Feeling Accomplished

I came home last night and French Nanny had done the laundry, baked a cake and cupcakes with the girls, cleaned the 1st floor, went to the pool with the little ones and played basketball with them. I could get used to that!

I went to bed exhausted and was looking forward to sleeping in until 0600, except our smoke detector chirped twice at 0515 for no reason. Of course, nobody but me work up from he smoke detector… So much for sleeping in!

I went to the 0700 WOD this morning and was surprised to see another 0600-er! Bo had missed the WOD yesterday so he was there to do it today, just like me.

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Skill: Kipping pull-ups practice

As per Coach AJ, if we were using band, she wanted us to do strict pull-ups and work on our swing instead. I tried using the red and purple bands, but had to increase to red and blue since I couldn’t do a single rep. I managed well considering and felt good doing those. Below are my reps:

5-6-7-7-7

WOD: Deadlimp

I had done this one back in May and had used 115# for the DL and had to go down from 35# to 26# for the reverse lunges as well as do step up box because my quads were seizing back then. My goal for today was to use 120# for the DL and 35# for the reverse lunges for all rounds. I had the 26# KB next to me, just in case. Midway through, I had to resort to doing step up boxes again, for fear of face planting on the box. I ploughed through with the reverse lunges and even though I had to break them into 2 sets of 6 for most rounds, I managed all rounds with that 35#KB! I was so happy! It was the 1st time I ever managed a full WOD with weighted lunges at that weight. For some reason, I’m still pretty weak on those and they are a struggle, but I pushed through and managed to finish it all with an average of 45s rest for each intervals!

I came back home and text Kathleen about the WOD. We had been texting back and forth about it last night and she wanted to know how I fared this morning (she had done it yesterday). I love how we can be “juiceheads” together and discuss and strategize over WODs! Strong women unite! I ate myself a lovely breakfast and got to work cleaning the rest of the house that French Nanny didn’t have time to do yesterday. I managed to do that while Ben finished the laundry (Thanks Babe! You rock!) and then got cooking. I am adapting this Beef Stroganoff recipe from The Paleo Mama for my slow cooker. I used ground beef and threw the beef, onions, garlic, mushrooms and seasonings in my InstantPot and sautéd it until the beef was cooked. I then shut off the sauté function, added 1 can coconut milk, 2 tsp of vegetable Better Than Bouillon, about 1-2 tsp of arrowroot powder, and about 2-3 tbsp of tomato paste (I usually freeze my left-overs from the can flat in a ziplock bag and cut whatever I need for recipes. Today, I just threw in whatever I had left in the freezer). Turn on my InstantPot on the slow cooker function on high for 4hrs. While this is stewing and filling the house with lovely comfort-food fragrance, I prepped a cauliflower head into rice and stir-fried my “rice” in the Wok. Now, everything will be ready for me to pack into work tonight when I get up from my nap! I’ll add some frozen kale in my container when I pack it up and that will be perfect, convenient and healthy! I’ll update with a picture once everything is ready to be photographed!

The girls have been absolute angels all morning. They’ve been playing together quietly while I was cleaning and I didn’t have to discipline them once! They sure are growing up!

Pushing Through

Thank goodness we have a king-sized bed because we ended up sleeping the 4 of us in it last night. Béatrice is having a hard time with her molars (finally) coming through on her lower gums and Rina was having bad dreams. At 0130, both Ben and I gave up and took the girls to bed with us. It took me a while to fall asleep because, as per her usual, Béatrice kept snuggling me and stroking my face and hair. Just as I was about to storm out of bed to go sleep downstairs on the couch, she finally settled. I was exhausted and I knew I would need to be rested for today’s WOD:

 

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Skill: Deadlifts 5×5 E90s

Last time we did these, I did 115# for all reps. This time around, we were to increase our weight as we went along. I managed the hook grip on all reps and didn’t drop the bar on the last rep. I managed a nice 20# PR on these today. Here were my weights:

95#-100#-105#-115#-135#

WOD: Thriller

The Box was full this morning and I managed to find a spot below the rig.

0600 crew represent!

The only problem was, I couldn’t see the clock so I had to move my box around in order to get a clear view of the clock when I was done. I really wanted to try 75#, but that would have given me no rest at all and that wasn’t the point of this WOD, so I went with 55# for the thrusters. I managed the first round unbroken,  then round 2 and 3 I took some rest at the top of the thruster. Round 4 was a struggle. I had to actually drop the bar after my 9th rep. I picked it back up and finished my last 3 reps before getting to the box jumps. I had to no rep myself on my 5th rep because I almost didn’t make it to the top of the box and had to balance myself with my hands. That was scary and it brought back flashback to that one time I mangled my shins:

Painful Memories!

I settled my nerves (and thanked the little man above I was wearing my shin pads) on top of the box and kept going, but that ate a lot of my time on that round. Here were my times for each rounds:

1. 1:29
2. 1:35
3. 1:36
4. 1:48

For a total combined (fastest and slowest interval) of 3:17. Not stellar, but considering my lack of sleep, I’ll take it. Thank goodness I’ve been gearing up to the Whole30 nutrition-wise, I’m pretty sure that’s what helped me today! Weirdly enough, my scar on my left shin from my fall back in November was throbbing and hurting once I was done. Phantom pain?!? Coincidence? In any case, it took a while for the throbbing to go away. I’m just glad I managed to finish this one without falling! 🙂

 

Never Again!

Yesterday, Rina came home from the Squash Club (she was with Ben at a tournament) with a small bag of Cheetos. It’s been a while since we had that kind of junk food in the house and I craved it immediately. I asked Ben to get us a bag as a treat after the girls would go to bed. We ate the whole bag last night.

This morning, during the warm-up, I felt like puking, I was huffing and puffing and the Ring Rows were my arch nemesis. Not to mention the profusion of sweat. I managed 60# on the slow power clean + Front Squat, but I need to remember to stay on my heels more. I’m thinking it might be time to invest in a pair of lifting shoes or at least, more neutral ones than my runners… I totally scaled the WOD too. I had to go TG all the way. It wasn’t pretty, but I made it through with a time of 6:17. Ugh! Never again will I binge like that on empty food. I made up for it today with a healthy peanut butter/homemade jam toast this morning, the Apple Butternut Squash soup for lunch with a kale salad and tonight will be leftovers Lentil Dal on a bed of spinach!

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The rest of today will be spent resting. Rina is tired from her weekend at the squash club and I’m beat from this morning’s WOD. There is still a load of laundry to be folded once it’s dry and I think I’ll have a little nap on the couch when the girls go for theirs. I clearly noticed the tremendous effect nutrition can have on your physical performance and

Never give up!

Ahhhhhhhhhhhh!

That’s how I’ve been feeling since the moment I woke up this morning. I feel like I just need to take a big breath and exhale. I am slightly frustrated. Frustrated to be so far away from all my good friends, frustrated to be so far from my parents, frustrated to be on my own most of the time. Don’t get me wrong, I am with my girls and I love them to pieces, but sometimes, I just need some adult conversation and it can be pretty lonely being at home all day.

I went to Crossfit and felt defeated even before I started moving. I need to stop with all this negative self talk. Yes, I am struggling at Crossfit, but I only have myself to blame. I’m not losing weight and I know it has to do with my nutrition. It’s just so dang hard to cook healthy vegan food that I end up eating alone anyway and then have to cook for Rina and cook something else for Béatrice. Although, Béa will sometimes eat what I cook for myself. I really want my girls to be eating healthy and not see me struggle so much with my weight. And I am frustrated with myself that I can’t get back to the Whole Foods Plant Based nutrition that I know is best for me and used to come so easy to me. Like Nicole (Not the fat kid in gym class anymore) said it so well in this post, I need to get off the roller coaster once and for all. Anyway, enough about this nutrition ride and onto today’s WOD:

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I was teamed up with a new (to me?) guy at the box. He looked to be about 15 so I knew he was gonna kill it and I was gonna slow him way down, but I didn’t care. We finished with a time of 17:27 and although those last wallballs kicked my round tush, I only scaled with the weight of the ball (I used a 10#). It is way better than when I started Crossfit (where I would normally scale the weights AND the # of reps). I managed to get through the WOD doing the FG  and the best thing of all, even though we finished about 2 minutes after everyone else, I managed to keep my last rowing interval with an average for 500m below 2:20. I know it’s far from being great, but compared to the 2:32 average I was at in the OnRamp class, I’d say it’s a good improvement! I just need to stop beating myself up when I’m not performing as well as I would like to. It’s just hard knowing that I used to be very athletic and am now stomped in my fitness because of my weight. In the meantime, I’ll keep giving it my all and will also remember to breathe!