This week has been better than last. I've been good about getting on the elliptical for at least 30 minutes 3 times this week, went on 1 jog, and have gotten into the habit of doing crunches daily. Tonight, right before I was about to go down to the basement to exercise, our water heater burst and flooded. So change of plans- help sop up water and skip the workout because there won't be hot water to shower with for at least 24 hours. I have a condition called Reynaud's where my body overreacts to temperature changes, and taking a cold shower would not only make me super crabby, I would most likely lose circulation in my hands and feet for a good while. That horrible numb tingling is just not worth it...I'll try and find a friend's house to shower at tomorrow morning. This is when still belonging to a gym would have been helpful.

My rule (to help me waste less time AND exercise more) is that if I wanted to watch something on Hulu, I had to watch it on the elliptical. There's a new, tantalizing episode of House just calling my name right now, but the floodzone, just feet away from my elliptical, is still being worked on by other household members- what to do?

Wash of a week

This past week was a bit of a wash. I had a family emergency that threw off my ability to exercise as much as I wanted to. I was away from home most of the week, but I did have occasional access to an elliptical. I got on the elliptical about 3 times for an average of 45 minutes. Otherwise, I did some crunches most days, and that was it. However, I didn’t feel comfortable going for solo runs in neighborhoods that I was not familiar with, especially since it was usually dark out by the time I got the chance to go.

Now that I am back home, I plan to get back into the swing of things, keeping in mind that this past week was largely out of my control. It’s when I beat myself up over things like this that I tend to get discouraged. If I plan to maintain my exercise habits for the rest of my life, there will undoubtedly be weeks like this. For me, keeping this in mind is much more encouraging and productive.

An inspiring person who makes me keep this last thought in mind is my father. He is dedicated to, and loves, playing tennis. Some weeks, he gets busy with work and has to cancel a few games or practices with friends, but always gets right back into it the moment he has time again. I hope to establish this as my pattern as well. I will not be able to get as discouraged or make excuses for myself and will be much more likely to pick myself up every time if the expectation is set to do so.

My motivations

This week: I ramped it up a bit. I went on 2 jogs (2-3 miles each), ellipticalled 3 times for an average of about 45 minutes each, and did about a minute of crunches almost every day. I was previously doing about 30 minutes of elliptical 2 or 3 times a week, so I’m happy about my progress this week.

My personal motivations for getting in shape:

My primary, more immediate motivation to get in shape is that great overall feeling of health and energy I get from exercising regularly. It helps me get out any pent up negative energy, anxiety, or anger and helps me feel more clear-headed and alive.

Another motivator is my family- both my parents are avid exercisers. They are both perfectly healthy and seem to never get sick. I predict they’ll live to 100, and I hope to do the same.

Lastly, I know what I’m capable of. To back up a bit, about two years ago, my mother and I decided to take up running together to complement our normal exercise routines. Though she ran about 25 marathons in her life, she stopped for the most part when she had kids. Though my mom and I would often start off a run together, I’d decide to pick up the pace at about the same time she’d decide to take a walk break. However, after several injuries, I had to stop running and instead stuck to the low-impact elliptical and the occasional kickboxing class. My mother continued running 1-2 times a week…

This week was the first time I’ve run with my mom in a year. We both ran the whole way and at the same pace….but it was a struggle for me to keep up. When we got to our end point, she was feeling great and had already begun stretching while I had my head down, hands on my knees, bending over a bush just in case…so I did the math. Given our age difference, my average VO2max (an aerobic measure of fitness) should be at least 40% higher than hers. Even with this natural advantage, I was clearly less fit. I’m not at all competitive with my mom, but I am competitive with myself. Growing up, I was always the short skinny kid. But I would play all the good positions in sports, beat all the boys at arm wrestling and held the school record for fastest rope climb for years. At the age of 20, my resting heart rate was 49. So if I was in a ravenous wolf chase today, the thought that 55 year-old woman would get away while I got eaten is just embarrassing, and Darwin would agree. 

My goal

My goal for this spring is to get back in shape. Growing up and through college, I had always been extremely active. I started at around 3 years old with ballet, and then as a kid, I played pretty much every sport in the book in both school and city league teams.  At the end of middle school, I went back to dancing, and was dancing 2-3 hrs/day, 5 times a week for the next 5 years. When I started college, my dancing began to decline due to a lack of resources and scheduling, but I still exercised at the gym when I could. 

About 6 months ago, I cancelled my gym membership because the classes weren’t that great and all I’d so there was elliptical. So I bought my own dinky (but perfectly functional) elliptical and am now ellipticalling at home for 30 min/day, 2 times a week, and that’s about it. Being in grad school and doing research has made exercising consistently difficult, but I could definitely still be more proactive about my fitness. I hope to exercise more again in order to improve my cardiovascular health, build back strength, reduce stress, and gain back more of that healthy, alive feeling that I had before.

My goal is to get up to 30-45 minutes of cardio 5 times/week and to diversify the kinds of exercise I’m doing so I’ll be in better overall shape. I will try to slowly add back running (a recently failed mission due to several injuries), and strength training (never done it), and hope to pick up other types of exercise like hiking in the local mountains, playing tennis with my dad, biking, or taking a random exercise class here and there. I was thinking of joining an adult league, but being able to devote specific and consistent time to a group isn’t something I think I can achieve with my inconsistent and often hectic schedule.  Hopefully, my strategy will make exercising more fun too. This will help me stay motivated past the end of spring.