Weekly Roundup – Week 26/2023 (Winning through the sickness)

When I sat down to write this post tonight, I had absolutely no idea what had happened in the past week. Well, other than Luca picking up Influenza B and taking up almost a permanent spot on the couch. The poor boy was pretty crook, but I’m happy to report he’s through it now.

We did have to abort our weekend plans for him to stay home and rest, but ultimately, I’m glad we did now that he’s better.

So, let’s take a look at the week that was.

Food

Honestly, I don’t remember much of what I ate last week. I do know that we picked up a new air fryer, and I was determined to try cooking a roast chicken in it. It worked great! A bit of spice rub on the skin, 50mins in the fryer and boom.

Dietician appointment

At one point I wasn’t sure I was going to make it (with Luca being sick), but my husband took over parenting duties while I headed out for the session.

I remembered how much I really appreciate her. She’s fun to talk to, she’s really upbeat…I really appreciate the sessions.

And…well, she floored me. I talked about my food, and how I have I haven’t done bad but haven’t done great either. And the next words out of her mouth blew me away.

“You’re so inspirational!”

Um…what?! I’d just told her how I didn’t feel like I was nailing it.

She reminded me of how far I’ve come, from everything I’d told her. And she’s right…I have come far. I need to remember that. I realised last week how sleep is a huge trigger for me. That I need the nightly meditation to just unwind and get better quality sleep. How I know what goals I need to hit with my fitness, and what I’m doing to try and get more movement into my day. The goal to work on mobility.

I need to remember that I’ve done some pretty great things, and overcome some pretty difficult times.

Sometimes I’m down…but I’m never out.

In 4 weeks I’ll be back to see her again, and we’ll be doing a body composition test to understand the breakdown between muscle and fat. Then from there, she’ll put together a more structured plan for me to help with my goal of the marathon next year. Essentially to help me lose weight while maintaining/building my muscle mass.

I just hope that I’ve learned the tools to be able to deal with the anxiety that will inevitably arise over a plan.

Meditation

I’m on a 14-day streak now! I’ve found that I’ve reached the point now where I look forward to my session before bed, and the idea of not doing it feels almost unforgivable.

I’m also learning skills that really help on a day-to-day basis.

• How to acknowledge a thought, then dismiss it and return back to the task I was doing.
• To “label” my thoughts or observations e.g. feelings (like physical feelings – a pain in the leg etc), or thoughts. Not judging them as right or wrong, just labelling them.
• More aware of my body. Just zoning in on a particular body part and focusing on actually feeling it, what it’s doing, if it’s cold, if it’s warm etc.

Today at work I realised how much more focused I felt. Whether it was a coincidence or not I don’t know, but I just felt like I achieved a lot. Perhaps meditation is helping me to improve my ability to rein in my wandering mind.

Exercise

Absolutely non-existent this week. It was survival mode. When I was working it was typically on the couch/dining table keeping an eye on my son, or quickly getting some time in my office hooked up to the monitors instead of the treadmill desk.

Towards the end of the week, I could feel myself starting to feel run down. I prioritised sleep, and taking in as many vitamins as I could. So far I’ve escaped unscathed, and given my flu shot is tomorrow, I’m hoping that I can manage to avoid it.

Goals for this week

This week I’m hitting the reset button, and looking to get back to some good habits.

• Hydration – my son stole all of my water bottles, and given he’s a hive of germs that I don’t want right now, I bought another one. So, back to trying to hit the 2L goal every day.
• Exercise – 30mins of movement of some kind every day. Preferably some strength in there.
• Mobility – I’ve slackened on this one. Time to get back to 20mins of stretching a day.
• Food – plan some meals for the week, try to stick to the guidelines from my dietician.

Hope you’re all having a great week!