That’s how long I’ve been going to the gym. Or, that’s the time between when I started and today. 10/21/2013 to 3/9/2015. 504 days (505 if you actually count today). A lot has happened in that time and yet it seems like not much has changed. I’ve lost weight, gained some of it back, and lost it again. I’ve gained confidence and had self doubt. I’ve met great people and made changes in my life that I’ll carry with me forever. In February of this year I enrolled to become a personal trainer. It still blows my mind to think how much I’ve come to enjoy fitness. Not just enjoy it, but to actually make a career out of it…mind boggling. It hasn’t been easy, but as they say, nothing worth having is easy. There has been an inordinate amount of frustration, mostly in the past few months. I gained a bit of weight back (21lbs to be exact), and it’s taken almost 3 months to lose it again. I haven’t lost it all but I’m down to 398 and still plugging away. Frustration at the injuries I’ve sustained. I’m sure I’ve talked about my foot/ankle before so that’s nothing new. I’ve been putting off surgery until I lose more weight. (that time might be up.) In the past few weeks I’ve injured my knee. It’s a mystery as to how it happened. I had an MRI last Monday and I’m waiting to hear about the results. Impatiently waiting. If I don’t hear anything tomorrow, I’m calling someone to bug for answers. I’ve been hard headed in working out injured. I’ve tried to figure it out the past couple of days as to why I haven’t made the smartest decisions and I haven’t really come up with anything. My back has been sore for a week or so and that’s affected my time in the gym. I seem to be falling apart and yet I know I could be a lot worse off. There is someone out there that has it worse than I do. My stuff is fixable. A surgery here or there and I’ll be good as new. Believe me when I say, I know how blessed I am. Truly.

With the injuries I have and the limitations it’s put on what I can really do in the gym, I am thinking I need to take a break with working out and work on healing. Nothing about that sentence makes me happy. Well, maybe the healing part. Ha! The part that doesn’t make me happy is taking time away from the gym. My home away from home. I’m nervous about getting out of my routine. I don’t want to miss out on the happenings at the gym. I’ve grown to love that place and I know I’ll miss it. Yes, I know it’s not forever, just until everything works properly again and I can work out without doing further damage. Being away will have me focusing more on eating correctly and I know I need that. Especially to stay in line with losing weight. Going there twice a day has become such a huge part of my life that I’m not sure how to not go there.

It’s been 12,096 hours, 725,760 minutes, 43,545,600 seconds…