Personal Training Days 1,2 &3

This week saw the beginning of my 4 week journey with Personal Trainer Extraordinaire, Simon Mckenzie!!

The first day was somewhat tough as the day began with a 4am airport run with my 9 & 2 year old, plus suitcase! We were all exhausted by 10am! Left to my own devises I would easily have talked myself out of anything that required physical exertion! That’s the beauty of having a personal trainer! Like many women I know, the idea of letting someone down and messing with their day is unthinkable!

Simon, on arrival explained that the first four days would be designed to awaken my various muscle groups and prepare them for the hard work that will start on day five! After the first days workout I actually felt energised! I was thankful for that!

Day 2 again was fairly light work and although I had slight aches from day 1 I am pleased to report that my body felt much looser. It’s amazing just to see even the smallest of results so quickly. This helped me feel motivated to work hard and see this through! Imagine the results after 4 weeks!

Day 3 was again easily achieved. Simon had me doing press ups as part of this session, which have not been my favourite exercise thus far. Having said that I am looking forward to being able to actually do them properly. I managed 3 with good form! I will be hopefully reporting 10 with ease by the end of week 4!!

My diet this week has been fairly normal as Simon asked me to do what I normally do and record what I eat, the time I ate it and monitor my mood for the next couple of hours after eating it. As we progress Simon will assess my habits. I will admit on day 1 I actually ate way more than usual! I know from experience that when I’ve not had enough sleep I feel much more hungry than usual! My body is desperate for energy from somewhere!! Enough sleep is a vital factor in my weight management!

Although I ate more than usual I made healthy choices for the most part! Starting the day with porridge, a lunch of pasta with avocado and cucumber with olive oil and lemon drizzled on top, fruit and nuts in between and a pack of walkers crisps and a bagel with cottage cheese and peanut butter thrown in for good measure. I have started my juicing regime of a minimum of 2 per day. My juices include apples, celery, green beans, spinach, kale, limes and ginger. These I will vary from day to day but will mostly be vegetables with apples to sweeten. Today’s included raw Beetroot. I feel the energy boost after drinking my juices within minutes. After a few days of juicing regularly I can see the difference in the condition of my skin! Ladies I believe completely in our ability to reverse the clock and when I combine exercise and juicing I see the results very quickly! My skin appears to be less lined and has a natural glow. I look a little younger! This is just day 3!!

Lastly I will share my weight and measurements with you. I won’t be checking these again until the end of the 4 weeks. I don’t believe in being a slave to the scales. I find this counter productive as I have known my weight to shift up or down by as much as 2kg from day to day! I can say that already I feel slimmer and muscles feel more toned! The mirror tells me the same story! My body reacts quickly!

Start Weight 70.3kg

Arms – Right – 11.1 inches
Left – 11.2 inches

Waist – 31.8 inches

Hips – 42.8 inches

Bust – 34.14 inches

Legs – Right – 25.14
Left – 25.10

Physiologically I feel great! Bring it on!!!!

Next session tomorrow morning! Lets go!! I will be attempting to blog my progress daily so I hope you check in and support me!! It helps!!

Time to sleep! Mwah xx

Exclusive Juicy Mama Offer!!!

So here it is!!!! An amazing exclusive offer up for grabs!!! My amazing experienced Personal Trainer will be training me 5 times per week for the next calendar month!!!! We are offering an additional place on this training programme which includes dietary plan and detox plan!!! We all know how much a personal trainer charges for their time but this will blow your mind!!! We are offering the right candidate this opportunity for £70…..!!!!!!! (Subject to minor adjustments)

In order to apply you must live in Eltham or surrounding areas! You must be able to be flexible with your time. You must have no known medical reasons that would stop you from participating and you must be prepared to set up a blog that will be publicised to track your progress!!

Please leave a comment if you wish to be considered for this exciting offer!! Time is also ticking as we wish to get the programme started THIS Monday!!!!! Any questions please ask away 🙂 !!!!!!

bgirl WONDERful

I found myself tumbling into 2014 with a heavy heart. Feelings of sadness, that had been so alien to me in recent years, took hold!

My initial reaction to these emotions was to comfort eat! The left over Christmas chocolates were my first victims but by no means the last! My second reaction, once the cupboards were bare…oops, was to frantically busy myself with reorganising my living space, and giving bags full to the brim to charity!!!!

There is a fundamental difference in who I am today and who I used to be. The me of today was fairly quick to recognise that the behaviours were designed to suppress the emotions that were present. These behaviours would have become the vicious cycle that we can find ourselves in. But this cycle did not begin here. I’d been gaining weight slowly since the summer but had not recognised this cycle beginning as dramatically as I now was. Mostly because my emotions were now screaming at me to acknowledge them, I understood that I’d been suppressing them for some time.

Through my observations of self, I have come to understand the connectedness of our mind and body. Our emotional wellbeing plays the most major role, in my opinion, of how our physical fitness and wellness will manifest. My continuing journey to a healthier version of me has to start with the mind. So what I did next is something we should all perhaps do more. I stopped.

I stopped pretending that I was ok. I stopped distracting myself from listening to my inner voice. I allowed the emotions to take over. It felt a little like losing control at first. A little scary even!

Those closest to me received sos messages of ‘I’m falling to pieces….aaaarrggghh’ and such like!! What can I say!! It’s my Greek-Cypriot heritage….we love a tragedy! Ha!

Once the drama subsided, the cause of my distress rose from the depths to the surface of my conscious mind and I knew what I had to do. Confront the issue in order to remove the negativity surrounding it and come to a place of acceptance and understanding.

With this now dealt with, I kid you not, the very next day I woke with the feeling of Springtime in the air. My senses were alive.

Empowered by the release and relief and the belief in my own abilities to nurture my own emotional wellbeing, I now feel ready to leap into 2014, with a headspin followed by my most badass bgirl pose….just to make sure you know I’m ready!! 🙂

Happy New Year All!!

Juicy Me!!!

Well, if there is one thing that I have always been….it’s juicy!!!

Being blessed with a body type that can be described with words such as, curvy, voluptuous, womanly, etc, has its clear advantages!!!! I am truly in love with my curves!!!

However, there have been times when I have not cared for myself in the way that I now know is essential. My story is one that very much illustrates the correlation between state of mind and physical health. An unhealthy relationship of eleven years and two children later, I found myself at 15 stone!

Two years ago the unhealthy relationship went!!! Woohoooo!!! And with it most of the weight I’d been carrying! It was really quite miraculous! I went from over 15 stone down to 11 stone 7lbs in a matter of weeks!

This was NOT the result of not eating and crying all day! It was the result of new found freedom, happiness and hope that I found again after so many years!

I learned to love and appreciate myself again. I healed my mind of the useless, poisonous thoughts that I had come to believe. Thoughts of my unworthiness that I hadn’t realised had grown to be such loud mantras in my mind!

Once my thoughts began to adjust so did my world around me! New opportunities, new friends, fresh ideas and the inspired action to make it all happen!

I found myself surrounded by dancers!!! People that train their bodies to the max! I rekindled my love of movement and reconnected with my body through the medium of dance!!!

One year on and my body was transformed! The weekly bboy, hip hop and waacking classes were paying off!! My core strength was hugely increased, my muscle tone and shape was better than i ever remembered it, even prior to children! All of this and the most satisfying part was that none of it felt remotely like hard work!!! I was just having fun!!!!

A few months later I made a major lifestyle change when I decided to home educate my eldest child. Finding less time for myself to indulge in the trips to the gym (they would not accept 8 year olds into the Creche no matter how much I begged them), and cooking more daytime meals, the weight began to creep back up! I put a stone back on with ease in the space of 3 weeks!!!

As I began telling myself ‘something has to be done’, so I received a call from a friend and personal trainer, Simon Mckenzie. We made plans to put in place 3 personal training session per week for a period of 3 months!!!

The decision to create a blog and document the progress was born from both Simons desire to have evidence to promote what can be done in a relatively short space of time, and my own desire to share my experiences with anyone that would benefit.

My discoveries have led me to believe that fitness should be FUN!

And ultimately, change must begin from within. The work of altering our internal mantras about ourselves is the key to all success!!

I considered posting some before pictures but I refuse to begin this journey by living in the past or focusing on what I don’t want! I will post some gems as the journey progresses but only if it serves the moment!

So with a laid back, easy feeling of knowing that I will achieve the reality of the visions I hold in my mind of the healthy mind, body and soul that I desire, I want anyone that reads this to not take anything I say too seriously!!!! ha! I will be attempting to not get bogged down in the detail of micro managing my fitness journey! That’s really not my style. I will instead be aiming to create a fun blog that provides an insight into the thoughts and feeling associated with this journey. In the process, my desire is to inspire as many people as possible and to receive inspiration from those that follow and interact!!

Let’s lighten up!!! :-))

Www.simon-Mckenzie.co.uk