Gym Buddy

So I lost my gym buddy and this has seriously derailed my exercise routine.

My friend Mandy joined the gym with me a year and a half ago, at that time I was the #1 cheerleader. I got us motivated and kept us that way for the entire workout.  But the days that I was low energy or wanted to bail Mandy kept me on track.  I can honestly say that without her I would have never completed the IronGirl last summer.  We trained together we supported each other and we completed the race together.

Recently Mandy switched gyms.  She wanted a place that had a pool and was closer to her house. While I totally get that, I am using her defection as a major excuse for my poor attendance at my kick butt classes.

I have little spurts of energy like last week where I somehow made it to the gym 3 times. Unfortunately, it is now Thursday and I have not made it at all this week.  I am signed up for the IronGirl in August so I actually HAVE to get my butt to the gym or I will never beat my time from last year. I am not sure what is wrong with me but I have this terrible habit of getting totally obsessed with something and donating 150% of my energy to it and then completely losing interest.  A perfect example of that is the Game of Thrones books. I read the first 3 books back to back completely devoted.  I made my husband read them so that I could talk to him about them, I made us watch the entire first season. Then I got 100 pages into book 4 and turned off. My husband has bow completed the book and is dying to talk to me about it and I have no interest in finishing the book. I am not sure what happened but I just got tired of reading about missing limbs and treachery.  Crazy, cause after months of calling my BFF and rehashing the previous nights pages I don’t even care what happened to the Starks of Winterfell.

So here I sit blogging instead of wrapping my kids in their coats and boots and shoving them in the car and going to the gym.  I have every excuse in the book: it’s too cold, my kids don’t cooperate, I don’t have a workout buddy,  I have too much to do, it’s too cold.  Oh did I mention it’s too cold??

It’s still January and my goal was to get to the gym 3 days a week and I am totally not achieving that goal. I really need Bob Harper to come over and whip my ass into shape.  Honestly I am totally feeling like the Biggest Loser and not the good kind! So today I might not make it to the gym but I am going to try really hard to get rid of the excuses and find some love for myself. I need to find my inner energy to carry me through this dry spell and stop blaming everyone and everything else for my lack of motivation. Maybe I should just curl up on the couch and finish that book!

I hate running!

I would just like to start by saying I hate running! Yes I mean the actual act of running not just running around doing stuff. I have spent 37 years avoiding running. I remember how happy I was to graduate high school and to never have to “run the mile” again. I was the kid who never ever ran until the day of “the mile”. I somehow felt that I had to actually RUN the entire thing or I would look like a person who couldn’t run. Yeah I know doesn’t make any sense. I would finish the mile and then spend the rest of the day trying to act like I wasn’t about to fall out of my chair. Then spend 3 days limping around trying to recover.

I have spent my adult life on every cardio machine at the gym except the treadmill. When my roommate in NYC went out for a run I remember the little voice in my head saying “I should really try that” as I grabbed another handful of M&Ms. I watch people running in my neighborhood or at the lake and I admire them. There has always been that part of me that wanted to be a runner. I have struggled with my weight my entire life. I have struggled even when I didn’t realize I didn’t need to. I have been on every diet ever known to man, I have starved and binged. Food has been my best friend and my enemy.

So here I am pushing 40 finally giving up on dieting. Since February I have gone to the gym 5 to 6 days a week. I push myself really hard and I see changes in my body but the scale is still the same. I am still wearing the same clothes and still not happy with what I see in the mirror (not that I ever will be). My personal trainer told me to increase my cardio a few months ago so I started taking Spin Class a few times a week. Still no change! She looked right at me and said there is no secret to this eat less and RUN! OMG please lord why is this the best way? I realize the eating less thing is not happening so I signed up for a 5K. Now any normal person would have said “OK I am running a 5K in a month I should start training.” Clearly I am not a normal person. It was “The Mile” all over again accept this time I was pushing a jogging stroller and a toddler. I ran the entire thing I didn’t die but I wanted to.

As I ran that 5K I realized a few things about myself.

– I was a lot stronger than I thought I was. For the pathetic 35 minutes it took me to run that 5K I never got a cramp, something that had always happened to me anytime I ran down the block before.
– Even though I felt like my boobs and my face were falling every time my foot hit the ground, I also felt a lightness in my body.
– As I watched the woman at the head of the race I compared myself to them. They were lean and fast. They were focused and determined. Aren’t I all of those things? Well.. maybe not lean but I could be.

What am I scared of? I have watched every season of The Biggest Loser and those people run every day! 400lb people are running on treadmills. Seriously if they can do it why can’t I? At the end of the day it’s determination over fear! I have spent my entire life telling myself I couldn’t run, I’m not a runner, I CAN’T do it. I think as much as I hate to admit it it just might be time to tell myself I CAN!