Running Ohm: Introductions Are In Order

Twas a dark and stormy night....

Not really but it seemed like a good way to start my blog as it has served so many writers before me.

When I turned 30, I realized I didn't really know who I was. Somewhere along the way to adulthood, I lost myself. Friends helped me and supported me thru this process of feeling my emotions, not being a people pleaser, realizing I can't fix everything, and discovering myself. In Runaway Bride, Julia Roberts' character didn't know how she liked her eggs. I was the same way.

So this is what I've found:

I live with depression and anxiety. They live in my head and try to get me to be the old me. I won't say that I suffer with them. It gives them too much power, but the truth is that they are there. I don't talk about them much as I don't want to give them too much power over my life. One of the biggest and most important things I learned is that feelings are not facts. The other thing is that it is ok for me to have emotions, feel them and let them go.

I used to spin poi, sometimes I spun fire poi. I wasn't sure what to do with them after awhile and set them aside, but I told a friend at work about them. One day, she was on Living Social and found a special for aerial yoga. She told me I should try it. I was suspicious about this whole concept. It seemed a little crazy. And, of course, I fell in love with it and now teach it part-time. Aerial yoga uses a hammock of 40 tricot denier to assist in regular yoga poses. It acts like a partner and a bolster. It uses gravity to deepen some asanas and, at the same time, takes the pressure of gravity off of other asanas. Regular yoga was difficult for me due to a form of myalgia I live with, but aerial yoga was a blessing.

Here is an album of aerial yoga

And here is me in one of my favorite poses.

As I mentioned, I do have myalgia which takes many forms including burning skin and joint pain. Because of this, I moved less. And with the depression, I ate more food. My weight skyrocketed. I decided I needed to do something about it and I started walking. The dog and I would go for hour long walks. It didn't work. I was still gaining weight and I didn't know why. While reading an article on Buzzfeed, I came across MyFitnessPal. The website helps you reach your weight goals with calorie counting and exercise tracking. It also has an active forum that has a wealth of information. You can find me here. And I started to lose weight very slowly. Very slowly. Too slowly. So slow, I started to feel defeated. I asked myself what I could do to increase my exercise level.

The answer was running. I rejected the idea. I was not a runner. I was not built for running. I have short stubby legs. Turtles passed me when I walked. But the calorie burn! I love food but food loves my waist line. So I tried it. It was not love at first jog. I despised it. I could barely jog a mile. Then, someone on the MFP forums suggested Couch to 5k by Zen Labs. You run in intervals, eventually running for a full 30 minutes. And I did it. And I enjoyed it. So I moved on to Bridge to 10k and I completed that too. I am now training for half marathon distances. I ran 9.56 miles without stopping on Saturday.

I am on Runkeeper.