Making my Bed

So if I want to make this goal a reality I need to change A LOT of bad habits.  Here are a few that I need to start doing:  actually exercising, eating healthier, getting enough sleep, stretching, having a real plan for my days, stop beating myself up over my weight and do something about it if I want it to be different, you know, the normal stuff. But, I have also learned that I need to make a bigger effort to be in the habit of making my bed everyday.

Why you ask?  Because my husband told me so. J  Not completely.  He is currently reading a book,  “The Power of Habit” by Charles Duhigg, that I look forward to reading when he is done.  In that book I guess it says to make your bed everyday.  I LOVE making my bed, I have been able to finally find a spread and pillows that I adore the look of.  Yesterday I didn’t make my bed, I had high hopes of having a super productive day, but no matter what I kept telling myself in my mind, I just didn’t have it in me to do anything I planned on doing.  I ended up sitting on the couch all day, watching pointless TV, reading Facebook playing solitaire and trying to write my last post.  I chalked it up to one of my “bad” days that you need to have every now and then.

Today I made my bed.  I had a very productive day.  Superstitious you might think, maybe.  But when I think back on the days that I feel are harder, they are the days that I haven’t made my bed.  Even if I have a day where not much of the “housekeeping” duties are done, but I the bed is made, I feel I have a happier day.  So as an experiment I am going to focus on the make-the-bed-everyday habit.  I figure it is a rather easy fast thing to do and maybe it will help me to be more willing to work on the other habits I need to change.

The Purge

I sat down this morning wanting to do another blog post.  I have a lot that I feel the need to put out there so that I can truly begin this journey.  I am excited about the direction I am taking in my life, but I feel the need to purge myself of some issues of my past so that I can really move on.  Because of all this in my head I was having trouble focusing my thoughts.  I didn’t want to put out an extremely long post that people wouldn’t finish…but maybe that is what I have to do.

My struggle has to do with the fact that I love the direction I am headed, but today I feel overwhelmed by my disgust at my current state.  Let me explain with a few stories that when all put together may help explain my current condition.  And once again I hope you will stick with me as I mull this over, because this could be REALLY long…

Story 1:

I have 3 beautiful children.  I love them dearly; I hate what motherhood has done to my body.  I put on 50 pounds with my first pregnancy.  I had never dreamed that I could weigh over 200 lbs.  I was a new mom and it didn’t bother me too much.  I was young and optimistic about getting that weight off.  I was able to drop below the 200’s for a while, but I slowly crept my way back up there. 

I was in the planning stages of a major weight loss regime when I found out I was pregnant with my second.  Her pregnancy was kind of a downer, unfortunately.  Most people in my ward didn’t realize I was pregnant until I was 6-7 months along, and some were still asking my husband (they didn’t confront me anymore) at 8-9 months preggers.  I am pleased to say I was able to keep my weight gain to 20-25 lbs.  The problem was that I left the hospital weighing THE EXACT SAME as I did when I went in.  I mean who has an 8 lb baby (plus water and placenta) and walks out of the hospital not losing ANY WEIGHT?  Low point I tell you.

I had almost 5 years to lose that weight before having my next baby, didn’t happen.  At one point I had gotten down to 190!  But it came back…with my third pregnancy I am pleased to say that I never did hit 250 lbs, but I was dangerously close.  Why am I telling you this?  Because I need to say that I am like many mothers and have dreams of being back to my before baby weight, but I am also a mother that tends to put the needs of my family ahead of my quest for a thinner me.

Story 2:

Next, I want to tell you an amazing story about my husband.  Three springs ago the two of us were one of those happy overweight couples.  I knew I was on the heavier side of the scale but I thought Brad only had an extra 20 lbs, maybe, but I didn’t see him as fat.  He, however, wanted to lose weight and he searched to find a way that would work for him.  Over the course of about 4 months he lost a total of 70 lbs! (Which, by the way, is 20 lbs more than we thought he could to lose.)  He changed the way he ate and he got really serious into cycling.  Even more amazing than losing all the weight is that he has kept it off all this time.  (I should also add that he accomplished all this while traveling 2-4 days every week.)  His triumph spurred me to try and get focused on my own weight loss.  I have tried more diets and things these past few years than I have in my entire life.  I was originally able to lose about 40 lbs, which is awesome, but lately I have put most of it back on.

Story 3:

Last night I had a wonderful evening with my family going to see Christmas lights.  We went to a few places that we knew had big displays.  I LOVE Christmas lights.  They seem to be one of my favorite things of the season because of the way that they make the dark street come to life.  But even though it was a magical evening, I was inwardly unhappy.  See just before starting the night I needed to go to my closet and change my clothes.  We were going to be outside for part of the night so despite the warm day, nights have gotten cooler here in Arizona (finally J) meaning pants and a long sleeve shirt.  When I grabbed a shirt that I wore comfortably last winter it was short and tight.  Disappointment coursed through me because I had previously discovered that I only have two pair of pants that fit me (and they are almost too small).  Now I realize that nothing of the winter clothes I wore last year fit me right.  I can wear them, but they are uncomfortably tight.

Story 4:

I am not sure what has happened over the past 5 years, but I seem to have a hard time making any kind of goal and keeping it.  I used to be that person that made a long list everyday and would work tirelessly to complete it.  I wasn’t one of those that got discouraged when I didn’t finish my list; I got spurred on to be better.  I had lists and lists of goals and ideals I was headed for.  But the more the years have past the harder it has been for me to make those lists.  The last few years I have almost completely given up on it.  I almost feel like if I write a goal down I am just setting myself up for failure.  I mean I can’t even keep my kitchen clean for a week when that is the only thing I try to do in a day, how am I going to create a goal and accomplish it?

What happens when you put all these together?  Someone that is out of her mind if she thinks she can become an ironwoman, that’s what.  But the crazy thing is I feel like by starting this blog and making myself accountable, I will.  Even if no one else EVER reads it I feel that if I can chart my journey, the good and the bad, I will someday cross that finish line.

The thing that got me so disgusted with my current place in life is a culmination of all the above reminiscing.  I obviously hate my body and can’t come to grips that I am fat.  Though I try desperately not to be I am insanely jealous of my husband, why can’t I lose 70 pounds practically overnight?  And lets face it I have become lazy, lazy, LAZY!

I cried today when I realized the reality of the situation, this is going to take time (lots of time), it is going to take planning (TONS), it will require work (get OFF that bottom fool), and most of all, patience.  I am SO not a patient person.  Some might disagree, but I fake it real good.

When I was crying to my dear sweet Bradley (yup I cried like a baby today) he reminded me of an experience I had that made me cry more.  When I was 12 I had an opportunity to go on a Pioneer Trek.  As youth we were put into families of about 16-20 kids, packed our clothes and sleeping bags into a handcart as well as the food and water we would need for the week and we were put to the task of pulling the cart along a dirt trail.  We were not told how long we would be walking and for the entire afternoon we were not given rest, food or water.  About an hour or so before dusk we stopped in a nice shady meadow in the bottom of a valley.  Our Ma’s and Pa’s left us for a bit while we rested up and goofed off.  When they came back we got a big drink of water and were then told that we were not allowed to talk.  They wanted us to just think about the experience, we were not told how long we needed to stay silent.  After a few minutes of walking Ma and Pa began pulling our “brothers” aside and as they did each one was told they couldn’t help us girls pull the cart anymore.  When they were all off and walking silently beside us the trail began to take us up a very steep sustained hill out of the valley.  Not only was the road steep it was also extremely rocky.  These would have been difficult conditions for our whole family to handle, but it was just us girls.  I have to tell you that our brothers were beside themselves, wanting to help but being obedient and not pulling.  They did find large sticks to put behind the wheels to help prevent us from going backwards, which at times we were doing.  They ran to who-knows-where to find water to soak their bandanas in so they could put the cool cloth on our sweaty foreheads.  Even with this encouragement the “women’s pull” was excruciating.  I was crying.  Every time I looked up that hill I felt we had made no progress.  I got to a point that I wanted to let go of the rope and pass out.  Just as I felt that I heard my sister next to me cry out softly, “Father, we can’t do it anymore, please help us.”  As soon as she finished whispering I realized that I didn’t hurt anymore.  I was moving but I didn’t feel the pain.  The awareness that God had stepped in and was pulling for us was so powerful, and so real.

When I think about that experience I realize I am deep in the throws of a one-woman pull right now.  I have a destination at the top of that hill that will mean ultimate triumph, but first I have to go through the pain and sweat and tears.  The road is steep and rough and LONG, but once again it will be worth it.

I want to thank those of you who have made it to the bottom of this post.  I greatly appreciate it.  I hope this purge of my struggles will allow me to move forward and to be patient as I do so.

The Challenge

So a dear friend comes up to me yesterday and let’s me know she read my blog.  I get all excited cause it is nice to know someone took the time to read what I have written.  Then she throws down the gauntlet, “I am running the Phoenix marathon in March.  Come run it with me.  There is time to train and when you run a marathon you will know you can do the Ironman.”  I know she was being supportive, but I took it more like a dare.

I tend to operate on dares.  I was dared by someone at the start of my mission to not shave my legs the whole 18 months I was gone…I came home with super hairy legs (kind of grosses me out to think about it).  Even ickier than that was that the first time I did shave those furry things, I shaved them in stripes (I was dared to).  Heebee geebies!  Anyway I really don’t like backing down from a “dare” so I spent the afternoon trying to decide how I felt about running a marathon in March.

I know I could finish.  One time I ran an entire 10K race after only two weeks of “training” (having not exercised for a year beforehand) and in my training the longest I was able to run was a mile and a half.  I told myself at the beginning of the 6.2 miles that I wanted to run the first 2 miles, and then I could walk.  I felt so accomplished when I passed the 2 miles and ended up running the whole thing.

But a marathon is a little bit more than that.  I don’t want my first marathon to be something I do just because I can cross the finish line, I could go walk 26.2 miles right now, it would take me a while and I would be tired after…but…not the way for me.  I think that has been a big factor to my not-quite-successes.  I know I can complete something so I set a huge goal for myself, reach for the stars right?  But I never really make a realistic plan to get there.

This is where I went wrong with my half-ironman this year.  I knew I could go out and cover the 70.3 miles to finish, I was training to make it happen, but I hadn’t really prepared myself for the major change in schedule.  I was able to maintain the 2-3 hours of training a day 5-6 days a week for a little bit, but finally the stress of such an abrupt change got the best of me and I needed to pull back and slow down.  I am not a 0-60 in 4 seconds kind of girl I guess.  I have always wanted to be the one that can change overnight, but I need to take it slow, you know like the tortoise.

So thank you for the challenge, I am going to take it slow.  I need to get exercise back into my regular routine, but be able to do so without disrupting my wife time or my mommy time.  I want to do this without causing injury or pushing myself too much so that I want to quit.  I am currently in the planning stage with my implementation beginning slowly.  I am going to take the challenge, but start slow.  I am going to aim for the half-marathon in March.  Start slow and make realistic, reachable changes.  I can do this!

The Pattern, Part 1

As I pick myself up and start back on my journey I find myself really desiring to stop feeling the failure.  True I have done 3 triathlons, some call me crazy for doing that much, but I have always felt like my efforts haven’t been what they could or should be.  I think it will be beneficial to examine these past efforts.

I trained pretty well for my 1st tri and felt great afterward.  I was quite discouraged at the fact that I ended up having to walk the 5K.  We think it was the altitude difference.  Every time I would start to jog I would only last 2 or 3 steps when I would be wheezing so hard I could barely breathe.  I did push myself to run the last 10th of a mile (cause I always like to finish my races running as hard as I can) and it took me the good part of 15 minutes to be able to talk to anyone after. 

All in all though the 1st tri was a success, so why did it take me years to do the next one?  Pregnancy was one excuse I guess.  I signed up for the Lake Powell Tri one year, but a small injury 2 months before the race was the “reason” I backed out.  When I signed up the next year I had 5 months to prepare and I just really didn’t do any serious training until about a month before. 

My husband and sister came with me and they both did the sprint distance.  Like I said, I knew it was going to take me 5 hours.  My goal was to complete the Olympic distance triathlon before I turned 35.  I was so slow that I was finishing my 1st lap of the swim when my sister was starting her race, I cheered her on; then she and all but 2 swimmers beat me out of the lake.  I wanted to quit when I hit the big hill on my first pass on the bike, I cried my way up it (as I walked along side the bike) and I wanted to curse when I had to do it again on the 2nd loop, but the downhill portion of the course was thrilling both times.  My husband walked the entire 10K with me, having finished his race 2nd in his age group.  My sister, after putting all our bikes and gear in the truck, met us for the last mile.  I remember looking at my watch at this point and realizing I had 11 minutes to the 5-hour mark and I wanted to squeak in under it, so I ran the last half-mile.  I don’t know my exact time, but it was under the 5 hours.

Does that count as a success?  I don’t know, afterward I always felt like I did give it my all during the race, I enjoyed it immensely and felt very accomplished, but I could have done so much more on the training.  My Lake Powell Tri last year was pretty much more of the same.  I was slow, like I expected to be due to lack of any real training, I had tons of fun during and was proud of what I did accomplish…but…

Herein lies my pattern.  I love the thrill of the race.  I love pushing myself to do something that others feel is too hard, but I tend to only love that feeling during the actual race.  I have a hard time enjoying the often mundaneness of training.  Because of that I let other distractions take precedence.  I end up not training like I could.  I go and enjoy my race anyway.  Then afterward I feel like I have failed because I have not given my best.  This is the pattern that I am determined to understand.

An Explanation

I feel that I should do a little explaining about triathlons.  Tri sports events have been present for quite some time in history.  In the 70's in California some organizers started doing swim, bike, run events.  In 1977 a group of athletes in Hawaii were debating who was more fit, runners, swimmers or cyclists.  They decided to do a triathlon that combined the longest events of each.  I like the note the racers got explaining the distances: "Swim 2.4 miles! Bike 112 miles! Run 26.2 miles! Brag for the rest of your life!"  "Whoever finishes first, we'll call him the ironman."  The first Ironman triathlon was held on February 18, 1978 with 15 athletes competing.  The first ironman, Gordon Haller, finished in just under 12 hours.

Over the years triathlons have been gaining in popularity and that is why there are so many different distances.  After all the total 140.6 miles in the Ironman is quite hard for most people to attempt.  The Half-Ironman is exactly that, half an Ironman (70.3 total miles).  Olympic and Sprint distances aren't always the same distances.  MOST Olympic triathlons have a 1000-1500 yard or meter swim, 20-25 mile bike and finish with a 10K (6.2 miles) run.  The Sprint distances also vary greatly but are usually about half of the Olympic.  More recently, once again due to popularity, Mini-Sprints are easier to find, as are triathlons for kids.

I am hoping to do an Ironman distance race by the time I turn 40, giving me 3 years.  Then I will be an ironwoman.  Just FYI when you convert 140.6 into kilometers it becomes 226K.  Get it?  226 Kae makes me an ironwoman!

Hope you enjoyed the history!

The Starting Line

Here I begin.  Getting to the start of the race can be almost as hard as the race itself or even the training required.  This blog is intended to be a way to document my journey to the starting line of an Ironman distance triathlon.  I feel the need to look to my past at the beginning of this journey and then I can move forward from there.

Let's mention grade school for a second.  I was never one of the athletes.  I tried running cross country in junior high...I lasted all of one race (a two-miler) after the race I quit the team.  I spent my high school career as a self proclaimed "All-Star Supporter."  My friends and I tried to attend as many sports games as possible (football, soccer, track, wrestling and sometimes baseball).  I did do a lot of hiking and we played ultimate frisbee, but I always considered myself one of the fat kids (if I could be high school weight, MAN!  That would be AWESOME!), so I never tried to do anything more physical.  

As my journey moved on to my college years I was exposed to more possibilities in life, that we don't all have to remain in the mold we thought we fit into in high school.  I loved the idea of finding who I was meant to be.  I served an 18-month church mission in South America where I really learned that my potential is endless, I still had my hang-ups, but I was full of enthusiasm for finding things I loved.  I am not sure if it was before or after I married the love of my life (Brad) that the idea of doing an Ironman entered my head, but is was around that time.  I remember reading an email about Dick Hoyt and the amazing father that he is to his son Rick, and I wanted more than ever to do triathlons.  A few years later I saw the youtube video about team Hoyt with the song "I Can Only Imagine" that shows the Hoyt duo competing in an Ironman and that seemed to seal my desire to do this ultimate test of endurance and become an "ironwoman" myself.

Even though the desire was there, I did nothing to really begin my journey for a few more years.  Finally I traveled to St. George, UT and raced my first Sprint distance triathlon.  What an amazing feeling to complete my first race.  I was SLOW!  The swim went well, the bike wasn't bad except that I thirsty for most of it and no matter how hard I tried I couldn't run or jog.  I ended up walking most of the 5K to finish, but I finished. :)  Over the next few years I tried to sign up for another triathlon, but I let excuses get in my way; no training time, no money for fees or travel, being too overweight to do it, etc.  Maybe some were legitimate excuses, but some were just me not wanting to put in the effort.  

When my 35th birthday was creeping up on me I started to feel the pressure of becoming an ironwoman before my life ended.  I signed up for an Olympic distance triathlon in Lake Powell the October before I was to turn 35.  I did not do as much training as I should have and because of that I went into it knowing it was going to take me five hours, that's right I said FIVE HOURS.  My goal was  just to finish the race because I was in worse physical shape than I had been at my previous triathlon (can I blame that on my third pregnancy?)  This course had us doing two laps on both the swim and bike courses.  I started in the second wave for the swim, but was third to last of everyone out of the water (yes I counted).  When I was coming around to make my second lap on my bike they tried to get me to go into the transition area because no other Olympic racer was still on the bike course.  By the time I started my run most of the competitors were heading home.  When I came in to finish EVERYTHING had been taken down and a handful of people were cleaning garbage off the parking lot.  When they saw me coming in they created a make-shift finish line for me by creating a funnel of people for me to run through.  The race organizer gave me a medal for my tenacity.

The following year, 2011, I went back to Lake Powell and completed the Sprint distance.  I don't think I came in last for the sprinters...but maybe I did, at least that time I got to run under the real finish line.  Once again I really hadn't trained for it.  This had become a pattern.  I still had the dream to do an Ironman, but I was starting to feel more and more like only a dream, one of those unattainable goals.

Earlier this year I tried to take a big step closer to the goal by signing up for a half-ironman in October.  All summer long I trained, well mostly.  As fall came I found myself being extremely stressed out trying to juggle all my roles; wife, mother, housekeeper, and triathlete.  One day in September I came as close to a nervous break-down as I ever have.  I realized that my priorities are not ordered in a manageable way and I had to cut something out.  Sorry Triathlete Kae, you need to take a break.  I still told myself I was going to attempt the Half-Ironman, I just had to stop trying to train for it.  Just days before the race I decided not to even start the race.  I had learned they had certain cut-off times for each leg and it was guaranteed that I would be kicked off the course during the bike portion, I might not even have finished the swim in time to start the bike.  This is one starting line that I now wish I would have made it to.  Perhaps I wouldn't have been able to finish, but I could have started.

However, this time off has been a blessing.  It tore at my heart that some of me (and others) felt like I was giving up completely, but I haven't.  I spent all of October trying to come up with a way to motivate myself to stop sitting by the side of my road to my dream and get back on the journey.  In that last week I had an epiphany, why don't I blog about it.  At the idea to the premise of my blog was a lot like the movie "Julie and Julia."  I would pick an Ironman that I was going to do and do a blow by blow of my training for it.  Then I realized that maybe that wouldn't work.  

After a few days of thought I came to the conclusion that what I really want is to share my journey, the successes AND the failures as I attempt to accomplish this.  To share if I can finally get my "baby weight" off, or if I can perform just fine with it hanging around.  To share when I finally get closer to finding the balance between so many important and demanding roles.  I guess my hope is that through my journey towards becoming an ironwoman I might just be able to inspire others to reach for their seemingly-out-of-reach-goals.  Maybe I won't change anyone else's life, but I really hope to change mine.