Stepping Up, with Heavy Feet

I left the house without much of a plan other than to do some cardio and core at the gym. I'm still nervous leaving the pups home alone. One has starting nibbling the holiday lights we have hanging in the window that serves as a type of nightlight for the livingroom. Those got tossed in the trash immediately. Mostly the dogs are good and just sleep on the sofa.

I did bring brand new expensive (for me) sneakers to test out: Brooks Adrenaline 13 size 7 extra wide. Brooks seems to cut their sneakers narrower than New Balance. I've got some decently comfortable NB 6.5 2E sneakers, but I need a second pair to alternate with. I've already tried on and returned 4 different pairs of sneakers. What surprises me about these sneakers is how heavy they are. Seriously. Really heavy. Like work boots. Glad I'm not actually running in these!

They are also oddly shaped with a protruding sole under the heel. There is adequate padding under the foot, but I'm not sure why the tongue needs so much, or any at all. It makes for a tight fit to the top of the foot. But the heel is loose, and that's probably because I have small boney feet with tiny heels. Manufacturers infer that buyers of wide shoes have fat feet. A lot of us, especially Asians and Native Americans, have wide feet that taper into narrow little heels. I could try padding it with heel strips but I've never found that to work well.

On the elliptical, the shoes are comfortable enough so that my pinky toe doesn't go numb and my hammertoes don't spasm. I have to be mindful not to trip over my own feet though because they ARE a half size too long. I knock out my pull-ups and core. After the StepMill, I think about trying a wider grip on the HGPU but the Stretch Cage is occupied. I hate waiting around so I just go straight to the Mat Stretch.

I've dropped all my holiday and post-biopsy weight in a week, but not in a healthy way. Still, it's nice to not have such uncomfortably tight clothes! It's hard to eat properly when your spouse has a completely different eating philosophy and practice -- the sharing of food is communal and social. Navigating this terrain is fraught with difficulties. I can't digest certain foods, especially fats, and he's on a keto-type diet that has him eating a lot of grease, protein, and salads drenched in dressing but shunning breads and grains. I like an egg on an English muffin or curried lentils over rice. Pasta and pizza are not off the table! Yeah, we're still figuring this out.

Minimal Thursday New Sneakers

30 min elliptical + 5cd
Program 3
Miles 2.91
Calories 327
HR 163-196 (86)

Cage Stretch
HGPU 23

Elbow Plank 60s
Sideway Scissors 60
Crunches 60/60
Bicycles 60
Side Planks 2 x 60s
Bird Dogs 2 x 60s

20 Step Mill
Level 4
Calories 127
Total steps 834
Floors 52
HR 140

Mat Stretch

Running In Place

Temps have cooled off and it feels a lot more like a lovely Autumn day. I'm really tired though, having gone to a "parent's night" meeting at the HS for financial aid regarding college. It's never too early to get pertinent information, especially when my son has been given the opportunity to earn college credits in HS at a substantially cheaper rate per credit.

I'd really just like to nap in the car but I don't. I'm tempted to do the same in the dry sauna at the gym, but that's too risky. Likely I'd in there for an awfully long time, and that's not safe for someone prone to heat sickness. The recumbent bike looks tempting. The cross-trainers have chatty people on them. Only the ellipticals are vacant. Sold. I do an easy pace on Program 1 for 30 plus minutes, skip the Cage Stretch and pull-ups, get my core exercises done, and then spend another 20 minutes on the Step Mill. Done! Now I'm awake so I can run errands like dragging old clothes off to Good Will. While I'm at that shopping plaza, I stop by the Starbucks to get a cup of coffee, because I'll need to be alert for Boy Scouts tonight.

I always ask for whatever dark roast they have and make the mistake of accepting their newest brew, Siren's Blend. It has citrus and floral notes with a hint of chocolate. Or so they claim. What it tastes like is soured coffee. It's probably the worst coffee I've ever had, with the exception of Golden Corral's insipid brown dishwater that not even sugar and creamer could help. I used to love the Komodo or the Sumatra blends, but now we don't patronize the chain (and no, I can't bring myself to go to Dunkin' either). Instead, we brew our own beans from Coffee Bean Direct, where we can order 5 lbs of Tanzanian peaberry at a time. When we want to be indulgent, Maui Peaberry or Maui Mokka coffee beans from Hanalei Coffee and Tea in Lihue are the best. No, we're not Kona coffee folks, and actually can't understand why anyone would drink that.

Hopefully, I'm sufficiently caffeinated to make it through the evening and still get to sleep at a reasonable hour. My son might be in HS, but I feel like I'm doing a lot of work just to gather the right information to make sure he doesn't miss out on any appropriate opportunities. It's something I wish my parents had done for me. It's not something that my husband's parents did for him either. I guess we are always trying to make up for our perceived childhood shortcomings. Meanwhile, tomorrow might be a Pull Day workout...

Mild Cardio Tuesday

30 elliptical + 5 cd
Program 1
Miles 2.84
Calories 314
HR 145-194 (85)

Floor Stretch

Elbow Plank 60s
Crunches Legs Up 60
Bicycles 60
Crunches Knees Bent 60
Horizontal Scissors 60
Side Planks 2 x 60s
Bird Dogs 2 x 60s

20 Step Mill
Level 3
Calories 112
Total steps 716
Floors 44
HR 119 (113-123)

Quick Mat Stretch

Another Link Between Exercise And Happiness

I got an hour more sleep last night but I still don't feel rested, mostly because I am falling short of the proverbial 8-hours everyone needs. At least I didn't yawn during cardio today. I'm guessing most gym-goers adhere to the three-day-a-week routine that constitutes most gym class schedules. There's barely anyone here when I show up. Even regulars trickle in an hour later than I expect. Today is a "mild" cardio workout, with no pullups or weights. I don't want to get sick now that flu season has started: naturally, it coincides with the beginning of the school year.

I can't help myself: I get on the elliptical, select Program 2 and cross my fingers. My knees don't whinge and I breathe a sigh of relief. I'm not pedaling super fast so none of this counts as HIIT cardio, but I am going at a consistent speed and almost make 3 miles in 35 minutes. Clearly, this qualifies as endurance cardio. After a cage stretch without any pull-ups, I march off to the classroom to do core. I'm clenching my abdominals during the 60 seconds of plank stillness, but I space out while counting to myself during the rest of crunches and leg lifts. A lot of the regulars show up while I'm high up on the Step Mill. Because I change my footing every 60 seconds, I don't really have the mind to watch anyone. I'm mostly staring at the clock on the dashboard and mouthing the words to my tunes.

The stretch area by the weights is full already so back to the classroom. Normally, at this time on a Monday-Wednesday-Friday, there's a class, but not today. It feels really odd to be skipping out of the gym so early! My new plan to is to get to the gym 5 days a week, but to only do mild cardio on two of those days so I don't totally wear myself down. I tried only going 3 days a week, and while I did get stuff done on those 2 non-workout days, I never quite felt as good. I've resigned myself to doing a lot more cardio than weights not just because of my glaucoma, but also because I need to exercise to a certain point in order to reap the mental benefits: anxiety relief.

An online article about the effects of sugary diets on the brain mentions a tryptophan metabolite called kynurenine (KYN) which is associated with levels of depression when it doesn't break down to kynurenic acid (KYNA). Endurance exercises (over weight-lifting) appear to promote KYNA, which has been linked to the protective effects of exercise against stress. This makes me less mournful about giving up a lot of my former exercises. Gotta move forward!

Mild Cardio Tuesday

30 min elliptical + 5cd
Program 2
Miles 2.90
Calories 325
HR 153-198 (85, 97, 87, 91)

Cage Stretch

Elbow Plank 60s
Crunches 60/60
Leg horizontal scissors 60
Bicycles 60
Side Planks 2 x 60s
Bird Dogs 2 x 60s

20 Step Mill
Level 3
Calories 113
Total steps 710
Floors 44
HR 135

Mat Stretch