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Frustration-Nothing has Changed, Everything has Changed

It seems every so often I do a nice little heart to heart here on Fitness is Sweet. These are the posts that I hate publishing and find semi-embarassing to look back on but post rashly and later realize they are part of life and evolution and all that.

I actually have a post that seems related now-a directionless post but it’s not very upbeat so it is still sitting in my drafts for another day-can’t have too much of that!

Right now I’m frustrated. Frustrated with myself. Sometimes I miss little freshman me.

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(File this picture under things I’ll regret posting.)

It’s interesting to read my old posts. If I was struggling at that time, I can tell. I’m glad I’ve become more secure and confident since then, and ultimately more sane.

On the other hand, I feel like I had better time management then (ok-this was forced by the many hours of rowing…), and I had better study habits. Well, I guess I would say I had fewer other distractions from school and spent less time on the Internet….it really is a black hole. I feel like in some ways I was more put together in aspects of my life-that’s not to say I haven’t matured and changed a lot, things are just…different.

The thing that is currently frustrating me is looking at old pictures and wishing I still looked like that. I’ve gone 2 years without losing the college weight, and then I start to wonder if I never will. It’s frustrating. And I’m tired of overeating or eating junk and feeling crappy.

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But then I never seem to get any better about it. I’ll eat healthy and make progress for a while, but like a cycle I revert to the same old habits.

I made some real progress on my Project last year (cutting out processed foods) but that made me so crazy! And it’s interesting to see posts from freshman year where I was definitely eating healthier.

And a big part of me worries that I’m wasting my college years by carrying the extra weight, which honestly is what scares me the most-I want to make the most of my time here!

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(I am happy to report that my room is way cleaner than last year at least…)

I guess what I’m saying is I’m frustrated and I don’t know what to do right now. I’m officially in half training mode, so I had plenty of time to think on my 8 mile run. I especially worry that any extra weight just aggravates my foot problems, and my foot wasn’t especially cooperative today.

And eating badly makes me feel bad, physically and mentally. Between stomach issues and eating junk, I’m sick of feeling gross. And I’m sick of the mental fogginess, distraction, and anxiety I get after eating too much junk.

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So I guess this post is more of a rant than anything else. I feel like I have about one of these each quarter-over 3 years, some things don’t change, yet I’m somehow a different person.

Speedy Feet-Life After Half Marathon Training

Happy Sunday! I’m currently holed up in a coffeeshop. It is such a beautiful day, so I biked off campus, books in tow, with the intention of spending all day doing schoolwork in a coffeeshop. However, I realized I forgot to bring several items critical to me actually doing my work, but I still want to spend a little time here, since I made the effort to bike all the way here. IMG_4942

 

A cappuccino, as always. I actually slept pretty late this morning. I stayed up late last night doing pretty wild things- helping my roommate start a food blog, reading my old blog posts, watching a Biochem lecture for fun, and rearranging my furniture at 1am. I’m clearly the life of the party. 

Also, I may finally be pumpkined out. For a snack, I had this:

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Pumpkin bread, cottage cheese with pumpkin butter and sunflower seed butter, and a pumpkin spice chai latte. 

 

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But I may or may not have had pumpkin bread for breakfast….

A few things though-this is the video I was watching: Sugar: The Bitter Truth. If you do anything today, please please please watch this! It’s one of my favorite videos, and this stuff is basically what I want to spend my life studying-and it’s been way too long since I last watched it!

Also-guess what? Instead of taking another Chem lab next quarter, I’m taking Human Nutrition, a higher level class than the Intro to Nutrition class I took last fall. I’m really excited-except that after I take this class, I’ll have taken all the Nutrition classes at my school. Yes, all 2. 

When I was helping my roommate figure out some blog things, I got sucked into reading some of my first blog posts. And possibly making fun of my past self a little bit. If you’re interested, here’s my first post. I think this was really great for me to re-read, because it reminds me of why I initially started blogging. 

I also read a lot of the posts from when I was rowing. It really made me miss rowing! I miss my teammates, being part of a team, and just in general doing a sport. However, there is a lot that sounds pretty torturous. Like my post titled “Cold and Wet…Again.” Key phrases such as “day 2 of our 3 workouts a day,” “it was sooo cold,” and “it started pouring while we were in the boat.” Yeah, given I’m such a wimp in the cold, it’s no wonder I got mono!

I read through some of the posts from last winter-I feel like my eating was a little more interesting, but I’m definitely in a much better place mentally now than I was then. 

Anyway, since I crave workout structure, I decided that I’m going to follow a Cross Country training plan in preparation for PRing a 5k in December. I’m actually super excited for this-there are lots of speed workouts, which are always fun, plus the runs are a lot shorter than my half training, so it will be a really nice change. I’m tentatively planning to always run in the morning, so I have some sort of structure in my schedule. Plus, that’s one of the times I know the track team isn’t practicing on the track. 

Also, if you’re wondering, the time I’m trying to beat is 24:58. I think it’s definitely doable-I hadn’t run much before that race, but I was in awesome rowing shape, so it will be interesting to see how fast I can get in the next 8 weeks or so. 

But I may or may not have ulterior motives than just PRing-last year I placed 5th in my division-and top 3 get medals. If I can break 24:00, I have a decent shot at placing. The only problem? I have absolutely no idea how fast I am right now-my last timed mile was 8:00, but that was when I was just coming off of Mono, and hadn’t run in many months. 

But here’s the thing-the only chance I might really have to place in races is while I’m still in the same age division-and in at my next birthday, I’ll move up a division. In my division, I was actually able to come in first in my 10k a year ago. So I think I need to run a ton of 5 and 10ks before I get any older! It’s definitely nice to have something different to train for-I’m really excited! I still miss my team sports though. There’s a running club, but my friends who regularly go basically told me I’d have to be able to run 10 miles at a 6:00 pace. Yeah, not happening. 

So, I mapped out a new running schedule for myself, and I’m going to spend the weeks leading up to my race getting fast, strong, and building endurance. One other thing I realized when I was reading my old posts was that I never really go into much detail about my workouts anymore-and my blog is called “FITNESS is Sweet.” So I’ll make sure to add more detail on those! I’m really excited for my new training-I start in a week, after one more long run. 

Sidenote-on my long run, if for some reason something goes wrong and I can’t finish, the place where I’d be when that might likely happen just so happens to be at my favorite froyo place. So even if I can’t finish, it’s a win-win, right??
And my roommate and I are officially the most popular people in our dorm.
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We put out candy yesterday and it was gone within an hour, so I had to restock! I lovelovelove that I still get to buy Halloween candy, even though I’m in a dorm!

Bloggers-do you ever read your old posts? Thoughts on them?