The Journey Begins Again

Hello All!

My name is Klaira Strickland and I am a recent graduate student in English. While at graduate school I took a huge leap and started focusing on my health as well as my studies. I started my journey February 8th, 2016. I had another blog where I tracked my progress with another friend but with our busy lives, crazy work load, and a lot of technical issues we gave up on it. I fell off the workout wagon for a semester because I was extremely stressed out but got motivated again through a dear friend. Now, another friend is starting her journey and I want to keep up with mine and stay accountable.

I have always struggled with my weight since I was younger. I got to a point where I just thought I was "big boned" and that I would always be big so I did nothing about it. I let myself go for lack of a better phrase and just dealt with it. I got larger as I matured and let it happen. I wasn't physically active like a lot of my friend group and would sit out of activities. I worked a physically demanding job at Total Wine over 2 years ago where I was on my feet a lot and lifting heavy wine boxes and beer. My body rebelled against me and I got severe sciatica in my left hip that rendered me unable to stand for more than an hour at a time. I went through physical therapy for 8 weeks and "managed" my pain thinking I would forever be broken. The sitting around and depression did not help my weight problems and I just continued to get bigger as time went on.

Moving across the country changed me in many ways. I got inspired and wanted to change my appearance as well as who I was. For a class project, I started my other blog. Starting small I got a gym membership at Snap Fitness and began my journey where I could only walk on the treadmill for 15 minutes at a time. I worked my way up to running and walking a 5K at my school and doing virtual races online through YesFit and the Hogwarts Running Club. After my break, I wanted to do something different. Cardio had burned me out and it was so boring. Eliza, a fellow graduate student and friend wanted to lift weights like she used to so she could tone up. We talked about it and she went a few times with me to Snap before she got a membership of her own. We lifted weights for the next 14 weeks 2-3 times a week. It was wonderful and the push I needed to get back into my health and fitness. I couldn't have done it without her.

Now I have moved back home to figure out my life from here and I have to find my groove again. After 2 weeks of searching for a gym and waiting for one to get back to me, my mom and I decided to get a family plan with the Y. My family have all been trying to be more healthy and get into a good workout routine. We are growing a garden with fresh herbs and veggies as well as sticking to our family plan.



At school, I would talk with Kelly during our recover nights from all the craziness of teaching and grad school. Her and her fiance, Matt have supported me from the beginning and were always there to listen to my struggles. Kelly told me how she wanted to work up to a 5K and I agreed that wherever I was in the world, when she was ready, I would do it with her. After sharing and talking more with her fiance and her we decided to start this blog together to help share our struggles, our successes, and support one another any way we can. With everyone banning together and Kelly and I documenting our progress, I feel much more confident that I can get down to my goal weight. When I started back in February 2016 I was at my max weight of 257. I decided not to weigh myself and chart my progress with small measurements and changes. I have since weighed myself when I started weight lifting and after 8 weeks I was 217. My goal is to get to 180 and be more muscle than I am fat. I am about halfway there so here's to another part of my lifestyle and fitness journey with Kelly by my side!

New Adventures, Old Friends

Hi everyone! I’m Kelly and, admittedly, new to blog writing. I’ve recently graduated with my Master’s Degree in English Literature, which is how Klaira and I met.  During our M.A. program, Klaira and I talked quite often about our various fitness goals, journeys up to that point, and the struggles we face sometimes.  Because of this, I’m really glad and touched that she approached me with this blog idea to document and share our different experiences towards engaging in more active lifestyles.

I’m pretty close to the very beginning of my fitness journey.  I’ve been doing yoga on and off for a while now, but nothing consistent and not a lot beyond that until now.  I’ll admit that a wide range of physical activity has always seemed to be daunting to me because of my size and build along with the fact that I have a few medical ailments that can make working out more of a challenge.

I was diagnosed with asthma when I was 8 years old and asthma attacks have been a regular part of my life since then. I’ve had each lung collapse spontaneously—one when I was about 9 and the other when I was 23—and I was recently diagnosed with Cholinergic Urticaria (I can’t pronounce it either, so no worries) which basically means my body treats physical activity like an allergy and I break out in hives from head to toe if my heart rate increases too much (Yes, I am actually allergic to exercise. Who knew?!).

While I’m on various treatments for these things, they have provided their own barriers when it came to getting physically active in the past.  I’ll probably discuss these, and other struggles, more as they crop up during this experience because, as my fiancé is regularly reminding me, “fitness is not a clean, upward slope, but a variety of successes, plateaus, and off days.”

I have no doubt that I’ll talk about Matt, my fiancé, a few times throughout this blog as he’s my running coach/buddy and veritable ass-kicker when needed.  

My goals for the time being are to do yoga more regularly and consistently while also trying my hand (foot?) at running. I have never run a mile under 12 minutes until recently and my goal is to, first, run a mile without stopping (no matter how long that mile time may be or how much I want to die while doing it) and, second, eventually complete a 5k all without breaking out in hives (at least significantly) or having a severe asthma attack. Yay! Goals!!

So, welcome to “Do Want Health” and thank you for following along.