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"How fragile we are... Begone fear!" - Dwarf Fortress Last year I was making fairly good progress on learning Italian and Irish, having fun dancing, and working on a one-hundred pushup challenge (I made it to 47 at a time). Then, in October, a surprise encounter with a newsstand led to a very serious concussion. Fun fact about concussions, they really mess with your co-ordination (as well as make it pretty much impossible to read or use the computer for a couple of weeks). Due to a series of unfortunate accidents, horrible DEX fumbles (that stacking head-injury penalty really sucks), and/or possibly pissing off unknown forces, I ended up with no less than four concussions within a 30 day period. I do not recommend it. Apparently it's really hard to move with head trauma, as well as, ya know, breathe. Or eat. So I ended up bored out of my skull and basically unable to do any form of exercise for a month or two. Add on to that the general despair from the brain scramble and losing almost all the progress I had made, and well, it was not a very happy time. A littttttle bit more backstory real fast. I am not a skinny person. I have never been. When I was in high school I weighed 170 pounds and could bench 185 [for the record I am a woman]. I was very fond of weight lifting for several years. In college I crept up to 210 pounds. After bailing out to help family stuff and pick up a job, I hung out around 250 pounds. And then 250 became 260, and 260 became 270. It was very, very frustrating. I would swim three miles, I would bike for 90 minutes, I would count calories and lift weights and yet despite it all I weighed somewhere between 250 and 270 pounds and not one thing would change that. In 2011 I managed to make it down to 237.25 before spiking all the way back up again. The worst part was it never, ever, looked like I was making progress. I always just generally looked the same. In 2012-2013 I pretty much just gave up. After all, nine years or so is quite a bit of time with nothing to basically show for it (in my magazine-conditioned brain). I stopped lifting. Then I stopped biking. Eventually I even stopped swimming. I would still walk, but the walks got shorter and shorter, and farther between. In early 2014 I decided I was being an idiot. This might have coincided with not being allowed on a particular fairground ride *cough*. Alright, so I hated calorie counting, fine I'd cross that off the list. And I'm not very into social media, so Fitocracy wasn't very effective. But I do enjoy games. I love games. So, as a fun exercise, I decided to stat myself DND-style and give myself quests. Write everything up in a Quest Log/Journal with very epic sounding accomplishments; "cleansed the dinning hall of vile filth" sounds way better than "cleaned the dishes." The two year lapse meant I was basically at ground zero, complete with the "holy monkeys on a unicycle I cannot do a single push up" moment. I made about seven months of progress (Italian! Wii Just Dance and Zumba! Push ups!) and then BAM! Concussions, apply directly to the forehead (and the sides of the head, and the back of the head for good measure). Bed rest. No exercise. Oh no, all my progress is ash on the wind. Over-the-top dramatics. And then, on November 29, 2014, I found Nerd Fitness. I could finally stand to be on the computer (for very short times) and was looking for inspiration on stating myself, again, since I was basically back at the start. Behold! I found the wonder that is the post on Paleo *insert heavenly choir*. I read all about it. I looked it over. I looked at it again. I said screw it, why not? I took photos (the world will never see these, at least not until I have cooler comparison photos). I started that day. I also decided to stop drinking Diet Coke on the same day. Ahahahahah. Oh the withdrawals. The post about becoming your own super hero really, really helped. Lady Aern does not drink Diet Coke! Because there is no Diet Coke in Faerûn. Two days in I convinced my Mom to join me (on Paleo, not on the Diet Coke). We stopped eating bread, and rice, and pasta, and microwave dinners. We stopped baking cookies and pies. There was a lot of chewing involved, so much chewing. It's been two and a half months now, and we're still going strong. I can see my ankles, my elbows, I can feel my spine and my hip bone, I can see my muscles all over my body in the weirdest places. A lot of medical stuff has cleared up. I now drink water, very small amounts of tea, and nothing else. I'm just now starting yoga with very, very simple routines since I'm still a bit medically fragile. I waited this long to post an introduction because I wanted to make sure I could actually stick with it. So here I am, hello everyone I'm Lady Aern, pleased to meet you! Game Over -- New Game? [Y/N] Y ================================================================= Initial Stats Started: Nov 29th, 2014 Gender: F Height: 5'4" Weight: 272 Size: 26 Current Stats Date: Feb 15th, 2015 Weight: 258.5 Size: 20/22 ================================================================= Primary Goals Achieve 170 pounds. Learn to parkour... and become decent at it. Secondary Goals Achieve size 12 clothing. Achieve 100 consecutive pushups. Achieve 10 consecutive pullups - it's been a long time since I've done those. Improve flexibility via yoga.