Take Two

I had a feeling this year wasn’t going to start out hardcore progress towards weight loss.

Let’s not call me a pessimist, but a realist. And, shocker, REALISM won out over progress.

• Week 1: surprise visit from the parent parent company CEO. Ended up being a very nice meet and greet, but it added a twist to what’s normally a week of just remembering how to human again after the holidays. Cold AF weather. Also, impromptu 25-mile training day when I realized that it was my last chance with the coming weeks ahead.
• Week 2: Theater outing and then a trip to Houston for a wedding. Less activity and more “sometimes food” than normal. Also, work begins to escalate.
• Week 3: More cold AF weather. Work ramps up to insane levels of insanity, we have D&D night and hosting the parents in the same weekend (social overextension, engage!)
• Week 4: Work gets even more stressful, last training day of 10 miles, allergies hit hardcore in Austin and I want to die.
• Week 5: Weather drama! 50k race! (post forthcoming) Work stress! Oh my!
• Week 6: 50k race recovery and uh… nonsense. More cold AF weather. Work reaches a crescendo where it feels like a four-day work week was at least two months. But… there is light at the end of the tunnel as some things have come to a conclusion.

So, here we are approaching Week 7, where it’s time to reset, stop the nonsense, stop making excuses, and get with the program, and make some progress. Now, to be fair, there needs to be a program again to get with. This has been solved.

#1 The unwanted kettlebell

I maybe had one week where I did good, every other week has been… eh. Either I’ve fallen off tracking or at least failed at keeping the numbers in balance. I have proven to myself time and time again if I don’t measure what I eat, I will overeat and gain weight. It’s just the price I have to pay to be me. It’s no big deal if I keep up with it every day, taking wayyyyy less time than doomscrolling or my Duolingo sessions. So, back to it. No excuses. 1200 calories + activity (and looking to average about 1500-2000/day depending on what I’m doing now that I’m not doing 5+ hour training sessions with some weekdays where I’m only walking 1 mile – workouts should have more consistency).

Due to various reasons above, I haven’t had that chat with whiskey yet. That happens today and the pins come out. I have a set number of drinks I’ll let myself have in a week, and each time I have one, I move the safety pin out of a glass in my kitchen. When the glass is empty… I’m done for the week (just like calories – when my calorie bank account is gone, I’m done eating for the day).

I have been so/so on lots of fruit and veggies. When I go out of town it disrupts my normal eating, and then also disrupts when I do a grocery order/get Snap Kitchen. Both trips we put off getting groceries a whole week. I need to aim to replenish my produce quicker once I’m back or I end up eating junk/takeout. The good news is that when I’ve taken my blood pressure, I’ve been normal. The one thing I have stuck with is not salting my food, and that seems to have been enough to keep that in line.

So, the big thing here is just go back to measuring things and re-establish the good habits. Today honestly feels more like New Years Day than Jan 1 did because I knew what I was up against early in the year. I mean, it’s not going to stop and it’s never going to be the perfect time. I’ve got March coming up which is always challenging (everyone’s birthdays! I’m going to GDC this year! office grand opening so we will have EVENTS! so many social obligations I’m already dreading the overextension!), but I have a few weeks to get there with some better practices and momentum. So, let’s make that happen by focusing on those.

#2 Sporty Stuff

Now that we’ve conquered the 50k, training will go back to being more reasonable than 5 to 8-hour hike/walks. I’m actually excited to get back to a little bit of triathlon training, if for no other reason than the variety. Trails have made me super strong and sturdy, so I don’t want to give them up completely, but maybe once a month for the hikes and for a few hours instead of most weekends for half of the day, and for fun, not trying to keep a specific pace.

I also am ready to re-acquaint myself with my bike (and possibly swimming). I can count on one hand the number of times I rode my bike since Kerrville, and I don’t need any fingers to count my trips to the pool (zero). I had thought PERHAPS I’d just gravitate towards one or both of those for extra inside activity but hopes and thoughts here did not work.

I need a plan. So, I’ll do that. Here’s what my next week will look like:

Week 1. Weather sucks Wed-Fri (Sat may be a little cold but not quite as bad).

• Monday – Run 5k, walk to the gym and back, lift chest and shoulders
• Tuesday – Bike 30 mins, walk 1+ mile
• Wednesday – lift back and biceps at home, walk 1 mile on the treadmill
• Thursday – Bike 30 mins, walk 1 mile on the treadmill
• Friday – lift legs with trainer, swim (???), walk mile inside
• Saturday – 5k+ run, walk a mile
• Sunday – walk

And now, let’s be honest about all the challenges to do this and get back to a calorie deficit.

• Monday – weather will be beautiful, and I have the day off. No excuses here.
• Tuesday – I’ll do the bike in the morning, so I don’t skip it. Weather looks nice for a walk outside so that should be enjoyable.
• Wednesday – Weather will suck, so not planning to leave the house for workouts. I can do all this between meetings at home.
• Thursday – Weather will suck, so I’ll do this in the morning at home so there are no excuses later.
  • We have a filmed interview that afternoon for work and a happy hour. I’ll plan to eat healthy foods at home (no going out for lunch or dinner too) and enjoy a few drinks as the calories allow.
• Friday – Weather will suck so this will all be inside. I have a trainer appointment anyway so I’m going to at least bring my swim stuff and TRY to swim.
  • D&D after work which means snacks. I’ll stick with the least offensive calories ones (pretzels/veggies/dip) and not buy anything fancy. Something like a big salad and brothy soup for dinner so I’m full on less calories than a normal meal.
• Saturday – I want to run so I will suck it up in what will be something like 40-ish degrees, with a walk cool down.
  • Family day. Woof. This one is difficult. Big meal, dessert, and in proximity to second helpings and snacks for 6+ hours. So, I guess I’ll make it a game. Every hour, I can pick at something but no more than that. If we eat lunch at noon, I can have a spoonful of extra veggies at 1. I can have a bite of chex mix at 2. I can pick up an extra slice of protein at 3. And… a small slice of whatever is dessert. I always feel sick after eating sweets, I really just want a taste not a full serving.
  • After the previous 3 days I will be socially overextended so plan some calories for a few drinks while reading my book and not talking to anyone.
• Sunday – Day off of everything (besides walking). Make sure to have a plan for Sunday morning food that fits in the calorie budget instead of ordering whatever for delivery. It does look really nice for a walk though, so enjoy it!

Yeah, it’s a lot. But at least thinking through what the week will entail helps me anticipate the situations where my plan will go off the rails. Weirdly enough, the week after has beautiful weather and NO social obligations, so it may look more like this:

• Monday – 5k run, walk to gym after work and lift back and biceps
• Tuesday – 30 min bike morning, 1+ mile walk after work
• Wednesday – lift legs at home, 1+ mile walk at lunch/after work
• Thursday – 5k run, 1+ mile walk at lunch/after work
• Friday – walk to gym, trainer chest and shoulders, swim
• Saturday – bike ride outside for the first time in forever
• Sunday – beautiful walk in the sunshine

…but, we always want to reset the plan the weekend before because who knows, I could have a long lost relative come into town or the opportunity to fly to Fiji or nuclear winter could happen (in which case, I probably have bigger problems).

Another thing that helps with this is using our “The Plan” spreadsheet where we would put all this stuff before, so it wasn’t a surprise what we were eating or doing or how we were working out that day. So, I’ve resurrected that as well.

In terms of the other stuff:

#3 Adulting

• We (mostly Joel!) cleaned out the nonsense in the cubby under the coffee table one day. It’s been bugging me for years. Most things were just junk but found some gems (old game CDs, etc).
• All the goodwill stuff went to goodwill, and the Christmas stuff got taken down… later than I’d like to admit but we got there!
• Doctors!
  • I had my checkup (I am a healthy human specimen, yay)
  • Had my pre-visit for the 45-year-old thing (colonoscopy) which I will have in April like a good girl even though I really wanted to just go for the “poop in a box” route (at least will do the actual procedure for the first one)
  • Had my moles checked and none are worrisome. Also yay!
• Lots of truck and camper drama to get us to the 50k race (again, mostly Joel) but everything is taken care of now.

For the next two weeks, I’m going to focus on the first two goals (building good habits) rather than more chores, but I do have some spring things I’d like to do so we’ll get back to that soon.

#4 Fun Stuff

I have been MOSTLY consumed with work, prepping for the 50k, cranky because of the weather and other stuff, and feeling socially overextended so I haven’t done a ton here. But, to not sell myself completely short:

• Saw two theater productions – Clue and Les Miserables
• Weekend trip to Houston for a wedding and a day of sightseeing in the city
• D&D with friends (and again this week)
• Family day (and again this week)
• Worked on the book at least once (and planning to this weekend as well)
• Picked up the guitar a little bit, but annoyed with the state of my office and the state of my guitars
• Some photo editing in there as well but definitely not that much
• Camping trip to Huntsville TX for the 50k race and relaxing after
• Walko Taco Day #2!

I have spent a lot more time reading and staring off into space to relax vs creating. It’s ok. It feels like the circle is coming around again. I shall restate my intentions and move along:

• 1 hour minimum of book work per week (more is great, but not to any point where I feel frustrated or burnt out)
• 1 guitar song per WFH day
• Get back to editing some photos while watching silly TV or just as a way to wind down after work vs doomscrolling

I think everything else waits a bit to be in focus. Trying to do all the things at once usually fails spectacularly.

#5 Work/Life Balance

This was absolute rubbish the last few weeks. I worked a full day in Houston only quitting an hour before leaving for the wedding. I reversed half a PTO day the day before the 50k because I just couldn’t NOT work. These were acute issues that have since resolved themselves, but it sucked that I couldn’t do a trip without work yet this year.

In the next two weeks, I resolve to swing the other way – putting work in a box when I leave and picking it up the next business day FOR REALS. I have done a good by keeping a solid to do list, have occasionally shut down Teams chats long enough to get focused work done instead of doing it badly while distracted, and I did schedule myself the 4pm hour daily basically to strategize on problems I don’t have time for otherwise, do correspondence I’ve been putting off, update my To Do list, and start winding down for the day. Not to say I can always leave by 5, but it’s the start of my wrap up most days.

So, yeah. February (the rest of it at least):

• Track the food, track the booze/empty calories (and aim for less of it), treat both things like a bank account that cannot be borrowed against. Make a food plan.
• Make biking and swimming a thing again and follow the workout plan.
• PLAN PLAN PLAN instead of winging it and then being surprised when things surprise me.
• 1 hour/week on the book, edit some photos, pick up the guitar but like the first three things on this list are the most important.

…and then we will deal with March things in March and figure out how to navigate birthday and traveling fun times without killing my momentum. But first, establishing that momentum with New Years Day Take Two!