Day TWO. 129 Days to go.

5/5 Intervals

This morning the alarm went of really early. Now as a day shift nurse (transitioning to night shift in just a few days), my alarm always goes off early in the morning. But this is a different early. The up before the birds, pitch black, ugly alarm before 5 am early. I was exhausted and sore and just didn't want to go. But i got up anyway. I ate a little pre-run fuel, got ready and  . . . crawled right back into bed. I just couldn't do it. Im not sure why, other than I didn't want to be a quitter but I got back up and drug my feet to the car to head to our meeting spot. I knew once I got going I would feel better but starting really does seem like the hardest part when your alarm goes off at 4:30 in the morning. But I made it there and started putting one foot in front of the other. Slowly, at first, then faster and faster. Before I knew it the first half of the run was done and I felt strong. At least more strong than tired! As we finished up, I felt a little twinge of disappointment as I saw our mile pace was slower than Day ONE. I allowed that to pass, because I had to. I then considered this is only Day TWO! We still have 129 days to go and when i first started this running process at the end of last year, my mile times had more of a range of 15-20 minutes!

A little side note . . . running is good for me, physically and emotionally but I know "You can't out run a bad diet!" So todays lunch is going to keep me on track. I am a fat kid running but I will do everything I can to make it an easier process!

Day ONE. 131 days to go.

Well I was so anxious about this run and worried I would fail miserably that i couldn't sleep last night. I took a sleeping pill at 9 pm and was still up at 1 am. Never mind that my first alarm was set for 4:30 am. I got up with every excuse not to go. I hadn't slept enough, Im just getting over a wicked stomach virus. Not to mention the old faithful excuses. I am too fat, I have bad knees. All very real and true, all in the way of getting out of the door but i put on my shoes and headband- with the very appropriate "Suck it up buttercup," and i drug my sleepy behind out of the house and to the meeting place for the first run. I got there to meet a new running partner and off we went. I had every ounce of fear that running for 5 minutes straight would be impossible. But if i got out there and only walked a mile, that would be a good place to start. With my running partners at my side, however I did it. I feel strong and happy with a good first run. I may be slower than most runners but for me its not a bad place to start. Im aware that not every run will be a good one but today was and I will take it! Day ONE for this round is done, and I don't have to do it again!

5/5 Intervals

                                                 

                                           

                                               Post Run picture. We are all sweaty and its still dark but we are still standing
                                              and even smiling.

Being BOLD. Another piece of the puzzle.

In this journey of fitness and health that I am on, I stumbled across Camp Gladiator thanks (i think!) to a co-worker. I had gone to Camp Gladiator one time a few years ago and had such a horrible time that I never went back. Nor would I consider it when my co-worker kept harassing me about it. Now in that time that passed, I had changed. I found a motivation for change and health. But the trainer there changed too. I am so thankful for that. Camp Gladiator is good for me. I feel stronger and healthier. I have built in accountability and the awesome campers around me push me beyond anything i would ever do on my own. I feared partners when I started, knowing I would never be able to keep up with anyone the trainer would pair me with. I would feel bad for holding them back. But that is not what happened at all. With the encouragement of the trainer, I dug deeper and did more than I ever imagined I could. Camp Gladiator is so good for me and a key piece in this journey that I am on. I am physically growing stronger, mentally growing tougher and socially growing more interactive.

All of this would have never happened were it not for my trainer. She is exactly the person that I walked up on and vomited a little in my mouth. She was this teeny tiny thing that was all muscle and scared the shit out of me all while I knew i would hate her from the get go. How could she train someone so fat when she had a perfect body and could never understand the struggle? And yet, by the end of that first work out I was hooked. From Day ONE, i felt like she was invested in me. She wanted me to succeed and even though I was just another camper, she made me feel like I mattered. Very quickly i found myself pushing harder when I wanted to be done because I wanted to work out and push hard for Jenny. She helped me stay injury free as I learned new things and she was faithful to give me high fives and tell me I was doing a good job. And she still does. Miss I don't stick with anything or anyone had been doing Camp Gladiator for 6 months. While this does require some commitment on my part, I know it would not be possible without her support. When I'm out and discouraged, I know a text is coming asking where I have been. When I'm there and have nothing left, I know she is my biggest cheerleader. Jenny has been like no trainer I have ever experienced and for that I am thankful. I am easily intimidated and like to run away but thankfully I landed in the perfect camp with the perfect trainer for me.

Camp Gladiator is a big piece of my current climb to health and I am thankful for that. I am also so thankful for the tiny little stick of dynamite that Jenny is and how she pushes and encourages me, probably more than she knows. Find that person for you, be that person for someone else and be strong! Be a beast mode for yourself! You can do more than you can even imagine!

Where I have come from . . .

I have a picture on my phone. It is a side by side that I look at on occasion to remind me that although I am not where I want to be and am struggling with my journey to fitness, I have come so far. I cant always see it in the mirror but seeing this picture helps me a bit. Now despite progress pictures occasionally being posted on media outlets, this one would never be shared. Maybe a quick show to someone but never where anyone would have access to it without my discretion and where I could not limit that viewing. I love the progress I see but I hate seeing how bad I let things get. This picture meant to be a motivator was a two-edge sword and also carried with it, 300 pounds of shame. How could one picture be so encouraging yet so painful? It’s a long story filled with the ups and downs of life but became so much more.

A month or two after making the photo, my trainer at Camp Gladiator texted me. The news was going to be doing a piece about Camp Gladiator; she wanted to know if I would be interviewed as a “Camp Gladiator success story” and share my before and after picture. Of course I freaked out and said an emphatic NO! I was on the schedule to work that day, 4 am was way too early to get up and I might be seen. I had very valid reasons for my no but as I thought about it I thought about the first time I visited Camp Gladiator and any number of other fitness outlets in the past. I never continued or even started some things because I didn’t look like the other people and there was no way I could do the things they were doing. I was stuck in this fat body where there were no workout clothes to wear and nowhere to turn to get started. It was a scary and hopeless place, so I just continued to lose weight in unhealthy manners followed by getting bigger and bigger when I decided what I was doing was not okay. And with that I decided to say yes. I decided that if even one person saw it and decided they could do it too, it would be worth all of the echoes in my head of the hateful things that would be said by others. I knew the struggle all too well and wanted others to know that I had been there and while I haven’t “made it,” I am moving in the right direction.

So I got brave, and woke up early and worked out, all while my heart was pounding with the anxiety of what I would be doing. I was called up to the camera, then, because of technical difficulties, I never went one. I never shared my story. I was a little disappointed to be honest but I realized that it didn’t mean I couldn’t share my story anyway.

So here it is . . .

I am a big girl. I come from two big parents and wont ever be small. In the deepest grips of an eating disorder I still wasn’t small but on the larger end of average. But I was sick and unhealthy. I knew it was wrong but the road to recovery was a rocky one and I found myself gaining a significant amount of weight in the process. But I kept getting back up which of course means falling. Sometimes I little trip on a shoe lace others jumping off of the side of a mountain.

Was camp Gladiator the trick to finally moving forward? No! I love Camp Gladiator and I love my trainer. A failed attempt years before though, shows that other factors had to change. The different trainer helped but I had to be different too. I had to think things could be different. I had to know I could do it and was worth it. I had to be okay with being seen. But Camp Gladiator, although an amazing piece of the puzzle, is just that. A piece of the puzzle. I credit this process to many puzzle pieces coming together.

Over the next weeks and months I will share the pieces of this puzzle that I have put together to this point and will continue to seek out the remaining pieces. This life is a process and I will do my best to enjoy it and do my best at it.

Half Training . . . Take Two . .

 It was almost exactly 4 months prior to todays facebook post that I was pushing through what felt like the worst torture and hell one could willingly go through on this earth. I swore that finish or not I would NEVER do this again. I was too fat to be doing things like this. I was slowing down my partner and therefore letting her down. And I would never recover from the physical pain it took to just put one foot in front of the other.  I would cross the finish line but felt defeated not victorious by the task at hand. The walk back to the hotel was miserable and I felt miserable. But today my running partner posted this picture with the question . . . who was up for it?

And of course, I said sign me up. Wait what? I swore I would never put myself through this again. Even with the weight I had lost, I was too fat to do that to my knees who had already had a life time of trouble. And when I hit that difficult mile, between mile 8 and 13, my mind wasn’t strong enough to push through. But the day after I realized I needed to take training more seriously NEXT time and that I would work on the difficult parts NEXT time. So here I am, four months later saying IM IN, for my second half marathon and the training that it involves. You see half marathons are really only about 1/3 of the race itself and that is being generous. But more than anything, it is the early mornings that you get up when you want to sleep in. Its pounding that pavement 3 times a week in addition to strength training. Its putting the disappointments of last one behind you and only holding on to the motivation and determination to improve. Yet as I look at the schedule and prepare for the first run in just a few days . . .

. . . I am filled with anxiety. I remember the pain. I remember the vomiting as I pushed beyond what I had ever done. Mostly I remember thinking I was holding my partner back. Yes I have done this before but is there need to do it again? I am significantly overweight (for those who prefer euphemisms) and will never be one of those people that I saw running past me that day.

But then I think of two people that were in the group of runners I consistently stayed with. One and older man that I really didn’t notice until at about mile 9 or 10, he tripped. Just a little error with footing and he was down on the ground. Elbow and knees cut open and bleeding. With runners gathered around him, he got back up and continued to put one foot in front of the other, blood dripping from his war wounds. Another was a young guy, an apparent military veteran. He was ripped, muscles everywhere but especially on his calf. That’s right just one calf. He had one leg amputated and by mile 8 his prosthesis was wearing into the remaining portion of his leg requiring regular stops on the route for relief and readjustments. So yes, the older man, the guy with one leg amputated and the aging girl with two bad knees who is too fat, all have reasons to not attempt one, let alone two half marathons. But I have to ask myself, what is the reason that I have to do this?

My reason is for me. For so long I wasn’t worth doing anything for myself. I was so afraid of failure that I wouldn’t try anything. And success wasn’t defined by what I did but how I compared with others. Clearly I am in no line for “winning the race.” But if my competition is with myself, with the task that should be impossible for someone like me, with saying yes each day I am supposed to run and putting in the work, and with maybe even improving on my run from the day before and the race before then that is the place of victory.

Am I still scared? Of course I am. But I will do it afraid and do it anyway. I will likely fall behind and slip up but I will keep my eyes on the goal and that is to finish.