another day down...

Yesterday went much better than expected as even though I did not rock the run I was able to run the entire 5K.  Several years ago I ran the same race without being in shape and I could not run a mile without stopping so yeah me for yesterday!  My other and I ate out and although I would not call it a healthy meal I felt I did not completely over indulge either in food or alcohol so another yeah me.   I had worked on my Italian lessons in the morning and the afternoon (Seriously if you want to learn a language Livemocha is incredible) and I felt like a made a tad bit of progress in comprehension and ability to make my tongue say all those crazy syllables.  My other and I worked on the puzzle in the night and it just overall felt like a pretty good day.  It was a small step towards being more what I want the days to be like.

I have started reading this book The End of Overeating and only a couple of chapters in and it is 1) much different than I expected 2) really interesting reading.  It is talking about how sugar, fat and salt make us want from a biological pleasure perspective MORE sugar, fat and salt and how the foods of today completely capitalize on the physiological reaction for most of us with the way they make the foods.  I havent finished yet but so far ..really interesting!

I went to a yoga class today despite being a bit nervous.  I made myself late because I became worried about the shoes I am going to wear and how bad my hair looked - ridiculous I know but sometimes neurosis is just an abusive thing in my head.  I get a bit nervous doing anything out of my comfort zone.  I started worrying about work (remember the one I am leaving) and about not being good enough, my shirt being too tight and bam I am out of the house 10 minutes later than I wanted to be.   I also start to wonder if I should not go because I am running late.  I laughed at myself a little because I was all stressed out about going to a yoga class.

I get there right on time, which is really about 10 minutes late because I wanted to get there early enough to deal with the registration bits.  

Turns out I was the only one who showed for the class so it was just me and the instructor.  She was nice and we had a pretty good class but wow nothing like yoga to expose your body for the shape it is actually in.  The thing about running is that it is just one step in front of the other and I can muscle through that even though it hurts.  However holding myself up with one leg outstretching the other leg and arm...there is no where to hide.  It felt great though afterwards and I can really feel the stretches.  I never did get to the cleansing my mind during the very end because if felt a bit awkward with only me there.

The good news is this afternoon I got a ton done and I am feeling pretty relaxed.  I was good not to waste my time and just wallow all afternoon.  I was going to try to go to one early in the morning tomorrow but I know I will bail because its cold and snowy and I would really need to leave the house at 6am.  Yikes!!   Tomorrow is a tough day.  10am coffee with an ex-employee turned mother to talk to.  Lunch with co-worker that I am actually sad to say goodbye too and really respect.  3pm meeting to say good bye to my team.  Maybe some after hours thing for the company to say goodbye.  It will be a hard day as I hate good-byes and I feel bad leaving them and we are all ready at this point to just move on.   Arrivederci!

Morning person by biology

Some how, some way, I have become an early riser, well let me be clear by early I mean 6am not 4 am.  I do mean that the minute I wake up I am wide awake and there is no going back to sleep for me.  You think I would rejoice at this news because it means that it is not hard for me to get up and get going.  It would allow me extra time to write in my blog and exercise and generally be more productive.  Unfortunately I have not embraced my new found wakened state and lay there longing for the ability to stay warm under the covers - envy my sig other and my dog who are both sleeping soundly.  The side effects are also that at night come 9 or 10 pm I am getting wiped out and those who slept in until 8 or 9 still feel great.  Boo!

I am starting to realized that I need to figure out a way to embrace this new me but I cannot help but wonder why it started happening.  I know older people (hey now I am not that old) are habitual earlier risers and early bird dinner is at 5pm because they are exhausted.  I had thought this was more a generational thing that these people had always been morning risers and when you don't have much to do at night you resort to going to bed earlier.  I swear what is happening to me is biological as my eyes pop open and even if I am still tired (which generally I am), the brain is chugging full steam ahead.    If it is biological - does it happen to everyone?  Am I eventually going to be a 4 am riser?  One of my favorite excuses for not exercising in the morning is that I am too tired and cannot get up.  Is my body plotting to take that excuse from me?  I know it would be a positive step for me ...but dang it I want to be deep asleep, warm and hitting the snooze button over and over begging for just another few minutes of shut eye.

If I wake up with ease at 6am, could 5am for exercise be so difficult?  If I actually got out of bed at 6, would that be enough time to get a run done in the morning?  God I hate that these questions are even a possibility.

Its early morning sunday the house is dark and everyone is asleep but me and the cats who are creating a ruckus at this very moment.  The sun is coming up and slowly the day is coming to light and I am sitting in the glow of my laptop trying to keep my promise to keep writing. Yesterday was a success as we went to the dog park and I managed to finagle the right phone upgrades - god I had forgotten how long all that takes.  We tried to see the movie but due to fire alarms we were unable.  We manage to scarf down some gorgeous oysters, crab legs and steak tartar instead.  I went to bed comparably sober which was a nice change but my stomach is still a weird acid pit that wants out of my body.  Drinking water now to see if I can settle it out.

I slept pretty well really except all the crazy work dreams and another weird dream where we realized that we were really just a colony on a large giant and not a planet after all - not sure what that was about.  The work dream was repetitive in I was trying to get a job and we were negotiating of 2K and while walking around the school there was a catholic priest giving prayer over lunch and outside there was a congregation of amish people and people from my current work were either joining this new company or talking to me about it - very strange.

We have our jingle bell run today and to say I am terrified is probably not over stating it.   I have gained a gazillion pounds and have not taken a step towards exercise in FOREVER.  I can either use this as the catalyst to start back up again or just suffer and forget.  You think it would be obvious which to do but it is winter and cold and I am struggling to find the motivation to exercise.  I have a friend that is probably right that I should pull back on my goals a bit so they do not feel like such trudgery (I know this is not an official word but it should be).  I have a google calendar called Renee's Training and really I have probably created it a dozen times over the last few years.  Carefully staking out each day's activity and the exercise plan that will get me....there...  but that is far as I get the plan to exercise rather than exercising.  I have the best intentions, the right ability to set goals and completely no follow through.  I have written about it a ton but the motivation is just not there.

I have been good that I told myself I would not sign up for big races, or buy new clothes or buy new cool clothes until I have been running and am on my plan...but none of that has motivated.  Although now my clothes are so tight I can barely wear them something has to happen ...I CANNOT buy fat clothes. I want to though because I want to walk into the first day of my new job feeling confident not like the walrus I feel like in my tight pants that barely button at the top.  My immediate fat points are my gut, thighs and butt (typical for a woman) which just destroy my pants.  When I was on the cleanse and lost the 6-8 pounds (must have been alcohol and sugar related - maybe carbs) I saw the thighs and gut immediately shrink down.  So what do I do - buy a few fat pants and try to remotivate or shove myself into my current pants and use the humiliation to motivate?   Jury is still out.

As much as it is the lack of exercise though - everything leads back to diet and food choices.  My brain knows this but when my other asks me would I like chicken and veggies, not only do I say no but part of me rebels and wants the carbs and "feel good" food more than I did before I heard the healthy option laid down.  I know I am not alone with this but damn it is a frustrating cycle.

Today's goals.  Run and try to have a good time rather than an emotional beating.  Go have lunch but do not overdo it on having beers and try to make some "decent" food choices.  This afternoon I have a few things of interest....work on the puzzle, make dinner for the boys (if they will be around) and maybe take the dog to the beach in the afternoon.  Tomorrow morning I have a Hot Yoga class in sight - which scares me a little because hot yoga destroys me but in a good way.

Alright I am going to go fire up my kick ass language class from Livemocha and try not to butcher the Italian language and after that I might sneak back into bed.   A domani!

I know I have been missing in action for awhile.  It has been gnawing on me that I have not been writing but I was not quite ready to face myself so I have been hiding from my blog.  A ton of things have happened and they are hard to all recount but the good news is that I have found myself a new job.  For my mental health, this was really needed because the negativity from work was impacting my ability to laugh and smile at home.  The irony is that the leaving part is incredibly hard on me as a person and I wonder the value of giving any real notice unless you have a specific task to do.  Being at work right now is difficult because I have become - as I should be - completely irrelevant. You add that with the awkwardness of being the one who is leaving and my own feelings of loyalty and guilt - these last few days have been really difficult.  Good news is that it almost over and I have a plan to mitigate the impact for next week so really I am calling it as of yesterday.

I have been "blaming" work for the stress and my complete over indulgence and under performing.  I think some of it is true because winding down from work I am really sort of shocked at how exhausted I feel.  I have 9 days more or less off and it is going to be my goal to feel better and rested at the end of this time.  It is going to require a little less alcohol and perhaps a work out or two rather than the type of days that is just feasting and indulgence.  I need a plan otherwise the days will just swirl and rush by and I will not really remember doing anything other that being on my computer or watching TV.  I will have read the internet if I do not have some sort of strategy.

Things I have though of is Dog Walking, Cooking, Reading (lame because I always do that), swimming, working out/running and that is really it - of coarse because those are always my standard answers.  Maybe it is a "one day at a time" type thing.  Today my goal is to go to the dog park, get a new phone and go see Tron and that does not seem very ambitious. Tomorrow the only thing on my list is a 5K run that I am dreading because I am so gross right now.  I have a whole list of things I would like to learn and do but when it comes to thinking about doing them and bringing the into the day I fail miserably.  I found this list of semi-productive things to do and it reminded me that I had put together a list and started to work on it slowly.

Here is my list:

• The stars/sky - I found a monthly meeting where there is a lecture and stargazing at Harvard.
• Learn a language - I am looking at classes rather than self-learning but trying to find ones that are not crazy money.  
• Rock Climbing - I dread this because of the shape I am in but it might be a fun thing to do as a regular night time or weekend activity.
• Guitar - Picking that back up and trying to play.
• Urban explorations - finding abandoned building to take pictures of even though I am not the photographer in the house.
• Geocaching just to try and see what it is like.
• Museums/Art - there are a ton of museums and art galleries to go and look at.  
• Yoga - I used to be really into Yoga and meditation and it was good for my mind and soul.  I should think about this more.
• Volleyball/Indoor soccer/some pick up type games that do not intimidate the hell out of me.

I will work today and tomorrow to do things with purpose and try to plan for a 9 days that brings me back around and releases my stress and prepares me for my new adventure!  If I don't write tomorrow....I will have already lost an opportunity.

Bad, Ugly and Hellish

So it has been a terrible few days for several reasons but I will start with the bad, then the ugly and move to the straight out hellish!  I have managed to gain every single pound back and spent the weekend eating without abandon.  I forgot all about clean food or eating the right calories or type of food and just went straight out and ate whatever the hell I wanted.  In addition to food gluttony, the ugly is the amount of alcohol that I consumed in the last few days have been "impressive" if that is the type of thing you are going for but not really my end game.   The hellish is the insane amount of pain I was in since three this morning and am still struggling with tonight due to a raging stomach and headache.

I went to the doctor today for several reasons 1) mammogram I had to get checked out again since I boycotted my biopsy 11 months ago and pissed off my doctor royally.  Turns out it was all ok and nothing has change so it was a big hub-bub over nothing.   If you have never had you boobs smashed and stretched by a complete stranger, you cannot understand the ugh-i-ness of a mammogram.  It is all for the better good I know but it sucks.  I am now on a six month rotation to ensure my calcifications are not anything evil. 

 2) My arches kill when I run and I wanted a referral to see a foot guy that could tell me if I needed different arch support for my shoes.  Referral accomplished!  

3) My hands are killing me - my thumbs specifically.  I have a natural grandmother with hands narled by arthritis and so this had me a little afraid but I figured it was carpal tunnel.  It turns out the one that hurts the most is showing signs of mild CMC joint degenerative changes with sclerosis and mild osseous proliferation.  I tried my usual method of self-diagnoses through google but it turns out it is not an easy thing to dumb down so I am waiting to hear from my doctor if that really matters and more important - how do I fix it?  This of coarse scares the living hell out of me....my hands really hurt and I am losing the ability to grip things without a lot of pain.   Ugh.

4) Since I was there and suffering from a terrible stomach ache - I braved up and asked her what could be going on and what was the best remedy when in this state. She guessed it was acid reflux or more likely gastritus.  Her first statement to me was to cut out alcohol and caffeine.  I am not a big caffeine person but see above about alcohol.  She said I needed to stop drinking and I looked at her and said forever?  She asked if that would be a problem and I felt pretty small at that point because in my mind I was screaming YES YES that would be a problem. The goal as she explained it is to stop drinking until my stomach lining truly heals and even then a limited amount.  I wanted the cleanse to be a cleanse not a lifestyle.  If I was going to be honest, I felt better (minus not having much energy) while on the cleanse.  I slept all night and did not wake up at my traditional 3 or 4 am and I never had a stomach ache and the gas/bloating discomfort definitely subsided.  Was it really just the alcohol or are there other things that my body is reacting to?  Why am I reacting now more than before?  Whatever it is TODAY sucked.  I am so uncomfortable, burning stomach and i just want to put food into my stomach to try to get it to stop feeling like a bubbling caldron of acid.

So reflecting on what today taught me from a medical perspective.  My body starting the process to break down and be a hinderance to my life.  Struggling to understand how I feel about all this but it really kind of sucks.  I am only 43 and overall I am ok, nothing life threatening....just life dampening.  Boo.

 

I thought I would write another musing while on this final plane ride for the week. I finished my book and this is a chance to get some words down.  I am not going to write about goals, motivation or food and I think we are all a bit tired of hearing me commit and fail or pontificate about way I should be or want to be or whatever rat hole I slip into.  Last night I had a really interesting conversation because it made me realize that all this pontification is really only a pretense of me trying to believe I know myself.

Six of us went out to dinner, four people from the customer team, a coworker and me. The big boss is French, a genuine guy, which is generally very interesting to talk to about almost anything.  The day had been a little brutal as they had spent most of it grilling me and talking about all the things my company does and is currently doing wrong.  It had been a tough couple of months for this customer and they had quite a bit of frustration that they wanted to share.  It had been rough but we all managed to keep it business and not personal.  On breaks, we laughed and chatted and then went back into the boxing ring when the meeting resumed.  It is not super easy for me to keep from getting too defensive and lash out, but taking the beatings with grace is what I get paid to do.

Anyway ... They want to go to dinner and they started it off wrong for me by saying we were going to a nice quite steakhouse that was a very good restaurant and would not be one of these loud generic places that were littered all over the area.  It sounded great to me, a nice meal, and a nice glass of wine - perfect way to end the stressful day. I knew the conversation would flow well because we had been more than able to communicate in the worst of times.

Where did we go? A typical chain steakhouse with dead animals all over the walls, loud, terrible service, no wine selection and a fairly generic menu. BOOO!!! I adjusted but I was damn disappointed but I will admit that my quality of my filet was very good.

As expected we chit chatted with the greatest of ease about wine, books, where they lived, and the conversation turned to food.  It turned out the big boss had strong opinions about loving food and wanting others to love it too - maybe it is a French thing? It started because two of his guys ordered their steak medium, which was a crime against the meat in his opinion - I actually agree with him. I am not clear how the conversation turned but he began to list of all the meats he likes to eat or has ever eaten. We talked about the easy ones duck, liver, ostrich, boar, deer and then started getting more off beat like bear, tongue, horse, intestines, cheeks and it went on and on.  We talked about fish and oysters snake and dog and he was pulling out pictures and talking about recipes - the man loves his food.  About half the table was adventurous with food and the other half was very conservative so it made for interesting dialog and dynamics.

We started down a path of texture and how that is a big killer for a lot of foods and everyone has different textures that just do not work for them. Sweetbread, Mushrooms, bone marrow, oysters and sea urchins were used as examples of foods with "texture issues." One of his guys was talking about how everyone has their line of something they would not consider eating - what was considered acceptable to even try to eat. He was actually not a very adventurous eater but some how started with he would never eat eyeballs - that to him was crossing the line.  As we talked further his line was actually much further back - raw fish, oysters, kidney, liver - but we all knew what he meant and we knew we all had our own line.  Except maybe for the big boss who could not think of anything other than dog that would cross his line.  One of the people was from china and lived in Singapore and told us as well as she could about the strange oddities in China and she would eat most things. Interesting but her line was really alcohol. She had only ever tasted alcohol and would never drink it again - she did not like the taste or the affect that she felt so it was knocked off the list. The irony was all of us telling her that if she drank more and kept at it she would like it more but no one stood up for bone marrow or oysters with the same fervor.

One of the coworkers joked that he never wanted to be in a plane crash because he was sure his boss would eat him. Which sparked the boss to tell the story about how he had heard one of the survivors of the rugby players plane crash (see the movie Alive! if you do not know what I am referring to) and the struggles and the challenges to make the decision to eat or not to eat - which was really deciding to live or not to live. He had a lot of details about their experience that in a different circumstance you would swear we were about to enter a scene of from a Hannibal Lector movie.

Eyeball man took a different angle and told me about how in his youth he had a choice of military or public service and he chose public service and was assigned to parametric team for a year. He was surprised the most about the way other people reacted when he would arrive on the scene. People would just stand there and watch other people die or get more injured and never provide a helping hand. They would almost seem just frozen or gawking to the point of inaction. Convinced these people would be the type that when confronted with the hypothetical question if they would help some one in danger they would respond emphatically yes.

These conversations sparked a challenge to my perception that we can know who we are and how we will respond to any situation that is extreme or perhaps even out of our normal experience. I spend a gazillion hours clearly defining myself and am fascinated by the idea that all my constructs of self may or may not hold up under unusual circumstances. Someone suffers or loses someone or something and we all have a judgment for what is the acceptable response in those situations. While not all our individual responses may align, in our mind we all have an answer (I think this is true but I have no facts) that comes to our minds immediately on the appropriate and even acceptable response. Those may be different as we have tolerance for not having the appropriate response but there is an acceptable answer as well that we have self-defined.

Would I eat human meat? If I really believed it was the only way to survive, most definitely. Would I crack under the pressure and turn into a screaming shrew on Amazing Race? I totally believe I would become irritated and unglued. Would I help someone who was being hurt or victimized in front of me? I would say yes unless the risk to my own self was too high. I do not think I would run into a burning building or draw sniper fire away from a victim, as the fear of my own safety would out weigh the desire to help a fellow human in distress. How would I manage a death of someone close to me? I think I would be sad, mourn and move on keeping the sadness inside and swallowing it for no one else to see. Are my responses acceptable or appropriate to everyone, probably not but they are how I see myself.

I know I deal with things but cutting them out of my mind and heart so I do not feel things that hurt.  I know that I genuinely want to help people but my own desire to survive is stronger than my sense of duty to my fellow human.  I know that I do not believe in god or the afterworld and actually have very little enthusiasm about this life, this world  and in the end would risk and retreat more than I would be proud of seeing in action.

I have historical trauma that tends to support my understanding of myself, but is it that the things I think relate are really shadows in comparison to an extreme condition? I have to believe my childhood was a bit of an extreme condition. I look at the years after childhood, full of strange and awful things and yet I survived them as I would have expected. The question in my mind is if we really do not know what we would do in an extreme circumstance or are we just not very honest with others and ourselves around us when we are asked.

So I quit the cleanse and I seemed to have quit everything else that was on track too.  I was writing consistently and then I just fell off the wagon.  It would have been an interesting time to try to write about my struggle on making decisions and where I was trying to find my balance but instead I just shut down and withdraw.  It is how I handle emotional stress and disappointment - partial or sometimes complete withdrawal from everything.  Failure seems to make me stop being everything I want to be not just one thing.  Hurt seems to pull me deep within myself terrified of the exposure I feel.

The irony is when I am completely alone and not sleeping and away from home I have this strange reaction of recommitting to everything and "refinding" myself.  However, from experience, it is just a mechanism that I use to deal with being away and isolated.  I have never returned from a trip and been super motivated and changed everything - or anything for that matter.

I am not lost on topics to write about and my mind is full of thoughts and interesting thoughts but there is something that just jams up inside of me when I am sitting at home feeling like a complete failure.  It is easier to throw myself into despair and continuing to screw up so I feel worse and worse.  It is such a consistant pattern and i can see it happening but i do not know how to stop it.  I sit thinking about writing and even get frustrated with myself and being unsatisfied with everything that I do.  The only thing I can say I did different this time is I did a ton of catch up on outstanding errands and bills that were months and months overdue.  Perhaps that is something to be proud of but one small solace in a two week spiral downwards.

The cleanse is dead

Alright so I do not really want to write but I am gonna.  The cleanse is dead.  It was such a high and then bam just like that it we ended it.   The comatose feeling definitely played a strong role in the death but really we were just done with the restrictive rice/beans veggies meals. We are foodies through and through and although we survived 14 days and even today we both stayed pretty well on target this was not a life style we could maintain.  I think most of the benefit was gained and really counting calories is more effective than wicked restrictive diets.  Don't believe me..read about the Twinkie weight loss plan.  So what is the plan?  I plan to keep within my calories (1200 a day), eat responsibly and exercise and I am left thinking that paying attention to what we eat will be more effective than not eating anything we enjoy.

So now what the hell will I talk about in this blog if I am not obsessed with food?  I am not exactly sure.  Although as long as I am counting calories there is a pretty good chance I will stay obsessed.  I guess I can talk about my running, my plans of running, my attempts at figuring out what the hell to do about swimming for my triathlon training.  Ugh.  Fall asleep yet.  Although I guess ranting about food is not really all that special either.

I am still exhausted on or off the cleanse but I think that may actually have to do with the fact that I work in a relatively stressful job and I haven't had a vacation in like forever and I am completely stressed out about money.  Boo hoo for me.  I should be glad I have a job and can give and do for everyone like I need/want to.

One thing I am going to do is to start to put together a list of recipes I want to cook.  Not necessarily for the holidays but I want to do one or two recipes a week just to try stuff out - even if it means dropping them off at work so we don't eat them all.  I have this system that I realized needs a little tweak because it is not quite right yet.  I subscribe to a gazillion food blogs because some of these sites are like porn with their gorgeous pictures and awesome sounding recipes.  I save all the recipes that capture me as a bookmark right now and that really is not working because the list is getting long.  I might need to capture it in something like evernote so I can control it better than just in a bookmark.  I also want to start making them and reviewing what I thought of the recipe and how close it came to my expectations.   My be a little spice for reading.   Hint - never google for "food porn" as there are some disturbing results.  I also like reading them for ideas of how to improve my own cooking creativity - I should clarify that My Guy does all the cooking I do some prep and some of the creativity.  He is the real chef in the kitchen but we make a good complementary team as I help with planning and ideas and he is just awesome.

Tomorrow I have to solve the pool problem and where I can go swimming on Wednesday.  There is a 30 day 30$ at Boston Sports that I might try or just do the YMCA either way it is going to cost me more than I wanted and there is no easy solution.  I have to put on my creative hat and figure this one out.

Sunday morning.  I decided to lessen the reigns on the cleanse a bit as neither one of us were feeling good enough to say that the cleanse was good for our bodies.  We have not dropped it all together but are going to try to add a few things in to improve the way we feel.  We had eggs with beans this morning and it was tasty and filling.   I am hoping the eggs provide a little more protein or substance to give me some energy during our run.  My thought is the gluten free goes but the low carbohydrate remains - which just means that I can eat bread but I do not make it a main part of my 1200 calories.   We added eggs and I have not figured out what to transform the Vegan aspect of the diet to but we broke it with having eggs this morning.   The idea of this cleanse was to feel better and remodulate our food intake.  Given that last night at 8pm we felt about 100 years old, some how I think that is not really working for us.  However, it has significantly helped with me as far as looking at what I eat and making real choices.

There was a quote up the other day that rang true "It is our decisions and not our desires that determine our destination" - Andy Stanley.  I figured out he is a religious guy and was probably taking it down a different alley but still I totally related.  It all comes down to the tension of desires - the pleasure versus long term results.  Maybe this month will help us not only rethink our decisions but help us learn to make better decisions.  The real purpose of this whole experiment is figuring out how to live balancing what we want NOW and what we want later for our long term success.  I do not under any circumstances want to just throw those 6 pounds back on to my body so I need to keep making good choices.

We did put together a list races that we would like to do in 2011 and it is a little scary and overwhelming.  I ran the Chicago marathon on pure determination with no training and no real health.  I still doubt I should actually count it as a marathon completed but there were names after me.  If I want to do what we are planning for 2011, I actually have to be in shape and I am terrified that I am not actually able to physically accomplish our goals.  The big goal is the Goofy in 2012 Disney - which is running a half and full marathon back to back.  The rest of the year is litered with Marathons, relay races, obstacle courses and currently one triathlon.  The triathlon adds a whole another level of complexity as I have to really be able to swim.  I am supposed to start that training next week as I will need to regularly train otherwise that will never be successful.  The whole plan means making a commitment to my training to pull it off and honestly I have never actually been that fit or that consistant with my work outs so what if I can't (but really that is what if I don't) how will I disappoint myself and my guy.  Is this amount of work something I really want?  However, just pretend for a minute I actually did it....WOW what a crazy year it would be and how proud would I be of myself.  

Ramblings from a plane

One thing I have noticed that is that my mind feels clearer and I am not feeling the stress as emotionally as I was feeling it before the cleanse.   The stress is still there and I impacted it but it does not feel like such a deathblow to my emotions.  It may also be that I have spent so much time in this mode that I have started to become a little bit immune to it all.

I am realizing that I am not sure how I spend all my free time.  TV has become harder to tolerate.  I spend an enormous amount of time just surfing the web but not with any real value.  Wandering around the internets has perhaps killed a little of my creativity and desire to do other things.  I know it slows down my book reading and it eats a tremendous amount of time. 

A typical night is TV in the background and me on the computer wandering around Reddit or all my RSS feeds.  It is not a complete waste because I somewhat enjoy it and it is a way to get completely disengaged from everything.  I do not really impact anything, learn anything …use my mind or am I just underrating the surfing.    I do learn and think but to what end?  It is just random and unfocused and unsustainable. 

It is really cold at home so I am really terrified about my consternation about continuing to run outside.  If I think of my plan, I have made it easy for myself.  I want to run in the morning 2 days during the week (5 miles) and then one weekend run that is longer but minimum of 5.  That would give me a 15-20 min mile a week for 15 weeks before the marathon.  This should be a really nice base for me to not knock the socks off the marathon but to do a decent showing.  I want to get to a 4 hour marathon, even if it is 4:59:59 but for the next one I will take a 5 hour marathon – remember I did a 6:30 marathon before so I am talking about a pretty dramatic increase. 

I want to do swimming 2 days a week as well.  I am trying to figure out if I can commit to doing it after work.  What I would like to do is right after work 2 nights stop by and practice swimming (I guess you call it a work out) for an hour.  I would also want to add a weekend swim but that is more optional as long as I do it during the week.  At least for a while – I may need to do it three times a week to really prepare for a triathlon. 

The other piece is weight lifting.  I have heard at my age that weight lifting is really good for bone density and generally you need that strength to do better at running and swimming.   The good news is I can do that at night at home or in the morning and do not have to fight the cold – so it should be easier to commit to being consistant. 

The real issue is I HATE GETTING OUT OF BED.  The idea of getting out of bed to go in the cold world to run or even down stairs to lift weights and swimming sounds like a horrible idea especially when laying in the nice cozy bed with the pup and my guy.   I guess it is a lot like this whole vegan gluten cleanse thing.  I just have to decide to do it and not treat it as a choice every morning.  As long as I leave it as an option I will always decide not to do it.  It is always easier to say no to a hard choice than just do what you have to do.

I know it sounds crazy but I am actually really digging the way I feel on this cleanse and am not sure how I am going to incorporate this back into a day to day lifestyle.  Would I ever want to live this extreme?  I do not think  it would be sustainable but yet I know people who do this as a lifestyle choice.  Do I never want to drink again – no – but do I do moderation well – lets be honest we all know the answer to that question.  I also wonder why I drink and as much as I do.  I actually do feel better when I don’t drink – not the short term but the long term.  The short term of buzzed and chilling out and eating feels great but then the next morning I do not feel well and I hate the way I look in the mirror and I cannot wear any of my clothes – those things feel worse than just bad.  Headaches, stomach aches, tired, emotional, fat…is that really better than the fun of drinking.  I have started thinking again of things I want to do rather than just being so overwhelmed by everything and alcohol consuming my time and energy.

Lots to think about.  I want a plan – but more than that I want to do it – not just have a plan but a real execution and success.   I have some ideas about some of the goals I want to get done this coming up year.  I think I might try to use FutureMe as a check in on myself. 

There needs to be more than just exercise too so I do not feel like it is all work and no play.  I need a vacation and other ways to relax.  I would love to go scuba diving once I am swimming well.  I think I want to try the guitar again to be able to play music is always something I have wanted.  Keep writing is important and maybe branching out more.  I miss poetry and art and wish I was attending more things that inspired and moved me.  I want to go snowmobiling.  I want to sky dive.   I want go back to Yellowstone or somewhere in the gorgeous west.  I would like to explore more towns – Montreal, Toronto, New York City.  There is so much to do and I have become stale and sinking into a world that is not motivating or sustainable. 

I guess I want to live and experience and do. 

Once upon a time I was a kid and when I was a kid I went to school and had some friends and barely made it through the whole experience.  There  are people I remembered, teachers I remembered but for the most part it was a blur and forgotten, not just elementary school but all the way until my 20's.  Fast forward many many years and some miraculous technology and Facebook enters the picture.  I am reconnected with people that I went to school with - some I remember and some honestly I do not.   I look at their pictures and I am never in anything but the classroom poised photo.  I do not remember any of the times that the pictures were taken and have no idea where I was.  I also saw pictures of staff and faculty and that was a bigger shock as i did not recognize a single person.  It actually makes me wonder if my history is real and what did I really experience during those years.  I am not sure any of the people that have "friended me" really remember me.  How could they -  when I barely remember myself?

So I have some weird reaction when I travel.  I get super motivated and introspective and live in this ideal world.  I wrote up the below while on a plane and I was not even drinking.  Maybe it is just the thin air or maybe it is the solitary time as I rarely talk to anyone and just think about who and what I want to be.  It is not all bad and some of it is worth thinking about but most of it just fantasy.  It is the rare hopefulness of what I can accomplish.

Before I add the dream talk, I want to add a bit about the cleanse.  Honestly I was hoping it would make me feel better.  It is better than where I was, but honestly I was in the heart of true gluttony.  I was eating everything bad for me from rich fabulous cheeses to desserts to massive quantities of anything.  I had lost perspective and would inhale food without thinking about it.  I had no governors, no rules, and no mechanism to really stop.  I realized that this cleanse has brought me to realize that I was really out of sync.  I had tried to modulate on my own but I could not get my act together.  This has really helped me understand what I have been putting into my body.  Losing 6 pounds also shows that it was dying to get off my body. However, the illusive fabulous energy, incredible skin, better sleep and all that has been very illusive.  I do not feel awful but I just do not feel very good either.  I really miss the energy during working out and running.  I feel like an empty shell.  I am not sure I will go beyond the 14 day point because I really do not like how I feel but I am not sure how to make it better - but I think it has something to do with a little more carbs and protein but still keeping my calorie level low enough to lose some of the weight I have wanted to lose.  

My head is throbbing and I need to write tonight to meet my Health Month goals.  It is good because I wrote a big long thing on the plane but I will work on that tomorrow and publish.   I was going to run today but I underestimated my period and the throbbing headache I would have.   I did not commit myself to getting up this morning so surprise surprise I did not get up.

I know that I can't count on myself running at night because honestly the stress is so much during the day that at night I am just done.  Maybe once I get more into a pattern but not to start.  

It is hard at my job because I am starting to show the wear and tear of not believing in the vision like everyone else.  I feel like such a negative nancy always thinking there is nothing we can do to make things better other than fix the actual problem.  The challenges are huge and I am just getting beat up and it makes it really hard to stay positive.  Ironically my whole job is to keep the teams believing, keep the customers believing and well hell probably believe myself.

I can hardly see and my head is about to split open.  I really need to go to bed but I am fighting it for no good reason.  Part of the cleanse is to not take medicines but I am really really close to breaking that rule.

Well enough of this because I can't think.  Tomorrow I am working from home and I have a few goals that I never accomplish generally. Putting it down in writing - I will run 4 miles run (no matter what the weather) my goal is to go around lunch.   It should be more than a goal ...it should be ... I will run 4 miles tomorrow.  Stay tuned.

Well yesterday was a fabulous day for me and I struggle a bit with telling myself I did a good job.  At breakfast I did the usual oatmeal and fruit and that was easy enough but lunch we went to chick-fil-a.  I was not sure how I was going to eat there and stay healthy.  Did I tell you that I actually love Chick-fil-A - or I did as a kid.  There was a miracle and there was a salad (with cheese but I ate around it) and a little cup of apples.  For dressing I got a little creative and used mustard and hot sauce and it added the flavor I needed to eat the salad because another dry lettuce adventure was not what I had in mind.  So yeah me!

I asked the customer I am at about running around the hotel and they gave me a nice little path around a local cemetery.  I was really good and got back to my room and tried not to even think about it and just get into my running clothes.  My feet where actually numb but I didn't use that as an excuse and went out.  I did a 3.2 mile run.  I did pretty crappy actually as I ended up walking a bit of it, but I had only had about 300 calories that day and 700 the day before and I am on my period so I can forgive myself a little.  Not to mention I struggle with leaving my hotel and getting out there.

It was actually just gorgeous too.  I wish sometimes that I could take pictures just as I am anywhere - maybe built into my body - because there were amazing leaves and cool headstones.  The weather was perfect, the trees were gorgeous and it was kind of interesting running through the old and new gravestones.  It made me think about the human condition where we feel a need to go visit the people we have lost in our lives.  I wonder if I would feel that way but I never think about wanting to go visit my grandparents or anything.  I do not think about people the same way and wonder if I am missing some sort of sympathy gene that makes me want to think of those people in the ground being any relation of the people we knew in our lives.

I read a reddit article about "who felt better after renouncing their faith" and I feel more aligned with the people struggle with not believing.  I wish there was something afterwards and I wish there was more purpose to this world and life but I just do not believe there is.  Well I struggle with it.  I do not believe in the organized religions view either christianity in god and heaven or the buddhist reincarnation until enlightenment.   It is hard to not understand and not believe all at the same time.  Some things in the world are magnificent and defy just natural understanding and yet that does not mean there is a being a deity in charge of it all.   Anyways. 

I also did a good job because I found a vegan gluten free restaurant ZiZi's using Happy Cow (awesome site)  that delivered an awesome meal to me and not only did I eat well - but I really enjoyed every bite of the meal.  It was delicious and felt good going in.  Yeah me!!

Quick diatribe about my inability to sleep, relax or leave my hotel room when I travel.  I do not know why I feel frozen and stuck inside this fish bowl of a hotel room.  I am not sure why i spend the entire night unable to sleep.  I struggle to even turn the TV and light off.  Honestly I have no idea why.  I have never had some terrible hotel accident or traveling incident.  It has always been this way.

I should go out and explore and see the town but instead I work I surf and I hide away.  In the morning I will delay and stutter and not going running - worried about being cold and getting lost.  Really i just get stuck.  It is an odd part of my person because I am considered (even by me) brave, inquisitive, friendly, and not like an agoraphobic at all.  It impacts me to the level that I literally wake up (wide awake) all night every couple of hours just to ensure I am off my game.

I wonder why?

Starving.  Well I feel like it.  I am traveling and trying to stay on the cleanse.  This morning was oatmeal but bet it was instant so it probably had gluten but I only had about 1/2 a cup and herbal tea.  Lunch was harder at this little greek hole in the wall the customer took us to.  I got a cucumber and tomato salad which had feta cheese (which I tried to work around) and a vegetarian wrap.  I didn't eat the pita but the wrap had a little yogurt sauce and I did not try to eat it but it was all over the lettuce so between that and the feta I broke  the dairy vegan rule.  SO after a bit of oatmeal and some tomatos and cucumbers I am left barely able to think.

I went through the hotel menu and think I found a few things that work.  Onion soup - no cheese no bread (probably chicken stock but beggars cant be choosers)  Steamed broccoli and a vegetarian napoleon which once I pulled off the cheese turned out to be a portabella mushroom and a little spinach as I avoided the mash potatoes as I think that counts as gluten.  The broccoli I am pretty sure had butter but gee it is just hard to control all the variables.  I am about 700 calories for the day which is problematic in many ways as I really want to run tomorrow and I have almost no food in me.  Surprisingly I feel full right now.

I can't tell you today how much I wanted the pita breads and the mash potatoes and the roll and the chocolate.  I wanted to use the excuse of no food around to eat bad food I could almost justify it.  I was good because I didn't want to feel that guilt of making "bad choices for good reasons."

I feel like food has become my whole life.  I think and talk about it more than I ever have before.   Its really crazy.  Although I put my pants on this morning and they fit a little better.  I did not feel as tired today and other than just being freezing I am actually doing well.  I remembered too that I am supposed to be suffering from PMS last week and then have my period this week.  

Dude - what the hell am I going to eat tomorrow?  I think chinese food.  the mornings are rough.  I will stick with the oatmeal and might eat chinese tomorrow for dinner.

Crazy dreams.  Well before I forget as the day is getting started...all night I dreamed of sweets.  Some of it may have been the guilt of eating a raw revolution bar "super food bar" because it had agave and coco.  The agave is actually acceptable on the cleanse but the coco is not and really it was a albeit very healthy - its just candy bar.   I regretted it - even though I loved it.  Anyway back to the dreams.  All night, I kept dreaming that I was cooking delicious chocolate treats for Cameron (thats how I knew it was not real) and I kept "accidentally" having to taste one or would eat one by mistake.  It was not just one dream but over and over again in different circumstances.  Maybe it is the guilt - Maybe it is the withdrawal of sugar but either way I woke up a bit confused about what I had done or not done.  I thought alcohol was going to be the hardest part - but really it is a part of the sugar issue since I have been primarily drinking white and champagne.  The sugar is a bigger devil for me I think.  It has been 48 hours which is what I heard it takes to get out of your system - but I forgot that doesn't mean my body would stop wanting it.

The night was restless anyways.  The pup was up at 2:30 and I thought I saw 1:00 go by on my own.  The alarm went off but I had been plagued by these crazy dreams waking up between each one a little surprised.  It is so dark now in the morning and I miss waking to daylight.   Anyway time to go start another day and I have to make sure I do not accidentally eat any delicious morsels.

Day 3 thoughts...

Another day drips by and I think about food, diet and exercise all the time. I really want a nap and need to go grocery shopping but that sounds this side of hell. I am going to set a time of 4:30 to go, so I can make sure I have dinner ready when my boy gets home. I hope the tired clears soon because each day feels like an eternity especially from 1- 4 pm - those are terrible hours.

I got all my numbers from my Precision Nutrition months so I could see how my weight fluctuated between January (166.5) and my weight now (161.5) and I was really disappointed to see I made it all the way down to 153 in May. I could have made my goals and I could have been in a completely different If I had kept going.  I would have done better in the Marathon and I could wear all the clothes in my closet rather than being forced into 2 or 3 outfits.  I would feel better and be more proud of myself something I could really use right now.  I am really glad that I caught myself because I surely would have gone past my 166.5 and kept heading up and up. I was out of control - wow like how I used past tense like i have this thing all nailed down - barely 15 minutes of Ab Ripper last night and now I am all "past tense" with my lack of motivation.

I keep reading about these amazing women who at 40 and 50 that are doing their first triathlon and coming in 1st place.  I know these are extreme women that are in amazing shape and I really want to be that kind of woman - but I just do not want to do the work.  I want to be one of those people that define myself as athletic, driven and committed but I am so tired and do not have a drop of energy.  I am not sure that is the cleanse because I have felt like this - well it seems like forever.  I wonder if everything is out of me (chemicals and toxins and all that crappy stuff) will I really feel better?  If so, I hope I stick with it or at least figure out what it is impacting me so much.  Precision Nutrition said the most important thing is that you are not seeing yourself as cheating because you want to do what you are doing and you do not "cheat" when you are on the right path that you believe in.  You only cheat when you are doing something against your nature and you want a "peek" back into your other life.

I really do want to commit to the entire 30 days of this cleanse.  I keep telling myself that so I do not forget that I want to do this.  I want to be this person and that it is not torture but a choice to get me where I want to be.  Maybe if you say it enough....it will be true...and the fact I want a donut, glass of wine (or bottle) and ice cream pie right now will fade.  It is not work the weight or the fat or the physical impact - just reminding myself.