12 Days of New Year's - Taking Better Care of my Body

Monday, February 22, 2016

I don't remember much about the first year after Moe died. It's mostly just a big blur of misery and pain, and I consider myself lucky that I survived it, with a great deal of help from those who love me past all reason.

The second year, I tried to concentrate on getting my mind right. Learning to concentrate again, learning to enjoy the things I enjoyed before her death, learning to channel my grief into productive things while still protecting my mental health and paying attention to my own grief journey.

This is the third year since we lost her. And this year, I want to make more of an effort to take care of my body.

It's not that I completely let myself go after Moe died. I still exercised on a fairly regular basis. I made an effort to eat balanced meals, even though I wasn't paying very much attention to quantity, calorie count, or fat content. I made an effort to stick with a routine. But I wasn't really taking care of my body in a way that was mindful.

So this year, I want to do a better job of being mindful about what I ask my body to do, and how I support it meeting those goals. I want to get my weight into the "normal" range, and take some strain off my joints and organs. I want to improve my nutrition, and give my body the fuel it needs to remain strong for many years to come. I want to work on strengthening my muscles, so that I will be strong and fit enough to do the things I want to do well into my senior years. I want to develop and maintain a lifestyle that allows me to maintain these changes, without it becoming so much work that I abandon the changes because I'm so tired of thinking about it.

I have confidence that I can do all those things, with the exception of the last one. I've never been very successful in maintaining food-related lifestyle changes, although I have the exercise and fitness changes licked. So my challenge will be to manage my food, long term, without allowing myself to go back to eating whatever I want, ALL THE TIME. There's a part of me that thinks, "If I can survive the death of my child, I can do this." And there's another part that thinks, "I survived the death of my child, I want to eat doughnuts EVERY SINGLE DAY."

We'll see which thought wins.

3 comments:

Anne C. said...

A good goal that I will join you in. This winter I have felt particularly slovenly in more ways than one. I haven't exercised. I haven't made good meals for myself. And my clothes are getting more and more worn out. I need to go shopping. And I hate shopping when I feel fat. I need to spend more attention on myself and my needs.

So you are not alone in this goal. Much love to you, my dear. (((((((HUG))))))

Stacey said...

I can get on this bandwagon as well. I hate tight clothes and I hate wasting money on better fitting - bc I'm not at my ideal weight for me - items. We are trying to change things at our house as well. We have things we want to do in our retirement years, and I would like to be fit enough to accomplish those.

I'm hoping that 2016 is the year I can be better to myself in regard to fitness/food.

Phiala said...

My version of that is "I survived cancer. Fuck everything; I'm having donuts."

Which, no. I need to be healthy so I can survive this whole rigamarole again someday. Which actually means having some body fat, because reserves are important too, but also eating healthy foods and exercising. I'm still figuring out how my body works now too though.

So yeah, bodies are complicated, brains are complicated. Love and hugs.