Morning vs. afternoon workouts

I think I'm finally going to admit that I don't like afternoon workouts. Today I got in to the gym at 4 and it was such a struggle to get in the groove. I felt like quitting early, which scared me, because I haven't felt that yet. I just know if those sorts of feelings keep piling up eventually this fitness kick will come to an end. Fortunately, at about 30 mins I got in the mood. However, this means I need to make some changes -- back to mornings.

I just don't know how I am going to make that work! I have to study at a minimum 6-8 hours a day and I have to do that out of the house (from past experience, staying at home to study is the most inefficient thing I could do!). I also don't want to sit around in my sweat to study. I tried a schedule where I did gym first, shower at home, and back out to the library/coffee shop to study, which worked great workout-wise. However, my studying suffered (which I was willing to let happen while the stakes were lower... but now they are not. I have boards in June, which is the biggest exam I will ever take. This is no SAT or MCAT... I am not exaggerating.) so I switched to study, gym, study. But working out has been extremely difficult - I can't push myself as hard or run as well at 4 PM.

Not sure what I will do.

Exam week recap

I'm writing at the end of a pretty crazy week - some positives, some negatives to talk about. I had a block final exam on Thursday (counted 78% towards my final grade - yikes!) and I spent the weekend at my mom's house.

The good:

• I ate really well during exam week. I ate a large salad and balanced dinner every day. I did not indulge in sweets or comfort food at all. In the past, I would give myself free reign on what I'd eat, with a it's-finals-I-deserve-it attitude.
• I worked out twice, the second time directly after the exam. Also unprecedented and definitely made me feel pretty virtuous. I did youtube workouts two of the other days, which was awesome (from sarahfit and blogilates).
• Grades were up within 24 hrs and I did great! So in the end, I managed to keep everything on my plate balanced. I do think I was more stressed for this exam than I normally would have been, and part of that is the fact that my fitness goals are a new priority (mostly I get very tired after working out and can't get in the same amount of study time as I used to - tiredness after workouts is a whole post I'll have to do sometime.)

The bad

• I ate incredibly unhealthy meals this weekend. My mom loves to take me out to eat and it's really hard to say no (impossible, really). She hardly goes out to eat unless she's treating me, so it's hard to deny her a chance to eat at her favorite places (as I'm typing this I can see how well my mom can convince me to do what she wants! In fact, my mom and my fitness goals is also a post on its own) Unfortunately, I now feel bloaty and gross and guilty. I know in the large scheme of things, these two days are blips on the radar as long as I get back into the usual. But I can also definitely see how losing momentum can completely derail a person.

For next week: I am doing an intense week of studying for board exams I will be taking in June. It really sucks that I'll be spending my spring break this way (!) but ya do what ya gotta do, I guess. However, I am also going to make sure I go to the gym/yoga.run every day. And I can't forget that I have a 5k on March 17th!