Well HELLO! Let’s catch up!

Whoa, whoa, whoa.

Literally WHO IS THIS!?

I figure there is no better time to [finally] blog again than when I am home sick with COVID. *womp womp* Is this what it takes for me to get my blogging act together??

Yes, actually, it definitely is.

I am very grateful to say that I have only been moderately sick with flu / bad cold symptoms this week. Started with a mild cold, then to a high fever, lots of fatigue, and all that traveled down to lower respiratory symptoms, which is where I’m at right now. The pesky (to say the least) virus appears to be making its rounds a little more again where I am. I hope you and yours are staying well ♥︎

Anyway, onto more exciting things. Let’s catch up! At the end you can find a montage of photos and videos of life recently.

Easter

He is Risen! Happy Easter season! And almost May!

I keep telling people that, starting from Easter weekend, it’s like all my weekends are going to be filled with plans after plans all the way until mid-June. And then it feels like the year is pretty much over at that point. It might as well be Christmas already; that’s how quickly it feels like time is flying.

I had the opportunity to spend Easter in Boston with my beloved friends who are still living up there since we all graduated college. All of my closest friends are still the ones I met through the Boston University Catholic Center (and now their new friends who they’ve made since then!). If you are a seasoned reader of this blog, you know I am pretty obsessed with them.

To love Him more and more

This is my petition to Jesus for this year especially. It’s simple and it has always been my petition, I guess. But more explicitly now, I desire to love Jesus more and more deeply, truly, and completely from all those small and perhaps imperceptible places of reservation in my heart. I am a slow work in progress, but He is helping me a lot.

What a pitiful state of humanity to need so much help just to love Jesus who has Loved us to death, but thankfully, He doesn’t mind us asking for the help.

Work

Can you believe I’ve been working as a doctor of physical therapy for 1.5 years already!? Neither can I.

I am still working at an outpatient orthopedic clinic, helping people with things you’d expect: neck, low back, shoulder, elbow, hand, hip, knee, ankle, post-op rehab, concussion (a fave of mine to treat!), headaches, vestibular dysfunction, balance/gait dysfunction… The list goes on. I’m learning a heck of a lot, and I hope to continue becoming the best clinician that I can be.

Training

Well this week training has been a big wash due to having COVID and not really loving the feeling my trachea gets when I try to do any sort of physical activity. Just these past couple of days I have been able to do some lower intensity KB things with lots of rest in between sets. I am grateful for that.

Otherwise, I am still training with kettlebells at home, though I recently joined my high school friend’s gym that he owns to start picking up the barbell again and to use other pieces of cardio and conditioning equipment that I don’t have at home. I am indebted to KBs and all my friends who have taught me how to use them, because they certainly have made me stronger and faster in ways that 6+ years of working out on my own could hardly do.

What am I training for? As cliché as it sounds, I really am training for life and work. My struggles and successes with strength and aerobic training (mostly strength though…aerobic I need to work on) help me to truly understand what I am asking of my patients and to give them the best cues for motor learning. It also makes my actual physical job easier!

I train 3-4 times per week for 15-60 minutes, depending on how much time I have. Making it work!

I would do another Spartan race perhaps… (I did a Spartan Beast (15 miles!) back in October and I am just now realizing that I never mentioned it on this blog! It was a grind but it was so fun.)

Eats

Check out the video below for a peek at some of the things I’ve been eating. I would no longer call myself a “healthy living blogger” based on the merit of my nutrition, but I would call myself a “healthy living blogger” by virtue of how much I don’t overanalyze my food anymore. I think it’s relatively nutritious, but ask a registered dietitian. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Oh, I do still love peanut butter and banana though. And dried figs with Greek yogurt. Some things don’t change.

————————

Here is the little spring montage covering life as of late. I created this because my media storage on WordPress is nearly full. I used to embed my Instagram posts on here to spice things up with media, but I decided to make my Insta private because creepy accounts/people abound on the interwebs, and it’s not worth it to me to keep my profile public, since my goal is not to grow a huge following. Instagram is way too palatable and addicting of a platform (as opposed to WordPress) with all of its algorithms that draw cool people, yes, but alsoooo unwanted eyes, so I’ll just keep the bubble closed.

Hence, a montage here to keep things exciting. Enjoy!

When I am not sick at home and when I am working, life is quite full to the brim. I expect that to be the same moving forward into spring and summer, but with Sunday school being over, I hope to add a couple more posts per month to this ol’ blog (which is 9 years old this year!). No promises, but I’ll try! I still love doing this.

Thank you, as always, for reading.

—————————

So tell me:

What is a highlight of your spring so far?

Have you returned to any activities recently as things have opened up more?

Anything exciting coming up for you in the month of May?

Advertisement

Weekly Moves and Grooves XVI {Listen To Your Body}

 Just popping in (very late) this evening to share…

weekly moves and grooves

Studying for finals swallowed me up this weekend. We are almost home free, fellas!

Sunday

20 min. bodyweight workout from Jess + leg strength

I loved this two-part bodyweight workout from Blonde Ponytail! I did it in my dorm at 7 pm because I wasn’t about that dark and cold mile trek to the gym on Sunday night.

20-mins-body-weight-workout

For the AMRAP, I did 9 or 10 rounds, I believe. I love how it moved quickly and incorporated simple yet effective functional movements. Like my favorite—burpees!

I also did three rounds of 10 pistol squats each leg + 20 Bulgarian split squat hops each leg. Those hops burnnnn.

Monday

5 min. row warmup + 400 Heavy Rep Workout from Hilary

heavy

{via}

This was fun and tough! I used a 20# dumbbell for the single arm high pulls, a 30# bar for the thrusters, and a 35# dumbbell for everything else (the gym here does not have kettlebells). Also, instead of jumping rope after each round, I did 10 pushup burpees. It was quick (under 30 min.) but effective! Just what a college student needs!

Tuesday

30 min. arc trainer + 8 min. ab tabata

I did steady state cardio and it felt like an eternity, but it was a nice way to loosen up after Monday’s workout.

For the ab tabata, I did 4 rounds of 20 sec. work, 10 sec. rest:

Wednesday

Rest

Thursday

5 min. stairmaster warmup + leg workout

This workout was all over the place because I was kind of tired and my back was bothering me, so it was all about listening to my body.

I started with 8 weighted pistol squats each leg + 30 side jump lunges, then 10 regular pistols each leg + 30 side jump lunges, and then I stopped with the pistols there because my lower back wasn’t happy about it.

3 rounds of each set:

  • 12-15 Bulgarian split squats each leg (25#) + 20 jump lunges
  • 20 plie squats (35#) + 8 pulses in plie + 10 pulse squat jumps (pulse five times in squat position before jumping up)
  • 8-10 hamstring curls (90#) + 20 surfer jumps

And then I started this burpee/arm ladder workout with goblet squats instead of swings, but I stopped short because my body was just done. Yes, I could have pushed through, but I wanted to be kind to myself and just stretch.

Friday

arm workout

I warmed up with some pushups and shoulder mobility exercises before jumping into a “wing it” workout.

  • 4 sets: 8 lat pull downs + 12 arnold presses
  • 10 pushup burpees (random)

3 sets of each:

I finished with an 8 minute ab tabata with reverse crunch leg lifts, mountain climbers, and side plank hip raises L/R.

Saturday

Rest/Walking

I will be posting a HECK of a lot more once finals are over because then I’ll be on winter break, during which I will have zero homework. Hallelujah!