A work in progress

I find myself struggling two days into this journey. Not that I thought it was going to be a cake walk, let's face it a cake walk would defeat the purpose. I'm sure some of you can relate to the busy mom story. I have two little girls, a 3 yr old and a 14 month old who pretty much call the shots on how my day is going to go. I learned long before my second daughter arrived that you go with the flow when it comes to your kids. You can't take your daily routine to seriously otherwise you spend more time lamenting the things you didn't get done rather then the things you did. 

I told myself when I decided to start this journey and really stick to it that I wasn't going to nag myself into feeling bad for not "working out." I decided to start small, get my butt off the couch more and moving around with my kids, not just watching them do all the moving. So far so good. I've gotten my girls out everyday going on 5 days straight now which is great for both of us. The weather is perfect and staying inside is misery with a three yr old who LOVES nothing more then to just run her little heart out. So even though I'm up and moving and outside, it still doesn't feel like it's enough. I'm not sweating. I'm not aching or feeling the burn and I used to love feeling the burn.

The one and only time I've had success losing weight was in my early twenties. I had just crossed over the 200 lb mark and I was miserable with the freshman 20 I had put on my first year of college. After hitting a major bump in my college career, becoming severely depressed and no longer being able to take care of myself and keep up with the demands of living 1000 miles away from home and keeping my grades up, I came home and basically wiped my schedule clean. Since I had a lot of free time it meant I had a lot of time to hit the gym and throw myself into the Atkins way of life. I could work out 2 hours a day or more. I was burning fat like crazy. I felt great. I lost 40 lbs in 6 months and felt better then I ever had. But it wasn't to last. 

Eventually I had to go back to finish my degree and to eating carbs, I LOVE bread! And eventually the 40 lbs came back and brought friends. The lbs added from having two pregnancies plus years of what I like to call "wear and tear" are not something I want to hold onto any longer. The difference now is there's not two hours in my day for the gym. Between working part-time, being a part-time student (still working on that degree) and a full time parent, I'm lucky I find 30 min in my day to do anything for myself. Two hours alone at the gym now seems like a luxury that I definitely can't afford which has started diminishing my goal of just getting off the couch and moving.

I want to move more, like on a treadmill, while listening to my ipod. 

I guess for right now my baby steps will have to suffice. I know I can find the time in there somewhere, it just may not be today or tomorrow.