"Oh, hey, I know you."

Today starts the 10th week of my new lifestyle.  I'm down 15.4 pounds and feeling good.  I've also reached a milestone that speaks to the title of this entire blog.  I'm starting to recognize myself in the mirror.  My face is less puffy and finally looks more like me!  Being able to recognize myself in a mirror is worth so much more than any number on the scale.  It's very exciting.  Add that to the fact that I'm in the last week or two of my Invisalign treatment (not counting retainers of course), and I really like what I see in the mirror.  Additionally, I am very proud of myself for making significant change to my eating habits.  This new lifestyle is not some yo-yo diet where I'm going up and down every couple of weeks.  I've lost weight consistently over the past nine weeks and I know my body thanks me for that.

My cardio workouts have been really great the last week or so and push ups are starting to get much easier, too.  My knees are feeling better so I can do more high impact options in my cardio, and I've been able to increase my weights on lunges.  I'm loving the longer Pump workouts this month because I get plenty of focused arm work which is shaping them up nicely.  This gal is on her way to some serious guns!  Love it!

My next workout program, after I finish Pump, will be ChaLean Extreme (CE) with Turbo Fire for cardio.  Since the CE workouts are much shorter than the full hour Pump workouts, I've been thinking about adding some additional targeted training after the CE workouts.  Once a week I'll add some additional booty work (from Brazil Butt Lift) and once or twice a week I'll add core work.  Each Pump workout includes a core track but CE doesn't have a targeted core section built into the workout.  I still have four weeks before I move on to the new program, so I may change my mind by then, but for now that sounds like a good idea to me.

In January I was planning to do Insanity, but I may push that back a couple months to do the new (doesn't come out til December) Les Mills Combat 60-day program.  From what I can tell so far, it's similar in intensity to Insanity, maybe slightly less, but is a mixed martial arts program rather than sports specific.  Since I love Turbo Fire, which combines kickboxing with dance, I thought I'd like Combat more than Insanity.  Plus, Combat has the same trainers from Pump, who I think are great.  I still want to do Insanity, and Asylum, but I think I'll push those back and do them when I'm closer to my goal.

Here's a quick trailer for Combat.  It looks SO MUCH FUN!

Stay healthy!