Pump Me UP

I have SAD. That's Seasonal Affective Disorder. I almost typed Seasonal Defective Disorder but realized that didn't work. Although I am defective as well. I probably didn't need to tell you that.

For those people that are lucky enough to live somewhere consistently sunny, you are probably not aware of SAD. It's the winter blues caused most likely but a lack of sunlight. If you want more information than you ever wanted to know about it check out Wikipedia.

I've come up with another acronym that might work for me as well: MAD - Motherhood Affective Disorder. MAD happens when your mothering abilities are affected by the incomprehensible behavior of your children. Like, say, your middle child says "that's not fair" for the 543,678 time because Malea and Sasha Obama get to have a sleepover and watch High School Musical 3 at home before anyone else can because they are the President's daughters. It also happens when your husband leaves town for more than 3 days. Guess who's out of town?

But I'm dealing, I'm coping. I would put my hands in the yoga namaste pose right now and take a deep breath but it's really difficult to type that way.

This morning I ventured out of my box a little bit. I decided I need to push myself to try different things or go for hour long walks in the bitter cold with my dog to battle SAD (and MAD). So I'm stepping out of my box and leaving the long johns in the drawer. I went to a free workout class at the YMCA called Strength and Endurance. Now, the free classes at the Y are for any member who wants to attend, generally at a beginning level. Well, this instructor stated right off that this was an ADVANCED class. Having seen this person around the "Y" I knew she wasn't kidding. Three were over 40 people in this class and I looked around at the others wondering how obvious it would be if I just picked up my mat, my weights, my ball and my stretchy rubber thingy and left. Well let's just say I stayed.

I'm glad I stayed. It was a challenge. So much so that the people around me were so focused they probably didn't notice me falling off the exercise ball and faking some of the exercises. It was nutso. I'd like to say that this instructor person is a psycho workout nazi. God love her. I tried to smile and not give her dirty looks.

But I think I'll go back next week because I need this. I need achy muscles so I feel like I'm making headway and I need a good challenge and this is a good challenge. I need to step into something I'm not comfortable with and make a fool out of myself. This should work just fine.

Check out my biceps...