Changes – SuperSonnek

Change.

So many things have changed since my last post. Some things I still need to write about, but are too painful to tackle right now.

But one thing that has made itself apparent is that change is looming on the doorstep. Changes that are due to the new perspective that I have on all things in my life. Stuff that used to be a Big Deal™ now seem trivial. Things that weren’t on my radar are now first and foremost in my mind.

As such, I’ve renamed the site to reflect the new direction of this blog – where I’ll post more about my life and everything in it, rather than just the health/fitness focus that I started with.

Speaking of fitness, I did start CrossFit again. So there’s still going to be fitness-related nonsense, but I’ll be adding more personal stuff as well. More on the catalyst of all these changes to come shortly.

Influencing Changes

There are a lot of things in our lives that are out of our control.

The weather.

Traffic.

Daylight Savings Time.

The days getting shorter in winter.

Other people.

It seems there’s a cycle of trying to control things that are out of your control, stressing out over those things, and then those things stressing you out more the next time you encounter them. You wonder why people are so miserable most of the time.

I’ll admit, I’ve raged against the machine of traffic and winter weather before. Now, I’m trying to make a conscious decision to look at things in a positive light, to not immediately go to the negative, and to try to influence others in my own way. I guess it helps that I’m in Oregon and not Minnesota where family and friends there are facing a shitstorm of a snowstorm on Monday.

Instead I have this:

Gorgeous fall leaf.

Taken Nov. 9th. I love Oregon!

Saturday, I finally convinced my husband to try Crossfit. The gym (box? place of torture?) I go to has a free “try it out” class at 8:30am every Saturday. It’s how I got a taste for and have been sticking with it the past two weeks.

I feel a huge difference in how I feel and how my clothing fits. I had weighed myself right before I started and a week from that date and I had gained 3lbs. Normally that would send me into a shame spiral, but the athlete in my said “hey dumbass, you’re gaining muscle – especially in your upper body because I don’t know if you knew this, but running doesn’t build muscle in your arms. DUH.”

Thanks Inner Athlete…although I could use a little less sass from you. 😛

Back to this weekend. About 3-4 years back, my husband went to a personal trainer twice a week and was in relatively good shape. Then, the trainer he went to quit and then he didn’t do any sort of fitness/sports/working out other than going on walks with me.

He had been complaining about “getting fat” and I had noticed that he would get winded vacuuming the house (yes, he cleans and I cook…great trade off!). I said I’d be the Guinea pig for Crossfit. I finally got him there and he discovered that he was very out of shape. It was a bit of a wakeup call for him that he needs to start taking care of his fitness. Made me very happy to hear that. 🙂

The best part about the gym I go to is that one of the two coaches is in his 50s and used to weigh almost 300 pounds. He had thyroid problems, couldn’t get off the couch without help, and had enough health problems that his heart stopped for about 5 min before they revived him. Coach Craig is living proof that you can go from sick and nearly dead to fit and healthy. The other benefit he brings is that he knows how to modify every exercise so you can do it.

Now, the hubby is all for starting Crossfit too. The way he said it was “I can’t afford not to spend the money on this to get my health back.”

That’s a change I can get behind.

What about you? What’s been your biggest challenge in change lately? What has been your biggest triumph when you wanted to make a change? I’d love to hear your stories! 🙂

Onward and Upward

I decided to try a new theme on the blog. I kinda like it.

This weekend, we had a good friend of ours visit from Minneapolis. His wife is off galavanting with her friends in Europe, and we convinced him to come hang out with us for a few days. We’ve been both feeling a bit homesick, so it was awesome seeing a familiar face.

It was a lot of fun! On Friday, we took a rainy drive to the coast where we enjoyed some burritos and toured the Tillamook cheese factory. Yesterday, we took a tour of wine country and did all sorts of touristy stuff.

Stoller Vineyard’s tasting room

SakeOne tasting room

Raptor Ridge Vineyard

View from inside Stoller tasting room

Penner-Ash Vineyard

Stoller Vineyards

Penner-Ash Vineyard

Inside the Stoller tasting room

Penner-Ash Vineyard

Side note: touring wineries (and doing wine tastings) is exhausting!

Now that we took him back to the airport this morning, we have a full day of doing nothing. Well, “nothing” in that we don’t have plans. But I have some plans of my own.

After seeing some weight creep back on the past few months and our eating habits devolving into something resembling a character in the movie Idiocracy, it’s time to hammer down.

Seeing photos of myself at my company’s Grand Meetup didn’t help either. When did I become so old and stodgy? Who’s that overweight old lady? OHMYFUCKINGGOD IT’S ME.

Thus, we’re going back to the Near-Paleo diet we had such success with. No grains, no dairy, and for the first week or so, no booze. I know I say that every other goddamn time I do these things, but I need to focus on other goals I want to do and boozing it up doesn’t help with those goals.

How can I go wrong with food like this?

Whole Foods garbage salad – all Paleo

Carne Asada steak over sautéed peppers and onions, topped with avocado, lime juice and cilantro.

Roast Chicken, roasted Brussels sprouts, and mashed garlic cauliflower

Paleo meatloaf, sautéed mushrooms, mashed cauliflower, and sautéed broccoli slaw.

Eggs and Asparagus

Romaine, roasted sweet potato and chicken

The other thing I’m going back to is my exercise routine. I need to get back to running at least three times a week and I’ve only taken advantage of the fitness center in my apartment complex ONCE since we moved in over a month ago. ONCE.

I also want to make sure I’m hitting my Fitbit step goal every day. Ten thousand steps is not a huge thing to do.

Does it sound like I’m trying to bite off more than I can chew? Perhaps. But I want to tackle this. Fuck feeling sorry for myself and making excuses. Time to put up or shut up. That’s what this blog is all about, right?

Going grocery shopping today and the plan for the week is:

Monday: Run
Tuesday: Upper body strength training
Wednesday: Run
Thursday: Lower body strength training
Friday: Rest
Saturday: Run
Sunday: Walking with hubby

Should be doable. I’m not setting distance goals for the running as that would be a one-way ticket to Injuryville, and I don’t want to go there.

Will post an update next week to see how I did! Wish me luck!