Fitness – Muddling Momma

Category: Fitness

07
Jul
2016

Daily Movement, Minimal Sweating

categories: Fitness, Product Reviews, Working Mom

This might come as a surprise to you, but I am super busy these days. Working full time, chasing a three year old, keeping the house in order and making time for self care even WITH a supportive, helpful husband is exhausting. And when my life gets crazy (so 90% of the time) exercise takes a backseat.

Also? I hate to sweat. So there’s that too.

But guess what! I figured out how to take time out of my work day to just move. Nothing too crazy like PX90 or Crossfit, but something to get me off my swivel chair and get the blood flowing without the sweat flowing. If you can relate, here are some ideas that have worked for me.

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{Walk it out} Taking a walk during your lunch break is probably the easiest and most common option to get moving during the day. Thankfully I work in a nice, safe office park where a lot of people are walking around the parking lots at lunch time. A quick 20 minute walk with a podcast not only gets the endorphins pumping but the fresh air and sunlight helps me come back to my desk focused. On hot days I break it up by walking around the perimeter of our building every time I go to the bathroom (which is often).

walk it out

{Online Gym 4 Me} I am a card carrying donor to a popular gym in my area. I went every so often, but I just can’t get comfortable there. I prefer to sweat in private. Which is why Online Gym 4 Me is PERFECT! It is both on demand classes and live classes. Since it is a London based company so the live class times aren’t always conducive to my schedule, I love the on demand options. At work I like the easier, shorter classes like Gentle Flow Yoga and Morning Salutations (the shorter classes are 15 minutes – perfect!). I just keep a yoga mat under my desk, shut the door, take off my shoes and let the instructor tell me what to do.

online gym 4 me

{Booty Loops} A common tip I hear is to stand up and move while you are on the phone. WELL – I will do you one better. Booty Loops. I laughed out loud when the company sent me these simple fitness straps to try, but they are no joke. On conference calls, webinars and virtual training I just slide on a Booty Loop and do a few strengthening exercises.

booty loop

{Stretching} I mentioned how I keep a yoga mat under my desk, but I also keep a tennis ball in my drawer. Sometimes, when I feel my shoulders touching my ear lobes or my nose touch the desk because I am so hunched over – I stretch it out. I google some sort of variation of ‘office yoga’ and take a few minutes to relax. I use the tennis ball for trigger point massage and it is usually just the pick me up I need.

Stretch it out

There you have it! I am not going to drop dresses sizes in a few months by doing just this, but it makes a world of difference in my mood and productivity.

You guessed it, parts of this post are sponsored. But my use and review are real. Trust me, they can’t afford to buy a positive review from me.

26
Oct
2015

My First ‘Real’ 5K

categories: Fitness

So I’ve completed two virtual 5Ks and really enjoyed them. I felt relaxed, was in the moment and bursting with pride when I finished. I know some people don’t see virtual 5Ks as ‘real 5ks’, or just paying for a medal – but I took them seriously. I didn’t even HOLD the medals until I was done and my time was submitted.

I thought it was time to run my first in person 5K and thankfully our local volunteer fire station was holding their annual 5/10K. I will be honest – I didn’t do much by way of training. I did a few runs in the weeks leading up, but I knew I was doing it for fun – not to win or PR.

So this past weekend when S. dropped me off at the starting line early – I wanted to barf. Everyone looked so … runner. Running groups showed up, everyone had a friend (or so it seemed) and I was instantly transported back to middle school. No one was mean, but they had their people and routine and I did not. It was like they had this language I didn’t speak at all. Granted, I didn’t really WANT to run with anyone else – I am very slow, and typically mix in walking when necessary. I figured others would do the same.

I got towards the back of pack and we were off! Well. Everyone else was off. I was doing a pretty fast walk, but double strollers were passing me. A three legged dog passed me. I am not making that up. A three legged dog. The 5K course was a complete circle and the 10K weaved in and out of the 5K course on side streets. So even when I was dead last, there was always a few of the 10Kers behind me. Most of the time.

I pretty much spent the first hour of the run fighting my inner mean girl. She was out in full force and loud. I couldn’t even hear my music. It was to the point where I even considered calling S. to just come pick me up on the corner. I really wanted to stop and cry – I was overwhelmed and embarrassed. What made me think I could do this? I thought a group would motivate me to push myself, but it had the opposite effect on me.

Basically by mile two I was chanting ‘just f*cking finish‘ in my head. I might have said it out loud. By mile 3, I was feeling a little better emotionally, but I realized I should have Ape taped my ankle, but I was just going to ‘f*cking finish’.

The finish line was ahead and I saw Mike and S. and my MIL there waiting for me. And I kept going. M. had to see his momma finish what she started right? Even when she wasn’t in her comfort zone, even when her body hurt, even when she was mad at herself and exhausted from fighting her inner mean girl. He had to see his momma finish. And he did.

After 1 hour and 7 minutes his momma just f*cking finished.

23
Jun
2015

First 5K

categories: Fitness, Health

Running? There is nowhere I need to be that quickly.

If I am running, you better run too because something is chasing me.

I am too overweight to run.

I’ll run, run to Dunkin Donuts real quick in my car.

What do you THINK about when you run? It seems so boring.

“Run fast for your mother, run fast for your father
Run for your children, for your sisters and brothers
Leave all your love and your longing behind
You can’t carry it with you if you want to survive … “

You never know when you might want to try something that at one time seemed so ridiculous. Thanks for hosting my first virtual 5K Fit, Fab and Lean!

11
Feb
2015

Run Run Run

categories: Fitness

I’ve spent a bit of time wondering if I should mention my new ‘thing’ because I feel like I have always started a new ‘thing’, gave it 110%, then forgotten about it a month later. Sewing reusable gift bags, Jazzercise class and tap dancing come to mind. As Awolnation say, ‘blame it on my ADD baby.’ But there are tidbits I want to share with you all, so I will share my current ‘thing’ – Couch to 5K training.

Last week I woke up and, literally twice, the first thing I thought about running. If you know me in real life, you know how I am not the running type. Or the fast moving type. Or the sweaty type. When someone would mention running I would respond by saying there is nowhere I need to be that quickly. But last week – something shifted. And it wasn’t in an ‘I need to lose weight’, or ‘I want to BE a runner’. It was just a ‘go run’.

I did some research and downloaded the Get Running app and on Thursday did my first ‘run’. It was hard. Real hard. Out of the 8 run sessions, I did 6. Saturday I had some fancy running clothes on and magically did all 8 sessions. It wasn’t fast and certainly wasn’t pretty. I had a repeat last night with the same results. It was still hard, but I didn’t talk myself out of doing it or try shortcuts. I just … did it.

I am not saying much about it on social media because I don’t necessarily need to motivating comments. Which sounds horrible. I do need them, I want them, but I don’t want to make this a big deal or be held accountable.

I don’t know if I am going to do the whole program, or even run a 5K. All I know is tomorrow morning I am going to get up and do the next session. Then we will see about the following session. It’s cool to see what a big scary goal can be reduced to when it is made into a one day at a time goal. It makes it so much less scary. I haven’t been very good at that in the past.

One of the most fun parts of my half hour sessions is my playlist. Music is such a part of my everyday life, so having a solid playlist is critical to running. Here’s what I am listening to right now – it’s equal parts upbeat AND promoting girl power. What’s on your workout playlist?