fitness

I am worthy and beautiful

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beautiful

I woke up this morning…Actually, it is more like I barely slept into the morning. I was a jumble of nerves. I was feeling anxious. I knew that I had to listen carefully to my body in that moment because it could be the difference between being anxious for a day and being depressed for months.

My body said, “I need yoga.”

So I cued up Yoga With Adrienne on Youtube and got on the mat. We started slowly in a seated pose. Then we did the breathing exercise that opened up my world. I felt calm. Then we moved into cat pose…then we moved. And as we moved into each pose and I got to connect with my body, I understood what was happening. My body was demanding attention. I cried a bit on the mat but I felt better for that moment with myself in a dark room.

I texted my friend and said, “I have abandoned my body. I don’t look at it in the mirror. I struggle to feed it. Even clothing it is a struggle. I need to make peace with my body.”

This epiphany reminds of reading Love Warrior by Glennon Doyle. A major theme is reuniting the self. The self is divided into the mind, body, and soul. She feeds her mind and her soul. She is disconnected from her body. In a lot of ways, I connect to this idea/situation. I have always been an avid reader. I take great pride in developing my mind. I am invested in my soul. My faith is a big part of my identity. My body and I though are not connected. I never felt like I looked how I felt. I often don’t feel like I look smart or accomplished or presentable. I often want to hide in public because I just like my body does not belong.

I have lived most of life at this point with a disordered eating behavior. I love the idea of cooking food more than the idea of eating it. When I do, I have to battle the shame I feel about feeding myself.  It has gotten easier over the years because even when I don’t love eating, I focus on the functional aspects of it. I just do it.

I go through cycles of taking care of myself. There are times when I exercise consistently. In those moments, I usually feel connected to my body. I look at my body more. I understand how it works. I take pride in beautifying myself. I feel a sense of grounding by engaging with my physical self.

At the moment, I am a year into a very sedentary phase. I have ignored my physicality. It is not just in the working out. It is in the way I refuse to care for my hair or my skin. It is in the lack of exercise. It is the lack of attention to what I eat. In many ways, I let my body go because I needed to focus on my mental health. Now that I am at a place where my mental health is stronger and I can say that happiness is a regular state of mind, I need to focus on my body.

I don’t need to diet like I have been tempted to in the last month or so. I know after 18 years in this battle of disordered eating that I do not do well with structure around my eating. I need to go back to creating nutrituous food and celebrating the art of eating.

I need to physically challenge my body. At the moment, I am inclined to focus on walking and yoga as means to do that.

I need to look at my face and body. I have been wearing more make-up of late. I have also been taking selfies. There is a part of me that feels narcissistic for taking pictures of myself. However, I recognize that in looking at myself and not cowering away from my own image, I am accepting that I am worthy and beautiful just as I am.

I don’t know what tomorrow brings. I do know that today, I started a new journey in understanding my relationship to my body.

 

 

 

March ON!

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March ONMarch is finally here and I am getting my head fully into the half-marathon training program that I am using. February seems to have snuck up on me and taken away my breathe. I found myself sick for the first two weeks in February. I was quite depressed about it because I thought it would ruin my training. After allowing my body to heal, I got back on the horse and I have to say that I am quite encouraged with the progress I am making.

I have been luck with Boston weather this year because we have not had a significant amount of snow. The weather has been quite warm for winter. This has meant that I am able to run outside instead of just relying on a treadmill for the early part of my training. This is a lucky break because I am discovering that running on a treadmill does not use the same muscles and strength as running outside. First few times I did a training run outside I felt some new muscles that I usually don’t engage when I use the treadmill

Running outside allows me to instinctively understand my body and develop a knack for pacing my runs.

Also running outside allows me to self-regulate my pace. This I am discovering is a critical part of training for race. It is awesome that running on a treadmill forces me to maintain a steady pace but it does not allow for the instinctive understanding of my body. By running outside, I am starting to understand what easy pace means to me. It means being able to breathe easily. It means being able to pick my foot up and put the other down without feeling heavy. And that easy pace is something that I want to sustain as I keep training for this half marathon.

I have been struggling with getting in my strength training and cross-training. I have added yoga to my program as a strength training and cross training activity because I feel like depending on the routine I get both benefits. In March though I am going to try to shift yoga to just a strength training activity.  I am planning on adding spinning as my cross training activity. I read an article in Runner’s World that said cycling gives you the equivalent of an easy run in terms of gaining efficiency in the body during running.

During this period, I have discovered that music makes a big difference in how I feel when I am running. I am absolutely loving Britney Spears’ “Work” like I was last month. That is my don’t quit/dig deep/get into euphoria jam. I definitely need to start making a playlist for the half-marathon.

As for food, I have been having a lot of beets. Beets are supposed to be energizing. Plus I just feel like the extra iron and calcium that I am getting is worth it. I love having my beets in smoothies. I need to clean up my diet a bit, though. I eat a lot of veggies naturally but I feel like I need to be more conscious of eating for function. I am resisting doing that nothing makes me more depressed that having to control my food. I work out so that I can have some freedom with my food. I will probably get more in tune with the necessary diet the closer I get to the race day. For now, I am practicing my regular moderation.

I am actually excited about all the changes going on with my body as I get more runs in. No, I am not losing a crazy amount of weight but my body is changing. I feel my strength in little and big ways. During yoga today, plank was not as hard as it used to be. I walked a steep hill the other day with a heavy bag and I barely felt it. It is moments like these that make me realize that my body is registering all my hard work. Hopefully, the commitment to training would see me to the finish line.

What’s in the Gym Bag?

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Are small towels motivation to get thinner?

Towels.jpg

I did not grow up in gym culture. I grew up in Lagos where exercise was really about walking from one place to another. Of course, there was inter-house sports day in school but it was sports was a special occassion. Physical Education classes were for learning rules of different games not actually playing games. By the time I left Lagos though, gym culture was slowly infiltrating the mainstream. I remember do crunches on the brown carpet in my mother’s house because I heard that was how people got flat tummy.

When I arrived in the US at 16 and started community college, my step-mother randomly signed me up for a step aerobic class. It was not in my original schedule but she slipped it in there. This was the first time that I was part of a formal “gym” class. That was 13 years ago.

In that time, I have become an active member of gym culture. One of the things that I have had to learn was how to pack a gym bag. Trust me when I say that a well packed gym bag is an essential part of my work-out. When I first started going to the gym, I was very body conscious. I was mystified as to why the towels just seemed so small. Are small towels motivation to get thinner?  At first I used to pack my own extra large towel with me to the gym. Now I don’t even bother putting a towel in my bag. No, I have not gotten thinner. I have simply gotten more body confident.

I have gotten really good at packing my gym bag to include the things that are essential to me. Here are a few things that I am currently packing in my gym bag

  1. Body Wash: This is a new product that I have gotten addicted to. I have finicky skin that gets itchy quickly so I have to be careful with my body wash. I have used so many great ones in the past. My current favorite body wash is the Arnica Sports Shower Gel by Weleda. This is a new product that I have gotten addicted to so quickly.
  2. Body Oil: I like oil. Some people find oil too greasy or too shiny to use on their skin. I am the opposite. I find oil to be the best thing for my skin. There are many great lotions on the market and I use them occasionally.  When I am treating my skin right though I use coconut oil or an oil blend that I have mixed at home myself. I am currently in love with the Nature’s Way Liquid Coconut Oil. I use that on my face and body at night at home. At the gym I use it on my body only.
  3. Face Wash: When I first moved back to the US in 2013, I did not really have a face care routine. I have become a face care addict in that time and I have tried many great brands. My favorite brand to use on my face hands down is Acure. I love their stuff so much. I use the Acure Facial Cleansing Creme because it is so gentle yet so effective. I can tell the difference in the quality of my skin.
  4. Face Oil: Again, I use Acure brand face oil. I am a big fan of their Argan oil. My favorite from their line though, for winter, is the Seriously Firming Facial Serum. This serum is really just an intense blend of Argan Oil, Borage Oil and Cranberry Oil. I wear it under my make-up as well.
  5.  Shower Cap: If you have black natural hair like I do or just a really delicate hair style then you understand this one. I don’t have a fancy shower cap. My sister bought one of those packs with hundreds of flimsy caps last year and I have just been using those.
  6. My Make-Up Bag: I don’t wear make-up everyday. Sometimes I wish I did but I don’t. However, I carry my make-up bag with me everyday in my gym bag because there are some days when I have time and I just really want to doll up my face. I will do another post on my make-up bag sometimes soon.
  7. Anti-perspirant/Deodorant: I use to wear a deodorant for a while simply because it is supposed to be better for the body. However, I found myself really conscious about my body odor. While I recognize the risk in wearing an anti-perspirant,I switched because it made me less self-conscious. I usually wear a gel from Secret.

Of course there are other things that I put in my gym bags depending on the day of the week. However, these are the things that are consistently in my bag. For things that I use out of the gym as well, I tend to buy two. I keep one in my gym bag permanently and I use one at home. It is just easier for me that way because I don’t have to worry about forgetting anything.

What do you have in your gym bag?

 

 

Day Zero

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athleteAs I type this I am sitting in my bed while I mentally calculate when to leave my house so that I can get to the gym, workout, get lunch and still get to my dentist appointment on time. This is now my life.

I signed up for a half-marathon. It was a spontaneous decision. Alright, it was not spontaneous like that. It was more like I saw an ad for the AirBnB Brooklyn Half 2016 and I though to myself I should run that. I have become a bit more adventurous as I try go out of my twenties strong. I saw this ad back at the beginning of January. Registration wasn’t for a few weeks so I told myself if I could start training consistently for it, I would sign up.

I have been spending a consistent amount of time in the gym lately. Loads of running and cycling. Recently I have added yoga and strength training to the mix. Running is hard. Some people get on that treadmill and they look like they were born to run. I have had to learn to run.

I have been running for a few years now, off and on. When I was 21, I trained for the San Diego Marathon. I loved every minute of it. The early morning runs. The abdominal work. The discovering weird food like GU. The pasta and broccoli in Marinara sauce with tuna before long runs. The sweaty body. I hated the injury that stopped me from running. I remember that foot injury everyday.

I ran again consistently in Manchester. Then I stopped running until I got to Boston. In between, I did a lot of walking around. I love walking so much. In New York, I used to challenge myself by walking for blocks and blocks. In Ibadan, the teachers taught I was crazy because I would walk from Eleyele to Dugbe often. There is nothing like movement to make me happy.

The funny part about my love of moving is that I have never really considered myself an athlete even though I put in a good amount of time moving. Maybe it is because of my body time. Sometimes when I have a conversation with people about running I feel like I haven’t earned the right to talk simply because my body isn’t skinny. I have put in the miles. But I don’t have the muscles therefore I feel like I can’t be a runner.

Now that I am running consistently again, I am not so worried about titles. Although, I do think I am a runner. I know I am an athlete. I know that because I put in the work everyday. I show up. I push through the discomfort. And I am enjoying this process.

I am enjoying it so much I strategically planned my day to sign up for the Brooklyn Half.  The tickets sold out in 52 minutes and I am one of the lucky ones.