Wear and Tear

Five weeks into school, and my stress levels are feeling it. Last Thursday, after a particularly grueling few days of road and treadmill work, strength training and pilates class, grad school, volunteer work, not to mention the ol' day job, I started to lose it. "Why," I asked my husband plaintively, "am I doing this? I still look in the mirror and loathe what I see."

Experience has taught me something. When I feel this way, I do not want to be parked on the couch and told how beautiful I am. I just don't want to care so much about how I look. Some body image issues never go away completely. The solution is to focus attention outward. I am excited about the things my body can do. I can run long, and sometimes I can run fast. I can carry a week's worth of groceries for two people inside all by myself. I can wear a million different hats in one day and feel powerful at the end of it.

How did I get myself out of that funk (besides avoiding both mirror and scale)? I planned three vacations (two little, one big), did some early birthday and Christmas shopping for my family, spent six hours working on my comps, and bought a new pair of running shoes. I'm such a bitch when my feet hurt.