I'm Healthy & I Know It

The final nudge for me to start blogging came whilst I was sitting in a salon chair getting my hairs did in October of 2010.  It went a little something like this.

Sara: yammer yammer "I want to be healthy" blah blah "have lost 80 lbs" gabbity gabbity "getting my life back"

*snip snip snip* Rebecca (of Modern Strands Hair Salon if you're in the Ames area): "You really should write this stuff down.  Have you ever thought of writing a blog?"

Once again the darling Rebecca pushed me into a beautiful epiphany (& a beautiful fuzz free lip, thank you very much!).  She's a fellow (& much more acomplished) runner & healthy eating enthusiast, so we often talk "shop."  Today I was kind of spewing a stream of consciousness rant about feeling glum about my progress this year & something rather large clicked. 

Since February 2010, my ultimate goals through all of my life changes have been to get healthy & to model healthy womanhood for my daughter.  My ultimate goals were not:

• to lose 135 lbs
• to be a size 6
• to be pretty
• to be skinny
• to be hot
• to rock a smokin' blue dress on our sixth anniversary

Ok, so I rocked the dress, but it wasn't the end goal.  I wanted/want to be healthy & to model that health in a way that is relevant to my daughter (& son, too!).

I've been feeling blue about my progress in my second year.  In Year One I lost 100 lbs & 54 inches over my whole body.  I dropped 8 pants sizes.  In Year Two I now hope to be able to say that I've lost 25 lbs by the middle of February.  Given that my goal was only 35 lbs, it feels like it wasn't too big of a task & I failed.  But, I return to my stated goals.  As I was prattling on to Rebecca this afternoon, I realized that in Year One, I barely even touched cardio.  I started Zumba in the last two months of Year One & that was really my first taste of a good sweat.  I didn't start running until mid-March, a month into Year Two.  Year Two found me able to do 5Ks & slog through a little race called Living History Farms.  Year Two is when I got healthy.  Year Two is when my daughter started to say, "I wunnin' like-a Mommy!" (Disclaimer: Since Coraline's birth maked the BEGINNING of Year One, this statement is more than a little unfair, but it still makes my heart swell every time she says it).

Looking at my overall progress toward my goals--not just the number on the scale--makes me feel really happy about Year Two & where I'm headed.  I haven't decided if I'm still chasing my stated goal weight of 134 lbs or if that was just an arbitrary number, but I have decided that there is no room for any more blue feelings...just blue dresses.  I'm healthy & I know it.