Well said, Shaun-T, well said.
This week I did some bad planning with the grocery list. I’m trying to find the right balance of cost efficiency, whole organic foods and limiting snack foods that lead to over-eating. I under-estimated the snack food side of the equation and subsequently, by Wednesday we were down to plain yogurt, Shakeology, meat, eggs and veggies. Not a lot of selection there, though probably great if you were on Atkin’s in induction phase (and homicidal, most likely). Anyway, the need for carbs caught up to me last night and due to lack of availability of quality guilt-free carbs… that blank was filled in with Pop Tarts and carrot cake. And the carrot cake wasn’t really even that good but I ate the whole damn thing because, well, you know. It’s cake.
Anyway to insure lack of stickage to my hips and tummy, I have a little ritual. When I eat uncleanly, I beat the crap out of those calories the next day and kick them the hell out of my body through some back-breaking come to Jesus cardio. I’m not kidding, there have been workouts in the past like these where afterwards I feel like I am drifting in and out of my body and seeing heavenly planes. And to think how much money people waste on crystal meth and ecstasy when all they had to do was try some HIIT.
If you aren’t familiar with HIIT, HIIT stands for High Intensity Interval Training. Basically, you do short intervals – say 30 to 60 seconds – where you work your body as hard as you possibly can whether it’s with heismans, jumping jacks, high knees, sprints or a combination of exercises followed by a small period of rest where your body burns a ton of calories trying to catch up on oxygen. If you want to know about EPOC (excess post-exercise oxygen consumption) check out this wikipedia entry: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Excess_post-exercise_oxygen_consumption
Anyway, today’s attempt at damage control workout choices were Turbo Fire’s Greatest HIIT’s and Insanity’s Pure Cardio. Greatest HIIT’s weren’t so bad. Turbo Fire is generally fun for me period plus the music makes it more survivable and Chalene pretty much knows just what to say and when to say it to keep me happily pushing through. And any woman who tops off a workout telling me to go shoe shopping well, bless her bouncy little blonde heart.
Insanity. Ugh. Shaun-T, your kind of a jerk. It really doesn’t help that A. You keep telling people to take breaks. B. The screen keeps flashing “Know your Limits!” and C. There is Tanya making her “O-face” through entire workout. What is UP with that girl!? Seriously, you could take her out of Insanity and plop her in a porno and she’d probably stay in context to either just doing what she does. It’s her facial expressions and lamaze/orgasm breathing coupled with the fact that all she says throughout is “wooo! yeah!” I tell, you, Saving Ryan’s Privates Part 2 has their leading female role.
Anyway, by the time I was done, I was trashed. I am still trashed. In fact, typing is about all I can do right now and I’m not even sure what I’m talking about anymore because looking for a picture of Tanya was distracting and now I’m thinking about tanning. Oh yeah… I was thinking about something while I was downstairs going through the last Insanity stretch trying to distract myself from wanting to punch Tanya in the face.
There are all these websites… BabyFit, BabyCenter… some others that crowd my Facebook newsfeed that are giving some really horrible messages to mothers. This is the message:
If you’ve had children, this is the best you can hope your abs will ever look:
This is horrifying to me. Women have to do something that requires such incredible strength and power: carry and birth a human. You can do P90X until the cows come home but deliver a child? That takes a warrior’s kind of power. So who the hell are these people to tell women that they don’t have any power over their bodies? As soon as you get that thought in your head, you get stuck there and you know what ladies? It’s bull shit.
I had a baby. Afterward I had abdominal surgery and have all kinds of scars on my tummy and you know what? This is my tummy. Sorry about the crummy cell shot but… well, I gotta work with what I got while the little monster sleeps!
I still have a little loose skin below my belly button and yup, have stretch marks all around my lower abs but I earned those. I’m a tiger who earned her fucking stripes. Giving birth requires power so I’ll wear my loose skin like a medal. But don’t let ANY stupid website tell you that you can’t shape up your postpartum tummy. That’s crap. You can do and be whatever the heck you put your mind to. You’re an Amazon warrior woman and you eat website authors like that for breakfast. UMCHAKA!!!!!!
Momma on Fire! 