So as I mentioned at the beginning of the week I'm running Race for Life at the end of the month. I decided that this will be my cue to get fit! So on Wednesday after finishing work at lunchtime I put on my exercise kit (it still fits after a 2 year break - good sign!) and stepped outside my front door to have a light jog and see how I got on.
Well I was pretty pleased with what I did actually considering I have done no real exercise in about a year (do a few Zumba classes count?) and I've not exactly been a healthy eater. I just did a 20 minute circuit locally to me that I calculated afterwards was about 1.6 miles. I jogged the whole way, and surprisingly I didn't have my usual mental battle going on of "I can't do this" the entire time. In fact my mind was pretty clear and I enjoyed the whole thing.
Only things I did wrong were to not take water, I know it was only a short jog but I did feel like I needed a slurp and I took the wrong key and ended up being locked out!! Durrr. Luckily my neighbour didn't mind having my sweaty personage on her property for a bit!
So there we have it. I've started training and it feels good. I plan to jog the same route again tomorrow and then next week I have an even better route in mind from my office to Victoria station which will take me past Buckingham Palace! Looking forward to that one! Will keep you posted.
If you would like to sponsor me you can do so here: https://www.raceforlifesponsorme.org/sharondonnelly0/
I've always had a love/ hate relationship with exercise. As a child I swam a lot, did the odd bit of netball for school but I didn't work my way through the BAGA badges or go to ballet. My exercise was mainly tearing up and down my road on my bike and running around with the other kids in the street. As I got into my teens I didn't really do anything exercise wise (apart from running about after boys!), it was only when I got to university that I started being more body conscious and that was as a result of going out with a Sports Science student who made me feel fat most of the time and wouldn't hold back from commenting on how I could do this and that to improve myself. I went to the gym on and off for years as a result of that relationship.
Eventually I realised that I was throwing my money away, I would join, go a lot for a month or two and then never go again. Instead of going to the gym I started to enter into fitness challenges, like 5k and 10k runs and a swimathon or two. And that kind of thing really is the way to float my fitness boat. I can safely say that my best motivation to get fit in my life was my wedding. I went to a personal trainer and did boxing and I thoroughly enjoyed every minute of it. The confidence it gave me and the way I felt about my appearance was brilliant. I didn't wimp out of my sessions with rubbish excuses and I found I could wear the clothes I wanted to.
Since then I've had two kids and in between having them I used the excuse that I was going to have another child at some point so there would be no point me getting into shape until I'd had baby number 2. Well now I find myself in that position. Child number 2 is on the scene and 6 months later I'm now urging myself to get out and do some exercise! And guess what in the last 3 weeks I have! I have Zumbaa-d!!! Three times!! And I've done 30 lengths at the local pool. I also bought some new running trainers so I have to get out in them and I've also signed up to this years Marie Curie Swimathon.
I intend to blog about my fitness and exercise achievements as and when, it won't necessarily be a weekly thing but I do think that making some commitment to write about it will make me do at least 1 thing a week.
What do I want to gain from exercising? To be honest, it's not really weight loss that I'm after. I'm 5 foot 11 inches and 11 stone 4lb if you really want to know, so well within the normal weight boundaries for my height. Obviously if I'm going to exercise and be healthy I probably will drop a few pounds, but what I really want is to tone up and *feel* fit. I want to get to the point that exercise makes me feel energised, pretty hard when my nights are interrupted by the baby and my daytime's are super busy running around after 2 kids. I want to fit into some jeans that have been in the back of my cupboard for a couple of years now. Favourite ones that I had to wave the white flag to. So there you go. I commit to get fit.
I'd love to know if you're also on a fitness drive and what you're up to, let's spur each other on - tweet me, facebook me. We can all do with encouragement sometimes when it's winter and the TV and comfort food are calling......let's do it together!
