Struggle #13: Sticking to My Guns

In one of my very first blog posts, I listed a set of rules for myself in following this new diet. One of was that I was only going to consume alcohol once every two weeks. While I was in Cincinnati I was very good at this and probably only drank 2 or 3 times.  Part of that was because I was working everyday and that I didn't have someone to go out with whenever I wanted to.

Being back at school and with close friends all the time, it is so easy for me to go out to dinner or happy hour and have a drink or two. But in all honesty, what does that one drink do for me? It doesn't get me drunk by any means. All it does is make me feel a bit more included, but that is all in my head. My friends are great people and if I don't want to drink, they won't pressure me. There is no need for me to have that one drink.

I still keep a food journal everyday because I have found that it helps keep me honest about what I am eating.  I have noticed these past few weeks I have had one drink here and there more frequently.  I know that one drink is not going to kill me but I need to stick to my guns and stick to the rules that I set for myself.  Every once in awhile it is acceptable but my current frequency can't even come close to the rules I set for myself. So once again, I am setting a goal for myself to decrease my frequency of drinking, no matter how little the amount may be, to once every two weeks.

The lovely ladies!

With that being said, I did manage to have a great weekend with the CrossFit St. Louis crew. We ventured to Fast Eddies in Alton, IL and had a great day/afternoon/evening! It was a beautiful day out and I am pretty sure I laughed the entire time. Someone is always doing something funny, crazy, or stupid. We borrowed someone's parents' mini van to transport us out there and hired a "sober driver" to drive us the 45 minutes back to St. Louis. Did you know there really is a "sober driver" service. They drop someone off to drive your car back to where you are going! I think this is such a nifty idea and it's super convenient.

 On a side note, I used to hate hamburgers. And when I say hate, I really mean HATE. I think the texture was the biggest thing that I struggled with but I was just never really a fan. This past week though, I have eaten two hamburgers! Granted they have has a lot of garnish to add some flavor and other texture to them but I am really proud of myself. That may sound stupid but I need to expand the meat options that I can easily make to something besides just chicken. I am going to have to recruit someone to teach me how to grill hamburgers but it is something else that I will hopefully be able to make soon!  Expanding my horizons :)

One last thing: Rouge tape use #142: taping holes in your khaki shorts. Thanks Dan for the creativity and endless laughs about this situation. Happy Monday everyone!

Strength #2: Cheering Loud and Proud

Goodness! This past week has been jammed packed for me. I made it home on Friday and was greeted by my adorable puppy, Holly (see video on the right). I got the chance to hang out with my family for a little bit which is always nice!  Although my mom did drag me to a soccer game on Friday night in the freezing cold and rain. My high school is known for their soccer and they were playing a team ranked 4th in the nation on Friday night. It was a very good game to watch but I have to admit the kids in front of me made the game. There were two little boys probably about 4 and 6 and their mom also had a little boy wrapped up in her coat about 6 months old. My mom and I both agreed she was crazy but the boys were adorable.  They got excited about every thing that happened during the game and when they got hot chocolate one of them exclaimed, "It tastes more like hot than chocolate." I about died of laughter.

Saturday I got the opportunity to watch my teammates compete in the competition I was supposed to be at because it was only about 45 minutes from home. I cheered my heart out and my throat was killing me on Sunday! I forgot to use my cheerleading diaphragm voice because I was going crazy for them. Upsetting, all those years of cheerleading didn't pay off, haha. This was my first time watching an individual competition besides regionals, but I am not really sure that counts. Just watching it taught me a lot about competing as an individual and I think it has prepared me a little bit more for when I do my first CrossFit competition as an individual.

It is an interesting experience because you have no one else to rely on. It is you and that barbell, rig, rower, ect in front of you. You have to be gutsy and lay it all on the line, no one is there to hide your weaknesses. My teammates did an incredible job at the competition! They gave it everything they had and I was so proud of them! I attempted to take some picture but my phone wasn't agreeing with the lighting in there really. Although it was fun cheering, next time I am going to be along side them competing with them!

This week of training has been interesting to say the least... I am trying so hard to behave myself and to give my knee a break so it can recover. Everything is becoming less and less painful but it still isn't 100% and that's frustrating. I am not very good at being injured but I am proud of myself for not competing last weekend and for staying off my knee this week. I am hoping next week I can start to load it a little bit more and start performing the workouts the prescribed way again. Time will tell but fingers crossed I will be good to go again soon, otherwise the air dyne and I are going to become even better friends. YUCK!

For your entertainment, proof I was a cheerleader at one point. 

I have been lucky enough to go to two St. Louis Cardinals games this week! I am batting about .500 right now seeing as they won one and lost the other. I get very engrossed in these games and cheer like a crazy lady here sometimes as well... I figure I am entertainment for all of those around me. I am hoping they can pull off another post-season stint! Right now we are 2.5 games ahead of the Pirates and our magic number is 10 games. So close!  While visiting the grocery store this week, I made the observation about how much my cart has changed in the past 3 months. It is crazy to think it has only been that short of a time period and really thinking about it, my new diet really doesn't bother me that much. Changes for the better!

Struggle #12: Listening to My Body

I am not happy about writing this post. Not. One. Bit.

I can't compete at the individual competition that I was supposed to do this weekend. I was so freaking excited to compete and show myself how all my hard work is paying off. But, alas, it just wasn't in the cards for me this weekend.

I somehow hurt my knee this past weekend playing soccer with a bunch of CrossFit people. Don't ask me how I did it, because in all honesty I am not really sure what happened. Being the great physical therapy student that I am (haha), I quickly started attempting to rule out everything that it could or couldn't be. I was pretty confident that it wasn't anything structural, but on Monday I still couldn't really bend my knee. I finally decided it was probably just inflammation of patellar tendon, but man it has caused pain this week.

Regionals. The ultimate goal. 

It has gotten a lot better throughout the week, but still it isn't well enough to squat with any weight on it. I have been icing it frequently, taking ibuprofen, and resting it. Goodness this rest thing is going to kill me! I am not good at it and it kills me watching everyone go hard at the gym and I can only do things with my arms. I honestly have been very successful though and I am proud of myself for that. I have done everything in my power to get it better ASAP, but my body just doesn't have it in it this week. I am pretty upset about it but I am trying to think about my future and not causing permanent damage to my knee.

So instead of competing this weekend, I will be headed home! I haven't been there since before I went to Cincinnati, so I am excited to hang out with my family and see my puppy! Since home is only about 40 minutes from the competition, I am going to go watch the CrossFit St. Louis competitors and be the best cheerleader that I can be! Don't worry, I actually was a cheerleader in high school, so I will be pretty darn amazing and loud!

On a positive note, I grilled about 5 pounds of chicken earlier this week... Oops! I did not realize how much that was until I took it out of the package! Dam Costco and their jumbo sizes. But I managed to successfully start the charcoal grill. However, I am still terrified that when I start it, the fire will engulf my hand! There could potentially be lighter fluid on my hand and the flame could just cause me to explode. I over think things... But the chicken is delicious and will continue to be for the next 3 weeks, haha.

One of my favorite things to pair it with are sweet potato fries! They are super easy to make, just cut up a sweet potato, place them in a bag, melt some coconut oil, drizzle it over them, and add some seasonings. Shake it up, lay it flat on a lined pan, and bake in the oven at 350 for 35-45 minutes. I usually flip them half way through just so both sides get a little crispy. The waiting part stinks but if you throw them in the oven before you make your main dish you won't even notice the time.

I also have applied to Lululemon for a holiday position and today I had my second interview with them! It was a yoga class in the middle of a farmer's market... Seemed interesting enough to me but it was a lot of fun and something different for me to do. The only really crappy thing was that the temperature here in St. Louis was about 60 degrees. Having my toes and fingers exposed was not fun and it took me a little time for all the feeling to come back to them! Anyways, I am hoping the contact me soon so I can see what the next step is for me to get hired!

Hurting my knee this week really put a damper on my mood all week. I was constantly thinking about the competition this weekend and if I should do it or not. While I am not really happy with my decision, I know it is the best decision for me and the health of my knee in the long run. I am proud of myself for finally making the decision (although with the help of a few others) not to compete, but this gives me even more fire to get in the gym and constantly improve. Hopefully by next week I will be ready to go and officially at peace with the decision I made.  Who knows, stranger things have happened.

Struggle #11: Taking a Rest Day

So after competing in the #BattleForCourage Ogar Strong competition last weekend, my body was wrecked.  I didn't realize this until Tuesday morning when I was trying to workout and I just had nothing in the tank. Wednesday morning rolled around and again my body just wouldn't cooperate. Thankfully, Thursday is a rest day for the competitors at my gym, so when that rolled around me body was yelling at me to rest and I finally listened.

I did end up at the gym participating in the Movement and Mobility class but that hour of torture by James was much needed to get my body moving again. The class is run by a PT who is certified in ART. He takes us through movements with various mobility tools to help our muscles relax and move in the correct way again. Being a PT student, I love picking his brain and asking questions about why we are doing the things we are doing. Anyways... I digress.

I returned to the gym on Friday morning and had a great workout! My body was able to move and I was able to walk out of the gym not feeling like a ton of bricks hit me in the face. Last week was not my best training week, but it was a learning week and that is what makes it invaluable. Even when you may not be moving your best, you can still learn something from every workout and that is what will ultimately make me a better CrossFit athlete.

A big lesson that I learned was even though I am young and sometimes I think I am invincible, I am not. My body needs rest. Moving heavy weight and performing numerous repetitions of various movements is not rest. And it's not smart. All it takes is one little thing to create a major set back and that would not be fun. I need to listen to my body and when it tells me to rest, I need to rest. I am an educated individual on the body and movement (at least I like to think so...) and I need to start acting like one. I need to make myself use the knowledge I possess on myself and not just my patients. How come it is so much easier to give advice than to receive it? I don't get it.

I also learned that I am not very good at sitting still... I guess my family and I always knew that (one of the reasons I am a PT major so I can move all day) but sitting still Thursday was tough. I love to move and to get the "workout high" and when I don't get that, I drive myself crazy. Number one, it is like 500x harder for me to focus, which makes the long 12 page assignment I have to do nearly impossible to get done (it still took all weekend so I probably can't single handily point fingers at the rest day). Number two, there are not enough new TV shows on right now to fill in my free time and Facebook/Instagram just don't provide enough entertainment when you look at them every 20 minutes. Oh well, I survived Thursday and still got my gym fix in so tI guess I can't complain too much.

I am starting to get excited for the FitBodies CrossFit competition I am doing this coming weekend! I tested the workouts yesterday morning and I am hoping I will be able to do well there. This will be my first ever individual competition so we shall see what happens but I am going in with confidence in my abilities. I think my parents are even going to come and watch so I am super excited.

This past Saturday I did play in a sand volleyball and got to show off my mad volleyball skills! Don't ask anyone on my team how I did because I am pretty sure we would have different answers. But it was fun and it's always nice to get out there and do something active outside of the gym! Anyways this past week was a rough week for me training wise but I learned some more things about myself, so I am going to keep them in mind and keep pushing forward to be the best I can be.

Strength #1: Doing it Live

Since I have wrote about 10 struggles, I figured I should write about a strength... It is so hard for me to identify my strengths, it just has never been one of those things I am good at. I struggle with every evaluation I have to do on myself while in the PT clinic and identifying my strengths. I even noticed myself saying I didn't know what my strengths were in CrossFit when I was asked this weekend. One thing I have noticed this past year as one of my strengths is "doing it live." In the PT clinic I can just kind of jump in and work my way through situations and same with WODs. Sometimes I just do a lot better when I don't know what it is, so I can't think about it and I just have to go into action.

This past weekend, I was definitely "doing it live." I was asked to compete on Friday at about noon, on a CrossFit team at the #BattleForCourage supporting Kevin Ogar, a CrossFitter who recently suffered a spinal cord injury. I knew no one on the team and had no idea what I was going to be doing. I had even done a hard workout on Friday morning because I had no idea that I would be competing later that evening! I arrived at the competition about 4 hours later from being asked to be on the team and met my teammates. I also learned that we would have a Reebok CrossFit Athlete on our team competing with us the entire weekend!

Wow! That was going to be awesome! The athlete that was going to be on our team was Libby DiBiase. I was so excited but nervous, and hoping that she was nice and a good teammate. Don't worry she was! We had a great time all weekend long, got along really well, and were able to really communicate as teammates. She answered every question I asked her honestly which meant a lot to me. All of the Reebok athletes were incredibly friendly the entire weekend. It was so cool that these athletes were out here competing with us and supporting a great cause. Reebok chooses their athletes well and boy do they represent their sponsor well. They were so easy to talk to, willing to answer any questions, and took pictures with everyone. I managed to get a few throughout the weekend...

The workouts this weekend tested us in every aspect possible. We did the Ogar WOD on Friday night, which was 3 snatches, 1 muscle up, and 14 wall balls for 3 rounds. It was fast paced and fun to really push yourself there. On Saturday morning we had to run a lovely 5K. Yuck! Not my idea of fun but I managed to run a respectable time and somehow won 1st place in the 19 and under category... Not quite sure how that worked out, since I am definitely older than 19, but oh well I got a nice plaque out of it.

The second workout Saturday was a 3 rep overhead squat and 3 sets of max pull-ups. My one rep max is 178# so I went in with the mind set I was going to hit about 155# and open up at 135#. However during warm up, Libby convinced me to open up at 155# and go from there. I was nervous but got out there and hit it! Did 165# without trouble, and then decided to go for 175#... The first two reps were great and the last one took a little stabilization in the bottom but I stood it up! I just hit 3# under my one rep max 3 times! Holy cow! I was pumped and so was everyone else around me even though I had just met them all the day before, it was awesome! One of the guys on my team also hit 3 at 300#!!! Holy cow! We crushed the workout!

Libby DiBiase and I

Our team! Libby, Justin, Nate, and I

The last workout Saturday introduced a new concept where we did a mini workout 5 times and the slowest time you got on it was your score for the workout... You better pace yourself but still go hard. It was fun and made you think in a different way! On Sunday the final workout included almost every CrossFit move and even had paddle boarding in it! Something none of us had really done before but we all had a good time doing it and no one fell into the lake with the burpees on the paddle board so that was a success! The workout overall took 47:00. There was no time cap so everyone got the chance to finish it! My team ended up getting 5th overall, which was pretty darn awesome considering we were all pieced together a few hours before the competition.

Afterwards, my good friend and training partner, Jen (whose team got 2nd overall) and I found our way to some much deserved margaritas, a nap, and then we had some more fun with a bunch of our CrossFit St. Louis friends later in the evening! This weekend was absolutely awesome for me! I learned so much about myself and gained a ton of confidence in my abilities. I learned that I am starting to get to a point where I can compete with higher level athletes. I think because I was thrown into this so late and didn't really have time to think about it, I was able to have fun the entire weekend. With every workout I was just "doing it live" and seeing where it would take me. I didn't put any pressure on myself and it helped me relax, enjoy the weekend, and compete well. This was a lesson I needed to learn first hand and I am hoping I can carry it with me into future competitions!

All of us having fun later on!

Jen and I celebrating the completion of the comp!

I always have problems making myself and eat and drink throughout a competition because I get nervous. I knew this weekend I would have to stay on top of things because we were outside the entire time and it was hot and humid. I reached out to Jacque for help with what to eat and she suggested for me to drink a few protein shakes throughout the day and find something to snack on (I brought my homemade Lara bars and they were delicious). I also forced myself eat lunch on Saturday of some pulled pork and sweet potato mash. Delicious and it helped fuel me to a PR in my overhead squats!

This weekend was totally unplanned and supposed to be relaxing but that didn't quite happen... Oh well it was and exciting weekend and I was able to learn a lot about myself! Today has been a day of recovery because being in the sun for 3 days straight and working out like we did takes it out of you! I am excited to get back into the gym and continue to work on improving day in and day out!

Anyways strength #1 done. We will see if I can find some more soon.