Posted onFebruary 27, 2015|Comments Off on Fitting Splurges Into My Meals (or How I Need To Eat For Life)
I’m still getting used to post-cleanse life. It’s tough to find a balance even though I completely understand what I need to do now. But I had some opportunities to test out my new knowledge with some splurges over the past week.
It started on Sunday with the Oscars Party. I ate cleanly and limited my calories before going to the party. I tried to go to the party without being hungry, but I knew I could be there from about 3-10pm, so I’d have to eat at some point. I did make some good choices like cut up veggies. But that wouldn’t be enough to hold me over for the evening.
The traditional thing that Chris and Marie make for their party is queso dip with chips. So I made a small portion of that for me and it was really delicious! By eating so clean and plain normally, things that are different taste more extreme than I’m used to. So less of it filled me up and satisfied me. Beyond that, I stayed with pretty healthy options for the rest of the party. My weight the next day was up a little, but that was to be expected because of sodium.
The next test for me was Disneyland. I ate breakfast and lunch at home (and also did a pre-Disneyland workout at Orangetheory) and brought a snack with me. The only thing I ate at the park was my soup in a bread bowl. No treats or candy for me. And all I drank was water. With my smart choices and all the walking I did, I lost the weight that I had gained from the Oscar Party while at Disneyland and splurging a little.
I also had a minor setback/splurge this past week with some crispy M&Ms. Those are my favorite and they only just came back into stores after being gone for a long time. I didn’t need them, but I had them. But I balanced it out by not eating as much for dinner that night.
I’m also looking at finding more good options for lunch. Now that my lunches can be cooked, I’m exploring what else I can eat while I work (which means that I need it to be ok to eat cold). Right now, I’m loving the quinoa cowboy veggie burgers from Trader Joes. I had one the other day with half an avocado and a banana. This kept me satisfied and full even through my workout!
I’m hoping to not have as many splurges/treats in a normal week. This weekend will be tough because I’m going wine tasting and will be going out for some nice meals. But once I’m back, I will be back to my almost always clean eating. But this is normal life, and I have to learn how to live this way and still continue the right way on my weight loss journey.
I recently renewed my annual pass for Disneyland. The level of pass that I have is only available for renewals, so I wanted to make sure that I renewed in time. I also made the decision to pay for the parking add-on, so I don’t have to spend $17 to park every time I go. I’m super glad I made that decision because just the other day, Disneyland eliminated the option to do a parking add-on (it’s only available now with the highest level pass which is about double the cost of my pass).
Right after I renewed my pass, I got a text from my Evil Twin Shey asking if I still had an annual pass. I told her I did and she said that she had been invited to an annual pass holder event and wanted to see if I wanted to be one of her guests! It was on this past Monday, which worked out perfectly for me!
When I got to the park, I took a few moments to enjoy the lack of crowds inside.
Good to know that Monday afternoons are pretty empty. I’ll have to go to Disneyland more often then!
Shey and her friends who were joining us weren’t at the park yet, so I decided to do a trip around Disneyland on the railroad.
I love the circle tour around the park. It’s so nice and relaxing and I get to see how crowded different areas of the park are that day. And my favorite thing is between the Tomorrowland and Main Street stations. They have the Grand Canyon and Primeval World dioramas! The Grand Canyon diorama was looking great. But when we got to the Primeval World section it was dark and covered by tarps. I guess that they were doing some work back there, but it was sad that we still were hearing the audio for the dinosaurs without getting to see them.
After getting back to the Main Street station, I realized that the parade was about to start. Since none of my friends were at the park yet, I decided to see if I could find somewhere to sit and watch it. And there was actually a bench right on the parade route with one seat left! So I sat back and watched the entire parade (I can’t remember the last time I did that).
The parade was pretty cute and as soon as the last float went past me, Shey texted me to say that they were all outside the gates of the park ready to get our wristbands for the event that evening! So I headed out to meet them and get checked in for the private event.
Since the private event in Disneyland didn’t start until 8pm, we decided to spent the first part of our time at California Adventure. Most of us wanted to ride on Tower of Terror, so that’s where we headed first. 4 of the 5 of us went on and I think we got a pretty funny photo (we are in the first row).
Next, we headed over to one of my favorite rides, Radiator Springs Racers. Again, only 4 of us rode and I think 2 of the girls in the group had never been on the ride before. We all had a great time, and our car tied in the race.
We also rode The Little Mermaid and Toy Story Mania. I rode alone on Toy Story Mania, so I couldn’t do some of the cool Easter Eggs on the ride (you really need 2 shooters for those), but I did get the second highest score in our vehicle.
Before getting some dinner, we went on California Screamin’. To make the wait shorter, we all went in the single rider line. I sat next to a guy who didn’t seem as enthusiastic about the ride as I was.
For dinner, I got baked potato soup in a bread bowl. It isn’t the healthiest thing I can get at the parks, but it’s definitely far from the worst. Plus, I kept my calories low for the beginning of the day and I know that I usually walk over 5 miles during a day at Disneyland. So the splurge was worth it (plus it was getting cold so soup warmed me up)!
Then we headed over to Disneyland where there was only about an hour before the private event started. Our first ride was Space Mountain. I decided to tell all the girls about my mom’s rule how you have to ride with your hands up the entire time. They all decided to try it and I think we all had a great time on the coaster.
After that, the park was starting to clear out. Only guests who had reserved spaces for the party could stay, and it was shocking how few people remained in the park! Our next stop was Star Tours, where we basically walked right on.
Followed by Buzz Lightyear’s Astro Blasters. I don’t know if I’ve ever walked on a ride as quickly. Shey and I rode together, and this was her first time on this ride. So I tried to help guide her to find the good targets, and I’m super impressed by her score! I never did that well on my first few times on the ride.
After Buzz Lightyear, I wanted to get an evil photo with my Evil Twin. So we found some pretty awesome evil hats for a quick photo.
One of the features of this private party were some awesome photo ops with characters that aren’t always out. We decided to check out the villains photo-op but the line was pretty insane. We guessed it would take us about an hour to get through the line, and since we wanted to maximize our time, we didn’t wait. Instead, we went on some more walk-on rides.
I love Big Thunder Mountain Railroad and I haven’t had a chance lately to ride it at night. So of course, that was next. The ride instead is already amazing, but what made it magical was what happened at the top of the mountain. The fireworks for Fantasmic were going off as we were on the ride! It was a super cheesy and magical moment that I loved!
We followed that up by riding Pirates Of The Caribbean where we got stuck for 5-10 minutes in the very beginning of the ride. It was right next to the Blue Bayou restaurant which is usually pretty busy. And it was closed during this event so it was completely empty and quiet. That was a little creepy. We finally got moving again and by the time we got off the ride, I realized that I only had time for another ride or two before I wanted to head home.
I really wanted to ride the Storybook Canal Boats at night to see all the buildings lit up. Plus, they recently added a “Frozen” section and I wanted to see how it was done. As soon as we got into the main part of the ride, I gasped. It looked amazing and beautiful!
The archways were all lit up with fairy lights and I really enjoyed the new “Frozen” castles.
I was planning on leaving then, but as we walked by Dumbo we realized that nobody was in line! I’ve never seen Dumbo without a crazy line, so of course we went on Dumbo!
I got my elephant all the way to the top and just spent the ride up in the air checking out all the amazing lights and sights of Fantasyland.
And as we were leaving the park, we noticed a dance party going on with a princess DJ and a guy walking around with a glass slipper. So we got a final group picture with the glass slipper.
By then, I had been at Disneyland for about 10 hours. It’s not the longest I’ve been there, but it was almost midnight so it was the latest I’ve been there. Plus I still had a drive home and had to work the next morning. But even though I left before the rest of my group, I felt like I had a super wonderful and full day at Disneyland!
I’m so grateful that my Evil Twin invited me to this event. It’s a rarity to see the parks so empty and I got to ride pretty much all of my favorite rides! This was the perfect way to start another year of having an annual pass!
For the Oscars this year, I was at Chris and Marie’shouse likeI always am. It really is such a great way to watch the awards and everyone who comes to the party is so awesome!
I was trying to plan out a super clever costume for a while and I decided that going as a Lego figure from “The Lego Movie” would be perfect! I was looking up costume ideas online when I noticed that someone else who attends the party had recently pinned several pins on Pinterest about Lego costume ideas. I was almost completely sure that they would be going as a Lego person, and I didn’t want to compete with that.
I was feeling a little uninspired by other movies so I was stuck on an idea until a few days before the show. I realized that while it might not be the most clever costume, I did have the clothing and some of the gear to go as Reese Witherspoon’s character from “Wild”. If I did that costume, I wouldn’t have to buy anything and it would be pretty comfortable to wear for the day.
So on the day of the party, I put on some workout clothes and my hiking shoes and grabbed my hiking poles and my backpack (which I stuffed my purse inside) and headed to the party. Considering the lack of effort I put into the costume, I think I looked pretty good!
I knew that my costume was pretty unlikely to win an award in the costume contest (I’ve only placed in that contest one time), so I was focusing on picking the winners on my ballot and hoping that I would place 1st or 2nd in that (since there are 2 prizes for guessing the winners). This wasn’t my most prepared year and I hadn’t seen as many of the films as I would have liked to, but I made my best guesses and felt pretty confident with what I picked.
That confidence was pretty short-lived once the show started. I did guess all of the acting categories correctly (and I’m super excited that JK Simmons won because he was a guest on the Inside Acting Podcastright before I started working with them). I also got the documentary and animation categories correct. But there were more that I guessed incorrectly than correctly.
I knew that there was no chance for me to win a prize, but that didn’t damper my experience at the party. I was having a great time and I thought that the Oscars were really good this year! I enjoyed the opening number as well as the performance for “Everything Is Awesome”. And while I was initially a little disappointed that Lady Gaga was the person doing the “Sound Of Music” montage, she did an amazing job and I really enjoyed watching how much Julie Andrews enjoyed Lady Gaga’s performance. And while the winners weren’t what I picked, I think all the winners were great choices and there were no awards where I was upset by who won.
After the awards were done, it was time for the costume parade so we could vote. Then it was time for the host and hostess to pass out the awards.
The friend who had pinned the Lego costumes on Pinterest was one of the winners. And all the other winners had costumes from “The Grand Budapest Hotel”.
Overall, it was the perfect way to spend Oscar Sunday. The rain was a little annoying, but since I was inside watching the awards pretty much the entire time, it didn’t bother me too much and I was able to have an amazing Sunday afternoon/evening!
Posted onFebruary 24, 2015|Comments Off on 2 Floods in 11 Hours (or I’m Glad I Knew Where The Water Shut-Off Was)
On Thursday night last week, I was getting into bed when I heard the strangest sound coming from my bathroom. It almost sounded like someone turned my bathtub on, but I knew that unless someone broke into my bathroom to do that, it wasn’t that. I was a bit tired so it took me a moment to get out of bed to investigate the noise, but as soon as I got into the bathroom, I’m glad I didn’t take longer.
The hose that connects the water from the valve in the wall to my sink had disconnected and water was spraying everywhere! There was already a layer of water on the floor and it was spilling into my bedroom.
After a second of freaking out, I knew that I needed to stop the water. My dad had showed me in the past how to shut off the water from both inside and outside my house. So I located the shut off valve in the wall and reached in to turn it off.
Then, I realized that the hose that disconnected was the hot water hose. And I keep my water heater really hot, so the water coming out was really hot as well. I knew I had to turn it off no matter what, so I reached in, ignored the pain from the hot water, and got the flooding to stop.
I then took a moment to evaluate the situation. I could see exactly which hose broke, but I knew that I didn’t want to fix this myself in case there was a bigger problem than that.
I got all the water cleaned up from the bathroom and bedroom floor and sent an emergency email to my landlord about this. Then I called my mom to ask about the pain I was feeling on my arm, shoulder, and back. All my skin was bright red and shiny, but my mom said that I should be fine (this issue was what made my workout on Friday tough).
The next morning, the handyman got to my house. He saw the problem and said that it would be a simple fix. About 15 minutes later, he put a new hose in and it was working great. Then he tested the cold water and the valve broke out of the wall and caused another flood.
And this time, since the valve was no longer in the wall, he had to run outside my house to turn off the water to my entire house from the outside. This also meant that the flooding was worse than what it was the night before.
Again, I cleaned up the flooding and worked on drying things that got wet (towels, rugs, and my shower curtain). But fortunately the handyman helped me because he said that this was his fault.
After about another hour, everything was fixed and better than ever.
So, what did I learn from having 2 floods within 11 hours? I’m sure happy that my dad taught me some very basic plumbing information so I could shut off the water. The handyman said that he’s been to places where the tenant didn’t know how to do that so the flooding was going until he got there and it usually got pretty bad. I’m also grateful that this happened when I was home. I couldn’t imagine how horrible it would have been if this happened when I was gone for several hours. It also made me happy that I rent and none of the repairs were at my cost. But I would eventually like to own a house or condo and I really should learn how to do some more things so that I could fix things like this on my own.
And I guess my floors are probably the cleanest they’ve been in a while since they got washed and deep cleaned twice in two days.
This week I only got 3 workouts in. I wish I could have gotten more workouts done, and it could have been accomplished. But I can’t have regrets in getting 3 workouts done when before Orangetheory I could only strive to get 3 workouts in in a week.
I thought I was starting my new temp job this past week, and that didn’t happen (I have no clue if it will happen this week either). But I planned my workouts with the assumption that I would be working the new job this week, so that restricted things a bit for me.
Monday was going to be a normal workout time. But then I realized that if I moved my workout to earlier, I could go to San Diego for the day. So I decided to sign up for a class at 7:30am. That’s so early for me! But I realized that unless I go to an earlier class, that is the only class time I could do if I wanted to do a workout before I start work (I will have to do that in about a week).
My body wasn’t really awake when I arrived to the workout, but I quickly perked up when I had to do my first push pace on the treadmill. I wasn’t in as much pain as I thought I would be, so that’s a big positive. And I think that my workout report proves that I kicked some butt in that early class!
It’s not my highest calorie burn, but it’s up there!
As far as timing it out for a before work workout, it worked perfectly. But then I realized that there was no traffic on the freeway when I was going to the class and home from the class. I forgot that Monday was a holiday so many people weren’t going to work. So I don’t know exactly how it will work out when there is traffic, but worst case I start my work shift with wet hair. That’s not the worst thing.
Wednesday was my usual class time and it felt much more normal to me than my early workout. But changing things up for me is a good thing and I know I probably need to do it more often.
Friday was a challenging day. I had a bit of an incident at my house on Thursday evening and Friday morning (more about that in another blog post) and I was dealing with a lot of shoulder, back, and arm pain. My upper body is usually where I can push myself more and more since I’m so limited in my hip movement. But this class I had to try to go more with my lower body to ease things on my upper body.
I did step ups onto the bench which is something I usually avoid. They hurt quite a bit, but I pushed through them and fortunately that section of the workout was done pretty quickly. And I think I didn’t feel as much pain in my hips as usual because I was dealing with pain in my upper body. So my mind must have been confused with all that extra pain in parts of my body that don’t usually hurt.
This week will be another 3 workout week. And the week after will probably have to be the same. I’m trying not to get frustrated because there are things that I’ve been looking forward to that are preventing me from working out. And I have to be ok with 3 workouts without thinking that I need to do more. Plus, in a few weeks my life will be calmer and I can get back to seeing how often I can have a 4 workout week.
But for now, when I “only ” have 3 workouts, I need to make sure I push myself as much as possible to get the most out of those 3 workouts.
Posted onFebruary 20, 2015|Comments Off on Bringing More Food Back Into My Diet (or Staying Vegetarian For Now)
This past week was my first post-cleanse week. Right when I started the cleanse, my plan was to have a steak on my first post-cleanse day. I was craving meat like crazy and that seemed like a good way to celebrate doing a cleanse (and being vegan) for 28 days.
But as the days in the cleanse went on, that plan started to change. I am still in the weight loss challenge at Orangetheory (1 week left to go with that) and my need to have a steak right away went away. Plus, I’ve got an amazing trip coming up next weekend with my mom and sister-in-law and my mom made reservations at a fancy steakhouse. I’m sure that that steak will be so much better than anything that I can make, so I’m going to wait.
My first post-cleanse grocery trip was a little overwhelming. Suddenly I could get whatever I wanted. If I wanted ice cream, I could have it again. If I wanted frozen mac and cheese (one of my favorite Trader Joes splurges), I could buy it. But I tried to focus on eating similarly to the cleanse plan.
I did get some frozen turkey burgers and frozen tilapia to keep in my freezer, but right now I don’t know if I’ll be eating them anytime soon. But they seemed like good “emergency” meal things to have. But I’m pretty much vegetarian at home right now.
The main things that I brought back into my diet were eggs and dairy. I’ve been eating eggs (1 whole egg and 2 egg whites) for breakfast most days. As much as I wanted to keep just having fruit for breakfast, that never satisfied me. I need protein in the mornings. I usually scramble the eggs up with some spinach and onions and top it with a 1/4 cup of cheese (which is the actual serving size and not just me dumping some cheese on top). I also added some greek yogurt back into my diet. I love to use it instead of sour cream for baked potatoes (my mom and dad now do that too). So I had it on Saturday night with some sautéed potatoes and onions. It was so yummy!
I also had a meal out this week. When I was in San Diego, I went out for dinner. There weren’t a ton of choices on the menu that seemed like good choices and almost everything had meat on it. I’m sure I could have asked for things to be made without meat, but the menu said “no substitutions” all over it. I feel good about my choice of Huevos Rancheros, but my body did have a big jump on the scale the next day. Not being able to control the oil, seasonings, and salt is not good for me as far as losing weight.
I tried not to freak out about the weight gain. I knew it must have been from salt in the food. But I had some good clean meals the few days after and that weight gain is gone.
My weight now is just under where it was at the end of the cleanse. So I’m still heading in the right direction even with the weight gain from Monday’s dinner.
I don’t know if I’ll be adding meat back into my diet this next week before my trip. I have a full day tomorrow where I won’t be home from 11am until maybe 10 or 11pm and then the next day is the Oscar party (I’m hoping that I can make good choices while I’m at the party).
But the main thing I’m doing (which is one of the lessons I learned at the end of the cleanse), is that it’s ok for me to have a treat or splurge every once in a while. It’s safer for me if those treats or splurges don’t happen in my house so that they don’t become a regular part of my diet. And when I’m not out or enjoying a treat, I need to focus on good clean foods at home. That way I can balance it all out.
It’s taken 31 years and a lot of different diets, but eating right without being super restrictive is finally making sense to me.
Last night was the first meeting of my new Women In Film mentoring circle. I was a little nervous going in because of my experience with my last mentoring circle. While I really loved getting to know the women in my last circle who showed up, out of 10 women only 3 of us regularly attending the meetings. And while I understand that we all live busy and crazy lives, it was still disappointing.
One of my new mentors is a manager and the other is a producer. They were both so nice at the meeting and their stories and experiences were amazing to hear about.
After our mentors introduced themselves, we went around introducing ourselves. In my last mentoring circle, almost all the mentees were actors. There were some writers, but most of them were also actors (I think there was only 1 writer who wasn’t an actor as well). But in this group, there is only 1 other actor! Everyone else has such a variety of jobs. There are writers, directors, producers, and even someone who helps entertainment industry companies rent office space!
Not only did all the other mentees have a wide range of jobs, they were all super supportive and enthusiastic about the mentoring circle and what we can accomplish as a group! My old circle was supportive, but we were looking more toward our mentors as guidance to what our group should do. This time, we are taking charge of things and are planning our own mentee meetings between the meetings with our mentors (I’m actually in charge of organizing our mentee meeting).
I left the meeting feeling super positive and excited to see what the next year will bring for me and the other women in my mentoring circle. I really feeling like I was put into an incredible group that will help me reach my goals (and of course I will help them as well).
I’m not trying to put down my last mentoring circle. I learned a lot from my mentors and the other women who regularly attended the meetings. But I really felt like there was so much more that I could have gotten out of that group than I did. And maybe part of that is my fault that I did not ask to see if we could do more. But now I’m super motivated to make this next year super productive and I know that this mentoring circle will help me reach my goals.
I always have Mondays off from my main day job (I work Tuesday-Saturday). I usually just spend the day getting stuff done around my house or running errands. They tend to be pretty lazy days (except for my workout).
But this past Monday my mom was down in San Diego visiting with my grandparents. Her cousin Karen (who I haven’t seen in over 20 years) was also down in San Diego. So I rearranged my day so I could spend a couple of hours in San Diego with everyone.
After an early workout and showering and dressing, I was on the road by 10:30am. The drive went much better than it has in the past. I was down at my grandparents’ place in 2 hours and arrived a few seconds after my mom and cousin Karen got there from their hotel as well.
Most of the day was spent in my grandparents’ condo just catching up. I hadn’t seen my grandparents’ since Thanksgiving so it was awesome to get to see them again. And my mom was at the tail end of a multi-state trip so she was filling me in on everything that she did. And of course, getting to talk with cousin Karen a lot.
We all went out for Mexican food for dinner. I knew we’d be going out to dinner, so I had planned my meals accordingly and saved a lot of calories for the meal. I also had done some research on good vegetarian options at Mexican restaurants (I still haven’t brought meat back into my diet yet).
I ended up getting Huevos Rancheros. It’s somewhat close to what I would make as a rice bowl at home, just with some eggs. Now that I’m being careful with what I’m eating, I’m realizing how difficult it can be to eat out. I had no control over oil, salt, or any other extras that were added into my meal. So I had to try to guess the nutrition levels of my meal as best as I could. But since I was careful with my breakfast and lunch, I think it was ok to splurge a little on my dinner. And I didn’t have any chips or partake in the pitcher of margaritas that the table got.
After dinner, we all headed back to my grandparents’ place and I got my car so I could head home again. I ended up being in San Diego for just under 7 hours, so that’s a pretty good visit.
The drive home was easy again and I was home in time to get some stuff done in preparation for my work week.
I’m so glad that the timing of things worked out so well for me to have a family day on Monday. My family has always been important to me, but I’ve realized lately that I need to put in a better effort to see my family. Time goes by quickly and I can easily go a few months without going to San Diego to see my grandparents and that’s not good. I might be going down to see them again in 2 months when my parents (and dog) are down there. But I’m still trying to work out the timing for that.
I know that it doesn’t seem like I did a lot on my day trip to San Diego, but just being around my family is such a great way for me to recharge and get ready to kick some butt again in my life.
I love that the Inside Acting Podcast is doing more and more hangout with our listeners! It was great when we had our Chipotle meetup, but not everyone was able to make that one. So we scheduled another dinner meetup for this past week.
The dinner was at Native Foods, which is a vegan restaurant very close to my house. At first, I wasn’t planning on eating there because it was going to be on the last day of my cleanse. But I did a lot of research on their menu and discovered 2 things that were actually cleanse-friendly (most of their food has soy in it which was not allowed on the cleanse). So I decided that I would celebrate the end of my cleanse with a meal that wasn’t prepared by me (the first meal like that in 28 days!).
I ended up getting a salad which was ginormous and super delicious! I was only able to eat about half of it, so a friend of mine ended up eating the rest. It felt so decadent to eat something that someone else made. I don’t know if I’ve ever felt that way about a restaurant meal before because I used to eat a lot of prepared foods (whether it was delivery or frozen meals from the store).
When I got to Native Foods, a couple of people were there. But before we knew it, we had about 25 people there! We took over a majority of the seating inside (we gave them a heads up about our group and they said “bring it”). It was so great to reconnect with old friends and to meet lots of new people. And everyone is so amazing and awesome!
And within the 25 or so people who were there, the entire team behind the podcast was there! I don’t believe that we have all been in one place at one time, so of course we took a team photo.
I ended up being at Native Foods for almost 5 hours. Time flew by just chatting about random stuff with everyone there.
I’m so happy that the podcast is now becoming a more social thing. And if you are interested in finding out more about our future hangouts (we’ve got a couple of ideas in the works right now), I recommend joining our email list. We send weekly emails and include any podcast events in the emails.
Posted onFebruary 16, 2015|Comments Off on Waiting On The Wait List (or The Text That Made My Week)
I think it’s pretty obvious now that I’m very focused on making sure that my workouts happen each week. While I’ve set my minimum number of workouts a week at 3, I really strive for 4. Especially since there are some weeks coming up soon where 4 workouts will be impossible. And if I want to reach my goal of 175 workouts this year, I have to spend about half the year working out 4 times a week.
This week was one of those weeks where I thought I could get in 4 workouts. Then, I found out about an event on Friday (more about that tomorrow) that I wasn’t going to miss. And since I thought I was starting my temp job this week, I didn’t know when else I could workout.
Then, I found out that the start date for the temp job was pushed back so I tried to get into a Thursday class. Unfortunately, there was already a waitlist and no guarantee that I would get in. I tried to think positively, but I was worried that I wouldn’t get in. I even wore my workout clothes that day not knowing whether or not I would get in my workout.
But then, I got this text and had a super enthusiastic response to it.
Thank goodness I got into class! I needed the workout after the crazy week I had at work and I love that my workouts are now the way I deal with stress (instead of food).
All my workouts this week went really well. I’m having some increasing hip issues with lifting my legs during step ups on the benches, but there are modifications that I can do. And I have an appointment with a hip surgeon in a few weeks, so I’ll go over that problem with them.
My favorite workout this week was on Saturday. Since it was Valentine’s Day, it was a partner workout. Partner workouts are great because I feel extra motivated to get through my sets quickly. My partner is depending on me. The cardio portion of the partner workout was a run/row. I ended up spending more than half of my time on the rower. I’m getting much better at the rower (I rowed 750 meters and 1000 meters without stopping earlier this week). While my technique isn’t perfect because of my hip, I’m definitely a better rower now than I was even a month ago.
The strength portion of the partner workout was half floor work and half strap work. When one of us was on the strap, the other was on the floor. The moves were all pretty tough, but I had an amazing partner (who I only met for the first time in class when we had to partner up). We got through the entire rotation of work twice, and I don’t believe that any other team was able to do so.
While I did get my 4 workouts in this week, the next 2 or 3 weeks will have to be 3 workout weeks. I’ve got lots of things coming up that will affect when I can work out (like being out-of-town or running my film festival). It actually making me a bit mad that I won’t be able to do 4 workouts in a week for a while, but I’m trying to go easy on myself. And I am trying a super early (at least for me) workout today so if that works out well for me, I might add that in to some of the weeks where I can only do 3 afternoon or weekend workouts.
As always, I’ll update you next week how this new plan goes!
Bringing More Food Back Into My Diet (or Staying Vegetarian For Now)
