My Journey With Health And Fitness – I Took A Day

My husband and I are up at our trailer on the lake enjoying some awesome summer weather. The one thing about doing this is we are quite isolated which gives the two of us some time to talk. Conversations have been around estate planning (it comes to the forefront when you see someone die unexpectantly) but more importantly handling the grief that I feel. Sometimes I wonder if my husband truly understands what I am going through and then he will surprise me with words that show me he does. Today it was my reluctance to transfer my phone to my brother’s iPhone 15 because I felt it was just another piece of him going away. My husband showed me his new iPhone 13 (which was also my brother’s) and said no, I think of it of always carrying him with me. Ok, I guess he does get it.

Being at the lake is often challenging. It can be hard to maintain proper eating habits (which I have done) but really it is getting workouts in that is often the struggle. I am proud to say when I talk about taking a day off it has nothing to do with the workouts as I have walked 3 1/2 hours both yesterday and today (ok, I do feel guilty that it is only 3 1/2 hours which is pretty sad). No, taking a day means something completely different.

Even though I told all of my volunteer organizations when my brother died that I was stepping back, that never really happened. I couldn’t because I felt so bad about letting them down that I tried to find a way to at minimum stay connected. Yes, I cut back a bit but I never stopped completely. I know in my head this was a bad decision because I needed some time for myself but I just couldn’t figure out a way to do that without disappointing the people I deal with (who quite frankly would have all understood me stepping back for a bit).

But yesterday I decided it was my day. I literally didn’t do anything for anyone other than myself. I took a day and I’ll be honest it felt pretty good. Just that one single day felt like it gave me the chance to breath, something that has been missing for a while. I took the day to sit outside and breath the fresh air. I took the day to clear my head and figure out what else I needed to do. I took the day to let the past month sink in and clear away the fog that has built up in my brain. I just took a day.

I feel better for having done this. I recognize that I was falling into a pretty deep hole and while the past week or so I have been trying to crawl my way out, I am not sure of my success. Now I feel I have aligned everything again and can start clearing out my to do list. This is not to say I won’t have some stumbles in the next few weeks but if I do, I will simply take another day.

What it also did was reinforce my determination to find a day each week to do something fun with my sister and husband. Already on the agenda for next week is a trip to the old Fort Langley, something I haven’t done in about four decades. Not sure the game plan for the following week but it should be something equally as fun.

As I tell people, right now it is one day at a time and yesterday was the best of those days. Oh and Saturday I might even forego the walking and just spend our last day at the trailer enjoying life.