CLOSING IN...

TWENTY FOUR DAYS LEFT...and about a MILLION things on my mind.

1. TRAINING
Well, I knew it was coming...with just over 3 weeks left, I knew I was bracing myself to be slapped with a ton of changes for my cardio/training and nutrition and it's pretty simple to predict what that's going to be at this point...So I'll be chugging away at the gym at all hours of the morning AND night while everyone's fast asleep, chomping on my tilapia (stinking up the breakroom at work) and doing absolutely everything in my power to get my body to freakin' RESPOND and drop this fat it's clinging to. I wanted to be closer than this at this point and that's just not happening.

2. COMPETITION PLANNING
I can't even begin to explain to you the complexity of prepping for all the "extras" outside of diet and exercise that go into each and every Competition...these are just a few of the things I've been dealing with in the last few days...
HAIR: booking a cut/color for the week before the show, investing in some legit hot rollers and searching desperately for a hairspray that will last, not to mention trying to learn how get a good hair tease to stay up all day/night.
MAKEUP: hitting up MAC for some dark(er) foundation and other stage makeup essentials and having makeup artist girlfriend teach me how to do it on my own for the show day :)
SMILE: teeth cleaning & whitening to make sure I sparkle on stage :D
HAIR REMOVAL: booking a bikini "sugaring" appointment, shaving/using cream to remove arm/leg hair, and going in for the usual threading for eyebrows.
TAN: booking my tanning appointments with JanTana, buying glaze/posing oil and spray for touch-ups backstage.
SUIT: finalizing the material and connectors for my suit and planning on driving down to SD for a couple more fittings.
JEWELRY: ordering earrings and bracelets to match my suit connectors
PACKING: probably investing in a luggage set, making a Competition Trip packing list, including a separate day-of list of things to bring with me to the show venue.
HOTEL: booking a hotel in SD for the night before and night of the show, buying/bringing my own bed linens, towels, etc. so my show tan doesn't stain the sheets :P
ENTRY FORMS: sending in my entry forms to the show promoter AND getting my NPC Card.

The sad part is, I'm SURE there are things I'm missing on that list, but that's all I can wrap my head around at this point!!

3. POSING
I've been practicing every day, but still do NOT feel 100% comfortable with my posing routine. Still feel like it's missing that smoothness and "pizazz" I need so I've been scouring youtube for videos of IFBB Bikini Pros to pick up on the nuances of their routines...I know I have to nail down my own routine ASAP so that I can just repeat, repeat, repeat and get the muscle memory going so that I don't have a major freak out on stage...

4. FOOD
HANGRY- "when you are so hungry that your lack of food causes you to become angry, frustrated or both"...yeah, that's me. LOL...honestly, the constant hunger is something I've gotten used to. Today I even did an experiment to see if I could survive without sugarfree gum and guess what, I'm still alive and kicking!! I've officially cut out diet soda, artificial sweetners and condiments altogether to try and reduce the bloat and excess water. The only thing I'll have is a tablespoon of salsa (basically serving as my "dressing") with my salad at dinner and that's it! I'm on all whole foods now (no protein shakes) and am 100% on plan...it's rough but it must be done in order to get to where I want to be in 3.5 weeks...

5. SLEEP
Yeah, it hasn't been going too well in this department as of late. I try EVERY NIGHT to knock out as early as my training schedule will allow because I know my body needs rest, BUT what sucks is that my training sessions last so long that by the time I come home and get ready for bed, my adrenaline is still pumping (not to mention the fact that I have a million things running through my mind ALL.THE.TIME.) and I can't get any shut-eye...and of course, I still have to drag my bootay out of bed at 4:30am to get in my AM cardio...which means I've been averaging about 5-6 hours of sleep every night--talk about running on empty :-/

4. TRAINING
No, this is not a typo...it's literally the FIRST and LAST thing on my mind every single day. Feeling "behind schedule" is no bueno, especially with the days slipping away...

SO off I go...pushing through the chaos and madness that is "Contest Prep"--June 9th will be here soon!

the SWITCH.

So I've come to this (long overdue) revelation about my training, my competition, my goals, my whole "fitness world" so-to-speak...It's MINE. Yep, that's right, it's ALL mine--it belongs to me, it's up to me, and at the end of each and every grueling day, it's FOR me. Once I snapped out of the "woe-is-me" funk I'd been in for the past few weeks, I realized that it's about time I took ownership of this whole damn thing and remember that I chose all this.

No one made me do it. No one had to tie me down and force-feed me clean foods or crack a whip and make me buy a gym membership and spend 2+ hours a day there....Nope, that was ALL ME. I wanted this. I wanted to be in the BEST shape of my life. I wanted to have a body I was proud of, that I could admire when I passed by a reflective surface. I wanted a body like all of those Fitness Models and Bikini Competitors I always envied, so I went out and worked for it. I put in the time, the effort, the energy, the sweat and I'm almost there..So tell me, what was with all that complaining? Geeeez, enough already!! Time to grin and bear it! Time to open your eyes and see that all that hard work is paying off big-time!! Time to STOP stressing it and START enjoying it!!

Once I exhaled and let go of all of that nervousness, insecurity, and anxiety I'd been holding on to all this time, it literally felt SO FREEING. I can stop obsessing over the scale and just focus on my training, let my body do it's thing and not "freak out" about how many days I have left until the proverbial "crunch time" approaches. I have to keep reminding myself over and over that I hired Kimbo for a reason--he trains the BEST and I want to be the BEST I can possibly be. Homeboy knows what he's doing and how to get me there, so I have to trust him completely. MY job is to eat my meals on time, train my booty off, and chill. Simple enough right? (Man, when I write it all out like that it makes me laugh at how crazy I've been over the past few weeks for worrying at all.) To be honest, I think the reason this all seems so much easier to me now is that I'm REALLY starting to see the changes in my body. Everything's leaning out and tightening up nicely...and the truth is, I'm STILL 5 weeks out and I don't want to PEAK too soon...In life, as in sports, you have to get HOT at just the right time ;) ...I've gotten to the point in my diet and training that feel like I'm in a "groove"...meals are like clockwork, training isn't such a chore (except on leg days because that shit KILLS!) and overall I feel like I can hold it down, whereas before I was so worried about messing something up that I was anxious ALL. THE. TIME...no bueno.

So, I've flipped the "switch" and am finally totally dialed in to my training...I realized that if I can dedicate 16 weeks of my life training and sculpting my body, I can do ANYTHING. So I did something I never in a million years thought I'd be able to do...which I will hereby label a "surprise" and reveal in the coming weeks ;)

36 days to go...