One month since self employment, challenges, and life in general.

So it's been just over a month since I packed in the old 7:30-6 and became a full time personal trainer and I have to say I think it is the best idea I've ever had. I am more focused now, than I have been for a very long time. I have more energy, more spring in my step.  I am smiling more than ever and I am happier than I have ever been. It is amazing what giving up your job that you loathe can do for you.

I currently have a mix of PT and Pole clients and all of them are at different points in their progress, which keeps me on my toes to make their workouts as fun and as interesting as possible.  The last I thing I want is for their hour with me to become samey. So I'm continuously researching ways to keep things interesting and it keeps it interesting for me too.  I tend to try all new exercises out on myself first, so I can really feel what's working where, which in turn helps me to explain it better to my clients. It's a win win really.  I am also very blessed that my clients are enjoying it, and keep coming back. They work hard and they make me very proud indeed.  Suffice to say, this is the best move I ever did and I love my job so much that it's really not work any more.  There is no, 'oh god I need to do this that and the other', it's more 'ooh right, that could be interesting, let's give that a try'.  Everything is brighter and generally more positive.

My eating patterns have been a little squiffy of late, and I have fantastic sweet tooth cravings again but I think this is due to the increase in my own training.  I am now able to train three times a week on pole techniques etc so my strength gains there should improve no end as well as regaining my confidence with tricks and inverts. I have also fallen back in love with running, probably helped by the fantastic weather we've had the last two weeks.  On top of that I'm doing some strength training (either at the gym or at home) three times a week and I've also added in 20 mins of flexibility every day while doing vocal exercises which is something I had been meaning to do but could never justify the time with the pressure of the day job. It is amazing the sense of freedom I now feel.

So with the running comes the challenge that is in the title of this 'ere blog.  My bestie decided that, with all this running I'm now doing, he would throw down the gauntlet and challenge me to join him in the Nottingham Half Marathon in September. 

After talking to my physio and being further along the rebuilding road from injury than I thought I was, the physio has said there is no reason (unless my knee says otherwise during the training) that I can't do the half marathon in 22 weeks time.  He also, after we initially thought June was too soon to attempt a 10km, has cleared me to do 10km at the start of July, again on the proviso that if my knee plays up I cease and drop back to where I was comfortable with my training and slow the increase in distance down.  The important thing that I needed to hear was when he commented, 'You are a fitness professional and you know your body better than anyone else, I trust your judgement to be sensible.' A timely reminder that I can't push it too hard and that we all need to listen to our bodies as they will always tell us when something's amiss.  He's a top fella.  And it's true, if I push my knee too fast too soon and the IT band irritation kicks in, I can't work.  I won't be able to demonstrate exercises, it will take at least 4 weeks for my knee to get back to full functionality so that I can demonstrate squats etc and at the moment the last thing I need is to not be able to work. So I'm being very sensible and I've managed to increase my distance to 4.35km without incident. *touches all available items made from wood*.  I am getting my own back on the best bud, and he has to join me in a obstacle course race. I'm thinking it might be too mean to get him to do the Spartan Beast (a half marathon with obstacles) but should he wish to embrace the challenge he's welcome to join me.... *throws down my own gauntlet*.  I will be running the Nottingham Half for Breast Cancer Campaign in honour of my cousin Mads who is doing well from her fight against breast cancer.   And as usual I'll be running the Race for Life in July (this is my 10km race, possibly with CJ again or if she's unable to make the same race she'll be running the Cardiff 10km RFL) and I'll be posting the links to the sponsor pages soon.


As for life in general, all is good.  I love my new career and have had a great session with one of my new clients this morning.  She's done exceptionally well and was happy to give everything a try once.  I absolutely am in love with life at the moment.  I have some pole niggles I need to work out, still having issues with my confidence in my inverts that I really need to punch through and get to grips with (pun intended).  But otherwise, I am having a ball.  Next step is to start the bootcamp training sessions up in my local area, although I have since discovered that the seafront is awash with people doing bootcamps, so forest based bootcamps for my clients it shall be, should be fun either way.  And hopefully I'll be doing some cover of classes for my local leisure centers.

As always, be kind to yourself, you rock!

Krissie
xx

Following your dream......

So today I resigned from my 9-5 desk job (or, as it has been recently, 7:30 - 6).  This is a huge step, this a definite leap into the unknown. But it's been something that I know I've been heading towards for the best part of two years.

When I started this blog I was already getting questions from people on Facebook, about how I had lost the weight and what I recommended. That gave me the inital idea for No More Mrs Fatty McFat; a hope that by documenting my weightloss and the pitfalls, highs, the education I gained etc that there would be information enough for someone to find and say 'That's what I needed to hear, that's the same as what I tried' etc.  I realised through answering some of the emails and comments that I got through, that there was a plethora of people (not just women) that wanted someone who understood what they were going through to help give them some solid advice. Most had said that when they have joined a gym, some lythe young adult not long from Sports Science degree at Uni was asigned as their inductor at the gym. The person that they were trying to get to understand their issues had never been fat, had never suffered the utter deflation that these people had, and to them it was exceptionally off putting.  Many never went back to the gym after that inital induction and are debating still if they should return.

I realised that I had a vantage point that the Instructors these people had been to didn't have. I have been obese, I have battled with the voices in my head that tell me I'd never be good enough, I have had those 3am binges where you eat until you are sick, I have had the angry screams at myself for allowing myself to become so hideous that I was afraid to leave the house.  I have been there, and I remember all too well what it is like to be that scared, unhappy person. So in August 2011, I decided I wanted to change my career.  I had changed jobs the year previous with a promotion of sorts in work. The job was very well paid but exceptionally stressful, often lonely and at certain points of the year had long hours (the height of festival season no less, so that scuppered the band a little) and I was utterly miserable.  I had spent so long on sorting my health out that now my inner peace and joy was being sucked out of me by the one thing that I felt I had no control over.

Wrong!  And I know fine well that that was wrong. Had I not taken back control of my health? Was I now just putting those fears onto something different? Yes, yes I was. That August, after a rather turse few words with a colleague that left me in a bit of an emotional state, I sat with OH and confessed how unhappy I was with my work life. That I had no joy in the bulk of my day as I sat behind a desk, lifelessly inputting, sorting and arranging data; that ultimately I felt as though I was being suffocated from the inside and needed to refocus my life. We sat and made a pros and cons list about giving up my job and the pros serverely outweighed the cons.  We talked at length about whether we could afford to drop to one income for a while, while I worked on building a client base etc, and I often have wondered if that was a selfish thing to ask of OH and a lot of responsibility to place on his shoulders.  But as he always tells me, we are a team, and when one of us needs to pick up the slack to ensure the other is back to a happy medium, then so be it.  (He's pretty awesome). The decision was made. I was going to re-train and become a Personal Trainer.



It really is, it's how we learn.



After much working out of finances, I realised that although I would have liked to have finished in the job sooner, March 2013 was going to be the goal. So the plan went into action. For the best part of 18 months, I have retrained so that I can offer an all round package for a variety of disciplines. I am a qualified Gym Instructor, I am a qualifed Pole Instructor, I can take small group training and am in the process of completeing the final modules for the Certificate in Personal Training as well as the Exercise to Music qualification so I can teach the myriad of cardio and strength based larger group classes that are out there.  I have done it, I have taken a dream that came from something I had once thought would never be, could never be me.  I want other people to feel what this feels like, that you can take back the control on your health and ultimately your life.  It's a pretty amazing feeling.

I was very touched the other day to get the following message from a friend, someone I met through a hobby:

Today I had a University interview, and they asked me to talk about someone who inspried me, and what I feel I could learn from them.  I told them about you, how you've changed your life in such a great way, and are now living the life you dreamed of.  I told them how inspired I've been by your determination, your kick-ass enthusiasm and how you don't let yourself be the cause of your own failure (by not making excuses to work out etc.)  You really show the rest of us how it's done, that if you want something and are prepared to work hard enough anything is possible. Thanks so much for that.

How awesome is that?  I'm so touched that she thought of me for that answer, and I'm fiercely proud that she's following her dream, and requalifying in what she honestly wishes to do.  Go Girl! It's hard to say, 'right that's it, I'm throwing off the security blanket and giving this a shot'.  But if you have things in place and support from wonderful people, (my friend has her partner's full support also, which is fantastic), and you can cleary make a run for it, then do so. Life is far too short to spend thinking 'what if...'.  Take it by the horns, life is meant to be lived.  And if you read this and think 'there is no way I could do that', then's that's fine, too. Sometimes the timing isn't right, sometimes we have to go a little further along the path to really see the exit.  But never say, never!

I'm not so naive as to think that I will walk out of this job and straight into a 10 clients, 4 bootcamps, 10 pole students a week lifestyle.  Oh no, I'm not that green!  I know it's going to be tough.  I know that I'm going to be working most of the day to drum up business and teaching very little to start, but eventually it will even out.  I know running my own business will be a challenge (I have been self-employed before) but I'm looking forward to it. Most of all, I'm looking forward to not having to think of something to make me smile when I get up in the morning, as there will be plenty to smile about.

So here's to the next chapter, it all starts on April 8th 2013!

Be kind to yourself, as always

Much Love

Krissie

x

A revamp to the website coming soon!