80 Pound Blitzkrieg

The Wake up-Snooze alarm cycle

Get out of bed... eventually

Greet the new day

Psych myself up for another day at the office

Haul ass to the office - arrive with all the enthusiasm I can possibly muster

Greet my colleagues

because, lets face it

and it's entirely their fault for being morons

Do that working thing for a while

Caffeinate

Ponder on what I am actually doing with my life in this job

Snack

Then a whole bunch of this for the afternoon

Followed by more colleague interactions

Finally it time for home and that magical thing gets to happen

And it's like the best part of the day

I really like my top hat, can I keep it?

I'm going to throw this out there straight off the bat - I am not now, nor have I ever been, known for my gracefulness. Or co-ordination. In fact, I seem to be one of the most accident prone people on the planet. In my (what feels like) very extensive life I have, chronologically, been concussed, drowned, electrocuted, broken my leg, concussed again (several times), had 3 car accidents, broken my nose, been concussed AGAIN by my cat, partially dislocated my knee and very recently been diagnosed with the "tightest ass ever" (I'm sure it's terminal). This is just the major stuff - last year I fell over twice in one week. One of those times was off a 20 inch box. 30 year olds are not designed for falling over - it takes a week to recover, it hurts and I'm pretty sure you aren't supposed to cry like a 3 year old, even though that's pretty much all you want to do.

So knowing what I know about myself, it really shouldn't have come as such a huge surprise, where by the mere act of removing myself from the shower has resulted in 3 days off work, an ultrasound and the complete inability for me to walk.

Mad Skillz - I has them.

The problem with this is when you live this kind of life:

you also end up with this kind of built in fear that you are going to die suddenly at the most inopportune moment - naked and alone, not to be found for 3 weeks, by which stage one of your cats has eaten you facial features. This was obviously the first and only thought that went through my head in the split second my foot slipped out from under me on the wet tiles of the bathroom floor... especially as the last thing I remember seeing before I hit the deck was my cat watching my from the hallway. Licking her lips. Oh God.

This is why I limit myself to one cat. That way I only have to outlive her and my eyelids will get to be buried with me. That and the fact that when you are single and over 30, more than one cat really signifies that the hope has died.

So you can imagine my relief when I opened my eyes. The fact that I could open them meant eyelids in tact. Suck it Smudge (cat), you will not feast on me this day!! Now the problem was the fact that I was still dripping wet, and as naked as the day I was born... and entirely unable to get back up.

Oh who am I kidding - it was more like this:

After some very graceful writhing on the wet floor, maybe a few tears and some very devout praying that I wasn't going to have to call for help, I managed to get myself upright, dry, semi clothed and assess the balloon that was now my foot. Well that's just frikn awesome, that is. Fortunately last week I redid my first aid certificate - their solution is RICE: Rest Ice Compression and Elevation. Rest wasn't a problem - I wasn't exactly moving anywhere in a hurry. This fact, however, made the last 3 components a little more difficult. So I changed the formula a *wee* bit. PRICE: Painkillers.... then something about like food or some thing... maybe I'll take a nap... hey why is my foot blue and purple and red ooooh pretty colours... I just wanna touch them OH SWEET MOTHER OF GOD THAT HURTS - GET ICE GET ICE!!! Yeah... I think they have that first formula for a reason.

Turns out after about 48 hours of intermittent icing, strapping, resting and elevating, my balloon has returned to something resembling  foot again and a lot of the initial pretty colourings have faded. Walking is not a lot of fun and boredom is now starting to slowly destroy my will to live.

Don't get me wrong, I feel like I have accomplished a lot in these last few days. I read the entire Hunger Games series and watched the first 2 movies. I am nearly up to date with most of the shows I never get to watch anymore. Except for a visit to the Doctor and getting my poor ankle ultrasounded, I haven't had to put pants on (which is particularly great because it bloody hurts), and I have fashioned my office chair into a viable means of room to room transport (with my co-ordination, mixed with painkillers, I don't see that going wrong at all). I have blogged for the first time in ages, have ordered a weeks worth of groceries online (yay - food! I needed to go shopping before I did this so I was down to a capsicum, a sweet potato and some chicken today - not inspiring) and am seriously considering taking a nap. So you can imagine I'm getting a weeeee bit on the bored side

So if you have any suggestions on how to keep oneself entertained - I am all ears. Although the following suggestions are not going to be helpful:

The Hokey Pokey - The leg can go in, the leg can come out, the leg cannot be shaken all about.

Kicking competitions - Can you be unarmed in a kicking competition?

I forgot to tell you about my physio appointment. I think I may have finally recovered from the trauma - maybe...

So I will give you a bit of background on my previous experiences with physios - being a sufferer of "lower back pain" for the last decade or so, I have seen doctors and physios alike seeking treatment for it, with pretty much the same response from all of them: Lose weight, the back pain will clear up. Yeah, thanks buddy, that's about as helpful as throwing a drowning man both ends of the rope.

After a few of these experiences, one might say I became *slightly* jaded in regard to certain medical professionals. That being said, I had great help with my bicep tendon tear last year... not so much with the hip flexor and groin tears though - it seemed to me that every time I hurt a "load bearing" support system, the solution was always 'drop some kgs'. 

Like I said - advise like that is about as useful as a solar powered flash light. I came to believe that it was just pain that I was going to have to put up with forever and, as such, worked around it - my posture changed, the way I moved changed, the way I went about manual handling was akin to that of your 85 year old nanna.

When I hurt my hips last June it got a lot worse - I was compensating with weird muscles when I was working out, every time I squatted I was in agony, I developed killer sciatica, and I went from having a bit of back pain to unable to straighten my legs, can barely move 90% of the time, quit crossfit hate my life type pain. A huge difference.

Even when I started at this new gym, I was hurting - I thought a drop off in intensity, the ability to lighten the lifting load and the time to mobilise would make it better - until I attempted a KB swing and just about passed out. I couldn't pop my hips, I still couldn't squat (to the point I have actually started to develop a pathological fear of squatting) and I couldn't sleep without pain killers. Not a good start. Luckily the new gym has an onsite physio and my coach basically insisted I go in for a consult. 

I'm gonna put this out there from the start - I am putting an inordinate amount of trust in the coaches of this new place - I mean, they seem to know what they are talking about and the likes, but that being said, it's not often that within 20 minutes of meeting a guy for the first time I let him have me pants-less on a table while he sticks stuff in my butt....

especially while not exclaiming "Damn you've got a tight ass"...

I fear I may have gotten ahead of myself.

Well, no not really. After a quick hand shake and explanation of the general area of pain, I was face down on the table, pants half down being dry needled from mid back to mid butt... and let me tell you that was a new lesson in pain. 

Apparently that wasn't enough. 

He was going to have to touch the butt. All of the butt. And the back and the legs and the hips. So it was pants off (and I would like to point out at this moment how VERY over due I was for any sort of below the waist hair removal treatment... I was wearing long pants for a reason!! MASSIVE SHAME FACE) and then I was summarily wedgied, palpated and touched in ways that brought back traumatic memories of certain moments of a Bali day spa trip.

My 20 minute consult turned into a 40 minute torture session. And it was, hands down, without a doubt the BEST THING THAT HAS EVER HAPPENED. To my ass anyway. I mean, sure the next 2 days were agonising and I was literally covered in bruises for most of the week, but I can walk, I can almost squat, I can move without constant pain! Hallelujah!! 

On top of the butt-blitzkreig, I was informed my posture needed some work... He called it Beyonce posture... shoulders back, tits out, butt out, unlocked knees. When I did it I felt less like Beyonce and more like...well, a duck. And coupling that with my newly discovered alarmingly long arm reach (my bench pin height is about 5 inches higher than the other girls I have benched with)... well I can only conclude that I now look like this:

Nah - it's actually not been that bad... but it is certainly taking some getting use too. Having spent so long hunched and trying to take up as little room as possible, taking up the room to have good posture, walking with my held held high, cranking out my butt and chest when I walk.. it's actually kind of empowering. It's remarkable - you actually feel more confident when you move with good posture. I'm not there yet - it still takes a lot of remembering and readjusting and correcting, but I think the attitude is half the battle too. But who knows, one day soon you might see me strutting down a city street near you being my all-powerful fabulous self - Queen Bey eat your heart out:

I watched Gravity last night. I have questions.

Do you think a fear of heights translates into space? I mean, on one level you are REALLY high up, but on another, it's not like you are falling. And isn't that what you are really afraid of when you refer to a fear of heights? In zero gravity space, you just float and drift there - so would you still be afraid of heights?

I started to think it would be more like that toe curling, sphincter tightening  fear you get when you are alone in deep water. You know - floating in the middle of the ocean alone. But then the thing that scares me about that is not knowing what is below you. I mean, in my head it is ALWAYS this:

In the ocean you know there are other things floating about and some of them will find you delicious, where as in space there isn't a whole lot else going on really... well certainly nothing that wants to eat you that we can announce with any certainty.

When you think about it, if space is the final frontier, a lot of people are kinda screwed if we ever have to relocate the population en masse... I figure space would have to be an agoraphobics worst nightmare, and I think the idea of hanging out in a space suit wouldn't be ideal for anyone with even the slightest notion of claustrophobia. And all the spinning would put off the dinophobes...

In fact that image alone is enough to terrify me. I get that this is a collection of pretty random thoughts - but seriously, doesn't this scare the crap out of anyone else? I get so caught up in my job and working out and food diaries and all the other teeny tiny, insignificant things that make up my life and then I think about my universal position and I despair that it all means nothing, that we are all just ants on a mountain and nothing I can do will ever change anything - I am just one person, with one lifetime after all.

I once had to write an exam essay for geopolitics on the statement "Our earth is one, our world is not" - basically I had to consider taking a look at human life on a global scale and its failure to measure up on a universal one. I guess the view from space makes you reconsider the necessity for borders.

It has been said that of all the creatures of the earth, humans are the only ones which alter the surroundings to suit their needs, whilst all others adapt. While the physical environment sustains us, it is our cultural, created environment that appears to destroy us. Long have we battled each other for land, resources, religion, human rights, when all the while our earth continues its long rotation around the sun, seemingly oblivious to the rabble upon its surface. It appears humanity’s greatest folly is its inability to comprehend that our time is not eternal here, and long after we are gone, the planet will still continue its path.

When I wrote this paper in 2004 the Australian Defence Force was operating in 11 different global operations, having personnel in Iraq and Iran, Solomon Islands, Persian Gulf, East Timor, Afghanistan, Israel, Syria, Lebanon, Jerusalem, Egypt, Eritrea and Ethiopia and the Southern Ocean - I guess on the upside, that number is down to six operations as of today (Department of Defence). On top of that, then-President Bush was announcing the ‘Axis of Evil’ in Iraq, Iran and North Korea, which only sought to draw attention away from other areas of conflict in Syria, Pakistan, India, China, Libya, Cuba, Sudan, Serbia, Somalia, Uganda, Myanmar, Congo, Bulgaria, Indonesia, Russia, Sierra Leone, El Salvador and Rwanda where daily human rights abuses occur (Marlatt, 2002). While major world powers push their right to see peace and equality in the Middle East, where a favourable result may see a drop in oil prices, they seem to not be as willing to quash all opposers of free will in other parts of the globe. It is this hypocrisy of morality and ethics that sees our world divided. Of course it is unrealistic to expect everyone just to be nice and get along, but one wonders what are we really fighting for? Or is the question what are we fighting against? It seems a global opinion that everyone is unique and we are all different in our own way, and yet when something we believe identifies with the same belief in another person, be it religion, culture or politics, we are find ourselves segregated from other parts of the global community, even though other beliefs may identify with those who we segregate ourselves from. We are not solely defined by one part of our beliefs, and yet it seems humanity is willing to kill or be killed to defend that part of ourselves.

We seem to fight for freedom: freedom from oppression, freedom of beliefs, the right to say and do what we want, when we want without fear of repercussions. But one must ask: how much right do we have to this right? In our society, where we do have this freedom, and we do acknowledge that everyone is different and unique, we still have conflict. By using our right to say and do what we want, we have a tendency to not take into consideration the feelings of others. This is a true failing of our species. Our inability to comprehend the effect we can have on others leads to more disharmony in our society than anything else. Outside our cultural environment we see how fragile ecosystems are and how one slight change, perhaps a few degrees in temperature, can destroy large webs of life. When are we going to see that our cultural landscape is exactly the same? Changing landscapes, be they political, religious, environmental or cultural, require adaption, and right now, we have to learn to adapt faster than evolution appears to let us. Our environment is changing so quickly and so often that we are barely able to keep up. It has been said that if the evolution of the globe could be measured on a 12 hour clock, humans would appear in the last second. And yet in that tiny fraction of time, they have changed the landscape so exponentially, it is a wonder how much more change at this pace we can sustain. Perhaps our greatest reason for a disharmonious world is not our ability to change the world, but our inability to adapt to what we have created.

I've decided that if I have to keep a food diary, I am going to have to have some fun with it. It is, therefore, now my mission to over describe the ever living shit out of everything I eat.

No more shall I be having a skinny cappuccino in the morning... Instead I will be having a dark roasted, robustly brewed cup of manna, the origins of which lie deep in the jungles of Africa. It will be served in the great Italian tradition with freshly heated and delicately frothed skim milk sourced from only the finest bovines, hand selected and raised in pristine conditions to ensure the delicate interplay between bean and cow is represented with integrity and perfection with each cup.

And that's just the beginning - the muesli I choke down every morning will be elevated from oats and shit to a veritable smorgasbord of deliciousness, my daily salad lunches will be mouthwatering displays of the outer reaches of my adjective ability. By the time this diary gets to my trainer, there will not be a describing word in the dictionary that hasn't been stretched to the absolute limit. There will be menus in top restaurants that wont have the the same level of absolute WANK that this food diary will have. 

Who knows, I might even learn to describe healthy food so well I wont mind eating it - when you stop looking at lettuce like, well, lettuce and start thinking of it as delicate leaves or hand picked fronds of greenery, it starts to sound a little more appetizing. It's all about sales really - if I can convince myself that I'm not eating healthy, I'm eating fancy then maybe I wont notice the complete lack of chicken nuggets and french fries in my current diet.

I need to make myself believe that I am not missing out.. in fact, it's everyone else that's missing out on my awesome food. That was, after all, one of the biggest struggles I had last time I tried this. I constantly felt like I was missing out on the fun stuff - you know cupcakes and lollies and sausage rolls. I mean they are the 'party foods' we all grew up with, every time you got to eat them you were having a great time. Those types of foods are the foods I associate with feeling happy - reward food, celebration food, treat food... I guess when I feel sad, that's part of the reason I turn to them. They are imprinted in my brain with happy memories so it's my go to for a mood pick-me-up. 

I think what I really need to work on is not just making healthy food habits, but also healthy food associations - connecting good food with good memories and reprogramming my brain to look there for solace, rather than in a bag on fun sized Mars Bars.

And then maybe one day I can reprogram all emotion/food connections so I don't look to eating as a solution to depression. Well a girl can dream anyway...

I decided to try doing that cooking thing, you know where you buy ingredients and make stuff out of them. It's still a pretty foreign concept to me (and a dangerous one based on my kitchen).  Look, it's not that I can't cook - it's that I don't cook. I mean, c'mon - the time, the mess, the shopping, the fore-thought, the desire to not eat the same dish 4 nights in a row because you cooked too much... cooking for one person is a butt load of effort for a meal that only you are going to appreciate (and only you are responsible for the cleaning). 

Case in point - my efforts this evening: 

I got home just after 6pm, which is pretty actually pretty early for me, and I had a pile of veggies left in the fridge from the weekend so I thought, 'what they hey - I've got the night off from the gym, let's do this'. So browsing through my goodies I had the following: 2 red capsicums, half a sweet potato,  half a butternut pumpkin, some asparagus, broccolini and some mixed lettuce. In my head I thought it would be perfect - I prep and cook them all and have a few meals out of it. So I have chopped, roasted, blanched, grilled and charred. I have turned, flipped, skinned and sprinkled. I have removed the cobwebs from my grill (and possibly cooked a large spider based on the distinct burning hair smell it was emitting shortly after I turned it on) and managed to not set fire to my oven again... or anything else for that matter (eyebrows still in tact).

In short: I have been cooking for 2 FUCKING HOURS.

Summary: I have given up and had a Lean Cuisine instead.

That's right, it is now after 8 o'clock and I am typing this in between mouthfuls of piping hot Chicken and Chorizo Risotto that took all of 4 and a half minutes to heat. Meanwhile, my roasted pumpkin and sweet potato are STILL IN THE FREAKING OVEN!!! This is why I don't cook. Although it would be a great weight loss tool if I did - BECAUSE I WOULD STARVE TO DEATH IN THE PROCESS!!

Update: Veggies are out of the oven and cool enough to add to my blanched broccolini, grilled asparagus, charred red capsicum and lettuce.

Result: 2 and a half hours and the result is a salad. A Fucking Salad. A Fucking Delicious Salad - but still salad nonetheless.

The raw food movement is looking pretty good right now. Silver lining - I now have lunch and dinner for most of the rest of the week and it will look impressive in my food diary.. when I eventually get to eat it.

Ok folks this is it - today is T-1 day to full body assault. We are talking Grievous bodily harm, atomic dietary blitz, man the battle stations, sound the alarms WE ARE UNDER ATTACK.

I just finished my 12 week program walk through with the new coach and I am a bit excited - it is a solid plan for mobility, rehabilitation, core strength, technique and form correction and (most importantly) body fat annihilation. And I was all like 'Woot, this will be awesome'... until he dropped the F bomb... well the F D Bombs: Food Diary. Ugh. Accountability. In WRITING. With like, honesty and stuff.

Yes I know, it's good for me and it will help and blah blah blah blah blah. But for the last few (coughsixcough) months I haven't really been thinking all too hard about what is going in me... nutritionally any way... and all those good habits I made last year kind of, well, vanished. So now I have to start all over again. And a little bit of me (ok 90% of me) is feeling a little bit like 'Can't we just hide under the blankets and wait for the world to just go away' instead of 'Yeah, clean eating! Woohoo Kale! Mmmm Quinoa get in ma belleh!'. And yes, I am fully aware that weight loss is diet based and most healthy food can actually be really tasty - but deep down inside, there is that part of me that knows potato chips are far tastier than kale chips and ice cream cannot be portion controlled and ermahgerd cheeeeesse!!!

Having to make those decision all over again and then everyday for the rest of my frikn life - to eat well, to really monitor treats, to be a responsible adult - they just make me weary. Sometimes the more responsibility you put on yourself, the less and less you feel like being a grown up. Can't someone else pay my bills and mortgage and clean and cook and work? Can't someone else decide what I want to be when I grow up and what I should do with my superannuation and how much of what type of insurance I need and do my taxes and tell me where the hell you learn all stuff you need to be a grown up? WHAT ARE INSURANCE PREMIUMS AND WHY DO I PAY THEM?

I feel like at 30, this is shit I should know - you know - how to make nutritional food for all the meals in a day, not just like, one of them and what some of my bills mean and product disclosures and what happens if I don't agree with all the terms and conditions but want the product anyway - is there grounds for negotiations? If not, why not? Is there are Being a Grown Up For Dummies? I think I need it.

I'm sorry, I tend to get a little 'tangent-y' when it comes to this stuff - I get asked to keep a food diary and all of a sudden I am having a panic attack about my lack of knowledge on tax law. I guess when you start having a hard look at one part of your life, like your diet, and you see certain irresponsible habits - you can see them in other parts of your life too. I can't decide if I'm just really ignorant on what it takes to be a grown up or if I am just clinging desperately to my youth with a giant Peter Pan complex. I think I am stubborn enough to never grow up if I really put my mind to it. I mean, do I really have to change... I'm pretty awesome as is, right?

I guess the defining moment is whenever I actually hang out with anyone a decade younger than me for any longer than about 5 minutes. It's usually about that time that I realise being a grown up isn't so bad, early bed time is a good idea, drinking on school nights is not and if I don't take care of my body now, I wont be alive to complain about how much more awesome things were when I was young. Food Diary it is then.

I'm going to level with you right now - if you aren't comfortable with the word "vagina" let me offer you some advise

1. Probably don't continue reading this post

2. Probably don't put your penis in one.

Most of the time I don't mind being a woman, it's got it's perks. But I just want to take a moment to cover off on some obvious design flaws that I think were overlooked in production.

Firstly - boobs. Starting with the obvious question: Is that really the best place for them?

Ok I am not here to offer engineering advise as to where else they might like to be located, but did anyone really think their current placement through? And this isn't even a size-ist argument. Even small boobs have their problems. But because big boobs are within my range of specialist knowledge I'd like to open with the following complaints:

- Why do they have to hurt so often?

- Why are they somewhere so very inconvenient to a standard range of motion for our arms

- What is the point of having some of them get so big? Even on an aesthetic level there is point of ridiculousness

- Why do they have the structural integrity of half-set pudding? This one bugs me more than the others - surely there could have been some sort of skeletal/muscular support system built into their design that would also accommodate their overall purpose. Most of the problems I have with them is the fact that behave like two bags of wet cement - and like most building products, much scaffolding is required to get them to set into any sort of reasonable shape each day. Surely at some point of evolution our genetic material must have thought 'oi vey, my back is killing me, I should really evolve some cells into some sort of matriclinous brassier for this poor species'. I truly believe the next phase of human evolution will involve the declining need for an angel card at Victoria's Secret.

But boobs aren't really my pet gripe when it comes to the indisputably conspicuous defects of the female form. No, that is reserved solely for the female reproductive system, in particular what I have come to refer to as "Shark Week". Because this:

In all honesty HOW IS THIS A PRACTICAL SYSTEM?? I just can't make sense of it, even on the most fundamental, evolutionary basis - it's ridiculous. Sure I know at one point we actually needed to actively perpetuate the population (although I'm pretty sure we have been self-sustaining long enough to relinquish the need). But still - how has bleeding for a week every month EVER been practical? Maybe our homo sapien predecessors would have survived longer in their caves if the female of the species weren't sending out wounded animal smoke signals to every passing carnivorous predator every month. That's probably also one of the reason women can be slightly irrational at that time - historically we've had defend ourselves from being the lunch of a hungry Sabre-tooth, so now we are evolutionar-ily prepossess to want to stab you in the face.

It's at this point I would like to take a massive back step with feminism. Sure, the equal rights movement brought out a lot of good for women... but in reality, we are not equal. If a man woke up one morning and found his penis had been bleeding profusely for the last 14 hours, I feel he would probably find it a reasonable excuse to, perhaps, take the day off, sort out his last will and testament, farewell his family and friends and accept the fact that his time had come. Women, on the other hand, are expected to put a plug in it, eat a chocolate and get on with the day. What sort of stupid system is this? Woman - you are bleeding, you are cramping, you are tired, your first instinct towards others leans heavily on the side of physical violence... and that's only if your back, boobs and head don't also ache. And if you're really lucky, you also feel like crying for no particular reason (other than all of the above, which I happen to think are perfectly good reasons for crying), and generally want nothing more than to curl back up into bed and sleep/die, either usually being ok at the time. People get admitted to hospitals for lesser symptoms than this!!!

And that's all before you add our "solutions" to the issue. The most popular solution is to take a small wad of cotton wadding and cram it in our most intimate of areas for hours at a time. Well until you use the wrong absorbency and it invariably leaks the one day you chose to wear white or you have to remove it under-used like a lump of sand paper because you use them whilst living under the constant threat of toxic shock syndrome and how long is too long?? That's right - our tampons are trying to kill us. Fun solution yeah!

But even that is better than some of the alternatives: maxi pads are about as much fun as wearing adult diapers and just as prone to spills. The thought of moon cups still makes me want to vomit a little.... and I don't think I have gotten around the practicalities of having to remove, empty, wash and reinsert the device in a world of public rest rooms. There is, of course, chemical intervention. Using your contraception to skip your periods is fine, until you don't and then it seems like you didn't skip them, you just saved them up and they all hit you at once (or is this just me??). Also, on a side note - I think our generation is still in a slightly experimental phase of hormone tampering - I wonder what future generations will make of our current medical interventions with pro-creation and contraception, considering what we now make of previous generation's efforts with it. But that is just a personal, uneducated, non-scientific opinion of very little credibility.

In other cultures, and at other times, women were sent into isolation for this magical time of the month. Sometimes to baths (I'll read that as Day Spa), sometimes to private tents - ostracised for the week for being unclean. But really, besides the ostracism - I don't think this is such a bad system. I couldn't imagine anything better than a society that decided 'You know what - that is a horrible process you are subjected to for the benefit of the species, how about you do you for the week, and we support that'.

And I'm not saying that we go back to sitting in tents for a week - no, I think feminism, and indoor plumbing, has come far enough that we should be able to say screw it, I'm going back to bed (right after I shower and change the sheets) or carry on as normal - I think we still deserve the choice. Bloody feminism has demanded equal rights and all of a sudden we don't feel like we have the choice to say this bodily function makes me un-functional. Now we have to pretend it doesn't affect us, and heaven forbid we talk about it or blame our moods and behaviour on it - such betrayal to the sex! We are the masters of our bodies and our emotions and behaviour and our uterus has no control over us!

Except when it totally does.

And should a mere male dare to crack wise in reference to the timing of certain mood swings then he shall be both crucified and burned alive! Look, I know it's not very liberated of me to say this, but I think we really might be missing the benefits of embracing the suck that is menstruation. We get a few days off to wallow in our most comfortable pajamas, bra-free and un-bothered by the rest of the world and the rest of the world doesn't have to put up with a bunch of women evolution designed to be particularly stabby a few days a month.

That is the tone of the emergency evacuation siren in my work building. Apparently it is also the tone currently playing in my digestive system. I've been a bit run down this week, feeling nauseous and a bit headachy, but this afternoon my body decided to run it's own surprise evacuation drill... you know, the kind where everything on the inside makes for the nearest exit... fun times.

Consequently I am now enjoying a workout free week. Perhaps "enjoying" is not quite the right word for it. Trust me, I would rather be working out right now, but unfortunately my anal sphincter has engendered me with severe trust issues of late. That and the fact that the household suffered extreme shortages in the TP department at a very inopportune moment this afternoon resulting in this

Thus a much required trip to the shops was took precedent over a ill-advised trip to the gym.

That actually turned out for the best - I have discovered that the best time to make good food decisions at the shops is when you are in the middle of regretting ever putting anything resembling food into your body. There is nothing quite like stomach churning nausea (and the ever present threat of launching a spontaneous and unpreventable shart that brings new definition to the phrase "Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs") to really set you up to make rapid, focused decisions with your nutrition. At least when I am game enough to eat again this week I will have lots of good foods to choose from.

HI Nicky,

I just wanted to say thank you - I got this message 2 weeks ago and it sat in my head like a worm. I didn't see it for the longest time because I was too afraid to look at this site with all the fitspo stuff on it while I was in the midst of sucking so hard at trying to be healthy - or not even trying as it turned out. The last few months have been really hard, but your message (when I finally saw it) reminded me what a powerful tool I had here - a place to brain dump all the stuff that was making me feel like crap and keeping me from reaching my goals and a place where people I don't know read what I'm going though and identify with it or find it inspiring. Most days I don't feel inspiring - most days I just feel sweaty and gross and want to eat ice-cream from the tub whilst binge watching Supernatural. But knowing that I am not alone with that makes it easier to pick myself back off the floor where I collapsed several months ago and try again. 

I guess I underestimated the power of a community - even an online one - and it's ability to forgive failing and encourage having another try. I felt a bit embarrassed that I just fell apart quite so spectacularly and entirely and didn't want to admit it - but I can hardly claim to be being honest on here without publishing my failures as much as my successes. So thank you for the reminder that I am here to be honest - not just with you guys, but with myself - this is my online accountability to living a healthier life in the real word... with all it's ups and downs and everything in between.

Hope you are still reading!

Ok time for a status update:

1. I broke up with crossfit. 

Big decision I know, but with a combination of work hours and injuries plaguing me, it just became impossible to train with anything resembling regularity. It was not an easy decision, and as I am now finding, exercising without a program is hard. Luckily that is being solved next week, which bring me to status update numero dos - 

2. New Gym

Scary new gym. I have now shifted my focus away from the crazy intensity of crossfit to the more measured madness of powerlifting. I have started training at PTC ( http://www.ptcperth.com.au/ for those of you playing at home). I think I am going to really like it there - and I think my body will benefit from the change of pace. I think I am also designed better to be a lifter than a crossfitter... although it does mean I will have to do a lot of conditioning work on my days off. 

3. New Program

The way my new training schedule is going to work is very different to what I am used to. Training is only 4 days a week instead of 6 - 3 weight sessions (squat, bench and deadlift are the focus) and then a conditioning class on Saturday mornings. I had a movement assessment on Friday night - basically one of the coached takes you through a series of movements and figures out how functional and flexible you are, how your core strength is, your stability and overall health. Having to run through the list of things that are currently wrong with me took a while... he needed more paper to keep up... but based on my results there are no restrictions on any of my basic movements. The only thing I need to stay clear of is overhead lifts until my trunk stability improves. Which is fine with me, anything that corrects my movements and works on my weaknesses is going to benefit me overall. This is a long term plan that is going to rehab my current injuries, build on my strengths, work on my weaknesses and turn me into a more functional athlete.

4. Speaking of athlete...

Last year when I was training for Primals I realised how very very motivating competition is. This is part of the reason I am really looking forward to improving my functionality - I really want to compete. But here is the double edged sword of that idea: powerlifting is divisionally ranked by body weight. Right now I would be in what is called 'Super Heavy Weight'... yuck. Just Yuck. I mean, c'mon - I've heard of calling a spade a spade, but really? Is there not something a little less demoralising to call it? Ugh.

So therein lies my dilemma - I could compete or I could wait until I was in a sub-90kg division to spare my dignity of being saddled with Super Heavy Weight as my wonderfully descriptive prénommer. As it stands I wouldn't be ready to compete for at least 3 months anyway, which does give me time to drop some of the weight I would need to drop - but I would be pushing it to get to a sub-90kg in that time. Especially with the way my diet has been lately.... bringing me nicely to point 4.

4. Nutrition... if you can really call it that.

Oh dear lord how the mighty have fallen. You know that promise you have with yourself that you will be better on Monday and you will eat only good food and totally eat so many vegetables and never eat pizza again. Well I have that conversation with myself most weeks now.

Ok EVERY week now.

I don't know what happened but DAMN! Did I fall off the healthy bandwagon with a thump! Luckily Pizza broke my fall or I could have really hurt myself. I guess one of the biggest things I noticed when I stopped writing was that I stopped being accountable for my diet, because who would know! And because food! Yeah, food - delicious delicious food. All up in my belly all the time. And don't kid yourself - I was definitely not binge eating vegetables - unless you count the peanuts inside the MnMs as legumes?

You probably shouldn't.

Which means according to the highly accurate and professionally calibrated scales at the new gym, I now have 7 kilos to lose AGAIN... as well as the other, you know, 30 odd ones that I was already working on. Boo! But it was totally the kick in the butt that I needed. I mean you can hardly eat Butterfingers for breakfast and hope to lose weight now, can you? Can you? No really - if you can, I would really like to know.

Basically on Monday I get my first 12 week training program - so along with that is going to be the unfun food "nutritional therapy". And all the joys that go along with it - the sugar cravings, withdrawals, cantankerousness, abject disgust in all humans not also in some state of suffering, violent outburst of loathing focused at smilers, and all-round grouchiness for at least the first 11 weeks and 6 days of this plan. Bring it on - it needs to happen and it needs to happen now!

To help get me started, this weekend I am doing a 48 hour rapid detox just to really torture myself - I mean, why only suffer a little bit, when you can suffer a whole lot? The fact that I have a Hen's day on Saturday should really turn the screws too. I'm super excited. Can't wait. Pumped, one might say.

Just fucking kill me already.

But there you have it - my plan for doing stuff this year. Fix body, lift heavy, eat good, don't kill anyone in the process.