Yesterday, I went to the gym to work out with my personal trainer, Lori. She and her husband own one of two gyms in my very small town. I picked her gym because the other one had too much stuff in too small of a space, and because her gym had a yoga class.

We did a whole body, strength workout that had a ton of loaded lunges and step exercises. We pretty much ended up working all major muscles to failure. I could barely walk at the end. After the session, she broke the news to me: They were closing the gym on April 30th.

I started at this gym on August 29th 2008. I remember this date because it was when I started working out with the goal of getting healthy and losing weight from my then 320 pounds. I had not set foot in a gym or otherwise exercised since Jr High school and I had never done Yoga before.

I started doing just Cardio and Yoga. Somehow, I lucked out and got an AWESOME yoga instructor named Dyane. Thanks to her instruction (and my hard work)  I have managed to completely eliminate lower back pain and constant headaches caused by my computing job.

I also lost weight. A lot of weight.

By the beginning of October I was 301 lbs. I added the personal trainer and am now at 270 lbs. I am also a ton stronger. I even have defined pecs, biceps, triceps, awesome shoulders, legs and butt. I still have a lot of fat around my belly to get rid of, but you can't complain about going from a 48 waist in jeans to a 36 waist in 6-8 months.

I am planning on moving soon so this won't really have too big of an impact on me, but this meant that yesterday's session will be my last with Lori, and today's yoga class will be my last with Dyane.

I have found myself morning this closure since yesterday. I am surprised by my feelings. I have also been really stiff and sore all day. My glutes have been sore all day because of all of those lunges. I nearly updated my facebook status to tell Lori that "my ass is sore because of what you did to me yesterday!" Somehow I don't think that such an update will go over very well. Even if it is the truth.

That is EXACTLY the type of workout that you want to have as a going away present. :)

 I will miss this gym, but I will keep working out and doing yoga. I WILL get washboard abs by the end of this summer and the 1-year aniversary.

Thanks Lori and Dyane for helping me to change my life. I will miss you.