P90X Review . . . day 8 . . . the "childbirth theory"

Okay, I'm back, which means I decided to stick it out. I felt terrible yesterday . . . lost my voice, sore throat, head cold that just left me feeling "icky". But I figured I'd "do my best & forget the rest" when we turned on the dvd for last night's workout. It was a repeat of last Monday's workout & I was amazed at how much more I could do (even feeling like I did) than I did last week.

So, here's my thinking. The premise of this workout is that you do a different dvd workout each day so your muscles don't get used to the same thing & you are continually building strength. I call it the "childbirth theory": when you give birth, you forget over time how painful it was so that you'll be willing to do it again & when you're in the middle of it again you suddenly remember that it really was like that the first time. So, last week we did our first workout & it was so hard but as the week went by it seemed like every workout was harder than the one before it & I forgot how hard that first one was. Coming back to it a week later, I realize that it was every bit as hard as the others we did through the week but I had just forgotten. If I had had to repeat that same first workout every day, I probably wouldn't have kept with it for a week, but having a week to "forget" about it, made me willing to do it again!

P90X Journey . . . Days 6 & 7

The Kenpo X routine on Saturday was fun but tough -- of course, this is P90X, so everything has to be tough! Sunday was supposed to be "rest & stretch". There's a "stretch" dvd that we put on but when we saw that it was 57 minutes long we decided that we weren't going to do it since we really try to keep Sundays as a day apart from the rest of the week & a 57 minute workout - even if it was "just" stretching - just didn't seem to fit for us.

The real difficult thing right now is that I've been fighting off a cold so I just am not working at full strength. And we've had sick kids that are up & down all night (last night I was up 6 times between the 2 kids). So, when I weighed in this morning & found myself up 1 pound since Saturday I was discouraged & just ready to forget it. So, my first official weigh in comes at 3 pounds down in our first week. And you'll know by whether I post tomorrow morning or not if I found the strength to keep going . . .

P90X Journey . . . day 5

"Date Night" last night was spent working out while the kids slept! It was legs, back & abs last night & I can't tell you how many times I saw what we were supposed to do next & said, "you've got to be kidding me!" I mean, really . . . one legged wall squats???!!!!

Despite the hard workouts, I feel pretty good when I'm done. My lower back has been sore but a little bit of painatrate cream eases some of that pain. And by the next day I'm sore but not so sore that I can't move.

And the best news of all was found on the scale this morning . . . I've lost 4 pounds since Monday!!! I found out my sister's husband did P90X in the past & he lost 8 pounds his first week -- I was sure I wouldn't have similar results, but my first weekly weigh-in won't officially be until Monday morning so if I can keep it up & have a great weekend . . . who knows?

Our P90X Journey . . . day 4

I've done yoga before, but tonight's yoga workout was KILLER! I think its been the toughest workout so far. Really hard & even though I was pushing through my feet were cramping up and I had to take several breaks. This workout was an hour & a half long & the repeated yoga combination over & over again felt like it was lasting an eternity. About halfway through, they switched to some different poses that did more balance work, so I was grateful for that!

Really started having some carb cravings today! The diet plan that I'm on only allows for 1 carb serving a day and as I fix meals for the kids, its really hard not to give in & enjoy what they're eating. I love my bread, potatoes, and especially pasta! I'm sticking pretty closely to the diet stuff, but probably not eating the right # of servings of veggies & proteins. Life is so busy that its hard for me to keep track . . . so my next project needs to be coming up with a good chart that is easy to mark.

P90X Journey . . . day 3

Last night's workout was arms & shoulders. I've had bursitis in my shoulder on & off for years so I have to carefully build my strength here. I did lighter weight & sometimes just the motion with no weight or bands at all. Felt my shoulder popping from time to time & just didn't want to re-injur to the point that I wouldn't be able to do anything. Amazingly I'm not having problems this morning so I must've done something right even though I definitely didn't get as hard of a workout last night. However, the ab ripper workout that went with it was definitely a killer -- I've never done (or I guess I should say "attempted") such a hard ab routine in my life.

I've decided to go with a protein shake for breakfast each morning. It doesn't taste too bad when mixed with bananas and fruit & is definitely better than eggs every morning since I'm not a big egg person. And I LOVE that turkey bacon is on the list of approved proteins! Honestly, I could be happy eating 12 pieces of turkey bacon a day to fulfill my protein requirement --- but I'm trying to be a little more diverse than that & only eat a couple pieces a day :)

P90X Journey . . . day 2

Last night was our day 2 workout . . . we're doing the lean program so it was cardio time. Even though I was sore throughout the day, I was looking forward to the workout. I was able to do more of it than the first workout & it was fun, though very intense. It was also a little bit shorter (maybe 10 min or so) than the first workout which was great since I didn't get home until later in the evening.

Did our shopping for the Fat Shredder meal plan on Monday night. I remember hearing somewhere that when you go shopping, 90% of what you get should be from the outer edge of the store with only grabbing a few things from the inner aisles. Well, for the first time ever, that really is what my grocery shopping experience was. Tons of the fresh stuff with only a couple things from the "inside" aisles. As we prepared Jeff's lunch & snacks to take to work, he was skeptical and thinking that he would be hungry during the day but he came home saying, "that was a LOT of food".

Our Journey with P90X . . . day 1

Okay, so we started out the year great . . . I lost all my baby weight & then some & then all sorts of stuff hit including my husband being gone on business for 2 months and some health problems. Fast forward to now & all of that weight I lost at the beginning of the year is back. Ugh! We've been working for several weeks to try to get back into shape but we've been half hearted about it & have experienced ZERO results.

So, while we were trying to figure out how we could both fit in workouts with busy schedules & 2 little kids, my sweet husband came up with a brilliant & sadistic idea. He had seen the commercials on tv for P90X and said we should do it together. I was thrilled with an idea that we could fit in (doing it in our own home after the kids go to bed) to our lives & even though I hadn't seen the commercials I went ahead and agreed.

OUCH! I should've seen what I was getting myself into before I agreed! Seriously, though, its a really tough workout & eating plan (which we're going to be pretty good with but allow a little leeway -- since we are of course doing this through the holidays). But I like the philosphy of "do your best & forget the rest". Day 1 of the workout was crazy intense & I definitely couldn't do all of it, but I did what I could which was more than I thought I could (if you can follow that). I was definitely sore afterwards but also felt good . . . & more of the same today. Even though I'm very sore, I am definitely looking forward to tonight's workout & to our results 90 days from now on January 28th . . . we'll keep you posted!!!