You Can't Ever Go Home Again

My goodness, you guys. It's been a helluva last 14 days... crap, I can't believe I waited so long to post. *sigh* I'm sorry.

So! Here we go, a recap on my last 2 weeks:

As I said in my most recent post, this year for Thanksgiving (since I wasn't busy popping out a baby) we went to Arkansas, where all my extended family is and/or gathers for the holidays. The time spent down there was wonderful. Being able to spend so much time with so much family is important to me, and it gave me a little bit of the break from work (and "real life" in general) that I was looking for and really needed. However, it felt like a short trip this time around even though it was only about a day less than usual, and the drive home was pretty nightmarish with a normally 7.5 hour drive, taking us close to 13 hours. 10 hours later it was time to get up and go to work/school/daycare for all of us!

Ugh.

I hadn't seen much of my extended family since Thanksgiving of 2010, and this year was a little strange for me. I don't know if it's because my stress level here in Virginia has been a bit higher this year or if I just am realizing that my grandparents aren't going to be around forever, or what - but I really had no desire to come back home. Seriously. Let my house, my job, my life, even my friends be damned. I just wanted to stay in Arkansas. Even though I couldn't honestly imagine actually living down there. Y'know, since I haven't in, oh, 20 years. Since I was 8. And things are certainly a bit different. It's funny how things don't seem quite as fresh and bright as they did as a kid - or even just a few years ago. It's true, you can't ever go home again.

I think I may just be looking for something different - maybe something a little slower. Maybe that's what draws me to the south. It's just a slower, more conscious way of living. Living for the sake of living, not for the sake of working. Not so much go, go, go all the time. I think it may be a case of "the grass is always greener" - maybe if I live somewhere different, none of the stress of real life could possibly follow me. We all know that isn’t true, and that philosophy that you can “leave behind” your worries is a big fat lie.

I ate like a total pig while we were there and couldn't seem to get my water in like I should have. I stepped on the scale the morning after we came home to reflect a 3 lb gain, but I'm almost certain that is water weight. Between the ridiculous amount of restaurant food and fast-food eaten and my period (sorry to the dudes out there reading) starting this weekend, water weight was bound to happen.

Non-Scale Victory: my Old Navy corduroy pants from 2010/pre-pregnancy 2011 not only fit, but are actually a little big now. My size 16 Gap khakis (which they don't make anymore and are the most flattering "business" type pants on me - go figure!) fit perfectly!! For my figure, Gap usually runs really small and I haven't been able to get in these slacks since 2009. Pretty exciting stuff.

So now that I've been all positive about my clothes... I can get negative on my body and my habits, right? I mean, I probably shouldn't... but I'm going to anyway:

The beginning of this month started out really well. I was sticking to my goals better than I think I have all year. Then getting ready for vacation happened, then the actual vacation happened, and even though that's only really about 2 weeks of being "out of it" on the health/fitness front, it feels like much, much longer. I was pretty positive in my last post, and this week I am feeling way down. It may be hormonal, but I feel like I should be kicking it in to gear with a little more consistency. One of my MyFitnessPal buddies posted a status the other day that said something along the lines of: You can only expect partial results from partial effort.

Truer words have never been spoken.

Okay, that may be an exaggeration... however, I definitely have only been giving this "getting healthy" thing a partial effort. I still eat fast food like it's going out of style, I'm lazy with getting my workouts in regularly, I've quit taking my walks since the weather turned cold (it's called a coat...and hat and gloves..), I'm getting out of control with my sweets consumption all over again, I feel like I've gained fat even though I'm maintaining weight and can still fit in my clothes, etc. etc. I know part of acting this way and feeling this way is the time of year. Winter is always really hard for me. I get so depressed and just want to sleep all day.

I know the negative inner-monologue doesn't do me any good either, but it's rough. I read through all these success stories on MFP, and I just keep thinking to myself, "That should be me. That could be me. If I could get it together."

I just need to motivate. Maybe I need to start doing my workouts in the morning before everyone else gets up. I hate waking up early and am a total night owl... but I also know it's hard for me to motivate for exercise when the kids need dinner and baths and bedtime stories, when the tv is on - beckoning me to sit with Mike on the sofa and settle in for the evening, when there's the possibility of going out for beers and bar food with friends. In the morning there aren't any of those things. It's just me. In the basement. With my weights and my stability ball.

Sidenote: I don't think I'm going to renew my gym membership since I haven't been since March - so I need to figure out a way to do HIIT inside at home. Purchasing a treadmill or elliptical right now is not an option, as I have no expendable income for that kind of stuff at the present time. If anyone has any good ideas, let me know. I suppose there's always running up and down the stairs. I used to do that when I first started one of Jackie Warner's workout routines... but if I'm going to seriously try to be getting up at 6am to workout, then running up and down the stairs might defeat my whole "no one is up to bother me" purpose. lol

I think another reason maybe I fall off the bandwagon so quickly with exercise is because I've been so focused on lifting... and you can't do that every day. I really need to work in things on my off-lifting days. Things like HIIT (as I mentioned above), yoga, just plain old walking. I think if I can make exercise an almost-everyday thing, I may be able to keep up with it a little easier. The trick there is to make sure I actually give myself true "rest" days and not get obsessed and overwork myself.

This all seems way more complicated than it needs to be. Maybe I should simplify for a couple months.. until we get through the roughest part of winter. Instead of going through these intricate weight training/circuit training routines, just make myself to commit to planks/side planks, squats/deadlifts, push-ups/dumbbell rows 3 non-consecutive days a week, 15-20 mins of HIIT 3 times a week and yoga 2 times a week. So it would look something like this:

• Mon/Weds/Fri: Strength followed by HIIT - 15 minutes each
• Tues/Thurs: Yoga - 45 minute routine

Wow, doesn't that look EASY and NOT time consuming?! Totally doable, right?! 

Perhaps I will create a challenge... (because we all know how well that worked out the last time I did it HA!)

Oh! I almost forgot: I am starting a burpee challenge on December 1st. I'm not entirely sure I can even do one burpee... let alone work up to 100. But let's face it, even if I can only do one or a few, that is some sort of exercise I'm getting every. day.

How are all my readers faring with the sad winter weather? Is it affecting your motivation and healthy habits?