Trying to stay positive

There are a lot of things that are running thru my brain this morning.  Mentally, emotionally I had kind of a rough day yesterday, last night.  I think part of it is exhaustion, part of it is some other outside stressors affecting me right now.  Stuff that I don’t really want to go into that much.  Some of it involves my family. Some of it involves a dog situation. Not my dog, the cute little pug I was babysitting and stress with that.  I say stress because well, she is Amanda’s sister’s dog and honestly Amanda’s sister is a train wreck.  I should not post too much because this a public forum but needless to say I have been concerned about the dogs well-being but am pretty much powerless to do anything about it. It’s honestly just causing me a ton of stress. Stupid I know. I wish I could turn of my feelers and not care about the situation.  I love animals way too much.

Then there is family issues yet again.  This is life, clearly. Now it seems my Grandma is dying.  My Grandpa just passed like 2 months ago and now my grandma is on hospice and has like 3 weeks left or so.  And then I don’t know.  As a general rule the healthier I tend to get the more distant I become from my family because there isn’t a single thing about them that leads a healthy lifestyle.  My mom used to go to the gym with me and care but that has all gone away.  She is completely void of health once again which makes me sad because it wasn’t about appearance, it was about her health and quality of life. 

My mom got a new boyfriend and at this point I am not 100% sure if I really like him or not. She had a boyfriend previously who perhaps everyone did not love but I really liked because he cared about health and fitness and I think he made her better.  This boyfriend, everyone else seems to really like but he tends to drag her down in the health world.  All they do is go out to eat together and take trips that involve lots of eating.  I don’t dislike him, it’s just that he seems not encouraging of being healthy.  But that is okay, everything doesn’t have to be about health. I totally get that. I understand that.  It just makes me more distant from everyone.  I don’t see my mom like I used to.  I rarely see her at this point.

I guess a lot of this is why I need this online world in some respects.  Everyone needs motivation and encouragement and support and I don’t get it from my family.  Chris understands, thank god.  I guess he is the only one I really got to choose.  You can’t choose your family.  That’s probably why on some level I was attracted to him to begin with.  He has always been more active and cared more about health and such.  If he didn’t, I would be lost on that front. It’s far too easy slip up and stray and you really need the people you live with in your life to be on your side, in your corner.  If he brought crap food into the house or cooked crap food it would be hard.

Regardless, I had a conversation with my mom last night and honestly I felt kind of crappy afterwards.  I don’t know.  Sometimes I think she just sees things so differently than me.  Maybe I am the one who is off, probably am.  It was just a long stressful day yesterday honestly.  I’m glad it’s over with. Not that I feel 100% better today, I kind of don’t.  I still feel in a bit of a funk but I’m trying. I try each day to be as positive and happy as possible.  It can be hard. Some days it’s REALLY hard.  Some days it’s all I can do to remind myself that I love my life and that I am in control of not only my life but how I choose to feel at any given moment.

Oh, last night at the gym was not that good. Actually, it pretty much sucked.  I was tired. I mean, is that even the least bit shocking? It’s not. I am not even really sure why I went, but I did.  I think because I said I was going to, so I did.  I didn’t warm up. I didn’t do anything to get my heart rate up before abs/core class and as a result burned like a whole whopping 40 calories during the entire 30 minute class.  That class does NOT elevate my heart rate.  It hurts my abs, which I guess is the point. But I was tired. I knew I was tired. And I just wanted to lie on the ground.

After class, I got up and started to tackle the overall upper body strength plan I worked up for myself.  Thank goodness I write these things out sometimes because it gives me a direction and a plan and something to work towards. When I am done, I can be done and go home.  I wrote the plan. I mentally committed to the plan, so I did the plan.  It wasn’t anything fancy. It wasn’t anything life altering. But it was strength training.  And overall actually my upper body feels sore today so there you go.  It might have worked.

Strength training does not burn calories.  It doesn’t mean it isn’t working or isn’t effective and needed.  I feel the effects of lifting weights.  My muscles definitely feel it and are growing but I didn’t scorch the calories for weight loss. Strength training isn’t utterly effective at weight loss but it is necessary as muscle burns more calories during the day than fat.  It’s all a complicated long process that honestly I generally tend to not dwell on. I just do both and call it good.  Get my cardio in and lift so that I cover all my bases.

All I know is that whatever I am doing is effectively working.  I swear I feel and look leaner every single day.  As I lose weight those muscles I have worked the past two years on building keep coming in more and more.  I am so proud of where I am at and the work I’ve put in.  I’m excited to see my Maui self.  It will be short lived because I know once my marathon is over I will ease up on both the exercise and the nutrition.  It will happen and I accept that.  Life is about ups and downs.  Periods of being really on and periods of off.  I’ve lived thru a lot of them now and can accept me and myself at all points on the spectrum.  I just happen to be crazy on right now.  I love it. I love how happy I generally am (baring the last 24 hours) This really is the happiest I’ve been in ages. Ever maybe.  I feel like everything is just clicking so well.  I am eating really well, good quality stuff.  I am not depriving myself.  I am exercising and actually enjoying the process of exercise. My running is improving.  I feel incredibly healthy and fit and my body is just thriving right now.  It’s a good place to be at.

Let’s see, I was a hungry girl as I knew I would be all day yesterday. I pretty much ate everything I brought, all my extra snacks and then some. Oh well, right?

I was beyond exhausted last night and went to bed early for me, but not really early at all. And I just was lying in bed and couldn’t sleep, thinking about all this stupid crap in my brain.  Fun times, right? Love it when you are exhausted and yet sleep eludes you.

Whatever, I fell asleep. I moved on.  I woke up this morning and really did wish I was feeling better, but sometimes no matter what you can’t entirely “will” yourself perfectly happy.  I did the best I could.  I really am trying today.  Typing this stuff out maybe helps? 

I don’t know, I am sure everything is fine and will be fine.  I am sure all is great.  Tonight I am back at the gym for day 10 in a row.  I know this is insane and it kind of happened and I am just going to with it because this weekend I get a break.  Tonight I run 3 miles and then take a 45 minute strength class. I think I might go ahead and try and get some bread for lunch somewhere, yup, just like bread, and eat a hunk of it so that I have some active carbs in my body to give me some necessary energy to run 3 miles and lift.  Otherwise I might be dragging more than I care to.

Good news is this might be my last intense workout till the weekend.  I don’t 100% know what’s going on. We are supposed to do family camping this weekend.  Actually we could leave Thursday night so I may or may not work out tomorrow night.  I have Friday off and we may leave Friday morning as well. Not sure.  So there’s a possibility I could have tomorrow off from working out and not go to the gym or else I might go and take the boot camp class but that would be it.  Sometime either Thursday or Friday I do need to do some sort of exercise. I can’t take off 3 days in a row from exercise. I will allow myself 2, but not 3.  It’s kind of my rule of thumb. Except when on vacation of course.  But anyway, I am definitely taking Saturday off as I am running a half on Sunday and with as much effort as I’ve put out lately, I need Saturday off.  Either I work out Thursday night at the gym and take Friday and Saturday off or I take Thursday off, and run Friday outside, and take Saturday off.  Either way, I will make it work somehow.

Did I mention I am still hungry as hell today.  My metabolism must be revving up lately, as I feel famished all the time and feel like I constantly need to eat. I think this is a good thing? Maybe?  I do feel really in control of my food these days and not like it is controlling me. I even went to the grocery store last night, while hungry and didn’t feel tempted to purchase any crap. It was all great healthy clean stuff.  Chicken, eggs, yogurt, peanut butter (this is clean if you don’t eat the whole jar!). 

Anyhow.  I feel pretty good despite some of the mental fog that is looming over me.  When the storm passes I am sure I am going to feel fantastic.  When I am this on, I try and just go with it!