So, we're 1 week into 2022.
The moment of truth: Have I already failed my health resolution?
NO
But, I'll admit, I didn't have the best week.
In an effort of fairness, let me split this into 2 responsible parties.
First, the easy part: Blaming someone else.
I had a pretty decent day on Monday. Exercise wise it wasn't fantastic (more on that later), but meal wise? I'm extremely proud to say I manage to have THREE good quality meals.
Normally, this is pretty tough for me. I'm either not hungry enough to eat that many, or I get lazy and substitute one of the meals for some garbage snacking.
But not this time. I ate three proper healthy meals, and even had a nice little protein bar for a snack.
It felt right. I felt like I was properly nourishing my body the way it ought to be nourished.
...Sounds good, yeah? So where's the drama?
I went to sleep that night, and woke up 3 hours later.
I had an appointment in a few hours from when I randomly woke up, and that kept me from falling back asleep.
I wasn't worried about missing it, I knew I had plenty of time for more shuteye plus I had multiple alarms set, but nope. My body refused to fall back asleep.
Ok, whatever. A shitty night of sleep. That it?
The next night, I got 2 hours of sleep, woke up for 6 hours, and finally fell back asleep for another 3 hours.
The thing about me is, sleep is very vital to me functioning well.
I feel like a fucking zombie if I don't get a decent 8 hours. And 2 nights back to back of me not being able to sleep was fucking killing me.
I seriously had moments where I thought I might die. My heart felt so heavy in my chest, I felt like I was running on literal fumes.
The uncontrollable stress that comes with that bullshit isn't fun either. I was angry, sad, frustrated, annoyed.
It was not a good few days.
But, thankfully we're living in the modern age where most problems have a solution.
Mine came in the form of tiny pills of melatonin.
So far, these have been working well. I've been able to fall asleep, and mostly stay asleep.
Most importantly, I've been getting my 8 hours again.
I also decided to do a mini-shopping spree and picked up some items for my sleep routine. Eye mask, comfy blankets, better pillows, etc.
This was a stressful few days of real shitty circumstances that wiped me out, BUT, I have to say... I'm happy how I managed it.
I got through it. I dealt with the bullshit. I reacted by trying to fix the problem rather than just hoping it would go away on its own.
That's a minor step forward for me, come to think of it. I'm usually too lazy or too scared to deal with issues affecting me.
But, if I'm gonna die, if that's always the endgame here, then why not try to fix things while I'm alive. What's the worse that can happen? It get worse & worse until it's so bad it kills me? We already acknowledge that's inevitable, so what's left to scare me with?
I don't know if I fully believe what I just wrote above, but I'd like to think I'm getting to that point.
Ok, so, that was the third party bullshit. Now to grow up & call out my own.
I did not work out as much as I would have liked this week.
I'm not at the point of hating myself yet, because A) bullshit sleep issues derailed me a bit, B) I'm aware of my short comings, C) we're only 1 week into this total life shift
I'll give myself some leeway, but I'll also cut the rope short and say "This is all you got".
I made my 1 slacker week. I got no more left.
Once again, I think I may have handled this situation by setting up a plan to address it.
I found my problem with working out was blocking out a time to do it.
"Eh, not now, I just ate."
"Not now, I'm about to eat."
"Not now, I'm going to bed."
"Not now, I just woke up."
So, my solution is to instead of trying to schedule out a 30 minute chunk at some unicorn like optimal time in my day, I'll instead just do small bits of 2-5 minute workouts all throughout my day.
I think to start off with, I'll do 2 minutes every 2 hours. That's about 14 minutes of workout in one day.
Once I feel like moving on, I'll bump it up to 5 minutes every 1 hour, for 70 minutes. I might stop near the end of my day on this schedule to make it closer to about 30-40 minutes of total workout.
Not only do I think this will be easy to stick to (I have NO fucking excuse to avoid a 2 minute work out), but it also encourages me to get up & move more as an added bonus. 1 big 30 minute sessions followed by 5 hours of sitting seems like it erases the benefits.
So, that was a recap of my first week on my improvement journey. Not a great start, but hey... This can be used as a pinpoint in the future to look back on and go "See? I didn't give up then. I'm not giving up now."
Bumpy roads are common in life. But, they're still just a road.
Keep driving. Keep going forward. You will reach your destination if you just keep going.
