Day 83

I'm going where there is no internet.  I am looking forward to "getting away from it all" even if it's only for 24 hours.

I rowed 2000m this morning and it took forever but it's cool.  I'm ready for my 2 day break.

I've eaten alright today but it's so difficult to be "mindful" which was the topic for depression class #3.  At one point I'm gobbling down brussels sprouts and granted they're brussels sprouts but still, I don't need to be eating as fast as possible.

My room has a fridge so I'm taking corned beef, greens, and curry cauliflower with me.  I've also got almond butter, apples, and bananas as snacks.

I'm no longer trying to be perfect, since this isn't possible anyways, but I do want to try/do my best.  I think I can be ok with this new mindset.  We'll see.

Day 82

Starting over.  Beginning again.  Turning over a new leaf.  Whatever.  Tomorrow needs to be the day.

I rowed 2000m in 8:41.  I'm going to row maybe a little bit tomorrow and then take 2 days off so I can try for a fast 2000 on Tuesday.  My strategy is going to be 1:57 pace for the first 500m, 1:55 pace for the middle 1000m, and then as fast as I can for the last 500m.  I don't know how this will pan out since I don't practice negative splitting very often.

I ate badly...but I was reading in the depression book something along the lines of...well of course you're falling back on your coping mechanism, you haven't learned a new one yet.  You can't be upset about going back to what you know.  Ok, yeah, I'll work with that for now.  Normally I'd try to eat for 45 more minutes until it's midnight but I already feel a bit sick so yeah, I'm done.

Day 81

Thank goodness tomorrow is the last day before break.  I should be able to make it through one more day.  I don't think I like teaching zero period anymore.  Kids are late, they're not awake, and they don't learn anything.  If I go back to teaching 1-6 then I get out later but I could start swimming or doing something in the morning at the gym again.  That was really an important part of my day.  I talked to God then and I don't do that now.  I can't think at night.  My brain is moving too fast.

Ehh to the eating.  I rowed 2000m tonight as part of the workout at the gym but no other rowing.  I'm planning on taking two days off so I can try for a new "fast" 2000m time on Tuesday afternoon.  We'll see how that goes.  After 10 weeks on this "training plan" I think I'll be a little bit faster.  Yay!  (I'm trying to convince myself of that yay.)

Day 80

Such a stressful day at school.  I hate test days, especially in AP Stats.  And there's another test tomorrow...a two day test...what was I thinking?

I rowed this morning at 5am.  It's nice having late start because then I can venture out to the gym in the morning.  I rowed 8000m in 38:36.  The clock was going as I got the rock out of my right shoe so that messed up my time a little.  There was no way I wanted to row that first 150m over again though so I was ok with the extra time.

I ate alright today.  I did have a mocha lite frappaccino from Starbucks.  Not the best choice but not nearly as bad as yesterday.

I need Monday to get here so I can see what the guy at Kaiser says.  I need a plan for my life.

Day 79

In regards to food, boo.  Enough said.

I rowed 3 sets of 2000m with 4 minutes rest in-between.  I did that after a bunch of running and deadlifts so my legs were done.  Probably not the best plan but oh well.  I finished in 8:00, 8:27 and 8:30.  It got done is what I'm telling myself.

I don't know if I'm eating less than ideally until Monday when I meet with the guy at Kaiser for the first time.  I feel like if this were a track meet then I would have false started so many times by now.  I'm no longer sure of what I'm waiting for.

Day 78

My finger is bleeding and I didn't eat very well this evening.  I almost got into a car accident this morning.  I'm really surprised I didn't get smashed between the other two cars.  I hung out with a friend tonight after depression class and that's always fun but the lead up isn't always great.  I'm generally wishing that I had not made any plans.  I know I need to be around people sometimes but the pull to "isolate" and just be alone is soooo strong.  It's a bit maddening trying to decide what is right and wrong for me.  It's also bizarre because I need to accept that what was right for me a year ago or even a month ago might not be right for me now.  I hate change.  This is still all so confusing.  So rack this up to an off gym day mini disaster.  Moving on...maybe.

Day 77

So maybe this morning I actually did what I wanted to do, not what I thought I wanted to do, or what I was supposed to want to do.  I dunno.  But I feel better today.

I woke up before 5am, no alarm.  I went back to sleep for about 45 minutes and then decided to get up and go row at 24hour.  So I rowed 8000m really slowly.  Tchaikovsky's 5th symphony not as good to row to as the piano concerto as an fyi.  I went to Wal-Mart because they were open at 7:10 and I got the stuff I had wanted to get last night.

By 7:25 or so I had parked my car back at my condo complex.  For months I've thought about jogging.  I know I'll lose weight if I jog.  I just will.  I've been holding steady for the past two months or so.  I know that last time I lost too much weight.  At least 10 people have told me this, sometimes unsolicited and sometimes after I mention that I know I had lost too much weight before.  It's frustrating to hear comments like that, even if they're true, because it was like people wanted to say, hey don't do too well.  And I know that's not true.  I know people were happy I was getting healthy.

I really don't want to invite the "don't get too skinny" comments again hence the no jogging even though I've wanted to for awhile now.  It's stupid but I also don't want to do "too good" at the gym.  I did well in high school and had no friends.  I like having friends.  Do I have to live in self-imposed mediocrity to have friends?  Ehh, I don't know the answer to this yet.

What I do know is that this morning after I had parked but before I went inside I said "screw it, i'm jogging".  I took the car key off my ring, took off my jacket, started the iPod back up and took off.  I jog occasionally during workouts at the gym but I haven't jogged more than a mile at once in about 4 months.  I was thinking I would go 2.  Then it was 3.  Then I thought about 5 and decided that 4 would be ok, all the while feeling less and less pissed off at the world as I went.  When I was getting close to finishing 4 I asked myself, as I passed my starting point, if I was still annoyed and I couldn't decide so I kept going.  Then I thought about stopping at 5 because my legs were starting to feel sore but as I came back by my starting point I felt ok so I kept going.  After 6 I decided I had nothing left to prove, I wasn't mad anymore, and I needed to eat so I could shower and get to church.

I'm never going to be "good" at running, especially because at my pace I'm technically "jogging", but I don't care.  I like to jog.  It's amazing to me how far a person can go using nothing but themselves to get there.  If the chance of being killed weren't so high I'd like to start jogging and just keep going, a la Forrest Gump.  Oh well, I'll take what I can get, and I don't care what people are going to say...it's just not worth it.  And really, I'm always going to care what people say...maybe I just won't let it bother me so much.