Nat's Wrap Up.....

My story is a bit different than Mandy's.........I have been heavy ever since I got out of high school and realized that you cant survive off of fast food. My eating habits changed after I had my daughter and had gallbladder issues. Ever since then I really researched what I was eating and how it was affecting my body. I have slowly lost weight over the past 3 years and even though I had lost some weight, I still wasnt comfortable with my body and how it looked! So then me & Mandy decided to do Body Back. 

When I signed up for Body Back I expected big changes, what I got was a life change :) I realized so many things about myself during this 8 weeks.......for example I really didnt hate working out or running like I thought, I hated being out of shape and how hard that made it! Now that I am more in shape, I actually like getting out of the house and being active every day! 

I will never be able to say enough wonderful things about the Body Back program. It has completely changed me, and I love it :) Amanda described Breanne so perfectly....."She knows just when to push you to your hardest, and when to back off and just say something sweet. ". 

Ok, on with my results....

Before, After, % Change

Weight: 158, 147, 7%

Chest: 37, 35, 5% <-- And I wasnt wearing a bra.....my boobs are actually shrinking! Damn!

Waist: 31, 28.5, 8% YAY!

Hips: 43, 41, 5%

Thigh: 26, 24.5, 6%

Arm: 11.5, 11, 4%

I cant believe I am going to put my before/after pictures on here but Mandy is right, we wanted this blog to be real so here goes..........

Seriously??? My back fat situation was RIDICULOUS! 

And my last picture is one of me in a bikini.....now I may not look like a supermodel but Body Back has given me the confidence to wear it even though I haven't owned one since high school!

Thank you Body Back girls for all of your support and kind words, you will forever have a spot in my heart :) Breanne, words cannot thank you enough for what you have done for me!

Now, my weight loss journey is not over. I would like to get down to 140 before going back to school. I weighed in this morning at 146.6 (Down 0.4 from final weigh in). Not a huge loss but I'm not surprised because i did splurge a little bit this weekend.......though after looking at my before pictures, I have NO appetite! 

Thank you everyone who has supported me through this process, Mandy - I could have never done it without you! We are doing so many life changing things together right now, I dont know how we are going to survive when we get jobs in the real world, without each other........hmmm maybe we just have to get jobs together! Love you!

XOXO,

Nat

RIPPED Weigh In

Weighed in at RIPPED today.

136.6.... I am down 2 lbs since friday! WOO HOO!

Come check it out. This class is not just for mom's, anyone can come. :)

http://www.t3fitnessenergy.com/R.I.P.P.E.D.html

Body Back Final Thoughts

After 30 minutes of trying to get the formatting correct on my last post, and not being able to write anymore after the pictures, I figured I would just make a new post. Lol.

So Body Back truly was an amazing journey to go on. I learned so much about myself and my capabilities. I had no idea that I could actually lose weight if I put my mind to it. I have become such a stronger person and I am so happy with the changes I see in my body.

When I started Body Back I heard a lot of people say, "why do you need to do that, you are already skinny." Well now I am exposed in my before and after pictures... I really wasn't skinny. I was 20lbs heavier than after I gave birth to Aaron. I don't know what happened in those three years but I really was not proud of how I let my body go.

Every time I have tried to lose weight or workout, I would give up after a week or sooner. Body back proved to me that I have it in me to focus my mind and lose the weight, while changing eating habits. I really believe that I have made permanent changes in my family, as far as food... and that means more than losing any weight.

Spending these last 8 weeks with my sister has grown our relationship in a different way. We always push each other, but to push each other and see such incredible results is so amazing. I love that I have her in my life.

Every single one of those women in body back and changed my life. I will take something from every one of them, and I am so grateful that I met them. I hope we can keep in touch, and maybe I will see some of you at RIPPED.

Breanne, has been an incredible instructor. Better than I could have ever asked. She knows just when to push you to your hardest, and when to back off and just say something sweet. She is probably one of the nicest (sometimes psychotic when it comes to working out) people I have ever met. I would not be where I am at right now if it wasn't for her. I am thankful that I met her and I am positive that this session won't be the last time she will push me to the point of throwing up.

The last 8 weeks have been such a roller coaster. We have cried, almost thrown up, laughed, sweated (is that a word?) and encouraged each other... what better way to spend my summer??

Thank you to everyone who has supported me, including my amazing husband and son. I am thankful for everyone in my life. I could not be happier.

The journey does not stop here. I will be doing RIPPED twice a week and stroller strides twice a week until school starts. I want to try to lost at least 5 more lbs before going back. Natalie and I will be weighing in every week, as well as taking pictures and measurements at the end of these next 5 weeks.

Alright, I think I need to be done before I start balling!!! :)

Here are a couple more pics from Body Back!!

Our sweaty hand prints from doing push ups after sprinting up mt. rubidoux

Such a beautiful way to start the morning.

After one of our last chance workouts.

Amanda's Final Assessments

Last Friday was our final assessment day. This is the day that it all came down to. Final weigh in, and final measurements, and final chance to see how far we have come with our workouts!

I woke up in the morning feeling fat. I ate out the night before because my husband's family was leaving for Haiti on missions trip with our church, and I am pretty sure the

excess sodium was stuck to my butt. I got ready and put on my clothes. I had cheer shorts on from when I was in high school

and a pink sports bra (funny thing about the sports bra, when we took our before pictures, I didn't have on a sports bra... so when you see how many inches I lost in my boobs, yea thats not accurate, because if I lost that many inches, I am pretty sure I would have holes.)

I looked in the mirror and thought to myself, ok what can I do to make this the best picture ever... lol ya I did it, I did like 10 sit ups. Crazy I know.... even when I was doing them, I was laughing at myself. I thought I

could tighten up those muscles so maybe I would have like a 2 pack, sitting on a tire of course.

It gets crazier, THEN I thought... hmm when is the last time I went to the bathroom (number 2) Maybe that will drop another .4 lbs. (I am weird about even .2 lbs). No luck there.

THEN.... I didn't eat breakfast (that would add the .4 lbs back on that I didn't lose from taking a crap). I also knew we wouldn't be doing any crazy workouts so I figured I would be fine.

So I got to the studio and weighed in.

138.4 - :( I was up 1.2 lbs. Maybe all my craziness made my body say, ummmm no your not gunna try to lose weight in the 30 minutes before weighing in.... so there, that will teach ya a lession! I think it also may be because my Aunt that visited a few weeks ago, was supposed to be coming again. :(

Total weight loss: 10.2 lbs. I am so proud of myself for losing that weight. I never thought this was possible, and now I know that it is. :)

Here are my before and after measurements... again disregard the chest measurement.

Chest 35.5 32.5 8%

Waist 29 28 3%

Hips 41.5 40.5 2%

Thigh 24.5 23.5 4%

Arm 11 10.5 5%

And here is my workout assessment:

Jump Rope 0:20 1:15 73%

Bicep Curls 22 40 45%

Plank 0:49 1:31 46%

Push Ups 8 28 71%

Sit Ups 16 23 30%

Squats 31 49 37%

Side Bridge 0:32 1:22 61%

My overall percentage of change was 394% YAY!!!!!

Now, I AM going to post my before and after pictures, but let me tell you... I had NO idea that I looked the way I looked on my before pics, seriously if I knew my back looked like that I would have laid off the oreo's for sure. I am so happy with my after results, but DANG.... I am embarrased even looking at before pictures! Oh well, I told myself I would be honest with this blog so here goes:

The final workout...

So this morning was our final workout of the Body Back program! Those of you who know me probably know that I have been DREADING it for as long as I have known about it! We were running up Mt. Rubidoux.....I hate running, so I was not looking forward to this!

My morning was a mess! My alarm clock went off and I apparently slept through it for 20 minutes because by the time I realized it was going off it was 5:05 and I needed to be there at 5:15! So I got dressed and ran out the door....I didnt even get a chance to eat breakfast (I know Breanne would kick me if she could right now), but I made it.

Then came the torture. We went up the steep way, and it felt VERY steep. Every time we were running I felt like my legs weighed a million pounds. I pushed through the pain and kept going until it got so bad that I felt like I had to stop. I slowed to a walk and heard Breanne behind me "DO NOT STOP RUNNING, PICK IT UP".....now she is normally a very sweet person, but when she yells at you during workouts she seems a tad possessed, so I ran again the rest of the way :) I remember Mandy telling Breanne she kinda wanted to punch her a little bit! There is something so intense about pushing your body to the limit and having someone push it even further.

We were all SO happy and proud of ourselves when we got to the top. We talked about what Body Back meant to us and we all pretty much cried like a bunch of sissy lala's. Tomorrow is assessment day and I'm so excited to see my results, but sad to see Body Back end! It's very bitter sweet.  We will update everyone tomorrow when we get our results :)

XOXO,

Nat

What Rhythm???

Okay so today starts week 8! Here are the weigh in results for the week....

Nat: 149.0 (Down 9 pounds)
Mandy: 137.2 (Down 11.6 pounds)

We are doing SOOO good! Im so proud of how much weight we have lost and better than that we have gotten so much stronger!!!

So this morning was quite an adventure! Breanne told us we were going to be having a "special workout" this morning. I figured it would be some torturous running class but it wasnt....it was Zumba! She had one of her Zumba instructors come in early and teach us! I was so excited because I had heard of it several times and wanted to try it! Then the music started and I realized that the salsa portion of my brain is extremely underdeveloped.

Me & Mandy kept talking about where our rhythm went! Back in our high school days we used to go to the club and get down & dirty......and we looked good doing it! So why did we suck at Zumba? Im convinced it is because we are not used to the salsa music. I KNOW we still have rhythm because every time it came to the "hump the air" move or the "hip rolls" we were having no trouble at all! I dont know how good we looked doing it but we felt good! So even though we both looked like we had no clue what we were doing, it was a lot of fun! Its a very high energy class with constant moving around! The instructor had some serious salsa rhythm.....her ass bounced to the music perfectly! The music was SO fast and her butt was just bouncing right on the beat every time! I dont know why mine cant do that! Oh well......I would totally do it again just because it was so fun!

Going into our final week our goals of 135 (Mandy) & 145 (Nat) are looming over our heads. We both really want to meet our goals but we dont plan on stopping our weight loss journey with this week. We plan on continuing throughout the rest of the Summer and of course when we go back to school we want to make sure we focus on taking care of ourselves so that we don't gain it back! Wish us luck for our final week! Our next workout is Mt. Rubidoux on Thursday....I am SO dreading it because we apparently have to run (yes run) up it....the steep route. So who wants to help me think of a REALLY good excuse for why I cant make it :) Just kidding Breanne.....I will be there!

XOXO,

Nat

Let's get RIPPED

We had another weigh in this morning. Usually it is on Monday morning's, but because of fourth of July we changed it to today. We had to be at the studio for a RIPPED class at 5:00am. I came in a couple minutes late and the studio was packed with women already starting their warm ups.

I dropped off my stuff, and saw the dreaded scale. I debated just starting my work out and then I would weigh in later, but for some reason I feel like if I jumble everything around before weighing in I will have a higher reading. Weird I know! So I weighed in...

and I gained 0.4lbs. :( I kind of expected that this week. I could pretty much feel all week that I wasn't losing any weight. Usually I feel super skinny the first couple of days during the week and then I start feeling a little more bloated by the end of the week. I also didn't stick to the meal plan very good.

According to Breanne, week 6 is notorious for good results, so I feel motivated now to get back on the meal plan, workout hard this week and drop a couple more pounds!!

So this morning we had a RIPPED class, which is a normal class that the studio holds on Tuesday's and Thursday's. Body Back's girls joined the RIPPED girls for a great workout. RIPPED is kind of like workout routines choreographed really well to music. Each song has specific areas that we work out. It was actually a lot of fun. I feel it brought out the cheerleader in me. Learning routines and grooving to music.

At one point, we were doing some leg squats and push ups, and during the push ups the music had this hardcore bass beat to it. I sat up and asked Natalie, "Don't you feel like a bad ass right now?"

There was another "routine" where it took a lot of coordination and it was very easy to get lost. I looked over at Natalie and she has this weird smile on her face and was just hopping awkwardly in place. It was pretty hilarious.

So after a great workout today, I am ready for the week... and I am hoping for a 2lb weight loss this week!!!! :)

XoXo

Amanda