Participants: Family minus Josh (Scout Camp) plus cousins Jake and Caly
Task: Caterpillars for 25 minutes.
Gold Star for the day undoubtedly goes to Andrew. He needed some encouragement but he ran the entire thing. He has never gone that far or that long non-stop before. I was very impressed with him. It was good to not see him quit, which is normally the problem. He gives up on hard things, but not today!
Every else did just fine. It was a nice slow pace so they didn’t quite run 2 miles. They all ran well and I didn’t hear any complaining.
This is the first time we’ve done Caterpillars without a baton to pass back. Instead, that last person would simply wait until they saw the person ahead of them finish their sprint, and then they would sprint to the front themselves. This adds more sprinting by eliminating the time for the baton to be passed back. They all handled it quite well. The added runner helped mitigate the extra running.
Overall a very good run. This is the first running log in a few weeks because we’ve been doing other things, so it was good to get back “on track.” I was able to walk almost a full lap with JR at a VERY slow pace. The time spent standing though took its toll and I was in quite a bit of pain at the end. Lifting Steven to get a drink near the end was excruciating.
I have video for you today… Enjoy!
UPDATE: new video without the music that got blocked!
This question was asked during church this week… “What motivates you?” I was able to sit through about 10 minutes of discussion before JR started fussing. He was loud enough that I needed to leave so that he didn’t bother the rest of the class. So I sat with him in the hall and thought about that singular question… what is my motivation?
Searching for Motivation
The first answer that came to mind to me is “I have no motivation.” I didn’t share this with the class, but kept it to myself. I do find it very hard much of the time to find motivation to do anything. I’m in a depressed mood much of the time.
Even when I have the desire to get up and do something, quite often the chronic pain is there to change my mind. I want to get up and be outside doing things, but knowing they are going to hurt while doing them AND continue hurting long after I’ve stopped makes it extremely difficult to do much at all.
Fear of pain
But that means that I am motivated to stay docile because of fear of pain. Having many times experienced headaches so bad that they leave me vomiting or blacked out, I find pain avoidance to be highly motivating.
Now, because I know that continuing to gain weight will also cause more pain, I do find motivation to do what I can. Even 8 years after being medically discharged I am still trying to find the threshold between activity and pain. The same fear of pain that sucks motivation from me, also makes me want to get up and do what I can so that I don’t get worse. It is a balancing act that I often feel I am failing at.
Love of family
Love for my family is the one thing that consistently overcome my fear of pain. I will do what NEEDS to be done for them even if I know it will be painful. Right now this is happening with getting my parents house cleaned out. We NEED a permanent place to live. Every day I wake up stiff, sore, and nauseated from pain. But the clock is ticking toward start of the next school year, so I get up and get moving.
Before this though there were many days when I probably would have stayed in bed all day. Or if I did get up, I wouldn’t go anywhere as I hate being in public. If it weren’t that Julie hates this and it makes her feel bad, then I’d never leave the house.
But making Julie happy and wanting to see the kids is enough to get me out of bed and dressed. It’s really been the only thing getting me to church for years. Don’t misunderstand, I love my church. I have a deep and abiding faith in Christ. But the pain and PTSD would be enough to keep me from attending except that Julie wants me there with the family. So I go, for love of the family.
Other motivation?
I don’t know if I can come up with another one. I don’t do much pleasure seeking, I don’t care about money, I’d rather not be famous. While at Fort Huachuca I lost the will to live, and am only still here today because of my love for Julie and the kids. There are occasionally things I would like to do, but they all largely go unfulfilled for reasons previously discussed. And even when I do something that I “want to do” it is largely unsatisfying.
I have good moments of laughter and love, but am largely unmotivated toward anything in particular. My decision making paradigm can basically be boiled down to pain avoidance and love of family.
I’d love to hear… what motivates you?
Andrew circa 2015 with our Great Pyrenees puppy ‘Chief’
It is time again for another doomed-to-fail weight loss attempt. Why Do I Do This To Myself?
It’s Glaringly Obvious!
Every time I look in a mirror, try to walk up a flight of stairs, or attempt to pick something up off of the ground, it is obvious why I need to lose weight. I’m a big, fat, slug of a man. The pain sucks. My back can’t handle the stress the weight causes. I’ve consistently gained 10lbs a year since getting injured. I don’t expect I could make it to my 50’s if don’t reverse course.
If I want to see my kids grow up or get married than I have to make weight loss a priority. If I would like to be able to remain mobile much longer than I must shed some pounds. I’d really love to be able to stop using my cane. If I continue to balloon then eventually my ankles, knees, or back will just give out and I’ll be in really bad shape. It should be glaringly obvious that if I want any quality of life that changes need to happen.
But I Also Have No Idea!
While it IS glaringly obvious that I need to lose weight, I simultaneously have no idea why I do this to myself. I have tried and failed so many time that I have no confidence that I can succeed. Does another attempt make any sense if I have anticipate failure? Yes, the results seem desirable and worth the effort; No, they don’t seem achievable.
But hey, would I really be “me” if I didn’t occasionally try insanely stupid things that seem doomed to failure from the beginning? Maybe it’s time for a “Here, hold my beer Sprite” type of moment.
Weight Loss Efforts
I will not be doing anything drastic. I will be trying to combine a small change in what I eat (my “diet”) with a small increase in exercise.
What I eat (diet)
I think the biggest effect could come from just a slight amount of self-control, namely, not eating or snacking after scriptures/bedtime for the kids. This usually happens around 9pm at our house, but I routinely consume a significant number of calories after this time. Eliminating this “after hours” eating could/should have the biggest impact on my weight loss.
I don’t usually have much of a breakfast, due mostly to morning back pain keeping me in bed until after normal breakfast hours. I know breakfast is “the most important meal of the day,” but this probably won’t change. My morning consumption however has already been changed from cereal or bacon/eggs into a fruit/veggie juice.
Julie and I bought a Champion Juicer that we love. We’ve had one for years (replaced after each fire). Julie has been making fresh juices for us most mornings as breakfast. The juicer tears apart the cells releasing the nutrients rich contents and eliminating the pulp/cell membrane.
A typical juice for two would include:
3 apples
1/10 of a pineapple
1/2 cup of mixed berries (blueberries, strawberry, raspberry, etc)
2 carrots
1/2 cucumber
1/2 stalk of celery
1 serving of some type of squash (zucchini, crook necked, etc)
small handful of spinach or kale (kale is bitter, use sparingly)
There are numerous books, websites, blogs, etc. that give you other recipes that are great. This one is kind of Julie’s go-to recipe. Just run it all through the juicer, stir, and enjoy. You can get a full days nutrients from just one glass of fresh juice. And it is easier than trying to eat that quantity of produce.
Exercise
This one has always been tough. The chronic pain makes everything hard. Combined with seeing how much ability I’ve lost, it becomes is very depressing. How do I overcome that?
I had always played a variety of sports that would have me running and jumping. But my weight and back problems don’t let me do either of those. AT ALL! Thankfully it is summer now, which provides an easy way to neutralize my massive weight: swimming.
Being in water relieves the stress that the weight puts on my body. It doesn’t hurt my leg joints nor my back. The plus side of having this much blubber is it’s buoyancy! The local Pleasant Grove pool is only open in summer, and so I am looking forward to taking advantage of our family pass.
The downside to swimming though is that in order to breath one must keep ones head out of the water. I’ve found that the arch in my back that this requires creates a more-than-acceptable level of pain. So in years past I haven’t swam either.
I’m ashamed to say it took me 9 years to solve the problem of breathing with my face underwater.
My magical breathe-under-water device. A snorkel and mask!
I don’t know why this “new technology” eluded me for so long, but I’m happy to say that I can now swim, pain free. Shoulder surgeries has left them weak which could be a problem with swimming too. Happily, I’ve found that also using fins give me plenty of propulsion to keep me at the surface without engaging my arms (the blubber helps too!).
So I can avoid back pain, rest my arms/shoulders when tired, and can get some exercise! I am thrilled and excited about this.
Optimism
I’m leery that something will go wrong. In the last few years something always seems to for me. But I am more cautiously optimistic. Not necessarily that I’ll lose weight, but that I can at least increase my activity level without a corresponding increase in pain.
If I can exercise, and if I can control what I eat, perhaps the weight loss will come. If weight loss can occur, perhaps the pain will decrease (or disappear?). And if I can be healthy and if the pain goes away, perhaps the depression/anxiety/PTSD will get better too. That is far too many if‘s for me to be hopeful, but maybe feeling doomed to failure isn’t realistic either.
So wish me luck. Words of encouragement are always welcome. Prayers are appreciated. Feel free to ask me how it is going. I need the accountability.
And please, stop running away and screaming when I take my shirt off at the pool. That could make a person feel bad you know 🙂
By “entire family” I don’t suggest that we all ran. I don’t run at all. JR is just barely walking (but doing a fabulous job of it), and Steven spent most of the time crying.
We were all present though. It was good quality family time, even with the tears involved.
Task
A 20/40 is just a longer variant of the 15/30 I’ve described before. 20 seconds of sprinting (100% full speed) followed by 40 seconds of walking. Repeat for 10 minutes. I switched to the 20/40 format for two reasons. First, it is a longer sprint which the older kids are ready for, and; second, it is easier to keep track of when to start/stop because it ends on each minute.
This time we had a new whistle we got to use so I didn’t have to yell STOP and START over and over. One whistle blast means run and 2 means stop. Much better for me!
Results
Not a particulartly good outing. We went much later in the evening that normal and almost nobody was excited for it. Having a bad attitude almost always leads to bad effort and bad results.
Josh only did about 1/2 of the laps before he was complaining his knee hurt, and so he walked the rest. Caitlin at almost exactly the same time said she twisted her ankle (on the flat track??), but continued half-heartedly. Kristie tried hard but was ornery about not being able to breath – this is her least favorite running activity. Even Julie had issues.
JR cried as soon as Mom ran away from him. Steven cried as soon as he realized he couldn’t keep up. Andrew finished one lap and begged to be done.
We were going to do 15 minutes of this exercise, but when Nikki came up at 10 minutes and claimed she needed to pee I called it quits, gave 3 blasts to signal we were done, and headed for the car. Julie had just started another lap and so she walked the whole thing to cool down. Who walked with her? The girl who supposedly needed to pee, “sooo bad!”.
I set up the GoPro, so I’ll edit the video if any of it is any good and post it at a later date.
I have them often, either because of the Mental Health issues or the never-ending chronic pain problems. I won’t dare say that I have more bad days than most, but I have plenty of them. So if you find yourself wondering why I haven’t posted anything in a few days, it is because I’ve strung a few less than stellar days together.
So please just keep us in your prayers. We’ll keep you abreast of what we’re doing just as soon as possible.
Thanks for everybody’s love and support.
Enjoy the picture of Andrew playing at the park a few weeks ago!
Andrew was not having a bad day while he played on the monkey bars!
Andrew was not having a bad day while he played on the monkey bars!