Lifting Fears

I survived my evening.  I was tired by the time I hit the gym.  Also traffic sucked yesterday so I was almost late to the gym for class so there was no mile warm up run which was probably fine all things considered. Instead I immediately went into abs/core class. I don’t really like this class because I don’t think I am ever working that hard.  I don’t work hard enough to actually get my abs sore probably because I hate having sore abs and therefore I don’t push myself.  Sometimes I can be such a slacker and I don’t fully understand why. I just hate abs I guess is the truth.  But the class unto itself is slow moving and not a calorie burner. I guess it’s good I pair it with a heavy cardio day.

So I did the class and then Amanda gave me her workout plan for the evening.  It was the same full on upper body workout that we did last week and she did today. I was being majorly lazy and didn’t want to write out my own plan. Sometimes it’s just easier to follow someone else’s.  As was the case last night.  I don’t particularly love all the exercises on the plan but sometimes it’s rewarding to do things you hate because I am not going to naturally do them on my own.  The workout went something like this.

Chest

Flat Dumbbell Chest Press (20 lbs each side)  x 20 reps

Flat Chest Flys (15 lbs each side) x 20 reps

10 Divebombers (These are horrible devil invented creations)

40 mountain Climbers

Repeat all x3 sets

Back

Wide Grip Lat Pulldowns (55 lbs) x 20 reps

Cable Rows (40 lbs) x 20 reps

Lower Back Extensions x 20 reps

Dumbbell Burpees with deadlifts (use 15 lb. each side and jump up and do a deadlift) x 20 reps

Repeat all x3 sets

Shoulders

Front Raises (5 lbs each side) x 20 reps

Side Raises (5 lbs each) x 20 reps

Rear Raises (5 lbs each) x 20 reps

Barbell Upright Row Immediately into overhead press ( 30 lb bar) x 20 reps  (This is brutal!)

Stability Ball Push ups x 10 reps

Repeat all x3 sets

Biceps

Barbell Curls (30 lb bar) x 20 sets

Hammer curls (15 lbs each side) x 20 sets

Repeat all x 3 sets

Triceps

Bench Dips x20 sets

Triceps Press Downs on machine (30 lbs) x 20 sets

Repeat all x3 sets

I know this was the workout because I took a picture of it!  It took a long time and it actually made me sweat.  It was hard.  Especially that entire shoulder section. Ouch! Especially after having done chest heavy to begin with.  I was really hoping to hit 361 calories burned so my total for the day was 1000.  I really thought for a second that I was going to have to do some cardio in there just to get the calorie burn, but I was wrong.  The abs class combined with this brutal upper body routine did the trick.  I hit my burn and I was done.  It was a long day.

 

Earlier in the day I did this little Instagram collage about moving forward. Really it’s just so I can have a mid-day post.

 

I went home and I swear it feels like the evening just goes by so quickly. By the time you do all the necessary things it’s like 9 PM and I’m making myself dinner and sitting down and I get these lovely doggie snuggles which always make my night.

The dogs snuggle with my almost every night honestly, but sometimes I just want to document it.  Do you see all that gray hair there in Molly’s hair?  My little girl is getting old and that makes me sad.  She is over 8 now and black doggies show their age way more than light colored dogs.  But I love her to death and she is the sweetest little thing.  I will never ever get tired of doggie snuggles.

Things felt okay, nothing too spectacular but then this morning I woke up mentally in a funk. Like in a crappy things just feel off kind of way.  Some days are just like that for no damned good reason at all.  Like I felt excessively bloated and fat and yucky.  I know I am not.  I know I am every bit just as good as I was yesterday, or last week, or at any point recently when I felt great about things.  But alas, today I just mentally feel like, boo, this sucks.  Not entirely sure what in particular sucks but I just feel off.  I know it will go away.  I also think sometimes I end up putting way too much pressure on myself. This always happens as well. 

I start to get way wrapped up in my own head games and brain and imperfections really and its dangerous.  I try and always take a step back and look at the greater/bigger happier picture.  I am only happy when I am truly loving myself and this life.  I have played the game a million times where I nitpick and tear apart all of my stupid imperfections but it never made me happy.   I think mentally I am terrified that I am going to lose all my muscle that they are dwindling somehow.  Because I haven’t really been lifting that much I’m starting to get panic in my brain that I am going to lose what I’ve worked so hard to gain.  I think its irrational fears like this that leave me mentally askew at points.  And even if I do lose some muscles which I am sure is happening to some extent, that’s okay.  It’s okay because like everything in life things ebb and flow.  And right now its run time and heavy running reason and training for a marathon and that requires my full attention.  Once the marathon is over I can start to work on lifting again.  I can work up a heavy lift plan that will help me bulk up some in the winter time.  That seems more logical all things considered. I can do that.  But alas, none of that helps the part of my brain that feels “off” today. The part that is messed up and trying to tell me that I don’t look as good as I did last week, or that I am extra fat.  It’s so ridiculous and if someone could ever figure out to eliminate such mindsets from the brains of women they’d be a gazzilionaire.  Yup, not a word, I don’t care.  They would be.  Women are messed up or rather our brains are on occasion.

Truthfully doesn’t matter what size you are, how much of anything you are, you will always have body insecurities and things you don’t like.  This is just how our brains work. End of Story.

 

And that is about all she wrote for the day. Except that my legs do feel tired today. But my marathon plan calls for a 3 mile run.  I don’t really know what I am going to do.  Actually I do know what I am going to do, we all know what I am going to do.  I am going to do the damned thing but I am probably not going to love it.  It is probably going to be a very miserable painful one. But It will get done.  And then its strength training class tonight as well.  That is the agenda.  Hopefully mentally I feel better about life by then.