At Goal, One Year Later

Yesterday was a special day for me, an important milestone on my journey. On November 4, 2012 I posted this picture for my blog post celebrating arriving at my goal weight.

11/4/12

And just now, I took another picture.

One year later, 11/5/13

In my goal blog post I wrote:

I know this number doesn't really change anything, but it just feels so good to finally hit it. So good. As far as eating, I plan to keep doing what I'm doing. I don't really feel like I'm "dieting" per se. I think I'm eating a healthy, balanced diet. I'll just have to see what happens with my weight.

What did happen with my weight is that I continued to lose for a while, dipping down to a low of 134.8 pounds. That was a week after getting diagnosed with pneumonia. I've dabbled around in my head with what my "maintenance" weight should be and I find I like being under 140. Being over 140 isn't so bad either, and I don't actually mind wobbling around in the low 140's, but I see that as a sign to tighten up some, get back under 140 and carry on.

Things are tricky right now because although my weight number is low, my percentage of body fat is creeping up, now up to 28.5%. Weight gain is sure to follow. But I'm feeling confident that once of I have this pneumonia thing kicked, I can get my butt back in gear and lose some of the extra fat.

So I thought I'd take a moment to reflect on my first year of maintenance by sharing some thoughts.

• I got pneumonia 4 months after reaching goal and had to go on bed rest. But managed to recover and get back on track. And now I have it again. I have no doubt I'll be back on track before too long.
• I completed 8 races in the past year - The Turkey Trot, Kaiser half, Rock-n-Roll half, The Guardsman 10k, See Jane Run half, 4th of July 4-miler, Santa Cruz Triathlon and the Nike Women's half.
• My relationship with food is really changing. I still overeat from time to time, I still get in trouble with cravings, I still make less helpful decisions, but each time I get back on track. And slowly, very slowly, the pull of food to solve my problems is lessening.

I could go on and on but just know this, I have changed. "Obviously," you might say, but I notice this change in such subtle and almost imperceptible ways and for whatever reason, those changes give me hope. Hope that I might continue to change and grow in such a way as to eventually eliminate this "problem" of my food intake altogether. Or at least mostly. I met a woman in WW who was in her 13th year of maintenance and she said she was there. It took her about 8 years of maintenance to get there, but she did. The idea that I might one day slay this demon altogether is hopeful.

I'm excited to go to WW next week and share the news. And I hope to inspire or motivate anyone that needs it because that's a big part of why I keep this up - blogging and sharing and telling everyone who wants to listen that change is hard, but it's worth it - to potentially inspire someone else to go after the dream, to fight for it, work for it, value it. I feel great about my body, great about clothes shopping and going to social events, great about seeing my own picture or bumping into an old friend, great about seeing an 'out of order' sign on the elevator or eating a candy bar in public - I feel great. A year later, and it still feels great. I hope to never forget how much I wanted this, how hard I worked (and continue to work), and how worth it it remains to keep going to the WW meetings now and keep getting on that scale every day for a reality check.

Thank you all for the support and encouragement over the past year, I've learned so many things in the comments and gained so much support from you guys. Thank you!

p.s. I had fried chicken for lunch today. That is all.

Pneumonia and a Good Cheerleader

Has it really been almost a week since my last post? Yeah, life happens. Anyway, I have some bad news. I have pneumonia again. Major. Bummer. I've been coughing for a while now, it started before the Nike half, seemed to clear up the day prior, but came back a couple days after. I wasn't planning to see a doc because I don't have a fever and haven't felt that rundown. Well, that's not true, on Friday I was practically falling asleep come late afternoon, and I was still at work. Not good form.

Anyway, I was repeatedly harassed encouraged to see a doctor and finally made an appointment just to keep the peace, feeling quite sure I didn't have anything. But when the doc put the stethoscope to my back she sighed and said, "oh, I'm sorry." She's a runner too and knows I'm struggling with no exercise. In fact, she rolled into the exam room in a wheelchair because of a stress fracture. The good news is, we caught it much earlier than last time and so I don't need to be on bed rest or anything. Just a week of antibiotics and no exercise. If my lungs are 80% clear at my follow up appointment next Thursday I can start exercising, slowly at first.

While I know I won't be starting from scratch it's also going to be a measured transition to back my routine. I can't dive back into running/biking/swimming/weight training at the same level I was before. And that's ok, I remind myself I'll get there again.

The thing that's made things so much harder is that not being able to exercise has come at a horrible time. The personal stress stuff I have going on is not letting up, and won't for some time really, and I've been feeling like a person in a vice, being squeezed tighter and tighter without being able to burn off steam in the gym or leave the stress in my dust out on the road. I know I'm not really writing about what's going on in my life, and I will eventually, it's just that right now it's all too personal, fresh and evolving to be opening up here.

But when things are more settled, when the unknown becomes more known, I'll share. Just know I'm going through all sorts of, "What fresh hell is this?" and it's not a good time to be sidelined from the exercise. I've been doing a lot of self talk to get me through.

You'll be able to exercise again one day.
It's not normal to feel this tired, you'll have energy again one day.
You'll get through this, it won't go on forever.
This is temporary.
When you can get back in the gym and out on the road, you'll rebuild your routine.
You're sick. Sick people rest. You're not lazy or slipping into old habits. You're sick.

I have no doubt that I'll get back to it. The old fears I used to have in this type of situation - that I'd fall off the wagon and regain weight - are not there. At least not much. I have a niggling fear that it will be too hard, that I won't be able to do what I used to do, but in those moments I calm myself by saying, "Not now, you can't challenge that now, but the time will come, very soon, when you can challenge that, and we'll see, once again, what you're made of."

The other complicating factor is food. And candy. The Halloween candy situation was just poor timing. I ate quite a bit of fun sized junk. But the Halloween candy is out of the house. I made a candy-for-toys trade with the kids and everyone walked away happy. But my meal choices, when I've even managed to eat a normal meal, have been less-than-stellar as well. Mostly though it's been a bowl of cereal here, a slice of bacon there. Donuts, bagels, and other random food encounters. That, coupled with the lack of exercise, leaves me feeling like crap. For the first time in ages I got a headache last night that didn't resolve with ibuprofen. Pre-lifestyle change I got headaches regularly, once a month or so, now I get them a couple times a year and almost exclusively when I'm not taking care of my body.

I haven't gained weight, though my body fat percentage is creeping up. If I were to continue on this path, the weight gain would follow. But I know I'm going to continue on this path. My weight is around 140 and my one year goaliversary is tomorrow! One year at my goal weight, I'm very excited to pass that milestone. This is not a passing fancy, this was not a diet. I'll write more about that in my goaliversary post.

In the meantime, life goes on. I'm putting one foot in front of the other, trying not to think too hard or too much, and doing my best to be a good cheerleader for myself. There's a woman inside jumping up and down, shaking her pom-poms, and screaming, "You've got this, keep going Michelle, you've got this!". Sometimes I question her enthusiasm but mostly I'm just grateful to have her. Conjuring up my inner cheerleader whenever I need her, another tool in my toolkit.

One Thing Leads to Another

It started after the Santa Cruz Triathlon, when I was just unfocused on my normal exercise routine. Then the Nike half came and went, and I was lucky enough to have a great event. So of course I had to take a bit of time to recover from that. Don't know if I mentioned this but my left knee was aching in the days after the race so I allowed a bit of extra time for that to heal. I finally made it into the gym this past Friday, and despite my knee still hurting a bit I managed 25 minutes on the upright bike followed by a short, full body weight lifting session. I did some pushups, squats, tricep and bicep work but didn't have time for any of my physical therapy or core work.

And then the cough/cold I'd had prior to Nike either resurfaced or I got sick again, not sure which but by Saturday morning I knew the truth, exercise at this point would only hurt, not help. I'm scared of pneumonia after the bout earlier this year so I'm motivated to take it easy and take the time for this cough to clear up. Add to that, yesterday my neck and shoulders started hurting and got progressively worse until today, when I woke up and could barely look side to side.

Did you add that all up? It's been four weeks since the Santa Cruz tri, which means four weeks since I've engaged in my regular exercise routine. And I miss it! I miss the endorphins more than anything, and the post-exercise feelings of self-satisfaction and relaxation. And this isn't coming at exactly a good time. My life continues to be more stressful than usual, family stuff and a bit of work stuff too, and I could use the de-stressing effects of exercise now more than ever.

But it is what it is. I'm not going to get all wound up about something I can't really do anything about. I have to get over this cough and let this pinched nerve, or whatever's happening in my neck/shoulders, settle down before I get back in the gym. I've read about people that take 4-6 weeks off from exercise every winter. Even some professional athletes do it. So I've decided to view it like that, an exercise sabbatical. My body obviously needs it right now.

My weight is still good. The weight log on my sidebar here is acting weird, when I enter a new weight it wants to log it at the bottom, forcing me to move it one week at a time up to the top. It's painfully tedious and I can't do that every week. But I just did it to finally add a new entry since it's been over a month since I posted one. So if you were wondering, my weight's been fine, I just have ot figure out why the log is glitchy.

I'm closing in on my one year anniversary of maintenance. In fact, it's only a week away! I hear from other maintainers that the first year is the hardest, and I'm hoping that's true. This year hasn't felt terribly hard necessarily, but it's not been easy either. Of course, I don't expect it to get easy for years to come, somewhere in the 5-10 year window, but I do hope it gets progressively less hard as time goes by. Which is what it has done now that I think about it. It's nowhere near as challenging to face food temptations or motivate myself to exercise (that, in fact, could almost be called easy now) as it was in the past.

And that, in turn, goes back to just how much I've changed over the past 6.5 years. February will be my 7 year anniversary of starting this journey (and blog) and much has changed during that time, the least of which is my body. The biggest change has taken place in my mind. There have also been changes in my activities, in my interests and hobbies, in the way I socialize and what I think is fun and interesting. But it's my mind, it's how I view food, exercise...heck, how I view life, those are the most profound changes. I went from someone who was willing to sit on the sidelines and watch life go by, content to let someone else make the calls, to now be someone who's in the game. It's not always easy to step onto the field, sometimes it's easier to be an armchair quarterback than it is to be the one throwing the ball, but win or lose, it's my game now, I'm making the calls, I'm running down the field, I'm taking full responsibility for the outcome and that feels better than the most comfortable couch in the world.

Before I close, a couple random photos from this past week...

My little Miss and I at the ice cream parlor

Curb your cravings...Nope, I passed.

In my next post I plan to write about how I'm feeling better and resisting all the Halloween candy. Positive thinking, one of the most powerful tools in my toolkit.

Re: Find Something You Love

A few posts back I mentioned that it's not always good advice to tell someone to "find something you love" when it comes to exercise. I remember hearing this advice in years past and thinking, "love? more like find something I don't hate." And what I believe is, it's probably too much to ask a sedentary, out of shape person who is carrying extra weight to find something you love. I think it can even further confirm their suspicion that they they didn't get the exercise gene, they feel convinced they'll never enjoy it and further, that people who do enjoy exercise are just different than they are.

So what to tell them instead? The truth. It will be uncomfortable at first. It will take time to build up endurance and strength. Maybe not find something you love but find something you can do. Whether it's a 15 minute walk three times a week or an aquacise class with the retired set. It doesn't matter so much what you do at first, what matters is that you do something. Early exercise habits are about just that, habit. Focus on building the habit more than on burning calories. And do it because you want the results, because you want change and you want a body you can feel good about. Do it for the same reason you clean the gutters or sweep the floor - not because you enjoy doing the work, but because you enjoy the outcome.

Over time, as you build up endurance and strength, you can begin to think about what you might enjoy and start searching for that. And who knows? Eventually, you may even find something you love. Just don't expect love at first sight. It took me years, years to enjoy running. Why did I stick with it all that time? Because I enjoyed the results, I enjoyed triathlons and running was a required part of that (or at least walking anyway) and I liked the idea of being a runner, even if I didn't really enjoy it - let alone love it. And now? I love it. I can say without reservation, I love running.

And that's the craziest change of all. I went from one of those people who thought she didn't have the exercise gene, who loved the couch more than anything, to a person who loves running, who loves exercise, who loves seeking out new ways to push my body and my mind. I had the exercise gene all along, it was just buried deep inside a too heavy body and a negative mind.

And with that, I'm off to the gym to do what I love.

Nike Women's Half-Marathon San Francisco Race Report

I'd planned to drive in the morning of the race. Which is no easy decision given the race begins at 6:30 in the morning and there are 30,000 runners. Add organizers/volunteers/spectators and the massive number of people was intimidating. But when BART (local transit) went on strike I started to panic. So I reached out to everyone I knew running the race and/or living in San Francisco, and I do mean everyone, and I was lucky enough to have my friend Irene offer me the floor of her hotel room. Whew! I met Irene some 8 years ago on the Body for Life California chat forum. That was pre-blog even (mine, not hers)! Way back then she invited me to the Muscletank website, which was my entry into online journaling and eventually led to my starting this blog. So in a way, I have Irene to thank for this blog. Irene and her husband Michael live in San Diego and despite not being all that far apart, we'd never met, until now.

So I happily packed up my sleeping bag and Big Agnes Q-core sleeping pad (that I use for backpacking) along with my gear and drove into the city. The humongous parking garage I'd planned to use said FULL but I managed to find a spot anyway. I have a feeling driving in Sunday morning would have been an unmitigated nightmare! I made my bed, ate two candy bars (a Snickers and a Reeses PB cup, if you must know) over the course of the evening, and chatted with Irene and Michael about all things running and the Nike race. This is her third time running the event so she had lots of tips and experience to share. Of course I had my period (what now seems like a race must-have, doh!) but at least the cold I'd gotten mid-week seemed all but gone.

My digs for the night. I couldn't have been happier!

Getting my gear together.

Check out that round race bib. Not a fan. Some things don't need improving. I felt like I was adding a little preggo bump to my belly. Not sure what time we finally drifted off to sleep but I think it was somewhere around 10:30pm.

The alarm went off at 5:30am and we slowly got our butts in gear. We were literally a few blocks from the start and from the hotel window I watched the masses file by. Race day, it's here! I felt in a strange no-man's-land kind of place. In the three weeks since the SC Triathlon I'd done exactly two training runs, one 8 miler and one 6 miler, and that was IT. No other training. In fact, no other exercise at all aside from a 10 mile hike. I had no idea how this race was going to play out. I'd guessed somewhere between 2.5 - 3 hours and hoped it would be closer to 2.5 hours.

We made our way to our corral (9:00 - 9:59 pace) and I felt like I was at a strange runner/rock concert. The crowd was massive. And yet I was seeing only a small part of it. I took pictures of what I could see of the crowd but there were more than 5 streets parallel to mine filled just like this. Amazing!

A look ahead

A look behind (that's a sea people as far as the eye can see!)

And a 3-person selfie of Irene, Michael and I.

It's still dark and cold outside and we're lining up with 30k people to run 13.1 miles. I think I've officially lost what was left of my mind. But at least I have good company. The race starts at 6:30am and it was maybe 10 minutes later when we were making our way to the starting line. We passed some other "corrals" (read: blocks upon blocks of people) so I snapped a picture. I think this is the 10:00 - 10:59 group but I'm not sure.

An aerial shot from the interwebs

Imagine blocks and blocks filled like that. And then I saw it, the starting line.

Here we go! (another borrowed picture)

It was still dark out and my memories of the first mile or so are hazy. I had a sweatshirt on that I'd planned to dump, a running skirt, my yellow See Jane Run half-marathon shirt and my Camelbak. The route starts mostly flat then a nice decline as we approach the Embarcadero. I wasn't sure how to pace myself so I decided to just run. Go figure. I was a bit concerned I might hit some kind of a lack-of-training wall around mile 7 or 8 but decided to just deal with it when it happens. My first mile went by in 9:51 (and included that nice bit of decline).

Mile 2 was flat and went by in 10:16 minutes. My heart-rate was in the low 150's and at that point I figured heart-rate was the best tool for pacing myself. I know low 150's means I'm not working too hard and that's about how it should be in mile 2. I felt warmed up so I dumped my sweatshirt at a donation box. Even though I'd purchased it at Goodwill for just this purpose, I still felt funny tossing it. Anyway, the start of mile 3 brought a small hill, I tackled that without issue. The real climb came during mile 6, when we started climbing from Crissy Field up toward the GG bridge. I'd had my first ShotBlok just before then.

Fortunately I've run this hill a few times in other races and in training runs. The difference is, I always peel off and head over the bridge and this time I just kept going, up, up, up the hill...all in all we climbed for about a mile. One of the longest climbs I've done on foot. We reached the top and you heard sighs of relief and even a few squeals of gratitude. And then wheeeeeee!!, what goes up, must come down, right? Here's the elevation profile.

Elevation profile

A pic I lifted from Twitter.

You go directly from running downhill to bam! Back up for another climb of about 1.5 miles. Did I walk up any of those hills? Hell no I didn't! There were moments when I wanted to stop, moments when I had to ask myself, "you want to walk, but can you run?" and the answer came back, "yes I can!". I slowed, my pace inched up to 11:21 during that first hill, 11:12 during the second, but I never walked. The slow pace was balanced by the downhills, 9:38 and 9:25 for those. Somewhere around mile 8 I also took a picture.

Run girls, run!

I'd gotten my phone out because I heard a text come in and wanted to make sure it wasn't about the kids, who were with a sitter. As if I could do something. Barring an emergency it's not like I could exactly hurry home.

Between the hills, the scenery, the funny/inspirational/encouraging signs and banners (one of my faves, "You Look Soooo Skinny!!"), the people watching (almost as good as the airport), and the occasional cheering squads the miles seemed to be flying by. I've never had the experience of miles going by like this before. From about mile 7 on I kept thinking, wait, are we at the next mile already? The scenery was a bit hampered by the fog. It never really burned off and we couldn't even see the GG bridge, despite running right by it. In fact, it stayed chilly for the entire run, which was fine as long as I was running.

After the bigger hills I see mile marker 10. What? Already? I had a second ShotBlok as we moved into GG park for a mild climb. I kept an eye on my heart-rate, and other than when climbing hills, it was fine. And I seemed to be staying roughly in the 10:00 - 10:30 range for pace, which made me happy. I passed a woman who said to her friend, "my entire body hurts," and that led me to do a body-check, I'm in some mild discomfort but really I'm fine. The body check has become a valuable tool when I'm feeling mentally tired. I mentally scan my body from head to toe and most of the time, I'm actually doing pretty good. It's my mind that gets beat. Though in this case, I hardly had time for that to happen, what with the race going by so fast!

I did have a mild crampy feelings in my calves, which is practically normal for me. But strangely my left arm kept feeling sore. As if I was holding it stiff, or it had just been let out of a cast. I kept having to shake it out for relief. But other than that and a small blister forming, I felt fine. At mile 12 I had one more ShotBlok (3 in all for the whole race), thinking, "eh, I've hardly had any, why not give myself a final boost." I finished up the last bit of incline and started mile 13, where it's all downhill or flat from there, feeling like a million bucks. I got this! I got this!! I ran the last mile while resting on a cloud - that's how I felt. And then I came around the corner onto The Great Highway to see the ocean, quickly followed by a big blue Finish sign floating over the street. I picked up the pace, and felt a rush of joy as I crossed the finish line.

Hallelujah! I never hit a wall, I never walked, I never hurt - I was a happy, happy girl!! A happy, grateful, joyous runner girl. I had a lot of time during that race to think about my life. Things aren't perfect but there's a lot to be thankful for. I will always be grateful for the health and well-being of my kids, my family, my loved ones and for my ability to experience joy and laughter and sadness and tears. The full spectrum of life, I'm alive and feeling it.

Ok, pictures and more pictures...

Earned, not given

The first thing you get is your Tiffany & Co finisher's necklace. SF Firemen dressed in tuxedos hand out the necklaces. This race knows how to treat a girl.

The X is because this is the 10th anniversary of the event. The other side says Nike Women's 2013 Marathon San Francisco. There was a card inside describing the significance of the triangle, something about a trifecta I think :)

After the necklace there's a line for your t-shirt. Lines, lines and more lines for everything. Tons of people, tons! But it was fairly well managed. After the t-shirt I got a space blanket. This was the first time I ever really needed one.

I started to get a chill. My phone wouldn't work due to about a million other people in the area trying to use theirs too so I couldn't track down Michael, who had my change of clothes. I accidentally snapped this picture of me but saved it because...look at my lips!

Gee, do I look cold? My lips are so blue!

Partly hoping I'd be warmer I went into the gear tent. It wasn't warmer but in my post-race haze I bought two shirts and a hat. Smart move, Nike, smart. I put one of them on, a pink long sleeved quarter zip, and kept trying to reach Michael. My whole body started to shiver and I seriously considered going to the medical tent, hoping it would be warm or have blankets or something. For the first time ever I could have cared less about a post-race massage. It's too cold to stand in line for that!

I happened upon the results computer and looked up my official time, 2:14:40. Woot! Guess I under-estimated my little runner legs. And heart.

What I really think is neat is my age group, 620th place out of 2983. And I finished 5997th out of 26,404 who finished the half-marathon. Not bad for a late bloomer. Finally, about an hour after I finished I was able to get a call out to Michael and track he and Irene down. I could barely talk at that point, and I all I could think about was putting on my sweat pants.

I'm wearing my space blanket backwards - doh!

Irene was happy with her time and we chatted about the race a bit before I had to leave to meet up with my tri runner girls. I found a corner inside of the lobby area and waited. Before too long Amy arrived and I told her how cold I felt. She gave me her sweatshirt (thank you Amy!!). I took off the shirt I ran in (it was still wet) and layered up all the clothes I had on top of that. It was another hour before the chill started to pass.

Starting to get warm.

I swapped that shirt for a red one, apparently they'd run out of these orange-ish ones but I like red better so that worked out nicely. Cool finisher's shirt, right? I wore it proudly today. A little wait longer and all the ladies from tri club had arrived for brunch. We sat outside but by this time I was ok, although I never took my space blanket off.

Oh yeah, we rock!

I started my meal with a Bailey's and coffee. I could've drank 6 of those. And ordered corn beef hash and eggs for breakfast. I really wanted french toast but that wasn't on the menu. We went over the race and the biggest thing was how different their experience was from mine. They all started together in the 11:00 - 11:59 corral and they said they spent the entire race having to navigate around walkers. Their description sounded downright horrible and one woman said she'd never do the race again. I told her to do it but pick a higher pace corral next time because while I had to maneuver around a few walkers here and there, it was nothing compared to what they described, "like trying to run a race down main street at Disneyland."

After breakfast I made my way back to the hotel to meet up with Irene and Michael. Packed my gear, congratulatory hugs all around, and then finally in my car. Whew, that's a long day! If it weren't for the cold I imagine I'd have felt a million times better, but I still felt pretty damn good about the whole thing. And my time, 2:14:40 - holy surprise! That's only 10 minutes slower than my PR. 

So I felt pretty good today. My left knee feels a bit tweaked, like it can't go straight when I walk, it's weird. I don't usually have knee issues and it didn't bother me at all during the race. I'm going to just rest it for a few days and hope it goes back to normal.

And then my plan is to get back to the gym. It's been forever since I've had any normal gym routine. I need to get my muscles back. And lean out some. I've been eating like a race horse. And while I am a racer, I'm not a horse. Time to scale back, tighten up, get stronger. Yours truly has some big things on the horizon and needs to look her best to represent the maintainers of the world! Or at least of the blogosphere.

Anyway, back to the race. I loved this race. Could you tell? And from now on I'm doing longer tapers. Two weeks minimum. This was an amazing experience. I sure hope I get in next year. Heck, I might even take on the full 26.2 next year.