Shred Day 22: total slump day

I felt so tired and lousy today. I did not have a good sleep last night. I have chronic pain in my neck, shoulder, and sometimes upper back (cause unknown) that has been there for nearly 18 months, and regular exercise is not alleviating it, as I thought it might. My lower back was also sore today. I have a weird blister on my finger that I think is infected (yet it's so small that I'm embarrassed to see a doctor about it). The kids were cranky (doing year-end testing; you'd think they would be happy to be so close to being finished school). I am sick to death of mosquitoes (you have to spray yourself head to toe in toxic repellent and wear a mesh hat if you want to do any serious weeding, and my flower beds are languishing...)

And it's Monday, which is reason enough.

I took my measurements this morning, and lost another 3 inches and a bit. That means I've lost 11 (eleven) whole inches since I started this Shred thing 3 weeks ago. I'm getting stronger and more streamlined, and yet I STILL feel depressed about being fat. What's up with that? Must be the curse of womanhood (or vanity) or plain old concupiscence. I need to be spending more time in prayer and less time obsessing about weight loss, or fat grams, or home renovation, or homeschooling, or gardening, or writing, or any of the multitude of things that consume my daily life.

I did not have time to exercise earlier in the day, so I (reluctantly) dragged myself to do the workout at 7:30 this evening. I "did" Level 3 (that is if, à la Bill Clinton, we can agree on the meaning of "did"). What a killer of a workout. I could not keep up even with the "easy" versions, and just cut down on the number of reps or just gave up on certain moves altogether. I have my work cut out for me with this Level. Maybe by Day 30, I'll be able to keep up with the whole thing (easy version). Probably not a good level to begin on a day when I was already feeling lousy. But those days will come (whether we're talking fitness or just life in general), and you gotta push through them.
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