Fit, Fab by 5OH!

So today I am finally writing, I am still working on myself.  I still struggle to put myself first.  I am going to be honest, there are many other things I would rather be doing than being on a treadmill. The last month I have been super busy enjoying visitors and to be honest slacking on my work outs.  I have allowed myself to slip back into excuses and finding many other things to do to avoid getting on the treadmill. You see when I started my journey I was alone in the mornings with nothing to do, but now that I am settled in and enjoying life and visitors on a regular basis it was easy to overlook the treadmill, but I continued to eat healthy, I continue to stay active and do things that I don't normally do, I have hiked waterfalls, I have gone snorkeling, I have been on a rope swing and plunged into a pool of water.  It is easy to loose focus with so many distractions, but I know I need to keep doing this to stay healthy and enjoy a more active life in Jamai...

Well yesterday I got my 100 badge, this means with Fitbit Coach I have sweated 100 sessions, I have walked and worked out 100 times!!! Wow!  I was so surprised. The challenge is real, exercise is not something you really "feel" like doing, it is something you must do.  Kind of like cooking, cleaning and grocery shopping.  I have been even more challenged by having visitors and trying to balance my time between visiting with them and doing what I must to stay healthy and strong.  I must admit I slacked quite a bit last week, I did the minimal exercise everyday, but when I realized I wasn't feeling as good, back at it I went. I am happy to say that exercise is now part of my routine, but once in awhile I have to adjust that routine to accommodate others, or realize that my visitors will go on without me and find something to do while I do what I have to do.  I realized this as I went about my daily activities that I must do, cook and grocery shop and they just...

I am not going to lie, this new journey for me has not been easy.  Easy is sitting on the couch saying I will start tomorrow, or okay I exercised today lets celebrate with junk food! Today! January 8, 2017 I have stayed true to myself, I remind myself of my reason to start all this, I was tired of feeling sick and tired.  I decided that I needed to stop making excuses.  Everytime I get on the treadmill I think I will only do as much as I can, as soon as I am tired I will stop.  But something strange happens - with every step I take, as I listen to the trainer in my ear and they are telling me to get ready to step it up or go another 60 seconds or its time to increase the incline, a little voice in my head quickly pops in and says you don't have to you know, and then I think momentarily thats right maybe I won't increase the incline I don't have too... but when that tone plays I all of sudden find myself doing it, I push the voices out of my head and push myself...

So it has been a little while since I posted and I am sure some may have thought that my fit and fab by fifty goal had fallen away as it has many times, but I am here to surprise you and tell you I am still on track. I was sick for a few days in early December and then I allowed myself to take a break for the holidays, but in between I did still manage to exercise more days in December than I didn't.  I am so pleased that I did not have to make a resolution to stay healthy or to exercise I just want to continue on the path that I am on. My son came home for Christmas and so I have I spent more time in "family" mode, resting, relaxing and just enjoying the holidays.  He goes back this Sunday but I found myself today craving to get back in the swing of things, I found myself wanting to get my steps in and get back on the treadmill, but most of all challenging myself with the fitbit coach. I was pleasantly surprised by that, I must admit.  I really do enjoy the workout...

So every "body" is different, but they all speak the same language.  We all know when we are tired, we all know when we are hungry, thirsty, in pain, etc.  Our bodies are really quite remarkable when we take a few minutes to think about it. So what I learnt last week was that sometimes we have to listen to our body, sometimes I can push through my illness and sometimes you just can't.  Sometimes we just need rest, and when we don't listen especially me with my lupus, my body will force me to rest.  So last week, I was forced to rest for 3 days. It took all my energy to feed myself and go to the bathroom, so workouts were definitely out of the question.  This is when my fear and doubt crept in, what if I don't get back on the horse, what if this is it an I never exercise again, I have stopped before will I stop again? Well after a few days of rest I awoke on Monday with the anticipation that I might not get on the treadmill.  But I put my exercise gear...

So another thing I have learnt in my month and a bit of exercise is the scale lies. This is not a correct measure of progress unfortunately.  We all have one and we all get on it and then curse when we don't like the number, and eat a donut or two if on a rare occasion we do... I stopped using my scale - I refused to get on it anymore as it was only lying to me I told myself, it must be broken, I am doing all this exercise and cardio and still weigh the same - it was trying to demotivate me? I decided to not measure myself by weight, instead I took a simple piece of string and put it around my thickest part (my tummy) and cut the string to size, then every Wednesday, not sure why Wednesday but that's the day, I put the string around and see the difference... it is happening gradually and I am happy with that... after all I didn't gain it all at once, how can you loose it that way. Again, I am not "dieting" I am feeding myself better foods, I am eating as m...

  So last night I got a new badge in my Fitbit Coach for 50 sessions sweated, I was so proud of myself, wow what an accomplishment, but why? You see I never needed to exercise, everyone would comment that I was already thin, or that I looked good, but slowly I wasn't liking what I saw in photos and in the mirror.  I realized I wasn't as thin as I thought I was, that maybe I should be doing something, because it seemed that once I turned 40 my metabolism thingy people talk about slowed down, maybe even packed up and left? I started to notice that I was consciously sucking it in for photos, and pushing my tongue to the roof of my mouth in photos to avoid the double chin - and I didn't like it.  This decision was all about me, I finally realized that maybe I did have a reason to get fit and be more healthy and that reason was me! I wanted this, I want to look at photos and like what I see again, I want to have arms that I want to show off and buy the sleeveless dress t...