I’ve decided I’m in maintenance mode when it comes to health and fitness, but I’m not one to stop tracking goals and progress. I love me some data! So I’ve started a new page for the next 12 weeks until Thansgiving, starting tomorrow. Lighter goals, but just as much activity and vigor is planned! I’ll update it weekly (“of course she will” – HA!).
Category Archives: Fitness and Health
Complete: Last 8 Weeks of Summer Fitness
It’s been a great 8 weeks! I was super focused on getting my body back into tip-top shape in preparation for the fall when I’ll have to move most of my workouts indoors. Let’s face it, running outside 5 days a week isn’t going to be doable. Bring on the kickboxing and INS.ANITY workouts!
I knew going into these 8 weeks that weight loss would be hard. I’d crept up to 146.4 in June and seemed to be hanging out there. I’d lost track of food and as we all know, you can’t out-work a crappy diet. That weight is still well within normal for my height and build (5’7 with a medium-large frame, BMI of 22.9), but it was feeling uncomfortable knowing that fall was around the corner. It was time to step it up.
I set goals for core strength, but I was meeting them almost immediately, so I dropped them. I set goals for cross training, and failed miserably. But in calorie consumption, mileage, and activity time goals, I exceeded all expectations… and they were lofty expectations! 1330 net calories a day, 5 hours a week of exercise, and 20-30 miles a week of running (or hiking or very brisk walking). As far as I’m concerned, these last 8 weeks have been very successful and I’m super happy. On top of meeting/exceeding those goals, I managed to drop a very solid 4.2 pounds (my wake-up weight today after no rigorous exercise yesterday and a rather unhealthy dinner last night) and I lost 1.0% body fat (which is 4.4% of the body fat I was carrying). I also dropped a collective 1.75 inches from my frame.
Going into the next 10 weeks, I have three simple goals… I must weigh 145 pounds or less every Wednesday, my body fat cannot go above 24%, and I want to keep doing 5 hours a week of vigorous activity. I chose Wednesday as my weigh-in day because my body has always corrected itself by then from the weekend before. Since I’m truly in maintenance mode (my rib cage is a solid 31 inches measured just below my breasts, and the doctor says it is impossible for it to get smaller, that this is how I’m built), a mid-week weigh-in makes sense. I’ll create a boring page for tracking purposes. I love tracking information!!!
Here are my stats from the last 8 weeks:
Summary (07/04/2015 – 08/28/2015)
- Weight: 142.2 Pounds
- Pounds Lost or Gained (started at 146.4 pounds): 4.2 Pound lost
- Body Fat %: 22.7%
- Body Fat % Lost or Gained (started at 23.7%): 1.0% Lost
- BMI: 22.3
- BMI Points Lost or Gained (started at 22.9): 0.6
- Workout Days (goal is 48 days)/Time Spent Being Active (goal is 40 hours): 44 Days/44 Hours 35 Minutes
- Miles Run (goal is 160-240 total miles): 199.70 Miles
- Days within Calorie Goals per MFP (goal is 45 days with an average of 1330 or less per day): 45 days
- 49,983 Total Calories in 45 days (average was 1110.73 calories per day
- Measurements:
- Natural Waist: 27.5 inches (28.25 inches on 07/07/15)
- Loss of 0.75 inches
- Belly Button: 31.75 inches (32 inches on 07/07/15
- Loss of 0.25 inches
- Hips: 35.75 inches ( 36.5 inches on 07/07/15)
- Loss of 0.75 inches
- Natural Waist: 27.5 inches (28.25 inches on 07/07/15)
Cross Training
We have a fantastic trail system in our community. Finding a trail to bike or run is never, EVER a problem here. The state has been working hard on expanding our “rails to trails” system and we have a very cool one just 20 minutes from our house. We have said for years that we need to go and check it out.
Yesterday, my good friend, Emily, asked if I wanted to run it with her. I suggested we bike so that Hottie and the boys could come too. We prepped the bikes, got the kids loaded, picked up Emily with her bike, and drove 20 minutes to the trailhead. And it started to storm. Ha! So much for “no precip for 110 minutes.”
We went to dinner, left the bikes on the rack, put the car in the garage, and had Emily stay the night. We stayed up late and watched a hilariously bad movie… Just like old times!
Bryson woke up at 6:20 so we went for a 5.5 mile run while the house slept. Hottie went for a run when we got back because Matthew wasn’t up yet. Once he was home, Matthew was up and the boys were fed, so we headed out once again to the trailhead.
This time, nothing but sunshine!
I volunteered to tow the boys in the Burley for the first time ever. That was easy, until it wasn’t on the way back with an insane head wind… But it was fun! They did great and we were biking for a little over an hour and went 10.4 miles.
It was worth the wait. The trail was beautiful and the bridge was, well, FANTASTIC!!! It was breathtaking, actually!
And I finally got some cross training in!
8 Weeks Left of Summer Fitness – Mid-Way Check-In
I got through the first 4 weeks of the final 8 weeks of summer with really great results with running, but totally skipped out on weight training (always my nemesis) and the 100 Pushups and 200 Sit Ups programs. In all fairness, after one week of doing the sit ups program, I tested in at 200 in a row – so that program really wasn’t the best for me. But the pushups were a different story. I hurt my wrist badly after the first week and a half and had to stop. I’ve been scared to start again. I am going to try to start again these final 4 weeks.
As a recap, here are my starting stats on 07/07/2015:
Starting Statistics on 07/07/2015
- Weight: 146.4 pounds
- Body Fat %: 23.7%
- BMI: 22.9
- Measurements:
- Natural Waist: 28.25 inches
- Belly Button: 32 inches
- Hips: 36.5 inches
- Core Strength Starting Stats:
- Starting Sit Ups: 105 (starting at Week 5 of the program)
- Starting Pushups: 32 – (starting at Week 3 of the program)
Goals for the 8 weeks:
Completely finish the core strength programs (200 sit ups, 100 pushups) weeks 2-7At least one (1) cross training session a week (this is hard for me to do in the summers because I’d rather run)Bands/resistance training once a week- Clean eating with just one cheat day a week (I will not be logging food here though, but I will confess my sins in the notes section each week – HA!)
- 20-30 Total running miles each week
- At least 5 hours a week of exercise (this includes running, core strength, resistance, cross training, lawn mowing, and HARD yard work that makes me sore the next day)
- Keep within my net calorie goals (1330 per day) 6 days per week (allowed 1 cheat day a week)
Here is where I ended up after 4 weeks – I’m quite happy considering that dropping weight just isn’t easy for me right now. I’m at a good BMI and body fat percentage for my height and age, so I can’t expect to lose much more without a serious overhaul of what I’m doing.
Week 4 Statistics
- Weight: 144.4 Pounds
- Pounds Lost or Gained: 2 Pound lost
- Body Fat %: 23.4%
- Body Fat % Lost or Gained: 0.3% Lost
- BMI: 22.6
- BMI change in 4 weeks (starting was 22.9): 0.3
- Workout Days (goal is 24 days)/Time Spent Being Active (goal is 20 hours): 21 Days/19 Hours 29 Minutes (damn – just shy of the goal!)
- Miles Run (goal is 80-120): 98.54 Miles
- Days within Calorie Goals per MFP: Of the 6 days a week that I tracked (allowing 1 free day a week), I averaged a net of 1,130 per day – right on par with a 1200 goal and well under a 1330 goal!
- Measurements:
- Natural Waist: 27.5 inches (28.25 on 07/15) – lost 0.75 inches
- Belly Button: 32 inches (32.0 on 07/15) – lost/gained 0 inches
- Hips: 36.0 inches (36.5 on 07/15) – lost 0.5 inches
So – I’m a happy camper right now! My average running distance has moved from 5 miles per day to 5.5-6 miles per day, so that’s awesome! My pace improves so I’m not spending much more time running that extra distance. Eating is going well, but I’ve got that so figured out that I’d be so angry with myself if it wasn’t going as planned. All-in-all, I’m happy and am ready to kick it up a bit these final 4 weeks.
Finishing Out Summer Fitness Plan
I need a new fitness plan. After thinking on it for quite a while, I came up with the one linked here. I’m testing in with my sit ups, pushups, and squats tonight and will kick that training off on Saturday. I’m running up until then and am logging as of this week. In case you’re interested, you can check it out, but don’t feel like you need to. 🙂
He’s Home!
Sammy went home yesterday! After 4.5 weeks of a coma, then “emerging,” and then in-patient therapy here in DSM, he went home.
It wasn’t supposed to be like this. I heard doctors tell us not to get our hopes up, not to expect rapid recovery, to keep expectations low.
When this all happened, the doctors told Uncle D that Sam would be in a coma anywhere from 2 weeks to 2 months. I saw Uncle D yesterday as we loaded his car with all of Sam’s things, and he said, “can you believe this? It’s like a movie ending. Not even 5 weeks ago I was told that my son would probably need 8 weeks to wake up, and right now, he’s being discharged. I thought to myself back then, ‘I can wait 60 days to see my son’s eyes again,’ but here we are. And when this all happened, I was told to not hope for much, and all I hoped for was for my son to be able to communicate with me again, in some way, even if it was minimal for the rest of his life.”
WOW.
As Hottie and I walked back to our car, I cried. I cried because as hopeful as I was (I NEVER thought for a minute that Sammy wouldn’t fully recover), I did not expect to be sending him home so soon. I was ready for 8 weeks of “sleeping.” I was ready for lots of in-patient therapy (we were told “months”). I was ready for a very long road. I wasn’t ready for such a quick turn-around, and neither were his therapists. As we said our goodbyes in Sam’s room, I asked one of his therapists, “is this normal?” She said no. She said that everyone is stunned by how quickly he recovered and that, “his young age is on his side.”
Sam truly is… amazing! He defied every single odd when it came to coming down with FES in the first place, and he defied all the odds in his lightning-fast recovery. My cousin posted on FB, “Can everyone please say, ‘BEST CASE SCENARIO?'” But this is better than the best case scenario. Although there is work to be done to get all of Sam’s functions “back to normal,” the best case scenario told us months before we’d see much improvement at all, and that the road would be very long. All things considered, the road has been quite short so far, and the road ahead will be much more pleasant than we were told it would be.
My Marathons for Sammy is complete – he’s home! I am finishing out this week and I owe him 0.3 miles to complete 4 marathons for him (why I didn’t finish those this morning… ugh! I had no idea!). I ran 104.8 miles in the time it took him to recover. I’m so glad he cut this challenge short for me 🙂
THIS Moment in Time – Hardest Four Miles of my Life
I’ve run every morning this week following a 6 miler on Saturday and a rest on Sunday. My body is shot. 19 miles in four days isn’t that much of a cumulative distance, but I usually take a rest after two days of running no matter how far (or not so far) I run in those two days. Four days in a row is tough on me, but the weather has been ridiculously beautiful! So I power on… and take breaks… at the park. You know, the park that is perfectly safe and requires none of my attention. 😁
Week One is DONE – And an Update!
I finished up my first week of “Marathons for Sammy” on Friday. It was a good week – not GREAT – but definitely good! Stats are there if you care at all 😉
In case you’re wondering, Sam is doing GREAT! We got devastating news a week ago this past Friday (docs said he’d never wake up) but then Sammy started kicking it into overdrive. HE IS AWAKE! Even better, he is starting to stand for longer and longer every day (up to 3 minutes, 45 seconds yesterday), moves his arms and legs and head etc., SMILES, laughs, talks, and can eat anything he wants now! My aunt keep reminding everyone that he is far from healed and has a long road ahead of him, but all that matters to me is that he is on the road!
It sounds like they will likely be moving Sam to my fair city for rehabilitation. This is great news for SK and me, and my other cousins and second cousins and aunt and uncle who live here. It is further away from home for my Aunt K and Uncle D, so that’s tough. But I think my aunt is looking forward to being closer to so much family. SK has decided to skip her NYC internship and stay with us longer – which we are very excited about! Her internship here is letting her stay on as long as she wants and she wants to stay close to Sam until she has to go back to school (only 45 minutes from here).
So – things are good! But you know, I always thought he’d wake up and recover. I honestly am not surprised. When I got the call a week ago that he would never wake up, I was DEVASTATED and in total shock and disbelief. I’ve just always thought he needed time to recover and get back to his life. He’s doing that!
Marathons for Sammy
In one of my aunt’s posts on Caring Bridge about Sam, she wrote about his recovery being like a marathon:
“Now, to further explain what the word “recover” means. Again, we have no way of knowing what the extent of his recovery will be. This is going to be a long-haul — doctors have referred to it as “a marathon”. We could see little improvement, a complete recovery, or somewhere in-between. Like we keep saying, we just don’t know, and won’t know until Sam wakes up.”
I’ve been struggling to come up with a new fitness plan for myself, and I really want to do more cross training. I need to get into the garage to kick the bag and do some INSA.NITY, but I really, really enjoy running. I’m thinking of running as much as I can in the mornings and evenings, and doing garage workouts a couple of days a week during nap time (they both still nap at the same time, but I think that’s coming to an end this summer…). When I read the above about Sam, I knew right away what my next self-imposed fitness challenge would be.
Until Sammy wakes up, I will run as many “marathons” as I can, meaning keep count of each and every run and start a new set every time I compile 26.2 miles. I tend to just think of him while I run, so why not run for him?
So far, I’ve logged 13.03 miles:
Tues, 06/02/15 5.24 miles
Wed, 06/03/15 3.03 miles (fastest ever, I might add!)
Thur, 06/04/15 4.76 miles
These are much shorter distances than I’m used to, but I like them quite a bit and I’m not training for anything right now (I did NOT run that half marathon on Saturday, which was a blessing since I had to drive 4.5 hours to Sam at 3:00 that afternoon). My goal is to log at least one cross training and also one strength session a week.
I’ll log everything here, and I’m starting on Saturday (but will include the miles already accumulated in marathon #1)
Fitness Check-In
My goodness, it’s been FOREVER since I’ve checked in here on my fitness. I was doing another 10 weeks of fitness challenge with myself, but quit after writing this post because, well… it was very eye-opening and I thought it was time for a break on weekly logging of stats. I didn’t even announce my departure from Fitness Staturdays – I just departed.
And it’s felt good.
But it is time to ramp things up again because my half marathon is next weekend and honestly, I’m ready for a change of pace. Running on a schedule is no fun at all and this time around (I’ve run 3-4 20K’s or half marathons in the past – I can’t remember), I told myself that I will not be doing this again. I had a pretty serious foot injury that should have side-lined me for at least 6 weeks, but a solid week of no running got me ready to run again (my doctor agreed it was OK). The injury (a ruptured plantar fascia in my left arch, meaning that it is forever severed and will never heal back together) should have been way more painful than it was, but my family’s insane pain threshold has been passed onto me and I healed up as quickly as I healed from my C-sections – so I’m out running again. BUT, the same thing could happen to my right foot, and that arch is burning a bit here and there, so I’m pretty nervous about the race. I’m doing a trial long run this weekend (10-11 miles) to see if I can do it without upsetting my arches, and I’m staying close to home. The longest I’ve run so far is 9 miles (which is when I ruptured it) so I know I can squeak out 13.1, but I’m not sure I want to. I’m not sure that I want to risk a similar, or worse, injury. It is more important to keep running for the rest of my life than to cross a particular finish line and have an injury that could side-line me for weeks to forever.
So I’m not sure.
Anyway, back to the point of this post – I’ve been running 20-30 miles a week both indoors and outdoors and it feels great, but I need a change. I need to get back out to the garage to do some kickboxing, I need to do INSA.NI.TY again, and I need to get back to ab and strength work. I’ve gotten a bit soft. Before you go on and say, “no you haven’t – etc. etc.” check out my stats from the last time I checked in:
- Weight: 137.8 Pounds
- Body Fat %: 21.9%
- BMI: 21.9
- Workout Days (goal is 6 days): 6 Days
- Time Spent Being Active: 4 Hours 42 Minutes
- Miles Run: 21.3 Miles
And compare them to now:
- Weight: 144.4 Pounds
- Difference of 6.6 pounds
- Body Fat %: 23.3%
- Difference of 1.4%
- BMI: 22.6
- Difference of 1.7
- Workout Days (goal is 6 days): 5 Days
- Time Spent Being Active: 6 Hours 2 Minutes
- A good increase, but it was a good week!
- Miles Run: 20.2 Miles (and includes 4 miles of walking)
This isn’t horrible by any stretch, but see what I mean? A little soft. It turns out that Bryson was a pretty serious little cardio machine and I didn’t even realize it. I plugged 200 calories a day into MFP for nursing, and I’m thinking it was much higher. I believe that 5 of the added 6.6 pounds is from weaning – that kid was keeping me trimmed down. Not counting his calorie usage correctly means that I shorted myself probably 100-150 calories a day, which explains why I dropped more than 1.5 pounds a week back then and was starting to look a little gaunt in the face (I can admit it).
So – once this race is or isn’t done, 😉 I’m going to take a week to figure out what I want to be doing. I REALLY love running, especially outside, but I need to get my strength up and my abs toned again. Man alive, I loved my abs back in January. Unfortunately, those aren’t easy to maintain (well, they actually are if I just do ab work while Hottie reads books to Matthew each night). I have a feeling that on the days I don’t run (I skip to rest my shins – if they didn’t hurt, I’d run every day), I think I’ll do some kickboxing since Matthew is OUT OF MY ROOM FOR NAPS and the bag in the garage won’t wake him now.
I’m not at all bothered by my current stats – I’ve never maintained 140-145 pounds in my life and I’ve maintained it since before Thanksgiving, so that’s awesome – but I need to mix things up a bit. And I need to stop eating sweets. Now that my period is back, I have a serious sweet tooth. Who knew?
I’ll check in with starting stats in a couple of weeks!
All the Sun For You 