By MIA FREEDMAN
So last week I nearly broke my own leg with a hand weight. It wasn’t a heavy weight. Just 1.5kg because Tracy Anderson says women shouldn’t lift weights heavier than that.
Tracy Anderson is Gwyneth’s trainer, did you know that? And also mine. If by ‘trainer’ you mean she’s on the DVDs I bought. So I’m a lot like Gwyneth. Except not at all.
I have no idea how I became interested in Tracy but it happened and here we are. I bought the DVDs online last year – left them to gather dust for a long time and now I do the exercises a few times a week in my lounge room. I wrote a while ago about my first attempt at doing Tracy (you can read that post here).
I exercise for the mental, stress-relieving benefits that cardio provides and I’ve found it one of the most effective ways of dealing with anxiety – something I will write about more one day because I’ve come to realise how very common it is.
So. Back to Saturday morning, me in front of the TV in the lounge room, doing dance cardio with Tracy who is like a little pocket rocket Barbie ninja bouncing power house.
Fortunately, my husband and teenager were out and my two smaller kids were watching TV elsewhere, utterly disinterested by the sight of Mummy galumphing around the lounge room while trying desperately to follow Tracy’s confoundingly changing moves.
That’s the point apparently – to keep mixing it up and not letting your body get used to any one type of movement. No chance of that. At one point, my mother-in-law arrived to pick up my daughter and tried gamely to have a conversation with me as I huffed, puffed, bounced and jumped.
Oh, and have I mentioned my pelvic floor? Do me a favour, do some squeezes as you continue to read this post. YOU CAN NEVER DO ENOUGH PELVIC FLOOR EXERCISES.
Jumping and pelvic floors are not friends.
And neither are handweights and poor spatial skills. That’s how I came a cropper – by misjudging the distance between my leg and my hand and smashing the handweight into my shin with much momentum because the moves were really fast. My children ran into the room, alerted by the sound of my yelping, to find me crumpled on the floor clutching my leg.
Top Comments
Thanks for reminding me to do my pelvic floor. Champion Mia! xDani
PS: our kids are very clever little vegemites and yes they are getting younger and conscious of their bodies because it's plastered all over social media, billboards, mags you name it. It's up to us to manage it.
I think it's good to explain to her what they are so that she doesn't have unrealistic expectations on her body... and that your daughter is perfect just the way she is.