Pictures are Fixed!

Several months back, I changed this blog over to a new email address. In doing so, I ended up losing all the pictures on the blog; I deleted them off the old account, but saved the pictures on my computer's hard drive to eventually re upload. Well, that day has finally arrived: all pictures are back! This is true for Fitness Reviews as well!

30 Day Shred

Yes, it's been awhile since I updated this blog. I have graduated school and had a busy summer/beginning of autumn. I have been moderately active, having discovered that pilates does not make my glucose level drop (while even mild yoga does).

But that really wasn't enough. I had a bit of an epiphany about a month ago: working out may not be inherently fun, but it will let your body actually do more crazy things (like climb monkey bars without your arms screaming at you). So I have decided to slowly up the exercise in my life and make a real effort to get into better shape. Sure, I fully expect the going to be tough thanks to my diabetes, but in the long run this will be totally worth it, making me healthier and happier (in theory).

To that end, I purchased Jillian Michaels 30 Day Shred dvd. I read a couple of really promising reviews, so this sounded like the dvd for me. Starting today, I was going to use it every day to jump start my new outlook on life.

Before I go any further, let me say that the day after Halloween is the worst day you can choose to try being healthier. There's a lot of junk food around and I know full well that I don't have the best will power.

But junk food aside, I actually did try this workout today. Before going any further, I will admit that I am in terrible shape, so anything this intense is going to help me. I was okay when it came to the ab section (thank you, pilates!) but I was dying, most especially in the strength section. I know full well that I'm not a fan of strength training, but I'm trying to keep my epiphany in mind while tackling it.

When I finished, sure, my arms and legs felt like jelly. I did stop part way through to check my glucose, so I didn't actually work out quite as intensely as I was supposed to (but like I said, I'm in terrible shape!) But I felt absolutely awful. I had a foul mood at the end of it, which came as quite a shock - working out is supposed to make you feel good (and it normally does). It's possible that this will pass in a week or so once I'm more used to the exercises (and exerting myself like that), but I'm really not sure what happened here.

On the plus side though, my glucose level didn't come crashing down, so that was encouraging.

Then while I was getting ready to write this post, I stumbled on this review. Apparently people are getting hurt by the 30 Day Shred. So now I may have to rethink my plan. At the very least I may have to come up with a better warm up to help protect myself (better safe than sorry, right?)

Either way, I was planning on giving my body a rest tomorrow (even though I'm supposed to be doing this dvd daily); I think I'll opt for a walk instead. I'm also going to look through all my other fitness dvd's and see what other options I have. And maybe one of them won't leave me in such a foul mood at the end of the workout.