This is really…it.
. I has a no track mind.
I’m glad we’re in agreement. I realized it was a big risk of disagreement at a deep level of an emotional subject, but I also know you aren’t one to whither when the chips are down. 
1 Like
There are things that would make me wither, but I don’t think his situation would have been that for me. Also, I hope that I’d have the courage to just carry something out without involving my children. On the other hand, who knows what kind of pain he might have been in. Maybe it was justified, who knows. I just know that it’s hard to hear my daughter cry.
I’m also a teeny-tiny bit afraid that this sciatica is my karma for all of the uncharitable thoughts I’ve had about him over the past month. I don’t want you to get sciatica, too, @SkyzykS! (lol)
3 Likes
Wouldn’t that be something?
I’ve had bouts of it from anterior pelvic tilt and tightening right across the iliac crest, but usually a couple mobility sessions clears it up.
. I dunno. My brother went through a period when he wanted to end it, but being a high break (c-5 & 6) quad, he had no ability to do it himself. So he asked me to get him some heroine so he could OD, which I would have to give him the shot of.
I refused. A lot of people in chairs take themselves out one way or another. Things changed though. He saw a doctor about it and got some help. A few years later he met his current wife, and life went on.
I guess my mother killing herself left me with a bad taste in my mouth, which has lingered for (yikes!) 40 years now. I feel for people who see that as the only way out of where they’re at, but it just doesn’t sit well with me.
Yeah. My impulse goes to anger when somebody inadvertently or carelessly hurts someone I care about. The sadness and other stuff makes its way in later, but I’m good at being angry and it feels better than sadness or profound loss.
2 Likes
Still trying to get my shit together, still struggling with discomfort, anxiety over making things worse, and the sucking pull of laziness and bad food.
I’m thinking about getting some celery, which I think would give me a leg up.
6 Likes
This will cancel out all the cookies, right?
2 Likes
But only if you’re going to “use it correctly”. Application is everything.
3 Likes
How much do you have, and in how many different places?
1 Like
I was thinking about stabbing people in the eye with it. Not everyone - just the people who annoy me, which are fairly numerous lately. Because I don’t like to eat it unless it’s cooked, at which point its utility as a weapon reduces anyway.
@Brant_Drake’s “water with hair in it” killed me.
6 Likes
Had PT yesterday and the PT, who works with elite skiers and is himself pretty badass in terms of training, said “you’re not happy unless you’re beating yourself up.” This because I’ve fallen into yoga while I wait to go back to normal stuff, but don’t know which positions are beneficial/detrimental.
I think “challenging myself” is more accurate than “beating myself up” (and also pot/kettle, the big hypocrite, which he acknowledges), but now I’m having to consider it.
It’s been a month. He’s saying 8-12 weeks of ideally just working the affected leg and walking 10 minutes at a time (form being the focus).
But I felt SO GOOD a month ago, and the changes to my body were magical. I want to keep them! I don’t want to start the 2025 T-ransformation back where I was last January.
Feeling really grumpy. I want to beat myself up and be happy!
9 Likes
Same!
3 Likes
I’ll echo @ChickenLittle with another SAME!! The struggle is real - but we’re all in it together. We just gotta remember that this is a season. The season will change - eventually…
3 Likes
This is the Buddhist concept of the second arrow. I made a mistake, first arrow. Now I am angry - the second arrow.
Don’t pull the second arrow.
Three days at Kripalu, that’s all I got for you.
1 Like
As is often the case, I’m not sure what you’re talking about, though of course I understand the words. I just never know how they apply. My mistake was getting a pinched nerve? Having strong mixed feelings about the death of my kids’ dad and toppling off an emotional balance beam?
You view things more punitively than I do - there seems always to be a bad guy in your equations, even if it’s oneself (mostly for you it’s oneself).
The second arrow - anger. When I say I want to beat myself up, I mean I want to return to my satisfying training routine/schedule. I also want to play kickball with my family, because it’s fun and joyous. Unfortunately it’s also not ideal for the broken toe I now understand is a problem.
I’m not angry at myself, I’m wildly sympathetic. Poor me! I totally don’t deserve to have to either hurt myself playing kickball or sit out while everyone else plays without me. Because I’m nice! And I definitely don’t deserve to have my training disrupted, because it’s super noble and healthy of me to do it in the first place. It’s practically heroic of me to set my alarm for 5:45 instead of 6:30, and yet there I go, getting up early, like a CHAMP.
@ChickenLittle and @QuadQueen, neither of you deserve any soul-crushing bullshit, either. Because you’re both also nice! You should be able to jump off of whatever rocks you want without getting hurt.
2 Likes
It’s part of the endeavor. When you’re pushing your body to change aggravations, setbacks and injuries are inevitable. You’re pushing beyond current limits. Frame it as a badge of honor that you were actually putting in work vs going through motions. If the transformation process requires shifting the completion date further down the line for an uncontrollable or at least unintentional outcome, so be it. Embrace the grind and enjoy the whole journey. Let the mental/emotional strength exercises you’ve been going through be your victory challenges for this segment and you’ll be back in the saddle.
I don’t have sciatica but I’ve been using DeFrancos Agile 8 for hip mobility for years (and may have even read about it here at some point), and it keeps me loose and recovering well through heavy power phases. IMO it’s best employed daily, with an additional session pre-training.
1 Like
I am sorry.
You don’t need to apologize - I appreciate that you always come from a good place when you offer suggestions to me. I just find myself so differently wired from you, I often struggle to understand the message. I’m not trying to throw advice back in your face, but rather explain the view from me, which therapy would help you do were you to engage in it (regarding others in your life who are not wired like you) but which retreats into silence (or whatever woo) never will.
I’ll look into it, thanks! I’ve been doing some mobility stuff with Tom Morrison on Youtube, but he irritates the shit out of me. His laugh makes me want to kill someone (hint: him! it’s him I want to kill).
1 Like
Friday, September 6
Weight 152.9
I posted about the sciatica 30 days ago, so it’s been just over a month of complete disruption, to include camping followed by company followed by out-of-town, etc. In addition to stopping workouts completely. There’s more coming - it’s fall in New England, so we have on the agenda the fair and festivals and birthday parties and husband’s goofball golf tournament (three day party at my house) and all the other stuff.
Sciatica is definitely getting better - at work I can stride down a long-ish hallway in a way that feels natural, but that’s not the case with anything longer, and on the treadmill I’m walking at a 3.2 max, where normally a relaxed cool down walk for me is 3.7 mph. I’ve landed on getting up in the morning ready and hopeful that I’ll be able to train, but letting the warmup and mobility stuff determine whether I do or not. So far not, in which case I just warm up and then stretch, but I suspect soon I’ll be able to go back into it.
I’ve put my diet back together, and that feels very good. Weight is up, but eh, it is what it is. No one is calling me crying, the weather is lovely, and the dog is stable again - so now I can stabilize.
New goals
I would like to drop weight, and am thinking that maybe I can get back down to my previous sustained low (147) before Jan 1 and next year’s challenge. More importantly (the goal), I want to finish the Girvan beginner program I was doing (I was 2 weeks away from completion, but may decide to restart, which sucks but I’m trying to be okay with it) and be firmly entrenched in Girvan’s Iron by the first of the year. At which point I’ll reassess and probably try to drop more weight.
In other words, return to where I was before the world tilted, and then continue along.
Editing to add 1 mile hike. Very pleasant - stopped because of time constraints rather than difficulty. May go back out after PT.
8 Likes
This sounds like a wise approach. Sustainable success seems to be at least as much about surviving the down parts as it is about hitting the high parts.
And by sustainable I mean enjoying healthy good-quality years well into your 50s and 60s and if we’re genetically lucky, maybe even beyond.
3 Likes
Yes, that’s what seems to be the case. I’m not training to win competitions but rather to win the right to an active weekend or vacation with just enough anti-fitness to make it fun.
I was reflecting yesterday that I want to be careful not to go into old age as a woman focused primarily on being thin and fit. As I pictured what it might look like to be around that woman - “here’s your brown rice and tart cherry juice! thank you for coming to dinner!” - I realized that it is most definitely not my goal to be that woman; toned and wrinkled and rigid with my lifestyle. Neither do I want to be a booze-swilling Hamburger Helper eater. I think maybe I’m shooting for 75% healthy and 25% ice cream and wine rather than 90/10. But I’m honestly not sure. I think that I first need to hunker down and drop 10-15 lbs, then figure out what maintenance requires. Why does it all have to be so hard? (She whined.)
Went for a second hike yesterday afternoon, so a total of maybe 2.5 miles plus the PT stuff (bike, leg work) and was definitely feeling it.
4 Likes