Normally Mondays are good days for me.  I'm rested up from the weekend and I have no trouble getting up and doing what I need to do.

Yesterday?  It was a no go.  Even though I had got to bed at 10:00 I ended up sleeping until 8:00 AM.

This morning, I again was fighting to wake-up/get myself out of bed.  Soooo I decided to try something different.  I'm going to listen to my body and take a week off.  No weight lifting, no running... I'm going to do some stretching just so I don't lose the progress I've made on my back and shoulder issues, but otherwise, I'm taking a rest!

The timing isn't the best because I have a race in just 4 weeks, but I'll just have to take this as a lesson learned and program (and do) my back off weeks a little better next time.

I'm hoping that this shutdown week will help me feel better and get me back into training consistently.

On the food front -- well, yesterday I just lost it.  I was tired and frustrated and well you name it :D  took 'binge day'.  I had a bunch of crap food like cupcakes and pizza.  It actually felt good to relax for that little bit.  What worries me is not the off day, but getting focus back.  Amazingly, although the feast beast has risen his head a few times today, it's been really easy to tell him to 'shut up' and go back to eating on plan.  that's a big deal for me.  As to how I feel after my junk food fest.  Honestly, I wish I felt worse.  I'm tired today, but I've been tired every day for a week now.  My stomach feels fine.  My only noticeable change is that my hands and wrists are really swollen and achy.  But, it is a reaction I should acknowledge.  Yes, there is a part of me that wishes I would get 'bent over the bowl' sick when I ate crap food.  But I don't :(

So, this week I'm going to do a lot of sitting around and eating good clean food.  I'm not expecting to make a lot of progress.  I may not even lose any weight.  But, I need to realize that this is a journey, a process and if I want to make a change and make it last, then I have to be in the moment and be open to learning the lessons I need to learn.  I have always been an 'all or nothing' person.  I'm working out 6 days a week for 3 months, or doing nothing for 3 months.  I'm eating super strict 'on plan' or cleaning out the candy isle every day.  None of that works as my body shows.

I've paid lip service to 'life style changes' in the past.  It's time to really figure out what it will take to make myself healthy and happy for a LIFETIME.  There's not doubt in my mind that Paleo is a big part of that.  Just as I'm sure that my lifestyle will sometimes include pizza and cupcakes.  For now, my goal is to keep my pizza and cupcake days down to once a month.  To that end, I've told the feast beast that he can have whatever he wants Feb 28th.

My lifestyle will also include weight lifting.  Probably more weight lifting then cardio because that's what I love doing.  But it's also going to have to include some rest.  I'm pretty sure that I get afraid to rest not because I'm worried about loss of progress, but because I'm afraid that if I put the weight down, I'll never pick it up again. It's happened to me in the past.  Again, I need to find that balance.  I think planning the rest will help with that balance.  If I'm taking a day off because it's part of my training - if I wake up thinking "My plan today is to rest"  then I'm never 'off my plan'.  So, I'm never getting out of the the habit of thinking what my goal for the day is.

And so - this week I'm resting.  No matter how guilty or scared it makes me feel. Next week I start back again.  I'll finish up the current weight cycle and my race training and run my first race of the year on Feb 27th.  In the meanwhile I'm going to review my year long plan and tweak it to make sure I get these planned rest days into the program so I don't burn out again.