Progress

Wow, what a difference 6 weeks and a running program have made. Granted, it has been a little longer than 6 weeks since I started trying to run but I feel the 6 week Weight Watchers program I used really did the most good.

As I said last week, I finished the program and did my 5k on Saturday. I did ok but knew that I needed to be better before I start my half marathon program. Because of that, tonight I started it over again. The first go round, my goal was just to finish. This time I am pushing myself and trying to really run. I know that may sound stupid but I was so out of shape when I started, to be able to finish the workouts, I could really on do a jog "shuffle" not a full stride run. It KILLED me because it did not feel natural at all but if I tried to full out run, I was so winded so quickly that I could not continue the workout. Now that I have increased my endurance with a slow pace, I am going back and starting over with faster pace during my runs using my full natural stride.

Tonight's workout was hard but felt amazing. I was exhausted and dripping with sweat by the end but I did it. And during my running intervals, I was running nearly a 10 minute mile pace. I don't know exactly what my pace was since my phone is dead so I couldn't use the tracker but we used our handheld GPS to track my overall distance and I used my watch for the time intervals. I did a total of 2 miles in 30 minutes with a 5 min warm up and then 1 minute run/1minute walk intervals. I am still running the block in our neighborhood. Each side of the block is approx. 1/10th of a mile. Some are a little longer, some a little shorter but there is one side that I know is 1/10th of a mile and I ran the entire side during one of my 1 minute intervals. Unless something is wrong with my math, that is a 10 mpm pace. Of course I couldn't run that pace for an entire mile yet but the point of running the program again is to eventually get there. I expect that as my distances get longer, my pace will slow down put just knowing that I have it in me somewhere makes me feel good. It reinforces the feeling that I can actually do this.

On a slightly different topic, I have been thinking about some information that I have been withholding. I've been thinking about how none of you really know where I started weight wise. Yes, some of you know me in real life and you know how big I look but only my husband and maybe one other person actually know how much I weigh. I've been going back and forth about when I would tell you that. I thought about waiting until I was near my goal and then posting a before and after shot to let you see the difference. I'm so ashamed of how far I let it go that I have been terrified of telling anyone how bad it really was. I'm starting to think I want to tell you. I want you to understand how some of the things that I talk about may seem like small things to most but they are huge to me because of where I started. no, I'm not morbidly obese. I'm not close to or over 300 lbs, so I do not have it as bad as some people but I also have way more than 20-40 lbs to lose. I think I am going to fill you in, but I think it will have to wait until tomorrow. I want to talk about how I got there and how I felt each time I crossed a new line. I want to celebrate tonight's victory a little longer before I dive into something so deeply personal and gut-wrenchingly emotional for me. 'Til then...