Sweatin' it at Home

After my little incident on Monday, I'm a little freaked out to go to the gym.  I know I shouldn't be.  I've gone there for quite a while and never had a problem before.  I carry benadryl.  I'm obviously capable of driving myself to the ER if a situation arises.  But I'm still freaked out.  So I'm working out at home for a few days until I get the courage up to hit the gym again.  And maybe tell the nice workers at the desk that I had a terrible allergic reaction.  And to start being the crazy machine cleaning lady by super wiping down the equipment before I use it.  I might invest in my own wipes....

Anyway.  I worked out at home yesterday.  Usually I'm terrible at actually doing this.  I start a 30 day challenge and then I give up.  But we're trying it again.  And I found a workout that's supposed to be as good as 30 Day Shred.  I can tell you I definitely liked it better.  I suck at videos because I want to watch my shows while I workout and I can't do that if I'm watching Jillian Michaels.  And then my desire to watch Gilmore Girls or the Mindy Project wins out over my desire to work out.

First I do the No-Excuse (Gymless) Workout.  You may've seen a picture I put on Instagram yesterday.  I seriously loved this workout so much.  Jumping jacks are growing on me.  And I actually felt like I got a good workout.  I was definitely glad I was doing it at home alone because well, jumping jacks are not pretty.  There's definite jiggling.  But that's the point, to decrease the jiggling, right.  I also walked up and down my driveway 5 times, it was about half a mile.  I would've done longer but it was crazy cold yesterday and I couldn't feel my face.

No link, sorry guys.  The link on Pinterest took me to shoes on Amazon...  Maybe it's a sign I should be buying shoes.  If you know the original link, let me know!

So, for my 30 day challenge, I'm combining two.  Maybe I'm trying to be an over achiever...  So I do this workout:

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Combined with this one.

 

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Well actually just the situps and lunges from the second one combined with everything from the first one.  And I do the same number of calf raises as I do leg lifts.  And I do the ab leg lifts and leg lifts on my side, you know, for inner thigh toning.

What are you guys up to?  Anybody else temporarily scared of the gym?  Or doing any great home workouts?

Hives

I thought I had the food allergy thing pretty well under control.  I've become a champion grocery shopper.  I read labels like it's going out of style.  I ask about allergens at restaurants.  I mean I am good.  And I do other stuff to stay healthy -- I drink tons of water, I exercise, I take vitamins.  So I'm trying to do everything right.

I headed off to the gym to run yesterday after work.  Apparently I'm going to become a runner.  Insane.  Well, I'm not sure my body is with me on running.  Last Monday I ran and the next day I was donkey kicked by the flu or something like it.  Hideous.  But yesterday I got right back up on that horse.  I ran.  Well I ran/walked.  Had a nice little warm up then ran for 45 seconds and walked for a minute and 15 seconds alternating for about 25 minutes.  Then I just walked the last 15 minutes.

When I got off the treadmill I noticed my lips felt kind of funny.  But I'd put on kind of tingly chapstick before heading into the gym and my mouth was dry from mouth breathing (hot, I know) so I didn't think much about it.  When I got in the car to head home I pulled down my visor mirror to check out my face a little.  I had hives on both sides of my lips.  And on my eyelids.  And the more I thought about it, the more I thought my throat felt a little iffy.  I'm always sure that I'm not really sick so I popped a Benadryl and headed to the gas station to fill up my car.  I felt progressively worse while I was pumping gas so I just filled it up about halfway and called my sister.  I was hoping she could convince me that it was okay to drive home and I just needed to relax for a bit.

Um, no.  She told me to quit driving around and go to urgent care or the ER.  I called a family friend who lives close and she came and met me at the ER.  And then my mother-in-law came.  And then the friend's husband came.  And then my husband got there...  I had quite the party in my little room.  But it was nice to feel so many people worried about me.

Anyway, it was definitely an allergic reaction to something.  What exactly, they weren't sure.  They pumped me full of steroids and it helped almost immediately.  I was fine within an hour of being admitted.  I got a prescription for prednisone to get me back to normal.  Cross your fingers it doesn't undo all the weight I've lost.  Because now I'm at an official 25 pounds.  Cue dancing and confetti.

All I can really think that might have caused it is touching the treadmill.  I'm allergic to soy, peanuts, and sesame seeds.  A little hives are kind of normal for me.  But nothing like this.  So my theory is that someone had peanuts right before they used the treadmill.  Didn't wash their hands.  Didn't wipe down the treadmill.  Then I touched it and of course rubbed my face because there was sweat from the running and then the hives happened.  That's just a theory of course.  So, now I'm going to become the crazy cleaning lady at the gym, wiping down my machine super thoroughly.  And I'm a little paranoid so I'm working out from home today.

Sickness and Septic Problems

Guys, January has started off with a bang.  Can we please go ahead and fast forward to spring?  I'm totally over winter and all the yuckiness it brings.

I thought I was doing so well and hadn't been sick all winter.  This is a serious accomplishment, especially for someone who works with kids every day.  But I take my vitamins, I wash my hands a lot, I keep hand sanitizer on my desk.  I should've known better than to brag about it.  Yesterday I spent the day alternating between laying under a pile of blankets on my couch trying to get warm and throwing all the covers off because I was burning up.  And after spending two hours at the doctors office and the pharmacy, all I know is that I don't have the flu and my insurance is a mess.  Ug.  Seriously guys.  Not cool.  I'm back in the land of the living today.  Definitely not 100% but better than I was.  And I have pudding cups so at least there's that.

And then there's the septic tank.  Um, yeah.  There are no pictures.  It's too horrifying.

So, a week ago Sunday we noticed some water in our basement.  Just around the hot water heater.  Not a huge deal, sometimes it leaks a little.  And I'd just taken a bath.  No reason to panic.  A week ago Monday I was home because of the weather (thanks subzero temperatures and snow!) so I did some laundry.  And I was treated to my basement storage room floor being completely covered with water.  Along with a few random spots of water on the floor in the basement bathroom.  I called my dad which resulted in trying to recreate the flooding to try to find the problem.  So we discovered running the washer was the problem.  I called my dad again and told him, he said call the plumber.

Fast forward to Monday this week.  And we've learned that apparently the bath tub and the shower both cause the water to flow in the basement.  So the plumber came on Monday.  He's delightful.  He tried everything he could think of.  And I did the basement flooding trick (I'm not talking like inches of water, just a covering of the floor in one room) so that he could further diagnose.  Well, it seems the pump on the septic tank is not working.  Apparently this is important and keeps iffy water from coming up in your basement.  Oh I saw it.  Coming out of the drain in the basement.  It was absolutely horrifying.  I mean like I just walked away.  So our plumber doesn't do septic tanks so now I have to find a septic tank guy.  But at least I kind of know what the problem is and our plumber didn't charge me anything.  I could've kissed him!  He has a policy of not charging if he doesn't fix anything.  I told you he was delightful!

So, with the septic issues, I've been showering instead of taking baths.  Guys, it's winter and I love hot baths more than most other things.  Especially when I'm sick.  So, now it's off to find a septic tank repair guy.

How's your new year going so far?  Anybody else have disastrous plumbing/water issues after the crazy cold weather?  I'm not really sure the cold was related to my septic pump problem, but I'm going to blame it anyway.