I've been thinking today. I've been thinking about how did I get to where I am physically (and mentally in some ways). The picture attached to this blog is from when I was about 16. I remember being embarrassed about the lines on my stomach, little did I know:) After the photographic evidence of a few days ago, it seemed worthwhile to trace the path from this picture to the one I posted recently. So forgive me if it seems indulgent, but what is a blog about yourself, if not indulgent:)
I graduated High School almost 25 years ago and like most teenage boys, weight and fitness weren't a great concern. I ate prodigious amounts of food and burned up every calorie through a mix of youthful metabolism and activity. I was an enthusiastic, if not overly successful basketball player and my 12 month a year obsession with playing and practicing made fitness a given. I certainly didn't think of it that way, but it was true nonetheless.
I went off to college and I clearly remember weighing 153 lbs. at the plasma center I visited in the fall to get some extra cash. My mother's horror at me giving fluids for money aside, I was pretty fit. Of course like many college freshmen, I added weight over the winter, particularly without my basketball habit being fed. I noticed in the spring I felt a bit heavier and started playing pick-up ball daily and got back to fighting weight pretty easily.
This pattern repeated itself for the next couple years, beef up in the winter and use pick up basketball to get fit later on. I remember getting on a scale in my second year and seeing a 187, which stunned me and I probably cut back on soda as a result. I would lose weight, but I didn't see that 153 for some time again. The last time was in the summer after I left college and broke up with my first serious girlfriend and I went crazy on fitness and cut way back on food for the first time. I didn't do it right but weight flew off and I may have gotten as low as 151, but not in a healthy way.
After I left my first try at college, I expanded the pattern. I coached basketball and would use the stress of coaching to give me an excuse to eat anything I wanted all winter. This would get balanced out by a regimen of pick-up games at the 7-10 basketball camps I worked a summer to make enough to live. Each year went by and I would recover a little less. As I hit my mid 20's that teenage metabolism was slipping away...
So each passing year added a few pounds, the pattern was not good and I started to get injuries like shin splints when I would overdo training, which then set me back further. As a start and stop fitness guy, the next big start period was in my later 20's, when a relationship ended and I started to compensate by running,something I'd never really enjoyed. I had friends who had taken up running 5k's at local races on the weekends and if I ran once or twice during the week, I could do those pretty easily. In fact I was surprised to find out that at many of these small town festivals, I could place in my age group and win a medal here and there. I now realize that had less to do with my speed than the fact that other 27 and 28 year olds weren't getting up at 6:00 on Saturdays to run races:)
I didn't weigh myself much then, but I knew I was fit, although certainly heavier than a decade earlier. Most of my friends weren't real fit, so I felt good around them, but I always felt bad around the young athletes I coached. My head didn't understand that they were 10 years younger and exercising all the time. Why would I look like them?
And then came my 30's....
What a schizophrenic decade that was. I got married, had two children, earned another degree, and developed a real big boy career. None of which seemed to benefit my fitness very much. All very positive things in my life but the change in my body in the decade of my 30's was astounding. I remember the following milestones:
- My first teaching job accompanied by weighing myself at basketball practice that winter and seeing 167, which seemed like a lot at the time
- The birth of my daughter along with my second teaching job in the district from hell, I think I weighed in the 180's by the end of that year
- Jumping ship to my first job at Western and going on a training binge to do a canoe, bike, run tri with my brother in 2003. Felt heavy but fit then
- Got promoted at work the next year and went back to grad school. Nothing good on the fitness front, I used my stress as an excuse to eat and lay around.
- 2006, just out of grad school, broke 200lbs and joined weight control program at work. Program was very successful and led to a sprint triathlon that summer and training for a half marathon in the fall as a cancer fundraiser
- 2007, weight down to low 180's for 1/2 marathon and two triathlons (sprint).
Not long after that I got promoted and used my new job as an excuse to fall apart. With a few fits and starts (a 5k here and there), I have been stuck there until I started this blog. I am now in my 40's and I want to get healthy.
Today's workout was good. 32 minutes on the elliptical followed by a complete one set circuit of cybex. Felt good enough to get me dreaming about a June triathlon, but I'm not sure. I've trained for those in 6-8 weeks before and it worked but I crashed afterward. This time I want to sustain momentum for life.
Food choices today were pretty good. I indulged in ice cream for the first time in several days but was careful otherwise and added a 40 minute dog walk to my workout. I must admit, as much as I love ice cream, I don't feel great after I eat it...
All in all, pretty good day. Thanks for indulging the long post.
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