Victory is mine.

My alarm went off at 4:50 AM yesterday and I bounced jubilantly (read: hit snooze, then crawled in slow motion while scowling) out of bed with the energy of Jillian Michaels on crack a dead snail. Once up, I threw on the new workout clothes and warmed up by dancing idiotically to Kanye West in front of my mirror (until I caught a glimpse of myself and how ridiculous I looked, at which point I turned around to face the wall). After the brief warm-up, I did all most of the stretches recommended on the Couch-to-5K website, but not as many reps as they recommended. Still, since I’ve never bothered to stretch before exercise, ever, I was happy with what I did.

I headed outside with my Couch-to-5K app strapped to my arm, and did the entire stinking day one workout. It was pretty simple. First, you warm up with a brisk walk for five minutes. Then the real work begins and you run for 60 seconds, walk for 90 seconds and repeat for 20 minutes before winding down with another 5-minute walk. The app was great because you never have to look at your phone to check the time. There is a little jingly noise and a voice prompt telling you to run, walk, run, walk at the proper times.

I did great for the first interval, but after that, I was tempted to chuck it all and just walk. I mean, seriously, I’m super out of shape and fat, so maybe I’m diving into this running thing a bit early, I reasoned with myself. But then I told myself to shut it, and kept running. I didn’t wanna, I didn’t like it, and I questioned the sanity of my desire to be a runner a few thousand times, but I kept going. I didn’t stop. I pushed through the pain, the breathlessness and the giant blisters forming on the back of my right ankle, and I did  it. Woo!

To an outsider watching, I may have looked like I was hobbling at the pace of an elderly person with hip fractures, but that doesn’t matter. What matters is that I finished. Sure, people who are used to exercise would probably scoff at a “simple” walk/run like the one I did, but to someone who hasn’t run in a minimum of two-and-a-half years, it was tough.

According to C25K, I’m only supposed to run every other day, so I’ll probably walk on my days off. I actually enjoy walking (probably because it’s not running!).

The only thing that suuuuucks about starting to exercise (other than it hurts and it’s not as fun as sleeping in or almost anything else that exists) is the inevitable weight gain. On Sunday morning when I got on the scale, I had lost another pound. Then, after walking Sunday night and running Monday morning, I gained 2. UGH. I know that it is just my muscles holding on to water, and that it doesn’t represent a “real” gain, but this has been one of the reasons over the years that I have chucked exercise—I just seem to lose faster when I’m not doing it. BUT. I know that overall, exercise will speed up the weight loss process and make me look and feel much better than eating right alone, so I’m going to ignore the scale for now (or only weigh in once a week, which is what I should be doing anyway).

One other minor thing that sucks is how nauseated I was after I finished the run. That always seems to happen when I work out my legs, and I've heard it's because the blood flow is concentrated in the legs and less in the head. I took a cold shower to cool off, then laid down on my bed with my legs up the wall to get some blood flow back to my brain, and I felt better after 10 minutes or so. 

So, another small victory is in the bag! Now to repeat this on a regular basis (gulp)… Someone remind me to wear a snugger sports bra.