Week two -- the scales fall or Rome wasn't built in a day

It’s not about the scale; it’s not about the numbers. The scale is not your friend. Do not let the scale dictate, for it will always lead you astray. Muscle weights more than fat. Muscle weights more than fat. Repeat after me: it’s not about the scale, muscle weights more than fat.
End of week two, and I don’t know if I weigh less than I did after the end of week one because the scales in my beautiful, light filled bathroom are different (read: lighter, happier, smarter) than the horrid, high, ridiculous scales at the gym.
I am trying not to think about the scales at the gym which have wiped out my triumphant 4.7 pound weight loss of the first week and replace it with an overall 5.1 pound weight loss at the end of this week. That would mean, this week I lost less than half a pound, but as I mentioned I am trying not to think about it that way.
If my goal is to loose one pound a week on average, I’m three pounds ahead of the game! Yes, that’s a better way to think. I’m three pounds up on my necessary per week weight loss.
Here I should say what I’m doing with my physical body. I have settled into a somewhat regular schedule at last. I am going to the gym to do weight training Tuesdays and Thursdays and Saturdays. The knowledgeable folks at Korezone insist there should be a rest day in between strength training. A rest day is good. Very, very, good.
The strength training is quite new to me. It involves a program written to my specific needs by the woman to whom I am assigned the lovely taut Ashley. She has tested me and looked for my muscle imbalances. Now she has me doing a series of repetitious sets, 15 of this, 15 of that, pause repeat. Quite a lot of time and energy is going into very basic big muscle movement right now. Squats, with weights, lunges, with weights, triceps curls, with weights, almost everything with weights. Except my core stuff. My core exercises simply involve gravity and lifting bits of my own big body off a mat. It’s funny how simple that sounds, and yet how painful and difficult that can be.
Ashley is very encouraging. When I left today she smiled at me and said one word: "Crash". This week coming is crash week. It means rather than two sets of each exercise, I will do three. It’s about building up strength and then pushing that to the max. Crash does not sound fun. Still, I smile back at Ashley, who is casually running one hour on the treadmill full tilt.
Back to the schedule: strength training is three times a week and I supplement that with yoga on the off days, Wednesdays and Fridays yoga is so very different and yet so good. So far, I think I like yoga days better than strength days. I like contemplating my breath, I like energizing parts of my body, I like trying to hold poses and imagining being a cat or a tree or some other etherial being. I like mimicing that thing with my body. I still try not to look in the mirror. In my head I am always lovely. I like the floating, vaguely Eastern feel of yoga and I like the fact that enlightenment seems to have little to do with sweat.
Mondays are my cardio days which means either a long brisk one hour walk (in the woods!! Yes! YES!) or at least 40 minutes on the treadmill, doing a walk one minute, run three minutes routine. Sundays are supposed to be days off, although there is talk around the house tonight of a cross country skiing expedition tomorrow to take advantage of the glorious winter weather. We skated today, too, and that’s not part of the “program.”
However, I realize I need daily exercise to become a normal, natural, desired part of my life. I’m not there yet. Yes, it does feel good to pile into bed at night bone tired and, yes, it does feel good to wake up in the morning and run my hand down my own thighs and feel the muscles there, solid and strong. But I don’t relish exercise, not yet, at least. I know it’s having an effect. I know that I weigh five pounds less than I did at the turn of the year.
I also know my head and my heart are happier because I’m doing something that’s good for me and this is about health and longevity.
I’m not sure about writing this blog. I’m not sure what that’s doing for me except forcing me to jot down some of my thoughts. I’m a bit embarrassed to give out the blog address because I have no idea, at this point, why anyone would want to read my weekly rambling about my own shrinking self. It feels slightly narcissistic, completely selfish but isn't this what the 50 weeks is supposed to me about, in part? Besides, I’m in too deep to get out now. I had my friend Robb set this up. I paid him. I'll soldier on and hope that no one reads.
I have had some thoughts about personal trainers, how I’ve always perceived them as a rich person’s luxury, but I’m changing my mind on that and I’ll speak to that issue later. Meanwhile, I’ll continue my mantra: the don’t let the numbers dictate, the scale is NOT your friend, muscle weights more than fat.
Onward to CRASH week! Oh, and yes, soon I will reveal my starting weight. I’m still not ready to do that publicly yet. And the post after next weeks, should include a photo. The photo -- headless, faceless – will be a body-only profile and front-on shot in black clothing against a white wall. I pledge to change it once a month at the end of each month. I hope it doesn't look like a target...



M