Planks, they do a body good

What Pilates, evil crunches, and straight diet couldn’t do for me, Coach NZ and Little Ring have! A series of events have recently occurred leading me to believe those two are serious miracle workers!

(1) CALL THE DOCTOR:

Princess: “I think I need to see the doctor?”
Big Ring: “Why?”
Princess: “I think something’s wrong with my belly; it doesn’t feel right.”
Big Ring: “What do you mean?”
Princess: “Feel it. It’s hard.”
With his hand on my stomach, he gave me a questionable look, not understanding my fear at all.
Princess: “It’s never been hard before, it’s always been soft. This is NOT normal!!!”

(2) THERE WILL BE BLOOD:

For the past few weeks, I’ve been struggling to insert infusions in my stomach, which has almost always been my go-to site for the infusions and before that the daily injections. I’ve been fighting to find a comfortable spot, I’ve been jabbing veins, which smarts like bloody hell, and I’ve got so many droplets of blood squirting up it looks like I’ve got the ebola of the belly! But last week was the tipper – I went through four infusions – FOUR!!! – in just two days! (Normally, one lasts 3-4 days.) I’d insert them and it would seriously feel as though I had a knife twisting back and forth in my belly. And one of them practically erupted under the skin – shooting blood like a canon when I pulled it out. I nearly went through a roll of toilet paper trying to clot the bloody thing!

Blood in the canula, never a good thing.

I couldn’t figure it out. What the hell was going on? Aside from when I was pregnant and my belly was stretched taut, I’ve never had a problem with my stomach for infusions – never. And then, four in one week – these suckers are NOT cheap!

(3) MIRROR, MIRROR ON THE WALL:

I’d been staring at my belly – for like the thousandth time in the mirror in recent weeks – wondering what was going on, trying to figure it out. For the life of me I didn’t understand why it was not softening, why it was not becoming the pre-pregnancy Buddha wish pot it had always been. I analyzed the last bits of pregnancy, by way of stretched skin, still hanging at the lower part of the abdomen; the section from the belly button to the rib cage; the rib cage to the breast bone. (I think I’ve got my anatomy right :)) It was in the latter two that I saw something, something I had never seen before.

Princess: “Big Ring! Big Ring! Come quick!”
Big Ring: “What? What?”
Princess: “I need you to look at something… look at my stomach… what do you see?”
He paused. His eyes moved up and down the area in question. Then he smiled.
Big Ring: “I see a flat stomach! You’re getting a four pack!”

Uh what? I spent hundreds of dollars on Pilates, I’ve done hundreds of much-hated crunches, I used to run five times a week, I used to eat nothing but health, and always – ALWAYS! – I had a soft midsection. And yet, three months of strength training with Coach NZ (and her little sidekick Little Ring whose giggles keeping me going) have changed that. A twice-a-week, half-hour circuit of lunges, squats, planks, side planks, airplanes, pushups, leg raises, and clam shells have started me down the path towards having my first ever four pack!!!

Goodbye Buddha. Hello abs of steel 😀