In Which I Curse The Holidays

It is what every dieter hates to see. Turkey, mashed potatoes, pumpkin pie. Ham, macaroni and cheese, corn, pecan pie. Chocolate in the stocking. Birthday cake on my birthday, which falls between the two holidays.Tons of alcohol and appetizers at my best friend's house to ring in the new year.

I have gained twelve pounds in the past 6 weeks. And my ass has grown from the size of Rhode Island to the size of Texas. My double chin is coming back and my spare tire has gone from a bicycle tire to that of a monster truck.

Enough self-hatred and beating myself up. Time to do something about it.

The good thing is that right after the holidays, New Year’s comes. I usually make several resolutions, which haven’t always been achieved in the past, but this year, actually got done. I finished my book. I lost a crap ton of weight. Forty-five pounds, to be exact. That’s a lot of weight. The size of a small child, at the least. I started being more active. I got into nursing school and have done well so far.

Even with the weight gain, I’m really only 15 pounds from my ultimate goal. It was suggested to me to try out Insanity, a DVD workout, which I’ve heard can leave people vomiting and wishing to die.

Sounds perfect.

In Which I (Stupidly) Listen To My Best Friend

I've been in a funk recently. Between school, work, the kids, the husband, and all the studying, I'm just worn out. I've been having some problems coping with things and today when I told my best friend Dejan that I was feeling icky, he had the brilliant idea that we should go running.

Now, while I did reach my original goal of 170 lb that I had set 2 years ago when I was 250 lbs (I'm actually 166 lbs as of today), I still need to tone the flab. And I haven't worked out in a couple of weeks because of being so busy...and let's face it...I'm lazy.

However, Dejan is not. He goes to the gym almost daily (he has a schedule set up) and is way more buff than I am. He drinks his little protein shakes and eats his tuna and lentil for dinner (it smells like vomit and looks even worse) and is all into working on his fitness.

In my lapse of insanity, I agree to go with him and actually get kind of stoked about the idea of running outside. I run on a treadmill, people. In a climate controlled gym. With filtered air.

What in the hell was I thinking??

It was a beautiful day here in G-ville, temps were in the 60s, sun shining, and there was a pretty boy running in front of me with his dog that I love almost as much as my own children. I was fine...for the first 2 minutes. Then we headed up a hill.

Running outside in the hellacious Greenville allergy-inducing air killed me. I made it for about the first mile before I made my running partners slow it down, then I let Dejan talk me back into running again. He allowed me to stop so he could talk to one of the umpteen million people here in town that he knows and I tried to calm my pounding heart and soothe my aching lungs while attempting to stay in the conversation.

Then the bastard made me run again. AND he made me do stairs, insisting that the stairs would help tone my ass, which in all honesty, could use a bit of toning. And by a bit, I mean a lot. All of me needs toning.

Anywho, so we finally made it back to his house, after 3 freaking miles of running through the park, downtown, and through the historic district...and I died.


I think I look like one of those chalk drawings left behind after a hit and run.