Friday Tri: 2 Experiments

Experiment #1: No Watch

I'm pretty sure most of the rest of you gave up watches a long time ago. I have a phone, but it isn't as easy to get out and look at as a watch, and for a long time I was using my watch for sports-related things like setting it to go off underwater while I was swimming, to make sure that I made my times on long swim sets (and also didn't forget which number I was on--it went off only on even numbered laps). But it broke 10 days ago and I thought it might be an interesting experiment to see what happened when I didn't have it.

There are a lot of times when I wonder what time it is, look at my left wrist, and remember I don't have my watch. Sometimes I then try to guess what time it is, based on the last time I knew and how much time I think has passed. But other times--and I think this is important--I simply shrug and say to myself, It is the time that it is and nothing you can do will change that. So get on with what you are doing. I was astonished to realize that I had actually deluded myself into thinking that my checking my watch frequently, I had some actual control over the universe through time. I have long prided myself on hurrying through things, so that I had more time to do other things. But ultimately, what am I doing this for? What is all the rush about? Is this really improving my life?

As for sports related items, looking at my watch or having it beep at me, also does not make me able to suddenly run faster, bike faster, or swim faster. And secondly, I think my hearing is going because I can't hear my watch beep under the water very well anymore anyway. Luckily, I am at a new pool with two clocks posted, one on either end, so I can look up and check my time there. Am I constantly doing that? Well, I do look a lot, but not every single length. Sometimes because of my stroke pattern, I end up needing to breathe on the wrong side at the end of the pool. Guess what? This is not the end of the world. I can still choose to swim fast or slow and checking my time doesn't change that. The rest of you probably figured this out a long time ago, too. Further proof that there are ways in which I am shockingly immature.

Experiment #2: No Calorie Counter

So, last week a friend of mine posted a link to an article about exercise addiction. As I was reading, I began to wonder if I am addicted to exercise. Everyone who probably knows me is probably groaning right about now, having figured this out months ago. But yes, it takes a while to process. As I was explaining to friends last night, one of the things an addict does is point out all the people who are MORE addicted. And then they say, well, that means I'm not addicted. If i don't do everything that guy does, then I'm not addicted. I shield myself by pointing to others.

My kids have been annoyed with my obsessive calorie counting for a long time now. I have logged all the food I have eaten every day for the last two years or more. It started when a friend mentioned myfitnesspal as a free app to help with weight loss. He said he was playing with it and asked me and my husband if we wanted to join him and be "friends" on-line and support each other. The first thing I said to him was, do you really want to introduce me to some new way for me to count stuff? You know how OCD I am. So he didn't press the issue, but nonetheless, I started that night and just kept going.

Even when I did Ironman competitions, I would make sure to keep track of every bottle of Gatorade I drank, every Power bar I ate, every chip or banana or pretzel that I got in. And even when myfitnesspal refused to count my Ironman days (it simply starts over counting how many days I've logged and refuses to display this information to my "friends" about how many calories I burned while exercising--for over 13 hours in one day).

And why did I do this?

Because there was a certain feedback mechanism that I thrive on. Every day, I was able to get my numbers below the little bar that marked how many calories I was allowed to eat, and then I felt good about myself. The days where my calories went "red" were bad days, and I wasn't as happy about those. This sounds really dumb, but there is something in me that likes this kind of feedback and control (sound familiar?).

I wondered sometimes why I was doing it. I don't really want to lose weight or gain weight. I'm perfectly happy with where I am and I don't exercise hours and hours a day without a purpose. If I'm training for an Ironman, then a couple days a week are long days (3-5 hours each), but when I'm not, I stick to 1-2 hours a day. But there is this illusion of control, that if you are tracking it, then you can make it do what you want.

I don't know that a doctor would think of me as clinically in need of intervention. If I am injured, I switch to other sports so I don't hurt myself. I don't really love pain. I don't force myself not to eat for hours on end. I haven't lost any dangerous amount of weight and I still cycle regularly. But still, I think I am in danger of losing sight of the goal. Instead of thinking about what was the best workout the day before a race last year, I would sometimes find myself just wanting my numbers to look "right" on my little weekly chart. And that is probably not a good trend.

So I have now gone 1 whole week without logging anything, either calories or exercise. And I discovered that I was spending way too much time looking at my chart and trying to figure out what I was "allowed" to have rather than finding things that were healthy and sounded like they tasted good. I was also working out based at least partly on how many calories I wanted to burn that day instead of doing a workout that either felt good or made sense in terms of my fitness goals.

I suspect that I will also feel less pressure to exercise when I am ill or have a concussion, as I did a couple of weeks ago. Even though I knew I was still not feeling well, I wanted to get my numbers to line up. I wanted to log in my exercise minutes, even when my husband and children and pretty much everyone I knew kept telling me that I should be going to the doctor and staying in bed. I told myself that because I wasn't doing any jumping or running that was likely to aggravate my head (which did probably help to some degree), then I was fine. So I stayed on my stationary bike. Which was probably stupid.

I'm proud of a lot of my accomplishment in triathlon. I don't plan to give it up, but I am hoping that this will help me re-evaluate my choices and my motives in a useful way. Like two years ago, when I made an effort not to write down any goals for races, I think this may actually help me improve my fitness. But even if it doesn't, I think it will help me be happier, and for some reason, I have to actually consciously try to reach for happiness and hold to it. It isn't something that I naturally look for. It isn't a number and I can't write up a little chart for my happiness. Although now that I think of it, maybe I could do something like that, after all . . .