An Update

Since school started up again (about a week and a half ago) I've been trying something a little different. I made the decision to try to eat more mindfully and to work out as much as I could find time to, and I also decided to take things day by day, week by week, to not make any goals beyond that, nor any plans. Well, I have to say, so far so good. This past week was a little shakier than the first week, but all in all, I've done much better than I had been doing and am going at a pace of something I can maintain rather than doing my usual full sprint ahead then falling down exhausted with an entire chocolate cake.

So, what exactly does this all look like? Well, first off, I am attempting to plan out my week in terms of when I can go run. I love running. It is my favorite. I love it more and more each time I go and take a stab at it, and when I just look at my week and see when I can do it rather than make a month's worth of planning things go much better. When I can't run I either don't work out or I do a kettle bell routine. Nothing I do, whether running or kettle bell, takes more than 30-40 minutes and, while my heart rate is definitely raised I can be sore the following day, it's not terribly intense.

As far as my nutrition and eating goes, this is a day by day, almost hour by hour piece of work. Prior to making the decision to be more mindful, I was ending my day stuffed to capacity every day, sometimes to the point of wishing I could make myself sick and empty everything out. That has stopped, and I've tried to eat mindfully, eat at our table versus the couch, and choose more nutritious foods. However, I am not counting calories or points. I'm not limiting myself to specific kinds of foods (though I am trying to back off sugar/desserts). And, when things haven't gone precisely as planned, I have made a point to not beat myself up, with mixed results (though, I will say, I feel considerably less guilt than I do when I'm on some sort of official plan).

As things stand now, I feel as though things are going pretty well. I still need to work on eating more mindfully and not using food to help cope with stressful days, but that will be something I will have to work on for the rest of my life, I think. However, this is a good route for me, being gentle with myself. I feel mentally well in this department when I do that, and there have been results, I think. I'm not weighing myself (I haven't yet thrown out our scale, but I think I will soon, if my husband doesn't object too much), but I know a few things are fitting me better than they had a couple of weeks ago. It's not a drastic change, and that's not really what I'm looking for at this point, but I won't say it's not nice.

I'm hoping that as work starts up again in full swing after next week, and my courses start next Tuesday that I'll be able to keep doing what I've been doing and don't let the added stress get me down too much.