Reminder: it's going to take take time & patience

Dear James, Daniel and Emily

Boy it was a struggle to get up & running today! But I did it, it was actually warmer than I expected, kind of nice. Which made it easier, and all the threatened wind stayed away until I was in cool down. And I had to get out today because it is supposed to snow again tonight and I might not have the motivation to run in snow tomorrow, and I know I won't have time Saturday morning.

I had to remind myself this morning that it will take some time to get this weight off, as I plateaued from last week. Plus, I was spoiled by all that initial weight loss courtesy of 2 illnesses keeping me from eating 2 weekends in a row. It's okay, I am settling into better habits, and now that I can resume running those habits will start to bear real fruit. And I can start to see a more normal progression instead of big drops followed by plateaus.

Sadly it appears that it is time to move on to my backup shoes. I was hoping to get more miles from this pair, just broke past 200, but I can blame some of that on the weight that I am trying to work off. Hopefully the next pair will last longer. But that is one reason why I am not falling back into the trap of getting the expensive shoes again. So long as my feet can take the minimalist, less expensive shoes I will keep wearing and buying them. 

When life gave me deep snow, I grabbed the shovel

Dear James, Daniel and Emily

In the grand scheme of things I could have run in the snow this morning. It wasn't that deep, just a couple of inches. And the sidewalks were probably better today than they will be tomorrow morning. But that is neither here nor there. Bottom line is I didn't feel like running in the snow, so I didn't.

What I did do was grab the broom and snow shovel and spent a good 30 minutes clearing the steps and driveway. So I still got my exercise. I could have done more but our wonderful neighbor beat me to it and had already cleared the sidewalks for the entire block. So I only had to clear our driveway and steps and mom's steps. Which was just enough to get a little blood pumping.

All of these delays in resuming my regular running schedule are a test, and good practice. I am being forced to rely on perfecting my eating habits as my sole method of weight reduction until I get back into a regular exercise habit. Which is good for the long run, even if a little frustrating now. But it is working as I can feel my pants getting looser, and I can wear my belt again without it bothering me.

So this mornings decision to make the best of a negative situation (deep snow preventing me from running) by getting my exercise by shoveling is an example of the overall plan of turning the negative (weather, sickness) into positives (reduced appetite, lost weight solely from eating less, finding exercise where I can.)

The morphing or evolution of bug forces me to change my focus

Dear James, Daniel and Emily,

I was sure confident that I had moved past the flu bug. I was ready to take the next step in my running over the weekend, resuming my plan of running my hillier routes. And let the calorie burn of the running help me move along on my overall fitness and weight loss plan. Yep that was where things stood on Thursday.

Friday morning I felt kind of crummy, but mainly just sore and had trouble warming up, so I didn't push the miles. By Friday night I was starting to feel bad, so I just sat & watched a couple of movies. Saturday morning when I got up I felt roughly like death warmed over. It felt like the same damn flu bug had returned, only not quite as much coughing.

So I curled up on the couch and watched TV/slept the day away (while Kim played Super Mom, I love her for that.) By Sunday I was marginally better but still pretty miserable. I suffered through the day, able to do a little more, mainly taking care of Kim and watching football. Monday we both skipped work and made a point to go the the Dr. Mainly with the goal of seeing what it was, because on a cursory reading of symptoms I was afraid we had contracted pneumonia. Fortunately it turned out that all we have is matching sinus infections.

Which means once I feel up to it I can resume running. Which sadly enough means that I am not running for at least a week, because I need to get past this, and the best weapon in my arsenal (aside from antibiotics) is sleep.

And that means I have to focus my mental energy on my improved eating habits, and keeping myself under my calorie count without the help of the burn of running. Which is harder. But, in the long run will be better, because if I can get myself used to following that calorie number without running than when the running resumes it will that much easier, hopefully leading to more weight loss! See there is a positive spin to this whole sad tale.

Working out the scheduling kinks, ignoring silly thoughts & challenging myself

Dear James, Daniel and Emily

I had a plan, I was going to use Monday & Friday as my new off days. But I must have been forgetting what i was like to work a full week, after 3 weeks of partial or full days off work, and then before the schedule was anything but consistent. But this morning I remembered why I used Thursdays as a recovery day. Trying to run 3 days in a row, on work days, with out current school & activity schedule, just isn't practical. By Thursday morning I am tired, so I need that day off.

Makes more sense to run Friday & then the weekend days as my long stretch, because it is easier to sleep in and recoup some time on those weekend days. No big deal, just commenting on why I didn't run today. Plus, since Friday and Saturday are traditionally the days when we don't eat as well for dinner (eating out, split meals etc.) it is better to start that day with a run.

My other challenge for the week was not being silly. By that I mean trying not to get that feeling that I should eat something sweet after dinner, and succumbing to that since Kim is out doing something with a kid. That is just a silly, partially stress related thought, and exactly the sort of thing I have to challenge myself to move away from and ignore.

Tomorrow is my weigh in and will be the best test of where my new approach is really taking me. And then I get to start really running again this weekend. I have been purposely taking it easy this week, running my simplest flattest route. But starting this weekend I want to get back to challenging myself to incorporating the hills again. Because I think that if I want the running to be something useful I need to challenge myself a little more this year, and not be so content with just running my normal flat 3 mile route a few days a week.

Using the momentum of recovery as basis for moving forward

Dear James, Daniel and Emily

The first few days of the New Year went well, I was running, and eating right. Then I caught the terrible flu bug that is making the rounds. Leading to several days of laying around, coughing so much it hurt, and having little to no energy. I was only able to get back to running this past Sunday, and even then it is clear I don't have my full wind back.

I could let this bring me down, forget about all my attempts to get back into good habits, and focus on rest as my form of recovery. Instead I am going to attempt to pull a mental jujitsu move, and let the momentum of recovery pull me forward into better habits.

The biggest place I am using this is eating. Specifically my appetite. One of the hardest things to change is appetite, eating less is hard. But, one of the byproducts of the flu was that I had several days with little to no appetite. And I have focused on not returning to the holiday eating habits as my body has recovered. Because, even in recovery, I simply don't need to be eating that much. So I am doing my best to simply ride that temporary loss of appetite and convert it into the good habit of eating less.

And so far so good. I am starting to see some small, subtle differences. Just have to retain my focus while the good habits take hold. And I have also been better at holding to the 'is it protein or fiber' question when eating anything. I haven't been perfect, but I have gotten better.

And while the physical recovery may take another week before I am back to the New Year running level I am at least at the stage where I am running again this week. And I know that if I just run, even if it is not the desired route or distances, those will come.

All in all, it sucked to get sick. But I can at least find ways to use the enforced down time to my advantage and let that be my basis in not only recovering from illness but also recovering from the lapsed bad habits of the extended holiday season.