The Gym is now my Friend

It has been awhile since I have written on my blog.  What can I say?  Life is busy and crazy and I find myself too tired to do much at the end of the day besides watching a show with my husband and catching up on email and facebook.  But my sweet husband is working at the fair in the RVCS Sasparilla booth tonight, the girls are sleeping and I have some down time.

Shonna is the best workout buddy in the world.

I have been focusing on getting healthy this last year.  It started with a drastic change in lifestyle-going gluten free overnight and never looking back.  That was the best move I have made in a long time.  Then I stopped eating peanuts. . . and oatmeal, eggs, cantelope and most dairy since they all made me sick too.  The migraines have all but disappeared.  That in itself was amazing.  I thought I would suffer with them every day until I died.  I thank the Lord all the time that I can face each new day with a clear head and no pain.

My amazing chiropractor, Dr. Pisenti, has been working slowly to get me healthy.  We started with my muscles and my out of wack spine.  That slowly improved.  Then I changed my diet and am now eating really healthy.  I still wasn't feeling amazing though and my back kept spasming with the littlest of irritation to it.  Patrick Pisenti encouraged me to start working out.  And the next phase of my new, healthier life began.

It wasn't an easy start.  It had many, many starts and stops and changes along the way.  I tried walking and jogging with Shonna, my sister in law.  The problem was, neither of us really liked walking or jogging.  We did enjoy the talking while walking, but the problem was that it got dark too early in the winter and the summer was hot.  Plus, it didn't seem to make that much of a difference for either of us.  So we stopped doing it many times.

Then, in January or February Shonna came home and announced that we were going to go to the gym and get a membership.  She didn't really give me a choice.  She wanted to do it and she didn't want to go alone.  I knew I needed the excercise, but I have never gone to a gym before.  So I finally consented and we signed up.

At first we mainly walked on the treadmill which was super boring.  We started using the weight machines and slowly began to gain strength.  It was way better having a place to go where you just focused on one thing (excercising) and there was no one begging you for a drink or to push them on the swings or to make dinner.  We could just go and excercise for an hour.  And we did it!!  Shonna and I went twice a week.  We started to loose a little weight and build up some endurance.

Then one day, a trainer who was working out on his own came over and gave us some tips.  He pretty much pulled us off of the weight machines and showed us how to do planks and lunges and a few things to do with the free weights.  It was good.  We immediately felt like we were getting a better workout.  Instead of working one muscle at a time while the rest of them did nothing, we were using our core mucsles in every movement we did.

Shortly after that, we signed up for our free trainer session.  Our trainer was awesome.  She discussed our goals and our current routine, then she gave us some new things to do.  We really liked her and decided to have her work with us twice a month.  Shonna and I are going to the gym at least three times a week now.  Sometimes up to five.  Our whole routine has changed.  We no longer work out on the weight machines.  The trainer encouraged us to do thirty seconds of an excersise  that would raise our heart rates, then thirty seconds of muscle building.  She recommended that we do things that keep getting our heart rate up, allow it to slow down a bit, then get it up again.  Each time we see her, she pushes us harder and harder.  She pushes me until I can not do another curl or push up.  We do leg work, abdominal work, arm work, core strengthening, cardio and weight training.  Slowly we are seeing results now.  The pounds are slowly coming off.  My endurance in improving.  I am slowly getting toned and feeling healthy.  Perhaps for the first time in my life I am really feeling healthy.  It is good to get to a point where I can run with my kids and not get winded.

This is the room where Shonna and I work out.  Wide open spaces, lots of "toys" and huge fans to cool us off.  It is a great place to get pumped up and work out.

A few weeks ago our trainer set up a circuit of six things for us to do in this room.  We did push ups off of the "stress relief" ball, lunges and squats in a square, sit ups on the BOSU (the both sides up half ball thing),  balanced on the BOSU  and lifted weights, used resistance bands to work our arms and this crazy thing where we have our hands on the BOSU, then we would jump out away from the BOSU, jump back next to it then lift the BOSU up over our heads.  We did each of these things for a minute with 15 sec to get to the next one.  After completing one round we rested for 90 seconds, then did it again. . . two more times.  I thought I was going to die.  It was a good feeling.  We have decided to do the circuit theme a bunch more since.  It totally pushes us to the breaking point. . . almost.  We leave energized and ready to take on the world.

We do planks (that is what this is) to see how our stamina is impoving.  At first we could only do about 15 seconds.  Now we can do about 55 seconds.  

 Every day for the last 10 - 15 years I had felt horrible and so tired.  I have taken control of my health for the first time ever and it feels good.  I love getting into shape and feeling healthy.   It takes a bit of hard work and determination.

What motivated you to get healthy or start working out?  I would love to hear your story.