Exerciers with physical health challenges new check in

Today I did Gym Style Back, Shoulders & Biceps.

Thanks for the advice about weighing, Katie and Cendrine. I was weighing daily to get an idea of how my weight fluctuates. I was able to not get emotionally invested in the number on the scale for many months, but lately I have been letting it get to me, so it's definitely time to back off. I'd like to just be done focusing on fat loss, but I still need to lose a couple of inches from my waist to lower my heart disease risk I guess. If it weren't for that, I'd be OK with being a little overweight. I keep reminding myself that I'm doing well with my nutritional goals most of the time, and I've come a long way with fat loss already.

Katie, that workout you put together sounds nice! How did the AG pilates class go? I'm sorry to hear that your son's neck is bothering him :(

Hi Elsie! Glad to have you here!
 
Katie, I'm so sorry to hear about your son's neck, what a bummer for him to miss the game!

Your class incorporating Pilates sounds great. Hopefully it's a way to keep boredom at bay for you!

Elsie, Hi! Happy to have you! Looking forward to getting to know you. Yo want to tell us a little about you?
 
Hi Elsie, It is so nice talking and getting to know others who love fitness as much as we all do. Please let us know more about yourself.
THe pilates with the hammock could potentially be interesting, I think is it going to take awhile for her to get a following. She did a mini w/o with myself and 2 other instructors last night. Hopefully she can make it more interesting when she is actually teaching the class, last night was pretty dull. There was so much material for them to learn in 2 days, last night was her way of figuring out what works and what doesn't, and how to cue certain moves.
My son went to the dr yesterday for his neck, he is having severe muscle spasms in the trapezius muscle. They gave him some steroids and muscle relaxers. They told him nothing else is wrong, but without an MRI I doubt they are sure of that. I really wish he would stop playing soccer!!
 
I was supposed to do legs today but ended up doing extended muscle work on the foam roller. I have never rolled my back muscles before but figured a way that works for me. For some reason my back muscles are really ropy and tight. I also have a bad knot on each side of my thigh, along the IT are. Sore work, but hope it helps loosen stuff up. Right now the muscles are so tight they make my knee caps pop when bending and unbending...

I hope the stuff they gave your son helps him quickly and that that really is all it is, Katie. Sorry the class was a bit boring....

Amy, I was thinking some more about what you said re weight loss. Do you think it would help you to take a couple of months off the weight loss focus and instead focus on maintenance? You can then pick up where you left off after having had a break. Supposedly it is good for the body to learn the new normal rather than being in constant change, I think I read somewhere that when you let your body be at the new lower weight a while, it resets what it considers normal and won't try so hard to get back to what was normal before. I don't know if that is true, but I just thought to encourage you that taking a break is totally permissible, and might even help.
 
Awww, thanks for the warm welcome ladies. : ) I'm fairly new to Cathe and everybody here just rocks! Been getting tips all around.
Today, completed Chalene Johnson Xtreme Get Lean Intervals and 5-7 mins of chest work on the ball. My first time with Chalene and while her workout was challenging, she talks way too much about "lifestyle" etc.
Haven't done pilates in a hammock but I have done restorative yoga in a swing hammock and thought it was fun and really good at passively opening the pelvic area and low back. Don't have a hammock at home, but just really enjoy restorative yoga in general and have been doing it for years now.
 
Hope you are having a real nice weekend.
Today, I did a Fitness Blender short ladder cardio workout, some rehab band work and went to a slow restorative yoga class tonight which helped my hip.
 
Forgot to post yesterday, I did great glutes yesterday and upper body trisets today.

Elsie, I've neve done Charlene, but have eyed her workouts a while back. What cathe workouts have you tried?
I remember my very first one was cardio and weights. Still love that one!

Busy day today, house full of kids for the day, better get ready for it!
 
Today's workout was Bob Harper Rev Cardio Conditioning (real tough & love his accent) & a short tricep workout of my own. Going for a brisk walk when the sun goes down and it is cooler.

Hey Cendrine. : )
In Cathe, I currently have Supersets (the older strength one, download), Hiit 40-20 (have not got all the way through yet ...LOL), STS abs plates & weights and the Dvds Hard Strikes and Turbo Barre. I love all of her workouts and am a fair newbie although I have fitness experience so to say. lol. I caught on to her when searching youtube and came across her library of single exercises on there. It must be from Xtrain, I believe. I am finding Turbo Barre tough on my tailbone even though I am a pilates gal. Not sure what's happening there, but I've decided to break on it for a bit. I do plan on getting more ofcourse as money & budgets allow. I have been looking at Great Legs and Abs for some time. Love the method in which that one is presented. And I am also wanting to get one of her strength "systems" as I am eyeing the daily deals to strike one on sale! : ) I love lifting, but find I am very bored doing it on my own so dvds etc. seems the way to go for me right now. Books and paper programs just are not motivating enough. I wish they were - they seem to be quite thorough. But I suppose because of my back issues (since I was 17) etc., and having come to fitness and more particularly pilates in the form of written instructions from doctors and therapists, it's too school-y. I know, not a proper word!
Thanks so much for the tip about Cardio & Weights .....that is looking like one I would like to download. : ) Have a break from the noise and bustle at the end of the day you hear!!
 
Cendrine, I have been considering taking a break from focusing on weight loss for a while. I think weighing myself less frequently will help a lot to keep me from focusing on it. I've been feeling much better since I've stayed off the scale. I will start with that and see how that goes for a while. It's got to be almost time to start transitioning into maintenance soon anyway. I'm about 12 pounds from the upper end of my BMI/healthy weight range, and I want to stay toward the top of that range so I can eat more :)

Elsie, I can totally relate to getting bored doing weight lifting without the DVDs. I was doing various bodybuilding.com programs before I got STS, but I would get bored with them after several weeks and never finished any of them! They were also designed for people to use in a gym, so I had to substitute a lot of exercises because I didn't have the equipment (and I'm not buying a gym membership!).

Friday I did STS Total Body. I needed to take a lot of breaks in between trisets, and I had to modify a couple of the ab moves. It was a tough one, but a good one. I also did Gym Style Chest & Triceps Sunday, but I think doing 4 weeks of Gym Styles is not going to happen, lol! I was spoiled by all the changes in STS and am already getting a little bored with doing the same program for more than 2 weeks. I was thinking about starting a new rotation - like maybe the STS/LIS 3 Month Transformation Rotation. I'm not sure if I want to commit to 3 months though. I've also been really stressed out for days and am needing to take a break tonight.
 
I ladies, I have had an interesting week. I found a stray kitten living in the wood pile we have outside. She was so scared and hungry. I am not a cat person, but I couldn't let her starve either. I started giving her food, I was hoping she would eventually be less frightened. We finally trapped her today, she couldn't be more than 10 weeks old. My vet agreed to take her if i paid $35. She is going to test her for feline leukemia and spay her, then she will try to find her a home.
I am in the 3rd week of doing Xtrain, upper body only. So far my golfer's elbow is ok. I am having some back discomfort, but I guess that is never going to go away. Yesterday I did my AG and yoga classes. Today will be xtrain bi's and tri's.
Amy, I don't think I ever made it a month with the gym style series. I needed a change after 2 weeks. I am even starting to feel that way with xtrain.
HAve a good day.
KAtie
 
: )
Thank you giving a kitty a life Katie. It`s interesting isn`t it how we do not consider ourselves cat people or whichever but they have this force that expand our hearts? I didn`t think cats were my thing either and then two needed a home in a hurry, I decided to give it to them and now almost 14 years later, one of them is still here with me and has seriously helped me through some hurt in this life. (the other little guy died of a congenital illness pretty early on). I don`t know what I`d do now without her. : )

Today, had to take it easy a bit as I didn`t get any sleep last night. Gentle Hatha yoga class this morning and did some low rep compound exercises on my own this afternoon.

Amy, bodybuilding.com is a useful resource for specific exercises & “moves`` I find.

Between Gym Styles and Xtrain, which one would you ladies say is the more interesting?
 
Hi Elsie, I would say xtrain is more interesting. The first one is a tri set, you work chest, then back, then shoulders. In the other, you do a bicep motion followed by a tri motion. You do this until the end, but each tri set is different. In gym styles, it is three sets of the same motion. To me, it is fine for a week or two, but then it bores me. You will gain more strength in gym styles, xtrain is more endurance based. If you can afford to I would say get both, they are very different. If I had to choose only one it would definitely be xtrain.

Today was a yoga class, I am taking a class re: alignment. It is slower paced to allow for proper alignment. This instructor us amazing! I have learned more in 3 classes than i have in 3 months at the other studio. I am getting in 3 yoga classes per week, and 3 anti gravity classes. It definitely helps my arthritis, too bad it doesn't cure it!!

I watched an amazing video today: http://www.mindbodygreen.com/revitalize/video/i-am-a-real-woman-so-is-every-other-woman
I think you ladies will enjoy it.
 
psusoccer17 said:
Hi Elsie, I would say xtrain is more interesting. The first one is a tri set, you work chest, then back, then shoulders. In the other, you do a bicep motion followed by a tri motion. You do this until the end, but each tri set is different. In gym styles, it is three sets of the same motion. To me, it is fine for a week or two, but then it bores me. You will gain more strength in gym styles, xtrain is more endurance based. If you can afford to I would say get both, they are very different. If I had to choose only one it would definitely be xtrain.

Today was a yoga class, I am taking a class re: alignment. It is slower paced to allow for proper alignment. This instructor us amazing! I have learned more in 3 classes than i have in 3 months at the other studio. I am getting in 3 yoga classes per week, and 3 anti gravity classes. It definitely helps my arthritis, too bad it doesn't cure it!!

I watched an amazing video today: http://www.mindbodygreen.com/revitalize/video/i-am-a-real-woman-so-is-every-other-woman
I think you ladies will enjoy it.
Click to expand...

Oh, thanks for those details re-Xtrain. Yeah, I can in no way afford both now! LOL. Glad to hear you found your way into a yoga class with a well educated instructor. That is happiness!! : ) I get more out of classical hatha and sivananda than any 'power' class. We are all different though, of course.
Gonna watch that vid you linked in a bit. Look interesting! : ) Thank you.
It is so hot here today, in terms of my workout, I am gonna do an 'old school' Jennifer Kries when it cools down a bit.
 
I'm supposed to be working ....hehe, but went ahead and had a watch anyway. Wow. Thank you. Can you believe people saw her as PLUS sized?! WTF!!!! I really liked what she had to say about dieting as well.
I had a bit of a moment (sort of anyway) like this just lately ......and perhaps I ought to consider myself lucky that I am in my mid-thirties and only now I have found myself feeling critical of my external self. A little anyway. I suppose I come from a place where I figured those things aren't useful. But anyway .....I have been taking some training in self massage and in particular, fascial release work for both physical ailments and trauma release. Into the fourth training class, I had to lift up my boot leg hemmed yoga stretchy pants ( I wear boot legged for a reason lol) to do some foot and ankle work. Sure, that's fine. But then, THEN .....the teacher brings out the MIRRORS! To show right on my legs and ankles. I have what these fashion mags like to shame 'cankles'. Yep. It's hereditary. They're like the queen's in her sweet kitten heels. I truly didn't care all that much about this throughout my life. But the other people in the class who all have these tiny ankles DID notice. and how could they not? We were lined up with these mirrors reflecting and the glariest reflection to me were these squared ankles alongside all of their dainty little ankles and toes. In summary, I felt like melting into the pool of poop I was feeling like and haven't worn a skirt in some time.
 
Today I did Step Blast, but I have been slacking off this week. First I had 3 days of pretty constant anxiety. I did work out one of those days, and I took a walk another day, but I came crashing down hard yesterday after the anxiety went down. I ate SO much, and I napped instead of exercising. I still felt kind of out of it for the first half of the day today. I also feel kind of lost as to what to do for a rotation. I found a 1-month STS/Low Impact Series rotation I think I might go with starting next week. But I also wonder if I should wait and see what Cathe's July rotation will be. There are so many options; it's difficult to choose!

Katie, I love kittens! How great that your vet would take care of her! Thank you for sharing the video. It really gave me a lot to think about. I may have to watch it again.

Elsie, I haven't tried Xtrain yet (maybe I should?), but I agree with Katie about Gym Styles.
 
I've had a weird week, workout wise too, taking the last two days off. I did cardio and weights today just so I don't go into the weekend having done nothing....

Katie, I love kittens! I'm glad you helped the little thing have a chance! Our cat is the baby of a rescue cat. I'm so glad the alignment class was so good, makes me want to take one, haven't had time to watch the video, will do so later.

Amy, I'm in the same boat about a rotation, very undecided... Lol. It seems I used to be able to do the same few workouts over and over when I first began long ago, but now I'm like you guys, two weeks of the same thing is about all I can take... Are any of you preordering the new series? I probably will, I know time is running out on that. Do you know what brought on the bouts of anxiety? I always wish I could analyze myself better, but a lot of the time things seem pretty out of the blue... I find I can see patterns or reasons in others, just not in myself...although I've gotten a little bit better.

Elsie, I second the xtrain over the gym style. I think you would have more variety, but I also like gym style. Fun to hear you have a cat, we have always been cat people here, although ds is pushing for a dog now.
 
So hot again, I just feel I didn't really push my limits with my workout today, but anyway, did a Millionaire Hoy dumbbell & bodyweight workout and then some back work with resistance bands. I'm considering dragging my butt to the air conditioned community center to get in a good wall climbing session tomorrow. The heat is unbearable.
Hope everyone is having the best weekend.
Amy, I hope your anxiety begins to subside or balance itself out. I know that lethargy that sets in after anxiety has burned through.
 
Yesterday I did my newest Jessica Smith workout. I decided that I would do the 90 Day Xtrain + Low Impact Series Rotation based on what everyone has said about Xtrain. Plus I've been wanting to check out the rest of the Low Impact Series - I've only done Low Impact Challenge. I don't have any slide & glide discs, so I hope I can get away with paper plates. It looks like I probably won't be able to get away with paper plates for the Slide & Glide Workout, but I'll just substitute another workout for that one.

Cendrine, I did preorder the ICE series. I decided to just get the downloads. I was going to wait a little longer since money is a little tight right now, but I don't want to pay even more later, lol!

My anxiety was brought on by the threat of severe weather (it never ended up happening), needing to leave my house for several hours for some work-related stuff 2 days in a row (I'm a bit agoraphobic and don't like driving very far), and my daughter being out of town. I've got generalized anxiety disorder, but the only treatment I got was SSRIs, and they never work on me. I think sedatives would help, but usually I get anxious when I have to do things (like drive or prepare for severe storms), and sedatives would make it impossible to do that. My daughter's back home, the weather has calmed down, and I don't need to leave town for a while, so I'm feeling much better now.

Elsie, I'm sorry to hear about the heat. It hasn't hit where I live yet, but it's just a matter of time. It's so hard to work out when it's hot, and my air conditioning never keeps up with the heat either. I hope you get some relief from the heat soon.
 
" Cendrine, I did preorder the ICE series. I decided to just get the downloads. I was going to wait a little longer since money is a little tight right now, but I don't want to pay even more later, lol! "

Hahaa! That is precisely where I am. I cannot actually afford it now, but I am pretty certain by the time the July 3 deadline rolls around, I will feel I need to buy it to avoid further costs. I was kinda holding out for the lifting portion to be offered as a sub package of sorts like what was with Ripped w HiiT which I didn't end up getting afterall, but anyway ...looks like it is unlikely to happen.
Amy, I've been managing panic disorder & ptsd for a number of years now, or managing it more than half of the time I should say, and yeah, ssris are pretty much useless. Benzos work for me (like Klonopin) but I built up a tolerance (no dependence thank goodness!), so they just didn't work for me any longer. I had success for many years with Dibenzepin, but then they didn't manufacture it for use here any longer and my Doc had a hard time finding anything to micmic it. I did intense CBT when I was younger which has been the most useful in helping me to predict onset and manage symptoms. I don't know how I would have turned out without it. lol! I also really, really like the benefits of yin yoga.

My workout today is Mindy Myrlea's body bar & ball. Too hot to do much of anything else. The climbing wall at the a-c'ed community centre was full of tweens, so I didn't bother. lol.
 
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