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Sunday, November 1, 2009

A Six Bag Limit

Apparently I have a six bag limit, bags of leaves that is. We missed our village's curb-side leaf pick up last week. That's okay because I would rather see those leaves improving that clay garden soil, but we still have to bag them up and drive them out. Today the weather was cooperative and I set out with alot of enthusiasm. Running the mower with bag attached and dumping the shredded green and brown into large plastic bags. A neighbor works at KRAFT and gets us these ?60- 90? gallon clear plastic bags, which would otherwise be waste.

I could only fill up 6 of these bags before I was pooped. My feet hurt and I was just tired. This is a problem. I have never really felt limited by my physical strength or endurance. Perhaps this is because I have realistic expectations of what my 39 year old body could do. But today I couldn't even fulfill my reasonable expectations. By spring I will need so much more out of my body; it's time for a change.

I am 40 - 50 lbs overweight, have crunchy knees(not painful but loud!), carpal tunnel, and now I think plantar fasciitis. What am I waiting for -diabetes, hypertension, cardiovascular disease? It stops now. I don't have the work excuse -I'm only at 25-30 hours per week. The girls are old enough to be very independent. I am in charge of most of the food coming out of the kitchen as well as the grocery shopping. My excuses are running out.

My subconscious is afraid-what if I try-really try and I can't do it? I've turned over a new leaf :) more times than I can count. How will this be different? I have some ideas. First, my goals will not be scale related but behavior related, as in meeting my goals of veggies, fruit and whole grains and number of minutes of physical activity rather than 2 lbs a week. I can control my behavior and the behavior will affect the scale. Second, I am going to re-join the YMCA- I need to get back to swimming to take things easy on my joints until my weight gets to a healthier place. Third, I am going to develop a kick-ass support network by blogging about my goals and progress along with joining Weight Watchers.

The tone of the posts will change somewhat -but it's my blog, so there!! All you lurkers out there-speak up! I'd love to know you are out there keeping me honest.

8 comments:

Meadowlark said...

Be careful what you wish for ;)

OK, I'll nag you.

Peace!

Hickchick said...

Woot woot my first nag i mean support network :)

Judy T said...

Maybe I need to join up along with you. Although, I don't know if it would be fair- I'm working on a 47 year old body! But I don't know if I'm brave enough to blog about it.
Judy

Really Rosiem said...

Wonderful goal and I'm cheering you on!

I started Weight Watchers two months ago. Unfortunately, I found the meetings too simple and thought most of the leaders here needed to shed more weight than I. Thus, totally bored with the meetings yet very self-motivated, I have had great success following the Weight Watchers program online. It's a great program and certainly worth the committment.

Already, I've lost 18.2 pounds in two months. Clothes that were way too tight are almost way too big now!

You can do it too! Good luck.

Sue said...

I wish you the best. Maybe announcing it on your blog IS the way to stick to it....cuz you'll have a whole bunch of people keeping you honest!
:D

Hickchick said...

Judy-there's nothing to fear, my blog self has no ego-nothing to loose!
Rose -thanks for the words about WW, and CONGRATULATION! I do plan to take advantage of the online tools, hopefully I can find a motivating group
Sue- thats the idea, hopefully!

Anonymous said...

Good luck with your new venture - its a great undertaking!

Eric Johnson said...

Congratulations! The frost in the air must be stirring up your body systems. I feel it to..... an urgency before winter clamps us down. I'm trying to stick to 3 hrs of outside activity a day so I dont hurt myself again. Glad you are getting activity outside. Rural life with Animals has lots of activity!!!!
Happy Days!