A little piece of my heart

I haven't really decided what I'm going to use this for. Maybe it's just a place to dump my thoughts about weight, exercise and anything else on my mind. Today, it's anxiety. As this school year approaches, I find myself getting more and more anxious. My younger son starts high school this year and my older son is a senior. Everything that is happening, I find myself acutely aware that it's the last time. Last first day of school, potentially the last family vacation, etc. My older son is my mini-me. He looks like me, he acts like me, and has always been one of my favorite people on the planet. Of course, none of that will change, but I can't help looking ahead and feeling sadness over the changes that will be coming up. One year from now, we'll be driving him to college and leaving him there. I will miss him so much that it makes me tear up even typing this. I'm so proud of him and I know he'll be great. It's the way it's supposed to be. But, it will tear a little piece of my heart out. So...I'm trying hard to focus on the now and enjoy every minute of this year. It's exciting - the college tours, the applications, the senior portrait...the horrible junior year and standardized testing is behind us and now it's just anticipation. It's all good, but it heightens my anxiety level. Typically, when I'm anxious, I eat and I tend to curl up in a ball and stop exercising. Hell, I stop interacting with the outside world beyond work. I'm hoping this time I can work on changing my reaction to the anxiety...exercise as therapy like all of my healthy friends do. I've been good on exercise - running/walking consistently every other day. I started with 100 steps. Last run, I was up to 180 between my "catch your breath" walks. Tomorrow, I'm shooting for 200. Soon, I won't be able to keep count and I'll have to find another way to track. Not a bad problem to have. I'm signed up for the color run 5k on October 16th and right now, my goal is to be able to run the whole thing. I don't give a hoot how slow I am...I just want to finish it without walking any of it. Fingers crossed.