Getting Back To It

Fitness is something that I enjoy. However, I tend to lack motivation a lot of the time. Hence, one of the many reasons that the Army is good for me. It forces me to make fitness a part of my regular routine, whether I want to or not.

Stateside, before I came to the Shit Hole, I did CrossFit. For those of you that don't know what CrossFit is, you can find out here. It was an amazing work out, and had the close-knit family feeling with the members that I had missed since leaving Basic Training. The encouragement, motivation and support from others suffering through the same misery spoke to that little part of my soul that missed the grueling days at Ft. Leonard Wood. Despite life being crazy the summer before I left for the Shit Hole, I fit in workouts fairly regularly, and saw progress. I was sad to leave them when my orders came, and I shipped off to Texas, and later the Shit Hole. And in the weeks that followed, my level of fitness declined. I was training hard in Texas, which left little time for PT, and when I finally arrived overseas, it took awhile to adjust enough to function on a day-to-day basis, let alone work out. So, when I finally did start training again, I was pretty much starting at ground zero. It was embarrassing.

But, I am happy to report that I have done some dramatic improving over the last several months, and the credit for that goes to a handful of Army NCO's that pushed me in Remedial PT, and some Navy cats that have continued the effort since I outgrew the Remedial PT. And now, after some cajoling, one of my Navy girls and I have convinced one of the Navy CrossFit instructors to hold an early morning class for us. It won't be daily, but it will be a handful of times a week. I'm just happy that I'm physically in a place that I can go back to CrossFit and not die, lol.

This morning was our first WOD. It was a baby-WOD by my old standards, and I'm equal parts happy and embarrassed to report that it killed me. I won't get into the technicalities of it (however, if you're interested, you can see it on my Facebook Page), but in an open-air gym in a place where the air quality sucks, my lungs burned almost as fiercely as my muscles, and I'm still marveling at the fact that I didn't puke somewhere in the middle of my breathless misery. It was a good day :)

I don't know what tomorrow holds, as far as fitness is concerned. My day-to-day schedule is kind a "fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants" kind of thing. But I am hopeful, and optimistic, knowing that somewhere soon, I will be back in the Box, and though its not home, in the Box of CrossFit LionHeart, its a good temporary fix to vent my frustrations, and maintain my own fitness standards.

I'm getting back to it -- back to normal, in a place that is anything but.