You are reading a single comment by @Tenderloin and its replies.
Click here to read the full conversation.
-
Strong post.
As a very recent new dad, I found that I slipped into zero exercise and high levels of cake eating, snacking and beer drinking in the few months after she arrived (maybe even sometime before when wife was v preggo). It's easy for me to say as I love it (now) but running really is the best bang for buck easy exercise out there, so if you are short for time/gear/mental capacity it is a great thing. The couch to 5k gets pretty much universal approval and there's an active running channel on this forum. I started running in Jan 2018 for the above reasons and it was pretty revolutionary - I dropped weight but mostly my mental health was much improved.
Tenderloin
Tl;dr incoming, but abusing this thread for therapy;
I need some accountability so I'll make a tentative promise to check back here. No idea what weight I am now, will need to see where our scales ended up in the move (that happened over 14 months ago...).
Stopped commuting when I started WFH about 4 years or so ago which lost me 80 - 100 miles a week on the bike. Then I had a kid (great excuse to not have the time to exercise and then comfort eat/drink). Had a minor mid life crisis and bought an MTB, went out once with @Dammit, which was great fun, but would have required too much of a time commitment on days where I couldn't really spare it, so sold that. Then I got myself a "nice" road bike, which started to help for a bit. I was getting out most evenings and at times that didn't overly burden ms_com with solo childcare. I was starting to go further and faster while also fitting into cycling clothes better. Then that bike got nicked, wasn't insured (because I was lazy and was about to sort it when we moved with the new house insurance) so didn't get replaced. As a result I've now done a grand total of fuck all exercise in about 14-16 months, with minimal amounts in the preceding 30. I have a cargo bike on order (due this month, hopefully) that will hopefully get some movement back into my day to day routine with nursery drop offs and grocery shopping. I tried running around the park that is literally next door, but a combination of boredom and self confidence issues meant that didn't go anywhere (literally and figuratively).
Subsequent lockdowns, general pandemic malaise, mental health dips have all contributed to me being in what is probably my worst physical condition. I'm sure I've been heavier, but I was still playing rugby and cycling then so had some semblance of fitness and resilience. I just feel like a mess now. It takes a lot of inner dialogue to just be able to get out and see people/be seen by people. Even recently, I went to go and help Henry with a bit of gardening, something I wouldn't have done just previously. But I decided it was something I wanted to do so offered my time before I could talk myself out of it. It was great, I thoroughly enjoyed the company and it was awesome to do something productive with someone else. I still felt embarrassed and ashamed the whole time. But, it made me want to get out and see people more, and I need to get over/resolve the self confidence issue somehow.
So, I'm 40 in a month and I am thoroughly over being upset by all of this. Things in many other respects are looking up so I feel like I have the cognitive capacity to better deal with it. I'll start with my current weight when I can find my bastard scales and work it out from there. Reducing the beer will be one big thing, not because I feel I have a problem with alcohol per se, I don't find myself looking for the escapism of booze or anything like that, it was just a very easy boredom remover (dark, cold evenings, not able to do much else for either fear of waking mini_com or just not being arsed to). And the snacks, christ the snacks. They snuck in over the holiday period in full force. Again, kind of comfort eating/treat yo'self for not being able to go and see my folks over Xmas. Too many takeaways yada yada yada.
I'll still have a beer and the odd pizza, just not 3 or 4 nights a week.