The Stairway to Heaven. Except, not.

So, I recently talked about some of the things I've done on my weight loss journey.  I've literally tried a million different ways to lose this bit of extra me.  But sometimes life has a way of kicking our asses, and motivation (for whatever reason) to keep trying and keeping fighting gets lost.

It's not easy changing your life.  And truly, any weight loss journey is about changing your life.  You need to commit to the journey and it takes a certain level of serious effort.  This isn't one of those passive hobbies you just sort of pick up and work on every now and again.  It's something that demands daily attention and effort.

My best friend, Tammi, and I have tried a lot.  We got gym memberships and spent damn near every day at the gym.  We did a little bit of everything at the gym.  We did the treadmill, the 30 minute room (dear God, that was no joke!), the weight machines, the bikes, the elliptical machines (ok, so we didn't do those very often, they really hurt!)...We basically tried to incorporate the entire gym into our workout routine.  We were killing it at the gym.  Crushing it.  Just not enough to be happy with our weight loss progress.

Now that I think about it, I'm pretty sure we're still getting charged for the gym, actually...

Next, we moved onto doing things like the squat challenge and the plank challenge, etc.  There were more than a few times when I wanted to kill Tammi, every time I heard her say "I found a new challenge!"  Some of these challenges are downright mean!  We twisted and contorted our bodies and pushed them to do things we hadn't previously imagined our bodies capable of.  And held it for long periods of time.  But, we were still left unfulfilled with our progress.

The ones I can do, and the ones I can't do.

I've tried doing yoga.  I actually find yoga to be quite nice.  I enjoy the stretching and trying to find my center and using my core.  I have HORRIBLE balance.  Dude, seriously, it's bad.  When I did my first (aptly named) awkward pose, I couldn't lift onto my toes without falling over.  It was a sad, sad sight.  I still can't quite breath through the half moon.  And you'd better give me a wide birth when I do the balancing stick pose.  My favorite is the warrior pose.  Not sure why, it just is.  But I still feel like it's just not enough.

We've tried walking and hiking and we've found that we really like hiking.  We get outside, soak up some vitamin D, connect with nature, and get to enjoy some really beautiful scenery!  Even when our hikes have gone horribly wrong (and some of them really have), we still end up having the time of our lives.

So  many effing stairs.

Last summer (back when we were still hiking noobs and didn't know wtf we were doing) we got it into our heads to climb the Manitou Springs Incline.  I'm still not entirely sure how we managed to survive this beast, and not just once, but twice.  Now, before I let  you get too terribly impressed with just how awesome we are (and we are), I feel I should mention that we only made it about 2/3 of the way up.  We left the stairs at the "bailout" and were quite happy to have made it that far!

The incline was/is a true test of strength.  I don't mean just physical strength, it's also a test of mental strength.   We had to endure quite a bit to get up this beast.  There are numerous points where we each wanted to give up.  Instead we cheered each other on and encouraged each other to propel ourselves further and further up the stairs.  I know there are probably a few people who would say "it's easy, I've done it in 30 mintues..."  To that I say, can you do it with an extra hundred pounds on your back???  No?  Well, I did!  That's right, I did this when I was still about 100 pounds overweight.  It hurt so bad I wanted to die.  Every inch of my being was screaming at me to stop.  I don't know what my driving force was those two days.  Could have been the desire to finish something I started.  Could've been I was too stubborn to call it quits.  Might have been that someone didn't think I even could and I needed to prove them wrong.  Maybe it was a need to say that I did it, even though I was sure I couldn't.

It took us just under three hours to make our treks.  I want to be sad that our time wasn't better.  I want to be sad that we didn't make it all the way to the top.  I want to be sad that there were people twice my age on the incline who passed us as we climbed, then passed us a second time as they made a second ascent.  I want to say I'm sad that I cried at a couple of points going up.

I want to be sad at all the shortcomings, but it's hard to be sad when you reach that "bailout" point and look down and see just how far you've come.

Couple of smug bitches.

We are total bad asses.  I'm so proud of us.  We've come a long way since we started.  We plan to keep going until we are standing on the top of this mountain, queens of the mother fucking world!