Personal Training: Was it Worth It?

So I made it. After four weeks of meeting with a personal trainer twice a week (while also attending a once a week), I survived… and I loved it.

At first, the idea of having that much intense exercise each week sounded daunting, schedule-wise as much as physically. But once I set the schedule and there was no moving it, it was actually pretty easy to let the rest of life flow around it. So lesson number one, you can always make the time if you really want to, especially if you have someone holding you accountable. My instructor was showing up at my door so there was no getting out of it.

Lesson number two, it doesn’t have to take a lot of room or equipment to get an intense full-body workout. Kristin, with YBY Fitness and Nutrition, showed up at my door some days with nothing but music and a few exercise bands. Other days she brought dumbbells ranging from three to eight pounds, or an exercise ball or a bosu ball. All of these are easy and fairly inexpensive home-gym equipment to have on hand.

Most days we worked out right in the front entrance/living room of my tiny apartment, with the exception of one gorgeous day that we went outside to the parking lot.  All we needed was a door or post to anchor the bands and enough room for me to lay flat on a mat and/or stand with my arms stretched out without hitting anything. That was it. And every day she had me sweating and working muscles like I never had before—even in a gym stocked with state-of-the-art equipment.

At first it was a little awkward to have someone standing over me watching my every move and counting my reps, but Kristin’s enthusiastic personality and easy friendliness quickly made it fun. I soon learned that one of the best reasons to do personal training is simply that you cannot cheat. She was counting my reps so I couldn’t lose count or stop early. She was watching my form and making sure I never shifted my position to let other muscles chip in and help out. She watched the intensity at which I did each exercise, making sure that each and every one pushed me to my limit for that muscle group so that by the final couple reps I could barely finish. “That’s good, you’re right where I want you,” she’d say as my muscles shook.

Normally in an exercise class or working out freestyle at the gym, I might get tired about half-way through and by the end be pretty tired, but in all honesty I could usually have happily gone on for another half hour at least. Never here. Five minutes into our routines I would be feeling my muscles. But we switched up the muscle groups so effectively that I also was always able to complete each thing required of me, if just barely on some of them. Kristin likes to say, “you can drop down, but never drop out,” because she always has an easier (or harder) version of an exercise if you need to adjust, so that you finish the reps even if you do them at a slightly different level.

These adjustments happened multiple times in both directions. She might have me pick up a weight, or drop a weight, depending on how I was progressing to increase or decrease the intensity. It was always about keeping form and making sure that my body was in alignment while I was working the muscles I was supposed to as hard as I possibly could.

I could feel my body change as she pushed me. And my confidence. By two weeks in I started believing that I could do anything she asked of me, and she started commenting on how  much stronger my form was already. I wanted to jump up and hug her on the last day when she said, “Wow, your pushups have gotten really strong”—this while I did them with my feet up on a wobbly exercise ball.

Kristin was also always willing to answer my questions as we went. When she would adjust my form, I’d ask her why and she always had a good answer for which muscles she was trying to hit and how my turning my arm slightly or bending my knees made that more effective. This was invaluable because now I can go do these exercises again on my own or with a buddy, and do them right and with power. Furthermore, she told me, and I know she wasn’t kidding, that I can always call her up or email if I’m trying to re-do one of her exercises and can’t remember a specific about it.

One column isn’t enough to describe the many things I learned from these four weeks, so stay tuned for more. And the excitement and hunger for more that it left me with, along with some great new muscle strength, tells me that it was worth it.