So I’m kind of irritated with myself when it comes to my exercise routine.

I have a 5K race coming up mid-March (Achilles St. Patrick’s Day Run) and a 10K planned at the start of April in Panama City, Florida (we’ll be on vacation there), but I’m feeling kind of like I’ve shot myself in the foot in regards to training. I put on a heap of weight in December and I’m struggling to get it off. All while trying to work on getting my running distances and speed back up to parr. I know that as the weight comes off, my speed will increase, but it’s frustrating. It’s frustrating because while I’m not starting from scratch, I’m working back up from a deficit just from having whacked on the weight and not exercised much throughout December. And that’s just stupid. Why do we do this to ourselves? We just let exercise fall by the wayside and then when we dive back in we’re in all kinds of pain and/or frustration. So while I’m lugging myself to the gym four times a week, I’m still annoyed that it’s gotten to this point. No one likes starting from scratch.

I’m lifting low amount of weight right now since I need to re-adjust myself so that my muscles don’t cave under the sudden pressure. I’m also only running around 5-7k at a go, which feels really, really puny compared to what I was doing when I was training for that half marathon last year. On the upside, I do have another half marathon planed (Ottawa Race Weekend in May) so I know that at some point I’ll be covering those distances again.

Anyway, that’s a brief amount of moaning about my miseries. It’s not always easy to try to stay fit. I’m not really motivated all that much right now, but I am thankful that I have enough of a “must exercise” mentality that I can drag my ass to the gym at 9 pm at night without having to put too much thought into it. One of the massive upsides to having maintained a consistent level of physical fitness last year is that I no longer find it difficult, or strenuous to push myself to go to the gym. Now it’s just a matter of fact and I do what needs to be done.

So while it’s not always easy, I’ll persevere regardless. I’m sure in a month or so I’ll feel back to normal, but for now… I grumpily push on, all while reading fitspo tumblrs to try to get me motivated! How about you? Are you struggling with your exercise routine, or your motivation to start one?