My first run in 3 months

As I mentioned before, I have had a BIG lifestyle change in the fourth quarter of 2013 and it has been difficult to make eating healthily and exercise a priority. I've found I've lost a bit of weight - not heaps but enough, 7-10lb - without any effort. This has made it pretty difficult to be motivated to work out and/or eat nothing but chia seeds. I have been so busy, so busy in such a really great way, that I haven't even had time to THINK about what might be a better dinner to have than "a jar of salsa" or what might be a better form of exercise than "thigh-toning slut drops". 

However, my busy life has come to an abrupt halt as it is now "Christmas holidays" and I have come back to the abyss of joy that is East Kent to celebrate our saviour's birth (I do actually LOVE my hometown but in a bit of an ironic way to be honest). I suddenly find myself with yawning gaps of time ahead of me. It's weird as when I'm busy I often crave time to myself to get on with things but at the same time when it actually happens I feel a bit weird and twitchy (I'm typing this at about 120 words per minute). So this afternoon I thought - WHAT BETTER TIME to get back into the 'fitness' swing of things? I caught sight of my amazing new trainers in the corner (more on that in my next post) and before I knew it I was rocking a ridiculously high ponytail, pulling on my mum's Tesco Cherokee joggers and heading out of the door towards the beach.

I only planned to run to the next bay and back as, well, it was my first run in three months and as mentioned, I have literally done no other exercise in this whole time, and I'd assumed I'd be dying at this point. I listened to the following playlist on repeat, and therefore felt like I was flying:

1.8 miles rolled around and I was approaching my parents' house again, and I just thought, "GOD, I FEEL AMAZING. THE COLD NEVER BOTHERED ME ANYWAY" [bonus points for getting the reference] so I thought I would just keep going, so basically ran around in circles for another 20 minutes, but the point is, I ran 5k!! Here is my proof:

So I did it, I might have run 5k slower than a literal snail on Valium, but I did it, I completed 5k without a single walk break when I hadn't ran at all in THREE MONTHS. I just felt SO HIGH, which I still feel now a couple of hours later, which might be why I KEEP USING CAPS. But what an ACTUALLY BRILLIANT FEELING.

Back before my life imploded and then brilliantly pieced itself back together again, I signed up to run a six mile race on the 23rd March 2014. I really feel with enough effort I might be able to complete that and in a decent time and all. I'm going to go for a few more casual runs over the Christmas break and then in January get on hard with training for that, WHY WOULDN'T I WHEN I COULD FEEL LIKE THIS THREE OR FOUR TIMES A WEEK OR WHATEVER. 

I am just so proud of myself right now, I began 2013 overweight and a bit unhappy and unable to run to the end of the road and back. And look at me now - just under three months ago I had nowhere to live and I thought my life was over. But now, my life is better than it has been for a very, very long time and I have the base level of fitness that I'm able to run 5k without even having any kind of coronary failure. This is why I started running, this is why I got addicted before, and this is why I should never have stopped - I love feeling good about myself, and I never feel better about myself than just after finishing a good run. If anyone reading this has thought about starting running but not sure if they can be bothered or if they would be any good or whatever - I urge you, please, just try. It will change your life and your outlook on it.