Letting It Go

OK so Christmas was super fun and all (at 5, Moana is pretty much at PEAK excitement over the Santa thing!) but there is a part of me that is glad it's over! I'm not like Ba-Humbug or anything... if I'm honest it's mostly just because all the food that has been in front of me in the past 3 weeks has been covered with butter and pecans (and maybe whipped cream) and I have about zero self-control around that stuff... especially when I am in a phase of 'training' that includes no actual 'training' and therefore requires no self-discipline! So it's a bit of a double whammy... eat delicious crap then don't train = feel like a slug + put 5 lbs right around your mid-section. So then you feel fat and sluggish so going for a run sounds like a terrible idea (um, who wants to feel like an elephant while running??) so might as well just eat more somethingorother withwhippedcreamplease. Why not?

So there you go. At least I know how I earned these extra pounds (my method was legit!), and yes I know it's fine, but there's a part of me that longs to feel energized like I used to feel after eating lots of fresh plants and putting in a strong training session! Eating crap makes me feel like crap and now I understand why so many Americans feel like crap all the time. It's not rocket science! It's diet.

Anyway, I think I can safely say that this is the longest self-imposed break I've ever taken from training. I've taken breaks before but they've mostly been forced upon me either by someone or something else... I've never just voluntarily let my fitness go like this just because I didn't feel like training. After Cozumel though my gut was telling me that I needed a long extended break. And as sad as it is to go from peak fitness to serious slug (seriously I mean how the hell does one's fitness decline so freakin' fast?!?) I do believe it was necessary for me this year both physically and mentally.

I did decide to go back to Crossfit a couple times/week. Mostly because it was something completely different than the long endurance training my body was used to and when I started to feel like I wanted to move again (but not swimbikerun) it seemed like a good option. So amazing too how I can go into that box and lift like 1/5 of what everyone else is lifting yet still be debilitated for 5 days afterward. So weak. Seriously- we were doing some sort of overhead jerk movement last week... I was doing it with 55lbs which seemed plenty heavy then I look over and next to me is a woman, 33 weeks pregnant, jerking 30lbs more than me. Like a boss! Um. Speechless. That is all.

On Christmas Eve I went and did one of their special crazy WODs... 12 days of Crossfit. It was 12 of their favorite moves done in rounds like 1; (2, 1); (3, 2, 1); (4, 3, 2, 1), etc up to 12 and by the 12th round I thought I was going to die.

I think it was the burpees that threw me over the edge, but I spent that whole 12th round trying to breathe while jumping and squatting and swinging and throwing that damn medicine ball around. I did manage the 2 strict pull-ups every round though and that made me proud!

Anyway, so that's a bit of what's going on here! But wait! There's more! I did get talked into getting back into the water this morning... my training partner Mark basically begged (ok not really) so I stuffed myself into my bathing suit and jogged 6 minutes down to the pool (HUGE perk of our new house location!)... so I did get back in and swim with him this morning and it was 2600M of ugly. Maybe I'll go back tomorrow. :)