Not counting calories.

So I went and saw a dietician a couple of weeks ago, to try and get some answers on how much I should really be eating with the activity I do. At the time obviously I was running, whereas now I am mainly swimming and cycling thanks to zee toe... She gave me a few pointers on some of the areas my nutrition was lacking (mainly calcium, need more vegetables at lunch, and cut down on my PB intake *gasp*) She also gave me a great plan to follow which should both help fuel my workouts / help recover as well as help me to lose some weight.

To be honest, I've been struggling to follow it! I follow it almost completely, except I have generally been eating one extra snack each day than she has put in the plan, and as a result my weight has been staying stable instead of me losing... which isn't too bad, I guess. I think also the reason I haven't lost anything is because I have been going out for dinner more often than usual, and indulging in a few of these:

Affogato - espresso shot poured over icecream. They are so freaking amazing. When I get obsessed with something food related, having it once does not cure the craving. I usually have to have it, like, once or twice a week probably five times before the craving goes! So I've been kinda going with it and indulging the craving. Just looking at that picture makes my mouth water...

One other thing which has been fantastic and the biggest relief ever, was following the dietician's plan means I am not counting calories. I feel so free! I have wanted to stop counting since forever, but having a plan in front of me means I feel like I finally have permission and can finally do it without feeling like I'm under or over-eating accidentally. It's so great!!!

On the workout front.... I am so bored of swimming. I guess it's because I don't know what to do. I kinda just jump in the pool and swim laps for 30 mins or an hour. Intervals doesn't make it more fun, and neither does changing style every 10 or so laps. I used to love swimming, but that was when I did it once a week. Doing it four times a week now, it's getting pretty old. I'm enjoying the weights I am doing though, and at least on the exercise bike I can pull out a magazine if it gets dull.

Oh well, one week of recovery down... five to seven to go??!

New exercise plan

Ha! Stupid no-running depression, I am totally kicking you to the curb with my new little exercise plan...

Instead of my usual:
4 x runs per week
2 x kickboxing (which I haven't been doing due to work + injury + christmas hols since NOVEMBER ugh)
1 x easy cross-train (swim/elliptical)
3 x weights (usually only manage one per week anyway)

I now have planned:
4 x swims per week (1 long, 1 fast, 2 easy)
2 x indoor bike (1 HIIT, 1 hills)
1 x easy cross-train (probably some game on Wii or modified yoga to only use upper body)
3 x weights sessions (mostly arms, though I think squats would be OK?)

It will be different, and hell yes I will still miss running, but this is a way to keep myself sane....

Oh, and I finally got the results for the cross-country I ran on the weekend... yes with my broken toe (I was clearly in some serious denial). I came 56 out of 86, lol... 20th out of the females and 6th in my age group. The girl who came first in my age group ran at a 5:13 pace. Totally doable, if I had actually run at race pace.... gets me motivated for next time!!

Here's some pics from the locations where the race was:

Yep that's my tiny little city in the background :) 

So purdy!

Broken toe :(

I know this will sound weird, but I was really glad to find out I had "broken" (hairline fracture) my toe. I have been limping for 10 days and the toe was still swollen, and I felt like I was being a sook thinking it still hurts.

Glad in that way... super upset in another. It was not even that long ago that I was really happy to be running at a 6 minute/km pace consistently. Well, today (yeah, after I got the X-ray, because I'm an idiot) I ran a 5 minute pace. (8 minute mile). I promise I will stop running if the doctor tells me to do so tomorrow when I show her the X-ray - as much as it pains me to say so. My toe hurt like hell after I did that run... I don't know what I was thinking :(

Anyway. So like always seems to happen with runners, just when you feel like you're getting somewhere good, along comes a fun injury. And mine wasn't even running induced, which annoys me even more. If you missed the story - I dropped a 73kg item on my shoe while at work.

I tried the elliptical and it hurt, the bike hurt too (the foot strap mainly kept touching my toe), and the rowing machine (which was sort of OK...?). I also tried doing a lunge and almost squealed.... so I'm left with probably upper arm strength work and swimming? BORING...

I'm guessing the doc is going to say 4-6 weeks to heal, since that's what Google has told me. Basically the whole of the rest of my uni holidays :( I was already bored enough without my running being taken away from me!!! Ugh...

 Here's the break - it looks like it's on both sides. The left bit actually protrudes on my toe and you can feel it... not like out of the skin or anything, but it's a distinct bump. In actuality it is a pretty mild fracture, but I've never broken a bone before so it's kinda fascinating to me.

Also - it is very difficult to take a photo of an X-ray.

In completely random other news, trying to boost my mood I had my first taste of fro-yo :D This was banana & chocolate, with blueberries, choc chips, m&ms, jelly beans, froot loops & gummy bears (Basically most of the toppings - I was going to go with just blueberries & choc chips but then I thought why not....!)

It was pretty good except some of the lollies were kind of stale :(

Also - I apologise for being super lazy commenting on blogs / replying to comments lately. I have no excuse since I'm still on uni break... I read blogs and then just don't comment... not sure why!

WIAW - Raw food cafe

Thanks Jenn for hosting this again :)

So anyway the last week or so where I live has been extremely hot. The last two days were 38'C and 40'C and this is the forecast for the next week:

Like.... WTF?! Seriously?! To put it in perspective for you Americans out there... 38'C is 100'F and 42'C is 107'F. The minimum temperature is hardly a minimum either!!!

My house doesn't have air conditioning... so I'm spending my days sticking to the leather couch and not moving a great deal. I have managed to drag myself to the gym for a run yesterday (where I splashed the crap out of the treadmill with sweat... isn't that a beautiful image??!) and a swim on Monday. Tonight might be another swim, I don't think I can face the weights room...

To anyone who says they are jealous, you have obviously never suffered a week of this heat... and to be fair, neither have I. Usually it is two to three days and then the relief of a cooler day - and that's bad enough!

Anyway enough talking about the weather, since this is in fact a WIAW... today mum & I went off to a Raw Food cafe. I've been wanting to go ever since I found out it opened up. It was FREAKING AMAZING....

Here's what we ate...

First out was our smoothies... mine was the green one (spinach & banana and I forget what else) and mum had the mango... it was like a lassi but with almond milk and walnuts and stuff. I tasted both, and both were delicious.

My main meal (nachos) This was soooo delicious. The crackers were I think flaxseed and buckwheat dehydrated, then a tomato salsa, guacamole and cashew "cream cheese". I ate every single crumb.

Mum's soup. She couldn't remember what was in it. Flax crackers on the side. It was yum though!

My dessert... a florentine. I can never say no to these, and why not a raw version too... (You can see how hot it is by the fact half the chocolate has already melted before I've touched it...)

Raw chocolate cheesecake. I tasted this too... it was SO GOOD! The base tasted like a walnutty mix, and I don't really know what was in the middle but it tasted pretty unhealthy even though it wasn't ;)

I would definitely go back there! The meal was about $65 for both drinks, both mains and desserts so pretty average pricing. And I felt full but not disgustingly bloaty gross full like you usually feel when you eat out. So it was great! 

This weekend I'm supposed to be running in my first club race which is a XC, but I'm pretty sure it will be cancelled. They said they will cancel it if the fire danger is in "extreme", and at the moment in the seven day forecast that's what it's saying... :( Hope it changes!!!

On other news... the foot that I dropped the generator on is not really healing and I swear there's a bone sticking up where it shouldn't be sticking up. I can't walk without pain, but I can run without pain. Work that one out.... :S It's also still swollen. But since I can still run without pain, I plan on it!!

Hope everyone enjoyed their Wednesdays :D

Everything will be OK.

I can't believe what a different person I become when I'm surrounded by people I love. I'm happy, bubbly, outgoing and apparently really funny. I just spent two weeks in Melbourne with 20 of my workmates. We see each other twice a year for two weeks, and we have become really close. I had such an amazing time and have a renewed vigour for life, I hope that it lasts!
I think a lot of the problems I was feeling before I left was just too much time on my hands to think. When I was surrounded by friends 24/7, I did not worry or think about food all the time. I was more relaxed. I didn't feel depressed, except 1 day when I just felt off anyway.
I ate really well and did heaps of exercise the first week:

Saturday: rest
Sunday: Interval run session with friends:
4 x 400m
2 x 200m
8 x 100m
(Pushups & squats inbetween each rep)
& a 1.25 km swim.
Monday: arm workout with friends: heaves, pushups, leg lifts & shoulder presses.
Tuesday: 4 km run
Wednesday: 5 km run
Thursday: random gym workout - kickboxing for 30 mins, legs for 30 minutes + 0.5km in the pool.
Friday: 5 km run + 1.65 km swim
Saturday: rest

All of the workouts were awesome fun.

The next week wasn't as great as I got busier with work and injured myself on the Wednesday:
Sunday: 9km run (split into 5 & 4)
Monday: 10 minute swim
Tuesday: rest
Wednesday: 7.5 km hilly run

and then nothing for four days...

My injury was sustained during work, basically I was lifting a generator which weighs 73kg out of a vehicle trailer with a friend, and must have lost my grip, it landed on my foot. Luckily the shoes are pretty good (not steel cap, but tough enough!) So all I sustained was dark bruising, swelling and a black toenail. It really hurts to bend the big toe though, so I've been limping around and not running. I'm hoping it will be fine soon?? I'm very lucky to have been wearing those shoes....

I plan on spending this week mainly doing swimming and strength work so to let it heal properly, but if I'm desperate I might give a go at running tomorrow and see how I feel.

I must mention also that I'm pretty proud of how disgustingly I ate in the second week... I know that sounds crazy haha :P But I literally had like 3000+ calories in the last three days (each day) - mostly in booze and hangover food! Had some AMAZING nights, and they were seriously really fun, so it was worth everything. I even had a Hungry Jacks (Burger King) meal and enjoyed it... mind you at the time I was really, really drunk and probably seriously needed it. The best part??? I didn't feel overly guilty, because I knew it was just a couple of days of fun and then I could resume eating normally and everything would be OK. I also did not count calories for the whole two weeks.

2011 in Pictures

Starting the positivity with a post of the fun things I did this year :)

This is really the only photo I have of me doing a fun run this year haha, and you can barely see me! I'm behind the dude with the white shirt and red bits - wearing blue shorts. But this year I ran in three - Bridges 10k, Run for a Reason 14k & City 2 Surf 12k. Next year, many many more races!

Hiked about 100 km of the Bibbulmun Track in Western Australia, in four days. It was stunning.

A sunset on the track.

Another evil hill, this is the part where I would always get separated from the group (That's me in the red jacket).

Looking exhausted on day four (me on the right)

Went to Vietnam, here is where I rode on the back of a motorbike up the Hoi Van Pass... it was about a four or five hour ride and with some amazing scenery.

A sunset on one of the small islands I stayed at overnight in Vietnam. This was one of my favourite nights there. After spending the day picking fruit, cycling around the island and chilling in a hammock... we watched the sunset and then had a traditional Vietnamese dinner. So relaxing.

I stayed in a five star hotel in Vietnam for my birthday, and when I had returned from the day's travelling, the hotel had left me a card, cake and a REAL bunch of roses!! It made me so happy to receive that when away from home :D

Did boot camp for a month. I LOVED it, but it was really inconvenient! 20 km from my home meant that on my busiest uni day I would be getting up at 5 am, driving there, doing the session, driving to uni - changing in the car!! (No showers at uni unless you pay!) and then being at uni from 7 am to 7 pm... driving home... which took another 40 mins. Was a REALLY long day... plus boot camp is super expensive and not feasible on a student budget. But I would love to do it again!

Got back into kickboxing and fought in a novice tournament after being back for one month :) I forgot how much I missed it till I got back, and can't wait to return after Christmas break.

One of the very few skydives I did this year - There was a Christmas themed party where we jumped in santa suits and elf suits, etc. I am the one I suppose you could say "facing" the camera. Was a fantastic day and so good to catch up with people I hadn't seen for months!

I wish I had more photos to share, but I think I got pretty slack with my camera... so there's not too many. I am not making new year's resolutions for 2012, but I hope to run the City 2 Surf half-marathon and to run as many 5k's as I can find. I also hope to adopt a more positive mindset in general, and to take more photos! :)

Ending the negativity

I've realised lately that I'm actually not as recovered as I thought I was. 

I've written several posts - about five, in fact - that I have decided not to post as they were just so negative. 

This isn't what I wanted this blog to be about at all. I'm confused about everything.

There is no need for another blogger out there who posts negative things or talks all about their ED, or seems to "encourage" the idea... I wanted this blog to be about being fit, healthy and happy - not counting calories and being unhappy - which is really the place I am at. I hate reading other blogs and seeing that people think they are better, when really they are not. It just makes me sad.

One thing that made me realise I am not recovered was how hard Christmas was for me. It wasn't that I was forced to eat anything I didn't want to, but I was constantly on edge and bit my whole family's head off with my attitude. They were mad at me for it. I did not enjoy Christmas at all.

I have made an appointment with a dietician, but I couldn't get in until the end of January. I don't know what the problem is, exactly... I'm not anorexic or bulimic as before, but I seem to be leaning much more towards the orthorexic ways and it's just not cool. I also think the fact that I've been quite depressed plays a big part, and eating healthy is something else to focus on. It's completely complicated by so many other factors!!

But as I said, I don't want this blog to be about that. So from now on, expect an end to the negativity - it means I will post much less, most likely - and a return to posts about my passions in life - running & kickboxing. I suppose that will become easier next year when I start doing more races.

I think I will make a start to posting positive posts soon, perhaps with some more "things that make me happy" type posts.

Progress!

It's really strange that the busier I am, the more posts I write. Since finishing exams, I have hardly written a thing in this blog! I guess because there is more to say when you're busy. I'm going to mix it up and write a post with random list type things, because lists are awesome.

I am, ever so slowly, increasing my running speed without trying. To be completely honest, although I've been "running" for a year... I've actually only been consistently running 3x a week for 16 weeks now. So I'm super happy that my pace has gone from roughly 6:50 to 6:00 in that time (KM paces), and who knows what it can improve to with time, maybe if I actually start doing intervals and tempo runs and all that kind of thing... all in good time though!! Too injury paranoid - plus I'm not training for anything in particular right now.

Well, that was point 1.... point 2.. I attempted to make the peanut butter protein cookies featured in my WIAW post. The batter was amazingly awesome. When it cooked, the texture came out strange, and the flavour wasn't quite the same. I haven't figured out where I went wrong yet, but I will give it another go at some point!! Would love to have some daily protein cookies mmmmmm....

OK, that's actually all I've got ;) My iPhone has stopped being able to import photos for some stupid reason, so I've got no photos and probably no WIAW tomorrow :(

2012 Running Goals

I've been pretty slack with both blog posting and blog commenting, even though I have been reading people's blogs. Not really sure why! I even missed WIAW because I was too slack to take pictures ;) Actually I've been pretty slack in everything. I've still been keeping to my running plans but all my other fitness plans have fallen by the wayside... this happens to me every now and then so I suppose I'll just take it in my stride and know that the motivation will be back again :)

I have been playing a disturbing amount of The Sims 3.... hey, don't judge me, I've got a 4 month break and have to fill my time somehow ;) I've had this legacy family that I've been playing with for years, and I'm almost up to the 10th generation! It's begun to go all slow and laggy though and is a pain to play... anyway, END that nerd talk! Ha!

Anywho, back to my original topic... or beginning my original topic? Instead of doing December goals I'm thinking of my goals for 2012. It's early, I know, but I have some pretty big goals for 2012.

Today I joined the WA Marathon Club (WA = Western Australian), who run a heap of fun runs throughout the year (3-4 runs every month!) and I plan on pretty much doing as many of those as I can. You have to do eight to get recognition in the yearly award things, so I'll aim for at least eight. There's a few cross-country runs too, which I have never run, so I'm excited for that.

I also plan on running a half-marathon in August, and have made myself a super-conservative rough plan on increasing mileage super slowly up until then. I figure I'd rather slowly up it instead of doing one of those 12 week super-quick increase plans. Makes sense to me, anyway. I've made it so it stagnates for a couple of weeks, then increases by 10% for a couple of weeks, then drops every 4 weeks by about 5 km for a "rest week" followed by going back to the previous week's mileage. If that makes sense?

eg:
Week 1: 25 km
Week 2: 25 km
Week 3: 27 km
Week 4: 29 km
Week 5: 25 km
Week 6: 29 km etc etc

The club also runs a couple of free training sessions during the week, so hopefully I'll be able to make those occasionally. Excited!!!

The difficulty again is fitting in kickboxing and strength work ;) I always find that difficult! Running is so much easier for me to stick to, because I can go at any time in any place.... kickboxing is at 7:45 pm at night, which is super late and I often spend all day finding reasons not to go (I'm always happy when I do go though!). Strength work... well sometimes I like it, but mostly I don't. Necessary evil to me.

Next semester I'm excited for my classes:
Cancer Control
Introduction to Psychology
Mental Health Promotion
Sexology.

None of them really have much to do with Nutrition but I think these will be very interesting. Not really sure what Sexology will involve just yet but I think it has to do with what makes your sexuality or something?? Only one of these classes has an exam so that's pretty cool too :) The rest are assignment based.

Anywho enough rambling for today. I'm off to decide what to make for dinner...

Banning myself from grocery shopping!

I have come to the conclusion that I need to ban myself temporarily from grocery shopping. With all the free time I've had since being on uni break, I have seriously been to the grocery store FIVE times this week... there were so many new products that I had to buy... like, I actually can't leave a new product on the shelf. I'm beginning to think it's a problem!!! I have spent a ridiculous amount of money on food I do not need! Of course it will get eaten but there is already plenty of food in my house.

I am going to *attempt* to fill the grocery shopping time with going for a daily walk instead, every day of December (Unless I'm going for a run that day, in which case I will run). This ties in with my (again) efforts to try and lose weight. I want to do it, but there's no pressing need. I'm in the healthy weight range, it's just that I have put on 8 kg since last year (I have no idea how... but moving back in with the parents probably didn't help) and my clothes don't fit the way they used to. Losing the 8 kg again will still put me in the healthy weight range, considering I am right at the upper end at the moment.

My plan is to hopefully see a dietician, as all of this "eat back your exercise calories" "don't eat back your exercise calories" and conflicting information all over the place has confused the hell out of me, to the point where I seem to switch between the two and probably confuse the hell out of my body. Obviously 1 year of uni has not taught me enough yet to figure out how to do it myself!

As well as that, continuing on with increasing my running mileage should help + more weights sessions...

I'm sure this blog entry had a point, I just can't remember what it was... anyway, the sea breeze is now in so it's time for a walk. (36'C / 96'F today!!)

Out of the comfort zone

Just a quick post to say I'll probably be AWOL for the next two weeks as I'm going out bush with work, leaving tomorrow. I have no idea what kind of access to the internet I'll have (probably none!).

It will have its benefits though - I likely won't be able to complete my goal of 100 km running for November because of this (Currently at 40 km, probably doing 10k tomorrow), but I WILL be able to complete the goal of getting out of my comfort zone for the entire time. I will have absolutely no control over the food I have access to, and likely will have no chance to exercise at all (Unless I do situps in my sleeping bag or something!!). I will also know NOBODY at all. Kind of an eating disordered / social anxiety person's nightmare, right?? Exactly why I should be doing it! Plus I get $...

I'm flying to the capital of Australia (Canberra) for this, so hopefully if I'm lucky I'll get a short amount of time to sightsee, as last time I was there I was 2 years old :)

Anyway, I will be back to stalk everyone's two week's worth of blog posts soon! Ciao!

Oh - I was going to mention, for those of you in the US - check out Earndit, it's a site that rewards you for your workouts. You get points for everything you do and then can cash them in for rewards - there's clothes, food and stuff. I've been a member for a while and have heaps of points but can't cash them in because most of the stuff is US only. I'm staying a member though because one day there might be something I can get, haha - and then I'll be rolling in the points!

WIAW #8 - Late to the party!

I've been having an annoying problem post-workout a lot of the time lately. If I run more than about 40 minutes or do a medium - hard run, I wind up with a full blown headache and bad nausea - unless I get serious with post-workout recovery:

- Stretch straight away.
- Drink diluted gatorade immediately while putting legs up on wall.
- Eat high protein item within 30 mins of coming back (Lately has been my peanut flour slice thing)
- Eat a spoonful of vegemite (super salty + B vitamins)
- Have a cold shower / ice shins

If I miss doing this, the sickness comes. It's kind of strange, you would think this would only happen after particularly difficult workouts, but it pretty much happens on any run unless it's super easy. I don't think it's dehydration, because I always make sure I have a big cup before I go and drink at least two or three after my electrolyte drink when I get back... then I thought it was the salt thing hence why I started having vegemite - which might be key? I don't know... anyway maybe I don't get enough salt in my diet generally. So I had Subway for lunch today, because everyone knows their bread is super high salt.

So without further ado (adieu?) here is Wednesday's foodstuffs...

Had the most simple breakfast ever. Kashi Golean with rice milk. That's it!

Went to the gym for a 30 min weights sesh + 3 km run, and afterwards downed this protein bar. Delicious!

Wanted to wear these shorts. I love these shorts - but I can't find a shirt that really goes with them! :( Maybe I'll have to go shopping again to find one ;) But what colours?!

Instead wore this shirt (with dark grey shorts) - this shows the heat / humidity here at the moment!! I'd like to believe it was my effort but I think the heat held most of the reason for the uber sweat.

This was lunch - almond spread & blackberry jam on wholemeal grain toast. Super inventive...

The other piece of bread held a baby banana with almond spread & cinnamon. So good!

Well, as for my November challenges... the eating more vegetables is going so so. I made dinner last night and it was a huge salad with tuna & goat's feta cheese.

The 100km for November? I've done 13 km so far on Nov 3 which is a great start, but I've found out that the work I'm doing for 2 weeks at the end of November will be out field camping, so there won't be much opportunity for ANY kind of exercise, let alone running. I've decided I'll just do what I would have done in the weeks I'm home and see how I go. (Plan was Week 1 - 24km, Week 2 - 26 km, Week 3 - 27 km, Week 4 - 23 km) or thereabouts.

And facing things that scare me - fighting in the kickboxing tournament this Saturday - will definitely recap that on here and how I go. I'm not expecting to win or even do great but I'm in it for fun and anything else is a bonus!

I really miss my blender and its ability to make creations like the above. :(

I've really enjoyed reading everyone's halloween posts and about things like how big pumpkin is!. We don't do any of that stuff here really so it's been really interesting to me. I never would have thought of having a coffee with pumpkin pie spice (which I'm assuming is kind of like nutmeg & cinnamon together?!). That sounds so delicious!!! And all the cool foods made into shapes of scary stuff. Love it!

And wow, I just realised how close it actually is to Christmas!! Oh noo....

P.S. I hate Summer and I am jealous of everyone that has winter coming up.

November Goals.

1. Eat more vegetables.

You would be surprised how little vegetables I actually eat. Considering I am an ex (sometimes questionable?) ED sufferer and 95% of what I eat is super healthy, I still don't consume enough vegetables! I'm a little paranoid about them actually... when I was eating super massive amounts in the past with my purely vegetable lunches, I had really bad gas.

2. Run 100 km in November.

I ran 75 km in October, so I'm upping the ante for November. Shouldn't be too difficult.

3. Do one thing each week to get myself out of my comfort zone. This can be anything - food related, social related, exercise related, whatever!

As for my October goals? I don't think I thought them out very well! They were:

1. Reduce the amount of coffee / diet coke I drink - this didn't happen. I drank only one diet coke a week the first three weeks, then had like four in the last week!

2. Prepare my lunch for the week on the weekend - this wasn't necessary as I only had one teaching week left, and the rest I was at home!

3. Actually schedule me-time that isn't exercise related into my study schedule, rather than procrastinating being my me-time - managed this one, though!

October Summary & Broken blender

I'm pretty stoked with how October has gone. 

I managed to do:

Bodypump 3 times.

My own weights sessions 2 times.

Kickboxing 6 times (not as much as I'd like, but exams held me back here....!!)

Swam 2 times

75km of running (average around 18km / week)

Yoga x 1 (not great!! Need to work on this...)

Elliptical twice.

So I'm thinking for November I'm going to aim for 100km running, and increase weights sessions. It's going to be much more difficult as I'll be away for three weeks with work and I have no idea what the hours are going to be like and whether I'll be able to access gyms and that kind of thing. I'll do an update on November goals later though.

I also finished uni for the year (1st year over! Woo!).

Yesterday morning's breakfast. It was meant to be a smoothie. In the middle of blending, the blender died. DEVASTATED. So I had berries floating in oat milk & yoghurt... I ended up draining the liquidy part and drinking that and eating the rest as a kind of oaty yoghurty mess thing. But... this means no smoothies for a while, and that makes me so so so sad!!! NoooooOOoo....

I've been really bored with food lately and have had to get inventive, so most of my meals have been mish-mash mixtures of totally random stuff - for example this was a piece of bread with cheese, chopped up falafel, and an egg mixed with mushroom and cajun spice... with a bit of spinach thrown on top. (SUPER ugly, isn't it? ;)

Falafel sandwich with random salad... it had pickles and bits of goat's cheese and other stuff.

This is probably the most random :) Some of mum's AWESOME pumpkin soup, two vegie sausages on bread, two mini falafels, and two mushrooms with vegemite on top.

I'm super hungry right now, hopefully dinner will be ready soon. We're having the full roast with all the trimmings for my brother's birthday.

Fitness... & Alcohol

I'm debating taking a blogging break, even though I only started a couple of months ago. I'm just in a funk a lot and negativity is no fun. But before that, I'm going to blog a bit of a fitness survey and then rant about alcohol. 

Five Fitness Things I can’t Live Without:

• My Nike Lunarglide +2, they are the comfiest running shoes I've ever had, they have great support and fit my feet so well, plus they are pretty haha.
• My iPhone - so I can use Runkeeper and log my runs and see where I'm struggling, where I'm doing well, etc... gives pacing, km's, calories, speed, etc.
• Decent running shorts. I've got two pairs of Nike tempo and a couple of Running Bare shorts that are fantastic. Definitely a good pair is underestimated, as if you're not wearing them... shorts ride up, get sweaty, all that kind of thing... a worthy investment methinks.
• I'm actually struggling to think of five. OK, hair ties. I can't stand my hair flying all over the place.
• Good sports bra for support, even though I don't need much ;P

Most Embarrassing Song I Listen to While Working Out:

• Hm, Pitbull - Shut it Down... lol... it played a lot in BodyPump for a while I think and I started to like it. Same with "Ravers in the UK". 

Favorite Pre-Workout Snack or Meal:

• It changes, I don't have a go-to... sometimes I'll have a banana, sometimes jam on bread, it depends on what I'm doing. Most of the time I'll go before breakfast though or a couple of hours after breakfast, so it's not an issue.

On My Fitness Bucket List:

• Run a half-marathon
• Run a full marathon
• Join a running club (There's a huge lack where I live, though, so will be a 30 min + drive...)
• Do well in the kickboxing tournament
• Try all the classes at the gym I haven't tried yet
• (There is LOADS more on my fitness bucket list...)

Must-Have Tech Tools:

• See above, the iPhone! or if I didn't have that, I'd probably get a Garmin.

Top Exercise Gear:

• This is pretty much the same as my gear I can't live without...

Motivational Mantras:

• I don't have any - maybe I should get some!!

Next Big Exercise Goal:

• At the moment just increasing my mileage up to the point where I can run 30+ km a week, but doing it as slowly as possible without making myself crazy ;)

Favorite Cardio Exercise:

• running, kickboxing... they kinda tie.

Favorite Strength Move:

• pushups, funnily enough.

ALCOHOL

I so had all these ideas to say about alcohol this morning while sitting on the train, and should have blogged then. OK, so basically I used to drink when I was 20-21 ish. Not a lot, but whenever I would go to parties it would ease my anxiety, and I was able to interact with people in a way I definitely couldn't before. Instead of being the shy girl that never talked, I turned into a crazy, fun, hyperactive person who would talk to ANYBODY and everyone thought I was funny and entertaining. That could have been something which turned into an addiction for me as I have an addictive personality, but it ended up just being left like that... something I did at the occasional party.

As my social anxiety started to get better and I started to talk to people on my own without alcohol, I started to dislike alcohol more and more, and wonder why people even drink, especially if they don't have social anxiety issues? I tried to quit, but gave into peer pressure most of the time, and ended up acting stupid a lot and regretting it.

Then the eating disorder came, and all of a sudden I had so many great excuses not to drink, not to go to parties, not to see my friends... so I stopped.

Anyway fast forward to now... I drink probably 1 or 2 times a year, feel intense guilt each time and tend to restrict the next day. I also get disgustingly, intensely ill from even the smallest amount of alcohol. You could say that's just what happens when you get older, but I mean it's ridiculous. So I went to see my friends on Saturday night, and it was like impossible not to drink. It's so ingrained in Australian culture, and all the things I do - skydivers are pretty much alcoholics, and they've known me to be a drinker in the past. So how could I not accept their "gifts" of beers, which they paid for, as a "welcome back" sort of gift? Wow I'm good at getting off drift... I'll come back to that though.

Anyway so Saturday night I had a grand total of three beers. I had a meal of roast beef with potatoes, peas, beans and pumpkin. I drank water before my first beer, after my first beer, and after my second beer. I then took a 600mL bottle to bed with me and sculled it. I did ALL THE RIGHT THINGS. I was not drunk, was barely even tipsy.

Sunday night I wake up with a horrendous headache, throbbing like a heartbeat. I feel sick to the stomach as if I've been up all night downing vodka or something deadly, and I spend the entire day lying on the couch with an icepack on my head groaning. It was ridiculous! All that from three beers. So henceforth I am completely and utterly off the booze. If it can make your body react like that from only three drinks, how can one drink supposedly be good for you?

So back to the culture thing. I hate that Australian culture is so, so, so RUN around the culture of drinking. Every weekend... have a barbecue - with drinks. Go to the beach - with drinks. Have a party - with drinks. Catch up with mates - over a drink. Go to a mate's house for the night - have drinks. Watch the footy - have drinks. Australia Day - let's get drunk. Christmas - drinks at the beach. You get the idea. Every event quickly turns into an excuse to drink. It's not healthy and something needs to be done about it.

Skydiving is similar - you do something for the first time, you owe a "carton" of beer to your friends. It's good in a way, in that it encourages you to get to know people and celebrates something new, all that kind of thing. But why with booze? Why does everything centre around booze?

This is one of the reasons why I am studying Health Promotion. There needs to be more done to reduce the prevalence of it, or perhaps encourage more activity without alcohol - like ads on TV or something, "Go for a jog with a friend" instead of "catch up for drinks" on the weekend. That kind of thing...

WOW, seriously gone on a rant now... and there's more I could say too... in fact I could probably go on for ages ;P

In other news - today I had my first exam and am confident of passing. One down, two to go...

All or Nothing

This is somewhat of a "negative nancy" or "debbie downer" post *and there may be triggering material*, but I'm getting increasingly frustrated at several things. First, my perfectionist attitude. Last semester at uni, I got all high distinctions, and was upset because they were not 90% high distinctions, but 80%. This semester I know I can't get high distinctions and therefore I don't feel like putting the effort in. What's the point if I can't get the highest mark? I know I've already passed all my topics before the exams, so that motivation isn't there either.

Then I did a fitness test this morning. I got the exact same score for 2.4 km (1.6 miles) of 12:40 mins as I did last year, when I was way more unfit(?) and doing way less running... it just frustrated me, especially as I definitely did not hold back this morning!

Also this morning I weighed myself and I had gained 1kg (2 pounds) from last week. Which makes my BMI now 24.5. (Much too close to overweight category for my liking...) This is beginning to be a really irritating constant struggle for me. Gain, lose, gain, lose, gain, lose, gain... it's the same as maintaining, I suppose, but it's almost like... one week am I doing it right, and the next I'm not? Or is that just normal fluctuation of maintaining? Am I eating enough, too much? Am I exercising enough? What am I doing wrong? Sometimes I think... well, the only thing that has ever worked for me to lose weight has been eating disorders, so maybe I should just do that again. But then my rational brain takes over, and says hell no! No WAY am I going back to that.

Anyway, I know I've lost it healthily before, but that was before I had ever known about calorie counting. I think it's pretty difficult once you have calorie counted for a long time to stop. After all, even if you do stop, you still know the calorie, fat, carb content of the majority of the food you eat from counting it for so long. I've tried stopping so many times, but I can't help but still count in my head. Or I go the other way and eat way too little or too much.

It doesn't even seem to make a difference when I make small changes, like increase intensity of exercise slightly / amount, or eat slightly less, or eat slightly more. I've tried all these little experiments... the main one I did was eating at "maintenance" calories for a month or two - which made me gain two kilos (4.5 pounds) which I just cannot lose again (A really GREAT experiment that was.... :( )

Even when I went on that hike for a week last month, and did 30 hours of hiking in a week.. I lost nothing.

I should not be still obsessed with my weight, because I am supposed to be recovered. I mean, I'm not obsessed the way I used to be... but I think it's just hard the days I weigh myself more than anything. At least now I'm doing exercise because I enjoy it rather than to burn calories. Honestly, I am so deeply in love with running and kickboxing right now. If only I could do it more often than I do! I've been sore a lot lately.

Because I don't like being a negative nancy for too long... I went to the shops for retail therapy... and bought TWO new running shorts, THREE running magazines, and some other stuff. One of my pairs of shorts is fluro orange :D How do you spell fluro, because blogger says that's incorrect?

So one of my plans is to incorporate more HIIT into my training schedule... I'm just not sure where to fit it... this is another problem of mine. How do I fit in one week:

Running x 3  (at the moment just increasing mileage, but eventually want 1 x long, 1 x intervals in that)
Kickboxing x 3
Weights x 2
Swimming x 1 (I use this to work on my breathing / as a recovery)
HIIT x 1
Yoga x 1 (usually after long run day)
Rest day x 1

... That's 11 days worth of workouts! Unless I double up on four of those days, it doesn't really work. There's the all or nothing again... this is kind of what I did before I got my ED - running every day, kickboxing every night.

OK... / end confusing rant.

Increasing mileage.

My fridge looks something like this again :(

And I really miss these muffins. They were super amazing. But I'm not in the mood for baking today - mainly because I don't feel like doing the dishes! I'm also not in the mood for shopping. Time for PB & J sandwiches, because we always have PB, J & bread!

Oops, off topic already :P

Anyway. So I would call myself a "beginner" runner, as although I've been running for about a year, I've not really been doing much mileage due to the injuries I've had from going out too fast too quick. I've been reading a lot of Runner's World, R4YL, Women's Running, Women's Health and running books, running websites etcetera as these injuries still plague me - mentally. 

I'm so so worried about getting injured and not being able to run again that I'm really careful about my schedule. I try to follow the 10% rule but there will always be something that will happen, like having to go away for work for a week or getting sick, and then I don't know how to pick up the schedule again.

 That or I run a race and I don't know how many days till I should run again, and then what kind of mileage. It seems like reading all these books and magazines should give me the answer, but it doesn't. Like there's sooo many schedules out there for "how to run a half-marathon" but what about once you've done the half-marathon?

Anyway so I've got the Runner's World Smartcoach app on my phone, where you plug in the statistics for your last race, current mileage and stuff like that and it comes up with a plan to run a race of your choice. I've been following it for five weeks so far no problems, but I'm still paranoid about injury. Like, it tells me to run at a 7:50 (km) pace, but I find this ridiculously, painfully slow and usually go at 6:50 instead... which is still slow, but I feel like because I'm not following it exactly that I'm going to get injured. I'm quite tired after each run and... I don't know!!! I'm basically using the app to attempt to increase my mileage, probably up to the point of running 30 km (18 miles) a week, but I may go for more, depending on how I feel.

I'm also finding it really difficult to not throw in a sprint or two, or just some faster running in what's supposed to be an easy run.. I just really love the feeling of running much faster!! Even if it's only for 10 or 20 seconds... Yeah, that's why I get injured ;P

How do you get over your fear of injury?? Despite getting as much knowledge as possible, and doing all the right recovery stuff...

This week I ran 21 km (13 miles) split into 3km, 8km & 10km. Maybe it would be easier if I split it to 5, 6, 10? or 6, 6, 9?

Next week one of my friends is going to do some interval training with a coach, I think maybe I should go with and just ask them these questions. Otherwise, I'm off to educate myself some more with my new Runner's World magazine... (November edition :D)

Sorry for this completely rambled and confusing post!

EDIT: I should probably add I'm also doing 2-3 kickboxing sessions a week, which sometimes incorporate sprints, and can also be quite demanding! Just went tonight and got absolutely smashed, with pyramid kicks, sprints, pushups, situps and all that kind of stuff...? I don't know, that might affect my running recovery also! OH... and anyone using blogspot... how do you reply to comments?!