Back on the bike as the clocks change and bring us longer days!

Like riding a bike

After a few weeks of zone 2 riding on Zwift, I finally got back cycling in the real world. It was a little under 40km, out to the east of Berlin to a small town called Strausberg. Despite the bitter cold numbing my hands and feet, there were moments when I was simply cruising, breathing in the cold air, and enjoying it. Since stopping drinking, my socialising has definitely dipped a bit, so being out riding with a friend also had a bit of extra meaning. Maybe that sounds dramatic, but after my seizures and shoulder injury, I couldn’t even lift my arm high enough to wash my stinking armpit, so the idea of getting on a bike had seemed pretty unlikely. It was simply good to be back on 2 wheels. Through this experience, I realised I took things like cycling, or simply washing my own hair, for granted.

Being honest with myself, my shoulder was feeling stiff towards the end, but largely I was comfortable on the bike. I’m looking forward to building consistency, getting some longer rides in, and hopefully doing a trip or 2 in the summer months. In related, yet less exciting news, I have been getting myself back to the gym once per week, trying to work on and strengthen my shoulder with exercises from physio. Movement is still hampered, but I was told it could take up to 1 year to fully recover, so early days yet.

Sober socials

In March, I glided past 5 months sober as my check-in point of 6 months gets closer and closer. I had a couple of nights out this month: one night of darts, and then a team event where we met up, played darts, had some beers, and went for food.

I won’t lie - I do think the team event would have been more fun if I was joining in with the beers, and maybe the night could have gone on longer. But at the same time, getting home at a decent time, spending some time with my beloved watching The Mentalist before tucking in to bed, and waking up hangover free is also fantastic.

Alcohol is still something I think about a lot - especially when it comes to socialising and as holiday season approaches. I don’t have a problem with alcohol, and never had, but I also know it’s no good for me. Yet even still, I think about being on a boat with a cold Efes in hand, and it’s incredibly appealing.

Despite all the quitlit I’ve read, and podcasts I’ve listened to, I still find it easier to speak and socialise after a few beers. I still think I have more fun too. As nights go on, I feel like a slightly more boring version of myself.

That isn’t to say I’ll automatically start again once 6 months passes - I’m simply reflecting and being honest. For all the benefits avoiding alcohol has brought over the last 5 months, I can’t pretend I don’t have 20+ years of memories and social habits tied up with it.

MacroFactor

I started using MacroFactor at the beginning of this month to track my food, and it’s been a complete eye-opener. For most of my adult life, I’ve been relatively active, whether that was going to the gym, playing football, badminton, running, or cycling. Aside from a couple of exceptions, though, I’ve never paid too much attention to what I eat. I love toast, tea & biscuits. I basically ate what I wanted, when I wanted, and my levels of activity compensated somewhat. I always seemed to stay the same weight, so I never had much reason to question it.

At the start of this year, I was the heaviest I’ve ever been. My level of activity was 0 due to my shoulder injury, and I wanted to drop some of that. Cutting alcohol completely has helped a lot, but using MacroFactor has made it painfully obvious that years of being active were doing a lot of heavy lifting for my diet. Turns out cheese on toast is not the nutritional powerhouse I had maybe convinced myself it was. Shocking stuff.

I’ve been using the app since March 3rd, tracking my food every day. This sounds painful, but actually, when you build up your own library of foods you eat, it’s trivial. Given I’m eating 3 times per day plus an evening snack, it’s not that bad at all.

I signed up for 6 months of the app as I think that’ll be enough to hit my goal, but regardless of whether I continue to log food, I will definitely make better choices about what I eat.

Reading

Seven Myths About Money: And the Truth About Finding Financial Freedom

I got round to finishing this book in March, and honestly, I really enjoyed it. It felt like a very good introduction to personal finance for someone like me, who is pretty clueless. From very basic things like interest rates on savings accounts vs inflation rates, through to investing, it makes these more complex topics quite approachable. As someone with little savings, no investments, and poor pension contributions, it was a bit of an eye-opener and has encouraged me to evaluate my spending habits.

Wrap up

March felt like progress on multiple fronts. Getting back to regular exercise, backing that up with no alcohol and better eating, and getting a little reality check about money too.

For April, I’m looking forward to another trip home towards the end of the month - let’s see how well my eating discipline holds up with the temptation of a Scottish breakfast under my nose!

Until next time…