Death by kettlebells

Today's WOD kicked my rear oh so bad.  We did a 9 minute warmup.  The goal was to use kettlebells constantly for 9 solid minutes...no stops or breaks.  I was wishing I'd grabbed a lighter bell within 60 seconds of the warmup.  My upper arms were on fire! 

Note: The gal is this picture is not me. 

For a skill set we did dead lifts.  Although I was able to deadlift 150 lbs last week, Derek had me keep the weight at 115lbs so I could concentrate on form.  I was hoping to see if I could of add more weight than last week, but alas I suppose form is far more important at this point.  Wrong form equals injuries and I definitely want to steer clear of those. 

Our WOD was 12 minutes AMRAP (as many rounds/reps as possible)

15 American kettlebell swings

12 hand release pushups

9 box jumps


It doesn't look hard.  It doesn't sound hard.  The first two rounds weren't hard.  Once I started my third round I wanted to die.  Dying would be less painful that what I was doing.  haha   I was able to just finish 6 rounds when the 12 minutes were up.  We had to write our scores on the board.  I didn't come in dead last, but I believe I was 2nd to last AND I did box step ups instead of jumps.  It's so hard to jump very high when you have lots of extra weight literally weighing you down.  Oh well.  Someday I'll get there, right?!

I've been slacking a bit with Paleo eating.  I haven't been totally off the wagon, but I definitely need to clean up my eating and get back on 100%.  I feel so much better when I do and my energy is through the roof. 

My inlaws are coming to visit in about 7 weeks.  I get so much anxiety when they visit.  I love my father in law dearly, but my mother in law is a monster.  She's so incredibly mean and rude.  She's loud, obnoxious and likes to cut me down.  She makes comments on my weight every year they visit.  She asked me a couple years ago if her son even loved me anymore because I'd gotten so fat.  Who does that?  I'm a quiet person by nature and hate to "rock the boat".  I've never really stood up for myself where she's concerned.  That crap isn't going to fly this year.  I feel strong mentally and I'm stronger physically.  I know I'm doing something good for my health and if she says anything, I'm going to put her in her place.  That being said.....I'm still feeling super anxious. 

Less Is More

My grandmother's memorial was very beautiful.  I'm sad she's gone from us but feel peace knowing she's with her Savior.

I didn't eat the best this weekend.  I had my parents and sister over for dinner Friday night.  We ate grilled chicken and sausages, a big green salad, a pasta salad,  and for dessert we had pound cake with homemade strawberry and huckleberry sauce to drizzle over.  Saturday was the memorial and I ended up eating a cookie and 2 pieces of cheese during the gathering afterwards.  We skipped lunch and were all starving.  Later in the evening my brother, sister and I all went out to eat.  As we sat down we realized it was the first time all three of us had done anything together since becoming adults.  How strange and sad.  We had a good time.  We ate delicious Greek food and finished off our meal with a square of baklava.  Mmmmmm!!  Do I feel guilty about not staying strictly Paleo.....not really. 

Yesterday after church we took the kids and the dog and went on a 3 mile hike.  It wasn't some sissy hike, it was an intense, fairly steep hike up to the top of a ridge and then a steep trek back to the bottom.  It took us about 2 hours.  We were all pretty wiped out.  I was proud of the kids for making it all the way and I was proud of myself for sticking to it.  About halfway up my husband suggested to turn around and go down and I told him that none of us are handicapped and have no reason why we couldn't complete the entire hike.  I think he was surprised and pleased I kept going.

I did get to attend my CrossFit class today. HURRAY!!!!  One of the trainers pulled me aside and asked if I did the burpee workout they emailed me.  I told him I did and that I also added a smaller kettle bell workout to it and finished up with 25 more burpees.  He looked a little frustrated and then told me that I was doing too much.  He said that less was more and what I did wasn't necessary.  I wanted to lift up my shirt and grab all my extra flab, shake it in his face and say, really?!?!?!?  It sure feels necessary when I'm such a fattie still.  I was a little hurt because I felt like I really pushed myself last week to get in some great workouts despite not being able to make it into class.  I have a super hard time when people criticize how I do things.   I tend to retreat inward and shy away from them.  He wasn't mean about it, he was just upfront and straight to the point.  Apparently when he tells me to do 50 burpees that's it.....I'm not to add or change the workouts given.  I need to suck it up and and not let his critique damped my spirit.  Now I know and I won't make that mistake again.

Today was hard.  We started off doing various types of lunges, most of which I'd never heard of before.  One was called the spider-man lunge.....it was definitely my favorite. 

We did lunges back and for across the gym for about 5 full minutes.  My legs were burning and quivering by the end.  Next we split up and did the skill sets.  The advanced group went with Jonathan and the rest went with Megan.  Megan had us grab a set of bars that were about 8 inches off the ground.  We were to hold onto them and lift our bodies off the floor for 10 seconds and then rest for 20 seconds.  I wasn't able to lift my entire body off the floor.  My heels still touched, but I at least was holding about 75% of my body weight off the floor.  We did that over and over and over and over.  I don't know how many rounds we did.  It felt like an eternity.  Next we grabbed kettle bells and did 10 rounds of 8 squats while holding the bell to our chests and then 5 kettle bell rows with each arm. 

By the end I looked like I dunked my head under water.  Sweat was pouring off my face and my hair was matted and sticking to my wet face and neck.  All my muscles were shaky and burning.  It's only because others were there and I had accountability that I didn't leave and go home at that point.  I didn't want to do the WOD, I was flippin' tired!!

We had about a 5 minute break and then started our WOD.  We started off with 2 minutes of burpees and then did 3 rounds of  
10 push ups

10 box jumps ( I did box step ups)

10 kettle bell swings over head

and then we finished off with another 2 minutes of burpees.


Those last two minutes of burpees felt like a living hell.  My body is so heavy that going to the floor and back up over and over is absolute torture!  I finished though and was super glad I didn't cry even though I felt like it.  I just wanted to sit in the corner and bawl my eyes out.  Afterwards we all did a cool down while rolling our muscles out on some foam rollers.  I caught one young gal looking at me.  I actually caught her several times.  I immediately looked down away from her eyes, I don't like people looking at me.  I looked down at my legs and saw just how fat my thighs were.  Was she looking at me because I am a fattie?  I always assume the worst case scenario.  Oh well.  I'm not there for them, I'm there for me.  I'm anxious to start seeing some big results in my weight and size.  Is it too much to ask to just wake up tomorrow and be thin?  Hehe 

What I'm eating today:

Breakfast~chocolate protein shake

after workout~turkey vegetable soup

Lunch~salad with homemade dressing and grilled chicken

Dinner~paleo stuffed peppers and sweet potato fries

Denial

I called my sister the other day and was telling her how I had a crying meltdown at CrossFit.  She told me to go online and watch old seasons of The Biggest Loser.  She said that it might be helpful for me to see other people struggling with changing their lives and watch them cry and have break downs of their own.  I started watching Season 6 last night.  My sis was right, it was helpful.  It's so easy to lose perspective.  I go to CrossFit and I see 20 people who for the most part are in great shape.  Sure, the workouts are tough for them, but this world is something they know and are used to. 

I've never been athletic.  I started gaining weight at 8 years old.  I wanted to be in dance classes when I was young, but my family was fairly poor and couldn't afford for us kids to be in sports.  When I was in 5th grade they told me I could join soft ball.  I didn't want to.  I wasn't huge, but I was chunky and had no idea what I was doing.  I felt guilty to turn it down, so I joined.  I remember standing up to bat and refusing to swing the bat at the ball because if I hit the ball, I'd have to run around the bases.  I hated running.  Plus I could feel my extra flesh bounce when I ran and it made me extremely self conscious.  I swung the bat one time during the entire soft ball season and I vowed never EVER to do sports again. 

My mother was overweight while I was growing up.  I remember she would politely bow out of any sort of physical activity if she could.  She would never go swimming with us and going on hikes was far and few between.  I hated that she was fat.  I hated that because of her insecurity she was holding the rest of us back......but the truth was I hated myself and I projected that onto my mother. 

Over the last 11 years of having 3 kids the weight really started to pack on.  I knew I wasn't a small girl, but I didn't really think I was as big as I was.  I made sure I wasn't in pictures and if I had to be in one, I tried to hide behind other people or objects so people couldn't see all my ugliness. 

Last summer my sister rented a jet ski and wanted my husband and I and our 3 kids to join her in riding it for a few hours.  She insisted on taking a picture of me and my husband on it.  I tried to hold my head at a forgiving angle and tried my best to look as slim as possible.  I wasn't very successful.

 

I was mortified when she posted this on facebook and I immediately deleted it.  Who was that person!?!  No way could that be me!  I didn't feel that fat on the inside.  Then I looked at my handsome husband and felt an overwhelming sense of sadness.  My sweet Benjamin has never said one word about my weight problems.  Never.  As I looked at him I felt like I didn't deserve him.  He loved to be active.  Being outside gives him so much joy and I try my hardest never to go outside.  The last few years he stopped asking me if I wanted to go on a hike or go to the beach because he knew I'd say no.  Instead he'd just announce that he was going to take the kids on a hike and he'd be back later.  I'd be relieved. 

 

It's really only been the last 6 months or so where I've really been open about where I am in my life.  The truth is I hated it.  I want to love it.  I love my husband and children dearly but my weight ruins everything!  I don't like meeting new people, I don't like it being hot outside because I refuse to wear shorts or sleeveless shirts to stay cool.  Eating, cooking became my only sources of joy.  Four months ago I chose to give up flour and sugar and it was incredibly tough.  After sticking to it for a couple of months, CrossFit came into my life and for the first time in a very very long time......I feel hope.  Joy has started replacing the sadness.  I want to be a better wife to my deserving husband and a better mother to my three loving children.  I want to be a person that is full of happiness and life.  I don't want to just get by day to day, I want to THRIVE!

 

 

I only get to live this life once and I'm tired of wasting time.  This journey I'm on is so incredibly hard.  It's also quite scary for me.  I can't imagine life without being heavy.  I'm thrilled to see what I will look like as a fit adult woman.  I'm ready to change my life, one step at a time.  The mountain I have to climb is so big right now that it's quite daunting.  One day at a time, one meal at a time, one workout at a time.  This girl refuses to be in denial for even one more day.  

The flu from hell....................

I know in my last post I mentioned getting out for a night to celebrate my 11th wedding anniversary....well.....it looks like it's going to be cancelled.  Apparently the flu we all had last weekend came back with a vengeance.  We haven't been this sick in years.  Why did it have to ruin Easter, my anniversary, and wreck havoc on my CrossFit workouts?  I know it's out of my hands but it really ticks me off.  STUPID FLIPPIN' FLU!

On another note, I'm really starting to enjoy finding and eating new paleo foods.  Yesterday I grilled up some turkey burgers and put them on a bed of organic spinach leaves and topped them with slivers of red onion, dill pickle, bacon and avocado slices.  I also baked up some homemade sweet potato fries.  Mmmmm it was so good!  Even the kids liked it. 

Despite not feeling very well, the workout was great.  We learned about dumbbell squat cleans.  Wow, what looks like a fairly simple movement (and it is) is also a great workout.  We did several of these and then learned all about pull-ups.  Only a couple people in my group can do a regular pull-up, so we learned all sorts of modified ones.  After doing several of these we did 5 rounds of dumbbell squat cleans and pull-ups.  12-8-6-4-2

After our workout was complete we talked more about nutrition and how several elements need to be in check for us to succeed as athletes.  EXERCISE~NUTRITION~SLEEP~STRESS
If any of those are out of whack, then we fail to get where we need to be.  My biggest issue will be the sleep part.  I've been an insomniac since I was in grade school.  It takes me a good hour to fall asleep on a good night and on a bad night it'll take several hours or I might never fall asleep.  It doesn't matter how much I exercise, sleep doesn't come easy for me.  Once I'm asleep I'm fine, it's just getting there that's the problem.  I've tried EVERYTHING to fix this problem and nothing seems to work that well.  We'll see how the sleep thing goes after a few months of CrossFit.  I feel like I have the nutrition down.  I like it, it's easy, I feel good eating it, I don't feel deprived.......hopefully it stays that way. 

Tomorrow we are going to do the same workout we did day one.  We're going to see if we can better our time.  I didn't complete it because I was having a moment in the bathroom reliving my dinner, so as long as I can finish tomorrow, I'll be very happy.  I can't believe bootcamp is just one workout away from being complete!!!  It feels good to force myself out of my comfort zone and do something that really means something.  It feels good to tell my kids what I'm doing and why I'm doing it.  I want them to learn that to change your life takes a lot of courage and effort, but it will pay off and be more rewarding than they could ever imagine.  I want my family to see that just because we were raised to love to eat and not exercise doesn't mean that we can't change that about ourselves. 

I'm going to have a cup of tea and maybe a square of dark chocolate while I catch up on some tv episodes before heading to bed. 

What I ate today:

Breakfast~green smoothie(1 cup packed organic baby spinach, 5 large frozen strawberries, 1 cup of unsweetened vanilla almond milk, 1/2 scoop vanilla whey protein powder, 1 TBS organic chia seeds, stevia)
Lunch~3 cups organic baby spinach, few slices of red onion, dill pickle, avocado, bacon, 8 oz turkey burger, dijon mustard
pre workout snack~1/4 cup sweet potato, 1 turkey sausage
post workout snack~1/2 cup mashed sweet potato, 2 oz ground turkey
Dinner~leftover steak and a big green salad with homemade dressing