In this episode of the Body Tinkerer…

207.4lbs

Look at that! I’m nearly down to my lowest weight, last reached about two months ago! I continued taking walks about every other day last week, which feels pretty good. Food choices are also going well.

However, it seems like I can’t shake this lower back pain for the life of me. (And believe me, I’ve tried to literally shake and shimmy and twist it away, and that just seems to make it worse.) It sidelined me from a walk last week, and again this morning, since it was so bad last night it hurt every time sat down in a chair or tried to get back up again.

Among other remedies, so far I’ve done the following: periodic stretching throughout the day, no more heels, no more period in case that was making it worse, more chiropractic adjustments (my neck sure does feel good now!), taking a week off Yoga, ibuprofen, heat packs, and ice packs. It won’t go away. It sticks around like a bad cold.

I’m beginning to think that I am unconsciously doing some horrible back-throwing-out thing without even knowing it. So I’ve started trying to catch myself in the act of doing bad posture things doing the day and correcting them when I can. Arching my back while I sit typing away at work? I try to hold my stomach muscles tighter to take up the slack. Locking my knees while I stand, hyper-extending my lower back? Keep knees soft and tilt the pelvis ever so slightly forward like a good Yoga student. Lean forward toward the computer screen? Square my shoulders and sit up straight as a church pew. But it’s so hard to keep it all up! I am going nuts with how this back pain is making life difficult.

It really feels like my body is a collection of bad mechanics. I know that weight loss will help a lot with this, because it will simply remove a lot of the strain from various joints and structures. But trying to get there gradually is hard when the squeaky wheel is my lower back, which so happens to also be the universal joint on which almost all body mechanics seem to depend. I don’t know if all my occasional tinkering (stomach in, pelvis tucked, shoulders back!) is working. If only my job could suddenly morph from deskbound writer to bedbound laze-about, I’d be set!

I suppose for now I’m going to keep my head up (stomach in, pelvis tucked, shoulders back!), my choices healthy, and my walks mindful. I’ll be a good little semi-vegetarian aspiring Yogi, with a touch of the reluctant mechanic thrown in for good measure, and hope for the best. I’d love some advice, if anyone has dealt with anything similar!

Starting my day mindful, intentional, tidy and happy

Psst, don’t tell that lazy brain of mine, but this morning I actually convinced my sleepy body to throw off the warm covers and go out for a walk! (Plus, two blog posts in two days, how about that!) It was pitch dark, it was raining in my face, but I did it! The requisite nine o’clock bedtime was accomplished with the help of a) no more Mad Men episodes to keep me away late on Mondays, and in fact no good Monday tv in general; b) sweet husband who reminded me it was 9pm because he wanted to go to bed earlier too, and c) sweet husband who also offered me his yellow rain jacket with the special Reflecty Stripes™ so I wouldn’t get paranoid about getting hit by drivers in our neighborhood, which has generous bike lanes but only the occasional sidewalk.

So out I walked for fifteen minutes down the road and fifteen back, and I’ve never felt so awake. It was really nice to be reminded of why I love the early mornings. I get to see the sleepy neighborhood, I get to putter around in the quiet house and snuggle with the cat. I have so much time that I not only eat breakfast and get ready, I also have time to unload the dishwasher and tidy up the kitchen and soak some quinoa for dinner later. What a lovely way to start the day! Mindful, intentional, tidy and happy.

I’d also like to say that my wonderful morning was made easier because of some recent furniture changes in our house. Maybe that sounds silly, but let me explain: my desk used to be cramped and in a corner, our dining room table is perpetually covered with my ongoing sewing projects, and there’s no place to eat in the kitchen. This means eating in the morning is usually confined to food in bar form, or skipped and eaten at work, or I would hunch over my laptop trying to take care of last minute bill work and other business. But this past weekend, we bought a two-person desk setup at IKEA (the Vika system, nearly twelve feet long) and then discovered that we had a tiny corner in the kitchen where our old kitchen table could be squeezed. Suddenly I not only have a space where I enjoy working, I also have a kitchen table to eat at! I can’t tell you how much this is changing my habits and my perspective on the house. Sometimes all it takes is a slight rearrangement and suddenly the house (and my inner life) seems so much more harmonious.

Meanwhile, I want to list out the vegetarian meals I’ve been planning:

• Quiche with leeks, potatoes, and Italian cheese blend
• Lentil soup with carrots, mushrooms and barley
• Baked potatoes with broccoli and cheese sauce
• Roasted butternut squash, quinoa and rainbow chard sautee
• Sweet potatoes and pepper stir fry over wild rice
• Falafel and chickpeas in pita bread (with tzatziki and lettuce)
• Potato zucchini carrot fritters with sour cream topping
• Roast butternut squash soup with toasted pine nuts

I’m not sure it’s all super-healthy (hello dairy fats!) but at least I’m getting in lots more veggies. In these meals, the protein comes from legumes or sometimes nuts sprinkled over top. I definitely need to keep an eye on my cheese consumption, though. I have a terrible weakness for soft cheeses, and I need to be careful I don’t cut out meat just for the sake of adding a nice melting chunk of triple cream Delice de Bourgogne.

Anyway, to come back to my main point, I was so pleased that I was able to get out for my inaugural morning walk today. It felt good, just as I knew it would, once I got past the terrible awfulness of setting that alarm for (*gasp*) 5:30am. The last thing I want to do next week is to come back and say I only went walking that one day, so my goal is to do it again tomorrow. Let’s go!