Exercise

When I was in high school, particularly my freshman year, I was in pretty good shape. Like, the best shape of my life. I was on the volleyball team and my coach took off-season training seriously (probably because we lost every game we played that year). I could pound out 30 pushups like it was nothing. I may have felt like throwing up after all the sprints we had to do, but I could do them. Eventually, I had to give up sports for theatre (yep, I was a drama geek) and they don't tell you this, but theatre isn't a very good workout.

Long story short, it's been a long time since I've had a consistent exercise routine. About a year and a half ago, I had a doctor tell me that I was a "weakling" and that I had "basically no musculature" in my neck and shoulders. For about 2 seconds, I was determined to start working out regularly, but then life got in the way and I had a baby, etc, etc. Finally, several months ago, I was having some serious insomnia issues. I think my body was all out of whack from waking up so much with Libby, that even when she started sleeping through the night, I couldn't. One night, while laying in bed awake for over FOUR hours, I decided it was high time to make exercise a priority. The next day, I went to the gym and worked out so hard I felt like throwing up. It only took an hour for me to fall asleep that night. The next day, I worked out hard again and I fell asleep even faster. Since then, I have made it a goal to exercise at least a few times a week. It was harder back in NC, since I didn't have a gym with a nursery, but I'm so lucky now to be able to drop Libby off and exercise during the day. 

Libby had a cold for about a week and it was killing me to not be able to work out. My sleep was suffering, too. Finally, her leaky nose was contained enough that I felt okay about taking her to the nursery and behold, I can sleep again. Today, I swam laps for the first time in a very long while, and I felt strong. I'm a terrible swimmer and my technique sucks, but it felt good. I felt good. And that's what matters.