Day 45, 46 and 47

 Still working out and that is going well. I think next week I can up the sets to 3 for each exercise. The warm up and cool down also make such a positive difference so I'm glad I added those in. Walking is going great and yesterday I did an extra long walk...almost 2 and 1/2 hours. Whew! And then another 45 minute walk with my favorite walking buddy. And best of all, I wasn't sore or anything. Woohoo! I'm eating better. Still having some chocolately goodness but I feel like overall I'm eating less junk and fewer snacks, so that's good. I'm also being more aware of how I feel as far as checking to see if I'm hungry before eating. That has worked well especially at night. I think I read somewhere that you shouldn't eat past a certain time in the evening so that your body has enough time to process food before sleep. So I try to keep that in mind when I decide whether or not to have an after dinner snack.

To continue my backstory, I did so=so in Cross Country for my Junior year and then Basketball wasn't good. All the years of running and jumping on the concrete floor finally caught up to me and I was diagnosed with "Jumpers Knee" in both knees. I don't know what the scientific name is but it basically meant I had to do some physical therapy for most of the season. Unfortunately, it didn't help. I wanted to quit Basketball but caved to peer pressure and stayed on the team. I wasn't able to run track that Spring and that did not help my attitude at all. Then, for my Senior year, my anger continued as well as my bad decisions. I ran Cross Country but didn't do very well. Then I played Basketball even though I knew it would mean no Track and Field. See, with my knee injuries, it wasn't obvious from the outside that anything was wrong. I would tell people about the pain I was in but since they couldn't see it, they didn't really believe me. Which of course just made me angrier.

I understand that ultimately, I only have myself to answer to for choices I made. And I absolutely have regrets about not speaking to my parents about this. Sadly, we can't go back in time and undo mistakes. Instead we can only move forward and try to learn and grow from them. For me, that took quite a few years. Eventually I got back into running and even completed a mini triathlon and two marathons. However, raising a child and going back to college to complete my degree, along with other life experiences, took my attention away from running. It's always been a part of me, I just ignored it for a while. But now, it's time to stop ignoring that call of the road (or track) and see what I can do.