A New Me

Bare with me, folks.  This is a long one! 

I started exercising again this summer.  It was more of a "You have to do this NOW, or you'll never do it and you'll die alone and miserably overweight and sad" blah blah blah....I decided that as part of the new me who is going to have to get a new life (long story), I need to shed some of this weight that suddenly appeared on my body over the course of 3 years (part of the long story I don't wish to tell at the moment). However, to understand why this is blog worthy, I have to take you back a bit.

About 12 years ago, I literally woke up one morning and realized that if I didn't lose weight, based on my family's history of diabetes and heart disease, I could possibly not see my kids grow up or my grandchildren.  The thought was so strong that on that very day, I changed.  I began to get in shape.  I went to my doctor, good ol' Dr. Brown, got a prescription for Zenical and started walking (which after a bit turned into running) and eating better.  Soon, I was running every single day - outside and on the treadmill if the weather was bad.

It took two years, but I dropped about 90 pounds.  At the time, it was more weight than my oldest daughter weighed!  I had reached 155 pounds (my goal was 150) and people were even telling my parents how great I looked.  One guy even told my mom, "He looked like a marathon runner!" when he saw me running one day.  Then, the accident happened.  I broke my shoulder playing softball.  Now, if you've never broken your shoulder, or known someone who has, it's a VERY debilitating break -  it hurt to walk, sit, move, take a shower, anything.  You really don't realize how much you use your shoulders for.  To be honest, the entire upper left side of my body, waist up to my shoulder, was useless for about a month.  It was at this time I started teaching, which every teacher knows how tiring and stressful it is for a first year teacher!  So basically, I would work all day, come home, take a pain pill and sleep all night.  Although it healed rather quickly,  it took a good 7-8 months before I could move without any pain at all, and another 2-3 months before I could walk a decent distance without it hurting.

So what, you say?  In exercising terms, this was the effect that one broken bone - in particular, THAT broken bone - had on me.  Its been said that for every 2 weeks of inactivity, you lose about a month's worth of the fitness level you were at previously.  It's safe to say that prior to the accident I was at a relatively high fitness level (I put in about 5-6 miles every single day).  Over the approximate 10-12 months of inactivity I had, that's about 25 months of workouts lost.  (In other words, read the entire two years I had worked hard at losing all this weight was shot.)  The good thing, however, was that the weight didn't come rushing back on - it took a good 10 years and a big life changing event for that to happen to me. 

Here's the kicker - ever since then, I have tried unsuccessfully to return to my fitness regimen.  I took Zenical faithfully for another 5 years or so, which helped me maintain my weight somewhat (I gained approx. 5 pounds a year, I guess) so that it actually snuck up on me.  However, I never felt, well, as centered as I used to be both physcially and mentally, so I would usually quit after a few weeks of running and around 10-15 pounds lost.  Yup, you guessed it - it all started coming back.

Then, fast forward to a little over 3 years ago.  I had a MAJOR life changing event - not one so uncommon to most people, but one that really set me back mentally, socially, and physically.  I hate to admit it, but mentally, I shut down.  WAY down.  I was pretty much a zombie for a while (maybe some of you can put why I talk about zombies so much and this episode together and NOW you understand, lol!)  Along with this and a new regimen of pills to take, yup, whammo!  All the weight shot back on me in the span of a year and a half.

Jump to now.  Different job (still teaching, just in a different school in the district and a different grade level), a new outlook, most days, on life.  The event hasn't changed and I still feel uncentered - in fact, almost awkward, when I run.  But running was how I did it before, and how I'll do it again.

So, why tell all this?  Well, it's two-fold...

1.  By writing it down and publishing it, I'm making a public affirmation.  I WILL lose this weight.  Now, I have the pressure of proving that I can and I have everyone reading this watching to see if I actually will do it.

and 2., I'm announcing that my life, while still not great, is getting better and by the time I lose all this weight, I expect to be centered and balanced, mentally and physically, once again.  Ok, and maybe for a third reason - I love the encouragement I get from you guys!

So here's to the new me, starting 3 weeks and 8 pounds ago.  Only 93 pounds to go!

Now, get off my lawn!