s-u-c-c-e-s-s

“S-U-C-C-E-S-S! That’s the way we spell success!”

My many years of cheer leading are coming back now. But why this particular cheer? Because last week, Hanna lost 3 pounds!!! The routine I have her on is working! I couldn’t be more happy or proud.

All of the complaining, all the whining, the crying, the arguing, the “whys”, and all the other constant battles we’ve had, have been worth it.

On our last workout of the week (Saturday), I warned her that I was going to push her HARD. I let her off easy earlier in the week because she had a sunburn, so I told her we were going to push it that morning. I told her, I’m not your mother or your friend right now, I’m your trainer and my job is to push you. I’m not going to coddle you, or feel sorry for you….I’m going to make you hurt. You WILL feel uncomfortable, you WILL sweat, you WILL be out of breath, and you WILL do this the right way.

I warned her…

I was watching her sloppy form; noodle arms and hunched back. And I corrected her. The first exercise was dumbbell squat to overhead raise and she looked more like she was bending over than squatting. Her arms were loose and bent. I told her how her form looked and how it was supposed to look. I showed her again and again. She tried again and again. I said, “You will not stop until you get it right. If that takes 100 reps….so be it”. Eventually, she got it. But it took a long time and she was not happy with me. On to wall ball squats. She was barely going down low enough to be considered movement at all. “lower” I said. Still not low enough. “LOWER!” I said again. Still, pretty pathetic. “LOWER!!!” I shouted. And she squatted and fell to the floor and glared at me, tears rolling down her face.

So I got down on the floor next to her and explained to her that if she is just going to cupcake her way through these exercises, not doing what she is supposed to do, not even breaking a sweat, she might as well not do them at all. No need to waste her time OR mine. Because she is not improving anything just going through the motions. Eventually she got up and starting listening to me and putting her heart into it.

We got through the workouts. She’s managed to stick to the diet. And she has seen success.

But even now, after she has seen the loss on the scale, and she knows that she needs to keep following my instructions, she tries to weasel her way out of the routine. I just have to keep drilling it into her head, over and over, that the routine is what is working for her. If she wants to blow it off, she’s not going to keep seeing results. And that seems to be enough motivation for her.

She starts swimming next Monday and that coupled with her at home workouts and proper diet should really accelerate her weight loss. I just hope we can keep training up once school starts, even though we will be doing it separately from each other. I will keep my morning workout schedule and then train her in the evening. It's going to require a little dedication on my part as well, but her happiness is worth it.