Frustration grows when you can’t do what you want.

I’ve struggled with some stomach issue for the past seven days, (I’ll spare you the gory details,) but at the end of it, I pretty much survived off of saltines and chicken broth for the better part of last week. Those two items fail to give an active body the energy she needs–so my brain was foggy, I had to re-arrange my clients because by 3pm I couldn’t really concentrate long enough to count reps and encourage anyone to do anything. My mind was home, on my couch, in front of Netflix and hoping that adding avocado to my broth wouldn’t upset my stomach to too much. (It did…)

So for five days I slept a lot, did the bare minimum at work. Came home and went to bed. I didn’t work out, I didn’t swim, I ubered and took a lot of buses, instead of walking like I usual. I was all sorts out of wack. I went through the weekend doing all the social things I wanted to do and just paid the price that was coming when I decided to have a cocktail or two on a basically week long empty stomach. Thank goodness for stretchy leggings and dresses to hide my bloat and discomfort.

So my frustration has come from being unable to DO WHAT I WANT when I have been feeling a bit better. I’m by no means eating normal meals yet, but I’m able to eat enough to not feel like I’m foggy and going to fall over. I was invited to try out a Soul Cycle class this morning. YES!  A new challenge. I’ve never really been one for group classes, or riding a bike that’s going no where, but it was free and with my girls from works, so why not!?

Fast forward to about 25 minutes into the class: heart rate racing, sweat dripping into my eyes, feeling sick and dizzy and having a super cool instructor yelling for us to peddle harder and KEEP GOING.

DAMNIT, I CAN’T. (Any other day, any other week I would have been super into it, super excited, super stoked to be getting my ass kicked in a whole new way. But after a week of being sick–not so into it.)

So my frustration grows; I’m in shape, I’m fit, I can work HARDER THAN THIS. But this morning I couldn’t. And I had to remind myself of this through out the entire class. That not being able to push myself as hard as usual isn’t my fault. That getting sick happens and I’m still recovering. I had to say “Hey Sloan, remember that tiny breakfast you ate this morning?Remember how your stomach hurt after just 150 calories of oatmeal? That wasn’t enough fuel for this, don’t beat yourself up for recovering!”

Moral of this story–I started to get really mad and pissed at myself for not being able ‘to do it’ this morning. But, I did. I’m actively learning to give myself leeway, to be sure to approach fitness as something I get to do and enjoy it. And not have it be yet another reason to beat myself up. Moving your body is always the right decision, however, how hard you are able to push yourself may not be in your control. And relinquishing that control is just as hard as that Spin class.