I Can Do This

 I’ve been slowly but surely falling off the wagon.  It’s hard to create new habits when I’m not sleeping more than 5 hours a night, and stress is giving me stomachaches so severe that I have trouble keeping food down.  And frankly, I’m too damn tired and stressed to care.  So my mood has been getting bleaker and bleaker, and I KNOW I would feel better if I ran some anxiety off on the treadmill, but at 4:30 in the morning I just don’t give a damn.  So I’ve been watching myself as though through a glass, knowing what’s coming, not wanting to deal, but unable to halt the descent.

Which is why I’m so glad for all of you guys.  Today MizFit posted this.  And I thought, “I could shake things up by NOT FALLING OFF THE DAMN WAGON.”  And it was a nudge. 

And then Attrice posted this.  And I thought, “I have to stop beating myself up.  I have to remember that where I am IS OK.  I have to remember that if all I can do is walk around the block, it is ENOUGH.  And I have to remember that losing weight and getting fit won’t magically make these days disappear altogether.  There will still be bad days, and they will still feel like this, and I will get up and work out and eat right and take care of myself because now, more than ever, my body needs it.”

And THEN The Family of Things wrote this.  And specifically, she said this:
It’s often too easy for me to break promises to myself [regarding food and exercise] (with the excuse of, “Well, who am I hurting?”), but I’m trying to honor those promises now with the same focus I would honor promises to anyone else.  I should give myself the same respect I would another person, right?
I had thought about my own stuff in those terms before, but I hadn’t thought about it that way in a long time.  It was a good reminder to me: I wouldn’t break promises to others, even if I was tired and stressed out.  I might have bad days, but I would do my damndest to follow through, and if I failed one day, I would redouble my efforts the next.  So why am a shooting myself in the foot?  Why do I think I’m not worth the same effort I would put out for someone else?  That way lies madness. 

So I came home and watched  some TV, and requested a jury-duty postponement (because they want me to report the week before escrow closes on my condo), and got some things done, and decided to go to bed early and get up and go to the gym in the morning.  I don’t feel like doing weights, which I’ve been doing MWF, but I decided that something is better than nothing, and if all I want to do is zone out on the treadmill tomorrow, then screw the weights.  (I actually prefer running to lifting when I’m stressed: there’s something meditative and hypnotic about the rhythm of my feet striking the ground/belt that lulls me into mindlessness, even when I’m watching TV on my iPod.)

I will concede that chicken and broccoli for lunch today was a BAD idea, though.  My body is too tired and stressed to digest more than simple carbs.  So I’ll do my best to choke down some pasta at lunch (because right now I’d just prefer not to eat ANYTHING, and one meal is better than none, right?), or maybe some chocolate soy milk with protein powder.  And I’ll go run off the anxiety.  (Or walk.  Depending on how much or little I’m eating.)

So I just wanted to say thanks.  You should all know that you make a difference, or at least you did to me, today.  I can get through the next few months, a little bit at a time.