.Really

It's a very Dianne thing to get random injuries that make people go "Really?!" when you tell them what happened. Insert a new one this past week - random arm injury from running.

Let's back it up a bit. In the last month I've been leading an indoor stairs club at work one or two times a week for 35-40 minutes of stairs. It's been very positive, and it's been nice to get back into the groove of working out again. Last weekend I started running again and OH did it ever feel good. I'm very much a seasonal runner as I absolutely love running outside but won't when it's too cold, there's too much snow or it's too icy. I guess that makes me a whimp. But it also makes me incredibly anxious all winter and I look forward to the spring so I can get the legs moving again! That day was this past Sunday.

My pace was slow, even a bit slower than my usual half marathon pace, but I felt really good. Damn did it ever feel good to get back out there! I was feeling really good and woke up the next morning a little sore, but chalked it up to the fact that I haven't run in awhile and was working out some new muscles. When I noticed my shoulders were a little sore, I figured it was because I kept them too tight when I ran. So Monday night, I went for another run. This one I wasn't feeling quite as great and even a bit sluggish but I thought that was probably because it was after work and I'm usually a morning runner. That night though the pain got worse, and as Tuesday went on it got to the point where I was having trouble picking up Kendrick (who's only 24 pounds) so I knew I had to go see the doctor.

My doctor wasn't in so I saw someone else. They had me do some physical testing (seeing how high I could lift my arm, reaching, etc) and said that they didn't think it was anything serious, but they'd set me up for an ultrasound and to take some Advil and the pain should subside in a few days. They thought it likely was the bicep muscle. I went to book the ultrasound and they said only a specialist can do it, there's only one location in the city and the earliest they can get me in is May 5. Seriously. So I went for a second opinion, and they told me that there's a possibility that it could be tendonitis, and if it's happening now it could happen again. He told me to try my best to pinpoint what I did last Sunday that could have caused it and I said honestly all I did was run, and was confused because I used that same motion to run stairs in the month prior. I asked if I should run (since on Friday I was feeling better) and he said yes, and if it hurt again to come back and see him. So I went for a run yesterday.

I went 7.5 KM and even though it was still at a slower than I would like I was feeling absolutely fantastic. So you can imagine my surprise when I woke up this morning and started to feel more pain in my shoulder. Grrr. Back to the doctor I go.

That being said, I will not let this stop me! I've noticed in the past month that the days that I'm physically active for more than 30 minutes, I feel a lot better overall. So I definitely plan to keep this up as often as possible and sign up for the MEC 10KM in May. I still have passes at Blitz that I need to utilize and I'd like to continue doing some yoga at Moksha too! I also signed up for an adult gymnastics class. Gymnastics was my passion almost all of my life, and it's been a long time since I've done any sort of training, so I'm really excited. Work is going to get busy again but I'm determined to keep that work/life balance that I've been keeping for the last few months when it comes to getting fit again. I admit that seeing my posts from last year at this time make me a little jealous and sad, because I'm pretty sure I've gained 10-15 pounds between then. That being said, this month was the year mark of being back to work after maternity leave and I think I'm slowly finally starting to get into a groove. This makes me happy!

Until next time...

xo

-Dianne

PS: As I was listening to my playlist at the end of my run, "Wasted Time" by Keith Urban came over my headphones. I admit I sang along to some parts but had never really listened to the words before. One line caught my eye...

Although I certainly don't consider running "Wasted Time", I do know a lot of people who are not a fan of running at all and may consider it as such. I just loved this line of the song because it reminded me of why I like running so much. I love running outside as it allows me to clear my head, de-stress, and set the tone for a really good day (especially running in the morning). As I was singing along to this song I just had to laugh - my hope for everyone is that they find something in their lives that they can be passionate about!

PPS: I really want to get back to writing once a month! I finish school in a few weeks and don't start up again until September (I'm taking two classes right now while I'm working full time) and I'm hoping that frees up a little more of my time. I also do have a re-brand in the works and am hoping it will be all good to go by the summer. Stay tuned!

.Planning

I miss running.

I really need a winter activity! Every year I say that, and every year I don't find one. I guess this year is a little different because my little man is keeping me pretty busy!

I've recently starting going to Blitz Conditioning for their early morning 6AM HIIT (High Intensity Interval Training) work outs and they have been great! I've gone once a week three weeks in a row now and this week I stepped it up a notch and went twice. I'm scheduled to go twice next week too! I'm thankful to have my cousin Adriana who's been coming with me in the mornings and motivating me to show up (because my goodness is it hard to get up at 4:50AM!)

It occurred to me the other day that my first run of the year is on March 6. That's like... six weeks away. AH! Since I'm a whimp and don't run in the snow, I'm going to have to find an indoor running track in the next week or two. Thankfully this one is a 5K so I'm going to slowly start back into training again in early February.

I've recently started taking Kendrick to gymnastics drop in at North Edmonton Gymnastics Club and he is loving it! He likes to hang on the bars, jump with Mommy into the foam pit, bounce on the trampoline, and pretty much climb anything he can. I've actually had to barricade my fireplace off because he's a climbing machine! He figured out stairs last month too. I can't wait to enroll him in classes when he's 18 months old!

My maternity leave is over in five weeks. I am feeling very conflicted! On one hand I am excited to go back to work and catch up on what I've missed this past year. I've brought Kendrick to visit my co-workers quite a few times this year, but I'm looking forward to seeing everyone again on a regular basis. I'm also excited to wear all the new work clothes I bought on Boxing Day! :) On the other hand, I am going to miss seeing Kendrick all day, every day! Maternity leave has been an absolute blast! I've made new mommy friends (which is pretty awesome considering I'm one of those girls that doesn't have a ton of close female friends) and Kendrick and I have gone on quite a few adventures! Most weeks we are out and about doing something fun at least 4-5 times and I'm loving every minute of it! Even though I know it means life is going to change drastically, I'm silently hoping that he takes his first steps before I go back so I don't feel like I missed out on that milestone. He's pretty close right now as he cruises along the furniture, so you never know!

After putting Kendrick to bed at 7:15PM tonight, I did some cleaning and straightening out of my house. Usually I put away all the toys (as usually my living room looks like a toy tornado hit it during the day) and get some cleaning done before I relax and de-stress before heading to bed. I realized today though when I go back to work, that doesn't leave me a lot of time with the little guy between the time I get home from work and the time he goes to bed! So I've decided to really start looking into meal planning. It may be time to start a new Pinterest board! I want to plan my meals for the week in advance, get the groceries each weekend, and then get them ready in freezer bags so that when I get home from work, it's as easy as putting everything in a pot or taking it out of the slow cooker! This will allow more family time and some healthier meals too! Although it doesn't seem like a tough task, it does seem a little daunting to be that organized every week. Does anyone out there meal plan and have any tips?

xo

-Dianne

PS: Stella & Dot is giving us Stylists a chance to earn a trip to Costa Rica! Considering we don't have a big vacation planned this year, I'd really LOVE to go! You can help me get there by shopping my website, hosting a trunk show, or joining my team and becoming a Stylist! Feel free to comment below or tweet me if any of these interest you! :)

PPS: I'm starting to make a dent on some of my 2016 goals! My new hobby is HIIT training, and I'm quite enjoying it! I haven't really made a dent on my debt yet, but will start that as soon as I start making a regular pay cheque again back at work! We did do a date night this January while Kendrick had a sleepover, and have one planned for February already which is exciting! I'm also 24 days in to #365DaysOfGratitude, and it's also going well! I'm not sure if I'll get to blog three times this month, but I shall certainly strive for February! Overall, I think it's a good start!

.Body Image

Most of us at one point or another have been uncomfortable with how we looked. I was very lucky in that I had a fabulous metabolism while I did competitive gymnastics up to my early 20's. I could eat whatever I wanted (which included fast food and way more pop than I should have drank) and not gain a pound or lose my washboard abs. I started to notice around 25 that I couldn't quite do that anymore. Not that I went on a diet, but I started to really read labels and look more into what I was eating. I am now a constant label reader and although I still give into cravings, I have definitely convinced myself to not eat something because of the calorie content, particularly when I was running on a regular basis!

During this pregnancy body image is something I'm struggling with. When you've been around the same size most of your life, it's very odd to go through these types of changes! I'm involved in a couple of baby message boards where some woman who are at the same stage I am are and have only gained 3-5 pounds - yet I'm at around 25 (the last doctor's appointment the nurse didn't even tell me how much I've gained, so I don't really know what that means haha). Most of the weight I've gained so far has been in the belly, and so far I've been able to avoid stretch marks by using a mixture of the Honest Company's Organic Healing Balm and Bio Oil every night before I go to bed. I bought two pairs of maternity pants two months ago and I absolutely hate them: although they seem like they'd be comfortable, my belly isn't big enough so they are constantly falling down. I've been making due with most of my current dress pants/skirts during the week with a belly band - which essentially helps keep your pants up even while they are unzipped! I can tell though that some of the weight is spreading out though because some of my pants are starting to get a bit too tight, so I'm kind of an in between stage. I also fight with my closet almost every morning. This dress is too short now, this shirt doesn't fit right, I don't have anything to match these pants, etc. I'm thankful for weekends when I can live in Lulus, sweatpants and Sweet Legs leggings!

This being said, I am not complaining. I am very grateful to be pregnant and excited to be a mom, no matter what a toll it takes on my body. It's just a bit of an adjustment, and I am very lucky that I have such supportive friends and family (especially my amazing husband) who are so complimentary and make me feel good! I've noticed that people are also very supportive of my eating habits; when I start to debate whether I should eat something I get the "don't worry, you're eating for two, it's ok!" As tempting as it is (I'm seriously hungry ALL the time), I'm trying purposely not to eat for two as I really want to get back working out/running after the baby. Although I know I'm going to gain weight, I want to try my best not to go overboard!

I've decided I'm going to challenge myself to a squat challenge. I'm going to try and do 10 squats a day every day after I get up or just before I go to bed. I've been feeling particularly lazy and although I'm not able to run anymore, there are things I can still do and this is something that won't take up much time but still be a bit of a workout. If 10 gets too easy, I'll add 1-2 each time and see how that goes. Anyone want to join me? :)

My friend Steinunn asked me yesterday if I enjoyed being pregnant. I've heard some women absolutely love being pregnant, and some that hate every minute. I'll be honest, I think I'm somewhere in between. The first couple months were spent being really stressed out & worried that something was going to go wrong. I had symptoms that could have meant things were going wrong but thankfully all the tests proved otherwise. It left me very overwhelmed, unmotivated for life in general and very sad. But once I was able to get past that point and we received positives from the ultrasounds, I'm now starting to finally feel excited. Although I'm not always comfortable with the way I look or the way I'm feeling sometimes (my tough points right now are mid-back pain, sleepiness during the day and insomnia at night) for the most part I feel pretty good. So I am lucky in that sense, and am very grateful that so far everything has gone OK. I continue to think positive thoughts to get me through the remaining 15ish weeks! :)

My point is that we are all human. There's probably very few people that are satisfied with how they look every single day, and that's ok. We're all different and unique and awesome in our own ways and I think it's important to realize that because it's definitely a life lesson I want to teach my future son one day. You just have to do what you can to make yourself feel good, and always try your best to feel comfortable in your own skin. I did that this weekend when I wore the new dress I'd picked out for my Christmas party! It's stretchy so I should be able to wear it after I have the baby, and it will still fit for the hubby's Christmas party in a couple of weeks!

xo
-Dianne

PS: We had an ultrasound yesterday and Baby Peanut looked like he was trying to eat his toes! Looks like we have a flexible little one on our hands...a future gymnast maybe? :)

PPS: Gigantic Black Friday sale starting today at www.stelladot.com/DianneCK! Some sale items up to 40% off! Make sure you check it out! Some items are already sold out!

.Injuries

I am what I think you could call "accident-prone". My first (and only) major injury doing gymnastics was a sprained ankle, and I did that doing a simple round-off (essentially, a cartwheel with oomph and landing on two feet) the day before one of the biggest competitions of my gymnastics career. My dad took me to the medi-center after practice where the doctor told me I shouldn't compete the next day. My response: "Oh, I'm competing. Tell me what I can do to make it through." I ended up taking all the elements of difficulty out of my routines and completed everything but vault; I even placed 7th on beam out of the 20 competitors! I'm sure the other girls were just shaking their heads as I hobbled up to get my ribbon.

Most of my major injuries have come by accident, or plain stupidity. In 2012 while playing slo-pitch with my company team, a ball from another field came over the dugout and hit me in the face while I was playing first base. The ball broke and shattered my nose and I needed 3 stitches, but thankfully I came out of that without a concussion or anything more severe. Then last summer, again playing slo-pitch, I jumped to catch a ball that was overthrown to me at first base. When I landed, I landed half on the base and half on the ground, so my ankle rolled and I ended up spraining my ankle quite badly (to be quite honest, I can't even remember which ankle I sprained the first time, so it may have been the same one I did as a gymnast, I'm not sure! This sprain was much worse though, and I spent 3 hours in emergency for them to suit me up with crutches and give me some T3's). Being on crutches for almost 2 weeks was definitely not fun, especially because my house has a lot of stairs, and I was headed to Stella & Dot's national conference in Las Vegas in 10 days!

The trip ended up going very well, people were so nice and helped me get food and such when it was a buffet, and I was able to get early entrance into our conferences so I could get a good seat without worrying about getting trampled in the crowd! Thankfully, I also went to physio and was able to train and successfully complete a half marathon less than two months later - and hit a new personal best while I was at it!

It's every athletes nightmare to get injured or sick; it puts a dead stop to training and when you're in the groove, it can sometimes it can be very hard to get that motivation back. That's kind of how I feel right now. The last few weeks, I've been making an effort to run and work out more, and then last sunday playing ball hockey I pulled a groin muscle (I know it sounds dumb, but I didn't even realize a girl could do that. Apparently I should have paid more attention in my anatomy class in university). After being in pain the first day, in the days following the pain started to subside to the point where 4 days later, I didn't feel it anymore. Unfortunately on Wednesday I started to get sick and caught a nasty cold that's been going around, so that kept me couch bound for a few days as well. I had contemplated going for a run yesterday, but then the weather gods decided to make it snow here in Edmonton (and I don't run much in the winter; more about that in a future post). It was probably for the better; I went dancing last night for my friend Sheena's birthday and I felt a little bit of pain while dancing, but not while walking. I went to play ball hockey today and realized damn, the stupid pain is still there. It's just in a different spot than when I started!

I had high hopes for this week including an early morning work out tomorrow, November Project on Wednesday and Friday, bootcamp Tuesday and Thursday, and some runs on the weekend. I was going to start it off easy since I had to take a week off, and see how the week went. Now it looks like I'll be spending the week with an ice pack! I'm trying to think of the positives though, as there is still 6 weeks until my first races of the season, so I still have lots of time to prepare. In reading a couple running blogs, I've also found out that there are other runners out there who do double runs in one day, so I'm not the only crazy one! (I will be running a 15K and a 10K on June 14th, both for different charities. They are both close to my heart so I couldn't choose - I'm hoping next year they will be on different weekends!)

Tomorrow starts a new week! As per my friend Debbie's advice, I may look into some yin yoga this week to help stretch everything out. Fingers crossed!

xo
-Dianne

.My "Why"

If you would have asked me in junior high or high school what kind of sports I liked, I can guarantee you that long distance running was the farthest from my mind. My first love was artistic gymnastics, which I did faithfully until I was 20 years old and involved in a car accident. I had to stop cold turkey for 6 months, and my body couldn't really handle competing at a high level after that. I dabbled in adult classes and occasionally go to drop-in, but sadly it's probably been a few years now since I did a back-handspring.

I participated in track and field through school, but mostly in long jump and shot put, which was fairly shocking for most considering my scrawny frame at the time, but I had built up arm muscles from gymnastics. I even qualified for the city finals a couple of times to represent my school! I also remember in gym class being told we had to run the 1500M, and having to walk for most of it and being one of the slowest in the class. It wasn't until a year after I met my now husband Brian that I even considered doing anything long distance.

Brian had mentioned to me in our first year of dating that his new year's resolution was to run a half marathon or complete a triathlon. I thought it might be fun to do that together, but wasn't sure I'd actually be able to do it. I had just joined an outdoor bootcamp which I loved, but when it came to anything running I couldn't even run a full mile without being out of breath. My body had changed a lot since I quit gymnastics and although I still had the small frame, I wasn't nearly as muscular or had the cardio fitness level I used to have. I also have a mixture of normal asthma and exercise-induced asthma, which I had never let stop me in the past, but worried that it may in this case.

So I thought to myself - I want to help him complete his goal AND I want to take part in this challenge as well. As I was taking part in bootcamp, I overheard one of the participants talking about a half marathon in Vegas that they were attending. I went home and looked it up - and said to Brian "Hey - how would you like to complete your new year's resolution in Vegas?" I had excellent travel benefits with my job at the airport at that point, so we booked our trip and started to train. We did some running together, and I continued in bootcamp. When it got too cold to run outside, I ran laps at the Kinsmen Sports Center. I think the most I ran before the big race was about 8 miles...and that was tough, so my goal was honestly just to cross the finish line before the 4 hour mark when they started removing racers from the course.

To this day and 4 half marathons later, the Rock 'n' Roll Las Vegas Half Marathon is still one of the coolest races I've ever run. We ran the inaugural race in 2009 which involved closing down the famous Las Vegas strip and running all the way up and down it (and then some) in the early hours of the morning. All the big hotel signs were lit up with encouragement for all the runners, and showed pump up tweets from friends and family. We ran the race together, and unfortunately Brian re-injured his knee while running so he ended up power walking after about six miles. Because of this, we ended up being the same speed and ended up crossing the finish line at the exact same moment holding hands. After that, something clicked. I was so happy I almost cried at the finish line, and even more thrilled that we were able to do it together. My goal was to finish the race in under 4 hours, and we finished in 2:58:16. I was hooked.

Fast forward to 2014 and I've fully caught the running bug. I've completed half marathons in Edmonton (AB), Canmore (AB), Disneyland and Disneyworld. I've completed some 10K's and 5K's along the way too. This summer I'll be running Color Me Rad (5K), Spartan Race (5K + obstacles), the Underwear Affair (10K to raise money for cancers below the waist), Run for Your Dad (15K to raise money for the Heart & Stroke Foundation), and the Edmonton half (13.1M). Currently I'm working hard on my 5K time to get it under 30 minutes, doing bootcamp 1-2 times a week at lunch, and fitting in some stairs and hills workouts with November Project Canada (which I will definitely go into more later in other posts). When I'm not running, I want to run! My personal best in a half marathon is 2:43 and I'm looking to improve that to 2:15 before I start training for a full marathon. My running goals include qualifying and running the Boston Marathon and New York Marathon one day!

Whenever I do a Stella & Dot trunk show, I start off by telling the ladies my "Why". This is something I've learned while working with Stella & Dot; and it's essentially the reason why you've decided to go on your journey! My "Why" for running is not complex; I love doing it, it keeps me in good cardio shape, and it provides that sense of accomplishment that I was missing in my life. One thing I really miss about gymnastics was competing - and although I don't race to win against other competitors, having people cheer you on and wait for you at the finish line is incredibly rewarding for me. I decided to start writing this blog to keep myself accountable with my running goals, and to share the random ups and downs I go through. Thanks for reading!

Keep calm & run on. Right? :) Now, to get over this bad cold so I can get back on track...

xo
-Dianne