paulapop’s BodyBlog

I just got home from my kickboxing class.  It was brutal, my  body hurts NOW, I wonder what I will feel like in the morning.  Even my hips hurt, my hamstrings are killing me, and my triceps want to leave home, and my quads are numb.  If I can walk tomorrow it will be a miracle.

I absolutely blasted my upper body today.  It felt great, I can remember a time when I couldn’t shoulder press even 15lbs for 10 reps, and now I am doing 35 and will be jumping to 40 next week for sure.  I am on a mission to tone my arms and today’s workout was a step in the right direction.  My triceps were burning when I was finished.  I love working out my arms!

Just so you all know, I’ve posted some progress pics   please be kind

Well dealing with them at the gym is fine, I’ve kind of look at them and see if I can pick out the one or two that might actually stick with it for more than  a month.  I keep my headphones in my ears so I don’t have to listen to them give me advice on how to work a machine or do a certain excercise.  But now they’ve invaded my work. 

At work I have two girls that are getting married this year and one older woman who are suddenly on the weight loss bandwagon.  Now don’t get me wrong, I do wish them the best, its just hard to eat my tuna salad (a can of tuna dumped on a garden salad) while they give me diet advice.  They talk about how much excercise they are going to do…..none has actually started excercising yet…one bought a whole home gym and the other a membership to my gym, the third just admits she has no intention of excercising.  I sit there listening while they talk about what it takes to loose weight, what they should be eating (but aren’t), how much cardio they will be doing…..eventually.  There is another girl that I work with that began a fitness lifestyle about 6 months ago, she’s done really well, lost about 25lbs and looks good.  Yesterday she was telling me she’s kinda fallen off the fitness wagon and needed me to help her get back on.  I started giving her the speech, If you quit now, everything you’ve done for the past 6 months will be gone, all your hard work will be for nothing etc etc…..The two psuedo fitness buffs piped in with their expert opinions.  I admit, I am cranky today, and perhaps I would feel differently if these two were friends of ours, but they are new employee’s, they’ve only been with us for a little over a month but it is just really getting to me that out of shape, junk food eating, persons that have never broken a sweat are suddenly experts because they "intend" to excercise and have been doing a bit of reading……..

Anyway enough of that.  I had a suprise session with my trainer this morning.  I was at the gym and her appointment didn’t show up so she asked if I wanted to move my early morning session scheduled for tomorrow, to today.  She had worked out a new routine for me that I know she was dying to try out.  She has been talking about for a couple of weeks.  It is a Push-Pull workout.  I had no idea what this was before today.  Basically it is an excercise that is a push movement, followed by an excercise that is a pull movement.  She had me doing heavy weights for short sets.  So for example I started with decline chest fly’s using 25lb dumbbells for 6 reps, 5 sets.  Then moved onto bent over rows.  So you can see the fly’s were a "push" the rows a "pull",then hacksquats (push) and preacher curls (pull),  shoulder presses (push), and tricep pressdowns (pull).  Get the idea?  It was a fun twist on some old excercises.  I enjoyed it.

I did manage to take the whole day off from the gym yesterday, so today’s blog is not about fitness, but a more personal dilema.

Ok, here’s the deal.  As some of you know, I am a photographer by trade.  My husband and I run a small photography business from our house, most of the business’ income comes from Wedding photography. 

When a couple contacts me to inquire about a wedding package, I set up an appt to go meet with them, show them my porfolio and a slideshow of a recent wedding I’ve done.  If they decide to hire me, I require a deposit, get some details about the wedding, and then its a done deal.

 Last night I went to meet with a couple that is getting married in August of this year. 

I am a pretty liberal kinda gal.  Live and let live, its your body, do what you like with it as long as you aren’t hurting anyone.  I admit, I am not crazy about facial piercings.  In fact, aside from earrings and MAYBE a tiny nose stud, I can’t stand facial piercings.  Well this couple I met with last night had so many facial piercings that I am sure on a sunny day the reflection off the metal in their face could be seen from space. 

I was looking at these people (kids) thinking…."these piercings are going to be a real problem to photograph outside of the studio"  Outdoor pictures on a sunny August day will have reflections.  So I decided to take the tactful route and I asked them if they would be leaving the facial jewelry in, or would they like me to bring someone along to do some makeup work and cover the open holes?

Well, no such luck, they are keeping them in.  Apparently it "defines" their relationship (God help them).  My dilema is, if they keep the facial jewelry in I will have to do more than normal amount of touchups on their outdoor and candid photo’s to be able to deal with the jewelry.  I am tempted to do their engagement photo’s outside and NOT touch them up so they can see how the jewelry will affect the photo’s.  Then of course I will touch them up to show them the difference, and explain if I have to do that much work on the wedding photo’s, the price is going to have to go up to reflect the extra work.  Do that sound fair to everyone?  What would you do?

Today is a complete day off for me.  I am taking the day off from work, and the day off from the gym.  I still haven’t been sleeping great, so I figured maybe I just need a total day off.  Between work and the gym, I usually leave my house at 6am (for the gym) and don’t get back home until after 8pm (from the gym).  I am thinking I might be in an "All work and no play" kinda situation, so today will be a mental play day.

Gosh, even as I am writing this I am thinking…….."Maybe I will just go to a class tonight, the new step class is at 6"…….ok, chase that thought out of my head.  Today is a Day off!  Now I am thinking…."maybe just a ball workout at home….."   Arghhhhhh I hate it when I get this way, I have this irrational fear that taking a day off will set me back.  I know the opposite is true, but for whatever reason I just can’t accept it.  I will force myself to stay home today, Maybe do a bit of housework, read, draw and meet a friend for a tea.  Thats it, Thats the plan.  Someone please smack me if I don’t stick to it and I end up at the gym!

I don’t know whats up with me lately, first I was in a funk, now I can’t sleep.  I didn’t get to bed until 11:30 last night and was up at 3:30 this morning, fell back asleep at 6:30am and of course my alarm went off at 7am, and I was at the gym for 8am.  I am POOPED!

I had a great workout this morning.  Did an hour of cardio and spent a half hour with my trainer. 

She offered some new challenges today, one of them I will have to work on is a standard seated row, except instead of sitting, you squat and hold it just above the seat, then row as normal watching your form so you don’t lean over.  I found the row fairly easy to do, holding the squat made my quads cry, and I found when I released the row, I had difficulty holding my form and really wanted to either go forward, or loose the squat.  I will have to keep working on it.

Ahhhhhhhhh I hate days like today, I overslept so I did not have time for the gym before work this morning, and I had a hockey fundraiser to attend for my nieces hockey team that I had to be at just an hour after I was done work so no time for the gym tonight.  I get cranky when I have to miss a scheduled workout!

Tomorrow is another day and I have an 8am appt with the trainer to make up for it, I will finally get to move some weight!

Have a great weekend everyone!

In the past I have really only one main supplement, that is of course, the good ole standby Whey Isolate.  Every 6 months I would a detox routine, and once I tried a metabolism booster (can’t even remember which one).  I also take a standard variety multi-vitamin (One a Day Weight Sense).

Since I’ve been in this funk I’ve been thinking of new goals to set and new things to try to try and pull me out of it.  I’ve decided that it is time for me to start working muscle definition and focus less on weight loss.  In other words, the weight is nearly off, so now I need to get lean.  I don’t just want to look thin…..I want to look GOOD!

So to that end I’ve added two supplements to my diet.  I’ve added CLA and creatine. It is a good time to start it since I’ve just taken all my measurements.

 Tonight was my first day taking them, and my 1st workout (kickboxing class). I have decidced to do a 5 day load with the creatine. It is tough to tell if there was any difference because kickboxing is a class not a session with free weights.  I can say this, I did feel as if I had more energy.  Will keep you posted.

I have to admit, I am still in kind of a funk.  I’ve been hitting it double time at the gym and I’ve been sore constantly for a week.  I enjoy the feeling of a sore muscle, in fact so much so that I can’t remember a time when at least one muscle in my body wasn’t sore.

The CW in me is suffering a bit too.  This may sound wierd but, the compliments are starting to annoy me.  We have to scan in when we enter our gym and when you scan in a picture of you flashes on the computer screen.  My picture is very old…..nearly 2 years old in fact. I was ALOT heavier then, and had really short hair.  It is a terrible picture but I kept it on the screen so that everytime I scanned in I would see the picture and remember why I was going there. 

Well, some of the staff at the gym has been showing my picture to other members.  Now please understand, the staff members are doing this with the best of intentions, and I am aware of that.  They are showing my picture to show people how far I’ve come.  I know I should be proud of that, but I am not.  I hate the way I look in that picture, and I hate the way the staff makes such a fuss over how well I’ve done.  I guess I just consider this whole thing a very personal journey that I dont’ really want to share with the world (ok I don’t want to share it with the whole world, but the Circle of course is the exception).  I’ve put ALOT of time, dicipline and hard work into my body and I guess I feel like it is kind of glossed over when my picture is shown with the comment "look at the difference in her, you can do it too"  It is true that anyone can transform their body IF they are willing ot put a lot of work, sweat and pain into it.  It is not simply a matter of going to the gym.

Maybe it is my funky mood making me feel like this, maybe it "anti-climatic goal achievement syndrome", or maybe it is just the annoyance of the January "resolutioners" looking at my picture that is getting to me.