1st Check-In Here

Hello all my new friends! First of all I want to say thank you all for the encouraging words of support. I’m still having great success on my journey, and it is time to give you an update with all that has happened in the past month.

First and foremost, I have hit two important goals.

1.) I have lost 32.6 lbs as of April 3rd. If you remember I started at 346lbs on January 15, 2012 and as of today I weigh 313.4lbs!!

2.)I have had great improvement with my A1c (3 month blood glucose average). In January it was at a very high 9.8. It is what started me on this journey. Well that and my doctor wanting me to go on insulin. Anyway, my last labs were on March 15 and my A1c had dropped down to 6.1. That was in only 2 months’ time, and would include one month were my average was 9.8.

So what have I’ve been doing to achieve these results? Pretty much the same things as in my previous post. Watching what I eat, and lots of exercising. Many days of the week, I’m doing some combination of walking/swimming for 1 ½ to 2 hours. Usually it is broken into 2 to 3 sessions per day.

Now lest you think it has all been rosy, let me assure you it hasn’t. I have my days were it has been a struggle to eat right. I still lose the battle on occasion. So far I have not had a week to week gain in weight although there have been times where I was sweating it out. This week may be one of those.

I still struggle at times to get off my behind and go do something. Most of the time that happens after many hard days of exercise, and I’ve learned that I have to give my body a rest day. For example this morning, I took an hour long walk, and my lower shin has been hurting ever since. Now I’m not sure if I’m going to rest in the next day or two, but I’m definitely will not be walking this evening or tomorrow. It will be time to swim, and keep the weight off of my lower shin. I will take a rest day sometime this week, but not exactly sure when that will be. I like to play it by how my body feels.

So what is up next? If it ain’t broken don’t fix it. As long as I’m making progress doing what I’m doing I do not see a need to change anything. The one thing I may do is get my bike in riding condition and throw that into the exercise mix. My next scheduled doctors visit is May 22, and my goal weight on that visit is going to be 300lbs. I want to shock the heck out of the doctor with my progress, and I think that is a goal I can achieve.

Till next time, Adios!

Greg

I am so proud of my brother!  He is working hard to lose the weight and stay OFF of insulin.  Please give him a shout-out of support, encouragament and love- ya’ll are so good at it.

Today, I bring you a special post….very special to me.  See, my brother Greg has embarked on his own weight loss journey and asked if he could write something up for Shrinking Jeans (that’s us up above).  He wanted to write his story and be accountable to others, in addition to himself. I may have squealed with delight!  Our family is big on hugs and pats on the back, but we don’t get much into the deeper stuff.  I want to say right now to you, bro’, how incredibly proud I am of you for taking this very important step FORWARD.  We love you and want you to reclaim your health and to live the life you deserve.  Everyone, meet my brother Greg and make sure to give him some *love* in the comments below!

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Hello, my name is Greg and I am Lisa’s older brother. This is my first ever attempt at blogging so bear with me as I learn the ropes.

To start off I’ll tell you about who I am and the things I like to do.

I’m 43 years old and am presently a substitute teacher in Houston. As I mentioned,  I am Lisa’s older brother, and I adore my nephews and niece. I do wish I could spend more time with them, but I enjoy immensely the time I do get with them. Lisa, please hurry up and get your new house built!

I’m a casual sports fan in that I will follow the teams that I support. One team would be the Houston Texans. I have been a season ticket holder since day one, and let me tell you there were some mighty lean years!  Some years it was hard to make myself get up and go to the game but this year has been much better.  I am also a big fan of the University of Houston Cougars and hope that they continue their upward climb from the dark days of the dissolution of the Southwest Conference.

My main hobby is scuba diving. I love to travel to Mexico, and specifically to Cozumel to scuba dive, and visit the great people of la isla. I wish I could go more than once a year, and hopefully will soon get back to going at least twice a year. I’m also hoping to one day become certified to dive cavern, and who knows maybe even cave diving could be in my future.

Just a little about my problem and how I got to the point I am at now. I have been overweight to one degree or another most of my life.  I have been a diabetic since the late 1990’s. During this time I have not taken care of myself. Yes I have had short periods or bursts of watching what I eat and exercising followed by long periods of eating whatever I want and being lazy.

Well as they say, the chickens have come home to roost.

At my last doctors’ visit, my A1C, which is a 3 month average blood glucose reading, was 9.8. The goal is to be under 6. I’ve been taking oral medications for the diabetes, blood pressure and cholesterol since I was diagnosed in the 1990’s. With this visit, the doctor wanted me to start taking insulin and was not happy when I said no. I told him that I wanted to try and manage my glucose with diet and exercise first, seriously this time.  He agreed to work with me- scheduling me to see a nutritionist, a pharmacologist and the diabetes management clinic.

Where am I going? Glad you asked! I’ve got my plan and I’m going to stick to it. The alternative is not where I want to go, and that is on insulin or worse. About a week before that doctor’s visit, I took a blood sugar reading and what I saw scared me into action.

That was 6 weeks ago..

I’ve started to eat better by cutting way back on the carbs and eating a lot less. The day I started I weighed 346, and lost almost 10lbs the first week. Since then I plateaued and fluctuated a few lbs. I’ve been walking nearly every day for 30 minutes. On February 12, 2012, I went to the gym to swim laps. This was the first time to swim laps in forever, and it felt good. I love swimming, and it will also give my shin bones a break. I’ve seen my daily sugar readings drop, and am looking forward to my next A1c test knowing that I will have dramatic improvement.

At the beginning of this journey, January 15, 2012, I weighed 346lbs.  I am 5’9″.

Today,  I weigh 326lbs.  I have lost 20lbs in 6 weeks.  I hope to lose a total of 30-40lbs by my next doctor visit on April 27th.

I’m looking forward to keeping everyone updated on my progress periodically- I could use all the support, motivation, and encouragement that you guys could spare.

This week’s menu plan is brought to us by Jen from Listen.Learn.Love.Mend. If you’re interested in menu planning for the Sisterhood, give us a shout in the comments! We love guest menu planners!

Shrinkers, I have been absent from the menu planning lately! When last I was here, I was still Jen in Real Life but I have since started a new blog and changed my twitter handle! I am now @mendingjen and can be found blogging at Listen.Learn.Love.Mend! Many of you may not know, but on November 17th I had knee and ankle surgery. I have been out of commission. In fact, I have not lifted a finger to do any work in the kitchen since surgery and I am not likely to return to full duty anytime soon! I am in a cast until December 27th. YES, you read that correct, I will still be in a cast (and still under doctor’s order for no weight on ankle) for Christmas.

I am the luckiest wife and mother on the whole planet (yep, I said that too and I believe it)!!! My husband and daughter have taken over ALL kitchen duties. I just make lists and help every one stay on task! The husband is a great cook, so again, me = LUCKY!

On the Menu:

Monday: Spaghetti and Meatballs with a Salad
Tuesday: Baked Mustard Chicken (similar to THIS) and green veg
Wednesday: Steak, baked potatoes and salad (Q’s Christmas Concert)
Thursday: Eggs over Chorizo & Potato Hash
Friday: Chinese My Way Stir-fry (any uncooked veggies from the week, plus some water chestnuts & snow peas, maybe some chicken or beef, all sauteed in a wok with teryaki & soy sauces served over rice)

Misc. Foods (prepared for lunches, snacks, or hunger attacks):
minestrone soup
Meatball Subs (leftover meatballs from Monday’s dinner are perfect for lunches)
Chicken Salad (bake an extra chicken breast on Tuesday to turn into chicken salad sandwiches for Wednesday lunch)

Groceries:

• 2 pounds pasta
• tomato sauce (we make our own)
• teriyaki sauce
• soy sauce
• can of water chestnuts
• Rice
• dried beans
• diced tomatoes
• loaf of bread
• parmesan cheese
• mustard
• 2 pounds lean ground beef
• 6- boneless, skinless chicken breasts
• 1-pound steak of choice
• 1 dozen eggs
• 3/4-pound chorizo sausage
• potatoes
• carrots
• lettuce (at least 2 heads)
• tomatoes
• cucumbers
• snap peas
• garlic
• broccoli
• misc. green veg (whatever looks good when we hit the produce store)
• sub rolls (from the bakery)
• PLUS – seasoning you probably have in your pantry

HAPPY EATING!!!

If you’re adding your link here, please be sure to link up with us! Just copy this link and add it to your post:

I am Menu Planning My Butt Off with the Sisterhood!

{Ann Gregory has been around the Sisterhood for AGES! She’s one of our favorites (every Sister has one!), and also one of our most supportive members. Two weekends ago Ann did something amazing – she walked 60 miles in 3 days. Ca you even imagine? She’s stopped in today to share her very inspirational story……so give it up for Ann – our 3 Day Walk champion!}

This past weekend I walked the Susan G. Komen 3 Day for the Cure. I can honestly say it ranks as one of best 5 things I have ever done! This was truly an experience that made me feel like I was more than a wife and mother. It gave me a purpose other than preparing meals, doing laundry and teaching That Other Kid (all worthwhile for our family but very mundane!)

This is Glenna…the reason I decided this was the year to “put your words into action” and walk the 3 Day for the Cure that I have wanted to do for years! She came down to join me for lunch on Saturday – the roughest day of the weekend for me! I’m so blessed to have her in my life and I’m so glad she didn’t let cancer beat her!

As a wife and mother I usually devote my attention to caring for my family. Rarely do I do something just because I want to make a difference in someone else’s life, but this weekend that’s what I did. Rarely do I do something purely for me. This weekend I did. Rarely do I do something that I have such a strong commitment to that I feel good about when I’m done. This weekend I did. Like most Americans I usually don’t follow through on things that I start doing. This weekend I followed through on the commitment that I made in July to walk the Komen 3 Day. Not only did I train for this event, but I raised more than $2300 to help find a cure for breast cancer {WAY TO GO, Ann!}. Then I followed up by walking 60 miles in 3 days!

Now that the Komen 3 Day is over for the year, I’m experiencing many emotions that I wasn’t prepared for. I was so exhilarated while I was walking. I felt on top of the world; like I could do anything I set my mind (and feet to). I felt as if I couldn’t be stopped.

I saw so many people this weekend with the same goal in mind – finding a cure for breast cancer. I walked with a woman on my team who was diagnosed with breast cancer last October and has gone through chemo, radiation, surgery, etc ALL while training TO WALK THE 3 DAY! She walked all 60 miles and was smiling, laughing and SERVING several other women on my team along the way!

Definitely applies here!

The lady on the far left is Yvette! She’s one of my heroes..the lady on my team I just mentioned!

All along the route people came out to cheer us on throughout our 60 miles. Many of these people spent the whole weekend following our route and setting up cheering stations and supporting us. Many of these people have a very personal reason for supporting us.

In case you can’t tell the top of her head says thank you! This one brought me to instant tears!

Some just wanted to say thank you for making a difference.There were times when I cried because there were so many people at a cheering station. There were times when we were walking that I was so physically and mentally exhausted I cried. There were times when I was in pain and wanted to cry, but I knew the discomfort I was in was NOTHING compared to the pain of breast cancer and all that goes with it. There were a few times I thought I could go on forever and there were times I didn’t think I could take another step!

There were times when the signs I saw posted along the route kept me going – “It’s kind of fun to do the impossible” really spoke to me!

I managed to walk all 60 miles and was encouraged to keep going by my wonderful friends who sent tweets, emails, letters and texts throughout the weekend.

Me at the finish line in front of Fair Park in Dallas (we started our journey in Plano)

Through this experience I have gained more than I could have ever imagined possible. I have gained lifetime friendships and a feeling of “I can do anything”!  I’m already planning to walk again next year because during this 5 months of training my husband’s step-mom was diagnosed with breast cancer and had to  have a double mastectomy. I want to put an end to reports like that!

The entire weekend was an experience I will never forget and I owe a huge thank you to many of my friends who donated money to help me raise the $2300 necessary to walk this event. Without your financial support and constant motivation I would not have been able to do this.

Now that the walk for this year is over I am going to apply what I have learned to my weight loss journey. If I can train, raise money, and walk 60 miles in 3 days I can do what most people consider the impossible – lose 40 or 50 more pounds! I have learned that I can do anything I set out to do! All I have to do is put my whole self into it! And I intend to do just that – the impossible really is possible when you want it bad enough!

We have another fabulous post on charity racing this week from Tiffany Zook. You can check out her first two posts in the series here: Find Your Passion and Demystifying Fundraising.

Lets face it, training for an endurance event is just plain hard. A very small percentage of people ever undertake training for a race, much less a long distance race. So how on earth do you do it? I can tell you for sure that there is no way I would have been able to do it without the motivation of doing it for my patients and for people all over the world who are battling blood cancers. As I discussed in the first post about discovering your passion, I have known my passion for years and am absolutely committed to cancer charities, specifically childhood cancer charities. So, yes, that is great and noble, but how do you use your passion to fuel your training?

It has been said that running is at least 90% mental effort. For me it has felt like that number is closer to 99%! I have had training days, coming off of too little sleep and hydration, in which I make my mind up to be determined to finish or climb a big hill, and I absolutely get there by the sheer power of my thoughts and mental strength. Imagine that mental determination coupled with the image of a loved one or a client who is enduring cancer treatment… For me, all I have to do is think about all of my pint-sized patients, who are running a much tougher race than the one I am physically running. I liken my journey to something they are currently enduring, such as recovering from treatment, or taking a long time to get recovered enough to attend school, or powering through to the end of treatment and finishing strong. Suddenly, when I replace my thinking with those images, I don’t focus on myself or the struggle I am conquering, instead, I am filled with the assurance that says “if they can do it, I can do it”. Very, very powerful words.

Currently, one of my honored teammates, Montana (you can read about him HERE), is recovering from a bone marrow transplant. His story began more than six years ago, when he was diagnosed with Non-Hodgkin Lymphoma. His cancer returned this past year and was wide-spread. He endured nearly six months of intense chemo and radiation before going for a bone marrow transplant. As you can imagine, treatment brought him as close to death without actually dying, as is conceivable, and yet, here he is recovering and returning to a sense of normal life. THAT inspires my every step. THAT inspires me to keep on going. THAT inspires me to endure the 5:00am training runs. THAT inspires me to fight for his cause!

You can see how easy it is to use your passion to fuel your training. On race day, it is infinitely more powerful, because in addition to you and your cause, you have countless others out there running for the same cause, all with their own story and their own motivation. There are thank you signs like these ones, showing gratitude for running in place of those who cannot.

And then, there are the survivors themselves who come out to cheer you on, OR who will be running next to you. Absolutely amazing.

I am certain that I would not have the running bug this bad or be as in love with endurance racing as I am, if I didn’t have a larger cause than myself to motivate me. It is incredibly humbling and motivating at the same time.

So, I challenge YOU to not only find your cause and surpass the fear of fundraising… I challenge YOU to kick your training up a notch by using your passion to motivate and fuel you. You will never be the same.

Hey all you Shrinkers!!  I’m Jen and I blog over at Jen in Real Life. In real life I am a teacher, mother, wife, runner…err currently injured runner, blogger, tweeter, friend…ok I am like most women…I wear many hats and I have many titles to match the hats. I blog my life, my journey and I keep it real. Once in a while, I blog about something food related but my Twitter and Facebook feeds are loaded with food! I tweet and Facebook recipes I must make and I tweet and Facebook fantastic pictures of the food porn coming out of my kitchen. I am always on the hunt for new and exciting and healthy foods to feed my family. I have to be creative to make everyone happy. I have to be creative to make us good quality meals without breaking the bank!

{Note from Editor to Jen: you need to get your butt on Pinterest so you can start pinning recipes, too! We’re there as Shrinking Jeans!}

On the Menu

Sunday 9/11: Biz’s Chicken Divan over egg noodles

Monday 9/12: Grilled Chicken Breast – baked-on-the-grill potatoes (white for the husband, sweets for me and the daughter) and veg

Tuesday 9/13: Pasta and Freezer Sauce and a BIG salad – I made a big batch of sauce and meatballs last week and the leftover was frozen for an easy school night dinner.

Wednesday 9/14: Leftovers Pizza & Salad – I will put aside sauce from Tuesday’s pasta for the pizza and I am purposely making Tuesday’s salad a BIG salad so there is leftover for tonight.

Thursday 9/15: Ground Turkey Reuben Melt (I am making this one up as I go – I will take pictures and blog a recipe when I am done) with Veggie Soup (I made this soup a few weeks ago and immediately froze a batch)

Friday 9/16: Steak – the husband’s request! I will add a potato and veg.

Misc. Food to Prep (to be used as snacks, lunches, pre-made breakfast)

• Broccoli Cheese Chowder
• Parmesan Spinach Cakes
• Eggy Muffins

Desserts:

• Lemonade Ice

Menu Planning Tips:

I have been menu planning for a few years now and I have gathered a few tricks. In my comments on my menu last week @ashleysh22 asked “How do you stick to your own schedule? My problem is that even when I write out a menu similar to this one – I can’t seem to stick to it. I come home and don’t feel like cooking. And then I fall behind. any advice?”

I will give you the advice I was once given: it is simply a plan to guide you through. You make the rules and don’t let your plan rule you.

Meaning….sometimes you switch things up! You come home from work and all you want is scrambled eggs or a quick sandwich. What was planned, what is in the fridge defrosting will be there tomorrow. If you get backed up that just means you have an already thought out meal for next week.

I plan my menu around my week. This week I have PT (Physical Therapy) three times and an acupuncture appointment. Plus, the first few weeks of school are crazy busy. I planned easy meals with built in leftover. Crockpots are a lifesaver! Plan your menu to match your weekly and family needs. Another lifesaver meal – the occasional breakfast for dinner – everyone loves it and it is EASY!

Have fun with your food!!

Happy Eating!!

xox, Jen

Be sure to blog your menu plan and link up below! We love finding new recipes, and who knows, maybe your recipe will be featured on our Shrinking Menu Plan!

Thanks so much for sharing your menu with us, Jen! Another fun website we’ve come to love is Say Mmm. It’s a free menu-planning site that allows you to save recipes, plan on a calendar, and organize lists and coupons. Check it out!

This week we have another great post from Tiffany Zook on Charity Racing – Finding Your Passion. If you didn’t see last week’s post, check it out here NOW!

There is no doubt that one of the most daunting and scary propositions about charity racing is the fundraising. Especially if you have never participated in any form of raising funds or quite simply, asking for money, it can be the single largest deterrent to jumping in and committing to a charity race. Now, here is the part where you may literally start laughing out loud, but here goes… I will tell you that fundraising is not as hard as it looks and does not have to be a daunting prospect, IF you have the right tools and utilize your resources.

First of all, lets pull apart some common excuses and fears. I have made many of these excuses myself.

1. What if people say no? First of all, people WILL say no, and many times the people who say no will surprise you. I have very close family members who have yet to donate to TNT. However, many will say yes! It is not personal when a person says no and if you make that paradigm shift, you will move right on to the next person, and just keep unabashedly asking.
2. How can I raise several thousand dollars in this economy? The Leukemia Lymphoma Society alone continues to raise more than $100 million annually through Team in Training… That continues IN THIS ECONOMY. When you are raising money for a cause that has touched so many lives, or a cause to which you have a personal connection, people generally find the money, even if it is a smaller amount.
3. How do I know that the funds are truly going to good use? Especially with the larger organizations that have formal charity racing programs, they can provide you with the data and information to show you exactly where the money goes, dollar for dollar.
4. How on earth do I get started – I have never done this before? You will be provided with a fundraising coach (with most formal programs), a fundraising resource kit, and so many ideas that you will have plenty to choose from. I, personally, have been blown away by the fundraising support.
5. What if I get started and cannot raise the fundraising minimum? Most organizations give you an “out” or a cutoff date by which you need to commit to the full minimum. This is usually about half way through the training season, at which time you can opt out and not complete the season if you feel that you will have too much difficulty (which is usually related to procrastination and not taking advantage of fundraising resources) raising the money.

If you have other fears or concerns that immediately come to mind, please do not hesitate to start the discussion below in the comments or to email me and we can discuss.

Once the excuses/fears are worked out and you have decided to move forward taking the leap of faith, what is next? What is tried and true? How can you get creative? How can you knock it all out without having to ask all of your friends and neighbors? I have come to realize that the options are endless and the ideas are only as limited as your thinking.

So, what are the tried and true methods of fundraising? Yep, you got it, good old letters and emails, explaining your cause and asking for your friends and family to partner with you. Now, within the tried and true, you can get pretty creative, such as making up a unique donor form, such as “donate your age” or “donate how strong you feel about the cause,” or “donate a dollar per mile”. You can also use your letter campaign to educate about your cause and really appeal to what their connection may be to the cause. Additionally, social networking has become the new tried and true. Most organizations give you a personalized website with the capability of adding blog like posts and linking them to Facebook and/or Twitter. Here is my current website with several different blog-like posts along with the introductory page, so that you can see the flexibility of your own website. Social Networking also gives you a continual pipeline to promote your cause and hit a large audience at all different times.

Second, there has never been a better reason to get creative. Catch people off guard and create the wow factor! One of the absolute best examples of creativity was the brain child of Team Shrinking Jeans own, Christie O. Her “treadmill in a mall” project, literally consisted in her running and walking on a treadmill for nearly 12 hours, in different hats and outfits, all the while beckoning all of the passers by to donate. She made almost $1000… On a treadmill… In a mall! Another way to get creative is to pool your resources with your team. Team Shrinking Jeans hosted a huge raffle, utilizing all team members contacts and access to donated products and then had multiple levels of entry into the raffle. Because we had a team page, every donation was split evenly and the fact that we had great things to give away, enticed people to participate. My current favorite is known as the “mile of quarters” fundraiser and a group of local TNT participants is in the middle of their own spin on it. You can read about what they are doing here. Let your mind go and go wild!

Lastly, and I think the true key to really going big and being able to knock it out without all of the letter writing and small projects, is to plan a large event. This is especially key if you have interest in working with the organization on an annual or semi-annual basis, and is exactly the place I currently find myself. I was first introduced to this by our fundraising mentor with my first TNT event. Shannon has two annual events, both yielding $5000-$10,000. One is a 5K race and the other is a wine tasting event. She does live in a small community, so planning a 5K isn’t quite as daunting as it would be in a larger city, but nevertheless, there are a myriad of things that are possible. I love that the hard work nets a huge return and can be duplicated year to year. Two ideas that I am working on currently, are a charity concert and a pre-screening for an anticipated movie premier. Both involve ticket sales and donated space/goods in return for exposure and PR.

The fundraising possibilities are endless and the help is always available for the taking. This is a small peak at my tips and insight, and I haven’t even mentioned restaurant “percent sales nights” or the value of seeking corporate sponsorship. If you take one thing away from this post, remember that when you are passionate about your cause, the ideas and various “mechanisms” for fundraising appear and the money comes in… Your passion paves the road!

Tiffany Zook will be doing a series of guest posts on racing for charity. She was a very important and passionate member of Team Shrinking Jeans when we raced with Team In Training and raised money for the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society. Tiffany was a rockstar fundraiser and motivational team member!! She is passionate about charity racing for good reason – she’s a pediatric oncology nurse, and has seen the good the funds raised do for cancer patients.

I have fallen in love with charity racing. Period. End of story.

Actually, this is just the beginning of my story. Many of you have heard of Team in Training, Race for the Cure, The Breast Cancer Three Day; St. Jude Children’s Cancer Research… The list goes on and on. For years I had thought that Team in Training would be a great way to give back and to learn how to run, but never had the courage to actually take action until January of 2010 when Shrinking Jeans put out the call and announcement that they would be putting a team together to participate in the Virtual Team in Training. I didn’t even hesitate and sent the email to say that I was “in”. It wasn’t until a couple of weeks into training that I even questioned what on earth I had signed up for. At the time I weighed well over 200 pounds and couldn’t run a block. Yet, I was compelled to jump on board. You see, I had a tremendous external motivation that propelled my fingers to type the email asking to be included in the team that would become “Team Shrinking Jeans”.

That external motivation happens to be my life’s work. Many of you know that I work as a Pediatric Oncology Nurse taking care of children with cancer and their families. I see the work of the Leukemia Lymphoma Society on a daily basis and I see how vital their work is in a very practical, tangible manner. Because this was a cause that I believed in from the very core of my being, I didn’t think twice about the fundraising aspect of participating in Team in Training (TNT). Truth be told I was much more freaked out by the training and the fact that I would be run/walking 13.1 miles after several months of training. It was a darn good thing I did sign up and was committed, because the first several weeks are rough and I may have been tempted to quit. I know for sure that quitting would have been much easier had I not been committed to a cause larger than a race. And now here I am, training for my third half marathon and my second event with Team in Training.

Team Shrinking Jeans

So why am I sharing all of this with you? Plain and simple, I have fallen in love with endurance running, participating in races and very most importantly, I LOVE charity racing! I want to challenge every one of you who have considered doing an endurance event like a half marathon, marathon, or triathlon to use your passion for the cause that is closest to your heart to help you take the first step in doing something that will forever change your life.

We all have our “cause”. For me it is childhood cancer. For Melissa it is Charity Water. For many of you it is breast cancer. For some it is at risk kids. I am sure that if we made a list of all the charities that tug at our heartstrings or that speak to our soul in a way that brings us to tears, it would be endless. For every cause there is the ability to pair it with an endurance event. Organizations such as Susan G. Komen and the Leukemia Lymphoma Society have very organized and structured programs in which they provide coaching, fundraising help and a seamless process to guide you through your event. There are many other non-profits who have smaller programs and provide some of the similar services as the frontrunners in the charity racing world. Then there are causes that do not have a formal program, but who would never in a million years turn down anyone who wants to raise money for them, and most of them have fundraising websites that you can personalize and use in any fashion you choose to raise funds. There are plenty of resources available from Shrinking Jeans to help you find a good training plan and lead you to the necessary resources you need to compete in an endurance event and thrive. I have become convinced that a cause close to your heart can propel you to do things that you mind may not be able to fathom.

In the cancer world alone, charity racing has not only raised funds to help cancer patients, but it is contributing to ground breaking research and new drug development. The July issue of Runner’s World (insert link www.runnersworld.com) Magazine, was completely dedicated to the role that running has played in the world of cancer. They detailed “Where the Fundraising Dollars Go”, and provide a list of cancer charities with a running connection. In discussing the translation of dollars to research, they say this:

“Support from groups like the Komen Foundation lets us focus on out-of-the-box type research… For example, Komen is helping finance a study we’re doing on the plasticity of cancer cells… On its website, the organization claims to have ‘touched every major breast-cancer break-through of the last 29 years.’ The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society takes an equally bold marketing approach, pointing to the support it provided in the development of Gleevec, a breakthrough leukemia drug, and its championing of ‘translational research’ which drives a drug’s passage from lab to clinical use”

Pretty darn amazing!

Charity racing allows you to be a voice for your cause, and the greatest side benefit is the way it transforms your health and fitness. It is nearly impossible to train for and endurance event without releasing a barrage of positive effects on your body, mind and soul. In the past year and a half since I first signed up with Team Shrinking Jeans to do TNT, I have taken off nearly 50 pounds, totally changed my body composition decreasing my body fat from over 40% to 26%, learned the value of strength training, and for the first summer in the last four years, I have not had to increase the dose of my anti-anxiety medication. I am forever indebted to Kirsten for being the catalyst that got Team Shrinking Jeans going and thus gave me a team, making the decision to take the plunge a bit less daunting.

In the coming weeks I will continue to share with you about my journey and share some important topics that are key to the journey, such as “Demystifying fundraising” – thinking out of the box and getting creative with fundraising, “How to use your cause as your greatest training tool” – learning how to channel your cause to be the most important fuel in your training and lastly we will take some time to hear personal accounts from sisters here at the Hood and their personal journeys with charity racing. For now, I challenge you to close your eyes and think about your “cause”, then think about being able to really contribute to that cause, then picture yourself making that decision and taking that hardest, yet most important first step to

Just do it…

Sign up…

Make the commitment.

I promise you, you will not regret it!