Weekend Un-warrior

A while back, I allowed myself to relax on the weekends, to "recover" from a week of working out hard, justifying it by how much of a hassel it is to workout when my kids and husband are all vying for my attention.  But today as I was running, I started to feel like the opposite of the weekend warrior, and it made me wonder where the logic was in skipping weekend workouts.  Maybe I am just being too easy on myself.  Granted, some weekends, I really do feel like I need a rest, but some I don't, and I rest reguardless.  It is just making it all the harder to keep progressing.  It doesn't help that I have also had more frequent lapses of clean eating as of late, and they usually fall on the weekend.  I did really well during the week, for the "special situation" meals I had planned.  Wednesday we had a lens manufacturer lab rep at our office all day, and she insisted on taking us to lunch, so we ate at a diner by my work.  If it's any indication of how horrible the food was, our orders arrived within two minutes of ordering.  Blah.  I had the tuna plate, which consisted of a huge lettuce leaf topped with a scoop of tuna salad (with pickle relish mixed in, disgusting!) and some tomato slices.  They also sent a bowl full of canned peaches (the disgusting stuff sitting in a pool of heavy syrup, you know the stuff that tastes exactly like the can they came in) which looked the same when they brought them out as when they mercifully took them away.  That was the cleanest thing on the menu.  My mother-in-law brought us out to dinner on Friday evening to celebrate my husband's birthday, and we went to one of my favorite restaurants, and I was good there too.  I had a reasonable serving of tortilla chips with salsa (about 8 chips) and ordered the Ahi tuna fajitas, which I ate with out the tortillas and no extra condiments.  I felt really good after that meal, and the tuna was perfectly cooked. 
Then came Saturday.  I did good all day until my husband went out to dinner with some of his friends, and I was left to entertain my kids.  We had movie night, and the kids wanted snacks, so of course I had to oblige.  We got some Doritos, puffy Cheetos, and popcorn.  The Doritos were a new flavor, pizza supreme, so of course I had to try them.  And several servings in, I had had enough and decided to switch to the Cheetos.  It was like a free-for-all, and I went overboard.  The next morning, I wanted caffeine, so I decided to walk to the convenience store (a mile roundtrip), as if that could even start to compensate for what I'd consumed the night before, but at least it was something. 
And now I have the Monday Morning Guilt.  In all reality, I didn't have the ritual Friday night cheat meal, so calorie-wise, it probably didn't do any more damage than the Domino's pizza does.  But it feels different because it wasn't planned, there was no benefit from it, and there is just absolutely no nutritional value to the chips.  I used to joke with my husbands that if I ate the entire bag of my favorite chips (at 2g protein per serving) it would be a high protein meal.  Not so funny, but that was at a time when I wasn't even thinking about getting healthy. 
So today, I decided to run.  And I started to, once again, change my game plan.  I am not liking how soft my arms are looking still, and I know that is due, in large part, to my not getting in enough strength training lately.  So, I am going to switch my focus to doing strength training every other day, and rotating running/walking on my cardio days.  At this point, I can only swing one workout a day, but I'm hoping to do more eventually.  I am also starting to feel like I need to get off the blood pressure medicine, as I feel like I'm going to pass out every time I stand up.  I didn't take it last night, to see how I feel without it, and this morning's run felt so productive.  I'm fairly sure it will only take a call to my doctor, and I should get approval to discontinue.  That would be fantastic.  Afterall, I have lost nearly 55 pounds since I was diagnosed. 
So, we start another week.  I have been wanting to try to run 3 miles, just to see where I'm at, but the only time I have the time is on the weekends, and it has been raining every weekend and is forecasted to storm again next weekend.  Sigh.  At least it's not snow!  Happy Monday everyone, hope your week gets off to a great start!

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