Monday, May 13, 2013

Weekend perspective

This morning my day started with running errands for my job. Nothing like an immediate Monday morning road trip. This lead to a late arrival in the office and then of course immediate issues I had to address in terms of work. But it is now the “afternoon” and I think I finally have a moment to eat a Smart Ones for lunch and of course type this post.

Let’s talk weekend shall we? I cannot say that I had a perfect great weekend in terms of health and fitness but it was by no means the worst I’ve had lately so I will take it. I would consider it an average weekend and honestly that is great by me. Basically my goal was to go into my Friday-Sunday stretch and not feel so guilty that I came here today and posted about how I lost it over the weekend. I can honestly say that my post will not say this. It wasn’t perfect but since I feel like I can barely remember some of what I ate (other than knowing that I did go over each day) so it probably wasn’t too terrible.

Friday not I did in fact take off from exercise and instead went out to dinner for Date night with Chris. We ended up at Mexican food where I did in fact eat too many chips and beans. I was hungry when I got there and of course they bring you those first. I also ordered a margarita. So yeah, that happened. Dinner itself wasn’t too horrible. We shared chicken fajitas. I didn’t eat any of the tortillas, instead I just had the vegetables and chicken and beans and guacamole. Amazingly good. I do know when I came home I had too much candy as desert but it was still okay.

Saturday morning I got up and went to the gym with my mom where I killed it. I am really digging on this whole Saturday morning gym workout schedule I seem to find myself on. I started off by killing it on the treadmill with a nice 30 minute plus run. I RAN… I put the treadmill on a 6.2 and just went for it. You want to talk about perspective or my genuine lack of any of it? Perspective that is. I run and I honestly have no clue what I really look like to other people when I run because who can? I know it doesn’t matter… AT ALL… but I just like to have an idea I guess for my own knowledge. Mainly I guess to gauge myself not really to compare. Anyhow, I will come back to this thought in a moment.

After my run, I hit up some weight machines. Did some arm work, did my sit-ups and pushups. Did a few more machines and then headed to the stair climber. I super love that stair climber. Who would have guessed it? The thing is this, I don’t “feel” like I am working as hard as I do when I run BUT I sweat like I’ve never dropped sweat on that machine. After 5 minutes of continual climbing on it the sweat is literally pooling on my body and dropping on EVERY single stupid step. It’s gross but slightly rewarding at the same time. So I end up doing a little over 15 minutes and it says I’ve climbed like 62 flights of stairs. I’m not sure if that is all that accurate. It doesn’t seem like I would actually be able to climb 62 flights in 15 minutes but nonetheless that’s the basis for next time to try and improve upon.

I finished up my workout with another 25 minutes or so on the treadmill. This takes me back to my previous perspective thought. As I was running I couldn’t help but watch the other people on the treadmills. Again, not because I want to be better or want to judge them, just because I’m trying to figure out my place in the world. Of the 15 people or so on the treadmills at that time, I was running, there was another girl running and then one girl going between a run and walk. Two girls got on treadmills next to me so I could see that there walking speed was a 4. That was good to know.

I think the thing is this, sometimes I feel like a fraud. I run. I love to run. I run all the time. These are true statements, but sometimes I feel like I have no idea if I am actually running or working out enough to actually be considered a runner. I know you are a runner if you run period. But I feel like a fraud because I only run on my treadmill at home and I don’t know how I would fair in the real world I guess. I am constantly just trying to find my place. So I was watching this girl run and run and I thought man, she is really running. She is hardcore running. I thought she was running at what I considered a good speed. So of course in my mind I’m thinking the girl is running at like a 7 or something because my perspective is just as fucked up about a treadmill speed as it is about anything. So of course, as this is the end of my workout my running is varying between a 5.6 and a 6.0 on the treadmill for this particular run. Decent speed but not killer. For the record in my first half hour run I decided to try running at a 7 speed on the treadmill and I actually managed to pull that off for a while.

Anyway, back to my story. I was certain this girl was killing it on the treadmill and I was like yeah, that girl is flying. I am certain I don’t look like that. That girl is clearly a RUNNER. When I finished, as we had to go at this point, I walked by her running, on purpose so I could just see what speed she was running at. Guys, it was a 5.2…. Perspective. It’s as hard to judge and gauge as our own self-perspective is. I was floored and yet I still have a hard time believing that I really look like a runner. Go figure. But I swear every time I go to the gym is good and I learn something about myself.

After the gym we went to my sister’s house where we changed and headed to Costco for staples. Staples for me included bananas, frozen fruit for my smoothies, egg beaters, lettuce, green beans and Monster Energy drinks. I know they are bad for you but I drink them anyway!

We did a few more errands and went to Panera Bread for lunch. Then Saturday night I ended up eating a bunch of Ritz crackers and cheese… still pretty tasty even if it wasn’t the most nutritious thing in the world. Yesterday I woke up later and ended up going to my mom’s around 10 for mother’s day stuff. My sister and I took my mom to Applebee’s where I got something off the 550 calorie or less menu. I spent my entire afternoon cleaning my house. Like good cleaning which actually ends up being quite intensive. I started cleaning the crap out of the fridge which in turn lead to like an hour of complete fridge cleanout. Removing all the shelves and whipping everything down. Major work. But it felt great when I was done with everything. Being at home all afternoon is hard on some of the food choices. Mainly the candy that I ate. Oh well. I still don’t think it was as bad as last weekend so I’m guessing its fine.

We did make an excellent dinner though. We had the green beans from Costco and grilled onions, with Salmon, a baked potato and a roll. This is my dinner last night since it was so pretty I had to take the picture.



Overall I don’t think things were too out of control. I didn’t exercise yesterday but I usually don’t on Sundays. Lately it seems that Fridays and Sundays are my days off. I will of course run tonight. Pretty much I like to stay on track Monday-Thursday with healthy eating and exercise. I Figure that is 4 out of the 7 days a week to stay on track. This should ultimately keep me pretty consistently healthy even if I do end up indulging most weekends. Honestly, like I said, this weekend was pretty okay. I know I ate too much in between. Hello Costco samples much :) But it’s cool. I’m really just trying to maintain at this point or else lose 3 more pounds really.

I am mostly excited to see where I can get my body fit and health wise. I am really liking the gym but I’m not sure if I like it enough to want to do it in an evening. I kind of like going home and running and already being home etc. But I love weekend workouts at the gym. We will see how it goes long term. Maybe after I get back from Maui I will consider a gym membership of my own but for now it is working to just go with my mom.

Oh and interesting story here. I have been wearing my lovely Old Navy Size 6 rockstar skinny jeans and all of a sudden they are starting to feel a little loose. Oops. So Friday night Chris wanted to go to old navy to try on some clothes. Since I was there, for the hell of it, I tried on size 4’s and yup, you guessed it. They fit much better. I am not sure how I feel about this because I clearly think there must be a sizing error with Old Navy because I have never in my entire life been a size 4 anything. EVER. Not in a pant for damned sure. Plus I have lots of size 6 jeans now so I am going to just keep wearing them and pulling them up as needed. If I lose more weight or if I get more toned as it seems might be happening to me, then I might have to consider another option but for now I’m not rushing out to buy the 4’s. I mean, I’m being realistic here and if I stayed exactly this same size as I am now I would be happy.

Two weeks from today is my 34th Birthday and then less than 3 weeks now is Maui. Time sure does fly. Here’s to the final push for the next three weeks to go to Maui feeling better than ever. Notice I said “feeling” not looking… because it really is about the feeling.

3 comments:

westmetromommy said...

So what if your weekend wasn't absolutely perfect when it comes to food and exercise? It sounds like you had a fulfilling and productive weekend, and that is what matters!

Unknown said...

It sounds like you had a healthy weekend, despite the Mexican. But you need nights like the Mexican night to keep you sane.

Melissa @ Faster In Water said...

Oh that meal does look fantastic! I like what you said about perspective on the treadmill. You are 100% a runner!