Checking in...

It's been really crazy lately at the school I teach at and I think that running has kind of kept me grounded. Last fall, while I was on maternity leave, one of our teachers passed away in his sleep. It hit the kids and faculty really hard. About a week ago a 9th grader (along with her mother and younger brother) was shot and killed by her step-father. Last Friday was the funeral and many of my 9th graders were there.

Sunday afternoon I got a call that a teacher in my department passed away Saturday night. Totally unexpected. She was in her early 50's (but she looked ten years younger) and in perfect health. Actually, she was one of the people I work with that inspired me to get into shape. Until a couple of years ago, Terri ran full and 1/2 marathons on a regular basis. We're all still in shock at school. Ironically, I thought of her last weekend when I was shopping at H&M because she shopped there a lot - she had amazing style.

I'm glad I'm still keeping up with running and I think it's helping me keep busy. I ran day two of week 5 yesterday. I ran 8 minutes, walked 5, ran 8, walked 5. The first 8 minutes were killing me until I realized Chris had just used the treadmill and left the incline at 4! I guess that's a drawback of sharing a treadmill :) The Disney 1/2 marathon is 50% full so we'll hopefully be signing up soon!

Ups and downs...

I'm finding myself lately torn between being really proud of myself for exercising on a regular basis and depressed because I still can't fit into all of my pre-pregnancy clothes. I know the saying "9 months on, 9 months off" but it's frustrating because some of my clothes fit ok and some won't even zip up :( I had a reality check today at the mall. I picked out a few cute tops at H&M to try on, plus a pair of pants and a skirt, and nothing fit. I got the pants in one size and the skirt in a size up and neither one came close to fitting. The shirts weren't too bad but my chest is still larger than normal. I'm afraid that if I buy tops now they won't fit once I stop nursing. I guess I'll hold off shopping for a few more weeks and hope that I drop some more weight.

On the bright side, I started week 5 of my program today and feel great. I walked 5 minutes to warm up, then ran 5 minutes, walked 3, and repeated that twice more. That's day one of week 5 - day two consists of running for 8 minutes and walking for 2 or 3 and day three is running for 20 minutes. I'm nervous about day three but then again just a few weeks ago running for 5 minutes nonstop scared me. I think starting slow has really been the trick to sticking with things now. I've been talking with a friend about running in a 5k in the next couple of months. Hopefully I can keep up the enthusiasm until next January!

Overdue update

I haven't posted in a long time - school has been really busy lately and Caitlin is certainly keeping us on our toes!

I just started week 4 today and I'm pretty sore. This week is jog for 3 minutes, walk for 90 seconds, jog for 5 minutes, and walk for 2 minutes repeated twice. I went a little over 2 miles, including a 5 minute warm-up and cool down.

Good news in the weight department: I finally am inching closer and closer to my pre-pregnancy weight! I was stuck at 150 for a long time but now I'm about 146. Some of my pants fit and some still don't. Hopefully by the spring I'll be able to fit into everything. I really need some new clothes but I want to wait until I lose all of the baby weight.