Day 34: Coming back

I'm almost over my illness, still coughing but more energetic and able to work out again. It's been a really rough few days around here because my daughter and my husband have also been sick. A 2-year-old is not the most logical of creatures under the best of circumstances, but a 2-year-old with some kind of mystery virus is basically a crazy person. I can imagine it would be frightening -- you don't know what's going on with your body, you don't know if you'll ever get better. I've pretty much had a toddler hanging off of me like a barnacle for the last 5 or 6 days.

So I'm bummed to have missed three workouts this week (THREE! I only missed one workout during the entire PCP) but I know it wasn't because I was too busy or too lazy or just didn't feel like it. I really knew that the best thing to do was to rest. I went to bed at 8 pm, slept until 7 am, plus usually managed to take a nap while my daughter slept in the afternoon. I've been the sleep ninja this week! And I kept to the diet, no problem. Happy to report that we're all feeling better now.

I agree with what Ellen said, the workouts do seem to be taking longer. I don't mess around while I'm working out either -- I learned my lesson on PCP to just move right along -- but it took me about an hour and 15 minutes today. There's just a lot to get through.

I like crescent kicks! They're fun and feel like some kind of groovy dance move.

I think I actually reached failure on the push kicks today. Maybe because I had a couple of days off and lost some conditioning this week, but it was really tough to keep good form throughout all the kicks.

The advice about relaxing during the flexibility portion has been really helpful. I keep hearing my favorite yoga teacher's voice in my head: "How can you find some ease in this posture?" I used to do a lot of yoga when I lived in NYC near a great studio, and I really feel like the prenatal yoga classes I took helped me to have a good delivery -- not only because of the physical benefits, but because they helped me learn to relax in the presence of physical discomfort. In the midst of the intense, scary experience of childbirth, I was able to call on that sensation of finding a little relaxation and a little space, and I didn't freak out. So it's very helpful to get that reminder again here -- no need to freak out if it's hard, just relax.

I recently heard someone say that the basic advice of all spiritual traditions is "Relax." Maybe that's true.