I can make lots of excuses as to why. The weather was wacky enough to keep it bone chilling cold. (and it’s hard to run outside in weather like that). No gym membership meant that I had no treadmill alternative to use. My normal cohorts, Michelle and Teri, both got busy with life and were difficult to schedule weekly runs with. and I just plain didn’t want to get out of bed to go to a 30-40-60 minute run a half hour away in the rain. wha wha wha. lots and lots of whining. But some pretty miraculous things happened lately that made me realize how thankful I should be.

First, Carol Toro called and asked me to do a mission moment for a team run. She said that she found me to be a great inspiration and she wanted me to share my TNT story. (So I told the story of Jimmy, a SURVIVOR of childhood AML) Second, a gal I know via Twitter and the general interwebs of Seattle, decided with her family to form a team and walk Relay for Life. She does this because her mother and cousin are both battling Cancer in their own way. A family of fighters and survivors to be sure. Third, another local Seattlelite tweeted/facebooked his wait from the OR waiting room while the love of his life lay on an Operating Room Table having Cancer removed from her breast. All these things are singularly breathtaking in their own right. You (or at least I) feel emotion when I read these words. They were all great reminders of how thankful I am to have the life I have.

So back up on the horse I got today. With diffuculty as my boyfriend Justin will tell you. He almost had to push me out the door. But out I went for 40 minutes on a day that would not normally be a run day. Alone as I haven’t done in quite a while. And I thought about these people and how lucky I am to have them, even peripherally, in my life. How I am thankful to have my friends and family share time with me day after week after month. How lucky I am to have my health. I think about how cancer tried to take loved ones away from one gal and how they told Cancer to EFF OFF! How wonderful it is to see their family bond as a unit. (Because not every family does or can). I thought about that guy and his wait and how happy he was to have it over. Most of all I thought about how important those 40 minutes were today and the 40 I have planned for tomorrow. For each of those minutes will help fight cancer through donations from my friends and family. And if you donate 10 cents or $10,0000 I thank you from the bottom of my heart.

And let me not forget to say Thank You. Thank you to my family and friends for loving my crazy self for exactly who I am. For being exactly who you are & being right where I’ve always needed you in life. Thank You to my co-workers and customers for keeping me more humble than my family does and reminding me day after day to be thankful for the gift of life. Thank you to the regular readers to my not so regular blog for sticking around and listening to the ramblings of a slightly neurotic woman. Thank you to my twitter friends for just being you. I’ve learned so much from just listening in on your conversations. Thank you for just being you.

There’s still lots of things to read and research. Paleo Hacks has seen me to be a constant visitor as has Punchfork via their iPad app. I’m learning to move past the anxiety attacks I was having in the first week or so when I didn’t know what to cook or what sides to make with my hunk of meat. My broiler pan and frying pan has gotten more use in the past few weeks than it has in the year prior. It’s also now easier for me to eat less fruit than when I started. It was suggested to me that using Mark Sisson’s website Mark’s Daily Apple, but I decided the primal format he suggests is too loose for me. Not enough structure and too many opportunities to cheat and fail.

What am I making?  Simple sides like Carrots and Cabbage sauteed in Butter with a dash of salt and pepper. Simple, yet so so flavorful.  I’ll also sautee just the cabbage and use it as a presentation background for my meat. After adding random veggies to the plate, it finishes out the food trifecta I always try to have. (For some reason I have it stuck in my head that there should be three things on the plate). I’m learning to pre-slice the carrots, peppers and cabbage so all I have to do is toss it into the pan or the salad or where ever I want it. I’m still learning to get off my but and do that. Roasted brussel sprouts are another favorite in my house only to be made more yummy when we discovered a yummy recipie for Brussel Sprout chips. (Again at Nomnompaleo.)

But I won’t lie. There are still many, many days when I feel lazy. Days when I don’t want to cook, much less clean up the mess from the night before. There are also nights when we commit ourselves to events with friends. Part of dieting is not just to hibernate yourself until you’re at the weight you want. It’s learning how to make those same choices in public. Thanks to the internet, it’s possible to plan ahead for ideas of what you might want to eat later. Giving you more time to make your menu decision as it were. Doing so has made eating out fairly simple. Still, there are occasional hiccups. Like going to a baby shower and feeling pressured to eat a cupcake becuase a well intentioned attendee is pushing them on you. Or making a restaurant choice with out actually reviewing what your choices are only to find there are no feasible options other than not eating. And most especially, not carrying around snacks that I know are acceptable to help in those situations.

Personally, I haven’t played the lotto, much less gambled at a casino in many years. Mostly because there were many points where I was having trouble making ends meet. Ensuring that those few dollars went where they were most useful every month gave me a sense of control that helped me handle those lean times. After that, not playing was more because I never really thought about it. The constant flutter of conversation around me though has me thinking twice given the size of tonight’s pot. Do I play? More importantly when family and friends less fortunate than I come asking for assistance, how do I hide tell them no?
Like many people, I know which charities I want to support. I have a basic idea of how I want to pay my parents back for all the trauma joy of raising me. And yes there will be frivolous spending. But what do I do when my friend in North Dakota pings me asking for a little help to send jr to fat camp. Or when my sister who doesn’t like me to begin with suddenly becomes the best friend I never had in grade school? It’s easy to say that you’ll be able to handle all the attention and new and charity requests for your time and new found money. But when family and friends are the ones approaching, how do you say no? Do you say yes all the time? My parents taught me growing up to not take anything for granted. To do for yourself and value the dollar you earned today because not everyone has that ability. How do you stay generous and loving and help others learn that same lesson?

I committed to eat healthier though. More fruits and Veggies, less snacks and desserts… All that fun jazz. I even have tried keeping a food diary which taught me a few things I wasn’t aware of. The first and foremost being that I ate too much junk and too many carbs. The next being that I didn’t eat enough even on my inactive days to properly fuel my active days. So I watched what I ate. I made a concious effort to eat protein, less carbs and well… frankly just MORE. My coaches with Team in Training remarked endlessly and with joy at how my body had changed over the course of the last year. And when I look at pictures I could see the change in my body structure. The problem with perception though, is that it does nothing for how you feel and those numbers on the scale. Instead of creeping downwards with all my positive changes, mine were creeping upwards. In fact, at my last Dr appt, I weighed in at 188. Something needed to change.

I can’t say that I made a concious effort to go Paleo or to even go on any type of diet. I’ve sneered at “Diets” as a four-letter word. It was something people ‘tried’ temporarily until they reached a specific weight, or they fit into a dress, pair of pants, bikini…  Few people I talked to referred to diet as a lifestyle change that I believe it should be. What really happened is that a friend posted a picture of yumminess from the blog NomNomPaleo via Punchfork. I saw it and wondered to myself why I hadn’t been using Punchfork more often for new recipies to try. I had it on my iPad, what was stopping me? I followed her yummy picture and discovered a Paleo blog with MANY, MANY RECIPIES. huh. Then I followed a link on her page that said What’s Paleo? that lead to her husband’s blog. The first few paragraphs helped convince me to finally give this change a try. (The picture of an asian family who had given up rice didn’t hurt).

The next day (yesterday), I had at least 30 tabs open all onto something paleo related. Fitbomb.com, NomNomPaleo, MultiplyDelicious, Whole9life, PaleoHacks and so many others. I even found a good book to help supplement all the different blogs I’ve begun reading. This book will help me maintain the nutrition levels I’ll need as a runner to ensure I don’t hit the wall when running my next half Marathon. It’s called The Paleo Diet for Athletes by Joe Friel & Loren Cordain. It’s pretty good so far.

One of the big things I found is that there is no one paleo diet. I could use big words, but let’s just sum it up by saying that some people say milk products are bad and others do not. Others say somethings are ok and others not. The best statement I saw said “THERE IS NO ONE DEFINITIVE “PALEO DIET.” Even cavepeople ate different diets.” (Thanks Fitbomb) So now all you Atkins-cavemen, South Beach Cavewomen, and Juicing Kidlets can stop worrying. Variation happens. Inuits ate differently than Polynesians, than Russians, and so on and so forth. The important thing is to not make excuses (Anyone watching Biggest Loser this season?) and stay committed to your goal. This is part of the reason, I made some changes today. A short FB conversation with my cousin who is a trainer on Bainbridge Island as well as with Justin convinced me to cut out those concessions I mentioned in my last post. I’ll be stopping the protein powder from my AM Smoothies as well as the Alcohol and add them back in if I find it really detrimental. (The protein powder I mean, not the alcohol. )

So it’s….. water? for me as well as some fresh-er Paleo friendly juices. We’ll have to see this weekend. I’ll also be making some homemade condiments, because I really do love my ketchup. Also because when I got yesterday’s Omlette, I automatically poured some without realizing I couldn’t have it. Isn’t self control awesome?

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 Here’s a great infographic (Because I know my friends loooooooooove Infographics)
More Health and Fitness News & Tips at Greatist. 

Now that you read that, you’re probably thinking it’s not so hard right?  Think again.  My first attempt was Wednesday night. League night in Kent for me and I headed out to the local dive bar. Have you tried to eat Healthy in a bar before? Not always possible.  Lots of deep fried breaded stuff, burgers, French fries…. I did my best, but failed QUITE a bit.

So reset to Thursday. Determination makes me want to follow this through. Food wise, yesterday was an interesting lesson in being prepared. As a new convert, I had a bit more planning that should have happened but didn’t. I woke up late and decided I would just buy lunch. Little did I forget that most of the options for breakfast/lunch wouldn’t be the best for my new lifestyle. (yes I said lifestyle. This isn’t a temporary diet to lose weight.) I finally chose a nice Veggie Omlette with No hashbrowns.   Delicious and it held me over until after lunch. I grabbed a bag of Beef Jerky as a snack and called it good. A successful day at work despite wishing I had planned better. Dinner was another story though. I had plans to meet some friends for dinner and conversation. That doesn’t happen as often as it should because we’re always so busy. As it was, one gal was sick and another had to fly out of town last minute. The difficult part of this? We had planned to meet at a Sushi restaurant. Oy, the rice. Justin teased me because he wondered how I would handle it. I calmly replied to him that I could always have Sashimi or something else. I just had to choose carefully. Little did I remember that Shoyu isn’t exactly Paleo and What’s Sashimi without it? I ended up choosing a teriyaki Salmon. It comes on a bed of stirfried veggies which is good. But I had no idea what kind of oils (if any) they used to cook it and the amount of sugar in Teriyaki is scary to think about.    I went home with a lot to think about and began prepping for today.  Veggie chopping, Kitchen cleaning, & prepping my breakfast and lunch.  Forty days is a long time and this may end up being a difficult journey that I’ll stop at the end of Lent. On the other hand, it could be an exciting one that leads to weight loss and healthier living.  I’ll also caveat this journey by saying that there are some things I’m not giving up. My protein shakes in the morning is one of them. I want to ensure that I’m kick starting my day off correctly and I’m unsure if I’ll be getting enough nutrition in during the day. These may eventually go away, but for now they’ll stay.  I’m also not staving off alcohol. I don’t think I drink enough for it to play a huge difference. I realize that I may be hamstringing myself, so these are options that could change in my journey. For now they’ll remain. Stay tuned to find out how I do!

edit: I’m told the new mobile version of my site makes that infograpic really really tiny. Use this link if you’re on a mobile platform for a better version.

We were released from work early, so I headed to the grocery store for a couple quick ingredients to make that wonderous smelling soup. I parked carefully still scared from my spinout last winter. The news reports over two dozen weather related accidents this year and the weather simply scares me. After I got out of my car, I saw what I initially thought was one guy holding a sign and a mountain of stuff on his back. Turns out the “mountain” included another man standing next to him.  In the few moments it took to realise this I realized that they were both probably homeless men and both would most likely be out in the rough elements that make up this weeks weather.

I thought about how cold I was during the 2nd half of my run on Saturday. 1.5 hours in snowy weather that I had hoped would hold off a few hours longer than it actually did. I thought of my friend Carol, who ran with me using hot hands in any place she was able to put it. I thought of the other friend who ran us who thought she might have narrowly missed frostbite and I thought of the situation of these two guys. I’m ashamed to admit I looked away. I am ashamed to admit that I choose not to go to the store they stood in front of that I wanted to go to because I didn’t want to walk past this with the few groceries I had, but was unwilling to share. I justified it by saying that my income is still slim enough that I really shouldn’t give what I can’t actually afford to share because it should go into my savings. But I arrived at home and realized that one of the stops I made in between the first and next time I avoided eye contact with these gentlemen I also stopped to pull some cash to send a friend as a gift. Because my life has been so fortunate and theirs have not. I justified it by saying I was scared. Two older men begging on the street and I was a young woman alone.

Why didn’t I have the same fear when the young black man pushed his window washing services on me yesterday at the Gas Station? He was most likely stronger and definitely more angry than either of these men appeared and yet these were the ones that I feared. It’s dark now and I can’t see my backyard. It’s approximately 36 degrees outside and my soup is bubbling away warmly behind me and I wonder what these two guys are doing to stay warm. Have they eaten today? What stopped me from at least giving them gift cards for Panda Express? Or the loaf of bread in my bag? It’s easy to fool yourself into thinking that homelessness and hardships are found in other areas. That you’ve isolated yourself in this bubble that hides many of the troubles of the world and then reality hits you.

In the same stream, another friend talked about the absence of anti-bullying laws in the state of Michigan. She’s concerned for the safety of her child as he finds his way in today’s society. But if this is the world he will grow into, are her efforts in vain? While we may not be saying it out loud, kids today are learning to mimic their adult counterparts not only by direct deed, but via idle comments and actions. Those little actions, that in themselves, may not seem harmful but when coupled with the actions and words of others paint a picture for the developing minds of our children that certain types of behavior is alright. Little boys wearing shirts that call girls icky, and equally precocious girls singing songs like Super Bass or Single Ladies containing lyrics impossible for her to understand. We call it cute or adorable and record videos posted to YouTube when our kids mimic adult behavior, but when do we cry foul and make it stop? Do we automatically say a little boy with a preference to Dora the Explorer versus her cousin Diego is automatically gay, but not that little girls with an affinity for cars and trucks above tiaras and tutus aren’t called butch?

We’re not advocating violence. Too many people are defending their actions and their thoughts. No one said you don’t have a right to them. Certainly, some behaviors should be admonished. But when did society change the rules to say that it’s okay for our news outlets to begin outing that poor behavior like some bad society column. It’s like reality TV has taken a twist in the real world. How people don’t see that poorly worded and rude comments are somewhat violent in their nature I don’t understand. Abuse is abuse whether it’s verbal or physical and none of us should put up with it.

edit – The story takes an even more bizarre change as the day goes on. Turns out the person being defamed isn’t the actual one who committed the offense. Can we say oops? Call him a dickhead if you want. Say it behind his back, in your private group of friends, but be careful how it spreads or the chances are you’ll end up on the foul end of your poor choice.

You have learned, over the years, to cook delicious food. At the elbows of your elders, you’ve learned to craft ethnic delicacies and everyday comfort foods. You’ve had some hiccups in the learning process, but it’s never stopped you from moving forward and trying again. And again. And again. Whether it’s the enjoyment of a good meal or getting the satisfaction from knowing that your hands crafted something that made people happy, it’s a task that never disheartens you. Friends, family and acquaintances know how you enjoy the art and make no qualms of showing their appreciation.

With all of this, I never fail to be puzzled at your insecurities. Why you distrust those closest to you and the disbelief that those same people will be there should you need it. Why you feel you need a mate to lean on and show you affection that is showered on you from so many other directions. Why you don’t believe enough in yourself and your abilities to let your strengths shine through. I believe in you. You are so akama’i with brains to spare. Even if you don’t believe it, I do. I think you hide your intellect behind your fears and wish you wouldn’t. Others believe in you and the things you can do. I won’t dwell on shoulda-woulda-coulda’s. Your life hasn’t been the easiest, but did what you could with it. Maybe it’s those hardships that waylaid you on your intended path. Maybe the choices were too hard and when you need help the most you either didn’t know how to ask for help or recognize the help you were getting. You did what had to be done because there was no other choice. Whatever it was, that’s the past and we can’t change it even if we wanted to. What you can do is move forward. Make informed choices and be the person we all know you can be. Be as strong as we know you can be.

This was supposed to be a post first 16 mile run report. Talking about how great it felt and how I finished. But instead, I let the demons in my head conquer me and didn’t run. I have lots of excuses – Doing my assigned waterstop as a mentor meant that my time got pushed off. A visit to my regional passport office AFTER that left me frustrated. I then had to deal with extra traffic due to a bridge closure that had me even MORE frustrated because on top of that I realized that I’d needed to pee for three hours and hadn’t eaten anything substantial yet (at 3pm). All while the idea that I had to run a 4.5 hour practice long run all by myself floated in the back of my head. Being upset and the anxiety issues I had dealing with my passport left me exhausted by the time I got home. I went in, ate something with the thought that I was still going to do it. I was going to lace up and hit the trail. After I ate so I was properly fueled. But the reality in it was that I was afraid and let it conquer me. Justin sympathized with my day and told me that it was ok. Just run tomorrow (Sunday) which made sense. I could do that and still be ok. But Sunday came and went. We got home from our morning plans and I sat on the couch and hyperventilated. I was afraid again. More excuses ensued. My running partners were all busy, the planned route was actually shorter than I had thought meaning it wasn’t going to simply be out and back. I’d be playing loop de loop. I would be out there on my own, despite my preference for the cooler weather and I was afraid. Afraid of the distance, afraid of being alone and all of those everyday frustrations of life that runs help with heaped on top of it. Justin was great. He poked and prodded and kept reminding me that I needed to go run. That time was running short for when running outside for that long would be safe. He even volunteered to meet me at my half way point to be waterstop in case I needed extra. He later revealed that after doing that he had planned to go run out and grab me a special dinner to surprise me.

 
But this morning, I sit here at work hoping that no one stops by and asks with a smile how my run went. I sit here without the painful, yet happy aches that comes from accomplishing something great. I sit here without the smile that I get from reading the likes and comments that come from posting a great weekend long run from my compadres on Dailymile.com, Nike+ and Facebook and I castigate myself. I still feel that anxiety in my chest that comes with the fears of a long run that I’ve not accomplished. I’ll try again tonight for a good long run and hopefully the happy cheerful chants from my coaches will echo in my head. They believe in me, why can’t I?

I don’t fault them the emotions they feel though. The sadness and remembered anguish from loved ones lost, the relived relief at hearing of bare misses because of the quirks in time and scheduling that allowed friends and family to not be in places that they would have normally been, the imagined fear of what could have been had our way of life changed more than it has or has their loved ones been lost in those instances by putting themselves in another’s shoes. I’ve been unfortunate enough to be faced with tragedy and seen what it can do to seemingly strong people. It’s not a pretty sight, so I don’t begrudge them that opportunity. However a quote came across my Facebook stream this weekend that best summed up how I felt:

Do not ask me where I was on 9/11 for that is not of importance to me. Ask instead if I have made the world a better place in the days since. Ask if there were tears for those I never met and prayers for families I do not know. Ask if I had faith in spite of the fear. Ask if I support the heroes, the warriors, the survivors and the ones still in the fight. Do not ask the “Where”. Ask instead “Who” I have become.

If you’ve been reading my blog with any regularity during the last year, you’ll see that I feel strongly for many people I’ve never had the privilege of meeting. (and regularity is obviously a relative term given how often I’m able to squeeze time in to write) These people are near and far and most of them have been Cancer patients or their relatives helping loved ones battle their way through the horrible disease. I honor their lives through running because the rigors of training for a endurance events like marathons and half-marathons are nothing compared to what they see in their day to day life. But I digress.

What have I done to make the world a better place? I could answer simply by putting the old adage of do good unto others into action on a day to day basis, but that’s definitely too simple for the actions necessary. Instead, I will say that I’ve made my life richer, not only by doing more, but by being open to more. By taking chances that ten years ago (heck, two years ago!) I would have been to afraid to make. By making a point to take time for those around me and by learning that the action or non-actions of others do not always reflect on the person I am. By cutting the histrionics from my life and dis-allowing the negativity of others to affect me. And by taking the time to smell the flowers and enjoy life. To write more, to play more, to love more. Because time is short and you never know when and where your next adventure will come from. As Albert Camus once said, “Don’t walk in front of me, I may not follow. Don’t walk behind me, I may not lead.”