During my failed no drinking month I decided to start exercising at home. When I first moved to Seattle I would walk 1.5 miles to work and 1.5 miles home (which included a few large hills). Since I started working from home my walking has decreased greatly and I wanted to offset my lack of exercise. I felt like a bit of a lump, especially with the weather getting colder I’ve really settled into my hibernation instincts.
This idea was cemented when I realized I could only do THREE KNEE PUSH UPS. WHAT?! So I decided to do push ups and squats three days a week: Monday, Wednesday and Friday. Luckily my partner has joined in and we now encourage each other. I doubt I would have kept going without him. Today is our 2 month anniversary of working out like this and I’m excited to keep it going. I’ve made some real progress.
As I said when I started I could barely do 3 knee push ups. I have been adding one every day after that (unless I fail out on one) and am now up to 16 with only a short break at 8. I am even pumping my arms instead of basically falling to the floor and trying to catch myself. Throughout the process I’ve routinely tried to see if I could do at least 1 real push up. One random Saturday I was actually able to! But when I tried again a few days later I fell on my face. That’s my goal for the rest of 2017: Do one real push up!
On the squats front I had to reset and re-reading the awesome book Starting Strength. I had forgotten how low an actual squat is. Perpendicular to the TOP of your thigh, not the bottom people! Since I’ve been doing them correctly I’ve gone from 15 squats to 36 and counting. This seems like a great way to get a little strength training in when gyms are too expensive and our floors can’t handle our own weight equipment.
My plan is to continue doing this throughout 2017 and set a new goal from there. To getting SWOL!