Sunday 3/23

1.1 miles, just to Walgreens to pick up a few things.

Saturday 3/22

4.5 to 5 miles at Reid Park. I'm not sure how long because I got turned around and when I tried to map it, I'm not sure exactly where I went.

2,7 miles

2.7 miles with the kid and stroller. I didn't start feeling like I was actually going to die until about 2.5 miles, so that is progress. I did about 2.3 miles in 40 minutes so my time is really bad. Oh well... I didn't say I would go fast. I just said I would go.

Yoga! Walk!

The yoga on Saturday tore up my knee. Well not tore it up, but worked it out pretty good. If I get get the muscles around the knee built back up, it will help. The weight issue is a major struggle, as always. Sunday I did 2 miles with the kid in the stroller. The stroller has something wrong with the front wheel. When I went fast, which is not fast, it wobbled. I'm going to look at it and see if there is anything I can do. So I wore my knee brace for the walk and today it's fairly painless. We will see how the day goes.

yoga!

60 minute yoga class at Chuze and about 5 minutes on the elliptical beforehand to warm up.

elliptical

I went to the gym and did 40 minutes on the elliptical at about 3.2 mph. Heart rate averaging about 155.

2 miles

2 miles down Pima street. Did the first 1.4 in 24 minutes (3.5 mph) with an attempt at actual exercise. Was starting to cough and was very tired, so strolled the rest of the way home. All together 35 minutes.

The Gym

Gyms have come a long way,  baby. Today I went with a friend to her gym. It was fantastic! The machines were clean, well-functioning, and easy to use. And plentiful. They have stair steppers, ellipticals, 2 kinds of bikes, treadmills, and lots of weight lifting. There were these machines that I have never seen before - personal trainer machines or something like that - I definitely want to investigate that next time I go. I am definitely thinking about joining. It's $9.99 a month with no contract, but you have to pay a stupid start-up fee and then an annual fee every January. It was so awesome though... the biggest ceiling fans I have ever seen. Ipod chargers built in to the machines. Fans built in to the treadmills. Plentiful TV's and all you have to do is plug your headphones in to the machine and choose the channel you want. Lots of cleaning stations. The best part - get this!! A "no grunting" rule. There is no cursing, shouting, yelling, or other kind of noise-making. They have created an atmosphere that is incredibly welcoming. I was very impressed, obviously.
So, I have exercised 3 days in a row. Today I did 3 machines and worked out for 45 minutes. It was so much more pleasant at that gym. The workout room at my apartment complex has 2 treadmills, 2 bikes, and 2 ellipticals. One of the elliptical display panels is all paint splattered and can't really be used. One of the bikes has a missing handle and a torn seat. Worst of all, it is hotter than hell in there. There is no cleaning station and not even a fan. It's better than nothing. It just doesn't inspire me to want to go in there much, or stay long once I'm there.
Food has gone well the last 2 days. I'm still eating too many calories but they are good calories, so I have no qualms about that.  I haven't weighed myself and I hope I don't give in and do it. It does absolutely no good. The scale doesn't tell me whether or not my clothes fit... only whether or not they SHOULD according to my history. That's bad because then I get on the scale, think oh, I can wear those shorts because this is how much I weight last time they fit! Then they don't fit, because my weight is distributed differently or whatever, and then I'm pissed. Being pissed about anything food or weight related leads to eating food. Stupid, huh?

The Answer

This morning I watched the political pundits, and I wanted to make fried potatoes and eggs and eat them while I watched. Instead, I made a smoothie with kale, spinach, carrots, berries, flaxseed, and some vitamin c and probiotics, and drank it. Then,  I wanted to make fried potatoes (at that point I was willing to give up the eggs) and sit and read my book. Instead, I got into my long-neglected workout clothes and went to the exercise room in my apartment complex. I rode the bike for 20 minutes and then walked on the treadmill for 10. After that, I wanted to make fried potatoes and sit and read my book. Instead, I made another smoothie sans flaxseed and supplements, and drank it. Now I will clean up and get to the grocery store when what I want to do is sit and read my book. (It's a really good book.)
If I only knew why I have the strength to do these things some days and not others, maybe I could find a way to make it happen more frequently. Because ultimately, the answer to my mood swings is not more pills. It's on the treadmill and the exercise bike and the elliptical. It's outside at 5 a.m. walking toward the sunrise. It's in the raw whole food smoothies. Why my logical brain can't be in charge all of the time I will probably never know, but I'm certainly going to take advantage of the times when it is. So far today, healthy is winning.

Freaking dreams!

My recurring school-themed dreams have started up again. They had gone away for a couple of weeks when my doctor started me on a new medication that is supposed to help me sleep better, which is supposed to help me stabilize. Waking up with knots in my stomach from the stupid dreams is SO not fun. On another note, I have been on a total and complete sugar binge for 3 days now. Digestive system in complete revolt and I feel like shit.

A Good Week

The past week has been mostly successful as far as my quest to adopt a whole foods diet. I have had cheese and some milk, but no meat other than shrimp that I had yesterday. My friend Maggie wants to do the juice reboot we saw when we watched "Fat, Sick, and Dying." (You can watch the movie at the same website for free - just go to the Home tab.) I don't think I want to do it. I simply cannot imagine giving up food for any period of time. I'm also worried about the low protein intake, although I have not found any evidence that it is a problem, even long-term. A large quantity of greens provides more protein than I knew.
Yesterday I stopped at Panda Express in between a doctor's appointment and a pedicure, and I ate the honey-walnut shrimp with chow mien. The chow mien was OK but I did not care for the feeling of chewing the shrimp, and it was way too sweet. The walnuts were candied, for god's sake. It was pretty much gross.
I'm feeling almost ready to start exercising again. I have to keep reminding myself that I can do other things besides trying to run. I just want so badly to get back into the shape I was before, when I was doing half marathons. Riding the bike and/or doing the elliptical will help get me ready. I just need to keep that in mind.
I'm much more stable following the adjustment to my medication a couple of weeks ago. I am not feeling sorry for myself anymore and feel happy most of the time. I had a dentist appointment on Friday, and those are always traumatic even though I get the nitrous oxide. I had to have extra novocaine because it was hurting on the side of my mouth opposite of where he was drilling. As a result, the entire lower left part of my face was numb, including my nose. It was horrid. Last night I dreamed that I was numb all the way up to one eye, and it wouldn't wear off, and I had to wear an eye patch. I don't know why the dentist is so freaking difficult for me, but whatever. I'm being an adult and getting it done, even though I hate it. My next appointment will be my last 2 fillings (I had 6) and then I have a crown that needs to be replaced. Yuck.

Wednesday Mostly Bitchery

It is really nice to have time to blog. It won't last long, I think... school starts August 6th, and starting August 22 I will be teaching a college class from 4:00 - 5:15, Monday through Thursday. I think that will pretty much take care of any kind of personal life I might have had.
I am gaining weight at an alarming rate. I have to go clothes shopping because I have exactly 2 work appropriate outfits that fit. I'm near utter despair. I know that in addition to adopting a whole foods, plant-based diet, I MUST exercise. I just haven't been able to make myself do it.
Mostly, it is emotional eating that is in my way. I've lost all of my close friends in the last half year or so. I've made one close friend, which helps, but the absence of my other close friends, and the ways in which I lost them, keeps me up at night. I try not to think about it. My disease has been out of hand, which has been a major contributor to both the loss of my friends and the eating. I want to work out ways to deal with my disease, when it is taking over my life and I don't yet know it. I wish to god I could find someone, anyone, who would be willing to put up with me when I am in the clutches of the thing. I mean a companion. My mom puts up with it, of course, and my daughters. They always forgive me my episodes, and for that I am truly thankful. They are never abusive, and when I come out of it, we talk about it, and move past it. My kids know they have a crazy mother, and they deal with it. My mom knows she has a crazy daughter, and she deals with it. My students always forgive me as well, even they don't know the reasons for my behavior. I am thankful for that as well. I almost think it would be better to have a disease that would kill me, because at least then I would know that there would be an end to it. When I think about all of this, I eat. Sometimes I eat until I feel sick. Eating makes me stop thinking about it. Sick, huh? Drinking makes me stop thinking about it too. Even worse.
Some of the friends had to go, and my disease had nothing to do with it. The one who became a coke whore and hooked up with my ex-boyfriend, for instance. Or, the one who didn't want to be my friend anymore when I stopped drinking. Or, the one who didn't want to talk about anything but work, and every conversation with her left me exhausted and stressed out.
Knowing I will live the rest of my life like this is enough to send me over the edge, if I dwell on it. So I try not to. I have to keep reminding myself that I didn't ask for this disease, it's not my fault that I have this disease, and that I am doing the absolute best I can to still be a good person even though I have this disease. I hate it though. I hate this disease with every fiber of my being. I resent it. I resent it taking over my life and wreaking havoc. I resent not knowing when that is happening, and therefore not having the ability to stop it. I resent not having a single person in my life who is willing to tell me when I am out of control, BEFORE the hateful thing wrecks my life and treats others poorly. I resent not being able to make other people understand that it's not ME. I resent who I am when I'm in the clutches of it. I resent having to hide it, the dirty secret, because once I use the vocabulary of the disease, I am "less than" in the eyes of others. I resent BEING "less than."
Most of all, I resent the people who think I am making the whole thing up. Fuck you, I want to say. I wish you could walk a mile in my shoes. I wish you could experience just one episode of each extreme of my disease. I wish you could know what it's like to have your life spiral out of control, and not even know it until after the damage has been done. I wish you could teeter on the edge of sanity. Just to know what it feels like. I wish you could understand the feeling of not wanting to live anymore because you don't have control of the life you have. I wish you could see what my daughters see. I wish, I wish, I wish. In the words of my papa, wish in one hand and shit in the other, and see which one fills up first. 
But enough of the pity party. If I can eat the foods that will help make me whole, and if I can take care of my body in a way that will help make me whole, it would change many things for the better. It's just a day at a time, an hour at a time. Yesterday I made it clear up until 4:30 before I lost it! Until that point, I had eaten nothing but whole, plant-based foods. Victory was mine for that part of the day! Maybe today it will last until 5:00... or even later... one can hope! One can try!

I watched "Forks Over Knives" and "Fat, Sick, and Dying" yesterday. They were both informative and eye-opening documentaries. I have been sort of gravitating toward a whole foods diet, having morning smoothies that contain nothing but whole, mostly organic foods, and a couple of natural supplements. The smoothies are filling and delicious and not difficult to keep as part of my routine. I am interested in learning more about the connection between diet and health, and the more I learn, the more I realized how much I don't know about food.
Last night I dreamed that I was over-the-top hungry and went to a drive-through. I ordered and wolfed down a giant hamburger without thinking about it. After, I was sitting there feeling sort of sick and I realized I had eaten red meat. I didn't feel shame or guilt or anything like that... it was more like, why the hell did I do that to myself? Now it's going to take at least a day before I feel normal again. That dream is a good example of how my food dreams are changing, along with my attitudes and beliefs about nutrition.
Walking along the back wall of the grocery store yesterday, where the juices, eggs, and dairy are stored, Jessica pointed to the juice drinks that are put in cartons and marketed as nutritious. She said, "I remember when I thought that was juice." It started me thinking about where my children learned about nutrition. I never explicitly taught them about nutrition. I believe this is because of ignorance on my part. I am guilty of feeding them the same bullshit I was fed about certain heavily-subsidized foods that are a large part of the American diet. "Drink your milk. It will give you strong bones and teeth." "Eat your meat. It has the protein you need to make you strong." I also told them the one thing that has always been true: "We need to eat more fruits and vegetables. They are good for us." Words are only words, and all three of us have struggled with weight, although my children not near as much as me.
That statement about fruits and vegetables is just about  the only thing that all of America seems to agree on regarding nutrition. Well, everybody except for maybe Dr. Atkins, and perhaps after death and in hindsight he agrees now, too.
What I realized yesterday is that, unbidden and without permission, our education system has taken on the task of teaching our children about nutrition. That doesn't seem like such a bad idea, in and of itself. Where else would our kids learn about food? Like me, most parents do not set out to teach their children about food. They teach by example. This would not necessarily be a bad thing; in fact, if the curriculum were science-based, it might even be a good thing. This is where it gets scary, though. The agriculture industry in general is heavily lobbied in Washington. Our public schools, without being checked, are teaching our kids about food. They are teaching about food in the classroom, and they are teaching about food in the cafeteria. The food in the cafeteria is crappy, and the lessons in the classroom are based on what the government tells us about nutrition. I'm beginning to be convinced that everything I thought I knew about nutrition is just plain wrong. There is proof all around us. As a nation, we are fat, sick, and dying. It's our food. I think Bill Maher had it right when he said something to the effect of, "There's no money in healthy people. There is no money in dead people either. The money is in the middle, where the sick people are. Somebody has got to say that pills are not the answer. Somebody has to stand up and say the answer is spinach."
There are a whole lot of people making a whole lot of money off of the fat, sick, and dying American population. It's something to think about.

Sunday already??

So here it is Sunday, and I need to do my long. BUT it's been a tough week. I only went on Monday and Thursday, and Monday's was very short. Tuesday, I sat up and dangled my feet off the bed to say my prayers. Next thing I knew, I was waking up at 5:00 (45 minutes later). I must have fallen asleep saying my prayers and got back under the covers without waking up. Wednesday I just kept hitting the snooze button. Friday I woke up feeling as though I was hit by a truck. I managed to get to work but then got the shivers and felt so poorly I left work and came home to bed. Yesterday I planned to go before work at my second job, but graded papers instead. So here I am and it's Sunday and I'm ill prepared to go 10% further than last week. It will have to be the same as last week and it will have to be ok! Hopefully I will have time later to map out my training for Denver at the end of May. I still have a lot of papers to grade, and I need to do lesson plans as well, not to mention it's the stupid superbowl today and I'm going to my dad's for the game. The good news is, I will have earned a couple of beers.
***Update: 3.25 miles, done and done! 

2 jobs + training for half marathon = very tired teacher

Yesterday I did 2 miles at a 15-minute mile pace. We went a different route, so poop dog, who is completely neurotic, was jumpy and obnoxious. I was irritable because I'm so tired, so I yelled at her and told her I wasn't going to bring her anymore, which I'm sure made her happy because she doesn't want to be dragged out of her bed in the first place.
I'm glad it's Friday and even though there has been a substitute teacher for 2 days because I had to go to a stupid vocabulary training, I'm going to find a math puzzle for the students to do so that I can get caught up. I'm totally in survivial mode and that's all right because I will survive.
I didn't exercise today... my stomach is in revolt and I don't know if it's from being tired or if I'm actually going to come down with something.... airborn to the rescue! Here's to crappy math teachers, hooray! Here's to the weekend, hooray! I'm planning on doing 3.7 miles on Sunday.

no dog = faster walk

This morning I did a very quick 1.4 miles. By very quick I mean about 20 minutes. I did faster than 15-minute miles. It was awesome. 

A hellish 3

I drank coffee, had my muscle milk and V-8, watched political pundits, and played on the computer. Then poop dog and I set out on our walk/jog. It is now officially a walk/jog because I set my interval timer for a 1:00 to 0:10 walk/jog ratio.Yes, 10 seconds... I have to start slow! It's the best way to change... one baby step at a time. I don't think the intervals were the reason that the trip never became joyful. It might be the 3 days off in a row, it might be the junk food I ate during my PMS. It might have been just one of those crappy days! Anyway it's done. Now I am going to rest before I go grocery shopping and get food ready for lunches and dinners this week.

Stupid timer!

I did 1.6 yesterday, in a hurry because I left late because I was fooling around on the internet. I was reading fairweather's post about the supportive family members and dogs being dragged out of their warm beds. It had never occurred to me to just drag poop dog out of the bed and make her come with me... after all, I don't want to go either, yet here I am in my outfit! So even though poop dog tried to escape my clutches, I put her harness and leash on and off we went. Lo and behold, once fat dog realized that poop dog was going whether or not she liked it, he decided he needed to have a walk too. So when I got back from my 1.6, I had to put his harness on and then take him with me for my cool down. (He has hip dysplaisa, so he can't go far.)
All of this and I was only 10 minutes later than usual for work. Yay!
Today is a rest day, meaning still a 12-hour workday but NO walk/jog.

new technology - time to learn it = slow walk

Yesterday I used my new iPod Nano that my wonderful daughters bought me for Christmas. I hadn't uploaded music to it yet because my work computer, which is the only one I have, got re-imaged and I lost all my music. I've been slowly getting it back. Finally this past weekend I got the music loaded on to the iPod. Off I went for my walk yesterday, sans poop dog again because she kept running away when I tried to put her coat on so I left her home. The iPod stopped playing music every time the screen went black, which was approximately every 30 seconds. I kept trying to figure out what was wrong with it, and while I was doing that, I was walking at little more than a stroll. Then my pants started to chafe because they are too small, and I said f*ck it and turned around. Turns out my ear buds weren't plugged in all the way. Dorkery of the highest order.
I'm off for today's walk/run. Hoping it will go better. I ate 3 damn chocolate truffles right before bed and now I have a sugar hangover, which I am sure the walk/run will cure if I go fast enough. I lost half a pound last week, which I guess is better than gaining, and is fortunate considering I was over my calories on 4 out of the 7 days.

quick 2

This morning I did 2.1 miles in 33 minutes.Good enough for me. The poop dog didn't want to go so I went by myself, and I wonder if taking her is slowing me down. I have to hold her on a very short leash so I can only pump with one arm while I am walking/jogging.
My right knee is beginning to complain. Let's hope it passes quickly. I'm wearing my knee brace to sleep. I don't know if that will make a difference.
I'm registered for the Colorado Colfax on May 20th and I'm very excited!! Classes at Pima will be over, and it is the weekend before the last week of school. I'm on the lookout for cheap plane tickets!