Going into the holidays

I am not fearful. I am not afraid of December. That's a first. I was TERRIFIED last December. Mainly because the WW meeting I was attending was being cancelled like 2 weeks before Christmas and then I couldn't find another meeting/time that fit and then I just went all balls crazy on the food and gained like 10lbs.

I would like to say that November-December are incredibly hard on me. I'm sure it's hard on many many people, but this time of year I'm afraid I'm a bit selfish in terms of what I feel. My dad passed on Christmas day 5 years ago this year. I start blanking out and going through cycles of depression/sadness right around November. I have a counselling appt. booked tomorrow because last week I couldn't move. I didn't want to get out of bed. I was lethargic and feeling like I had a weight sitting on my chest, holding me down. My arms felt heavy and it was a huge challenge to go about my day and not just spend it crying curled up in my bed with my puppy. I will go through bouts of this until we move into January (and then periodically throughout the year, but not as bad). I have never seen anyone before for this, and I think I am beyond due for it.

Alas, not all is gloom and doom. I have three weeks until the Moroccan and I go on a cruise to the Bahamas!! 7 nights out of NYC. This will be my first year not being with my mom, so I needed a vacation to take my mind off of it. Until we get back and then he's jetting off to Dubai for a week, leaving me alone for New Years and my birthday. I'd better get something pretty out of it.

We got our Christmas tree yesterday so now my energy is spent trying to keep my dog from jumping up for all the ornaments. I tried to put a barricade around it this morning and we shall see if that works. So I am putting myself into the Christmas spirit and will start my baking soon.

My crossfit and food are going well. I'm so glad I found such a supportive crossfit gym. The people I normally train with are amazing. It's very rewarding to finally find something fitness related that I actually like.

So my plan for December is to be normal. To not have a plan really. I will workout, I will track and portion my food, and I will be conscious of what I'm doing. There is no reason to be afraid of this month.

:)

I hurt and I was ok!

I did the following workout today: http://toneitup.com/blog.php?Stair-Blasting-Circuit-5596 from Tone It Up. I used the stairs in my building. The workout said to find stairs with about 50 steps...so I live on the 12th floor, and so I ran from the 12th to the 17th, feeling all virtuous till I remembered my building doesn't have a 13th or 14th floor! lol. But all in all it was about 3-4 floors per stair interval. My heart was pounding! You run your stairs, walk back, then do a toning move (burpees in a stair well anybody??) then stairs again, then toning move, etc., etc.

Wow is all I have to say. Over in about 15-20 minutes, legs burning, lungs burning (there was a lot of burning going on! lol). This is something I can do easily! Now that I know how much time it doesn't take, this would be a nice morning wake-up.

Part of my fitness fear has been about finding things I like. Running and I will never be besties...bootcamp, umm, nope (was ok when I first started out, but now I just get frustrated at the slow pace and standard moves), dvds, can only go through those so many times. I need booty busting workouts that I can do easily, and so I really love that site I stumbled upon. These are motivating and hard core and I am happy to say that I like doing them (only done 2 so far, so maybe I'm in the honeymoon phase), but part of my fear has been about trying new things. But I tried this workout, and I took on spinning (class tomorrow!) so I think I am finally finding what works.

I am a little concerned about my lung power. When I do intense cardio my bronchials BURN...like hurt so much I can feel it in my teeth (anyone else??)...I try to breath through my nose and that helps a bit, but I don't know if that's something I should get looked at, or if that's just because I let my lung health decline a bit by not going to the gym. I don't get faint or dizzy or anything, I can still breathe, but it hurts.

Anyway, very happy with myself today...stayed completely OP and I found a great workout. I also read an inspiring WW story from one of those weekly emails they send. The lady was a serial WW-er (ahem, like me), and I really liked her message about it all clicking for her. I'm not going to sit here and announce that I am never going off plan every again, cause hello set up for failure...but it's motivational nonetheless :)

Self Esteem is nice

I did a baby resistance workout today. Nothing too crazy. Just a body weight/kettle bell weight (cause I didn't want to go all the way down to my gym where the regular free weights are) lower body routine that I found in Pinterest.

I left it pretty late in the day. I ended up making turkey soup from the leftovers from Monday (a little late, but my mom was remiss in sending me the time honoured recipe from my youth), as well as buttermilk biscuits from the WW site. Full dinner for about 6 pp or so (wasn't sure how to calculate home made turkey broth...did chicken broth instead, but I'm sure mine had a lot more fat in it). I was tired from working and cooking/baking but I made myself do it in order to get the popcorn and coke zero I was saving for my after dinner snack. So I sucked it up and just did it.

I was still a little bit scared. My bf is working in the same room and I didn't want/couldn't handle any judgement. I actually asked him to not make fun of me (pre-emptive I guess). He's never made fun of me working out before...but I was still nervous.

So I think what I am accomplishing is slowly breaking down the mental barriers that I somehow put up for myself in the past two months. I like having my self-esteem up where it's supposed to be. So it feels really good to have set plans for myself over the past couple days and actually have achieved them.

I even have points left over for the day. Not really planning on having them since I think my dinner was underestimated.

Now to get through tomorrow.