Category: Confidence

Low

A low point. A lull. A dark place. Depression.

I would put money down on the fact that none of those words or phrases sparked good feelings in you. Yeah, me either. However, sometimes they are my reality… like right now.

I am in a pretty weird place mentally right now. I can’t explain why I feel like I do. I can even rationally and objectively say that there’s no real reason for it. I woke up in fog like 10 days ago, and besides a slight break when I was visiting family and had some excitement and happiness around that, I feel like I can’t shake it. I am tired… no, exhausted, in a way that I can’t describe other than to say that sleep doesn’t help. I wouldn’t say that I feel sad, but I definitely feel pretty apathetic. I am having a hard time relating to anyone so I’ve been pretty much sticking to myself unless I have to be around others. I guess that’s what the mental health world would call self-isolation.

I have been dealing with some mental health stuff for a few months now that I’m not ready to go into detail on, but it’s been a lot to process. I spent so much time and energy trying to understand it that I honestly think I totally zapped myself of all energy. I am still my highly functional self at work, but when the day is done, I feel like all my energy went into work and I have nothing left to give to friends, my husband, and family. I have been fortunate that I have had several days where I was scheduled to be off during all of this. I haven’t worked out in over 2 weeks and, while I know I need to, I haven’t been able to make myself. Maybe some of it is the social aspect. I absolutely love doing CrossFit and thoroughly enjoy the people I work out with, but I am so afraid that they’ll see me like this that I’ve avoided going. I told myself that I would work out this afternoon. I am going to try to keep that commitment to myself.

Normally when I write, I try to approach the world in a positive way. Forgive me, but today, I just can’t. I am honestly only writing in hopes that spilling my guts onto a keyboard and screen will give me some perspective. Here’s the honest truth, I am tired, self-isolating, and down. I know I won’t be here forever. I know the fog will lift and I’ll see the sun again. I don’t know when, but I know it will happen. That said, how I feel right now really friggin’ sucks. It might not be the most positive and uplifting thing to read, but it is reality. One of the things that I pride myself on is being willing to be open and honest and show you who I really am. It is a goal of mine to use my platform to show reality, even when reality isn’t all that pretty. Currently, on a lot of days, it takes all my energy just to get out of bed and look like a human. Then I scrape more energy together to get through my work days. I feel really foggy when I go into conversations, but I think I am doing an okay job of faking it when I need to. Faking it… not ideal but also a reality for many of us.

Maybe sitting here writing this will help. Maybe it won’t. It’s okay if it doesn’t and it would be great if it did. Either way, I will be okay, and if nothing else, I feel less alone when I am “talking” in this blog. Sometimes the starting point is just saying “hey, I’m not okay right now.” It is okay not to be okay… and today I am not okay.

Letting Go… Maybe?

Letting go… one of the hardest concepts in life.

Think about all the things that are hard to let go of. Right down to material possessions like old clothes and homes, I think humans really struggle to let go. There are things that are harder to release yourself from like memories, both good and bad, people, thoughts, whether negative or positive, our own toxic traits, and so many other things.

As I think about the year 2020, one of the things I struggled with the hardest was letting go. I’d guess that everyone has had some struggles this year. This has been a year full of “will things ever be normal again?” We have clung so tightly to what once was that, at times, it has been difficult to enjoy where we are now.

My inability to let go has taken so much joy from my days in the last year. When I say that, I know I am judging my own feelings, which is not okay, but I am choosing to hang on to this, and I know that. I have been in situations that have been incredibly difficult this year. There have been lost loved ones, friendships that have ended, moments of incredible uncertainty, mourning the loss of what once was in my job, and a ton of time spent alone to agonize over all of the above.

Here is the thing, we ALL carry baggage. Even people who will tell you to “just let it go,” are carrying full suitcases of shit from their past. Ever had a situation cause you to struggle to trust others? Baggage. Ever carried old hurts into new relationships? Baggage. Ever let your childhood trauma cause troubles in your adult life? Baggage. I could go on, but you get the point. Is we’re going to carry baggage regardless, how do we do it in a healthy way?

Resolutions are definitely ridiculous and often don’t end favorably. That said, maybe what I need to do in 2021 and beyond, is learn to let go of certain things and carry the rest in a better way. Maybe the best thing to do is remember that while 2020 was insanely challenging, I have never had a year where I learned more.

Despite all the tears, loss, and struggles, there was beauty that came out of a tough year. I learned to let go of my fears and judgement and recognize that I have feelings, lots of them, and feeling them is better than constantly stuffing them. I learned that I am blessed by some really true friendships that have helped me through some big challenges. I also learned that there were some friendships that just weren’t meant to be that I will always miss, and maybe never completely understand the loss of. I have learned a lot about death, grief, and loss, including a solid working knowledge of how I process grief. I have learned that my thoughts about things control my feelings, and not the other way around, which means I am capable of changing my own narrative if I focus on thinking differently. I have basically learned to get real with myself, even when it’s the hardest thing to do.

Maybe I don’t have the whole “letting go” thing down yet, and maybe I never will. Maybe, just maybe, it is okay to hang onto some things when you clean out your closet. When you dig deep into your closet, you almost always find that awful crop top you wore in your early 20’s, and its easy to put that in the donation bag… however, you probably have some fun memories made wearing that thing that you can keep without hanging onto the actual shirt. Odds are, you also have some less than stellar memories in that crop top, which you can also hang onto… but find a new shirt too, make memories in it, learn lessons wearing it, eventually get rid of the actual shirt, keep more memories, but keep the ones you choose to keep. You can do the same with the stages of life. It is possible to accept that that phase (the crop top phase) is over, let go of what you choose to and keep what you choose to.

Here is to a happy and healthy 2021, full of new experiences, lessons, and hopefully a lot of love for ourselves and those around us.

The Sham that is Self-Care.

Self-care seems to be the latest trending fad. Everything is self-care and honestly, I am over it. Yes, there is value in self-care, but most of the time I think we are missing the point.

Is self-care a spa day or a manicure? Yes, of course, that could be a form of self-care, but there is so much more to it than that. Sometimes you absolutely need to prioritize getting a massage, or a facial, or a new haircut. Without a doubt, that is self-care in one form. That said, I don’t think stuff like that is even the tip of the iceberg when it comes to caring for oneself.

Another thing I feel like I have encountered, and probably done plenty of myself, is the idea that we need to remove everyone from our lives that is “toxic,” while failing to acknowledge that we are also toxic. Is it important to remove or unfollow people that make us feel shitty? OF COURSE. However, we also need to realize that we might be the person someone else is unfollowing because we make them feel shitty. It’s not a one way street. EVERY SINGLE PERSON WALKING THIS PLANET HAS TOXIC TRAITS. No one is exempt. Self-care also doesn’t mean that we don’t have to care for anyone else. “I’m doing me” does not mean that we don’t have to be there for anyone else. Being a good friend and human is also important. I can tell you from my own first hand experience that pushing others away in an attempt to better ourselves ends so badly. I have watched friendships and past relationships blow up in my face because I failed to take care of the people I cared for while only worrying about myself. Eliminating interpersonal relationships because you are “doing you,” could, in theory, be a means of self-care, but it is a lonely road.

You want to know what I am doing lately to care for myself?

I am learning to allow myself to feel all of my negative emotions and be okay with that. I am acknowledging that I will probably always carry around a high level of anxiety and learning that it is okay, despite it being the most emotionally wrenching thing in my life. I am spending time alone and writing down my thoughts, no matter how vile they may be. I am learning that I judge myself entirely too much, and trying to learn how not to do that. It isn’t easy, but it is a form of self-care.

I am learning that I am not the person I thought I was. I am not capable of always being an extrovert, and honestly, people exhaust me. I am realizing that forcing myself to be social when I don’t feel up for it actually hurts my relationships more than it helps them. Despite feeling some sense of FOMO, sometimes I just need to say no to plans because I need mental rest in order to show up better for the people I love.

I am someone who feels like perfection is possible, but for some reason I think I need to be perfect at everything I do. I always have. It is probably some sort of coping mechanism of children with traumatic upbringings or something. Regardless, I have set a standard for myself that is impossible, and while I know that logically, it doesn’t stop my inner self critic. I have to constantly be working on the idea that sometimes a B effort is good enough and not everything has to be an A+.

I am also working on the concept that it is not circumstances that cause my reactions to things, but my thoughts about said circumstances. Even if someone looked me in the eye right now and told me I wasn’t looking my best, that is merely a circumstance. My thoughts about what that means are what is causing me to have negative feelings. Today, for example, my circumstance is that I am tired and not feeling 100%. Instead of just accepting that, my mind automatically thinks I am not going to get anything done today which causes me to feel inadequate. My goal is to be able to think “I might not get the house cleaned, but this is a great time to catch up on some reading or watch that movie I have been wanting to watch.” I’d love to be able to do that and feel like I did exactly what I set out to do today, to rest.

My point is that self-care, as we mentally portray it, is entirely inaccurate. More often than not, it is the tough stuff. The stuff where you dig deep into your soul and really look at yourself to try to clean up some of your toxic traits to live a healthier life. Sometimes it is getting the damn massage, but also not feeling guilty that you took a time out to do it. Sometimes it is admitting to yourself that you are, in fact, toxic, and that it isn’t always everyone else around you. Sometimes self-care is knowing that you are “doing you,” but taking a time out when a friend needs you, even when it wasn’t convenient. Sometimes, self-care is saying no to plans because you know damn well that you can’t show up how you want to… and NOT having FOMO about it. So, by all means, enjoy a spa day or a red wine bubble bath, but also take some time to do the tough stuff.

Auld Lang Syne

So begins another new year, and all the resolutions that come with these sorts of momentous occasions. Change is good and for some people a big event like a new year is a great time to start a change. I am not one to be a huge believer in resolutions, but I do see value in them. I think that anything that promotes positive change in our lives, whatever that may be, is valuable. That said, I have been thinking about the year ahead and some of my goals and what I want to accomplish and started making a list of things I want to do or change in 2020. Writing things down makes them more concrete for me, so I thought I’d share.

1. Read more. This year, I want to immerse myself in more books. Fiction, non-fiction, self-help, etc. All of the above. When I am reading more, I feel more mentally stimulated. It helps me at work, as well as in the rest of my life. For me, sometimes “read” more means more audio books because of all the time I spend in the car for work. I do plan to increase my time spent listening to audio books, but I really want to spend more time with… wait for it… paper books. I don’t want my time spent reading to be screen time. Part of why I want to read more is to reduce screen time.
2. Write more. Writing is an outlet for me. It helps me center myself and refocus when I am struggling with life and all of its anxiety. When I initially started considering this, I thought about setting a finite goal like “publish a blog every week,” but that’s not necessarily reasonable. Sometimes I just don’t have an experience or feeling I need to write about. I do hope to publish blogs more often this year, so I hope you all enjoy.
3. Maintain a more positive attitude. This is something I have been working on for a while, and I do believe I’ve made progress, but this will forever be a goal. Life is a gift, and it is important to treat it as such. Every second spent in a bad headspace is a second that you cannot get back. Our seconds of living are not infinite. That said, maintaining a positive attitude does not mean that a person must walk around bubbly happy every second of every day. For me, it means little things like remembering that things don’t happen to me, they just happen, and how I handle them matters. It also means that having the “I can’t” attitude needs to be a thing of the past.
4. Minimize my alcohol consumption. In 2019, I made a lot of positive diet changes and got consistent with my workouts. One thing I continued to hold onto was my alcohol consumption. I don’t drink to excess constantly or anything. However, I am basically mentally trained to cure boredom with food and drink. It isn’t uncommon to fill a Saturday afternoon with “lets go grab pizza and beers.” While I do think this is something that is okay to do on occasion, its become a thing I do too often. It is often harmful to my training and doesn’t align with the fitness goals I have set for myself.
5. Avoid situations and people that don’t feel positive or happy. This goes back to maintaining a positive attitude for me. While I know and appreciate that I am very much in charge of my mindset, part of that is surrounding myself with like-minded, positive people and situations. I wrote a blog a little while back about a change of scenery and the importance of cheering each other on and not being in situations where an entire group of people are having a conversation that is nothing but bashing someone else. I meant everything that I wrote. I want to be in good situations with uplifting people whenever possible.
6. Stop minimizing my feelings and allow myself to be more vulnerable. You guys, I can be a lot to handle. I am so emotional. At my worst, I am sensitive, stubborn, difficult, and borderline depressive. I care about everything and I feel everything. At my best I am generous, caring, and always available to the people I love. I spend so much time trying to fit in a box and not be “too much” for people. While I do think it is important to have control over emotions, I also think its important to let people see me for who I am, even on the tough days. Looking back, I think most of the times in life when I have fallen into a longer term, negative attitude has been the result of burying feelings.
7. Stop worrying so much about what my body looks like and focus on what it is capable of. I have spent too many years thinking I weighed too much. 2019 was maybe the first year that I really started to appreciate all the things my body can do. We ask our bodies to handle so much, and really, we should appreciate them instead of hating them. I can lift heavy weights, do gymnastics movements, run long distances, and climb mountains, among so many other things. I have a lot to celebrate. I am physically capable of so much, so why do I still let a scale define me some days? That is some crap that needs to be left behind.
8. Take space when I need it. This is simple really. I do not need to be constantly available to the world. Of course, it is important to be there for friends and family, but it is also important to be available for oneself. I am done showing up for every little outing that comes up. This year I am going to take time away from people when I need it. I am going to give myself space to breathe. I am going to allow myself to say no and be okay with missing out on things. Mostly, I am going to allow myself time to reflect and be alone when I am tired either physically or mentally.
9. Prioritize sleep. Anyone who knows me knows that sleep is such an issue for me. I am either getting 9 hours of sleep or 3. I have a hard time falling asleep sometimes. I am on prescription medication to help me sleep. I am going to try to be as consistent as possible with bed time. From a training perspective, it is so important for recovery. From a life perspective, it is so important for a good attitude. Getting enough sleep is also detrimental to controlling my emotions.
10. Spend more time talking about the present and future than the past. We cannot change what has happened in the past, but we can sure as hell plan for the future. We can also be present in the now. I want to talk about hopes and dreams for the future with my people. I want to put my phone and other distractions away and be present to have these conversations in the moment.

 
I truly hope that 2020 is the best year yet for all of us. I really hope that in a year’s time I can look back at this blog and say that I made some progress towards all these things. It’s the roaring 20’s and its time for a glow up.

I Failed Today…

Have you ever thought about what it means to be a failure? Like during those times when you feel like a failure or feel like you are failing at a certain aspect of life, what does that mean in the grand scheme of life?

When I look up the definition of failure, there are 3 things listed.
1. Lack of success. This is a basic definition. Success is the inverse of failure, so it makes sense as a definition. However, who defines success? If we are looking at a math problem, I suppose success is finding the right answer. That’s black and white though. If you say you are failing at parenting, for example, how do you define success? My point is that we often set our own expectations for what success means.
2. The omission of expected or required action. I love this one because it uses the word “expected” within it. To my point earlier, you set the expectation.
3. The action or state of not functioning. This definition is the one used in the medical community. As health care workers, when we talk about heart failure or total organ failure, we mean that parts of the body are just blatantly not functioning in the way they were designed to. This is the definition used in the mechanical world too. However, I think that it is valid in life. Back to the example before, to fail at parenting, one would simply have to not function in any capacity as a parent.

I have a friend who has been struggling. No, this is not one of those “asking for a friend” things. I am writing about all of this with her permission. To make a long story incredibly short, we had a lengthy text exchange a little over a week ago that was full of negative self-talk and “I feel like a failure” from her. The whole thing made me incredibly sad and I got defensive. I was defending her to her, in a way. It ultimately came down to me saying “STOP BEING ABUSIVE TO YOURSELF!” After me being a little harsh with her, we started getting to the root of the issue, which was ultimately that her self esteem was in a tough place and that she wanted to get back to eating healthier, living a healthier lifestyle, etc.

We set these incredibly high expectations for ourselves based on the picture perfect lives we see others leading. What you see on social media isn’t real. You might see a picture-perfect family or a mom you assume is perfect, but I can guarantee you that the perfect family has skeletons and that perfect mom has days where she wants to run away from her family too. This is life. It’s normal to feel that way sometimes. Its normal to have bad days. This doesn’t make you a failure.

I am really trying, in my own life, to look at things that I once viewed as failures as opportunities now. Simple things like instead of viewing not getting a job I applied for as a failure, maybe it was an opportunity to improve my resume’ or practice my interviewing skills. In the gym, if I fail a lift, I look at it as an opportunity to work on my accessory strength.

In the bigger life things, like marriage for example, I am also trying to evaluate my own expectations of myself. What are they based on? Are they reasonable? If I mess something up in my marriage, its really an opportunity to talk through it and hopefully gain a deeper understanding of one another.

Bottom line is that life isn’t easy. It is even harder if we are walking around calling ourselves failures. If you can recognize when things aren’t going how you’d hoped and start making plans for growth from that, there is no failure. That means you made yourself better in that moment. Its okay to not be perfect, because guess what?! No one is.

New Year, New Me.

Alright, its been awhile. I know.

I want to write about something tonight, but be forewarned that fitness will be a piece of this post. In particular, CrossFit is at the heart of it. I am about the be “that” person. You know what they say about CrossFit, right? Its like reverse Fight Club in that the first rule is that you never shut the hell up about it.

That said, stick with me. I am not going to write about specific WODs or lifting or burpees. Promise. I have been on this journey for nearly 18 months and I have started really thinking about the areas of my life that have been positively impacted by my fitness. There are the obvious things, like losing weight and my overall health, but what I want to talk about today are some other areas of my life that have been positively impacted.

1. My marriage. I write about this as the first thing because it might be the most important one. In June, we celebrated our 10th anniversary. This is a big accomplishment for a number of reasons, but mostly because marriage is simultaneously the hardest and best thing I have ever done. Anyone who is married knows that its not easy. Taking your life and crashing it into someone else’s and trying to make that a cohesive unit is a challenge, no matter how much you love someone. There are amazing days and there are challenging days and in between its just normal days. My mindset about my marriage is so strong right now and I think that comes from an underlying mentality of not quitting. Just like a challenging workout, when it gets really difficult, you keep going. You don’t quit. I look at my marriage with a “keep going, no matter what” mindset.
2. My confidence level in my career (and basically everywhere). Many of you know that I got promoted at work earlier this year. It took a lot for me to get through that process. It also wasn’t the first promotion position I had applied for with my company. It was the first one I was ready for mentally. For the first time ever, I walked into a job interview feeling like I was ready to do well under pressure. You see, for the last nearly 18 months, I have spent time nearly everyday doing things out of my comfort zone in the gym. I have done some things that I never thought possible, but mostly I have learned to be comfortable outside my comfort zone. Think about all the ways that can transfer into life and career. Think of all the things you would do if you weren’t afraid of being uncomfortable.
3. My willingness to be adventurous. This kind of falls into the comfort zone thing. I have a newfound respect for the sense of accomplishment that comes with being able to say “I did that!” Whenever I see a long hero WOD posted, I cringe, but then I want to do it simply so I can feel the sense of accomplishment that comes with it. Guess who willingly jumped into the Pacific Ocean with sharks on vacation? I did. Was I scared? HELL YES! I also had the moment of realizing that I didn’t want to leave that trip without saying that I did it. I am terrified of heights but I am really working to force myself to do things that help me face that fear. You miss out on a lot of fun adventures if you don’t deal with what scares you.
4. My body image and relationship with food. You guys, being a female means I still have days where I look in the mirror and absolutely pick myself apart. I still have days where I get caught up in the scale no matter how hard I try not to let my weight determine my happiness. I wrote a pretty good blog a year ago about one of those days. What I can tell you is that those days are a lot less frequent than they used to be. I have finally started being proud of my body for what it is capable of instead of how it looks. There is so much freedom in that. For the first time in my life, I view food with a healthy mindset. I know it is important to appropriately fuel my body, but I also know that doesn’t mean depriving myself of everything I love. I eat carbs, EVERY SINGLE DAY. I don’t crash diet, and I don’t beat myself up for every bite of food I eat. I can tell when I haven’t eaten enough and I know that it is important not to under eat and put my body into starvation mode. Also, I now understand that sometimes you have a bad eating day, but it doesn’t have to derail you. You can get back on track and put that behind you. It is possible to like your body and enjoy food without stress. Its not easy, but it is possible.

My life has been bettered on so many levels by changing my mindset. I know that CrossFit didn’t do the work to make me better, I did the work, but I am so grateful for the coaches and gym family who have helped me discover myself. I am so grateful to be more happy, healthy, humble, and positive.

Taking on Water

One year ago, my body tried to tell me to slow the hell down. One year ago, I might’ve been the worst listener on the planet.

Here’s the thing about our bodies… THEY KNOW. They try to tell us when we are going too hard, doing too much, and stressing too hard. Have you ever been in a life situation where you were proverbially taking on water and you knew it, but instead of fixing the problem, you just kept going until your ship sank? That is what I did last April. Bear with me, this is going to be a long post…

It started out simple enough. I woke up on a Sunday morning feeling crappy, lethargic, and exhausted. I ran a few errands and quickly realized I needed to lay down. I spent half a day in bed and decided to randomly check my temperature because of how I was feeling. 102… so I took some ibuprofen and went back to bed. The first of several critical mistakes came the following morning. I had a crazy busy six-day work week full of travel and chaos. Trips to Wyoming, Eastern Montana, and a medical conference requiring me to be out of town even on a Saturday. These weeks are not entirely uncommon in my work life, but this was a particularly busy week. I woke up on Monday still running a fever, and instead of resting like I should have, I packed up my car and grabbed some ibuprofen and took off for Gillette, Wyoming. I think back to this moment now and say to myself “what the hell, Kristin?”

I guess I assumed that the fever would resolve, and I’d be fine. That first night was when I noticed that I was getting these red blotches on my legs, but I assumed it was a side effect of the fever. My appetite was shot but again, just the fever, right? It’ll be better tomorrow, right? It wasn’t better tomorrow, or the next day, and the red blotches just kept multiplying until I had a solid rash covering my arms and legs. Wednesday night and Thursday were where the situation got ugly. I was alternating ibuprofen and Tylenol every 2 hours. Setting alarms all night because if I missed a dose, the fever would sky rocket to 102/103 so fast. I worked all day Wednesday and was supposed to get on a little tiny plane to Sidney, MT on Thursday. Wednesday night, I started vomiting… like a lot. I had barely eaten since Sunday. At 4AM on Thursday morning, I ended up canceling my trip and calling in sick. I was in a hotel room in Billings, MT but I was such a mess that I just had to rest. Friday, I still got up and went to work despite not really feeling much better. I was working a conference where there were two-hour time slots between times when we needed to be at the conference center and I was going to my car to sleep between every session. At this point, I even had rash on my chin and face that I covered with makeup. I had to go out and buy a long sleeve shirt to wear that day, so I could cover how bad this had gotten. When I finished working that day, I went back to my hotel room and laid on the bed and cried. Then I started throwing up again and laying there on the floor of my hotel room in between. At about 6:30 that night, I decided I couldn’t take it anymore and went to the doctor.

Shit got real quickly. The walk-in doctor gave me some Tylenol because my fever was back up and immediately sent me to the ER. Keep in mind, this is all happening in Billings, MT which is 3.5 hours from home. In the ER they hooked me up to IV’s and started running every lab test known to man. The ER doctors were very bothered by the fever with a rash and somewhere around 10pm, they told me I wasn’t leaving. I called my husband and told him to get ready to come down, but in the morning when it was light and safe to drive. Thankfully, my brother and his wife as well as some great friends live in Billings. They came to the rescue and hung with me because I was terrified about an impending hospital admission.

At the end of this, I spent 3 nights in a hospital bed on a lot of drugs. I had given myself aspiration pneumonia on top of the weird unknown virus that I had. I was severely dehydrated; my kidneys were in an acute state of distress called AKI (acute kidney injury) from dehydration and all the ibuprofen I had been taking. Additionally, my liver was really pissed off from Tylenol. They never did figure out what the virus was, but they made me stay till the fever had mostly resolved and the rash had started to look better. It was awful, and I have so many regrets about my epic failure to listen to my body. When all this happened, I did not put a ton of info out there. Lots of people knew what had happened but I didn’t go very public because I was exhausted and a little embarrassed by how dumb I was.

Now, looking back, this was an important moment in my life. Not only did I learn a valuable lesson about taking care of myself and listening to my body, but I also ended up making an epic comeback. The last year has been full of growth. I am talking about the kind of personal growth that only comes from facing something tough.

I had literally started doing CrossFit about two months before this happened. I was making some gains. Let me tell you what… if you want to see rapid strength loss, a hospital bed is the place to be. In a week, essentially, I lost 20 lbs. After I got out of the hospital, I was told to take at least another week off from work and working out. I was so exhausted even though I was on the mend, so I absolutely needed that time. Going back to the gym was so terrible. The first day, I remember we were doing back squats and that was when I realized how weak I was. I had to bail on a squat and I walked to a wall and kicked it because I was so angry. The second day, I cried through a bunch of thrusters. The pneumonia made everything cardio feel like actual death. That damn pneumonia took almost 8 weeks to recover from fully. On top of that, my white blood cell count was elevated for 8-12 weeks after I was “better.” It took so much mental tenacity to keep showing up and keep working out. I can tell you right now that if I hadn’t been surrounded by coaches who totally committed to helping me get through this and a support network of workout buddies who cheered me on and pushed me to show up even when I was crying, I’d have quit.

Those of you who know me, know that I have rebounded fully and then some. I am stronger and faster physically than I ever was a year later. On top of that, I learned so much about my ability to fight through tough stuff. I learned how strong I am as a person. I also learned to let go of “I can’t” or “I’m afraid” and set some serious goals and work my ass off to achieve them. I learned to be open about struggles, because we all have them. I learned to take leaps out of my comfort zone. I learned that a little confidence in yourself goes a long damn way. I learned that I only have one body and I need to listen when it needs something. I learned that I have a fierce and supportive group of friends who have my back and will take care of me when I need it most. Embarrassed as I was that I essentially did this to myself, I am so grateful I went through this. It drove me and taught me a lot about who I am.

In all of this, there are a couple big takeaways. LISTEN TO YOUR BODY, PEOPLE! Rest when you need it! Don’t continue taking on water until you sink. Ask for help. Do whatever you need to so you can ensure you have time for self-care, no matter what that means. Secondly, don’t ever let a bad situation of a little adversity take you out of the game entirely. Use it as fuel for your fire. Keep pushing, strive for more, and I promise you’ll be better for it.

For those of you that read this far, thank you for sticking with me… I know it was a long one, but I hope it was worth the read.

Examining what I tolerate… of myself.

I’ve been doing a lot of reflecting lately, it seems. For some reason, as the year ends, I find myself thinking about a lot of things and reading more and just generally trying to figure out if I am where I want to be in life. 2018 has been an evolution of sorts for me. I started the year out in sort of a rut where my confidence was shaky, and I was trying to figure out what makes Kristin happy. Kind of a “something is missing” situation. I spent most of this year working to figure out the missing pieces and figuring out how to situate my life so that I could fill those holes. I am proud to say that 2018 is ending a lot differently than it started for me. My reflecting right now has more to do with what needs to be eliminated from my life. What are the barriers to feeling happy right now? Are there things that I do or that I allow that maybe set me back in life. So, I started listing things off in my head initially and then in a list and today I discovered that I need to share some things both for accountability and for personal clarity. Being honest with yourself isn’t easy it seems. I suppose the best approach to this blog is a list, and as you all know by now that is often my style. Here are some things I am done with going forward.

1. Comparing myself to anyone other than myself. I constantly find myself looking at what others are doing in all facets of life and scrutinizing if I am good enough. My life progress isn’t wrapped up in what others are doing but rather in my own improvement. Am I perfect? No. Will I ever be? No. Am I doing better than I was a year ago? Definitely.

 
2. Giving more to people than they will ever give to me. I seem to have an affinity towards people who sort of suck the life out of me. My nature is to be a giver, so I gravitate towards doing things for others ahead of myself often. This has nothing to do with anything money wise, but rather with giving my heart and emotions to people. Giving yourself to others is not a bad thing, at all. However, the last year of my life has taught me that I need to stop giving so much of myself to people who will never return those favors.

 
3. Seeking the approval of others. This is one I have put so much thought into as of lately. Generally, I am a very confident person and I don’t seek out much validation from others. That said, I still catch myself seeking approval from people at times. I really hope to be more unapologetically me in the coming months.

 
4. Being overly emotional about people and things that I cannot control. I really do try to only allow myself to stress on the things that I am able to control. That said, I tend to let myself go into a tailspin at times over the things other people say and do. I cannot control what is happening or what other people say to me, but I can control my reaction (or over reaction) to it. Again, this goes back to giving too much of my emotions to things.

 
5. Explaining to people that I barely know why I don’t have kids. Yeah, this one is a lot more specific than some of the others. Here’s the thing… my uterus is sort of my deal, friends. If you know me and care about me and want to ask questions, I am more than willing to have a conversation with you about this. I know I have written about some of my reasons for not having children in the past and I am totally willing to be forthcoming about it. That said, I am so over answering the question “why don’t you have kids?” in its variety of forms to people who don’t know me. The truth is that people have their reasons why they do certain things. Having children is a very personal choice and whether the answer is “because we don’t want them” or “because we are unable to have them,” it’s not any stranger’s business to question the choice. I don’t walk around asking people why they chose to have children, because that seems rude… so I also tend to think its rude to question the choice not to have them.

 
6. Sacrificing my health for anything. Some of you probably know that in December of last year and then again in April of this year, I battled some intense and strange viruses. I don’t know if they were the same thing or totally different, but both times I ended up missing a week of work and in the second illness, I got to spend three nights in the hospital in Billings. I can honestly say that I can’t remember being sicker in my life. The worst part of it all? I legitimately worked up until the day I ended up in the hospital. I drove all over Montana and Wyoming with a 102-103 fever. Not only was it the sickest I can remember being, but in hindsight, it was also the dumbest I can remember being. What kind of idiot decides that work is so important that they would perpetuate an illness to the point of landing in a hospital bed? Yeah, that’s me. Never again.

 
7. Continuing friendships with toxic people. Plain and simple, bring something positive to my life or go away. I am a damn good friend to people and all I ask is that the people I surround myself with bring something good to the table.

 
8. Not fully committing myself to myself. Yeah, you read that right. I will love myself first and most going forward. I have found that my relationships with others seem to improve when I take care of me. I will stop making excuses and just commit myself to improving.

 
So, there is my accountability to myself. I hope that if nothing else, thinking about what I wrote makes people examine what they tolerate. We all deserve to be happy. Figure out what you need to do and go in that direction. If you aren’t your best, you’re no good to anyone else either.

Just Let Me Overthink About It…

If second guessing myself were an Olympic sport, I think I would have a collection of gold medals larger than the one Michael Phelps boasts. I am not remotely kidding. I used to joke that anything worth considering was worth overthinking in my world. This quality of mine has made so many things harder than they have to be and has caused me to have a ridiculous number of emotional meltdowns over the years.

You want to hear something funny? I have been fortunate to have a successful healthcare career that has progressed from working as a clinic receptionist into my current sales role. EVERY SINGLE TIME that I progressed in my career or got promoted, I was 100% sure I was going to fail and that I wasn’t smart or capable enough to do the job. EVERY SINGLE TIME that I was promoted or moved up in roles, I legitimately thought I wasn’t going to get the job. I will never forget the day I got the call offering me my current job. I had been waiting a few weeks to hear something official post interview. I had driven to meet my husband for lunch that day and had decided there was no way that I was going to get this job that I wanted so badly. I was sitting at lunch with him scowling at a bowl of tomato soup and being pissed off about something that wasn’t even confirmed. As we were finishing up our meal, my phone rang with a number from Denver… I went outside to take the call and at the end of it, I had a new job. Clearly my ESP is broken.

This translates over into my gym life too. It is not uncommon for a coach to look at me and remind me of what I can do. Not only do my coaches have to remind me, but my gym friends also push me through my constant second guessing myself. The reminders to try the Rx weight or to add weight are continuous. Thankfully I have a great support network that reminds me what I am capable of and that faces some of the same mindsets as I do at times.

The reason that this is even coming up is because it occurred to me yesterday, as I was second guessing myself through some work stuff that I have going on, that I really need to knock this crap off. At a minimum I need to take some steps to do it less. It comes from this insecure place that is very deep inside of me. I think that place might always be there, but I need to quiet it down. As per usual, my mind functions in lists, so here are some things I am going to try to do to stop the insecure second guessing.

1. I will never say I can’t do something without at least trying it at the gym. If a coach tells me I can do more, I will try it before I get all sassy and pout about it. 97% of the time they know my ability better than I do. The rare exception comes when I am super sore or something like my nutrition is amiss and they aren’t aware of it.

 
2. I will stop being so negative in my head. This applies to so many things in my life. Second guessing myself is essentially another form of negative self-talk. I pride myself on trying to not bash on myself about how I look or my body. This needs to be applicable to my ability to do things and how capable I am at my job.

 
3. I will start taking compliments better. Other people don’t endorse me or say nice things about me because they are just messing around and want to see me fail. Honestly, I literally will tell people they are wrong when they pay me a compliment. For example, one time a girl in a coffee drive through told me that I had amazing eyes… my response? “No, I don’t.” That is some ridiculousness right there. This is also applicable to the times when I have had a boss or colleague sing my praises. I often don’t think I am doing anything special and I need to get better at recognizing that it’s an insult to me and to the person singing my praises when I act like the compliments are crap.

 
4. When that doubtful voice starts getting loud, I will take some time to really think about what I am second guessing. Even if that means writing down the reasons why I should be confident in myself with whatever I am doing. Mostly because this will help me to refocus and not get caught up in a spiral of self-deprecation.

 
In a nutshell, it’s basically time to start embracing my inner badass and owning what she can accomplish as much as I own her failures. Baby steps…

I Had a Crazy Moment… And I’m Entitled to That…Occasionally.

Ever had a completely irrational moment? Like one so epically bad that you don’t even know who you were in that moment? Let me tell you how I ruined a good portion of my Sunday…

As so many of you know I have been on a journey with fitness and general transformation. Obviously, journeys like this have a ton of rewards, but they don’t go without their struggles. I had a test done that measures body composition on Sunday morning. So, in a nutshell, things like body fat percentage, muscle mass, weight, etc. When the results came out, I was in shock… and not in a good way. My body fat was substantially elevated, and I had lost multiple pounds of muscle in a 7-week period. Mind you, I have been working my ass off. Did I make the best eating choices this summer? No. Did I let my nutrition get completely out of control? No. Did I enjoy my summer with some splurges and maybe more beer than I would usually drink? YES! Do I regret the times spent with friends enjoying meals and drinks? Not in a million years. Instead of thinking logically and rationally that maybe the test was off because the fluctuations were just too out of control, what did I do? I immediately repeated that stupid test. Five minutes later, I was up another half percent in body fat and had managed to lose another half-pound of muscle.

At this point, the rational response might’ve been to be skeptical about the results knowing what my pictures show and what I have been doing. Did I choose the rational path? Hell no. What path did I choose, you ask? The epic meltdown, totally crazy path. Driving away from the test, I made it about 6 blocks before the tears started. And we are talking full waterworks, you guys… this was not one tiny tear, this was full on bawling.

Thankfully, one of my good friends had gone with me and was somewhat aware that I was unhappy with the results. As she told me today, it wasn’t until she texted me that she became aware that I was in a “remove all the sharp objects from the house” type of moment. She texted me not to worry about the results because they didn’t make sense and were clearly wrong. My response? Calling myself a “fat mess” and basically saying that I should quit doing all the things I have been doing. Mind you, while I am responding to this text calling myself fat, I am also sitting on my couch hysterically crying. This is not a proud moment for me to share with you, but it needs to be shared. Unbeknownst to me, some other friends had also been summoned to try to help, but to no avail. I just sat there crying, angrily responding to texts, and saying horrible things to my friends about myself. THANK GOD my husband was not home while this was going on. I can only imagine how ugly I could’ve been to him in this moment.

After all of this I decided I’d go ahead and retest in the morning as we had a few drinks on Saturday ahead of these goofy tests I did Sunday. I would hydrate well and see what happened. I also decided somewhere in my crazy state that starvation would fix everything. Yeah, I didn’t say this was my most brilliant moment. I’ve heard that being hungry really makes a person less crazy and upset… insert huge eyeroll here. I did end up eating dinner with some friends and did not go full starvation mode, but I also thought about every bite I took that day.

This is where this story gets comical. I hydrated like crazy and truly woke up Monday weighing a few pounds less. True water weight loss. I went on my way to repeat the test that had already ruined one day of my life. The repeat test was even worse. Somehow, I had gone to sleep and gained another half percent of body fat and lost 2 pounds of muscle. So basically, in a 24-hour time period, I managed to lose about 3-4 pounds of muscle. It was in this moment that it occurred to me that one of two things had happened. The test was either off because of things going on in my body or the test was just not correct. I chose to roll my eyes, fantasize about kicking the machine, and go about my day.

I am not a person to believe that tests are incorrect just because they aren’t going the way I want them to, but this time I have logical reasons to believe that it is incorrect. I have pictures that show my progress. I have visible abs for the first time in my life. I am lifting heavier weights than ever before. It truly does not make sense that I have lost muscle this rapidly. Also, the fact that the results were so different each time makes me believe there were issues.

So that’s a crap ton of back story, but it’s important for several reasons. I have spent most of yesterday and today reflecting on this whole mess. There are so many lessons here, so stick with me for a bit more reading.

1.  I am better than numbers on a piece of paper. I know my story and I know that I have worked my ass off to be stronger and faster. I know that while I’m not 100% where I want to be, I am probably still the strongest and the fastest I have ever been in my life. I let a fancy scale make me forget all of that and reduce me to a crying mess. Screw that scale. How dare I let something like a number diminish my confidence and make me feel bad about a journey I have poured my everything into?

2.  I called myself fat. If you ask my friends, I am the first person to lay into them when they talk to themselves like this. I hate negative self-talk and I threaten to slap people for it. So, why in the hell was I calling myself fat? I am not dumb, but this was a truly dumb moment. I am in the best shape of my adult life and I work so hard to be strong… not skinny or fat, but strong and healthy.

3.  I let this whole mess ruin my Sunday. Instead of enjoying my rest day from the gym and relaxing with family and friends, I spent half of my day alone and crying on my couch. I let that fancy scale control my mood and make me sad. That is time that I will never get back. Time that I spent with horrible things rolling through my head. I’m not proud of that, but I got something positive out of it, reflection and growth.

4.  I repeated a test multiple times that made me feel bad about myself and it got worse every single time. I don’t know if the test is accurate or not, but what I do know is that I won’t be doing one again for a while, if ever. Why? Simply enough, I know I am making progress and I know my body is changing and there are a million other ways to see that. I don’t need to be reduced to a number at this point.

5.  I told myself and my close friends that I might quit doing CrossFit because it “is clearly not working.” WHAT THE HELL?!?!? This is the moment I reflect on and think I was so irrational. If you know me at all, you know that CrossFit has changed me in so many ways. I am better physically, but also mentally. I look at my body different than I ever have (well, except on Sunday when I apparently had a psychotic break…). I have met some lifelong friends and strengthened my existing friendships. I have incredible coaches who support me and want me to do better. Who in their right mind walks away from that?

In all of this, there is a silver lining. As women especially, our brains function emotionally. I had a crazy moment and I am entitled to them…occasionally. However, I think the end goal is to learn from those moments, no matter what causes them. Also, for the sake of all that is holy, stop being mean to yourself. Think about the things you are saying to yourself… if your friend called you a fat mess, would you keep that person in your life? Then don’t say those things about yourself. I know it can be hard and we live in a society that has a certain expectation. If you are doing the best you can do in this life, then give yourself some credit. Don’t let a scale own you, ever… if you are working on being physically fit, there is so much more to look at. Do you feel better? Faster? Stronger? If you can say yes to any of those things, you are doing well for yourself.
If nothing else, I hope my insecure, irrational moment can be a reminder that we all go through these things. You aren’t alone, but please don’t let these moments control your happiness. You are better than that. I am better than that. We are all better than that.