Learning to Remember Who I Am

I had been feeling pretty good about myself.

But, life has a way of reminding you.  Expectations vs. Reality.

This has been a very hard week.  With every win, there's been two bigger losses.  I'm down to 278.  Which means I've lost 8 pounds since last week.  Many people at work, friends of mine, were very complimentary to me this week about the weight loss.  It's noticeable.

I started the Chalean program a week early, just out of boredom.  And I crushed it the first two workouts.  The third one, Burn Circuit 3, struck back.  I hyperextended my knee about halfway through.  I had to cut off the last exercise group, which upset me.

I played basketball last night.  It'll be the last time with that group until it gets cold again.

I sucked.  Really.  Just terrible.  It's the worst I've played in a long time.  I should be better now.  At least not worse.  I can play harder and jump higher.  But my shot is gone, and my defensive instincts have seem to completely left me.  I was routinely beaten last night by moves that I used to be able to anticipate.  The only thing I could do to contribute was to make sure I got all the rebounds, which I did relatively well.

Then there's the car.  Massive fuel leaks.  From the lines on either side of the filter, from the sending unit on the top of the gas tank as well.  Also, one of the frame mounts was rotted off.  I could only afford to fix the lines and the frame mount.  The tank and sending unit will have to wait.

This was also week 5 of the couch to 5k program.  I crushed the first two sessions.  Today was the final one of the week.  The first one that was a full run, the whole time.  No walking sessions.  I was really pumped for it.  I just knew I was going to knock it out.

It didn't work out that way.

I ran for the first 12 minutes.  After that...I just couldn't do it.  I didn't have it in me.  It was supposed to be 20 full minutes of running.  In the program, the longest so far had been 8 minutes, which I did Wednesday with no problem.

But I couldn't do it today.  I failed.  And I failed hard.

I'm reminded.  Of who I am.  A man who lost his wife, and has his kids 50 per cent of the time.  I'm pretty much broke, left with two incomes worth of bills and only one income.  And I'm alone.  It sucks.  I'm tired of it.  I feel like every time I try to do something about it, life will remind me.

This is who I am.  Unfortunately, some days, it feels like all I'll ever be.

Wow, this was uplifting.  Sorry.