Tracking Progress....Stress Alert!

Week 1 is completed. It went past in an absolute whirl. Sometimes being busy can be the best way to tackle change because it becomes robotic. This week has been exactly like that; work, train, food prep, family time, housework…repeat. I can only remember the important portions – walnuts, chicken cakes, salmon and chocolate casein crunchy delight.

I also have vivid memories of Monday night. The night I decided to weigh myself in the name of ‘Tracking Results’. It was comical. I had a shower to wash off all excessive and weighty dirt. I chose the lightest and smallest pieces of clothing (smalls!!) I could find. I finished my water consumption nice and early that day in lieu of the Big Event. I waited until my hair dried after the shower. It was obvious I was nervous because I kept babbling about nothing. I found any and every reason to deviate from the task. Then…with much fuss and stupidity, I decided it was time to step onto the digital life-changer … (you don’t have to tell me I’m dramatic! I know already).

Aha – I hatched a cunning plan just seconds from ‘the moment’! Genuis!!!!

 “Does it really matter what I weigh?” – No
“Are we only really interested in progress?” – Yes

So it was settled. I would stand on the scales while Rob used a cap to shield my fragile eyes from the glaring numbers. He would note down the ‘situation’ and write it somewhere far, far away, and in code least I start trying to find it on some sad and lonely night.

Another quick wee, a bit of incessant babbling and it was Time. With trepidation I stepped on board. “Damn” says Rob. “What??? What??? Am I too heavy to register??? WHAT???”. Error code – batteries dead. Haven’t touched the bloody thing since last May and it’s managed to flatten over 11 months. What’s more – it’s one of those round batteries …. the ones most of us don’t have lying around in our junk drawer!!Crap!!!

Rob to the rescue and he find one solitary little round silver battery. Inserted. We’re off on round two.

Few more stupid, nervous jokes (my way of dealing with excess stress – has definitely got me in trouble before), and I’m stepping on, Rob is shielding me from the shocking truth and we’ve finally completed the job. I’m proud to say I didn’t outright ask Rob what the numbers were. If I’m being truly honest, I asked a few strategic questions but he wasn’t playing the game. If you don't get it by now, I'm actually quite high maintenance. Thank goodness he enjoys the challenge. I still don’t know where he wrote it down and there’s a slight possibility that he will forget where himself. That would be a real disaster because I already feel a slight touch of nerves and excitement when anticipating progress update in one month.

Along with the scales, I took some photos. I’m quite a confident person but have to admit a real weakness when looking at my own photos. It’s something I’m working on because I feel sad when women can’t look at themselves and see their own beauty. So I’m forcing myself to look and accept where I’m at, and feel proud that I’m a very healthy, strong and focused woman. And that’s the absolute truth whether I’m at work, pre-comp, at the park, out for dinner or in the middle of my off-season, measuring progress. It’s still me. And these days I quite like me. Unlike many, I wouldn’t swap and go back in time for all of the tea in China (my mum uses this phrase and it’s a little absurd because I think there’s way more tea in India).

I’m not sure I’m ready to share my pics quite yet. Hang on.... have had a quick look through and yep - not ready! But I’ll definitely work on that.

 

Day 1 In the Life....

 

The day approached quickly. I thought I had longer. I was gently exploring the idea of starting comp prep and I foolishly spoke it out loud just 7 short days ago. “Being organised” I thought. Giving myself time to contemplate the more structured life while sitting back in my food-freedom for a month or two more. Ingrid had other plans and worked at lightning speed. I suspect she was secretly insanely jealous of my relaxed approach to nutrition.

I got the message to begin on Monday so Sunday was ear-marked to get it all ready. Being on nightshift, I had not made one move toward prep as of Sunday lunchtime. That’s what happens on nightshift…nothing. I’m like a walking zombie. I work all night, sleep all day, and rip people’s heads off during both portions. It’s not that I hate nightshift per say….I just don’t think it likes me very much.

So Sunday came and Rob took the bull by the horns and took the shopping list and smacked around the debit card a bit. He came home with every possible combination of my plan. There were green bags loaded with food in every direction. It’s about at this point that my OCD kicks in a little and I am then compelled to sort the mess out and load up that fridge with Tupperware.

First job for me….roasting walnuts. What a butt-stupid thing to do on a hungry Sunday arvo. Nothing wrong with a few nuts in the gob…..it’s just that half a kilo of nutty goodness is not necessary unless you’re a piglet who knows that full freedom is on its way out! I felt really queasy after that little session. Never mind, I washed it down with fresh pears….that I also had a little gorge on. Finally I put it all together and assembled my lovely little pear, walnut and spinach dressed salad.  By the time it was completed, I didn’t ever want to look at a pear or walnut again! Or at least until the morning.

Monday came, as I knew it would, and I arrived home from work at 7am ready for a small snooze. First in the mouth goes a concoction of oats, fruit and protein – seriously and honestly… I feel I could never get sick of fruity, creamy porridge! I really think this sport favours those with a boring palette. Those that don’t mind shovelling in the same old tastes day in and day out for months on end. Not that it has to boring but we live in a world where boredom is a buzz word. People get bored with their food, bored with their jobs, bored with their…stuff (I hate stuff!!!!). Most of the innovations these days revolve around providing the quick changes in life to protect against boredom. Well I happily claim to be a boring eater who doesn’t mind trudging along with the same stuff for months (if not years) on end. Makes life easy. As long as I have salt, pepper and vinegar/oil dressing.

Moving On. I slept until 11am and tried to open my lil peepers. Looked like one of those furry animals that used to scream, “bright lights, bright lights!!” on some 80’s movie. Decided I would scare children if I faced the world looking like that so I gave in to a couple more hours in the sack and finally arose like Lazarus at about 1pm. From there it’s time to shovel in my pear and walnut salad with some tasty tuna before heading to the gym.

Hamstrings day and I’m only doing about 4 reps. I got it nice and heavy. Heavier than I’ve ever gone before. Heavy enough that, when I foolishly took all of the weight plates off one side of the bar, the other end tipped and the plates crashed off and rolled around the gym floor. The world constantly works in ways to never make me feel cool at the gym.

Completed workout with eyes still burning from not-quite-enough-sleep and returned home to down another meal dominated by chicken cakes. Yep. You can have your chocolate cake. I prefer mine chicken flavour. Actually, prefer  might be too strong a word. Maybe choose is more accurate.

Kids home, homework tackled. Homework is like another workout in itself. I am pulled in three directions at once. Child number three likes me to test his spelling first. Swiftly following spelling are two reading books. And finally, he is trying to learn the moves to “Let’s Get Ridiculous” and he takes this task very seriously. Child two is writing a piece on what Easter means to our family. I prudently thought I should explain to him the Easter Story before he admitted that it only means a chocolate hunt. I needn’t have bothered because he wrote, “Easter doesn’t really mean anything to us. We don’t do anything at Easter. We don’t even really get much chocolate”. How stingy does that make me look??!!! Finally, Child Number 1 is doing a persuasive text on Why School Is Better Than Staying At Home. Thank the Easter God that she is on the affirmative and I offered tons of reasons from a parents’ perspective of why going to school is better. Mostly she went with her own ideas.

Following homework is housework. In our house, starting up the vaccume means that the tv needs to go on even louder. Very uncool on their behalf as it only highlighted that they were watching tv while I was working! Nightshift Boxing Day means I’m allowed to yell like a mad woman with good reason. I only have the 12 hours immediately post the last nightshift to do so legally so I made good use of this and gave everyone chores to do and no tv as a background.

Following housework and it’s food time again. This time it’s salmon and veg. Can’t complain about that. Then it’s kids’ bed time which is yet another mini-workout. Each wants to be the recipient of the last kiss so we do this mad sort of dance around the bedrooms. I’d like to say we laugh and giggle and make a big joke out of it. But we don’t. It ends in some sort of scary growl and mumbling about bare bums being spanked if there’s another peep….more grumbles about how unfair kids are to their parents and why won’t they consider how much we do with work, house work, dishing up dinners, paying for camps…..until they are so bored with our grumbles that they all go to sleep.

From there it’s an icy coke zero. I don’t normally do fizzy (that’s “fuzzy” for my kiwi comrades) drinks. But it’s a bit of a transition from the treats I’ve been eating to the more structured comp prep life so I decided to cut myself a break. Needless to say it was on my menu otherwise I wouldn’t have had it.

Bit of tv. Tried to download the last season of Sons of Anarchy…but I’m a download retard and ended up looking at pages full of ads offering me Chinese women for cheap. So I watched Louis Theroux who was visiting the Pro Wrestling capital of America. They did some scary shit with barbed wire. Made me glad I’m into bodybuilding.

Finally it’s bed time. But not before a casein shake. Rob chooses shake, I choose goop. Whatever the case, a little gooey bowl of choccy goodness is AOK with me.

And then sleep…sleep…sleep.

Day one done and dusted. Day two has just started and the porridge is down. Now it’s time to hit those legs.

I Don't Do Things By Halves.....Ever

I have a habit of speaking out...and then actually doing it. But it's more than that. I feel compelled to do it. I don't believe I can physically say I'll do something and not do it.

 

This can be such a wonderful thing and bring excitement, change and new opportunities. It can also work against and bring unnecessary change or a move that happens to quick. I’ve had my fair share of both. Let me give you examples;

 

 

·        While at a party, sucking on beer and chuffing on a fag, I spoke with the then-Commander of the Northland Police in NZ. For some stupid reason he suggested I try out for the Police. All 80 odd kilos of me. I laughed and laughed, but secretly my mind started ticking over about how I could make that happen. I jokingly said, “Double dare me”. He said, “Double dare”. Damn!!!!  That’s enough to turn the switch in my head and I’m on the mental track to conquering a pretty big goal!!

Somehow I had to get my very unfit and massively flabby bum around a 2.4km track in less that 11:15m. Yep – that’s about 4.5mns per kilometre. I was not a runner. I did not like running, I did not watch running, I did not hanker to be a runner. I hated it. But that was the goal and that’s what I had to conquer. So I hired a PT and made it happen. 8 weeks later I completed that run in 11:13km. I cried with the emotion of it all. Yet they still hired me.

 

·        Some two years later I was talking with some colleagues about the upcoming promotional exams. Mostly people spaced it out over a couple of years due to the heavy workload. And here I am talking away about it and someone dares me to do it in one year. He bet me a carton of beer. I would have taken on the bet for one can – I just can’t help myself when someone eludes to the fact that ‘it can’t be done’.

So over the next 12 months I completed 3 practical assignments, two 3-hour law exams and a university management paper. Not so spectacular in itself, but working full time shift work, planning and executing a wedding, buying my first house and falling pregnant, all happened pretty much in that 12 months. It was hell.

 Did I learn my lesson? Not a chance. My life is a series of accepted dares.

·        In 1995 I spoke to someone about travelling and helping out overseas. They asked me if I wanted to go to Tasmania. “Woohoo – hell yes” I said. I heard wrong – it was actually Tanzania and suddenly I find myself living next to the Masaii and eating bbq’d goat for lunch on a regular basis. Hakuna Matata! Not often in life where you get the chance to attend a female circumcision ceremony and have a little nibble on raw meat. The small things in life.

·        In 2003, a friend of the family bought a property three hours away from our home in Auckland. They got a quote from a landscaper for $15,000 to do the driveway, retaining wall, lay grass and design and implement the gardens. Rob and I looked at each (now that I have a partner in crime – these hair-brained ideas often start with that particular look). One glance and we knew we were on the same page. “We’ll do it for $14K” we said. Done deal.

I simply cannot use words that will describe enough how hard it was to complete this task. You see, we had a one month old baby, a 15 month old toddler and had never laid grass, designed a garden or paved a driveway before. We spent one gruelling week trying to manage two babies around this mammoth task, adding that the temperature in Taupo felt like about -10C!!! Mental note to self: what sounds easy isn’t. 

·        Or how about the time we moved house for about the 5^th time (we used to buy and sell houses as a hobby). We decided THIS IS IT – we are NOT moving for a few years. About four weeks went by when a real estate knocked on the door stating that he had a client that was interested in houses in our area. I decided to play along and gave him a price exactly $30,000 more than we had paid just four weeks ago. He brought around an unconditional contract that night for the exact amount. Didn’t even haggle. Yeah…..that was quite a hard one to break to Rob. But we did it – we moved one street away. Least we didn’t have to take the furniture far!

So as you can see, I don’t do much by halves. It sort of goes like this;

·        I have a niggling thought

·        I say it out loud or someone lays down a dare

·        I can’t help myself – I work like a woman possessed to make it happen

So what’s the point of all of this? Haha  - not much. I just like telling funny stories.

However, there is some relevance. Competitions to me are just like the above. It’s like someone double dares me to do it. As my 20 week competition preparation phase looms near, I just can’t wait for the day that the switch flicks over. I go from Off Mode…to On Mode. No turning back. No questioning. Just do it. Follow the bouncing ball and do as I’m told. Watch the progress unfold and feel the warm glow of achievement.

Can’t wait.