Fitness Fellowship 2024: Week 35 Check-in

[sylvanwitch]

Greetings, fellow spinners on this planet Earth!

How has the week that has been treated you? I hope it's been a good one, full of little joys and accomplishments. Please do share your fitness ups and downs here, as usual, and know that--also as usual--there will be no judgement, only kindness and support.



Weight: Just a tiny bit up from last week's weight.

Eating plan: I get tired of hearing me talk about how I can't stick to my own plans. *sighs* The fact is, I've been anxious and sad about going back to work this week (tomorrow is the first full day of classes for the new school year), and I've been eating to drown that out. I have mostly been eating healthy food, but I've been eating too much of it (and too many pints of non-diary frozen dessert).

Exercise: Despite being tired on the three days I had full or partial days at work last week, I did manage to get an hour or nearly an hour of exercise every day, including daily yoga and lifting. For the first time, I earned a monthly "Gains" badge for registering four hours of weight training. I was proud of myself for that and hope to duplicate the achievement in September.

Meditation: I'm doing 15 minutes of yoga every day, and part of that practice is Savasana, which allows me some deep breathing and mind-clearing.

Hydration: Ugh. I struggled with this and found myself truly parched a few times while at school, despite carrying around a big bottle of iced water. I will do better as I readjust to my new teaching schedule.

Sleep: This has been rough. I've been all over the place with bedtimes and have had a real struggle to fall and stay asleep. I'm hoping I'll be so tired this week that I do start getting more regular, longer bouts of sleep.

Plan: Do my best.


I'm sending out all the groovy vibes I can spare for a good week for you all!

Comments

[china_shop]

*hugs, affirmation, and encouragement* I hope the new school year has some unanticipated joy and blessings in store for you. <3

I'm trying to ramp up my exercise a bit, but it's making me so tired and cranky in the evenings. When I got my fitbit a couple of years ago, it came with a free year's Premium membership, which included a "readiness" score telling me how much intensity to aim for on a given day. Since my membership lapsed, I'm missing that; I push myself when I should probably take it easy, and vice versa.

Thank you for your exercise description, sylvanwitch! It's reminded me that exercise doesn't have to be powering away on my exercise machine. I might aim for a gentle youtube workout today. (Though the advantage of going on my machine is that I can read or watch TV.)

I've also cut out most sugary food and am snacking less, over the last couple of weeks. Wow, that's not easy. (The general impetus behind all this is that I had an annual check-up with my GP, and I know BMIs are BS, but it did make me think that biking might be easier if I was dragging a little less weight around. Let's see how long it lasts.)

[sylvanwitch]

Thank you so much! *clings*. I can use all the encouragement I can get this morning. ;-)

I have a Garmin smartwatch, and similar to your Fitbit, it has a "body battery" score and gives me little notifications when my battery is getting low or when I've had too much "restoration"--lol! I hope you find ways to exercise that work best for you and allow you to recharge your battery without overdoing it.

Also, I am in BIG awe of your banishing of sugar and snacking. I am weak, weak, weak when it comes to "treats," and even though I do factor them into my daily calorie count ("saving" calories for a treat, that is), I also know they aren't doing me any good in the weight loss department, so I especially admire folks like you who can achieve a better balance.

Good luck this week with everything, my friend! *hugs*

still hanging in there

[oldtoadwoman]

I'm doing okay weight-wise though I'm not sure why. I have not been behaving myself this week. I'm entirely there with you on beginning-of-the-schoolyear anxiety and stress and/or comfort eating. I fully expected to be way up when I weighed in this morning, but I'm only up a pound from my recent low. (I've always said that I'd probably be a better dieter if my weight more obviously mirrored my behavior. But sometimes I eat stuff I shouldn't and still lose weight and other times I'm super diligent and still gain weight and even though, intellectually, I know that on average the healthier eating is the way to go, it's hard to resist an "occasional" treat when it doesn't always seem to matter ... until it does.)

Re: still hanging in there

[sylvanwitch]

Oh, boy, do I feel you on this comment, re: the scale not reflecting the treats or the "being good." I have the SAME issue. I really do need validation in the form of a number, and that can make it super hard to give up, for example, a frozen dessert.

SO much empathy and commiseration about the new teaching job, my friend! Good luck!

[delphi]

Reflecting those groovy vibes back and hoping they take. <3

I'm sorry it's been a rough week. I'm feeling the work stress right now too, and all I can say is that you have my wholehearted admiration for the exercise you've been getting in. I hope you give yourself full credit for that, because it's fantastic.

I fell off the caffeine wagon this past week (which was very much a response to being stressed and craving both a pick-me-up and a sugar rush, since my caffeine delivery system of choice is an iced cappuccino) and immediately regretted it, so I'm focusing this week on not letting that become a habit again.

[sylvanwitch]

Thank you so much, both for the vibes and the encouragement about exercise. I appreciate your kindness SO much, especially writing this as I am at my desk at school, trying to get my head in the game for first period. ;-)

You have been doing SO well with avoiding the Iced Capp, and I know you can do it again! I don't blame you for giving in, and I hope you aren't suffering too much for having given in and that avoiding the sugary caffeine rush in the future is easier for you.

More good vibes coming your way! I hope your week is a better one!

[luzula]

I'm sorry that you're stressed! Best of luck, I hope all the rest of your life doesn't increase the stress from work, anyway.

I am also stressed, because I'll be moving next week and also have all the administrative stuff around buying a house to deal with! Augh!!

Last week I went hiking for two days, and also got started exercising again. Weight stable. Sleep okay. Hope I can keep that (exercise, weight, sleep) going this week too.

[sylvanwitch]

Thank you for the good wishes; they are MUCH appreciated.

Please know that I am sending you ALL the good moving and signing-things vibes I have and hoping that everything goes smoothly, without any bumps in the road.

I hope you do find time to exercise but also that you are as gentle with yourself as you can be.

Good luck on your move!

(Just think: Soon, you'll be in your new home!)

[oschun]

Plan: Do my best.

So true, hon! So absolutely true. It's all we CAN do. Personally, I'm giving myself until the end of next week before I even think about health goals and what I want the structure of my week to look like. I can't think about fasting and exercise at the moment. I just have to reorientate myself and remember how to *be* this other person called a teacher.

I've also struggled with sleep the past three nights. I knew I would so I bought a herbal pillow spray. Supposedly studies have proven it to work. Maybe it does, but my brain is just too alert. It takes me a while to fall asleep and I then wake up at whatever o' clock in the morning and lie there in the dark going through mental to-do lists, which means I'm now associating the smell of lavender, vetiver and chamomile with disrupted sleep! (Maybe I should try chloroform instead!) Anyway, I'm going to stop using it and try it again after the first full week of teaching.

[sylvanwitch]

I think your plan is so sensible, and I'm sending you all the good vibes I can spare for a smooth transition back into your teaching life. I so relate to what you say here about having to be this other person. This year, more than any before, I am grieving the person I have to put aside when September comes. The summer me is just such a very different person in many ways. *sighs*

I also hope your sleep regulates soon. I, too, am struggling with staying asleep, and my dreams lately have been those borderline ones between sleeping and waking, so sometimes I'll realize I'm awake and think I *have* been for hours, and I really cannot tell if I have genuinely slept or if I've just been drifting in and out over that line. It is SO frustrating (and exhausting).

You may be onto something with the chloroform suggestion!

Big, big *hugs* to you and all the good back-to-school vibes I can spare.