STATurday

About two weeks ago, I stepped on the scale, and saw a number that terrified me, a number that felt like the last stepping stone toward the number I said I'd never go to again.

When I was 19, I contracted some sort of spinal virus that affected me like a stroke (among other things).  I lost a lot of gross and fine motor function on the left side of my body, and it took about two years to regain it.  During that time, I was sick a lot, and spent almost every non-working hour in bed.  As a result, I gained a tremendous amount of weight.  Toward the end of the second year, I started to feel better, and to regain control of my left side.  I started walking almost every day with my roommate, and made an effort to control my diet.  I lost some weight and then moved back to Russia and lost most of the rest of what I'd gained.  I vowed never to get that big again unless a gestating baby was involved.

This past year has been frustrating and scary--I've gained some weight (after losing only half of the baby weight from Ponchik) and I've felt like my body was spiraling out of control, bloating and expanding, unable to trust my body's signals.  This was all despite my efforts to be mindful of my caloric intake.

Something just snapped in me when I saw that number.  I decided that I was done with coddling my injuries, and that I needed to get my diet back on track.  I've been frustrated for a long time with the paucity of food options available to me, between the allergy restrictions and the fat/fiber restrictions from gastroparesis.  It occurred to me recently, after doing some more reading about gastroparesis, that a lot of symptoms I had chalked up to PCOS were in fact because of malnutrition due to the gastroparesis.  Even the rapid weight gains over the past year could be because my body thinks it is starving and holding on to every calorie it can get. I knew that I needed to get my nutrition on track.

I finally found a nutritionist who a) returned my phone call; b) did not hang up on me when I explained that I do *not* have diabetes; and c) was willing to work me, despite a rather daunting list of things I can't or shouldn't eat.  The basic trouble is in a healthy normal person, moderate fat and and high fiber foods are the ways that the body feels full without a high caloric load.   There is almost nothing in those categories that are okay for me to eat in any quantity.  The preferred diet for gastroparesis is white, mostly bland, and pretty soft.  In other words, the anti-diet.  I've tried to follow the guidelines, but I get frustrated with the small range of things available, once I cut out the food allergens, and I also end up feeling hungry all the time (and, paradoxically, bloated).  So I end up eating more fiber or fat than I should and paying severe consequences as a result.

The nutritionist and I spent a long intake session talking through my history, plus the restrictions, and came up with a few key things to try.  I immediately ran into difficulties for a variety of reasons, but after a follow-up call a few days after the intake, and some days to work out the kinks, I'm feeling better about my options.  

This week, I decided to give a birthday present to myself: I rejoined the gym I used to belong to before Birdie was born.  Their rates are much lower than when I was a member before, and their babysitting is much more reasonable.  The gym is about 3 city blocks from my house, and next to the Whole Foods that we frequent.  I feel hugely motivated to get into the rhythm of working out regularly again, and also to be better about hitting a specific calorie target each day.

I've been mostly housebound this winter with the kids' health issues, and spending 90 minutes in the car most days with school drop off and pick up, and going back to the T25 Beachbody workouts wasn't a great fit even though I really like the workouts.  I needed to get out of the house, and I needed something temperature controlled, because it is too hot in my house in the summer to work out at home.  So the gym was the logical answer.

When I was active with the T25 Beachbody workouts, in the fall and early winter of 2013-2014, one feature of the group support was a weekly check-in called STATurday.  We had to check in with the Facebook group and say how much we lost (or gained) in inches and pounds, and also how well we kept up with our workouts that week.  It was a useful touchpoint in the week.

I'd like to start doing that here, to chronicle progress and failure, to document the journey (again) and perhaps someone will find it helpful along the way.  I don't really know how often I plan to check in on the blog.  I'll have to feel my way through it.  I'm using My Fitness Pal again to track calories and exercise, at the request of the nutritionist, so I have a pretty good metric of how my week is going.

So here's the skinny (or, in my case, fatty) for this week:  I had my fitness orientation at the gym yesterday, which included a body fat test using calipers (the next best thing to hydrostatic testing) and the number was....troubling.  I was expecting it, given my weight, but it still gave me pause.  The trainer who met with me gave me a circuit to use for strength training, and I'm doing cardio on my own.  He gave me a target of 27 pounds to lose, which I feel is attainable, given time.

I'm trying to make good food choices most of the time, and not freaking out over times when I don't make a good choice, or when I make a bad choice intentionally.  I'm tracking calories closely, and telling myself again: This is the way it is going to be.  I've lost 2 pounds this week.

I've been doing interval training on the treadmill, which basically means I walk a lap at 3.7-4.0 mph and run a lap at 5.5-6.0 mph until I get to 2.25 miles and then I do a cool down.  It ends up being about 40 minutes and 2.5 miles for about 225 calories burned.  I need to replace the battery in my Polar Fit watch, but once I do, I'm going to start wearing it while working out, just to be more accurate about the burn.

I joined the gym on Wednesday, and have gone three days this week (I'm planning to go on Saturday too, and will do my 2.5 miles)  I did my cardio interval training those three days, plus a strength training circuit on Friday.  I got my first runner's high on Wednesday, and, while I was tired and sore after the next two workouts, I felt it was time well spent.

My plan going forward is to do cardio 5-6 days, and strength training 2-3 days.  I know that sounds like a crazy schedule, but I know that in the beginning, at least for me, consistency is the best thing for developing the habit.  We have some small trips planned soon, and I'm going to bring my T25 workouts with me so I can stay on track while I'm away from home.

I realize too that my daily routine is going to be different.  I need to approach this thing like it is my job.  I've been in the habit of doing a lot of my sewing in the mornings and knitting in the afternoons, and I'm not willing to get up before the kids on a regular basis to work out, so I'm going to have to give up a lot of my sewing time, at least for now.  In a way, that is okay with me.  I'm kind of ready for a sewing break, and my body has changed enough this year that my slopers are starting to be a bit off.  I need to do this for myself right now, and I've got enough clothes for the moment.  I can still knit or do hand work in the afternoons to give myself the creative outlet.

So week one: 2 pounds down, 7.5 miles interval training, 40 minutes circuit training

Bam.  Let's do this thing.