fear

When I started my fitness journey I had made a promise to my son I would get healthy. It was hard. I remember being on that treadmill at a whopping 3.8 miles an hour pushing so hard to work up to two miles at a time. Then, I always knew I pushed hard when on the way home I would break out in hives. To this day, none of my medical colleagues can tell my why in those moments I would have such a huge histamine release, but I did. Here I sit, two years later, many more training sessions behind me and have not experienced that in a very long time. However, it is stuff like this that seemed to provoke fear. Would I anaphylax and stop breathing?  Couple this with my history of terrible obesity fueling previous difficult exercise attempts. I had fear of wheezing, fear of sweating too much, fear of looking silly, the list was endless. In talking with a team 1DOS member yesterday who was trying to figure out how to push harder it suddenly dawned on me that every harder thing we attempt is limited solely by fear.

I started to think about all the things I was afraid of along the way. Would I hurt my shoulder if I tried a heavier weight despite being more than comfortable with what I was lifting at the time. Truthfully, I pushed past that through a trainer laughing and telling me to lift heavier, thus fueling my fear of looking silly. I was afraid for a time if I rowed harder I would pass out. Well that is possible, but I could probably go a bit harder than I was and not pass out. Little by little. Fear after fear. Slowly putting them to rest until I got pretty comfortable with making progress. The hives went away and I found myself in a good place. Chugging along like the Little Engine That Could. Small gains every week, new goals set. Over and over.

Then came today. A Spartan workout. Two hours of Spartan training by Spartan trainers. Yep I could do that. I did a 90 minute Orangetheory yesterday. I got this. Then I got the email. The confirmation of today's adventure. Um. This workout was partially outside. Um. It is Syracuse. It is December. Outside?  Enter fear. Yesterday, watching the several inches of snow fall I got really worried. I had no idea if we would be in a park or a parking lot or what. But the Batman to my Robin, my son was going. I simply could not bail out on him. So, I did my best to dress in layers and try to be ready.

We got up early, 5:30, as Syracuse is a 2 hour drive. I guess it was a good thing the snow had stopped.....maybe not such a great thing it was replaced by freezing rain. The drive up just fueled my concern. On arriving, we found the hosting gym was a warehouse gym on the fourth floor of this old industrial building. It was painted black with rings a ropes hanging from the ceiling. Yep a badass gym. We were told at the door we would be outside for half the workout. Well, that meant parking lot. I spent the first half worrying about what being outside would be. It was cold. It was wet. It was a light mist of a rain. I would soon find out.

The trainer outlined the core Spartan exercises and several of them involved being on the ground. I looked around at the puddles and slush and it seemed terrifying. Pretty soon it was time. I would realize doing diamond push-ups on cold wet concrete with numb fingers and wet hair from the rain that those people who told me in the beginning that I was capable of so much more just may have been right. People knowing I was doing this,  did laugh at me today. Why on earth would I get up at 5 in the morning, drive two hours to workout in the snow and rain today? Because I am finally learning that there is something amazing that lives on the other side of my biggest fears and sometimes that means spending a little time doing burpees in the snow.

Finding the Hero

A few days ago I walked into my bedroom to find "Underdog" playing on TV. I chuckled to myself as I thought about how somehow there is something magical about the master bedroom for kids. Something completely different about laying in the king sized bed and watching TV instead of the giant TV in the family room. I remember doing the same in my parents' room. I chose the little black and white for the chance to lay on the king sized waterbed over the pre remote era color Zenith that sat firmly on the multi shaded brown shag carpet in the family room. That thing was probably 4 million pounds. Somehow being in that bedroom made me feel more important. Nonetheless, it got me thinking about superheroes . The transformation of a mild mannered, nearly invisible person to an epic crime fighter performing physical feats.  We all love that story and have heard it in many varieties. It is the stuff of blockbuster movies.

On this fitness journey I guess you could say I was the underdog. Decades of obesity and epic fails with my own health. There are many others like me out there. The Shoeshine Boys, Clark Kents and Peter Parkers of our time. The unassuming nerds that never seemed like they could go places. Some of us keep ourselves in that place, believing the voices in our heads that start with,"I can't..." while others learn to take off the obligatory white button down shirt and discover the superhero like insignia on our chests. I suppose if I could figure out a magical formula to give to people to be able to easily make that leap I would be a millionaire. Maybe Peter Parker could send me the magical spider that transformed his world.....

For me, it has been learning what I was actually capable of versus what I thought I was capable of. In my world that came from a variety of sources. Friends who had traveled this road and trainers who I originally thought were nuts with how confident they were in my abilities. Little by little my figurative white shirt began to open up to reveal there was a higher caliber of person underneath, capable of so much more.  I may not leap tall buildings or swing from a web but I learned I can climb 10 foot walls and cross some cool monkey bars without falling into a pit of mud. The funny thing is I could not do that when the same style bars were on the playground at my grade school, or maybe it was just I had no idea I could.  Each muddy challenge, every bump and bruise and even the shear terror of some of the challenges have begun to help me find the best version of myself.

So if I could open up that shirt to reveal my superhero chest what would it be?  As a true child of the 80's I suppose it would be a Linda Carter style Wonder Woman ensemble, however, sadly the good people of Victoria's Secret have not busted into the superhero fashion world, which to be fair, is probably more a blessing than a curse. If they had I may end up the cover page of the people of Wal Mart.

Nonetheless, learning to not settle for mild mannered persona, somehow not capable of more has been a journey. One I am still working on. There are still the days I need to take myself back, lay in my own king sized bed, watching the smaller TV and finding my own importance just like the kids. I am only grateful now to not have the tiny black and white with rabbit ears.

Paying it Forward

I seemed to have had a small hiatus from blogging. Since the epic Spartan Race a lot has happened.  I have found some other lifetime non athletes to take on the Chicago Super. We have become a ragtag team each with our own fitness story to tell. Each one of us coming from a different unhealthy place for a variety of reasons. Slowly but surely our team has grown in just one month's time. We have learned to become accountable to one another and encourage one another and now every last one of us is financially committed to this 8-11 mile race.

This single thing had me thinking about public journeys. Going public with my journey was a bit like being naked at Wal Mart on Black Friday. Terrifying. Vulnerable. We all end up on this journey due to some sort of failing or pain and to make it all public is the chance to relive it all and be rejected all over again. Yet I have found something different entirely.

Our team is 1DOS.  One degree of separation. A teammate deemed me the "Kevin Bacon" of the group as all members know me from a different place. As it turns out, a friend not on the team knows Kevin and let him know about our team and apparently he is now in our corner too....no pressure there. Only Kevin Bacon watching. Well as my friend explained he texted Kyra as Kevin is not great about answering. Ok wait.... Kyra Sedgwick?  Well 1DOS would not let her down either....hopefully.

This week our team has grown to seven members. Seven terrified people risking public physical failure and staying on a path none of us have been able to stay on before. Seeing everyone's gains is awe inspiring as everyone pushes a wee bit harder each day to do the team proud.

With all this I was finally able to answer a lifelong question. Why?  Why am I fighting obesity?  Why am I bullied? Why can I not do this?  Decades of anguish.  Decades of failure. Now I am able to take that and use it to drag others along this path.  Seeing the excitement in their posts, the enthusiasm over our big race which by all rights none of us thought we could do makes every last bit of this lifelong battle absolutely worth it. My ability to pay this forward this holiday season is truly a gift and a constant reminder that once again the best is yet to come.

So hiatus is over. Time to get this blog moving again as Team 1DOS has a story to tell and we have only started chapter one. AROO!

Spartan reflections

The voices. The voices we all have in our heads on some sort of replay. It has been an interesting week as I neared ever closer to my first Spartan Race Saturday. I know people say before you die your life flashes before your eyes. In my case taking on a giant feat I never thought was possible it was more the quiet replay if a lifetime of voices slowly entering in and out of my consciousness throughout the week as the race got closer.

When I was in elementary school there were no buddy benches. No anti bully movements. Childhood obesity was not an epidemic and there was no such thing as a "participation trophy". I for some reason, was reminded of lining up along the brick wall of Abraham Lincoln School as the token fat kid as some much healthier athletic children were choosing up sides for the sport of the day. I would be picked last. Somehow the  consolation prize for whatever team captain came up short. As I think of this I remember the eye rolls and the nearly audible sighs as I joined whatever team got stuck with me. Thus went all of school for me. I would be last to finish the mile. Wheezing as I climbed "hernia hill" in junior high to end that run faced by all of my thinner fitter classmates.

I thought about the bullying I went through. in my head this week I could almost hear the things that were said and done. I could hear the negative things said by family reminding I just would not measure up and a host of other things that I now know kept me improsioned in layers of fat and lifetime of obesity.

Saturday was a new beginning for me. Despite two years of training and innumerable life changes I feel like I am once again at the starting line of a whole new world of bigger things. My day started with 20 of my closest friends meeting Jack and I for breakfast for a big send off to the pinnacle of my training. We laughed and we ate and I could hear the laughter much louder than my previous prison of negativity. As Jack and I took off for Boston, as is often our way, deep discussion ensued. His future, the election, and treading ever so lightly into what our next race might be provided we survived this.

As we parked the car we were engulfed in the history of Fenway. The neighborhood surrounding not much different than the vibe of my beloved Wrigley. We could hear the music from the stadium, the sun was setting and the lights coming up in the stadium itself. Ultimately we found ourselves it the tunnel with a four foot wall standing between us and the starting line. Finally, it was our turn. We hoisted it over the wall and took off with 13 other runners most of whom sprinted out of the tunnel and onto the field. We did not. In that moment, despite the sprinting runners poking my crazy competitive nature I found myself saying to Jack,"I am starting at my base pace and running my own race." He just smiled as he knew I was trying to convince myself of this. Later as we passed most of these runners I would find that strategy to be useful. Up and down, crisscrossing the stadium at times just running, at times, carrying sand bags or a five gallon jug of water at others. There would be the z wall I came off of and had to do my burpees. Jack did them with me despite making it across counting them out and encouraging me every step of the way. There would be the box jumps I have not done since I broke my hip and scaling a 15 foot cargo net despite my horrible fear of heights, the run outside the stadium along the upper deck walkway where we could look at the night Boston skyline and see for what appeared to be miles. Then there were walls. The four footer at the start was the shortest. They got taller as the race went on, the last being ten feet. A ten foot wall. No rope. Just this gigantic wall that seemed impossible. Even at 5 ft 10 the wall looked huge. A fellow spartan stopped to show me how to do it and before I knew it I was over. The final obstacle was hanging heavy bags to push through. I channeled my inner black belt, as I trained in martial arts for eight years, and emerged sprinting faster than I ever have crossing the finish line throwing my arms around my Batman Jack and bursting into tears. It was an end to the negative voices that trapped me in a sea of obesity for decades. As it turns out, those voices were wrong. I am capable of so much more. Having the medal around my neck was surreal and I am almost afraid to see the professional pics in a few days as I am sure my face is tear stained and wearing a look of disbelief. Seeing my own son's pride in me and uttering the words,"yeah mom. We did that " was just indescribable.

As we reveled on the way home, our excitement was overshadowed by news there were gunmen at the mall where he worked. Shots fired into the Hollister where he is employed. A busy Sat he normally would have been there but was with me instead. We began to consider all the things that had to happen to keep him safe today. I had to be fit. I had to be at a place where we could do this race. He had to be fit too. He commits to training with me two days a week now. Two years led up to this moment. It is overwhelming that he was supposed to be there.

So many emotions we could not even fully process, especially me. Joe DeSena who invented the Spartan Race always says, you will know at the finish line why you do this race. I certainly knew some stuff in my sobbing moment at the finish line, like a lifetime of obesity, bullying and negativity was no longer permanent, but, more importantly, what I figured out in the aftermath was I have so much more to discover. As I turn 47 today I now feel Saturday's finish line is now my starting line. Jack and I spent the day texting to work out our next races. It is time to take on more. Spartan Winter Sprint is already committed, but more importantly and scary...Spartan Super Chicago here we come. As always today is a new beginning. The best is yet to come.

Inspiration from My Kinda Cubs

I can remember sitting on the multicolored brown shag carpeting in the basement watching the zenith with the rabbit ears as my dad sat on the mod style avocado green canvas couch behind me. Granted we had a very stylish bright orange high back chair and mustard yellow shorter round chair to match but he preferred the couch. It was the early 80's and summer in Chicago which meant two things. The Cubs on WGN, with Harry Carey announcing and watermelon. My dad even introduced my oldest two children to this tradition when they were little. Back in those days the Cubs were not a winning team. They did not need to be really. They were a Chicago institution and still are. It was about the atmosphere and the love of the game and I can guarantee a good chunk of my childhood friends have similar memories of watching them in their own horribly decorated family rooms.

This year was different. As most of the free world knows a 108 year drought was broken last week. Over a century. I found myself thinking about how exciting it was for us fans to watch the crazy celebrations and have our smallest children wander through the house singing,"Go Cubs Go"....ok that would be my smallest child....as if the Cubs had finally crossed the ultimate finish line. It occurred to me all of the athletes that came and went in that time period. Slugging away yet never hitting this mark. There was all the management that I would only assume was trying desperately to get the Cubs back on top. The frustration that likely ensued over this many years without a winning season.

I think this should be our takeaway from the Cubs. We all have those fans who support us no matter what our failures are. Those are the people we need to keep in our lives. The ones willing to sit on the shag carpet and cheer us on when we fall on our faces, or as Bill Murray did on camera, openly weep for us in our successes. These are the people who sing along with Harry Carey in the seventh inning stretch no matter how many runs behind we are.

Outside of the people, the Cubs have taught us a lot about perseverance. Exactly 108 years of perseverance. Getting my head around that is almost impossible. Falling down, getting up again to slug it out some more, strategizing and re strategizing for over a century despite frustration is nothing short of inspirational. I think about my decades of weight loss and fitness failures. The fair weather friends that have come and gone as I fell on my face time after time. The crazy strategies I employed myself, everything from fad diets to pills, to different exercise attempts , like in the 90's when I attended step aerobics at a studio that had an affinity for the song,"Achy Breaky Heart". Failing and failing again. Until now.

This is why this week my Cubs workout tank demonstrates more than my love for my kinda town. It inspires me to keep slugging, keep going and look for the true fans in my life.  As I look toward my Spartan Race, in six days, a World Series of sorts for me as until now I had considered this completely out of reach I consider the Cubs winning the series to be my sign that I too, can cross this finish line. Ironically the race is at Fenway. The only thing that would make it better would be if it were at Wrigley.

Well, it won't stop me from singing,"hey Chicago, what do you say?  The Cubs are going to win today!"

Pieces of My Puzzle

A 1000 piece puzzle. One of my 84 year old father's favorite activities. When I was growing up he would start one and sit there for hours on end carefully sorting the edge pieces, slowly finding parts of pictures as he smoked his pipe. The smell of whiskey Borkum Riff in the air. Hours and hours across days at a time he would patiently put them together. Us kids would stop by and help from time to time until the last piece was in. I remember that sense of satisfaction that went with the puzzle completion. It would sit on the card table a few days as we would admire it walking by. Then, one day he would simply dismantle it, put it back in the box and on the shelf. This one act I really struggled with. I mean really.....all that work to just dismantle it. Later I would learn that there was a product called puzzle glue. However for my dad, that was not needed. He would simply need another few days to work it again months later or he would simply get a new one. He never had the need for puzzle glue or framing.

I often think about puzzles when I look at my schedule. I have work at two different ER's, four children still at home at very different places in their lives.  The college kid learning to fly, the junior high boy fighting through those years, the little guys learning to read in a language that is not their first.  My schedule is like a jigsaw puzzle. Fitting the pieces together sometimes minute by minute. Coordinating activities, work, rides.... every week is an endless 1000 piece puzzle it is my job to put together.

That brings me to last week. I had picked up two days at my moonlighting gig. That brought my hours to 72 in 8 days. Six on, one off, one on. It just so happened that Hell Week was the same 8 days. Plus the kids' Halloween, half days due to parent teacher conferences and all other kinds of crazy. Yet. It was Hell Week at OTF.  There is this thing that happens when you make your journey public. You have very little room to give up. How to uphold that image of motivation and clean living when I really want my favorite sweats and a glass of wine and to sleep for about a week.

So, I sat at my table, following my dad's lead. I had the calendar in front of me trying to make all the pieces fit. I put my workouts behind kids and work but ahead of sleep and TV. I fit it all in even if it meant one 5:00 am workout where my 20 year old had come home to sleep and watch his siblings so I could go. Wow. That was a rough morning as I had gotten home from work at 11:30. I got it done though.  In the end I earned a spooky looking black tshirt with a cool looking skull on it for my efforts. There was something particularly ironic about that shirt and the challenges I beat to earn it. There were the obligatory pictures and high fives at the gym. I had done it.

In that moment I wondered if this is how my dad felt looking at the completed puzzle. That moment of satisfaction in a hard fought success. Then it happened. The realization that I had to turn the page on the calendar. A new week. A new puzzle. The completed puzzle would be dismantled and put back in the box and I would have to start again figuring it all out. This puzzle was different though. This one held a race looming ever closer and the notion that if I can work 72 hours in 8 days and still not miss a workout I certainly had no excuse this week, where I only work 28 hours in 6 days. I would try to hang my hat on taking a break for my two overnight shifts later this week but even that seems a bit flimsy after what I just did. So here I am. Workouts scheduled. Kids' schedule complete and race looming. That being said I think I finally understand the value of dismantling that puzzle and putting it back in the box like my dad used to. It is not about destroying what you worked hard to achieve, it is about reevaluating and working it out  again.... only better. I guess maybe my dad had it right all along. So this week I will keep the puzzle glue on the shelf and keep working as there are only 11 days 'till race day.

Live Our Lives in Chains

"Pinball Wizard", "Owner of the Lonely Heart", "I Can't Drive 55".....thus went the rocking playlist for the power workout the other day. The trainer, who is likely half my age, admitted with a chuckle,  had never heard half of the songs. Well, the other forty somethings and I had a great time singing along and in my case, tormenting my 20 year old working out with me that day, who surely would have preferred a little Wiz Khalifa to power through that 300 meter row.

By the time I hit the tread blocks, I was ready for the all outs that would surely come being a power day when I found myself suddenly blindsided. Hit square between the eyes with the musical styling of the Eagles. More specifically "Already Gone". I had not heard this in probably a decade. . As I sang along in my head, as singing out loud had two problems. First, I cannot carry a tune and second, running at full tilt on the treadmill does not lend itself to breathing let alone singing. However, there are times when you hear a song that feels a bit like an old shoe but suddenly seems all new again.

Well I know it wasn't you who held me down
Heaven knows it wasn't you who set me free
So often times it happens that we live our lives in chains
And we never even know we have the key

....and there it is..the reminder of all those times in my life I had blamed other people for my struggles with obesity. I had the bullies who's words were all too easy to settle into. There were those in my life who needed me to be that fat person to fill a need in their own lives.  I had my self imposed limitations where I put myself in that box. The one where I was convinced I "will never be thin, I am
Just not made that way" "I am not a runner and never will be" The laundry list of "I can't do that" which includes everything from wearing clothes not found in the plus size section to sticking to a healthy lifestyle to running a mile to ever even considering being on a rower.

 I was reminded I did live my life in chains. In my mind's eye I see the large links on the iron chains that wrapped around the Marley brothers from the Dickens classic. Each link a different representation of the things that kept me from reaching goals or moving in a positive direction. There are people on some of the links, other links hold my own limitations I have placed on myself some new, some so old that those links had been deeply imbedded in my own psyche. As I have battled through all of this, little by little snipping off link after link over the last two years:   diet, exercise, attitude, and changing relationships, I find I still am surprised by these links falling away. As the song goes, I finally learned I had the key all along.

So as I puff along through the LONG all outs that day...a full minute sprint might as well be a decade in this new runner's world,  I realize it is time to embrace the old me before I put her on a shelf as she has made me who I am today but at the same time realize she is already gone. That being said, it is time to lace up the Nike runners I love so much and have at it again. The big scary race is in 21 days and the only way to silence that little voice in my head from one of those chain links that says "maybe I can't do this" is to get to work so I can truly as the song goes."sing that victory song".

Car Cleaning Confessions

I have a confession. I drive a mom mobile. No not quite a minivan as even I have certain lines I cannot in good conscience cross. This busy working mom of five is a step down on the mom car continuum. I drive a suburban. Said suburban has the obligatory "SUNY Albany Mom" sticker on the back sandwiched somewhere between my orange theory sticker, of course, and my "OBX" sticker, which serves as my reminder that no matter how difficult life is at times, come July I will be able to watch the sun rise over the Atlantic. In that sense I resemble every other mom of a large family I know.

Being the hauling kids car, I am sure I am like most other moms.  My car collects crap. Papers from Sunday school. Forgotten half eaten snacks and a wide collection of clothing. Now to be fair, to hear my husband tell it my car likely houses something else. Chickens. He enjoys pointing out at any given time he fears he will open the doors and chickens will fly out. I mean really. Chickens. After all he should know they do not fly.

Regardless, I find every few days I need to locate a large trash can and pull up to unload the latest remnants of kid related refuse. Today was that day. One of my day off tasks. I must confess however, my car today had bread. The bread from two days of breakfast sandwiches from Starbucks. The bread was still neatly in the white Starbucks bag no longer holding the egg and sausage it once did.   Ok. This one was on me. It dawned on me, in that moment, that somewhere there is an entire landfill full of the bread I stopped eating about two years ago. Honestly, I have done all kinds of things with bread in two years. Thrown it away. Fed it to the dog.....anything by put it in my system.  Ah my beloved bread. Prior to two years ago I made my own bread from scratch, rising and kneading the dough and carefully watching it brown to perfection. I made all kinds of bread even the sweet kinds like pumpkin and banana. Yes bread and I had a love affair that was only mirrored by my ability to fit into nothing less than plus sized clothing.

Now here I sit planning for my next race in 3 weeks and two other races in the coming months finally grasping my own metabolic issues and understanding the relationship between carbs and my weight, I find the end of this love affair with bread and my ceremoniously throwing it in the trash today more like slaying a dragon and less like cleaning out my car.  I realized how much better my life is without it. Now as a side note...I have considered lobbying the good people at Starbucks to give me a low carb option to avoid my abuse of the local landfill with my bread wasting problem. Will save that for project for another day, and just to set the record straight only three beach towels, a cooler, several empty water bottles, some straw wrappers and an old apple were found in there. No chickens. Tonight's chicken came strictly from Price Chopper.

That Magical Phrase

"The best is yet to come". This phrase seems to have become a mainstay of this magical decade in my life better known as my 40's. I have found it can be used in just about every aspect of my life. There are days like yesterday, when I hit a personal best on the treadmill and it comes out triumphantly from me as I see even better things in my training future.

There are other times it comes in a low voice, almost shaky surrounded by question marks from the pits of my soul. For example, waiting through a painful 3 year Haitian adoption full of crazy twists and turns and frustration, often the phrase was uttered to try to convince myself it would be ok and I would one day hold my babies permanently, that day did come. Or when I was laying in a hospital bed February 8 of this year with a hip full of new hardware after spending a year training. I had to put my anger at this injury at bay with this phrase.

Today, I am faced with a wallet a little lighter and an email confirming me as team captain for Team Awaken confirming my registration for a Spartan Race November 12 with my partner in crime Jack. There was something so exciting about that yet terrifying at the same time. The terrifying came as I replayed lots of different things in my mind today. The statistic that only 50% of hip fracture patients ever get back to their previous level of activity, yet am looking to go beyond that. The fact that I will be 47 two days after the race. Really?  Taking on a first Spartan race at my age?  I have heard that from several people. Maybe I should just swim, take up something safer....all things I have heard fairly recently. All these things allowing that magical phrase to get quieter and quieter in my soul.

Then...as my patients were all simmering waiting for tests and my charting was caught up I found myself stumbling across an article. Sister Madonna Buder. I had never heard of this woman but what I would learn changed my day. She is an 86 year old iron man athlete, not to mention Catholic nun, still competing 17 hour races annually. She began her race career at 48 when she was encouraged to discover the link between mental, physical and spiritual well being.  This completely resonated with me as I searched to find my physical health by shutting out the negativity in my life and letting my spiritual side be my guide as my earlier blog posts talk about. This woman even broke her pelvis and recovered only to race again. I have no idea what those post fracture statistics look like but they cannot be all that different than my hip. Ironically, she broke her pelvis training just like me and my hip. She has now raced almost as long as I have been alive which is staggering. I am finding I have spent the rest of the day learning all I can about this lady and as I do that shakey, low voiced questionable "best is yet to come" has gathered some steam and is growing more and more solid.

So, although the Spartan Team Awaken is small, we are mighty and must live by Sister Madonna's example that come Nov 12.....the best is yet to come.

Finding the Calm

52 hours in 5 days, one day off followed by 5 more days of the same and it is only day 4 of this craziness. Add that to some of the messiness of life has weighed heavily on me lately. To date I have found exhausting myself completely at the gym has been an effective tool for dealing with things,  however today, my ride to my moonlighting job proved to be a bit more restless than usual. Even my 2.5 mile run plus floor and rowing at OTF at 6:15 this morning had not settled things much in my soul.

I found my mind wandering on the drive through the messiness of it all hoping to find the magical

solution when I suddenly found myself northbound on the thruway 70 miles an hour through the rolling hills of upstate NY. A familiar drive for me, as until August I did it morn less than 3-4 times a week. Now my primary job takes me into the city of Albany. The opposite direction of this. So, today was the first time I had gone this way in about two weeks.  Today I was struck by the fiery bursts of fall color starting to peek through the green. The sun was out, not a cloud in the sky and in that moment it was as if a picture of vibrant colors against the bluest of skies had been painted only for me. 

Seeing all that fall beauty reminded me of something. This caliber of beauty exists despite the trials of life. It emerges even when the answers do not. It also reminded me that in the craziness of the last few days I need to look hard for the beauty in the midst of the chaos. I will admit I may or may morn have pulled out the iPhone camera in an attempt to capture that moment on camera to save for later.....it resulted in a great picture of the window of my suburban and the highway. The colors were so bright, so expansive and so big a camera just was not enough. Perhaps God's way of telling me to enjoy it in that moment not when I could no longer see it. 

In that moment, a song came on. Anyone who knows me knows I am one who believes in the notion that there is a song for every mood and situation. In fact my daughter Grace is named for the Matt Maher song "Your Grace is Enough" as her adoption took so long and was so difficult, Grace was all I had in those moments. Then there is the polar opposite sentiment as I have a need for the Beastie Boys for the killer out of bed for the 5:00 am workout.  I have the 80's for long car rides to torment my 20 year old and on and on. I generally have one rule when it comes to music. No country. Just is not my thing. However today,  for some odd reason my Sirius radio went rogue. I suddenly was aware of Taylor Swift coming through the speakers. Not someone I generally listen to but in that moment as I drove the last few miles toward my exit almost disappointed the ride was over and I was leaving this setting the perfect phrase came on. It is something I think about in this moment finally in my sweats after a sixteen hour day still reveling in the sudden burst of color that brought me an oasis of calm in the crazy of life.

"....and when I got home, before I said Amen asking God if He can play it again...."

Out of the Comfort Zone.....Again

As I have had to take a couple days to unpack from my trip I just now realize they are gone. By "they" I mean my favorite pair of Columbia black flip flops. Rugged enough for any beach or rocky shores, yet supportive enough to do a full day of errand running without a problem, yet versatile enough to wear with any outfit. In fact, when I was in Arizona a friend pointed out in the desert heat they were starting to melt a bit and I took great care to move them out of the sun.

These shoes have many memories in them. Past vacations where I wore them to watch the sunrise over the Atlantic in the Outer Banks to watching the sunset over the Gulf of Mexico on the beach at Marco Island. They held the memories of pool days with my babies, an epic cruise to the Bahamas and now an epic girls' weekend. I suppose from that Kistner it could be surmised I am a bit of a beach girl. I have often said I needed little more than a stick and a tarp and the sound of roaring waves. I suppose I had always envisioned this pair of flip flops would work well in that vision too. I guess in the end I am a bit lost without my shoes today but it reminded me of something. Taking this journey to change my entire life I have had to leave a lot of old favorite things behind.

I have had to leave behind foods I truly loved such as chips.....ah chips. I have left behind some old habits of dealing with life in unhealthy ways, and left behind a whole lot of sleep for those early morning OTF sessions. I have begun to now think those old ways and my old life was as simple as my favorite comfortable pair of flip flops. Never wavering, always the same. Trapped in a sea of complacency disguised as a comfortable shoe.

As I wrestled with my latest goal.....do I run a Spartan Race for my birthday?  I find I have submitted to my earlier complacency and have started to come up with reasons why not. It was simply more comfortable to rest on the laurels of the mud run.  Eighteen months of training, 5.5 miles of mud and 30 obstacles and a good cry at the finish line. All in all an epic day that surpassed anything I could have imagined for that experience.

Resting on that experience I realized it was becoming more comfortable to just put other things ahead of this Spartan Race now that it is getting close.  I needed to go see my granddaughter. I should probably work. The holidays were close to that race. It was becoming easier to pick a different race much further away. As I do this I have once again found myself in that usual place of  anxiety over being able to do this. Paralyzed in my own comfort zone.  As I found myself doing the dreaded burpees at OTF I had several people remind me of the role of burpees in the Spartan Race and I decided it was time to get moving. As I cautiously tossed out the inquiry on social media to see which of my teammates wanted to do this I found the response terrifying. The team is being assembled as we speak with an offer to help us train in an obstacle gym between now and then.

So there it is. Comfortable shoes gone. Comfort zone once again shattered. Cheers to my team for pushing me into a birthday celebration the likes of which I have never seen before, and here's to our next five weeks of training. Guess this means I should ask for new flip flops for my birthday too, may this pair see more happy times and epic memories than the last.

Girls Weekend Reflection

It would seem I have been on a bit of a hiatus for a week or so. The reality is I have been traveling. First to see my granddaughter then on for a girls' weekend in Arizona. I have often wondered about but what that type of weekend would look like. It was not something I had done before and I was seeing women I had not spent time with in 20 years. Coming off the plane in the nice warm desert from a chilly upstate New York I began to relax immediately, with the friendly face of my old roommate meeting me right in baggage.

In the days that followed, I would have a great reminder of what it was to be 21 again. Carefree,  and laughs that I have not had in a very long time. I did not eat clean,  I probably drank more than I should have and trained only one time in 5 days. A complete departure from my current life which has become strict with the diet and training not less than an hour a day. I keep stats of my fastest runs and rows. My graph of PR's with weights....on and on it goes.  Through it all, rather than feeling the guilt of not being stringent with my diet, or for the first time being away from my family for a time that belonged  only to me, I felt renewed. In that space lives the 20 something girl who learned to be on her own with the support of these women.  With these women I had made the transition from shy overweight girl to successful adult.  It reminded me of where I came from and where I ended up and certainly the debt of gratitude for shaping me into who I am today that I owe these women I am blessed to call sisters.


So, as I got up this morning, starting the washer, making lunches, preparing for the gym and a ten hour shift I have no regrets for my pizza eating or beer drinking weekend. I feel renewed and ready for a triumphant return to the gym and finalizing plans for a race next month. Mostly I realized I had learned something. People always tell me to take a day off. Have one bite of something I shouldn't. I usually dig my heels in and say no. I was even the one crutching  it into the gym ten days post op after hip surgery. Not that dedication is a bad thing, but finding renewal just may matter just as much. Now I may rethink that in an hour at OTF when I take on my run for the first time in days, but know the bigger picture will matter more.

So to my girls I say thank you for reminding me who I am, and more importantly, helping me find balance in the care of myself. So.....pack those cactus shaped shot glasses away carefully, see ya' next year bitches!  Love you all.

I Knew at The Finish Line

A wee bit of sunburn, scrapes on my knees and elbows, bruised shin and a load of extremely muddy laundry...... that is what I have right now. Well,  that and a whole lot more. About a year ago I read "Spartan Up" by Joe Cena. It answered the question,"why?  Why pay good money to push your body to the limit?  What is the point of the cuts and bruises that follow?"  Joe had an easy answer to that. "You'll know at the finish line."

Today, I ran up a beautiful hill to find one last obstacle. A muddy hill to climb and descend followed by a long mud pit that led to a rainbow colored inflatable archway marking the finish. Five miles. Thirty obstacles. What did I know in that moment?  Well a whole lot of things.

I learned I can be afraid of heights and still climb the 8 foot wall followed by the ten foot wall without a rope just a little help from my friends.  It was a good thing that these were the 2nd and 3rd obstacles as it seemed to help me to start with a bit of confidence. Following that I learned I could carry 50 pounds of sand for a quarter mile without a problem. During that quarter mile though I was able to think about having this plus 27 pounds that I was carrying around every single day two years ago. Somehow the bag of sand seemed a bit easier.

I learned I could swing on a rope over a trench filled with mud despite being terrified I would fall in. I also learned said terror was shared with a trusted team member and not only could I do it, she could too. Somehow sharing the fear and conquering it together made for quite a moment. I learned I could scale a muddy riverbank up and down and up and down and my hip would be rock solid. There were larger rope clubs over walls, crawling yards and yards through mud with overhead boards that kept me low enough to emerge with what appeared to be a muddy beard. There were burpees in a mud pit not as penalties, but as part of the course and of course the running, tire flips, climbing over muddy hay bales and running through the woods over and under trees on their sides.  On and on it went. Wet. Muddy. Up. Down.Cimb. Crawl. Mud and the almighty slip and slide.

All at once.  There it was. Right in front of me. Fear in an obstacle. Decades of anxiety wrapped into this one thing. Flashbacks of school yard failure right there. A straight 15 foot iron pipe over a vat of mud and a sign that simply said,"monkey bars". Monkey bars. Wow. I never could do it well. I watched the other kids do it like they were some sort of spider monkey. I put this to rest a long time ago along with the rope climb and conquering the awful mile and a half run in junior high named the Cooper. Yet here it was. Monkey bars. I gripped it three or four times until I actually gave it a try. Terrified of looking silly, old emotion had a great team, and afraid of falling in. Irrational fears. Then I did it. Hand over hand. Fifteen feet across. Not one drop of mud. I stood looking at my son stunned. I said to him more than once,"I did it". He just nodded. Ok he may have thought I lost it at that moment, but that by far was my favorite moment of the day.

So as I passed under the rainbow archway I think I learned no wall is too high with a great team to give me a boost, and I am never too old to conquer longstanding fears and being able to see the freedom that comes as those fears faded away. As I sit nursing my wounds and cleaning the mud out of my ears I know in my heart of hearts every ounce of effort I put in these last two years was absolutely worth it.

In reference to yesterday's comment on the quest for the snapdragon.... my snapdragon has shown up. It is the Tristate Sprint in 2017. Crossing the finish line today reminded me once again the best is yet to come.

Snapdragons

The sun was shining bright today in the upstate New York orchard where I go in September. It was that magical day when I was made aware by said orchard that the honeycrisp apples were ready to be picked. I suppose it was about five years ago when I discovered this magical food. It is the perfect variety of crispness and sourness that I wait all year for. This orchard grows them as big as my head and to be quite honest my fantasies of eating these begin sometime in late July. Yesterday was the day. I took my 5 and 6 year old off the bus and directly to the orchard. I think they must have eaten three apiece while picking them and admittedly I took my job as token adult to be quality control as I sampled some as well. I carefully taught them to look for the ones with some red on them. Watch for worm holes and no. We do not pick them up off the ground and put them in the bag. Only fresh from the tree. Ah yes....my annual quest for the honeycrisp apple was being realized right there in the afternoon sun.

Looking at the wet grass and trees as my 5 and 6 year old wandered around eating apple after apple I began to wonder what my big race would be like. What the finish line would look like or better yet how that would feel. A lifetime of epic fails to be healthy, now 18 months of solid training with time off for the tiny broken hip and surgery....wait. I broke my freaking hip 7.5 months ago and had surgery. Sudden anxiety over that....rattling around thoughts suddenly interrupted by overflowing bags of my coveted honey crisps that two little guys could not lift. This led to serious apple sorting and a drive back to check out.

At the scales I struck up a conversation with the orchard guy. I admitted my honeycrisp addiction and  he assures me I am not alone in this addiction and really at this point there truly was no need for outside help or some sort of honeycrisp support group. As I paid I felt that final sense of accomplishment. Mission accomplished. That is until his parting words to me were,"hey, if you like those you should try our Snapdragons. A hybrid between the honeycrisp and a gala."  As I drove off trying to envision this I was struck by the sudden need for a new apple quest. The snapdragon.....yes. Next time.

In that moment I also realized perhaps I had this race all wrong. I have nothing else on the books definitely for another event. I have been invited to two other events but nothing in stone. I have a feeling I had considered this a final destination of sorts. Cross the finish line. Put a lifetime of fitness failures spanning back to grade school behind me. Beat the odds that were stacked against me after a surgical repair of a hip fracture.  I have a knack of doing that when I reach goals. Complacency.  The curse of the modern adult. This time though just maybe I should finish the race,  God willing, and look for the guy with the snapdragons. I have a feeling that is the guy who sees the best is yet to come.

School?! Again?!

My youngest child is 5 and started kindergarten two weeks ago. This is my happy go lucky, sleep loving hulk of a child at 54 pounds. I guess someone forgot to tell him he came to menstarving from an orphanage.  Nonetheless, here he is. This morning I went into his room at 6:30 for our new normal morning exchange. I wake him up and he says,"why?"  I explain he has school and in a look of absolutely outrage he says,"school?! Again?!"  This leads to the explanation he has school every day and as I explained to some friends earlier I have not had the heart to explain to him this will
Go on for the next 12 years after kindergarten. I am personally now on day six of a particularly hard seven day work stretch. No. My bosses are not masochists, I just needed to squeeze in some time at my moonlighting gig before going out of town. I put him on the bus and stumbled in for a cup of coffee in my favorite mug and began to suddenly understand his emotion.

Through my exhaustion I realized I had the gym scheduled for an hour later. I suddenly had the urge to say "the gym?! Again?!"  I even chuckle to myself as I think about it. I began to think about how many things in life are so important yet seem like such a struggle sometimes.  There is the "work?! Again?!" Or "laundry?! Again?!" I never think twice about making my children do the hard work yet at times have the urge to give up on my own. Giving in to the day to day "agains?!" But ignoring the personal ones. In terms of the gym I began to think about times over the years I did just that. I took the easier road in a moment of exhaustion and lived to regret missing out on the greater things that could have followed.

As for today, my son was meeting me for a workout. That pushed my mama soul to lead by example and not back out. Now I may have required my typical loud music, ok Beastie Boys today, and a few four letter words on my way to the gym through the exhaustion. What the end product of my angry drive and presence at the gym was some pretty fast rowing, conquering the jump squat for the first time since I broke my hip, an all out at my personal best and a really good latte with my adult child. Things I would never have had during a nap. It occurs to me I am pretty lucky my 20 year old seems to like to hang out with his mom sometimes. It also occurs to me one day he will have his own family and not have as much time on his hands like he does now. So I suppose the answer to my earlier question "the gym?! Again?" Is now,"Yes!  The gym. Again. 💗💗💗💗". Beastie Boys motivation notwithstanding. Besides we are four days away from race day.....I know that day I will be glad I did not take a nap this morning.

As for my youngest?  He came bounding off the bus and is now sucking on his frozen gogurt chattering endlessly about recess and friends and story time. Somehow I think he may have changed his mind to "school again💗💗💗💗".

Animal Crackers

"That was the best 3.67 I have spent in a long time. I just wanted to pamper myself". Thus went the text from my daughter the new mother. She also sent a photo of her triumphant purchase: a bag of good old fashioned iced animal crackers. These were the pink and white waxy frosted crackers with the multicolored nonpareils. Yes. These were a childhood favorite of hers cultivated by yours truly. They are a far cry from the clean eating treats I make now. They probably never go bad due to the industrial strength preservatives involved in their making. Nonetheless, through the sea of diapers and sleepless nights somehow these seemed to soothe her new mama soul.

This got me to thinking about my absolute belief in rewarding myself for goals achieved. When I first started losing weight I promised myself an Alex and Ani bracelet for each ten pounds. When I lost the first ten I remember feeling just a bit of disappointment that magically I had not transformed into some sort of supermodel. This is old thinking for any of us who have battled weight. I bought the bracelet that said,"it's not a sprint, it's a marathon". I have found this to be excruciating at times but true nonetheless. The second one was the "living water" bracelet as it reminded me of just who was the living water and who all these hopes and dreams rest on. My third was the Cubs bracelet because after all, every thought does not have to be deep and I am just a Chicago girl living in New York. Along he way there have been other rewards. Things designed to fill the space once occupied by my previous comfort, food. There is my love of a good mani and pedi as well as my constant admiration of my hair dresser who I swear is part magician.

For my daughter her reward of keeping my precious granddaughter alive and well for a whole month came down to animal crackers. Rewards were definitely in order at that point.  If she only knew that her attempt to cling to the comforts of her childhood will soon become staple food, as my Bella grows some more, along with goldfish and juice boxes. I did not have the nerve to tell her one day she will be washing mushy animal crackers out of Bella's hair and really her rewards will change to something a bit more palatable.

My next goal?  I finally for the first time in my life broke a 10 minute mile today. Not too bad considering it was the second mile I ran. The first was 10:10. That was not going to work. Now to shoot for 8 minutes in the next twelve months......my reward?  At the moment that secret is safe with the good people of Amazon....

I Just May Have a Shoe Addiction

I suppose the phone call I got in college from my mother should have been my first clue that I just may have a problem with shoes. She had found a very large bag full of my shoes in my closet. They were shoes from all walks of my high school life. Gym shoes, softball cleats and even my beloved pink converse high tops. As the bag was quite large and I had not lived at home in some time she wondered why I kept this. Did I need it?  What did I plan to do with them?  The answer to question one was probably not, and question two was I had no idea. One thing I was sure of. They would fit. Not like jeans that may become too tight or shirts that would be too small. Shoes never let me down.

The thought of this bag of shoes occurred to me yesterday as I was discussing appropriate race footwear with my son. I explained to him that although his Rosche Runs are well worn and getting muddy and ruined would not break his heart, it was likely safer for him to have obstacle racing shoes like mine. My Reebock orange, pink and yellow high tech trail shoes. I had a discussion about toe picks and mud drainage technology as it relates to climbing over muddy walls. Ultimately we got a similar pair for him ordered.

Nonetheless, this led to me going into the closet for a survey of my shoes. Yes, I realize stereotypical women love shoes. Seeing the Kardashian's closets, OK, my oldest male child is a fan and forces me to watch, I see dozens of pairs of heels by many famous makers such as Jimmy Choo. The reality is, my shoes are a bit different. My life is lived in three types of outfits. Gym clothes, scrubs and jeans. My shoes match accordingly. Looking at the casual collection I see a couple pairs of Sperry's, one pair clearly not fit for much in the outside world but fit my feet so perfectly I think I have convinced myself the newer pair just will never live up to the hype of the old pair. There is the Ugg mocassin. This is my first upstate New York winter shoe. That year we survived inch after inch of snow wondering if we had actually moved to the North Pole. A note on the Ugg moccasin to the various critics.....they have a sole. So technically they are not a slipper. Plus they were the only shoes I could safely get on after my hip surgery as they required no bending at the waist to tie. Then there are the flip flops. This is the place I dare not even quantify how many I have. Some I wear and some I do not. I look at the black pair of croc flip flops that got me all over Haiti for 3.5 weeks when I was bringing Grace and Alex home. I had no other shoes as I got stuck in country at the end and had to send everything home that I could when my husband had to leave to keep my luggage to a minimum knowing I would have two kids in tow on the way home by myself. I have the patent leather blue pumps that matched my dress perfectly for my high school reunion some years back. Then the perfect orange and red staple shoes I wore to a hospital gala.  Yes, I am one to buy the perfect shoe for the perfect dress for a special occasion. I suppose I justify it by telling myself shoes always for no matter what. So if I get the red and orange heeled strappy sandals I will have them in case another awesome dress came along for a different occasion. To be fair I have several pairs of shoes that fall into this category.

This brings me to my collection of Dansko clogs. The hallmark of anyone who works in a hospital. Black, blue, brown and watermarked....each pair representing a different period in my career. Each pair with their own story to tell of lives saved and lives lost and as any emergency medicine person will tell you....given our particular culture each pair screams almost audibly the particular brand of sarcasm we all share in my field.

Then there are gym shoes. Lots and lots of gym shoes. I will say in a general sense I am a Nike girl. Long narrow feet with a high arch make them perfect. Through this journey I have had all kinds. Runners, Frees, custom rosches and currently a hybrid shoe. Each shoe tells a story like a photo album of sorts. Some were rewards to myself for goals met and others purchased out of changing workouts demanding something different. The story of next week's racing shoe probably the best of all. I had wanted to race. I was terrified I could not do it. When I successfully completed the dry tri a year ago I ordered these. Just what I would need for a mud run.  I figured if I invested in the shoe it would push me to get there. Many times I have cursed the shoes. Three months of crutches had made me wonder if this was ever going to happen. During that period it was as if they mocked me. Yet today I dust them off and try them on. As always, shoes did not disappoint. A perfect fit. Here we go....a year later. 7 days to go!.

The Ragtag Team of Awaken

"He is jealous for me, loves like a hurricane, I am a tree....."
Thus is the backdrop for my ride to work as I plug along on the thruway in my giant suburban mom mobile. Anyone who knows me knows I have fairly eclectic musical tastes as it would not be unusual for this David Crowder Christian classic to be followed by some Guns N Roses or even some Ed Sheeran. I suppose at the end of the day it would make me having a bright future as an award winning DJ fairly unlikely.


As the song progresses I find my mind wandering to:  a cooler with ice, some cans of fit aid, kind bars, water, a spare set of clothes, God don't forget that. This goes the ever growing mental checklist for my first five mile mud run next Saturday. I must admit my heart pounds ever so slightly at the thought. I set out to be fit enough to do something like this for 19 months and here I am 9 days away. It is terrifying and exciting at the same time. Nineteen months of work, with six weeks off for an injury. Here it is.

I suppose outside of the obvious, what is unique about this event is that it is something that I actively recruited a team for and helped organize. I have organized lots of stuff before now, well....I do have five children, so just organizing a regular week for me I suppose takes a higher level of organizational skill than people with smaller families. Honestly, at times breakfast is a major production. Nonetheless, here I go with my assembled team for a physical even. At the moment we are a fairly unmatched team of five. I think I am the oldest at nearly 47, my son is the youngest at 20 and there are three others in between, one of whom is a Spartan racer of epic proportions taking on the Ultra Beast at Killington this weekend. (Good luck Juan!). So why are we together?  We represent Awaken Church. The nondenominational church home I attend. Something about this combination of people who came together under this spiritual umbrella has settled my over the top chronic anxiety  over running and this big race to occasional mild palpitations. Besides, having my Spartan racing pal there means he will be strong enough to pull me over the muddy wall if I can't do it myself. As these thoughts occur to me I hear the final line "I don't have time to maintain these regrets when I think about the way He loves me...". Thank you Mister Crowder for that very powerful reminder of such things.

With my mental list done and deep thoughts settled I finally pull into the parking structure of the hospital to hear the next track. Adele "Rolling in the Deep". Oh yes. We will be deep. Deep in mud and in that moment we will almost have it all.....  Let's Go Team Awaken!

Flawsome

Recently, through the miracle of social media I had a friend introduce me to the word "flawsome". The word refers to the ability to embrace the flaws and still be awesome. Today, I had a chance to really put the phrase to good use. You see....I am a grandmother. A fairly new grandmother at that. My daughter had baby Bella almost four weeks ago. My daughter spent some time yesterday talking about how she wished she had been thinner before she got pregnant. She felt if this were the case, the post partum struggle to find her new normal would be easier. It made me think about how often important events happen and we begin to wish for something different that had come first. I think about a particularly difficult 10k I did some years back. In the weeks that followed the event I had ever so many blisters to make we wish I had trained more or well....at all. It is as if tapping the retrospective wish granting virtual fairy godmother would somehow have me wake up healthy and somehow conquer that race like an Olympian.

It occurs to me that the entertainment industry has made a lot of money allowing us to lose ourselves in the fantasy of the fairy godmother or even the genie in a bottle to grant our every wish. These are great escapes but far to often I think we lose ourselves in the notion of wishing for something better or different in our past to account for being somehow less than we think we should be in the present. For me, the constant wishing did absolutely nothing but hold me hostage to the failures and not looking toward where I could be.

The diet industry in a similar fashion has had their share of fairy godmothers and magicians promising a quick fix in a matter of days which is probably what makes a lot of them so attractive. Trust me. I drank the cabbage juice, took the pills, made the shakes and nursed the surgical scars. Nothing actually granted my magical wishes until I found the people who felt I was flawsome even when I was still wishing. These people helped me to see every little gain was to be celebrated until little by little every little change amounted to a huge leap into the place where I now am, almost two years into my journey. Some of these folks are friends. Some are family and some are my beloved trainers who laughed at me when I said "I can't" and held my wishes tight so I could learn to grant them myself.

I explained to my daughter that maybe she was not what she wanted to be in this moment, but she was better than she was yesterday and will be better tomorrow as long as she embraces who she is flaws and all. Then take her wishing and figure out what she can wish for today that is attainable. Apparently that wishful attainable scenario had something to do with wishing to replace cheap diapers as they relate the poop of a breast fed baby and a heck of a lot of laundry. Not being in medicine like me, her exposure to this sort of thing prior to now has been somewhat limited.  She met that goal yesterday and I think this Fairy God Nana may need to help that wish along with a cyber trip to Amazon. As far as her body image goes she has already dropped some of the baby weight and she is mothering like a champ. That is the most flawsome thing I can think of for her today.

As for me, my wish is to have a PR in something every single week. Inching along little by little making slow and steady progress. Like yesterday when a trainer decided he needed to take the class I was in and occupy the treadmill and later the weight station and later the rower next to me.   This was so daunting to try to perform for a member of the team that helped make me what I am today. These people have taught me to be my own genie in a bottle and I was going to show them just what I was now made of. The best news was I did not die or fall off the treadmill as I ran my best all out at 7.5mph. I did not die when I rowed at nearly 400 watts and I did not give myself a concussion doing a 25 pound single arm snatch all PR's for me. In those moments I was free from all those years wasted on wishing and overcome by the notion that the best is yet to come.

A final note to my dearest daughter....may you continue to be flawsome just like the rest of us. Do not give up on what you can be, kiss Nana's baby Bella, tell her I will see her in two weeks and most importantly may the rest of your  day be leaky diaper free.

Sunday Funday Chicago Style

Yesterday was Sunday Funday at Orangetheory Fitness. That translates to represent your favorite football team. So there I was in the middle of Giants/Patriots country standing tall only Chicago Bears orange tank top. Yes. I know they are not the top team in the league, but probably what my working out pals do not realize is that during that two mile power walk uphill I was able to reflect on the Bears I grew up with. These were the Bears in their heyday. The days when Jim McMahon was quarterback, Ditka was king and everyone knew the Fridge was more than just an appliance. We all knew the Super Bowl Shuffle with our Wayfarers on.

Growing up in the 80's in Chicago held lots of greatness. There were the Cubs, who were not very good at that time but the fans had heart and soul. It turns out in the last two years that fan loyalty would be greatly rewarded as they at long last head into the post season. Probably my most nostalgic memory is the food. Ah. Food in Chicago.

First there was the pizza. living in New York now I can say  there is a huge difference between Chcago pizza and what my friends in New York consider pizza. Chicago pizza has a crispy sturdy crust rather than a flimsy crust that requires some sort of folding over technique making it a pizza sandwich of sorts. In Chicago we have deep dish pizza, where arguably the best comes from Gino's in the city. I doubt there is a kid from the suburbs that did not find themselves putting their name on the wall over a booth somewhere in that place. In Glen Ellyn we had Barones. Anyone from there knows this is the hometown favorite. It was such a favorite I would often hear my own mother wish we could have that for Thanksgiving. Sausage and mushroom on little squares of crispy goodness....Later on, trips home from college always meant at least one meal from there. One fateful night one of my brothers and I were home for a weekend. We had both been out with our respective groups of friends and had gotten home hungry. He suggested we hit up Barones for a late night snack. I, of course, was a broke college student but he assured me he would buy. When the bill came he instructed the waitress to give it to me and promptly got in the car and drove away, waving at me through the front window of the restaurant. After I panicked for a few minutes and then he came back laughing that he had gotten me good. That night I was eternally grateful I did not have to wash dishes.

Second, there was Italian Beef. Portillos. Red and white bags of greasy wonderment. Italian beef has nothing to do with pasta or red sauce. It has to do with a slow braised beef braised with Italian spices served on a soft white roll soggy with the juice topped with peppers. Complete nirvana on a bun. Portillos is also famous for their Chicago style hot dogs, yes. They essentailly have a salad on them. Yes they are on a steamed poppy seed bun. To my New York friends this seems strange but to us Chicagoans it is just normal. Plus Portillos was the only place I know that had crinkle cut fries as I mentioned before....fries. One of my many food vises.

Yes. Chicago food.  Yes I am aware that this combination of saturated fats and high starch offerings likely contributed to my lifelong problem with obesity but it does not stop my nostalgia for my Chcago roots. During that time side pony tails were side pony tails and neon and rubber black bracelets resembling Madonna were simply cool.  My nostalgia for all things Chicago was probably only fueled by the trainer playing "Rock the Casbah" just as I entered my 10% incline at 4.4 miles per hour reminding me once again that the 80's may be over, the Bears are likely not a Suoer Bowl favorite, and I no longer live in Chicago, but as time has proven....you can take the girl out of Chcago but not the Chicago out of the girl.

Race Day Reflections

Race day finally arrived bright and early this morning.  The day itself was overcast and gray, but muggy.  We had no rain out on the course though and for that I was certainly grateful!  It was so interesting the things that came back to me as I pulled into the parking area of Ellms Farm.  I instantly became nervous.  Running Anxiety.  I have had it enough times to now think it just must be a thing.  If it does not exist in the DSM, I would maintain that it certainly should.  My favorite sidekick and I took off for the check in and got our bibs and we were ready to roll.  The thing I noticed first was the course had been changed.  The start line was last year's finish line and vice versa.  So much for having confidence in the course.  Enter worsening running anxiety.....although I will say I did my best to cover this for a well crafted selfie, because in the golden age of social media, all important events require the well crafted selfie.  This being my first race since breaking my hip certainly qualified as an important event.

Finally the air horn blew and we were off.  Climbing over the incline shown behind us and down the first slide off to the gravel trail.  OK....in that moment I realized there were two problems with this scenario.  I had failed to consider that inflatable obstacles are not stable.  Rocking and rolling and being tossed around.  In this moment I had to add yet another thing to my list of things that were completely different after a hip fracture.  I believe I have now started to get to the place where my life is broken up into two parts in terms of exercise.  There is the BHF (before hip fracture) and AHF, (after hip fracture).  I realized the instability of the obstacles was probably the most challenging and I had to take them on much slower than I did last year.  I am proud to say I did complete them all.  I shall now be queen of the bounce house.  Problem number two was running on gravel.  I have run a lot in the last 2.5 months.  I have gone as far as 4 miles at a time.....yeah on the treadmill or the flat, paved, bike path.  Gravel was a bit more challenging not because it hurt, but it fed my fear of falling AHF quite well.  For the record, this is a very healthy, nearly irrational at times, fear.  Drops of water on the tile floor, ice outside, a kid quickly zig zagging in front of me all seem to provoke a fairly emotional reaction.  Anyway, the instability of the obstacles and the gravel both got my wheels turning as to what types of training I will need to do to help with stability issues.  I see regular dates with a bosu ball in my future...

What was so ironic about all of this was last year, the running was hard.  I could not run the whole way because, by that time, unbeknownst to me my hip already had a stress fracture.  Running hurt.  The cardiovascular piece was not there either.  So, those bouncy obstacles were the best part of the race.  Today, all in, we ran it all finishing the whole thing in 35 minutes.  Down the last stretch we came around the corner and were instantly disappointed it was over.  Last year, as I came up that hill I committed to running the last little bit and finish strong.  Now, that same run was the easiest and I once again realized my running anxiety was such a waste of time especially in light of the fancy metal and finisher's shirt I scored at the end. Anyone who has raced before knows this to be the best part.  Now if only I could score a Queen of the Bounce House Tiara to show off to my Spartan Racing pals...

Probably my favorite thing about today came through Timehop.  It was a meme that I posted a year ago as I struggled to keep going.  As I have talked about before, staying on the path to health and fitness can be really hard.  It truly is a solo journey which is easy to walk away from when the only one you are truly accountable to is yourself and the past attempts at walking this road had resulted in dismal failure. A year ago I still had significant weight to lose.  I was in pain with my hip and stretched thin with work and family.  Working out at OrangeTheory was still very hard even taking the easier options on things.  There were moments I questioned if I could keep going or even if I could ever get where I truly wanted to be.  I must have had one of those moments exactly one year ago today when I posted this. 

 

 

 

Honestly?  I think I am finding out.....

The Miracle of Racing

As I wade through yet another recovery day as tomorrow is race day it gave me a chance to redirect my soulful pining for Orange Theory, and my low lying anxiety that exists with every workout day missed as if somehow I will wake up the plus sized lady I once was. Today's reflection is on my first solo race of last year. One year ago I ran the Insane Inflatable 5k. My sidekick was stuck with cheerleading duties at U Albany and I was on my own.  I considered for a brief moment playing the sympathy card and pushing my ever understanding husband to come with the kids. However at that point my 3 youngest were 4,5 and 10. To have that brood in the midst of a crowded place with inflatable stuff was probably not something that would make me wife of the year. My second option was to not go at all. After all I had never done any kind of obstacle racing and now with nobody there to push me through like I had with the dry triathlon about six weeks earlier it seemed so daunting. 

Yes. I took a gentle ribbing from Spartan Racing friends who teased about my "silly little bounce house thing". Maybe this was the thing that pushed me as if I bowed out of this event it would have made facing my own quitting that much worse. So I went. I pulled into a local farm on a warm day in Sept and parked amongst the recently harvested corn rows. I walked to the check in by myself and had a good look around. Lots of groups from every walk of life and fitness level and every age. As is human nature, I found myself looking around for people who probably would be a little slower than me or maybe struggle a bit. Not that I wanted them to fail, I just did not want to feel the anxiety of being last that had been instilled in me back in my Hadley Junior High days and being the last one finishing the Cooper. 

Finally it was my wave time. We were off. Over the obstacle, and down the trail I went. One by one I took on the obstacles. Some of the runners were faster than me, some were slower. However, I will never forget one woman. She outweighed me by about 50 pounds. She did not appear to be the picture of fitness yet there she was running along the trail and ultimately encouraging me. She explained she had started racing a year before and had fallen in love with it. We did a good chunk of the course together as she pushed me along and reminded me when you take on obstacles size does not necessarily matter. Ultimately we got separated but she tossed a few words of encouragement to me as we did. That I will not forget. 

Finally I came up on the last hill. I could see the final slide gleaming in the sunlight and I realized I just may be able to do this. To some it may have seemed like a silly bouncy house thing, but to me, that last slide looked a whole lot like the backside of Mount Everest. As I slid down I realized that I had conquered this race all by myself, not because of someone else dragging me, pushed along by the kind words of a stranger, but essentially by myself. In the moment of the photographer snapping my picture as I slid down, I began to realize I was probably capable of more than just this, not only in the world of obstacle racing but in life. 

So tomorrow I will set off on the same race. This time with my sidekick Jack, my 20 year old son and life coach who is really more like the Batman to my Robin. This is now one year later, the race is now our warm up. What once looked so huge and so scary is the warm up for our much bigger 5 mile 30 obstacle race in two weeks. Yes. The terror of that impending event is already keeping me up at night. Nonetheless, it is amazing to me what one year can bring. Cannot wait to share my race day reflections and as always believing the best is yet to come.

Labor Day

Labor Day. The end of summer. Kids back to school and moms, ok when I say "moms" I am actually more or less referring to me, enjoy a cup of coffee uninterrupted by demands for breakfast with a healthy dose of SpongeBob. It also symbolizes the end of summer and by the end of summer I mean the end of a season that strikes fear in the heart of overweight women. Bathing suit season. Winter is one thing. Hoodies. Sweaters. Big jackets. All things designed to hide a multitude of sins. However, a bathing suit is not that forgiving. For a girl who would like nothing better than to live on a beach somewhere and never wear shoes again, the notion of finding a bathing suit at my former 77 pound heavier self was terrifying.

When I was a kid there were few options in swimwear. In general, it was the speedo racing suit or a string bikini. Very little in between. I can still remember my favorite speedo suit. It was marbeled orange.  I spent a lot of time at Sunset Pool in Glen Ellyn, a suburb of Chicago where I grew up. It would not me unusual for me to be there six hours a day. In those days at age 9 or 10 I could ride my bike the couple miles there and just turn up for dinner. The question is, did I ever competitively swim?  I did. I was about 7 or 8 and was one of the few kids who could get from one end of the pool to the other with the cursed butterfly stroke. I hated it then and hate it now. Michael Phelps I am not.

So bathing suit shopping was hard. Many times in my adult life I would take ten suits into the dressing room only to have 10 failures. My parts did not fit into those. Not well anyway. I would ultimately settle on some sort of one piece that simply did not suck. If I had the opportunity to wear said not sucking suit, I would spend my time either in the water or laying on the beach or pool deck. Any other activity required the obligatory cover up. I mean really "cover up" has just matriculated to be a kinder way to refer to a mumu, mostly because mumu was too close to what I would consider a cow noise. Perhaps we have now graduated to a more politically correct name for that garment. I would also see these really big women in the "swim dress" which at that time I refused to give in to as to me that clearly meant I had given up. What 28 year old wears a swim dress anyway?  Not this girl.

Then I had weight loss surgery. I had a whole new set of problems. I had loose belly skin. So by this time the good people at Spanx had broken into swimwear and my life was suddenly better. There are other shape wear swim wear companies who cater to this struggle and for that we are all incredibly grateful. Miraclesuit, as it turns out is true to its name. However, these things are expensive. $100 or more depending. Plus the problem with that industrial strength spandex is when it gets wet and you have to use the bathroom it does take super human strength to wiggle in and out of the thing. Thus the popularity of the tankini. Whoever thought of that seriously is owed some gratitude from me.

Well, bathing suit season may officially be ending and my current tankinis are fading. Which brings me to my big event of the day. In a few weeks I will have a reunion with some of the greatest women I have ever known. My sorority sisters. These women laughed and cried with me during those years and probably still hold some of my life's best times in their hearts. We have rented  a house in a warmer climate and had the chance to buy a new bathing suit. For the first time in my adult life, I ordered a regular suit. Not shape wear. Not plus size. Just a regular tankini with a bit of a flowing top to hide what remains of my belly issues, which are 100% better secondary to the dreaded routine "core blasts" OTF treats me to several times a week. The suit was $17.98. I ordered it thinking if it did not work I was not out much. It arrived today and worked perfectly. Will post pics from my trip....

The point is this. This journey is full of fear. Fear on more levels than I realized. Each day finding a way to conquer even the smallest brings me one day closer to my goals.

Because Some of the Best Things Come From Bacon

In high school most of us could not wait to be seniors. We had an open campus and were allowed to leave for lunch. I remember going to McDonalds. I would have what was generally my go to indulgence. Fries. Not just any fries. Fresh from the fryer, crispy and hot enough to just about burn my tongue with the perfect coating of salt. The perfect marriage of fat and salt. Yes. I am a savory indulger. Yes I liked sweets but really the fat and salt fed my soul much better than anything. This brings me to the topic of bacon.

Beloved bacon. In the early 90's the trend was the low fat diet. Yes. I did that too. Funny I can still tell you how many fat grams are in various foods. Like 11 animal crackers have 2. However, this period of time demonized my beloved bacon. High in fat and salt and not felt to carry much in the way of nutrition. In fact it was just about deemed the devil's food. I learned to eat turkey bacon. Ok and on that topic. Turkey bacon. Ever tried it?  It is dry. It is chewy....as in flossing for days chewy and in no way resembles the real deal. That is why I say "learned to eat". Definitely an acquired taste and in no way fed my urges for savory salty fried food.

Fast forward to the good Dr Atkins. A pioneer in the low carb movement. He suggested bacon was our friend. This notion immediately made me a fan. As I moved my way through better fitting low carb diets, as I currently am a big fan of a modified paleo. It is all the paleo plus dairy for me. I am a cheese lover from way back. This type of eating allows for bacon and lots of it. What was once the greatest demon in dieting is now my hero.

I have learned to do all kinds of things with bacon. My current passion is combining it with natural sweeteners. For example wrapping carrots in bacon, roasting it, and putting pure maple syrup on as a glaze or like I did last night, doing a similar thing with spiralized butternut squash. I put bacon on my romaine heart lettuce wraps, and as I learned in Haiti, bacon marries perfectly with fresh avocado.  More on the spiralizer and my love for it to come. For me, bacon has soothed my savage french fry loving soul, however there are lots of other foods I have given up that I still hunt for a replacement for. Take crackers for example. Nothing crunches like crackers or even chips. Yes I know raw vegetables are crunchy but it just is not the same. I have played around with using coconut flour and almond flour in things but the consistency is not the same. Will just have to keep looking. For now, I will rest in my love of bacon and be grateful it is no longer the demon it was made out to be.

The Cooper

Presidential Physical Fitness Test. The Mile. The Cooper. Good Lord the Cooper. In the culture of Hadley Junior High the Cooper struck fear in my obese heart. It was a mile and a half run that was done a couple times a year. One lap around the whole school yard followed by this crazy dirt trail. I could not run more than a hundred yards let alone a mile and a half. This was all made worse by the horrible red polyester gym shorts and red marbled ringer tee with my name written on the front in magic marker. Being the 80's, this ensemble could only be completed with the accessory of long tube socks and a kickin' pair of suade Puma's.

I remember the anxiety that came before this. I knew I would be last. I knew I would be wheezing and I knew I would be sweaty the rest of the day. Each running of this horrible thing did not disappoint in this regard. Then there was the locker room. We had a car wash style shower where it was essentially a tunnel to walk through with shower heads at various heights. We had green stiff weird smelling towels not much bigger than hand towels. Not to mention my existence of the fat girl in a locker room. I shudder just thinking about it. All of these things brought together an air off awfulness when the word "Cooper" was uttered by a way too excited gym teacher.

Today, I sit four days from my first race this season. I will admit it is twice as long as The Cooper. It is for fun and goes off in waves so there really is no chance of being last. I have traded the tube socks for high performance Under Armour socks (anyone who knows me knows I clearly have an under armour addiction, and may in fact need an intervention).  I have traded suade Pumas for Nike runners and polyester does not exist in my wardrobe. Nonetheless, the anxiety of running still exists even when my biggest obstacle this weekend is just an inflated tower and there is even beer at the end. Last year I ran this as a regular race. This year it is a warm up for a much bigger, much more terrifying 5 mile mud run two weeks from now.

I am finding that saying "life begins at the end of my comfort zone" rings true. As I move further along it becomes readily apparent my comfort zone had a pretty small radius before now. I am learning to embrace the phrase,"if it is really scary must mean I should do it". Time to put the trauma of the Cooper behind me and take on the obstacles one at a time.

Time to Work Out. Damn it.

Well today will make my 9th ten hour shift in 11 days. I work as an ER nurse practitioner in a busy city based ER. The work is challenging, fun at times and devastating at others. Nonetheless, the schedule is unpredictable and all over the place. In total I work 14 shifts a month but some weeks are heavier than others. This stretch is particularly long due to me being out of town in a few weeks. It is stretches like this that make everything difficult. My ever growing pile of laundry that mocks me each day is case and point. The kids go back to school this week which meant my one and only day off was spent running for haircuts, getting school supplies and trying desperately to be sure there was some food in the house when I am not. That made Friday more like a marathon than a rest day.

So, translate that to healthy lifestyle changes. How the hell do you get a workout in when there are so many other things to do?  Well lots of times I get comments like,"I don't know how you do it."  Now, in the past I would say that I would be the first to make a comment like that. However, belonging to a gym that charges if you miss a class is a great motivator. I also play this game with myself where I put the master calendar in front of me and schedule each day's Orange Theory class weeks in advance, wherever it will fit. Sometimes that is 5:00am, other times 7:15pm. I can honestly say I think I have been to every time slot they offer. Ah....the life of a shift worker. Nothing is consistent.

Yes. This sounds like a good idea. Schedule time to workout. Put it down and make it work. There is only one downside to that logic. It is getting up at 4:15am to work out when you have worked 12 hours the day before and are staring down another twelve on that day. This requires a wide variety of inspirational things to get there. First, there is the music. For this I apologize to my neighbors. Yes. I know that the music emanating from my monster Suburban of a mom mobile may be a bit much at 4:45 am, especially when it tends to be old school heavy metal like Guns and Roses, but I need something to wake me up at that hour. Second, I find a carefully woven web of profanity on my drive to the gym is particularly helpful. No. I don't want to be out of my f'ing bed. No. I did not decide this eight hours ago as I was still at f'ing work. Yes I realize by not canceling earlier I will be charged. No. I do not want to be charged.  I realize I have carefully selected my time slot so someone else cannot have it. However, I now find a healthy loathing of the poor wait listed person who could not get into class as they are likely cozied up in a warm bed and I am not.  Damn it. Why the hell did I sign up for this?  The beauty of said tirade to the back drop of 80's heavy metal does seem to bring my heart rate up a bit to be ready for class.  A word about said profanity to my church friends and fellow Christians. I have reconciled these episodes with the understanding that hour of the day was deemed "ungodly" at some point in history which allows for me to say ungodly things for that period of time.

What follows this ugly scene is me pasting a smile on my face and exchanging pleasantries with the rest of the rise and grind crew who appear about as awake as I do. What follows this is a workout that frankly is not as good as later in the day when I train, but a workout nonetheless. Calories burned. Sweat dripping and the urge to curse heavily stops. What follows is nothing less than bliss when there is no line at Starbucks at 6:05 when I get to have a latte that I swear tastes better than any other latte any other time of the day.

The 80's

I am a child of the 80's. Those were the days. Prince had me wearing a raspberry beret, Katrina had me walking on sunshine, and Bon Jovi wanted me dead or alive. I even subscribed to every teen girl's fantasy of having John Cusak in a long trench coat with a large boom box standing outside my window blasting Peter Gabriel. In my old age now, I do get to see John Cusak now when my brother, who has extremely good Cubs season tickets texts me his picture in a complete attempt to tease his little sister. It works. Then there was the hair. The huge hair. The bigger the better at that point. I am sure my alpha gamma delta sisters would probably verify there is likely a huge hole in the ozone over 200 South Summit in Iowa City even to this day from our love of aquanet.

Yes. Those were the days. One thing the eighties had that was not so nostalgic was bullies. A friend following along with this blog reminded me yesterday of the comments that were made to those of us unlucky enough to be overweight children. Yes. In the 80's bullies were bullies. There was name calling, spit ball throwing, house egging and notes left in lockers. I had all of that and more.

There were the straightforward bullies who could come up with nothing more creative than "fat". Then there were the more creative bullies. One that stands out is a kid who kept calling me "Jonah" thinking he was so clever all the while realizing Jonah was the man inside the belly of the whale. Not the actual whale. My shyness and poor self image at that point prevented me from pointing that out.

In those days, bullying was part of being on the school yard. A well placed punch when it involved boys was tolerated in retaliation. Now these things would involve police, lawyers and sensitivity training. It has been encouraging to me to see this sort of change. The movement afoot to accept physical differences no matter the cause. However, for this of us products of the 80's we still carry this stuff around. This makes the negative voices in our heads a wee bit louder and complements tough to internalize.

For me, fighting off the negativity is a constant struggle even now. I have found the best way for me to turn down the voices is through exercise. Thinking I could not achieve any measure of success goes down when today I rowed faster than yesterday or lifted heavier, or even something as simple as two weeks ago when I did a 90 minute Orange Theory and simply did not die. Oh the negative voices will always be there but keeping in perspective they no longer own me as they did in my childhood is a great feeling.

As a side note....yes I still rock out to the 80's. Nothing like a little Culture Club to get revved up for an ER shift. However I think all would agree....leaving the neon wardrobe and big hair that could not even be tamed with a banana clip behind was truly something to be thankful for.

Reluctantly Embracing the Chemistry

Trunkal obesity, Apple shaped, big gut, chicken legs.....yep all phrases that seem to describe the basic body archetype I fall into as do many members of my family. Now that last one is really more a relative term. Legs appear chicken like relative to the larger mid section. Regardless, this is me. Call it what you will. Over the years this particular shape began to take focus in the medical community. What did it mean?  Well, I think the most mainstream definition in females is something called "metabolic syndrome", or in some cases, like mine, "polycystic ovarian syndrome". Big fancy words that mean basically the body makes insulin, the tissues are just resistant to using it properly. Translation?  Anything that raises blood sugar like sweets and carbohydrates like bread make me fat.

Now this is not something I knew all along. In my obese laiden childhood I was simply fat because my family was for the most part overweight. Genetics. There are a laundry list of things that lead to obesity. Genetics, thyroid issues, medications.....the list is actually quite long. For me it meant two things. The first was long periods of resignation to this. I have this. I will be fat. I cannot fix it. See?  I have labwork and paperwork that support this notion. So there it is. The cool thing about that particular brand of resignation is it allows for an acceptance of the larger version of myself and serves as a license to just eat what I want and be sedentary because I cannot win this war anyway.

There is a whole uncool side of that too. That is the side that is pissed. Pissed off that I will never achieve what thin people do, or so I thought. It is this anger that would lead to the multitude of failed weight loss attempts. The commercial diet programs where I could never quite reach the goal. Not to say theses were bad diets for the most part. Each one offers something that is relevant and helpful. However, in retrospect I can honestly say my failure likely came from my reluctance to accept my own chemistry. Take Weight Watchers. "Eat what you want"'they said. Perfect. I did not have to let go of the foods I liked. The breads. The pizza. The cookie. .......oh the cookie......having a Girl Scout Thin Mint fantasy moment......  Anyway, I carefully measured and counted points. I would lose. Of course I would lose. I had traded my resignation to fatness to being on calorie count. The losing would stop eventually. I would stall out and then quit. Why the hell should I meticulously count points if the scale would only mock me in the end anyway.

Even after gastric bypass, where my eating was surgically restricted and my ability to tolerate sweets was taken away I still decided I needed sweets in my life.  There is really only so much savory one can tolerate. I tried artificially sweetened stuff like sugar free candy or sugar free protein bars. Guess what. After a particularly unpleasant experience after eating a "low carb" protein  bar....yep, thought I might be dying.....it was explained to me by my dietitian that some people process sugar alcohols the same as sugar. It turns out most "sugar free" stuff has sugar alcohol. That is me. So that leaves most heavily artificially sweetened things out.

In a triumphant,"I will have carbs and be healthy" moment I jumped on the whole grain bandwagon making a trip to whole foods for every whole grain known to man and made granola. Yep. Cannot lose with that either. Damn it. It just did not seem fair that others could have all the carbs they wanted yet I could not. Not even the "good carbs". As a side note I now maintain that particular phrase is an oxymoron.

So, what it boils down to is this. My body chemistry is such that if have to make a choice. Carbs of any kind or be fat. Period. I decided nearly two years ago to cut the carbs and see what happened. Well first things first. Nobody, I mean nobody, can live on bacon and eggs around the clock. It sucks. Despite the hype, bacon does lose its appeal when that is all you have. I have always loved to cook, so have had to refocus on just what I was making.  I challenged myself to make things with some flavor. Most importantly, I challenged myself to color. Once upon a time I had seen something on TV about "brown food". All unhealthy food was brown. Fried. Bread. Starch. All brown. So when I cook now I like to count how many colors I can get on the plate and more importantly, how does it taste. I figured if I was dealt this hand I might as well own it.  It has not been all sunshine and roses. I have had some epic fails in the kitchen just like anyone else. Food that did not even remotely resemble the picture on Pinterest or taste anything like I thought it would but I am figuring it out. My latest passion?  The spiralizer. Zucchini noodles with avocado pesto was my latest conquest.

So, where did that leave me? Leaving the carbs behind 20 months ago has left me 77 pounds lighter.  It gave me a stunning appointment with my PCP who told me to stop my insulin resistance lowering medication last time "because you do not need it."  Yet, at the same time I have developed a new phobia. Fear of carbs. Trust me. It is a thing. Now I need the occasional carb to enhance my performance in the gym and have a healthy fear of what carbs do to me.

Nonetheless, this comes to mind to say that lots of us have been dealt the obesity hand for one reason or another, but it is possible to stop cursing the hand and instead embrace that chemistry and try to move on to a completely different place.