Category Archives: Tough Stuff

A Bit Over-Scheduled (or Starting To Stress Out)

Posted on November 17, 2015 | 1 comment

For the past few weeks, my schedule has been pretty crazy. Every weekend is filled with something (sometimes something fun and sometimes lots of working at some of the day jobs). A few weeks ago, I realized that my next day off without having something on my schedule like work, class, or hosting an out-of-town friend would be Thanksgiving. I’m not used to not having a day every so often to just relax and do what I want to do. Right now, every day has something important and on a specific schedule. And that freaked me out a bit.

Now that my Thanksgiving trip is about a week away, I’m still extremely busy and I’m starting to worry about how I will get everything done before I head down to San Diego to be with my family.

I have to work while I’m in San Diego (I work the day before and the day after Thanksgiving) so I need to make sure I pack all of my work stuff. That ends up being very last minute because I will be driving down to San Diego right after a work shift next week. So I need to wait to pack everything I need until I’m logged out of my shift. But I’m starting to work on a work related packing list so I don’t forget anything.

I also have a few food things I need to make and bring down to Thanksgiving. I won’t have time to make them until after my class on Monday next week (that alone is stressing me out), but I’m starting on my shopping lists now and I’m hoping that I can get the ingredients this week so everything is ready for me to go Monday afternoon.

I also have gifts for a couple of people. I have a Hanukkah gift for my mom (I’ll write about that next week because it’s an awesome gift that I think you all might love), a Hanukkah gift for Ross and Krystle, and a birthday gift for my Dad (he got his Hanukkah gift back in April because I knew he’d want it as soon as possible). I’ve also got face paint for my cousin’s kids (it’s tradition) and I’m still thinking about bringing something else to maybe help decorate the house. Fortunately, all the gifts are all wrapped and in a bag with the face paint. It’s ready to go in my car but again it’s something else to have to remember to pack.

And of course, I have to start thinking about what clothes I want to bring with me. I’ll be doing another Thanksgiving morning workout with some of my family so there’s that checklist too (can you tell that I’m checklist obsessed right now?).

With all that I have to do plus lots of work do to for my day jobs, I know that when Thanksgiving day comes and I have the day off to spend with my family I will be very grateful. I’m trying not to get overwhelmed by everything I have to do, but that’s just who I am. The checklists are helping me because I can see exactly what I’m planning on bringing and when I’m packing up my car and I make sure that I don’t forget anything.

I am very happy that I can drive to Thanksgiving and don’t have to worry about flying because I can bring a lot more stuff and it’s easier to pack my car with several random small bags instead of trying to make sure everything fits into airline regulations. At least that’s one thing I don’t have to stress about.

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Default ThumbnailHow Is It Almost Thanksgiving?!? (or Working On My Checklist) Default ThumbnailGetting Ready For Thanksgiving (or I Wish Flying Was Easier) Default ThumbnailFull Thanksgiving Trip (or Being With My Family In San Diego) Default ThumbnailFocusing On The Happy (or What Will Be Good At Thanksgiving) Default ThumbnailSan Diego Day (or Hanging Out With Family On My Day Off) Default ThumbnailThanksgiving Meal Prep (or Hopefully Everything Tastes Great)

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Posted in Celebrations, Family, Fun Stuff, Tough Stuff, Travel

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Hard Time At The Hard Rock Cafe 5K (or At Least I Looked Awesome!)

Posted on November 10, 2015 | 6 comments

This past Saturday was the Hard Rock Cafe 5K (this year they also had a 10K, but I wasn’t going to do a 10K). It was my 3rd year doing this race and I was really excited to be doing the race again this year. And even more exciting, my friend Kate flew down to LA for the weekend to do the race with me (more about our weekend adventures tomorrow).

I wish I could tell you that I killed it at the race and everything went amazing. But sadly, that wasn’t the case.

I’m not 100% sure what happened, but things seemed weird starting the night before. As I was going to bed, I said to Kate how it didn’t feel like the night before a race. Maybe it’s because someone was sleeping in my living room. Maybe it was because I hadn’t gone to the bib pickup that day to get all my race stuff (Kate and I were going to pick our race things up on Saturday morning).

On race day, I was up at 4:30am and we were out the door by 5:15. Traffic was light so we got to the Hard Rock Cafe nice and early. We got our race stuff, went back down to my car in the parking structure, and got ready. Once it was closer to 6am, we went back up to the street to warm up and make sure we had good spots in the starting area so Kate could avoid the walkers and I could be out-of-the-way for the runners.

Hard Rock Cafe

And of course, we had to take a pre-race photo together.

Pre Race Photo

Kate went up to the front of the pack after that and I hung back and tried to relax and not stress out about the race. While I was waiting for the race to start, I managed to make a few new friends because of the awesome tank top I was wearing that day (hi Susie!!). The race was supposed to start at 7am, but we ended up starting closer to 7:15am.

Right from the beginning, things didn’t feel right to me. My legs were stiff from waiting so long for the start of the race and I was feeling pain in my shins and calf starting at the half mile mark. As much as I wanted to push myself, I was struggling. I checked out my tracking app on my phone at the 1 mile marker and saw that the first mile was about 30 seconds slower than what my mile time was at my PR.

At that point, I realized it would be pretty impossible to make up that time plus be 30 seconds faster on the next two miles, so I stopped trying to push as hard and decided to just focus on finishing without having to take a break.

Right after that realization, Kate was passing me going back toward the finish line. She was having a tough race as well (but she ended up placing 4th in our division, 7th in women, and 41st in the entire race).

The rest of the race seemed to take a while. I tried to focus on the streets going by and knowing that I will be done with the race soon enough. My race photos are all pretty serious looking since I was so focused.

Race Time

As I was almost at the finish line, I saw Kate hanging out there waiting for me to finish. She walked next to me for the last minute and we both were sharing how we had pretty bad race days. I crossed the finish line about 90 seconds slower than my PR (I split the different between my time at the Hard Rock Cafe 5K last year and the Hollywood Half 5K in April).

Even though I didn’t PR, I still got my amazing medal!

Post Race Selfie

After the race, Kate and I got breakfast at the Hard Rock Cafe and I got one last photo on the stairs to the Dolby theater to celebrate completing my race.

Oscar Stairs

As soon as I got home, I added my newest medal to my wall (which is starting to look very full now).

Medal Hanger

Even though the race wasn’t great for me, I did it and I didn’t finish last (which is something that I am terrified of doing one day). I’m so proud of Kate for how well she finished in the race and I’m glad that neither of us really gave up.

While I love my race medal (it’s so sparkly!), my favorite thing from the race was the shirt that I wore! I ordered a tank top from Mighty Petunia after doing a random google search for motivational tank tops. So many motivational tank tops are silly and cheesy, but I love the messages that are on the Mighty Petunia tanks. They are fun and I am already picking out which ones I want next! And I got a ton of compliments on it at the race.

Since I loved my Mighty Petunia tank top so much, Cathy (who is the owner of Mighty Petunia) has given me a promo code to share with all of you! If you buy something from their site, use the promo code “Bombshell” and you’ll get 10% off of your order. And the shirts are so reasonably priced already so the 10% off is just icing on the cake! I hope that you guys will take advantage of the discount and support this great business!

While my race day wasn’t great, I managed to find ways to keep a somewhat positive mindset and was able to focus on the things that made me happy (like my tank top and the medal I got at the finish line). My next 5K is in April and while I’m hoping I’ll PR at that race, I just want to have a more positive race experience and I’ll be happy.

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Default ThumbnailHard Rock Cafe 5K Take 2 (or Trying To Not Be Frustrated With A PR) Default ThumbnailI Can’t Believe My Race Time (or A 5K With My TIU Friends) Default ThumbnailRevlon Run/Walk (or I Survived 5K #3!) Default ThumbnailTraining For A 5K Without Planning On Doing Them (or I Think I’m Only Doing 3 5Ks This Year) Default Thumbnail5K #7 (or I Was Prepared For The Worst And Got The Best) Default ThumbnailOnce Upon A Time: The Rock Opera (or An Awesome Giveaway!)

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Posted in Fitness, Fun Stuff, Shopping, Tough Stuff

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Baby Steps Back To Cooking (or My Check In Kicked My Butt Into Gear)

Posted on November 6, 2015 | Comments Off on Baby Steps Back To Cooking (or My Check In Kicked My Butt Into Gear)

I recently did a check in with myself on how I’m doing for my goals for the year. I’m actually pretty proud of myself on how well I’m doing on my goals and that I may get pretty much all of them checked off by the end of the year.

But the one goal where I would have to give myself a failing grade would be cooking more often for myself. I got into the groove of cooking for a while, but the novelty of it wore off (yes, it felt like a novelty and not a requirement) and I got lazy again. I haven’t been eating take out or at a restaurant all the time, but I’ve definitely been taking advantage of frozen meals and easy things.

I feel like cooking for myself on a regular basis is going to be a battle for the long run. Part of the problem is my eating disorder. I can forget to eat and then when I get hungry I’m starving and want something to eat now. I don’t want to have to spend time cooking something.

I really should be on an eating schedule and set alarms to remember to eat at the right times. But my schedule can be a bit crazy so sometimes it’s not possible to eat when I want to. There are days at my day job where I’m on back to back customer calls and chats for a couple of hours. Sometimes, I don’t get a real break the entire shift. I can usually run and grab a protein bar or banana to eat, but microwaving food sometimes takes too long and my food might sit in the microwave for an hour after cooking before I can eat it.

The one meal that is easiest for me to control is breakfast. With the exceptions of Mondays (when I’m doing a workout at 7:30am because of my class), I always have at least an hour after waking up before I have to work. That’s more than enough time for me to make some sort of breakfast for myself. I’m still usually preparing something that requires minimum effort (avocado toast, peanut butter on toast, fruit, or ricotta cheese and honey), but it’s still better than other options that are out there.

With lunch on workdays always being something tough for me, I’m moving my focus on to dinner. While it’s not easy to cook after getting home from an afternoon workout (when I’m starving when I get home and need to eat pretty quickly), there are still plenty of evenings or afternoons that I can bulk cook or just make something that will have leftovers for a day or two.

I need to get back into the habit of doing that. Every time I say that, something is weird in my schedule that makes me say that I’ll start next week. Next week then has issues in it too. And it’s an endless cycle. I’m taking the baby steps into cooking dinner at home. I’m trying to get things at the store that make things easy to prepare. It’s not the cheapest option, but it’s still cheaper than eating outside of my house. And if the leap from where I’ve been to cooking is too big, these smaller steps can help bridge the gap.

I’m still working through this and like I said that it’s an ongoing battle. I hate that this is something that comes so easily to so many people and it’s so tough with me. But hopefully I can start transitioning back into cooking so that next year I can be closer to the goal that I set for myself this year.

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Default ThumbnailLack Of Planning (or No Home Cooking This Week) Default ThumbnailBaby Steps With Cooking (or I’m Cautiously Optimistic) Default ThumbnailDoing More Cooking (or Maybe It Does Save Time) Default ThumbnailHome Cooking (or Getting Used To Making What I Eat) Default ThumbnailStill Figuring Out Meal Planning (or Will Food Ever Be Easy For Me?) Default ThumbnailGetting My Butt In Gear (or Missing Out On Fun Stuff To Work)

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Posted in Food, Health, Tough Stuff, Weight Loss

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Miss You Already (or Women Filmmakers and Cancer Patients)

Posted on November 5, 2015 | 1 comment

I recently had an opportunity to see an advance screening of “Miss You Already”. I was excited enough to go see a new movie, but this screening also had a Q&A with the director, Catherine Hardwicke, as well as with Toni Collette and Tyson Ritter, who are actors in the film. While going to screenings are a fairly regular occurrence through my union, my WIF membership, or other industry opportunities; this one ended up being very special for me.

The first thing that was so special about this screening was the casualness of the entire event. Usually when there is a screening with a Q&A, after the Q&A is done the cast and crew are whisked away by their publicists and other handlers and are in their cars before the audience gets to move. There’s almost never interaction between the audience and the guests.

That was not the case with this screening. It seemed to be not only a WIF event, but a crew and production team screening. Many people in the audience were involved with the film in various positions and they had a little after party after the screening that my friend who joined me for the screening and I got invited to join.

I got to talk to Catherine Hardwicke a little bit. She’s seriously amazing. She’s a big advocate for making sure that more movies are made with female directors and writers. Men are a majority of writers and directors and things really should be more balanced. She is an incredible director and I feel honored that I got to meet her and she spent a little bit of time talking with me (and taking this awesome picture with me).

Miss You Already

The other reason why this screening was so special to me was the subject. Without giving a ton of spoilers away, one of the characters in the film gets a breast cancer diagnosis. The character has to go through several of the same treatments that my mom went through (the character had a similar type of breast cancer). But the way the character reacted to her cancer was very different from how my mom did and that made me feel so grateful for my mom.

When my mom was diagnosed, she told me pretty much right away. I wasn’t able to share it with friends right away because we wanted family to know first and my mom to get through some things before the news was shared. But it was a pretty open discussion with us all. I could ask my mom anything I wanted to without fear of her reaction or upsetting her. A lot of things were (and still are) unknowns, but nothing was hidden from me or anyone else in the family who wanted to know.

After my mom’s surgery, I saw her in Tahoe when I went to visit my family. While I was there, I got to see my mom’s scar and what things looked like. That helped me feel much more comfortable with everything. When you look up post-mastectomy photos online, they can seem both scary and unbelievable. Seeing what it looked like on my mom normalized things.

Through surgery, chemo, and radiation; my mom kept a very positive attitude. Yes, technically cancer at any stage can kill you (or the treatments can kill you or make you sick), but as a family we just focused on positivity and recovery and believed that my mom would get through this just fine. That’s exactly what happened, but I know that even if it wasn’t that way my mom would have still maintained her positivity. Again, that all made me feel much better about the circumstances and helped me avoid googling things that I shouldn’t.

For all I know, my mom just put on a brave face for us all and it was much scarier and more horrible than I know; but if she did protect me from the negativity I appreciate that.

Obviously, my mom’s cancer story isn’t everyone’s cancer story. Not everyone has the ability to stay positive or immediately get a fatal diagnosis. And my family is much luckier than most because almost everyone is in medicine so we understood things without having to do as much research (and that research is so terrifying). And even though the story in “Miss You Already” isn’t my mom’s story, it’s so refreshing to see a cancer story that tells things honestly and doesn’t make it seem easy or so hard that life is over from the moment you are diagnosed.

“Miss You Already” opens this weekend and I really encourage you all to go and see it. Not only will you be supporting a fabulous movie, you will be telling the studios that films by female directors are popular and there should be more of them. Both of those things are very worthy things to support.

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Default ThumbnailA Screening At The Walt Disney Studios Lot (or “What The F@#- Is Cancer And Why Does Everyone Have It?” Default ThumbnailCancer Questions (or Hopefully This Will Help Someone Else) Default ThumbnailAn Evening Of Fabulous Women (or Getting More Involved At Women In Film) Default ThumbnailMy Big Fat Greek Wedding 2 (or A Movie With A Fun Friend) Default ThumbnailF#*k Cancer (or Proof That My Mom Is A Badass) Default ThumbnailThe Sorority Nobody Wants To Belong To (or Getting Support From Strangers)

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Posted in Acting, Family, Tough Stuff

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How Is This Year Almost Over? (or Doing A Check In On My Goals)

Posted on October 28, 2015 | 1 comment

I was on the phone with a friend the other day and it came up that this year is over in 2 months. I know I say this every year but it’s crazy how fast the year is going by! It feels like my birthday was just a few weeks ago!

I’m not the type of person to do quarterly check ins with my goals (so many friends are trying to get me to do this and I’m thinking about maybe doing it next year), but with 2 months left I did want to see how I’m doing with what I set as goals for this year.

My first goal was to do 175 workouts at Orangetheory this year. Not counting the workout I’ll be doing today, I’m at 142 workouts. I’m very much on track to hit my goal, but I need to get back to 4 workouts a week soon so I make sure that I get there. But it’s very possible and I’m really happy with myself that I’ve gotten this close so far.

My next goal was having at least 4 home cooked dinners a week. This one I’m not doing so great with. If you could microwaved dinners as home cooked (I don’t), then I’m doing amazing. But I’ve really gotten out of my cooking trend that I was in for so long and I’m struggling to get back in to. A lot of that has to do with working one of my jobs on the weekends when I used to do meal prepping or knowing that I won’t be at home many nights a week. This is a scheduling issue that I’m always working on and I know that I need to make it a better priority in life.

Next on my list was getting down to 2 main day jobs. This one I actually did! I now have my box office from home job (which I’ve been at for over a year) as one of those main jobs and my data entry job with my old boss as my other main day job. I also have my sporadic jobs (babysitting, the film festival, my weekend box office job with an old boss), but I’m definitely down to 2 main day jobs. I have to admit that I’m shocked that I accomplished this one since it was the hardest one in my mind. I’m now looking at some other day jobs with more flexibility (my main box office job isn’t as flexible as I’d like it to be), but I’m very happy for now with the 2 main jobs I have and I’m super grateful to have them both.

Getting into an improv class was checked off the list last week when I started at UCB and I’ll be doing those classes for 6 more weeks. Again, I’m super shocked that I got this done because I’ve been wanting to do it for a while and haven’t had the chance or money to do so.

I haven’t been able to travel a lot this year. I’ve gone to San Diego a bunch and I went to Napa earlier in the year, but I was really hoping to do another New York trip this fall. There were schedule and financial issues with doing that trip, but it’s looking like it might be in the works for 2016.

And my final goal (as it always has been) was to keep blogging. I’ve had people ask me how long I can keep up blogging 5 days a week every week and I’m happy that I haven’t quit doing that yet. There may come a day in the future that I miss a day or that I decide to go down in the number of posts a week. But I’m still happy with my schedule as it is and it seems that you all like reading my posts too.

So that’s my almost the end of the year check in with my 2015 goals. They aren’t all done yet, but I’m making huge steps and progress so far and I feel like on December 31st I will be looking back and realizing that I got most or all of my goals accomplished for the year.

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Default Thumbnail2015 Recap (or How I Did On My Goals) Default ThumbnailWhat I Plan To Do This Year (or 2015 Goals) Default ThumbnailMy 2016 Goals (or I’ve Got Some Big Ideas This Year) Default Thumbnail2014 Goals (or Hoping To Get More Goals Done This Year) Default ThumbnailAn Almost End Of The Year Review (or Looking Back At My Goals) Default Thumbnail2020 Goals (New Year, Not All New Goals)

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Posted in Celebrations, Food, Fun Stuff, Tough Stuff

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Still Taking This A Bit Easy (or Not Going To Push Too Hard)

Posted on October 26, 2015 | 1 comment

I had every intention of doing 4 workouts this past week. My calf feels normal most of the time and I’m almost back to my old treadmill speed. Instead, I only did 3 workouts and it looks like I’ll be doing that for the next few weeks as well.

It’s not really all about how my calf feels. I did feel some pain this week (many during a strength day when all the treadmill work was on hills), but it’s not unbearable. I also felt some hip pain that was a bit scary at first, but fortunately was not my cartilage tearing because the pain ended the next day.

One of the big reasons for not adding the 4th workout into my week yet is scheduling issues. I know that that shouldn’t be my excuse, but it is. And with my 5K coming up soon, I don’t want to push myself too hard so that I can do the best that I can at the race.

Besides only doing 3 workouts this week and having some pain issues, I did have some pretty great moments in my workouts. I’m still working on the rowing improvements (which I’ll need this week because it’s Hell Week!) and I had some great sprint rows. I know that distance rows are my weakest point, but those are rare in class and they get pretty painful for me to do.

On my weights, I did most of my things with 15 pound weights, but I was doing squats and pullovers with 20 pounds so I’m very happy with that. I’m hoping that I can do some of my stronger arm things (like bicep curls) with 20 pound weights soon. I’ve never been scared of bulking up by using heavier weights so the only thing holding me back is my own strength.

I’m still stuck at 3.4 miles an hour on the treadmill. And I have a feeling that I’ll probably be there for the next two weeks leading up to the race. If my race ends up being at 3.4 miles an hour, I won’t PR. But since my adrenaline on race day always makes me walk faster (plus I won’t be at an incline), there’s still hope for me. But I’m scared to increase the speed and hurt my calf because that will definitely hurt my race time. So I’m just going to focus on staying where I am for now and after my race is done I will reevaluate and see what I’m hoping to do for my race in April.

I’ve had so many huge improvements over the past year that it can be tough to feel stagnant and not moving forward anymore. But no matter what fitness level someone is at, there is always a point where you hit your max. I know I’m not there yet, but I have to get through this time now where my focus is recovery before getting back to working on improvements again.

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Default ThumbnailWorkouts With Modifications (or Dealing With A New Injury) Default ThumbnailTough Workout Week (or I Made It Through My 4 Workouts) Default ThumbnailMore Progress And Steps Back (or Trying My Hardest) Default ThumbnailTaking Things A Bit Easier (or No More Injuries) Default ThumbnailNew Limits (or Having Friends To Push Me) Default ThumbnailTime To Push Myself Again (or Running Some Hills)

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Posted in Fitness, Fun Stuff, Health, Tough Stuff

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10 Years Later (or A Good Memory and A Bad Memory)

Posted on October 23, 2015 | Comments Off on 10 Years Later (or A Good Memory and A Bad Memory)

10 years ago, I was visiting my cousin Adam and his girlfriend Keri in Portland for the weekend. It was a pretty amazing weekend. It was the first time visiting my cousin on my own without other family there and we went out and did so much fun stuff! I really felt like it was a real “adult” trip.

The highlight of my weekend in Portland was going out on Adam’s sailboat. I remember that there was pretty much no wind that day so we were more motoring than sailing, but I still got to go out on the boat and check out the work that he had done on it. Even with not really getting to sail, I loved being on the water.

100_0462.JPG

After saying goodbye to Adam and Keri at the Portland airport, I went to my gate and waited for my flight (I think this was still in the time where you had to line up for Southwest to have a good spot in the A group). I was sitting by the gate and when it was time for me to get up and get on the plane, I tried to stand and immediately had a shooting pain and collapsed on the ground.

To this day, I have no idea how I got onto the plane, through LAX, and home. I’m sure I was a little out of it due to the pain. I just remember waking up the next morning and not being able to put weight on my right leg. Of course, my first reaction was to call my mom. And since I had awesome health insurance then, she told me to make an appointment and see a doctor to figure out what happened.

At first, I was diagnosed with a torn quad muscle (knowing what a torn calf feels like now, I finally understand why I was diagnosed with that at first). After a few weeks of the pain, I saw another doctor and got the same diagnosis again but was also told to go to physical therapy 2-3 times a week to help my recovery (at the time, my insurance covered all appointments in full so I was fine doing that). I was getting ultrasound therapy for a few months with very little improvement. My pain started to change into a locking sensation in my hip.

After sharing that information with my physical therapist, he got me a referral to the surgeon who ended up being my first hip surgeon and properly diagnosing me after months of believing that it was a muscle tear.

9 months from collapsing in the airport I had my hip surgery. The journey with my hip issues has been going ever since.

It’s so crazy to think that it has been 10 years since I fell in the airport. It feels like yesterday and a million years ago at the same time. But instead of focusing on that somewhat annoying anniversary, I’m focusing on the fun that I had on that trip. I had the best time with Adam and Keri that weekend and I think that that was the trip that really built my friendship with Keri. I saw her in person so few times from the time I met her until she passed away. So each of those in-person memories is so precious to me.

Even though that trip 10 years ago ended on a pretty sucky note, everything else leading up to it was so amazing and my only regret is that I don’t have more pictures from that weekend.

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Posted in Family, Fun Stuff, Health, Tough Stuff, Travel

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Back To School (or Another Round Of Improv)

Posted on October 20, 2015 | 2 comments

I’ve been saying that this would be a goal of mine for a while, but yesterday I officially started improv classes at UCB! I was able to save up the money for the class in August, but I had to wait until there was a class time that worked with my schedule (I wasn’t going to quit my job to attend a class that lasts 8 weeks).

Finally, there was a Monday mid-day class on the registration list and I paid right away to guarantee my spot. I signed up a little while ago, so I’ve had a lot of time to think about going back into an improv class.

This is my first improv class since my beloved acting coach, Kip, passed away 5 years ago. Maybe if money and the schedule wasn’t an issue that I would have taken a class earlier this year. But before this year, I wasn’t ready to do an improv class. Kip was very influential in my life and I was scared that doing improv was going to make me sad.

Fortunately, the class didn’t do that to me yesterday. There were times that made me think of him because the lessons we were doing were identical to things I used to do in Kip’s class (which I found ironic because Kip was a founding member of a different improv company), but I think that overall the class was great and I’m looking forward to the next 7 weeks.

Besides my classes with Kip, I’ve done a couple of years of improv training with a different troupe. But because it wasn’t very well-known (even though it’s based in LA), many casting directors are asking for actors to study improv with one of the big schools. So taking this class at UCB is helping me accomplish that.

In the first class, it was a lot of introduction to improv. There are some people in the class who have never taken improv, and I needed to learn the style and rules of the improv games that UCB does. And it was a good refresher course for me to make sure that I’m the most supportive team member that I can be.

I have to say, I was very impressed with the UCB setup. I’m used to taking improv classes in a casting room (after hours) or at the theater where the shows would take place. But at UCB, they have a big building with dozens of classrooms, a theater, and a cafe. It was more like a school than a theater, and I really liked that.

UCB Classroom

I have a bit of homework to do before my next class on Monday next week, and I’m really going to try my best to get it all done plus do a little extra. Just because this is an introduction to improv class doesn’t mean I’m going to slack off. I’m taking this seriously and maybe after completing this class I will feel at home here and will continue to take the next set of classes.

I’m glad that I was able to get together the funds and a class worked out with my schedule. After taking my first class, I don’t feel the same pull holding me back from taking classes that might “replace” Kip. I’m aware that that was a weird issue to have, but because Kip was such a huge part of my life, I had trouble moving on. But I feel like I’m finally at that point and I’m excited to see how I can use what he taught me over the years in a new space with new people.

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Default ThumbnailMore Comfortable In Improv Class (or Making Friends With My Classmates) Default ThumbnailFinding Soul Mates (or Why I’m Having A Tough Time Finding An Improv Class) Default ThumbnailGraduation Show (or Completing Improv 101) Default ThumbnailHomework and Other Work (or Taking My Class Seriously) Default ThumbnailMaking Strides In Class (or Relaxing And Having Fun) Default ThumbnailHalfway Through Class (or Not Thinking About The Next Step)

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Posted in Acting, Fun Stuff, Tough Stuff

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Following My Doctor’s Instructions (or Days Off From Vyvanse)

Posted on October 16, 2015 | 1 comment

At my last appointment with my therapist, we covered a bunch of things. We discussed my decrease in exercise due to my calf tear and the anxiety it caused me (if only I knew then that coming up there would be a week where I could only work out once). We talked about my happiness checklist and the fact that I’ve continued to do it every day as he asked me to. I’m still one of the only patients who has actually followed through with this homework assignment he has given to many patients. And we also talked about how I was doing on Vyvanse.

I’m very torn on Vyvanse. Since increasing my dosage to 2 pills a day instead of 1 pill a day, I’ve noticed that it does help me more often. But it doesn’t help all the time like I wished that it would. I know that it’s an aid and not a miracle drug, but that doesn’t stop me from wishing it was a miracle drug.

While it does help at times controlling my hunger (and I do sometimes forget to eat most of the day) it isn’t a weight loss medication so I’m not seeing a huge change on the scale. I know that I shouldn’t judge the medicine’s success by what number is on the scale, but I do.

I expressed these frustrations to my therapist when I was there last. He brought up a suggestion to me that I’ve been trying to test out. He wants me to try going one or two days a week without taking Vyvanse. He wants me to do that on days that I’m not doing anything that may put me in a tough situation with food.

At first, I didn’t want to do this. But the more I thought about it, the more it made sense. Since this is a time release medication it’s good to have days without it so my body doesn’t get used to it. I’m close to the maximum dose that my therapist would prescribe, so he doesn’t want to keep increasing it because I will max out soon. So having days with no medication and then days with medication is a way to keep my body from getting used to the dosage.

I wasn’t sure when I’d try doing this at first, but then when I got sick I just forgot to take my medicine (despite the alarms I set on my phone). There were 3 days in a row that I didn’t take it. Those 3 days were pretty much a blur to me due to how sick I was, so I can’t say if I felt that different compared to when I’m taking them. I tried another day without medicine this past Sunday (it wasn’t a busy day for me so it seemed like a good day to try it) and I did notice a difference. It’s almost as if my anxiety got worse because I was terrified on how I would feel without the medicine.

But I got through the day just fine and since then the past few days have been better days for me. I don’t necessarily feel like the medication is working more. But it feels like the concerns that I have in my head every day are a bit quieter for me. It’s not going to be easy to find days that I’m ok with not taking my medicine, but I’m going to try to find one day a week that I can do it. If I can’t, that’s ok but at least I’m making a real effort in trying it. And knowing how much better I feel this week is motivation to keep having a day off.

Of course, I still wish that Vyvanse works more than it does. It’s unrealistic but I can dream. But at least now I have a much more positive opinion of Vyvanse than I did before and I think that will help with the success of the drug.

Are any of my readers on Vyvanse? I’m curious about your experience on it because when I’ve done Google research it seems like I’m having a unique experience. If you don’t want to comment (and be public about being on it), feel free to use the contact page to send me a message privately.

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Default ThumbnailAnother Therapist Check In (or Showing Off My Happiness Checklist) Default ThumbnailOver A Month On Vyvanse (or A Meeting With My Therapist) Default ThumbnailA Year On Vyvanse (or Help Is Expensive) Default Thumbnail1 Week On Vyvanse (or Hoping To Answer Some Questions) Default ThumbnailWith The Good Comes The Bad (or My Vyvanse-Free Weekend) Default ThumbnailA Quick Vyvanse Update (or I Guess Forgetting Helps Time Pass)

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Posted in Food, Health, Tough Stuff

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Injury After Injury (or I Swear It’s Not Because I’m A Klutz)

Posted on October 15, 2015 | 1 comment

I feel like the past few months have been me dealing with one injury after another. Of course, there is always my hip issues. Those are probably going to be around for the rest of my life (even if I have surgeries to fix them). Then I had my torn calf over the summer. I was hoping that would be better in a few weeks, but I’m still dealing with the recovery from that (but I’m feeling almost 100% again).

Because of the hip issues and the torn calf, I started favoring walking differently. This has been an ongoing issue with my hips (my shoes for the last 10 years have worn down in funny patterns), but with the calf I started to favor the other leg. In doing that, I caused some ankle and knee pain.

Then because of who knows what, I started getting the most epic blisters on my heels. It’s not because of my shoes (I’ve used the same type of running shoes for a while now), so I’m not sure what’s causing it. But it made it more difficult for me to walk and do other things.

I’ve been a klutz my entire life. I’m rarely without a bruise or a scratch of some sort. In fact, right now, I’ve got a pretty nasty bruise on my knee where I bumped into my front door (don’t ask). But these issues are not klutz related ones. These are real injuries.

My dad has said that this is what comes with becoming an athlete. And while I agree with him, it’s not fun and I feel like there must be something I can do differently to work on preventing or limiting these issues.

I’m working on stretching more throughout the day and trying to get up from my desk as least once an hour to move around. It hasn’t been easy with the injuries I’ve got right now, but I want to start building better habits for the future. I’m also trying to limit the number of painkillers I take in a week. I still take one before each workout, but I know that taking them only dulls the pain that I feel and doesn’t always allow me to know when I’m pushing myself too much. If I don’t have a painkiller in my system, I should feel pain sooner and therefore know to stop what I’m doing.

It’s funny to me that I’m dealing with so many more injuries now than I did last year when I was starting my workout routine. Of course, there was the quad strain after my very first Orangetheory workout that had me struggling to walk for a couple of days after (thank goodness that was just that one time). But since then I’ve been relatively injury free until this summer. Maybe I’m working that much harder in my workouts? Or maybe I was overdue for some injuries and they are all happening now.

No matter what, unless I’m horribly sick like I was 2 weeks ago, I’m not letting these injuries prevent me from working out. I’m looking at them like a badge of honor. Because unless my klutz injuries, I’ve earned these by kicking butt.

I just wish that they would hurt less and get better sooner.

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Default ThumbnailTransitioning Back To Normal (or Going Slow) Default ThumbnailThere’s No Problem With Orangetheory (or My Side Of The Article) Default ThumbnailTrying To Be Patient (or Did I Re-Injury Myself?) Default ThumbnailWorkouts With Modifications (or Dealing With A New Injury) Default ThumbnailLearning How To Maximize My Injury (or Feeling More Normal) Default ThumbnailBeing a Graceful Klutz (or Why I’m Black and Blue)

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Posted in Fitness, Fun Stuff, Health, Tough Stuff

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