Day 23

Hold the presses, I exercised twice today.  I think I feel good...and I don't think I'm mentally ill.

I started an exercise page on this blog, just to log what I'm doing.  Exercise feels different now.  I'm not putting pressure on myself to do a specific thing with a specific frequency, I'm not making like Nike and saying "Just Do It"....instead I'm saying, "Just Do Something, Anything, Move your butt for 30 minutes."

I've told myself it can be whatever floats my boat: swimming, walking, elliptical, a class, an online video, a DVD, the Wii, whatever.  When I think of all the options I get kind of excited and lost in the choosing instead of thinking "arrgh, I HAVE to do this".  I distract myself like a squirrel with the plethora of exercise opportunities I can think of.  And before I know it, I kind of want to do them.  If I think ahead of what I have to do, I can talk myself out of it.  But if I start thinking in more of a choice mode, I have an entirely different perspective.  Well, they do say variety is the spice of life.

I do still need some accountability to get moving.  I got up and worked out arms with my trainer today at 6:30am for 30 minutes.  She went on to do cardio and I went home for morning school prep stuff.  But after dropping off son, I found I wanted to do something else.  Just for another 30 minutes.  I think that is my max attention span for exercise so I'm telling myself I can do anything for just 30 minutes.

I mentioned I tried Zumba last week but it didn't feel like dancing.  It felt too choreographed, too fast, too many move changes.  But I tried it and that had been one of my declared goals.

Today I went online.  Holy crapola why haven't I done this before???  I have a drawer of DVDs and most have really long workouts.  Ick.  Most are at least an hour.  But online there are free workouts everywhere of different types and length.  I can't believe I haven't explored this before.

I found DanceWithShelly (click) today!  She is my new buddy!  This Zumba video is only 30 minutes and I didn't need a lot of space to do it.  I just put it on my laptop in my bedroom and went to town.  The music was much more my speed.  I already am debating whether I want to just keep doing this video over and over or try some of her others.  Amen for a normal, healthy looking woman just getting down in front of her camera for me!!!

So I'm looking forward to exploring what else is out there online!  I found that I wanted to actually do this dancing today verus sitting at my computer.  Who knew??

(Right now I'm blogging and blowing off work, but better than blogging and blowing off exercise!)

I know that if I was drinking regularly I wouldn't have this enthusiasm.  I do like feeling not tired.

I'm still getting hot flashes which are driving me NUTS but other than those few minutes per hour, I feel pretty good.

I still need to focus on my diet - eliminating hot drinks, fizzy drinks and eating better overall is supposed to help with menopause too, so that's my next move when I'm ready.  Right now I'm arming myself with personal fans to cope.

Getting through a hot flash is not unlike a craving for alcohol.  They don't last all that long and I just have to push through them.  The difference is I don't have a quick fix to forget about it.  There is nothing to do but grin and bear it.  With an alcohol craving it's really easy to think a glass of wine will just kill that craving.  But it brings so much else with it that I really don't want.

I'm happy I'm at Day 23.  I still want wine, I do.  I still think about it in the evenings.  One problem is that I've always enjoyed pre-dinner drinking.  Sitting outside, relaxing with wine, before dinner.  The issue is that then I would drink too much, be not motivated to make dinner or sloshed enough that dinner wouldn't come out quite right.  Now it's great to not have dinner prep issues but I usually sit outside, push through the craving, feel depressed and then give up and go inside to make dinner.

I'm going to change the order of things.  So we're going to eat earlier, which is better for you anyway as I understand, and then, if I still want to sit outside in the evening and drink whatever N/A stuff I can find, I can do that.  I'm thinking that doing this after a full belly and closer to bedtime will help with not wanting alcohol as much.  I usually don't want anything to drink after dinner.  Will see if this helps!  I really need to get some changes made and other tools in place during these next 7 days.

I'm struggling with the idea of forever.  I'm pretty sure I'll "cheat" now and again.  But if I can make this a true lifestyle change and not a diet where I feel like I am miserable and missing out, then it may finally stick.  So far, the positives of not drinking definitely outweigh the benefits.  As compared to 2016, this time I don't see any benefits to drinking.  Simply an addiction, simply a letting myself down when I do drink.  In 2016, I thought there were benefits and I was just in excess mode.  Now, I know for sure I prefer to not drink.  I  don't like who I am when I do drink.  It's definitely a mind shift from a few years ago.

Onward....

HD