Wednesday, April 23, 2014

Fifty-five...


 
No you never see it coming,
Always wind up wondering where it went.
Only time will tell if it was time well spent.
It's another revelation,celebrating what I should have done
With these souvenirs of my trip around the sun.  - Jimmy Buffett


Today is my fifty-fifth birthday.  It's actually pretty exciting to think that I haven't really done too much wrong this last year so I think I'll just celebrate the things I did do.  I am strong, fit, and really healthy.  I feel great.  Well, my knee hurts a little.  That's probably from the workout Hubs came up with yesterday for us to do...run, run, run, do a dozen burpees, run, run, run, do 24 air squats, run, run, run, do 36 walking lunges on the beach, run, run, run, do 48 flutter kicks on those big wooden boxes where the lifeguards stash the beach umbrellas-

Yep, on the beach.  So that is something to celebrate for sure.  If you are going to mess up your knee a little bit, it might as well be on the beach in the beautiful low country of South Carolina.  By the time all that was done, we'd been four miles.  I am just going to have to celebrate running four miles, too.

I do have a clever husband who can come up with this stuff.

I could easily think of quite a list of things to celebrate this day, but it would certainly get tedious to read it all.  What I do want to write about today is a revelation that the above mentioned Hubs came up with the other day.  There are too many blogs out there devoted to Paleo recipes.  I really have to agree.  The glitch that folks have in going Paleo has nothing to do with what to cook; it has to do with adapting to the Paleo Lifestyle.  And what that lifestyle means is different for everyone.

I watch people a lot these days, which sounds creepy, but I am naturally curious about stuff.  I see people who move slowly when they get out of  their cars and wonder if they are in pain.  I wonder if the overweight guy who was grunting as he fixed our fridge the other day was so really so uncomfortable because of inflammation in his body.

I can relate to that because I was in pain and I was uncomfortable almost all of the time.  That was only a year and half ago.  What  a new outlook this hard work, and I must say, God's Good Grace have brought to me!

We had a challenge at our gym last month and Coach asked me to speak about the Paleo Lifestyle.  I had to admit that I came to this from a different place than someone who wants only to lose weight.  Being in pain was a huge motivation for trying something so new and different.  I mean I was a vegetarian, for crying out loud.  I never really had a hard time adapting to eating the  whole, nutritious, satisfying foods that we now eat.  (Probably because they are whole, nutritious, and satisfying...but that's just my comment because not only am I naturally curious, I am a natural smarty-pants as well.)  I don't slip up and cheat because I don't want to go back to the way I was.  That was not only being overweight, but hurting from all of the issues with my back.  I know that those issues are still there; they are just silent.  And I would like it very much if they would just stay that way.

It's a little hard for both Hubs and me to understand why Paleo is difficult for a lot of people.  It is also pretty disappointing, in all honesty, to share something that has been life changing and have it not catch on. Especially when it's someone you love.  We've had family members give up after asking for help.  It was our choice, of course to spend our time explaining and coaching.  It was also their choice,as Yoda says, to do or do not.

I choose to do this.  For whatever reason... whether it's the most valuable one of  feeling good,  the fun one of being able to run four miles and do a crazy WOD on the beach, or the vain one which is the joy of fitting into a size zero or two (!!!)  I choose to live the Paleo way which I have adapted for my own needs.


I'd like to make this blog more about exploring ways to adapt to living the Paleo Lifestyle and I may be in for some disappointments, but that's okay.  I can't come to your house and cook for you, but I can write lots of thoughts and tips on how Hubs and I have made things work for us.  I agree with him that it may be a more helpful approach.

I did say that I have a clever husband, didn't I?

Just to end my birthday post, I want to share a story.  The picture above was from my birthday dinner last year.  We had a lovely time at a really fancy steak house and the wait staff wanted to bring me a dessert.  I turned it down, I hope graciously enough, which elicited a big grin from Hubs.  It also elicited a candle and a Happy Birthday wish written in icing from the chef.  Someone told me that it was just sad to 'have' to turn down a treat.  I disagree.

It's a celebration of choosing what is best for me. 



 



Take good care, k.



No comments:

Post a Comment