Gloomy Day Blues

Today I'm having the gloomy day blues.

After it was eighty and bright yesterday, the rain returned and the temperatures have gone down to the high forties today.  On top of that add an entire family of snotty allergy sufferers, all doped up on Claritin, and it makes for a day when the To Do list looks insurmountable and working out feels, well, blech.

We all get these wish I could stay at home and snuggle into a sweater or bed kind of days. It's easier to do when one is a toddler. One simply needs to rub one’s eyes and say "Seepy" a few times for the parental units catch on and solve the issue. But for us adults, the To Do list calls and we plow forward, while really wanting to fall asleep in our chair.

I wonder what the equivalent is in the Middle East. They don't have overcast or allergy filled days - ever. Sure, it gets hot, but it's dry heat and SUNNY. I wonder if, for folks there, it's the sand storm blues.  But I digress.

Yesterday’s weekly weigh in was relatively satisfying. I hadn’t gained any weight, and I hadn’t lost any either. I’d been a bit freaked out because a mid-week weigh in had shown a ten pound weight spike. But that was inconsistent with all other weigh ins last week, so I’m happy to claim the status quo weight.

It feels like my body isn’t necessarily at a plateau, but rather regrouping before the next series of losses. After working out, and losing weight, steadily for about four months (and fifteen pounds), I think my body deserves the momentary rest to regroup. Lord knows I do. But then, that’s probably the gloomy day blues talking.

I wonder what you all do out there to brighten up on days like today? Do you give in to the ache to sleep, or do you power up with caffeine?

Feel free to email me or comment here. I'd love to try your tricks and report back in a future blog post.

Fear & Food (3.24.11)

Image via Wikipedia

I was whipping along, happy in my weekly progress and slowly plowing through my first personal goals, when life, as it is sometimes apt to do, threw my weight loss a curve ball.

As is not often the case, it could not have been anticipated, as many have called what happened an act of God. You see, last week the East coast saw some rain. Make that buckets full of torrential rain and you might have the correct idea. We were impacted, because Dear Husband was travelling for work and the bridge we use to access the outside world was literally washed away. All of last week I would stand looking at the whitewater that was the river between us and, well, everything else. And did I mention that our cars were safely nestled in our garage on our side of the river? :Sigh:

So my child and I were stuck at home alone with no route of vehicular egress and I was stressed. What if anything happened and we needed emergency services? What if something happened to me and my child was stuck alone? What if, what if, what if?

While I continued to religiously do my EA Sports Active 2 routine, with my child trying to do it alongside me, I needed to attend to my child’s needs, bridge repair coordination, work and keeping Dear Husband abreast of the situation, which seemed to change most hours of most days: more rain, sleet, snow, ice, walk bridge, walk bridge warping, and the list went on and on. It’s one thing to be concerned and handle inconveniences; it’s a completely different experience to go through those same things as a parent.

After my child went to bed at night, I’d have a beer (or two), replay the day, try to get ahead on things for the following day, plan out potential crisis aversion and….emotionally eat. It’s not like we have much unhealthy stuff in the house (shucksthank God), but as with anything else, something in moderation like a few cheddar bunnies turns into something else entirely when one goes off the reservation – like consuming an entire box of cheddar bunnies in one sitting.

End results: Dear Husband is home, bridge is completely repaired, child is happy and healthy, my EA Sports Active 2 trainer is happy that I completed all of the required workouts last week, I was tremendously productive in work, I got very little sleep and ate waaaayyyyyy too much. So at this week’s weigh in, I was up two pounds instead of down one.

Final analysis, I am happy that everyone is healthy; things could have been much worse (our hearts and prayers are with the people of Japan and the Middle East); we’re grateful for our friends around the world who offered immediate support; and I have a new understanding of emotional eating in general and my emotional eating in particular. It’s something I’ll watch out for in stressful situations, but will also embrace as a short term necessity. So long as one gets back to the cycle of healthy eating, exercise and healthy choices, all is not lost – in fact, insight makes us all winners.

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