Ample, bodacious, big

This post hasn't been easy to write. I've been trying to find the words, to try and cheer it up, but that has just resulted in quietly, privately, agonizing over something that I know a lot of people have felt before, or are currently feeling.

I have only lost 25 of the 40 pounds I gained when I was pregnant with Genevieve. I can't blame not being able to shed the pounds on anyone but myself- I was down to 8 lbs above my pre-pregnancy weight when I started *really* making ice cream last year. And then the scale crept up, the way it always does when my beloved ice cream and I rediscover our love for each other.

Me? I love the flavor, the texture, the euphoria that comes with each bite. And my beloved ice cream? Sticks to me like a faithful friend.

More specifically, it sticks to my rear end, making it more ample and ensuring the legacy that my mother bequeathed upon me, which her mother bequeathed upon her, which I will pass on to Genevieve. An ample behind. A bodacious booty. A big butt.

Fabulousness is also part of her legacy.

It never has bothered me before, really, because as soon as my pants started feeling snug, I would (and could) do something about it. The insidious thing is that the bad feelings don't just hit you like a tidal wave, they creep up on you until one day you realize that you don't like how you look in the mirror. Slowly, the same way your pants gradually get tighter and tighter, until the day you realize that you are being positively strangled.

The first time I noticed it was my birthday, when Andrew gave me a 10-class yoga gift certificate. It came with a very nice note, but all I saw was subtext. And the subtext read, "IT'S BEEN NEARLY A YEAR AND YOU ARE STILL FAT. HAPPY BIRTHDAY, FATSO."

I didn't cry in front of my guests, but there were tears, later.

How do you reconcile not liking what you see in the mirror with wanting to raise a confident daughter with a positive body image? I feel like a hypocrite, but I know that I haven't ever felt this way about my body before.

The worst part is how keenly aware I have been; when you're crawling and squatting to play, you notice when you don't have room to move in your pants. After two months of letting my vanity win out, I gave up and bought larger pants. Fat pants.

You know what? I'm happier. I can comfortably play on the floor and the pants *look* better on me- imagine that, pants that fit properly LOOK better, too. The only problem is my perception of the number on the label.

What I can't manage to do is get out and *go* to yoga. But the great thing about yoga is that you can do it basically anywhere, with barely anything. So, I'm going to start doing yoga with Genevieve, and hopefully a combination of the yoga and the mouse-wrangling will yield some positive results.

(I also got fat yoga pants, since getting into my regular yoga pants was like trying to stuff too much filling into uncooperative sausage casing. There is nothing that motivates you less than your *exercise* clothes being too tight.)

Part of having positive body image is learning healthy habits. I need to model these if not only for my own health, but for Genevieve's as well.

Enough complaining. Let's walk, Mama.

Fortunately, I have my own personal trainer, who is a huge fan of long walks.

Yoga and Dogs

Doing yoga at home can be a challenge. Sometimes, it's motivation; sometimes, it's a space issue. Mostly it's a space issue. Our house wasn't really laid out for any type of movement-based activity indoors. That's fine, but it means that every time we want to do any type of working out, we have to move around the furniture in the living room. And also, drop the blinds. (We have our own Gladys Kravitz living across the street.)

There are two more obstacles to doing yoga in the house. Two sweet, furry, opportunistic obstacles. As soon as I roll out my yoga mat, it's open season for wrestling on the floor. So, we wrestle on the floor (because the stay-put-while-snuggling policy also applies to active playtime), and then I can do my yoga.

"Yoga" might translate to "watching TV while propped on pillows" sometimes.

Maybe.

As you'll notice, Niki is smack-dab in the middle of my yoga mat, comfortably snuggled between bolsters. The best way that I've found of dealing with this is to first take pictures, then to snuggle up next to him, give him a few belly rubs, and wait a few minutes until he gets bored with my neediness and changes location.

He calls this pose "sad and unloved dog". Don't be fooled by those big, brown eyes.

[Yes, I know this trains both of the dogs to continue to do what they're doing, but taking a few minutes to snuggle my dogs is good for everyone.]

Lest you think that once Niki has been sufficiently snuggled, the obstacles to practicing yoga at home are over, that's only half of the issue. I have *two* dogs, if you remember. Two dogs who have learned to work cooperatively.

Once I start warming up and going through poses, I have Elphie walking across my mat, underneath me in downward dog, weaving around my feet in squatted poses, and my personal favorite, curling up in the open area when I do supta baddha konasana. I call this "agility yoga", where I am the agility course.

It's mostly funny, but it means that if I were *able* to do handstands, I couldn't do it in the house for fear of falling on or accidentally kicking one of the dogs. I'm mostly afraid that I'll just break my neck doing it, and I doubt they'll call 911. Crow pose is also out of the question, if you were curious. Too much temptation for dog-style identity verification. They're good dogs, and they've been taught the "polite nose" command, but they're not made of stone.

Elphie, ever the precocious dog, also likes to compete. I do downward dog, Elphie sighs a deeply disappointed sigh and does downward dog, presumably to show me the correct way of doing it. Same thing for upward dog. To be totally fair, she's way better at yoga than I am. But I'm working on that.

Eventually, they get bored with the agility portion of the floor show, and wait for me to do something extended and uncomfortable (like hold plank), and that's when it's time for kisses. It's hard to keep your core strong while someone is licking your nose. Or elbow. Try it.

I could put them out in the yard, or behind the dog gate; I just don't want to. That's reserved for when they really need to be out of the way, for their own safety. Yoga is just cooperative playtime.

Plus, they've known not to walk on my knitting while it's blocking since they were puppies. They've got their priorities straight.

What doesn't kill us makes us hotter

Yoga is the best part of my week; I've been going to classes regularly since August. I'm not good at it (yet), but I like how it makes me feel. You shouldn't confuse that with "I like doing yoga", because as soon as class starts to get challenging, the Inner Dissenter starts whining about if class will EVER be over.

In case you're not familiar, the Inner Dissenter is the voice that tells you that you're not good enough, you're not a fastidious enough flosser, or that you look fat in those jeans. Mostly, the Inner Dissenter is a jerk.

[Side note: I think my personal hell is one where you're in a super-hard yoga class that never, ever ends. Or, sitting in a perpetually spinning office chair.]

I tried out a variety of classes, and throughout the week, my yoga workout varies. There is one class that is an ongoing challenge for me, taught by Kent Bond, who is the founder of Willow Glen Yoga. It's only the second yoga studio I've ever been to, but I like it LOADS better than That Other Place. They encourage the use of props, and for those of us who might be out of shape (or "alternatively shaped", as I like to think of it) props make easing into the positions much, much easier. It's taken a lot of the misery, pain, and self-loathing out of doing yoga, as far as I'm concerned.

Some of the classes are lovely and slow, but still on the challenging side. Not Kent's class. Kent's class delivers a Chuck Norris sized punch in the face, the core, and the hamstrings. Kent's class is simultaneously the most challenging and the most satisfying class of my week. The first few weeks were really frustrating for me; I felt betrayed by my lack of body awareness, my lack of balance, and my lack of sheer strength. I'm used to being a quick study, but my brain and body have had a really tough time with yoga.

Going to yoga has been incredibly humbling. I'm not used to struggling to learn something, and the first few classes I took with Kent were a challenge to say the least. The first class was an exercise in humility: every pose that we did in class, Kent would come by and correct me. When we were in a pose and he would pass me, it felt like a victory; I'd have a ticker-tape parade in my head. Halfway through class, every time Kent walked towards me, I thought, "Please don't be here to correct me." Then, I realized, No Jasmin, you're wrong.

I was there to learn, and unless I wanted to do it incorrectly (and risk injuring myself), I needed to really absorb the correction. Being a quick study has made me a lazy learner; if I don't get it right away, my inclination is to quit. Frankly speaking, that is crap.

The Inner Dissenter was louder than ever, saying all sorts of unflattering things about my learning ability, and was encouraging me to roll up my yoga mat, go home, and have a bowl of ice cream instead of doing the Hard Yoga.

I thought loudly to the Inner Dissenter, Shut up and let me learn.

I pushed through to the end of class, and ached all the way home. When I got there, Andrew asked me how it had gone, to which I responded, "Miserable. I'm going to keep going until it's not so hard."

And I have. In the last couple of weeks, I've noticed that I'm able to hold the poses more easily, my flexibility has increased, my balance is improved, and my shape has changed, noticeably. 


Maybe if I approach intarsia with the same gusto, it won't be so horrible.

Beating the clock

If you've been reading the blog for any length of time, you will have noticed that when I decide to do something, there is no stopping me. Whether it's finding an out-of-print book, or completing a project, it always happens- usually before schedule.

Per Dr. B's instructions to exercise, I've been doing a minimum of half an hour every day. (Notice how I say "minimum". It's been closer to 45 mins- 1hr.) On Monday, I went to the mandatory orientation for the gym at work so that I could start doing time at the gym everyday in lieu of a long, leisurely lunch with WorkHusbandMike.

WHMike was on board on Friday, letting me know he'd be my workout buddy. Come Monday, he was shocked when I insisted on taking the stairs after lunch. (We work on the second floor.)

Those of us in the corporate world know that meetings will be meetings, so WHMike couldn't make it today. So, I went by myself.

I got on the machine, started up the iPod, and did two miles. Mile one took twelve minutes. (This would be the second fastest mile I have done since high school.) Originally, I had decided to do a mile, then get back to the grindstone.

But.

The exercise machines have little LCD data things on them. How many calories you've burned, your time, and the distance you've gone. While I don't care about the calorie bit, watching my distance vs. the time lapsed got my competitive side up and roaring.

I pushed through the stitch in my side (deeeeep breaths!), and did another mile.

In eight and a half minutes. Beating my best time from high school by a minute and a half. That's right. Two miles in UNDER twenty minutes.

I stepped off of the machine, and woo! Light-headed. But, again, I'm feeling really good.

Oh, and it doesn't hurt that my abs and obliques are starting to be all washboard-y.