Tuesday, December 30, 2008

One Step at a Time

I know you are all on the edge of your seats with my progress...

I have definitely gotten my eating back under control this week, Hallelujah!
I'm feeling much better.

The insomnia has returned, however. I was up until midnight last night, then bright-eyed and bushy-tailed at 3:30am this morning. So, I laid in bed cursing the clock instead of getting up and going for a run.

Tomorrow morning is my Friday (I took Friday off work, and Thursday is a holiday). I've decided that I will just get up and run tomorrow morning, come hell or high water. I'll only have to suffer through one day of complete exhaustion at work.

A friend at work loaned me a couple of "Core Rhythms" dvd's to get my opinion of them, so I will HAVE to do those over the next few days, also. She just got them- got suckered in by the infomercial. I love to dance, but I'm not the smoothest dancer so this should be interesting...

I'm planning a long (ish) run on Thursday as a positive start to my New Year.
Then, my first race of the year on Saturday.
My plan at this point: Faking it.
I really feel like curling up and not doing much of anything, but I have to get in gear.

I'm still mulling over my 2009 Goals, I'll have something posted later this week.

Monday, December 29, 2008

Perspective...

I was talking to the Maintenance Manager at work today. He and I work very closely together on several projects. I was talking about my lack of give-a-damn lately, and how my weight has ballooned out of control. (Obsessed, am I?)

He told me it sounded like I have a bad case of cabin fever and that I need to get out and DO something about it. Yup, he's right.

It's really tough when you've gotten to this place to drag yourself out of it. At least, for me it is.

I should be able to sleep well tonight, since I didn't sleep at all last night. Hopefully that will spur me on to "DO something about it".

It's not a great idea getting your days and nights turned around when you're off work and don't have to be anywhere at any particular time. It makes it that much tougher on Day 1 back to work.

Sunday, December 28, 2008

Reformed Gym Rat No More

I’ve been somewhat MIA lately.

Nope, I haven’t been running. Not since the Jingle Bell Run.

I haven’t been working out much to speak of either.

First, the good. We had a fantastic Christmas. As always, I spent far too much on the kids, but they each got exactly what they wanted. My daughter got a touch-screen computer (and I inherited her year old laptop), Rock Band for Wii (the whole set), and some other various games, clothes, and a book from the fam and money from my parents.

My son got a new guitar and amp, a digital camcorder, a subscription to Xbox Live and the wireless adaptor for his Xbox to allow him to go online (we only have wireless internet at home), plus lots of band t-shirts from my fam and money from my parents.

I got some cool stuff, too from my fam. Some Pampered Chef stuff from my sis, Coca-Cola memorabilia from my bro and fam, a blender, talking Hoops and Yoyo calendar, and money from my parents (which bought me a Tomtom that I really wanted!).


Next the bad. I had an entire week off work and did absolutely nothing constructive with it. My big plan was to get my sleeping back on track and get back into the groove with running and lifting. I wound up staying up until 2 or 3 am every night, sleeping until 9 or 10am, then lounging around in sweats (or shorts) all day. The worst part, there were 3 days where the weather was so warm that I had the windows open in the house (65-70 degrees). Did I take advantage of the unseasonably warm weather? NOPE! I spent my time lounging about the house and eating junk food. Christmas was the worst. It was like I couldn’t stop myself.


And the ugly. I stepped on the scale on Christmas morning (I couldn’t help myself). It was bad. I stepped on the scale on Dec 26. It was 6 lbs higher. The day after Christmas, I weighed the same as I weighed the day that I brought my son home from the hospital 14+ years ago. I was mortified back then to be that huge. Bear in mind that I gained 50 lbs with each of my kids, they are only 12.5 months apart, so I didn’t lose all of the weight from #1 before getting pg with #2. I have never weighed this much before or since then… until now.

What to do about it? There’s not a lot I can do quickly at this point. I have gotten beyond the point where a few weeks is going to get me back to my fighting weight. This is going to take some serious work. And, the fact that I’m embarassed to go out in public makes it that much harder. I have a 5K scheduled for Sat, Jan 3 that I suppose I will run. I don’t want to, but that fact tells me that I definitely need to. I am going to work on putting together some short term and long term goals this week that will help me to get back to normal. I’m usually not much of a New Year’s Resolution type of person, but 2009 may be the year that I make some.

I have been doing a lot of reading this week, and one thing I read was in one of Jillian Michaels’ books. It said: “As you envision the changes in your future, you must begin to let go of your past… Forget about fat periods or skinny periods in your life.” A lot of my problems this year stem from the fact that I have never had a “real” problem with my weight. Before this year, I have never been “technically” overweight. I think I have let that fact affect me more than it should. I am so obsessed by it. I find myself talking about the “good old days” far too often. You know, the days when I spent half my free time at the gym, and had the body to show for it. That is not the case any more, and I need to get a handle on the present, and start looking toward the future.

OK. Enough about all that. Stay tuned, my goals for 2009 will be coming soon, and whatever goals I wind up with will be tracked through shorter-term goals.

Monday, December 8, 2008

Jingle Bell Run 5K - December 6

The Jingle Bell Run was scheduled to begin at 9am, or 8:45am, depending on which side of the race form you were looking at.

We hadn't agreed on a time to leave for the race prior to Saturday morning. Knowing that the race is about 30 minutes or so from my house, I got ready around 7-7:30am. Barbie called when she left her house. She said the roads were pretty bad, but she was on her way. Our first snow of the year came on Friday night.

We made it to the race at 8:30 ish and found that the race was going to have an even later start than planned. The race director was unable to be there, and the people who were taking over for her were out digging the mile markers out of the snow. It was only a couple of inches, it wasn't like it was a blizzard or something! Ah, well, that gave us more time to dread the race and try to talk each other out of running it.

Not wanting to stand around and wait, we went back to the car and started getting ready. You know, second-guessing what to wear for the weather, making sure Garmin has acquired the satellites, getting the ipod headphones untangled and ready to go. We figured we would see everybody come out of the building where the packet pick-up was taking place and meet up with them at the starting line.

BAD PLAN! The starting line was actually BEHIND the building, and everybody went out the back door when the race was getting ready to begin. All of a sudden, we looked up and saw a bunch of walkers moseying past the front of the car. What?? That CAN'T be the walkers for the RACE, can it?

Ummmm, yes, yes it can. We bolted out of the car and over to the race start. Luckily, this is a small town race, and we know the people taking care of timing. OK, so they will be taking 2:29 off our finish time. Off we go!

Let me just say, it's kind of fun to start a race late and chase everybody down. I was passing EVERYBODY! OK, so maybe most of them were walkers, but I'll take it! The course wasn't quite the same as last year. I thought there must be some shortcut at the end. Nope.
There was apparently some confusion over where the last turn should be.

Actual distance: 3.85 miles
My time (Garmin): 37:09 (9:39 pace)

We left before the race results, as we were not going to make a big deal about asking them to update our times. It was our own stupid fault that we missed the start! Barbie would have won the overall race if the times were adjusted. There was only one girl ahead of her, and not by 2 minutes. When the results are published, I'll know if the times were adjusted, but I'm happy to have gotten out there anyhow.

I didn't run all last week, as I was attempting to keep from getting a full-blown cold... my first in 3 YEARS!! UGH!!
I was out of commission for the most part on Sunday with the cold, but I'm feeling great today.

After the race, we went out for Mexican and wine (of course) and then headed home.

Later, I took the kids shopping again, and I've ALMOST finished my Christmas shopping. Of course, when the kids each want $500-$1,000 gifts, it doesn't take long to finish. One item for each kid and I'm DONE! Christmas morning isn't gonna be much of a surprise, but at least they'll have surprise gifts at my parents'.

Monday, December 1, 2008

Great River Road Race Report - or Happy Birthday to ME!!

Holy long title, Batman!

After totally blowing it on Thanksgiving, even though I had a plan to keep my eating in check... I proceeded to shop away the day AFTER Thanksgiving, getting a late start (thus avoiding the worst of the crowds) and getting a big chunk of my Christmas shopping done.

Saturday, 11/29 was my 35th birthday and the day of the Great River Road 10 mile race. The race was an out-and-back, right along the Mississippi River. I had signed up on Wednesday, along with a couple of friends. They tried (a little) to talk me out of it, but I figured I could at least have a healthy START to my day.

When Saturday arrived, I did NOT want to run 10 miles. Ugh! What was I thinking?? I tried to talk THEM out of it after we had already arrived at the race. But, alas, it was too late. We were doomed to run it.

I am SO glad that we did! At the start, it was about 40 degrees. This would normally be shorts weather for me. But, the race was right along the RIVER for crying out loud. And, I was COLD! So, I wore pants and a lightweight long sleeve shirt.

On the way out, it was SO HOT! I thought I had overdressed. I enjoyed the out-and-back, because we could see the frontrunners on their way back. Angie and I ran together, with Barbie taking off and beating us by almost 30 minutes. Gah!

At the turnaround, I was glad to be "overdressed". We ran the last 5 miles into a headwind. I wasn't there to "race". I hadn't ran since 11/16 (are you surprised?). Before that, I ran on 11/8 and 11/1. I was just there to run 10 miles. Or walk. Angie drug me through the last couple of miles, and we wound up running it in an 'official' time of 1:47:15. Not great, but I was fine with it.

Here are a couple of shots of Angie and I at the finish:




Afterward, we went out for Mexican (of course) and a couple of glasses of wine (of course).