Five check-mark day
Tag: Sleep
Not insomniac
I don’t want to sleep because I have nothing to look forward to for when I wake up.
Five check mark day
Steps (target: 10000)
Floors (10)
Active minutes (500)
Sleep (8 hours)
Hydration (2800ml)
I get four of them frequently, it’s the sleep one that’s rare. Yesterday I slept so early that my ‘go to sleep’ reminder alarm at 21:30 woke me up 🙂
The long, deep sleep probably helped with today’s run. It was way faster than usual and with great form, specially on the ascents and descents.
I think watching the 5000m final (Athletics world championships) yesterday helped with the form.
The run also brought the week’s running total to above 50Km—the first one since the marathon in April.
81.4
The weighing scale read 81.4 Kg on Saturday, 10 Aug. Last time I weighed this much was on 26th February, more than five months ago.
As recently as a month ago, on 5th July, I weighed just 78 Kg. I gained 3.4 kilos in a month!
That 81.4 isn’t a single spike. My average weight last week was 80.3 Kg. A month ago it was 78.3 Kg. Even the weekly average increased by 2 kilos :(
Based on BMI (25.4), that makes me officially overweight.
The siesta / the coffee nap
Today was an 8/10 day.
I had a productive morning of work, and a good round of ankle exercises, stretching and wobble board (~4 mins nonstop). Then the boys and I went for a brisk walk in the woods. The wind was blowing from the north, so the wheat husk didn’t bother me much on the walk today. Did a few more stretches on return, then the boy and I had lunch.
If the day had ended there, it’d have still been a 6/10 day1.
Lunch was two courses—a toast with egg mayo and some bhaji (minus pav), and two pieces of oven cooked chicken fillet. It was heavy. By the time I finished lunch, made and drank coffee, my brain was shutting down and eyes were closing. I put on British F1 practice session on the TV but could barely keep my eyes open.
With the boy snuggled up next to me, there was no point fighting the sleep. So, I set an alarm for 15 mins later, took off the specs, and lay down next to him on the (sleep corner) of the sofa. 15 mins later I snoozed the alarm. 9 more mins. Next time the alarm rang, I was already partly awake. I stayed on the sofa, enjoying the boy’s hug, and read the latest Stratechery article (It’s about Shopify—one of the new tech companies I quite admire). By the time the article finished, I was wide awake, full of energy and raring to go.
If the morning work session was productive, the evening session was doubly so. I wasn’t just getting a lot of work done, I was even enjoying it—both the work and the feeling. It was awesome. I took a break midway to walk around a bit. I also cut and diced some apples during the break—treats for me and the boys. Then it was back upstairs for more work. Finally, I had to stop working and tear myself away from the desk at 19:30, an hour after my ‘stop work’ alarm.
R had gone to get the cold pizza for dinner, so the boy and I spent 10 mins walking around in the backyard—smelling the flowers, the clean breeze, and making sure I achieve my step target.
It was a good day.
Listening to the body
Despite the worries (which all turned out real), I ended up having a decent day yesterday. I wrote to Axc, but never heard back from them. I’m trying to make myself accept their decision. I also failed the blood test—joint lowest ever score of 131 g/l. On the other hand, I did end up getting a fair amount of work done. I also enjoyed the run in the evening—35 mins of easy run finished with 20 mins of fartlek. I ended the day very tired, slightly disheartened (I’d expected the reply from Axc at end of day), but fairly satisfied. I even finished reading a book in the bed before sleeping.
Today began well—woke to Chewie snuggled up between my legs. Worked for a couple of hours, then went downstairs for a bit of stretching, refreshing, and to pick up Dudley—today is Dudley Wednesday :)
By the time I returned back upstairs, it was already over 3 hours since I’d woken up. The morning coffee had worn off, and I was feeling surprisingly drowsy. These are usually my freshest, most productive hours. This could be due to the hay fever tab, or an effect of the run and foam rolling last evening.
I could have made another coffee, and warded the drowsiness off. But, for once, I decided to listen to the body and give it a break. I had no immediate deadlines, and I had already done over 2 hours of productive work. So, I went downstairs, drank a lot of water, got under the covers, called the boys onto the bed, set an alarm for 90 mins, and we all went to sleep1 :)
It was a beautiful, warm sleep with both boys snuggled on either side. I woke up refreshed. Not just the mind, even the legs and body felt a lot recovered. We drank more water, and went for a walk. Followed it up with lunch, another short rest, and then back to work2. It’s been another super productive 3 hours now, and I am back to being satisfied. And happy. Mostly.
And down…
I’ve been having a decent long stretch of good days. I’ve been very productive with work, with non-work work, been running regularly, sleeping well, and been mostly happy. Today is bent on breaking the streak.
I slept over 10 hours last night. It was not a good sleep. (Don’t all bad days start with bad sleep?)
I remember having a good dream—I had two good friends I used to live with, one of their friends brought over his dogs (big scary Rottweilers) who got along fabulously with me. I must’ve woken up around this time. That may be why I remember the dream. That’s also probably why rest of the sleep was bad. I had a bad cold—the bedside kerchief is a testament to that. The head started clouding over with all the bad thoughts and worries. I had to resort to some meditation exercises to get myself back to sleep.
In the morning, I woke up before the first alarm (5:10), but was in a terrible state—nose and head full of fluid, and body feeling tired. The Brooklands parkrun plans went out the window. I switched off the alarms and went back to sleep. Finally got out of bed at 10!
A bad night was followed by a not so good morning. The loo visit was unfruitful. I skipped this morning’s Duolingo practice. Took the boys for only a short walk. Didn’t even feel like finishing the coffee that R had left for me.
Now I’ve got to go for the Saturday run but it’s warm outside and I’ve got no spirit.
Moments of quiet…
Son, sleep, sun
Successful tweak – meditation before sleeping
For the last 10 days, I have meditated in bed before sleeping.
I updated my pre-sleep routine. It now starts with meditating for 10 minutes – usually Daily Calm, though yesterday I tried and liked a quiet meditation. Then I massage my feet, ankles and achilles with a massage ball before wearing sleeping socks (keeping feet warm). Finally, I read a book till the eyes shut off – usually 5-15 minutes.
I have been really enjoying this routine. The meditation calms me down drastically. The massage helps the feet stay fitter while I am increasing running mileage (or at least I think it helps). Then I read something – an easy book1 or a few paragraphs of Meditations (Marcus Aurelius).
I have been having really good sleep – drifting into it peacefully, and waking calm. The anxieties from rest of the day have mostly kept at bay. I’m lovin’ it.
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