Week five is over!

Week 5

I would love to tell you week five was as successful for me as week four, but I might be lying.  In terms of number of days worked out I believe I had two run/walk days and one core dynamics DVD day.  I did up the amount of running time in my run walks, so I will consider that a small victory.  I also achieved leg pain.  Inner thighs and quads were the most painful parts.  I reread a few parts of my Chi Running book that I mentioned in my first post just so I could remember the important parts of my form I needed to work on.  I personally need to remember to keep my feet pointing straight.  My toes tend to want to point outward and I suppose that makes me look like a duck waddling.  Why did none of my friends tell me????  So I used this pain and a busy weekend to skip the gym and recover a little.  With four days off I only had some knee pain which I was able to mask with ibuprofen.

This is also the week of the healthy eater.  I dropped some serious money at the grocery store this past week on fresh fruits and vegetables.  Then again today as well.  I loaded my cart with berries, apples, kiwi, oranges, bananas, cucumbers, broccoli, cauliflower, mushrooms, spinach, and cherry tomatoes.  The most unhealthy item in my cart was a box of granola bars.  I even turned down the pretzels.  It's not that they were high in fat or calories, but I wanted to make sure I didn't eat pretzels instead of fruits and vegetables.  Over the past years of packing a lunch, I have noticed I will eat everything but the fruits and veggies.  I don't understand why.  I love fruits and vegetables.  Most all of them taste great.  I think they are just not what I crave.  I go for the carb heavy, salt laden entree first.  I will admit that produce does not give me the same feeling of fullness or satisfaction that a carb meal does.  So here's to conquering that!  My epiphany this week was also the thought that maybe running would be easier if I didn't weigh so much.  I want to run to lose weight but I need to lose weight to  run.  No wonder so many fat people (myself included) can't stay motivated.  I will be retraining my brain to crave fresh produce.  I will not buy chocolate anything and will stay out of the candy dish in Kathy's office at work.  I don't think we have anymore birthdays to celebrate anytime soon so I don't need to worry about cake for awhile.

This switch up in my diet also comes from not seeing any results on the scale or the way my clothes are fitting.  I know it has only been five weeks, and the first three were just walking three to for times a week, but I wanted to be down a few pounds at the very least.  The only bit of encouragement I have noticed was when I was putting lotion on my legs at the gym this morning.  My calves looked a little more muscular.  Not super cut by any means but definitely some improvement when I flexed.  Maybe that is where I found the motivation to do 3.5 miles of run/walk today.  I have Wednesday off this week so it will be easier to fit in another midday workout.  I am even thinking about getting out of bed earlier so I can get to the gym before work instead of trying to do it all after.  Of course that means getting up before five so I can have time to shower and get the kid ready before my long drive.  I'll let you know how I did!