Barriers

240.6 lbs.

So obviously, August and September were not good months for me. I made more of an effort to exercise in October. I was trying for the 30 minutes, 3x a week but only managed 2x a week.

In November, I'm now trying to do 6 minutes Monday - Friday so that I have a total for the week of 90 minutes. First week, I fell short and only did it Monday, Tuesday, and Friday. Managed an extra walk to the park on Friday for a few more minutes.

I should make it this week because the kids are off from school 2 days so I got a walk in this morning.

I realized that at work, we examine programs to determine what the barriers will be to implementing the program because we have found too many times that we come up with a great program that goes nowhere. We are always saying "this would work fabulously if they would only do x,y, and z." We know that we have to address x,y, and z when we roll out or we might as well not bother. So, I decided I need to apply the same idea to my weight.

So here are my barriers to excercise:

People

I hate exercising around other people. This is why gyms and groups and get with a buddy programs don't work for me. It's why I don't exercise at home because my family is always around. The time in my life that I exercised the most was when I was single. I could do an aerobics video when I got home or go for a walk. While I do encounter people when I walk, it's usually brief. However, I know if I find myself essentially walking the same route as someone else, I will cut the walk short. The lack of alone time is a major reason I don't exercise.

Tired

I am not sleeping well and seem to have crushing fatigue most days. Hormones or adrenal fatigue from stress maybe. But it kicks my butt. I wake up tired and can barely go through the motions to get to my morning coffee, which may or may not finally get me going on some kind of normal level. By the end of the day, I'm usually exhausted and barely have energy to do anything more than surf the net.

Time

So I probably have more time than I think, particularly at the end of the day. I run into the other barriers preventing me from doing the exercise.

Clothes

I don't mind changing from jammies into workout clothes. On the weekends, I do that, have my coffee, check my email, go for a walk and then come home and shower and tackle the day. That routine works for me. Unfortunately, it only works on the weekends. On the weekdays, I'm always getting up in the middle of a sleep cycle, dragging myself out of bed to quickly shower and get dressed, make lunches, and finally have my coffee. Getting up early isn't consistently an option. I'm tired when my alarm goes off. I'll be tired if it goes off 45 minutes earlier.

Changing into workout clothes when I get home from work isn't appealing either. I have things to do before I'd have time to workout. Then what am I supposed to do stay in workout clothes until bedtime? Go to bed unshowered? Take another shower? Yeah, that isn't happening.

Weather

I'm a fair weather walker. Too hot and I don't want to do it. Too cold or rainy and I don't want to do it. Too dark out and I don't want to do it. It doesn't take much to stop me. This is however, I think the barrier that is easiest to overcome with a just do it attitude.

Summary

It's pretty clear that consistent exercise is only going to happen for me in the morning. I've been very consistent for the last 6 weeks exercising every morning on the weekends. I've gained 2 pounds over that 6 weeks. I need to see how eating fits into this because I am entering the time of year when I typically gain 5-7 pounds. I think that is a combination of the holiday eating and the fact that I stop exercising even on the weekends because the weather gets bad. GOAL 1 - don't let the weather derail my weekend walking. GOAL 2 - keep trying to get that 6 minutes of stretching, arm circles, running in place, and knee lifts done every weekday.

Need to work on the tiredness. Ordered some Essential Oils to see if that will help with my sleep and my energy. If I could master that, I could get up early enough to do an aerobics video in the morning. Really if I could wake up at 5 am and not be exhausted doing so, I could exercise every morning. Though, I'm not sure a 9 pm bedtime is doable. That's essentially when my kids go to bed. Soon, they will be staying up later.