Wednesday, February 16, 2011

Jillian Michaels - Kicking my "you know what" in 20 minute increments

Most of you know that I have been overweight ever since college, and that it is this huge life hindrance that I've been trying to overcome. I'm currently doing Weight Watchers from home using their eTools, and have had some early success.

I've also discovered that watching people achieve dramatic weight loss on television has the effect of getting me to be motivated in my weight loss. Randomly one night, we started watching The Biggest Loser and we're totally hooked! Then, completely randomly, I saw an ad for a Jillian Michaels workout DVD. I walked over to Wal-Mart (yes, I live a block from a Wal-Mart, but we never go b/c we're a little elitist when it comes to shopping), and they had one of her DVDs, the 30-Day Shred. I bought that, plus some 3 lb weights, and put the DVD in that night.

I LOVE her workouts! They remind me of the short period of time I worked with a trainer, very similar moves and similar level of intensity. The video is only about 28 minutes, of which 20 minutes are high intensity. 7 workouts in, I'm already seeing substantial improvement in my strength, endurance, and muscle tone, and have official graduated from Level 1 to Level 2 (If I do Level 3 as well as I can do Level 1 now in 5 weeks, I will have exceeded my expectations). My goal is to finish 30 workouts in 7-8 weeks, and then move on to the "6 week Six Pack," another Jillian DVD. But I will say, they are effective and efficient workouts, and I see Jillian in a completely different way now on the TV show!

I originally planned to minimize my workouts while I lose my first quarter of weight loss, but I have to say, I'm glad I found something that I can do from home that is as efficient as this, and I am enjoying the challenge so far. The soreness is not fun, but feeling strong is :-)

Update 2/23: I just finished my 11th workout, after 3 days off the video. It was an odd mixture of easy and hard, but I am happy to be more than 1/3 done!

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