My workout yesterday was Physique 57 dvd. It has been giving me such great results !!! I have to report that my results are showing. Now my workouts weren't consistent last month since I started doing the barre workouts due to illness. My measurements show I am down overall 2.5 inches most of in in the ab area and in my thighs.

More importantly that is happening to my body is cardiovascular endurance and strength. Today I was able to do kettlebell swings for a longer period of time than I could ever do before.

Normally I struggle to breathe when I walk. I have always have had difficulty with that all my life even when I have walked consistently. Now that I am doing these workouts, its training the larger muscles so that I have a better cardio endurance. Barre workouts are not considered cardio workouts but for me they work better than any cardio workout that I have ever done at strengthening that part of me. It gives me hope that one day maybe I will have the strength to run. Who knows.

Today I felt like a Winner !!! Like I had control over my body for a few moments. It gave me such great Joy. The migraines I have been having the last few days and nausea eased up. My husband and I enjoyed the cool, beautiful, sunny winter day with a nature walk together.

We enjoyed each others company for about 2.25 miles around a ranch with walking trails that wound around several large ponds. It is a beautiful walk with lots of oak trees and native flora. The wild life is abundant making its presence well-known. It is mating season or perhaps coupling season at the moment. I am not a naturalist, but I am well aware the Canadian geese and the ducks are forming pairs. They are getting into the mood. The males are strutting around as we walk proclaiming that they are the ones and to stay away from their females or else !!!

During our walk I was able to report some exciting progress. We haven't walked for a bit due to the holidays and I have been under the weather will illness. So during the mean time I have been doing dvds at home. Particularly P 57 dvds. This walk is always very hard for me since I have MS and its 2.25 miles long. It is filled with several big steep hills that always leave me feeling like I am gasping for air and struggling to climp up them at a snails pace. They are at the end of the walk when I am worn out to make it even more of a challenge.

Well today I concquored the Hills !!! I walked up them at a brisk pace and I did it talking without gasping for air !!! When I got to the top I did a happy dance with my cane in the air feeling like I conquered the hill. Then later we got to the second hill and I beat it also !!! It was followed by a second happy Dance !!! So if your ever in town and you see this lady waving her cane around doing a happy dance its probably me. LOL.

Have you ever felt totally crushed and defeated in your life. I was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis a few years ago. Its been quite life changing. Not the diagnosis but rather the effect of the disease, how it messes with you. Often I walk into walls from lack of balance. How one day you can walk and the next day you can't. How one moment you can get up out the a chair with out help and the next time you need someone to help you because your muscles just won't work. Or you try to get words to come out of your mouth but your brain doesn't express the thoughts and your tounge is too heavy to say the words without it sounding slurred like you are a drunk retard. When you go to walk you don't know if your muscles will stiffen up like a penguin and you will wobble from side to side like frankenstein or if your legs will suddenly buckle and you end up on your face. Its totally a mysterious disease that challenges one to know end.

The exercise I am doing kettlebells, resistance bands, yoga, barre, all seem to be helping to repair the damage that is done by the disease. It seems to help retrain the neuropathyways perhaps. It seems overall that there is improvement. So never ever give up. I still have ups and down, but I am improving.

Well these Barre workouts are really helpful for me. I just thought I would share the results. Overall, out of all the workouts I think they are extremely helpful !!!

Obstacles cannot crush me. Every obstacle yields to stern resolve. He who is fixed to a star does not change his mind.
– Leonardo da Vinci

Every day you may make progress. Every step may be fruitful. Yet there will stretch out before you an ever-lengthening, ever-ascending, ever-improving path. You know you will never get to the end of the journey. But this, so far from discouraging, only adds to the joy and glory of the climb. – Winston Churchill