Getting there slowly but surely

Today for my run jog / walk session I decided to just make sure I focus on keeping a slow pace.  Of course I found it easier it being later in the afternoon when less people were out and about and I decided to just see how I went.  And I managed to jog slowly for around 19 minutes and looking at the distance would appear to be around 2.6km.  I'm hoping to be ready for a 5km fun run by the end of the year which a friend and I will do together.  She wanted me to do one in Levin now in October, but I don't think I'll be ready just yet.

Lots of work to do...

I went out for another walk / run jog today.  I managed to run for about 7 minutes (which felt like 20) before I felt I needed to walk again and then a further 3 minutes (but by then I reached an uphill bit in the road so had to walk from there).  Not brilliant, but I'm happy with it.  It is better than nothing. 

Apart from my impatience I realised I have to also work on my self-consciousness and shyness.  I can be extremely pushy when it comes to people and causes I believe in, but I am actually really shy and so each time I go out for my walk / run jog, I try and make sure it is at a time I am not likely to meet anybody who might recognise me.  And so each time it happens that I run jog past somebody I might know it really throws me.  So I have a bit of work to do!

It's been a little while...

since I updated this blog.  Last week I decided to just put the walking / running on hold.  The week before my knee still felt rather sore and whenever I went for a walk it would suddenly become really painful about halfway making it really uncomfortable walking back.  So I decided to just take a break.

This morning was really nice weather wise and my knee felt significantly better and so off I went - mostly walking with a bit of a jogging thrown in.  And it was okay.  Exhausting but not uncomfortable! 

I have to learn patience though.  I am typically a very impatient person wanting everything to happen right now and of course it is going to take a long time before I will be considered fit in any way.

Apart from an embarrassing moment, I feel pretty proud

Today I decided to go for my walk again.  My knee was feeling better so I thought I'd give it a go.  I walked earlier in the week and it was okay.  So Bianca and I set off for her friends' home a bit further up the street.  They invited her for a sleep over (second night in a row - isn't she lucky?).  And so Bianca set off on her scooter and scooted off a bit ahead of me while I was walking with her bag and listened to Basshunter on my ipod.  I like Basshunter because his music is a bit faster and so it encourages me to up my pace a little bit.  A bit ahead of me Bianca suddenly stopped and said "Mum, I can hear you!"  So embarrassed!!!!  Turned out I was singing along and let me tell you - my singing is best kept for the shower or if I'm on the way somewhere in the car.  By myself.  Where others don't have to hear me.  Or when the kids want me to sing the sleepy time song I made up for Bianca when she was about 4 weeks old (yes, after 8 years I'm still asked to sing it every night). 

But anyway, got there and I had a cup of tea and a chat with Bianca's friends' parents and finally I left and set off on my walk.  I decided I would try and jog just to see how it goes and I kept coping and kept feeling comfortable enough and wow!  I managed to jog quite a bit further than I ever thought would be possible.  But there I was.  Not feeling like I was about to die.  Sure my legs felt like jelly when I stopped and walked the rest of the way home, but I wasn't significantly out of breath and my legs coped okay.  Wow! I'm pretty impressed with myself.  I might actually be able to put a 5km run on my list.

So apart from embarrassing myself, I feel incredibly proud of what I achieved today.  I think there is hope for me yet!

Need to re-focus

Next week I need to re-focus my fitness efforts.  I have lost a bit of focus on the eating / exercise front.  Not that I've been eating too much and I certainly have not given in to any temptation, but I don't think I'm eating enough during the day at the moment.  So need to get back to those healthy snacks in between the breakfast / lunch / suppers.

Bianca's teacher told me today that he enjoys running hills.  He updated one of his entries with a photo of him participating in one of his runs and look - he doesn't even look tired!  A friend who is also busy learning to run a 5km race and is doing so incredibly well were saying to me just recently how much she hates running uphill and I think at this stage I very much agree :-)

At least I managed a walk

Managed a walk today along with Basshunter on the ipod.  I wasn't able to even jog really slowly, but at least I went for a walk and that is something. 

I didn't go for a walk yesterday partly because Bianca and I were quite focused on her special project and partly because I was just not in the right frame of mind.  But yes, new day today. 

The sun is out shining today so it is a really nice day for walking (even if it is a bit on the chilly side).

:-(

My one knee is still a little bit painful.  Not extremely sore, but definitely this nagging sort of painful feeling that just sits there.  Sigh!  So there is no way I can go out to attempt any kind of running tomorrow.  Paul suggested that I should maybe just walk for a few days.  And that really does make sense.  I will take any advice I can get and Paul is certainly an expert when it comes to running - so very valuable advice. 

The thing that drives me

Today's run / walk session was challenging.  For some reason my knees or the joint bits by my knees felt quite stiff and vaguely painful.  Not significantly, but a bit.  I don't know why - I didn't do anything different, I had a rest day in between, my legs were not sore from last time.  Sigh!  Not sure what was up. 

Today I found myself wondering how long before running becomes comfortable and possibly easier.  Right now I am dreading week 3 onwards to be honest. 

Remind me again why I chose to do a 5km run as my goal...

Oh well, I suppose this is like anything in life, if you really want something you need to put the effort in.  And we all know the effort is not always going to be easy. 

One thing that drives me though is the time Bianca was still on treatment and the one drug in particular really affected her legs making it nearly impossible to run and certainly not the way other kids would run.  So once her school had a cross country event which for Bianca's age really just meant running around the field and I was so worried that she would fail before she even started.  The school assured me that Bianca could either have a walking buddy or be a special helper.  And Bianca insisted she was going to participate.  And not only that, but she finished the race, despite coming dead last.  Now that is determination for you!  Read about that day here.

On track

Today is just a tiny little bit over a month ago that I started working towards getting fitter and healthier.  The first time (on this journey) I weighed myself was the 4th of August and today is the 6th of September.  In total I have lost 2.3kg.  It is really comforting to see this!

Last night I started adding weights into the mix.  So now on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays I  plan to do weights.  One day upper body and the next lower body.  They say resistance training is really good for burning fat and it will add variety to the exercise workout.  On Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays I will continue with my couch to 5km run / walk programme.  I started last week and did 2 days of Week 1 of the programme.  This week I am doing week 1 again. 

I was looking at the weather this morning and it looked like it was going to rain.  I'm not really keen to run in the rain to be honest, but thankfully it just stayed overcast and didn't actually rain.  Phew!

And so it all begins

The arrival of Spring!  Spring is one of my favourite seasons!  And so along with the arrival of new beginnings and new life I have taken one more step in the direction of getting fitter and healthier. 

Yesterday my new shoes arrived.  I was sooo excited.  So along with that I went and got a few other things to get ready for the couch to 5km programme I am interested in doing.  I bought a new tracksuit (not quite ready for shorts yet) and a good sports bra and a money belt so I have somewhere to put my ipod and keys and cell phone. 

And today I started.  I did week 1 day 1.  I will do week 1 this week and next week and from there move on.  You are supposed to have a rest day in between and fit in 3 days of training each week.  And I did it.  The last minute running was pretty hard and I run really slow still, but hopefully in a few weeks from now I'll actually be a bit faster.

I think perhaps because for the past 2 weeks in my mind I have committed to this programme, just as I have in my mind committed to my eating and I would say that the mindset is definitely one that is pushing me through. 

I did another thing recently and last night and that was to get rid of a very toxic friendship as well as a few blogs that are just plain draining to read - always wanting approval.  Always writing about how unsure they feeling and they just want constant reassurance.  But then when they make decisions and things don't go as they hoped, then the whole world knows how they have been wronged.  So yes, I just don't want to spend all my energy and all my focus on these kind of situations.  The toxic friendship is somebody who is extremely needy and extremely self-centered and when it is not about her she takes complete offence.  She is often quite negative also likes to play mind games and last night I have just had enough and removed her from my Facebook profile.

Life is far too short to be dragged down by toxic situations.  I'd rather focus on the good and supportive friends.  The ones you can simply just be yourself.  The ones who are low maintenance.

So here is to spring, new beginnings, a positive mindset and on my way to getting fit and healthy!

Progress is progress

Since Thursday we've been dealing with colds at our house.  First Caitlyn I had to keep home from daycare on Thursday and then on the weekend Bianca started getting really unwell and this morning is still home off school.  And now I have a slight cold too.  Sigh!  Come-on spring / summer - time to come now!  So no walking right now! :-(.  Oh well.

On the up side, I have been pretty good at sticking to my better eating.  Even when I had to make cupcakes on Friday for a bake sale I only tasted one small cupcake without any frosting / caramel and it was simply just to make sure it was cooked well enough.

Now during August I lost 1.5kg.  It isn't a whole lot, but considering I haven't been doing too much exercise I think it is pretty good.  And there were 2 weeks where I fell off the wagon.  And to be honest, those diets where you lose loads in a really short period of time - they don't work.  So I'm pretty pleased.

Another thing I have noticed - I used to often have an afternoon nap feeling incredibly tired.  But now, I have not had an afternoon nap for a while.  And I'm thinking it is because I eat less rubbish.  So that is a really positive sign for me.

So all in all I'm making progress, even if it is slow progress, but progress is progress!

Taking the first step

I have taken the first step in getting fitter. 

A friend has been doing the Couch to 5k programme and it seems a good way to get into running (note I didn't say easy, I said good).  It is good because it is a slow and gradual process to go from nothing to being able to manage a 5k run.  And I love that it has podcasts you can download to your ipod so I'll have a little voice guiding me when I should walk and when I should run and so on. 

One of my biggest problems with starting this is my shoes.  I have 2 pairs of running type shoes.  A pair I've had for a while and a newer pair.  Usually I wear the older pair when I go for my walks and they are okay.  I didn't choose the shoes for any particular purpose and gave no real thought to what should go into choosing shoes.  The other day I went for my walk and I wore the newer pair and they are okay for around the house or strolling around the mall, but halfway with my walk (the one where I try and walk a bit faster) my toes became numb.  So not good!  No way that I'm able to even attempt a run with this.

So today (upon a friend's suggestion) I went to a place where they looked at my feet.  They look at your arch, they look at your stride and whether your ankles roll inwards or outwards or are straight.  I never knew choosing shoes were so technical.  But there you go.  They also look at where I put most of my weight when I walk and they use this sensor mat and then they fit you into shoes based on that and make you walk on a treadmill and then they do this video thing that shoes them whether your feet are straight or not and so they keep going until they find a pair of shoes that fit as well as they can. 

I didn't end up buying my shoes from them because the cost was a bit above my price range and since I'm a beginner I can't justify spending the amount they were charging. 

My friend then pointed me to a great site.  She's ordered from them before and they are reliable and they were significantly cheaper than the store. 

So now I've made the first step.  Soon my shoes will be here.  And that means I will be all set.  And to justify the cost, I simply must work hard at my goal. 

All set for tomorrow

Tonight I cooked cottage pie.  I don't cook with oil and it was pretty much just mince with some mixed vegetables added in and then of course potato.  Oh and of course I found a Continental flavour mix that I added just to give it a nicer flavour.  Typically we don't cook with loads of salt, and over time we actually got used to the taste of food containing less salt.  One thing I noticed though is that there was around 125ml of fat that I poured off the mince before I added the vegetables and the flavour mix.

I still have to get into the habit of actually pre-planning meals, but at least I gave some thought to meals tomorrow.  I want and need to get back on track. Now if somebody can help me understand these food labels that would be great - what quantity protein and carb in each meal?  Do I look at the per serving numbers or the per 100g numbers?  It's like a whole foreign world to me.

And of course I definitely need to go walking again tomorrow.  Currently my route is 3.7km and I'm trying to see a different route so that I could work on increasing it to 5km. 

This past weekend a friend was doing a 5km family fun run.  And I thought that maybe I need to look around for another 5km fun run later this year and work towards that.  This way I'll actually work towards something.  And then maybe I'll get Terence to buy me some running shoes for my birthday.  Nothing too fancy, but something that is better than I currently have.

Falling off the wagon...

Urgh, and just as I thought I had a good thing going I fell off the wagon.  Last week on Monday and Tuesday were the days I helped the sheep.  Sadly she couldn't be saved. :-(.  I do feel a bit better when the SPCA inspector (when I went to buy cat food) explained that when sheep go down, in all likelihood they won't be getting back up again).  So I know I did everything I possibly could.  I helped to make her more comfortable and I brought her water.  There wasn't more I could do. 

Wednesday Bianca had her 2 monthly hospital visit and that means travel for an hour to Wellington hospital, doing blood test, having the appointment and driving an hour back again.  And unfortunately this is when the wheels of the wagon started coming off.  I was completely unprepared with my meals. 

And then from Thursday until yesterday I have been working incredibly hard to finish the presents that the group of parents were organising for the netball teacher to say thank you for coaching our kids.  I went through about 600 photos I took during the season, copied all those to disk for the teacher, made a certificate which I put in a frame alongside the team photo and I managed to make a scrapbook with a selection of photos to summarise the netball season.  And because I'm me and I have a tendency to go completely overboard I suddenly had a thought.  I had some extra photos and wouldn't it be cool if I gave each girl a selection of photos showing them in action and what if I actually made extra copies of the team photo and put it in a cardboard folder with the names at the bottom - that would be cool.  And so after many hours, I was finally ready.

But unfortunately it does mean that with everything going on I have not had time to focus on my eating and walking (and it didn't help that last week we had snow and lots of rain and freezing cold temperatures).  I wonder why I didn't wait until the summer to start my new lifestyle plans...

So between today and tomorrow I'll need to sit down again and get my head around a plan.  It is not so easy / simple coming up with the eating plans because some of the things like wholemeal pasta cost quite a bit more than the white flour ones and buying things like protein shakes is going to be out of the question because these things would just throw our budget completely out.  And of course my kids eat fairly well (they even eat broccoli), but there are limits and we are working on that, but they won't be happy to eat very different things all of a sudden.  So I'll need to keep thinking. 

A not so efficient day...

I didn't do any exercise yesterday.  I had Caitlyn with me the whole day and so that makes it hard to actually go walking.  But I was going to haul out the Wii Fit and do some of the things on there.  Unfortunately my day started dealing with an unwell sheep and it ended up taking a large portion of my day.  That and house cleaning.  Yes, the never ending house cleaning.  Sigh!  I did stay on track with eating as well as I could (even though I haven't yet had a chance to sit down and do meal plans).  I went to bed at 10pm after being up and busy the whole day for 15 hours straight with dropping Bianca off at school, cleaning the house, doing some ironing, help with the sheep, looking after Caitlyn and... and... and...  Life sure gets busy sometimes...

This morning my legs are sore.  And it must be from walking to and from the sheep a large portion of yesterday.  And at times carrying around 4L of water.  And trying to roll a sheep onto her tummy.  So I guess if that counts as some exercise then I've done some exercise :-).

What I ate today

So I think today was not too bad eating-wise, but I'm still struggling with the whole eating snacks of both a protein as well as a carb during the day. 

For breakfast I had my usual weet-bix and milk (no sugar).  But what am I supposed to do for a protein?  Hmmm - I'm not really much of a meat eater in the morning (other than perhaps bacon which would totally defeat what I'm trying to achieve).  Maybe I could add a boiled egg?  But can I eat eggs every day?  I'm also not big on protein bars because they are so expensive and that just pushes our budget completely out. 

I had a banana in between. 

For lunch I had a breadroll with greens, spring onion and smoked salmon.

I had another banana later on.

And for supper we had chicken tacos.  I had 2 tortillas (lower fat ones), some chicken breast cut into pieces, some greens, spring onion, half a small avo, 1 tomato and some taco sauce.

And I had more water than yesterday.  And my usual cup of hot chocolate (as described yesterday).

I think I might be slightly better prepared tomorrow. 

What I ate yesterday

I really need to start planning my meals ahead of time.  I think later today I will sit down and attempt to do this for this coming week. 

Yesterday for breakfast I had weet-bix with some milk.  No sugar.  I had a cup of hot chocolate - the kind you make with water and a little bit of milk added and I don't add sugar.  It has less sugar than the typical ones you make with milk. Hmmm, I'll need to find something as a protein I think...


I took Bianca to netball so didn't have any snacks in the morning.

For lunch I had 2 small wholemeal breadrolls and had some greens (a combination of rocket, spinach and some other greens), some smoked salmon, a half a small avocado and spring onion. 

I had a banana later in the afternoon.

For supper we had some pork steak with mixed vegetables, a bit of beetroot and a jacket potato.  I did make a cheese sauce which is a cheese sauce powder mixed with half a cup of water and half a cup of milk and I added a bit of Edam cheese some garlic, peri peri and pepper. 

I had another cup of hot chocolate after supper.

Oh and I had some water during the day, but I don't think it was as much as I really should be having.

So I really need to sit down and think about meals this coming week to make sure I have sufficient protein added for each meal.  I think lunch was okay and supper was okay, but breakfast and snacks not as good as it can be...  So lots and lots to learn.

The Start

There is always a start to a new journey.  And this is the start to my new journey.  I am tired of being fat and unfit and it is time to do something to get myself on the road to a healthier lifestyle. 

I need to lose about 23kg.  And I would love to eventually be able to enter a running race, but that will take time.  For now I will just get back to walking.   I started a route last time I did a bit of walking and it is around 3.7km and right now it takes me about 40 minutes to walk that.  It is a nice route.  A relaxing route past houses and trees and listening to the birds chirping away in the trees.  And on a sunny day you simply can't beat that.  I will also be investigating possibly going swimming again, but I'll need to see what options there are at the local indoor swimming pool.

I'll also have to plan some meals.  We don't do too bad I guess - we don't cook with salt, we rarely use oil and rather use our George Foreman grill to grill meat or we bake things in the oven.  We steam our veggies in the microwave or eat things like carrots raw.  We cut down on drinking diet coke.  We don't drink coffee, but I do have a sweet tooth and that is my downfall unfortunately.  And the kids and I love baking which doesn't help to stop the temptations (sigh!).   And I think we probably don't choose the best carbohydrates all of the time.  So I have a lot to learn about making good eating / meal choices. 

I believe that if I can just keep going I will succeed.  After all if this inspirational lady can do it, then I can too.   So here I go - wish me luck! :-)