Set Backs

"If people are trying to bring you down, it only means that YOU are above them." -Anonymous.

Over the last year, my fitness level has suffered and there are several reasons for this. 1) I allowed someone who put me down, make me believe in the 'no you can't, no you don't, your're not worth it' mentality that he was feeding me; and 2) I suffered some medical set backs as well. 

You have to surround yourself with people that lift you up and support you in what you do! Even your fitness goals! I've always had that! And I've taken it somewhat for granted, until I had just the opposite. Lesson is, if there's someone in your life holding you back or telling you that you aren't who you know in your heart that you are, let them go! You will better off for it. 

I also had set backs with my physical strength. I suffered somewhat of a medical anomoly when I contracted a severe infection deep inside a muscle. I was laid up in the hospital off and on for over a month. I couldn't walk, sit up, or bare to even lay down without a pretty good dose of pain medicine. I was given 8 different iv antibiotics and a heavy concoction of oral medications. I thought I might never walk normally again, and doctors had advised me if that risk. But I slowly improved!

After getting rid of a pretty bad influence in my life, and beginning to heal physically (and emotionally), I've re-dedicated my self to some fairly simple fitness goals. 

I'm running again, working out again, doing regular circuits (see some of my other posts), and eating right.

I hope to be able to run a complete 5k just two short weeks from now. I've always hated running, which you know if you've followed this blog. So it's a particularly significant challenge for me both mentally and physically. I feel like I need to prove to myself that I can do this, and I can set some higher goals. I need to know my legs and mind can carry me anywhere I want to go. 

I challenge you, to also set a plan in motion to conquer whatever has been setting you back! :)

Being an All Star, My Personal Story

The Work is Worth it.- National Cheerleading Association

Something I don't post a lot about is my personal experience as an all star cheerleader and gymnast, the catalyst of my crazy fitness journey. 

 

I can pin point for you the exact moment I became obsessed with all star cheerleading. It was a moment that has shaped my life forever there after. I was maybe 6 years old, watching tv, and on ESPN there they were- These college all star cheerleaders from Kentucky. It was the early 90's and they were incredible. I was taking gymnastics at that time and just about the age to start on a competitive gymnastic team, which would require my mom to drive me 30 minutes away to a new gymnastics gym. She always supported whatever activity I wanted to pursue but she was not so keen on commuting me to a big competitive gym. I watched these cheerleaders and I announced to my mom that I wanted to be a cheerleader like that. I distinctly remember because she said ok, and she signed me up to be a part of a pop warner cheerleading team. I quickly realized that this was not the same kind of cheerleading. It was a friend who I met through this who showed me a video of Florida's Top Gun cheerleaders. Girls my age, on an all star team, doing the things I had seen those college cheerleaders do. We decided we needed to start an all star team then and there.

In 1993, we got a coach from pop warner to leave her job and the first all star team in Santa Cruz county was born!

 We were not very good. We didn't win any championships that year, but we did compete. And I loved it. The blinding lights, the cameras, the roar of the crowd, I was hooked. Fast forward a few years and you would find me winning national championships, being on ESPN myself, and competing on multiple teams.
 
I spent 10 years of my life deeply entrenched in that world and have since found no workout like it. I still follow the sport, and many of my fellow alumni are still cheering or owners of their own gyms. It's a world that once you enter, you never really leave. 

But all star cheerleading for one of the worlds greatest Cheergyms, has left me with injuries and limitations in my adult life that I can't deny. I've posted about how I can't run because my knee swells, but the extent my injuries is so much more than that. I have a torn rotator cuff in my shoulder, cartalige and ligament damage to my knee, nerve damage in my elbow and hips, pain in my back and hips from years of over stretching, I have generally bad ankles, and tendentious in both my feet. 

Still all of that has been worth it. I know my body, I know it can do much more than appears, and I developed true strength of heart and confidence in myself. I can say that, for the time I cheered, I was one of the best. And I credit that experience with my obsession to push my physical limits and for playing an important role in a lot of my achievements in life. As of yet, I've found nothing as challenging, but I love working out and will still tumble around a cheer gym from time to time ;) and am always down to try a new workout or class. 

 

It's so important to know yourself, own it, and to share our fitness stories. I was a cheerleader, what's your story?