Week 12: Experimenting with diet

This week in my personal training session with Suzy I put the gloves on and spent the session boxing. It was really easy to get the heart rate up and the sweat flowing while boxing and I actually enjoyed it and want to check out a boxing class.

I am doing a little bit of experimenting with my diet this week. I have been eating my carbohydrates in the morning, and then cutting the carbs right back after lunch. It is hard as I love my pasta and rice and seeing the rest of the family eat them at dinner makes me want to eat them too. What makes it easier is that I am eating a larger than usual portion of protein with lots of the veggies that I love such as mushrooms, eggplant and cauliflower. I am looking forward to seeing if this type of eating routine does anything to my weight loss and blood sugar levels.

I have been thinking of what to do when the Transform Your Life program finishes next week. I found out today that I will still have access to the centre, the gym, the pool and all the classes for an extra three weeks, only without the one-on-one personal training sessions. This is great as it will give me an opportunity to see how I go at maintaining the good routines that I have started without the push from my personal trainers. Having said that I feel like that I have developed good relationships with a lot of the gym instructors at the centre and I know that they will continue to encourage me to continue with the journey I have begun.

Week 11: WOW....I can jog!

Eleven weeks ago I would not have thought it possible that I could maintain a jog for more than a few seconds, but through this week I started with a 30 second jog on the treadmill and I am now able to jog for 2 minutes!

It has been harder to get to the gym this week as I have been sick and have had sick children. (Did I jinks myself last week when I said I now had some gym equipment that I can use as home if need be?) So I have now used my Mother's Day present which comes with a 25 minute workout using the resistance bands. However I missed the gym environment as I seem to push myself harder when there are others exercising around me.

I was unable to get to the gym 2 days in a row this week and I really wanted to get there, so much so that yesterday, after looking after a sick daughter all day, I managed to make it to the gym at 8.30pm to fit in an hour session before the centre closed. Perhaps I am starting to develop a habit, a slight addiction to exercise??

The small group training session was lead by a new trainer, Shardi. She lead the group through a varied program which worked my upper body as well as getting my heart rate up. This included boxing, push-ups, squats while throwing a medicine ball, and rowing with resistance bands. She advised that if I was doing the exercises correctly, I should feel it the following day. And I did!!!

Week 10: Under 110kg!

Current Weight 109.9kg

Look at that number above, I am finally under 110kg! These kilograms have been much harder to lose that I would ever have thought, but I am proud of the way I have lost them. I have lost these kilos as a result of all the hard work I have put in, both at the gym and it eating healthier. For the most part my blogs have been positive but all the changes I have introduced haven't been easy. Some days I really don't want to go to the gym, I cry because I want to stay home where it is warm and comfortable, I want to sit read a book and munch through a whole packet of corn chips. But I get over it, put one foot out the door and head for the gym because I know that all this is for my greater good. And also I have to write my blog and I don't want to say that I didn't go to the gym at all for an entire week :)

This week I had a PT session with Tracey. What I like about PT sessions is that my trainers make it so much easier to challenge myself and make me go further than I think I can. This time I went up to level 6 on the treadmill, to level 7 on the stair climber, squats with a 12 kg weight, and worked on my upper body pulling weights. It was quite a work out! This week I also swam 1.25 km, did a water workout, concentrated on mastering changes to my gym program, and did a Small Group Training session.

It was Mother's Day this week and instead of being showered with chocolates my lovely family gave me some resistance bands. These are fantastic. I have used them in classes and training sessions and now I can use them at home too. Although I enjoy (mostly) going to the gym some days it just doesn't work out. Sometimes the busyness of life gets in the way with sick kids, work, family and study. So I am building up a collection of portable gym equipment. So far I have hand weights, a exercise ball, and now resistance bands. Now I can create my own little exercise circuit when I can't get to the gym.

Week 9: My clothes are too big!

Current weight: 110.6kg

The biggest excitement for this week is that I now have a pile of clothes that no longer fit me because they are TOO BIG! I have never had this before, as I have slowly and surely piled on the weight over the past 15 years. I really want to bring this bag of clothes to the op-shop but I'm a little afraid that I will need them again, so my fall back position is putting them in a box in the shed. Hopefully the box will never be opened again until my grandchildren go through my possessions when I am dead and exclaim “I can't believe grandma was ever big enough to fit into these clothes!”

It has been business as usual at the gym. Working through my gym program, using the pool, and attending a class or two. After nine weeks I would have thought I would be over aches and pains after my sessions but they are still constant friends , although they are not as severe as when I first started exercising. As I change the exercises that I do, and attend different classes I am working different muscles at different intensities and this is still effecting my body. After the STEP class last week I had aching knees for days!

I had a personal training session with Suzy this week. She led me through some whole body exercises that really got the heart pumping, and the sweat flowing. We took some video footage to give you an indication of some of the exercises I did in our half hour session. As you can see I am getting a good work out. I am puffing, red-faced and glowing.