A common question I get asked a lot recently is:

“Where do you find the time?”
“How do you fit everything in?”

It’s 11.25pm and I’m sitting in front on my laptop, iPad and iPhone.  There are social media badges everywhere. I’ve been up since 6.30am. I’m suffering from ‘Computer Face’ where my face goes red and vision goes funny as I’ve sat here for so long.

There has barely been enough time in the day to eat, go to the toilet and take care of myself. This is the reason I’ve been looking slightly homeless recently and have been wearing the same outfit for nearly 3 days.
Makeup takes 15 minutes to put on, but I don’t have 15 minutes. It’s quicker to pick up clothes from the day before or go to bed in my training gear than get new ones. Laundry takes at least 10 minutes, I could write an email to a sponsor in that time! Yes, I know, I am a bit of a tramp.

I have however done the important things for the challenge; trained twice, eaten just enough to stay mildly sane and functioning and I have gained a new sponsor. I’ve also worked, listed things on eBay (I’m selling all my belongings to raise money for our challenge) and seen my mum. Oh yes, I also raised £6 for our campaign. Check me out. Just another £119,994 to go ; )

Mat and I are fortunate enough to work for ourselves, so we’re able to manage our work schedule to fit around the row. Mat however is setting up a new business and that is proving a challenge in itself.

We do not own a TV, we do not sit on the sofa, (we don’t even own a sofa), we are frequently in a ‘meeting’ with each other to discuss everything row related and we eat anything and everything at anytime (thank you Bulk Powders for our new 4 Seed Peanut Butter – I’ve been eating that out the pot today to keep me going).

We’ve been training most mornings since October (2015) and it’s now become a habit.  If we don’t row for a few days, we get withdrawal symptoms. It still sucks some mornings (most mornings) but we are committed to our challenge.
I come up with my best ideas when I’m training and now take a dictaphone so I can record them as they come into my head. Exercise is a magical thing. My mind relaxes and ideas emerge.

I’m a bit of a 9-hours-sleep-a-night girl, but recently I’ve been settling with 6.  I’m stuck to this computer and taking in far too much blue light for my liking. 

I get told by the people I live with to “get off the computer, it’s not good for you to spend that long on there,” ,“come and sit with us and watch TV”. That was the plan tonight at 7.30pm. 4 hours later, I am still here.

So, I guess the answer to the question is:

We just find the time and fit it all in. With only 24 hours in the day, we have to stretch ourselves and make sacrifices. And that sometimes means we don’t see our friends and family as much as we’d like, we don’t spend time relaxing and can annoy people by not replying to their messages and calls (sorry if you are one of those people). If I’m in the flow I have to go with it, even if do get Computer Face. I couldn’t sleep the other morning, so got up at 3am and built our website.  It was done by 8am. That felt good.

I’m signing off after a busy day and I’ll be on my rowing machine again in 7 hours. Maybe I’ll have a rest on Sunday.