Women's World

I joined a gym 2 weeks ago because I heard on the radio that they were having a one-day special where you could join for $1 instead of the usual $99 or $199. I realized that I wasn't going to get back into exercising on my own because it's been over a year since Alisa was born and I hadn't done anything yet. I've been thinking about joining a women's gym for years so I didn't have to think twice about joining when I heard the special offer. I knew that the fact that I am now paying $49.99/month for a gym membership will motivate me to exercise, if only to get my money's worth.

Women's World is about 5 minutes from my house and they have free unlimited classes and childcare. It will certainly make it easier to exercise knowing that if Craig is busy, I can bring Alisa with me and drop her off in the awesome kids' room. They also make smoothies for $2-$3.50 so that's handy as you can get them with protein building or fat burning powder and even use them as a meal replacement. Most of the treadmills, ellipticals and stairmasters have little TVs attached so you can plug in some headphones and watch whatever while you exercise.

The day after I joined, I had my fitness assessment. I knew that I gained 10 pounds since Alisa was born (after having lost all the pregnancy gain by nursing), but I was horrified to hear that my BMI is 34% (last I had it checked was in college and it was 26%). My almost daily bowl of ice cream 2-3 hours before bedtime was a big contributor to this weight gain.

The next day I had the intro to circuit training (free with membership). I signed up for a month of personal training so my personal trainer was the one to show me how to use all the circuit training machines and what weight and number of reps to start with. She wrote it down on a log that I can use whenever I go there so I can easily keep track of what I do each time.

I'm most excited about attending the fitness classes. So far I've tried the Triple Twenty class, the Body Pump class and the Zumba class. I enjoyed and was challenged during all of them. The challenge during the Zumba class was more coordination than endurance. In case you don't know about Zumba (the newest rage), it's Latin-infused aerobic dancing. I have no dancing skills so I was very awkward during the class. However, nobody was paying attention to me so I wasn't too concerned. I will go again sometime because I enjoyed it and the music. It will just take time to learn the steps and become more comfortable shaking my hips and what not.

I had my first personal training session last week and boy was it tough! I enjoyed it though. My trainer showed me lots of moves with free weights that I had never seen before. A couple days later, I started the treadmill workout plan that my trainer developed. It's basically walking slow for 2 minutes, walking fast for 2 minutes, jogging for 2 minutes and then repeating each of the 3 for 3 minutes, then 4 minutes, then back down to 3 minutes and then 2 minutes (42 minutes total). As time goes on, I will be able to do each activity faster and will end up walking/jogging farther and burning more calories in the same amount of time. I'm supposed to do weight training every 3 days (to give my muscles time to repair in between workouts) and cardio 4-6 times per week (for at least 45 minutes each time) so that could be the treadmill workout or going to a class.

Anyway, everyone I've encountered at the gym has been really nice and helpful (staff and fellow exercisers). I like being there and that's a good sign. After all, my workouts wouldn't endure if I hated being at the gym.

I've been keeping a food log of all the foods (with portion sizes) I eat each day as recommended by my trainer. I haven't done a food log in years. It is kind of annoying but it is certainly eye opening to how many calories I take in. Also, just the fact that I have to write down everything I eat and knowing my trainer will see it, makes me think twice about whether or not I really want to eat that cookie or whatever. I won't have to do the log forever, just long enough to get a good idea on how to judge my caloric intake. To reach my goal weight of 135 lbs by spring (losing 1 lb/week), I need to consume 1200-1500 calories per day. On days that I exercise (burn 200+ calories) I can consume closer to 1500 calories. On days that I don't exercise, I should try to consume closer to 1200 calories. It is certainly an adjustment to cut down my caloric intake (I've been bad the past few months eating too much fast food and almost always eating a snack too close to bedtime) but I am getting there.

We'll see how I do during the holidays! It shouldn't be as difficult as last year because we won't be visiting family for Christmas (I'm sad about that) and therefore be bombarded by tasty treats every day.