NOTHING IS GONNA KEEP ME DOWN!

Today started out a little rough. I had stomach issues and was running to the bathroom every 15-30 minutes for the first 5 hours of the day (5 am-10am). I believe it was due to my session of Reflexology last night. I think she was able to work the toxins and waste out of me, so that is a good thing! As tired as we all are, I could have used that time to sleep my morning away but I refused to waste it like that. Instead I spent it awake and blogging, catching up on emails and all the emails people are sending me with questions, etc.

I was happy to join my group again at 11am for our stretch class! It felt good to be back in the program and that class was awesome! I left feeling like I could go climb a mountain! (Sure wish I hadn't missed the hike..it is the biggest calorie burn of the day!)

Since I missed breakfast, I was ANXIOUS to get Lunch and it didn't disappoint!

While we were at lunch Jerry and Estella Hayes gave us the most inspiring presentation about their experience and how they got on the show. We were all in tears and so proud of them for saving their lives. I will share that in a different post a little later. But here is a little snippet in their presentation! As many of you Biggest Loser fans know, Jerry went on after only losing 26 pounds on the ranch to winning the at home prize!

Following this amazing lecture there was a space of time for me to go to open gym. On my way there I ended up crossing paths with my new friend Shelene (who I talked about in day one, and will tell you more about her later). We ended up talking about God and how he is in the details of our life. She is a dear soul and I feel safe and loved by her already. I opened up to her and had a little cry session, telling her my story a bit. After we had a very good talk she said to me, "Hey, I know you love Candace Cameron, she just texted me and told me that she was right behind our housing shooting a movie, do you wanna go meet her?!" I was ECSTATIC of course! So we walked at a good pace over to see where she was filming a new Lifetime movie "Puppy Love." Candace was so gracious and made me feel loved right away. It was also fun to see how the set ran and such. One of the funny things is that it was a FREEZING day and they were filming pool side. All the cast were dressed for pool weather and the crew had on Eskimo type hooded coats, I got a kick from that!

The classes this afternoon were KILLER! We had a ball works class where we did a combination of weights, cardio and stretch all using yoga balls (I will be posting the worded workout for this for some people who are looking for a ball workout soon). My left arm is a lot weaker than my right so this class challenged me!

Next class is called "TREADING." In this class we start on a machine and go AS HARD as we can go for 5 minutes. Then we have a 5 minute cool down. Then go as hard as we go for 4 minutes, with a 4 minute recovery. The go as hard as we can go for 3 minutes, with a 3 minute recovery. We go all the way to 1, but I think you get the picture. After that we do a 30 second sprint with a 30 sec recovery and end with a 30 second sprint with a 3 minute cool down. It is challenging, but you feel AWESOME at the end! Today, because of my calves I choose to use the bike. But at recovery 3, I hopped on the Arc Trainer and did that the rest of the time. Here are some of my teammates using the spin bikes as their treading machine of choice!

After those two challenging classes we has a water class that was more of a cool down this time. And cool down it was! It was FREEZING outside. Our instructors don't get in the water, they stay on the surface and show us what to do and walk around to make sure we are doing it correctly. Our instructor was wearing a ski parka, a scarf and gloves and we were in swimsuits in the pool...it really was cold!

Dinner tonight was scrumptious! Grilled Chicken with a green fruit salad and Apple cobbler for dessert! MMMMM!

Tonight as I was at dinner, I was thinking about how I missed one of the most important parts of my workout today, the hike. The Calorie burn from my hike helps me to meet my goals. I was going to let stomach issues keep me down, so I hit the gym for one solo workout before bed and while my clothes were in the wash, it was perfect!

I finished the night with an AMAZING talk with two great girls here, Heather and Haley. We talked about life in our fat shells, we talked about weight loss and gain. We talked about Dr. Huizenga's Book, "Where did all the Fat Go" and how there are some great suggestions on how to know your calories for your body etc in there. But most importantly we talked about US, our journeys, the things that are hard, the challenges of doing some of the routines as a fat person. Sometimes it is hard because most of the trainers haven't been overweight themselves and they try to put you in a position that is nearly impossible for you to mimic because you have a belly or fat getting in the way. It was awesome to talk to some girls (much smaller than I) that knew what I was talking about and knew the discomfort and pain that does cause.
Today I had increased energy and felt rejuvenated! I think the reflexology from Rosa really contributed to that! It was a wonderful, soul searching and accomplished day for me! I love being away from the pressures of life for a bit and being able to focus on me, I never do that and need to be better!

Happy Thursday everyone!