ups and downs

i cannot find my membership card to the gym. i can see it clearly in my mind, and i feel like i just saw it the other day, but i can't for the life of me remember where.

this was a problem because i needed to renew my membership in time for thrive.

yesterday i called the customer service line and had them look me up by name. it worked and it probably saved me $50. if i had just renewed online, i would not have had the nice operator waive the 're-activation fee' for me. (if i had not let the membership lapse, i probably could have avoided the fee as well, but i knew i wasn't going to use the gym in my last trimester or on maternity leave. after that, well, i didn't know what was going to happen.)

he said it would take a day for the renweal to be reflected in the system, but i didn't want to wait that long.

i went to the gym, hoping that the same receptionist would be there as has been for the past 2 years. bingo! we chatted about our babies and then i told her about the renewal and the card, yada yada. she waved me on through. (dang! maybe i could've avoided paying the renewal fee altogether!)

i jumped on the treadmill, but i couldn't get it to wake up. i didn't think i was gone long enough to forget how to use the machinery. after my third try, i got started. i went for the fat-burning program and the machine went crazy adjusting the incline in order to keep my heart rate at its target. those heart monitors on the handles are useless. how can i be clipping along, even at just 3mph, and have a pulse of 54? nobody even has a resting rate that low, except lance armstrong. i wore my pedometer while on the treadmill and added almost 2000 paces to my total.

it was so good to be exercising again; the adrenaline was flowing, i had an endorphin high--until my body crashed about an hour later. it felt like it just shut down. ah, that sluggishness of the first 2 weeks of working out. i did not miss that.

i feel like this is a good start to the program. the first two days i got back on track with caloric intake (i only was a little bit hungry) and the third day added the cardio. next week i will add weight training again (after i find my gloves.)