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So this week was pretty cool for the most part.  I turned 36, we had a three day weekend, I walk/ran two unofficial 5K’s and I ran a whole mile.
Yup!  Remember the post where I realized I couldn’t run a mile yet.  Well I can now!
It began last Thursday when it was raining.  I was supposed to walk on my lunch but it was POURING outside so I didn’t end up doing it.  Instead The Hubs took me out to lunch and I made good choices.  By my afternoon break the skies hadn’t cleared but the rain had mostly stopped so I got changed and told myself I would at least go for a quick walk.  I walked for a minute and a half before I started running, telling myself I would stop whenever I felt like it, at least I was moving.
Prior to this I had only been able to run for five minutes at a time, so in my mind I was shooting for five minutes but after the five passed I felt I could keep going so I did.  After 12 minutes of running the only reason I stopped was because my break was over.  Don’t get me wrong I was glad to stop but I felt I could have gone a little bit longer.
The unfortunate part of the run is that my GPS doesn’t work in the cul de sac I run in by my office so I wasn’t able to see what my distance or speed was, just my time.
Friday I had a chiro appt so I took that as my rest day since I had a pretty big adjustment.
Saturday I got up, got dressed and headed down to the local middle school.  I had no intentions other than just to walk/run until I wanted to stop.
I walked the first five minutes and then took off in a run.  Knowing that I was able to do 12 minutes on Thursday, I did push myself a bit more than normal and after 13 1/2 minutes according to the GPS on my phone I had run a mile from the time I started running.  I was elated, but I was also exhausted so I walked the rest of the time, finishing 3.1 miles in a little over 43 minutes.  Pretty exciting stuff.
Sunday the Hubs had to help his dad chop down a tree in their yard so I decided to tag along and try out my MIL’s treadmill.  I hadn’t used a treadmill since last August when we were on vacation in Vegas and I was trying to keep the buffet’s from doing TOO much damage to my waistline.  As I remembered it, it was WAY easier to run/walk on a treadmill than it was outside, so I was excited to try it again.
Well, I managed to walk/run (mostly walk)2 miles in about 35 minutes and by the time I was done I was DRENCHED!  Literally dripping and my tee shirt was sopping wet.
I guess because I have trained myself outside, it is harder for me to do it on a treadmill now.  It’s so weird but after I was done I knew I didn’t want a treadmill.  I like to mix up my pace depending on my music and it was too hard to keep upping and lowering the speed.  I’ll stick with my outside walking thankyouverymuch!
After that my friend Paula took me out to lunch for my birthday where I may have made poor choices but the first thing I did when we got the food was cut it in half and set it aside.  And as for the strawberry margarita, well it was my birthday!!! 
Monday, since I was so disappointed with my performance on the treadmill I boogied back over to the middle school track and completed another 5K.  This one was done by running five minute, walking five minutes, running five, walking five and so on and so forth.  My finishing time was only a minute more than the last time so that was encouraging.
As for the rest of the week I have been getting my run/walks in on my lunch breaks.  More walking than running because I was trying to give my body a bit of a rest after the weekend.
Today however, I completed my longest consecutive run.  Fifteen whole minutes.  Only two minutes longer than my last one but still!!!  This is HUGE for me.  For so long I didn’t even think I could do FIVE!  I hate to pat myself on the back but DANG! I’m psyched!

So tell me when was the first time you felt like a real runner?

Sooooooooo…I gained at my weigh in today.  One pound.
As I stepped on the scale and saw the number, my mind immediately started in with excuses.  “You should really hold off and weigh in tomorrow.”  “You drank a whole bottle of water when you took your advil at four this morning, you don’t normally do that.”  “You are on your period, you should really wait a day to see if the bloat goes down.”
And while these are all true, here are some more facts:
I did not track my food all last weekend.  I didn’t cheat per say but I did a lot of “a bite of this here” and “a taste of this there” and we all know how that goes.  I also only exercised 3 times this week and one was kinda half assed. 
So while I AM in fact on my period and retaining water, I don’t think that is to blame for my gain.  I let myself get lazy this week and I am paying the price for it on the weigh in.
While it would be easy to delay the weigh in one more day to see if that pound will drop off, that defeats the whole purpose of having a weigh in day right?  I need to hold myself accountable for my actions and let’s face it, this is going to happen from time to time.  I am human and since this is a lifestyle change I have to realize that as long as I don’t let myself spiral out of control, once in a while I will show a gain.  As long as it is only ONCE AND A WHILE I am okay with that.  It sucks but that’s life.

So I’ve been training pretty steady right along for that five K right?  Remember in the last entry how I said it was coming up on Sunday?
Yup!  So I rested all day on Saturday and then got up raring to go on Sunday morning.  I showered, got in my gear and was eating my bowl of Kashi Golean Crunch while my husband searched for directions to the race so he could plug them into the TomTom for me.
I’m crunching down on the cereal and checking my email when I hear him say: “Huh.”
I just figured he had stopped to read an email or something so I ignored him and continued mentally patting myself on the back for being up so early and ready for the race.
“Um, Kel…”  my husband said turning to face me.
“Mmm?”  says I, fully prepared to tune him out if he was going to launch into a guitar related story.
“Everything I pull up on the race says that it was yesterday.”
What??  Well, clearly my husband was mistaken, so I searched my email for my confirmation from active.com and see, there it was, clear as day May 15th.
Saturday.  YESterday!
Words cannot describe how disappointed I was in myself.  I guess I assumed it was on a Sunday because 90 percent of the 5K’s I do are on Sundays.  I can’t believe I was that careless and didn’t double check the dates.
So after beating myself up for a little while I decided that since I was up and in my gear I was going to go walk my own damn 5K at the track of a local school.  And I did.  And I finished 3.1 miles in 48 minutes which is a very good time for me.  But my heart was just not in it.  I came home and instead of feeling elated from the time and the endorphins I cried in the shower like a baby.
To be fair, I am PMSing and am fully aware that has a lot to do with it but I have really let this get to me and I’m not sure why.
It’s even carried over to the sucky mood that I am in today.  I’m letting it spiral into a depression of me saying I’m sick of dieting and I’m sick of exercising when I’m really not.  This sort of mood really needs to be saved for when I hit a plateau but I haven’t!  I am still losing and am doing really well at my walk/running so what the hell???
I know it is a big bummer that I missed the race and all but why am I letting it get to me so badly.
I guess I should just chalk it up to PMS and the bad weather and be done with it.  Hmph.

Never in my life did I think that I would utter the phrase “I only walked a mile today.” but that is exactly what I did this morning.
ONLY one mile.  Heh.
It wasn’t until my boss pointed out that I had, in fact, walked a WHOLE mile that I realized how it sounded.  The old-unfit me would have have laughed right in the face of anyone that even suggested that I walk so much as a quarter of a mile.
Back in a land far far away before I’d even heard of a 5 or 10 K, a mile seemed like such an impossible distance to walk.  At my heaviest, I could barely walk our dog to the end of the street and back and when I did I was in severe pain from lugging around all the extra weight.  I couldn’t fathom the idea of walking a mile.  Hello??  That is what they made cars for!!
Last weekend I walked/jogged 3 miles FOR FUN.  Okay it was also to test my time for the upcoming 5K but still, I didn’t have to.  I’ve been consistent with my pace and times to know roughly what I’ll finish at.

I did it because I wanted to.

The old me would have told the new me I was crazy and then gone off in search of some Cheetos.
This week has been crazy.  While we were away on vacation my husband’s office changed the times of his mandatory training this week to start at 7:00 am.
Well, here is the thing.  Our reliable car is currently not drive-able.  At all.  It won’t fire up and we’ve been meaning to get it towed to the garage to find out what is wrong with it.  Since Rob and I both work in the same business park and both start work at 8:30 it hasn’t been that high of a priority because we can carpool.
Since my office doesn’t even open it’s doors until at least eight, this is a little problem for me.
So what have I been doing for the 1 plus hour between the time I drop off my husband off and can get into my office?
Well I walked of course silly!  Don’t you remember the theme of this entry?
I wore my sweats to work and brought my work clothes in a backpack then I parked at my building and set out.
“The Loop” here in our business park is approx 1.7 miles and has a couple of steep hills.
Know the best thing about going up hill?  You get to go down hill eventually.  What I found on the downhills is that I had no problem running them.  I know that sounds like a “Duh!” moment since, well, it’s DOWN hill, but I actually kept running after the ground leveled off and only went back to walking when the hills went upwards again.
It ended up shaving 10 minutes off the time I normally finish when I just walk the loop.  It seems like such a small thing, but it is really kind of a big deal to me.
Doing it two days in a row however, was a bit much on my knees and ankles so today I only power walked around my building until I reached a mile and then called it a day.  Thus my “only walking a mile” comment.
What I really like about getting my exercise in first thing is that the rest of the day is mine to enjoy.
Also so that I don’t have time to talk myself out of it.  If I wait until my lunch hour there is a 25 percent chance that I will convince myself to take the day off.  If I wait until after work–well forget it, that isn’t an option.  My track record is proof that I just won’t do it at all if I wait until after work.
The flip side of the whole getting it out of the way thing is getting up so much earlier.  You wouldn’t think that two hours would make such a difference but dang!  I’m tired!  I guess I’ll have to find a happy medium.
The 5K is on Sunday and while I was so sure I would be running this one I know now that isn’t going to possible.  I will run part of it, but my body just isn’t ready to run three miles in a row.
The good news is that when I walked/jogged the 3 miles this last weekend I finished 3.1 miles in 45 minutes.  That is a 15 minute mile!

I’m pretty happy about that.

Back from our trip to Santa Cruz.  If you want to read about the actual trip you can Click Here to view my regular blog.

Okay, so I didn’t always make fantastic decisions but I did make a large series of good ones.  The Subway finder app for my iphone kept changing locations on the subway sandwich shop that was supposed to be the closest and I never ended up finding it the entire trip.  Stupid free app. 

I was able to find a local sandwich shop that was able to accommodate my demands of “on the side” and “very light on” very well.  They only had white bread unfortunately but I did the best I could.  Not to mention the fact that I didn’t touch one bite of boardwalk food.  To be fair, the funnelcake and deep fried twinkie stands were closed but I would have been able to resist them, I am sure of it.  I did resist corndogs, deep fried cheesecake, slurpies, and pizza.

In fact, thanks to bringing my own portioned out servings of Kashi Go Lean Crunch and bagel thins I wasn’t hungry at all on the boardwalk and wasn’t that tempted.  Gooooooo pre planning! 

The one thing I did give in to was a delicious turkey melt sandwich at the bowling alley near the boardwalk.  We had a coupon for a free round of bowling and by the time we were ready to use it I was quite hungry, and the selection at the bowling alley snack bar wasn’t that great.  So we had a Turkey Melt but I did get it on whole wheat and I got a side salad instead of fries.  Plus the hubby and I split it so maybe it wasn’t too bad right?

On the way back to the hotel I stopped at the sandwich shop again and got another sandwich for dinner.  My husband had requested chicken wings but they didn’t have any so instead I got what they called spicy bread sticks.  I am not a fan of spicy foods so I figured I wouldn’t be tempted.  Um…yeah.  All it was, was cheese bread with a couple of jalapenos on top.  Once I had one bite and realized it wasn’t spicy I overindulged.  I admit it.  I didn’t want to but by the time I realized I was doing it I had already wolfed down half of the bread sticks.

So I didn’t lose any weight this week.  I didn’t gain either though, so I am happy with that.  I would have loved a loss but I was dreading a gain so I guess it worked out okay.

What was awesome about this trip was how many observations I had about the things I can do now that I couldn’t before.  There was no way I could have ever done all the walking on this trip with the ease that I did it.  We parked the car at the hotel when we checked in and didn’t move it again until we left.  Every place we went we walked to and while everything was in walking distance, it was still a bit of a hike and not something I would have been able to do without my back hurting when I was heavier.

What I noticed the most was that I didn’t sweat.  I know that sounds like a very weird statement but when I was heavier I sweat All. The. Time.  Just sitting here like I am now and typing I would have been sweating.  But this trip we walked all over here and there in fairly warm weather and I didn’t sweat!  I did a little bit while bowling but that was it.  It’s not something that I think about on a daily basis so I had to sit back and realize that other than when I exercise, I haven’t really sweat like that in a long time.  This is encouraging.  It used to be downright embarrassing.

I was also able to hoist myself up onto the pony’s on the merry go round with ease as well as not being embarrassed about how I looked while bowling.  They sound like stupid little things but they all add up.  I even ran up a flight of stairs just because I could!  Hah!

Even the hubby commented on how proud he was of all the things that I could do this trip without complaints and such.

It really is a good feeling.

All my life road trips meant food.  Before we even left town we were shopping for salty snacks and sweet candy goodness for the road.  Hungry or not, road tripping meant stuffing my face with whatever I wanted and loving every minute of it.  Once we were at our destination it was all about where we could find the yummiest, most bad for us food around us and have it delivered.

I guess it must have been that way ever since I was young.  My family and I used to make the long trek from Maine to West Virginia in the old station wagon every year to see my dad’s family.  I don’t remember much of it other than it being riddled stops at fast food places to keep us kids quiet on the road.

Ever since I have been dieting, road trips have also meant a free pass on eating.  No matter what diet I was following, I looked forward to each trip so I could gorge on food with the excuse that finding food on my diet was “Soooo hard!”

Today we are taking a vacation to Santa Cruz.  It is not all that far from my house but it would normally still be an excuse for eating my weight in pizza.  It was last year when we came out here. 

Last night, I carefully portioned out healthy snacks for the road which we didn’t even touch because…we weren’t hungry.  Interesting concept huh?  I also packed some bagel thins and portioned out cereal for the continental breakfasts in the mornings.  They will have toasters and milk so we will be set for the morning.

So far we set out to find a Subway but the closest we found was a different kind of sub shop where my husband and I split a turkey sub with no dressing and a diet soda.  Totally delicious and satisfying.

Tonight we will get some Mexican food(hey, it’s cinco de mayo!) but I will get a vegetarian burrito w/ guac and sour cream on the side and then transfer it all into a high fiber tortilla that I also packed ahead of time.

It may not seem like much, but it is a huge step for me and I’m pretty proud of myself.

Okay, time to hit the pool for some exercise!

Yesterday Brooke posted this entry on her blog.  Go ahead and go read it if you haven’t already.  It is significant to what I am going to post about today.  I’ll wait, it’s okay.

…

Read it?  Okay good.  So you see how she ended up running a mile yesterday and how she realized the Couch25K was kinda holding her back and she realized on her own with just her music she was able to break out and run without excuses.  She ran a MILE!  That’s huge!

So I got to thinking.  I had just gotten done with week four of the Couch25k on Friday and what she was saying made sense.  Hey!  Maybe that will work for me!!

With a good frame of mind I set out for the Carmel High School track this morning.  It would be the first time I would be walking on a track since my own high school days(far far ago) and I was actually looking forward to the flat course.  I had told myself I would walk the first five minutes and then jog until I wanted to stop.

When I got to the track there was a young man running laps and I admit, I let it intimidate me.  Instead of walking for five minutes, I walked the first mile.  When he finally left I started to run.  I was pumped.  I was in the zone.  I was…

…not ready for this at all.

I discovered something today.  While Brooke was held back by the Couch25k program, I realized that I actually need the structure of it to KEEP me running.  I didn’t even run for a full minute.  With no end in sight to look forward to I let myself stop over and over again and eventually stopped trying to run all together.  I think I ran for a total of 2 whole minutes in the 3.3 miles I walked today.

Okay.  I either had a bad day, or I am just not a runner.  Either of these scenarios, I am okay with by the way.  I’m done beating myself up over not hitting a running goal.  Here’s why:

I discovered power walking today.

Last night I downloaded a slew of good BPM songs to my IPOD in preparation for my run today.  Once I realized I wasn’t going to be running, I hit the 145 BPM songs in my playlist and I just started going for it.  Walking, but at a really fast pace.  Turns out my power walking pace isn’t that much less than my jogging pace.  The difference is, is that I don’t feel like shooting myself in the head while power walking like I do while running.    I managed to finish 3 miles today in 47 minutes, that is six minutes shaved off the last 5K I walked in February!

I only did 3.3 miles, and could have gone farther, but I forgot to bring water with me and I was getting kinda dehydrated.

I think next weekend I might see about doing four miles.

So you see, it wasn’t a total failure.  I mean, I didn’t do what I set out to do, but I realized how far I have come and didn’t let it bother me.

I’m not going to give up on running.  It just might be taking a back burner while I work on getting more pounds off and conditioning myself a little bit more.

Either way, thanks Brooke for being an inspiration!!