This is me before

This is me before.  And this is me… before.  I’m still before. I’m not after yet.  I’ve got no amazing transformation pictures to show you of myself in a bikini or standing in a pair of pants that could now fit two of me.  This isn’t that kind of blog (but maybe someday…).  Here I am trying to figure out what the heck started this and where it will lead.  And maybe a month from now I’ll be back to twinkies and pepsi, but… maybe not.

I know people who have lost weight.  Even a transformative amount.  You always want to ask them “how did you do it… why did you start...which infomercial or piece of exercise equipment finally did it for you?  What’s the magic pill, the secret to sticking with it, the answer?"  And I’d always be disappointed, as I would be if I asked myself why I am now 2 months in to doing something I could never last more than a week doing before.  Why did I start?  Why have I not given up yet?

I’m quite new to this whole “being healthy” thing, so anyone who’s got this healthy lifestyle thing down pat who wants to leave tips in the comments, go for it.  Here’s what I’ve been doing, and mostly succeeding at.  I started running (trying to) 2 months ago.  A little after that I started to eat a little better.  Drink a little more water.  All for the sake of making it to the end of the block.  I started using an app to track my calories.  This was annoying at first because I’ve been on a diet once in my life.  For about a week.  I like food, and especially junk food.  I like pepsi and carbs and sugar.  Anytime I thought about depriving myself of those things it would make me angry and hostile.  Why should I?  For my health you say?  Pshaw.  I’ve got good genes, my grandma lived to 98 and where do you think I got my sweet tooth from?

Also, other than while pregnant, I’ve weighed the same weight my entire adult life.  Granted the weight has moved to different places on my body in the last 20 years but the number is the same.  It's a really weird phenomenon.  I could do yoga every day for a year and it wouldn’t change.  I could join a gym and do an hour of aerobics and another of weightlifting daily for months, didn’t matter.  That one week diet which was super restrictive and hard to follow and made me feel like crap?  Weight didn’t budge.  Eat whatever I want?  Still there.  So why should I?  Why should I count calories, eat healthier, cut out pepsi?  None of it would matter.  Wah wah wah. 

So counting calories for me had much the same effect that first week of running did.  I kind of gave up and rebelled for a few days.  Then I felt like crap and my stomach felt horrendous.  All bloated out to looking like I was 8 months preggers and if I had to wear jeans feeling like I was being strangled at the waist.  But that was totally normal for me.  So I got a few books at the library and thought maybe I’ll try going gluten free for a few days to see if that helps.  That seemed like a daunting task but with all the gluten free stuff available nowadays it wasn’t actually hard at all.  

Pretty soon I’m mostly avoiding gluten and just eating healthier.  And it’s crazy but it’s not that hard.  It's all in the timing because a year ago, or 10 years ago, it would have been very hard.  You can totally know what's right without doing it.  I'm not trying to say it's easy.  It's just the right time for me all of a sudden.  I feel like I can, rather than feeling like I should.  I’m drinking water instead of pepsi and I’m not even pissed about it.  Super Crazy.  It’s me working backwards.  It’s not I need to lose weight to fit into this swimsuit.  It’s me wanting to feel better and go farther so what can I do for my body to get it there?  Seems pretty simple when I think about it now.

Hey and you know what?  That stubborn number on the scale which has led me to believe I’ve owned faulty scales my whole life?  It’s dropping.  A little at a time, but there it goes.  What do you know?  So a healthy diet and exercise really are the way to do it?  Huh.

Do I have an end date in mind?  Am I thinking, oh thank God I only have to be on this diet until…?  Nope I’m not.  And that’s why I have the audacity to be writing this blog.  Because I feel like maybe I’ve finally figured something out that lots of people already know.  And I’m pretty happy about it. 

I used to think of how hard it would be to deprive myself of pepsi (5 days no pepsi over here), carbs and sugar.  But it’s really hard to describe why it’s not hard right now.  Diet calls to mind passing things up that you really want and always feeling hungry.  I’m not on a diet.  I’m just being healthier.  And it’s going good.

Almost 2 weeks ago, I increased my jogging mileage a little too quickly, or maybe I wasn’t warmed up enough, or maybe the running shoes I’ve had for 5 years but never used for running were old and worn out, but I pulled a muscle in my hip.  I was limping around for a couple days.  It got better pretty quickly but I didn’t go running for almost 2 weeks because I could still feel it and didn’t want to further injure myself.  And you know what?  I couldn’t wait to go out running again.  That’s how I have the audacity to write this blog.  Because running is super hard.  And I am terrible at it, but I am doing it.  And when I can’t, I want to be.  And when I do, I am awesome.

So this is me before. And during.  And I don't really want there to be an after.  Because that implies an end.  And I'm just getting started.

If I can do it.. wait, I can do it?

Lying in my bed in the morning I often spend lots of time there just thinking long meandering thoughts.  One recurring thought I’ve had is, “I wonder if I could run to the end of my street.”  I live on a long country road a half a mile from the end.  I don’t know how many times I’ve thought this thought since moving here 4 years ago.  I also don’t have any clue as to why one weekend morning 2 months ago I got out of bed, put on some gym shoes and decided to find out the answer.

The answer was, obviously, “um no sweetie, you can’t run that far”.  But then a weird thing happened.  I got up the next morning and tried again, and the next day and the next.  I went “running” every morning for a week.  I still couldn’t make it to the end running the whole way, but I was trying.  I brought along my husband’s inhaler and would hit it every other minute until I was shaking from the albuterol.  Can’t run?  Just you watch me.

Each day I went a little farther, I’d turn the corner at the end and go a little longer before turning back.  I did a mile, mile and a half, two miles.  I still couldn’t run for a long distance, but I’d jog and walk and jog and walk.  Trying to cut the walking time down each time.  With the exercise induced asthma I often started strong and by the 2^nd or 3^rd interval I was really hurting.

The day I did two miles I mostly walked it.  I had a cramp in my side and my shoe was killing my foot.  Even though I had gone farther than I’d gone before, I felt defeated.  Instead of the victory of distance, I felt the defeat of only walking rather than the jog/walk I’d been doing.  The progress I’d made that week, eating a little healthier, upping my water intake – that was all because of the dream of running and it was all about to change.

Does this make sense? No, of course not.  But maybe that’s why my daughter gets incredibly frustrated when she can’t do something perfectly the first time she tries.  She’s just like me.  When you are good at plenty of things and then you come across something you’re not so good at, it’s easier to quit than be frustrated.  So I did.  And for the next week, I didn’t run.  Or walk.  I ate as much junk food as I wanted, maybe more.  I drank more pepsi than normal. I was, for some reason pissed off and feeling rebellious.  Oh yeah body?  You’re 37 years old and you can walk 2 miles but you can hardly run?  I’ll show you!

But after a week, my pity party wore off and I decided to try again.  And I kept trying.  Don’t ask me why.  I’d go every other day.  And 2 weeks later, I ran all the way to end of the road without stopping!  Cue that Rocky music!!  And I think that’s when my head got on board.  

Over the next few days I started to increase my distance.  A mile, a mile and a half, two miles – still jog/walking but hell, still going.  I’d feel awesome on the days I ran, lousy on the days I didn’t.  It’s hard to get the motivation to put on a sports bra and layers of clothes when your warm bed is calling you back, but:

So this may be a thing now for me.  Who woulda thunk?  I’m not here to motivate or inspire because I have no idea how this started.  Other than one day I got up and put on some running shoes and stepped out the door.  But it’s 2 months later and here I am still doing it.