Sweet wonderful workouts

Exercise is now such a big part of my life, I have a hard time imagining life without it. During my interview with Jenna from the Gettysburg Times, she asked me to expand more on it when I said something along those lines and it made me remember how key it is to my happiness.

Friends, family, and fellow ww members ask me frequently how I have enough time to workout.  Having too busy a life and "not enough time to work out" is the #1 excuse people use.  They mention that it must be because I don't have kids and my job gives me flexibility so I must have more free time. That must be why I workout so much!

It's true, I don't have kids and I'm sure that makes it worlds easier than a busy mom or dad but my job sometimes makes it nearly impossible to work out.  I really enjoy my job (when I'm not completely stressed out by it), but I travel a lot.  In fact, there was a time that I would be gone an entire week at least once a month in Pittsburgh, or some other city at a conference. Staying at a hotel.  With a crappy hotel gym.  Not ideal conditions, people.

And guess what? I still worked out.  Some days it was just 30 minutes on an elliptical or stationary bike, but I didn't let the crappy gym or fact that I was completely exhausted from work and traveling all over to keep me from working out.  Even 100 lbs heavier ago I felt that I HAD to get my butt into the gym.  Then it was more about losing weight and burning calories, but I felt the pull to exercise, whatever the reason. And I MAKE time.  If it is important enough to you, you will make it happen.  Adrian can attest that some days I get up at 5:30am so I can workout before work (he probably thinks I have lost my mind these mornings).  Other days I go straight to the gym after work and change there so I won't allow any excuses to get in the way when I get home.  Adrian has heard me say before "I'm sorry hunny, I need to get to the gym before I come home or I won't go."  Thank my lucky stars he has always been so supportive of me. <3

 Friday was stressful for me.  Jenna called me asking if they could put my heaviest weight (and current weight) into the article.  I literally stuttered and panicked my way through a "can I think about it and call you back?"  After nearly having a panic attack while driving on I-695 (not a good place for this to happen, take my word for it), my body went to I NEED TO WORKOUT. GIVE ME ENDORPHINS NOW!!   Ironically, this made me calm down almost immediately because my mind did not go to I NEED COMFORT! FEED ME! and it made me insanely happy that the binge monster was still passed out in the basement.

I called my darling husband and asked him a tough question that I know he didn't want to answer but he is just awesome so he did.  "As a reporter would you want to have my weight in the story?"  Of course, his answer was yes.  So needless to say, my weight got into the story and I'm glad it did.

Having said that.....from the moment after I gave Jenna my before and current weight and the go ahead I felt like a complete nervous wreck.  How harshly would people judge me? What would they think about how I got to that weight? You can imagine where else my imagination took me over the hour drive home.

Needless to say, I got home and drug my exhausted and stressed body to the Y.  My plan was 30 minutes of hills on the stationary bike then about 30 minutes of strength training.  Well.....I was so anxious about the article coming out the next day, I couldn't drag myself away from my comfort zone.  After about 90 minutes on the bike I finally staggered off and started my planned strength training routine.  I was so exhausted I had to do jumping jacks before traveling lunges to get me pumped up enough to do them and I repeated this pump up routine before several exercises so that I wouldn't flat out quit on myself.

I finally left the gym 2.5 hours after arriving.  I did do a nice 15 minutes of stretching because 90 minutes on the stationary bike then almost an hour of squats and lunges will make your legs ache and tight.  I also made my abs go into full muscle spasm by putting them through 2 sets of 20 reps of passovers (if you have never done these, they are like sweet death to your lower abs), leg lifts, bicycles, bench v-crunches and ball crunches.  My abs are still thanking me for the sweet torture, especially after an Emily workout today with some more.

Now a days I don't feel complete without a good sweat.  When I get stressed for any reason, my body craves the powerful and sweet release of endorphins that comes from a hard workout.  FINALLY my body does not crave food.  I couldn't feel more relieved that I have been able to train my body away from needing food to comfort me.  Of course there are some days that my binge monster rears her ugly head and demands that I eat an entire bag of chips or a giant candy bar.  That doesn't mean I have to listen to her though!

Last Chance Workout

Today I completed what was probably the hardest workout of my life and survived to tell the tale!

I know what you're thinking- P90X, Insanity, Turbo Fire, Bob Harper's Inside Out Method, or Jillian's 30 day shred? NOPE. And I have done all of those, by the way. :P

It was a circuit from non other than Emily, my trainer. She created it last night and after completing it had this to say about it: "The best kind of workout is the one where you want to puke and/or cry halfway through, but you dig deep and find the motivation to finish." So well said, especially since during this workout I definitely wanted to cry and/or scream a couple times. Or just kill her. That is, if I could just catch my breath long enough to do any of those things. To have the sheer audacity to give me this crazy workout- to actually think I could do this? CRAZY!

Well, obviously she wasn't crazy because I completed it- 2 full rounds of this insane circuit that after 1 round I wanted to throttle her when she said "Ok, let's do that again!" Squats, lunges, cardio, abs and more cardio till I felt like my legs were made of lead....or jello. I'm pretty sure that if I'm able to walk tomorrow it will be a miracle.

The worst part of the workout, which was also the greatest, was the last 15 minutes on the treadmill. I never knew that walking could ever be so close to hell- but try walking 3.7 mph at a 10% incline and then you might understand. My heart rate was up the whole workout- but during those last 15 minutes of each set it stayed steady between 170-176. WOW!

There was a point, about 2 minutes into my second circuit on the treadmill when I wanted to quit. No, quitting is not strong enough. I wanted to kill Emily for thinking I could do this then fall over and join her on the floor. She recognized my change immediately and told me that I was hitting my mental wall. "Push through it, you can do this! Remember, you already did this once before." Of course, my excuses reared their ugly head and I was ready for her "Yeah, but I just did a whole extra circuit before this one....I can't do this!" She went right on encouraging me until I realized what I was doing- making excuses. I have come so far through this journey, and I was not about to let the last 15 minutes of this hour and twenty minute workout beat me. So I jumped the wall and kept right on going. It sucked and it was a brutal 10 minutes but I pushed through it!! When I was able to bring the incline back down and cool off I had a major endorphin high and felt like I was walking on air. Now that is a last chance workout! Without the annoying hassle of humiliating yourself in front of the country on national television.

I definitely owe some major props to Emily today- I have never in my life been pushed like that and gotten over the mental wall of a brutal workout. I've always just stopped before getting to that point. But, today I hit that point and pushed passed it. I'll definitely be sore tomorrow.... yet I can't wait to do it all over again! :)

What happened to the old Colleen? I for one, am glad she's taken a hiatus.