31 Weeks!

That's how far it is between this day and my goal date for my BIG goal. My big goal isn't size or weight based. It's not getting back to Pre-Baby body (I'm fitter and smaller than I ever was before Lexi, and almost where I was before Declan in size, though not weight.) It's not to be skinny for my sister's wedding-or to be "skinny" ever. 

I. WANT. ABS. 

So, my big goal has been, for a long time, Abs by my 35th Birthday. Which is thirty one weeks from today. I think it's in reach. I'm likely not gonna have Jillian's low body fat type abs, but  I can still have them visible. 

The HOW: 

-this holiday season I'm doing the Mommy Trainer 15 day challenge (adjusted to fit my workout schedule) and the Model Body 15 day challenge (again adjusting for my schedule). 

-I'll also be adding a few supplements to help me get all I can out of these workouts. 

-I've mapped out a formula to keep my food on point. I don't believe in depriving myself, but instead, I make "treat food" part of the plan. This includes allowing one "off road" meal or sometimes DAY a week. This keeps me from feeling deprived without negatively affecting results. 

-starting 1/2/17 I'll be doing another round of BodyShred, and hopefully that will help me round out the portion of my journey focusing on fat loss. 

-after Bodyshred I'll take a yoga recovery week, then do a few weeks of Master Trainer workouts, and hopefully...

-at that point I'll be able to shift focus to yoga, and keep HIIT/weight training in the schedule twice a week, and keep up my cycle schedule. It'll look like this:

 M/W/F : 45-60 min yoga, walk or light cardio 

T/Th: 45-60m HIIT workout, 60min cycle

Sa: 20 min cycle intervals

Hopefully that new schedule works to help me reach my goals of muscular arms and abs and maintain my fat loss. I'll probably throw in a round of Bodyshred every few months to mix it up too. 

Updates, goals reached, challenges.

 

I finished Bodyshred on November 11, and it felt so good, but also kind of anticlimactic, and I'm not sure why. I never really expected to finish it able to do everything the workout asked of me, and I am proud that I fought through that last week, when the workouts were so hard it felt like I was modifying more than actually following the moves. Or maybe it was because my sister was getting engaged in two days, and that was consuming my thoughts and feelings. Maybe it was because I felt like my body wasn't really changing, despite my giving everything I had. 

Except it was, and is. My body did the ridiculous swelling thing it does through most of the program, and it was difficult to see any exterior payoff to all my hard work. On the Friday before my last week of Bodyshred, my size 8 jeans were feeling incredibly tight and I thought, this better come off when I get a little chance to recover. Well, the next Thursday, I felt kinda skinny, and decided to see what I weighed. The scale had faithfully claimed since Declan was 2 weeks old that I weighed 182 (or more, some days!) despite me losing pant sizes and working out like a beast. Not this day. This day it told me 174. Well good. I'll take that. Then, sometime that weekend, I tried on my size six jeans, and they slid right on and there was no muffin top. 

This past week was not intended to be a recovery week, but due to a perfect storm on my mental health affecting my physical health, it was, for the most part. That also gave me a chance to actually see the changes in my body. I saw another movement on the scale (171) and I tried on my size fours twice. The first time I just wanted to see how close I was to being able to button and zip-I didn't really think they'd come over my hips! They buttoned and zipped with little effort. The second time, yesterday, there was no muffin top. What is this world? They weren't comfortable, but they went on. So that gives me some fuel to think that maybe in the next 5 weeks of workouts I can make the difference between where I am now and "comfortable". Y'know, everyone's Holiday plan. Hahahaha! 

I'm starting the first of two challenges I've got on deck for the holidays today,  and I'm gonna record stats for once:

Weight: 171

Waist: 30

Hips: 40

Chest:40

Cage : 33

Thigh: 23

Calf:14

Bicep(not flexed): 11

I'm trying to prepare myself for the likelihood of swelling up again, at least a bit, but hopefully even our trip at Christmas won't jack up my results too much. 

This is (probably) our last week of nursing, which will get its own post, but this means next week I can start taking a pre workout and BCAA supplements! I'm excited about that and really hope there's a positive effect on my muscle building, workout performance, and overall energy. 

I'm a bit overtired today from a very emotional and mentally challenging week, and resulting lack of sleep, but I'm so excited for what's ahead. 

31 weeks! 

Comparison-to myself

I think we all struggle with comparing ourselves to others. It's natural, something in our DNA, to compete, probably a survival thing. But it sucks. It's not fair, and it's not productive outside a survival or competition (like for a sport or game show type thing) context. It saps our enjoyment of who we are and where we are, and who needs that? 

I used to compare myself appearance-wise to my little sister. I won't get into all the reasons that was dumb, but thankfully I've (mostly) slayed that dragon. I still compare myself to others and find myself wanting sometimes, but right now, the hurdle I'm finding in my way is comparing my current body to my own, at this point post Lexi, meaning when Lexi was 17, 18, 19, 20 months old. It's just not fair, because obviously everything is different now than it was then.

-I had one child, not two, and she was the easiest baby ever. She slept till ten am regularly and if she did wake before I was ready for her, she played happily in her crib until I came. Declan hates being in his crib, and on average wakes at 7:30. This is a HUGE difference, because it means that now, if I want to get my workout done before the kids are up I'll have to be up and moving by 545. I'm working toward that goal, but right now, instead of: get up at 5:45-eat/Jesus time-work out, my morning routine looks like: wake at 6:30, have Scott hold me till my anxiety lets me breathe or have calm rational thoughts (this varies, and some mornings isn't an issue), coffee/eat/Jesus time, Declan is up, nurse him, give him breakfast, Lexi is up, wrangle her to the table, do school while she eats, convince them both to go upstairs and play, do my workout with one ear inclined to make sure everything is ok upstairs and probably a few trips upstairs to referee. By the time I'm done it's somewhere around 11, and I'm physically and emotionally spent for the day already, because of the next HUGE difference between 19 month old Lexi's mama and 4 year old Lexi and 19 month old Declan's mama. 

-I did not have PPDA when Lexi was 19 mos. I didn't have it at all. I had a miscarriage on the day lexi was 18 mos old and it broke my heart, but I was in better mental health even after that than I am today. Even on good days (I think I'm on day 6 or 7 in a row now) I have to battle constantly to keep the triggers at arms length because I know I'm one thought away from paralyzing fear. My life is wonderful, I'm so happy with it, but I'm also always petrified of everything falling apart. 

My fitness is, along with protecting sleep and eating nutritive foods, my medicine. I need it, and I really do want to be able to get up early enough to get my main workout done before the kids are up, so we can have more time to play and less awkward safety fears for me. I'm making progress, but man! 

-I also finished weaning Lexi the day she turned 19 mos. Declan will be 20 mos in a week and is still nursing 3x a day. I'm fine with that, but I know it's also a factor in my metabolism.

-another factor is that our bodies and metabolisms change. Mine has always been challenging, and now I'm three years older, I've got chemical stuff going on with the ppda, and PCOS. It's not an excuse to give up or slack off, it's a reason to fight. And that's what I'm doing every single day. I'm fighting. 

You know what else? I'm not actually that far off from where I was then, I'm just hard on myself. I'm just about one size behind where I was then. I got my size four Capri pants when lexi was 20 mos and one week old-5 weeks after she weaned. So, if I'm still nursing 3x a day, that could be the factor. Plus, like I said, life is just different.

I've gotta be ok with that. I've gotta hike this part of the mountain and conquer it. Just because I can't get my size four skinny jeans over my hips today doesn't mean in two months I won't be able to button and zip them. I am mighty and an overcomer. And so are you. 

Ten.

Note: I was told about 7 years ago to stop marking this anniversary and "move on" by a couple people I consider close friends, and I was told the same only a couple months after our second loss by a family member. I realize that not everyone sees pregnancy loss as a big deal, or understands deep mourning for a child one has never met.  If you are one of those folks, this post isn't for you. I don't say that with hostility, I just don't want to waste your time. 

To my first baby: 

It was ten years ago this Sunday (October 9) that I said goodbye to you. Not just to you, but to the dreams I had of who you could be.  That was the day you were born, impossibly early, after a short labor that wrenched my heart as much as my body. I held you in my hand, knowing I'd never hold you in my arms.   I never got to know you, even whether you're a boy or girl, but despite the shortness of our time together- 

Sweet Little Baby, you changed me forever. Until your sister came along, nothing in my life had such an impact. Everything that followed your birth,  (because it was a birth-I labored 97 hours with your sister and brother, and your birth counts too.) whether it seemed good or bad at the time, happened because, for a brief time, you lived in me and I will never be the same. 

Without your birth I would never have instant messaged the author I discovered when I was pregnant with you and recovering from your loss, we never would have become friends, leading me to all sorts of new online pursuits to escape from the pain I couldn't handle. Without you, the friendship wouldn't have led to a job, to many new friendships-many of the people reading this wouldn't be, because podcasting wouldn't have become what it was to me. 

I wouldn't have almost lost your daddy to the mistakes that stemmed from unresolved grief-but you know what? Even that was a gift, because losing you, and all the ways it tore us apart was the catalyst for the ground up rebuilding of our marriage and I wouldn't trade that for anything. Little Baby, it hurt so bad, but it's created a new marriage- and better, more mature and united, understanding, forgiving, and spiritually united parents for your brother and sister. 

Losing you, and the way it broke us apart for awhile ended up preparing your daddy for when we lost September baby too. He knew what to do, and how to love me better, because he learned from you. 

Because of you, my first baby, I had hope. I knew my body could conceive, and so had something to give me courage while we waited. 

Because of you, I am more thankful. For your sister, from the moment I knew she was growing, for your daddy, who is servant leadership personified, for your brother, whose unpredictability is his charm. I don't take a single moment for granted, because I know the sadness of dreams dashed.

Because of you, I am more patient. I waited a long time for your sister, but more than that, I have a greater capacity for patience *with* her and Declan. I never got to love you like I wanted, and knowing that loss and all the years I waited after, keeps in perspective the gift of motherhood. 

Because of you I celebrate every moment of magic in motherhood, because it feels like such a gift, I can't take it for granted the way I may have if it had come easily. I let Lexi climb in bed and hold her a little while in the night when she wakes, partly because I'll never have that with you. I fought with all I had for a nursing relationship with Declan, and I'm letting him keep nursing even now, because it's a powerful and tender thing, and I'll only get to experience that intimacy for a short time, and I never did with you. 

The past ten years have been long and short and up and down, but I wouldn't trade them, or the short time I had with you. Lexi and Declan are my rainbow babies, and there can be no rainbow without the rain. I celebrate you, and the gift that you were, and are, and will always be. 

I miss you, though I never met you, but I know someday I will. 

Why I share, and some updates

Maybe you're a new friend of mine, or maybe an old friend who's just never clicked over here. Maybe you're rolling your eyes at my constant status updates about my fitness journey on FB. Regardless how you got here, welcome, and thank you!  

I share a lot about my fitness journey and my mental health challenges, and there are a few reasons why. Spoiler alert-none of them is because I'm bragging about how awesome I am! Hahahaha. Also not because I want anyone to feel sorry for me. Now we've covered the non-reasons, here are the actual reasons I share: 

-it's cathartic. I process things by talking about them. It helps me clarify my thoughts, and make sense of thing. It strengthens my resolve and solidifies my plans. 

-I want to have a reference point in the future. I blog so I can remember the journey, what worked, what didn't, and the timeline, in case I face the same challenges again. 

The biggest reason I share though, is because I want to encourage. I felt so alone for so long, like this (fitness, health, mental health) came easily to everyone else and I must be a failure and a loser. I've realized that's far from true, and so I'm on a mission to share-because maybe my journey, and my resolve to keep fighting for my goals will encourage someone else to also. We are in this together. 

So, all that said, here are some updates:

I had tried taking evening primrose oil after reading a lot about it helping with pms, anxiety, depression, and other PCOS symptoms. After about two weeks I stopped-three days ago- because though my period came only ten days late instead of 3-4 weeks, my anxiety and depression during those ten days and the following five days of my period were flat out unbearable. There's no way of knowing if the timing of my period or the mental health challenge spike was related to the EPO, it wasn't worth the risk that if I continued I'd get even worse off or even stay the same to see if maybe it regulated my period-something that should happen on its own as Declan weans. It was so miserable, y'all. 

***Side note, on 10/2 he will have nursed longer than Lexi did. I see little sign of him slowing down, though he doesn't need his before nap nurse, and maybe even the one after. We still do them, most days,because he doesn't turn me down, and the snuggles are so sweet. He  loves his morning milk though. Like with Lexi, I think that'll be the last to go, even after bedtime, because Scott puts him to bed anyway. ***

Due to the mental health challenges the past few weeks, I'm not where I want to be with my daily routine, particularly my level of exercise, so I'm revising my goals, without giving myself room to slack off.

I'm probably not going to be wearing my size 4's in another 6 weeks-considering somehow my 6's, that did fit before vacation, are muffin toppy again. That may be due to the hormonal cycle combined with the swelling from working out again after a couple weeks off, (which is why I really shouldn't take more than one week off, my body freaks out...), but regardless, I'm not 3/4 of a size away from those pants fitting. Revising this goal is hard, partly because I've had the date of 10/31 set in my head for so long, and partly because I don't really know what to expect from myself, what's reasonable. The last time I went from an 8 to a 4, it took me somewhere around 4-5 months, and I had a pregnancy and stopped nursing during that time. I had also started from a heavier place and maybe there was momentum? I don't really know. All I can really do is put my head down and grind hard, eat clean, and recover well. My meal planning is on track, sleep is getting better, and my workout intensity is good. I'm excited to start cycling 3x a week again, and even more excited to continue making my yoga practice a priority. Ultimately I'd like to be doing HIIT and cycle twice a week and yoga six times a week as my fitness routine, but for now, and until I reach some big goals, it's gotta be HIIT 4x, cycle 3x, yoga 6x. 

All that to say, I'm making a soft goal of thanksgiving for those jeans, and hopefully I'm just gonna enjoy the ride there. I'm just so ready to be done with the "weight loss" part of this journey and be able to focus more on performance and developing my yoga practice. Both those elements are definitely there now, but feeling good in clothes is a priority and a distraction. Having babies has changed my body, and I'm good with that-and let's be real, my pre-baby body was never as fit, healthy, and strong as this body I have now. However, I don't feel like it's wrong to want to drop some extra fluff-as long as I acknowledge and love the beauty that exists along the way. 

I have a tendency to be hyper aware of my belly and label myself "disgusting" because the flesh there is so...fleshy. I'm mostly ok with the rest of my body, though obviously I'm loving every muscle that pops more and every place that gets less smooshy. But my belly. Ugh. I'm working hard at patience and loving myself along the journey there. It's also the only place that extra bulk limits me during workouts-I can't bring knee to nose because my belly is in the way, range of motion is limited on other ab moves, how much further could I fold in standing forward fold? 

I am committed to positive self talk, not just for me, but for Lexi. Lately she's around when I'm working out (getting myself going in the morning is a challenge!) and I make sure to tell her that we work out because it makes us strong and mighty! I never mention wanting to be smaller or skinnier, only stronger. I want her to always love herself for exactly who she is and only strive to *be* better and healthier and stronger- I think my fitness journey stalled out for so long because I didn't get that. I was so focused on being "skinny" that I missed the beauty of strength and the things my body could do! I only really fell in love with my body and really embraced what it can do in September of 2011 when I started practicing yoga. Almost ten years of trying so hard to be thin came before that. It was great timing though, because 6 weeks later I got pregnant with Lexi, and I really fell in love with my body then! And I needed that foundation to begin the climb back, and to really discover the athlete inside me in 2013. I have struggled since then, off and on to re-focus myself, and the desire to be skinny pops up when I compare sometimes, but that's why my hashtag for this part of my journey is 

#ropesngunsnabs 

The Tide

I've finally realized that the best analogy for the fluidity of my mental/emotional state these days is the tide. It's cyclical overall (cuz it's hormonal, duh) and yet, a riptide (calm at the surface, treacherous below--caused by triggers, some predictable, some not ) is always possible, and tidal waves are a thing too. High tide is when I feel like I could drown (the past week or so) and am too tired but must keep fighting to stay afloat, and low tide is when I feel able to wiggle my toes, turn my face to the sun, and relax. And y'know what else is awesome about low tide? You see the treasures that high tide left behind. ☺️

Today I woke like I have for almost two weeks now, with an elephant on my chest and my stomach roiling. The difference is, that like yesterday, there were no fearful thoughts to match. The physical does still affect the emotional though. Yesterday was Wednesday and I didn't have to get up and moving immediately, so I lay in Scott's arms and chatted lightly until my body relaxed and I moved on with my day. It wasn't ideal, but my body is tired and has been through the wringer between PPDA, pms, and BodyShred lately so it's not surprising. Today, all the above is true, but I didn't have the time to lie in bed till I felt better, though I stole a few extra minutes. I'm moving more slowly through my morning routine than I'd like, repeating truths to myself to fend off any thoughts that might try to come- any riptide lurking below my calm waters. 

The kids are healthy. 

Lexi will learn to obey. 

You are doing a great job.

You will get better, healthier, physically and emotionally. 

You are worth the struggle.

You are worth loving. 

You feel this way because you are tired, but you are getting stronger and you will rest better for the work. 

It is low tide. The sun is rising. I'll feel it soon. I'm healing. One moment at a time He is renewing me. 

LMAL: Health

This chapter is totally in my wheelhouse-it almost feels like cheating to get to focus on it! Don't be too surprised if you see the next chapter of my experiment too, alongside this, since physical health is a huge focus of my life on the daily anyway. 

I've discovered that my physical well being and mental health are inextricably linked, that a workout is like a hit of Prozac-usually-and that tired turns into crazed with anxiety fairly easily. Add PMS/PMDD to the mix, keeping in mind that because of my PCOS, PMS can last *weeks*, and it's quite a handful to manage. So, yes, I must take care of my health, mental and physical, and the two are one. 

Personally, I find a ramp-up to a pace I can maintain serves me best and allows me to multiply my "spoons" (daily energy resources) over time. I build, slowly and carefully, (since overtired equals crazy and miserable) and push, while protecting recovery carefully, and when I get to the level of physical activity I want to be at, I can then increase intensity in specific areas, and the increased energy I get allows me to manage other areas of life better, like housework, getting the kids out to the park, etc. As my mental health improves, I hope to overcome some big obstacles, but for now I'm focusing on what's in front of me, right? 

My experiment: 

-workout is job 1 each day

-rest and recovery are equally important. 

-keep the day rolling as routine is built, rather than letting surprises derail the day. 

-be kind to myself with expectations.