Bridges Through Life

Feeling Like You Belong: A New Chapter Begins

August 16, 2018 by Alicia 1 Comment

You know what a great feeling is?! Feeling like you belong. Am I right?! Everyone has moments where they feel out of place and then come the moments where you really feel like “I belong here.” That second one is how I am currently feeling.

It has been nothing short of a busy week of residency on the Penn State campus. Before you ask “which campus?,” it’s the State College campus and the one I believe is the main Penn State campus. It took me just a bit over 3 hours to drive here on Sunday and it was a surprisingly beautiful day for driving once I left the Binghamton area. I think tomorrow (Friday) may hold an entirely different experience as I read the hazardous weather statements with heavy rains…

Anyway back to the good news…I already recapped Sunday here, so let’s get to the weekdays.

Monday morning our residency began at 8am with breakfast, meeting our teams and lots of information about what is ahead. Each team also created a form of transportation to describe our team and a name. We are Apollo 5. Please enjoy my drawing skills and the fact that my team made me the driver of the rocket, possibly because I love to work ahead.

Throughout our time, they have kept us well fed. Between breakfast, lunch and dinner buffets, we have also had snacks in the morning and afternoon. I definitely was surprised by the amount of food. While you easily have the options and can overeat, I felt I took small portions of most things as I wanted to try as much as possible in some of the buffets. I didn’t pass up dessert any day, but usually just chose one meal to have dessert or have cookies at snack time.

Also let’s not forget when we changed rooms Wednesday and suddenly had a slushee machine. I had to get a small lemonade slushee post lunch Wednesday.

After Monday, our days began at 7am with breakfast in the restaurant. Since I am a big breakfast lover, I was down there by 7:05 at the latest probably. On Tuesday I had set my alarm for 6:30, but after that I set my alarm for 6am so I could enjoy black tea plus collagen in my room while doing some of the reading before heading down for breakfast. I brought collagen and am glad I did for some protein boost as I know I have been light on the meat.

Since our days were pretty much scheduled from 7am-7pm and mostly included sitting, I was fine with eating a bit less than usual. I was actually quite excited when we had some free time Thursday afternoon and I hit up the pool and did 100 laps. I still have it!! However, I do believe the length of the pool was only around 20yds as opposed to 25m which would be standard. It was a nice lap lane however and I had the pool to myself.

side note, it’s way better to swim laps in a one piece

The week has included a ton of group work and really connecting with our groups. My group seems great so far and we are efficient at getting tasks done. I hope this continues through the semester.

From breakfast, lunch and dinner, I have enjoyed meeting new people and learning about their backgrounds and what they enjoy. I thought it was great that we were able to introduce ourselves to everyone in the group, which took 3 days during breaks because there are 88 of us, but we did it and it helped to learn some fun facts about one another and connect. I have been able to share my work experience, travel stories and my goals for the future with these new connections. Sharing and getting feedback has been amazing and really made me feel like I belong. Not only that, I have my team and more. My team will be changing each semester for different classes as we are all on different paths, but I am not doing this alone. I really feel like there is support in this team environment. Having these face to face experiences and chatting over meals has been amazing!! It reassures me that I made the right choice with Penn State and also with pursuing my MBA now. Had I tried (and I did apply) years ago, I would have felt completely different and more like it was forced upon me, whereas now I feel like it really was my choice and I have a direction to go with it.

Cheers to a new chapter beginning. It will certainly be challenging working and going to school as well as balancing other activities, but it will be worth it.

Nittany Lions Penn State — wheel pose at Nittany Lion Shrine

We are….Penn State!!

The Ups and Downs Over the Weekend

August 13, 2018 by Alicia 1 Comment

The weekend started on a down note when I learned my grandfather passed Friday morning. We had just learned about 3 weeks ago that he had pancreatic cancer and it was terminal so I was basically hanging by the phone for 3 weeks waiting. I am very glad that I got to visit my grandparents in early July and that my grandparents made the move from Florida to Ohio when they did so my grandma is not alone and has support from my aunt and isn’t by herself. Friday/Saturday also happened to be the 1 year anniversary from when Brian’s dad suddenly passed. It’s one of those days in your memories that you can recall all the details when something like that happens.

Despite the sad news to begin the weekend, it was a very exciting weekend for me. By the time this post is up, I will be in University Park, PA starting my grad school MBA program with Penn State. It’s funny how life goes sometimes. I actually had applied to Penn State my last year at SUNY Buffalo when I wasn’t sure what to do with my life so I was looking to get a degree in meteorology. When that didn’t work out, I entered the “real world” and moved home and got a job. Now 6 years later, I have worked in 3 states at 3 different companies and moved 4 times (plus world travel for 4 months) in 4 years. I do believe that things happen when they are meant to and this time I feel much more ready for grad school.

While the program is an online program and I am new to taking online classes, they require a 1 week residency on campus and we complete about 50% of the work for a required team work class in this week. I have been working on the readings and assignments over the last week and I think this class will definitely provide a lot of insight for me to apply to my current job and future. I am also excited that I get to meet fellow students and my online teachers to network with everyone. Penn State has a HUGE alumni network, probably bigger than SUNY Buffalo and I love that!! I went to a large high school (class of 800 students or so) and my dad always thought that would mean I would want to go to a smaller college. Nope I keep going bigger and bigger. This is why I am a city girl at heart.

Saturday was a rainy morning and I had some errands to run but the store I wanted to go to didn’t open until 9am and of course my “sleeping in” meant I was awake at 6:30am. I had some time to make breakfast and started to watch Nailed It on Netflix. If you are looking for a good laugh, I highly recommend. It definitely lifted my spirits some.

After running my errands, I did some cleaning and packing. I didn’t really have much on my agenda for the day, but just checking things off my to do list felt good. I did more reading so that I won’t be cramming in reading during the busy week at school.

Since the rain stopped by the afternoon, I decided to head out for a 30 minute run. This was the first time I had to run for a full 3 minutes within the 30 minutes. I alternated between 90 second jog, 90 second walk, 3 minute run, 3 minute walk per the couch to 5k app. It was definitely tough, but I pushed through and immediately took a cold shower following because it was quite humid.

I then decided to bake some cookies and finally used my fancy pampered chef cookie scoop. It’s definitely fun to use and then all the cookies look more uniform, but I also like using a teaspoon like my mom always did for baking cookies.

Cookies made and it was time to be lazy on the couch for the remainder of the day. I assembled my dinner with whatever was left in the fridge which included black beans, zoodles and I cooked up some chicken from the freezer. It was actually quite a filling meal.

Sunday morning I was up around the same time, 6:30am as the sun was streaming in the bedroom. It was nice to see the sun in the morning after Saturday’s gloomy morning. I made some breakfast and then went to a yoga class I haven’t been to in a while. I usually lift on Sunday morning but with being out of town this week and already being sore, I needed some yoga.

Yoga was a great start to my morning. I then came home and assembled a snack plate and had some salad for an early lunch. Then around 11:30 I decided to get on the road. It was only a 3 hour drive which took me 3.5 hours with a stop to grab an iced tea (always) and to pee from drinking all that iced tea lol.

I checked into the hotel and I was an hour early, but it wasn’t an issue. I changed into my swim suit and decided to find the pool. After asking a couple workers at the hotel, I got directions and the guy said “good luck” which made me think the pool was hard to find, but once I knew kind of where I was going, it wasn’t bad at all. Oh man I haven’t swam laps since swimming in various pools around Australia, so it was nice to get into the water and swim again. Like riding a bike it came right back to me, but due to some kids playing in the pool, I didn’t try to swim laps for too long. I then enjoyed the hot tub.

pool ready — nice long mirror in the hotel bathroom

A quick rinse off shower and then I got dressed and headed to State College to grab some dinner. I got a hamburger since I know most of the week will be buffet style food and not really sure what that will look like. Dining alone was a bit awkward, but it was nice to explore the town for a bit.

My feet and ankles were quite sore from running Saturday though so shortly after 6 I headed back to my hotel room and did some more reading and relaxed before the busy week.

If you went to grad school, was it right after your bachelor’s or did you wait a few years?

Fitness Genes Data Results

August 2, 2018 by Alicia 2 Comments

With all my interest in health and fitness, I was curious about what my Fitness Genes were. I wrote a bit about my (non) athletic background to my current training in this post. For the Fitness Genes testing, you collect a saliva sample and mail in the box. About 4 weeks later, you will receive your results. Included in the results are certain DNA genes that measure your endurance, metabolism, lactose tolerance, energy and more. From your results, it provides you with personal insights on how you can improve your training and nutrition and you can purchase workout guides or meal plans as additions.

**I was provided with a free kit in exchange for a review. All opinions are my own.**

Fitness genes booth — Getting my kit at Blogfest

Once I got back from Blogfest, I mailed my Fitness Genes kit in. Just about 4 weeks later, I received my results back. I could not stop reading all the info. I was surprised at how many genes they were able to measure from my small sample. Certain facts now make sense to why I feel a certain way after eating a type of food or why weightlifting seems to work so well for my body.

When you get your results back, you can log into the Fitness Genes site and click on DNA results from the home screen.

From there you will see a list of genes and your results. You can then click on each gene for a description of what it is and what your personal results mean as well as how you measure against a sample size for the population. For some I was in the majority, while others I was in the 10% range which was interesting.

A few Interesting takeaways from my results:

ACE gene for endurance – I have II which is two copies of the endurance I allele. From the results, it means I have more slow twitch muscle fibers, which apparently are good for endurance activities such as long distance running and cycling. However, my results also noted that “untrained II individuals are slightly weaker, have smaller muscles and are more susceptible to muscle damage from eccentric exercise.” I guess this means I should consistently be working out to keep up my muscles. I have never tried to train to run in the past, so I can not say how good of a long distance runner I would be. But I have thought about doing a sprint triathlon sometime in the future.
FTO gene for appetite – apparently I carry two As which means I have a higher risk of obesity because I naturally have a tendency to want to eat more even after a meal. I have higher levels of the “hunger hormone”. I guess it’s good that I have worked on healthy habits because this gene usually means you crave fattier foods or fried foods. I do gravitate towards more healthy fats and high protein these days to help me feel full, but fried foods don’t make me feel well, so I think that’s a good thing. I don’t want knowing these results to scare me for the future but I think as long as I continue to exercise and keep up my healthy eating habits, I will be good. It does make sense to me though because I really am often still hungry after eating and after waiting the 20ish minutes even. Sometimes I just don’t eat enough to fuel my heavy lifting, but I am working on finding that balance. [Also note that you may find some genes at one end of the spectrum and other genes at the opposite end so maybe in the end they balance each other. I definitely found this with certain risks. ]
ACVR1B gene for muscle strength I have AA which means I have the genotype for higher strength. Perhaps this is part of why I see such great results with lifting weights.
HERC2 a gene for eye color – I wasn’t expecting this to be measured but mine was spot on with GG, meaning I have lower levels of melanin and an 84% change of blue eyes (which I have).
CLOCK – a gene for sleep. My results were CT, meaning I carry one night owl and one early bird gene. The C allele is “associated with developing a disturbed body clock” and also my sleep pattern can interfere with my muscle recovery or weight loss goals. I have always been an early bird, but I can see the tendency for disturbed body clock as some nights I can roll a lot. Also I have noticed more DOMS when I am getting less sleep so I do try to aim for about 7 hours a night if I can and semi make up time sleeping for 8-10 hours on weekends when possible. In summer with the sunlight I can’t sleep in as well. Sun is up and I am up, definitely an early bird.

Most Surprising:

I am lactose tolerant. I self diagnosed myself to be lactose intolerant that I developed around age 17/18 as milk and ice cream greatly upset my stomach. It could be that I developed a sensitivity and since I have stayed away from both for almost 10 years (there was a denial period), maybe I would be ok to have each from time to time but personal my skin looks better with eating limited dairy and after how I would feel from drinking milk or eating ice cream, I just can’t go back at this point. I eat cheese from time to time and am not bothered if I order something out with cheese on it, but I do prefer to be dairy free at least 80% of the time. I also have noticed that if milk is cooked in something, for example, pancakes, it doesn’t usually bother me, but overall I try to stick to almond milk when I do use milk.

In addition to the DNA results, Fitness Genes also provides personal insights taking the information from the genes you carry and offering recommendations of types of workouts and diet that may work best for you.

For example, for me, they recommended a low glycemic diet. This actually made a lot of sense to me because when I eat carb heavy food, like sweets, sometimes I don’t feel well. It is the heavily processed food that doesn’t make me feel great. When I eat sweet potatoes, I feel good for example, so I know I need to focus on whole foods. Also eating more protein helps me to feel more full which helps to balance out my gene for appetite I suppose.

Overall, I was very fascinated by all my results. I definitely will be using this information to improve my eating habits further and my weight training. Also maybe there is hope that I can run a 5K without stopping due to some of my endurance genes and oxygen genes. I just need some training.

What genes would you be most curious about?

My (non) Athletic Background VS Current Day

August 1, 2018 by Alicia Leave a Comment

This post is a little background before I get into my results from Fitness Genes. Stay tuned for Part 2.

**I was provided with a free kit in exchange for a review. All opinions are my own.**

Hey there. Have you ever wondered what fitness genes you might have and what workouts and nutrition is best for you? Perhaps you are not seeing the results you would like with your workouts. This is because every one of us is unique and while 1 program may work for some people, it may not work for you. I am a believer that genes play a huge role in our body physique as well as our performance in fitness. This is why some people do well doing only yoga every day and others prefer HIIT style training a few days a week.

While I was at Blogfest last month, I stopped by the Fitness Genes booth. I hadn’t heard about them before Blogfest, but after talking with a representative and seeing all the data you could get, I was intrigued. Some of you may not know that my bachelor’s degree is in Applied Mathematics. I love charts and numbers!! The data is even better when you can apply it to your own life too.

Growing up, I was not athletic. I mean besides being “queen of the monkey bars” at the playground, I never did sports (at least for very long). I was the “follower” and did things because my friends did them. I dabbled in ice skating for a few years, but that was short lived. I did ballet for a bit, but never felt flexible enough and my friend quit so I quit. Once I was 8 years old, I could start tap dance and since I reached about high school when that friend moved away, I actually made the decision to continue with dance and made new friends. I’m glad by high school I could make up my own mind.

In high school I was also on the swim team one year. This was mainly because swimming was one thing I could do and another friend was on the diving team so it was a way to spend more time with her. Swimming was also a no cut sport so if you could stick it out, you were in. [A little side story, you had to have a doctor appointment before being on a sports team. At my appointment, my doctor tried to say in a kind way how I was really out of shape and should go to the gym a bit before starting on the swim team. That summer I went to the gym a bit with my dad, but I wasn’t really that into it and was only going because the doctor advised me to.] I gave it my all for 1 season, but then I was wiped. I would say the season got me into shape better, but I also look back and know I wasn’t in a healthy state because I didn’t get my period the entire 3 months of the swim season. Sorry for the TMI, but looking back I feel that is important to note. I decided to just continue with dance 1 night a week. Overall, I clearly wasn’t athletic. I dreaded that mile run in gym class and the fitness week. I had little endurance and honestly was pretty weak. Though from my body and look, you would guess I was “in shape” as I never was overweight or anything. Ask me to run and you would see a very different result.

It wasn’t until college, after I met Brian, and he decided he wanted to lose weight and lift weights in the gym. I felt better going with him because we were both beginners to weight lifting and we could help each other out. Honestly he helped me more than I helped him I think. We got stronger together and the gym was finally less intimidating. We even got a couple of our friends to join in our workout sessions too. By this point, we each had our own apartments, so we also worked on our nutrition. I saw amazing results in my body!! It wasn’t that I needed to lose weight, but I felt like I had little muscle and lifting weights worked on burning fat and building muscle in my body. While I have had mini hiatuses, I have continued weight training since 2010.

Fall 2009 before weightlifting — Fall 2009 before we weightlifted together

Since living on my own the last 4 years, I have experimented a lot with nutrition and reflected on how my body feels with what I eat. Brian experimented with keto a couple years ago and that got me to first track my food and protein and fat intake. I did learn that I felt more satisfied and better with higher protein and fats and fewer carbs. Though I never went full keto, just cutting down my amount of carbs, helped me feel better. When it came time to train for my meet this year, reaching the amount of carbs my coach advised was really challenging for me. I actually had an issue in my freshman year of college where I got shaky and dizzy spells and I still don’t have a clear answer on that but I cleaned up my diet after that and it helped. I find the processed carbs and too much sugar can make me feel unwell.

Currently, my workout schedule is 4 days a week lifting, 1-2 days for yoga (usually aerial and vinyasa, sometimes yin) and some days walk/jog training from couch to 5k app. I don’t have a pool to swim at right now, but for the past 4ish years (minus my travel time), I have done 3 days lifting, 2 days yoga and 1 day pool. Sometimes I do lifting and yoga in the same day, but I do try to have 1 full rest day a week.

Now let’s get to my Fitness Genes test results because surprisingly (or not) they explain a bit of what I have discovered on my own as well as other interesting facts. Check out tomorrow’s post for my Fitness Genes review and results.

Were you always athletic?

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