Take two...or three or four? Who's counting....

January:  No one said it would be easy.  I haven't been perfect.  But I did attack January with a vengeance.  I saw changes pretty quickly at first.  I was motivated and determined.  I wasn't working out every day, but I really tried.  I probably made it about 4 days a week.  But hey, compared to the nothing that I was doing before, this was a major improvement. 
That first week was brutal! I did day 1's workout, which was cardio.  My legs were so sore the next day.  I worked day 2:  upper body.  It wasn't nearly as bad.  It was kinda easy.  The abs section was near the end and I didn't quite make it through.  By Wednesday, I could not sit and stand.  I was so ridiculously sore I couldn't fathom the idea of working out.  Thursday I fought my way through it.  I really don't remember the rest of the week... but I kept at it one day at a time.
Then I started to notice something else.  When I missed a day, it made restarting my workout that much harder.  I ran into additional troubles as the month went on, my back, my wrist (I'm still dealing with this one, but it's better-I think), running out of town at the spur of the moment to visit my 103 year old grandmother in poor health, but I didn't stop.  I may not have worked out every, single, day, but I was doing it most of the time. 
I didn't give up, like I had in the fall.  I didn't quit or take a day off.  When I "fell of the clean-eating wagon" I didn't let it ruin the rest of the day, or the next.  Instead, I would get back to making better choices almost immediately.  Even on days when I wanted to eat all the carbs (these days still happen), I was honest with my group.  Magically, they would post the exact thing I needed to hear.
 My favorite one of recent was, "This is the difference between habits and temporary changes. You are creating habits which means even when you miss a workout or eat a donut or watch My Little Pony on the couch for two days straight because your kids need you, you will pick it all back up the next day. Don’t let one day or two days ruin your stride. Be kind to yourself. Habits are just that, ones we keep in place forever."  (This was technically from a brutal day in February) Nearing the end of January, I became frustrated.  I had seen my goal for the month as attainable, and I was close.  I wanted a 12 lb loss, and I was at 10 with one week to go.  Maybe I thought, "2 lbs is easy, I can slack a bit"  and I wasn't as perfect as I should have been.  I know that I had started retaining water and I was very angry.  By the end of the month of January, my 10lb loss, had diminished to only 8lbs.  I was pist.  I shared with my group and they had plenty of encouraging words.  I was reminded that 8lbs is like 32 sticks of butter.  That's alot of freaking butter...
Going into February, I thought I'd psyched myself back up. I know now, that I didn't.  This is hard.  I knew it wasn't going to be easy.  I'm still not giving up.  I'm committed to a new me.