Finisher's Medal Day

Today is Finisher's Medal Day. (Note the metallic colors!)

 While this day is generally reserved for marathon racers,something about it screamed out to me. Everyone in life is running towards something. When you are young, you're running towards that high school diploma. Then maybe college degree after that. Some of us run toward careers and others run toward a life of fun and travel and freedom. Some run toward love and marriage and a family. You race to buy an awesome car, or a nice house or even that pair of jeans that fit just right. Everyone runs toward one goal or another and hopefully they reach the finish line. Maybe not in your preferred time, and maybe you had to take a few detours along the way. But every goal, every accomplishment makes you a finisher, whether anyone else sees it or not.

Family fun

Today was one of those days I used to dream about. In the morning we played and tickled and all that fun stuff. Then, I was out and about with my beautiful family. My amazing son and my loving husband. We walked all over town, played at the sound garden. We had lunch downtown. Little man actually ate what we bought him at a restaurant. We came home and relaxed for a little bit and then went to the store and got dinner. Which, by the way, little man ate almost all of his dinner too. Then we played as a family before getting ready to brush his teeth and send him to bed. He even let me brush his teeth without a fight.
I know my last two posts were about fitness, and if you really need me to work that in, I got over 11,000 steps in today. This was just one of those days that I really just need to remember. This was one of those days that every parent dreams of. This is one of those days that I wish could last forever.

Not giving up

Well, so far the exercise part of this journey is going pretty well. Although today and yesterday were off days for me. I went a little too hard on Wednesday morning. I did the 30 day fit challenge and then right after that I did my kick boxing routine. Well, that has kind of hindered things. My thigh muscles, while they feel more pronounced are absolutely killing me. Every time I stand up or sit down I regret it. It is finally getting better though. Anyway, I went back and looked at my calorie counting app since I started it on like the 13th or so and I have only gone over my allotted calories twice. Although, I still think I need to do more than just count calories. As much as I hate doing it, I think I am going to have to download My Fitness Pal instead. That one counts more than just calories. I really thought that working out more was going to help but it turns out "you can't out train a bad diet." So my plan is to start working harder on the food I eat. I will admit that it proving to be harder than I thought. But my first goal is going to be giving up pop and honestly only having one or two energy drinks a week. I say that all the time, but I always end up giving in. This time I'll go to almost strictly coffee, tea and water. Which reminds me. I am going to get this tea from the Natural Foods store downtown. It's a matcha green tea.  I hear it's good for weight loss. So I am going to try that too. I also have decided that instead of having a big goal, like weighing 175 lbs, I will do little goals. So right now it is either to weigh 240 lbs, down from 260. Either that or to wear a size 14. Whichever comes first. All I know is that I am really proud of myself for not giving up or getting lazy. I am that kind of person that gives up way too easily when I don't see results pretty much right away. So, I am going to continue to work hard and do better and I am hoping to at least feel better.

The beginning of my fit and fabulous journey

So, a few days ago I decided I was going to get in shape. I got my results back from my pap and I have abnormal cells. So, needless to say, I am scared crap-less. So that night I spent a good two hours online researching fitness, running, counting calories and all that good stuff. The thing is, I have done this before. I have sat there at night reading about things like the Couch to 5K program and beginner running, cardio for overweight people. The problem is, I would come up with this big plan to start running, fall asleep and wake up the next morning with absolutely no motivation whatsoever.

Well, I guess this time is different. The next day I spent the beginning of my day downloading and checking out a bunch of apps for counting calories, tracking fitness and counting steps. I finally decided on a trio of apps: Google Fit, Noom Weight Loss Coach and their other app Noom Walk, which tracks your steps. Later that day with my little man (one of the biggest reasons for all of this) went down for his nap, I found a beginners kickboxing lesson on YouTube. I am not going to lie, it was in no way easy. Now, Alan and I walk like crazy, but we walk for fun. It is never too fast or too hard. It very rarely gets my heart pumping or sweat dripping. There is definitely a difference between walking leisurely for 5 miles and a 25 minute cardio kickboxing session when you are an overweight, out of shape, pack a day smoker. But I did it. And let me just say, I felt amazing after. I'm not kidding. I really felt great. Yeah, my legs were tired and my arms were a little sore and I was completely out of breath for a good 10 minutes, but I felt awesome. I felt like a rock star. But of course in the back of my mind I had this fear that I would wake up the next day and not want to do anything at all.

Well, I am proud to say that today was the next day and this girl kicked butt again. When little man went down for his nap I did a 30 minute beginner yoga session. I don't want to do too much too fast so I thought I could do a little low impact workout. Well, that just wasn't enough for me. So after dinner I loaded little man into the jogging stroller that I am now super giddy that we have, and took off for a walk. I walked about a mile, although it wasn't all walking. I actually jogged. I'm not going to sit here and say it was awesome, or flawless or even that I felt that great. It wasn’t and I didn't. I actually only jogged for a total of 2 minutes. One minute with two minutes of walking in between. Now I know to some people that may not seem like anything, but to me…wow. All I can really say is wow. And to top it all off, I smoked less than a pack of cigarettes both days and I also stayed under my allotted calories both days. Today I even had more "green foods" than anything else.

The pride that I feel in myself is really an amazing motivator. So is my son, this health scare and that feeling I am going to have when I step on the scale see that I am starting to lose weight. This is going to be one heck of a journey, and it is going to be hard and there will be days where I am going to want to give up. I am really just hoping that by writing this down here, I can inspire myself when I truly need it. And maybe someone will stumble upon with and I can inspire them too.

My favorite Mommy and Daddy blogs...

     Okay, so admittedly this is a lazy post. I didn't post yesterday and I'm not sure if I did the day before. But it's the weekend and I tend to spend a lot of time with Alan and Little Man on the weekend. Anyway, I figured I should at least post something, so I found a list of topics for a Mommy blog and rolled a 100 sided die and got the question "My 10 favorite mom bloggers are_______...." I'm not sure if I can come up with 10, but I will try and I will link to their pages if anyone actually reads this and wants to check them out. So, here are my 10(if I can count that high) favorite parent blogs/bloggers.

1.      The first Mommy blog I found after finding out I was expecting was written by Dani Ryan. Her wittiness and honesty instantly drew me in and I literally spent hours at a time reading her entire blog. Every single post. Since then she has revamped her blog a bit to include recipes, crafts and other things as well as funny stories about raising her daughter. I want to be a lot like her, only she would probably be disappointed in me because I can't stand wine. Oh well. Check out her awesome blog here.
2. The second in this list is a Dad blog. This is actually the most recent one I have found. I love it. He is absolutely hilarious, but I also like his open-mindedness and also his honesty. (If you can't tell, I really appreciate honesty.) I will be honest since I love it so much, I totally stole my sign-off from him, as he ends his posts with "Dad". The man's name is John Kinnear and you can read his blog here.
3. My third favorite is actually a collection of writers at an awesome site called .scarymommy.com. Some of the (again with this) most honest words about pregnancy and motherhood I found in these pages. And they are hilarious almost every single time. 

     Okay, like I said...and keep in mind I am being honest here...I can't come up with more than three. Part of that could be because since having Little Man, my already horrid memory has plummeted due to lack of sleep and probably nutrition. Another part could be maybe I didn't read enough of them. I had a whole list of them on my computer that I had every intention of reading, but I totally didn't. It was hard to read what with the constant stream of reality TV and dramas that were on all the time. Let's just say I keep my DVR packed and it was really bad while pregnant. But whatever the reason, there are only three. Unless you want to be totally awesome and count the third as a whole bunch, in which case I probably went way over ten, making me an over-achiever for once! Yay me! So check them out and tell them who sent you!

     Love,
     Mom

     What are some of your favorites? I am always up for a new read. Let me know in the comments!

This is what it's all about...

     Unlike last night, this post is going to be short and sweet. I'm a woman, I can change my direction anytime I please. Onward to the post.

     Tonight I had my big a-ha moment. Through all the mistakes I have made in the last two months, all the times I have wondered what the hell I was doing, all the time I wanted to run away and never look back, I knew there was a reason for it all. Tonight it really hit me what that reason was. We had a very uneventful night. Little Man was a good boy and napped without fighting it and gave Mommy a chance to watch a movie. Okay, two movies. After he woke up and I gave him a bottle and changed him, I started bouncing him in his bouncy seat. As I was talking to him, he gave me a huge smile. Now usually, I get one smile a day and that's it. He is a very mysterious child. But tonight, as I got all excited thanking him for the smile, he smiled again. Again I went crazy thanking him and telling him I loved him and he smiled again. My little guy was so happy that Mommy loved him and was just playing attention to him. He was happy that I was just there. I won't lie, I'm a total sap and I cried a little. I picked him up and cuddled him and I too, was happy that I was just there.

Love,

Mom

What was your big a-ha moment? When did you realize that you were doing it right? 

Looking back a ways...

     Disclaimer: This is going to be a particularly long and sappy post. Read at your own risk.
     So today Little Man turned two months old. After I bathed him, read to him and fed him, I sat on the edge of the bed rocking him to sleep. As I sang softly to him I couldn't help but think about the road that led me to being the lucky woman who gets to rock him to sleep. 
     I will never forget the night I found out I was pregnant. It was October 21, 2013. It was a beautiful, clear night. Alan had made me buy the pregnancy tests to take. I told him I didn't need to take one. This would be like all the other times I had taken one and it would turn out that I was just skipping Mother Nature's monthly gift for a few months like I used to. Alas, Alan was relentless. So I gave in, warning him that they are more effective first thing in the morning, trying to get him to let me wait a little longer. I didn't want that mixture of relief and disappointment over a negative test again. So I took the test and left it on the bathroom counter, walked out and shut the door. I set the timer on the microwave for five minutes, three extra, just to be sure. When the timer went off I was a total smart ass and asked Alan, "when this is negative will you leave me alone about it?" His reply was just as smart assed as mine. "I will after you take another one in the morning and that's negative." So I walked into that bathroom and halfway in I saw those two pink lines. One was freaking dark and the other a little paler. I screamed. He came running. We hugged. Blah blah blah. It was the most amazing feeling I had felt since getting married.
     My pregnancy was tremendous. I had morning sickness, but it wasn't bad. I actually wish that vomiting for the rest of my life was exactly like morning sickness. You feel sick, you puke, you feel great for the rest of the day. The second trimester was just as great. Every time the nurses or doctors asked how I was feeling, I very humbly (note the sarcasm) announced that I felt fantastic. I was always afraid that being a bigger girl, I wasn't going to show when I was pregnant. Boy, the end of the second trimester started to prove me wrong and by the time the third came I couldn't get out of bed by myself because I was so huge. I was slower than usual. A little grumpier than usual. My hips hurt more, my back hurt more. Slowly everything started to suck. 
     At some point I had had an ultrasound that showed Little Man had some swelling in the kidneys, indicating water that shouldn't have been there. They assured me it was nothing to worry about but they wanted to keep an eye on it. So I had another ultrasound. I remember the next appointment after that. When the doctor told me I was to go downstate to Maternal Fetal Medicine to have a 3d scan I was terrified and so was Alan. We thought for sure Little Man was really sick in there. 
     Now this is where things really turned. I was in the middle of my 38th week when I went to that scan downstate. My mom went with us as well as Alan's mom, who drove. Now, this office is in a pretty big city and it was about two hours away. His mom's driving is freaking terrifying. So when they took my blood pressure and it was higher than it should have been, I wasn't surprised. When they came in to take it again and it was still pretty high, I still wasn't surprised...after all, they were doing an ultrasound to see just how bad Little Man's kidneys were. I was scared. When they took it again and it was still high, I was too engrossed in seeing my little guy's face so clearly that I just didn't care. After the scan they took us to a different room and we waited for the doctor. When he came in he didn't even mention the kidneys. Not until after he informed me I was to go back to my hometown and be induced. I was not to go home first. Do not pass Go and all that crap. I cried, Alan cried, my mom cried...Alan's mom just pissed me off. But that's a story for another time. The doctor finally did mention his kidneys and he said that it had progressed but they would worry more about it if Little Man's postpartum ultrasound still showed it.
     So, fast forward a few hours, and an unadvised trip home, I was all checked into the hospital. Total bed rest except to use the bathroom. Oh man that sucked. It took them three days before Little Man finally made his way into the world. May 30th, 2014 at 8:44 pm. only about a week early as he was due on June 7th. We were so proud as the doctor caught him and exclaimed "He is peeing on me!" However, my pride and happiness was cut short as the doctor told the nurses to get another doctor on the phone because I was bleeding too much. I bled a liter of blood in three minutes and I tore like a mofo. Later than night I was allowed a much needed shower...a shower that ended up being the scariest thing that ever happened to me. I passed out. Twice. I had lost way too much blood earlier. My heart rate had dropped, my blood pressure had really dropped. All I could think of was that my little guy wasn't going to have a mommy. Also I kept telling them to tell Alan that I loved him. I didn't realize he was in the room, freaking out, but I knew he needed to know that. That and he had to take care of Little Man. 
     I turned out to be fine, Little Man's ultrasound showed no water at all. We went home two days later. The rest is (recent) history. It was been a quick two months. I swear it flew by. He has learned and grown so much. There is so much that I can't wait to teach him and to see him accomplish. Especially sleeping through the night, because as I finish this he is starting to stir. Even though he has only been asleep for approximately 46 minutes. Kid, can't I catch a break?! But after two months, all I can say is it's worth it. It is all so worth it. Out of the whole pregnancy and delivery process, all I will remember is seeing that perfect face for the very first time. As Amy Lee so beautifully put it after the birth of her own first child, "The world exploded into technicolor." And it did.
     
     Love,
     Mom

Also, even though we're married and should celebrate that anniversary, I just wanted to say Happy 6 years together Alan. I appreciate you putting up with my crap!