Weirdness

I went to the gym on Tuesday, then Thursday.  *grins*  and now weirdness has set in.  My good hip is cramping, and my injured hip “pops.”  It feels like the muscle catches on something and then releases like a rubber band.  The funny thing is that after 5 min on the treadmill, my ARMS hurt.

Tuesday, I did the interval training on the stationary bike, lvl 3 and lvl 8 like earlier.  Then the 5 min on the tread mill at lvl 1 speed and lvl 1 elevation.  Thursday, I did the sit up, stand and twist exercise.  I use the inclined bench. I hold a 10 pound weight on my chest while I lie on the bench, then I rise to a sitting position and stand up in one motion.  Then I twist left and right without moving my hips then return to the lying down position again.  I did 3 sets of 15.  This was followed the 5 min on the treadmill on lvl 1 and 1.  Argh!

The popping sensation doesn’t hurt, so I don’t think I’m tearing muscle, but it is annoying.

In case you’re wondering, and even if you’re not, I am monitoring my carb intake and protein.  I cannot get enough protein without getting lots of fat.  It seemed that I was awfully busy this week!!!  But I continued to eat right.  I went to bed before midnight every night I was so tired.  I guess that’s a good thing as more sleep helps you realize you’re not desperate for food and on the hunt for a week.  At least that’s how I understand the psychology.

What I don’t understand is that it’s not calories in versus calories out, or energy expended in working out, or strength in both voluntary and involuntary muscle that causes weight gain or loss…it’s psychology.  I HATE psychology.  I prefer math, statistics, biochemistry and physiology.   There’s no “theory” there at least at the level I’m working at.  It’s facts and numbers and chemical reactions and such.  You can put the numbers to paper and do this and this and this and you get that result.  But no….If your body thinks (that’s like saying if your pillow thinks, or your chair thinks…) that there may be a problem getting food, it will store up food for a rainy day.  In other words, if you skip a meal, you get fatter.  If your body thinks that it has to stay up longer in order to protect itself or look for food, it stores more food.  In other words, if you stay up all night playing video games, you get fatter.  Even if you don’t stay up all hours of the night and eat regularly, if you don’t eat enough calories, your body thinks to itself, “Self, this person is crazy, store up more food!  We have no idea what’s coming up next!!!”  and you get fatter.  C’MON body!  Get with the program!  Do the MATH!  You already have too much stored, and the rats are going to get it or it will spoil!  (Body laughs knowingly…fat doesn’t spoil!)  Yes it does, did you smell that old Crisco we threw out last week?  (Body is shocked.  Body isn’t very smart.  Body is a pillow.)  I want to smack Body.  Body is not supposed to think.  NOOOO, could it be?  It ISN’T body that’s thinking!!!  It’s OBE.  (remember Obe?  The name I gave to my sentient fat?)  Obe laughs uproariously.   (check my previous blog)   “Obe!  Look!  A Donut!!!”  Obe runs for the donut, I close the door and lock him in.  Obe is not happy.

Back on the horse

The horse doesn’t like me though.

In trying to recover strength in the leg with the broken hip, I have to do stationary bike work.  I was doing interval training:  4 min on level 3 (omg, that’s like a little kid bike!) and then 1 min at lvl 8.  Lvl 8 used to be my starting point!  I did 30 min of this. I then decided to try grand battement exercises as my flexibility has been compromised.  I discovered that when the moving leg was the injured one, I had full range of movement.  When the standing leg was the injured one, I couldn’t get my other leg to move!  If, however, I used my crutch to help support me, the uninjured leg did right what it was supposed to and moved pretty well.  Isn’t that weird?

ANYWAY, so now I’m sore.  Partly due to being on a stationary bike for 1/2 hour after not done anything over the holiday, I am actually saddle sore!  My butt hurts!  Get the horse tie in now?  I guess I need to get back to the gym again today or suffer the consequences.  Oh my.  I guess I need to do the weight training with a little cardio today.

According to my new resolution, my lines are, “OH GOODY!  I get to go to the gym and see what I can do today!  I can hardly wait!”  If I say it enough…

 

Fail

All that work.  I’m a failure.  How useless am I?  Why even try?

Wow, I read this from a friend of mine and thought that sounded familiar.  Oh yeah.  I said that.  I jumped into my teaching/coaching mode and asked some questions to change the direction of his thinking and then formulated a plan of instruction to lead him to a better conclusion.  Silly me.  I should have done that on myself!!!

Why didn’t I?  It’s harder to get perspective when you’re in the middle of the mess.  When you’re stuck in a hole, all you can see is hole.  You don’t see the birds and the clouds and the trees and the snow and the… see?  All you see is the hole.  Someone yells down the hole, “YOU SHOULD SEE THIS LOVELY SUNSET!”  And of course you’re thinking, “What’s a sunset?  I’m in a hole.”  Someone else yells down, “I JUST HEARD THE MOST BEAUTIFUL BIRDSONG!”  I’m hearing dripping noises.  “YOU SHOULD TRY THIS MARVELOUS DINNER!”  I’m in a hole–there’s no food down here.  The people outside of the hole think that motivating you will get you out of the hole.  Send someone down with a rope!

Failing at something is a normal process.  If you were good at something from the beginning, you wouldn’t grow, you wouldn’t add to your knowledge or wisdom, you wouldn’t get stronger or more flexible.  A failure is not someone that tries and goofs up. A failure is someone that doesn’t try anything new.   Too much psychology spends time in labeling people and situations.  All those silly tests and quizzes on Facebook tend to help you explore your giftedness and then slap a label on you.  Which villain are you?  Which Celtic myth are you?  Which Harry Potter professor are you?  Why do we do these quizzes?  How do you feel when you discover that you’re too wimpy and kind-hearted to be a villain?  Are you disappointed?  What if you find out your not Celtic?  What if you turn out to be the janitor in Harry Potter?  Does that make you feel bad?  I took a Hymn quiz and got 100%.  This meant I was the elite of Catholics.  I took the same test that said I was in the top 1% of Lutherans.  Wait…  It was the exact same questions!  So what does that mean?

We have been led to believe that we must fit into a category or a description.  We belong to this group or that group.  We succeed or we fail.  But that is not the case.  In order to succeed, you have to fail.  It is not the million dollars you’ve saved, it is the person you had to become to save it.  It is not the marathon you finished in record time, it was the hours and hours of trying and failing that allowed you to run the marathon.  It is not the straight A’s, but the student you have to become to get them.  Each journey will have failures in it.  You have to fall short in order to grow enough to succeed.

I failed in my diet yesterday.  Yes, it was mostly protein–cheese, summer sausage,ham and cheese ball with Triscuits.  Then I had homemade eggnog.  Wow!  I love that stuff!  But I am not a failure.  I will eat well today.  I will do my PT exercises.

Failure is not a character trait, it is just a measure against a goal you set that tells you how far you need to go.  Have you reached it?  “Not yet.”

And if you know someone in a hole, get in there with them and work things out together.  Happy New Year.