Be a Beachbody Success Story!

As many of you know, I owe the 34 pounds I have lost since the beginning of June to Beachbody's amazing fitness programs and their outstanding meal replacement shake called Shakeology. I am proud to be sharing my success as a Team Beachbody coach.

One of the best things I get to do as a Team Beachbody coach is help others make amazing changes in their health.

I’m very excited to share my upcoming Team Beachbody 30 day Weight Loss test group starting on the September10th! I’m taking the first 5 SERIOUS people who are ready to see an overall improvement in their health! If you are looking to have better digestion, curb your cravings, LOSE WEIGHT or maintain your current weight, lower your cholesterol, and GAIN ENERGY, this is for you!!!!

This is the complete package to success. You get a first class fitness plan, an exceptional meal replacement shake, meal plans, shopping lists, access to a private facebook group for motivation and accountability, as well as contests and prizes. TOGETHER we will share our stories of success!

Remember there is a strict limit of 5 participants. Message me or click LIKE for more info!

Fear and Opportunity

I love my comfort zone. It's such a cozy place. When I am there, I know everything will be OK. I have large walls in place to keep me safe. My comfort zone is filled with baggy clothes, tacos, and low expectations.

Nothing hurts me there, but nothing really great happens there either.

Great things require me to leave the safety of my comfort zone.

I left it a few years ago when I decided to go back to school. Sometimes I think that I'm nuts to juggle a house, a family, and a challenging course load. It doesn't matter though, because that hunch I've had for years was dead on. I was meant to be a nurse.

I love my new life and my new career path. I love sitting in that classroom learning all kinds of amazingly complex things about the human body. I find my clinical experiences to be pure joy. I leave the hospital after each clinical day exhausted, but with a huge smile on my face. I am where I am supposed to be.

Nursing school is amazing...and completely out of my comfort zone.

This blog is another step out of my comfort zone. I would like to say that posting my starting weight to all of you was the scariest thing ever. It wasn't. The truly scary thing is knowing that if I don't see this thing all the way through, I will basically fail in front of the entire world (or the very tiny fraction of it that actually reads my blog). I did it anyway. This blog is my accountability. I also hope that it will eventually serve as inspiration for others on the same long journey.

This blog is definitely not in my comfort zone.

I'm doing one more thing that is not in my comfort zone.

I decided to become a Team Beachbody Coach. If you have been reading this blog, then you know that I owe a good portion of my success to good nutrition and an excellent exercise program. The nutrition comes from drinking Beachbody's Shakeology every day and the exercise program is from Beachbody too. Most people are familiar with Beachbody through infomercials. p90x, Insanity, Brazil Butt Lift, and TurboFire are just a few of the awesome programs Beachbody has to offer.

This is the first time that I have followed an exercise program instead of just winging it myself. My results have been amazing!

Beachbody also has a network marketing program called Team Beachbody. I can use word of mouth advertising to share the offerings of the company that is literally changing my life and be paid for my efforts. I am on a team of hundreds of Independent Team Beachbody coaches that support and encourage each other. There are many people on the team making over $1000 a week!

That's why I am leaving my comfort zone and once again try something new. You see, we also have a family goal to have my husband leave his job as a tugboat captain and be able to go to nursing school instead. To achieve that goal we need to save about $50,000. Yes, you read that correctly $50,000.

As a independent Team Beachbody Coach, I can achieve our financial goals while achieving my weight loss goals. My success story is my own ongoing personal testimonial to the quality of Beachbody offerings. My role as an Coach is to inspire and encourage others to achieve their own goals.

One of the best things that Team Beachbody Coaches do for others is host challenge
groups.

Challenge groups are small groups of people committed to improving their health through fitness and excellent nutrition. I am very excited to be preparing to host my first challenge group! This is a results oriented group with lots of personal attention, so there will be a strict limit of five participants. I will be posting details and accepting participants starting on Saturday so check back soon!

If you would like information on Beachbody products, the Team Beachbody income opportunity, or would like me send info on the challenge group to your inbox, please leave a comment or email me at kimgetsfit@gmail.com.

Epic Fail

I promised myself when I started this blog that I would chronicle everything. The good and the bad. Well today is bad. I'm hungry. Not that little pang in the stomach hungry. I'm talking about the kind of hunger that is constant no matter what you eat and consumes your thoughts.

The worst part about the hunger is that I caused it. It's all my fault. You see, when you feed your body deeply nutritious foods on a regular basis, you really shouldn't be hungry when you are losing weight. That has been my experience so far. I listen to my body, eat nutritious things, and exercise. No hunger.

Yesterday I made a series of very bad choices.

Yesterday was a big family outing. I took the kids to an amusement park with my cousin and her son. The park was a few hours away and the day was very long. I started out making good choices. I woke up early enough to take a nice long walk and to drink my Shakeology before leaving. I even made a plan to stop at Wendy's before entering the park to have my favorite salad for lunch.

That's when the good choices stopped. I didn't pack snacks. Not even one. We were running late and I wanted to get on the road. I made a quick trip through the drive through at Dunkin Donuts for the kids' breakfast and we were off.

The kids fell asleep in the car so we didn't make any stops. I ate a small package of "emergency almonds" that I keep in the car but by the time we got to Wendy's two and a half hours later I was pretty hungry.

I ate my salad as planned and I was pretty happy with myself.

Did you know that healthy foods are pretty scarce in the average amusement park?

Well they are. I somehow got it in my head that it was better to not eat than to eat junk. I let myself get hungrier and hungrier. At one point, I ate half of a soft pretzel. BAD choice. Pure empty calories that are 100% fast carbs. I went from low blood sugar to rollercoaster blood sugar. Fast carbs on an empty stomach is a big no-no for weight loss. There were no healthy dinner choices in the park so I decided to wait until we left to eat. Other than a few bites fried dough, I had nothing else all day.

I was starving by the time we stopped for dinner at 8:30. Really starving. I had a chicken salad and some grapes. I thought all was well again.

I COULD NOT HAVE BEEN MORE WRONG!

You see, our hunger mechanism is designed to keep us alive in times of famine. Basically any time you are hungry and you ignore the hunger and don't feed your body, your body freaks out and thinks you might die.

That's what my body thinks right now. You see, my body cannot comprehend any reason why I would walk past tons of food while I was hungry. It can only assume that no food was available all day. I had a one day mini-famine.

Since my body does not want to die, it's going to make darn sure I eat every calorie I can find today.

ENTER HUNGER AND CRAVINGS...

Today I am hungry moments after eating. It's a ever present hunger that has me constantly thinking of food. I also have cravings. Chocolate, fast food, fried rice. I'm craving all those things at the same time right now. It's not my body's fault. I made the choice not to eat. My body just wants to avoid starvation.

I should have eaten something in the park. A wrap, a burger. Anything is better than starvation. When your body perceives starvation, hunger and cravings kick in and your body drops your metabolism like a rock.

So basically you want to eat constantly and you burn nothing. Sounds like a recipe for diet failure, right. That's what most people do on a diet. Kind of scary to think about. What happens when your metabolism is in the basement and you start to EAT again? You store fat. Lots of fat. Nice protective fat to insulate your from another famine.

Today, I am paying the price for yesterday's epic fail.

I have a choice to make. I can try my hardest to repair the damage or I can give in to the cravings and pig out on junk.

I choose the hard road. I am going to fix this. I am going to forget about weight loss for the day and forget about calories. I will need to eat very frequently. I will avoid junk and eat salads, veggies, meats, beans, and nuts. Lots of high nutrient, high protein foods with slowly absorbed carbs. I will probably have a second serving of Shakeology to give me an extra dose of intense nutrition. I need to even out my insulin production an show my body that food is available.

Instead of 3 small meals and 2 snacks, I will eat a series of small snacks every hour or so as well as my three small meals. Tonight I will do my usual workout. Tomorrow it will be business as usual.

Next time I will pack snacks and make a plan. I never want to do this to myself again.

And The Winner Is...

Liz!!!!

Liz please send me your address and let me know whether you would prefer Chocolate or Greenberry flavor. Thanks to everyone who left comments on the blog or on my facebook post!

Random Things...and a Contest!

So today's post is just a few random things grouped together that really don't relate at all.

I cracked my back today! Don't worry. I'm not talking about some major injury that may leave me paralyzed. I'm talking about that thing you do when your spine feels all tight so you twist around and feel a good pop or two and end up feeling all relaxed. Yeah, that one. Well I haven't been able to do that in about a year. The bigger I got, the harder it was to stretch and twist. The less I stretched, the more tight I got. Right before I started my fitness plan I was so tight that my upper back would actually crack when I sneezed! I've gained a lot of flexibility by working out and that coupled with my weight loss means I can finally twist and stretch my back again. Hooray for small victories!!!

Second, nursing school is starting back up in less than three weeks. That's just nineteen short days before I have to rebalance my priorities and juggle being a wife, mom, and student with my fitness goals. I am currently working on a menu "template" so that I can rotate between a selection of dinners that work for me that I can prepare in advance and serve quickly. I am using the Team Beachbody Club meal plans as base and then tweaking them a bit to match the needs of my family. In the next few weeks, I'll be posting several of the recipes.

Finally, I'm looking for ideas for healthy snacks that are easy to pack and bring with me to class and to the hospital. I have a few standbys that I carry with me now, but it's always good to have new ideas.

So that brings me to the contest! I never really win anything, but I love entering contests. I especially love entering contests on blogs. In the spirit of upping the odds dramatically for you, I decided to host my first contest now....when the blog is brand new and hardly anyone is reading this thing. So basically, your odds of winning are down right fantastic. The prize is a sample of Shakeology. It's my secret weapon I've been using every day as a nutrient dense meal replacement for breakfast. You will get to choose your flavor: Chocolate or Greenberry.

All you have to do to enter is share your favorite on the go healthy snack in the comments.

I'm Celebrating!

Today is a big day!!!! I am officially down to 230. That's a loss of 31.2 pounds. That's 25% of the way there. Only ninety more pounds to go!

Why celebrate 25%?

One hundred twenty one pounds is a BIG goal. Frankly, it's too big to really think about. If I didn't break it down into more reasonable chunks then I would get too discouraged by the long road ahead and just give up. I chose to break the goal down in reasonable chunks instead.

I started my fitness plan on June 6th. My first goal was to lose the first 31.2 pounds by the time I go back to school on August 27th.

I finished that goal THREE WEEKS EARLY!!!

I like the idea of using the fall semester as my next block of time to complete my goal, so I'm going to set a smaller goal to get me through to the start of school. I would like to lose six more pounds by the time school starts on the 27th.

So that's my goal...now here is what I am celebrating.

• I'm down two sizes.
• I had to buy new scrubs for school because the old ones fell down when I tried them on.
• I have MUSCLES now, even if you can't see them really well when you look at me yet, I feel STRONG!!!
• My blood pressure has dropped from 152/90 to 128/82.
• I have ENERGY!!!! I can stay up until 11 and then wake up first think in the morning ready to sweat!!!
• My daughter told me she loves to give me hugs now because her arms wrap all the way around!!!


I am just loving today!!!

So What Is Shakeology???

Here is a great video about Shakeology!  Feel free to message me or leave a comment if you have any questions.  If you are interested in ordering Shakeology you can click the Shakeology button on the right or message me to learn how get a discount!

My Story

This is me before I started my fitness plan.

My kids snapped this picture of me one night at a restaurant.  I was too tired to cook.  Can you see how miserable I look?  I was that tired every night.  I'm a mom and a nursing student.  I thought I was too busy to do anything about my health.

When my classes ended this spring, we took the kids to Orlando.  I was miserable on that vacation. It was six solid days of walking through theme parks. I was so out of shape that the walking completely wore me out. I had massive blisters on my feet and I lived on Advil to sooth the soreness in my feet and legs. I was very happy to go home.

 The fatigue was no surprise. I am a nursing student. Spending all day on my feet during clinical practice just wears me out. I once took my son to the movies after a day at the hospital and fell asleep during the opening credits and woke up for the ending ones. I was always tired. I can't tell you how many times this year I went to bed before my kids because I could not keep my eyes open past 7:30. Seriously, I couldn't make it to 8pm.

 In nursing school I learned all about heart disease and diabetes. Those lectures scared me to death. I was on the fast track to high blood pressure (OK, I was already there), type 2 diabetes, and an early death.

 I came back from Florida and announced that I needed to lose weight. I climbed on my scale and nearly fainted. I weighed 261.2 pounds. Ouch. That was way more than I thought. I realized at that moment that I needed to lose 121.2 pounds. That's a LOT of weight. A lot.

 I decided to watch my eating and begin exercising. Initially, I started to walk 2 miles a day and eat less. I told a neighbor that I was trying to lose weight and she insisted that I join her for a workout. She was doing this program that she bought over the internet and she thought it would be perfect for me.

 She was right. I was challenged by the workout, but I could make it through. The instructor was very motivating. The instructor's name was Chalene Johnson and the program was called Chalean Extreme. I rushed right home and called my husband and told him that I needed to order it right away.

 Chalean Extreme is one of those programs from BeachBody, the people who make P90X and Insanity. The program came just a few days and I jumped right in. Chalene's motto for the program is "Muscle Burns Fat". Boy is that true! You lift weights (or use the included resistance tubing) three days a week. I started feeling a difference in my muscles almost right away. My metabolism started to rev up and the scale started to show results faster!

 When I ordered my program, it came with a sample of something called Shakeology. Shakeology is a meal replacement/nutrition shake. I watched a video about it and it looked pretty amazing. It claimed it could help you lose weight and curb cravings. I thought about all the times I starved while trying Slimfast and thought "yeah, right". But it was free so I tried it....and it was really good. It tastes a lot like a McDonald's chocolate shake (which I happen to love). I still didn't believe that it could help me lose weight or curb cravings, but I liked the idea of a yummy chocolate shake for breakfast, so I asked Ken if I could order a month's supply.

 Shakeology costs more than something like Slimfast and I wasn't sure he'd go for it. He asked me a few really good questions. 1) Do I really think that it will help me reach my goals....yes. 2) Will I substitute Shakeology for my morning trip to Tim Hortins or Dunkin Donuts......yes. 3) Can I return it if it doesn't work...yes, there is a 30 day bottom of the bag guarantee. Then my very smart husband said that we wouldn't really be spending any extra and I should go for it.

 He also said that his roommate from college posted that he is some kind of Beachbody coach. Ken asked me to contact him and ask him if there was any way to get a discount. Kevin, the roommate, explained that I could buy Shakeology as a customer or as a coach. Coaches get a 25% discount.

 I explained that I was far from a fitness instructor. Very far. He explained that Beachbody coaches are just people who love Beachbody products and share them with others. Coaches provide moral support to others and they make a commission on any orders their friends place. He said Beachbody has a network marketing program because word of mouth is an extremely effective way to spread the word about their products.

 I liked the idea of a 25% discount so I signed up to be a coach and placed my Shakeology order.

 I just have to tell you that Shakeology is AMAZING! I have lost 29 pounds in 8 weeks!!! More amazing is that the craving thing is true. I don't have cravings anymore. Not for chocolate, not for chips, or fast food. I used to be a slave to my cravings. I couldn't buy a bag of chocolate chips unless I baked the cookies that day...I would eat the chips straight from the bag.

 Shakeology is a nutrient dense shake made from over 70 superfoods and no chemicals. It is intense nutrition. My skin is smoother and so healthy looking and I have so much energy!

 I know that if I still had those cravings I wouldn't be losing weight right now. I usually can't make it more than a week or so on a diet. The craving and hunger kill me. That's not the case now. I drink Shakeology, eat a sensible diet that is lower in carbs, and work out daily. Shakelogy and Chalean Extreme are my two new best friends!!!!

 I love what I am doing and I want to share Beachbody with the world! If you are interested in Shakeology or a Beachbody fitness program leave me a comment or contact me on facebook. There are several ways to save money. I can help you with finding what works best for you!!!

 Oh, by the way, this is me today. I still have a lot to lose, but I'm on my way!!