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I worked out for the 1st time this year. I didn't WANT to really, but by the end, was glad I went.

Getting onto the wagon after the holidays (a la resolutions or OTHERWISE) is kind of easy to START, but difficult to maintain. You get into this ass kicking mentality, but by the end of the month the gym is empty again, you feel slack and winter is crushing your drive to get up and GO.

Personally, in addition to this, I'm feeling a little disheartened because of the weight I gained over the holidays. (Self control? What does THAT mean?) But what's done is done, and I'm ready to pick it up and relearn and start again. Refocus. Thinking of summer. Shorts and bathing suits and new tattoos and the PRIDE festival and the beach. It's more fun than the reality that is the FREEZING COLD OUTDOORS.

I feel like I've been out of routine forever, but it's only been ONE week.

Today's Workout

FLASHBACK: To Jill in her recent CPR certification course where the trainer tells her and the rest of the class that if a heart is going 180+ beats per minute (BPM), it's going go fast there's a possibility you can give yourself a heart attack.

CUT TO: Me running 7.5 miles per hour for 30 seconds on the treadmill. I have never run faster than this. EVER. People could be chasing me with an axe and I'd be more sluggish. This is officially an interval sprint.
Jill and I have been using intervals (alternating between running HARD and running less hard) in our cardio to keep ourselves challenged.

CLOSE UP: The heart rate monitor on my wrist, showing a solid 181 BPM. Surrounded by old people with white hair and I'm about to collapse and be the one to have an exercise induced heart failure.

Today, I almost gave myself a heart attack. Good start to the workout year. Lesson of the day: moderation.

Blanket Burning

Awhile ago, I read a great post about the F word over at Bonjour Gazel. That's right, we're talking about FAT again. (If you haven't checked out Gazel's blog, do it. She has stellar taste and she writes eloquently about everything.) Basically, the summary of the post was that your weight and health is YOUR business, not anyone else's. Anyone who thinks it's their right to ask you how much you weigh, or judge you, or give you advice deserves a flip of a big different kind of F word.

I'm hoping to make something clear, because over the next couple of months, I'm going to be working out and losing some weight, building myself some healthy ass-kicking habits.
This is just what I need to do, personally.

I have come miles and miles in terms of understanding who I am and accepting myself and thinking I'm beautiful, but I still feel the need to get fit. This isn't because I want to look like a billboard or a girl in a perfume ad (bitch, please, curves are where it's at!), but I want to be more like me.

If watching TV teaches us anything, it's that apparently ALL fat people would be more beautiful if they lost weight. That they all secretly yearn to be thin, that they ALL eat badly. They all want to be saved by the church of skinny and cry on TV. Well, I'm calling complete BULLSHIT on that.

I have met and seen SO MANY amazing, beautiful, stylish, gorgeous people who just happen to be plus sized. They are loud and proud and they rock the world. These wonderful people have made me realize that being FAT isn't the issue. Personal confidence is the issue. If you want to be large or small it doesn't matter, EMBRACE yourself. Do what you want, no matter if that's running a 5K, eating a cupcake (or two!), or wearing horizontal stripes.

If I could walk around and NOT care about what other people thought about me, I wouldn't feel the need to go to the gym and work out. But that's not the person I am. I am glad I grew up fat, for all the pain it caused me, it also taught me a bunch of things I might NEVER have learned. I would be a different person. I learned compassion, humility and I'm sure it sparked a passion for writing in me, but there are some things that are still holding me back. Being fat also taught me anger, and bitterness and resentment, things I never want to feel towards people I truly care about. It brings out the worst in me, and the worst now needs to be taken care of. Now that I have realized the beauty that fat has given me, I need to handle the darkness it has given me too. Wow, cue the dramatic music...

I can't get over this idea, that what is holding me back from living my life is my own body. What's holding me back, is me. I've been told I have a bold personality, but there is a difference between volume, and action. I can live now, but I'd be hiding inside myself, wrapped in my security blanket. So that's what is going to have to happen now: bear hunting and blanket burning.

What do you love about yourself about today? What do you wish other people could learn to embrace more?

5K AWAY!

Today I ran my first road race EVER. I woke up at 7AM to eat a decent breakfast and get ready. Then my mom, my sisters and I headed off to the stadium, to kick our collective butts and to see if we were made of tougher stuff. (Where was my dad in all of this you ask? It's Father's Day! Dad went off golfing instead. He's a golfer, not a runner so it's a perfect arrangement.)

The world of racing was new to me so I just tried to think of a regular run but it didn't keep me from getting nervous. I looked at all the chiseled, hard core runners around me and I thought, gord dermitt, what've I gotten myself into? These people had athlete written ALL OVER them and I....well.... let's say at least I was trying. My sister Jill snapped this picture of my mom and my little sister Kacy just before the race started. Note the shirt collar tug- oh, nerves!

The run was hard. I couldn't run the whole thing, so I opted to walk for a little every now and again. My body isn't used to all the hard work yet... even though I've been working out for almost two months now, it takes years of dedication to become a great runner. So I guess this is a good starting place! I've only practiced the 5K two or three times before today, because I wasn't sure I would be here for race day. This is a picture Jill snapped. She finished up 6 or 7 minutes before me so she saw me walk into the stadium and then proceed to plough the track to the finish. Action shot! (Note: The song I'm listening to in this picture is Pain by Jimmy Eat World. Appropriate since by now my lungs and legs were aching.)
It turns out that I beat my personal time by 3 minutes or so! We're still waiting for official chip times to be posted online, so that's approximate... But I was pretty proud of myself for cutting those off. And now I'm only going to get faster. I'm determined... and I think I'm hooked. I'm already eager to run another one!

Oooh, a participant medal!

Hot Hot Heat

Before Saturday, I'd never done yoga, and I'd really never done hot yoga. So when big sister Jill woke me up with an invite to try a class with her and her boyfriend Steve, it seemed like an innocent, ambitious change to my fitness routine. I was on the 7th day of a workout binge and the gym seemed about as interesting as blah flavoured oatmeal. So I threw on some workout clothes, grabbed a bottle of water and we headed out to face our destiny. (You think I'm being overdramatic here, but I'm really, REALLY not.)

We arrived at Jill's usual Moksha studio to find it under renovation. This would have been the end if not for a high strung yoga junkie who rolled up in a white car and with a neurotic snap of her cell phone, had her husband googling the schedules and addresses of other studios nearby within minutes. She told us about a Bikram studio nearby, but said she didn't go there often because you weren't allowed to wear green and they kept the room hotter. (At this point, not for the last time that day, I wondered what the hell we were walking into.) We decided to check out the Bikram place; but it turned out they didn't have a class until 4, so we had hours to kill.

We returned home to eat and rest up. Killing time, I checked out the website for the studio, which said things like: "Bring a positive mental attitude and sense of adventure." And if that wasn't enough, it also promised "...you’ll laugh, cry, moan, groan, [and] sweat...” And I thought, how cheesy. Then the website said not to eat 2-3 hours before coming, because you might feel nauseous. My second pang of worry struck. The website was also how I learned that ALL Bikram classes were 90 minutes in length. Jill usually attends 60 minute classes, and avoids 90 minute classes out of a sense of sanity, so I decided to keep this information to myself. I was curious to experience my first yoga class and I wasn't letting something like an extra 30 minutes in 105 degree heat put me off.

When we finally found ourselves in the line to sign up. It was 15$ for one class, but 30$ for a beginner's pass, unlimited class for two weeks. I figured even if it sucked, the benefits and the challenge were tantalizing. So with that, goodbye, money. People lingered in the reception area in various states of minimalist workout clothing.
We picked up our mats and walked into the studio. It was filled with people lying on mats all over the floor. It was dead silent. Oh yeah, and did I mention it was HOT? We were stepping into a sauna on the sun. The air was thick, a humid, summer day without any wind. The kind of hot where you sweat by doing nothing. If the heat had been a celebrity, it would have been the product of a threesome between Rihanna, Scarlett Johansson and Brad Pitt.

I laid down flat on my mat to wait, and it wasn't so bad. Wouldn't it be cool, I thought, if I actually had some super immunity to heat and the class was a breeze? Still and warm, this seemed possible. That's when the instructor came in. Apparently the only rules were to try and stay in the room the whole time, and to lay down if you felt dizzy. Uh oh. Then she said we were going to start with a breathing exercise, laced her fingers beneath her chin and took a deep breath that made her sound like she was sucking the soul out of a small orphan. (Poor little Timmy!) The deepest breath you've ever taken in your whole life. Soon the whole class joined in, and it was a terrifying orchestra of wraiths. I heard a whole orphanage of poor, wounded children having their souls hoovered clean out of them.

After this, came the poses. We began transforming our bodies from bone and muscle into toothpicks and rubber bands. Suddenly my arms and legs were a Rubiks cube that I could not for the life of me figure out how to solve. I was a pretzel, twisting. A puzzle, not sure what was supposed to lock in where. I was an extra hard bonus question at the end of the test.
It was both mentally and physically trying. There was no music to pull you out of the moment, and the 40 degree heat forced you to have the concentration you couldn't ask of 100% orange juice. You had mentally direct your body into the pose, hold it with your muscles, and meanwhile, be hyperaware of each and every drop of sweat literally pouring out of you, sliding down your skin and pooling in a tiny ocean at your feet. The pounding of my heart swallowed my entire head whole. I forgot to breath.

Over the 90 minutes I went through a couple of stages:
• At first I was fine.
• I began to feel like a baked potato, wrapped in foil, easy to pierce, probably capable of melting butter on my skin.
• I was amazed at how by body was capable of stretching and folding in the heat. I was a psychedelic lawn chair.
• I distinctly remember a moment where I thought I was going to break down and cry. I didn't know if yoga had hit a soft spot or I had just lost hope of ever seeing the light of day again. I kept it all together, but that feeling of vulnerability was a cocktail of anxiety and panic.
• Just after the instructor told us we have 40 minutes left, some part of me began to come to terms with my own mortality. Everyone else seemed to be in the same state.

When I looked into the mirrors on the wall, the red faces of my comrades were stony and serious, glistening with a lacquer of sheer-goddamn-strength of will. Jill's eyes were glazed over and black, like a doll's eyes, having just committed murder. Steve's face said he was about to take on his own death in a showdown at high noon. Then I met my own stare the mirror. I was smirking. Smirking. Maybe I was refusing to let Bikram break me, or I had tapped the inner echelons of my own madness, but whatever it was, whoever it was in that mirror happened to be a shiny, frightening stranger. Someone more powerful, more dangerous than me. Someone armed with either a lot of firepower or rabies. I was Tyler freaking Durden.

We were so sweaty it looked like we had showered. I had to close my eyes because sweat was pouring into them. I could taste the salt in my sweat when I opened my mouth to breath, and Jill noted later, that her fingers had gone prune-y, like she had taken a long hot bath. In way, we sort of had. A long hot soak in our own sweat and a tub of WHY DO PEOPLE DO THIS? But, at the end of it all, we walked out of the studio, I realized the answer to that question.

I felt light as a feather, like I wasn't walking but gliding instead. It was like suddenly I was graceful. The air was cool and fresh. Every breath I took felt like a gift. Life was a waking dream. I felt strong, powerful and accomplished and once again, mentally stable. There was not a drop of anxiety in my whole body. It all made sense. I was a Simon and Garfunkel ballad if it woke up from a nap and was still sleepy. Then, at the same time I felt as though I was a deer, powerful and ready to trample the guys who shot Bambi's mom. I think it's on that weird cocktail of feelings that people become physically hooked. I can understand it completely. In fact, I'm going again tomorrow...and I'm getting up EARLY to do it. In the words of Chuck Palahniuk: "It's only after we lose everything that we're free to do anything."

And in the words of me: "Bikram yoga: go for the workout, stay for the chance to face your own death."

Inquiring minds want to know: have you tried hot yoga? What did you think of it? If you haven't, would you ever?

Sportin' Style

I had to take a few snaps of my outfit for today. I was on my way out the door when I had a flash of inspiration. It was a sudden moment of complete and total EUREKA. So I stopped in mid-step, pivoted and dashed back inside. I grabbed my camera and went to the back deck to take a couple of pictures.... Did I mention that I was on my way to the gym?

Did I also mention I'm a total ham?

I can snap pictures of me making faces at the camera in all kinds of pretty dresses, and that's cool, it's fun, but I'm not always comfortable with it, because it's only half honest.
When it comes down to it, I change outfits twice a day almost every day. This is my OTHER uniform, something I have been, and will be rocking daily for weeks, months and hopefully years to come. Don't worry, I promise I'm not going to go on another I NEED TO LOSE WEIGHT rant, I'm here to talk about gym fashion. You know, serious stuff, people! If it's important enough to make it into my everyday life, it's important enough to write about in my blog.

There are four elements to this outfit:
1. The headgear
2. The tee
3. The shorts
4. The shoes

1 & 2.... As I'm sure you can see, I stay awesome at the gym by wearing sunglasses... I also rock them at night and in the bar, like an 80s song AND a douchebag. My hair gets pulled up into a tight bun and my bangs are held back with an elastic headband. Please note how nothing in this outfit is colour coordinated. I did that on purpose, to be ironic, or whatever.

As for the t-shirt.... The Hart Dynasty is a WWE wrestling tag team from Canada. Recently I went through an easy six month phase of being completely obsessed with the drama of pro wrestling. (Side note: RIP Randy Savage.) I know it's all set up, but the athleticism, a sense of showmanship and it's cheesy as hell.... Right up my alley. I only wish I had been into it in the 90s, because apparently that was golden age... Whatever, I still loves me some Miz, some John Morrison and some Daniel Bryan. Dear future employer, stumbling onto this blog.......I have nothing to say at the moment that might salvage your opinion of me. I'll get back to you on this.

You normally don't see this much swagger from someone in biking shorts.

3 & 4... shorts and shoes. The shorts are from Joe Fresh, and I'm pretty sure my mom bought them on sale. I don't even know how to tell you what colour they are. The racing stripes are some washed out pink and the main part is some weird green-grey-concrete tone I've never been able to nail down. I like them because they don't ride up when I'm on a roll. Also, anything equipped with racing stripes gets a thumbs up in my book.

The shoes are white, yellow and black Reeboks. I think I've have them since at least my first year of college... three years ago. I really think they pull the whole look together, don't you? It's like I always say... There's something about a pair of well loved, dirty running shoes that adds a touch of class to the ensemble.

Realistically, this is what I'm wearing when I'm not prancing around in dresses, sandals or skinny jeans. JUST GLAMOROUS. What do y'all rock when you aren't being fabulous citizens of the world?

Zumba

In my seemingly never ending mission to find personal fitness and self control around food, I'm trying to find exercise I like doing. It's not as hard as it sounds... Mostly I avoid spinning like the pedal pushing torture-fest that it is. I tend to like cardio that gets my blood pumping and my feet moving. Short form on this one:

SPIN = BAD. RUNNING = GOOD.

So for the past two weeks I've been going to Zumba classes at my gym. For those of you who don't know what Zumba means, it's Spanish for, "your arms, hips and feet are ALL GOING TO BE DOING DIFFERENT THINGS SIMULTANEOUSLY!"... Or something. I couldn't find it on Wikipedia, and let's face it after that, the lazy searcher knows when the battle is over.

Zumba is basically dance routines with the adrenaline pumped up to 100%, set to the music from around the world. E.g. salsa and merengue (which IS music and not fluffed up egg whites, thank you very much) as well as some Indian and African music that got punched in the teeth by techno pop. Basically you follow the instructor as best as you can through choreographed dances that kick your ASS. The first week I went I was tripping over myself and shuffling to keep up.

I watched the instructor as she grapevined with her feet, her hips swiveled and her arms somehow managed to weave in a graceful manner ALL at the same time. Impossible. I was staring, trying to remember which was my right and my left. Eventually I got the hit of the beat into my head and I let myself have fun with it. I know lots of people say they're really self conscious in a gym/fitness class setting... and I might have been like that for awhile... But even if I can't keep up or get all the steps right, I always make a point to keep moving. I'm not there to impress anyone, I'm there to have fun!

You too can be this cool. (Source.)

The other awesome thing about these classes is that anyone can try them. There are girls bigger than me, ladies smaller than me, women my age, older, purple, you name it. At the end of my second class I was dripping sweat, my pulse was pounding and I was happy as hell.

I guess this just means that it pays off to give everything a try or two... and if you can't cut it with spinning, like me, I would recommend Zumba. The music is a little different from your repetitive top 40. You get to shake it out, feel kinda exotic and it's the kind of workout you underestimate. Trust me.

I'm just warning you now, despite the talk about salsa, shaking and gyrating, this class is NOT SEXY. You get grossly hot under the collar and you sweat in places you didn't know you could sweat... Still, it's completely worth it.