Whole30 Day 2. Invasion of the Swimsuits

Today was a fairly decent Whole30 day.  We had a big work meeting with a catered lunch.  I had delicious steak, steamed broccoli and cauliflower, guacamole, and salsa.  I knew what we were having and could plan accordingly.  For dinner I had more of the tuna salad and lettuce wraps.  I'm definitely keeping that in the rotation.  So, all in all, the world was graced with a successful day in the eating department.

Today I also received a shipment of new swimsuits. A couple of my old suits died, so I was excited for the excuse to splurge on some new ones.  It's a fact that I love a swimsuit.  After new socks, swimsuits are my favorite purchase. They are comfortable, they remind me of vacation and, most importantly, they remind me of swimming.  I tried them on with Taz as my audience.  He's great because he's not very judgmental.  He's a dog, so he's just concerned about when I'm going to feed him and rub his ears.  He doesn't care that my gut sticks out in the bathing suit.  He thinks it's stupid that I try them on at all.  He's more of a "go for it" kind of guy.

I put the first suit on, and I loved the color.  I felt fun and swimmy and ready to hit the beach or the pool or the lake or anything else I could hit with some water and some swimming.  Then I looked in the mirror, and my external vision crushed the mental image I had of myself. It's like a huge boulder bounded down my mental mountain and flattened entire villages of joy, happiness, and confidence. 

I hate when that happens.  I will be walking along, having a perfectly great day.  In my head I'm looking cool, I'm feeling great, nothing can stop me as I breeze along like Mary Tyler Moore conquering the big city. "Girl, I look SO adorable.  I have reached the nirvana of external representation of my internal coolness.  I can't be stopped."

Then, at some point during the day, I'll catch my reflection in a mirror or a window, and that vision I had in my head will die a swift, agonizing death.  Gone is the cute, carefree, put-together look. Gone is the confident, happy-go-lucky Allison.  She has been replaced by the sad, frumpy, blah, loser Allison. Loser Allison is a real drag.  "Seriously? How have all my a-hole friends been letting me walk around like this ALL day? Sheesh. And my hair? Is that really how my hair looks? And where did the fat arm come from? Freaking fat arm! NOOOOO! Why did I even try when there's frump and bad hair and the fat arm?" 

After my initial swimsuit disappointment, I forged ahead and tried on the next suit while mentally adjusting my expectations when I looked in the mirror.  Does it cover the ta-tas? Great.  Does it make my butt look big?  Hahahahaha. Kidding. Of COURSE it makes my butt look big. Does it at least look somewhat presentable for public viewing? Yes. Do I like the color? Great color. OK.  I'll live with it. 

I'm lucky that I love swimming.  Well, I love bobbing around in the water and doing handstands and floating around.  Being in and near the water is one of my favorite things.  That's probably partially because fat floats so well.  I'm like a talking buoy.  You could drop me in the ocean, and I could help guide ships to harbor. 

My love of swimming and water far outweigh my aversion to being seen in public in a bathing suit.  For someone so chunky, I sure do wear a swimsuit a lot. Sure, I have moments like I described above, but I try to push ahead.  I have lots of moments where I also feel cute and fun and happy in a bathing suit because that means I am near water. So it's not all Loser Allison.  Sometimes it's Happy Fun Swim Time Allison. 

I've read that swimming is great exercise for all fitness levels.  The heavier you are (to a point) the easier swimming is because you are buoyant.  The more fit you become, the harder swimming gets because muscle doesn't float like fat.  It's brilliant.  The difficulty level increases to match your level of fitness.  How cool is that?  I started swimming laps a couple of years ago to push myself to do something besides bobbing around and practicing the perfect handstand, and I found that I liked swimming laps, too. I was good at it.  It was an exercise I could be decent at even though I wasn't the skinniest or most fit person on the planet. An added bonus is you don't sweat while swimming. That's important when you live in a desert. I also like the hot tub I reward myself with after swimming laps.  It makes me feel like those Olympic divers that immediately climb out of the pool and into the hot tub to wait on their scores.  I'm part of the athletic elite! 

Part of my May challenge is to get back into swimming at least three times a week and pushing myself to get in race shape for a swim in the fall. The weirdest thing when I did the Whole30 before was that after about 1 week, I noticed that my speed and endurance increased significantly. It was like a light switch turned on, and VOILA! I was a swimming machine.  I'm looking forward to that change again.  Look out world.  It's swimsuit season.