On July 26, I posted that I was going to start working with a personal trainer to help me find a sustainable and healthy workout routine. If you’d like to read that post here’s the link to it! FITNESS JOURNEY BEGINNING! Not only that, but I had the goal of adjusting my eating habits and working to create more healthy lifestyle habits for myself. Here we are, now on October 25. I’ve been working with my trainer for about three months now and I just wanted to give a little fitness journey update!
I think the hardest thing for me this past three months has been training my mindset. I’m easily motivated to workout and hardly find myself having to force myself to do my workouts, but I struggle with the progress part of this whole process. After dealing with such painfully-slow healing with my injuries in high school, my patience has really been cut short and I get frustrated easily when I don’t see progress or improvement quickly. There have been moments where I’ve stared at myself in the mirror and still hated what I see but I’ve noticed that I’m feeling that way, less and less as I’ve been working out more. I still struggle with my patience but I’m starting to appreciate the process and celebrate the small progressions and little victories. When I first started with my trainer, I was tracking my activity in a log but now with my watch, I just track my workouts from there. In my log, I was tracking the little victories I had and I think that’s part of the reason I’m starting to see a more positive mindset when it comes to progress and I’m starting to be a bit kinder to myself.
My favorite thing to do is look back on that activity log and see those little sprinkles of positivity. Like on August 22nd, I did bench squats for the first time and that was my first time ever lifting truly heavy weight. I squatted 95 pounds that day. When I first started in the gym, I was mainly working with 10 and 15 pound weights during arm circuits and arm workouts but it was really tough. For being a tennis player and also setter during my volleyball years, I’m shocked my upper body strength was so weak!! That has been one of the main focuses of the time with my trainer. Upper. Body. Strength. On September 19th, I wrote that I was finally able to EASILY work with the 15 pound weights. Good day. 🙂 The next weekend, my trainer noted that my core was clearly stronger because I was able to do an exercise that I hadn’t been able to do when I first started working with her. That was something that made me really happy. In October, some of the highlights came from October 2nd where I wrote that I didn’t expect myself to be able to do wide leg squats with a 65 pound kettlebell as easily as I did. I also bench pressed for the first time that week and lifted 55 pounds. Not much, but a good start. I also did some core stuff with these weird elbow sock things where you dangle off of the ground and I found those really fun. I stopped tracking my activity after I got my Galaxy Watch 3 for my birthday since my watch can do that for me, but I still note the little things that motivate me to push myself harder. Like last weekend, my delts were really starting to get some definition and just yesterday, I bench squatted 125 pounds, setting a new PR for myself. I was really proud of that. This fitness journey has been no joke. I’ve been really sore some days but I love the feeling of being sore. It means things are working and progress is being made!!
When this all began, my first few workouts were very full-body focused and as I’ve progressed, the days have become more focused on arms, legs, triceps/back, glutes/back, and cardio. I appreciate the focused days, especially arm days. They suck but I find myself enjoying those the most because I feel like I die the least on arm days haha. My trainer has also been such an important part of this whole fitness journey. She’s an amazing person and I’m so happy to consider her not only a mentor but also a friend. She has done so much for me and I love getting to workout with her and laugh and have fun, even when she’s killing me with the intense workouts.
I’ve really tried to refrain from making the goal of all of this to lose weight. That’s not what this is about. I’ve told myself that I’m working to get stronger mentally and physically. With that said however, I have lost 8 pounds to this day. I see and feel strength in my arms and core and my legs are feeling a bit tighter. As I mentioned a little before, I feel better about myself but I still have some things to work on regarding the mental aspect of this all.
Regarding food, I try to stick to the same things when I’m at school. Breakfast is avocado toast with two poached eggs and I try to add some sort of sausage or other protein when I can. For lunch and dinner, it varies, but I’ve cut out pasta (unless it’s whole wheat) and have really tried to up my protein and fiber intake. I eat a lot of salads and soups and have really enjoyed making use of my air fryer to help keep vegetables and also potatoes more fun and hopefully more healthy. As far as sugar intake goes, I really limit that in the mornings because in the past, that’s where I’ve taken in a lot of sugar whether that was from some sugary coffee/tea drink or a pastry or some sweet yogurt, etc. I still enjoy sweets occasionally, but I’ve found that I’m just a lot less inclined to eat sweets now. I still do really enjoy the occasional trip to Starbucks though, I will say that.
From the past three months, I’m most happy to see my mindset begin to transform. Nothing comes overnight and this is something my mom has told me over and over again but in the past, I’ve just been frustrated by that comment because I wanted results that instant so I could be happy with myself again. Sometimes, I still feel that way, but it’s all getting better. Some things just take time and it’s so much more worth it to celebrate the little victories and enjoy the progress. Have a good week everyone.
