I completed month one and started month two. Here are some lessons I have learned along the way:
It is hard to do push-ups with two little girls laying their heads on the floor under your face and saying "hi mommy!"
This is a basic lesson - trying to stick to any exercise regimen with little kids can be difficult. Sometimes they want to do it with mommy, so then they completely get in the way. Other times they are off entertaining themselves. (i.e. destroying something valuable or messing up the house) You have to make up your mind that taking care of your health is more important than any challenge that comes up and just do it.
Kids can also be great motivators.
Insanity has the fit test so you can see your improvement along the way. There is also the scale and taking measurements - all things that you can use to monitor how successful your health plan is at accomplishing your goals. But for me, nothing is as motivating as hearing my daughter say, "Mom, your butt is getting smaller!"
Headbands and towels are not optional.
This is especially true if you are doing Insanity. I have NEVER sweat as much during a workout in my life as I do with Insanity. And it is only getting worse as the morning temperatures are getting warmer. Trying to keep pushing it with Shaun T. while you have sweat running into your eyes is not a pretty picture. Neither is trying to do moving push-ups through pools of sweat on a wood floor. (that picture on the Insanity dvd is NOT an exaggeration!)
After completing month one, and attempting month two, I have made the decision to start over at the beginning of month one. I believe this is a good decision as the point of doing Insanity was to get healthy. For me, that's going to take a little longer since I was living a pretty sedentary lifestyle going into this. But I am not in any way discouraged. At least now I know the complete insaneness (is that a word?) that comes with the month 2 workouts, so I know what I am working up to.
I also made the decision to go all raw during the next 60 days. There is a reason for this madness. Back when I was working with
Optimal Health Systems, I decided to go on a 100% raw food diet. My boss had just the year before set the Guinness World record for the most push-ups in one minute. The background on that happening was that he was the team nutritionist for the Phoenix Suns. He was telling the coaches about a better training method for their players. They weren't convinced enough to try it but challenged him to train using his method for one month and then attempt to break the world record for the most push-ups in a minute. (during half-time at one of the games, no less!) If he could do that, then they would use his training methods. With Guinness record officials on site and tapes rolling, he landed himself as a new world record holder. Sorry, I can't remember now how many he did - 118?? 123?? Not sure. Somewhere in that ballpark.
But there was actually more to this story than his training method. He also went 100% raw food for that month he was training to set the record. He had noticed that when he was on an all raw diet, his strength improved. Every night before bed he would do sit-ups and push-ups. During the raw food diet, he could do them effortlessly, and even increased how many he was doing. He shared this tip with me one day because I was questioning whether there was really any benefit to going all raw or if you could just eat healthy and supplement with enzymes. (He also told me about the more complex issue of levorotatory cells and dextrorotatory cells - counter clockwise spinning cells and clockwise spinning cells - and how your bodies cells spin one direction as does live food, but cooked food cells spin the opposite direction, etc.) I was thinking about him sharing that tidbit of info with me and thought that it would be interesting to experiment for myself.
Since I am starting over on the 60 day Insanity program, it makes it easy for me to track 60 days of raw simultaneously. I am looking forward to seeing if I can feel a difference and sharing it with you here on the blog. Plus I will have the accountability of reporting my findings, so that will help me stay on track. :)
Now, to catch up on some pics of the girls. Since I had received my first deposit from a couple for my Bradley class, I splurged and let the girls each pick out a dress from Costco. They had a hard time choosing, but eventually decided on this one. They HAD to have the same one. Love those girls! :)
Trinity was trying to be pouty because I was going to be helping in Angelina's Sunday school room that morning.
David started being silly to get Trinity to smile. She's trying hard to stay pouty.
I think they picked out a nice dress - very cute. :) Trinity actually has quite the eye for fashion. She decided a few weeks ago that I didn't need to dress her or Angelina anymore - that she was going to do it herself. I have been constantly impressed with her ability to match up really nice looking outfits from all our second hand clothes. I think I'm going to have her start picking out my outfits!
Posted in:
health,
Insanity,
Raw_Vegan Lane
on
Wednesday, June 2, 2010
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1:00 PM