Let’s be honest, exercise is HARD… Especially when you stop for a while and then have to get back at it. I have to be honest and tell you all that I really do NOT enjoy exercise at all. I don’t understand those people who talk about endorphins and hyperactivity after exercise. I have yet to experience any of those phenomenons. After exercise, all I want to do is to take a nap! While I know that it is extremely important and I can tell a big difference in my abilities to do those simple tasks like standing, bending and lifting things every day, after exercising for any length of time I am completely spent! My arms and hands shake quite a bit and my legs are well… WOBBLY! 🙂
I have not yet posted about my recent personal loss. I am not ready to do so yet either. I will only say that these last three weeks have been the hardest of my entire life. We all think we have challenges and we also have a tendency to whine about a lot. I often have to stop myself from going to dark places and doom and gloom when I struggle with things in my own life. I am not immune to difficult days and I am not especially good at being an overall positive person at all times.
What I am learning though is that when I tend to focus on the negative- all the things in my life that are going wrong and all the things I am frustrated with, that is all I can think about and it tends to have a snowball effect on my day. I find more and more and more things going wrong throughout the day. On those days, I find nothing positive happens. However, when I try to find the good in every situation- the fact that I was blessed with a wonderful person in my life for over 42 years while I had him. I’m blessed that I have a wonderful husband who loves and supports me in everything I do and that I have a son who is smart and loving and thoughtful- one that any girl out there would be so very lucky to have by their side. That is the good stuff! That is what is right in my world. At the beginning of today I was feeling a bit lost with all the changes I am going through in my life this year. My mind still wanders throughout the day thinking of everything that has happened these past few weeks and it is a bit hard to focus.
Then at lunchtime my doorbell rings and it is this wonderful person- my trainer & good friend, Ruth Ungerer. She is such a wonderful person that really believes in me and she takes her own personal time each and every week to invest in my well being! She is here to listen when I need to talk, she is here to encourage me when I need some desperately as well. For people like me, exercise is so very hard. I stumble and I fall. I can’t imagine that it is something she loves doing- coming here week after week, but she does it and for that I am very thankful! Without her, I don’t think I would keep at it. She keeps me accountable and she keeps me focused. Although my body is screaming at me to stop, she reminds me that the investment is worth it. She tells me how strong I am and she reminds me why I am doing this- ALL of this, even this site and blog and the endless hours I put into it. It is because I want to make a difference!
At the end of the day, although I have to admit that although I like getting some attention for the weight loss and I like the number I see on the scale- that is not my WHY anymore.
Here it is- My WHY: Itis to keep on dancing with friends, to
keep travelling to all those places that I have never been, to be able to stand next to my son at his wedding one day and to be able to play with my grandchildren that I hope to have in the (far) future. 🙂 The exercises I am doing are not going to win me any bikini contest or medal- but they just may keep me out of that wheelchair a little longer, and THAT is a good thing. So, from this bruised and sore WobblyGirl to all of you out there- Do what you need to do, whatever you can do to keep investing in your health every day.
Think of your WHY and then do what you can to keep those goals in your mind as you sweat a little more and nap a little less. And for you CMTers out there, it does not matter if you are already in that chair or not- you still need to work at keeping your body moving. I hope that with my good friend Ruth’s help, we can inspire you to do some basic exercises to keep what muscle you still have firing. Life is what we make of it- good or bad. Let’s make it great!
Blessings to all of you ,
Stacie