Days 26-29: Yoga/whoops, Base & Back, Rest Day, Recovery & Mobility

As I type the title it seems like I haven’t done much these past four days. That makes me really sad with 30 day pictures happening tomorrow.

I had intended to do Yoga. Even planning on doing it prior to my husband coming home. But, for the third time this week, it was one of those nights that when the kiddos went to bed they continued to need me and I ended up cuddling with the girl for sleep. I vaguely remember when my husband came home, but that certainly didn’t equate to my getting up and doing yoga. In four weeks I’ve done yoga twice. That’s not a good record and I’m pretty unhappy about it. I may have to suck it up and get up early on Fridays.

Base & Back was a great workout. I was hoping it would be, as this was one of my favorites in the One on One series. The mixing of pull up/chin up moves and plyo is a great total body routine. I have a long way to go to be able to do as many plyo reps as I would like. It’s nice to have routines that are fun and have room for progress. Definitely the best day out of these four.

Sunday rest day I did a little foam rolling, but didn’t put in the DVD. Probably didn’t eat as good as I should’ve with the Super Bowl. But, before heading to the party I had a Shakeology and some chicken, so that helped me not eat a ton of bad snack foods.

Monday morning I woke up with a full on head cold that I’d been fighting for a while. By “morning,” I mean 3am. I reset the alarm for 6am but woke up at 5:30. So, no 4:30 Chest Back & Balance. I decided that it would be wise for me to use this week as a Recovery Week; then I can hit the routines full force next week. I’m sure my head, shoulder, elbow, and wrist will thank me. Mostly my head. No time for the full Recovery & Mobility routine today, but I did pop in the DVD and follow along with the foam rolling segment. Made my legs and shoulder pretty happy.

Recovery week consists of alternating Recovery & Mobility and Yoga. So, tomorrow I’ll tackle yoga. As long as my head isn’t too unhappy when I’m upside down it should be a good week. I’m pretty sad that the week of 30 day pictures is the week that I’m taking it easy. But I need to look at the big picture and my body is crying for a little break.

Day 25: X2 Shoulders & Arms/ ARX

I was so excited that Shoulders & Arms was just over 50 mins. It’ll totally be doable to tag Ab Ripper on to that in the morning. Unfortunately, not today due to a hectic morning… but in general. This week has been really weird at night; two of the three nights have seen the kiddos up late and consequently I’ve just gone to bed with them. Here’s hoping tonight can be back to our normal schedule with me getting stuff done (including Ab Ripper) after they go to bed.

I wasn’t sure what to expect with Shoulders & Arms. With the shoulder pain I’ve been having I wasn’t sure if I was even going to be able to do it. Turns out I didn’t have to worry. The foam rolling in the beginning was great for my shoulder and the moves never hurt it! The workout was a set of moves repeated three times. I like that set up because I know exactly what’s coming next and if Tony gets long winded I can just move to the next thing.

So far Phase 2 seems heavy on the arm work and I kind of missed that after the One on Ones. Today most exercises were done on one leg or the stability ball so the balance factor really helped to work the whole body.

The low point of today was when one of my weights ‘rained’ in my eye. Our 10lb weights are the old concrete in a plastic shell type and one has a crack in it. I had to pause the DVD and rinse my eye. But, that did motivate me to duct tape the crack. Guess the weight won’t be getting any lighter anymore. Maybe it’s time for more modern weights.

 

Ooh...and I got Ab Ripper done when the kiddos went to bed. Man, that's hard!

Day 24: Recovery & Mobility

Ah…. My body is feeling great after the stretching and foam rolling. I was tempted to sleep in, but my whole body was crying for the foam roller. My left shoulder is especially sore due to past injury; it still hurts but the foam roller really worked out some of the muscle aches. The best thing is that my hips feel all stretched out and gumby. I think I’m ready for whatever workout Tony throws at us next.

Day 23: Plyocide

Today was my second time using Beachbody’s new E&E pre-workout drink. I think that stands for Energy & Endurance. Did it give me either? I think so. I certainly pushed myself harder than I have in the past, but this did lead to me stopping to catch my breath more. Certainly got the heart rate up today! I like that the drink is primarily a ton of various B vitamins. Beachbody has some great supplements and the nutritionists who develop them seem to know what they’re doing. Side note: I’m so glad we have Shakeology again. I can’t speak highly enough of that drink!

This is the first time I’ve had the 4lb medicine ball for Plyocide. It was really nice to use for the weighted Mary Katherine Lunges; and I noticed that Tony is the only person on the DVD using the 8lb version. I felt that with the 4lb ball I could have better form. The other time I used the 4lb was for the squat jump move and it allowed me to go faster; unsure if I prefer faster with less weight or slower with more weight. With the squat jump move I again noticed that only Tony uses 8lbs and everyone’s going fast; so I guess that answers my question.

Sadly last night I failed at doing Ab Ripper. Never had a kid-free moment. Some nights are like that. Though I did get to take the kiddos in the double stroller for a 1.5 mile walk; that was lovely. I’ll shoot for Ab Ripper tonight. I may just have to do that on the nights I can, regardless of if it lines up with the nights I’m supposed to. I’ll plan on doing it at least 3 times per week and let life determine which days.

Days 19-22: X2 Yoga, X2 Balance & Power, Rest day, Chest + Back + Balance/ARX2… plus thoughts on motivation

This morning I read an article about the obesity level among nurses: 55%. Ridiculous for those who are in charge of the health of others. And a good reminder of why it’s important to do something. I can certainly see where a nurse, working long shifts on their feet, would find it difficult to eat nutritious food, eat proper portions, find time to exercise, and find time to get a solid night of sleep. On the other hand, I would think that caring for others in poor health would be a huge motivator to take control of the factors that you can (i.e. eating right, exercising, sleeping). My job is not long hours (40 per week… I choose to work 9 hr days Mon-Thurs and 4 hours on Fri). My job is not on my feet (I spend much of my time on the computer, sitting on a balance ball). My job does not place me directly with people who are sick or ailing. I do have difficulty managing the factors I can regarding a healthy life style. But I’m relatively healthy and I would like to maintain that. I don’t like paying co-pays to the doctor. I know from the past that the fitter I am the more energy I have. It’s important to me to be able to lift, carry, and play with my children. These are the things that motivate me.

It was a hard weekend to stay motivated, as weekends tend to be.

Friday I found myself asleep on the couch when my husband came home from work. But, he woke me, put in the Yoga DVD, pushed play and pushed pause. So I got up, changed clothes, and we worked out. I don’t know that I’ve ever wanted to do yoga less than I did on Friday. During the first stretch my body was crazy stiff. By the end my body felt all stretched out and happy. And that reminded me why it’s important to do the things you really don’t want to. Finishing was an accomplishment, but starting was the hard part.

Saturday my husband did his workout during the kids’ naptime and I did mine when they went to bed. As much as I used to love working out at night I’m now finding that the morning is better for me. Never thought that would be the case. At least it wasn’t as late as Friday night. I’m getting much better at the balance moves though my right side is still more of a challenge. Love seeing progress. I’ve come a long way in the past three weeks. Saturday officially ended week 3 and I decided I’m going to move on to Phase 2. I can always go back to Phase 1 if I decide more work is needed. Or there’s the recovery week option if Phase 2 leaves me too sore.

Sunday I was really happy to have a rest day. My daughter had a horrible night (teething) that had us up from 9-11:30 (wonderful hubby let me go to bed at 10) and 1:30-4 (I took this shift by myself since aforementioned hubby had to get up for a makeup workout in the morning). So glad there only ended up being one night of this! Despite being tired, Sunday was a nice rest day. I weighed myself and found that I’ve lost nearly 10 lbs in the past 3 weeks! But I was more excited about fitting into a dress that I previously could not; the last time I tried the dress I got the zipper about halfway up. On Sunday the dress was almost a little loose in some areas. Love seeing results!

Monday morning I awoke at 4:30 to start Phase 2. What may be the most challenging for me is that Ab Ripper X2 is done 3 times per week. That will make those workouts about an hour fifteen and I generally don’t have that kind of time in the morning; so I’ll be making myself do the 15 minute Ab Ripper in the evenings. I think once I get into this habit it won’t be a big deal. Once the kids are in bed 15 minutes isn’t that much. It’ll almost take me longer to get ready. Course, I can probably do Ab Ripper in my pjs on the kids’ play mat. Anyhow, the first workout in Phase 2 was Chest + Back + Balance. The chest moves are all also balance moves; once I get the balance down I think the chest will feel the moves more. Today I spent a lot of my time figuring out how to balance on 4 medicine balls or one stability ball and 2 medicine balls. There was a fair amount of falling today. It won’t take much to start seeing progress. The back moves were pull up/chin up type moves. Since (A) we don’t have a pull up bar in the living room and (B) I can’t really do a pull up without assistance I used the bands. Compared to the P90X One on One series, it was nice to have a band example for all the moves. I knew that the modifications I was doing were the proper ones to work the right muscle groups. I think I’ll like this workout a whole lot more when I get the form down. And a bonus is that plain ole pushups are going to seem really easy after this!

Day 18: Total Body/ARX

I actually made it through Ab Ripper! I mean I wasn’t able to do all the reps, but I had time to finish. Felt good about that. Especially since I’m thinking of moving to the next phase and that’ll have me doing Ab Ripper most days. Should be able to see improvements on performance with that schedule. There are some new ab moves that I really like and others that I find nearly impossible. Nice to be able to work on my weak spots.

Balance on my right side continues to be a challenge, but I’m doing much better than I used to and I feel great on my left side. I did experience some left wrist pain today that I couldn’t explain and it kept me from some of the medicine ball pushups to side balance; though I was able to get one on my right side without dropping my knee, so that was improvement. That was also a pretty awesome run on sentence. Oh, well.

Tomorrow I’m determined that my husband and I will do Yoga together. I kind of missed doing it last week. My wrist doesn’t seem to be bothering me, but then I’m not currently putting body weight on it. We’ll see what it thinks of chaturanga. An interesting side note, I used to feel that my left arm was much stronger and now I’m finding that my right arm actually feels better with higher reps. Perhaps this is due to having less range of motion in my left shoulder, or currently the wrist pain. Or maybe I’m becoming more balanced in my strength.

I’m signed up for a Warrior Dash in June. So, I’ll be needing all the strength I can gain. It’s only a 5k, but seems like it’ll be overall more challenging than the ½ marathon in May. If nothing else it will be more of a mental challenge. A Warrior Dash has obstacles along the course. So in addition to running just over 3 miles you also scale walls, cross rope bridges, slide down muddy hills, crawl under barbed wire, and jump over fire. I think it has a total of like 9-10 obstacles. Should be quite the morning!

Day 17 – Recovery & Mobility… and not quitting

I really didn’t want to get up when the alarm went off at 4:30 this morning. But I knew that my body would benefit more from this workout than laying in bed. I really think the foam rolling and stretching allow me to push the other workouts harder. It’s like my body’s reward for working hard the other days.

I saw a quote this morning that said, “Tired of starting over? Stop quitting.” I like that. Albeit the past two times I’ve ‘started over’ with my fitness it’s been because of pregnancy/childbirth. But, I can relate to the tendency to stop. It’s so easy to skip a day or choose a TV show and the couch. But doing those things once or twice easily becomes doing those things routinely. And TV shows suck you in so fast, leading you to believe that you can’t miss the next episode. At least I’m easily sucked into this. The funny thing is, when I’m hooked on a show I feel like I would be missing so much without it. Then when the season breaks or I miss a couple of weeks for another reason I realize that I really don’t miss the show at all and life is lived without a screen. I’ll admit I have favorite shows that I watch online, but I can do that without revolving my life around a network’s schedule, and in less time. I’m using TV as an example, but how many other things do we schedule our life around when they’re really not that important? Why do we find it so hard to set life goals and schedule our lives around activities that will help us meet those goals? They say that it takes 30 days for an activity to become routine/habit and only 3 days to break that habit. I don’t know that I buy those numbers, but I strongly believe that it’s harder to do something than do nothing. Unless, of course, one is trying to break a bad habit and replace it with ‘nothing.’

Anyway, that’s a pretty long rabbit trail to say that every day we make decisions. Little decisions with big long term consequences. I also recently saw a quote from Tony Horton that said something like, “Today’s goal: eat healthy and exercise. Tomorrow: Repeat.” I think that’s the start of not quitting. Everyday make a decision to do something to move toward your goal. Today’s decision was to get up with the alarm and treat my body to some foam rolling and stretching. My body’s already thanking me.