Detour

ski week

I took this week off of work because my son's public school has a "ski week" this week. Well, they don't call it that because that would be saying out loud how ridiculously privileged the families in the district are. But, in a move that proved to be the right thing and also long overdue, my son transferred to a private school a month ago and that school doesn't have the week off. I needed a break so I kept my planned vacation.

I'm working on a post about public schools; stay tuned.

As is typical of me, I did not spend the week relaxing, rather I built an Olympic lifting platform for our garage.  Check it out:

  

Cool, huh?  Our weights aren't here yet, so I haven't been able to workout, but it should be fully functional in 10 days or so.  Yay! By far the hardest part about this project was rearranging and making space in my garage.  That's also not finished, but I was able to create the space to build the platform.  

I have decided to back off on my running and crossfit "metcon" workouts for 3 months.  What's a metcon?  From the crossfit discussion boards:

Metcon doesn't have a strict definition. Its about intensity. Intensity is about power output.

If i had to define metcon i would do it like this 

1. High Heart Rate 

2. Simultaneous Use of Many Muscles 

3. Continuous Movement 

4. Short to Medium Time (5-30 min) 

and the best way to tell if your doing a metcon workout..... 

YOU'LL KNOW IT !!!  

An example of a metcon is this (from my gym's site):

30 Deadlifts @ 225# (men)/155#(women)

Rest 1 Minute

30 Pull-Ups

Rest 1 Minute

30 DB Snatches Each Arm @ 45# (men)/30#(women)

Rest 1 Minute

30 Knees-to-Elbows (Hang from the pull up bar and raise your knees to your elbows. Try it.)

Looks horrible doesn't it?  These workouts are all about power and your heartrate spikes very high, but they are short.  Most metcons are timed; the person who performs all the prescribed reps/distance (sometimes 200 or 400 meter runs are thrown in) in the fastest time wins. Sometimes there is a prescribed amount of time and the person who does the most reps wins.

Being able to handle heavy metcons is the holy grail of crossfit.  

So why am I giving them up?  

Well, let's think about power.  How can you increase your power output?  Power is work over time. So I can get stronger or I can get faster.  Or both. 

Since our metcons usually involve lifting heavy shit, getting stronger will make me faster.  In the workout above, if my single rep max (the amount I can lift one time) is 160#, doing thirty reps at 155# will take me all day.  If my single rep max is 250#, this wil be a much easier and faster workout for me.

My strength is a limiting factor.  I am strong compared to the average 5'3" 135# woman.  But I am not strong enough to kill those metcons, or even to make a decent showing in olympic lifting.  

And here's the rub: doing too much high intensity power work or running will interfere with your ability to get stronger. The best way to get strong is to lift as heavy as you can (in the 1-5 rep range) eat a lot and sit on the couch.  Anything else you do (working, parenting, running errands, housework...) will detract from getting stronger.  

So in order to get better at the heavy metcons, I need to stop doing them for a while. Seems incongruous, but it's not really.  Athletes have been using strength training to lay a foundation for (later) speed for years.

So, I am going to do only strength workouts for a while: heavy front squats, back squats, shoulder presses, push presses, power cleans, clean and jerk and snatch. Also pull ups and bench press. I will still do HIIT (high intensity interval training) running workouts once or twice a week (those are generally also strength workouts and are a good compliment to Oly lifting)

But what about my heart and lungs?  Yes, my conditioning will suffer.  But that's ok, at the end of 3 months I will start training for general conditioning again.  And the beauty of it is that you can generally keep your strength gains when you go back to doing metcons.

I hear women complain about their inability to get stronger sometimes.  Well, if you are doing a gazillion hours of cardio per week, you won't get stronger or it will be very slow.  If you want to get stronger, build in a strength cycle.  Athletes do this in most disciplines, even endurance athletes. It's a good idea even if your primary goal is to be a faster runner or cyclist.  It requires patience and managing our emotional relationship to exercising.  In other words, recognizing that you do not have to be sweating profusely and burning a certain number of calories per session to be making gains in fitness.  

This is training for performance.  Here are some pictures of strong crossfit women I know:

 

  

 

 

I love these photos.  I love crossfit.  It is the hardest sport I've ever been involved in.  Every one of these women, these different body types, is incredibly strong and getting stronger all the time. These women all push themselves, on a regular basis, to a place most people don't ever experience. They all inspire me every day.

That's me running in front (no, I wasn't winning anything, we were warming up):

My son and I in a competition last year:

 

  

I'm off to lift something heavy now...

P.S.: I am officially the "Coolest Mom on the Block" for building an olympic platform in my garage on my vacation.

i suck

Things that are pissing me off right now:

• My sloooow progress on adding weight to my olympic lifts.
• My loss of strength in other lifts.
• My waistband's refusal to loosen despite a few weeks of dieting.
• My dog's need to chew every damn piece of furniture in my house.
• My son's inability to do a damn thing, including getting up in the morning, without my intervention.
• Sarah Palin

Things that are making me happy right now:

• My going to the gym anyway.
• My  improved form even if I still can't pick up any damn weight.
• My son's amazing progress in his lifting and that he is getting a charge from it.
• My son's happiness in his new school and my JOY at no longer getting daily calls from the public high school
• My improved running.
• My impending week off work next week.

I don't know what I can do about the kid and the dog.  The kid is getting lectured and the dog is confined to an ever shrinking area in the house.  Soon, he will spend entire days in the bathroom. The dog, not the kid.  Actually, come to think of it, the kid spends a lot of time in the bathroom already...

I can do nothing about Sarah Palin.

But I might have a shot at fixing my fitness problems.

It's hard to keep up your inspiration to keep dieting/training/keeping on when the results are so slow that they are not discernible.  I have a couple of tricks for those times.  I go back to the first step as laid down by Black Hockey Jesus:

The crux of the First Step in The 365 Day BHJ Fitness Regime is intense self loathing: “We admitted that we are disgusting excuses for people and we hate ourselves.”

I look in the mirror and tell myself I suck.  It's my fault that I am not doing better. This is true.  Fitness is like high school grades:  Results are a reflection of effort.

Actually, I don't hate myself.  But I do suck.  This is an important distinction because hanging my "value as a person" on how disciplined I've been is stupid.  But recognizing that my results reflect my effort is right.  Also, it will save me tons of time I could otherwise spend wondering alternately if I have "a metabolic disorder" or why God hates me.  

This is not negative thinking.  This is recognizing that how fit I am is in my control.  This is positive.  I have control over my level of suckitude.

Then, I tighten it up.  I recommit to the principles of of my diet.  I talked over here about how important diet is in losing weight.  No more "tiny cheats."  

Then, I take a look at my workouts.  Have I really been going as hard as I can?  Or have I been letting that tiny voice that says "good enough" stop me from lifting that heavier weight or going that much faster? Have I been letting fear drive the bus? Am I complacent?

Do I let it creep into my brain that it's "good enough" for a 48 year old?

Fuck that.  I have no idea where my limits are.  I am not up against them yet, I know this deep in my heart.  

I need to hit it harder.  I need to pay attention to detail.  I need to do the extras, the stretching and the abs. I need to do the foundation work and squat 2 days a week.

I need to keep my eye on the prize and keep my goals in mind.  I also need to remind myself that I have been moving towards them and that the changes I am making will get me there faster.  When I want that ice cream I will ask myself if it will help me lift more weight.

Bottom line: be honest about I got where i am and what it will take to change it.  Then: Just Do It.

  

find your thrill

Well, that was fun.  Five days and a bottle of Vicodin later and I feel almost human.  I think I may actually be able to work out tomorrow for the first time in several days.

When I can't exercise I get cranky.  Really, it's a mood enhancer for me.  Which is why I'm such an addict. I wrote here about how it started, my bodybuilding past.  

I did bodybuilding style workouts for 16 years, even when I was no longer a bodybuilder.  I think there are huge benefits to lifting weights.  After bodybuilding I ran (all distances from 5k to marathon), rode and raced bikes (road and mountain),  and did triathlons (up to olympic distance).  I threw myself into each sport with fervor and dedication.  I ran 70 mile weeks when I ran, rode 250 mile weeks when I was a cyclist and trained for 12-15 hours per week as a triathlete.  I don't understand moderate.  Sometimes I wish I was one of those people that can go for a meandering 10 mile bike ride along the bay on the weekend.  But unless there is some sort of way to compete with someone, or conquer a weight, distance or speed I haven't done before; I'm not too interested.

I've thought a lot about that, my competitiveness. And I think it's ok to be competitive. It's important to channel it to those places where it's appropriate.  I always have an outlet  in my life where I can compete in a healthy way.

The point is; I don't throw myself in halfway.  When I started running my first training run was a 5k and I immediately started running 6 miles a day with stadium stairs thrown in once a week.  When I bought my first road bike in college (days after I had finished a marathon and could no longer stomach even the sight of my running shoes), my first ride was 70 miles with a hill they called cardiac hill.

I'm still trying to make my point which is not that I'm a badass, but that I never got hurt.  Nope.  No knee problems or overuse injuries no matter what crazy shit I threw at my body.  Why?  I believe it is because I had such a strong foundation from lifting.  

A few years ago (during my triathlon phase) I stopped lifting. I had just burnt out on the bodybuilding style workout...lift a weight you can manage for 8-10 reps, rest repeat...on and on for each body part.  I was bored.  I was bored with the workouts and bored with the gym.  So I stopped.  I did yoga instead.

I started getting hurt.  Tendonitis in a knee that made cycling excruciating.  Then a torn hamstring that impaired my running for a year (including the several months that I employed my usual treatment: ignore it and hope it goes away).  It sucked.

So I started looking for a more interesting way to lift weights. I also was burning out on the hardcore endurance activity.  During my triathlon training I discovered my body responded pretty well to interval training and i started doing more of that than the traditional "go lots of miles at a steady pace."  Also, my own theories of weightlifting had evolved, I only wanted to do movements that gave me a lot of bang for my buck.  Think pull ups instead of bicep curls, the benefit of pull ups is you don't only work your arms but your entire back.

As I got older, I found that shorter workouts of extremely high intensity were what I wanted to do. By accident I found Crossfit.

I love Crossfit.  I love the intensity, I love the fact that there is skill work, I love the lifting, I love the competition.  Crossfit introduced me to Olympic Lifting.  So now I run, do crossfit and Olympic Lifting.  I usually only run up to a 5k distance, once a week I run sprints.  I am always going for intensity.  I love the community I have at my gym.  I am sure that if I ever get tired of it, there will be something new to get fanatical about.

Sometimes I run into people I haven't seen for years.  When they ask me what I'm up to and I tell them about my latest thing they say, "You're so disciplined."  Well no.  I am actually doing the things I love.  I loved getting close to nature on my long runs and bike rides, loved getting to places I wouldn't otherwise see.  I love seeing a new city by running through it; nothing can compare.  I love lifting a scary ass barbell above my head and encouraging my friends to do the same.  I love doing all of those things with my son.  

For me, this is just living.

flashdance

I started exercising in the Dark Ages.  No, that's not a reference to the fact that I am a crone, it's a reference to the fact that that I cut my fitness teeth in the eighties. 

The eighties were not the age of fitness enlightenment.  Oh, we thought they were! We had discovered fitness as a nation.  The "jogging boom" of the seventies had given way to aerobics studios and walk-a-thons.  We were breathless in our enthusiasm: Low-impact aerobics!  Low fat diets!  Rice cakes!  Walkmans! 

America had discovered being in shape.  It wasn't just for athletes any more.  There was a whole generation of women whose marriages had unexpectedly imploded mid-life. They went to work for the first time.  They discovered Jazzercise and sweat for the first time.  It was the embodiment of the American dream; you could reshape yourself into someone better.  Start over.  Not age.  Jane Fonda made workout videos.  Jamie Lee Curtis showed us that we could be perfect.  Oprah got skinny. 

Here was the dogma:  Eat a low fat, high carbohydrate diet.  Exercise at a moderate intensity and you will burn more fat.  Stay around 60% of your max heart rate for at least 40 minutes a day and you'll look like Jane and Jamie.

Yeah. Bullshit.

Let me back up.

Where was I in the eighties?  Well, aerobics saved my life.  After my tentative start, I dove in with mind, body and soul. I took two classes per day.  WIthin 6 months, I was teaching classes myself. I was an evangelist.  I checked out nutrition texts at the library and read them cover to cover.  I preached to my classes about good food; complex carbs, the importance of calcium, the benefits of nonfat dairy products, the evils of saturated fats.  I was happy for the first time in my adult life.  I looked good, I felt good.  Most importantly I was helping others to do the same.

One day, I was in a fitness equipment store shopping for something that could make me even fitter. Ankle weights or some stupid shit.  I was checking out the muscle magazines.  I loved seeing photos of female bodybuilders.  Maybe it was because I felt that I had a better chance of looking like that than I did of looking like a fashion model.  I've always been kind of solidly built, big arms and big legs, short limbed.  I didn't stand a snowball's chance in hell of ever becoming "willowy".  But these strong lean women were something else.  I loved their strength and I really loved that this was an alternative view of feminine beauty and perfection.

"Where do you train?"  Oh fuck.  Was that the guy at the counter?  The one I may have noticed before in this store who may have been part of the reason I stopped by?  And "train"?  How cool was that?

"Um. I don't.  I just like to look at these."  I managed to stammer while bending down to retrieve the magazine I'd dropped when I jumped.

"Well you look like you do."  He looked amused.  

A viewing of Pumping Iron II sealed the deal for me. Bodybuilding was a sport I wanted to try.

So I joined his gym, a hole in the wall called "Solid Sweat" and spent the next few years changing my body drastically. That's the point of bodybuilding.  It's the only sport i know where the competition has nothing to do with the training.  Training to build muscle is hard.  It requires lifting heavy, scary weights, regularly.  It involves coming face to face with your limitations.  You either lift it or you don't.  There's nowhere to hide. 

BTW, this is why you won't, especially if your female, "bulk up" if you start lifting.  It's fucking hard to build muscle. It's so hard that I seriously considered using steroids.  To build muscle you have to lift so hard you can barely fucking walk.  It will not happen by accident.  You will not wake up big.  Fuck.

And training for competition is so much harder.  Because on top of the workouts, you have to be fanatical about diet, rest, and every other aspect of your life.  It took over my life, but with a lifetime of "fatty" comments floating around in my brain, I had something to prove.  I was going to get on stage in a tiny bikini.  And I did.

I learned so much about what works and what doesn't work in terms of getting fit and lean. Bodybuilders have been getting lean for years.  Bodybuilders did not jump on the high carb band wagon in the eighties.  I finally got lean following a bodybuilding diet that was high in protein, low in carbs, low fat and made up of mostly unprocessed food.

The recommendations for a healthy diet seem to change every few years.  The low fat craze of the eighties is likely a factor in the fattening of America; the introduction of "low fat" processed food was co-incident with a steep rise in sugar and high fructose corn syrup consumption.  In the 80s the NIH funded an advertising campaign to encourage people to reduce their consumption of eggs that was based on flawed science.  We are increasingly aware that the government agencies charged with setting our nutritional standards are beholden to big agriculture and sometimes bad science. 

There are voices of dissent to mainstream nutrition.

The same can be said for what sort of exercise to do to get in shape.  There are many different theories on what works.

I will talk more in my next post about what I have learned over the years about what works and what doesn't for getting "in shape".  I will talk about my own results on a diet that is way too high in fat for the nutritionists, but has helped me improve my performance across the board.  I want you to take all I say as one data point in your quest to find what works for you.

I want to make one point in this post:  If you want to get fit, do your homework.  Figure out what you want to do or be.  Then research it.  Find a plan and STICK TO IT for a prescribed period of time.  Keep track.  Track results.  Find what works and what doesn't.

You have access to the best laboratory in the world: your body.  Research on it.

Let me give you an example of what I mean:

Let's take the marathon.  "Old school" marathon training has runners running 50-100 mile weeks. Newer "less is more" theories have runners doing shorter workouts at higher intensities.  The old school method is the one that works for me if I want to run a marathon (which, btw, is stupid for me.  Not a good sport for me.  I have learned this the hard way.) I know what works because I've followed both types of programs.  I followed the program religiously (even when I felt one wasn't working) so that I would have good information.  I've raced using both and one is clearly better than the other for me.

So, if I ever run another marathon, well, please shoot me if I talk about it.  If I survive and insist on running anyway, I know what method works for me.

If you use a coach, trainer or nutritionist, trust them, do what they say.  If it doesn't work for you, move on.  There are many, many ways to get there; wherever there is.  Become an expert on you and you will find your path.

how to get fat skinny

Many of my favorite bloggers are in the midst of new fitness and/or weight loss regimens (new year, new decade). Many, like Jonniker, are using Jillian Michaels 30 day shred.  (Hi, Jonna! Don't worry, the nausea will pass and, also, you will be able to pick up your baby again at some point...) Some are running.  Many are combining their workouts with nutritional changes; check out the challenge at MamaPop.

Since I've been at this fitness thing for over 25 years (fuck), I thought I'd share some of what I have learned about what works and what doesn't.  Not that you asked, but blogging is better than bossing my friends around. Which is what I usually do.

First, there is a distinction between getting fit and losing weight. I'll stick to  losing weight in this post since that's what most people think they want to do (I'll talk about fitness later):

1.   Losing weight is ALL about diet. 

2.  I'm not kidding.

3.  You can lose weight without exercising at all.

4.  Really.

5.  You can exercise like a mofo and not lose an ounce (or any size).

6.   I am not shitting you.

7.   You can do all the crunches you want; abs are made in the kitchen.

Heresy one:  Exercise is not the most important thing in losing weight.

You are stuck with the calories in vs. calories out equation.  Sorry.  If you lower your fat intake to 5% of your diet but are still taking in more than you burn you will gain weight.  If you drastically reduce carbs but are still eating too many calories (my personal favorite way to do this is with the excessive consumption of almond butter) you will gain weight.  Yes you will.  You can train for a marathon, run 50 mile weeks and not lose weight, if you eat what you burn.  I've done it.

Heresy two: A reduction in calories is what matters for weight loss.

People will argue with the above statement and claim that low carb diets are more effective.  Science doesn't back this up. To the extent that low carb diets are effective at all  it is because they are low cal diets. The same can be said of weight watchers, south beach, zone.  Every one of these diets reduces caloric intake. (Again, we are talking strictly weight loss, there are benefits to a carb controlled diet in managing some chronic diseases like diabetes and I am not even going to pay attention to extreme shit like going into ketosis, I'm sure there are sites that cater to supermodels that talk about that kind of insanity)

But! Some people find they are more comfortable slashing calories if they do it by lowering carbs.  In other words, having a higher percentage of your calories come from protein and fat may control your appetite better that just cutting calories.  This is true for me, if I am cutting calories, I have to cut carbs or I will chew off my arm.

Heresy three:  The quality of your calories doesn't matter for weight loss. 

No shit.  You can eat only Snickers and lose weight (however, see above about chewing off arm). You may increase your chances of developing a disease, but we don't care about that!  We just want to look hot! The best source of information I have found about this is Lyle MacDonald's site. Lyle has been working with athletes and bodybuilders for years and has been collecting scientific literature on fat loss, much of which is indexed on his site.  Bodybuilders get leaner for competition than any other athletes and we can learn a lot from them (the only time I ever got below 10% body fat was following a bodybuilding diet and training program).  You can learn a lot from them and from Lyle. 

Personally, I find that eating whole, unprocessed foods makes me feel less deprived mentally because I can eat more volume and bulk than if I eat processed food.

Heresy four (the corollary to number three; I'm telling you this shit is hard):  Just changing the quality of your food is likely not enough to put you in a calorie deficit.

Unless you had a pretty crappy diet to begin with or are a 15 year old boy with a ridiculous metabolism, you will probably have to keep track of what you eat, and this means weighing your food.  This is definitely true for small framed women over 40 who have a desk job.  Why?

Well, take me for example.  I'm 5'4," old as fuck, have a desk job,  and usually weigh between 135-140 lbs.  (Shut up.  I have a lot of muscle)  If I want to lose 2 pounds a week and I'm not exercising, I need to limit my intake to 850 kcals day.  (fuck, fuck, fuck) It would be very, very easy to blow this number and inadvertently add 200-500 kcal per day. Don't believe me?  Watch Leigh Peele's video.  In my case, that's adding over 20% to the my daily intake. How much does that suck?  The only way to really know you are sticking to a low calorie diet is to weigh your food. Obviously, if you can eat 2500 kcal per day and lose weight, there is more room for error. However, you will need to reduce your intake by 3500 kcal per week for each pound you want to lose.  Which is why it is difficult for smaller, older females to lose weight rapidly.  More reasons it sucks to be me.

Heresy five: You need to cheat.  

"What?  You just got done telling me I need to weigh everything..."  You do.  If you are serious about losing weight you need to keep track of what you eat.  But!  This shit will make you crazy. No.  Really crazy.  When I was pre-contest dieting for bodybuilding, I had a dream one night that I sat down with a spoon and a box of nonfat dry milk powder and pigged out  That was a good dream!  I was beyond deprived.  Do not go there.  Trust me.  You need a mental break.   There are also some good arguments for why you need regular breaks physiologically (again, look at Lyle's site, his more extreme diets have structured re-feeds. Look up info about the hormone Leptin).  I don't think you can separate the mental from the physiological here, allowing yourself a cheat meal or a cheat day will make it much easier to stick to a plan.  Again, if you are me and can only eat a pittance to begin the fuck with, you have to be careful of your cheat.  That sundae as big as your head can wipe out a week of dieting.  Fuck.

I remember being in a Venice Beach Supermarket the morning after the Mr. Olympia contest. There were several professional bodybuilders walking around with carts filled with Twinkies, fruit pies, donuts and other crap.  Extreme deprivation will seriously mess you up.  The urge to binge can become uncontrollable.  Do not fuck with extreme deprivation.

Ok. Here's the thing.  Nothing that I said above is about good health.  Nothing that I have said above has anything to do with performance.  Nothing I said above has anything to do with fat loss vs. loss of lean body mass. To cut calories without regard for the quality of your food, your macro-nutrient ratio, or attention to your activity level is straight dumb. You might as well also smoke and take amphetamines if all that really matters is losing weight. Save your flames; I AM NOT RECOMMENDING THIS APPROACH.  But you must know the basic facts to design an effective program and this is part of the equation.

someone saved my life

I grew up fat.  

Actually, not really.  But I grew up not skinny in an era when Twiggy was an icon.   I had a lavender vinyl Twiggy lunch box.  Thin was in.

I remember evaluating the shape of my arms in Kindergarten and understanding that they were too thick and shapeless to be acceptable.  I had pale skin, freckles, thunder thighs and a big butt. Kids were mean.  I remember every single nasty comment I ever heard from the thin brown girls. I felt unacceptable.

I was born in 1961, so my formative years passed in a world that hadn't yet enacted Title IX. There were no girls' soccer leagues.  Our mothers didn't exercise.  There wasn't women's college or pro basketball. We had gymnasts, figure skaters and Billy Jean King.  But even those sports were not for every girl.  The only girls I knew who participated in those sports had Olympic dreams.   

Our health classes focused on menstruation and VD (venereal disease).  That's what we called STD's before HIV took sexually transmitted diseases beyond the venereal. We didn't talk about nutrition, lifestyle related diseases, the relationship between stress and exercise.  Our parents still smoked and had cocktails every night.  In my house we had  "hors d'oeuvres"  before dinner. Potato chips and clam dip.  

In my family, intelligence and creativity was revered.  The subject of athletic prowess just didn't come up. Every four years we watched the Olympics and we understood that those people, that level of discipline and aggression, lived a world apart from normal people.

I woke up one morning when I was twenty three choking on the certainty that I was going to die. Too soon.  I don't know where it came from but lying there with the four walls of my bedroom closing in on me, I couldn't see a future.  Any future.   My self loathing had grown so much there wasn't room for anything else inside of me.  The drugs and alcohol were no longer working.  I had no education, no skills, and no future.  My life was beyond chaotic and I felt insane.

And I was fat.  We can argue about how fat I was, but it was the thing that I hated the most about myself. I'm ashamed to admit this.  I was not depressed abut the state of my mental and physical health, which was abysmal, but rather about how I looked.

I'd made attempts to "get in shape" before.  By now it was the early eighties and even normal people jogged and did par course calisthenics, the seventies brought us that.  I tried to jog for the first time  when I was about 18.  I drove down to the junior high school (3 blocks away) and tried to run around the hockey field.  I went around once (probably 1/10 of a mile) and I thought I was going to DIE.   I had to lie down in the muddy grass and concentrate on not losing my lunch. Of course I had asthma and I smoked, but I really couldn't imagine how anyone actually could do that sport.  I developed a respect bordering on awe for joggers.  I went home and had a beer.

I didn't try it again until I was 21 or so.  That time, I actually bought some expensive running shoes, blue New Balances.  I thought I looked pretty cool in them.  I put on some sweats and left the house early in the morning. I made it about half a block, then I walked a bit.  When I was coming back down my street, some young guys drove by and one of them yelled out the window "You ain't gonna get all that off just walking."  I slunk home and stashed the shoes in the back of my closet.  

When I found myself at the bottom of a pit that morning two years later I had NO idea what to do to change my life. There was so much wrong. I had didn't know how to live a good life or where to start.  I was so bereft of self love that I had no idea how to treat other people.  I didn't know how to reach out or who to reach out to. I felt completely alone in the world.  I didn't know how to achieve goals or even understand the need to set them.  I was 23 and I had been abusing drugs and alcohol for ten years.

But I knew what I hated the most on that day was how I looked.  I was invisible.  I felt people's eyes slide over me when I went out. I wasn't someone they wanted to know.  My entire life felt like junior high.  I was unacceptable.

There was this kernel of pride and arrogance inside me.  I knew I was smart. I'd read a bunch of classic novels, all of Shakespeare's plays.  I was good with words.  I had good taste.  But people looked at me and saw something else. Lazy. Slovenly.  I was really pissed about it.  But I was also miserable, so tired of having men want to date my friends and never me.  So tired of the unrequited love that seemed to be my lot in life.  I understood even then that those things were more about my perception of myself than they were about the shape of my body or my uneducated status.  I just didn't know how to fix it.

I looked myself in the mirror and decided I had to do SOMETHING.  I had to stop hating myself. I either had to accept myself as I was or I had to change.  I didn't know what I could change. The mountain of problems in my life seemed insurmountable.  I thought about working on accepting my size, but I didn't feel strong enough to eradicate the years and years of messages that taught me it wasn't ok to be fat.  And physically, I felt like shit.

I decided that maybe, just maybe, if I got a little bit healthier physically, it would be like picking up a corner of my crazy life.  Maybe I could just do that one thing.

There was this aerobics studio up the street from me. The shades were always closed so you couldn't see inside from the street.  I only ever saw women going in there.  It seemed like a place to start.  I dug out those still new running shoes and pulled on my big over-sized 50% polyester bright green sweat pants, took a deep breath, and walked up the street.

It was a midday class, I think there were only about 10 women in the class. The woman who taught the class was a lithe beauty named Andrea.  I will never forget her. She was kind and welcoming.  I searched her eyes for judgment when I shook her hand and I couldn't find any. She started the music and gave cues. The class went right and I went left. I didn't know what a grapevine or the charleston step was.  I was all over the place.

But, Oh! Was it fun.  The music was groovin and I felt like I was out dancing.  The hour went by in a flash.  I felt amazing.  I walked home with my head held high.  I was full of hope for a different life.  

And it was the beginning of a different life.  I was 23 and it was the first time I had taken care of myself in any way.  I was still a child, an unformed person in so many ways.  I hadn't had the ordinary experiences of a passage into adulthood, I hadn't gone off to college or traveled the world.  I hadn't had a lot of guidance in "how to live."  That day, I knew something big had happened.  I didn't realize until years later that I had taken my first real step towards growing up.

the thrill of victory

The debate I wrote about in my last post ruffled all kinds of feathers and caused some serious soul searching.  I want to write more about that later, but in the meantime I thought I would lighten the mood by posting my race report from the San Francisco Nike Women's Marathon I ran with my son in 2007 (he was 13 at the time).

Race Report

A and I woke up before sunrise and, after running around like headless chickens yelling at each other a relaxing cup of coffee, we headed over to the City. We found my friend Christine and headed up to the start. Union Square was packed with runners including many, many annoying inspiring “Team in Training” runners who really, really annoyingly, touchingly held hands to form human chains to stay together while moving through the crowd. We smiled and threw an elbow our good mornings and grew faint with anxiety soaked up the energy of the crowd.

We cried during the national anthem, whoever sang it was very good and all eyes were lifted to the flags atop the hotels surrounding the square. It was an emotional moment in which we could almost forget we were all participating in something really stupid really feel the community spirit.

We found our pace leader, a 54 year old woman named Deb who has obviously been a customer of BALCO taken really good care of herself. After running with her for about 3 miles I dropped back to avoid sudden death from cardiac arrest see how A was doing. I didn’t really NEED to finish in 4:20 and anyway, I could catch her later if she sprained an ankle or something I felt like losing my breakfast in front of 23,000 runners taking the pace back up a little. We started our climb up through the Presidio and I smiled as the runners around me turned up their ipods to drown out the exceedingly loud and disturbing sound of my labored breathing began to really focus.

We cruised up Clement Street to the really loud and obnoxious encouraging sounds of all the supporters. We heard “Go Team” so many times the phrase will always make me want to hurl smile.

At mile 8, I started to cramp excruciatingly felt a little depleted so I had a shot blok. A shot blok is a little like a soft gummy bear that contains electrolytes. Imagine my surprise when I bit into it and broke a tooth! I stealthily stashed the disembodied tooth in my fuel belt and thought about how God hates me the tooth fairy. I was having a good day.

By mile 11 my legs were cramped knots of pain warming up. As I approached the turnaround for the half marathoners I thought I could just turn around and lie to everyone about running the full marathon happily of those who were about to finish their first long race and remembered that all race results would be published. I pressed on because I have a ridiculous ego and could not admit to the world that I couldn’t finish the full marathon.

The 4:30 pace leader passed me as I was dry heaving in the bushes taking in the beauty of the park. I tried to trip her smiled and waved. So neat how Nike had them carry those cute little signs so you could watch your increasingly diminishing goals float out of your reach!

I have to admit, the next several miles were something of a blur of tears and self recrimination excitement. I remember the smiling face of the 4:40 pace leader and trying to remember that move where you can kill someone by hitting their nose into their skull at just the right angle how lucky I was to be out there. Running around the Godforsaken desolate place that is Lake Merced and hearing the sounds of those freaks shooting, actually shooting, at clay plates in the middle of the city while we were dying out there nature was an experience I’ll not soon repeat, I’m sure.

The last three miles I was struck by how like labor and delivery the peak experience of childbirth this was. Just like then, there were many people happily telling me I was almost there which I was NOT because when it sucks that much one more minute is an ETERNITY cheering me on. I picked up my stride to approximately the stride of a demented pigeon with a broken leg. My death march marathon was coming to a pathetic and really ugly triumphant end. I looked at the hot fireman in the tux who handed me my finisher’s necklace and burst into tears before leaning over to dry heave some more smiled graciously before hobbling strolling away to a quiet corner where I could concentrate and, hopefully, remember my name.

A and Christine had equally horrifying successful experiences. We are glad it is OVER we did this. The race raised 18.5 MILLION dollars for leukemia and lymphoma research, which is amazing.

Now I am enjoying hobbling around like a 90 year old woman my recovery. I am resting a lot and learning to plan my trips to the kitchen and bathroom carefully because it takes some time to get there and enjoying my meds downtime.

Really, each and every one of you should consider doing an event like this.

it's complicated

There's been a debate raging at Swistle's and at Kristin's fitness blog 
Aquafit that touches on what I think of as fat politics.  Here's a a comment I wrote on Kristin's blog (more about this journey of mine later):

"I've looked at fat from both sides now..."

I was a pretty fat kid into my early twenties.  Getting fit saved my life.  It taught me things about how to live that my parents should have.  I learned discipline, how to achieve goals and to respect myself.  

But.

But, the ugly underbelly of my journey was the body image piece.  When I first got fit, the reward was in the improved body image.  I was no longer invisible to the world.  I got attention.  I got on stage in a bikini at 9% bodyfat for a bodybuilding competition.  It was powerful to be thin.  I thought about it all the time.

I discovered that I always saw flaws, even at 9% body fat.  I discovered that my moods were negatively affected by the strict dieting I had to do.  I discovered that I wasn't meant to be that lean.  It took such an effort.  I was very close to developing an eating disorder.  I was boring as hell.

That was 22 years ago, Since then?  I've run marathons, done triathlons, raced bikes (road and mountain) and competed in weightlifting competitions.  I eat and train for performance.  I look pretty good for a 48 year old mom when I have my clothes on.

I don't look like Linda or Kristen.  And the voice that tells me I should is still inside my head and it bugs the f&*@k out of me.  So when I hear Kristen and Linda talk about the effect of exercise on their bodies it does make me uncomfortable. I feel like it's dangerously close to becoming part of the "you should exercise to be hot" chorus that I wish would just go away...please don't flame me for saying that I know it's not what either of them intend, but there it is.

But when they talk about what it feels like to achieve goals, I get it.  I am always training for something.  I push myself very hard to be better, stronger, faster.  See, I've discovered that training hard makes me happy and balanced, and keeps my depression at bay.  I wish we talked about these elements of fitness more.  

I catch myself feeling superior all the time, for being the only one at the track at dawn doing intervals, for ordering meat and veggies at dinner and eschewing the bread, for running a 5k in under 24 minutes...And it is NOT ok.  I am not better than other people because I can always find the time and because I do it even though it's hard.  Fitness is a  closely held value of mine, I need it as part of my life and it makes me happy.  
I'm lucky.  I found that.  But I really believe that other people can feel happy and balanced without it.  And I've met people who really, truly, loathe exercise.  Far be it from me to tell them they should do it. Even if they want to lose weight. ( Recent studies show that NEAT, non exercise activity thermogenesis, the time you spend house cleaning, gardening, running after your kids can be much more important to weight loss than "exercise").

But Im sure there are a lot of people out there  suffering like I was, people who don't know yet that exercise can bring you joy just in the act of doing it.  It can help with depression, anxiety, insomnia.  Those are the people I wish we fitness mavens would spend time trying to reach.  I don't really care about the message that everyone can change their body for the better, what I do care about is the message that everyone can surprise themselves by finding the limits of what they are capable of.   Really.  I promise.