When the weight on your shoulders doesn't make you feel any stronger

[Day 67A]

Days like today happen. Sometimes I get through them, sometimes I don't. All I could do was give it a swing today and if it wasn't meant to be, it wasn't meant to be. I got through 3.5 things in my workout and called it a day. Story later, summary first.

Today's AM Workout: Gym sesh, ~40 mins
Summary:

• Back squats: WU 12 @ 65#, 3 x 12 @ 105#
• Flat bench: WU 12 @ 45#, 3 x 12/10/8 @ 85#
• Deadlifts: 3 x 8 @ 145#
• Pulldowns: 3 x 12/8-4/12 @ 7 plates alt. wide/narrow grip

Hit Rate: 70/77 (90.9%)

I had a late night last night. Anxiety/stress has been getting to me lately. I think I still have a really hard time justifying why I do this. I'm like literally one of the least athletic people I know, I just happened to have been involved in an endurance sport my entire life so it seems like I could pass for someone who is actually athletic but I'm really really not. Most people with a little bit of talent and some amount of training would fly by me when it comes to this stuff so I always find myself asking exactly why it is that I even bother funneling all this time and energy into something I'm just not very good at. And that's really discouraging. I'm still sorting those feelings out I guess.

But the point is, I was up late and I was thinking I would likely just have to pass on the gym this morning to make sure I got enough sleep but I ended up waking up at 5 am and thought about going back to bed but decided I should just suck it up and go to the gym. So I did. And I really wasn't into it. I got through the squats and bench and deadlifts alright but after that I just wanted to go home so badly. I sat around for a bit and eventually talked myself into hitting the pulldowns, but I didn't even finish all four sets of those. I just wanted to go home. So I did. Even though I did pretty well in terms of what I did do weight wise and rep scheme wise, I'm just really unhappy about quitting like that. I hate feeling like a quitter. I hate not enjoying what it is that I'm doing. I hate feeling like all of this is such a slog and I'm not getting anywhere and I need to work harder but my mind is so resistant to it right now. I'm giving it my best but my best is just a poor showing and I don't really know what to take from this other than that.

Henry's been trying to help me sort it out. He just wants me to be happy but I honestly don't know how to be happy with anything short of accomplishing exactly what I set out to accomplish. And right now that's not what's happening, so of course I'm not happy. Some people think the answer to that is to lower the bar, but honestly how is that any different from just falling short? It's like falling short but without even trying. That's gotta be worse. I dunno. Working through it. Easy run in the afternoon. We'll see where the day takes us.

Much love,
Jess

The bad and the good (aka turning things around)

[Day 57]

I have a lot to say but it's late so I'm gonna keep it brief. The day started real bad. Sort of a carry over from last night. I wasn't very productive in the evening, which was upsetting and kept me up late and made me really emotional. I was just dissatisfied with myself, I had wanted more out of myself and wasn't getting it and it was upsetting. I ended up deciding to skip morning practice today because I didn't get to sleep until the wee hours of the morning and it meant I really started the day on the wrong foot. It felt awful to start your day by not doing something that you feel is important to do and feeling like all the blame for that rests with poor decision making from the prior day. It was hard to see the rest of the day as even worthwhile because I knew no matter how well I did with it, the best it could turn out to be was an average day and I wanted more than that. So that was rough.

But then things got better. I went to a doctor's appointment and got a well-woman check up which is something I had been meaning to do for a long time but never got around to. It made me feel like I was being a responsible adult and honestly just the act of taking care of yourself in some way always feeds positive behaviour. Things sort of made a turn for the better from there. I reviewed for my quiz in the afternoon, I hung out with some friends, I attended and paid attention in lecture, it was all good stuff. Then I decided that instead of just taking an easy long run today, I would do my long run with a few pick ups to try and get back into running a little faster than my typical slow. Here's the summary.

Today's Workout: PM long run, 10 mi, counterclockwise loop + Wydown
Summary: 10.44 mi, 1:32:47, 8:53 pace

• The structure was 1 mi warm up, then 3 x 2/1 mi @ under 8:30 for the efforts and under 9:30 for the recoveries.

Pace splits by mile: 9:15, 8:42, 8:33, 9:13, 8:39, 8:27, 9:26, 8:37, 8:31, 9:18, 9:19 (effort miles are bolded)
Hit Rate: 62/68 (91.1%; this includes the missed AM swim)

Notes/thoughts:

• I'm getting back to that place where 10 miles feels like a pretty average day. It takes a toll on me afterwards for sure, but during the run I don't feel like I'm struggling to cover the distance, so it's good to feel really controlled and at peace with the distance.
• 176 cadence average today, killed it. Actually really enjoyed moving faster in general, had a little bit more hang time in the air on my strides and it felt like flying. It was more effort, but it was really worth the feeling of moving faster.
• Third round got rough but I knew going into it that I was going to hit them. I just felt it in my body and I knew it was probably gonna hurt, but I knew had it. It did hurt. I couldn't keep it off my face which made me feel kinda bad but whatever.
• It's worth noting that there was more net elevation loss on the effort miles and more net elevation gain on the recovery miles, just the way the terrain played out, which may have gone into why these paces look the way they do. I definitely charged the downhills to get as much out of them as I could and it played to my advantage today. Maybe running the route in reverse will change these things. 
• A bit of R ankle pain on the downhills, knees feel solid though.
• Honestly I wasn't expecting to be able to pull this run off as solidly as I did. I guess I'm in better shape than I thought and the loads of recovery time between my last workout (Thursday AM) and this one (Friday PM) helped a lot.

Long ride w/ Brian and maybe some other people (????? idk) tomorrow morning. It'll be the longest ride I've ever been on by close to 20 miles so uh...wish me luck...Bringing all the food. Okay bed now!

Much love,

Jess