Recovery Time...Weekly Weight Update

How do you recover from only one weigh-in over five weeks? You climb back on the horse and start again. Last week I ran a crazy hard 5K with some friends. I didn't think I would be as sore as I was but I ached after the race. What I was proud of the most was the type of aching. It wasn't exercise ache but injury ache.

Let me try to explain. You know that feeling when you haven't worked out in a long time or you had a super hard workout and the next day your muscles don't want to work? The kind of pain that makes it nearly impossible to lift your arms? The kind that makes your quads scream as you try to do something simple like walking down the stairs? That is exercise ache.

Exercise ache doesn't ever leave but the more you exercise the shorter the recovery time. When I first started running it would take me days or weeks for my legs to stop throbbing after a run. Now the exercise ache takes no more than two days to subside but more often than not I'm fully recovered by the next day which makes it easier to get up and run again. There is an old saying that it takes money to make money. It's true that the more money you have the easier it is to make more money. The same can be true when it comes to exercise. The more you exercise the less time it takes to recover and it makes it that much easier to keep going and to continue running.

Injury ache, on the other hand, is an entirely different story. Injury ache isn't the result of exercise but the result of something that happened during exercise. Think a twisted ankle or a torn muscle. These kinds of things won't ever go away in the same manner as exercise ache. These kinds of things take time and relaxation. You can't push through an injury ache the way you can with exercise ache. You have to rest.

By Sunday morning the exercise ache from the crazy mountain run had subsided but there was an injury ache that I didn't notice until I stood up out of bed. My feet ached like crazy. They cramped and throbbed. This was new when it came to running for me but I knew the cause was the downhill run during the previous day's 5K. The trial was rocky and steep. Going down was less like running and more like a controlled fall. The controlled fall meant landing hard with each step, sometimes on big and jagged rocks. The result was bruised and extremely sore soles. It was tough to walk and I felt every step until Tuesday.

Why was this a positive? Because my body had recovered from the exercise, even if it wasn't recovered from the injury ache. In prior experiences struggling through weight loss I would easily give up or fall into old patterns because I was sore from the exercise ache. Now I feel like my body can recover from the exercise ache in a reasonable amount of time. So by Tuesday I was back on the road getting in a run (even if it was a short Tuesday run due to prior bowling commitments) instead of sitting on the couch eating ice cream and watching another episode of Friends.

Even though the recovery was positive the rest of the week consisted of eating way too much which resulted in a big gain. The end of the week consisted of 5 straight meals that were not made at home, beginning with lunch on Friday through dinner on Sunday. This was clearly a big cause of this weeks fluctuation. I'm not too worried about it because I started back up my Saturday long runs through some multi-tasking.

I have been driving around with one headlight (just like the Wallflowers' song) and no rear view mirror (just like the Pearl Jam song) so I needed to get to the shop to get them fixed. I'm mechanically inclined enough to fix a headlight but don't have the equipment to fix a rear view mirror. While I was waiting at the shop I decided multi-task and get in a run around Fairfax while they were fixing my car. It was a great use of time and goes to show that there is always time to work out. While they were putting my car back together I started back up on my 10K trainer which I will be running the Saturday before Father's Day. Happy Father's Day to me.

So, this weeks results were a downer but you can't keep a good man down. I gained 1.6 lbs this week bringing my current weight up to 207.6 lbs and my total weight loss back up above 60 lbs at 59.8 lbs. That means its time to really rededicate myself to Weight Watchers. I'm going to be tracking every point and monitoring every exercise I do this week. I only need 2.8 lbs to get a massage and it's been that way too long now so it's time to get it done.

Yes! Rizzo's reign of terror has finally come to an end. Her constant running to prepare for a 10-miler finally ceased and I could once again compete against a normal person instead of some super human that should be in the picture above. I have finally taken back the Bring It On! challenge crown for the month of April. This week wasn't even close with Rizzo accumulating 41.5 miles compared to my 46.0 miles. The month was even bigger victory with my 186.7 miles crushing her 167.9 miles. I can't wait to sit back, relax, and watch super heroes beat the crap out of each other for 2 1/2 hours. It will be glorious. #TeamCap #TeamClark #Iknowhashtagsdontworkinablog.

P.S. Before leaving our mini-vacation on Sunday we met up with a friend of Rizzo and her daughter for a play date. It was lots of fun watching the girls play together. While we were walking up to the playground, the Mom's and the girls all held hands while walking. It was very cute.

Little kids holding hands is the cutest.

P.P.S. It's been about 3 weeks since I posted about my potential lupus. How the heck did I end up on a mailing list already?!?! How did they know? And how could they have possibly figured out that my real name is Resident? Unbelievable!