Time for a fresh start

It's always important to remember that when you start the journey again, the distance to the end is not as far as when you began the first time.  It's 2011 and I'm making some new starts.  New job - one that will come with it's own challenges but very much challenges I'm looking forward to aaaaannnndddd.... I'm starting to focus on myself again. No, I'm not spending hours gazing at myself in ponds a la narcissus but I have been spending some time working out what my goals for the year are re my physical and mental health.

I got in over my head a bit last year towards the end.  I got it done but there were costs and those costs involved the loss of routines that were good for me.

Time to reestablish those positive routines and reap the benefits from them.  Time to make the best choice I can make for me at the time, not the easiest choice.

I'm doing it in phases, experience having taught me that if I try to change everything at once it becomes too much and it all falls in a heap.

Step one:  With start of the new job, start riding to work again.  (As stupid as it sounds, I lost my garage pass for a couple of months and as my bike lives in the garage, I didn't ride.  Found pass, am riding again).

Step two: Get back to gym.  I love going to the gym, I love how it makes me feel and I love the amazing community that the girls at Fernwood Canberra City help create and maintain.  It's a simple fact that I'm happiest when I'm exercising regularly.

Step three:  Get Foxy!  The spring challenge at the gym kicks off in a couple of weeks and I can't wait. It's very structured and that appeals to my brain in managing it as a part of my lifestyle.  Plus my competitive nature kicks in.  This is also the time to start setting some better eating patterns in place.  I know the rules, I just have to create a way of following that works for me.

Step four: Maintain it!   This is the tricky one.  I need to ensure that I can maintain the patterns I create.

I've found that doing a bit of journalling helps me clarify my thoughts so expect me to witter on everynow and then.

Day 9 - Gah

Wow, did anyone get the number of the mountain that fell on me? Woke up when the alarm went off, attempted to roll over and realised that while the spirit was willing the body was using very strong language to suggest more sleep. I'd been meaning to get to Group Slim at 7 and to do a quick bike ride but I think the thing I'm understanding better this challenge is that I need to respect what my body is telling me.  I roll over and sleep for another hour and a half and still feel like a mountain fell on me but it's a slightly smaller mountain.  Less Mt Everest, more Mount Snowdon.  Have some breakfast and struggle to the office.


I'm using slim cheese slices as a snack.  I love my cheese.  It's probably my greatest food passion.  I need to balance that love of it with eating sensibly and denial is not the strategy to use.  So I'm using the slices as an everyday option and keeping the really good quality cheese for special occasions.  If people can social smokers, why can't I be a social cheese eater?  


I'm finding that prioritising my exercise is having benefits for my work day as well.  By making sure I take my breaks, I'm being more productive in the time that I'm in the office.   Take today for example, we have a CEO update scheduled over lunch (they cater but I'm not sure what they'll cater so I bring my own lunch).  It's done by 1.30 so I head off to the gym for half hour bike ride. 


Start to feel like I'm making some really good progress with the project I'm currently working on.  Is a good sense of achievement and I celebrate with a fruit snack tub. Apricots today!.


Back to the gym, I'm feeling fairly good as I settle in for bike ride number 2 of the day.  I'm knocking off about 20km a day on the bike at a min setting of 6 and feeling pretty good about it.  I finish up and dash into Combat.  I can't speak highly enough about how much I enjoy this class.  Did I feel like a right idiot the first couple of times? Yes. Did this stop me from enjoying the class and getting better? Not at all.  Combat is a combination of martial arts (karate, muy thai, kung fu), tai chi and boxing.  Such a rush.  I'm sweating like a sweating thing when I stagger home.  The stairs on exit out of the gym seem particularly cruel tonight.


Collapse on the couch and thank heavens for leftovers, my curry tastes even better today than it did yesterday, the eggplant has gotten to the exact consistency I love. Mmmm.  Am planning to make cycle in the morning.  Will see how I go, am very weary.  Looks like I'm going to make my plan for an early night primarily as I'm really struggling to keep my eyes open.  Night all...

Day 8 - Wow

The fact that it was pouring with rain this morning may have been a contributing factor to me staying in bed rather than getting up at 5 to head off to the gym by 6.  The other factor may have been that Monday's I finish choir rehearsal at 9 in the evening having dashed there from the gym following a group PT session. I say dash, stagger may be more appropriate. I'm finding one of the changes I've noticed from my first week is that I'm not scrabbling about for solutions when I need to have a meal at home whether that is breakfast, lunch or dinner.    Take breakfast for example, because I've planned I can just grab some weetbix, add a spoon of sultanas, a teaspoon of sugar and go from there.  Makes me feel a lot more confident about making the right choice.   

Today was D day or weigh day for week one.  Even though it was in the evening, it did linger on my mind a bit. I knew how hard I'd worked and really wanted a good result to show for it.  The old fears kept coming back and I could feel myself starting to find all the excuses for a poor result despite the work.  Had those 3 drinks on Sunday night undone all my efforts?  The home made pizza?   

The draw of healthy choice awesome provided me a nice lunch and snacks for the day.  I had to stop myself being stupid and not eating, this isn't about starving myself for a good result, its about making some healthy choices that benefit my lifestyle and get me to achieve my goals.  My afternoon is filled with meetings which helps distract me from the scales that lie in my future.

Get to gym - hop on a bike until Leanne is able to see me.  We jump right into the deep end and hop on the scales.  Wow. Okay, that was far less painful than I've been making it all day.  I lost SEVEN PERCENT body fat in one week.  I'm gobsmacked.  Plus the 1.5kg weight loss really didn't hurt at all either.  I'm really really happy.  I'm also pretty damn happy to hear that I've topped the challenge for our gym this week.  Our team is in 5th place but I'm not sure that all our team members have been remembering to record their points each trip.   

Back onto the bike.  45 minutes later I've done 15km and am a tad warm and sweaty.  We're going to start our group PT session with the endurance challenge for the week which is holding a isolated wall squat for as long as possible while holding a min of a 2kg weight.  We all aim for a minute and we manage to do it!  Our group PT session tonight is boxing.  Tam (Tamara) our team leader regularly runs the boxing workshops at Canberra city and is one of the toughest boxing coaches I've worked with.  We work out guts out for 45 minutes.  It's a mix of speed, conditioning, strength, all about keeping our heart rates up as we jab, cross, uppercut and high punch our way through the session.  There's an evil set at the end that involves punching for 20 secs followed by a plank for 20 secs repeated for 2 minutes.  It nearly kills us all and we lie like a bunch of stunned mullets at the end of the session. 

Get to rehearsal a bit later than normal as we ran a little over time.  I'm knacked.  Absolutely knackered.  The music is lovely and manages to give me the energy to go on.   Miss C and I sing our way through the tenor parts (I'm having fun singing tenor, have previously sung alto and soprano) some beautiful harmony lines.  I throw together a quick pork, zucchini and eggplant curry when we get back to mine just after 9.  Yay for leftovers for lunch for tomorrow.

Really happy with my first week, now to keep it going!

Day 5 Hitting the Wall

Oh that wall. There it is.  Friday morning the alarm went off at 5 and I ... didn't.  I'd plan to hit the RPM glass at 6.05 but I just needed some sleep.  I'm trying to listen to what my body needs and not burn myself out so I reset the alarm and got up at 7.30. Really struggled with getting going.  Made sure I had some breakfast (having some choices at home makes things so much easy), walked out the door, realised I'd forgotten my dinner and headed back to collect it.  Got stuck into taskmargeddon once I hit the office.  I think I'm making progress but it's still a little over whelming.

Had a look at my gym timetable and spot a spin class at lunch. Have a quick snack about half an hour before I'm planning on leaving. This sleeping in thing has put my schedule out it feels foodwise. All feels a bit late. Head off to the gym only to find that the instructors can't make it. Bugger. Adele mentions that the pump class is on so decide to that. My it's been a while since I did pump.  I watch my weights and pace myself.  Still do it a bit tough. Realise that I need to drop my upper body weights to look after my shoulder so I do.  Its still frurstrating but I know it's getting stronger, I just have to be patient.

My legs are screaming after pump so I jump on a bike for half an hour.  I know from listening to my instructors that turning my legs over will help flush the lactic acid from my muscles and also help me get to my goal of 20km.  I'm feeling so much better. The happy endorphins are obviously starting to kick in.

Back to work, focus, focus, focus.  Focus made much easier by the consumption of lunch.  Yay for lunch.  I've got a big night planned but I've made a commitment to myself that I'm heading back to gym before the pub.  Knowing I'm going out, I  put in a much higher intensity half hour on the bike which leaves me huffing and puffing.  Once I'm at the pub I think about having a drink but am not really in the mood so grab a diet coke.  The girls head off and I tuck into my dinner. Mmmm stirfry with a hint of chilli. Knowing it was there meant that I didn't stress about it or pick a cruddy choice. I know I've got a day tomorrow which I can't really control the catering so making good choices today takes some of the pressure off.    The show is fabulous and  I slowly meander my way home.  Tired but happy.