Day Thirty: Shredded!

That's me done with my very first round of the 30 Day Shred! YAY! I'm feeling so awesome today! It was hard and there were many days I totally wanted to give up, but I kept on trucking and now here I am at the end! Eff yeah!

Am I shredded? Do I have a six pack? Am I twenty pounds down from where I started? Well, not quite. I probably do have a six pack, but it's still hiding behind a pretty decent layer of fat. Still, it does feel rock hard under there, so as soon as my weight loss catches up, I've got a pretty amazing head start. And I can't even imagine what I'd look like with a six pack! I've never been anywhere close to having one! I'm also not twenty pounds down from my start weight but there is a few things to be said for that. First of all, I AM 13 pounds down as of today! YAY! I probably would actually be the twenty pounds down if I hadn't had the whole vacation backslide in the middle of things. But, that being said, the 30 Day Shred hasn't been my only exercise I've been doing daily either. Here's how it breaks down:

For all of level one I wasn't doing any other exercise and honestly I didn't see much shifting of weight that first week. What I did see was my muscle tone start to pick up a bit and harden up. I'm sure the weight loss was coming, but once I into the swing of this commitment to work out every day, I started adding other stuff in. For all of level two, I also did both levels of her Yoga Meltdown every day along with the Shred. Now, this is where the weight really started flying off. No joke. It was around then that I counted up what I'd lost in the time I had lost it and realised that, if I work my ass off, I can be at my goal weight by the time we hit Portugal. It will take a whole lot of focus on my part, but if I don't give up, I can wear my bikini to the beach. It's been many years since I've been comfortable wearing my bikini out. I hardly even know why I have it. So, for level three I really hit things hard. Since I'm not working much at the moment and I have ended up with a bunch of free time, I put myself to work. The Shred became the shortest thing I did. I have an elliptical machine at home so what I started doing is 10 minutes running on the elliptical, 10 minutes of abs (crunches, leg lowers, ect) and repeat. FOR TWO HOURS. This hurts, but it's also sort of amazing. By the end of it, I've gotten in an hour on the elliptical and an hour of ab work. I drop an amazing amount of weight and I feel so much better. I've been sleeping better at night and had a ton more energy during the day. Plus, just so it doesn't get boring, I've been watching shows on youtube that have been cut into 10 minute increments and use that to time myself.

So I guess you couldn't use me as a barometer for how well the shred works on it's own as far as it being a singular weight loss tool BUT it is what kicked me off and got my motivation up. I would absolutely recommend the Shred to anyone who is looking for somewhere to get started!

Day Ten: The end of level one!!!

That's me done with level one! I'm totally excited to be done with it-and with no days left off in between! I can't wait to see what level two has in store for me. I keep wanting to peek, but I'm not gonna.

I'm so proud of myself for being a third of the way through and still going strong. Especially with Giant having had a four day weekend this week. It's always so easy to pass off on my exercise routines when he's home (he's just so comfortable to lay around with!) but I didn't let it sway me. I guess I'm getting better at this whole will power thing.

Willpower is such a funny thing. It used to be a laughable notion for me. I had zero healthy habits and I'm not even kidding. Back in school and then all the way through to my mid 20s I was lazy as hell, ate anything that looked good in the moment, smoked like a train, and basically never moved a muscle. What a turn around to see me now. Now I strive to better myself every single day (even when it's the last thing I feel like doing). I eat an amazing amount of fresh fruit and veg every day and have traded the last of my bad sweets for dates! Now my stomach turns when I even smell cigarette smoke and I'm successfully working out every day-even when no one's looking ;)

I saw this post this morning of a woman who has reached her goal weight. Instead of posting the regular before and after pictures showing side, front, and back she just had two pictures of her face and it told the whole story. What a huge, beautiful grin she had on in the second photo. And I was thinking, if I can back to my goal weight, maybe I'll post the video John took of me that made me realise I wanted to absolutely get out of this body I trapped myself in and feel good again next to a video of me once I'm done. It's still a ways off, of course but I think it makes sense.

I've also been reading about isometrics today. For the most part, they seem to be yoga postures held for various amounts of time, but just with a more scientific-sounding name. Any experience with that out there? I'd love to hear people's thoughts on it...