Traveling

So first this trip has been particularly hard on me due to me not taking it with my family.  I have never traveled without my kids. But they are still in school so it only made sense to leave them them with there other mom since we are moving in only 24 short days.

Secondly I decided mostly because of financial reasons to take the bus which of course prolongs the trip which would be only a few short hours by plane or train (though it not an option train wise in TN due to there not being any trains here). For some reason it was hard for me to tell anyone I was taking the bus due to the faces I would get making that decision.  They all assumed I was flying in and i didnt tell them otherwise. But regardless because we are making this big move in a few short weeks this was the best way to do it.

Third I would be doing this trip as a paleo yogi. Which means everywhere we stop for food would not be paleo. Case and point it’s 3:40 am and we have stopped in Virginia for 45 mins for our breakfast at… McDonald’s 😱. Considering I’m allergic to soy and  vegetable oil is made from soy bean oil I can not eat here at all and the only a person not only with an allergy could eat healthy is oatmeal here but it is a grain and I can not eat grains on paleo. There for 21hrs of a trip of places I can not eat is  wearing on me alittle.  I do have things I packed such as apple chips, tuna, apple sauces and coconut water to get me through this. I’m sure this will at least help me not gain since I’m not able to work out till I get to NJ.

Fourth I’m a active yogi.  I feel restricted in this little moving box with wheels. I want to do yoga,  run, weight train hell even spin class right now then sitting down.

Fifth and I think this is the most important is that due to the many stops on this trip I have only been able to sleep 2hrs so far. Not that I sleep well on a normal basis because I do not this only worsen this . I’m sure I will sleep longer than I have in many months once I get to my mother’s house.

And the only thing that is driving me is that I want this job, I need this job no they need me. I can say a million reasons why I can be amazing for this position and believe me I will to them. But this would certainly be one of them how many people would travel 21hrs for this interview knowing they would barely eat the whole time and sleep? Not many at all I’m sure. I know that of I’m meant to have this job the universe will just let it be. And I will out shine the rest.

Till next time…

Enjoyable weekend

It was a great weekend with the family.   We enjoyed Allysa second birthday.

My lady and I had some well deserved time together.  It has been a long time since I have had a Saturday off to have family time. Most nights end with us settling in talking about our days and passing out to HGTV.  So it was nice just to be us for a while.

Of course us going to rivers and spires ended with Aries having a meltdown. He was doing so well when we were there but at a certain point he got tired. Once that happens you know a meltdown is coming soon. I had to carry him out of the festival on my shoulder.  He was of course fighting me. I was in a dress braless for the first time ever and he was trying to pull them out so I would let him go. 

But I didn’t.  A few things I realized during this meltdown. 1.I was carrying him and he felt so light to me which means thr lifting weights are helping.

  2. I was calm through the whole thing.  I tried to get him to do his pranyama breathing but he said he didn’t want to. I can respect that.  Later on he told me he did his breathing and he felt better.  So yoga has helped my reaction and even my children when they get upset.

Dinner tonight was Paleo burgers and fries: turkey burger, lactose free cheese, tomatoes,  cucumbers, turkey bacon, iceburg lettace wraps,and  plantain fries baked in  coconut oil. Grapefruit moctail: grapefruit juice and sparkling water.

I’m working on handstands now. Prep on the wall. I love that within finding yoga I have managed to find myself. I grow more and more into the person I’m ment to be.

Till next time…

Happy 2nd birthday Allysa

You were our miracle post deployment baby. The moment I saw the pregnant on the test I fell in love with you. First heart beat, first kick, birth,  first walk, first words no matter what you did we were so proud of you and knew you were going to be amazingly smart like your brother and sister, be one of a kind, and be feisty like her momma Latoya. So our parenting and lifestyle isn’t conventional but beyond all that i can safety say you are your momma and I love child. I couldn’t be prouder of you our  little country princess. Happy birthday Allysa Kai! Let’s party your second bday hard 🎂🎁🎉🎊

Got my belly drew on

First time at the beach

First Halloween

Giggle fits

First birthday

First time aries met Allysa

First time Arielle met Allysa

First school party

Last night being 1 years old

Moving

So it has been a very busy 2 weeks.  2 weeks ago I went on a yoga retreat with my teacher training crew

As you can see I had an amazing yoga time out in the woods camping. This weekend I announced to my guru’s that I was moving back to NJ in the summer. Flipped my training so I can focus on the teaching now and the book work when I live so that I can still get my 200ryt.

Mean while I gave notice at work, started the stuff you need to do when you move.

Just trying to get as many classes in at this point and get ready for this new part of our lives.

I’m about to take a hard core so I will write again soon.

Till next time….

You will be loved and forever missed

This week was a hard one.  I started off my new workout schedule of 4:45 gym, 6 am yoga and then 915 with my lady. And I was doing well until our puppy passed away suddenly on Wednesday night. One moment your cuddling and loving on her and the next she’s gone. But that is how life is short and a beautiful world. And Harlie’s time with us was short since we only had her since December but it was a beautiful, happy and spoiled world.

Dec 2013

Arielle loving on her

1 hour before she died

We are trying our best for the kids not to be a complete mess but we loved her like one of our children. RIP Harlie and I’m glad you blessed our family with your love for as long as you did.

What’s the difference between raja boot camp and hard core hot yoga?

There has been the question floating around both of amazing 2 studios. What is the difference between raja boot camp and hard core yoga? So when billy asked me to write up a little something about both I jumped at the chance.

Hard core is taught by Victoria and Raja boot camp is taught by our lovely Sarah G. Both of these wonderful ladies have the heart and the passion to kick us into shape! You start off both classes with the pranayama breathing which is how we start any class at raja because it’s the breath of life.

Hardcore has started off with a forward fold then dogward facing dog into a plank. 6 planks later when you feel that you want to give up Victoria let’s you know you can do this and gives you a sort of break into a upward facing dog (don’t worry the planks will be back later). This of course is only the first 10 minutes of the class and you wonder if you have made some sort of mistake taking the class named “hard core” when you realize your back into plank again 4 more times. All jokes aside alot of the things I love about hard core is the fact that victoria takes more time to talk you into postures. And will help you with an extra inch which can help you get into something you have never gotten into before. A little fact for all of you the class “hard core” got its name from Victoria’s choice of playlist which is varies from tool to marilyn manson.

I had taken Sarah G. classes many times before but not since it became Raja boot camp. So my mission at 6am was to get my butt kicked. Raja boot camp starts off with the sun salutations to really warm your body up. Followed by what we call in the yoga world as almost a vinyasa flow (which is when you keep going from one posture to another without a break). Even though you have sweat dripping in your nose by this point Sarah’s soft encouraging voice gets you through it. Her chair series and balancing series were an amazing burn that even with as many classes I have taken she had me stretch deeper than I have ever before. The way she works a serious burn and spirituality into one class made me feel like my mind, body and soul got a total reset. Raja boot camp playlist was also like walking into the greatest dance club ever. I know that if my body wasn’t busy getting a deep burn I could have been dancing through it.

I love both of these classes because they both making you work harder than you ever thought you could. With amazing teachers that can encourage and support you makes all the difference in your yoga journey. A few last things is that a strap or a block is your friend in either class to help you build your flexibly. Also hard core sometimes is a little more interactive that all the other classes at raja hot yoga. And I would like to mention raja boot camp has a very amazing guided mediation during savasana. I would encourage all of you to try both classes if you haven’t had a chance yet.

I’m like batman

I have moments through my day that I think im like a yoga version of batman.

By day I work with special needs children and the county contact for Autism Tennessee. By night a super yogi. Between all that I’m also mom of a special needs child (Aries) and my 2 girls. And engaged to the most amazing lady on the planet. There has to be something said for the moms that keep going to squeeze a lifetime in one day from 7am-1am. But I’m very blessed to have all these things to do and people to love. And I wouldn’t have it any other way.

Even when I was working yesterday I spotted an angry birds plush which we didn’t have. Aries is 7 and the biggest angry birds fan that I know. We have at least 15 of these birds around our house.

He has been named bubble. And both Aries and Arielle are in love with him

Mean while I was able to do my first Victoria only triple class. I had only done one 3 class day before on November 23rd and it felt like I almost died. I wasn’t ready. But I did the 915, 7pm and because I got a work cancel after the 7 I stayed for the 830 as well. I was in the zone. I did 14 planks, 17 headstands and 9 minutes of dead dog. Holy smokes! We took a pic to remember the day that will forever be known as the day Victoria broke me (March 20th)

This weekend I started to teach my kids yoga series at the daycare. I’m so excited and ready. It’s only a 30 minute class but it’s going to be so much fun :).

Till we meet again…

A good yogi week

So at random my prayers were answered on saturday afternoon by my  yoga family (sorry it took me so long to write it has a busy few couple of days). So I am back in the apprenticeship for good.

We did our first meeting on the first 4 chapters of bikrams yoga yesterday. A great meeting indeed. I loved hearing everyone’s thoughts of the material and the bonding of some of us. They gave us our next set of things we need to get done and even mentioned camping in a few weeks together.  I honestly have never been camping before.  But I love nature so I’m very excited about all that.

On Sunday I went to a advanced postures workshop.  It was so much fun.

I loved that I had more time to try new things that I wanted to get into but never had the time to.

Meanwhile I got to testing class today for my fellow yogi’s for her hip hop yoga class. I loved it. You could tell she’s was nervous but it was good teaching, good workout and good playlist. I can’t wait till she can show her gift to the community of raja.

Thinking about teaching has made me nervous but I know I can do it.

Till next time

Deep in prayer

So right now some things have come up that isn’t allowing me to do the teacher training as I wanted to. So I have to decided to do deep prayer/mediation 3 times a day until my new path is shown or my old path has reopened.

Meanwhile I have been quite sick this week. I’m not sure if one of my client or the baby gave it to me. I have a pretty manly voice right now and a bad cough. But at least everything else has stopped.

I love you all and I will do a complete update soon.

Till we meet again

My story

People always ask me about my story or what shaped me into the person I am right now. So I figured I could share with you guys as well because I’m sure you guys are curious.

If I start from the beginning, I could say that I have always been a pretty responsible child. I had to be some of the things I witnessed growing up shaped my thoughts on relationships should work. My father was very abusive to my mom. He was unsupportive of anything she did. The kind of guy to take the battery out of your car when your going to school or throw your keys in the backyard when it was night. And of course hit her, scream at her and brake her down.

I’m 5 years older than my brother so there was alot I tried to shield him from. The beatings I took for leaving a dish in the sink or for my brother because he was far to young to understand that everything in our lives at that point was subject to beatings.

In addition to that I was raped in middle school by a boy who was supposed to be my friend.  I had a bit of a mental breakdown which resulted in me not being in school for the rest of Middle school. I was worked on intensely to get through what had happened to me. But the thing that stuck by me the most was the fact that my mom stuck by me and my father told me he thought the whole thing was a lie I thought up for attention.

My parents got separated and divorced shortly after. Living with my mom and my brother away from him was beyond liberating.  I had a freedom that I wasn’t use to and of course I abused it by doing things that were out of character.  Drinking, partying, sex, and  smoking were a few of my pretty reckless things.

I met my ex husband at 17 and everything changed for me. He seemed like the right guy, the kind guy to the point where my mom would joke about him being whipped.

I got pregnant fall after we graduated high school. I was in love with Aries before I met him. I remember playing a perfect circle to my belly and he would just kick and kick. Being so ill during his pregnancy made me grow up in a way I never thought I could. I was in the hospital 8 times that year due to my kidneys having a blockage. It kept me with over 103 fevers. I worried if I would lose Aries during all of this since all my doctors wanted to just focus on my health and not both of us. 

I got married at 19 and had Aries 2 months after. He was beautiful and a happy boy. During this time my ex started to verbally and physically abuse me. It lasted our whole marriage. Aries got diagnosed with autism and my ex never dealt with it. I raised Aries and Arielle by myself. My ex joined the army and we moved to TN.

It was hard to deal with the controlling me, the abuse and try to raise my kids. He knew I had nothing and no one but him. He cheated many times and as a result to everything I ate and I ate.

This went on for almost 8 years until he threatened to kill me in my sleep. I took charge and told him i couldn’t do this anymore. The hardest moment of my life was to look in my children’s faces and realize that if I stayed with him they most likely wouldn’t remember me if he had killed me. So I had to break the cycle for them. So last April 1st we got separated he got out of the army and moved back to NJ.

Last july after a pretty stressful visit to NJ for the kids a friend told me I needed to check out raja hot yoga and take a billy class.  I did the next morning at a 915. Went to the studio, paid and took a class from billy. I was still overweight, and very unflexible I listened to him preach from his heart while we did the raja series. He talked about needing to let go and start fresh. And that your life is just beginning and not over as if he knew me. I came back the next day at the same time and got my first unlimited month.

During my 8 months of going to raja I have become flexible,  opened my heart, gained more patience, became more spiritual,  lost 57lbs and 6 inches, and above all else I learned to live and love my life. I can say that yoga saved my life. But specifically raja hot yoga gave me my life back. I made a family there and friends. They have gotten me through the toughest part of my life  and got me to love myself. Words can’t even describe everything I have gone through with them but what I know I always use to say that in one hour I get my therapy, my church, my workout and as many hugs you could take.

No matter all that i have gone through I have become a stronger person from it all. And I can’t wait to inspire others to get through the hardest parts of their lives as well. 

Till we meet again