Why I Do What I Do...

Those of you who know me understand that teaching isn't just a career for me. I don't do it because I'm just "good with kids"...although, I really am.  I definitely don't do it because you get summers off...because teachers truly don't, which is a discussion that merits its own separate blog post!  If you really want to know why I teach, here it is.

Valentine's Day is still a big deal in elementary schools.  Even the "too-cool-for-school" fifth graders I teach still look forward to making their mailboxes and exchanging greetings of friendship and love on this holiday. In fact, some of the 10 and 11 year old kiddos go all out for Valentine's Day.  This year, because I happen to have wildly talented and creative little people in my care, about half my class made their own handmade Valentine cards.  (I particularly enjoyed the Star Wars themed ones that said, "This is not the Valentine you are looking for.")

This year, the week of our Valentine's celebration started out on a sad note, though.  One of our class members had a sudden death in the family and had to travel to attend his grandmother's funeral.  He wouldn't be at school for Valentine's Day.  We have a community sharing time every day at our school called Pride Time that keeps us relating well to each other as a class in hugely wonderful ways.  When I let the class know what was happening at Pride Time, the response overwhelmed me.  I expected them to be very concerned for their classmate because this is a particularly closely bonded group of students.  What I didn't anticipate was the depths to which that care and concern would impact us all.

This Was A Bigger Deal Than I Knew...

Yesterday, I drew the line in the sand and made the decision that today was Day One...a new beginning to reclaiming my fitness...the point at which I would head back to the gym and begin my do-over of the past fifteen months.  And I did.  And it was hard.  Really hard.  But it was also a much bigger deal than I anticipated it would be.

Physically, I wasn't nearly as bad off as I was the first time I stepped in a gym four years ago, despite the fact that I now have one new titanium knee and one old bone-on-bone arthritic knee that's getting its own titanium upgrade in four more months.  That was a big surprise for me.  In all fairness, I am nowhere near as fit as I was when the knee problems forced me out of the gym back at the end of 2013. But I'm also not nearly as out of shape as I was my first day in a gym in 2011. Those two and a half years of workouts had some residual effects on my body. They also left an imprint on my brain.

I wanted to get on an elliptical today at the gym to be very friendly to my knees while I did my cardio workout, but they were filled.  So I went to the exercise bikes and was able to raise my heart rate enough to hit my own cardio range while I pedaled for half an hour. My knees did surprisingly well, especially the new one.  The old one balked and squealed at me, but I ignored its whining and went right on pedaling.  Sometimes, you just have to suck it up and do what you have to do, and today was one of those times.

When the Direction Isn't Forward...

Hello, friends.  If you followed my first blog, you will surely remember that much of it was about my experiences in finding myself while I dropped 100 pounds.  So, perhaps you'll understand that this blog post is one I never wanted to write.

At my annual checkup yesterday, I had to face an ugly truth that I've been watching reveal itself in my mirror over the past year or so with no workouts.  I've regained 45 of those pounds.  

What do you do when the direction you're moving isn't forward?  Part of me wants to hide under my covers and pretend that the past few years haven't happened...to go back to that day in January of 2012 where I hit my biggest goal and felt success like I'd never known and re-do life from that point forward. I want to rewrite those intervening years so that there would be no debilitating knee pain and subsequent knee replacement and no family fraying at the edges. There would be easy-going and forward-moving gains in my overall health, my weight would still be dropping, and all would be right with the world.

But then there's this part of me that is firmly grounded in reality.  And in all honesty, that's the girl who needs to respond to this. She's the one I found on that Journey to Me ..and she's the only one who is going to turn this around and get me moving in the right direction again.