I’m tired of caring about what I eat.
I’m tired of caring about what I look like.
I’m tired of trying to figure out my diet and what will work for me as I age.
Trying to figure out my nutrition and meal plans only add to my exhaustion at the end of the night.
I’m frustrated, and I’m about to throw in the towel, say “Fuck it,” and not think about food at all.
There are various areas of our lives that we feel good about: spiritual, physical, mental, relational, financial, and overall quality of life.
Feeling good is a challenge for most of us in at least one of these areas. We struggle with one or more of these aspects every day.
For me, it’s been the physical.
As you know, my hormones have been all over the place, and I’m still trying to figure out what to eat and when and what time of the month, so I feel really good physically.
There are days when I get it right and days I don’t get it right.
And if I’m doing really well with the eating/hormone balance, then I’m usually struggling with some kind of strain or pull instead.
I try to accept that this is the life I’m chosen, but some days are just plain hard to get through.
I keep going. Every day hoping to get it just a little bit more right and praying I discover the secret and balance of eating, sleep, and working out to make it the best day ever.
We all know this is important: taking care of our body. But how many of us actually do it?
Yesterday, I saw my chiropractor. I love my chiropractor. Ever since Bruck my arms have been whacked. Sore. Wrist hurts. Bruised. You name it.
My chiropractor fixed my wrist. It feels SO much better now. The pain is gone and the range of motion is back.
Last week, I got a massage. It felt SO good. Again, range of motion returned. Knots disappeared. I felt so much better.
Nutrition. Lately, I’ve been eating pretty crappy. So much ice cream and chocolate in the house it’s hard to resist. I tightened this up last week as well. Again, I feel SO much better.
Sleep. I’ve been trying to sleep more. Going all day on 5 hours of sleep is exhausting. My body cries!
Taking care of your body involves effort, time, and attention. But it’s worth it especially as you age. It’s necessary if you want to continue doing the things you like to do.
You are given one body. Appreciate it. Care for it. Love it. Be grateful for it.
Without it, you’d be….
I’m such a hypocrite.
Because I hit the scale every morning and depending on what it says, I let it influence my mood.
I’m writing this to convince myself it’s not about the number on the scale. It’s how I feel every moment of every day. How I treat my body. How I eat. How I workout. How I sleep. How I rest. How I live.
This is what matters.
It’s not about how I look in the mirror. Nor about how my clothes fit (because it’s hard to find clothes that fit me and look good on me unless it’s workout gear).
It’s all in the mind. It’s accepting me, and how God designed my body and being done with it. There’s no manipulation.
The only control is the day-to-day activities/fuel I do/feed myself.
These little decisions that add up in big ways.
It’s mental.
So stop playing the game society tells you to play.
Lead with your heart, soul, mind, and spirit.
The rest will fall into place…
Commit.
The word of the year for me.
Commit to ring muscles ups. Handstand walks.
Commit to eating for life.
No longer a diet. A nutrition plan. A fad.
As I’ve told you, my body has been out of whack lately. And I need to reign it in.
Exercise. Nutrition. Self-care.
The piece that’s been lacking consistency is the nutrition. One day I’m on target. Next I fall off big time. The next few days are on and off. And so on and so forth.
So the self-pity party is ending. It’s time to commit. Today. And why not? It is Mother’s Day after all. The perfect gift to myself. The end of rollercoasters and feeling like a failure.
Happy Mother’s Day to all!
I feel blah.
Again.
Remember my original post?
It’s the same thing again.
I feel like it’s a constant fight with my body and its hormones and food and exercise and sleep and life (parenting and work and money and decisions and living).
I just want to throw in the towel at some moments.
“I give up! I give up. I. GIVE. UP!”
Never-ending work. Effort. Hassels. Setbacks. Sins.
Remember your blessings. Remember your blessings. Remember your blessings.
You have life. You have your family. You have your pets. You have your health. You are unlimited in mobility. Unlimited in life. In career. In what you want to do. You live in a country of choice. You have a purpose. A reason. A gift.
Remember…
I now realize why a lot of people fail diets, exercise, New Year’s Resolutions, and any other challenge they face.
Because it’s hard work.
I keep a journal of what went well on that day, areas I can grow, and what I learned and this is what I learned yesterday.
I ate really well yesterday until dinner time. My husband cooked a really good dinner and I ate too much. But it was really good! Grilled chicken, sweet potatoes, garlic bread, and broccoli and cauliflower.
Today is a new day.
I get to start over!
Could you imagine if we didn’t have days and nights and we’d be stuck on the same day (If you lived on Venus, the day would last 5, 832 hours! That’s 243 Earth days!).
This is like everything in life.
If you fail (as we all do every day of our lives), you get to start over! Quite frequently in fact.
Try this next time you fail at a meal: start over on the next meal. It’s another opportunity to get it right. And if we get it right 80% of the time, we’ll still meet our goals. Don’t get frustrated and throw in the towel and proclaim, “Well, that didn’t work!” One step at a time. Always.
Try this with anything in life.
Failing is ok.
Quitting is not ok.
Learn from your mistakes and attack the next time with a vengeance!
Happy learning!!
Some days it’s hard to be sore.
Hard to do every day tasks like laundry and dishes when you have to squat and all your legs want to do is shout at you.
Every day activities most do with ease become a challenge when you CrossFit as much as I do.
Yet, I’d have it no other way.
We are all products of our lifestyle whether we know it or not.
A friend of mine is overweight. She’s been 100 lbs overweight for over 10 years now. She keeps hopping from diet to diet, exclaiming how “this one is better” and “this one will work.”
I’ve told her my philosophy and all I’ve read about the Zone Diet and Mindless Eating. It goes in one ear and out the other.
Another friend of mine bemoans how she can’t lose 10 lbs. Yet her Facebook page is always covered with her out with her friends, drinking mimosas and eating probably more than is recommended. She works out, but hasn’t changed.
Same thing with her.
My mom starves herself. Literally. She is one fall away from death. She can’t remember things because she doesn’t feed her brain. She smokes and has horrible migraines. In her mind though she’s healthy.
I can preach all I want, but you have to listen and want to change your lifestyle.
Then I think People can say the same thing about me. Complaining how I work out too much and I can’t move because I did 300 squats, etc.
Ultimately, it’s your life. You only have one to live. Be happy and content with it.
I know this is hard as I’m still trying to find my sweet spot to have the abs I want yet be healthy and happy and still enjoy all the richness God has blessed me with.
We (especially us women) beat ourselves up so much over looks and in the end we’re all the same. We all age. We all go through the same processes if you’re a mother in terms of bodily changes.
We all face challenges. It’s how you respond to the challenges that determines your mindset.
If it’s truly important, you’ll change. If it’s not and you’re happy with where you’re at, then BE HAPPY! Quit comparing yourself to others and be content with who you are.
If you’re not content, then change it.
Life is what you make it. If you want to starve, then do it. If you want to enjoy your friends and go out all the time, do it. If you want to kill yourself with workouts, do it.
It’s your life, your body, your choice. Don’t let others shame you. Don’t feel bad about it. Embrace it.
Or change it.
It’s your choice….
Now live with it…
…is weekends.
Most people are awesome at dieting and sticking to their meal plans and macro counting Monday-Thursday.
They do everything right. They pack their lunches. They turn down cookies at work. They weigh and measure their food. They avoid fast food. They don’t snack outside of their planned snacks. They are on the path to success until….
Friday night. Saturday. Sunday.
Then these same people who wouldn’t touch a piece of chocolate on Tuesday are wolfing down chocolate pie and ice cream, guzzling beers at the local hang out, and eating a meal of 2000 calories after work. Then, figuring they already broke their diet, they continue to do so all weekend until Monday comes around. They get back on their diet only to break during the weekend again and wonder why their body composition hasn’t changed or they haven’t lost weight.
In order for your diet/meal/nutrition plan to work, adherence is the key. It trumps everything else. You have to stick to it. Almost always. 95% of the time. If you want results.
Can you have a cookie? A piece of pie? Ice cream?
Yes!
If it fits into your macros for the day.
Otherwise, a small cookie, a small piece of pie, a small bit of ice cream.
AND THAT’S IT!
Many diets out there allow you to cheat. Regularly.
A lot of nutrition plans use the 80/20 rule: adhere 80% of the time, cheat 20% of the time.
This can potentially work.
The problem is most people abuse the 20%. And the 20% turns into 25% or 30% or more. Then they are in trouble. But they tell themselves “Hey, it’s ok. It’s a cheat meal.”
When cheat meals become excessive, you’ve lost. You’ve negated all the work you did during the week and you’re at square one. You look the same. You feel the same (maybe even worse because you’ve cheated when you know you shouldn’t have). And you’re so frustrated you throw in the towel altogether on eating healthy.
I propose a solution: tell yourself you can’t cheat. Make this your mentality. Change how you look and feel once and for all and it’ll be a lot easier to turn down a beer.
Can you have pumpkin pie on Thanksgiving?
Of course!
That’s the 5%. And no more.
I challenge you to make the change today and let me know the results!
Best of luck!!
I’m just now finishing up a Nutrition course I’ve taken through WodPrep.com
It was really good information.
However, what I was looking for I didn’t find.
And I did realize through this course that I’ll never find it.
I was looking for a nutrition/meal plan for life. Something I could follow every day without thinking about it that would give me the body I want and allow my body to keep doing what I’ve asked it to do.
This does not exist.
Why?
Because the human body is always changing. Outside factors such as exercise and the intensity causes your needs to change. Hormones will play a huge factor. As will your individual metabolism.
It’s depressing.
To me at least.
I’m the person who plans out everything as much as possible without factoring in the curveballs life throws you continuously.
With all the sacrifices I make on a daily basis (my recent blog post HERE on this), I was hoping not to have to make this sacrifice: the nutrition one. The one where everything has to be controlled and if you deviate too much, you set yourself back days. The guilt you have over the cheesecake drenched in hot fudge sauce (what I had yesterday). Every day starting over and hoping you can avoid your temptations. Battling the fatigue from this fight every day.
However, all this makes sense. I was 33 when I realized I couldn’t eat anything I wanted anymore. And now I’m realizing I have to constantly adjust as well.
Sigh….
The first step in progress is recognizing the issue. This does take a huge burden off of my shoulders as I’ve been struggling with nutrition for a while now.
I know I’ll get it.
But the fight continues…
My Journey to the CrossFit Games 