10 years later

Have you ever had one of those days where it seemed like all the progress you had made to becoming the person you want to be was gone. It's like realizing you started sprinting toward your finish line and then after a few steps got too winded to finish the race, so you sat down on the track and had an extra large piece of chocolate cake. What you don't do that!?! Just kidding. Kind of. Anyway, I had read over some of my old posts a couple of days ago. They boasted about all the progress I've made in my addiction to television, lack of exercise, and the like. Well I am sorry to say that I'm back at the starting point. Television has become a staple in our daily lives again. You wouldn't think so since it's summer and most shows are repeats but nevertheless I watch constantly. In May I found out that a team I was working so hard to be a part of didn't choose me so I stopped exercising so hard. In return my body is back in a gelatinous shape. Although I said that I'm committed to running a half marathon by September I have barely trained. Cardiovascularly I'm not ready. I gave my husband a big party for his 30th birthday. I decided to dig up all the pictures of his past birthdays and make them into a collage, when I came across this picture.



It was taken spring break 2001. I was 19 and my husband and I had just started dating. Seeing this picture and what my body use to look like sent me into a shame spiral. I thought to myself, How did this girl who's diet consisted of frozen waffles, pop-tarts, bagels, and ice cream look like this? Yes I know that she hadn't given birth or entered her 20's let alone be almost through them, but I still somehow deluded myself into believing that I still looked like that. Well... to be honest I thought I was pretty close to looking like that again. Just a few more crunches......

You must be thinking that I'm a vain and shallow person who only cares about looks, but that just isn't true. What I care about is feeling good. Being healthy and in shape. The kind of shape that will keep everything in your body functioning to it's best and to live a very long vital life. And when your body starts to ooze out of the top of your pants you just don't feel your best. On the plus side, today I'm eating more vegetables than ever before. I can run a couple of miles without stopping, something that 19 year old girl never would have attempted.

I don't know if I'll ever even look remotely close to that girl again, but I sure as hell am not going to give up on creating my best body so that I can live my best life!