Gyms and Whitesnake

Last winter, during my blog hiatus, I had a minor crisis occur in my little world. My gym, quite abruptly, closed.

Ok, I know this sounds like no big deal and in the greater scheme of things, it isn't, but to my little world at the time, it was a huge deal.

I'd been going to the gym for over a year at that point. Which was a pretty big deal for me. I'd finally found a place and a routine that worked for me. Somewhere I was comfortable. But one day in February, I showed up for my after work workout to find a note on the ground floor saying that effective immediately, the place was closed. The poor staff were blind sided too. I was stunned. And very upset. I even cried a little. You see, this wasn't just some gym. It was a life line. Even now, sitting here writing this, it's upsetting me again and I have tears in my eyes.

The exercise was helping to keep my mood in check during the winter, helping me to keep my inner demons in check and securely locked away. I made friends there. I'd see the same people during my work outs and became invested in their lives and their progress. The coaches were our cheerleaders. We laughed together. It wasn't just some gym where you went in, put your head down, did your workout and left. People noticed when I wasn't there. People were genuinely invested in how I was doing and how I was progressing. And just like that, it was all gone. Poof. I actually felt like someone had died. I grieved the loss. And truthfully, I was terrified. I was at a complete loss as to what I was going to do. I couldn't switch to another location because there wasn't one close enough to my home or work to make it viable. I seriously didn't know what I was going to do. Didn't know how I was going to cope.

About a month later, my friend MA convinced me to try an aquafit class at her gym. I've taken one before and I like swimming so I gave it a try. I liked it. So I signed up. For roughly 9 months, I've been going to aquafit. At first it was 3 times a week and then it dropped to twice a week. We did try adding in a floor class to fill up that 3rd day but couldn't find one we liked or were comfortable with. By the end of November, I think I was making it to 1 class a week and as of today, I haven't been to a class since mid-December. I've lost all desire to get in that pool. Part of that is the fact that I don't like standing in -20C weather, with semi wet hair, waiting for a bus after the class. It's a welcome change in the summer but in the winter, it sucks.

Between December 2014 and now, I've managed to gain roughly 25lbs. I've never been bigger in my life than I am right now. This isn't good. It's bad. Very, very bad. I've stopped going places, I've stopped seeing people because I'm embarrassed. Hell, even my 3 year old niece called me out at Christmas (totally adorable "out of the mouths of babes" moment, which I actually laughed at). I'm not comfortable in my own skin at the moment, and that hurts.

Don't get me wrong, I still have self respect and dignity and will put anyone in their place should they dare say anything negative me about my weight but at the same time, I've very aware and conscious of the fact that I'm slowly killing myself.

Today I took a tiny step to try to fix things. Well, actually I took the step last Friday, they just didn't have any spots open until today. All those friggin' New Year's Resolution people taking up the prime spots. Bastards. LOL. Anyhow, I signed up for an orientation session at my new gym. Hell, I've been there for almost a year now so I guess it's high time that I figure out how to use something more than the pool eh?

A personal trainer takes us around the gym and shows us what to use and how to use it. It was an hour long session with 3 of us and the trainer. He gave us a basic and rather simple follow plan. It's doable. 5 minutes of warm up on a cardio machine followed by 4 machines and then 2 strength exercises done on the floor, with 10-20 minutes of cardio to end it off. The trainer recommended that we do the cardio part 5-6 days a week and add the weights in for 3 of the days. I managed not to laugh in his face.  I only had a hard time on one of the machines. I have to give the trainer props here. He looked at me and said that he had an alternate for me as he didn't think this particular machine wouldn't be effective for me. He wrote the other suggestion on my sheet, wrote down the name of a website where I can find a tutorial on how to do it and gave me his card so that I can email him and let him know when I'd be in the gym so he could come and see me and show me how to do it as well. Well then.

I was anxious before the session and I felt a sense of trepidation walking into the gym but I made it through the session and then stayed to do some walking on the treadmill. I then ended up doing a whole boat load more walking while I ran errands and got groceries and I've been hobbling around my apartment all afternoon/evening but that's a whole other story. My previous gym was a women's only thing. And there weren't any mirrors in the gym. This one is co-ed and there are mirrors all over the damn place. This is one of the times/places that I want to be invisible. I'm ok with a trainer watching me but I don't like others being able to do so and I sure as shit don't want to be able to see myself when I'm working out either.

But I guess I'm just going to have to get over that eh? Now I have an entire day ahead of me to psych myself up to attempt this on my own Monday after work. Cue Whitesnake.... :) (bonus points to anyone who gets that reference).

Sigh. This should be interesting........God help me!!

Good Night!

Sarah

"Venus in Front of the Mirror" - Peter Paul Rubens

Mini Milestones

My day has been a day of some mini milestones which I didn't actually realize until late this afternoon.

For starters, today marks 2 weeks without sugar. I even survived the dessert section of an All-You-Can-Eat Buffet on the weekend. I broke down and bought some sugar free Jello Mousse cups to help with the chocolate cravings. Otherwise, fruit has been satisfying my sweet cravings and I'm feeling pretty darn good.
I'm finding it rather shocking just how much sugar is in things that you don't think have sugar in them or should have sugar in them. The one that surprised me the most are the frozen dinner and the supposed "Healthy" steamer style bowls. They have insane amounts of sugar in them. Talk about buyer be ware.

This evening also marked my 50th workout at Curves. Their computer system keeps track and lets me know how many workouts I've had when I sign in. I'll admit it. I'm a little proud of myself. I've actually kept with it for 5.5 months now. It's become routine for me and I actually enjoy it. Yes. I just said that I enjoy exercise. Some days it is hard to drag my ass there, like tonight. I was really tired after work. I've been tired all week. And it was really grey and blah out. Snow was in the forecast. And I'm reading a really good book right now (Omens by Kelly Armstrong) and all I could think about was going home, curling up and reading. But I didn't. I went to Curves. I was rewarded with my favourite coach being there (She normally works mornings except for Fridays) and I got in a good work out. Beat my target again for the 6th or 7th consecutive work out and it was my 50th workout. Something seems to have clicked. Now if my knee would just cooperate.....

Work is going well. It's been pretty steady so it's keeping me out of trouble. My co-workers are still providing me with a good deal of amusement. I swear, one day I'm going to write a book about my life in that office. I got a piece of good news last week too. I wrote a test on the 10th as part of a hiring process. I got the score back on the 12th and I did a pretty good job, scoring 42 out of 50. I'll take it, especially since I was still recovering from my cold and thanks to my inconsiderate neighbours, I only had 4 hours of sleep the night before the test. Oh yeah, and they tried to blow us up during the test too! (Blasting at the building site behind the test centre). Made for a very interesting day.

Tomorrow is the first day of spring. Not that you'd know it from looking out the window. We had snow today and there's snow in the forecast again tomorrow. The City of Ottawa set a new record on Monday. It was the coldest St. Patrick's Day in Ottawa's recorded history. Lucky us. Two years ago we had a heat wave and set a record of +25. It got so hot in our office that we got sent home. I'd much prefer that to this. I'm very excited at the prospect of having Spring here soon. It means longer days and more sunlight. It also means that I survived the dark, cold days of winter and I once again triumphed over my demons. I must say, this has been one of the best winter's I've had in a very long time. My seasonal depression really stayed in check and I've had  very few down days. There were a couple weeks between January and February that I found a little rough and had no energy but they were short lived and I bounced back quickly. I honestly think that Curves had a lot to do with the improvement in my mood. They say that exercise is good for more than your physical health. Who knew that they were right? LOL.

Steph and I checked out one of the positive signs of spring 2 weekend's ago: Blowing up the ice on the Rideau River. We got there too late to see the ice being blown up as they were further up the river, but we heard and felt some of the blasts and we did get to see the very beautiful and very frozen Rideau Falls. It was rather interesting to see. I got a lot of amusement out of watching the large ice chunks from up river going over the falls and creating quite the splash at the bottom. It was almost as amusing as watching Steph sniff bread in the grocery store but that's a story for another day. So is staying out to 2:30am, betting on electronic horses at the Casino in Quebec :) LOL.

I can hear my book calling me so I should sign off, go and curl up and read a little before bed. Or a lot.

Good Night!

Sarah

Very Frozen Rideau Falls - Steph took the photo when we stopped to check them out 2 weeks ago. So cold! But so beautiful!!

CONTROL!!!!!!! (And yes, I'm back)

I know. I haven't been blogging lately. It's not that I haven't had anything on my mind, it's more that I've had too much on my mind and I need the time to figure it out and process it myself. And I have to admit. Sometimes I feel very stupid sharing my miscellaneous ramblings because I don't think they make sense.

Anyhow, a lot has happened.

For starters, I found some sort of inner courage and along with 2 friends, I went out to a meet and greet event. Which lead to me meeting and greeting some people. This then lead to a coffee outing with one said person which turned out to be a very interesting and very enlightening event. Yes, it was a male and no, there weren't any sparks. But he's an interesting fellow who reminds me of someone I used to know. My little foray into the social world also lead to my first real date in 3 years. That was an adventure onto itself, which involved running into my ex (I don't think he saw me) and some verbal sparring over our own take on the world. Don't get your hopes up folks, I don't see this going anywhere. I'll keep you posted.

I took some time off and went home for Thanksgiving. I got to spend some awesome quality time with my parents, a short visit with my great aunt and uncle and my grandparents and I got to see my completely adorable niece. And my brother too. My niece is just starting to talk. I really do wish I could see her and talk to her more often. She really has no idea who I am. Thankfully she didn't run screaming from me so that's a major plus. The time off was great. I really needed it.

Work has been very stressful for the past few months. Why? It's been nothing but change. A new regime has taken over and are shaping our office to their vision. I've always been the type of person who's resistant to change but I've gotten much better working where I do. Change is an ever present constant in our place of work and I think I've done a pretty good job of adjusting to it. But there's just been so much change lately and it's happened so fast that I'm not sure what to make of all of it. And yeah, some of it's affecting me directly. My role will be changing. My responsibilities will be changing. And God's honest truth, I'm not entirely sure how I feel about that. I was angry about it for a little bit but that's subsided for the most part. Now I'm cautiously optimistic about it. Let's face it, it's the new management's purgative to make whatever changes they want and there isn't a damn thing I can do about it, so why should I stress out? I'm still employed. I'm still at the same level and pay grade. I'll still be doing some of what I do now plus some new tasks. And I have no control over it. So I just need to let it go. Roll with the punches. I need to focus on the things that I can control. Just like what my mom told me this morning: "Take it easy and don't stress out about things that you have no control over."

Sage advice if you ask me. Which leads me to what I got up to after work today... earlier this month, Steph and I went to the Women's Show. Had a blast, got a lot of free stuff, including me winning a 1 month membership to Curves. For those of you who don't know, Curves is an exercise facility designed for women only. I've been a big girl all my life. Call me plus-sized or full-figured or even obese (because clinically, I am) but just don't call me Fat. Fat is a substance, not a state of being. It's like me calling someone Jello. You can't be Jello any more than I can be Fat. Anyhow, lately my size has been bothering me. I'm not comfortable in my own skin anymore. A few weeks back I pulled a muscle in my back while trying to do up my bra. Not good. That's worse than the time I pulled the muscle in my neck by sneezing. I haven't been sleeping well. I've been fighting with my clothes because even my looser items are starting to get tight and I think I look like I'm stuffed sausage half the time when I go out. My weight has stopped me from enjoying some things that I like to do. So I knew that the time had come to make a real effort to change things. To get healthy. I love myself. And it's because I love myself that I know that I need to do this. I don't want to get type 2 diabetes. I don't want to increase my risk of heart disease or stroke or cancer. There's enough stuff in this world that can kill me. I don't want to be deliberately taking away my longevity by continuing on with the lifestyle I'm currently leading. I'm really good at failing. I've done it a lot. I know how to do it and am pretty darn good at it. But I've never really tried to fail at failing. So perhaps it's time I gave that whirl. I'm well aware that this endeavour isn't going to be an easy one. I'm sure it's going to be very difficult. And most likely painful. But all the the things in life worth doing are seldom easy. I have a plan. I have the means. I have the mind set. So let's do this. Let me actually control something I have some control over!

My first workout is tomorrow. I'll be sure to blog out that misadventure, providing I can lift my arms high enough to type. LOL.

Good Night!

Sarah

Really has nothing to do with the blog, I just like the duckies :)