As I’d mentioned previously, I’m excited about this new year. I’ve taken some time to recenter myself, and I’m feeling energized in moving forward with clear focus.

Here’s a blurb, a brief summary, a bit of backstory for any of you who are new here: 2023 was a horrendous, heinous, atrocious year. Yours was, too? I am so sincerely sorry.

2023 got the better of me because I allowed it to. I found myself focusing on each awful thing that happened because I got swept up into the whole of it. I lost my footing, which I guess was easy to do. After all, before I could recover from one thing, the next thing hit, and so on, and so forth. Not only was there no respite between events, but many of them overlapped. 

The one blissful, magnificent, luminous spot in the clouded-over year was our wedding and honeymoon. As soon as we got back, 2023 started up again.

So I got swept up in this ridiculous tidal wave, and I allowed it to set me back. At some point, instead of working through my grief, I withdrew from the world.

And I got nothing done.

And I’m in pretty terrible physical shape.

So this year, I’m going to get shit done. I’m going to get back into great shape. Most importantly, I’m going to get strong again and return to the level of physical conditioning that makes me feel right. (I do not need or want to lose weight. I want my muscle mass back, thank you.)

You know what I find to be interesting? On the surface, my personal set-backs looked, to me, like failures, but upon reflection, I recognize that they were not. I didn’t fail. I flailed. It was my own fault that the year was a gigantic flail-fest, and I’ve learned from it. There will be no flailing in 2024, my friends. I know that there won’t be, and not because I believe that nothing will go wrong. I’m under no such impression. I know for a fact that I wasn’t born yesterday; I have zero expectations of uneventfulness from this new year. Indeed, 2024 has already thrown in not one, but two crises. They hurled in quite rudely only 13 days into the year, but I was mentally refreshed and ready for them.

This year is going to be better because I’m going to make it better, I’ve decided. I’ve written out some goals and other notes in a journal that I keep at hand:

It’s been going well. Really well. Firstly, I had to get back on course, and I have, and I’m pleased with this accomplishment. My life required a compass calibration, and I made that happen. I’m heading in the right direction.

Secondly, we’re 18 days into the year, and I’ve logged in workouts on nine of those days! I’m currently working out at home, lifting weights (6x) and throwing punches and kicks (1x). The other two days were walking days. It’s a start. What I’m aiming for is three strength-training workouts and two combat workouts per week, plus a walk every day. As it is, I’m feeling good despite my slow start – because it’s a start! – and I’m enjoying the feeling of strength coming back.

Oh, but – if consistency is key to fitness success – and I believe that it is – then I did fail in 2023, in this regard. To be fair, though, two unique medical events occurred and disrupted my fitness momentum in 2023: respiratory aspiration and subsequent long-term pneumonia with residual lung damage (May-present), and COVID (November).

I’m incredibly happy and grateful to be back after losing control of my health and well-being in the midst of 2023’s villainous shenanigans. Getting out of shape was as detrimental to my mental health as was my shutting down and withdrawing. I have PTSD. I need structure and physical activity in my life in order to function in a healthy, balanced way.

Preview to next week’s post: Also in 2023, I decided to wean off of benzos and ditch hormone replacement therapy. This threw a double blow to my sleep. Never mind my classic chronic issue of getting to bed too late! That was – is – a behavioral pattern. What’s happening now is physical: sleep has been an actual struggle in and of itself. I’ve been working on it, and I think I’ve finally arrived at a method that promotes drug-free sleep for Yours Truly, who has taken Klonopin every night for, oh, 20+ years.

I’m excited to share this part of my journey, too, and I’ll do so in hopes that someone (one of you?) can benefit from my trial and error.

Speaking of sleep, it’s well past that time. Stay healthy, my friends. Until next week!