Marching Into the Peace Corps, Pt 43: When You Fall Off the Wagon, Flagging It Back Down Can be Difficult

I must confess that despite my best efforts this spring to get into a bikini for the first time in 20 years, I failed and generally know why.

When I moved from Texas to New Jersey, I had not been overly active as compared to the way I used to be. Actually, since mid November when I broke up with a man who would’ve fit under the category “opposites don’t attract”, I went off my diet a bit. Comfort food was my friend, and I didn’t run my usual six miles a day. I was having a very hard time taking my own advice.

It also didn’t help when I had my first major fall while running. Actually, when I hit the ground, it looked more like a baseball player trying to steal second base – I slid on my chest, stomach, and legs for several feet until momentum no longer carried me. I went down with a garage door opener in one pocket, an ipod wannabe around my neck, and my cell phone in the other pocket. Of all the things that caused injury, it was the garage door opener in my left pocket. Upon returning to running 3 weeks later, which didn’t feel too bad, I then slipped and fell in bathroom, hurting the left quad again. I hung up my sneakers until mid February until I had some mental mapping of my new location in New Jersey.

I had decided the cold wasn’t going to be an excuse, so I went out and purchased a cheap set of thermal underwear. Determined, I took to the streets for my first 3.5 mile run, thinking it would go fast and easy, which neither it turned out to be. My lungs hurt, and I didn’t think my slow down in activity would’ve made such a difference in a short period of time. It took a couple of weeks before I could run the 3.5 miles comfortably, and on the first really nice spring day…I fell once again, and hung up my sneakers. Another fall wasn’t going to keep me from getting skinny.

During the winter, I figured I had managed to drop down to maybe 130 pounds (I couldn’t tell as my scale had been shipped to New Jersey ahead of me six months prior to my departure from Texas), but after the move, the first thing I went looking for was the scale. I had to have some idea where I was beyond how my clothes fit; it registered 137 pounds. This still leaves me guessing that I might have been as low as 125 pounds during my best period.

I was fitting in a size six pair of jeans, which was probably closer to a real size 10, and had outgrown my size four which I fit in while dating the man of my undoing, which I’d guess would be closer to a size 8. The “size six” jeans have a 32 inch waist, while the “size four” jeans have a size 30 inch waist; I was able to fit into a “size two” pair of jeans of the same label, and I’ve got second hand pants with a 29 inch waist I was fitting into.

After my fall, I decided to get back into the P90X routine, only moving it up a notch to the “doubles” (twice a day). I wasn’t seeing the results I wanted, so I added in a few of my old vitamin friends as well as an additional program called Turbulence Training. I was working out hard, got back down into my “size four” jeans and to 131 pounds, and for the first time I was starting to see a tiny bit of four pack abdominals peeking out!

As the old proverb states, “…the Lord giveth, and the Lord taketh away”: I managed to land a part-time job that put me on my feet in dress shoes for hours at a time. I thought it was a blessing, but it turned out to be a punishment. My feet hurt so badly at the end of shifts, I would be limping for hours afterward. I dreaded working the night shift, only to be back in the store less than 12 hours later for an opening, with little recovery time.

After a few months, I was let go, but I still have a reminder of my time there. I went from 131 pounds to 140 in two weeks; I also have black spots on both my big toe nails I’m guessing are bruises. All my hard work from the spring had been essentially undone.

How do you gain nine pounds in two weeks? It turns out, very easily. I couldn’t drink my usual 3-4 liters of water and was lucky if I managed to drink one during the day. You can’t be on a sales floor and always excusing yourself for a restroom break. Heck, there were times I wasn’t allowed a restroom break at all! I had been on a set eating schedule of every three hours, and what I mean by “eating”, it could be as simple as a handful of nuts. At this job, there was no sneaking food on the sales floor, and breaks were a foreign concept to management. I was lucky when they remembered to allow me a state mandated lunch break!

These factors created a perfect storm: I couldn’t eat or drink as I had before, and it set into motion huge carbohydrate swings as my blood sugar dropped. There were times I felt like I was going to pass out on the sales floor, but I had to suck it up and shake it off. My feet hurt so badly at the end of my shifts, the thought of a hard P90X workout was unrealistic. Working on the night shifts, I came home angry and tired, which was a recipe for stress eating. No water, the starvation response, emotional eating patterns, and no exercise…seems you can put on a lot of weight overnight as I discovered.

After I lost the job, I weighed 137 pounds. I was set up to take on another job, but it fell through due to the bad economy. As more of these situations took place, I began to feel worse about myself and sunk into a mini-depression. My personal blog, which I had updated and constantly researched stories, I couldn’t bring myself to update it. At my worst during this period, I was up to 144 pounds. My top mental limit I had set for myself was 140 pounds, so I started back on my diet and dropped back down to 137, but I hadn’t made friends again with exercise. I knew I couldn’t keep the weight off with just cutting calories having been down this road before.

I was feeling physically and emotionally lousy, and I knew I felt my best when I worked out, but it’s easier said that done. I know for a fact and from research that those who exercise and eat well are better equipped to handle stress, or to be able to shake it off faster when it hits. It’s all in the endorphins, and when I was angry, I used to run and then forget what I was mad about. I may not have felt “good”, but I felt level headed and back in control. It’s hard to work out when you’re depressed and your butt becomes one with the couch – I’ll be the first to admit it.

About two weeks ago, I started to flirt around again with the idea of exercising. I had stepped on the scale and it registered 143 pounds again. It had been three whole months since I last worked out, and I knew I wasn’t in good enough shape for the P90X program, but I felt helpless because I didn’t know what do. For that matter, I wasn’t even sure I was that out of shape I couldn’t do the P90X; there was a lot of denial and fear on my part.

Thinking back to the scale and the weight I gained, I could: 1. beat myself up and see the fact I gained between 13-18 pounds (if my 125 guestimate was correct), 2. I could take comfort in I only gained back 13-18 pounds out of my total 75 pound loss, 3. I could pat myself on the back for holding off the majority of the weight.

Beating yourself up is no good; that’s the rest of the world’s job and you don’t need to add to the daily grinding. Gaining any of the weight back is not good, but the reality is most of us do gain some, or all of it back. In the past, I usually regained it all back within a short period of time; to be holding so much of it off ten months later tells me I have the ability to maintain a weight loss. This is key – knowing you can, and learning to set a comfort zone point where you realize change is needed. It’s easier to lose five pounds versus 30 pounds, and if you let the weight creep back on, the fear will keep you from doing what you have to control it.

I swallowed hard and went into the workout room. Remembering the words of Tony Horton, I kept hearing things like “don’t let your ego get in the way”, and “don’t try and be hero and lift too much and hurt yourself”, I decided I needed to play it safe and plug in the very first workout DVD I started with – Slim in 6. I kept thinking I wouldn’t get anything out of it, but at least I was moving around and warming up the muscles to work out. Instead, I huffed and puffed outside of my maximum target heart rate, which shocked me! My cardio endurance had fallen through the floor worse than it had last summer (you can’t do anything outside in Texas during the summer months).

The next day I had the truth of the matter…my thighs, butt, and abs were sore and I was stiff as a board! The workout was 25 minutes long, and I couldn’t believe how I’d let myself go to hurt this much! Almost a week later, I went back for round two, and it was a little better. I took the next day off and let the muscles recover. I did the beginner’s workout three times before I moved to the second in the series, “Ramp it Up”.

There was a dieting website I used to belong to, and I can remember this woman posting a question about how long does it take for your body to lose muscle tone. She wanted to get ripped for summer, and then take the whole summer off, figuring her body would stay in great shape the entire time. I remember laughing at her and answering she wouldn’t maintain that muscle definition for long, and now I know just how short of a time you can lose the muscle definition you’ve worked so hard to gain. Even worse, how much it hurts when (or if) you start back up on your routine.

One of my friends said I was a slave to exercise earlier this year. Lately she’s been asking if I’ve been exercising at all. I used to cringe when she posed the question I didn’t want to hear, but next time she asks, I can honestly tell her I’m back on the wagon I fell off of months ago. I can’t say which is harder – starting a new exercise program, or getting back on the wagon after you’ve fallen off.