Amazing Day!

Today's session was awesome. A lot of work, but awesome. My abdominal muscles feel incredibly sore this evening, but it's that good sore...it's just reminding me of how hard I worked today!

We started out with the typical arm warmp-ups--- lil circle forwards and back, twisted invisible doorknobs. bent elbows in and out, pushed arms up and down with bent elbows. If you are ever feeling cold, I would reccommend doing a few rounds of these warm-ups...They really get your blood flowing!

After my warm-ups, I lined up my chair with this pilates chair-thing so that my feet were lined-up with the footrest part of it. Nicole sat on the actual seat part of it, and placed my feet on the footrest of the chair. The footrest moves up and down, held up by springs, by which you can adjust the resistance.Nicole helped to keep my feet and knees in line while I used my hamstings to push down on the footrest, and come back up. I'm of course, sore as hell now, but it's just my body reminding me of my hard work today!

Then, Nicole transferred me over to a wooden box. I was able to hang-on to the TRX hanging above me. I worked on sitting up tall, keeping my hips straight, and constantly reassuring myself that I COULD hold myself there without falling.

When I got comfortable sitting, Nicole had me try standing! I was able to stand however, I used a lot of my arm strength to pull me up, rather than leg strength to push me up.

Nicole the had me sit back down and do sit-ups on the box Yeah, I know it sounds pretty crazy for a disabled person to do, but that's why I love Nicole! She held on to my wrists, and I slowly lowered myself back, then used my abs to sit me back up. I think we did about 15 of these intense sit-ups!

Then it was time to stand again. This time, I stood facing the mirror with one arm around Nicole's shoulders. She widened my stance to help me put more weight through the left leg. By widening my stance, my left hip is forced to be pulled down lower, whereas in a narrower leg position, my left hip sits higher up, making my right leg bear the majority of my weight.

I also stood so I could see my reflection sideways in the mirror. Standing in this position helped me to see how my butt sticks out when I'm standing. I need to bring my pelvis/hips forward in order to get a tighter, "normal" stand.

So, today I really feel positive about how my progress is coming along. I think my abs are finally kicking-in, and I can see and feel the muscle areas I need to focus my efforts on. I really think that our session today also helped Nicole see where/what we need to work on.