Search the Community

Hello all! My name is Ashleigh (aka Unicoroner) and I have been a long-time Nerd Fitness lurker for the last 2-2.5ish years. For some weird reason, I never knew about this forum and am excited to utilize it to help in keeping me accountable. I currently work as an ICU nurse and am also in grad school to become a nurse practitioner. I have roughly 4 semesters left, but it feels like a lifetime and academia is sucking away at my will to live. I live in Chicago with my partner and our dog, Maddie. Before we had some medical setbacks in 2016, we were more active with hiking, biking, camping, playing soccer, and running. Now we do a whole lot of school work and spend too much time stress-eating and procrastinating. (But that's about to change!!) This coming September, I will be turning 42 - which, as we all know, is the answer to the Question of Life, the Universe, and Everything!! I want to leave these last unhealthy 3-5 years of my life behind me and relearn how to be intentional, healthy, committed, and engaged in this awesome experience called "Life" once again! I also really want to be able to do a strict pull-up and not worry about my left kneecap sliding out of place anymore. My Main Goal is to lose 40+ lbs and increase my overall strength. My goals for this 4 week challenge are as follows: 1) Over the next 4 weeks, I will adopt the “never two bad meals in a row” mantra! 2) Over the next 4 weeks, I will get over my fear of the gym and attend at least 2x a week! 3) Over the next 4 weeks, I will food prep healthy meals for the week each Sunday! 4) Over the next 4 weeks, I will meditate at least 4 days a week! Happy Tuesday! Onward! Unicoroner

Super newbie here. For my first quest, I'm focusing not on fitness per se, but on overall health. A little backstory: I've been running consistently (4x week) for about 6 months now. Those 6 months have also been pretty rough on me (a big breakup, moving, general life upheaval and some borderline depression), and running has been the one thing that's consistently made me happy. And it's a great healthy thing to be doing for myself - but it's been the only healthy thing I've been doing for myself. I've been eating a lot of comfort-food crap (box mac and cheese!), maybe having a little too much booze, not sleeping enough, and just generally not taking care of myself. And it shows! I'm constantly tired. I look sick. My under-eye circles are out of control. I've been noticeably grumpy and short-tempered. I want all that to change. I want to be healthy. Main Quest: Create a baseline level of good health. Quiet and re-center my mind: Meditate every day; journal every day.Cut out the junk! No more meals from boxes, no more fast food, no more Cheetos or candy bars. Real food, with the occasional high-quality treat thrown in, will be much better for me. SLEEP, DANG IT! Get at least 7 hours each night. More is better. Side Quest: Create! I've let a lot of things that used to be pretty important to me slip, especially my creative and artistic endeavors. Rather than trying to get back into all of them at once, I want to spend these next 6 weeks focusing on my writing. I will write three short-form pieces that I can submit to humor sites.