Hurricane Irene

Image by NASA Goddard Photo and Video via Flickr

Sometimes Mother Nature puts a crimp in even the best intentions.

We, like so many people on the East coast, have been a wee bit set back by Irene. So many have it worse than we do, so we count ourselves lucky and pray for the people who have been harder hit.

Our power and bridge are out again, and we’re not certain when either will be back. This time the bridge was actually entirely washed away down river by a flash flood of epic proportions that rose approximately eight feet in thirty minutes. That was on top of the elevated river level (approximately ten feet above normal) and whitewater conditions. Due to the quick onset, we surmise that a lake upstream breached its bank like a dam breaking.

We’re all together and we have our health, water from the river to flush the toilets, bottled water to drink, a generator to run some urgent electrical units like the refrigerator, and emergency supplies, so it could be a lot worse and we’re hopeful that it will get a lot better very soon.

That being said, all of our time is presently consumed by caring for our toddler, and keeping us all safe and healthy. The only exercise I’ve gotten since Saturday is toting buckets of water, chasing our toddler, trying to keep myself and the foresaid toddler clean, and hiking along a relative cliff for purposes those who know us understand. Our previous mountaineering skills are coming to good use.

I’ll update you once our bridge is fixed and our electricity is back on, so that I can get back to my Losing Gamer campaign. Until then, stay safe!

Acorns

Image by clocker via FlickrThere are many subtle differences between running inside versus outside; the most obvious to me is the engagement of the senses.

Inside treadmill running can be an intense workout. It’s relatively direct in that one may program in hill intervals, varying courses and intense pace. Basically, one can push oneself as hard as one wants via buttons on the machine itself.

It’s also diverting. Now-a-days most people run toward an enormous flat screened TV bracketed to the wall directly ahead of the machine, so one may watch music videos, DVDs or regular programming. Ear pods and headphones allow the runner to listen to what’s on the screen or something completely different. I’m actually surprised that no one has developed a way to play video games while one is on a treadmill, sort of like Gamercize’s step and cycle machines. If someone out there develops the technology, please let me know, as I’d like to try it!

Outside, one must deal with the course that actually exists. The runner has the ability to vary her pace and the route taken depending her fitness level and the level of workout desired. Once you’re on the road, though, it’s much easier to settle into the workout and allow your mind and senses to wander.

I do not run with music. It’s not a hard core thing with me, as I understand it is with others, but more because I like to hear the wind in the leaves, the birds chirping, the deer squealing, etc. One can hear cars approaching and their general speed, so that one can move aside.

Mostly I like the ability to think that running without music gives me. Loud songs with intense bass battle my mind wandering. The quietude that my own breathing and footsteps give me allows me the space to defrag my consciousness like I defrag my desktop once a week. My mind moves through my various To Do lists and I can make mental notes of what goes where, what needs immediate action and what can be put aside for a wee bit.

Image by joshme17 via FlickrToday, as the wind blew across my face, leaves rustled and a rabbit hopped into a bush ahead of me, I dissected an insurance clause of a contract. As that box got moved to its defragged space, I noticed that the air spelled a little less lush and a bit more dry-rustley, like autumn. Looking down, I realized that I was running among the first fallen acorns of the season and thought about the intensity of the impending cooler months. Not only was my entire body occupied in the running experience, but all five senses and my mind were engaged as well. For as long as possible, I look forward to running outside.

Mid-August Malaise

Image via WikipediaAlthough writers' block doesn't hit me often, it does seem to have hit this week.

Everything is going along as planned. Work outs are going well. Weight stays lower than the weeks before. A couple of friends and I have signed up for another 10K in early October, which should be fun.

We're all enjoying the lovely summer with loads of fun outside activities and healthy eating.


Is there anything in particular you'd like me to discuss at this point in August? Email me and let me know.

***

Check back tomorrow for this week's guest blogger: friend and author, Sarena Straus!

Author Interview: Shoshanna Evers!

I’m quite excited to introduce our second guest to the blog by way of this interview: author and my friend, Shoshanna Evers. Multi-published erotic romance author Shoshanna Evers is published with Ellora's Cave, The Wild Rose Press, Cleis Press (Best Bondage Erotica 2012) and Berkley Heat (Agony/Ecstasy). She’s the editor of the upcoming How to Write Hot Sex: Tips from Multi-Published Erotic Romance Authors. She’s truly an inspiration to me and our mutual friends. Somehow she manages to successfully juggle family life, caring for an active toddler, writing her syndicated advice column, working as a registered nurse and polishing multiple writing projects simultaneously. I always wonder how she does it all, and does it so well. Read on, and let’s find out!

What do you write?

I write romance that tends to lean toward graphic and erotic. The focus is always on the love story, and sex is part of it.

Is it easy? Do you like writing? Do the words fly from your pen?

I love writing, I’ve been doing it since I was a child. And yes, sometimes it feels easy and I’m thinking so fast my fingers can’t keep up—and I’m a pretty fast typist J But sometimes it’s work, when I have a deadline or edits to do and I’m exhausted from chasing my toddler all day. I still sit down and put my hands on the keyboard, which is how I’ve been able to write so many books. You can fix a crappy rough draft, but you can’t revise a blank page.

And what’s the deal with your writing blogs? You also have blogs about writing as a craft, right?

I have a blog for writers called www.TheWritersChallenge.com. It started in 2009 when I decided to get serious about becoming an author and chronicle my journey. I was so very honest and open back then, posting every rejection letter and every story idea. I’m more reserved now that I’m published, because I know people are actually reading the things I blog about. Now I do a lot more in the way of author interviews.

I also do occasional writing challenges (such as #May50K and #Aug40K) and create blogs just for those events so my regular blog doesn’t get overwhelmed. The writing challenges are my way of having accountability when I need to get a certain amount of writing done. Other authors and aspiring writers join in and post their daily word counts so we can cheer each other on. Oh, and I do a group blog called Flirty Author Bitches.

How do you find time?

I make time. The main way is I don’t watch TV, and I stay up late. That’s the main way I find time. One of my friends gets up early before anyone else in her house does so she can sit and work for a bit. I’m a night owl, so I wait for my son to go to sleep and then I hit the computer.

How do you find balance in your life between writing, working, family, chores, son, etc?

There’s no perfect balance, honestly. I wish I could say I’ve found the secret to balancing it all. Everything gets done imperfectly, as far as I’m concerned. When I’m working as an RN, I’m not playing with my son or writing. When I’m writing, I’m not cleaning the house or hanging out with my husband. When I’m with my family and I have a deadline or a story idea I’m excited about, sometimes it’s hard for me to be completely in the moment because a part of me wishes I could be writing. It’s hard. So I just have to accept that nothing is going to be perfect, and that’s okay. That’s the balance, I guess.

Do you feel more fulfilled now than before your wrote professionally – ie, now that you have better balance in your life?

I feel more fulfilled now that I’m getting paid to write professionally because it validates all the time I spend writing. A huge amount of my life is spent in a chair, staring at a computer screen, imagining things, LOL.

Do you ever feel overwhelmed? If so, how do you work through it? Ie, how to you stay balanced in a sometimes unbalanced world?

I’m often overwhelmed because I give myself a lot of projects, but I think I like it that way because I do it to myself all the time. Writing books isn’t just about finding the time to write them, it’s about submitting the manuscripts to my editors or my agent, writing synopses and queries, revising manuscripts, going over contracts, editing a book for content and then doing copy-edits, etcetera. Oh, and promotion. Blog posts, interviews, Twitter, Facebook, conferences, that sort of thing.

I was feeling a bit underworked in July so I created the #Aug40k challenge, to write 40,000 words in August. Then all at once I had major revisions on a book to do, minor revisions on another, copy-edits on another, and submissions from an anthology I’m editing all coming in at once. And I still want to write 40K. There’s no balance there, just a lot of late hours, LOL. You have to love what you do, and then it’s all fun.

Other thoughts?

Thanks for having me on your blog, Jenn! I love to hear from readers and writers. My email is shoshanna.evers @ yahoo. com (no spaces).

Sexily *Evers* After... ShoshannaEvers.com
Titles at Ellora's Cave
Titles at The Wild Rose Press
Agony/Ecstasy, Dec 2011, Berkley Heat
Best Bondage Erotica 2012 , Dec 2011 Cleis Press
Titles on Amazon

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Reassessment

Image via Wikipedia

Over the last week or so, I’ve reflected a lot about goals and accomplishment.

At some point this week, I’d hoped to have lost 30 pounds in 2011, which is 60 pounds or so (as I stopped minding the number in the last fortnight of pregnancy) overall since my highest pregnancy weight. As noted in the prior sentence, I’m going to also start listing the pregnancy starting weight moving forward. Some women begin their weight loss number from a big event or tippy-top highest-of-high weight (for me, the pregnancy high weight). Some women simply list their recent losses from their latest plateau (for me, my exergaming campaign). I had been doing the latter, but it was confusing a bunch of folks. So, from now on, I’ll also mention the 30 (or so) pregnancy pounds that were lost, differentiating them from the additional weight lost during this exergaming campaign.

The main reason for this week’s arbitrary goal has been seeing the aim of wearing a specific swimsuit. Without getting into it too much, I’d assumed that I’d look a certain way in the suit if I weighed a certain weight. Well, as with many prior assumptions, I was wrong. Point in fact, I look great in the bathing suit in question right now and I’m three pounds short of this week’s goal weight.

So, Dear Reader, as I know some of you want to know, here's the 8.5ish month weight loss progress report. I’ve lost 27 pounds thus far in 2011 and 57 or so overall since my high pregnancy weight. As mentioned in other posts, weight loss itself is not my only aim. I've gone much farther in all other goal categories than I'd ever expected by this point, or, in some cases, ever.

I could have made my weight loss goal and then some if I’d changed my eating by crash dieting, gone on a liquid fast (aka cleanse) or some such. I contemplated a number of those options, but at the beginning of the campaign, I’d committed to losing the weight through exergaming and other activities. If I was to radically change my eating, I wouldn’t be able to work out as I have been. So I made the conscious decision to continue eating healthily. I’m satisfied with that choice.

While the weight loss has slowed down significantly, I know that my body is becoming more muscle and less fat. Since muscle weighs more than fat, I’ve been tightening up, slimming down and fitting into smaller clothing.

Over the last couple of weeks, my weight loss seems to have bumped down from its plateau somewhat, due to Zumba Fitness and running. I really think this combo is killer for the metabolism.

So for now, I’ve reassessed, and have moved the 30 pound goal to sometime in September, which will still keep me on track to losing 40+ pounds by the end of 2011.

Where are you in your yearlong goals? What about the shorter term ones?

***

Check back tomorrow for our fabulous guest blogger, successful erotic romance novelist Shoshanna Evers!

Reflection on Video Games and a 10K

Image via Wikipedia

When I embarked on this exergaming campaign at the end of 2010, I had two goals

1)      To find out if a person (me) actually could lose weight by using video games; and

2)      To lose weight.

As I’ve discussed, I really did have quite a bit of skepticism that one could actually, really, honest to goodness lose weight using video games. It didn’t equate for me at all. I honestly thought it was a bunch of marketing phooey.  Since then, I’ve learned better.

I now know that video games make working out a lot of fun, and that one (me) can lose weight by using them. Thus far, I’ve lost 25+ pounds, with my next weight goal coming up in the next couple of weeks. As we hear through the ECA’s Gamers for Health initiative, video games help hundreds of thousands of you lose weight too. They’re that good of a catalyst.

As I’ve discussed, exergames also act as a gateway for many of us, getting us to try other activities, like running as I did. Each season offers a different set of challenges and opportunities for active play inside and outside one’s house.

As the year has progressed, and I’ve gotten thinner, lighter and more fit, the number and breadth of my goals has multiplied. Each week seems to bring a new goal, and each few weeks seem to open up more goals being achieved.

In the last seven days alone I ran a 6.2 mile race – yes, that’s how long a 10K is – and fit into a size smaller jeans. Earlier this year it would not have been possible. Simply *not* *possible*.  Before last week, 6.2 miles was for crazy-insane DISTANCE RUNNER people to run (in my lay person’s estimation); it was not a distance that a *normal* jogger would do (when I did jog, as I considered myself). Now I’m looking forward to running other 10K races THIS FALL and wondering how long it will take me to scale up to run a half marathon. Um, yes. I *did* just write that.

As I just mentioned, I also fit into a size smaller Leavis 501s. Now, for me, this particular size jeans is important, because it was the size I used to steal from boyfriends in college, my 20s, my 30s and now from my husband. They may be a bit snug, but I can fit into them and button them all the way up. A few weeks ago, I couldn’t pull them up one leg all the way. So Dear Husband better either buy more jeans or watch out, as they’re going to start migrating over to me. Perhaps I’ll simply buy a couple of pairs for myself. Hm. We’ll see.

So would any of this be possible without exergames, as a friend recently asked? My early August assessment is, probably not. I still get up off the bed, couch, chair or floor to Zumba and step, which make up the bulk of my weekly workouts.  All of the other fitness and goal achievement flows from it.

How is your workout routine going in this steamy month?

Related articles

• "Video Gamers": New Book on Video Game Players and Culture (prfire.co.uk)
• Paging Dr. Mario: Are video games a health scourge or saviour? (life.nationalpost.com)

Welcome Guest Blogger: Christina Bost Seaton!

I am so flattered that Jenn asked me to provide a guest post for Losing Gamer about me and the book that I co-authored with Cordell Parvin, Say Ciao To Chow Mein: Conquering Career Burnout.

Cordell and I met my very first day of my very first job, when I was participating in first-year orientation at the firm’s headquarters, and he emerged from his office to find out where his secretary had gone (she was helping me get the printer set up on my computer!)  We bonded over our shared interests in books like Stephen Covey’s The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People and he answered my questions about what I needed to do to succeed now that I was a part of BigLaw.

Several months and many email and phone conversations later, Cordell asked me if I would be willing to help him with a parable book he was writing about Tony Caruso, a fictional junior associate at a BigLaw firm who was feeling overwhelmed by the demands of his job.  Two years later, Say Ciao To Chow Mein: Conquering Career Burnout was published and I was thrilled to say that I was the co-author.  I love that the book reads like a story, but provides practical how-to techniques (such as using SMART Goals) for taking control over your career and your personal life. 

Like all of you, I am juggling a host of family and work-related responsibilities.  I am a busy litigation attorney trying to do great work for my clients.  I am a senior associate who would like to be elevated to partner, who is working on building a book of business.  I am also the wife of busy tax attorney and musician.  I am daughter helping her father with his new business and her mother with her business.  I am a granddaughter, a friend, and a volunteer.  Trying to fulfill these roles, and make everyone happy all the time, is—as you might imagine—quite exhausting.  Sometimes I feel like there is no time left for me!

Many people talk about having balance in your work and life.  Naysayers, on the other hand, say we can’t have it all. 

I think that we can have it all, but not all at the same time.  I think that what we really want in our lives is control, not balance.

In the beginning of my career, I felt the need to establish myself at work.  I put in long hours at the office, working late into the night (and early morning!) and many weekends to prove my value to the firm.  During one particularly awful time, I worked over 700 hours in a two month period.  At some point, I realized that there was no way I could maintain our home in the way that I desired, so I hired a fantastic cleaning lady to come every two weeks.

While some parts of that time were really difficult, I wouldn’t change that decision at all.  I think that new employees should treat their work like deposits into a bank.  Over time those deposits will accrue interest—here, goodwill—that can be withdrawn.  For instance, after a year as an employee, once I had proven myself as a hard worker, I joined the New York Junior League.  Because I had established a reputation as someone who worked hard, my co-workers knew that they could trust my judgment when I told them that it was important for me to leave work early twice a month to volunteer.

As my career advanced, however, I realized that I wasn’t taking enough care of myself.  I thought that if I couldn’t take care of myself, how would I be able to take care of the future children that I ultimately hope to have some day?  I didn’t want to be a tired zombie who never went to bed before two or three in the morning.  I was sick and tired of feeling, well, sick and tired.  I realized that I would never have any time for myself if I didn’t treat myself like a priority too. 

So, I followed what I preached in Say Ciao To Chow Mein: Conquering Career Burnout.  I wrote out a list of personal goals that were Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic, and Timely.  I promised myself that I would get 7 hours of sleep at least five nights a week.  I made it my goal to go to the gym at least three times a week.  And each and every day, when I woke up, I wrote down how many hours I had slept, and I made a note in my blackberry each time I went to the gym.  I made the conscious decision to make myself a priority.  I continued to bill approximately the same hours at my job, but I changed my schedule so that I would leave work at a regular time, go to the gym, and log back on and resume working from home.  This required me to be more efficient—less time spent on Facebook!

Six months later, I found myself going to the gym more than three times a week.  I found that my sleep schedule had somewhat readjusted, so that it was a bit easier for me to go to bed earlier and wake up earlier.  I found that I wasn’t craving unhealthy food as much since I was finally getting enough sleep.  I found that I was actually more efficient when I was working because I wasn’t so tired.

After a year, I decided to take the plunge and hire a personal trainer.  Now, when I look in the mirror, I see that I am the most fit I’ve been since high school, and I wonder why it took me so long to realize that I could look like that again.  I feel powerful and more confident.

Working out hasn’t been a magical panacea—I still get stressed out by work sometimes, and I still feel like there isn’t enough time for me sometimes.  But now when I am work and really stressed out, I start to crave the time when I can go home and run on the elliptical, because that will relieve my stress better than anything else (even Twix)!  More importantly, I know that I have a realistic plan for changing my behaviors for the better.

I am still not balanced.  I spend the vast majority of my time working, but I have a business and personal development plan, and I know that the work I’m doing is helping me move closer and closer to my goals.  I am okay with not being balanced though; I have control over my life and the direction in which I’m going.  Isn’t control what we’re really looking for—not balance?

On To the Next Physical Challenge

 

The morning air was only somewhat hot and sticky when my Friend, E, picked me up to drive to the Jan Peek race on Saturday.

Our sleep the night before had been merely mediocre, as we were both a bit apprehensive and nervous about the impending race. She, because she hadn’t run in a couple of weeks; me, because I’d never run a 10K before. We’d both gotten up at 6:00 am and pinged each other on Facebook. It felt like an early morning high five – we’re up; we’re nearly heading out; yay!

We wanted to make sure we got there with time to casually check in (and get free t-shirts), so we ended up arriving about 40 minutes early. As the race start time was postponed 15 minutes, we had a ton of time to spare. Runners big and small, stylish and not so much so, all milled about in lose groups, some coming up to ask us about our shoes and their comparative performance.  We were both wearing our Merrell Barefoot Foot Gloves. Hers are a lovely shade of violet and mine are pink. Our feet looked like the happy lady sisters that they were.  E answered most of the questions, as she has much more experience than me.

It was lovely doing the race with a friend. The experience gave us some down time to simply chat, which is generally hard to carve out, as we both juggling work, home, and motherhood. While we didn’t run together very long, as her pace is far beyond mine, it was pleasant going to and through the process together. Jan Peek was a back and return race this year, so we passed each other mid-way through the course, which was neat. I hope we’re able to do more races together.

The next thing we knew, the race organizers asked us all to gather in the street, and we all started to run as a pack. Some peeled away quickly, then others’ paces took them around a corner, and then the back of the pack moved on. After a quick chat, E moved along finding someone else farther up to pace herself with, which was great. I knew I would be one of the slowest, and was totally okay with that. I wasn’t there to try to best any time or try to be Wild E Coyote. I was there to run the entire course and finish it, regardless of time.

For most of the race, I was one of the final five. There was the woman with the earphones, the couple running together, the woman in pink and me (the lady in red). On the down slopes they’d try to outpace one of us, but they’d generally slow down on the up slopes and a new order would emerge. My pace felt like it remained constant on the ups and downs. Generally, I’d pull ahead on the ups and fall behind one or more on the downs, and I realized that they had trained to be able to do that and I hadn’t. It gave me something to think about for future training.

Ultimately, while I was the final person to complete the race, I did complete it, and I approached the finish line with a police escort, which was neat. I also learned that I’d bested my prior 10K run number by 15 minutes, which shows me that I can push myself harder on my normal runs than I thought possible.

E and I have already discussed other 10Ks we can do locally this fall, as well as other race options. How is your training going?

###

In other news, check back tomorrow for our first guest blogger! My friend, and author, Christina Bost Seaton will be discussing balance and her book Say Ciao to Chow Mein: Conquering Career Burnout.

Rest Day

Image by Roslan Tangah (aka Rasso) via Flickr

This is my first post about inactivity. I thought I should make note of it, because, unlike the rest of my blog, it’s about intentional inaction, which does not come easily to me. And, please note, this picture (-->) is not me...but it sure looks like she's reaxing, doesn't it?

Basically, I’ve always been the type of person who has very intense periods of relaxation when they do in fact happen.  Friends who have travelled with me on vacation have been shocked at how inactive I can become, because I’m normally multi-tasking up a storm. Once someone I was travelling with threw a hairbrush at me in order to try to rouse me from lying on my bed in utter exhaustion so that we could go bar hopping. It didn’t work.

Not that the rest of life stops when I take a moment out of one aspect of the daily/weekly/whatever grind/plan/whatever. I still have work, chores and fun activities planned for the day, but there will consciously be no planned exercise.

I’m taking the time out because tomorrow morning I’m running my first 10K (6.2 mile) ever. It’s stunning to me that this is in fact happening, because up until a couple of months ago, I couldn’t run more than a mile without dropping. A friend and I signed up for the race and are carpooling. Our Dear Husbands and Dear Children will be there to greet us at the finish line. My goal is simply to finish while still moving forward. Wish me luck!

 ***

In other news, next Tuesday my friend and author Christina Bost Seaton will be posting a guest blog post here! Come check it out! It’s all about finding balance in life, which is also the subject of her book Say Ciao to Chow Mein: Conquering Career Burnout.

Related articles

• On relaxation (mavenlinks.wordpress.com)
• Relax Already: Make a Cup of Tea (fitsugar.com)
• 8-Week Beginner 10K Running Schedule (fitsugar.com)
• 8/5/11 - Friday - Importance of Rest and Recovery/Avoid Overtraining (midwestfit.com)

Kate Middleton's Bod



Ok, so since I'm on a diet, body conscience kick with the celebrity coverage, I had to opine on Kate Middleton’s diet, wardrobe, hotness, etc.

I grew up in a family who’s women folk have always discussed two other families as though they live(d) down the block: the Kennedys and the Royals.  The Kennedys seem to have moved away to a not-so-cool town, and we all stopped discussing them, when Andrew Cuomo divorced one about a decade ago. The divorce had nothing to do with our communal ditching of Kennedy discussions; it was simply around that time that it happened.

The Royals, on the other hand, continue to intrigue. Thanksgiving and Christmas gatherings are always filled with new nuggets of Fergy, Wills, Harry, Charles, Camilla, Kate and their goings on. From hideous hat incidents to stunts that are simply not done dear, this cast of characters (aka royal family) warm our hearts.

As the newest edition to the group, Kate Middleton offers much to discuss. She’s beautiful, slender and has a great stylist. Plus, she's (gasp!) a commoner just like us. We also know that we’ll have her around for a long, long time as maybe even one day a (gulp) queen!

Her big coming out was definitely her recent wedding to William, future King of England (natch). We learned about her jewelry, her clothing, her background, and her diet. While she claims that she forgets to eat sometimes, one wonders, how is that even possible when she has personal servants who schedule her meals for her?

Officially, she espouses a healthy diet and exercise. According to sources, she works out approximately 1 hour a day five days a week, which is really quite good and should help her stay healthy. She enjoys cycling, strength training, and running. Her body shows it (see pic above).

The net has been abuzz that to get super-slimmed down for her wedding, she tried the Dukan diet, which her mom uses to watch her weight. So that you don’t need to read the entire book, the Dukan diet, which French folks swear by, consists of two phases, one allows you to only eat lean meat for a short period of time and the second encourages you to incorporate vegetables into the diet on a rotating basis, like every other day or five days on and five days off. It sounds mighty similar to the Atkins diet, which many in the States have tried. As with the Atkins diet, and starvation discussed yesterday, the weight seems to creep back (plus some), once one steps away from the diet. So if you want to keep the weight off, you kind of need to stay on the diet indefinitely, which is hard on a number of levels, and may not even be healthy.

Have any of you tried the Atkins or Dukan diet? Have you kept the weight off long term?

Related articles

• The Lowdown on the Dukan Diet (fitsugar.com)
• Kate Middleton Looks Svelte Before the Big Day (fitsugar.com)

Starving Jessica Alba

Image via WikipediaI think we can all agree, regardless of gender or sexual orientation, that Jessica Alba is hot. Well, most of the time. The mommies among us might agree that she has been gorgeous through both of her pregnancies, but it seems not everyone agrees.

Evidently many folks out there, including Jessica Alba herself, don't think so. They think that she has to look like her idealized airbrushed self from the pictured Playboy cover shoot from 2006, before she even thought of becoming pregnant. They think she needs to look like that to get the good parts, get the call backs and be taken seriously. Ok, srsly?

This disturbs me. Here's a woman who is a pretty okay actress, seems like she might be a sweetie in real life, has a lovely family life with her second child on the way and yet she's only satisfied if she looks a certain way, regardless of whatever she has going on in her life. She's out there saying that to lose her baby weight she resorts to starving herself.

I *get* that as an actress, her career is based on how she looks. I *get* that casting agents will look at pregnant pictures of her and wonder if she can carry their show/movie/video. I *get* that she gets paid for looking pretty in pictures. But isn't she more than that? Don't her backers want women of the world, like me, to see her as a more fully developed character person? Isn't that what we're all striving to do, build our own complex stories?

I'm actually not angered by her admission, as she obviously has an understanding of what is expected of her; rather, I'm saddened by the situation and think it's a false premise.

As all of the reality TV shows on A & E, Bravo, the Oprah Winfrey Network, and Oprah herself, show us, humans, particularly women, particularly the 24-55 head of household shopping and movie ticket buying public, loooooove slow steady character building stories. Who doesn't watch at least *one* of the Real Housewives sagas? Who didn't cry with Shannon when Gene Simmons proposed? Who hasn't watched Oprah's network programming and thought "right on sistah (or brotha)"? Ok, so I'll admit, I watch all of them (and more) at odd hours when Dear Husband and Dear Child are snoozing. I have suggestions for one or two other shows for the networks; but hey, that's not my gig and they’re not askin’ my opinion on it, ya know?

But back to our regularly scheduled blogging....

By Jessica Alba admitting that she feels she needs to starve herself, she's sending a sad message to us all. You know that tweeners, teens, and young and old women alike are reading these stories and thinking, "Great! See, that's what women do; we starve ourselves to reach our goals." Considering that the average woman gains 15-25 pounds after she's married, and gains an additional 30 pounds when pregnant (I do NOT make these stats up), the starving thing might sound like an easy fix, but it's not. By starving, one is going to war against oneself. The only way to keep the starved weight off is to sustain the starved environment - ie, Jessica Alba will need to keep starving herself *indefinitely* to try to keep the starved weight off.

And forget about breastfeeding, which studies are lauding as one of the biggest gifts we mothers can give to our children. Studies show that even extremely malnourished women in developing countries give their children nutritious breast milk; even if it may be pulling the nutrients necessary from their bones.
But by stopping breastfeeding to starve her body into weight loss submission, she may be making her journey unnecessarily harder. I, like many breastfeeding mamas, found that I lost the pregnancy weight within the first six weeks post partum (after giving birth) doing nothing besides breastfeeding. However, many moms do not. If it's solely pregnancy weight that she's trying to lose, perhaps breastfeeding is a better answer than starving, and weight training after breastfeeding ceases might help her get the definition she's looking for.

Slow, steady weight loss is the better option in my humble opinion.


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Simple Exercise

Image by mikebaird via FlickrWhen was the last time you felt like a kid running just to feel the wind on your hair and skin, or hugged yourself and swayed back and forth, or started singing to yourself? That long, hunh?

Try one of those activities tomorrow, and let me know how it makes you feel. I'll bet it cheers up the rest of your day.

Zumba Fitness

There are so many places one can begin with Zumba Fitness, but I’ll start with one – it kicks my ass in a completely new way. It’s really not like much of anything I’ve tried before.

It’s the perfect complement to running, since running is all about moving forward with momentum, whereas Zumba is all about swishing side to side with obtainable sexiness. While most workouts involve forward/back action, Zumba mostly involves side to side action, which works new muscles and jiggles normally dormant jiggly bits, in original and interesting ways. To a large extent, you don’t know what’s coming with Zumba and once you’ve gotten there, the routine has moved on to something else.

It took me a while to cruise into it and just be one with the Zumba. At first, I thought I’d try out the “how to” instructional phase. That was interesting. Basically, the instructor says, let’s start slow with this, yes that’s right, lets add this, good…..and then it’s as though she’s been injected into a popcorn machine and begins bouncing all over the screen as though we’re supposed to as well. While I could not keep up, it was so hysterical that I began to laugh very loudly. It was absurd to think that I’d begin moving like that at that velocity that quickly. But even in the laughter, Zumba Fitness pulls you in, because it’s completely disarming. No one expects you to bounce around like a ping pong ball.

The point of this video game is working out and having fun. And once you give in to the rhythm and allow yourself to attempt the moves, it is a lot of fun. I caught myself thinking that this video game would be perfect for a college student or someone in their twenties, because it’s so freeing. But wait, this middle aged woman (me) was feeling the freedom and goin’ for it. Like a 20 year old.

The fact that the music is in Spanish also forces you to simply feel the music and let it move your body.  Thank God it’s a video game that I can do in my bedroom, as opposed to going through the hip grinding, salsa swaying, tush thrusting bits in front of people one doesn’t know, let alone people one does! The first few times I worked out with Zumba Fitness, I had to stop and recalibrate my butt, tummy and thighs. I kept losing the rhythm, because I’d never really experienced anything like it before. It’s kind of like Dirty Dancing and you’re Baby. No one really expects much of you, especially if you’re alone in your bedroom working out, but you can cut loose and have the time of your life.

There’s too much to write about Zumba Fitness, and Zumba in general, for one post, so I’ll end this post here and return with more discussion of the actual sequences and my takes on them in a later post. If you haven’t gotten it yet, do so now; you won’t regret it. It rocks.

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