Fit for 30

Wednesday 11th of July, 2012

Well, lookie here! It's been more than a month since I wrote here. I guess that shows that my usual food-related posts are more important to me than my fitness ones. No surprises there!

I got up to Week 4 of C25k before being benched for ten days with a bout of bronchitis... and then a bad heart week followed, as they tend to when I'm run down. So I'm nowhere near as far along as I had hoped, which is kind of annoying because this weekend I'm participating in the 5km Run Melbourne event! I somehow suspect it will involve more walking than running, but meh - at least I'm giving it a go, which is more than I can say for most couch potatoes.

Interestingly, my first run back after illness I decided just to see how much running I could do. I decided to set a quite reasonable goal of running 5 minute blocks with 2 minute rests, and discovered that - with the exception of one interval where the ol' ticker wasn't playing the game and I stopped after a minute - it was generally well within the realms of my capability. At one point I even jogged for seven minutes straight and probably could have gone for longer, but there was a steep hill in front of me and I didn't want to push things too far too soon. Some would call that soft, but I know my body and I call that wise!

So I think a lot of it is a mind game, and things like pain or discomfort or fear can really put a dint in that. Wish me luck for Sunday, and if you want to (please do!), you can donate to the Victor Chang Heart Research Institute by clicking here. The Donate bottom is on the bottom right hand side of the page. They do research into various heart conditions and diseases including (but not limited to) Long QT Syndrome, so the more people that donate, the more likely they'll fix me for good, one day!

Tuesday 29th of May, 2012

Huh. Not quite sure how an entire month has passed since my last update, but there you have it.

I've been doing pretty well, with the exception of eating a lot of cake due to a cake decorating course. Theoretically I'm within my calorie requirements but I'm not losing any weight so perhaps not. But I AM getting fitter, which is why I'm here to start with. I have also lost a couple of centimetres off my waist, and my "fat" jeans are a breeze to button instead of having to suck it all in and lever them shut. Not long until they start falling down (hopefully), and then it'll be time to get back into my "skinny" jeans. Not that they're skinny by global standards, but they are by comparison to, oh, I don't know, my entire life!!!

I began the C25k (couch to 5km) program last week. Week 1 was a breeze for me, but Week 2 has been pretty horrible so far (one run in!). I know I have to keep with it, but gosh it's hard! Last night's effort was what one might refer to as a nanna shuffle... so it's a darned good thing that it was dark and I was alone. My heart has behaved itself relatively well, although I still have a moment of panic at the start of each run, which probably doesn't help matters, and occasional hiccups as I start or stop the jogging component - I don't think my heart likes my pace to change but once it settles into a rhythm it's happy enough. My muscles aren't hurting quite like they were, which is a good thing. A very good thing. And when they do hurt, it's weird muscles. Can someone explain to me why the tops of my shoulders hurt when I jog??

I'm hoping to make June the month that I move for at least 20 minutes each day, and possibly also the month I don't eat red meat, and/or the month I don't eat processed foods. We'll see.

Monday 30th of April, 2012

Well I didn't have the greatest of weekends - I fell off the wagon a bit with the healthy eating, because we celebrated mother's day early as I'll be away on the day. But I did lose half a kilo during the week, which is good. Unfortunately, though, I had a dizzy spell on my walk on Saturday. Not happy. Not happy at all. I exercised nearly every day this week, but exercising is hurting my muscles like you wouldn't believe, and is making me sweat up a storm. I think it's the higher dose of the heart medication I'm on that does it. I envy those with good physical health SO much, and wish they realised what a precious gift they have. I'm grumpy now so I'm going to stop writing. Wish me luck for the coming week!

Wednesday 25th of April, 2012 - ANZAC Day

I've done really well for the last ten days - watching that I don't put too much junk in my mouth, eating lots of fruit and vegies, and have exercised every day bar one (unless you count the ten minute return trip to work. I didn't go for a walk that night because it was freeeeeezing!). I just came back from a 50 minute walk that took me a little over 50 minutes, so I was powering along and my heart was fine - huzzah! Weirdly, I didn't start sweating until I stopped but that's pretty normal for me. We all know I'm a bit spesh. But I'm now motivated to exercise harder and get my fitness up. Not long now and my body will beg me to jog... we'll see!

I weighed in on Sunday and have lost nearly 2kg, which is a big amount... but bear in mind that it's only really the first week of really trying which is usually where you lose the most and that, prior to that, the crap I was putting into my mouth was astounding. I was also completely inactive. I wouldn't normally expect to lose more than .5kg or so in a week, and am making an effort to put MORE into my mouth to make sure I'm getting the balance right. Let's face it - I like food too much to ever starve. But I think my body likes being at the weight it was for the last two years, and is keen to return to that weight. I suspect once I reach that goal that's when the hard yards will really begin.

I think my motivation has been helped by joining MyFitnessPal. It has quite a good database of food and exercise, plus a community aspect. You can also make your food diary public and you are therefore a whole lot more accountable. It's funny, though, what people eat. My day will be made up of cereal with fruit, salad with lean protein at lunch, something heavy on the vegies for dinner, with snacks of fruit and yoghurt and some sort of treat like frozen yoghurt or dried fruit or both, depending on how much I exercise. I never go hungry. But other people are eating allllllll sorts of processed or fried crap, but just less of it... or more of it, and then getting on the treadmill for two hours. It's kind of vouyeristic but I like it :)

So I'm off to a good start, and I'm feeling motivated, so yay! My pants are also less tight which is comforting :)

Monday 16th of March, 2012

Easter was... well, Easter. You know how it goes. And it was a holiday, too. You know how that goes as well. Things got a little ugly, shall we say.

I have signed up to MyFitnessPal.com (username vanessalillian82) because it's a good way of tracking your progress. I obviously lied when I said I didn't care about the weight, but we all knew that, didn't we ;) So I'll put the weight loss widget on the sidebar (if I can figure out how), just to humour myself! Mind you, today it's telling me I haven't eaten enough, but I'm just not hungry. Go figure.

Over the last few weeks I have focused on increasing incidental exercise rather than formal exercise. For example, now that I'm back at work, there's an automatic ten minutes spent walking each day (still not allowed to drive). I was absolutely buggered for the first few days but I'm getting used to it now. And I mowed my mum's lawn on Saturday, which took me two hours because the grass was so damned long - more "marathon" than "incidental", perhaps...

My heart has been misbehaving (and I'm pretty sure I've come close to a zap on more than one occasion, but I won't know if it's all in my head until I see the doctor in about 3 weeks' time), so suffice it to say I have been somewhat less than keen to work up a sweat. I don't want the fear to beat me, but man, sometimes it's hard not to let it.

So my goals for the week are to eat cleanly (no processed gunk, the exceptions being diet yoghurt and sultanas... oh, and mentos!), and to move every day (beyond my walk to work). I plan to walk around the block of an evening, not go to the pub for my usual parma, and to have a go at one of Michelle Bridges' DVDs, which seems to be set up in an achievably bite-sized manner, as well as a few of her recipes. I'll let you know what it's like.

Wish me luck!

Sunday 24th of March, 2012

I am hereby replacing the tab entitled "I Can't Believe I'm Sharing This" with "Fit for 30".

The previous incarnation was a bit on the negative, sad-sack side and it was altogether a bit of a waste of space. I'm not entirely sure what I want to achieve with this tab but I guess I just want to keep myself a bit more motivated over the next few months. I'm turning the big three-oh in July and I'd really like to be looking - and feeling - as good as I possibly can be!

The last few months have been pretty ordinary health-wise; between my little adventure over the new year and the pacemaker surgery I had a couple of weeks ago, it goes without saying that I am not exactly in peak form. It was bad enough before the surgery because I was having quite a bit of trouble with my arrhythmias, but post-surgery I have been physically unable to move much. I mean, I can walk, but I can't do anything with my arms. I'm still sleeping flat on my back because rolling over is uncomfortable. Try it out for just a few nights. It'll drive you nuts!

It's a little bit horrifying how quickly your fitness leaves you when you sit on your arse all day. Before the surgery there was a noticable difference in muscle fatigue on the rare occasions I was able to exercise (which I presume is related to the increased doseage of beta blockers I have been on), but now, boy oh boy do I tire easily now -  baking and decorating a batch of cupcakes tuckers me out! But I'm going back to work on Monday, so, provided just being at work all day doesn't tire me out, I'm going to start by walking around just one of those flat blocks of an evening. And then once I'm okay with that I'll go for two. And then three. And then four...

Suffice it to say I have stacked on a few kilos whilst I recouperating (mum's one of those nurturers who likes to feed people, particularly those who are ill or sad) and I am back to the weight I was - and hated - in highschool (and yet, a totally different shape, which is great!), but right now it's more important to feed my body than to worry about what it looks like. Yeah. Tell that to the pants that don't fit...

So anyway, my focus is going to be more on fitness. If my cardiologist lets me (and I won't know until May 6th), I'd really like to complete that Couch to 5km program before my birthday. If he says yes I will literally have to begin on the day of the appointment, and have to keep up with the progam, which, given how closely I have to listen to my body, may not be possible. But as I said, it's something I'd like to try. Failing that, I'd like to be able to do the Thousand Steps walk in the Dandenongs, preferably without stopping. I'd also like to get back into yoga, and make an effort to go swimming more often. I don't know how many of these things will pan out, but they're reasonable goals to have.

I will obviously be ecstatic with any weight loss that comes with the fitness but I will try not to get hung up on it. I really am realising that how I feel is more important than a number. Yeah, I'm not sure I believe myself either...

Anyway, wish me luck, and best of luck with your own fitness!