****Contact me at gatordeb@gmail.com !!!****

• What is the meaning behind "Debbie Tough" ?
• Introduction (please read first)

• Update - 8/29/11
• What I've learned from the dizziness so far - 2/24/11
• Burning out, binging, re-purposing, and the road to the end (another random, unfinished entry) - 1/12/2011
• Losing it all - some random thoughts, an unfinished entry - 12/10/2010
• Vertigo - and finding out what you want. - 11/10/2010
• The BodyBugg - 10/31/2010
• Dizziness and vertigo (July 2010 - Present, published 10/30/10)
• Losing the reason to run - and gaining it back (July-August 2010)
• The Aftermath (6/26/10-October 2010, published 10/30/10)
• The Marathon (6/26/10, cue Jaws music, published 10/30/10)
• Motivation (published 10/27/10)

Weekly posts, 2010

• 6/21-7/4
• 6/14-6/20
• 6/7-6/13
• 5/31-6/6 (Dad's Death Day 1-year-anniversary)
• 5/24-5/30 (Went Skydiving for my birthday)
• 5/17-5/23
• 5/10-5/16
• 5/3-5/9
• 4/26-5/2
• 4/19-4/25
• 4/12-4/18
• 4/5-4/11
• 3/29-4/4 - Shifting gears a little bit, more info on me sprinkled in with the exercise blogging
• 3/22-3/28
• 3/15-3/21
• 3/8-3/14 - Zumba training, willPower and Grace certification.
• 3/1-3/7 - BOOT CAMP LAS VEGAS ADVENTURE BEGINS (and ends), Schwinn training.
• 02/22-02/28 Last gym week before Boot Camp month. New instructors: Nancy (TKB), Anita (TKB).  Injured my back during Monday's Lift, knee pain, dropped a dumbbell on my finger, Ride2Recovery.
• 02/15-02/21 TKB certification.  25 gym classes, 7 classes in one day.  New instructors:  Lola (Zumba), Albena (BodyCombat), Patrick (Zumba, one-timer), Erin (BodyCombat)
• 02/08-02/14 Still sick, took five days off, weight and fat # down; AFAA training, taught first "segment," got over fear of performing in front of people.
• 02/01-02/07 Still sick.  Still moving.  Can't exercise.  Niacin adverse reaction ("Saturday Night" update); killed the virus!!
• 01/25-01/31  Moving houses, modified week (11 classes only); new instructors, Ginger (Zumba), Glen (Lift), old instructors, new classes (Linda, TKB); sick
• 01/18-01/24  New instructor, Megan (Zumba), and old instructor new class, Beth (TKB)
• 01/11-01/17
• 01/04-01/10  1/8 == free BodyBugg, already ordered

Weekly posts, 2009

• 12/28-01/03    12/31/09 == half-year mark
• 12/21-12/27
• 12/14-12/20 
• 12/07-12/13  (24 classes in one week at 24 Hour Fitness)

^---Blogging starts here with all entries going forward---^

• 11/30-12/06
• 11/23-11/29
• 11/16-11/22
• 11/09-11/15
• 11/02-11/08
• 10/26-11/01
• 10/19-10/25
• 10/12-10/18
• 10/05-10/11 (started continuous logging)
• 09/28-10/04
• 09/21-09/27
• 09/02-09/20
• 09/01/09 - Started going to fitness classes
• August - Slim-in-Six, not blogged closely.
• July 3rd, 2009 - Started going to the gym.

24 Turbos In A Row At 24 Hour Fitness (on hold until February due to (good) Life Stuff).

The measurements post (Latest measurements:  12/18/09).  Have new measurements, will update next week.

The picture progression post / The start and current picture post (will update next week).

Food logging shorthand explanations - work in progress, will have links up by the end of February.

Aflac Iron Girl Sprint Triathlon - May 15th, 2010 - Training info

(The following are all outdated, will update one day):
Nutrition info
Shakeology Recipes
What week are we on?
24 Hour Fitness vs. Las Vegas Athletic Club
My favorite gym classes
My reward when I reach 110 lbs (adjusted from 140)

Update.

It's been a while since I posted.  Whew.  Well, I guess there's some catching up to do.  I'm around 135 lbs.  4 weeks ago I started a new push (8/1/11) to be 115 lbs by the end of the year.  Had gotten to 131.5 lbs and I've kept the 7K deficits per week but I've lost inches and am at 29.5 " at the waist, so I'm losing inches and gained a  bit of weight.  Not despairing about that yet.  I had gotten as far up at 149 lbs.  Eating normal, chicken, cereal, milk, peanut butter, fruits and vegetables.  Yep, went to a Vitamix demo and got inspired to take the Vitamix out of the box (a year and four months after I bought it).  Now I love this carrot/roma tomato/spinach/mini pepper soup with Italian blend seasoning... 50 calories per cup and delicious.  So now I eat (well, drink) vegetables, and LOVE IT.

Dizziness still there.  So it wasn't the vegetables (or lack of).  I'll throw in some random stuff to catch up a bit.  I learned to control my eating, and some days I stay at the 700's and 800's and one day I even went to 240 calories (3 apples, 3 classes... because of the dizziness I can't do classes without food, and apples hold me up pretty well... I wouldn't chance a class while fasting even though I can get through the whole day without working out fasting).  I know I'm going into anorexic mind-set territory, and maybe it's arrogant to think I can dabble in it and not be sucked into the mentality.  I.e. I can have and exercise power over food but to the degree that I want, while I'm staying in control, instead of it taking control over me.  It's like going into an asylum and being sure you can make it back out sane.  There's some degree of risk that it'll take you and suck you in.  Maybe that's what makes it thrilling.  If that's what it is.  Eh, at the end of the day I love food too much to be anorexic, I restrict when I need to and let loose the rest of the time.

Some days I'll have as high as 2700 calories.  As long as I'm at a 7K deficit at the end of the week, I don't care how it's distributed.  Works out to about 1450 average calories a day.  No going into Monday.  End of Sunday, 7K deficit.  I've done it (with deficits like 7007) the past four weeks.  No compromises, and I think that's why it's working again after being stuck at 140 lbs forever.

2-year anniversary of group classes Thursday.  Going for 25 classes this week.  2 down, 23 to go.  Whew.  I was in the middle of class #1 when I decided to go for it.  I don't think I can out-eat 25 classes.

I decided I was too scattered.  First get to 115 lbs.  Then gain muscle.  Then train for triathlons.  Ironman one day.

I have a shoulder injury that's still healing, about 7 weeks now.  Took a BodyPump Sunday and 2.5 lbs on each side was hard, so I'm going to keep it at that.  I went back to BP too soon a few weeks ago and re-injured it.  So there I was taking BP and I'm shaking so hard out of fear.  My body's terrified of getting injured again.  I was surprised how hard I was shaking and breathing shallowly.  Definitely an emotive reaction to it.

I found out that if I put my water bottle in front of me and focus on it I can do squats without getting dizzy, and it's awesome to be able to do them again.  It also weakens the dizziness for a bit.  Never gone, but better sometimes.  It's been a year.

When I got the shoulder injury I was in the middle of Zumba and all of a sudden I couldn't raise my left arm.  Freaked me out.  I cut it down to just Turbokicks because I could do them without using the left arm at all (and burned around 75% of the calories which makes sense because I was using 75% of my body... but I burned more calories than staying at home!!) and spins  TKB was easy to modify.  Zumba uses both hands a lot so it was harder and I skipped it for a few weeks.  Then added some moves with the left arm, then everything.  Repeated punching with the left arm still bothers me a bit, as does cycle sometimes.  I think I hurt it at a Groupon boot camp I was trying out.

At least the BP didn't make the shoulder worse.  That's promising.  I lost a LOT of strength!!  I have a new focus, though, this time 115 will happen.  Then the muscle building.  Then the triathlon training.  I don't have time for everything at once.

Met this awesome instructor named Rachel over at Charleston and Lamb and love her TKB and Zumba (which I've restarted).  Two years later, still meeting awesome instructors.

I'm FINALLY liking what I see in the mirror, I look skinnier.  Although I still want to lose 20 lbs more.  107 is unhealthy, 115 is good for me.

I've monitored sugar so I don't have low blood sugar (it's right at dead center of healthy, 100 is dead average, I was 101), but apples hold me up through anything.  I was in the middle of a TKB and felt I was going to faint so I walked out, ate an apple, and was able to come back and finish and literally felt like somebody was holding my body up by my armpits.  Apples are my safety food.

A bit scattered today as I catch up on things.  Had John this morning and then Rachel's Zumba, Kelly's TKB tonight to round out Monday.  Body feeling great.  Can't wait to do this !!

What I learned being dizzy - Part 1, initial thoughts. 2/24/2011

I've been trying to sit down and write it all and that hasn't worked so maybe I just need to write some, and then tomorrow some more, and just little entries instead of one big one.

On August of 2010 I started suffering from dizziness.  The room doesn't spin, I don't spin, it's more of a feeling that I'm vibrating.  At the beginning it came and went, came and went, and progressively got worse and worse.  Went to two general doctors, a neuro-ophthalmologist, a balance center, and an ENT.  Had an MRI, sinus CAT scan, bloodwork.  Conclusion:  They don't know what's wrong, or how to fix it, and I just have to wait it out.  Today it is February 24th, 2011.  Almost seven months.  In the last few days of July I got really sick at Camp Turbo (last year), so maybe that's it.  So I just have to wait it out.  The ENT said worst case scenario a nerve got destroyed and it takes 18-24 months to regenerate.  So that's hope, it's not forever, it's just right now (where have I heard that before?).

I gave up exercising (TurboKick, Zumba, Spin) for various reasons.  I feel like I'm going to faint and I get nauseous.  Right now I equate exercise with fun, and I don't want to start equating exercise with something negative, so that when the dizziness goes away I can step right back into it.  And I've tried not to develop a victim mentality and I think I hung on as long as I could, but I really think I'm not in physical conditions to exercise aerobically right now.

So I'm stepping it up with my food.  139 lbs right now, 90 days left until my birthday.  Going to see if I can monitor food and go to the goal of 115 lbs by then.  24 lbs in 3 months, doable.

BodyPump, a weight class, is even hard on me.  I had to give up martial arts too.  Pretty much anything, I can't seem to do cardio on my feet.  Maybe do the recumbent bike for my cardio.

There's a class at the gym called SilverSneakers.  It's a mix of balance drills, weight training, and some other stuff involving a chair.  It would get out of the house and into a group environment.  And it's something I can manage.  But it's mostly for older adults and I feel conscientious going to my first class.  It's funny because when I was 76 lbs heavier I never cared if I was the fattest in the class, but I'm very conscientious about going to a class that may have mostly older people there.  But I'll try it once.  I can take two on Tuesday and two on Thursday.

I walked out of three of the last six classes I took at the gym.  The last one was a TurboKick class.  I walked out after five minutes, the warm-up.  And as I walked to my car I just started crying, like I did when I could barely go downhill that day at boot camp.  Losing physicality has a great mental effect on me.  That's what I want to be careful.  I love group classes still, and I want to keep it that way.

And it's funny but it's very easy to get depressed if you spend a lot of time at home.  I've been surprised to find depressive thoughts that I used to have before, and depressive feelings.  But I've found that for me personally it takes three aspects to be depressed.  The feelings, thoughts, but there's a third part... I don't, the actions part?  That completes the cycle and allows depression to exist.  And THAT part is gone.  It's not there anymore.  I left it behind that day during the extreme challenge and never picked it back up.  So I'm not depressed even though I find myself going, whoa, there's that depressive feeling, I thought I left THAT behind.  But it really is like I lost the ability to be depressed.

And there have been benefits to the dizziness.  I was afraid that if I was unable to exercise I would regain the weight back, and I didn't.  And I even can lose weight without exercise with everything I learned about food.  And I found that I'm miserable in bed without being able to move and I miss my aerobics classes.  So Fat Debbie really is gone, never to reappear.  I mean, I had all the necessary components to be Fat Debbie again.  And I didn't.  And that's a huge, no pun intended, weight off my shoulders.  I can say now with even more certainty that I'll never be fat again.

The dizziness will be gone one day and I'll retake my aerobics classes with even more gusto than before.  And I against using smilies in my blog, but ":)"

You know, it seems to be I have to be strong through this, there's not really a choice.  But part of me WANTS to be a victim, I want to curl up and feel sorry for myself, but after everything that happened through the working out and all the transformation that happened inside, I can't.  It's just not in me anymore.   I was always a fighter, but I learned how to put it into action.  But I was thinking I don't WANT to go through hardship and I don't WANT to be strong, but I don't really have a choice.

Well, that pretty much sums up what I've learned about the dizziness so far.  Maybe now I can go back to regular blogging :)

Burning out, binging, re-purposing, and the road to the end (1/12/11)

4545. That's the amount of calories in the following: Little Caesar's cheese pizza to go (2000 calories, 8 slices at 250 calories each, cheesy bread (1300, 130 each times 10), hot wings (400, 8 times 50), crazy bread (800, 100 times 8), and crazy sauce (45). Of course I can't eat the whole thing in one sitting. Eat as much as I can and then nibble throughout the day. That's my cheat meal/day of choice. Had 4 of those (or may even have been 3) in the past 18.5 months. So I guess in the numbers I'm still ahead. And I look forward to more of those meals in the future, but not until I hit 115 lbs. Want some comparisons? 4545 calories equals about 56 apples or about 26 boxed meals that I eat at 170 calories each. About 22-30 bananas. 568 strawberries. Etc.

I've been going up and down and up and down between the lowest of 129.5 lbs and 140 lbs since April of this year. I even got up to 145 lbs (one more lb and I would have been considered "overweight" so I've still kept my "normal" weight since April) after this last "binge" (what's the difference between a cheat meal, a buffet, and what society calls a binge?) and now I'm down to 137.5 lbs. But something changed after that last cheat/binge meal. I'm not going back up again. 22.5 lbs more lbs to go, but each time I hit a number, I know I will never see that number again. I'll never be 138 lbs again. There's a determination that has finally gripped me and is helping me to the end.

What's funny is that I wasn't trying to make myself feel good with that meal. I wasn't trying to fill some deep void in my soul. I wasn't trying to make myself happy. I just like how it tastes and I wanted the instant gratification of that taste. I think that's the difference now, if I eat food like that I know exactly why I'm eating it, so there was no guilt at all after every meal because I did exactly what I wanted. What happened was that the calories set me back too much (that's about 1.5 lbs in calories) and I just don't want that many calories in at once until I reach my goal weight, at which time with the working out that I do I'll be able to eat whatever I want (up to a point, but we're talking ~2800 calories a day to maintain or even more).

In other news, I burned out. I was there in the middle of a Zumba class and I thought I just can't do this class anymore. I know 90% of the routines used at 24HF and Gold's. Over and over and over and over and over again. It's like I couldn't do just one more dance without my head exploding. The next day I did a cycle and then waited an hour for a TurboKick and walked out of the gym 5 minutes before class time. I just couldn't bring myself to take the class. I was done.

The following Monday I started my triathlon training. By that Thursday, I was done with that. I skipped the $80 marathon I had paid for and I plan on skipping three other events I paid for for a total of $320. I feel so very close to hating working out, and so far working out has been fun. If I push myself into either triathlon training or doing the events I run the risk of going back to Fat Debbie. For $320? No way. I have to be careful. That was last week. And this week I went back to the gym and I've been enjoying it again, although I definitely need to try some different instructors because I need a change. No matter how much you love the class or the instructor, you burn out sooner or later. It took me 16.5 months of group classes at 2-5 classes a day to burn out. That's at least 1000 classes and that's a low estimate. And I keep trying to make myself into something that I'm not. I can't do the same thing over and over and over again, I need a little bit of everything, to be able to switch from one thing to another on a whim from one second to the next. Rest of January, gym (YMCA for the last two weeks to get some new instructors and classes), February is Cross Fit, March is Bikram Yoga, April is a boot camp program at a gym. By then I should be at 115 lbs. Also bought some games for the PS3 (Zumba, Your Shape, Active 2.0), XBOX (Biggest Loser, Dance Central), and Wii (Gold's Cardio Workout) to add some variety and ease of scheduling.

So no more triathlons, no more rules, just wake up, pick what to do, have fun. That's what works and I don't know why I keep trying to change it. But at least I guess it's comforting to know I can spot a burnout and take steps to halt it and reverse it.

As an endnote, here's some stuff I wrote on Facebook about food:


Hey, sounds simple, but after 18 months of almost daily weighing, it becomes a habit... brush teeth, comb hair, scale. Gym, scale. Scales everywhere!! You really do get scared that you're going to gain all the weight back if you don't monitor it everyday :)

---

Since April I've been losing and gaining the same 10 pounds. Been up and down around 4 cycles now. You really do get a point where you ask yourself, really? Is food really worth pushing the goal back over and over again? Because trust me, it's not that I don't WANT to go back to pizza, burgers, and hot dogs (the three main food groups). And you start thinking that you can't do this to yourself any longer and that you have to tighten up for one last push and finish off what you started, and you can't keep sabotaging yourself.

And I was thinking about how there's always going to be "a special occasion." There's New Year's, December holidays, 4th of July, birthdays, weddings. We have taught ourselves that we deserve to be happy and food makes us happy to we deserve to eat and we equate food with happiness. Society as a whole. Add that to a brain pre-wired to want to eat in excess, and it's all downhill from there.

So you get a to a point and you get sick and tired of the whole thing and start looking at why you want to eat at that particular moment and if it's not out of hunger, you decide you're worth more than that instant gratification and just say no. You realize you're not going to starve and you know how much is a reasonable amount per day and you put your foot down and decide to just say no.

Or something like that ;)

Because it's not that you can turn off cravings or that you don't pass a chocolate cake and don't want to eat the whole thing anymore. It's just that you become tired of doing that to yourself. And you finally understand that passing up on dessert is not "denying yourself." We have this whole thing about "denying ourselves." And it goes back to we want to believe we are good and if we are good we deserve to be happy and food makes us feel good so we think food makes us happy so we want to eat. And if we -don't- eat then we are castigating and denying ourselves of, ultimately, happiness. That's the world as it exists right now. And our brain plays right into that happily.

Losing it all - some random thoughts, an unfinished entry - 12/10/10

So here we are, 17.5 months after I started working out.  I always say that I didn't lose the 75 lbs, that it was all somehow given to me.  That it was easy.  One day the cravings just stopped and the working out just starting, like flipping a light switch.

I got to 130 lbs and I'm back up to 140 lbs.  I've been gaining and losing these same 10 lbs for months now.  I've gotten to 130 lbs twice and then back up.  Down, up.  So now I'm at 75  lbs lost from 215lbs on 7/3/09.

I used to, a long time ago, eat four hamburgers at a time.  20 cheese sticks.  Two McDonalds Breakfast Deluxes (not all at the same time, each one of those was a meal).  I'd get this urge and I'd drive to the drive-through and it was like I couldn't stop myself even if I wanted to.  All that stopped on 7/3/09.

These past few weeks I've been getting this hunger that I can't seem to satiate or stop.  Yesterday I have 10 fiber bars, about 200-300 grapes, and 3 boxed meals.  I'd say about 2500 calories.  And no exercise.  So that's about 700 calories over.  I haven't had a deficit in over a week.  Eat, eat, eat.  The feeling that I can't stop myself.  And the vertigo medicine is making me feel not sleepy, but so exhausted that I can't get out of bed.  Although it takes the symptoms away completely, it makes me so tired that I stay in bed anyway.  I see the specialist in 8 days so at least there's an end in sight regarding the vertigo.  Or at least a checkpoint.  Hope.

I thought it was the vertigo medicine that was making me feel hungry but I'd stop it for two days, enough to rid my system of it according to the balance center, and the hunger is still there.

It's as if someone said, here, we got you to 140 lbs.  Now we're leaving, and you'll be left at the same point as you were before, with that hunger and inability to stop eating and dragging yourself to exercise.  Have fun!  It's as if someone gave me training wheels and now they're being taken off and I have to take it from here.  And you know what I decided it will take from here?  Courage.  Because I have to believe I'm strong enough to resist the eating urges.

It's like the depression.  Let me tell you a story of how I "beat" depression.  From the time I was 10 to the time I was 31, 21 years.  It affected every area of my life.  I had to drop classes in college because of it.  It affected jobs.  Everything.  Then one day I was behind someone important to me and they had hurt their foot.  And we were walking back to our car with this group of people from working out in the river.  And I told her she could lean on me and I'd help her back.  She said no, of course.  She was too tough for that.  It was actually one of the qualities I liked most about her.  So there I am, walking behind her, looking at her feet moving and double-stepping now and then through the pain.  I will never forget those minutes.  It's like when time stands still.  And I thought to myself, that if I want someone to lean on me, they have to, at least for that specific moment in time, feel that I am stronger than them.  It's just common sense, if you lean on something weaker than you, it breaks and you fall.  You lean on a wall that will stand your weight.  You lean on a person that can, at that moment in time, hold you up.  So then I started thinking that I wanted her to feel like she could lean on me so I had to be strong enough in her eyes for that.  And then I started wondering what that entailed.  And all this internal dialogue took a couple of minutes at most.  And it was then that I decided that I would never be depressed again.  Not that I couldn't be depressed again, but that I wouldn't.  (that for me is a huge difference) And it has been months and I haven't been depressed since.  Those first few weeks I'd feel myself getting depressed, and I'd say out loud "No, Debbie."  I'd be in the car, pop open the mirror (parked), look into my eyes, and say "No, Debbie."  Out loud.  I haven't had to do that lately, now I just don't get depressed.  After 21 years, it was ironically that easy.

What makes something happen at a specific moment in time?

Vertigo ... and finding your choice (11/10/2010)

Since early August (it is Wednesday 11/10/10 today) I have been suffering from vertigo.  First it got me for four days, then went away, then came and went in spurts.  When it came I'd stop exercising for a day or two then go back to it hard again.  I kept my credo of what you can, when you can.  I woke up fine, I worked out.  I woke up with vertigo, I stayed home.  The times I exercised with vertigo it was very hard on me.  Then 8 days ago, last week Tuesday, it came and hasn't let up.  I've spent the whole 8 days working or in bed.  Even walking has been hard.  It's like that feeling when you're about to go down a roller coaster, that queasiness just as you're going to go down, but -all- the time if you're not laying down, and sometimes even if you are, and this feeling of things just vibrating, and feeling your eyes twitterring (back to the glasses which do help but don't take it away, and I tried an Antiver-generic anti-vertigo medicine along with a water pill to get rid of sodium but neither helped), and the nausea.  I'd stumble around just walking and this whole roller coaster dizzy as hell feeling I'd get whenever I'd get up.  I almost tipped backwards going up the stairs.  Dad much?  I do wonder if this could be what happened to him.  Because something I'll never know is whether he died because he fell down the stairs or whether he fell down the stairs because he died.  It's been getting progressively worse.  I seriously thought of taking short-term disability time away from work.  I'm sure the symptoms were having a mental effect on me.  I just want the vertigo to stop.  I want my life back.

My previous doctor told me to eat more and exercise less.  All of a sudden losing weight is being used against me.  If a heavy smoker goes to the doctor with a cough, the doctor's first instinct is probably going to be lung cancer.  Well, work out a lot and lose a lot of weight and everything physical that now happens to you is because you work out a lot.  So now I have that bias going against me.

Underwent some blood tests and switched doctors and the theory is that it's vestibular.  That there's inner ear crystals that have become dislodged and cause the inner ear fluid to go one way while the body goes the other confusing the brain.  I have an appointment later today to go to the Werner balance center for assessment and treatment.  Get the crystals back in placed through vestibular therapy, solved (you can Google for the details).  Hopefully I can get this fixed and back on the road.

Throughout the past year I've had my physicals up and downs and whenever I have a down I know exactly what I'm missing now, and I didn't before.  Right before this bout of vertigo I had my taekwondo midterm and I have a picture of me in mid-air kicking, with some respectable air.  That's my body, and I am amazed it can do it.  I probably haven't lost a lot of that in a week out of commission.  I've been eating over what I've burned but I allowed myself that also.  Know when to fight, know when to push, know when to back off for now.  I don't see the point in exercising with vertigo that may be fixed in 2-3 weeks.  Stay in bed, eat reasonably, get this fixed, come back.  Gain a few pounds?  I'll lose them.  Ironically I've lost a few pounds and I'm now at 130-132 lbs, with a lowest-ever at 129.5 lbs when I fasted for Yom Kippur this year (including 24 hours of no water).  I was around 135 lbs a week ago so probably the same weight with fluid fluctuations.  200 calories over burn is 1 lbs over two weeks.  I can deal.

So I wasn't worried about the not working out.  I caught up on my reading.  And I wasn't worried about the food.  I'd bounce back from anything.  Hopefully I can get this fixed and come back hard.  And I was trying to find whether I wanted to do triathlons and marathons and ultramarathons and find that drive inside of me and I was having trouble finding that.  I went back and forth, I want to, I don't want to, I want to, I don't want to, and I couldn't make up my mind.  Then this latest bout of vertigo. 

And I was in the bathroom today washing my hands and I looked in the mirror and I knew.  I just knew.  It wasn't even a particularly long glance, just a quick glance, but I knew.  Just in the same way that back in January I would look at myself in the eyes when I ran the LVAC track and would pass by the mirrors and I had this feeling that I was seeing the Debbie I was going to become and she was telling me just wait, you'll see it all in time, this time it wasn't like seeing a future Debbie, this was just like being able to see inside of myself and have a clarity and an understanding.  I'm in it for the long haul.  I am giving my body fully to it.  I am going to push.  I am going to become an endurance athlete.  I know what my choice is now.  The vertigo helped me realize that.  I -am- scared that it will be hard to start exercising again after the rest (I have  been playing video games also and watching Netflix.... the horror).  I've had fears that I'd fall back into old habits and not "come back."  But I know I will push and I will start exercising again and my body will slowly and gradually improve.  I like that jumping kick body and never realized all this cross-training (gym classes, triathlons, marathons, martial arts) would benefit each other interchangeably.  I don't want to give up that body and I want an ever better one.  It's not about losing weight at all.  I want the best body I can have, I want to do amazing things with it.  And as this year dies down with my first triathlon and marathon, I'm thirsty for a challenge.  I want the Half Ironman, fully ran marathon, and Full Ironman next year.  I want to go back to Running with the Devil in June and beat it.  Run it all the way.  Then in 2012 do a 50 mile, then a 100 mile, keep doing Ironmans, etc.  I want, and I saw it in my eyes in that mirror.  I honestly didn't know whether I wanted it or not a week ago, but I found out through this experience that I do, after all.

And it keeps happening.  The times when I learn the most keep being the times when things don't go my way.  I know exactly what I've gained, and I like it.

The BodyBugg - 10/31/2010

When I joined 24 Hour Fitness they had a new member program in which if you did a certain number of things you got a BodyBugg (http://my.apexfitness.com/) for free.  The BB is, in short, a device that estimates how many calories you have burned that day.  It also tells you steps, estimates the amount of time you have spent in moderate to vigrous activity, and has a "trip" feature.  Reset it before a class and look at the numbers after the class.  It needs a web subscription program for $10 or less a month depending on how many months you pre-pay and the website allows you to track your food and has charts and graphs.

I got it and started using it in January.  Around May or so I got the challenge to stop using it and measuring life, and I did.  After a couple of months, it came back on.

So there's the two camps, the camp that thinks that you shouldn't measure life and the camp that thinks you should.  Which is the right answer?  I honestly don't think there is one.  I have tried it both ways and I think both sides have merit.  I think the BodyBugg can be used as a convenient tool.  I like 1000 calorie deficits so I just eat 1000 less than what the BodyBugg says I burned that day (and after all this time I can now estimate how many calories I have left to burn pretty accurately and what different activities burn).  Before the BodyBugg I used a Polar Heart Rate monitor to measure calories burned during exercise and the 24 Hour Fitness website to estimate calories burned throughout the day, and when I did one day comparing both, I ended up with a difference of about 25 calories using both methods.  Pretty darn accurate.

I also think there's a point to enjoying life without measuring, to living in the moment.  To run just to run, to swim just to swim, to exercise just for the heck of it, without worrying about how many calories you are burning.  And there definitely is a point to not swap one unhealthy way of living for another.

In the meantime, mine stays on.  Maybe it will be different once I'm a goal weight.  I'm always of the mindset that things are not "forever," just for "right now," and something that may be "right" now may not be right in the future and vice-versa.  I found that when I took the BB off I still kept tallys in my head.  After 16 months I just know how many calories food has and how many calories I probably burned in a certain hour of exercise.  You just become accurate at estimating.  All the BB does is it actually lets me not worry about all the calculations and just gives me a number, and so does the food logging website.  So for me it actually makes it simple and faster.

I think it's a great weight-losing tool and can be functionally used in a healthy weight.  Once at goal weight, however, it may be time to let it go.  The good thing about it?  It's always there if needed.

Dizziness and vertigo (August 2010 - Present)

During the last couple of days of July and first couple of days in August 2010 I was at Camp Do More, Chalene Johnson's camp full with workouts, fashion, and talks.  I was in the middle of the loss I talked about last post and this helped a lot in healing, especially the talks.  It was like every talk was directed towards me and the situation. I was also able to talk about it to my trip companion at length and just being able to talk about it helped start the healing process.

I got sick during camp and by the last day I wasn't even going to the workouts.  From the hotel there I joined a 60 Days to Diamond group (long story, Beachbody related) but the important thing is that I underwent a three-day cleanse of 800 calories a day.  And it was then that I learned that my body doesn't respond well to cleanses or low-calorie.  I need FOOD.  But it was around that time that the dizziness and vertigo started, and to this day it hasn't let up.  It comes and goes, I have good days and bad days (today is a bad, no exercise day) and I've had to control food in order to still met my goals, eat enough, and not exercise some days.

I had blood tests drawn and my doctor said I was hypoglycemic (59 fasting) and told me to eat more and exercise less.  A doctor actually told me to eat more and exercise less.  How many times do you hear doctors say that?  And say that TO ME.  It's absurd, and if you had told me that 16 months ago I wouldn't have believed you.

But I didn't want to do that so I modified what I ate and have the episodes under control for the most part, and my down days are few and far apart.  And the good days are GOOD.  So I pretty much show up and give it my all and on days without vertigo or dizziness I'm like a kid in a candy store when I exercise because I get full use of my body.  I used to say that I was lucky that my body followed me everywhere.  It doesn't anymore.  But I still follow my credo:  Do what you can, when you can.  And when I can, I enjoy the hell out of it.

I'm still undergoing tests to see what's going on.  Work in progress.  I've had to become my own advocate and research and go back with test codes so that the doctor can write me lab slips.  This whole journey has made me a bit more assured of myself.

So on dizzy days I stay home and read or watch TV (I can't even get out of bed, I stumble standing up).  And I rest and sleep.  And on good days I work out 2-4 hours.  I still go to group classes but I take it down instead of up.  What I can, when I can.

Most of the time if I don't turn or bend over I can take a group class without much difficulty, and I found I can take spin while sick or dizzy just by holding on very tight to the handlebars to keep me on top of the bike.

Losing the reason to run - and gaining it back (July-August 2010).

Something happened in July 2010.  What happened is not going to the focus of this post, but rather what emerged from it.  I used to run for other people. When I ran, I didn't run for me.  I ran because other people thought I could run, because other people believed in me.  I'd picture other people running alongside me or holding a rope pulling me forward.  I was very extrinsic when it came to running.  It didn't come from inside, it came from outside.  But outside sources of motivation are not always available.  What do you do in that situation?  And that's exactly the kind of situation I found myself in on July 2010.  I almost stopped running.  I almost stopped doing triathlons.  And I had to decide.  Who, and what, was I running for?  I decided I had to change.  I couldn't run "for" other people anymore.  I had to run for me.  When it came down to the line, I had to be enough.  I had to be able to go out there "alone" and make it because of me, not because of someone else.  And I really changed in July and August 2010 and I switched from running extrinsically to running intrinsically, and I decided the strength and determination to run had to come from inside, not outside.  Motivation and pep talks and people who believe in you are of course wonderful and always welcome, but first and foremost, you have to believe in yourself.

I suffered a loss that month (not from death, call it geographically moving away).  And it was 13 months after my dad died (which, by the way, I'm probably not over it; I'm probably still in denial over that one.... nothing I can do but wait it out).  So I told myself, look what happened when dad died.  You transformed your life.  Not on purpose, but it happened.  You took this huge loss and turned it into the most wonderful thing you ever did for yourself.  So how can  you take this current situation and make it into something good?  It was at that point that I started embracing mistakes because they just showed me what not to do next time.  I was always one of those people paralyzed by the fear of making mistakes.  But I've found that you can learn more when things DON'T go your way.

So those were two major shifts I underwent in late July early August, and they have shaped who I'm becoming tremendously.  And it's all part of the journey.  I don't know where it leads, but I know I'm enjoying the hell out of the ride.  And now I'm starting to understand motivation.  Why get out there in 100+ degree weather and attempt to run 50 miles?  Because it's hard and overcoming it builds character and it makes you fight against all your fears and insecurities.  In essence, every obstacle you overcome makes you a better person.

The Aftermath From The Marathon (6/26/10-October 2010).

I finished the marathon, got in the car, and drove home.  It was time to go to work.  I had taken Friday night off in order to sleep for the marathon but I hadn't taken Saturday night off.  I was hoping to finish with enough time to sleep a few hours.  I finished in 9 hours and 15 minutes, or at 7:15pm or so.  I work at 9:15p.  It takes about an hour to get home and 15 minutes to get to work.  I got home, and I knew I wasn't going to go to work that day.  In retrospect, I have no idea how I thought I could do my first marathon and then go to work.  Looking back, it's laughable.  Live and learn.

By the time I got home I started to hurt.  I think what really messed up my recovery was the sunburn.  I had the sunburn from hell (from running Running with the Devil without sunscreen).  There are so many things I could have done without the sunburn:  Touch my skin, massage, go into the jacuzzi, stretch, etc.  I couldn't touch my body.  It was a sunburn so bad I was shaking uncontrollably.  There were blisters and peeling galore and I think it took two weeks to subside.  The sunburn along with the aches and pain made it painful to walk, sit, lay, anything, really.  I could only lay on one side, not on my back.  I could not make contact with my calves, it hurt too much.  It took me 10-20 minutes to make it up the stairs and lay in bed, and then I called in sick.  Then I had to go to the bathroom.  Because of the sunburn it was an ordeal to get into and out of bed.  I strongly considered wetting the bed.  I could always change the sheets.  It took me 10 minutes to work up the courage to go to the bathroom.  I couldn't sit properly on the toilet because of the sunburn.  By now my legs were starting to really hurt because of the run and it hurt to stand up, sit down, walk.  I hobbled, and poorly at that.  I was a mess.  I was not expecting that.  It was then that I realized I had finally met my match.  And I had finally done it.  I had finally broken myself.

I somehow went to sleep that night, Saturday night.  And Sunday I stayed home all day in bed on one side only trying to move as little as possible trying to let the body heal.  I did go to work Sunday night.  I don't know how I managed to wear pants.  I almost didn't, work dress code be damned.  Monday I got the bright idea of taking an aqua class.  Because of the sunburn, the jacuzzi was out of the question.  And I don't know why I got the idea in my head of taking an aqua class, I just did.  And I got in the pool.  Suzi was teaching, my first class with Suzi.  When I got out an hour later, my hobbling started resembling a walk.  I was almost walking normally.  It healed me tremendously.  Next marathon I'm getting into a pool as soon as possible after the event.  It was the most wonderful thing ever.  I credit Suzi and her aqua class in getting me to walk normally again.  Tuesday, another aqua class.  Getting better and better, able to sit and stand better.  Wednesday, spin.  It hurt at the beginning but it was like getting creaky gears turning again, the more they turned, the better they turned.  It was literally rehabbing myself, like my body needed to learn how to move again, like it forgot how to move.

And I experienced the most curious thing ever.  I couldn't run.  I would think, ok, Debbie, RUN!!  And I would inch forward and .... nothing.  I think I wasn't able to run until Thursday and it was only a mild trot for a few paces.  I thought that was the coolest thing ever.  I lost the ability to run.  It was like my body was scared of running, like it thought that if it ran for me again I would put it through another marathon.  If you ever watched Speed Racer (the cartoons), there's an episode where SR crashes and gets scared of racing and Pops straps him to a chair making him watch a racing simulator while SR sweats.  That's how it was.  Especially with cycle, I think cycle got me running again because it taught my body how to get used to that sense of speed again.  It was really like I knew what steps to follow to rehab myself, as everything I did helped inch me along to recovery.

There is one thing that I didn't get back for a long time, and that was the mile in boot camp.  In a sense I never got it back.  I've written how I started running that mile in the back of the pack and I even got there first on occasion, but mostly towards the front.  After the marathon, I was next to last every single time or last.  I lost my mile.  And I quit boot camp before getting it back.  It wasn't until October 26th 2010 that I finally regained the pre-marathon pace of 5.7 MPH (previous had been 5.56 MPH) for an hour.  It took me exactly 4 months to come back from the marathon.  They say it takes a week to recover for every mile ran in your first marathon.  I ran 14 and walked 12.2 and it took me 17 weeks to recover.  Sounds about right.  And right after that run I regained the ability to blog.  Something happened inside that took four months to heal.  I definitely bit more than I could chew.

It was right around this time that I really got hooked into marathons and triathlons (even broken as I was) and I wanted to do endurance events = 26+ miles.  50, 100, 250, etc.  And I started adding a run before boot camp.  But I found that my body couldn't take the high impact of boot camp after the run, or maybe I hadn't healed properly yet.  But I suffered.  I hobbled.  I hurt.  And my last day of boot camp I was going DOWN towers barely able to move in a down incline and I just stopped and cried.  I couldn't do that to myself any longer.  I had to choose, triathlons or boot camp.  Triathlons won.  And so I quit book camp four short months after I started.

It is now October 30th, 2010, and I'm battling a flu, but I'm reading The Long Run by Matthew Long.  It's very inspiring.  I WILL do a Half Iron in 2011 and a Full Iron in 2012 or sooner.  And one day I will run a full marathon.  I have two Halfs coming up, at Valley of Fire on 11/20/10 (why do I always pick sites with hot imagery to them?) and the Las Vegas Rock n Roll on 12/05/10.  Then let 2011 begin.

The Marathon (6/26/10)

I don't know why it's so hard to write about the marathon.  I don't view it as a traumatic event, but here we are four months later and this entry has taken a long time and a lot out of me to write. Something happened in the marathon. Something happened inside. I think I broke myself. Well, let's not get ahead of ourselves.

The marathon was at Boulder Beach on Saturday, 6/26/2010.  I wanted to do the marathon because I started working out on 7/3/09 and I started running in early January 2010, so if I somehow managed to do this it would be less than a year from the time I started working out and less than six months from the time I couldn't run 30 seconds.  I hadn't trained -at all.-  I wanted that for myself, and through sheer will alone I was going to do it.  Sure, I could fail, but I had to try, and there was no time to train.  I'd rather show up and fail than never having shown up at all, and I still feel that way.  Show up and do what you can, when you can.  I learned about the marathon I think not too long before the actual event.  I was active, going to boot camp and taking classes at the gym, but other than boot camp I didn't run.

Running With The Devil Marathon runs along Lake Mead in Boulder City and is so named because the temperatures are in the 90's-100's.  Right in the middle of summer.  It's not just a marathon, it's a hot marathon.  Not the kind of marathon they advise for a first-timer.  It started I believe at 10a, fairly late because they wanted the sun to be nice and hot for us.   Most events start at 6a or so.

I woke up early and had all my supplies ready from the night before:  fanny pack with 10 protein bars, iPod with my marathon playlist, carb chews, electrolyte pills, and cell phone (I never run without my cell phone fully charged, never know what may happen, especially when I'm running in the middle of nowhere, but I tend to not be ON it while I run).  Race materials.  Boot camp shirt, bandanna, and dog tags.  CamelBak.  I was good to go.  I decided that the extra weight was worth it, that I'd rather be over-prepared.

I got there with over half an hour left.  I weighed in and then went back to the car to relax before the race.  16 of water down, port-a-potty visit, retie shoes, check my supplies.  All good.

Race time.  We bunched up as a group and took a picture.  Then it was off, nice easy pace to start.  There were stations every three miles or so, with a weigh-in halfway to make sure you didn't lose 4% of your body weigh or you were disqualified.  Lose 2% and you had to rehydrate yourself before continuing.  The stations were interesting.  I brought supplies to be self-sufficient and only stopped to refill the CamelBak, but by the end, I was so grateful they were there and I was sitting, drinking, eating.  I got so excited when I saw gummi bears.  And ate a lot of bread with peanut butter.  The bananas were kind of gross because of the heat and so were the potatoes and salt so I skipped them.

Right at the beginning within the first 2-3 miles something was wrong.  I felt kind of dizzy but I didn't know why.  Ate a protein bar.  Took an electrolyte pill.  Ate a carb chew.  Drank some water.  Then I felt well, so ONE of those things helped.  That was the only protein bar I ate.  They were too "heavy" to run with.  I like that, trying to figure out what's wrong by listening to your body and fixing it.  I didn't felt unwell the rest of the marathon.  And right towards the beginning my knee was hurting (which it had been doing for a couple of weeks) but I massaged it briefly and it held up well.  I was going to wear a knee brace but I decided against it as I felt it added too much bulk and restricted mobility.  I WAS wearing an ankle brace.

I ran a total of 14 miles, so I ran a full half-marathon.  I will add times later but I got there about 3.5 hours after I started.  I actually GAINED weight mid-way, which I guess it's ok.  You don't get disqualified for gaining weight.  I didn't go to the bathroom until very late into the marathon and I think I only went once, maybe twice, and not really because I had to go but because I could not be certain I wouldn't need within the next three miles and I didn't want to go on the side of the road.

I don't know why I stopped running at mile 14.  My body just knew.  I think that's my biggest strength, I know when to push and when to back away, so I'm not really worried about pushing my body.  Then I had to get back to the car, 12.2 miles away.  It was going to take hours, and I was not looking forward to it, but sometimes it's harder to quit than to keep going.  So I started walking back.  Up to that moment I really truly believed I was going to run 26.2 miles out of sheer will.  I was going to do it.  And I don't quit.  When I run a race I'm either going to faint or finish.  So far I've finished.  I get into that I'm going all-out mentality where -nothing- will stop me.  It really started with that run to the wall in boot camp.  The floor or the wall.  Collapsing or the finish line.  There's no in-betweens.  So for me it was very hard to start walking.  Because I couldn't say I ran a marathon.  I've amended it to say I've completed a marathon and then explain I ran 14 miles and walked 12.2, and I incidentally ran my first half-marathon.  One day I will run 26.2 miles straight, it's just a matter of time.  And it was a good thing I stopped when I did.  I really think that if the distance had been half a mile longer I wouldn't have made it.  I used to think you could walk forever.  I was wrong.  I really think I went beyond what my body could.  People said I could have died.  I say yeah.  And see, the thing is, you don't really WANT to die.  You don't really think you're going to die.  And you're probably not going to die.  There's ambulances.  The body will shut down (faint) probably before any long-term damage is done.  People at the rest stops will stop you from continuing.  There's many contingencies.  Do people die at marathons?  Sure, but it's very uncommon.  And what people don't get is that this is the same as rock climbing or motocross racing or even trick bicycling.  It's about pushing against something and having a little bit of risk. It's about going against nature, and winning.  Heck, my dad died at home going down the stairs.  And people tell me I'm chasing death with all that I do, that I'm looking to join him.  And that actually is as far away from the truth as you can get.  By dying the way he did he left me with the ability to overcome fear.  When I was about to skydive from the plane yeah I thought I could die, but what was I going do, go home because home is safer?  Dad showed me that you can't be afraid of life because death can come anytime, anywhere, and in any shape.  So live life.  Fully.  And all of this has actually allowed me to live life like never before.  I've lived more in the past 16 months than in the previous 31 years of my life.  So no, it actually isn't about having a death wish.  All of this is about having a life wish.  I'm sick and tired of laying in bed at home being scared of life.  I'm going to go out there and experience it.

Another thing that people fail to realize is that it has been 16 months.  How reckless can I be that I have done a lot of crazy stuff and I'm still in one piece?  And that's where we come back to knowing when to push and when to pull back.  Have that ability and you feel secure in that whatever happens, you'll make it out intact at the other side.  It can't ALL be dumb luck, I'm sure my actions have carried me a long way in being safe and healthy.  And, after all, if I die or get injured then I can't do the next crazy thing, and it's all about the next crazy thing.

So I started walking at mile 14.  It was going to be a long way home.  Then came Mile 17.  Something happened on Mile 17.  I was going to get to the next rest station and I was going to ask to be driven back.  I was done.  Close to five hours by then.  You had to finish the whole thing within ten hours.  I was finished.  I was ready for the experience to be over.  Hey, I ran a half marathon, so I got THAT out of the day.  Debbie, who never quit, was throwing in the towel.  I wanted to go home and forget this marathon had ever happened.  I had enough adventure for a while.

Then, all of a sudden, I realized that I had just climbed this monster hill, the worst part of the course, and, within half a mile of the station where I was going to quit, I was ok.  I could finish.  It was then, around mile 17.5, that I knew I was going to finish.  I didn't think I was going to finish, I knew I was going to finish.

I'm glad I had nail clippers with me.  I kept using them trying to get rid of a nail until I figured out the pain was actually a bit of skin that had rubbed off, and was a bit raw.  Sat at the side of the road clipping a handful of times.  Somewhere after the half-way mark (I think) I gave away all the protein bars, they added too much weight.  First I left some at a table then I dumped the rest on another table at a different rest stop.  I didn't drink much, but then again I'm not a big drinker, I go on one-hour runs without water all the time.  Next time it's just me and the CamelBak, I feel secure that the rest stops will provide all the nourishment I need.

Oh, and the electrolyte pills.  It is my belief that those electrolyte pills are what allowed me to finish.  They were a lifesaver.  Who cares if it was mental or physical, I think they really helped.  I started with a schedule, two electrolyte pills and a carb chew every mile, then whenever I felt I needed one, then towards the end I stopped taking them.  I may just take them as needed next time.  The carb chews, which I had in the fridge since the day before so that they were nice and cold, were a gooey hot mess by midway.  Nothing to do about that during a marathon called Running with the Devil.

When I was within 0.80 miles of the end, another runner collapsed (but was still conscious).  Something about his calves locking up and he was done.  I offered him carb chews, electrolyte pills, but he said no, it was too late.  He was doing the 50 miles and he got stuck and unable to finish and picked up by ambulance 0.80 miles from the end.  Me?  I would have been rolling to the finish line.  You don't need your calves to roll.

Towards the end I started sitting at rest stops and I realized I was going to burn, bad.  I hadn't put on ANY sunscreen and I literally could feel my calves sizzling and people kept exclaiming at how pink they were, and around mile 20 I started getting sunscreen put on by others at rest stops.  I could barely move.  There was this other runner who was about to get a special prize by completing a certain number of Calico Racing events and he didn't think he could finish.  I told him that all I had waiting for me at the finish line was going to work that night, that he could at least look forward to a prize.  He did finish, in over 10 hours.

I finished in 9 hours and 15 minutes.  When I was going through the finish line someone cheered and I gave a little whoop, but I didn't feel it.  You're supposed to feel this rush of euphoria at finishing your first marathon, but I felt nothing.  I had nothing left to feel with.  There was nothing left inside, no energy to form emotions with.  I got in the car and went home after picking up my medal.  It was time to go to work.

In the next entry I will discuss the repercussions of the marathon.  And believe me, there were many.  But to this day, I would do it all over again in a heartbeat.  I asked myself when I stopped running where was the Debbie who never quit.  It turned out she was there all along.  I truly believe I gave it all I had and more and it took me to the brink and back.  And that's an experience that lasts you for a lifetime.

Motivation

Well, here we are.  Last time I blogged regularly was right before the 6/26/10 marathon and today is the 19th of September, so almost three months.  A LOT of write about.  I'm switching it over to topics while I catch up and once I do I'll decide where I'll keep with topics or dates.

This post will start up with a bit on motivation and then go into THE MARATHON, which was on 6/26/10.

Motivation.  What drives me?  I realized that I have a few qualities that have helped me to lose weight (yesterday night reached 129.5 lbs.  85.5 lost in 63 weeks (1.357 average pounds per week) and 100.5 lbs down from heaviest weight)).  I had been feeling a bit down and wrote these three messages to someone on Facebook about it, and I think they sum it up well, so instead of repeating myself I'll just cut and paste.  I think this also encapsulates very well the state of mind I have been in for the last couple of months.

Well, I did have one person tell me at work to stop talking about working out and eating right because "everyone" was sick and tired of listening to it and that no one that would tell me the truth would tell me that I look healthy. Another person told me not to take three classes in a row but that I was going to do what I wanted anyway and what do they know they're just an instructor and to enjoy my workout. I don't feel very changey. Nowadays I'm just glad if I go through a day without pissing anyone off lol

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And that's the thing... I didn't even go out to change myself it just kind of happened. I don't know if you know how it all got started. On 6/2/09 at night I talked to my dad and six hours later we got a call that he slipped down the stairs at home, hit his head, and died (he lived in another country). Went to bury him and came back on 7/2 at 11:00p. On 7/3/09 I stepped into a 24 Hour Fitness and the rest is history. But it wasn't really a choice like "Oh I have to make his death count for something" or anything like that. It wasn't something I CHOSE to do, it was something I DID. I don't even know why. I don't even know what drives me.

And I think people don't realize what an adjustment this is for someone going through it. I mean one day you wake up and you're looking at a stranger in the mirror. I hated my face when it started thinning out (but I'm getting used to it). And you pretty much lose your fat self and you have to pretty much let go of who you were and become somebody else whether you want to or not on some level. That was the hardest part, saying goodbye to whom I call Fat Debbie. I miss her sometimes. I'll go into a room of people and I'll feel more comfortable around fat people. Like if you are Hispanic and go into a room with a bunch of people of different ethnicities, you'll feel a sense of belonging with people who also share that with you. Because there's a part of me deep down that will ALWAYS be Fat Debbie. Maybe it's different for people who have been thin before but I had never been thin my whole life, always overweight or obese, mostly obese.

And what's funny is that I had to start thinking of myself as having a physical side and I never had that before.

I don't know how you're supposed to lose weight or what you're supposed to do or act or say. Never done it to this scale before. And according to other people I do it wrong half the time lol I'm just trying to hang on for dear life as I barrel down a highway at lightning speed, so to speak. I think I'm a pretty open and accepting person and I don't need people to agree with what I do but it just seems like if I don't agree with someone else I'm doing it wrong. I DID decide (or not even decided but just did) from early on that I wasn't going to listen to anybody but do this my own way. I had to do this the way it worked for me and not anybody else. No rest days. Seven classes in one day. I give 110%. Some days that is seven classes, some days that means laying in bed resting. My 110% changes but not the 110%. But I had to do this my way. And that just seems to rub people the wrong way.

I wrote negatively (in a way) about BodyPump (that a group class can by design never be as effective for a specific individual than a workout routine especially designed for that individual) and pissed another instructor off.

So nowadays I'm feeling that no matter what I do I'm doing it all wrong lol :(

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And on top of everything else I developed vertigo six weeks ago. So I went from 21 classes a week to having difficulty getting out of bed in a short period of time. But I mentioned the vertigo to an instructor and she wrote back how she also suffered from vertigo and I realized I was having a pity party. If she could teach with vertigo I could take a class with vertigo. This was Wednesday. And I noticed how I wrote that I was waiting for things to go back to "normal." So I decided that instead of waiting for the vertigo to go away to go back to normal I just had to adjust to what normal is for me and make vertigo my new normal. Had an awesome three classes in a row today, dizziness and all =) [Friday]  I'll just be the one that has vertigo and takes classes (undergoing tests at the doctor now to try to figure out what is causing it... should have blood tests back Monday. Heart and sugar fine. Next up is an ears/nose/throat doctor and so on down the line).

I use calories burned during workouts to gauge what shape my body is in. I can tell you if I'm sick by how many calories I burned in a class. I got up to 550 (only three times) but I hit 500 regularly. Then the vertigo hit. And I went down to 430 and even 392 in one class. That one hit me hard. That's the instructor I wrote to. Now from one day to the next I'm up to 497. Not 500 but pretty darn close. I feel like I'm pretty much "back" after weeks of being off =) But I decided the vertigo is not going to stop me so I adjust when I need to (I'll do extra jumping jacks instead of lounging to the floor). I find I do well if I stay "up" i.e. not bending below the waist. Slowly I'll learn how to go down also while not getting too dizzy or dealing with it. I'm teaching myself how to move with vertigo, i.e. being very light on my feet so that I can adjust my stance if I start swaying.

And I think something people don't realize is that the stubborness, hard-headedness, and refusal to listen and follow the status quo IS the reason I am where I am. That's what makes me me. The OCD about calories and workout schedules and calories burned IS what allowed me to get here. Everything that people say is wrong is precisely what allowed this to happen to me.

When [somebody who I will talk about in a future post, although don't hold your breath for names or identifying information, and no, we're not talking a romantic relationship, we're talking person-that-forever-changed-my-life relationship] "dumped" me I made a choice. I told myself that look at what came out of my dad dying without me even deciding on it. If all this could come out of that, how could I use her dumping me in order to become better? Every time there's a setback in my life now I try to come out of it better. And I used to exercise FOR other people (i.e. I ran because she believed in me) but I decided from now on I didn't run for anybody else. I ran for me. The inner strength couldn't come from other people anymore, it had to come from me. I got to that point from a huge loss in my life and I got to this point through another huge loss. I used to tell people I was lucky to have her in my life and meant it, and all of I sudden I didn't have her anymore. So I've had to deal with three huge losses this past year: My dad, Fat Debbie, and her.

I don't think I know how to give up any longer. Something always happens that keeps the spark alive. I am just beginning :)

So, let's talk about motivation.  I think I can pinpoint three specific instances when a specific person made a huge difference in me continuing the journey.  The first was my first week of taking group classes at 24 Hour Fitness back in the first week of September 2009.  I had just come from my third set of measurements by a trainer (I had four free sessions).  All my measurements went down from the first to the second set but they went back UP from the second to the third set, most to first-set levels.  I had been working out for two months.  I was crushed.  And I told an instructor about it.  This must have been my second class with her.  And it wasn't what she said or what she did, it was just the way she made me feel.  Like it was going to be ok.  That's why even though I don't call her that to other people, she's my favorite instructor.  Because she was there at the beginning when I was down and propped me back up.  Who knows if I would have kept up with it if it wasn't for her.

The second is another instructor.  She gave me inner strength and belief in myself.  I guess this is as good a time as any to write HOW I "beat" the depression I had for 21 years, from 10 to 31 years of age.  We were going up a mountain and she had hurt her foot and I wanted her to lean on me for support but she's tough as nails and declined (can't blame her there, I'd probably have declined also).  So I was there walking behind her.  I will always remember that moment.  I thought of myself, why should she lean on me?  If I want her to be able to lean on me I have to be stronger than her.  I have to be worthy of having her lean on me, so to speak.  I have to be stronger than her (at moments) for her to lean on me because you wouldn't lean on someone weaker than you (at the moment) because then you'd both just fall to the ground.  So, walking there behind her looking at her heels striking the ground, I made a decision.  I could never be depressed again.  I had to be strong.  I wanted her to lean on me so I had to be stronger than her.  And I haven't been depressed since.  It's not that I won't be depressed any more, it's that I can't be depressed anymore.  And I think there's a huge difference in that.  She gave me that, and believing in myself, and trusting myself, and never giving up.

The third instructor has been there since pretty much the beginning of the group classes (October as opposed to September 2009).  When I started running on January 2010 I couldn't run 30 seconds.  I started running at the LVAC indoor track.  Out of all the instructors she was the one I chose, for some reason, to "accompany"  me in my runs.  Maybe it was because she always said "you can do anything twice."  There are four lap clocks in the track attached to the ceiling, in the middle of each stretch.  It would take me about 30 seconds to get from clock to clock, and about two minutes for the whole track, and it's 5.5 times per mile, so I guess I was doing an 11-minute mile, which doesn't sound terribly bad when you think about it.  And it was because of her that I hung on many times and I was able to run 30 seconds, then one minute, then two minutes.  Her and the person above got me running.

Monday, June 21st, 2010, through Sunday, July 4th, 2010 (Yep, 2-weeker, but a bit of stuff)

Well, I'm writing this on Tuesday the 29th and have quite a bit of stuff to catch up on.  Lots of thoughts and feelings to write about.  So I'm just going to take it one thing at a time.

I'll start with Father's Day (the 20th) since I didn't write about it there.  Father's Day was really hard, and I was not expecting that.  I would have thought the anniversary of his death would have been worse, but nope, it was freaking Father's Day.  I think that's going to be my hard day of the year.  And I had already gone through one fatherless Father's Day but I guess I was in too much of a shock since it had only been 22 days since he passed away the first go-around.  And Facebook was full of people wishing each other Happy Father's Day and it just got to be too much and for the first time that I can remember I sought out exercise to make me feel better.  I left the house and I went to the gym.  Took Melina for the first time.  First instructor in months that gave me 600+ calories (601).  I used to do 600's when I was heavier but not for a while.  Most give me 430-470, Kathy gives me high 500's consistently, but Melina gave me 601.  Got a nice Zumba buzz and it was the best way to beat the Father's Day blues.  That day was a complete surprise to me, though.  I am in no way over the grieving process, it turns out.

The depression has been gone since 5/22/10.  Nowadays I don't even have to fight it off, it doesn't come.  Never say never but I will never be depressed again, I will fight it off, but haven't had to fight it off for a couple of weeks.

And this will close this off.  On to the next week, where I discuss the marathon, even though it happened on 6/26.

Monday, June 14th, 2010, through Sunday, June 20th, 2010 (Father's Day).

Saturday Night:  I've been working a lot on the book and hence been neglecting the blog.  The book will come first but I will work on the blog also.  I just passed 10K words after 25 days, 401 words a day, target of 277.  In less than nine months I could have a book.  It's kind of like having a child in a way.

Haven't slept well this week so boot camp has been uneven and haven't really had a GOOD day.  Friday went to the crapper when we hiked instead of running and I got lost at the end.  But I went up a hill, found the nearest set of buildings, and started walking there.  Got to the area where we run to the hill, get a rock, and bring it back in teams (later called "the wash" by Eyes) and I had spotted the highway when they found me in the Hummer.  I didn't have any water with me so I wasn't running.  I would have made it all the way back to the park.

I tried to do a 24.59 or better 5K today but failed and did 28.5X, less than a minute and a half more from my personal best.  And I realized something.

I've lost that killer instinct.  Like I really wanted that 25 5K but I knew I wasn't going to do it yesterday, I just knew, the same way I new I was going to do a sub-30 5K the previous time.  And I was happy just showing up, moving, running, living.  I've lost that cutthroat instinct.  I'll still try, but I'm happy just showing up.  And I don't necessarily think it's a bad change.  I feel I've changed inside and that hunger is gone and there's just a peace and complacency and happiness.  And we're talking less than 4 minutes difference from what I wanted and from what I got.

But somehow I feel REALLY good about the marathon next Saturday.  Just as I felt I wasn't going to do the 25 5K, I feel that I will do the marathon without stopping/walking.  And if I had to choose between the two I'd rather do the marathon.  I guess I feel good enough that I can just show up and consistently do under-30 5Ks.  And you may do everything right - rest, food, etc., and still have a sucky day (but I only slept 2 hours or so yesterday, might think about melatonin, I have trouble falling asleep).

Until I started going to bc I wouldn't initiate hugs. And the reason for that would be two-fold. First, who was I to think that I was worth enough to be the one starting it and second who would ever want to hug me? Call center job, living at home with mom, no husband or kids, in debt... up to 7/3/09 my life was a failure. I was a failure. I have called my reflection in the mirror a loser.

I always felt I had to keep doing stuff for people because I saw what they brought into the relationship but who could possibly want me just for me. My whole life has been about waiting until I do something wrong and mess up the relationship. Because it always happens, people leave. I wondered sometimes if I myself would be my friend, and half the time I wasn't sure.

For the first time in my life I am really developing a sense of self-worth. Takes times but big changes take time. Today, just feeling I'm good at something, anything, is good enough me.

I've been thinking about feeling confident enough in yourself without developing an ego.  I really feel a change happening inside and I really think I like who I am becoming.  I don't think I have much of a say as to what my core substance is but luckily it seems to be something I can live it and even embrace.  I'm developing a sense of peace as opposed to this frenzied pace all the time, but still being able to compete.  Show up, compete, try to win or get a personal best, but be happy just showing up and be happy without having to compete all the time.  I don't need a number to feel good about myself.

I did reach a new low weight, 138.5 lbs.

More on all of this later but at least I felt I'm caught up on the blog.  Some weeks will have more general thoughts like this one as opposed to structured.  I AM back to wearing the BodyBugg, more on that later just because I have to get ready for work.

Monday, June 7th, 2010, through Sunday, June 14th, 2010.

MONDAY AFTERNOON:  This morning in boot camp I didn't have it.  Last week caught up with me.  But now when I don't have it I'm middle of the pack whereas before when I didn't have it I was last.  So my worst is now average.  Progress.  And the heat.  This was the first day that it was really hot (108 degrees Fahrenheit).  I haven't really exercised in the heat (and that's why I did worse on Sunday than on Tuesday at Flag Mountain, that and all the exercise I did in-between).  So I'm not used to exercising in the heat.  My body will adjust and I will up the water.  But when you exercise in the heat for months and then it cools down, your fitness has gotten so much better, you're leaps and bounds improved, so exercising in the heat actually helps your fitness even more.  It'll just take time.  So sucky boot camp.  I hate boot camps like these because I can't perform to my level, and it brings me down.  That's ok, as long as I have boot camps like last Friday now and the, I can stand a few like today.  I just show up and give what I got that day.

Then I locked my keys in the trunk and had to wait an hour in the heat for the locksmith.  The good part about starting the week this sucky is that, while it's true it all can go to hell in a handbasket, odds are in my favor that the week will get better.  Can't wait!!

I want to talk about your body being "free."  When you run there's a point when you stop running and you start flying, where your body feels light as a feather.  I've reached that point a couple of times and I'm looking to start making it happen more often.  You have to really be aware of your body, in the sense of where your left arm begins and ends, where your right leg begins and ends, your feet touching the ground, the resistance of the air..... and then realizing all of that really doesn't pull you back as much as you think and just gunning it.  Working on that.

Debbie all caught up and out.

THURSDAY AFTERNOON:  Well, Tuesday sucked a little bit also.  We had to climb up this hill during class as a mini-impromptu hike during boot camp and I apparently put my hand on a cactus and got all these little fine thorns in my left hand all over my fingers (I have finger-less gloves), and had to come down a steep rocky mountain without being able to use my hands much, and when I hike I use my hands and arms extensively, so that part kind of sucked.  Went on my behind sliding down (on purpose) a bit, I just wanted to get off that hill.  Did the rest of that class with the thorns, as it was mostly running.  Got them all out with tweezers when I got home.

Then that night when I was driving to work, I was going in a straight line, and a car going in the opposite direction turns right in front to me to his left, my right, to go into a side street, and I had to brake hard to avoid hitting him (or her).  Went a little to the left and almost went into a tailspin.

Wednesday, though, went by without incident.  Got to take Kathy's Zumba, my favorite Zumba.

My sucky days are getting better so that they're decent physical-wise.  My run today was 8:24, wasn't trying for time as I didn't know it was timed, fastest 7:49, so my regular time is getting to be pretty fast.  Two more Zumbas today and an hour of weightlifting at the gym.

Yesterday I decided to wear the BodyBugg again, and I'm wearing it today and going back to calorie-counting with a 1,000 deficit.  With two hours of exercise a day I can eat a decent 1600 calories a day while keeping a 1000 deficit.  Started at exactly 145, 70 lbs down.  I'm doing one hour of lifting a day in order to be able to have a caloric deficit while saving muscle and maybe even building it.  One hour a day of lifting and lots of protein should do the trick.  Plus the two hours of exercise.  Boot camp plus running/biking/Zumba/TurboKick, and swimming as something extra 2-4 times a week just to train for triathlons.

Don't know if I mentioned this but I will be doing a marathon on the 26th.  No half, just going from 10K to the full.  Less than a year from when I started working out and less than six months from when I couldn't run half a second.

And that closes out the week so far.  Debbie out.

Writing this on 6/19/10 (Saturday of "next week"):  Friday was one of the best boot camp days I've had.  We went running for a whole hour and ran 5.5X miles, almost a 10K, in that hour.  I was able to keep up with Eyes the whole time and it was awesome.  I really enjoy the feeling of running next to somebody, it is the greatest feeling in the world, just out there running.  Running has to be one of my most favorite things to do in the world.

Sunday I went to hike Turtlehead Peak with Sam.  We went bouldering in the beginning a bit and then he sped off and since I had never gone that route I ended up going up and down the hardest route possible (not on purpose) and it took me 10.5 hours instead of under 5.  But I made it.  With the water and food I had, the CamelBak plus my running water bottle and a handful of protein bars.  It was the first time I almost turned around on the way up but I gauged I had enough water and I did, I had just a bit left when I got back to the car.  It wasn't until I was 50 feet or so from the car that I felt like I was going to pass out.  So it was a miserable day but I went rock climbing a lot and I learned what my current hiking limit is.  I also defaced the mountain three times.  Those protein bars were not agreeing with me.  And I looked for the Geocache but I didn't find it.  I'll have to go again.  At one point I was going down and got stuck climbing down a rock called for help no one answered, got myself down.

And that closes this week.  Debbie out.

Monday, May 31st, 2010, through Sunday, June 6th, 2010.

MONDAY AFTERNOON: I got really into GeoCaching last week and found my first, stuck beneath a doggie tin (where you deposit doggie waste) in front of the house. Looked for another one today without luck. It's an addictive hobby, it's hard, it's active, it's fun, and after the initial $40 investment for the software and $30 a year for the website, it's free. There's one on top of Turtlehead, Peak, will re-sign that one and take a picture on Thursday.




I was looking into the mirror and it's getting harder and harder to reconcile that person with "Old Debbie." It's not that I don't know who I am, it's that there's so many internal and external changes that happened pretty much in 11 months so far that you look at yourself and you are almost looking into a stranger. You change and you hope you still like yourself at the other end. There's a strength that's developing in me, and I'm not used to seeing that strength. I'm not someone who can be pushed around anymore, and that scares me a little.




Take Miriam. Elementary school teacher I just found on Facebook. Part of me wants to ask her Why. Why didn't you stand up for me. She wasn't like Gladys, who actually PICKED on me, nevermind not defended me. I have good memories of Miriam, like she was a kind teacher. But the rest of my life at that point still sucked. And part of me wants to ask, Didn't you see anything? What if I was in front of Gladys, all 140-lbs 32-year-old me? What if I had a chance to ask why? Do I even want to? Is it a truer test of strength if you can walk away from your past and just keep on with the present?




There's two camps. One, like Freud, says that you have to "fix" your past to move on, that you have to come to a resolution with it. The other says to just leave the past behind and just move on. I waver back and forth, I've never been able to make a firm decision either way on which way is the better way or the "right" way.





It's a weird feeling, the feeling of being strong. I haven't entirely warmed up to it yet. You look into your eyes in the mirror and you see someone you can't push around. And I'm not used to that looking back and me and it doesn't feel familiar. See, and the thing of it all is, that I picture myself being face to face with someone who actually picked on me in the past, and I really hope if that moment comes that I just turn around and walk away. Not because I'm weak, but because I'm strong. I really don't want to become a bitter person and I certainly don't want "revenge." People do the best they can. If someone picked on me, that was filling a need they had.




When you are a child adults are supposed to stand up for you. And no one did for me, and I wasn't able to do it for myself because of how young I was. But then you reach an age where you naturally start standing up for yourself but by that time, you're so beaten up you pretty much give up on fighting back and let life happen to you. No one really teaches you to stand up for yourself, so you never really learn.




Then you start working out, and find out that you actually CAN do something. And other people give you the feeling that they believe in you, and you are successful at one thing, then another, then another, and you slowly start believing in yourself. And then you meet someone else who seems to accept you for who you are, and that would have been helpful all alone, but it's even more helpful now, because you're not ever sure who you are anymore. You are rediscovering yourself. Well, not really rediscovering. You are getting to know yourself, period. And you find yourself in an environment where you don't have to be second-guessing yourself all the time and you are safe to probe around and figure out who you are and act that way. You find yourself being "safe" in more and more places.




And it's a combination of that, confidence and safety, that creates strength.




TUESDAY EARLY MORNING: So we're doing flag mountain tomorrow. And for the first time ever, I'm scared of boot camp. I had some butterflies that first day, but this is cold clammy fear. It's a steep hill and first we have to go up but worse we ave to go down. And I'm scared to death. Of course I'm going to show up tomorrow, skipping it would never enter my mind, but I'm terrified. I've dubbed it Flag Mountain, because we're taking a piece of cloth stuck to a pole, putting our names on it, and planting it on top. I mean, how significant, right, I can have my name up there and conquer the mountain. They should wait until I get back down to plant it.




I've been to Flag Mountain once before, I found. It was that time we dragged tired up a mountain. On the way down it was so steep, I went down on my butt. And we only went up part of the mountain, the easy part.




So yeah, scared. It's a weird feeling to be scared of boot camp. I'm not even scared of jumping off a cliff into the rocks below for Jagged Edge, which we're doing in late July. I'm not scared to jump off a cliff but I am scared of going up and down a mountain. Go figure.




What needs to happen is that I need to slip and fall, which I haven't done yet, so that I can see there's no big deal to it. I think the fear is psychological and stems from my dad pulling me down mountains when I was little.




TUESDAY AFTERNOON: So I posted on FaceBook how I was scared of Flag Mountain and Eyes challenged me to do it half an hour up and half an hour down, and that was it. She said the C word. There's something about someone challenging me to something that turns me on fire. So I get to Mission Hills, sign the flag, and I was very nervous. And when I get nervous I ramble. And we were starting the hike and I kept looking at the floor, I was so nervous. And I started slow and as I progressed I got faster and faster. And then I saw them, at the top of the hill. And something happened. And I ran. I ran through rocks going up and a mountain top towards them. I mean actual running, through a rocky terrain up a narrow trail at the top of a mountain. And up mini-hills, and down mini-hills, and scrambling up rocks, and just running. And I was free. And I was figuratively and literally on top of the world. And the switch turned and I was completely free. And I got there. Not in the half an hour and not in the half an hour down, but I made great time compared to me and I lost the fear of rocky inclines. It's gone.




Going down was quite the experience. I went down every which way. Bearcrawling backwards most of the way because I wanted to go down FAST, and that was the fastest way, on all four backwards just sliding down the mountain fast. And I went forwards standing up, and sideways. It was the most awesomest thing ever. And, for me, I went down that mountain FAST.




It's one of those things that you know will change your life but you're so wiped out from the experience you don't have the energy to figure out HOW it will change your life.




We hadn't had enough adventures for the day so we went GeoCaching and found two. I went down in reverse through The Loop - down the rocky hill instead of up, the first half of The Loop. By now I had these huge calluses in my feet because hiking shoes are not for running. So it was slow going down. But next time we do The Loop, I am throwing myself at it. Next time we do ANY kind of hill, that hill is mine. I was going down that mountain, and it was mine. And that's an awesome feeling. So the going down The Loop was slower because my feet were just killing me by then, and I tried to ignore the pain as best I could. I want that hill when I'm good and rested, I'll show it who's boss. I've learned to BOTH go up and down hills. I can move quickly (or quicker) through them now.




There's two things that REALLY helped. First, HIKING SHOES. They DO make a difference. Who knew HIKING SHOES would be so awesome for HIKING. Like NIGHT and DAY. THAT amazing. Caps amazing. I am never hiking without hiking shoes again, going to keep them in the trunk of my car along with the weight vest and a mat. Anytime, anything, anywhere. And the second thing was the CamelBack, those water backpacks. Allowed me not to carry my water bottle and I used my hands A LOT. Gloves helped as usual. It would have hurt without gloves. I got enough scratches left even WITH the gloves.




So we did the reverse of the first half of The Loop and a total of about 2.5 Towers hills, and we found two GeoCaches, my #2 and #3, and I am now totally and completely addicted to them. Dru found the first one and me the second one.




It was a good day. Debbie Out. Tomorrow I'll write more about looking into a stranger's eyes. As a starting point, mom told me yesterday "They changed my daughter." She can sense it, just like I can. SOMEthing changed, what that something is, it's too early to tell. Debbie Out for real now.




SATURDAY MORNING: Wednesday was uneventful. Thursday I went to Turtlehead Peak in remembrance of dad's first Dad's Death Day Anniversary. I wanted to go by myself first to be able to grieve in peace and second because I needed to get over the fear of getting lost and being alone in the mountains (and was able to do both). I think I'm ready to move on with my life (not that I didn't before, but I found a kind of peace now that I'm over the first year of him dying.... if I'm not looking straight into his picture, I'm OK. If I look into his face I get a little choked up, not ready for that yet).




Once I get to the top, I think I found the GeoCache. Books and goodies inside. It isn't until I GET HOME that I read a post that that box is not a GeoCache, the GeoCache is hidden under a tree and not out in the open. Who the hell leaves a fake GeoCache 50 feet away from the real one 2.5 MILES UP IN A FREAKING MOUNTAIN IN THE MIDDLE OF NOWHERE?!?! But I'm not bitter.




I'm going back next week Sunday and finding the real one and putting stickers all over THIS box saying THIS IS NOT THE REAL GEOCACHE. Watch me.







So I'm sitting up there all alone and signing the fake GeoCache book and someone comes up and asks what's that a log book? And I say yes it's a GeoCache. And she says A GEOCACHE really?!?! And I get all excited and say YES!! Are you into GeoCaching?!?! And she says no, but my friend is into it BIG TIME!! And then I hear a voice, Is that Debbie?!?! And who comes walking up to the top of Turtlehead Peak other than Michele. We were both like NO FREAKING WAY.

At one point she turns to one in her group of four and says, That's Debbie, and the other person goes, I know, I've seen her picture on Facebook




Just think of the timing in order to meet somebody you know on top of the peak.


When we went down I was able to go much faster since I'm not alone anymore. Not complete, but I'm mostly done with my fear of hikes.


On Friday Eyes substituted a morning boot camp and I went. This week's boot camps have been hard on me, just physically, I haven't been "there" there. Other than Turtlehead Peak, Flag Mountain tomorrow, the 10K, a Zumba, and 50 laps in the pool, I haven't done any extra exercise other than the 5 boot camp sessions. I guess my body needed a rest (and if you read the blog regularly you know that's NOT sarcasm).


So the first one was at 6a and then the regular 9:30a one. And my body was all there for 9:30a. I needed that. I needed one good boot camp session. It keeps me going strong. I can make it through what I call a sucky boot camp week performance-wise and be all refreshed by one good one.




We did towers and the warm-up was the loop. I've gotten sooooo much better at hiking, that now I can get to the top WITH the group (and even ahead of some instead of far behind in last), and then we're talking running, which is my thing. So I'm getting better at my weakness and at my strength. But if I can keep people in my line of sight, I can easily overtake them once we get on pavement (I still lose some ground running on rocks but it's getting less and less and once we get on pavement, it's mine). And I think running today's 10K at the pace I wanted instead of at my pace is going to help me figure out some mental running things and break free of a running barrier that we all have that ties us down to the ground.




I'm glad I had that session. Now I'm good to go all hardcore on Monday. We went up the hill, down the hill, some running, up the hill, down the hill, and I was first because Dru wasn't feeling well, so I was really second. I'm down on myself a lot and I like it because it just drives me harder and harder each time, but I was thinking that I don't think I'm that fit but look who I'm measuring myself against - the cream of the crop. So I think in boot camp we're all in the top 10-25% of fit people, and I'm middle of the pack in that (last of the pack when it comes to the top - Eyes, Jill, Dru, Sara if she ever comes back), and almost there when it comes to others. You have to learn to figure out who's underperforming based on their true ability, because for one reason or another, some people don't run as fast as they can, so you can't even base their running ability on how they run in boot camp. And of course you can't base it on how they look, you have to base it on how they run. We inherited another good runner who seems to come a lot and who's ahead of me but who I can overtake on one of those special days, whenever the next one comes. I have to have that click moment to overtake her, it's not an everyday thing, but it's doable.








Today I ran a 10K.


Course was 10.14K in 1:00:21 watch time (1:00:12 official time). If you divide time by seconds and multiply by 10K, that's 59:31 for the 10K. I did right under 28 for the 5K, beating my previous 5K time. 6.3 MPH (10K is 6.21 miles). Hot and hilly. Beat my previous 10K time by way over 10 minutes in a month and 11 days, or almost 10%. Second 10K.





On the 10K today I tried to keep a 10K/hr pace because I wanted an hour or less 10K (which I did), and I felt like fainting the whole way through. I didn't go at my pace, 10K/hr was definitely above what I could do physically, but I wanted it. And I thought that I always SAY I want something I don't know I can finish, and here it was, and I took it. I felt like stopping sooooooo many times, but there were only two ways I was going to stop: At the finish line, or fainting. You have a determination that overtakes everything and you WILL do it no matter what. I was not going to stop. My mind takes over. And it's as hard for me as it is for anybody else and I have the same self-doubts as anybody else, but for some reason sometimes I can tap into that inner strength we all have and make magic happen like today. Because for me, a 10K in under an hour was making magic happen. I ran an hour at a pace faster than I could handle.





Tomorrow we go to Flag Mountain again just for the hell of it, nothing better to do. I can't wait, I'm going for time. That mountain will be mine. I take no prisoners lately. I'm doing something, I'm going for it. I'm beginning to realize that there's a point where you become "free" physically.




MONDAY OF NEXT WEEK: I want to wrap the week and then move on. I was sooo much more tired this time from everything I did during the week that I was a lot slower, but made it up and down in 2:03:46, counting the time spent on top. I want to go back and do Flag Mountain many more times. I want to go back next week and take tons of pictures and then go back the week after and go for a better time and just keep going. It's fast, it's hard, it's fun, and I know where it is. Do it enough, and you get better at it. But I need a good pair of hiking shoes. $150 will do it. Saving up to it. I'll do enough hiking that they'll pay off for themselves. Went to IHOP afterwards and had some pancakes, eggs, and turkey bacon. I love that place.




That's it for this week. On to the seventh. Debbie Out.