Awaken The Athlete Intro

Welcome to my newest blog series, I'm inspired to write it and hoping it inspires you in some way.

There's 2 main reasons I wanted to share this.  One is that being a trainer I get to see first hand all the various fitness blockages people go through with things in life or whatever it may be.  I know that many of you can relate, even if your story details differ.  The overall idea of finding strength is a common thread among us.  The other reason is to show you that you may be short changing yourself and capable of more than you give yourself credit for.  In pushing my clients and myself I have seen many people think those who achieve certain goals have some special magic or genetics when in fact most people who think those goals are unreachable CAN also achieve these or similar goals .  I love it when a client says, 'I did not think I could do that, wow'.  That is why I do what I do!

My history is one of a girl who always wanted to do active things but usually could not or had to quit because of some health issues. 

My environment was not healthy, lots of extreme borderline behaviors around me plus stresses that are damaging to all areas of health especially in a child.  That became a lifelong exposure as it was family related.

Age 3 I started with chronic pneumonias but since Chronic Bronchial Asthma and 'allergy related asthmas' were still highly unknown, I went misdiagnosed until age 6.   My teeth rotted from the medications, and I spent months out of school either at home or in the hospital for most of my childhood even after I was diagnosed.

From age 6 to about 23 the drugs were all either band aids or experimental.  The theophylline destroyed my stomach, and I was regularly on prednisone.  I used my rescue inhaler Ventolin on avg 26 times per day.  This drug makes your heart work twice as hard as normal.  The prednisone is a catabolic steroid which destroys bone density and can be dangerous taken long term.  Your immune system lets the drug do the job and lowers itself until you get off it and immunity slowly restores.

I wanted to dance and join in on sports day and be able to race friends running down the block, but I paid dearly if I tried, losing breath to dangerous levels.

In my mid teens I had horrible weight gains from the prednisone and constant stomach discomforts from the theophylline.  This lead me into the world of vegetarianism, eating disorders and dieting.

The vegetarianism was an excellent area to learn and experience.  I never stopped since.

The dieting started with Dr. Scarsdale vegetarian diet or ideas from weight watchers but I had no idea what I was doing.  Of course this trial and error is what taught me over my lifetime but as a teen exposed to the trend of anorexia paired with my idea of feeling fat with no success in my first few attempts dieting, it was easy to lean toward starvation type dieting.  I never got into the purging trend.  I had enough trouble keeping food down with the stomach issues from the asthma drugs so purging came on its own!  It may have helped if someone told me the drug caused weight gain, water retention and so forth.

At 17 my father died, anorexia, starvation took over.  I had no appetite, nausea at the thought of food, so I didn't eat.  I think over the first few months after his death, a friend was taking me for a small order of fries each day to get something down.  My dad was my only ally in this lifetime and he was gone.

9 months later I had gone from 140lbs to 97lbs and puking blood.

By this point my stomach would never be the same and years later I would finally be diagnosed with IBS.

I lost the weight alright but was not happy with the left over, my body looked no better skinny!  My recovery began and over the next 2 years I not only learned the fit direction I learned what I was going to do for the rest of my life!  Eating regularly was the only way.  That in itself saved my life.

Check back tomorrow and daily over the next few weeks as I post more about where I am at with each days exercise and nutrition, sharing some great information, ideas and motivation! 

I will share with you how I was again triggered through loss and death, going from fittest ever to maybe the worse shape ever, and now recovering, this time from a longer run of starvation.  Working my way back and to a better version of my previous best! 

Watch me transform over the next 3 months, transform along with me!