As you all know I really enjoy my work with Body After Baby Chicago. She comes over twice a week, kicks my butt and I always feel stronger, taller, more energetic when we're done.  Where I have trouble in this whole getting healthy thing is doing work outs on my own.  They do happen on occasion, but a lot of the time I keep putting it off until it's bedtime and who really wants to work up a sweat then?

So I've been looking for some classes and other opportunities for me to get some cardio in on the days I don't work with Body After Baby.  I need a leader, a teacher, a coach.  In life, I like to be the boss.  In fitness, I need someone else telling me what to do.

So when I saw that Stroller Strides was doing a 5K training program I thought perfect! Last weekend I strapped on my running shoes and headed out to a nearby park to get a jog/walk in.  The program is great--Stroller Strides talks about proper running form, where to get good running shoes, etc. before sending you off on your laps around the park.  While I'm not a huge fan of running (and in the interest of full disclosure, I ended up speed walking more than running) I felt GREAT when it was over.  And it was nice to have my exercise out of the way before 9AM!

Monday I was a little sore; no biggie.  Tuesday, same thing.  But Tuesday night--WOW!  Suddenly my lower back started hurting and it has been a pain in my...well, lower back since then.  I've iced, I've stretched, I've gone to the chiropractor (who recommended the icing and stretching) but I'm still hurting. 

According to my chiropractor, the pain is coming from one of my stabilizer muscles.  When you've been out of shape (as I sadly have been) and you start introducing new exercises, your smaller muscles (the ones you've  been ignoring) get fatigued and so the larger muscles take over and do more work.  Which in turn fatigues them, causing PAIN!

So it looks like I'll be walking the 5K training program for a while.  Which is frustrating, but I keep reminding myself of that ecard that's floating around Facebook right now.  "No matter how slow you are, you're still lapping everyone on the couch."

Now here's the cautionary party of this whole story--if you're still healthy, if you're still in shape, STAY THAT WAY!  What I've always known, but have definitely had reinforced through this whole journey is, while it's pretty d*mn easy to get overweight and out of shape, it's SOOOO much harder to get it all back. 

And if, like me, you are trying to get it all back, go slow, listen to your body and remember--you're still lapping everyone on the couch!