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 30th 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 13th.
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.