WEEKLY CHECK-IN Saturday December 24th!
WEEKLY CHECK-IN DECEMBER 24th!
HEY EVERYONE!!
How has everyone been doing this week?! We have MADE IT!! We are at the "END" of our Healthy Holiday Challenge!!! AND ITS CHRISTMAS EVE!!
HOW IS EVERYONE DOING?!!! How do you feel?........ How have you been doing with your own personal goals for yourself?..How does everyone feel now that the challenge has ended!?! ... Have you created any new goals for yourself that you will stick with? Have you made it easier for yourself to do so? Have you created any new habits?!....Are you ready to go into the Christmas season or the NEW Year with a more healthier or positive attitude for yourself?.... or, simply just let us know how you have been over the course of the week! Are you proud of yourself, your accomplishments?! We want to hear from you!
This week has been a little up and down ..... Although I kept up with my goals and the Challenge itself, I had some personal issues and anxiety that mentally kept me from doing all that I wanted to do, or should have/could have done for myself.
But, when I feel I'm not completely on track with one thing, I try to make sure that I do even better at other things... My steps weren't where I wanted them to be each day,( I like to average a certain amount a day) ,...... but I did keep up with healthy eating, and water, and other things. I wanted to be sure to keep on track as much as possible "Between" the two holidays of Thanksgiving and Christmas. Because thats usually when people tend to get off course with snacks/treats/extra's/candies/events/parties....etc...etc... or simply just "giving into the spirit of the holiday" by having an extra piece of this or that, or not having or making enough time to exercise etc......
Overall with the personal or daily stressors as well as the chillier weather and not being able to get outdoors as often as I used to, I feel that I have done very well. And I feel good about going into Christmas Day and not feel guilty about "enjoying" myself or certain treats around me since I've done so well for so long. This weekend I want to focus on my faith and my family.. And enjoy the family time together~
@tranquilForever68 @Countrygirl1231 @WhimsicalDancer @amazingsunshine91 @Nethersong @windflowers @hippie_boo @PoliteOcean @Idonotthinkanyonecares @lovingBanana5204 @M432 @Casscass @IcedPhoenix @TripleChances @AdiAdaJaz315 @Elon @Rosieee22 @Mellietronx @Mfai @Helping2findAway @CoffeeAndCaring @Alexaners7734 @Soleena @savannah67 @BridgetAileen @wouldyoubesokind @HalliwellSister @brilliantshoe @AffyAvo @SecretNotes26 @PuppyLove13 @wylycyote @SunshineNaina @Unicorn2015 @Solitaryshadow @SadMe70 @LonelyAngels @redpanda101 @dapperRaspberries5277
@PoliteOcean, the challenge was a good one to keep me focused on continuing to make healthy choices during the holiday season while still indulging occasionally. I was able to keep up with my goals except for one week when I seem to have forgotten my vitamin one day and only exercised twice. That was a rough week for me depression-wise as well as being even more "spontaneous" than my schedule usually is. LOL! So I'm very happy with the results.
My whole focus for this year has been self-care, and I'm much better at it than any of my previous years...which is quite a few. 
So ending up on a positive note with this healthy challenge was perfect and put an exclamation point on this year's success. And that success is very important. It has me motivated to continue my healthy choices and self-care routines even though my focus word will be different for 2017. I don't know what the focus will be yet, but whatever it is, I know it will be amazing.
@BridgetAileen
Thats awesome Bridget... I knew that you would do great in this challenge. And you've succeeded!.... I'm sure whatever your goals are for the coming year, that you will by far exceed those as well. You have done so great this year, I have watched you in this community since the beginning of the year when we started the Healthy Living room and discussions.....and we have all just kept growing! 'Together"!.... Sharing our ups and downs and challenges in our journeys. You have done such a great job, and I see the changes in you. . I too have learned to put more Self Care at the "Fore-Front" for myself.Good Luck to you in whatever your focus ends up being for the New Year....and be sure to share your ongoing progress and excellent suggestions with us!
@PoliteOcean, I think *we* have grown a lot. The Healthy Living Community has been integral to my success. Being able to come here, be inspired by y'all, laugh with y'all, chat with y'all, and to share what I'm learrning with y'all has kept me motivated and encouraged. I couldn't do it without my friends here!
I'm looking forward to where we're all going this next year. It's bound to be awsome!
Overall, I'm finding it tough to feel positive about what was going on this past month. I had to give up some of the things I have been doing that were not part of this challenge because of health issues.
The self-massages have not become a habit. As pressure is a trigger they were something I had to be very cautious about when I already had too many other triggers going on. This past week or so as I started to do more daily tasks I did see a big need for them though. I feel so much tightness in my body that is leading to pain. I want to get into this being a habit and I need to find a way to figure that out when it's not something I can do all the time. Connect it to something I do regularly where I can decide each day if it's reasonable or not.
The body scans were helpful. I do think I've gotten into a habit moreso with these. While I have been checking in with how I'm feeling for quite some time I think doing it a bit more methological manner -was beneficial. With my surgery I was very quick to pick up on a non-throat HAE attack. I'm usually focused on my throat and I do think this practice may have helped me recognize a different attack site quickly. I also learned something - my husband really dislikes guided meditation/ASMR type of audio clips. I had no idea he even knew what ASMR was but one time when he joined me in bed when I had just started a yoga video for my body scan he refused to be in the room with it and explained how he found all of that stuff really creepy. So for any video/audio based ones I've learned that those need to be done when he's not hanging out right with me - gotta get to bed earlier than him if I want to try it right before sleeping in bed.
@AffyAvo Guided meditation helps me a lot too.. But I understand how some might find it creepy..
@AffyAvo
Thanks for letting us know how things are going.... I'm glad to hear that even though you had some difficulties and challenges, that you were able to continue to do the best that you were able to do. And its great that you have found that the body scans are workingfor you and will try to continue to keep up with those as well as the self-massage when you are able.
On another note, ( I kinda did a "lol" about the hubby/creepy thing) I had to question what he thought was so 'creepy' about it?
@AffyAvo, you've discovered a lot over this past month! You found that some things work for you, some things don't, and that you need to adjust some other things. I think that's fantastic! I'm like you in that I need to link together some of my new habits to something I already do on a regular basis. Adding the daily vitamin was easy because I slipped it in with my meds and blood glucosse test. The exercise was a bit more of a challenge because I didn't link it to another routine.
I particularly like what you said about checking with yourself daily to see if a self massage would be appropriate for that day rather than automatically doing one. Genius!
Well done, Affy!!! 
It's been an emotionally challenging week.. The depression seems to be attacking me more.. So though I've been exercising, instead of the usual 60 minutes, I'm doing 30-45 minutes.. And I haven't had cookies but I seem to be having chips.. I just hope this passes soon..
@PuppyLove13
I understand what you mean Puppy... Same thing happened to me only it was my Anxiety..... So I cut down on how much time I was putting in on mine as well... but at least we got it in right?!... So thats still a great accomplishment. 
@PoliteOcean I guess so.. But I suppose the mental issues keep us from appreciating it :)
@PuppyLove13, I think there must be something in the air or some such thing because iit seems like so many people I know have been having a very difficult time emotionally this past week or even two. I know last week was hard for me. This week has slowly gotten better teeny bit by teeny bit. But I'll take any bit I can get. Sending you warm fuzzies!
@PoliteOcean
This week was up and down, and a bit all over the place, not because of the Holidays but because still I couldn't adjust the habits to the more irregular life.
And now it's over? Already? I feel like half way through, maybe Probably because most of it still a work in progress, half-explored ideas that need refining to fit my mental baggage.
The good-chocolate only was the easiest part, it was a habit I'd had but compromised. Coming back to it was almost natural, although I did spend a few uncomfortable moments at the store.
The Journal. Oh boy. I decided to try it after seeing it mentioned in a post, and thought, hey, why not try it, I hear it's good. However, this task ended up becoming a dreaded chore. It suffered from my problems as much as it reflected them: I like keeping everything stuffed in a dark corner somewhere. I put it through several changes of rules, and I might keep experimenting with it just to see what happens. I did find three ways to use it that worked:
a) Make to-do lists for the future, not just things I need to do, but things I would like to consider. It helps with smaller, less relevant plans. I have tons of ideas that just get forgotten instead of getting properly rejected.
b) notes and mind maps on random daily events e.g. fictional plots or characters (I'm lazily learning to understand those better), real life news or relationships etc., anything that I've felt interested in during the day. Makes me pay more attention, analyze and keep my opinion separate from others'. It's fun too.
And as for my inner life c) writing down metaphorical "sketches", small, cartoon-like scenes from my daydreams with personal symbolism. They are rare and take effort to put into words due to their floating, thought-like nature, but it's not as repellant than "writing down my feelings" every day.
Special thanks to @lovingBanana5204 and @wildatheart88 for sharing some experience and ideas.
And finally, the 100 squats a day. Also a bit of a struggle because of various problems, mostly the tedious nature of the exercise, so eventually I had to exchange it for other exercises just to keep going. But it turned out well, I think. The improvement has been obvious, long stairs are suddenly not a problem, anything that involves lifting heavy things I can do without risking my back. And although It doesn't feel motivating exactly, it is very satisfying. So I've decided to keep the squats in my daily life, and also I've decided to figure out a broader exercise regiment. It will take some research to make it suitable for the goal I have in mind, but it should be good.
All in all, the whole think felt less like a challenge and more like an experiment, and now it feels like it isn't over, but it is... the daily check-ins are. They worked, to my surprise :D I might be heading the healthy living forum for future help.
@Soleena
It sounds like you have made some Great changes and great "Revelations" about yourself!?!....
I think its great that you don't consider the challenge "Over" because, this was really just a 'Jump Start" for everyone to start incorporating healthier changes and habits into their lifestyle!...
And great job on writing breaking-down each aspect of your challenge and what you found helpful and what you didnt!. Thats great work!... I too and not to great at "Journaling" like I used to be when I was much younger, but what I find VERY helpful to me now is writing down "positive" things, quotes or scriptures that help me to move forward each day in a positive way! So really its about finding anything that will work for you!.... And it seems like you have! Great job and keep going! Don't stop! Keep up the great work!
@Soleena, it sounds like you are well on your way to some fantastic habits! I can certainly understand how squats could become boring. *yawns* You mentioned finding some other things to incorporate. I think that's a fabulous idea! I'm trying to decide on a good "program" for exercise. I love walking and tai chi. I've been doing some beginner/senior yoga. I've seen the zumba videos that were posted here in the Healthy Living Community, and they looked like fun. So I've been thinking about rotating some or all of those activites, or doing two activities a day for a shorter amount of time each. So there's some experimentation to do there to see what keeps my interest, is easy on my knees (don't ever get bad knees! It *hurts* something awful!), and pushes my heart enough but not too much.
As far as journaling goes, try a variety of types of entries...just like you mentioned. Lists, quotes, thoughts about anything and everything, the best part of the day, etc. Get some crayons, Sharpies, markers, colored pencils, paints, etc. and try just sketching things that just come to you. Yesterday, for example, I took some acrylic paints (turquoise, purple, yellow, light green, and pink) and just smooshed them around on a two page spread of my journal. That's all I've done so far, but I can add more paint, draw with markers on top of it, add photographs or pictures pulled from magazine or catalogs, write a quote...whatever I wish...whenever the mood strikes me. This one that I just started is a composition book in which I glued 2-3 pages together with glue stick so they'd be sturdier. You can get sketch books for not too much...and they don't have the lines in them. But I don't really care if the lines are there or not. It's just for me. I put some notes in it and then used colored pencils to make designs around what I wrote. So write something in nice big lettering and decorate all around it. It doesn't have to be all artsy and perfect. That's not the point. The point is to have fun and allow your journal to be an outlet for things that you want to express or even to "get out of your system". You can finish an entry or not. I have plenty of journal entries that are a line or two long and then abandoned because I didn't feel like writing. I don't write every day. Far from it. I try to do something...anything...once a week. If I do more, that's great. If not, it's not a big deal. One day I even wrote, "I'm tired. I don't want to write, so I'm not." LOL! Until recently, I would always try to write at least half a page. It got to the point that I didn't ever want to get my journal out. It wasn't fun and motivating. So I'm approaching my journal...well, journals because I have more than one...just like I'll be approaching exercise. Variety is the spice of life! At least it is for me. 
@BridgetAileen
@PoliteOcean The analysis at the end was something I looked forward to for the entire month. :)
This is a lot of help! Writing down positive quotes or thoughts would be great for me, I have a tendency to be a downer... not sure it won't get in the way though. But I can imagine at least one drawing-related exercise I used to do that would be easy and fun... I've missed doodling. Thanks, guys!
@Soleena, just use that journal however works for you. Let what wants to come out come out in whatever way it wants. I find I'm enjoying this way of journaling much more enjoyable. And also more helpful. *hugs*
@PoliteOcean I have been doing great on keeping my body moving, but I have been indulging with some sweets :/
@Mellietronx
Well Mellie, even though you are "indulging" some, the GREAT thing is that you said you are doing great and keeping yourself MOVING! So keep up the great work on that!
@Mellietronx, that's great that you keep yourself moving! Well done!
@PoliteOcean
i have not achieved much in this week but i am looking forward to improve in the next week
@EssenceOfHope
Thats ok Hope! Not all weeks will be great ones as far as our goals for ourselves, but each day, or each week, is Always another chance to improve the things that you want to improve and work on them! You can do it!
@PoliteOcean
Thank You
@EssenceOfHope, I think we all have weeks like that. Tell yourself that it will be just fine. Just start up again...don't try to catch up. Just pick it up again. I missed both of my goals last week, but I exceeded the week before and met them this week. I did struggle for a brief time with disappointment, but people here in the community reminded me that I'd be just fine this week. And they were right. I know you'll do better next week!
@BridgetAileen
I am going to try . Thanks 
Alive. A little depressed but will survive.
@Wildatheart88
Hey! Haven't seen you around since the daily check in vanishings. Doesn't look like you're doing the greatest either... Hopefully one random person remembering you on the internet will make you feel just a bit better... :) Just keep swimming.
I did meditation yesterday.
