Tag Archives: tired

Lost Ability

25 Nov

I have lost the ability to sleep, which I gotta say, really sucks. 😛 Normally I have trouble getting to sleep but I eventually manage it and once asleep I sleep like the dead. Earthquake? No waking up happening over here. Really bad storm? Nope. Loud noises outside my window? Nah. My ability to sleep through pretty much anything has always been something I have enjoyed, it meant that even if I didn’t get a long sleep time I got good quality sleep which, for my body anyways, seems to be the more important aspect about sleeping.

I know a lot of people are all “you gotta get 8 hours, blah blah blah” and I do understand about sleep being the time our bodies restore themselves and I also get how certain chemicals are released that help with losing or maintaining or gaining weight and how if we don’t get the right amount of sleep it can sabotage all that nice work we do during the day to keep ourselves looking how we want (-or for some of us, the work we do to try to get ourselves looking how we want *shuffles feet*) but I also think that every person is different and there can be no set rules about anything when it comes to our bodies and what is best. I can function wonderfully for a week at a time with only 3 hours sleep each night, I don’t nap, I don’t look tired (thank goodness!) and I’m not performing at diminished capacity or refraining from doing all my normal stuff due to tiredness…I do however eat more carbs lol

But this, this not being able to get to sleep and when I do manage to nod off not being able to stay asleep, this is just not pleasant. I’m cold throughout the day (and while yes, I am always a bit chilled this is a deep in the bones cold that my sweaters and endless cups of tea are doing nothing to touch), I am grumpier then normal, my eating is off (as in, I’m not really eating) and I feeeeeeel tired, ugh. Nobody likes to feel tired, that draggy don’t want to do anything but zone out and nap feeling, boo!

I haven’t figured out how to combat this little problem. I am refusing to let myself nap (something I seem able to do, so at least I know I can fall asleep…eventually, and at inconvenient times lol) but if I nap then I really can’t sleep that night which screws me up for work the next day, sigh.

Today after work I did some errands, then came to the apartment, watched a dvd, talked on the phone with peeps, scrubbed my bathroom from top to bottom, basically did whatever I could to keep my mind engaged enough that I wouldn’t nap cause oh man did I want to! I’m hoping that by not only refusing my body the nap it wants but also doing physical stuff around the apartment I wear myself out enough that tonight I get that elusive snooze fest *crosses fingers*

You’d think that if my mind/body won’t let me sleep I’d at least be more productive during those late night hours and be, I don’t know, solving world hunger, or writing the next great novel, doing something constructive and impressive with all this available time. Wouldn’t it be nice if this insomnia-fest was the universe’s way of giving me more time to get stuff done? Sadly though, just because I am not asleep at 3am doesn’t mean I am not tired so I am in bed, laying there with my hot water bottle and my comfy pillows, wishing for sleep, and hoping I at least doze off a bit, but not really succeeding. I figure I must be dozing off at least a bit here and there otherwise I’d be in crazy land by now from lack of REM time but I know it’s not so much unconscious time as to count as a real nights sleep. *rolls eyes*

Tomorrow I am taking down my dream catcher, it’s new and I wonder if there are too many bad karma vibes attached to it for it to be working…don’t laugh, or, fine, laugh, but know that if you were here in front of me I’d smack you for disrespecting the dream catcher 😛 I have had a dream catcher for so many years it’s crazy. I get bad dreams and I swear by my dream catcher. I don’t care if it’s a mental thing, you know, a I-think-it’s-working-therefore-it-is-working or if it really works, all I know is that it comforts me to have it hanging there, guarding me while I sleep…or not sleep as the recent case may be…but like I said, this one is new so maybe that has something to do with my new bout of insomnia…can’t hurt to take it down and try…course, I’m taking it down when I don’t work the next day so that if my removing it makes things worse it won’t set me up for a crap ass day at work…hope for the best but prepare for the worst right? 😉

 

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Harder Then Usual

22 Mar

Do you ever have a day where your energy is lower than normal and you just have no motivation to do anything, let alone exercise? That was me today, blerg.

I’m not sure what happened…I woke up, had no energy, but hey, its morning who has energy in the morning? Only crazy people that’s who! lol I figured I’d be fine once I ate but no-go with that. I ate, waited a half hour, went to the gym and I swear I thought I was gonna fall off the treadmill when running my sprints – now that would have been embarrassing! 😛

Normally my cardio days are my “better days” at the gym, not because I’m necessarily better at cardio then weights it’s more that at least on cardio days I know for sure what I’m doing and am not worrying about my form or forgetting something. Plus, I’m not having to deal with the funny looks from the guys in the free weight area who always start off smirking at me like it’s a joke I’m lifting weights and then turn to contemplation as they realize I’m using 20lbs weights for some of my moves and seem to actually know what I’m doing. *rolls eyes*

But today, even as I started on the treadmill I knew it was gonna be hard, my yawning was a good indication of that lol and the fact that getting my legs to move at even a light warm-up jog pace was seriously hard work.

Here’s what I do when running on cardio days:

I jog for 3 minutes to warm up at 4 mph, then I sprint for 30 seconds at a pace of  9 mph, then I go back to jogging at 4 mph for 1.5 minutes, then I sprint at 9 mph for another 30 seconds…it keeps repeating like that but eventually my sprints get up to a speed of 9.5 mph. After I have sprinted 8 times I cool down. In total I’m on the treadmill for 20 minutes – not too shabby, right? Well, every cardio day I have to do better then the cardio day prior, on Monday I did 4 sprints at 9 mph and 4 sprints at 9.5 mph so today I should have done 4 at 9 mph, 3 at 9.5 mph and 1 at 10 mph but it soooo didn’t happen. 😛 Since I was really having to push to stay on the treadmill at 9.5 mph I was certain if I upped the speed on the last sprint I’d be screwed…and embarrassed when I fell…and possibly injured. 😉

I was mad at myself when I got off the treadmill, mad I wasn’t able to somehow magically push myself to do that final sprint at a speed of 10 mph, mad I almost didn’t make it through the last sprint at 9.5 mph, mad that instead of enjoying the run like I usually do my head was filled with negative thoughts about how tired I was, how I just couldn’t do this today, how I felt like I was gonna throw up, how I should just skip the run cause hey, nobody will know, *rolls eyes* Sure, if nobody asked me how my run went nobody would know if I skipped it, except…I would know, and talk about screwing myself up for next cardio day…if I can’t make it through my run today then on Friday I’d have that in my head, the mentality that I can’t do it anymore, it’s too much for me, I’m too slow or too weak or too lazy or too fat or too something and then not only would I be working to keep pace with the treadmill I’d be fighting an even harder battle against my own brain and it’s negative thoughts – I’m not sure that’s a battle I know I can win.

NC says a big part of pushing yourself at the gym is getting past all the bullshit in your head, pushing past what your brain says is your limit, he also says the days you don’t want to go are the days you have to go. Anybody can work out on a day they feel great, have loads of energy and are psyched for it. But to go and push yourself in the gym on a day where the planets aren’t all perfectly aligned and you’re not in the perfect place/mood to exercise, those are the days that show you what you can make yourself do, that’s when you see your strength and get past your mental blocks.

I don’t know that I actually got past a mental block today, I barely made it through that last sprint, and since I didn’t up the speed I feel like a bit of a failure, at the same time, I know if I had upped the speed I wouldn’t have made it through the entire 30 second sprint, so, isn’t it better to do the sprint at 9.5 and do the entire 30 seconds instead of go at a speed of 10 but only make it to say 15 seconds? Although! Maybe that’s my mental block? Maybe if I had pushed it to 10 I would have found some deep well of energy or perseverance or pig-headedness that would have helped me force my way through the 30 seconds, crap, now I really wish I’d tried the 10 mph…

I’m not sure why I bottomed out today energy wise, I have been eating according to my food plan this week, no cheating! Yah! Which means I’m getting lots of protein (119.9g today), a decent amount of fat (47.9g today), low-ish carbs (113.4 g today, ok fine, higher then they should be by 13.4 grams, so shoot me! 😛 ), I’m staying hydrated, I’m following all the rules so, what gives? If following the rules means I’m gonna lose all my energy mid week and suck at cardio then I’m screwed cause as we all know from my performance at the gym today, I’m not so great at pushing through to new achievements when I have no energy, is anybody? Maybe I’m just extraordinarily lazy, well ok, yeah I am, but I mean even more lazy then even I realized – which would be scary lol 😀

I just don’t know, I’m kinda at loose ends about what happened, about why I tanked out energy wise, about why I didn’t force myself to try the 10 mph. Sure, it’s easy to blame the not running at 10 mph on the whole no energy thing, but is that a cop out? Could I have done it if I’d tried and not let myself convince myself I wouldn’t be able to do it? I know when I was on the treadmill running, coming up to that last sprint I knew without a doubt I couldn’t run it at 10 mph, that I didn’t have enough left in me to make it…but now that it is hours later I’m filled with self doubt…I hate self doubt, it’s such a downer. 😛

Guess I’ll just have to push even harder on Friday (my next cardio day) and see if I can make it to 10 mph that day, no! Not see if I can! I Can! I will make it! Look out 10 mph, you’re miiiiine! (maybe if I start psyching myself up for it now it’ll be easier to overcome the mental block on Friday? lol 😉 )

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“That Day”

17 Aug

Do you ever have “that day” – you know, the day where you don’t feel sick but you don’t feel quite right? That day where your energy is totally bottomed out right from when you woke up? That day when you don’t even have the energy to care about not having energy and while yes you can still do stuff it takes all your mental pushing to actually do even the tiniest thing? phew, that was a long sentence, take a breath now. teehee

That was my day yesterday. It was weird. I woke up tired, lol, that’s never fun! I thought maybe I just had a bad sleep, no biggy, get up and get going and the energy will come back, shrug, it’s happened before. But no, I got up, ate, chilled for a bit, forced myself to go for my hike – and even though I went I will confess I didn’t put as much effort in to it as normal so I felt like a slacker even while hiking! lol – then I spent the rest of the day at home trying to convince myself to do mildy important things, like eat. *rolls eyes*

Today was a bit better…I didn’t wake up tired but I did wake up later then normal, and I had absolutely no desire to do anything so I skipped my hike and only went to Boxerfit class. This means I earned 7 exercise points today instead of 10, to think this makes me feel lazy when once upon a time 7 exercise points in one day would totally impress me. 😛 lol

I’m not sure what is going on, like I wrote at the beginning of this post I don’t feel sick, I just feel as if something is not quite right…and I can’t peg what that is. shrug. Whatever it is that has gotten unbalanced I am taking steps to correct it. 🙂

I was able to go grocery shopping today, I have been strapped for cash and not able to buy anything so I’ve been living off what I have already, that sounds worse then it is, lol, it’s no big deal. I have frozen veggies and I had some frozen lean ground turkey (that I turned into burger patties that were accidentally waaaay salty, sigh, slight miscalculation there lol) and I have baked beans an such so I was able to eat ok. What I was missing was fresh fruit/veggies, well really, any kind of fresh produce, yogurt…you know, perishables. But! today I got to go grocery shopping, yah! I can’t remember the last time grocery shopping brought such a sense of relief lol 😛

I got to buy yogurt, salad, fruit, veggies – ah, it was glorious! Also, I had a wicked 50% off coupon for frozen chicken breasts (that mom emailed me, thanks Mom!) but the store was sold out so they extended my coupon for 3 whole months! How sweet is that?! I mean yeah, I would have liked to be able to buy the chicken today but since I couldn’t it’s great that the coupon will not expire for so long, that way, if I can’t afford to buy it next week I don’t lose the chance to use the coupon. Yah! 🙂 Go Safeway Go! lol

Ok, fine, I am lame, go ahead and laugh, me getting so psyched about grocery shopping and the length of time my coupon will last, but hey, getting psyched about the simple things makes life a lot more enjoyable. 😛

I think the addition of fresh produce will help my energy levels go back up, I mean without all my normal fruit servings I am low in natural sugar and all kinds of other good things – that can’t be good! I’ve also been working on increasing my protein intake since I got back from AB, I managed it really well last week but not quite as well this week so I’ll focus on that and the eating of fresh produce again. And of course I am keeping myself nice an hydrated. 🙂

 

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Conversations With…Myself?

21 Oct

Do you ever talk to yourself? I’m sure you do…I think we probably all do at some point. I have conversations with myself all the time – don’t worry, I am not that crazy person who talks out loud on the bus, lol, the convos are all in my head. Oh, and it’s not like I am running some commentary about everything I see and experience, the convos all have a point and are to help me decide on a course of action or figure out how to do something…you know, they have a purpose. lol. 😛

So, here is how my convo went today when I was on the way home from work:

Me: I can’t wait to get home and sit on the couch, I am so frickin tired.

Me: You have to exercise first, don’t forget!

Me: I don’t wanna! *stomps foot*pouts*

Me: Don’t you want to get skinny? You’re never going to get an agent if you don’t lose weight. *glares*

Me: Well…yeah, I wanna lose weight but…I am tired, and I think it’s raining, I can’t go hiking in the rain…

Me: Who cares if it rains, go out anyways!

Me: Hmmm, no, my hair will go frizzy and it’s cold and it’s already getting dark…and look at those clouds, it’s gonna pour.

Me: And who is going to see you and your frizzy hair? Nobody!

Me: Ok, listen, my hair isn’t the point. I have errands to do and I am hungry and I’ve been cold and tired all day and I have laundry and whenever I go hiking I don’t get to finish my laundry until way late and I want to go to bed early.

Me: Do your laundry another time, eesh.

Me: Dude, you’re in my head, you know I have specific laundry days and this is one of them!

Me:  If you don’t lose weight this week you know you’re gonna be pissed at yourself…so don’t blame me!

Me: Whatever. I am ignoring you now and going home to eat carbs. 😛

Aaaaahhh, a glimpse in to my head, enjoy yourself? lol. So, I continued to ignore that voice in my head and made myself a nice big plate of whole wheat pasta with some mixed vegg thrown in and topped with an alfredo sun dried tomato sauce, it was gooooood! Totally worth the points. 😀

Today was just a “day” ya know? I woke up hungry and stayed hungry all day, ugh, I hate that! On top of the hunger I was tired and cold and I kept walking in to walls, what’s with that?!?! So I decided that yes, exercise is good, but getting a proper nights sleep (something I haven’t managed to do all frickin week!) is better for me at this point, so no hike tonight. Instead it’s been an evening of pasta, laundry and phone calls…oh, and of course writing this blog. 😛

Today I ate:

29 grams Special K Vanilla Almond = 2 points

1/2 cup 1% milk = 1 point

1 small banana = 1 point

1 Activia = 2 points

1 Amy’s Indian Mattar Paneer = 6 points

1 piece toast = 1 point

2 triangles light laughing cow = 1 point

mixed raw veggies = 0 points

85 grams whole wheat spaghetti = 5 points

1/4 cup Classico alfredo and sundried tomato sauce = 2 points

mixed cooked veggies = 0 points

1 shortbread cookie = 1 point

1 Thinsations Fudge Dipped Bar = 1 point

Total points eaten 23.

Now I know I usually try to not eat my flex points but considering how hungry I have felt all day I am impressed I didn’t go farther over my daily 22 points. Oy! All I wanted to do today was eat and/or sleep. lol. If I could have slept while eating I would have! I am feeling so hungry because I am so tired, I know this, when thinking rationally I am aware of this and that is how I managed to not over eat while at work  but still…once I got home all I could think was “carbs!” and “bed!” I gotta get more sleep cause I don’t wanna go through another “hungry day” just cause I am tired, that’s just not cool man, not cool.

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