Head Colds can't Stop Me!
Oh how life can be so fickle sometimes! The very day I wrote my last post about feeling so good, I started getting a scratchy throat. By the end of the following day I had a full blown head cold. I do not get sick often so I try not to complain, but I did end up having laryngitis and needing to take a day off on Friday. Today is the first day since Thursday that my voice sounds pretty much normal. I think I am finally getting over the hump.
My period started right at the same time as the cold came on, which left me feeling very drained. Despite that, I am trying to be more active. I took my dog for decent length walks Friday, Sat and Sunday. My hips still hurt because I haven't been strengthening my legs, but I will admit I hurt a lot less than I had. I have been experimenting with different posture during walking, and even trying to change my stride a little. One thing I noticed is that my legs aren't as close together as before, there's less there, but I was still walking with a bit of a wide stance to avoid my legs rubbing together. When I fixed that and straightened out my spine a bit, I had less pressure in my hips. So, I think in the long run, I will get the hip pain under control. I am going to try to be more conscious about my posture while sitting at work as well, because the hips are involved in all of that.
Last night I was up for a while coughing, but when I finally slept I fell into wonderful dreams about traveling the California coast by a train that had a glass roof so you could see the stars. It was a very tranquil dream and it still felt really great when I woke, but waking in the middle of a dream always makes me feel super, extra tired. So getting moving without popping a caffeine pill first thing in the morning was a lot tougher today than it has been recently. I still have one caffeinated drink (Mio energy in water) and today I made it a little stronger to help wake me. It was sprinkling and overcast this morning when I took my dog out, my favorite kind of weather, especially when it's still warm out. That helped me feel more awake too. By the time I finished breakfast I had about a half hour before getting ready for work, I begrudgingly got on the bike. I put in 15 minutes of real workout, then a 3 minute cool down. Between the work, the extreme humidity and the new higher dose of my diuretic, I was a hot, sweaty mess, but I felt so good. And when I got off the bike, I noticed how much better my hips felt because I really used my leg and butt muscles. This is the ticket for me. Yes, I'd love to be outside walking, I sure do like to be in nature, but I once I strengthen my muscles walking won't cause me pain and I can do it as much as I like. So next spring and summer I will have that as a more viable option.
Today's personal victory came by surprise. I can tell I'm losing weight slowly but it's really hard to measure because I wear a lot of skirts and dresses and elastic waisted stuff, which sort of conforms to shape so it pretty much always feels like it fits. My bath towel, though, is a different story. When I get out of the shower I wrap myself in my towel; it hasn't closed without a gap in years and I usually don't really think about it unless someone is in the vicinity and I am desperately trying to hide myself or position the gap in an acceptable place. Today when I wrapped my towel it closed. There was no gap! I don't know if this is new or if I just haven't noticed it until today. It is such a small thing, but it sure felt fantastic! Its been so long since I have been on a good roll, doing good things for myself and feeling really alive. I think this is maintainable, it just takes planning and doing. Sounds simple, doesn't it? Once I focused my mind on my heart health and stopped worrying about what I was sacrificing, it felt like my decision was already made, nothing to reconsider or ponder. I want my heart to be healthy, I want my body to be able to move with ease. The answer has always been there, I was just to stuck by past emotional pain to take action. I healed some of those places by reading books by Geneen Roth, focusing on the pain, finding things that make me feel wonderful, and being mindful about emotional gut-reactions that seem out of place or overexaggerated. I started meditating more and challenging/changing old thought patterns and I started to choose to be happier and let some things go that aren't serving me. It time to not be on a diet, to figure out my own thoughts and to examine what I was letting hurt me from so many years ago, those things I held onto by choice and I could just as easily release them. At the end of the year I will turn 46 and I am happy to say that right now, today, I feel younger than I have in years! Now that's worth everything it took to get here. And then some.
My period started right at the same time as the cold came on, which left me feeling very drained. Despite that, I am trying to be more active. I took my dog for decent length walks Friday, Sat and Sunday. My hips still hurt because I haven't been strengthening my legs, but I will admit I hurt a lot less than I had. I have been experimenting with different posture during walking, and even trying to change my stride a little. One thing I noticed is that my legs aren't as close together as before, there's less there, but I was still walking with a bit of a wide stance to avoid my legs rubbing together. When I fixed that and straightened out my spine a bit, I had less pressure in my hips. So, I think in the long run, I will get the hip pain under control. I am going to try to be more conscious about my posture while sitting at work as well, because the hips are involved in all of that.
Last night I was up for a while coughing, but when I finally slept I fell into wonderful dreams about traveling the California coast by a train that had a glass roof so you could see the stars. It was a very tranquil dream and it still felt really great when I woke, but waking in the middle of a dream always makes me feel super, extra tired. So getting moving without popping a caffeine pill first thing in the morning was a lot tougher today than it has been recently. I still have one caffeinated drink (Mio energy in water) and today I made it a little stronger to help wake me. It was sprinkling and overcast this morning when I took my dog out, my favorite kind of weather, especially when it's still warm out. That helped me feel more awake too. By the time I finished breakfast I had about a half hour before getting ready for work, I begrudgingly got on the bike. I put in 15 minutes of real workout, then a 3 minute cool down. Between the work, the extreme humidity and the new higher dose of my diuretic, I was a hot, sweaty mess, but I felt so good. And when I got off the bike, I noticed how much better my hips felt because I really used my leg and butt muscles. This is the ticket for me. Yes, I'd love to be outside walking, I sure do like to be in nature, but I once I strengthen my muscles walking won't cause me pain and I can do it as much as I like. So next spring and summer I will have that as a more viable option.
Today's personal victory came by surprise. I can tell I'm losing weight slowly but it's really hard to measure because I wear a lot of skirts and dresses and elastic waisted stuff, which sort of conforms to shape so it pretty much always feels like it fits. My bath towel, though, is a different story. When I get out of the shower I wrap myself in my towel; it hasn't closed without a gap in years and I usually don't really think about it unless someone is in the vicinity and I am desperately trying to hide myself or position the gap in an acceptable place. Today when I wrapped my towel it closed. There was no gap! I don't know if this is new or if I just haven't noticed it until today. It is such a small thing, but it sure felt fantastic! Its been so long since I have been on a good roll, doing good things for myself and feeling really alive. I think this is maintainable, it just takes planning and doing. Sounds simple, doesn't it? Once I focused my mind on my heart health and stopped worrying about what I was sacrificing, it felt like my decision was already made, nothing to reconsider or ponder. I want my heart to be healthy, I want my body to be able to move with ease. The answer has always been there, I was just to stuck by past emotional pain to take action. I healed some of those places by reading books by Geneen Roth, focusing on the pain, finding things that make me feel wonderful, and being mindful about emotional gut-reactions that seem out of place or overexaggerated. I started meditating more and challenging/changing old thought patterns and I started to choose to be happier and let some things go that aren't serving me. It time to not be on a diet, to figure out my own thoughts and to examine what I was letting hurt me from so many years ago, those things I held onto by choice and I could just as easily release them. At the end of the year I will turn 46 and I am happy to say that right now, today, I feel younger than I have in years! Now that's worth everything it took to get here. And then some.
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