Variety is the Spice of Life/Everything's Better in a Costume

I have two different exercises topics to discuss and I could make two posts, but why?  Here they are:

1) Variety is the Spice of Life

I decided to get a very small cardio workout in today before we went rock climbing.  I headed to the condo gym to elliptical for around 20 minutes. When I got there it was empty--which I love.  The sole recumbent bike caught my eye.  The apartment has 4 treadmills, 3 ellipticals and a recumbent bike.  I thought, "Sure, why not?  Variety *is* the spice of life."  So, I did 20 minutes on the recumbent bike.  I didn't push it too hard as I knew I was climbing in another hour or so. 

I will say that I think I never actually used it correctly the entire 20 minutes.  Allow me to explain.  Perhaps a photo would help:

So, the seat.  I tried to position it so that while cycling it felt natural...whatever that means.  The thing has arm rests!  So naturally, I tried to sit back...and my bottom kept sliding forward.  It also has a place to grab in front of you, so I grabbed it...and it felt like my knees were coming really close to my chest.  I am sure it was fine.  I just focused on shifting around and trying not to hurt myself.  :)

Bikes are hard.


2) Everything's Better in  Costume

Next, we went to the climbing gym for our regular Wednesday climbing session (we climb most Mondays and Wednesdays--you know, when there aren't major hurricanes or anything).  Seeing as how it is Halloween, we went in our costumes for this year: Waldo & Wenda:

We had bought the costumes for the wicked awesome Pre-Halloween party, but due to unforeseen circumstances, we were unable to attend.  Anyways, many climbers come to the gym in costume on Halloween (so claims my husband), so we went.  There were many other people in costumes and they were great!  There was an amazing Popeye & Olive Oyl, Tinkerbell, 2 Ninjas, Alice (from Alice in Wonderland), Santa and a very clever Dorian Gray (a man dressed in grey wearing a *laminated* photo of Dory--stellar).  But I digress.

Ok, I'll digress a little longer.  When Waldo and I saw the Ninjas it was an awkward period of smiling and saying hello to each other, and, because I cannot handle awkward silently I said, "We're all just trying to blend in..." in my awkward, making a joke voice.  And they did not laugh.  I hate ninjas...

Alright, so for the climbing.  We both had GREAT climbing nights!  Josh conquered his goal for the YEAR to climb a 5.12 clean.  Yes, friends, with two months to spare.  It was all him, but I like to take credit for belaying him and yelling a very timely, "You should chalk up now!" to him.  And he did chalk up.  (I declare myself MVS: Most Valuable Supporter.)

I started with my favorite 5.6 on the slab and did it twice in a row to work on my climbing stamina.  Next I did a 5.7 on the slab that has a very tough start.  I had done it before but needed some help with the start.  This time I did it myself, clean, and did a crazy move to get past the tough part (it involved resting on the jug with my knee--I know, right?  I am amazing).  Very pleased.  Next, I did a different 5.7 on the slab that was challenging, but I didn't give up and I did it clean.  My confidence really needed a night like tonight. 

I really feel like having my eating under control makes me a better climber.  Also, the physical exercise, of course.  I just feel like being properly nourished and hydrated makes such a difference!  I must remember this in the future...  :)

Great day all around! 

Hurricanes are Cold

Today is Tuesday--do you know what that means?  It means it's a couch-to-5k day!  Week 2, Day 1 to be precise.

Since the hurricane devastated us (read: we had one flicker of power, my husband says 2)(sorry for the slam yesterday, Pepco)(hey, when I'm wrong I say I'm wrong), we got the day off from work!  So we headed out for a nice, slightly rainy, slightly windy outdoor run.  Normally we run out to the Woodrow Wilson bridge and back, but as we just had a hurricane pass through we thought, maaaaaybe running across a 2 mile bridge is not the best idea.  Unsure as to whether or not we are allowed to run on the streets of National Harbor (seriously, they have fake cops on tricycle segway knockoffs who will reprimand you for doing things--nicely, of course), we decided to run toward the back of the property where it has not yet been developed and there are only townhouses in the corner.

This was my great idea.  So we set off.   As soon as we walked outside, we were *freezing*.  We warmed up once we started running, but the warm-up was c-c-c-c-cold!

I quickly learned that National Harbor is built on an incline.  We are very much so toward the bottom of said incline.  Let's just say I was embarrassed by the heavy breathing I had toward the end of the 5 minute warm-up walk (which, in my defense, was entirely uphill).  Today's plan is 90 seconds of running followed by 2 minutes of walking, for a total of 20 minutes.   It was nice.  I love running in windy, lightly drizzly coldness!

The second running interval was entirely uphill, but other than that it wasn't too bad.  We zig-zagged back down the hill in an attempt to save our knees.  I think we were successful.  During the final running interval, we saw a deer at the edge of the woods.  Upon further inspection, there were at least two more slightly deeper in the woods.  What a great run!

***Topic Change Alert***

I've been doing very well with my food.  The myfitnesspal.com system is working very well for me.  I'm curious to see how the first week goes to see if my results match my hard work!  Friday I will weigh-in and see the fruits of my labor!

I am doing things a bit differently--it is all about total calories in vs calories burned.  I do try to keep it balanced, but I am not as rigid as before.  By way of a tasty example, today I used a free Pinkberry mini coupon I had.  I had chocolate hazelnut frozen yogurt (135 calories) with chocolate shavings (35 calories) as a topping.  I still have 115 calories remaining for the day, but will leave those be as I am satisfied. 

If get my desired results and can eat Pinkberry, I could get used to this...

Midday Day Off Lifting

Snow day with no snow?  Yes, please!  (<--see how happy I am?  This will change once we inevitably lose power due to the FRANKENSTORM!!!.  Stay tuned for the next post which will likely be days later once power is restored.  I'm scowling at you, Pepco.)

Today I initially had the great idea of doing a 30-50 minute stair workout in our building going only upstairs, then jogging to the elevator, jogging back to the staircase and doing it again, repeatedly.  My husband was on board with this plan.  Then it occurred to me that due to the hurricane, we would not be going rock climbing tonight, and as such a better supplementary workout would be lifting.

However, since I was *SO* excited about stairs we decided to do a 10 minute stair warm-up.  And we sort of did.  Sort of...

You see, we have lived here for nearly 5 months and have never actually taken the stairs.  I know where the stairwell by our unit is (coughacrossthehallfromourdoorcough), but I have never actually used them.  And they are nowhere near the elevators, which I know very well. 

We went to the gym to drop off our water bottles and my lifting bag then headed to the stairwell.  The gym is on the "mezzanine" level and the stairwell by it only goes down one floor to the street.  Fail.  There is another stairwell on that floor.  Which *also* only goes to the street.  Double Mezzanine Fail.

So, we took the elevator up one floor to the 2nd floor and headed to the stairwell across from our unit.  We went from floor 2 up to floor 10.  We then went (read: I walked, Josh jogged) to the elevator and went back to the 2nd floor to do it again.  I noticed on the second run that the stairwell claims to go from C2 (the lowest garage level) up to floor 10.  So, I naturally had the brilliant idea of doing C2 through 10 for the last run.  We went to C2 in the garage, pretty easily found the stairwell entrance, climbed up past C1 to the first floor--where we came up against a locked gate and had to exit outside on the street.  Sigh.  We then quit the stairs and went to the gym to lift.  The whole ordeal lasted 11 1/2 minutes.  Nice warm-up.  :)

I went for a basic reintroduction to lifting.  I shot for 12-15 reps on each set:

Seated Leg Extensions: 85/15, 85/15, 100/15
Seated Leg Curls: 85/15, 100/15, 100/15
Lat Pulldowns: 40/15, 55/l5, 70/15
Seated Cable Row: 40/15, 55/15, 55/12
Chest Superset
   DB Chest Press: 15/15, 15/12, 15/12
   DB Chest Flyes: 15/15, 15/12, 15/12

It felt good to be lifting again.  I am hoping to do this once a week.  I should probably add back in shoulders and arms too.  And core.  Baby steps.

Getting Back Into It

I had intended to visit my mother in New Hampshire this weekend, but canceled the trip last minute to avoid getting stuck there in the event this massive hurricane hit sooner than expected and the airport wouldn't allow flights in tonight.  It seems as though I would have been fine at this point, but I think I made the right choice.  It didn't hurt that my mother passionately told me not to come.  Repeatedly.

As a result of this decision, I was able to use this weekend to get settled into using myfitnesspal.com.  Also, I was able to do day 3 of the couch-to-5K program yesterday and get an elliptical session in today.  It is unlikely that those things would have happened if I stuck with my original weekend plans.

I think it's my inner math nerd that takes so well to the myfitnesspal.com program.  I have a set number of calories and exercise gives me more.  I log as I go and can always see the number of remaining calories.  If I complete the day *under* the limit, it tells all of my myfitnesspal friends (which currently consist of Holly and my husband) that I did that. 

 Wanting to always see the success posted seems to be motivation enough for me to stick to it.  At least for now.  I am going to ride this for as long as possible.

The calorie limit seems to be for the average woman, my height and weight.  It may be on target, it may not.  To me, the only way to find out is to stick to their plan and see if I get the expected results.  If not, I modify.  Easy peasy lemon squeezy.

It feels good to be getting back into things.  It felt good this morning to choose to do 30  minutes on the elliptical.  It feels good every time I think before eating and know that when I do decide to eat, I can do it within the appropriate limits. I'm really excited to keep this trend up.  :)

Obligatory First Post

It's been about a year--but I'm back.  Whatever that means.  :)

My first blog was a journey to lose a significant amount weight and become healthy for the first time in my adult life.  My second blog was my attempt to maintain the progress I had made and to explore life as a healthy me, both physically and emotionally.  The past few years have been the best of my life and are only getting better.  I truly hope that I can say the same thing about every year to come in this life!

Well, my emotional health has been great!  My physical health has declined, but I am still *much* better than where I started.

First, food.  For the last year or so, I have not stuck to a healthy food plan.  Having said that, my overall appetite is smaller.  I simply am not interested in or able to eat the volumes I ate before my weight loss journey began.  But I certainly can eat the bad, sugary, carb-filled, high-calorie foods--just in smaller portions than before.  This has undoubtedly helped mitigate the weight gain damage, but the weight gain is definitely there.  I have put back on around 50 of the pounds I originally lost.  But numbers are weird when it comes to weight.  My body is not the same body as the early-weight-loss-journey Erin who weighed this number; I am in a much smaller clothing size.   

Next, the exercise.  My husband and I indoor rock climb twice a week.  For the most part I stick to that, but I didn't go more than once or twice the entire month of September.  On the whole though, I rock climbed twice a week.  Most weeks, that is it.  Not good.  I am trying to do cardio on two off days at work.  I have a FREE GYM to use (a really nice one!) and I rarely take advantage.  So, I have been trying to be diligent about packing a bag.  Again, I don't always.

So, that's where I was.  Now, for where I am/plan to go.

Despite my snack/dessert issues, my actual meal choices have remained pretty healthy and similar to the diet plan when I was losing/maintaining.  Thanks to the encouragement from Holly, my husband and I have joined myfitnesspal.com.  It.  Is.  Awesome.  I have the app on my iPhone and so can track my food from almost anywhere--no excuses.  Also, their database has almost EVERY food product in it.  I have not not found (nice double negative usage, I know) anything yet (this is a whole 2 days of food tracking here).  My food plan is simple: keep sticking to my healthy plan and track the calories; goal: eat less calories than my limit. 

Typical Day Example?  Okay.

Breakfast: my egg sandwich of champions (Multi-grain sandwich thin, 2 fried eggs, 2 canadian bacon), coffee with cream and sugar
Snack #1: yogurt, fruit, sometimes granola blend
Lunch: leftovers from dinner the night before (see "Dinner" below)
Snack #2: Powerbar (or something like that)
Dinner: meat, vegetables, sometimes potatoes or cous cous or rice or something

To complicate things, I have had pretty bad stomach pains for about a year or two.  I am in the process of trying to figure out why and so this may be shaken up a bit if I start experimenting with foods to see if anything is causing it.  More to come later on that likely.

Ok.  Now the exciting part!  The exercise plan!!!  I got married in May and do you know what *that* means???  Yeh-heh-heh-hesssssss.  It means I have a workout partner.  We love to workout together so it's very good for me.  I get to spend time with the love of my life and it helps keep me on track.  Like I said, we've been good about rock climbing, but not everything else (well, *he* has been great at cardio...just notsomuch me).  We are doing the couch-to-5K program.  It is simpler than I need, but I think it's nice to start from the ground up sometimes.  We just finished Week 1!  As I told my husband today, we always knew we could, but we just proved that we can fit 5 workout days in one week.  Game.  On.  (Secret: I want to get back to 6 days/week and add in a lifting day too!)

And here are my goals:

1. Be in shape again: I want to be able to do things like run a 5K because a friend is and have no need to prep for it. 
2. Lose 30 pounds: I know I said I gained back around 50, but my low from 2010 was too low for maintenance.  I was 17.2% body fat.  I want to be in the low 20s.  Basically, I want to wear a size 10/12.  I think that's 30 pounds.
3. Feel strong again: This may sound crazy, but I miss DOMS.  I miss feeling my muscles.  I miss being able to bench 120 pounds for a full set.  I want it back.

So, yeah.  That's where I am.  And where I want to go.  And how I plan to get there.  I'll post along the way if you care to join me...again.  :)