Intermittently Intolerant (Manda)

Ok, so it's been another couple of months.
I got better, but I still have a lingering intolerance (which may only have noticeable effects when I'm busy or stressed).

Being unable to eat much dairy - my favorite three foodgroups - is helping me curb my slightly silly eating habits. I'm using soymilk for breakfast, which gives me one good (but not excessive) dairy-inclusive dessert during the day, should the opportunity arise.

Meanwhile, I've learned that when I drink water (and noncaffeinated tea), I eat less. So I'm trying this mental thing where I have a glass of water before snacks or dessert. I tend to be satisfied with less of the food after a glass of water, so when I actually remember that I do this, it's working well! (Also, eating veggies helps).

69.5 kilos.
(Oh, by the way - as far as I can tell, that's the lightest I've weighed in on this blog. Hooray!)

I'm still around

Hi All,

I am still around, getting rounder. Since holidays I haven't made much progress, actually over the holiday period I gained again. This past weekend we have been away celebrating our 40th wedding anniversary. So now all that is past, I am going to get going again. I need to lower carbs to start things working again, so today is the first day of being really good again. My exercise has been slack to non existent so that will improve too. So shortly I hope to be again celebrating 60 kg and then I will continue from where I left off some time back. I also need to improve my fitness level and that did start over the week end we walked a long long way.

So hopefully later in the week I can show some improvement. I have a long way to go.

This exercise might, just might, be making some difference (HJ)

It's Monday. That's the day to up the challenge in the exercise.

So I'm now doing 16 times up and down the stairs. That's 256 individual steps each way (albeit changing between up and down every 16 repetitions). I've decided I'm going to make it to 20 times, then start pushing the time frame required, and maybe add some weight. 2 kg of flour in my back-pack?

I've also upped the rowing by adding 3 mins of as fast as I can: 2 mins fast, then normal 5 mins, then 1 min fast again. This leaves me with 28 mins total. I don't have time to look at more than 30 mins, so once I hit that I'll just have to increase the fast mins and/or resistance. I will only do the longer row (i.e. more than 20 mins) on days when I'm doing a short bike ride. It keeps it interesting to mix it up a bit.

I made 1050 repetitions this morning. That's impressive to me - into 4 figures!

Not riding my bike for a week between Christmas and New Year has really impacted on my bike-fitness. I'm struggling with the normal 2km, and haven't even considered the longer one last week. (Then again, it could be the heat. Or the fact that I'm doing extra other exercise in the mornings before I go, so I'm tired already before I start.)

I've also been walking the dog a few afternoons in the week. It isn't for fitness, more for fresh air and dog-time and mind-relaxing. It also gets my walking muscles going, so that although the pace I go is no-where near fast enough to keep up with my Mum* it will mean I actually can walk when we go overseas.

So I guess I'm doing stairs, at least 20 mins rowing, and 4 km on the bike about 4 mornings a week. It's got to be doing something, right?

*Yes. The same Mum as was attacked by a dog and hasn't yet regained pain-free mobility. The same Mum who is more than 20 years older than I am. Sad, isn't it?

A matter of timing (Emily Sue)

Having spent weeks alternating between doing workout DVDs and walking on my treadmill, I have decided that I would rather walk outside while the weather is still nice. This is Melbourne, after all, and it's going to start getting cold a lot sooner than I would like. Might as well get outside while I still can.

I have mapped out a little 6km walk and have been doing that early every morning. "Early" means I usually start at about 5.50am. Never in my life would I have imagined I'd be doing such a thing. We're on daylight saving time here so the sun's not up some days and it's barely even light. I usually walk out my front door thinking, "Really? This is what I do now?" ;)

It's a walk with a few small hills - two are a short, sharp incline and two are a long, steady incline - and the rest is mostly flat. I usually do the walk in 70 minutes, meaning my average speed is (obviously) just under 6km/h. In the past few days I've been working on getting my time down - goal is to do the walk in 60 minutes or less, so I know my average speed is 6km/h or faster. Yesterday I managed to get it down to 67 minutes, which was the first time I'd been under 70 minutes. Yay! And today... today I did it in 63 minutes. How did I manage such a feat? Partly by walking faster, and partly by jogging bits of it.* Jogging. IN PUBLIC. (My route is mostly along main roads.) Believe me, this is NOT like me at all. I am not what you'd call a natural athlete, and certainly not a natural runner. I look awkward, I'm in constant danger of tripping over, everything wobbles all over the place and I start puffing and turn tomato-red in a matter of seconds. Which might be okay, except that I happen to have a very round face - so I'm not just red; I look like I ACTUALLY have a tomato for a head.

Kind of like this, only with less smiling and more grimacing.

So you see, I don't exercise in public. That's part of the reason I bought a treadmill, so I could turn red and work on my cardiac arrest in the privacy of my own home. And yet, there I was this morning. Huffing, puffing, wobbling and turning red while cars drove by. No one stopped to render medical assistance, so it's possible I didn't look as bad as I thought. And when I got home I felt great. My body is getting stronger and my attitude to helping it get stronger is changing too. That's a win, in my book.

* By "bits of it" I mean I jogged in 30-60 second bursts, 4-5 times. At my current fitness level that's roughly equivalent to a half-marathon.
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Getting there (ES)

I'm not sure how to measure what my success has been like lately. I'm mostly sticking to a good routine of getting up early to exercise, eating good food including loads of fruit (still loving those green smoothies for breakfast - check out this video) and lots of salad, because it's been too hot to cook much. I've had some not-so-great days with food and exercise but on balance I think I've mostly had good days.

So have I lost weight? Yes! And... no! My weight has been up and down so I'm not paying too much attention to it as an indicator of where I'm at. I'm trying to pay more attention to my body than to the scales. And my body tells me that the changes to my diet and exercise levels are doing me good. I have more energy and I feel stronger. I'm still a complete weakling, muscle-wise, but I'm finding many exercises are getting easier so something is definitely improving there.

The interesting thing about starting my day with the green smoothie is that my body now craves it. I feel more energised and alert, and when I start the day with the smoothie I find I tend to eat better all day, whereas on the days where I don't have it I am more likely to snack on things that aren't as healthy for me. Interesting and somewhat unexpected benefit. I suppose it's not surprising - I'm now having around 6 serves of fruit per day, compared with about 3 serves per week previously. Of course my body is enjoying the extra nutrients and fibre. I'd like to increase my serves of veges too... so I either need to wait for the weather to cool down, or expand my repertoire of raw vegetable dishes.

Calorie-wise I'm still tracking on My Fitness Pal. In truth I eat the same things most days so I could probably estimate, but at the moment I am still too likely to binge when I'm having a bad day. Tracking calories gives me some accountability, and is also helping me learn to allow for "bad" foods (eg, chocolate, takeaway) within my calorie limit. This is important for me because I struggle with disordered eating and my tendency is to see eating chocolate etc as a failure, and therefore decide I've blown it anyway so I might as well keep bingeing until I feel sick. Not helpful for my physical OR mental health. Being able to CHOOSE to eat less-than-ideal foods, on purpose and within my calories, is a big thing. I'm not particularly good at it yet, but never mind. The path to good mental health is a marathon, not a sprint.

So in summary - I'm not losing much weight but I'm getting healthier and stronger, and feeling good.
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Exercise Conundrum (HJ)

So I'm not trying to lose weight, really (although it would be nice). I want to get fit.

The problem being that if your goal is to lose a few kg it is easy to see if you're succeeding or not. If you want to get fitter, how do you really know if you're getting to your goal?

You see, as each thing you've been doing gets easier, the only way to get more fit is to do more. When your goal is to be able to work for some hours on an archaeological dig, or walk up Mt Nebo or whatever, how do you actually know if you're on track?

So all I can do is do more and more exercise and get fitter and fitter, but eventually you run out of time that is able to be devoted to exercise (which, let's face it isn't a whole lot of time because there's heaps of other things that I need to be doing - Biggest Loser this ain't).

So I really need to get some goals for precisely fit do I want to be?

Suggestions (not all at the same time, mind you):

30 mins rowing

30 mins bike ride

20 times up and down the steps.

The thing is, I'm well on the way to these goals. And the additional medium paced 20 min walk with the LBD doesn't really add all that much to my conditioning.

But does being able to do any of these really help me to shovel dirt, be on my hands and knees scraping away at stuff, or walking for miles around ancient sites?

I need to get me some goals. More hills in the bike ride? Up the resistance on the rowing machine? Carry stuff up and down the stairs?

PS. I've decided that I'm not going to weigh-in until the end of the month. There's been no change much since I recommenced this fitness kick a couple of months ago. I think I've lost about 1.2kg in about 3 months. So hopefully a month apart may make any difference a bit more noticeable. We'll see.

Enough? (HJ)

I've been thinking yesterday and the day before that that I really need to add some challenges to my exercise routine. If I'm going to enjoy my time overseas, I need to be fit. And getting fit requires that the degree of difficulty is slowly increasing (time, or weight, etc).

So today...

Today I got up and did the steps 10 times, rather than the 8 that I have been doing. That's 160 steps up and 160 steps down. I WILL be able to get to obscure places overseas that require my body to cope with elevation.

Backed that up with 20mins rowing. Rowing is my core/arms exercise that also gets a little cardio-vascular on the side. It is my standard exercise that I really need to do to discharge my responsibility to myself to try to get/keep fit. I haven't rowed this week, so it was amazing that I managed it well, and I decided that with the extra steps and riding down to morning prayer I'd leave it at that. (Besides, Emily Sue said that 20 mins is her minimum and anything else is bonus. If it's good enough for Emily Sue...)

Then I decided that I'd cycle the long way down to morning prayer. I've been doing that a few times this week instead of rowing. It's about 20 mins instead of under 10. I should work out the distance.* About three blocks into the alternative route the chain fell off my bike, so I had to abort and head for the local Anglican church to be on time.

Then after prayer I thought, "Why the heck can't I do my extra circuit on the way HOME? After all, technically it's a holiday day for me today and I don't need to BE anywhere."

So I did.

On the way home I also did the few extra blocks to get to the little butcher that I patronise to pick up our Christmas ham. Thankfully it's pretty much flattish and downhill from there.

This afternoon I had to make the trip to Mum & Dad's, so being a lovely overcast, cool day I decided to take the bike. After coasting down the lovely hill from our place I had to start going back up the hill to their place and my legs decided that they weren't exactly fresh. I made it, though.

On the way back (which is mostly downhill until you have to go up our killer hill again) I think I nearly died. I think the pump that is my heart was really running out of juice.

I don't think I need to walk the dog this afternoon. Do you?

*The actual distance of my long, loopy way is 6.2km, the short way is 2km home again from there. Of course, the long, loopy way was selected primarily on the basis of the fact that because it follows the river most of the way it is pretty flat. I LIKE flat. But I would have done at least an extra 1 - 1.5 km in my aborted initial attempt and the detour to the butcher. It is not unreasonable to assume I did 10 km on the bike this morning, then another 4km this arvo.

Same same (ES)

I've just had three weeks off work, which meant I had three weeks of no exercise and not caring what I ate. Add some stress to that, for various reasons, and there may have been some binge eating. Ahem. Moving right along...

I started back at work this week, and also started back on my early morning routine of exercise and a decent breakfast (and taking the time to pack a decent lunch). I've decided that when I exercise I'd like to do 20 minutes minimum, because having my heart rate up for that amount of time is about what I need to burn off adrenaline and keep my anxiety at a pretty good level. But anything after that is a bonus - so if I do 45 minutes one day and only 20 minutes the next day, that's totally fine. It's not that I did "only" 20 minutes on day 2; it's that I did an extra 25 minutes on day 1. This way of thinking has helped to stop those conversations with myself. You know the ones... "You did 45 minutes yesterday and today you want to stop at 20. That's pathetic! What's wrong with you? It's less than half what you did yesterday - that's a huge step backwards!" Unhelpful, yes? Yes.

I have to say I'm still loving the early-to-bed, early-to-rise routine. I get so much done in the mornings and it kick-starts my day beautifully. Of course, this hasn't resulted in any weight loss, but I guess that will come eventually. Blobbing around for three weeks didn't help, obviously, although I am back to the weight I was a month ago. Still a way to go to get my fitness and energy levels back up there, but that will come. Right now I have a groin injury - just like a footballer - which I can really feel when I walk so I'm taking a few days off to rest it. It's just a muscle thing and will heal fine. And the lesson here, kids, is (a) warm up first and (b) don't keep up a brisk walk and/or jog when you're obviously tired out and therefore your form is rubbish. Don't be a hero - it leads to injury.

Nothing to see here, people (HJ)

So a few weeks later and I'm doing 20 mins on the rowing machine, and still riding my bike about three times in the week (although the rainy days have pulled that count down this week), and I'm now at the end of my week of doing the steps 8 times.

I did actually have a second bike ride one day last week, and I did not die.

But still no change in the weight stakes. (still wobbling around the horrible round number I don't want to think about)

What do you mean I've got to make some better food choices?

Going Down (HJ)

I made it to just under the horrible number I don't want to think about, much less talk about. (Like 0.1kg under, but hey...)

I've increased my rowing to 15 minutes about 4 times a week because I think it's time for a challenge.

I'm not having to put my bike down to first gear for the long slog up the hill from town anymore, and I've been doing about three trips into town each week. I'm not up to much more distance than that (2km) or for that matter riding to two things in the one day. But it's a start.

But last week my challenge was to go up and down the stairs 5 times 3-4 times a week. Different muscle set and for me going up has always been really hard work. It occurs to me that if I want to get to the monastery at Meteora or to the top of Mt Nebo to see where Moses got to watch the Israelites cross the Jordan in June/July this year I will need to improve my ability to go up. Or at least, I will enjoy the trip more if I do.

So, the plan is to be able to go up & down the internal stairs 20 times in a row. This week I've increased it to 6 times and I'm surprised I'm not dead. Or having weird heart-y things.

So I must be getting fitter, right?

Give or Take (HJ)

I haven't been really keen to post.

This might be because as of the end of semester I'd almost beaten my best weight ever (if I was a cow heading for the sale yards, that is). I didn't want to talk about it.

But it does give one a certain amount of motivation when they look in the mirror in some of their clothes and realise that the pregnancy rumours are going to be up and running again (if they aren't already) if one doesn't DO SOMETHING.

So I'm trying to get more active. I like food. I like lots of it, and some of the lots I like is not necessarily healthy.

So I will begrudgingly exercise in order to be able to eat moderate amounts of whatever the heck I want. Yes, I will continue to have healthy breakfast. No, I don't need a huge amount of lunch. Yes, I will try to have fruit and/or yoghurt for dessert.

But there will be occasional cakey-things. Or hot chips. or ice-cream. Or cheesecake.

I've been doing 10 mins rowing most mornings (oh, how the mighty have fallen), and I rode my bike three times this week to things I would normally take the car for.

I have been Zumba DVDing a couple of times when I have time, too.

I was walking the LBD a few times a week, but the bike riding is leaving me pretty worn out, so I've been slack this week.

Anyway, apart from the fact that I didn't write down the number representing the zenith of my weight-gain, it appears that in the last two weeks I've lost a kilo. Give or Take. Possibly as much as 1.3.

But then, one of the nannas at mainly music asked me if I'd lost some weight. I didn't really think one kg would make that much difference.

Maybe I'm building muscle!

My body can do stuff (ES)

So I've been pretty consistent with exercising every morning. I miss a few days here and there but I'd say I average at least 5 days per week (at the unholy time of about 5.45am). I don't appear to have lost any weight although I'm not 100% sure my scales are accurate. Yesterday I did the get-off-get-on-again thing and somehow gained a whole kilo. Did it again and gained another 500g. Kept doing it out of curiosity and managed to lose all that "weight" again in small increments over 5 minutes or so. Very strange, and it's the only time the scales have ever done that. I tested it again this morning and it was completely consistent, but of course now I don't know if the consistent weight it showed me is my ACTUAL weight. I think I might go with measurements instead.

A few months ago I finally got my act together and saw a podiatrist, who expressed great horror at a number of problems with my feet and ankles. She prescribed orthotics, which I have been wearing and noticing the difference. The pain in the side of my knee, which had been waking me up at night, has pretty much gone. I thought this all boded well, so a few weeks ago when on the treadmill I increased the speed to a jog. Not a good idea, as it turns out - I was limping within five steps because I had shooting pain in my knee, in a different spot from the previous pain. This is not unexpected because my knees and ankles are still getting used to behaving like normal knees and ankles instead of wobbling all over the place. Still, disappointing.

Earlier this week I decided to give jogging a go again, to see if the knee has improved. To my delight, I managed half a minute of jogging without pain. I've been testing it out each day, doing bursts of 1-2 minutes of jogging. And it's been fine, but the really great thing is that I am able to jog at a much higher speed than I've ever been able to do previously. When I was doing C25K before I usually jogged at a very shuffly and slow 6.5kmh, reducing to 6kmh when I got tired. I walked at 5-5.5kmh. Now I am walking at 6-6.5kmh and jogging at 7.5-8kmh. This is HUGE for me. I think I have jogged at 7.5kmh just once before, and I managed maybe 30 seconds. Now I'm doing 2 minutes at 8kmh and I'm still feeling okay when I finish. I cannot tell you how thrilled I am about this. I said in a previous blog entry that I'm concentrating on health and strength... and I think it's working. I am actually feeling fitter and stronger. How great is that??

Prepare to be amazed ...

Today I did it! I swam 50 laps, that is 2.5km!!! The first 10 laps were killers as usual, laps 22-24 were depressing because it was still hard going and I knew I wasn't halfway yet, but sometime in the late 20s I settled into my strokes and breathing and it became easier.

I have added two more laps into the set that I repeat. They are non-flippers laps, the trickiest for me due to my tiny inadequate feet. My set of eight now looks like
1. Kickboard & flippers, tread water for a minute at the deep end
2. Kickboard & flippers
3. Freestyle, girlpower only
4. Breaststroke, girlpower only
5. Freestyle, flippers
6. Breaststroke, flippers
7. Freestyle, hand paddles & flippers
8. Breaststroke, hand paddles & flippers.

So you see, my swimming is greatly flipper-assisted. But I like it that way.

Today after four sets (32 laps) I just kept powering up and down with my flippers. I took them off for a few laps but by then the exhaustion was showing and it was a bit too much. I needed two kickboard laps to rest a bit.

I powered past 40 laps and began to marvel at how I was now swimming personal bests - every lap was the furthest I'd ever swum! I was so relieved when laps 46-49 were done. And can you imagine how I felt on Lap 50? Woo hoo! It was exhilarating!

I guess now I need to find time to go and buy my reward!

By the way... (ES)

Lest you think I've become a spinach-smoothie swilling exercise freak, I thought you'd like to know I just had a packet of Zig Zag Twisties. The big packet. 376 calories.

They were good.
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Health and Strength (Emily Sue)

I have no idea what I weighed last time, but today I weigh 72.8kg, which is down a bit. And that's good, but I've had a bit of a brain-shift about how I'm handling this.

I have spent most of my life with body image issues and related disordered eating. I feel like I've been following diets and food rules my whole life, and I'm always feeling guilty about eating 'bad' foods or not exercising enough. (How much is "enough" anyway?) So I must ask myself... is that any way to live? I'm thinking NO.

It occurred to me recently that having a weight loss goal is not helping me. By that I mean, having weight loss as my ENTIRE goal. It means that every time I exercise, I see it as a means to lose weight. When I eat something 'healthy', it's to lose weight. When I deny myself something 'bad', it's to lose weight. This is probably not news to anyone, but that is not actually enjoyable. Further, once I lose weight I know I will stop exercising, stop eating healthy food and go back to the 'bad' foods. Even calling them BAD foods is so unhelpful. Food is not good or bad; it's just food.

So my goal has changed. I'm still counting calories and staying within a specified amount that will help me lose weight sensibly, but weight loss is not my ultimate goal. I am aiming to be healthy and strong. God gave me a body that works well (knees and eyesight not withstanding) and it is a JOY to be strong enough to do things like walk to the shops instead of drive, or walk up a big hill because there's a fantastic view at the top. It's a joy to be able to pick up my podgy cats (they're pretty heavy). It's a joy to know my body is capable of doing 50 minutes on the treadmill - I certainly wasn't capable of that a year ago, and now I feel strong when I finish.

Having this little mind-shift has been incredibly helpful. I've just discovered green smoothies (basically it's a mix of 60% fruit - whatever you like - and 40% green leafy vegetables like spinach, kale or chard, plus a cup or two of water, blend until smooth and drink) and I'm loving them - not because they are a 'weight loss' food, but because they taste great and I honestly feel fantastic when I start the day with one. I know they sound horrible, but they are soooo good. And you can't taste the spinach. This morning's smoothie had apple, orange, pineapple, banana, almond meal (for protein) and spinach. It was delicious.

I've had the same mind shift with exercise. So this morning when I was doing a workout from a DVD I wasn't thinking, "Keep going, you need to lose weight"; I was thinking, "Hey, I can do this one a bit more easily now. I must be getting stronger. Awesome!"

This doesn't mean I leap out of bed every morning all excited about exercise and healthy eating. I still have to employ the 'don't negotiate with terrorists' method to get me out of bed. I still eat chocolate and chips and other things, and sometimes I still have a total calorie blowout. But I am no longer punishing myself, and I'm no longer obsessed with the NEED to lose weight. I'm concentrating on health and strength and if it leads to weight loss, that's great. If it doesn't, I'm still going to rejoice in the things my body can do, and in how healthy I feel.
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I'm back LLL

Hi All,

I have been doing other things and forgetting to post. My weight dropped below the magic 60kg and that was my next target. So to celebrate I had cheesecake, would you believe 3 times in one week. That didn't have the desired effect.

I have also had 2 trips away the first in a caring role was ok, but the Sunshine Coast for 2 days wasn't and they have a gelati shop which needed visiting, twice. Then we added a church fete and the baking and eating involved there. Add to that lot a lack of motivation and guess what you have?

Fortunately, well there has to be an upside for the last 6 days I have had a tummy upset that was persistent to say the least, and that lost me 900g. Even though I haven't walked for a week.

So I have had ups and downs and today on a bounce I weigh 59.8kg. I have really settled on the target weight now and that is between 56 - 57kg so that means another 3 kg to go. I really feel like forgetting the whole thing, but if I don't keep going now I fear the starting again won't happen, so onwards.

How much can I lose before Christmas? That's me for now.

Swimming with and without terrorists

I'm back into swimming, praise be given the long cold winter is over!  Yeah yeah, I could have used the little indoor pool with its lanes of unspecified length, but seriously?  Winter, swimming, me?  Don't want to not going to do it.

Now that the 50 metre pool is open again, I've been going every Monday with a "Don't negotiate with terrorists" attitude.  After my first aborted attempt at going, that is.  On that first day, it was cold and drizzly, and there were no parks in front of the pool, beside the pool, over the road in the carpark designated as overflow parking for the pool, the council carpark adjacent to that, or up the street.  I could have parked in the shopping centre or library carpark and walked to the pool, but the fact that all the carparks were full indicated that perhaps the pool was packed too.  So I let the terrorist beat me that day.

I've been surprised to see that I've picked up where I left off before winter.  30 laps, which is 1.5km, and completing it in nearly 30 minutes.  This is 30 minutes on The P'ool Clock, which I spell with an apostrophe in my mind because it is about as accurate and keeps time as well as The Playschool Clock, necessitating the apostrophe.

My Personal Trainer, okay, my good friend who is really knowledgeable about nutrition and fitness who is studying to be a Personal Trainer, said that to build up fitness and go further, going 10% further each week is a good rule of thumb.  I don't see this as an infinite possibility, but today I decided to try 33 laps, just to see if I survived.

A funny thing happens as I swim.  The first lap nearly kills me.  It's my freestyle lap and I tend to go a bit hard first up, because I'm cold in the water and want to get warm.  (I also wear flippers to give extra resistance - excessive cardio kills me and I like to mix a good amount of strength training into anything I do.  The flippers work lots of muscle groups in my legs, and help me actually move forward in the pool, unlike my tiny size 6 feet - about as effective as paddling a canoe using butter knives.)  The second lap is breaststroke, and it's my favourite in the set of 6 laps I repeat, but the third is where I put on my hand paddles for extra resistance and go hard at freestyle again. The third lap is usually when I start questioning whether I'll make it to 10 laps, let alone 30.

By laps 12, 13 and 14, I'm a bit depressed I'm not half-way yet, and wonder if I should stop at 20.  But by 18, I know that I'll make the distance.

Today though, but the time I got to 26, I knew I had more than 4 more laps in me, and I also knew I'd make it to 33 easily.

Better make it 34, I thought.  Don't want to get out at the deep end, and walk in the wind down to where my towel is.

But then after 34, I knew I would make it to 40.  By that stage I'd abandoned my usual set of 6 laps and ditched the hand paddles and kickboard laps.  I was just doing freestyle and breaststroke, and I noticed that as I did my freestyle laps (35, 37, 39) I started wondering if I'd do 40 laps.  I was getting pretty exhausted by this time.  But the breaststroke laps encouraged me - during 34, 36 and 38 I knew I could make it.

And I did!  I swam 40 laps, 2km!

How about after I do 50 laps (2.5km) I treat myself to a pair of swim fins?

Exercise Terrorism (Emily Sue)

I can't even remember when I last posted... I know it was after a brief burst of enthusiasm. :) I think I'm about 300g lighter than then. But that's not what I want to share today.

I read a lot of blogs, and today there was a great post on Mia Freedman's blog about exercise. The link is here but I'll quote my favourite part for you. It's longish, but worth reading. (She's quoting a conversation with Michelle Bridges, one of the Biggest Loser trainers.) 

Like the rest of us, Michelle doesn’t adore exercise when she’s doing it and she doesn’t particularly look forward to it. And it’s this myth – that we should LOVE exercise and be inspired to do it – that so many of us use as an excuse not to.

Michelle says she’s asked about motivation all the time because people assume she is a motivation machine. But she’s not. “I don’t wake up, pump my fist in the air and go ‘YES! I’M GOING RUNNING! RUNNING! YESSSSSSS!’” she insists. Just like she doesn’t wake up and go “YES! I’M HAVING A SHOWER AND BRUSHING MY TEETH.”  Or “YES! I HAVE A DENTIST APPOINTMENT!” It’s just what she does.

If you wait for motivation to magically appear? You’ll still be sprawled on your couch watching The Real Housewives in a decade. The clouds do not part. Inspiration does not strike. You will probably never be overcome by the urge to exercise. You. Just. Do. It.

Accidentally, I’ve taken this approach to exercise for a long time. It’s also known as the Don’t-Negotiate-With-Terrorists method if by ‘terrorists’ you mean the self-sabotaging parts of yourself that would prefer to sleep-in or go for drinks after work instead of moving vigorously until parts of your body hurt and get sweaty.

I don’t negotiate with myself about exercise. Ever. I’ve done the same thing for years. And years and years. Exercise is one of the most boring and predictable things in my life but also one of the most important. Without it, I’m Moody McBitchface. The way I sidestep the need for motivation is to remove as many variables as possible – I exercise indoors so weather doesn’t matter. I exercise alone so I’m not relying on anyone. I don’t have a trainer or do classes so it’s not budget dependent. I always exercise in the morning and always on cardio machines. The morning part is crucial. It means I don’t spend the day having those exhausting debates in my head about whether I will or won’t do it after work. Exercising in the morning is as much a part of my routine as getting dressed.

I just love the "Don't Negotiate With Terrorists" method. It's my new mantra... because those 'terrorist' thoughts get me all the time. "Oh, I can't be bothered. I have insomnia so I should sleep when I can. I will do it tonight. I'll be late for work. I'll go for a walk at lunchtime. I don't have any sports bras clean." You name the excuse, I've probably made it.

This afternoon I desperately wanted a nap. Daylight saving started this morning so I lost an hour of sleep and my body was protesting. I was on my computer and I was almost nodding off as I typed. I was soooo tempted to sleep... but I thought, "No. Don't negotiate with terrorists." I pulled on some exercise gear, put in a workout DVD and did that for 40 minutes. Then, feeling still inspired, I put on a Star Trek DVD and walked on the treadmill for an hour while it played. ONE HOUR. I walked 5.5km and I felt great at the end. Of course, I don't expect to do that amount of exercise every day but I hope to do SOME.

Don't Negotiate With Terrorists.

I love it.
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Progressing (HJ)

Mum indicated that she hasn't been progressing at all, so this is the perfect opportunity to say that I HAVE progressed!

I have put on more weight. Aren't you proud of me?

Medicinal chocolate is to blame, but I'm hoping that now I'm on holidays I have a little more time to make some better choices. So I started with 5mins rowing again and did 20 mins Zumba and avoided the last slice of cheesecake.... and finished my assignment entirely (unless I get keen enough to kill the remaining 400 words over limit. If I don't get keen, it's going in un-culled, because I have no idea what more I can take out).

PS. For the record, when I made a crack about LLL always being at the top, it was more to stimulate others to post, not to stop you-know-who.

Not Progressing LLL

Hi All,

After a comment made by a certain person who blogged rubbish, I have been scared to blog. But here goes, I will take my courage and give it a go.

Yes, I have been absent for some weeks and my progress is nil. When my weight settled after holidays I was about what I am now. Today I weigh 60.5kg, I have been doing all the right things and nothing is happening, so tomorrow I go away for a week and that will give me further time to think things through.

In the last week I have heard a few times about diets that have only protein for 2 weeks, and they lose between a kg a day and 5 kg in 2 weeks, so I will continue to think about doing that drastic bit to remove the last 4kg.

At least I haven't gone up in weight. So I will see you all in a couple of weeks, and may you all be more successful than I am at present.