Today, I ran in the New Bedford Half Marathon. I ran 14 miles last weekend, so I knew I could do the distance, but this was my first "real" race longer than a 10k. For no good reason, I was all antsy-in-the-pantsy before the race and felt an awkward combination of nervous, excited, and really just wanting to spend a day on the couch. Given the pace I've been running the last couple of months, I was hoping to finish in about 3 hours, but honestly I just wanted to survive long enough to say I completed the race and post annoyingly on Facebook about it (you're welcome).
Knowing that I am roughly as slow as molasses, I knew that I would be way back in the pack and probably running pretty much alone after the 10-minute-milers took off. I've only ever been a slow runner, at least as long as I've been any kind of runner at all, so I have come to terms with the fact that my recent accomplishment of running a mile in under 11 minutes, for example, is only impressive in a subjective way. I did not anticipate that my slowness would pose a morale problem for me, race or no race.
And then today happened. I was maintaining a pace of about 13 minutes. I was happy about how the race was going and feeling relatively good. At each mile, there was a large sign and a timer clock, which I found very helpful. As I crested a slight hill and approached the five mile mark just over an hour into the race, a red pick-up truck passed me and pulled over next to the mile sign and timer. The driver broke down the timer and tripod, chucked them in the back of the truck, and drove away. I didn't even get a chance to see the official time before he did it. As far as I knew, he was going to go along the course and break down all of the timer clocks before I got there, and it was only mile 5 of 13.
Usually in a long race, the last couple of miles are where runners make it or break it. For a half marathon, miles 11-12 are crucial. But for me, for this race, mile 5 was the greatest challenge I have experienced as a runner. When I saw that guy breaking down the timer and packing up like the race was already over, I became so disheartened. I was furious at the guy for fucking with my mojo, and the wind that had previously been in my sails was instead trying to prevent my forward motion. (There was, in fact, a strong headwind for a lot of the race, to be fair.) There was a substantial crowd along the route right at the mile 5 point, but many of them had been out there for almost an hour and their interest was clearly waning, which was understandable considering that large packs of runners had been replaced by individuals or small groups many feet apart.
As I chugged along the route past the place where the timer used to be, I looked to the spectators to bring me back up. I listened to the words of support from the crowd, unmistakably tinged with sympathy and pity. The more patronizing (yet obviously genuine) things I heard, the more I felt like Li'l Brudder, a one-legged dog that can "make it on [his] own" and is "such a trooper". I didn't want or need their pity. I might be slow, but I was not in danger of not finishing, if I may be permitted a double negative. In my head, I kicked myself for looking to others for motivation when I knew that only a week earlier, I had done 14 miles with no crowd, no music, no mile markers, and no promise of a big official finish line at the end. The only thing I had waiting for me at the end of that run had been a mile-and-a-half walk home. I didn't get bummed out by anything because I hadn't been counting on anything other than myself.
This would have made for a great pep talk from me to me if I had been thinking this way after mile 5, but basically I just slogged through until I realized the rest of the timers were still up (if sometimes strangely inaccurate) and that the crowd was a bonus, not something I really needed. By mile 7, when the course followed the coast of New Bedford for about four miles, I was back to neutral and actually enjoying the smell of the ocean (and the long-awaited existence of port-a-potties). When I reached mile 11 and a slow caravan of police cars alerted me and the nearby runners that the course was opening back up to traffic, I was better able to handle the natural consequence of being a slowpoke. I was much more prepared for this reality given my anticipated pace, and shortly after the cars starting coming, Dan met me and ran/walked along with me for about half a mile; he could not have been more welcome. He snuck away to cut over to the finish line, and with half a mile left, I turned up the Led Zeppelin and went for it.
I finished in 2:51:50, more than eight minutes faster than I had dared to hope earlier that morning. According to the race results, only 52 people out of more than 3100 finished slower than I did, but I don't really care. The Dreamfar lady who speed-walks was only 14 minutes slower than me, or about a minute slower in overall pace. I don't really care about that either.
There's something that happens when you don't give up. It's often subtle, masked by self-deprecating humor, sarcasm, exhaustion, knee pain, and whatever else you can throw at it, but there is a satisfaction that comes with doing something when it would have been easier not to. There's a lesson I've been teaching myself (and learning from the other Dreamfar people) with these runs. Stopping when you want to stop gives you immediate satisfaction. It lasts a few minutes, maybe a few hours, and is later replaced with a dull sort of blah borne from not doing what you said you would do. But not stopping, refusing to give up, is much harder. It doesn't feel good right away. But it does feel good later, and you can go back to that feeling over and over again whenever you need it. Remember when I felt shitty and didn't really want to keep running, but then I did? That was great. Remember when I pushed through and just decided that I wasn't tired? Bitchin'. I think most people realize this from an objective standpoint, but it's a whole other animal to make it into a course of action and, eventually, a habit.
I have a quote hanging up in my classroom that is intended to motivate students to come to school when they really don't feel like it. My students often have in common a set of traits that have made school problematic and will only get worse as they enter post-secondary education and/or the workforce. This quote is trying to communicate the importance of perseverance, and now I'm thinking I also hung it up for my own benefit. The quote is from Muhammad Ali: "I hated every minute of training, but I said, 'Don't quit. Suffer now and live the rest of your life as a champion.'"
Man, fuck that guy in the red truck. He sucks and I'm great. So there.
Monday, March 18, 2013
Friday, February 22, 2013
Diary of a Fat Girl - Episode 24: Losing 60 Pounds by Being Imperfect
Hi, my name is Amber, and I am a douchebag elitist.
That's a harder admission for me to make than labeling myself a fat girl, as I did in the very first post of this blog series back in July of 2011. It's easy for me to be unhappy about my weight - or at least it was when I actually felt that way - but it's harder for me to be unhappy about being great. And by great I mean snotty. It's easy to conflate those two things if you're self-applying labels. I don't know what makes a person turn into an elitist, but I know for me it happened really early. When we finally got internet service at my house when I was in high school (suddenly this sounds like a very old-person sort of thing to say), I spent a lot of time arguing on the internet and trying to be right about absolutely everything. Which, for a 16-year-old, just isn't going to happen. But I felt smarter than everyone around me and I thought that that justified whatever level of snobbery my giant head could support.
As I rapidly approach 30 years of age, my elitism is continually getting tempered by the real world. It's like a rough stone pelted by lots of debris - eventually that stone will smooth out because of those impacts. So, although it's not saying much, I can at least aver that I am not as bad as I used to be. I still wrestle with the tendency, though, to be right about everything. It's a high standard to set for one's self, being right all the time. I'm sure that there are some people who combine egotism and elitism in such a way that it requires no self-reflection, but for me, I have to set the example of what I preach in whatever realm we happen to be dealing with. Hypocrisy infuriates me, so I at least try to avoid being a hypocrite.
When I started my actually-successful fitness and fat loss trek (as opposed to all the failures of the past), I was relatively ignorant, as n00bs tend to be. I had some first-hand experience with exercise and nutrition, but my science was weak, as was my practice. By the time I learned enough to know what I was doing, it became clear that I still hardly knew anything. I knew, however, that if I was going to make this work, we were talking about a complete lifestyle change. Which is super fucking scary.
The exercise component was actually the easy part for me. I enjoy exercise, which I know isn't true of a majority of people, but as many can tell you, all the exercise in the world isn't going to undo the damage of a preposterous diet. You can't outrun chicken fingers and french fries, at least not for long. There are lots of asterisks and subtleties to this principle, but the rule of thumb is that you have to expend more calories than you take in if you're trying to lose weight. If you're eating around maintenance (that is, equal amounts in and out, so maintaining weight) then you could theoretically just add some exercise to your day and slowly lose weight. But for most of us at the time when we decide to get our shit together, we're either gaining weight or maintaining a ridiculously unhealthy weight, so a walk around the block isn't going to do the job.
Knowing that I would have to alter my eating habits drastically gave me a lot of anxiety. You see, I'm a picky eater. I've talked about it here before, so I won't get into the whole rigamarole, but basically I don't eat a variety of foods, I don't try new foods, and I hate flavor. At least unfamiliar flavor, which is almost everything. I like my food boring, straightforward, predictable, and thoroughly play-tested. If I started eliminating entire foods from my diet, I would run into serious problems. But with such frequent players as french fries, Doritos, soda, and chocolate, well...how the fuck was that going to work?
I decided that I would simply follow the math of (calories out) - (calories in) = >0. I switched from full calorie soda to a variety of acceptable diet sodas (currently Pepsi Next is well-stocked in my house), but other than that, I just worried about the math. If I could "afford" to eat junk food, then fine. If I couldn't, then I didn't. My portions were measured and consistently small. A food scale became absolutely essential to making this work. Some days I went over my calories. More than some, really. But instead of thinking of every day as a final test of my will, I thought of every day as a practice run. If I noticed that I was emotionally eating, or eating past satiety, or eating because of a social situation, I made a mental note of it and used that information to improve my habits. I didn't go on guilt trips over eating a cookie or having an extra meatball with dinner. I used my dropping weight to motivate myself to keep going, and used the stalls/plateaus either as pieces of data to improve my routines or simply just ignored them.
In this manner, I have lost 60 pounds. I'm basically at maintenance weight, although I'm intending to lose another 5-10 pounds over the course of my marathon training (my bodyfat % is still higher than I'd like, so that's really where I'm focusing right now - the weight is really a non-issue at this point, which is nice to say). It has been hard work. I spend a lot of time and energy giving a shit. It's really, really easy to be fat. Not emotionally, of course, but with the day to day stuff? Yeah, that's pretty fucking simple. Eat, sit, sleep, repeat. Now, I wear a FitBit to track my steps and activity throughout the day, weigh and measure all my food, log everything I eat and drink on MyFitnessPal, use GymPact to make sure I'm exercising enough times during the week, and log all of my exercise on Fitocracy. It is a lot of work, and I'm sure it looks obsessive to someone who couldn't imagine themselves doing all of that stuff, but it's what has worked for me.
So when I read posts on Fitocracy or hear trainers talk about the importance of "eating clean" or choosing "whole foods" or sticking to "paleo" or whatever else their thing is, I get really worried about the n00bs. If I had truly believed that I wouldn't find success if I kept eating processed foods, I might never have tried. How many people get turned off by "experts" who espouse certain methodologies or strategies without acknowledging the myriad ways in which one can become healthier? I remember how badly I wanted to know, to understand the right way of doing things so that I could be efficient and correct and perfect.
It is a huge relief to be imperfect. Knowing that I am choosing a path that is not some objective ideal but is rather what I need, it makes everything so much better. It's still hard for me to interact with others on this issue because I sometimes interpret advice that contradicts my methods to be a personal indictment, but I know that it's not. I know that advice about food is probably falling on deaf ears with me because, frankly, I'm not going to eat a pomegranate. It's not going to happen. But if that pomegranate helps someone else, well then, godspeed.
There's this concept called "risk management" that I think applies to fitness. In risk management, you identify the courses of action available to you, look at the possible outcomes from all of those actions, and then determine what the risks and benefits are for each. For a simple example: if I cut my finger, I have two basic options, to use a bandage or not. If I use a bandage, I minimize the bleeding and minimize the risk of infection, but I also risk that ouchy feeling of taking the bandage off later. If I don't use a bandage, I'll get blood everywhere and I might also get an infection, but I won't have to take a bandage off. In my assessment, I determine that the better course of action is to use a bandage, and that the ouchy feeling later is an acceptable risk.
With fitness, risk management comes in to play all the time, or at least it should. People often get overwhelmed with all of the new studies that come out revealing that basically everything is bad for you. Eggs are bad, butter is bad, red meat is bad, caffeine is bad, and good lord is diet soda the fucking devil. It'll give your cancer cancer. If you eliminated every food from your diet that has ever been shown to have negative effects in humans, you'd fucking starve. That's not to say the studies are bullshit or that you shouldn't listen to research on harmful foods. If Splenda gives you stomach cramps, stop using Splenda, dick.
But if we're being realistic, you can't create a nutrition plan based on only eating and drinking things universally considered to be healthy, because that plan doesn't exist. If you're trying to gain muscle so you're taking in extra protein, there's some problem to identify with every possible fucking protein source. Eggs raise your cholesterol, beef lowers your lifespan, milk...god, don't even get me started on milk. To hear the milk-is-for-babies people talk is like nails on a chalkboard. Milk is delicious, bitches! Anyway, I digress. Food science is not black and white, and neither should be anyone's thinking on their own nutrition and fitness. So often, I've seen people foster this mindset of "well, if I can't get to the gym three times a week, I might as well not go at all." It's such disordered thinking, but I understand where it's coming from. There are plenty of things in this world that only count if you do them all the way. Just watch an episode of Pawn Stars where someone tries to unload a half-finished car refurb that cost waaaaay more than they're ever going to recoup. It's not hard to see how the all-or-nothing mindset finds its way into fitness and nutrition when, really, it has no place there.
This is why I try to keep my thoughts to myself when I feel myself getting critical of someone else's nutrition or fitness plan. My internal mantra has become, "If they're not going to hurt themselves and it might work, just let it happen." I know full well that I have no business being elitist about this stuff because, by all accounts, I'm doing it wrong. I had chicken fingers and french fries four days in a row this week. In a row. That's crazy even for me. But I also know that it's vacation, that my calorie counts are solid, and that I'm hungrier than usual because I'm running more and more every week. Without any context (or maybe even with some context), someone looking at my food log might be horrified and assume I'm going to put all my weight back on in no time. But I know better, and I don't need anyone else to agree with my shit.
So if you're reading this and you're trying to conform to some article or study or person's plan for the absolutely correct and perfect strategies for nutrition and fitness that, like, are the only way to do this stuff, take a moment and think about whether or not that plan, whole hog, is right for you. If you skip the gym because you don't feel like doing what's on the docket for that day, maybe it's time to revisit the docket, you know? Allow yourself to be a little inefficient and a little weird (a lot weird) and a little wrong. Trying to be perfect means that you will fail every single day forever. Try to be imperfect, a controlled demolition, and you'll succeed a helluva lot more.
That's a harder admission for me to make than labeling myself a fat girl, as I did in the very first post of this blog series back in July of 2011. It's easy for me to be unhappy about my weight - or at least it was when I actually felt that way - but it's harder for me to be unhappy about being great. And by great I mean snotty. It's easy to conflate those two things if you're self-applying labels. I don't know what makes a person turn into an elitist, but I know for me it happened really early. When we finally got internet service at my house when I was in high school (suddenly this sounds like a very old-person sort of thing to say), I spent a lot of time arguing on the internet and trying to be right about absolutely everything. Which, for a 16-year-old, just isn't going to happen. But I felt smarter than everyone around me and I thought that that justified whatever level of snobbery my giant head could support.
As I rapidly approach 30 years of age, my elitism is continually getting tempered by the real world. It's like a rough stone pelted by lots of debris - eventually that stone will smooth out because of those impacts. So, although it's not saying much, I can at least aver that I am not as bad as I used to be. I still wrestle with the tendency, though, to be right about everything. It's a high standard to set for one's self, being right all the time. I'm sure that there are some people who combine egotism and elitism in such a way that it requires no self-reflection, but for me, I have to set the example of what I preach in whatever realm we happen to be dealing with. Hypocrisy infuriates me, so I at least try to avoid being a hypocrite.
When I started my actually-successful fitness and fat loss trek (as opposed to all the failures of the past), I was relatively ignorant, as n00bs tend to be. I had some first-hand experience with exercise and nutrition, but my science was weak, as was my practice. By the time I learned enough to know what I was doing, it became clear that I still hardly knew anything. I knew, however, that if I was going to make this work, we were talking about a complete lifestyle change. Which is super fucking scary.
The exercise component was actually the easy part for me. I enjoy exercise, which I know isn't true of a majority of people, but as many can tell you, all the exercise in the world isn't going to undo the damage of a preposterous diet. You can't outrun chicken fingers and french fries, at least not for long. There are lots of asterisks and subtleties to this principle, but the rule of thumb is that you have to expend more calories than you take in if you're trying to lose weight. If you're eating around maintenance (that is, equal amounts in and out, so maintaining weight) then you could theoretically just add some exercise to your day and slowly lose weight. But for most of us at the time when we decide to get our shit together, we're either gaining weight or maintaining a ridiculously unhealthy weight, so a walk around the block isn't going to do the job.
Knowing that I would have to alter my eating habits drastically gave me a lot of anxiety. You see, I'm a picky eater. I've talked about it here before, so I won't get into the whole rigamarole, but basically I don't eat a variety of foods, I don't try new foods, and I hate flavor. At least unfamiliar flavor, which is almost everything. I like my food boring, straightforward, predictable, and thoroughly play-tested. If I started eliminating entire foods from my diet, I would run into serious problems. But with such frequent players as french fries, Doritos, soda, and chocolate, well...how the fuck was that going to work?
I decided that I would simply follow the math of (calories out) - (calories in) = >0. I switched from full calorie soda to a variety of acceptable diet sodas (currently Pepsi Next is well-stocked in my house), but other than that, I just worried about the math. If I could "afford" to eat junk food, then fine. If I couldn't, then I didn't. My portions were measured and consistently small. A food scale became absolutely essential to making this work. Some days I went over my calories. More than some, really. But instead of thinking of every day as a final test of my will, I thought of every day as a practice run. If I noticed that I was emotionally eating, or eating past satiety, or eating because of a social situation, I made a mental note of it and used that information to improve my habits. I didn't go on guilt trips over eating a cookie or having an extra meatball with dinner. I used my dropping weight to motivate myself to keep going, and used the stalls/plateaus either as pieces of data to improve my routines or simply just ignored them.
In this manner, I have lost 60 pounds. I'm basically at maintenance weight, although I'm intending to lose another 5-10 pounds over the course of my marathon training (my bodyfat % is still higher than I'd like, so that's really where I'm focusing right now - the weight is really a non-issue at this point, which is nice to say). It has been hard work. I spend a lot of time and energy giving a shit. It's really, really easy to be fat. Not emotionally, of course, but with the day to day stuff? Yeah, that's pretty fucking simple. Eat, sit, sleep, repeat. Now, I wear a FitBit to track my steps and activity throughout the day, weigh and measure all my food, log everything I eat and drink on MyFitnessPal, use GymPact to make sure I'm exercising enough times during the week, and log all of my exercise on Fitocracy. It is a lot of work, and I'm sure it looks obsessive to someone who couldn't imagine themselves doing all of that stuff, but it's what has worked for me.
So when I read posts on Fitocracy or hear trainers talk about the importance of "eating clean" or choosing "whole foods" or sticking to "paleo" or whatever else their thing is, I get really worried about the n00bs. If I had truly believed that I wouldn't find success if I kept eating processed foods, I might never have tried. How many people get turned off by "experts" who espouse certain methodologies or strategies without acknowledging the myriad ways in which one can become healthier? I remember how badly I wanted to know, to understand the right way of doing things so that I could be efficient and correct and perfect.
It is a huge relief to be imperfect. Knowing that I am choosing a path that is not some objective ideal but is rather what I need, it makes everything so much better. It's still hard for me to interact with others on this issue because I sometimes interpret advice that contradicts my methods to be a personal indictment, but I know that it's not. I know that advice about food is probably falling on deaf ears with me because, frankly, I'm not going to eat a pomegranate. It's not going to happen. But if that pomegranate helps someone else, well then, godspeed.
There's this concept called "risk management" that I think applies to fitness. In risk management, you identify the courses of action available to you, look at the possible outcomes from all of those actions, and then determine what the risks and benefits are for each. For a simple example: if I cut my finger, I have two basic options, to use a bandage or not. If I use a bandage, I minimize the bleeding and minimize the risk of infection, but I also risk that ouchy feeling of taking the bandage off later. If I don't use a bandage, I'll get blood everywhere and I might also get an infection, but I won't have to take a bandage off. In my assessment, I determine that the better course of action is to use a bandage, and that the ouchy feeling later is an acceptable risk.
With fitness, risk management comes in to play all the time, or at least it should. People often get overwhelmed with all of the new studies that come out revealing that basically everything is bad for you. Eggs are bad, butter is bad, red meat is bad, caffeine is bad, and good lord is diet soda the fucking devil. It'll give your cancer cancer. If you eliminated every food from your diet that has ever been shown to have negative effects in humans, you'd fucking starve. That's not to say the studies are bullshit or that you shouldn't listen to research on harmful foods. If Splenda gives you stomach cramps, stop using Splenda, dick.
But if we're being realistic, you can't create a nutrition plan based on only eating and drinking things universally considered to be healthy, because that plan doesn't exist. If you're trying to gain muscle so you're taking in extra protein, there's some problem to identify with every possible fucking protein source. Eggs raise your cholesterol, beef lowers your lifespan, milk...god, don't even get me started on milk. To hear the milk-is-for-babies people talk is like nails on a chalkboard. Milk is delicious, bitches! Anyway, I digress. Food science is not black and white, and neither should be anyone's thinking on their own nutrition and fitness. So often, I've seen people foster this mindset of "well, if I can't get to the gym three times a week, I might as well not go at all." It's such disordered thinking, but I understand where it's coming from. There are plenty of things in this world that only count if you do them all the way. Just watch an episode of Pawn Stars where someone tries to unload a half-finished car refurb that cost waaaaay more than they're ever going to recoup. It's not hard to see how the all-or-nothing mindset finds its way into fitness and nutrition when, really, it has no place there.
This is why I try to keep my thoughts to myself when I feel myself getting critical of someone else's nutrition or fitness plan. My internal mantra has become, "If they're not going to hurt themselves and it might work, just let it happen." I know full well that I have no business being elitist about this stuff because, by all accounts, I'm doing it wrong. I had chicken fingers and french fries four days in a row this week. In a row. That's crazy even for me. But I also know that it's vacation, that my calorie counts are solid, and that I'm hungrier than usual because I'm running more and more every week. Without any context (or maybe even with some context), someone looking at my food log might be horrified and assume I'm going to put all my weight back on in no time. But I know better, and I don't need anyone else to agree with my shit.
So if you're reading this and you're trying to conform to some article or study or person's plan for the absolutely correct and perfect strategies for nutrition and fitness that, like, are the only way to do this stuff, take a moment and think about whether or not that plan, whole hog, is right for you. If you skip the gym because you don't feel like doing what's on the docket for that day, maybe it's time to revisit the docket, you know? Allow yourself to be a little inefficient and a little weird (a lot weird) and a little wrong. Trying to be perfect means that you will fail every single day forever. Try to be imperfect, a controlled demolition, and you'll succeed a helluva lot more.
Wednesday, January 30, 2013
Diary of a Fat Girl - Episode 23: Trying to Enjoy Being Foolish
At the beginning of the school year, I tried to start a fitness club at my school. We don't really have extracurricular activities because, frankly, ain't nobody got time for that. The students who end up in my program are trying to spend as little time in school as possible, so staying late to hang out isn't usually on the agenda. But when I shopped the idea around, many students expressed an interest. I wasn't sure exactly what the club would look like - considering we don't have a gym, an open field, or funds for equipment (or a place to put that equipment), we'd have to connect with a local business or just make do with what we had. When one of the counselors at the school heard what I was trying to do, he told me about this program called Dreamfar High School Marathon.
Dreamfar trains high school students to run a marathon. That might sound crazy to you because it kind of is. But the idea is that, by challenging students to push themselves and do something that less than 1% of people will ever do, Dreamfar teaches kids much more about themselves than most of their other high school experiences. Teachers at each participating school volunteer to lead their teams and conduct the practice runs after school, and community members volunteer as mentors to run with students during the whole-team long runs on Saturdays. I started with 4 runners and a lot of maybes. By the end of first quarter, I had no runners left. I didn't realize it at the time, but that was pretty much my last chance to back out. I could have quit and no one would have blamed me for it - after all, my students up and quit on me, so it made sense that I would stop.
But I didn't even consider that. I was training to run a marathon. Just because my kids quit didn't mean that my training was less valuable. So I stayed on as a mentor and just switched roles. I do my practice runs by myself on week days after work and join the team on Saturdays. This weekend, I'm going to run 11 miles. As is the case with the last three Saturday runs, this will again be the longest distance I've ever run. Seven was fine. Eight was lovely. Nine hurt like hell. Nine was the first run I've done with Dreamfar that made me reconsider my participation in the program. And not really reconsider, as if I was ready to stop training. But for the first time, I recognized the reality that I was not bound to this program for any reason. The only thing keeping me there was my own desire to push myself and be a part of something beyond just me. No students would be abandoned if I left - there is no person for whom I am the only connection they have to Dreamfar.
The couple of practice runs I did the week following the 9-miler weren't great either. I did them, and they were fine, but I didn't get that surge of satisfaction afterward that I usually feel when I complete a run. I felt tired during the run, battled a voice in the back of my head telling me that I could do a partial run because hey-man-you-did-nine-miles-so-it's-cool, and felt like I was fighting a losing battle. I thought to myself, Self, you never really intended to run a marathon anyway. That's for crazy people. You even said, when you first started running, that you didn't plan to get into real distance running. So why are you bothering? I went into this past Sunday's 10k race feeling pretty meh about running.
And then I beat my best pace and finished 15 minutes faster than I had planned. A time of 1:15 for a 10k might not be great for a runner runner, but for me, it's amazing. My fastest 5k time is 39 minutes, so even if I didn't have to slow down to double my distance, I still was 3 minutes faster than I would have been at that pace. AND that 5k time was running outright, whereas this 10k (as all other Dreamfar runs) was an interval run with 3 minutes of running and 1 minute of walking. It was a challenging run, but I kept a surprisingly consistent pace the entire time, enjoyed myself, and only cared a little that it was something like 15º with a brutal wind chill.
That 10k helped me recapture something I had started to lose. I don't know if it's motivation or perseverance or just enjoyment of the activity. But I reconnected with it then, and I felt it again yesterday as I plugged through another 3.5 miles on the treadmill (sidenote: I usually use my gym's window-facing treadmills if I run inside, but when those were all taken, Law & Order: SVU made a very compelling case for the TV-facing machines). Hopefully, as I take advantage of the unseasonably warm weather this afternoon, I'll feel it again as I cruise down the Esplanade trying not to get mugged.
I genuinely don't know how the 11-mile run this Saturday is going to go. If I split the difference between my standard slow pace and my most recent 10k pace, it'll take me 2.5 hours. That's a long time to pound the pavement. If I push myself too hard, run through "bad" pain, or get sloppy, I could be looking at serious injury, either acute or chronic. Besides possibly killing my hopes of finishing the marathon in May, an injury could seriously derail my entire fitness routine and make my life miserable. I'm doing this for my benefit, not as punishment, so I need to make sure that I'm pulling away from this experience with a net gain. Last week, I wasn't feeling it. I was putting more into the runs than I was getting out. That feels different this week, and I hope it stays that way.
For now, I'm trying to enjoy being foolish. It's foolish to just fall into a marathon training program. It's foolish to keep doing it even when your students quit. It's foolish to try to do this while planning a wedding. But I'd rather be a fool than a quitter.
Dreamfar trains high school students to run a marathon. That might sound crazy to you because it kind of is. But the idea is that, by challenging students to push themselves and do something that less than 1% of people will ever do, Dreamfar teaches kids much more about themselves than most of their other high school experiences. Teachers at each participating school volunteer to lead their teams and conduct the practice runs after school, and community members volunteer as mentors to run with students during the whole-team long runs on Saturdays. I started with 4 runners and a lot of maybes. By the end of first quarter, I had no runners left. I didn't realize it at the time, but that was pretty much my last chance to back out. I could have quit and no one would have blamed me for it - after all, my students up and quit on me, so it made sense that I would stop.
But I didn't even consider that. I was training to run a marathon. Just because my kids quit didn't mean that my training was less valuable. So I stayed on as a mentor and just switched roles. I do my practice runs by myself on week days after work and join the team on Saturdays. This weekend, I'm going to run 11 miles. As is the case with the last three Saturday runs, this will again be the longest distance I've ever run. Seven was fine. Eight was lovely. Nine hurt like hell. Nine was the first run I've done with Dreamfar that made me reconsider my participation in the program. And not really reconsider, as if I was ready to stop training. But for the first time, I recognized the reality that I was not bound to this program for any reason. The only thing keeping me there was my own desire to push myself and be a part of something beyond just me. No students would be abandoned if I left - there is no person for whom I am the only connection they have to Dreamfar.
The couple of practice runs I did the week following the 9-miler weren't great either. I did them, and they were fine, but I didn't get that surge of satisfaction afterward that I usually feel when I complete a run. I felt tired during the run, battled a voice in the back of my head telling me that I could do a partial run because hey-man-you-did-nine-miles-so-it's-cool, and felt like I was fighting a losing battle. I thought to myself, Self, you never really intended to run a marathon anyway. That's for crazy people. You even said, when you first started running, that you didn't plan to get into real distance running. So why are you bothering? I went into this past Sunday's 10k race feeling pretty meh about running.
That 10k helped me recapture something I had started to lose. I don't know if it's motivation or perseverance or just enjoyment of the activity. But I reconnected with it then, and I felt it again yesterday as I plugged through another 3.5 miles on the treadmill (sidenote: I usually use my gym's window-facing treadmills if I run inside, but when those were all taken, Law & Order: SVU made a very compelling case for the TV-facing machines). Hopefully, as I take advantage of the unseasonably warm weather this afternoon, I'll feel it again as I cruise down the Esplanade trying not to get mugged.
I genuinely don't know how the 11-mile run this Saturday is going to go. If I split the difference between my standard slow pace and my most recent 10k pace, it'll take me 2.5 hours. That's a long time to pound the pavement. If I push myself too hard, run through "bad" pain, or get sloppy, I could be looking at serious injury, either acute or chronic. Besides possibly killing my hopes of finishing the marathon in May, an injury could seriously derail my entire fitness routine and make my life miserable. I'm doing this for my benefit, not as punishment, so I need to make sure that I'm pulling away from this experience with a net gain. Last week, I wasn't feeling it. I was putting more into the runs than I was getting out. That feels different this week, and I hope it stays that way.
For now, I'm trying to enjoy being foolish. It's foolish to just fall into a marathon training program. It's foolish to keep doing it even when your students quit. It's foolish to try to do this while planning a wedding. But I'd rather be a fool than a quitter.
Tuesday, January 01, 2013
Diary of a Fat Girl - Episode 22: Before I'm 30 (Not Very Scary Edition)
This past Saturday, I turned 29 years old. It was a rather anticlimactic birthday, no party or anything like that, just a dinner with Dan and our friend Brian. With a birthday so close to Christmas, it's usually not a big to-do and often gets lost in all the celebrations and travel that go on at the end of the year, so it takes me a while to realize that I'm a new number. I liked 28; it was a good year for me. I got engaged right at the start, lost a bunch of weight, got a lot stronger, earned my master's degree, and did some pretty fun stuff. But I also have a lot of goals and things about my life I'd like to revise. I've never been particularly afraid of turning 30, but I'm willing to use the "things to do before I'm 30" thing as motivation if it gets me going.
1. Be better about maintaining friendships - there's nothing like a 3-person birthday dinner (self and live-in fiance included) to make you realize that your social situation is kind of shitty. I've always been a hermit, preferring to keep to myself and stay home if it's up to me. When I have a free evening (or even a free Saturday) ahead of me, I don't think, "well, I'd better see what my friends are up to and make some plans to fill that time!" Instead, I think "thank god, a nice obligation-free period of time in which I can either be solitary or just watch TV with Dan." I know that seems unhealthy to some people, but those people don't know what an introvert is. Hanging out with people can be pretty exhausting for me, even though I do genuinely enjoy it, so I don't often seek out social interaction. The volume of interaction that occurs without me trying to do anything extra is just fine, so I let people come to me, rather than going to others. The problem is, when it comes time to count your friends, introverts may not find those numbers to be satisfactory. Although I don't know that it's within my power (or even preferable) to change my fundamental nature, but I can make a more concerted effort to maintain my existing friendships. Even if it's just sending a few e-mails every week or keeping up text messages, it's better than nothing.
2. Run a marathon - I've been training for the 2013 Providence Cox Marathon for a couple of months now, and it's starting to get serious. I recently ran 7 miles, the longest distance for me so far, and it's only going to get harder. To date, I've never run a distance so arduous that I've had to stop. It's kind of scary to know that, at some point, I'm going to reach a limit. Hopefully it won't be anything drastic or injury-inducing, considering I'm following a conservative training plan that gradually adds distance week by week, but I know that at some point, my body is not going to be able to do what I'm asking it to do. I hit limits all the time in my weight lifting, but that's kind of the point. Try to move something too heavy, back it off a little bit, then keep training until you can lift that heavy weight. With running, it's not quite the same. You don't try to run 20 miles, fail, and then notch it back to 18. That's not really how it works. Here's hoping that May 12th is a positive experience, chafing and busted knees notwithstanding.
3. Get married - Well, unless something really fucked up happens, this is going to occur whether I do a "good job" or not. But there's a lot of planning to do, and both Dan and I have been kind of lazy about it. We need to pick a JP, DJ, staffing company to serve food, alcohol provider, hotel for a block of rooms, and a bunch of other stuff. I'm buying a dress in February, but that's pretty much the only thing I've planned. The wedding is going to be pretty laid-back, but I need to be less laid-back about getting it sorted out.
4. Seriously examine employment opportunities - I love my job passionately, and I'm deeply invested in alternative education in Boston. That being said, there are two big reasons for me to start looking at other jobs. First, I'm very underpaid. With my degree and years of experience, I should be making something like $15,000 more than what I'm getting. It's not that my school doesn't value my services, but rather that they're broke as fuck and can't afford to pay a salary equivalent to Boston Public Schools' teacher salary. So the money thing is a big deal, especially if Dan and I plan to have kids and buy a bigger house at some point in the not-too-distant future. A second issue, and one that is harder to pinpoint, is the shift in my school's focus with regard to its population. Currently we serve "at-risk youth" from BPS, usually kids who have dropped out or maybe had a kid and they need a school where they can get back on track and graduate. Our students usually have a lot of complication in their home lives, and we have a counselor on staff during the school day to help kids refocus on school and process their issues enough to get back to work. But pressure from BPS and community organizations is shifting us to serve more of a SPED population, which is not something we're currently designed or staffed for. We don't have aides or paraprofessionals, and none of us are trained to teach special education students. I've never been particularly interested in working with that population, so it makes sense for me to start looking elsewhere before my school wastes its money trying to train me to teach a population I don't really intend to teach. Unfortunately, English teachers are a dime a dozen, and ironically, it's a lot easier to get hired if you're SPED certified. Sigh.
5. Complete a Run Ruckus with aplomb - I'm doing the 4-mile Run Ruckus in mid-June 2013. It's a month after the marathon and a month before the wedding, which I hope is enough time on either end. I know it will take a few weeks to recover fully from the marathon, but the Ruckus is certainly a very different sort of physical stress, so I'm hoping that I won't still be a worn-out wreck from the marathon, assuming, of course, I get to the marathon without injury and finish without dying. Two pretty big assumptions. The Run Ruckus will be a big opportunity for me to claim some of the glory I had hoped to achieve during May's Run For Your Lives zombie 5k. As wonderful as it was to finish the 5k and to feel the accomplishment of doing something I had trained for (for, like, 6 months), the race was not the experience I had been hoping for - it was short on obstacles and long on trekking through really deep mud. Fewer than 20% of the finishers had any flags remaining by the end (and were therefore "alive"), which meant that there was NO chance of me surviving, which was kind of a bummer. The theoretically dangerous parts were really simple and brief, and the theoretically less dangerous parts were actually super scary because it turns out that traipsing through muddy, hilly woods isn't super safe. Because we did a later race time, the obstacles were generally busted and the ones at the end had lines, which was a big let-down. Nothing like freezing your ass off and waiting 100 yards from the finish line for an hour to really get your adrenaline up, eh? The Run Ruckus seems to be a much more obstacle-centric affair, and will hopefully be less goopy. It's New England, so who knows, but fingers crossed. I picked a much earlier heat time after the 3pm massacre at RFYL. In preparation for the Ruckus, I'll be working on agility, interval training, grip strength, and lots of upper body work. It would be nice to be able to do a chin-up.
6. Push myself to keep learning - Whether it's keeping up with/relearning some of my Spanish, finally getting behind the wheel of a car (the most terrifying thing on the entire planet, as far as I'm concerned), or getting versed enough in one or more sciences to get certified to teach them, I need to keep learning. I've been done with grad school for a year and it's time to spend some of my free evenings putting things into my brain instead of allowing images to gently caress my occipital lobe. I also need to be more aggressive about reading. I have a backlog of, no exaggeration, 75 or 100 books, fiction and non-fiction, just waiting to be read. Stuttering my way through them on the subway to/from work is all well and fine, but a book every 2-3 weeks isn't cutting it. Some of the most profound experiences I've had in the last year have been through reading non-fiction, so I need to make that a larger priority for me. My goal is to read 50 books this year, of any genre and length. I'd also like to keep track of what I've read and what my thoughts are as I finish them. This would mean less time spent surfing the couch with Dan (unless he wants to read instead of watch TV - ha!), but I think it would be good for me.
If being 29 is even close to as great as being 28 was, I've got quite a year ahead of me. This last year wasn't entirely without its challenges, but my personal growth was pretty badass, and it's amazing how great the average day feels when grad school is over. I intend to ride this post-grad-school wave for a lonnnnnng time. Here's hoping for a fun, better-all-the-time sort of year. Happy New Year, people.
1. Be better about maintaining friendships - there's nothing like a 3-person birthday dinner (self and live-in fiance included) to make you realize that your social situation is kind of shitty. I've always been a hermit, preferring to keep to myself and stay home if it's up to me. When I have a free evening (or even a free Saturday) ahead of me, I don't think, "well, I'd better see what my friends are up to and make some plans to fill that time!" Instead, I think "thank god, a nice obligation-free period of time in which I can either be solitary or just watch TV with Dan." I know that seems unhealthy to some people, but those people don't know what an introvert is. Hanging out with people can be pretty exhausting for me, even though I do genuinely enjoy it, so I don't often seek out social interaction. The volume of interaction that occurs without me trying to do anything extra is just fine, so I let people come to me, rather than going to others. The problem is, when it comes time to count your friends, introverts may not find those numbers to be satisfactory. Although I don't know that it's within my power (or even preferable) to change my fundamental nature, but I can make a more concerted effort to maintain my existing friendships. Even if it's just sending a few e-mails every week or keeping up text messages, it's better than nothing.
2. Run a marathon - I've been training for the 2013 Providence Cox Marathon for a couple of months now, and it's starting to get serious. I recently ran 7 miles, the longest distance for me so far, and it's only going to get harder. To date, I've never run a distance so arduous that I've had to stop. It's kind of scary to know that, at some point, I'm going to reach a limit. Hopefully it won't be anything drastic or injury-inducing, considering I'm following a conservative training plan that gradually adds distance week by week, but I know that at some point, my body is not going to be able to do what I'm asking it to do. I hit limits all the time in my weight lifting, but that's kind of the point. Try to move something too heavy, back it off a little bit, then keep training until you can lift that heavy weight. With running, it's not quite the same. You don't try to run 20 miles, fail, and then notch it back to 18. That's not really how it works. Here's hoping that May 12th is a positive experience, chafing and busted knees notwithstanding.
3. Get married - Well, unless something really fucked up happens, this is going to occur whether I do a "good job" or not. But there's a lot of planning to do, and both Dan and I have been kind of lazy about it. We need to pick a JP, DJ, staffing company to serve food, alcohol provider, hotel for a block of rooms, and a bunch of other stuff. I'm buying a dress in February, but that's pretty much the only thing I've planned. The wedding is going to be pretty laid-back, but I need to be less laid-back about getting it sorted out.
4. Seriously examine employment opportunities - I love my job passionately, and I'm deeply invested in alternative education in Boston. That being said, there are two big reasons for me to start looking at other jobs. First, I'm very underpaid. With my degree and years of experience, I should be making something like $15,000 more than what I'm getting. It's not that my school doesn't value my services, but rather that they're broke as fuck and can't afford to pay a salary equivalent to Boston Public Schools' teacher salary. So the money thing is a big deal, especially if Dan and I plan to have kids and buy a bigger house at some point in the not-too-distant future. A second issue, and one that is harder to pinpoint, is the shift in my school's focus with regard to its population. Currently we serve "at-risk youth" from BPS, usually kids who have dropped out or maybe had a kid and they need a school where they can get back on track and graduate. Our students usually have a lot of complication in their home lives, and we have a counselor on staff during the school day to help kids refocus on school and process their issues enough to get back to work. But pressure from BPS and community organizations is shifting us to serve more of a SPED population, which is not something we're currently designed or staffed for. We don't have aides or paraprofessionals, and none of us are trained to teach special education students. I've never been particularly interested in working with that population, so it makes sense for me to start looking elsewhere before my school wastes its money trying to train me to teach a population I don't really intend to teach. Unfortunately, English teachers are a dime a dozen, and ironically, it's a lot easier to get hired if you're SPED certified. Sigh.
5. Complete a Run Ruckus with aplomb - I'm doing the 4-mile Run Ruckus in mid-June 2013. It's a month after the marathon and a month before the wedding, which I hope is enough time on either end. I know it will take a few weeks to recover fully from the marathon, but the Ruckus is certainly a very different sort of physical stress, so I'm hoping that I won't still be a worn-out wreck from the marathon, assuming, of course, I get to the marathon without injury and finish without dying. Two pretty big assumptions. The Run Ruckus will be a big opportunity for me to claim some of the glory I had hoped to achieve during May's Run For Your Lives zombie 5k. As wonderful as it was to finish the 5k and to feel the accomplishment of doing something I had trained for (for, like, 6 months), the race was not the experience I had been hoping for - it was short on obstacles and long on trekking through really deep mud. Fewer than 20% of the finishers had any flags remaining by the end (and were therefore "alive"), which meant that there was NO chance of me surviving, which was kind of a bummer. The theoretically dangerous parts were really simple and brief, and the theoretically less dangerous parts were actually super scary because it turns out that traipsing through muddy, hilly woods isn't super safe. Because we did a later race time, the obstacles were generally busted and the ones at the end had lines, which was a big let-down. Nothing like freezing your ass off and waiting 100 yards from the finish line for an hour to really get your adrenaline up, eh? The Run Ruckus seems to be a much more obstacle-centric affair, and will hopefully be less goopy. It's New England, so who knows, but fingers crossed. I picked a much earlier heat time after the 3pm massacre at RFYL. In preparation for the Ruckus, I'll be working on agility, interval training, grip strength, and lots of upper body work. It would be nice to be able to do a chin-up.
6. Push myself to keep learning - Whether it's keeping up with/relearning some of my Spanish, finally getting behind the wheel of a car (the most terrifying thing on the entire planet, as far as I'm concerned), or getting versed enough in one or more sciences to get certified to teach them, I need to keep learning. I've been done with grad school for a year and it's time to spend some of my free evenings putting things into my brain instead of allowing images to gently caress my occipital lobe. I also need to be more aggressive about reading. I have a backlog of, no exaggeration, 75 or 100 books, fiction and non-fiction, just waiting to be read. Stuttering my way through them on the subway to/from work is all well and fine, but a book every 2-3 weeks isn't cutting it. Some of the most profound experiences I've had in the last year have been through reading non-fiction, so I need to make that a larger priority for me. My goal is to read 50 books this year, of any genre and length. I'd also like to keep track of what I've read and what my thoughts are as I finish them. This would mean less time spent surfing the couch with Dan (unless he wants to read instead of watch TV - ha!), but I think it would be good for me.
If being 29 is even close to as great as being 28 was, I've got quite a year ahead of me. This last year wasn't entirely without its challenges, but my personal growth was pretty badass, and it's amazing how great the average day feels when grad school is over. I intend to ride this post-grad-school wave for a lonnnnnng time. Here's hoping for a fun, better-all-the-time sort of year. Happy New Year, people.
Friday, December 28, 2012
The One Where Amber Talks (almost coherently) About Religion
With the Christmas season recently completed, God and Jesus and those fellas have been on some people's minds an awful lot lately. When word spread of the massacre in Newtown, many people turned to religion for comfort and to ask how something like that could happen. Prayers were said and vigils were held.
Then something else happened. Some of the people who turned to God for comfort then shifted their gaze. In sadness and anger, they wielded religion as a weapon. "If God were more present in our schools," they said, "things like this wouldn't happen." Shaking their heads, they mused, "this is what happens when you turn your back on God."
I got really, really angry when I read things like that. I am still angry thinking about it. I'm still not sure if I am truly able to put words to my feelings, but I'm going to try.
Passing judgment on others is not okay. Wrapped up in the sentiments I summarized above is the assumption that those who are not Christian must therefore be morally void or bad people. Is that really what these people believe? That there are those who are saved, the good people, and then those who are not, the bad people? I'm not a Biblical scholar nor am I a Christian, so I'll abstain from quoting religious texts with which I'm not really familiar, but my understanding has always been that Christianity is a religion of charity, love, and forgiveness. Maybe that's not so?
My other primary problem with the sentiments about God in schools is that, well, they're wrong. Factually. God wouldn't prevent people from shooting each other any more than he has prevented priests from molesting kids. A glib point, yes, but it holds water. Being Christian doesn't remove the existence of free will. People will do what they want to do, and while the pressures of religious doctrine might encourage certain behaviors, it's not a mathematical certainty. Think about the people who bomb abortion clinics - they actually believe they are doing God's will by murdering people. They don't see any problem with killing people to prevent the killing of (tiny) people...who, in fact, are also killed in the prevention killings. But those crazies are not the ones (as far as I know) who have been proclaiming with sorrow that God could have saved the children of Newtown. It's the normal people who aren't crazy. They really, truly believe that a Bible in every classroom and a prayer at the start of each day would somehow prevent things like this. I can't imagine a sadder, more confused line of logic.
Recently, a crazy person shot a bunch of firefighters in NYC. Are we really going to blame the godlessness of firehouses, now? Or perhaps we're going to accuse the neighborhood in which the man lived of not being holy enough? When we start blaming the victims or the community rather than the perpetrator, we absolve him of any wrongdoing. It is the same line of logic that argues a woman's skimpy outfit invited sexual assault. Even in less-charged circumstances, the same logic follows. If you hadn't left your purse open, your phone wouldn't have been stolen. If you had gotten that fancy security system, your break-in would have stopped at the front door. If you hadn't been walking in that bad neighborhood, you wouldn't have been mugged.
We've probably all thought those things. I am constantly reminding my students to keep their phones and bags on them and not to leave things on a table if they're leaving the room. It's sad, particularly because I teach in a tiny school where we call each other by first name and at least attempt to have a respectful, safe environment, but it's the reality. And yet, there is an important distinction that needs to be made here. If a student's phone is stolen after they left it on the table, it's not that student's fault. They might have been able to prevent the theft, yes, but it is the fault of the thief. Period.
If we blame the student, we remove personal responsibility from the thief, as if it is in the student's power to keep the phone safe but not in the thief's power to not steal a phone. Maybe this sort of victim-blaming mentality is a mechanism we use to make ourselves feel safer. If it's the victim's fault when something happens to them, then it was within the victim's power to prevent it. If it's in the victim's power to prevent bad things, then it's within my power to prevent bad things from happening to me. Hence, I am safe.
Is this really how we want our elementary school students to think? If they had just prayed harder, maybe a random person wouldn't have shot their friends, their teachers? If the teachers had just broken the law and forced religious teachings into the classroom, then the shooter would have skipped that room? If we blame the school for not being holy enough, we are automatically blaming the individuals within that school.
Think about who that really means. Teachers who lied to the shooter to protect their students only to be shot themselves. Staff who shielded students with their own bodies and were killed. The acts of courage and love performed that day should be beyond reproach. If I can break my own rule and quote some scripture: "Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends." (John 15:13) If a teacher performs an act of the greatest possible love, doesn't that mean that God is already in our schools? Doesn't that mean that He is already within those who love and care for others, those who would protect innocent children without hesitation?
I worry that the self-satisfied superiority expressed by those who blame secular education for the shooting means that those people do not see any other problems that need to be addressed. If the issue is the lack of God in schools, then there is no need to examine our gun laws, or the lack of availability of mental health services in this country, or the way news organizations celebritize mass shooters. That mindset makes me sad, and a little scared. There have been plenty of all-Christian-all-the-time communities throughout history, and none of those (as far as I know) were without problems. Putting a cross on every door and the Commandments in every main office of every school isn't the solution. But maybe if we all took some of that scripture, the bits about love and forgiveness and charity, and actually did what it said, we'd be in much better shape.
"If anyone says, 'I love God,' and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen. And this commandment we have from him: whoever loves God must also love his brother." (John 4:20-21)
Then something else happened. Some of the people who turned to God for comfort then shifted their gaze. In sadness and anger, they wielded religion as a weapon. "If God were more present in our schools," they said, "things like this wouldn't happen." Shaking their heads, they mused, "this is what happens when you turn your back on God."
I got really, really angry when I read things like that. I am still angry thinking about it. I'm still not sure if I am truly able to put words to my feelings, but I'm going to try.
Passing judgment on others is not okay. Wrapped up in the sentiments I summarized above is the assumption that those who are not Christian must therefore be morally void or bad people. Is that really what these people believe? That there are those who are saved, the good people, and then those who are not, the bad people? I'm not a Biblical scholar nor am I a Christian, so I'll abstain from quoting religious texts with which I'm not really familiar, but my understanding has always been that Christianity is a religion of charity, love, and forgiveness. Maybe that's not so?
My other primary problem with the sentiments about God in schools is that, well, they're wrong. Factually. God wouldn't prevent people from shooting each other any more than he has prevented priests from molesting kids. A glib point, yes, but it holds water. Being Christian doesn't remove the existence of free will. People will do what they want to do, and while the pressures of religious doctrine might encourage certain behaviors, it's not a mathematical certainty. Think about the people who bomb abortion clinics - they actually believe they are doing God's will by murdering people. They don't see any problem with killing people to prevent the killing of (tiny) people...who, in fact, are also killed in the prevention killings. But those crazies are not the ones (as far as I know) who have been proclaiming with sorrow that God could have saved the children of Newtown. It's the normal people who aren't crazy. They really, truly believe that a Bible in every classroom and a prayer at the start of each day would somehow prevent things like this. I can't imagine a sadder, more confused line of logic.
Recently, a crazy person shot a bunch of firefighters in NYC. Are we really going to blame the godlessness of firehouses, now? Or perhaps we're going to accuse the neighborhood in which the man lived of not being holy enough? When we start blaming the victims or the community rather than the perpetrator, we absolve him of any wrongdoing. It is the same line of logic that argues a woman's skimpy outfit invited sexual assault. Even in less-charged circumstances, the same logic follows. If you hadn't left your purse open, your phone wouldn't have been stolen. If you had gotten that fancy security system, your break-in would have stopped at the front door. If you hadn't been walking in that bad neighborhood, you wouldn't have been mugged.
We've probably all thought those things. I am constantly reminding my students to keep their phones and bags on them and not to leave things on a table if they're leaving the room. It's sad, particularly because I teach in a tiny school where we call each other by first name and at least attempt to have a respectful, safe environment, but it's the reality. And yet, there is an important distinction that needs to be made here. If a student's phone is stolen after they left it on the table, it's not that student's fault. They might have been able to prevent the theft, yes, but it is the fault of the thief. Period.
If we blame the student, we remove personal responsibility from the thief, as if it is in the student's power to keep the phone safe but not in the thief's power to not steal a phone. Maybe this sort of victim-blaming mentality is a mechanism we use to make ourselves feel safer. If it's the victim's fault when something happens to them, then it was within the victim's power to prevent it. If it's in the victim's power to prevent bad things, then it's within my power to prevent bad things from happening to me. Hence, I am safe.
Is this really how we want our elementary school students to think? If they had just prayed harder, maybe a random person wouldn't have shot their friends, their teachers? If the teachers had just broken the law and forced religious teachings into the classroom, then the shooter would have skipped that room? If we blame the school for not being holy enough, we are automatically blaming the individuals within that school.
Think about who that really means. Teachers who lied to the shooter to protect their students only to be shot themselves. Staff who shielded students with their own bodies and were killed. The acts of courage and love performed that day should be beyond reproach. If I can break my own rule and quote some scripture: "Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends." (John 15:13) If a teacher performs an act of the greatest possible love, doesn't that mean that God is already in our schools? Doesn't that mean that He is already within those who love and care for others, those who would protect innocent children without hesitation?
I worry that the self-satisfied superiority expressed by those who blame secular education for the shooting means that those people do not see any other problems that need to be addressed. If the issue is the lack of God in schools, then there is no need to examine our gun laws, or the lack of availability of mental health services in this country, or the way news organizations celebritize mass shooters. That mindset makes me sad, and a little scared. There have been plenty of all-Christian-all-the-time communities throughout history, and none of those (as far as I know) were without problems. Putting a cross on every door and the Commandments in every main office of every school isn't the solution. But maybe if we all took some of that scripture, the bits about love and forgiveness and charity, and actually did what it said, we'd be in much better shape.
"If anyone says, 'I love God,' and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen. And this commandment we have from him: whoever loves God must also love his brother." (John 4:20-21)
Monday, December 24, 2012
A Brief Commentary on the Concept of the "Friendzone"
[Spoiler alert: This post is more aggressively offensive than usual.]
I've spent the last few minutes reading the tumblr Nice Guys of OkCupid, which is amazing. The joke is essentially the same from post to post, but it's a funny one, and one I think needs to be made. The short version, for you non-click-through people, is that men on this particular dating website complain about how women don't want to date them because they're "too nice" but then post other things on the same website that reveal how awful they are as people. I'm sure plenty of people have plenty say about this, but before I get caught up in Christmas Eve gift anticipation and sugar overdoses, I'll post my 2¢ here. Sidenote, I'm pretty impressed with myself that I remembered the number pad alt code for the cent sign.
The problem with identifying as a nice guy: Here's the thing, fellas. YOU ARE SUPPOSED TO BE NICE. That is a basic human quality. It doesn't mean you have to be perfect, but rather that your intentions should be mostly good instead of mostly bad. You're allowed to make mistakes, to have flaws, but you should be a good person. Being nice is not something you get a fucking cookie for. It is a requirement for continued social interaction with anyone else who is also nice. Which, I'd like to think, covers most people. The guys who you claim are all assholes who get the girls? They're probably mostly nice, too. The problem is that they either made mistakes, or there was a fundamental disconnect in their relationships that caused one or both parties to be hurt. Sure, some of them are serial cheaters or just horrible people, but if you genuinely think that those qualities are what draw women to those men, you are crazypants. And yes, there are some qualities that sometimes get bundled with dickish behavior - for example, being forward, taking risks, that sort of thing - but if you are psychotic enough to think that most or even some women are actively attracted to men that exist solely to cause them pain, just do us all a favor and kill yourself.
And that whole nice thing that you're so goddamned proud of? That entitles you to nothing. You do not earn an Old Fashioned by pulling out a chair or holding a door. You don't get blowies just for paying attention to a girl's story for 10 solid minutes. And you sure as SHIT don't get laid because you bought dinner. Women are not automatically prostitutes, whether the currency is dollar bills or steak tips. If you assume that you are owed any sort of affection or sexual favors because you did something nice, then you don't understand what "nice" means. Seriously. Like, not at all. If you identify as a "nice guy" but you also get upset when a girl doesn't put out after you bought her dinner, you are retarded.
The reality of your situation: You probably are nice. I mean, I don't necessarily know that for sure, but if I'm assuming that most people are nice, there's a statistically significant chance that you are, in fact, nice. But, if you're nice, why aren't you dating whatever the 2012 equivalent of Carmen Electra is? Dan says I mean Kate Upton. So yeah, why aren't you dating Kate Upton? Well, a lot of fucking reasons that have very little to do with your fundamental niceness. Here are some possibilities:
But seriously fellas, turn your gaze inward. I'm not saying you need to be self-loathing or what have you, but rather that you should understand a simple concept: the common denominator in all of your failures with women is YOU. It's not that all women are the same. You are the same with all these women. I don't know exactly what your goddamned problem is, but rest assured that it is YOUR problem. If you're so angry about all these girls you love dating assholes over and over, never realizing that a great guy is right in front of them...well what does it then say about you that you keep pursuing these unavailable/uninterested women over and over again? Who are YOU ignoring, discarding, disregarding, or rejecting? What women would love the chance to dote on you if only you would ever take your head out of your ass and look at them? Well, maybe none. I don't really know. But seriously, stop playing the victim. It's depressing, unattractive, and ultimately sets you up to have an oppositional relationship with all women. Not exactly great for your romantic future. If you see women as obstacles to be overcome or territory to be taken, why don't you do us all a favor and wear a t-shirt that says "I have the mentality of a rapist" and save us all the trouble of identifying you at a party.
Ugh. Go fuck yourselves, you whiny pricks. Merry Christmas.
I've spent the last few minutes reading the tumblr Nice Guys of OkCupid, which is amazing. The joke is essentially the same from post to post, but it's a funny one, and one I think needs to be made. The short version, for you non-click-through people, is that men on this particular dating website complain about how women don't want to date them because they're "too nice" but then post other things on the same website that reveal how awful they are as people. I'm sure plenty of people have plenty say about this, but before I get caught up in Christmas Eve gift anticipation and sugar overdoses, I'll post my 2¢ here. Sidenote, I'm pretty impressed with myself that I remembered the number pad alt code for the cent sign.
The problem with identifying as a nice guy: Here's the thing, fellas. YOU ARE SUPPOSED TO BE NICE. That is a basic human quality. It doesn't mean you have to be perfect, but rather that your intentions should be mostly good instead of mostly bad. You're allowed to make mistakes, to have flaws, but you should be a good person. Being nice is not something you get a fucking cookie for. It is a requirement for continued social interaction with anyone else who is also nice. Which, I'd like to think, covers most people. The guys who you claim are all assholes who get the girls? They're probably mostly nice, too. The problem is that they either made mistakes, or there was a fundamental disconnect in their relationships that caused one or both parties to be hurt. Sure, some of them are serial cheaters or just horrible people, but if you genuinely think that those qualities are what draw women to those men, you are crazypants. And yes, there are some qualities that sometimes get bundled with dickish behavior - for example, being forward, taking risks, that sort of thing - but if you are psychotic enough to think that most or even some women are actively attracted to men that exist solely to cause them pain, just do us all a favor and kill yourself.
And that whole nice thing that you're so goddamned proud of? That entitles you to nothing. You do not earn an Old Fashioned by pulling out a chair or holding a door. You don't get blowies just for paying attention to a girl's story for 10 solid minutes. And you sure as SHIT don't get laid because you bought dinner. Women are not automatically prostitutes, whether the currency is dollar bills or steak tips. If you assume that you are owed any sort of affection or sexual favors because you did something nice, then you don't understand what "nice" means. Seriously. Like, not at all. If you identify as a "nice guy" but you also get upset when a girl doesn't put out after you bought her dinner, you are retarded.
The reality of your situation: You probably are nice. I mean, I don't necessarily know that for sure, but if I'm assuming that most people are nice, there's a statistically significant chance that you are, in fact, nice. But, if you're nice, why aren't you dating whatever the 2012 equivalent of Carmen Electra is? Dan says I mean Kate Upton. So yeah, why aren't you dating Kate Upton? Well, a lot of fucking reasons that have very little to do with your fundamental niceness. Here are some possibilities:
- You are unattractive. This could be a busted face, a terrible body, awful hair, or just something gross about you. Again, I don't know you. It might be fixable, it might not.
- You are depressing as FUCK. People who mope around all day are not fun to be around. Who wants to date somebody like that?
- You whine like a little bitch. (See previous point.)
- You have no idea how to interact with people, especially women to whom you are attracted.
- You keep aiming too high. Realistically assess the women you're pursuing. Are you even close to their level? Never go more than 2 above your own rating. Realistically I'm a 5, maybe a 6 provided I'm wearing a push-up bra. I'm not out there chasing 9s and then getting pissy when they choose to date other 9s.
- Your priorities make no sense and you take good things for granted. If a girl puts you in the "friendzone", either value her friendship for what it is and move on or tell her to go fuck herself. If you wait around for her to realize why you're awesome, you're not listening, dumbass. SHE SAID NO. If you're not willing to listen to her extremely clear fucking signals that you're so mad about, what makes you think you'd be a suitable boyfriend? (Also, this.)
- You are not as nice as you think you are. Again, this is fodder for the Nice Guys of OkCupid tumblr, so I don't need to go there.
But seriously fellas, turn your gaze inward. I'm not saying you need to be self-loathing or what have you, but rather that you should understand a simple concept: the common denominator in all of your failures with women is YOU. It's not that all women are the same. You are the same with all these women. I don't know exactly what your goddamned problem is, but rest assured that it is YOUR problem. If you're so angry about all these girls you love dating assholes over and over, never realizing that a great guy is right in front of them...well what does it then say about you that you keep pursuing these unavailable/uninterested women over and over again? Who are YOU ignoring, discarding, disregarding, or rejecting? What women would love the chance to dote on you if only you would ever take your head out of your ass and look at them? Well, maybe none. I don't really know. But seriously, stop playing the victim. It's depressing, unattractive, and ultimately sets you up to have an oppositional relationship with all women. Not exactly great for your romantic future. If you see women as obstacles to be overcome or territory to be taken, why don't you do us all a favor and wear a t-shirt that says "I have the mentality of a rapist" and save us all the trouble of identifying you at a party.
Ugh. Go fuck yourselves, you whiny pricks. Merry Christmas.
Tuesday, December 04, 2012
Diary of a Fat Girl - Episode 21: Yikes
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| Summer 2011 |
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| Graduation Up-All-Night 2002 |
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| Move-Out Day 2003 |
My freshman year of college proved somewhat counter to the general expectation. By the end of the year, I ended up losing probably 10 pounds, though I can't remember how much I weighed at any given point during that time. I hated most of the food served in the dining halls and had yet to discover the glory of the student union food court and the fried bonanza known as "Late Night" that began after dinner service ended. My roommate (pictured) and I even occasionally woke up early to haul our asses all the way across campus to exercise at the tiny gym. Granted, we didn't know any better and just spent a half hour recumbent cycling before walking home, but it was better than the zero exercising we did most of the time. Freshman year ended up being the last time I saw a weight in the almost-healthy range for a while.
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| End of the School Year 2004 |
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| Iftar (Dinner during Ramadan) 2005 |
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| Summer Job Faux Prom 2006 |
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| Brother's Wedding 2007 |
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| Wedding of Aforementioned Roommate 2008 |
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| Alzheimer's Walk 2009 |
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| Halloween 2010 |
That gets us back to the summer of 2011 and my ecstatic fucking ice cream face. I had taught for five years, finished the coursework for a masters degree, bought a goddamned condo (well, jointly), and formed a stable and healthy relationship with a guy who liked to play video games as much as I like to watch (currently he's embarrassing his AI opponents in Saints Row: The Third). Basically, I had all my shit sorted out, my stress post-grad-school was dropping like a stone, and I became acutely aware of how fucking miserable my weight and my body were making me. I felt awkward and lumbering, weak, swollen...I wouldn't even fully realize how yucky I felt until the weight started coming off.
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| Post-Zombie 5k May 2012 |
I began to see my relationship with food and my body as primarily psychological in nature rather than physical/practical. I still eat shitty food pretty regularly. Sometimes I go over my calories for the day. But I have been losing weight for 18 months and I'm not looking back. I do my best not to let the stalls and plateaus affect me, because I know that maintenance, at least for me, is its own kind of progress, and that I am doing good work. Perfection is not the goal; improvement is.
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| July 2012 |
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| August 2012 |
But I think it's good to be scared. It keeps me focused and accountable. Having positive things to head toward is wonderful, and that's the stuff that keeps me motivated day in and day out. But having negative things to run away from has its own benefits. If I'm not driven to go for a run because of the wonderful way I'll feel afterward, maybe I'll get my ass out on the road because if I don't, I'll blow up like a puffer fish and have to go buy all my own clothing back from the Good Will down the street. It might be an exaggeration, but if I'm not scared, it means I'm complacent, or worse - indifferent. I won't let that happen. I look and feel too awesome to let it get like that.
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| November 2012 |
Thursday, September 27, 2012
Why I Will Not Pretend to Mourn John Silber
John Silber died today. He was the President of Boston University, my alma mater, for 25 years, and Chancellor of BU for the better part of the decade after. It was during my time as an undergrad at BU that he retired from his Chancellor's post and became President Emeritus, which in his case meant that he officially retired but always seemed to be around. Silber was and continues to be a legend at the university, feared by many, respected by most, known by all. Sherborn Street, the road connecting Commonwealth Avenue to my former street, Bay State Road, was officially renamed Silber Way in 2008.
When I was a student at BU, I despised John Silber. I considered some of his policies, notably the guest policy, to be backward and oppressive. Under the Silber guest policy, residents who had guests would either need to kick said guests out at 8pm or apply for an overnight pass (limited in number per semester). For residents who had guests of the opposite gender, a resident of the same gender as the guest would need to co-sign for the guest and take responsibility for that guest. For example, a female student with a male guest would need a male resident to sign off on the guest. Silber repeatedly defended the gender aspect of the guest policy, asserting that he would not relax the rules in order to permit students to have "weekend love nests" in their residences. I got the gentlest version of these draconian policies because I lived in a small brownstone with no security desk or university scrutiny. Even so, I was delighted to hear that the policy was changed in 2007. It did not bother me that the former policy affected me so much - in fact, it essentially did not - rather, I simply found it to be morally wrong.
But the real problem with the old guest policy, and my real problem with John Silber, is the rigid adherence to "traditional values". Despite having run as a Democrat in the 1990 gubernatorial election (and losing, partly because he always seemed angry, and alienated many liberal voters with his conservative rhetoric), Silber would be right at home with many Republicans today, particularly on social issues. In the Fall of 2002, as I took my first classes at Boston University and met many of my future best friends for the first time, John Silber disbanded Boston University Academy's gay-straight alliance. Claiming that the high school group was not, in fact, a support and discussion group for LGBTQ students and their allies, Silber charged that they were recruiting brand new gays with "homosexual militancy." Arguing that the school did not intend to provide "sex ed" in the form of a GSA, Silber shut the group down to put an end to the "evangelism" that was taking place. I cannot speak to the mission or actions of the BUA GSA, but I can say that the GSA in my high school was a great place to feel safe, talk about school, and eat bagels. I don't ever remember anyone trying to talk me out of liking boys.
What I find so disturbing about John Silber and his stances on social issues are his arrogance and condescension. Although I cannot claim to have read his collected works or attended many of his speeches, I have read and heard enough to know that his opinions are set in stone. He does not fare well in gray areas with wiggle room - things are or they are not, and decisions should be made accordingly (it is no surprise that Silber studied and followed the writings of Emmanuel Kant, a philosopher who valued logic above all else). In fact, when Silber put his name in the running for Superintendent of Boston Public Schools, Menino was concerned that Silber would not be a good fit for the job because of his unwillingness to work in a nuanced, delicate, and careful way. There were two categories, as far as John Silber was concerned: Silber's thoughts and all of the incorrect opinions. While many praised John Silber for his fortitude and firm stances on issues about which he has strong feelings, it is not hard to imagine how that quality could alienate some, which many blame for BU's embarrassingly low alumni giving rate during Silber's tenure at the university. As a side note, BU's alumni giving rate has been rising in recent years and is now at 12%, counter to the pressures of the current economy.
I'm sure that as the news of Silber's passing spreads, my fellow alumni will express a variety of opinions about the man and his legacy. There is no doubt that our experiences at Boston University were deeply colored by Silber's policies and presence. I know that it's frowned upon to speak ill of the dead, but I cannot and will not wax mournful about a man who I found to be so personally abhorrent. Although the news stories I have read have at least touched upon the more controversial and memorable aspects of Silber's career, the tone is, of course, overwhelmingly positive, as is required of any remembrances of someone who is not, say, a terrorist or mass murderer. Silber made many positive changes at BU, and I agree with his choice to emphasize teacher quality rather than simply cultivate a staff of tenured professors who no longer have to try. He brought in Elie Wiesel after all, so he isn't all bad. But I will not pretend that I am sad about his passing, because beneath his rhetoric and philosophical positions, there was a bedrock of intolerance and disdain. The world could do with a little bit less of that.
When I was a student at BU, I despised John Silber. I considered some of his policies, notably the guest policy, to be backward and oppressive. Under the Silber guest policy, residents who had guests would either need to kick said guests out at 8pm or apply for an overnight pass (limited in number per semester). For residents who had guests of the opposite gender, a resident of the same gender as the guest would need to co-sign for the guest and take responsibility for that guest. For example, a female student with a male guest would need a male resident to sign off on the guest. Silber repeatedly defended the gender aspect of the guest policy, asserting that he would not relax the rules in order to permit students to have "weekend love nests" in their residences. I got the gentlest version of these draconian policies because I lived in a small brownstone with no security desk or university scrutiny. Even so, I was delighted to hear that the policy was changed in 2007. It did not bother me that the former policy affected me so much - in fact, it essentially did not - rather, I simply found it to be morally wrong.
But the real problem with the old guest policy, and my real problem with John Silber, is the rigid adherence to "traditional values". Despite having run as a Democrat in the 1990 gubernatorial election (and losing, partly because he always seemed angry, and alienated many liberal voters with his conservative rhetoric), Silber would be right at home with many Republicans today, particularly on social issues. In the Fall of 2002, as I took my first classes at Boston University and met many of my future best friends for the first time, John Silber disbanded Boston University Academy's gay-straight alliance. Claiming that the high school group was not, in fact, a support and discussion group for LGBTQ students and their allies, Silber charged that they were recruiting brand new gays with "homosexual militancy." Arguing that the school did not intend to provide "sex ed" in the form of a GSA, Silber shut the group down to put an end to the "evangelism" that was taking place. I cannot speak to the mission or actions of the BUA GSA, but I can say that the GSA in my high school was a great place to feel safe, talk about school, and eat bagels. I don't ever remember anyone trying to talk me out of liking boys.
What I find so disturbing about John Silber and his stances on social issues are his arrogance and condescension. Although I cannot claim to have read his collected works or attended many of his speeches, I have read and heard enough to know that his opinions are set in stone. He does not fare well in gray areas with wiggle room - things are or they are not, and decisions should be made accordingly (it is no surprise that Silber studied and followed the writings of Emmanuel Kant, a philosopher who valued logic above all else). In fact, when Silber put his name in the running for Superintendent of Boston Public Schools, Menino was concerned that Silber would not be a good fit for the job because of his unwillingness to work in a nuanced, delicate, and careful way. There were two categories, as far as John Silber was concerned: Silber's thoughts and all of the incorrect opinions. While many praised John Silber for his fortitude and firm stances on issues about which he has strong feelings, it is not hard to imagine how that quality could alienate some, which many blame for BU's embarrassingly low alumni giving rate during Silber's tenure at the university. As a side note, BU's alumni giving rate has been rising in recent years and is now at 12%, counter to the pressures of the current economy.
I'm sure that as the news of Silber's passing spreads, my fellow alumni will express a variety of opinions about the man and his legacy. There is no doubt that our experiences at Boston University were deeply colored by Silber's policies and presence. I know that it's frowned upon to speak ill of the dead, but I cannot and will not wax mournful about a man who I found to be so personally abhorrent. Although the news stories I have read have at least touched upon the more controversial and memorable aspects of Silber's career, the tone is, of course, overwhelmingly positive, as is required of any remembrances of someone who is not, say, a terrorist or mass murderer. Silber made many positive changes at BU, and I agree with his choice to emphasize teacher quality rather than simply cultivate a staff of tenured professors who no longer have to try. He brought in Elie Wiesel after all, so he isn't all bad. But I will not pretend that I am sad about his passing, because beneath his rhetoric and philosophical positions, there was a bedrock of intolerance and disdain. The world could do with a little bit less of that.
Thursday, July 19, 2012
Diary of a Fat Girl - Episode 20: The Year in Fat
I'm sitting out on the back porch, sipping my Pepsi Max and enjoying the first non-deathly-hot-and-humid day in probably a week. I've been empaneled on a jury for the last three days and it's getting exhausting - it's like being in a very, very long grad school class where at the end, instead of writing a paper, you have to decide whether or not someone goes to jail. The weight of the responsibility and the absolutely horrifying details of the case have been wearing me down. It is part of the reason that this post is a day late. However, as I have learned over the past year, you gotta let a lotta shit go. No biggie. Woooooosah.
Upon re-reading my very first Diary of a Fat girl post, I realized that the introspective and conversational tone has leeched out of my more recent entries. I could try systematically to diagnose that problem, but I think it's probably just that there have been no major things going on with my fitness/weight loss, and it's become pretty well incorporated into my life so as to become far less noteworthy. To avoid such a fate here, however, I'm going to try something new.
At this point, you have a lot on your mind. Thankfully, you did a smart thing and wrote some of that shit down, which was pretty helpful. I don't know if you can tell yet, but it really did make a big difference to start writing about all the emotional, social, and psychological complexities involved in trying to lose weight. Keep it up, and stay honest.
In a few months, you're going to join a website called Fitocracy. No, don't join now; what did I just say? Anyway, this site is pretty neat. The "exercise is a video game" element is cool, of course, but really what you're going to find valuable is the education and the community. Most of the people there are super nice and supportive, and also have really good advice. You'll have a lot of questions that feel like stupid questions, but the answers are waiting for you there, and no one will poke fun at you for asking. Oh, and don't forget to follow Niobe back when she follows you. I know you don't know her yet, but trust me, she's amazing and also posts really hot pictures of herself. So...twofer.
There are some caveats to this whole Online Fitness Community thing, though. You know how the internet tends to make totally normal people into assholes? Well, even though I just said that most people on Fitocracy aren't dicks, it only takes a few to ruin it for everyone. There will be petty arguments, judgmental douchebags, and lots and lots of elitist posturing. People will make fun of ignorant individuals (many of whom fit into categories like curl bros and cardio bunnies) for being stupid, without seeming to recognize that those people are a) earlier versions of the cool people on the website who just haven't figured their shit out yet and b) the ones who need the most help and support, not derision and dismissal. You will even laugh at, take part in, and initiate some of these fun-pokings. It's probably because you feel super excited to know all the things you know now, and can't help but get elitist about it. But knock it off. It's not cool and it doesn't make you cooler to do it.
Also, a bit of education advice: don't stop learning. Every few months you're going to feel like, "I just learned and incorporated the thing I was missing. Now I have figured things out. I know things now. I have completed my learning." Not only is this just stupid, but it also makes you slower to realize when you're starting to learn new things that you should pay attention to right away. For example, right now you basically just do Turbo Jam for exercise, plus walking and sometimes a bit of elliptical-ing. There's nothing wrong with any of those things. In fact, Turbo Jam still kicks my ass, and I've been doing it for a year longer than you. Well, not like a consistent year, but you get it. Anyway, right now you think that you have this fitness thing sort of cornered. Burn calories however you can, the end.
Well, that's not the worst way of looking at things, but you're excluding a lot of really fun, challenging, satisfying, and productive exercise. Guess what? When you're me, you'll be able to run a 5k no problem. I shit you not! I'm not saying that we become particularly speedy - in fact, our normal running speed clocks in around a very brisk walk - but we run now. So that's kind of awesome, right? But right now, I know you're thinking that running is fucking impossible and that just hoofing it to catch the T is beyond what can reasonably be asked of a person. But that's before Couch-to-5k. Trust me. You won't start it until after the New Year, but when you do, it's going to blow your socks off. Oh, and don't worry, the winter is going to be super mild. That doesn't create a paradox if I tell you that shit, right? Wait, am I my own grandfather now? I don't really understand time travel.
So I guess what I'm saying is that you have to stay open to new things. I know that we don't like new things. New things are terrible. BUT in this case especially, new things are awesome and we have to try them. When you join Fitocracy and notice that everyone gets these crazy high point totals for lifting weights, you'll see what I mean. The machines over by the cardio room are NOT the same as free weights. I'm not going to bother schooling you now because you'll figure this all out (with a lot of help) later, but I'm just saying...keep your mouth shut 90% of the time and your eyes/ears open 100% of the time.
Unsurprisingly, I'm sure you realize by now, the whole exercise component of this is not the hard part. Not by a long shot. The fucking food thing is SUPER annoying. Keeping track of food isn't really a problem, necessarily. Soon Dan will get a food scale and you can go very OCD very quickly. It'll help. But trying to limit calories all the time can be a bitch, and you'll have to get used to what it feels like to be hungry. Here's the cool part though. You know how when you get hungry kind of suddenly, you can sometimes get light-headed and have a headache and get suuuuuuper pissy? Well, when you stop eating shitty food for every meal and drinking full-calorie soda like it's a life-giving substance, that doesn't happen anymore. Like, almost ever. It's not something you'll notice right away (sort of like not being able to prove a negative), but eventually you'll realize that you just get hungry like a normal person, and nothing worse ever comes of it. I think they call that "not being pre-diabetic."
But with all the up-sides to having more of a handle on the food situation, the problem is that you have to keep a handle on the food situation all the time. The habits that you're worried about, where you eat terrible food in response to pretty much every emotional state and situation possible, those don't really go away. I mean, I can't speak for July 2013 Amber (I suspect that Amber will be very busy, but I don't want to ruin the surprise, so I'll just say that good things are afoot), but July 2012 Amber still wants to eat chocolate and chips and fried food when things are rough, or when things are great, or when things are boring. And as you know, those three states cover pretty much all the time. So the battle to maintain good/better habits is something that's just part of our reality matrix now. No use kvetching about it. Just do the work.
And you do have to work for everything you want. I know that right now, you're looking at skinny chicks on the subway or hipsters strolling Harvard Ave in the jeans that just seem to get skinnier by the day, and you're thinking, "why do I have to bust my ass to weigh 190, but those fucking shitbags get to be skinny while eating six McDonald's cheeseburgers and drinking fucking Starbucks 900-calorie frappuccinos all goddamned day?" First of all, calm the fuck down. There is no reason to get that mad. Second, those people aren't actually healthy. To your untrained eye, they certainly look healthy, and most of them would probably pass a standard medical exam with flying colors. But they're not fit. The double-zero girls would break in half if they tried to deadlift their own bodyweight, something you will accomplish next year. The guys are just as weak. Watch them run for the train or bus next time. They huff and puff just as hard as you. Having less mass means fuck-all. Oh, and they're just as unhappy with their bodies as you are with yours.
This also dovetails rather well into a particularly important life lesson, and I'd love to save you some grief by imparting it to you now. It's time to stop giving a fuck about what other people say and do. I'm not saying you should go live in a cave and sever all social ties, and I'm not saying you should disregard the actions, words, and feelings of your loved ones. I know it's been a whole year but I'm not a monster, geez. What I am saying is that your bitterness about others' metabolism isn't helping anyone. Neither are your judgments of others' habits and workouts, your butthurt when people online shit all over something you like (or were taught to do, or whatever), or your analysis of the way people talk to you about your weight loss and fitness schtick. Right now, you give a LOT of fucks about that kind of thing, and it's a waste of time and energy. It's a tricky game, because I just finished telling you to learn from people and keep your eyes/ears open, but life ain't black and white, baby. Oh, and don't call people "bby" on Fitocracy - it's probably a Reddit thing that you'll never understand, but regardless of the origin, it's not part of your internet thing and there's no reason to appropriate it. There is unbelievably immense passive pressure to conform on that website, and the last thing you need to do is start omitting an A because someone else did. Everyone will still like you, it's okay.
One of the most important things you'll learn is that there are a lot of ways to do this right. Everyone has their own "this is the right way" spiel to give, but in all honesty, fuck that. If something helps and doesn't hurt, then it's correct. That's a highly subjective and personal assessment, so things that work for you might not work for other people, and vice versa, but basically, don't start regretting shit like, "oh, why didn't I start lifting weights six months ago?" or whatever. You will lose a bunch of weight doing mostly in-home cardio, and then you'll keep losing weight when you add a shitload of weight training and running. You'll change your calorie goals several times, going as low as 1200 and as high as 1800, and there are lots of days you go way over. None of those modes of operation are The Right Way, per sé. All of it gives you results that make you happy and healthy. The whole year in front of you is full of teh win, and the ways in which you choose to execute that victory are all fine. Don't start ranking your shit, like "oh, I am worth more today because I touched a barbell but yesterday I only ran so I wasn't worth as much." All the shit you're doing is improving from where you used to be, so don't obsess over become more correct, more efficient, more acceptable to some unknown third party. Somewhere behind all the lazy/indifferent/understanding/IDGAF in you, there's a perfectionist streak that gets really upset when something turns out to be less effective than you thought or when you feel you've wasted time/effort/whatever. Striving for your best is great, but there's no use getting upset about shit you can't change. Use your energy for the future (hey, that's me!) and not for the past.
Oh, and with your squats, break from the hip first, not the knees. That's half the reason you're so fucking unstable, and it takes you like 10 months to figure it out. Flexibility couldn't hurt either.
Lots of love,
Future You
Upon re-reading my very first Diary of a Fat girl post, I realized that the introspective and conversational tone has leeched out of my more recent entries. I could try systematically to diagnose that problem, but I think it's probably just that there have been no major things going on with my fitness/weight loss, and it's become pretty well incorporated into my life so as to become far less noteworthy. To avoid such a fate here, however, I'm going to try something new.
Dear July 2011 Amber,
Hey, it's me, Future You. As much as I would love to spend time telling you winning sports bets to make and shit like it's Back to the Future Part 2, I'm going to do my favorite thing - talk about me. Er, you. Or, uh, us. Yeah, us.At this point, you have a lot on your mind. Thankfully, you did a smart thing and wrote some of that shit down, which was pretty helpful. I don't know if you can tell yet, but it really did make a big difference to start writing about all the emotional, social, and psychological complexities involved in trying to lose weight. Keep it up, and stay honest.
In a few months, you're going to join a website called Fitocracy. No, don't join now; what did I just say? Anyway, this site is pretty neat. The "exercise is a video game" element is cool, of course, but really what you're going to find valuable is the education and the community. Most of the people there are super nice and supportive, and also have really good advice. You'll have a lot of questions that feel like stupid questions, but the answers are waiting for you there, and no one will poke fun at you for asking. Oh, and don't forget to follow Niobe back when she follows you. I know you don't know her yet, but trust me, she's amazing and also posts really hot pictures of herself. So...twofer.
There are some caveats to this whole Online Fitness Community thing, though. You know how the internet tends to make totally normal people into assholes? Well, even though I just said that most people on Fitocracy aren't dicks, it only takes a few to ruin it for everyone. There will be petty arguments, judgmental douchebags, and lots and lots of elitist posturing. People will make fun of ignorant individuals (many of whom fit into categories like curl bros and cardio bunnies) for being stupid, without seeming to recognize that those people are a) earlier versions of the cool people on the website who just haven't figured their shit out yet and b) the ones who need the most help and support, not derision and dismissal. You will even laugh at, take part in, and initiate some of these fun-pokings. It's probably because you feel super excited to know all the things you know now, and can't help but get elitist about it. But knock it off. It's not cool and it doesn't make you cooler to do it.
Also, a bit of education advice: don't stop learning. Every few months you're going to feel like, "I just learned and incorporated the thing I was missing. Now I have figured things out. I know things now. I have completed my learning." Not only is this just stupid, but it also makes you slower to realize when you're starting to learn new things that you should pay attention to right away. For example, right now you basically just do Turbo Jam for exercise, plus walking and sometimes a bit of elliptical-ing. There's nothing wrong with any of those things. In fact, Turbo Jam still kicks my ass, and I've been doing it for a year longer than you. Well, not like a consistent year, but you get it. Anyway, right now you think that you have this fitness thing sort of cornered. Burn calories however you can, the end.
Well, that's not the worst way of looking at things, but you're excluding a lot of really fun, challenging, satisfying, and productive exercise. Guess what? When you're me, you'll be able to run a 5k no problem. I shit you not! I'm not saying that we become particularly speedy - in fact, our normal running speed clocks in around a very brisk walk - but we run now. So that's kind of awesome, right? But right now, I know you're thinking that running is fucking impossible and that just hoofing it to catch the T is beyond what can reasonably be asked of a person. But that's before Couch-to-5k. Trust me. You won't start it until after the New Year, but when you do, it's going to blow your socks off. Oh, and don't worry, the winter is going to be super mild. That doesn't create a paradox if I tell you that shit, right? Wait, am I my own grandfather now? I don't really understand time travel.
So I guess what I'm saying is that you have to stay open to new things. I know that we don't like new things. New things are terrible. BUT in this case especially, new things are awesome and we have to try them. When you join Fitocracy and notice that everyone gets these crazy high point totals for lifting weights, you'll see what I mean. The machines over by the cardio room are NOT the same as free weights. I'm not going to bother schooling you now because you'll figure this all out (with a lot of help) later, but I'm just saying...keep your mouth shut 90% of the time and your eyes/ears open 100% of the time.
Unsurprisingly, I'm sure you realize by now, the whole exercise component of this is not the hard part. Not by a long shot. The fucking food thing is SUPER annoying. Keeping track of food isn't really a problem, necessarily. Soon Dan will get a food scale and you can go very OCD very quickly. It'll help. But trying to limit calories all the time can be a bitch, and you'll have to get used to what it feels like to be hungry. Here's the cool part though. You know how when you get hungry kind of suddenly, you can sometimes get light-headed and have a headache and get suuuuuuper pissy? Well, when you stop eating shitty food for every meal and drinking full-calorie soda like it's a life-giving substance, that doesn't happen anymore. Like, almost ever. It's not something you'll notice right away (sort of like not being able to prove a negative), but eventually you'll realize that you just get hungry like a normal person, and nothing worse ever comes of it. I think they call that "not being pre-diabetic."
But with all the up-sides to having more of a handle on the food situation, the problem is that you have to keep a handle on the food situation all the time. The habits that you're worried about, where you eat terrible food in response to pretty much every emotional state and situation possible, those don't really go away. I mean, I can't speak for July 2013 Amber (I suspect that Amber will be very busy, but I don't want to ruin the surprise, so I'll just say that good things are afoot), but July 2012 Amber still wants to eat chocolate and chips and fried food when things are rough, or when things are great, or when things are boring. And as you know, those three states cover pretty much all the time. So the battle to maintain good/better habits is something that's just part of our reality matrix now. No use kvetching about it. Just do the work.
And you do have to work for everything you want. I know that right now, you're looking at skinny chicks on the subway or hipsters strolling Harvard Ave in the jeans that just seem to get skinnier by the day, and you're thinking, "why do I have to bust my ass to weigh 190, but those fucking shitbags get to be skinny while eating six McDonald's cheeseburgers and drinking fucking Starbucks 900-calorie frappuccinos all goddamned day?" First of all, calm the fuck down. There is no reason to get that mad. Second, those people aren't actually healthy. To your untrained eye, they certainly look healthy, and most of them would probably pass a standard medical exam with flying colors. But they're not fit. The double-zero girls would break in half if they tried to deadlift their own bodyweight, something you will accomplish next year. The guys are just as weak. Watch them run for the train or bus next time. They huff and puff just as hard as you. Having less mass means fuck-all. Oh, and they're just as unhappy with their bodies as you are with yours.
This also dovetails rather well into a particularly important life lesson, and I'd love to save you some grief by imparting it to you now. It's time to stop giving a fuck about what other people say and do. I'm not saying you should go live in a cave and sever all social ties, and I'm not saying you should disregard the actions, words, and feelings of your loved ones. I know it's been a whole year but I'm not a monster, geez. What I am saying is that your bitterness about others' metabolism isn't helping anyone. Neither are your judgments of others' habits and workouts, your butthurt when people online shit all over something you like (or were taught to do, or whatever), or your analysis of the way people talk to you about your weight loss and fitness schtick. Right now, you give a LOT of fucks about that kind of thing, and it's a waste of time and energy. It's a tricky game, because I just finished telling you to learn from people and keep your eyes/ears open, but life ain't black and white, baby. Oh, and don't call people "bby" on Fitocracy - it's probably a Reddit thing that you'll never understand, but regardless of the origin, it's not part of your internet thing and there's no reason to appropriate it. There is unbelievably immense passive pressure to conform on that website, and the last thing you need to do is start omitting an A because someone else did. Everyone will still like you, it's okay.
One of the most important things you'll learn is that there are a lot of ways to do this right. Everyone has their own "this is the right way" spiel to give, but in all honesty, fuck that. If something helps and doesn't hurt, then it's correct. That's a highly subjective and personal assessment, so things that work for you might not work for other people, and vice versa, but basically, don't start regretting shit like, "oh, why didn't I start lifting weights six months ago?" or whatever. You will lose a bunch of weight doing mostly in-home cardio, and then you'll keep losing weight when you add a shitload of weight training and running. You'll change your calorie goals several times, going as low as 1200 and as high as 1800, and there are lots of days you go way over. None of those modes of operation are The Right Way, per sé. All of it gives you results that make you happy and healthy. The whole year in front of you is full of teh win, and the ways in which you choose to execute that victory are all fine. Don't start ranking your shit, like "oh, I am worth more today because I touched a barbell but yesterday I only ran so I wasn't worth as much." All the shit you're doing is improving from where you used to be, so don't obsess over become more correct, more efficient, more acceptable to some unknown third party. Somewhere behind all the lazy/indifferent/understanding/IDGAF in you, there's a perfectionist streak that gets really upset when something turns out to be less effective than you thought or when you feel you've wasted time/effort/whatever. Striving for your best is great, but there's no use getting upset about shit you can't change. Use your energy for the future (hey, that's me!) and not for the past.
Oh, and with your squats, break from the hip first, not the knees. That's half the reason you're so fucking unstable, and it takes you like 10 months to figure it out. Flexibility couldn't hurt either.
Lots of love,
Future You
Tuesday, July 17, 2012
Diary of a Fat Girl - Episode 19: On Eating More, Branching Out, and Hitting a Benchmark
This part was written in June:
I've started writing this entry a few times in the last couple of weeks, more from a place of obligation than inspiration, if I'm being honest. A few important fitness/health things have occurred in recent weeks, though the writing content associated with them is probably a collective paragraph (though let's be real - I'll probably talk your ear off about them). Things have been pleasant and calm on the home front. Dan's job keeps him pretty well exhausted most of the time, with on-call weeks and late work nights and long commutes, but it pays well and he enjoys the challenge. My job is in the strange waking dream state that is post-senior/pre-summer June; because my program is so tiny, everyone takes final exams at the same time, and then seniors leave. The few weeks after that are still a part of fourth term and count for grades, but the underclassmen who remain are already in summer mode. This year, a particularly virulent strain of this disease has spread to the staff as well, and we're all silently wondering, "why am I still here?" It's hard to blame the kids for feeling unmotivated and unfocused when we're having the same issues.
...Which is directly related to the next piece of news: I got an iPad. And it is awesome. Now, I can't really speak to the incredible capabilities of the iPad because I've been using it almost exclusively to play Plague Inc., a 99¢ game that has consumed nearly every waking moment of my life for the last week. It's a strategy game in which you play as a disease (or as God, depending on how you look at it) with the goal of infecting and killing every last human on Earth. With seven different pathogens (from bacteria to nano-viruses to prions, et al) and three difficulty levels, the game has more depth than I would expect for something that is seemingly so straightforward. It took me a few days to really nail my strategy down, but I beat the last remaining level on "brutal" difficulty this morning on the train, which unlocked three cheat-filled bonus levels. So I've got my afternoon planned out. It's not like I have grading or planning to do...sigh.
The boredom is sort of pleasant, however. Normally I'm a frantic mess this time of year, trying to finish projects for my second job (writing science workbooks) that are generally sent to the printer at the end of June or early July. Although that job still exists, the amount and type of work have changed, leaving me with a smaller future paycheck but also a calm end to the school year for the first time ever. In the evenings, I spend my time couch-surfing, web-surfing, and pandemic-modeling. I have an abundance of free time, something I value extremely highly on the other side of grad school, and I'm not particularly eager to give it up. I did take a summer job "teaching" summer school (in quotes because the kids are doing independent online courses and I'm a glorified lab monitor), but it's only 20 hours a week and there are two weeks off on either end. I suspect that the iPad, or at the very least, several novels, will get plenty of use during that time.
That all being said, I do have a twinge of guilt over the free time because I've been using even less of it for fitness work, rather than using more of it. It's only been about two weeks of slacking off, but it coincides with my adoption of a new lifting program, the parameters of which have me doing less work than I was doing in the first place. So all told, I'm doing less each time I exercise and I'm exercising less often. Not exactly the change I was going for. The program I'm doing is from the book New Rules of Lifting for Women, something that sat in my Amazon shopping cart for weeks on end before I finally purchased it last month. The book itself is a quick read (I finished it in about a day), but it's full of comprehensive info regarding nutrition, exercise guidelines/basics, and specific training schedules for lifting. The routines are challenging and designed to avoid classic over-training (something I don't think I was guilty of, but I'm trusting the program right now and seeing where it takes me). The Phase 1 exercises are mostly familiar (deadlifts, squats, lunges, lat pulldowns, cable rows, OHPs, etc.) with a few new additions (stability ball jackknifes). I did switch from doing kneeling push-ups (aka girl push-ups) to incline push-ups using the smith machine, which were more challenging but also more doable, if that makes any sense. My ROM is much better on the incline push-ups and I am able to do enough reps to be sore the next day; I'm hoping this will lead me to doing regular push-ups and will also improve my bench numbers.
One aspect of the NROLFW program is eating more calories. Up until recently, I've been eating between 1200 and 1400 calories depending on the day (on days when I burn a lot, I eat more), which makes for a deficit of about 500 calories a day, suggesting weight loss of a pound a week. I've gotten used to that level of eating, and I also got used to feeling hungry sometimes, something I would not have abided before. NROLFW, however, suggests that eating at such a deficit is not particularly helpful, healthwise, and that only those looking to lose significant amounts of fat should be worrying about getting calories low. According to the formulas in the book (which are pretty standard across multiple websites), I need about 1900 calories a day to maintain my weight if I'm not doing anything special (i.e. not working out). On days I exercise, I need more like 2100-2200 calories to maintain my weight, though that number obviously varies based on what I do and how much I do. To that end, I've increased my daily calorie goal to 1800 on most days with bumps to more on lifting days. I drink a protein shake on those days, which I've gotten used to, and I try to eat more chicken breasts for dinner, even though they're too boring for even me. The hardest part has actually been trying to care about macros, considering I get well over 50% of my calories from carbs every day (usually 55-60%, whereas it should be 40-45%). Bumping up my protein and reducing my carbs is a lot harder for me than cutting calories in general. Dealing with both number of calories and sources of calories makes the restriction more problematic, at least in my head.
The actual exercises in the program, however, seem a little too easy for me. Given that the program recommends 2-3 sessions a week (and I've only been doing 2), there are several days each week that I am able and willing to do work but shouldn't do any strength training. Some of those days are running days, which is something I'm still trying to work on in both speed and stamina. According to my personal trainer (who is taking the summer off and might be moving....laaaaaaame) and several websites and the NROLFW book, I should be focusing on interval training rather than steady state cardio. However, I enjoy longer easier runs a lot more than short, intense runs. I know that "enjoy" and "should do" are not the same, and the beginning of the C25K program was closer to interval training than steady state cardio anyway (and I did just fine there and saw amazing progress in a short amount of time), so I know what I should be doing, but it's hard to get motivated to do it when I don't have a regimen/goal/schedule to work with. If I want to hit a 10-minute mile, however, I would be better off doing short rounds of interval training than running a mile every week and shaving a few seconds off.
I have, however, had some running success lately. On June 2nd, I ran in the 2nd Annual Pug Rescue of New England 5k in South Boston (Castle Island, to be exact). Considering the RFYL 5k was more of a mud hike than a run, and considering I was held up for almost an hour at the final obstacles, the PRoNE 5k was the first real 5k race I've ever done. The weather was as abysmal as it could be for June in Boston. It rained heavily the entire time, with ferocious winds coming off of the ocean and spraying the runners with stinging salt water. It was slightly cold, which meant that the wind and rain combined to make for hypothermia-inducing conditions. On any other day, the route would have been beautiful: overlooking the ocean the entire time and ending near a historic fort with beautiful grassy areas everywhere. But instead, it was a shitstorm. Apparently, though, I thrive in such conditions, because I posted a time of 39:06, which beats my previous treadmill time by like 2 minutes. I think it was a combination of the motivation boost of being in a real race with other people and the overwhelming desire to go home and get out of the rain. It took me several hours (including a nap) to feel normal and warm again after that. I'm hoping my future events are less taxing on my homeostasis.
[static hisssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss]
This part was written today:
Things have improved quite a bit, motivation-wise, since I stopped writing last month. Once school ended, I found myself sufficiently refreshed enough to hit the gym about 5 days a week, rather than 2 or 3, and I have finally finished stage 1 of the NROLFW. To be honest, I got pretty bored with stage 1 after a few weeks because it the same two routines back and forth for 16 sessions. Without bench presses (which make me feel super-human even though I'm benching like 50 lbs) and any real variation between the sessions, I found myself going through the motions more than thriving in the activities. Stage 1 is over, though, and thankfully the subsequent stages are all fewer than 16 sessions (most are half that) and have more exercises to do during each session (with the exception of a special stage designed to make me able to do a chin-up - which is going to be awesome). So this past week I've been substantially less bored at the gym. I've also starting doing interval runs, which are not as bad as I made them out to be in my brain. I do need more running songs, though.
As for weight/calories/other things, I finally hit the 50 pounds lost mark at the beginning of June. It was a much bigger deal at the time, because I've been stuck within a pound of that weight since then, although at least that was kind of on purpose. My aforementioned calorie re-working put me right around maintenance, and when you combine that with a little bit of gym deceleration, you get stalled weight loss. I didn't put a bunch of weight back on, which I'm happy about, AND I did manage to do a little recomp in the meantime. I finally broke down and bought one of those impedance scales with the metal things you step on. Yeah, it's not super accurate, but at least it's consistently inaccurate, if that makes sense. Great for tracking delta-F, where F is fat. If I "calibrate" this reading against the hand impedance meter I used at the gym twice before, I have lost at LEAST 3-4% body fat in the last 3 months, and if I ignore science and controls, then it's almost twice that number! Of course, I have lost pounds in that time, so it's not all balanced by muscle gain, but I can only expect so much muscle gain/maintenance on a cut, even a meager one. That being said, I am ready to start losing pounds (net) again, so I have cut my target calories from 1800 to 1600. Still a lot more than the 1200-1400 I was shooting for before, but not so close to maintenance. We'll see how it goes.
To be honest, the reason I'm so hastily wrapping up this entry is that tomorrow marks one year since I started my Diary of a Fat Girl series, and I intend to write something (hopefully) more interesting and more coherent than this mish-mash of unconnected updates. If I allow myself the indulgence, they may be one or more numbered lists. You know how I feel about that shit. For now, please accept my apologies for passing this off as worth your time. I could never be a professional writer because it pains me to throw anything out; I get attached to everything. Exhibit A, ladies and gentleman.
I've started writing this entry a few times in the last couple of weeks, more from a place of obligation than inspiration, if I'm being honest. A few important fitness/health things have occurred in recent weeks, though the writing content associated with them is probably a collective paragraph (though let's be real - I'll probably talk your ear off about them). Things have been pleasant and calm on the home front. Dan's job keeps him pretty well exhausted most of the time, with on-call weeks and late work nights and long commutes, but it pays well and he enjoys the challenge. My job is in the strange waking dream state that is post-senior/pre-summer June; because my program is so tiny, everyone takes final exams at the same time, and then seniors leave. The few weeks after that are still a part of fourth term and count for grades, but the underclassmen who remain are already in summer mode. This year, a particularly virulent strain of this disease has spread to the staff as well, and we're all silently wondering, "why am I still here?" It's hard to blame the kids for feeling unmotivated and unfocused when we're having the same issues.
...Which is directly related to the next piece of news: I got an iPad. And it is awesome. Now, I can't really speak to the incredible capabilities of the iPad because I've been using it almost exclusively to play Plague Inc., a 99¢ game that has consumed nearly every waking moment of my life for the last week. It's a strategy game in which you play as a disease (or as God, depending on how you look at it) with the goal of infecting and killing every last human on Earth. With seven different pathogens (from bacteria to nano-viruses to prions, et al) and three difficulty levels, the game has more depth than I would expect for something that is seemingly so straightforward. It took me a few days to really nail my strategy down, but I beat the last remaining level on "brutal" difficulty this morning on the train, which unlocked three cheat-filled bonus levels. So I've got my afternoon planned out. It's not like I have grading or planning to do...sigh.
The boredom is sort of pleasant, however. Normally I'm a frantic mess this time of year, trying to finish projects for my second job (writing science workbooks) that are generally sent to the printer at the end of June or early July. Although that job still exists, the amount and type of work have changed, leaving me with a smaller future paycheck but also a calm end to the school year for the first time ever. In the evenings, I spend my time couch-surfing, web-surfing, and pandemic-modeling. I have an abundance of free time, something I value extremely highly on the other side of grad school, and I'm not particularly eager to give it up. I did take a summer job "teaching" summer school (in quotes because the kids are doing independent online courses and I'm a glorified lab monitor), but it's only 20 hours a week and there are two weeks off on either end. I suspect that the iPad, or at the very least, several novels, will get plenty of use during that time.
That all being said, I do have a twinge of guilt over the free time because I've been using even less of it for fitness work, rather than using more of it. It's only been about two weeks of slacking off, but it coincides with my adoption of a new lifting program, the parameters of which have me doing less work than I was doing in the first place. So all told, I'm doing less each time I exercise and I'm exercising less often. Not exactly the change I was going for. The program I'm doing is from the book New Rules of Lifting for Women, something that sat in my Amazon shopping cart for weeks on end before I finally purchased it last month. The book itself is a quick read (I finished it in about a day), but it's full of comprehensive info regarding nutrition, exercise guidelines/basics, and specific training schedules for lifting. The routines are challenging and designed to avoid classic over-training (something I don't think I was guilty of, but I'm trusting the program right now and seeing where it takes me). The Phase 1 exercises are mostly familiar (deadlifts, squats, lunges, lat pulldowns, cable rows, OHPs, etc.) with a few new additions (stability ball jackknifes). I did switch from doing kneeling push-ups (aka girl push-ups) to incline push-ups using the smith machine, which were more challenging but also more doable, if that makes any sense. My ROM is much better on the incline push-ups and I am able to do enough reps to be sore the next day; I'm hoping this will lead me to doing regular push-ups and will also improve my bench numbers.
One aspect of the NROLFW program is eating more calories. Up until recently, I've been eating between 1200 and 1400 calories depending on the day (on days when I burn a lot, I eat more), which makes for a deficit of about 500 calories a day, suggesting weight loss of a pound a week. I've gotten used to that level of eating, and I also got used to feeling hungry sometimes, something I would not have abided before. NROLFW, however, suggests that eating at such a deficit is not particularly helpful, healthwise, and that only those looking to lose significant amounts of fat should be worrying about getting calories low. According to the formulas in the book (which are pretty standard across multiple websites), I need about 1900 calories a day to maintain my weight if I'm not doing anything special (i.e. not working out). On days I exercise, I need more like 2100-2200 calories to maintain my weight, though that number obviously varies based on what I do and how much I do. To that end, I've increased my daily calorie goal to 1800 on most days with bumps to more on lifting days. I drink a protein shake on those days, which I've gotten used to, and I try to eat more chicken breasts for dinner, even though they're too boring for even me. The hardest part has actually been trying to care about macros, considering I get well over 50% of my calories from carbs every day (usually 55-60%, whereas it should be 40-45%). Bumping up my protein and reducing my carbs is a lot harder for me than cutting calories in general. Dealing with both number of calories and sources of calories makes the restriction more problematic, at least in my head.
The actual exercises in the program, however, seem a little too easy for me. Given that the program recommends 2-3 sessions a week (and I've only been doing 2), there are several days each week that I am able and willing to do work but shouldn't do any strength training. Some of those days are running days, which is something I'm still trying to work on in both speed and stamina. According to my personal trainer (who is taking the summer off and might be moving....laaaaaaame) and several websites and the NROLFW book, I should be focusing on interval training rather than steady state cardio. However, I enjoy longer easier runs a lot more than short, intense runs. I know that "enjoy" and "should do" are not the same, and the beginning of the C25K program was closer to interval training than steady state cardio anyway (and I did just fine there and saw amazing progress in a short amount of time), so I know what I should be doing, but it's hard to get motivated to do it when I don't have a regimen/goal/schedule to work with. If I want to hit a 10-minute mile, however, I would be better off doing short rounds of interval training than running a mile every week and shaving a few seconds off.
I have, however, had some running success lately. On June 2nd, I ran in the 2nd Annual Pug Rescue of New England 5k in South Boston (Castle Island, to be exact). Considering the RFYL 5k was more of a mud hike than a run, and considering I was held up for almost an hour at the final obstacles, the PRoNE 5k was the first real 5k race I've ever done. The weather was as abysmal as it could be for June in Boston. It rained heavily the entire time, with ferocious winds coming off of the ocean and spraying the runners with stinging salt water. It was slightly cold, which meant that the wind and rain combined to make for hypothermia-inducing conditions. On any other day, the route would have been beautiful: overlooking the ocean the entire time and ending near a historic fort with beautiful grassy areas everywhere. But instead, it was a shitstorm. Apparently, though, I thrive in such conditions, because I posted a time of 39:06, which beats my previous treadmill time by like 2 minutes. I think it was a combination of the motivation boost of being in a real race with other people and the overwhelming desire to go home and get out of the rain. It took me several hours (including a nap) to feel normal and warm again after that. I'm hoping my future events are less taxing on my homeostasis.
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This part was written today:
Things have improved quite a bit, motivation-wise, since I stopped writing last month. Once school ended, I found myself sufficiently refreshed enough to hit the gym about 5 days a week, rather than 2 or 3, and I have finally finished stage 1 of the NROLFW. To be honest, I got pretty bored with stage 1 after a few weeks because it the same two routines back and forth for 16 sessions. Without bench presses (which make me feel super-human even though I'm benching like 50 lbs) and any real variation between the sessions, I found myself going through the motions more than thriving in the activities. Stage 1 is over, though, and thankfully the subsequent stages are all fewer than 16 sessions (most are half that) and have more exercises to do during each session (with the exception of a special stage designed to make me able to do a chin-up - which is going to be awesome). So this past week I've been substantially less bored at the gym. I've also starting doing interval runs, which are not as bad as I made them out to be in my brain. I do need more running songs, though.
As for weight/calories/other things, I finally hit the 50 pounds lost mark at the beginning of June. It was a much bigger deal at the time, because I've been stuck within a pound of that weight since then, although at least that was kind of on purpose. My aforementioned calorie re-working put me right around maintenance, and when you combine that with a little bit of gym deceleration, you get stalled weight loss. I didn't put a bunch of weight back on, which I'm happy about, AND I did manage to do a little recomp in the meantime. I finally broke down and bought one of those impedance scales with the metal things you step on. Yeah, it's not super accurate, but at least it's consistently inaccurate, if that makes sense. Great for tracking delta-F, where F is fat. If I "calibrate" this reading against the hand impedance meter I used at the gym twice before, I have lost at LEAST 3-4% body fat in the last 3 months, and if I ignore science and controls, then it's almost twice that number! Of course, I have lost pounds in that time, so it's not all balanced by muscle gain, but I can only expect so much muscle gain/maintenance on a cut, even a meager one. That being said, I am ready to start losing pounds (net) again, so I have cut my target calories from 1800 to 1600. Still a lot more than the 1200-1400 I was shooting for before, but not so close to maintenance. We'll see how it goes.
To be honest, the reason I'm so hastily wrapping up this entry is that tomorrow marks one year since I started my Diary of a Fat Girl series, and I intend to write something (hopefully) more interesting and more coherent than this mish-mash of unconnected updates. If I allow myself the indulgence, they may be one or more numbered lists. You know how I feel about that shit. For now, please accept my apologies for passing this off as worth your time. I could never be a professional writer because it pains me to throw anything out; I get attached to everything. Exhibit A, ladies and gentleman.
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