needing to modify, and also that I was able to get through the 3 sets instead of just 2. The only thing I still don’t love about the program is the fricken 15-20 minute “warm-up”. It seems excessive. But I’m hoping once I get more familiar with it, it’ll go a little faster. Overall it took me about an hour to get through Workout A. This is only about 10-15 minutes longer than my ‘some lifting, some jumping around, some stretching’ goof-off routine I’ve been doing the last few weeks – and, as I said, the more familiar I become with the routine and the less I have to stop to look at the book, it may be faster. I see people on the MFP forums talk about how it only takes them about 30-45 mins, so there you have it.

This week is my fourth week back in the regular exercise game, so this weekend I’ll take new measurements (I took some a few weeks ago to see where I was from November, but never posted them – oops!) and new pictures. I already have a feeling that the new pictures are going to be much better than those above.