Insanity

The journey of losing my baby weight has been long and tenuous. For months, I have logged nearly every food that crossed my lips. I have sweat away hours of my life, and it has been a struggle. For exercise, I have always preferred running just because I like the sweat I get and I feel like I really worked out. I miss resistance training, but I don't always know what to do on my own. I lacked the motivation to create workouts in my living room. Because Garrett works nights and little buddy goes to bed relatively early and I can't leave the house, I considered buying a treadmill. But then I realized just how expensive they are. I couldn't figure out where I would put it in our house or garage, and I read about how expensive maintenance would be. So I went another direction... I bought Insanity. And now I'm addicted. I had a favorite instructor of group fitness classes at the gym, but then our gym recently closed and she moved to a gym I couldn't afford. This is the closest thing to one of her workouts.

I was planning on only doing an Insanity workout when I couldn't get outside to run due to Garrett's schedule or the rain, but I find myself preferring the workout to running or going to the gym, even when I can. The workouts include all my favorite elements: the time goes by fast, the exercises are in short bursts (30 seconds at a time), I definitely sweat a lot, the exercises incorporate both cardio and resistance training, and I get a good yoga-type stretch in. The other thing I like about the program is the nutrition guide. While I'm not following that exactly, the meals they suggest and the portion sizes are something that you could read anywhere about eating real, whole foods in smaller portions throughout the day. No rocket science or "food" food. They do suggest P90X bars and Shakeology shakes in places, but only as options and not as the only way to get results.

So I'm training for a half marathon May 20th so I still need to get some training runs in. For the last two weeks I've been running twice per week and doing Insanity twice per week. My long run for tomorrow is 8 miles. We'll see how I do, but I truly feel great!

Lucky

Being a full-time, working, new mom can be overwhelming. I know that I am not the only wife or teacher or mother that feels this way. Not by a long shot. And I'm not a single mom: I have a wonderful, loving, helpful husband who is an exceptional father to our son. I know that in many ways, I am so lucky to have what I have.

This squishy face just reminds me to appreciate the little things and try to sleep as sound as he does...