5 windy miles

RUN 5 miles in 52.5 minutes, no walks or rests

It's finally warmer out, but misty with rain in the area and WINDY. Ugh. But otherwise a great run, on the high school loop that with a tweak adds up to 5 miles if I overlap just 0.1 miles past the house. 

Last night some toenails on my right foot bothered me, I expected to find them swollen or red or just as bothered as I was - but they look normal enough. And my right hamstring is tight. I can feel the pull when bend to reach something low or stretch it. In addition to a tight right ankle, it made for a rough-feeling run. So I need to focus on this right leg, and enjoy the rest I have for the next few days. 

I attended Coach's Tuesday night group session, I was alone with LA in MO and had just spent the last few hours nom'ing in the kitchen. I sat for all of it, but stared at the phone and bounced and bounced, back and forth, and over ate. I did the same thing Monday night. Lonely. I was eating to avoid how I was feeling. Usually M is there too, but he's out now. No more. 

Ironically enough, the topic of the group session was emotional eating, it had been for the whole month of March so I now need to go back and listen to that, given that it seems to be an issue. I don't think of lonely, bored, and waiting as emotional prompts to eat - but they are! I was lonely these last two nights, so I ate to avoid it. When I'm waiting for something, to leave or run or go somewhere, I'll wait in the kitchen and grab a snack. 

In Tuesday's individual call, I discussed this with CP. The general guidance is - my thoughts control my emotions, so what am I thinking in these moments? I'm not, which is part of the problem. I don't think I just do. But it's on me to take responsibility and ownership of what happens. There's no one else to blame, and besides blaming someone else takes away my control and makes me a victim (of myself?). 

After Tuesday's call, I managed to do as I promised - come home, walk the dog, wash my face, do a chore - then sit for dinner. I did this Wednesday night too. And then on Weds I stopped earlier than I did before, not early enough, but earlier. And I didn't go to bed feeling sick and upset. Progress!

8, 9, 10!! 600m repeats (200m) on treadmill

RUN just over an hour, 6 miles, 10x 600m (200m)

No strength, I'd planned to but didn't. I went home to walk the dog instead.

I was hungry and kinda low energy, but that was all in my head. Once I got going in an interval I was just fine. I'd forgotten to set the treadmill to 60 mins so at 2.5 miles it went into cool down. This messed with  my plan to do 600s - run 0.38 then rest until 0.5, run until 0.88 then rest until 1 - and I lost count, and ugh. I added it up, realized I was at 5, promised to do at least 8, got confused about how I was supposed to reach 6 miles with 8 intervals and a 1 mile each WU and CD, realized I was only planning 8 miles initially, got to 9 and kept going, got to 10 and kept going -- I did all 10!

I didn't pay attention to speed, I just did 6.5 to start then moved up to a max of 7.2.

Yes!

A week alone, rest week, pre wedding - keep it together!

Plan:
Monday rest
Tuesday 4 changed to 6 miles, Strength, and 600m speed repeats
Wednesday rest
Thursday 6 miles
Friday strength, drop dog, work?, shuttle to airport
Saturday and Sunday travel and wedding

Easy week?! Not really, I'm alone for it and in the past I relieve stress by M. But no more M (2 weeks!) and I need something else. 

This can be my week to get back on track from the Coaching goals. I've fallen off of strength training now for 3 or 4 weeks, 3 at least. The IF is more stress than success. And the 24-hour plan ahead is only for the first meal, the second is random shit. 

So these are simple goals.
1. IF the goal was 16:8. That means 6pm-10am or 8pm to noon or whatever's in between. I still run fasted, but then I eat around 10 am. Today (monday) I ate a little bit around 745am due to "nausea" and thinking that if I ate just a little bit it would go away. It did. But did I just convince myself of that? AT MINIMUM it should be 14 hours. That's easy enough. But come on - fucking try a little harder. You have it in your head that "ooooh I get famine brain" and "it stresses me to have to wait" and "I just feel better to eat a little" but FUCKING HELL that's all mental games. You're FINE. Delayed gratification. 

2. Banned foods. This is going good - fruits out now for 5 weeks-ish, bacon out for 2-plus weeks, PB out for about 2-weeks. But dairy - OOF - I'm eating a lot. So my goal this week is RECIPE ONLY dairy, and I threw out all other forms that didn't make the recipes this week. Way too much dairy, probably progress-stopping type dairy!

3. Speaking of progress - I'm between 127.4 and 131.2!! I used to be between 134 and 137!! 

4. 24-hour preplanning. Totes failing on this one. I plan out M1 (then don't eat it per IF plan) then M3 is "eh I'm not in the mood for that" or worse yet "I blew my plan with CO and have to change". And further I do the olives, salad, tomato paste nomnoms and blow the plan. The plan this week has:
M1= 6 white, 4 yolks, 1/6th salmon can, 1x lowfat cottage cheese
M3= 6.3ox beef, 5g ghee, 75 cals lowfat sour cream, 2x california mix veg""
Salad= greens, cucumber, roma tomato

I haven't added that up yet.... 1134 of 44g/45g carbs, 103/105 protein, 59/66 fat. GOOD!
That leaves me some olives or carrot to nom. 

DO THIS

Treadmill long run

Week summary
Tuesday 4 miles with speedwork, 2x 1000m
Wednesday 10 miles in the rain
Friday 4.2 miles (cut short the 6 miler to be with LA before his exam)
Saturday was gonna run 2 miles, we didn't
Sunday 18 miler on a treadmill!

Yikes, that Sunday run! On Friday LA had a peds shelf exam in the morning and I had a doctor's appointment. His stress levels were high and I hung around the house to be there before he started the exam. But then since I had to leave on a schedule to get to the appointment, it meant I missed the last two miles of the run. I brought all the running gear Friday to work hoping I'd get to run two loops around the hospital but it didn't happen. 

Then Saturday morning it snowed! WTH. Then neither of us really felt like running, and I was having my usual anxiety about "getting things done". He didn't come downstairs until 10:30 ish, I ended up breaking my fast early and eating around 9am waiting for him. And I'm terrible with the waiting, I get anxious about all the things to get done, and resentful that I have to wait. I needed to return the wedding shirt, wanted to go to the asian grocer for the white cups, he wanted to go to the russian store, I skipped going to the craft store for the river pebbles (stained glass project) and I skipped going to lab. He was upset that I "had all this stuff to get done" and "listicles" and "it's Saturday". He doesn't understand my preference to get shit done, I don't understand his preference to do nothing for a day. 

And I missed my run, and really that was bothering me. And I broke my fast. And he's leaving Sunday for a week in MO. Altogether = stressed me. 

Sunday I thought would be my long run day to burn off the stress and get my head better. I could do my meal prep in the afternoon, get chores done, start getting ahead of the week. Call Eva, as that was way overdue. But LA didn't leave until 2pm!! I ended up again breaking my fast early (thinking he was leaving around 11 or so, but he changed his mind), then I ate again around 1pm, then UGH I'm worried I'm overfull. 

He leaves, I tear up, but head directly to the gym. It's 11F windchill, windy, and I hates wind. My luck it's a wind fuck on race day. Anyway, off to the gym worried about my energy and gut. It was OK!! I'd focused on light foods (and way overate the entire weekend, separate story), had only water and salt water bottles to alternate, and ate not a bite the entire run. My energy was steady  and maybe a bit flat. 

I did 5.5 miles for the first and second hours, then lengthened my walks in the 3rd hour to 0.15-0.25 at each mile, and started to feel eager to get away around mile 16. The last two miles were a drudge fest - perfect!! I'd thought about doing 20 miles (to make up for the 2 missed miles) but I didn't have the form or the desire once I'd' hit 18.

Home to meal prep and kids call, the LA call, then EW call, then shower and bed. I was feeling good after the run! No pains, problems, complaints. YAY! 

Supersonic 127.4

Rest day, I'll run the 6 miles tomorrow

I know this journal isn't about weight loss really, it's about training. But the weight has been impacting my training, and it's become a part of it. 

I haven't been under 128 since March 2019 - three years! 

This may be a blip, and tomorrow I'll be back to something more. But this is motivating - what I'm doing is WORKING. Finally. I'm still sitting to eat, not sure if that's a huge contributor or not. And no M now since last Tuesday! That's major.

My pants feel great today, my next immediate goal is the wedding pants to be more comfortable. One week. 

10 miles cold and raining

RUN 10 miles in 1:48

Before bed I learned that the rain I didn't know about tonight was also something I didn't know about for today's run. Luckily it was a light rain, unluckily it was still cold - high 30s. Ugh, it's spring!
 

I mapped out 10 versions of a 10 miler yesterday, on a full loop and the second a two-loop. They started out the same - south on Oak Valley to Target - and after that the paths diverged. I was undecided, but thinking I'd do the two-loops in case I needed something from the house (excuse) or maybe needed a water (poor planning) or a bathroom (unlikely). 

I had a headwind on Oak Valley, yuck, but still felt good especially once I'd warmed up a bit. I had my small 4-5oz hand bottle with salt, my audiobook about the Romanovs, and a headlight it turns out I didn't need. 

The two loops were even, no issues, some foot fatigue and soreness at the end. I regret having nom'd some ground beef and a bite of gouda cheese though - I'm supposed to run fasted!! But I did get the goal of drinking my full recovery bottle and waiting until later in the morning for breakfast. 

Yesterday with Coach - he thinks if I can get 1 or 2 20 milers in, practicing the foods I might bring with me, I could be OK to run the Glass City marathon in one month. One Month! And even though I'm not quickly losing weight, I'm feeling so much better in so many other ways that while it bothers me, it doesn't worry me. 

I did my measurements for him this morning and found I'd lost 0.5-1 inch in abdomen, hips, and thigh!! 
And I'm got the goal yesterday of sitting to eat. But I started munching after dinner and again later before bed. Not good! 

Have I had a Mindset Shift?

RUN 4 miles in 40 mins, with 2x 1000m speedwork

I'll be adding COMMUTE here soon, it's on my list to get Puppy ready to go, even though the morning weather is less than ideally warm. 

Today's run was 2 miles with LA (preparing for Army 2 mile under 21 mins) and he was out of breath by the end. I was jealous and took that forward into my workout. We did the Pittsfield Library and back. 

Then I was on my own for 2x 1000m at 10K sets. Embarrassingly, last night I couldn't do the math for 1000m to miles, I knew it would be "about 0.65", but didn't connect the km to miles until I asked the iPhone for an answer. 0.62 miles

The plan was at the start of a 1.0 mile lap, to go and run until 0.62 miles. The first interval was in 4:53 with the slight downhill on Maple, the second was 4:50 coming back but without the hill. I was winded at the end, happily, but surprised to find I still had some pep during the cool down. When I'm running fast, I don't feel like my feet are going to land correctly, is that giving some hesitation? And I was a bit disappointed to see the paces afterwards - very close to my mile TT time last week - shouldn't these have been faster at only 0.62 miles? But the instructions was for 10K pace. I dunno.

Sunday on my long run with the Kastor audiobook I started to have a mindset shift. I realized about 1 minute away from my parent's house that I'd forgotten my water bottle. Instead of turning around to get it, it turned into a punishment for me - if you're going to be so stupid to forget that, then you're going to be thirsty. Huh? Why do I think that? Why am I so hard on myself? 

And in a question for Coach (only a month left, I NEED to mindset shift NOW) is if I'm graceful with myself, forgiving if that's the word, how will I improve myself. If everytime I make a mistake I let it go with grace, where's the repercussions of the mistake? On the scale, I guess.

Starting Sunday, after the equinox, I vowed to sit during all foods. No more countertop. And dang that was hard yesterday! But it did slow me down. And I'm back on track with wanting to stick to my plans (the Make A Plan 24 Hours Out was slipping for me) (no fuck that I was slipping on the goal, not the other way around!). 

Progress seems minimal, when the scale doesn't change much. But instead of peaking to 137 for whatevershit hormone stuff is going on, I went up to 134 or 135 and came back down to 131 instead of 134. But I'm stalled there.

Nothing changes if nothing changes. I gave up sugar and fruit and bacon, but added cheese. I gave up on IF and changed to 3 smaller meals. I stayed at 14-1500/day even though I added running, but I'm not an accurate logger. 

My mind has definitely improved the past few weeks. I feel like things are clearer and there's less problems to deal with. I see an avenue for change an improvement, finally, after months or years of anxiety and stress. 

The mindset shift is hard to write, it's more of a feeling. But I feel like an athlete. I feel strong and fast and more decisive. I feel like I can challenge myself and respond to it, instead of feeling piled on. I'm confronting problems and passing on stressful thoughts and looking for more. 

But I need to look for less too, haha, or the scale goals won't be there.