Keep Going

I started exercising again on November 4th, and I haven’t stopped since. I’m driven to keep going out of fear. Each rest day that I take makes me afraid that I will get lazy again and lose all motivation. Of course, the 15 pounds I have lost is plenty of motivation too. Even at the height of my 5K training a while ago, I never lost more than about 15 pounds. While I haven’t started running again, I have gotten very good at various workouts on the elliptical. It is my goal to start the Couch to 5K app again after Christmas. I want to get back out there and run. I’ve been acquiring new fitness gear little by little and I’m hoping that there will be a new pair of running shoes in my future.

I’ve reached a point where I am in uncharted territory. I am currently at the point where I left off the last time I was on a quest to get healthy. What happens now? Am I really capable of losing more than 15 pounds? Can I run another 5K without giving up on exercise after I complete it? I am confident that the answer is ‘yes’ to those last two questions. And for the first question, what happens now is that I keep going. I’m getting pretty bored with the elliptical and after two days of only doing the bare minimum of 30 minutes on it, I knew I had to go longer today and I dreaded it. To motivate me, I decided to put on my running playlist through the bluetooth speaker I have and go all out for a full hour. It worked. There is some kind of magic to the songs I have on that playlist. They all remind me of the time that I called myself a runner and that’s always enough motivation for me. Of course, the speaker battery died with 20 minutes left, so I had to keep going in silence.

Even though the elliptical is wearing out its welcome in my routine, I have a rule that once I start the time on it or start the interval routines I created on the iPad, I don’t stop and get off. It helps keep me going knowing that I just have to get started, because once I do, I’m not stepping off until I’m done.

The last time I was on my fitness journey, I was motivated by the desire to have children. The unhealthy nature of my body would not have made pregnancy safe for me. This time around, I’m doing this for my overall health. I love that my resting heart rate is in the 60s instead of the 90s and I’m anxious to see the results of my blood work from earlier this week. My husband and I have made the decision to grow our family through adoption, so at this point, I’m getting healthy for me. Because I’m 35 years old and take a medication for my blood pressure, one for my cholesterol, and one for my blood sugar. All the medication I take for my mental health is non-negotiable. I’m not concerned about that medicine. I know I will be taking that for the rest of my life, exercising and eating healthy will not the chemical imbalance in my brain. And I’m o.k. with that. Taking three medicines for health conditions that I can control is not o.k. with me. So I’ll keep going.

I’ll keep going until I can’t imagine my life without exercising. I’ll keep going because when my husband and I bring children into our home, I want to set a good example for them. But most importantly, I’ll keep going for me. For pride in myself, for a sense of accomplishment, and for the satisfaction in knowing I did something that changed my life for the better.