Dreaded Weigh In Wednesday

Wednesday is weigh in day, and I hate it, I even tried to make myself forget so I wouldn't have to weigh in - and I don't know why when this time round I know I've stuck to the plan.

Deep breath, step on, scales say 1kg gone, so step off, step on again, yep 1kg gone! Gone since Sunday.

My success can only be put down to keeping my eating on track, no compromises what so ever. I now agree with Mish (why did I doubt her) when she said weight loss is 80% food.

Today I've fought another battle and won. In the past I've used WI day as an excuse to stray from the plan as you have all week to make up for it. After lunch I was craving Mint Slice Pods (my idea of heaven), I even got my wallet out ready to go to the shop. SNAP! Wallet went back in my bag, and I made myself a 1/2 strength Jarrah Hot Choc. This curbed my craving and now I'm OK.

I don't need Pod's to survive. And I'll be much happier when I get into bed tonight and know honestly that I stuck to my plan.

So here's cheers to a good week ahead.

Exercise wise, went to the gym last night for a weights sesh. Back was OK, but not flash, so kept lower body light and tried to smash out upper body. The main things was that I felt sane again, I was slowly going crazy not exercising. Am going to try a walk/jog tonight around our house yard.

This 12wbt journey is very challenging. From the workouts to getting your mindset right, it's not easy, but the results will be worth it.

The thing that makes it bearable is that there are others going through the same thing as me. And although I've never met them/you, I see their/your tweets, facebook updates and posts on the forums and know I'm not alone. I see their/your struggles and realise I can do this. I see their/your success and aspire to be like them/you.

Big shout out to you all, I could not do this without you.

Hate being injured, but I'm lucky

I'm off to my chiro in about 1/2 hour to see if she can work her magic and fix my back - she usually does.

Last weekend, one of my mates dropped me on a concrete dance floor and I landed fair on the bottom of my back. I am lucky - lucky it wasn't my head otherwise I think I would have been knocked out and have split my head open.

It is really sore, but me being me have just kept about doing the essential stuff (riding horses for 30-40mins per day) and thought I'd be fine to play polocrosse on the weekend.

Bad, bad move. The playing part was OK, but heck trying to swing my leg over my saddle to get on and off almost bought me to tears. I'm sure my OH was just looking at me wondering why I was playing, but he doesn't say anything as I'm not the nicest person when I'm sore, my horse is going like crap and I'm playing like crap - so after 10 years he worked out to keep his mouth shut (poor man).

With today being day 1 of Round 2 12wbt I am annoyed that I can't run or do the hard core cardio in the program. I don't even think that I'll be able to do the toning leg exercises either.

But actually, I think I'm lucky. Lucky as when I did round 1 my exercise was great but my food let me down - bad choices, too much, letting the old 'ah well you've blown your cals today why bother now' attitude get me down.

Today I've had to concentrate on my food and drinks. Brekkie was more cals than I thought, so I'll have to forgo an arvo snack and have a light dinner - neither of which are going to kill me.

I'm going to win this battle and will get back to my exercise regime, but at the moment I'm going to remain thinking that I am lucky to have this injury cause I am now forced to bring my eating under control.

I'm off to see my chiro now, fingers crossed she works her magic, but maybe not too quickly!

Work/life balance - follow up week 2 I think?

So far, so good with the reorganisation of my working week.

By having the two buffer days, I find that I am allocating 'stuff' through the week to those days.

On my 3 'productive' days I basically only do my work - the exceptions to this so far have been to answer staff questions, which can't be avoided.

I had my 2 free days last weekend, and felt so much better for it. It cleared my head, I went to work refreshed on Monday and have been in a better mood for it all week.

My boss is from the old school where if your a business owner you'll have to do so much more work. Well that doesn't fly with me, I just needed to work smarter and make sure my time at work was super productive - ok I still get distracted by Twitter, Facebook & 12wbt forums, but I'm a work in progress.

I am fitting in working polocrosse horses and my training without any worries.

So all in all, I'm pretty happy with the balance I have bought back into my life - I'm sure my partner will be too.

What are you doing to keep/bring back the work/life balance in your life? I'd love to hear.

18 weeks til Melbourne Marathon - training

I've had a bit of a rethink about my training. I have polocrosse for the next 5 weekends then 1 off then another 2 in a row, so I don't have time to do my long run on Sunday.

I had a bit of a melt down yesterday and thought 'why bother if I can't do my long run'. This attitude does not cut it with me anymore, there will be no more of 'all or nothing'.

Last night after dinner and a bit of me time, I pulled out some other training programs and my diary and penciled in another plan.

So what if for the next 5 weeks I wont get in a long run on Sundays, I will need to work harder through the week and be prepared to do all my long runs after the polocrosse season is over.

This weeks plan:

• Tuesday - 6 x 1min sprints with 45sec standing recovery and weights (lower body)
• DONE - Instead of the sprints listed, I did Mish's treddy intervals at FITNESS FREAKS level. Admittely, I did have to drop the speed back to 10km for the last 2 minutes of the hill section, but I did it and I did 2 rounds of it (almost killed me, don't tell Mish!). Then I did my legs and really pushed myself with the weights. So am now buggered and not far out of bed.
• Wednesday - 1hr run
• DONE - well I did 30mins outside in the dark and cold (JFDI). It's been ages since I've run outside, and I forgot how much harder it was. And it didn't help that I caned my legs with sprints and weights yesterday. Ah well, all part of the learning curve and might need to adjust my training program to suit.
• Thursday - 6 x 2min sprints with 1min standing recovery and weights (upper body)
• Friday - 60min run
• Saturday & Sunday - at polocrosse, but if I get back early enough I would like to do a 1-1.5hr run

Here's cheers to a new training week!

This weeks training

Training for this week - with only 19 weeks till Melbourne Marathon - is:

Tuesday - 50min run, comfortable

• DONE, did a level 8 hill program @ 10km/hour, as I live where it's flat, I think I need to do some hills on the treddy as they just kill me.

Wednesday - 50min run, comfortable

• DONE 02.06.10 - and there was nothing comfortable about it.
• I didn't want to do it, so had a stern talk with myself and put it out on Twitter that I would be doing my run.
• Got on the treddy and still didn't want to do it, legs tired form yesterday, so had to talk myself through 10min lots.
• In the end I did my 50min run at about 10-11km/hour with a 1% incline, don't know how far I ran as I bumped the stop button - I think my body joined my mind in makin excuses. I only had 5mins to go and a there was a quick flash go through my mind that sounded something like 'ah its only 5 mins, don't worry about it'. Like I said, just a flash, it was gone and I did the last 5mins!
  

Thursday - rest day, might do some weights (legs?)

• Am having a complete rest day today, not doing weights, have jobs to do at home. Will plan my week better next week to start including 2 x weights sessions per week.

Friday - sprints 6x2min with 1min standing recovery, then do arms

Saturday - 50min run, comfortable

Sunday - 2hr run (oh no not again)

Now its out in cyberspace I have to do it, don't I????

Work life balance - I'm bringing it back

I had a moment of clarity while running for 2hrs on Sunday.

Lately I'm feeling that my work/life balance is completely out of whack. I'm up at 4am working, work when I get home and work on weekends.

I know that something is going to give sooner rather than later and I realised this yesterday when I drove to work in a foul mood and I hadn't even got here yet! And please note, I love my job.

I will not give up my horses or polocrosse or my 12wbt journey or my marathon training, so I need to devise a plan that fits everything in.

Just recently I learnt about a man named Dan Sullivan and his version of a working week. In short it works likes this:

• You have 3 highly productiove days where you do what makes you money,
• You have 2 'buffer' days where you do all the other stuff involved in your work, and
• You have 2 free days where you do not do any work.

My understanding of this is that if you know you are going to have those 2 free days, you will do everything in your power that have your work done over those 3 productive days and 2 buffer days - bit like when your getting ready to go on holidays.

I am going to follow this principal to my work life.

Monday and Friday
These are my buffer days. I will be doing our bookwork, chasing up information required and doing other jobs that need to be done but are not part of the 'money making' operation of the business. For too long I have been working in the business and not spending enough time working on the business.

Tuesday, Wednesday & Thursday
These are going to be my highly productive days (oooops today is Tuesday). These days I will concentrate on doing the jobs that are imperitive to our business making money.

Saturday & Sunday
Whooo hooo, by doing this I have now earnt some free time! And here's hoping that I never drive to work on Monday again feeling like yesterday.

I'm going to take this a step further as I have to exercise myself and my horses every day, so I will not be getting to work before 8am and will be leaving at 5:30 - is that too much to ask?

OK, I understand that at times things are going to be out of my control and I may have to do a bit on a weekend, but why can't I work my backside off during the week so I dont have to work on weekends (and at 4am in the morning).

I will keep you updated on my progress with my working week - starting next week. And I would also be interested in your thought on what has and hasn't worked for you.

12wbt ROUND 2

Ok, I did round 1 and was not very happy with my performance.

Towards the end I had some difficult decisions to make with regards to my work/business life which really got me down - I would say bordering on depressed - and I could not pull myself out of the rut and hence everything went to the dogs.

So, I have decided today that I will be joining round 2 of Michelle Bridge's 12wbt and I will smash it out until the end.

Why you may ask am I doing this after failing the first time? Well that is what I have asked myself....and I am doing round 2 cause:

• I need to get a handle on my emotional eating - you name an emotion and I will eat for it!
• Winter is my 'danger zone' as it's easy to stay in bed of a morning and not exercise and it feels so good to eat heaps of warming (and fattening) foods,
• I want to run a 1/2 marathon in July and the Melbourne Marathin in October - so feel this will help keep me on track, and
• I have a whole other wardrobe that I would love to wear again, and
• Most of all, I want to be the best version of me that I can possibly be.

And, as a side note, my mum is doing round 2 so I would like to do it with her to support each other.

So, here goes nothing!