In the meantime.

It’s been a hell of a month.

I was in an accident. My car was totaled. I’m sad about it but Ben and I had already been throwing around the idea of a more fuel efficient car since I drive 100 miles round trip to get to work every day. We are trying to take the payout for the car, then money we can make selling some of the aftermarkets parts off if it to pay for a used Prius or comparable car.

Ben had surgery on his spine to fix a protrusion the size of a silver dollar. The good news is that the numbness and constant severe pain he was feeling in his leg has gone, the bad news is that recovery from the surgery was not nearly as easy as they made it sound! He’s about a week and a half out from surgery and is slowly getting better every day. He’s even been able to spend a little bit of time at the dog park the last few days.

Oh, and also, we are like totally broke. Well, that’s not completel true but for the first time in a long, long, long time I am REALLY worried about money. And it sucks. I look at everything around the house and wonder what I could sell it for. And the stress is finally starting to break me down. I’m so much more lucky than a lot of people in that Ben and I have a support system, like my amazing Dad and step-mom, but we both REALLY want to NOT have to ask for help. I mean, if it comes to that we are both willing to do it, it’s not so much a pride thing, it’s more of… we REALLY just want to be able to do this. To prove to OURSELVES that we are fighters and willing to do whatever it takes to fix things.

So, I dunno, that’s where I am right now. I know there are a lot of people out there worse of than we are so I feel like an ass complaining about stuff like this but… this is where I am. I don’t know what the future holds for us right now but I know that we are going to face it together and fight it as a team. I’ve heard that money problems like this often are hard on relationships but it’s been the opposite for us. We’ve both realized that no matter how broke we are, a hug, or one of us grabbing the other’s hand while watching the dogs play somehow feels more powerful. We are one and we are going to do this together and this hug, it’s free, and it feels good.

Women usually love what they buy, yet hate two-thirds of what is in their closets.

So, I’ve needed new jeans for about a month and a half. I’ve been rotating between THREE PAIR and trying to dress them up in different ways to not make it looks like I only had THREE PAIR and I was quickly beginning to think that the people at work assume I live out of the trunk of my car. Or a cardboard box. Either way.

The problem is that, we really don’t have the money for me to go and buy new jeans right now, especially since (HOPEFULLY) in another two months when I’m done with P90X, I’ll need MORE jeans. Then today I remembered a friend mentioning The Goodwill the other day and was like DUH! I’ve gotten jeans there before because, HELLO CHEAP! I totally rock The Goodwill jeans.

ANYWAY! I’ve been telling myself for at least a week now that I have a LOT OF JEANS, I just need to go through and try them on and for sure before I go and BUY anymore. But… there was a big part of me that KNEW I’d be disappointed at all the pairs I couldn’t fit into yet so I’ve been making excuses EVERY DAY.

Then today, when I got out of a bath after a pretty intense Plymometrics workout, I looked over at my THREE PAIR of jeans laying on the floor and went to pick them up to put them in the wash and was like FUCK THIS, I’M TIRED OF THESE JEANS. So I started pulling out pairs of jeans and tried EVERY SINGLE PAIR ON. Here is how it went.

8 pair – still too small
6 pair – FIT! But have holes or are inappropriate for work, but will make GREAT weekend/yard working jeans
3 pair – entirely too big
9 pair – FIT PERFECTLY!

NINE PAIR! I HAVE NINE PAIRS OF JEANS THAT FIT!

NINE!

So when Ben called to me for some reason I came bounding out of the room:

Me: GUESS WHAT!? ARE YOU LISTENING TO ME!?
Ben: Yes, I am listening to you.
Me: So, I was totally going to go shopping for new jeans but told myself I HAD to try all my jeans on BEFORE I went so I did and GUESS WHAT?!
Ben: You have jeans that fit?
Me: (All in one breath) NINE PAIR! AND THREE ARE TOO BIG AND SIX FIT BUT HAVE HOLES AND EIGHT ARE TOO SMALL BUT NINE PAIR FIT!
Ben: You have 26 PAIRS OF JEANS?!
Me: Shit.
Ben: TWENTY SIX PAIRS. OF. JEANS!
Me: I’ll be down to watch Lost in a second! I LOVE YOU OKAY BYE!

Cardinal Rule of Wifehood: Never admit to the number of shoes, purses, eye shadows or jeans you own. The poor men just can’t handle it.

Seriously though, after he got past the initial shock, he congratulated me and told me how proud he was and really, I am so proud of MYSELF. Even though I’ve been doing P90X for two 15 days now, until today I hadn’t lost any weight. I know I’ve gained muscle because I can see it, so I know I’ve lost fat because I’m not GAINING weight but actual pounds had not come off yet. Then yesterday I mentioned it on my P90X blog and this morning, BAM!

THE POUND. The pound I’ve been waiting to see for two weeks so I can finally officially say: I have lost 40 pounds.

I feel SO GOOD. I feel STRONG. I feel FIT. I feel like my lungs are bigger, my heart is stronger and my endurance is sky high.

I owe huge, gigantic, TOTALLY BIG thank you’s to two very important people:

Ben. Who has supported and encouraged me every single step of the way. He has been tough on me when I needed it and sensitive when I really needed a break. There is no way that I could have done this without the constant support and encouragement from my husband. And I know how hard it is for him to sit there and WATCH but not be able to DO since he’s pretty much stuck on the couch till his back surgery on the 15th of this month. To be able to stay upbeat and positive and supportive while he’s been down is a BIG DEAL to me. Thank you, honey.

And!

Julie. Who’s own transformation is just… AMAZING. I’ve known Julie for a LONG time. I got to hold her 1st baby the day he was born, I was there to watch her walk down the isle, and even though I’m a hippy liberal SHE STILL LIKES ME! What she’s given to me in a healthy body, mind and spirit is more than I ever expected. She makes me laugh pretty much every day and keeps me motivated to PUSH PLAY and BRING IT! Thank you, Julie!

*flex*

I know that some of you have been asking me WHERE THE HELL ARE YOU YOU!? And the answer is here: http://health.aflux.net/

I started P90X 11 days ago. The first day I threw up, a few days later I laid in the floor wondered WHAT THE HELL AM I THINKING, then yesterday I wanted to punch a wall because this is HARD.

Also, it’s been pretty much the most awesome thing ever. I’m sleeping better, have more energy, I can SEE muscle growing which means fat MUST be disappearing because my weight has stayed the same!

So, no, I’m not abandoning aflux. And yes, I do still have a life outside of working out but time has become a precious commodity and once I have a better balance down I’ll be back here again. I miss blogging and all your comments and ALL OF YOU. Like OHMYGOSH so much.

Purge

I’ve been thinking about this for awhile. A purge. Then things like the earthquake in Haiti happen, or you read a particularly moving piece about a homeless person, or you see a friend lose a beloved pet, or you see two friends lose them… and it makes even more sense.

I have all these things, these material things that sit unused on shelves, or tucked into little corners of the house or shoved under the seat in my car. Thousands of dollars worth of THINGS. Unused, uncared about, unnoticed and completely unnecessary. Last weekend, on a whim, I ransacked my closet and got rid of anything I couldn’t remember having worn in a year. There was a lot more I could have gotten rid of, but, baby steps. Then I made Cassidy do the same thing and she got rid of more than I did. Off to the Goodwill it all went. I always have Cassidy go with me when I donate stuff. I think it’s important that people she be a part of that. I did some searching the other day though and found a battered women’s shelter in a nearby town so this weekend, when I do another purge, that’s where we’ll be taking them all.

Then I’m going to move onto some of the big ticket items. I realized on a daily basis I carry around about $2300 worth or stuff between the purse, DSLR + accessories, Flip, iPhone, etc. It’s silly. But, unfortunately it’s all stuff I’d feel lost without. The spare iPhone that’s been sitting there unused for a year, the two Window’s smart phones, the HD mini camcorder… not so much! I don’t need five Coach purses, I don’t need 10 pairs of black strappy heels, I just don’t. So I’m going to start getting rid of these things. Sell some on Ebay, Craigslist, some of it I’ll just give away. We could use the money right now for sure, bit good karma can be just as important.

There is so much more though. The guest bedroom is full of boxes we haven’t unpacked since we moved a year and a half ago! THINGS! I haven’t used my desktop for anything other than data storage and a print server in over a year. THINGS! We have a cat house that the cat’s haven’t cared about just sitting there (although, moving it upstairs where they always are might help), extra dog crates, the list just goes on and on and on.

After The Purge, The Decorating will once again commence. Looking at Brittney‘s pretty pictures of her house inspired me. The clean, uncluttered, pretties are what I want in a home. Keyword: UNCLUTTERED.

I can’t wait. And of course, I’ll take lots of pictures along the way.

Either you run the day or the day runs you.

I promised in a past post that I’d update you all on this weight loss thing and how it’s going. So here we go.

I’ve lost 31.5 pounds and 10% body fat. That’s a lot of fat. The last time I was at the gym I picked up a 30 pound weight just to see what it felt like and my body goaned and my heart skipped and my head exploded. 30 pounds is HEAVY!

A lot of people in real life always dance around The Question. The “What did you weight to start” question. I’ve never really understood that. Like, why is The Weight Question something that people are so reluctant to answer? It’s a number. It doesn’t define your self worth. It doesn’t MEAN anything to anybody but the person answering the question. I think that most women are scared to answer it, especailly when a skinnier person is asking, because women are SO OBSESSED with that number. It’s like a competition. It’s not. Women, seriously, stop it. I’d rather be 140 pounds of lean muscle mass than 105 pounds of weak emaciated limbs. The Number has a different meaning for evey person and using it to gain some kind of psychological upper hand is lame and catty and why 81% of the female population bugs the shit out of me.

Last September, a few days before my birthday, I got on the scale for the first time in MONTHS AND MONTHS and expected to weight MAYBE 200 pounds. I weighed 230. My body groaned and my heart skipped a beat and my head exploded. It’s a general theme. That wasn’t even the worst part. Ben and I made the collective decision to Get Healthy so we went to the gym and I ran for two minutes and had to stop because I felt like I was going to FUCKING DIE RIGHT THERE OMG. I couldn’t believe how out of shape I was. I was ashamed and sad and SCARED.

Today, four months later I weigh 197.6 which is progress! But still around 40 pounds from where I think a healthy weight is for me. I’ll never be 120 pounds again and, honestly, I don’t ever want to be that tiny. I want muscles. I want strong powerful legs and biceps and CURVES. I don’t think I’d make a good skinny girl.

I feel better, my clothes fit better, I’m stronger, I’m a better me. It hasn’t been easy. When the first pounds come off you feel GREAT. You are MOTIVATED and AWESOME and YEAH! Then you hit a wall. I haven’t lost any weight in the last two weeks and I have to keep reminding myself that I’m STRONGER. I have muscles now that I didn’t have before but it’s still easy to fall into that little lull that leads back to The Quitting. I set a challenge for myself this week to do intense cardio every day. For me this will be TurboJam kicking my ass.

One of the hardest parts of this entire journey so far has been what I see as a personal defeat: The Running. I LOVE to run. I love the sound of my feet hitting the ground, the feeling of air deep down in my lungs, the empty mind as I focus on breathing and getting to my next goal. It’s therapeutic and I love it. I’ve come leaps and bounds from that first two minute run. Cardiovascularly, I think I could run MILES but my shins start to ache after the first mile. Like, BAD ACHE. Like, have consistent pain for the week following. Like, actually limp up and down stairs for the next three days. I can’t begin to explain how frustrating this is to me. I feel like I have failed. My body is failing me.

So here’s my plan. My final effort. I’m going to give this one last try force my body with all my might to shape the fuck up. I’m ordring some shin compression wraps as soon as I’m done posting this and as soon as they get here my run will look like this.

1) Wear compression wraps
2) 10 minute FAST walk to warm my muscles up.
3) 1 mile run at 5.5 MPH (I can go faster but I want a baby step here)
4) IMMEDIATELY ice. Like, get off the treadmill, stretch, drive home, ICE.
5) Aspirin!
6) See how I am the next day.

This is pretty much my last ditch effort. I can’t tell you how bad I want this to work. I just can’t.

Till then, the rest of this week will look like this:

Wednesday: TurboJam Cardio Party
Thursday: Core training at home on the ball with the medicine ball & AbJam
Friday: Gym (cardio and upper body. Have I mentioned I’m addicted to my new bicep muscles?)
Saturday: TurboJam Cardio Party
Sunday: Core training at home on the ball with the medicine ball & AbJam
Monday: Gym (cardio and upper body)

We’ll see how that goes. I want my legs to be completely rested (from weight training at least) when I go for that first run.

AND! Now I’ve gone on a lot longer than I meant to.

Night!

PS – I might start doing some videos they way Julie is. I love watching them and I like the idea of being 1) accountable, and 2) able to look back later and see the change in body and attitude.

PSS – Talk me out of getting a fourth tattoo. Seriously. It’s been on my mind a lot lately.