So in my last post I let you know about the rough week I had earlier this month. I was hoping that last week, during Mac's spring break, things would get better. I knew it was going to be a little hard because we went to Pensacola the first weekend for Mac to do the Tough Mudder and then we were planning on possibly visiting family later in the week so I was going to need to squeeze in my workouts. I had scheduled the personal trainer sessions for Tuesday afternoon and Thursday morning and I needed to find one other day to head in to get an hour done. However, once we got home from Pensacola, nothing went as planned.
Monday afternoon Mac got sick. We weren't sure if it was a virus or food poisoning, but he was definitely not feeling well. He was sick several times that night but I thought he had finally settled down for some sleep around 3am so I decided to take a shower. That was a mistake. He ended up getting sick again but since I was in our bathroom, he got up to go to the guest bathroom. I got out of the shower only to hear him call to me from the dark just outside of our bathroom. He told me he needed me to turn on the light and not freak out. I turned on the light to find him lying on the tile floor in our sun room holding the back of his head. On the way back to bed, he felt faint and tried to sit down. He fainted before he could sit down and hit his head on the floor and busted it open. I looked at it and immediately knew we had to go to the hospital to get it stitched up.
Getting him out of the house was a pretty big task. He was weak and dehydrated and bleeding. I got us both dressed and got him to the car. We made it to the ER and got him inside. He was still feeling a little sick and then there was the head thing. They checked on him and got him into an exam room. We waited for nearly an hour before anything really happened. They took some blood to do labs and took him back for a CT scan to make sure everything was ok. He ended up getting sick once more and then they finally put him on fluids. They finally cleaned the wound on his head and stapled it up. That was torture for both of us. After that, they basically forgot about his head. They had a bigger problem. His labs were all fine and his CT was clear but he was EXTREMELY dehydrated. After the first bag of fluids, they checked his blood pressure but it wasn't great so they gave him another bag. An hour later, they checked again when he finished the second liter of fluids and things were worse. When he stood up, his BP bottomed out and he was very dizzy. They finally decided to double bag his fluids and that finally stabilized his blood pressure and made him feel better. After the third and fourth bags, they checked and his BP was better. He was able to stand without much difficulty and even walked up and down the hall. He also was able to go to the bathroom which was a good sign. Finally, eight hours after going to the ER for a head laceration, he was no longer dehydrated and we could go home.
I blamed myself for him fainting. I felt like if I had not been in the shower, he wouldn't have needed to walk so far and would not have fainted. The truth is, if he had not fallen and needed staples, I would have never known how severely dehydrated he was. I knew he had been feeling bad but I had no idea how sick he was until we were at the hospital. It turns out, it was more than likely food poisoning from some left overs we brought back from Pensacola.
I was heading to bed when everything happened and so I was not able to actually sleep until I had taken Mac home and then picked up his prescriptions. By the time I was back and settled down, it was 2pm and I had a session scheduled for 5pm. Yeah, that wasn't going to happen. I texted my trainer and told her I wasn't going to make it. Mac and I both slept most of the afternoon, got up , had a little something to eat and went back to bed a few hours later. We were both exhausted. Margaret offered to let me come in on Wednesday but I was still so drained, it didn't happen. Plus we had to figure out a Dr for Mac so we could make an appointment for his staples to be removed.
I finally made it in for a session Thursday morning. Thankfully, it was an upper body day and I wasn't too dead by the end. Once I was home, we had to drive to Alabama for Mac to have a military photo taken. After that, we hit the commissary(man I miss those) and then went to see my parents for dinner before heading home. Friday night I went in to the gym to do the interval run training I had missed on Wednesday instead of the walk that was on the schedule. I didn't quite do exactly what was in the plan but to make up for it, I decided to run one minute close to as fast as I could. I maintained a 7mph pace on the treadmill for a minute after I had been running for 20 minutes. Saturday, I did the run on the books and it SUCKED. I felt like I had never ran before. Everything hurt and it was just bad. I hate it when I have runs like that but after the week I had, I wasn't surprised.
I really hope the bad run is over. Mac is doing fine and I am trying to get back into a good routine. My run training has a 5K on the schedule for next weekend. I am still not 100% sure if I am going to do one but I am going to try. I think I may try to get a massage before so I can loosen everything up. Other than that, I really need to get my nutrition back under control. I was slowly starting to get better but the last week and a half that all went out the window. I have a lot of work to do, but I know if I focus, I can do it. I just hope there aren't any more crazy surprises that pop up and throw everything out of whack.
Wednesday, March 18, 2015
Friday, March 6, 2015
Moving forward when you really want to stop
Sometimes you just have an off week. That has been this week for me. I have gone in for my workouts but I really didn't want to do it. I just didn't feel great and other things just made it worse. One thing that I hate about being paired up with Margaret is that she does not do sessions during the time that I would really like to go in. I wish I could train at around 2 but she doesn't take clients between noon and 4pm because she teaches a class at 5:30AM and deserves a little break since she also does sessions in the evening. That means I either have to go in during the morning, which I hate or during peak times in the afternoon which makes equipment availability an issue.
Monday I went in at 10:45 which was fine. We did legs and as usual, I was pretty tired when I left. That night was also the first night of my run training. So my legs were pretty tired that night. I was supposed to go in on Wednesday but she ended up rescheduling me for Thursday morning at 10. It was the earliest I had gone in and it was tough getting everything right that morning. I had also ran pretty hard the night before so I was still feeling that. We were supposed to do upper body. Apparently, she forgot that. Instead she had me do lower again and it SUCKED. My legs were so tired. It was the first day that I really hated my workout. I didn't sleep well the night before, had to get up earlier and then had to do lower body on fatigued legs. It was not fun.
Today I went in at 11:15 and that was a little better. We did upper body this time and she really pushed me. I really like that she pushes me but sometimes she over estimates my abilities and it is really tough. We had to change the end of the workout because my forearms were on fire and I could not grip the handles on the last machine well enough to do it. I could barely lift my arms when I was done. Brushing my hair and taking a shower really sucked.
It's been one of those weeks when I just really wanted to stay in bed but I didn't. I'm glad I did it but I'm not happy about it, if that makes sense. Hopefully next week will be better.
Monday I went in at 10:45 which was fine. We did legs and as usual, I was pretty tired when I left. That night was also the first night of my run training. So my legs were pretty tired that night. I was supposed to go in on Wednesday but she ended up rescheduling me for Thursday morning at 10. It was the earliest I had gone in and it was tough getting everything right that morning. I had also ran pretty hard the night before so I was still feeling that. We were supposed to do upper body. Apparently, she forgot that. Instead she had me do lower again and it SUCKED. My legs were so tired. It was the first day that I really hated my workout. I didn't sleep well the night before, had to get up earlier and then had to do lower body on fatigued legs. It was not fun.
Today I went in at 11:15 and that was a little better. We did upper body this time and she really pushed me. I really like that she pushes me but sometimes she over estimates my abilities and it is really tough. We had to change the end of the workout because my forearms were on fire and I could not grip the handles on the last machine well enough to do it. I could barely lift my arms when I was done. Brushing my hair and taking a shower really sucked.
It's been one of those weeks when I just really wanted to stay in bed but I didn't. I'm glad I did it but I'm not happy about it, if that makes sense. Hopefully next week will be better.
Monday, March 2, 2015
Playing catch up
Sorry I haven't recapped the last two weeks. The first week with my personal trainer was a blur followed by a weekend at Disney cheering at Princess Half Marathon. Then last week did not go as planned. I ended up getting sick(sinus issues) so I only got one workout done. I will try to catch you up on everything now.
In my last post I had just finished my first workout with Margaret. As I mentioned before, she is also a runner and that is one of the reasons the head trainer suggested I work with her. She has really been great. She understands a runners body and has helped push me. It has been so rewarding having someone recognize and celebrate your strengths instead of just brushing me off because I am over weight. As she had me doing certain exercises, she would comment that she could tell I was a runner and that made me very proud. There have been so many times in the past 4 years that I have told people I was a runner and they never believed me due to my size. Having this tiny, all muscle woman say, "I can tell you have runner's calves," made me smile. It's just really nice having some validation.
However, I did have to learn a few things from that first workout. I am so used to my legs being so strong, which they are, but I found out my right side is much weaker than my left. I know that seems backwards since I am right handed but it makes sense. In 2002, I had knee surgery to reconstruct my left ACL. After that, I spent 6 months in rehab, rebuilding my muscles in the left leg. They mainly focused on that one leg so before I was done, it was stronger than the right. In the years since my surgery, my left knee has done great and the beating my right knee took while I walked on a bum leg for 5 months has started to show. I have some arthritis issues in the right knee that aren't present in the left. That means I tend to favor my left leg which has made it even stronger. I am also very, very stubborn. There was one exercise that we did with a machine that isolated each leg. We started with the left and it was tough. When I switched to the right, it was very hard. I should have asked her to drop the weight on the right side, but I didn't, and it was brutal. In the first set on that machine, I worked my right quad to muscle failure. That made the rest of the workout VERY difficult. I was too stubborn to let her know and I paid for it dearly. The second round on the machine, I had no choice but to ask for the weight to be reduced but I was already so tired. I could barely walk after my first workout with her and it was entirely my fault.
Wednesday of that week I went in for my second session with her. This time we were focusing on core and upper body.(Thank goodness because I was still so sore from Monday) I kept telling her I had no upper body strength but she proved me wrong. Every time I would start a new exercise, she would start low and have to bump up the weight so that I was using enough effort to do some good. She kept telling me that I was stronger than I thought. She sets up circuits around the gym focusing on one group of muscles for about three exercises and then moving to another set of muscles for three other exercises and we do two rounds of all the exercises as quickly as possible. My thirty minutes with her are packed.
Thursday, she had me start out with a little boxing and then we worked on core and lower body. It was not nearly as intense as day one with her and I was learning to let her know when I needed to change the weights. That part took a lot of learning on my part as well though. A certain weight would feel fine for the first few reps but 8-10 reps in, I would be struggling. She told me she wanted me to be at about a 70% effort at first so that I could last through the 15-20 reps we do each set. It took me some time to figure out what that felt like so that I could give her accurate feed back on the weight we were using.
I lost a little bit of weight in my first week with Margaret but I was not being as strict with my diet so it wasn't a huge difference. I'm so glad that I was told to drop the BL crazy 15 day start because I think I may have killed someone by the end. Instead, I am paying attention to what I usually gravitate towards and trying to make better choices and implementing them slowly. The headache I had during the time I was following the BL 15 day plan was excruciating and I was so glad when I was able to eat normally again so it would go away. Now we are focusing on small changes that will have a bigger long term affect instead of extreme changes for a big short term loss.
My plan was to typically do Monday, Wednesday, Friday one week and then Tuesday, Thursday the next but because I was traveling to Princess on Friday, I had to squeeze them in on back to back days during that first week. It was absolutely exhausting. By the time I was getting ready to head down to cheer at Princess, I was beat. I was also glad I was not following the strict diet rules while going to Disney. That would have been torture. I took it pretty easy during the weekend to allow my body to recover but I was still so tired on Sunday when I was driving back. I spent that night with my feet up and didn't do much Monday either.
Tuesday started week two with Margaret and I was only scheduled for Tuesday and Thursday. That morning I was so close to text her to say I wasn't coming in because I didn't feel well. I thought I was just being lazy so I got up and headed out to the gym. When I arrived, I went to the back to check in for the BL stuff and as I was finishing up, she came over. She noticed the look on my face and said I looked discouraged. I told her that wasn't it, I just didn't feel well. She was hoping to be able to knock it out of me so we started working out. We started off with some boxing , which was fine and then headed into the strength exercises. As we progressed, my head started hurting worse and worse and I was light headed a few times. She had me doing squats on a Smith machine and it totally screwed with my head. I kept pushing through but I could feel myself slowing down. Towards the end of the workout, she wanted me to stand sideways next to a rebound board, twist towards it, throw a medicine ball and catch it before twisting to the other side and repeating. About three reps in, I had to stop because I was getting so dizzy. She took the ball from me and had me go to a machine that would allow me to work the same muscles by twisting my lower body while keeping my head straight on. A couple in to it I had to stop because I was hit by a wave of nausea. She moved me to some machines where I could sit and work the outer and inner thighs. That was much better. She was glad that I kept pushing but could tell that I was not feeling great. I appreciated that she wanted to help me still get in a workout without making myself feel worse. I headed home and crashed for the rest of the day. My sinuses were so full of pressure it was causing me to have a headache and the pressure in my ears was screwing with my balance.
Thursday morning, my alarm went off and the pain in my ear was still there. I decided to play it safe and text to let her know I wasn't coming in. I didn't do much for the rest of the week, which isn't great, but I think my body needed the down time. I had gone so hard the week before and then the huge temperature swings over the weekend messed with my head and I just needed a break. I took some time this weekend to really think about and plan what I wanted to do in the next few months.
Early registration for Wine and Dine opens tomorrow and I am planning to sign Mac and I up. The 10K time we have been using for proof of time is finally too old and I don't have another good time to submit. I want to do a 10K sometime within the time submission window so that I can hopefully get a decent corral placement for the race. While looking over things this weekend, I found a 10K training plan through Garmin Connect that would end on Memorial Day weekend if I started it today. So, I am starting today. This plan is a little different from plans I have used before but I like that. It has cross training days worked in so I have put it all in a calendar that I printed out so I can give it to Margaret. I meant to take it in today but I forgot. I told her about it and she is excited and happy that I thought to make up a calendar that she can use to help plan my workouts. This way she can see what I have lined up and can find the best days to work my lower body and not burn me out too much for a run. This also means that I won't be using the pretty MWF, TR schedule that I had planned, but that's ok. It actually works out a little better because it was easier for me to find exactly 10 sessions each month instead of going over a few times if I followed the 3/2 schedule. I will have to find a class or something to go in for a few times so I get my three workouts each week for BL but I can just use a treadmill or bike for some of my scheduled stuff and that will count too.
Today, Margaret told me that she sees a lot of potential for success in me. I really like working with her and I am excited about what we will be able to do together. I am not setting a specific pace or time goal for the 10K in May but I am hoping that all the work we are doing together will help me have a good time to submit to RunDisney. I really want to be a better, stronger runner by the time we get to Wine and Dine in November.
In my last post I had just finished my first workout with Margaret. As I mentioned before, she is also a runner and that is one of the reasons the head trainer suggested I work with her. She has really been great. She understands a runners body and has helped push me. It has been so rewarding having someone recognize and celebrate your strengths instead of just brushing me off because I am over weight. As she had me doing certain exercises, she would comment that she could tell I was a runner and that made me very proud. There have been so many times in the past 4 years that I have told people I was a runner and they never believed me due to my size. Having this tiny, all muscle woman say, "I can tell you have runner's calves," made me smile. It's just really nice having some validation.
However, I did have to learn a few things from that first workout. I am so used to my legs being so strong, which they are, but I found out my right side is much weaker than my left. I know that seems backwards since I am right handed but it makes sense. In 2002, I had knee surgery to reconstruct my left ACL. After that, I spent 6 months in rehab, rebuilding my muscles in the left leg. They mainly focused on that one leg so before I was done, it was stronger than the right. In the years since my surgery, my left knee has done great and the beating my right knee took while I walked on a bum leg for 5 months has started to show. I have some arthritis issues in the right knee that aren't present in the left. That means I tend to favor my left leg which has made it even stronger. I am also very, very stubborn. There was one exercise that we did with a machine that isolated each leg. We started with the left and it was tough. When I switched to the right, it was very hard. I should have asked her to drop the weight on the right side, but I didn't, and it was brutal. In the first set on that machine, I worked my right quad to muscle failure. That made the rest of the workout VERY difficult. I was too stubborn to let her know and I paid for it dearly. The second round on the machine, I had no choice but to ask for the weight to be reduced but I was already so tired. I could barely walk after my first workout with her and it was entirely my fault.
Wednesday of that week I went in for my second session with her. This time we were focusing on core and upper body.(Thank goodness because I was still so sore from Monday) I kept telling her I had no upper body strength but she proved me wrong. Every time I would start a new exercise, she would start low and have to bump up the weight so that I was using enough effort to do some good. She kept telling me that I was stronger than I thought. She sets up circuits around the gym focusing on one group of muscles for about three exercises and then moving to another set of muscles for three other exercises and we do two rounds of all the exercises as quickly as possible. My thirty minutes with her are packed.
Thursday, she had me start out with a little boxing and then we worked on core and lower body. It was not nearly as intense as day one with her and I was learning to let her know when I needed to change the weights. That part took a lot of learning on my part as well though. A certain weight would feel fine for the first few reps but 8-10 reps in, I would be struggling. She told me she wanted me to be at about a 70% effort at first so that I could last through the 15-20 reps we do each set. It took me some time to figure out what that felt like so that I could give her accurate feed back on the weight we were using.
I lost a little bit of weight in my first week with Margaret but I was not being as strict with my diet so it wasn't a huge difference. I'm so glad that I was told to drop the BL crazy 15 day start because I think I may have killed someone by the end. Instead, I am paying attention to what I usually gravitate towards and trying to make better choices and implementing them slowly. The headache I had during the time I was following the BL 15 day plan was excruciating and I was so glad when I was able to eat normally again so it would go away. Now we are focusing on small changes that will have a bigger long term affect instead of extreme changes for a big short term loss.
My plan was to typically do Monday, Wednesday, Friday one week and then Tuesday, Thursday the next but because I was traveling to Princess on Friday, I had to squeeze them in on back to back days during that first week. It was absolutely exhausting. By the time I was getting ready to head down to cheer at Princess, I was beat. I was also glad I was not following the strict diet rules while going to Disney. That would have been torture. I took it pretty easy during the weekend to allow my body to recover but I was still so tired on Sunday when I was driving back. I spent that night with my feet up and didn't do much Monday either.
Tuesday started week two with Margaret and I was only scheduled for Tuesday and Thursday. That morning I was so close to text her to say I wasn't coming in because I didn't feel well. I thought I was just being lazy so I got up and headed out to the gym. When I arrived, I went to the back to check in for the BL stuff and as I was finishing up, she came over. She noticed the look on my face and said I looked discouraged. I told her that wasn't it, I just didn't feel well. She was hoping to be able to knock it out of me so we started working out. We started off with some boxing , which was fine and then headed into the strength exercises. As we progressed, my head started hurting worse and worse and I was light headed a few times. She had me doing squats on a Smith machine and it totally screwed with my head. I kept pushing through but I could feel myself slowing down. Towards the end of the workout, she wanted me to stand sideways next to a rebound board, twist towards it, throw a medicine ball and catch it before twisting to the other side and repeating. About three reps in, I had to stop because I was getting so dizzy. She took the ball from me and had me go to a machine that would allow me to work the same muscles by twisting my lower body while keeping my head straight on. A couple in to it I had to stop because I was hit by a wave of nausea. She moved me to some machines where I could sit and work the outer and inner thighs. That was much better. She was glad that I kept pushing but could tell that I was not feeling great. I appreciated that she wanted to help me still get in a workout without making myself feel worse. I headed home and crashed for the rest of the day. My sinuses were so full of pressure it was causing me to have a headache and the pressure in my ears was screwing with my balance.
Thursday morning, my alarm went off and the pain in my ear was still there. I decided to play it safe and text to let her know I wasn't coming in. I didn't do much for the rest of the week, which isn't great, but I think my body needed the down time. I had gone so hard the week before and then the huge temperature swings over the weekend messed with my head and I just needed a break. I took some time this weekend to really think about and plan what I wanted to do in the next few months.
Early registration for Wine and Dine opens tomorrow and I am planning to sign Mac and I up. The 10K time we have been using for proof of time is finally too old and I don't have another good time to submit. I want to do a 10K sometime within the time submission window so that I can hopefully get a decent corral placement for the race. While looking over things this weekend, I found a 10K training plan through Garmin Connect that would end on Memorial Day weekend if I started it today. So, I am starting today. This plan is a little different from plans I have used before but I like that. It has cross training days worked in so I have put it all in a calendar that I printed out so I can give it to Margaret. I meant to take it in today but I forgot. I told her about it and she is excited and happy that I thought to make up a calendar that she can use to help plan my workouts. This way she can see what I have lined up and can find the best days to work my lower body and not burn me out too much for a run. This also means that I won't be using the pretty MWF, TR schedule that I had planned, but that's ok. It actually works out a little better because it was easier for me to find exactly 10 sessions each month instead of going over a few times if I followed the 3/2 schedule. I will have to find a class or something to go in for a few times so I get my three workouts each week for BL but I can just use a treadmill or bike for some of my scheduled stuff and that will count too.
Today, Margaret told me that she sees a lot of potential for success in me. I really like working with her and I am excited about what we will be able to do together. I am not setting a specific pace or time goal for the 10K in May but I am hoping that all the work we are doing together will help me have a good time to submit to RunDisney. I really want to be a better, stronger runner by the time we get to Wine and Dine in November.
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