Month: July 2023

A Race for July

On By LeraIn Life, running, weight lossLeave a comment

I ran my first 5k of the year on Thursday! My performance was absolutely awful, but I still had fun anyway.

It was a hot and very humid evening with the race starting at 7:30pm. I started out really strong with one of my fastest miles ever. I got a cramp in my calf just five minutes into the race, but I was able to push past that well enough and finish that first mile on track to PR. After that, I slowed down to a slow jog, and then ended up walking. The heat was making me feel dizzy and I ended up just walking most of the rest of the race. It was my own fault for starting too fast. I was happy enough to just finish this one.

After the race, there was a concert and dinner that was included in the race entry fee, so I met up with my running friends and we enjoyed a picnic on the grass while listening to the music until the sky grew dark and the fireflies came out. All in all, it was a fun night, even if I had one of my worst races.

5 Month Weight Progress

On By LeraIn Life, weight lossLeave a comment

Good evening, readers! I just had my second progress check for my weight loss with my doctor, and he was pleased with where things are. I’ve lost 32 pounds in the last five months! The first two and a half months I made way more progress than this second two and a half months (24 lbs vs 8 lbs), but he told me that usually by this point he’s seen patients gain weight back, and not to be too worried about slower progress because it naturally comes off faster at the beginning. That said, he gave me some advice to try, which was to set five pound goals at a time rather than just focusing on how far I still have to go. He told me that any time I do a workout, I should focus on my next small goal number and keep that at the front of my mind while I’m pushing myself.

He asked me what my diet was like, and I told him I was doing well eating clean 80% of the time, but that I’m sure if I cleaned it up more, I might see more progress. I was a lot more strict with myself in the first two months than I have been lately, so it makes sense. I’ve been more aware of not giving in to temptation lately, even bypassing a new limited time flavor iced cappuccino from one of my favorite cafes.

So yeah, going to be checking back in with my doctor in eight weeks, and hopefully I can manage to eat clean 95%+ of the time and see some faster progress. It’s really motivating to have an appointment scheduled because I know I can’t just slack off until my yearly appointment next winter, which is exactly what happened last year. I’m so grateful to have such excellent support from him. He even told me he was proud of my progress. In my daily life, I’m surrounded by people who tell me to treat myself to some good food or drink, so it’s nice to have someone to talk to about how hard it is to avoid that mentality all the time. The fun foods will always be there in the future, so I feel like I don’t want to jeopardize my progress with that kind of stuff on a daily basis.

One final note is that I signed up for Wondr, which is a weight loss program my job lets me access for free. It’s focused on making little lifestyle changes that add up over time, so I think getting a different perspective through that will help. My doctor has personally used it and really had a lot of good things to say about it when I brought I up, so I’m hoping it will be a great resource.