It's a Christmas Miracle

Usually the holiday season is the time of year when I just say go hang and eat what I want. By now I have already put on pounds.  Even though I know that whatever I put on now I will be sweating and cursing to get off in January and February and March....... Last year I even took the month of December off from exercise because, dang it, I was just burned out.
 Not that that worked, I apparently get cranky without my yoga.  Some people drink, some do cocaine, I have my endorphins.
                                                       
And my coffee. Don't take my coffee away from me. I don't even need caffeinated, just drinking decaf has a placebo effect on me. But I digress. I found myself doing yoga a week or two into December. But I still gained seven pounds from last year's holiday fun.
I got on the scale the at the beginning of December and I was at the lowest point that I have been in 6 to 8 years.

                                                      
                                                      How did this miracle happen?

 I blame running. Not only am I burning calories, but I find that I just don't want to eat as much. This makes sense if you think about why I eat.
My husband is a smoker. I don't think it is fair to nag him to quit if I can't kick my own addiction: food. I know, I know, we all need to eat to survive. My food addiction isn't about survival but enjoyment. I am easily swayed; reading an excellent description of a meal in a book can make me immediately crave whatever the characters are having.  Savory meats and puddings in historical fiction sound much better than they most likely were. My cravings usually revolve around spicy and salty, but I venture into sweets sometimes too.
I eat when I'm bored. Sad. Happy. Even when I am nauseous I feel if I put the right thing in my stomach I will feel better. Food is a cure-all to me. In the past when I lost weight, it seemed to be an immediate invitation to eat more.
This year that hasn't happened. All the work I did with the 7 Day workout and my running seems to be stripping me down to who I should be. Maybe it's just the endorphins talking, but I want to keep the momentum going more than I want the holiday food. At least, not in excess. I pretty much eat what I want, but in smaller quantities.  I made snickerdoodles from scratch for my party, and only had one beforehand. In previous years my guests would have been lucky to get half of them.
Now the holidays are over and I got on the scale: minus  .02 lbs. Not a lot, but certainly not  plus seven extra pounds. My food cravings are increasing a bit, which is odd now that the holiday season is over. However, the will power I developed during the holidays seemed to have carried over. I look at the food and then decide whether I am bored or if I really need something. Not that I don't still eat it occasionally, but at least I know what I am doing!
Running seems to have increased my motivation. Before I was exercising to lose weight. Now I am losing weight and eating right so that I can run better. The endorphins are still the same, however. While running may not be the answer for everyone, I do hope that everyone can find that one sport that turns the motivation around.

                                

 The enjoyment of the sport make it much easier to deny the occasional bowl of ice cream or pizza when you can get out there and fly down the road.  

New Year's Eve

Today's Plan: run
I didn't want to run today. I didn't want to do anything today. But as I took Monday off, I was stuck with exercising in some fashion today. One should never take the first day of the week. Turns into a pattern as by the end of the week, I will be ready for a day off again when Monday rolls around.

Mother Nature finally realized that tomorrow is January and perhaps she should be seasonal.  It was 9 degrees when I went out to feed the horse. I came back inside and had breakfast.

After running to town (gotcha there, didn't I?) with the husband, I decided that it probably wasn't going to get any warmer and I better get out there.

18 degrees when I left the house. Leggings, an insulated layer and windpants plus two layers of fleece and a vest with gloves and I was ready to go. Today was a carrot and stick day: I promised myself a carrot and when I reached the carrot, I smacked myself with the stick!

 I had spent yesterday doing some heavy aerobics, so my thighs felt like mush. Ever have those days where you don't really feel in control of your legs? They found a rhythm and no matter what I thought, they weren't speeding up or slowing down.  The first half mile sucked. I think that is the technical term for it.  After that I kept promising myself that if I only did a mile, I would go back and do some yoga or weight lifting. To avoid that, to go home and be able to sit, I had to do two miles.

I was trying to avoid the wind, so my route was rather varied today.  After reading a trail running magazine, I am thinking about trying that. So when I saw a track leading off into a field today, I took it.

This is a great time of year to run in the fields, all is broken down and it easy to the holes before you run into them. Unfortunately the wind cut my excursion into the field short today. I will try again soon.

Turning around, I headed back towards home. Going down the hill to my house, I thought, I can go further. So I aimed at the half mile point beyond my house. Going up the hill to that point, I thought, why do I do this to myself? My legs felt like stone, my breath didn't reach deep into lungs, and the top of the hill seemed so far away.

I knew I could turn around where I was and still be over the two mile mark, but I had a specific point in mind and darned if I wasn't going to get there. Stupid OCD. But I made it, came home and stretched. Then I sat down!

Post Crazy....

I have to say here that I love Christmas and all it entails. I have spent the last two weeks soaking up Christmas movie classics and planning two (yes, not one but two) celebrations here at my house. I love the spirit of Christmas and while I agree with Charlie Brown that it is too commercialized, I also, like CB, wasn't going to let that ruin my Christmas. I make many of my gifts so I do avoid a lot of the retail mayhem. And, as a family, we don't go crazy. There are no TVs or cars bought and put under our tree.
I am what you would call a "crafty" person: there is no craft out there that scares me. I have made jewelry, soap, candles, and when the kids were younger, knit scarves and sewn fleece hats. Mistakes have been made, like the year I made the fleece hats and sewed the stretchy side of the fleece the wrong way and the hat wouldn't stretch to go around the kid's head. Or the poncho coat that I made that swallowed my sister in law. And my knitting doesn't go much beyond the scarves, I have carpel tunnel and tendinitis, so after two or three rows I need a break. And I am beyond horrible at keeping a gauge. But I digress.
This years gifts (jewelry, tea & potpourri) turned out excellently. The gatherings of the various families seemed to make everyone happy and the dinners (aside from squash gone bad) went on the table smoothly. And on Christmas night, I slept. And slept. I think the technical term is "crashed". And didn't have much get up and go on Friday either.
So, you ask, did I exercise? Were there any runs in those two weeks? Or was it just a sentimental snooze in between tasks?
The answer is yes, I did get some time and energy expended. However, Mother Nature, being whimsical as always, thought that rain would be lovely for Christmas weather. So not too many runs, but a couple in between the rain drops.  Fate, not feeling that losing my job and setting up for the holidays while searching for work was enough stress, also cursed me with that lingering malady, nasopharyngitis. Otherwise known as a cold. I have to say, it is very hard to do yoga poses, such as downward dog, when one's head is full and one's nose is dripping. I did my most "uprightest" yoga last week. And am very glad to be able to breathe through my nose this week.

12/15/14

Plan for the week: run, yoga, sprinkle in 7 day exercises
I know I complained (and complained) about having to do the 7 day exercises every, well, day, but  I am going to keep them in my rotation. They definitely toned me. I have to say that lunges can certainly make a runner. My thighs are so strong right now. Particularly on hills. If you have hills, as I do, I would suggest lunges, lunges, and then a few more lunges.
In one set of 7 day exercises 3 out of the 5 exercises has squats and lunges involved. I guess that really helped me. Three sets three times a week: I think I could even stay on Charby if she got excited at this point. Of course, I will have to keep doing them as I don't think I am getting on Charby until next spring. At which point she is sure to put me to the test. Back to the weather: I don't foresee any decent ground for a four-legged beastie to be exercised on anytime soon.
Mother Nature has been extremely capricious up here. Snow, rain, ice, mud, we have had it all. When I went out for a run one day this week it was unexpectedly lovely, everything had a sugar sprinkled and glazed look.

                                                The apples looked so cool with their glaze,
                                                            just ready for the plucking,

where the evergreens all looked as if Mother Nature 

had sprinkled confectionery sugar all over them.

Running outside does so much to uplift my spirits. I read an article recently where the runner said               " there's magic to be harvested, but you have

       to lace your shoes with at least the

slightest seed of a smile"

I have to say I don't agree with that. I can be having the worst day ever and go for a run and I feel so much better after just the first quarter mile. I have to focus on something other than my misery--or I may end up on my butt after I misstep. Once I am in the groove, my muscles moving smoothly along, my brain starts to work on the problem and if I don't find a solution, the endorphins at least kick in and it doesn't seem as bad. Even on a bad run day, where I have to use the carrot method to get me out to my destination, and I have side cramps and each footfall seems to take forever, I feel better when I get back: I did it through the awfulness and that can always make one feel better about oneself.

I think it just proves that we all run for different reasons. And have different ways of getting ourselves out there. But in the end, we all run. We all know the joy, the freedom of running away from our problems....and running back to face them, stronger for the journey.

12/8 My Week in Review

Last week was a....difficult week. It was the third week of my 7 Day plan and thank goodness. I was feeling the frustration of being locked into certain exercises and not having time to expand into other exercises. Time is not really an issue any longer as I  lost my job on Monday.
Even though I had more time, I was so overwhelmed that whenever I pulled up my blog to write, I couldn't sort out anything to say. Plus, I had been doing the same thing for three weeks. How much could I say about it?
I spent the week on the computer: looking at job sites, looking up career change information, doing tests to see what careers would fit my personality, thinking about college until my eyes crossed. Another reason my blog didn't get written. Today I went for my first long (my personal 5k route) run in weeks and it felt sooooo good.

I let it all swirl around in my head and this is what I think I learned this week:
   take the time to put in contacts in this weather. The metal of the glasses bites into my nose and eventually the glass fogs up and doesn't clear
  I would like to pick a career  path where I get to help people, not sell them "stuff"
  I'm a bit of an introvert (according to Jung--I think he could be right)
  Run on the white snow edges, it's safer than the ice and makes fun "crunchy" noises!
  I'm going back to school (how scary is that). I can go get a degree and still have 25 or more years to work
  There is always a silver lining. Sometimes a dark pewter lining, and you have to shine it up a bit, but it's there

I have always been a floater. When I ran out of money for college I simply shrugged my shoulders and went to work. I don't mind work, I've done a lot of rather arduous jobs. But now I think I'm going to make a plan, and pick work that satisfies me. We will see how that goes.


 

12/1

Today's Plan: Run with A set of 7day
From crisp winter we have settled on muddy spring today. I can only think of my spring runs for track in high school. I remember running back to the school with wet, dragging sweat pants. I am very glad I don't wear those anymore. The wind pants I wore today were much more practical. And lighter. The run went well, but again time became an issue. I was only able to get 2 sets of my 7 day exercises in. I am happy to say that I am definitely getting better at this set. I have to divulge a secret: I haven't gotten past one set of the other set. We will have to see tomorrow!

11/30

Today's Plan: run with 7day
I was getting a bit lost in my A and B sets for the 7day plan this week. I don't know why.  It just seems like a blur. As I made my plans for the day, I realized that I had not taken a day off this week. I wanted to start fresh on Monday, so I decided to take today off. Not that I got much rest. One cleaned, organized and redone library later, I had an attack of allergies.  Not only did I come up with a box of books to donate, I washed a couple loads of clothes to donate as well. After lunch I went to work on the cabinets under the kitchen and bathroom sinks.  After all the work I got the reward of watching the 4:25 football game.  All in all, a good day.