Look Mom! More Milestones!
Yesterday I took Stella to her weekly soccer at the Y. Usually what I do is drop her off at the field, put Sammy in the kid care, and lift weights for about a half hour, then go back out to the field to watch Stella, do some ab work and stretches, and watch her play. No, I;m not a bad mom for not watching the first half; I can only watch a bunch of kids do their flamingo stretches for so long before I feel my own muscles tighten up. They really don't get going until the second half anyway. Stella is an aggressive player, and she's fun to watch.
So anyway, I'm on the field, doing my stretches, and I'm doing a pile of these when suddenly I get the idea that maybe I should try to lift up my hips with my hands and get halfway to a yoga plow pose. I'm not a yoga person, but when I was a kid, I used to just balance my hips on my hands and keep my legs perpendicular for what seemed like hours. It just felt good.
Well, about a year ago, I attempted that, and humiliatingly enough, couldn't get my hips off the ground, much less up in the air. I couldn't even hoist them onto my hands so that my arms could help balance them up in the air.I about cried: Jesus, I'm fat and I'm out of shape. Worse yet, there was Stella, fresh from gymnastics class, doing it, flipping over, and flopping about. "Mom, it's easy. Just go like this," and she'd get her hips up in the air, not even needing her hands to do it.
So yesterday, for some reason, I tried it again, and lo and behold, I did it! I wanted to yell across the field, "Look Stella, I can do it, I can lift my hips off the ground, and I don't need my hands for balance until I'm ready to hold it up there!" But she was too busy playing soccer, and in fact, just when I came down and looked around the field, she scored a goal. WOO-HOO, for both of us. She'd had about 7 shots on goal yesterday (is that a soccer term? I know it’s a hockey term...) but they were either weak, or stopped by a particularly effective goalie, but finally, after keeping at it, she got one in and it was like we shared this exhuberant, finally-I--did-it! moment. The kids took a break to hydrate, during which Stella gave me a hug, "Didja see me! I scored!" Yes I did, hon, did you see me? No, she didn't, but it didn't matter. I did about 10 more of those hip raises because I could.
Its times like this that the slow weight loss doesn't matter in some respects. As I've posted earlier, its been a slow summer on the scale, but while the scale isn't showing a whole lot, my clothes are fitting better, I'm doing stuff I never thought I could do again ( running? Did you say running?) and I suspect the weight loss is going slow partly because of that: I'm getting cocky, and the fact that I have a link to a previous post very early in this blog that discusses this very thing points out that this is a recurrent behavior I need to work on. Look, I can fit in these clothes that haven't fit since before I had Stella, I can do hip raises, hell, I can have Leon's Frozen Custard every night can't I? No, I cannot. But the good news all around is that its really helped me identify a behavioral problem I have to conquer if I'm going to be succuessful at this. I have to stop treating milestones as goals.
So anyway, I'm on the field, doing my stretches, and I'm doing a pile of these when suddenly I get the idea that maybe I should try to lift up my hips with my hands and get halfway to a yoga plow pose. I'm not a yoga person, but when I was a kid, I used to just balance my hips on my hands and keep my legs perpendicular for what seemed like hours. It just felt good.
Well, about a year ago, I attempted that, and humiliatingly enough, couldn't get my hips off the ground, much less up in the air. I couldn't even hoist them onto my hands so that my arms could help balance them up in the air.I about cried: Jesus, I'm fat and I'm out of shape. Worse yet, there was Stella, fresh from gymnastics class, doing it, flipping over, and flopping about. "Mom, it's easy. Just go like this," and she'd get her hips up in the air, not even needing her hands to do it.
So yesterday, for some reason, I tried it again, and lo and behold, I did it! I wanted to yell across the field, "Look Stella, I can do it, I can lift my hips off the ground, and I don't need my hands for balance until I'm ready to hold it up there!" But she was too busy playing soccer, and in fact, just when I came down and looked around the field, she scored a goal. WOO-HOO, for both of us. She'd had about 7 shots on goal yesterday (is that a soccer term? I know it’s a hockey term...) but they were either weak, or stopped by a particularly effective goalie, but finally, after keeping at it, she got one in and it was like we shared this exhuberant, finally-I--did-it! moment. The kids took a break to hydrate, during which Stella gave me a hug, "Didja see me! I scored!" Yes I did, hon, did you see me? No, she didn't, but it didn't matter. I did about 10 more of those hip raises because I could.
Its times like this that the slow weight loss doesn't matter in some respects. As I've posted earlier, its been a slow summer on the scale, but while the scale isn't showing a whole lot, my clothes are fitting better, I'm doing stuff I never thought I could do again ( running? Did you say running?) and I suspect the weight loss is going slow partly because of that: I'm getting cocky, and the fact that I have a link to a previous post very early in this blog that discusses this very thing points out that this is a recurrent behavior I need to work on. Look, I can fit in these clothes that haven't fit since before I had Stella, I can do hip raises, hell, I can have Leon's Frozen Custard every night can't I? No, I cannot. But the good news all around is that its really helped me identify a behavioral problem I have to conquer if I'm going to be succuessful at this. I have to stop treating milestones as goals.
Comments
i remember the first time i was able to get up off the living room sofa ~ my favorite spot in the house where i used to watch the birds, read, daydream. i had reached a point in my fatness that it was such a struggle, i just topped sitting there.
about 50 pounds down from my (last, truly the last) top weight, i plopped down, then though "oh shoot! now i'll have to struggle up" but i didn't. i got up almost like a normal person and now, at -110, i am able to hope off that sofa like a sprightly thing :-)
this journey can be so much fun. it made me very happy to read of your triumph.
by the way, i was working out HARD at the gym 6 days a week. lifting heavy, lots of cardio. took a yoga class and it nearly killed me...
lynette