The Resilience of Spirit: Pam Sherman's Journey from Accident to Fitness Triumph

Transcript

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All right and we're back.

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This is Life Changing Challengers.

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My name is Brad Miners, I'm your host today and I am delighted and so honored to have Pam Sherman with us.

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She's an author, she's a speaker, she's a coach.

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She's a seven times author, to include books such as 21 Days to a Leaner you your Health is your Wealth.

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Rules for Weight Loss, Nutrition for Athletes that's one I want to pick up.

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How to avoid the freshman 15.

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Now, that's a little that takes a little vibe off the other end the Daily 3M Journal, the perfect balance plan and workbook.

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She has been a personal trainer for over 27 years.

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She's a coach.

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She's a speaker on the Fit app radio or Fit radio app, Sorry.

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She's a speaker on the Fit Radio app and she strives to help women lose weight, gain confidence and move toward a lifelong wellness.

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Pam, thank you for being here.

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I'm so honored to have you here.

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How are you today?

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I'm so excited.

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I was telling my husband I'm in his office right now like I gotta go in.

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I'm talking to Brad.

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It's going to be a great interview.

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We have so much in common because I used to be an endurance runner and that's what you coach.

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Not anymore but I was, and, like I know, we have to keep it to a certain time, but we could talk for a long time, brad.

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Oh, I am, yes, I.

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That's definitely a part in the cards for to figure out a different topic and talk again, but I really want to get into you right, your story.

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And then there was a little bit of a.

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You had a kind of a traumatic thing that happened to you and you came back from it, which is what this podcast is really all about.

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So what?

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So let's talk about you first and give us a little background of where you grew up and what was a compliment of your household and your environment.

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Sure, my family group.

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I moved a lot growing up.

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I have two older brothers.

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They're six and seven years older than me.

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I lived on the East Coast when I was born.

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We moved to the San Francisco Bay Area as a five-year-old.

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So five to ten were very formative years because in the 70s parents actually didn't care where you were, they just kicked you out of the house.

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So I was with my older brothers a lot because they had to watch after me and they were very athletic.

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So I grew up throwing a football, playing baseball, doing all the tag Everything that the kids don't do now.

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We did back then.

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We just played all day long and that was.

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I guess I was a tomboy because I had two older brothers.

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And then when I was in fifth grade we moved to Connecticut and my dad was actually an amazing runner.

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In college His four by four team almost made it to the Olympic trials and he was a recreational runner before.

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It was cool, before they had one running shoe back in the seventies and a little girl wanted to be like her dad.

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One day I said can I go for a run with you?

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And he was like sure, now in Connecticut he was very nice, brad.

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He took me to a high school track because Connecticut is so hilly.

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I ran two miles without stopping and thought it was the greatest thing in the world.

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It was just like that clicked for me.

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As a kid I would run a couple days a week because I just loved it.

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And then in high school I did cross country and track Very mediocre, but that's where I met my best friends, who I still love to this day.

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And in college I went to the Ohio State University.

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Yes, my friends and I were not good enough to run at a Big Ten school so we thought might as well run the Columbus Marathon every year because we loved running together.

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So that was a tradition.

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We started and we did for eight or nine years Along the way.

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I qualified for Boston.

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I ran Boston.

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Once I ran a Buffalo Marathon I have a brother in Buffalo Did a couple Sacramento, because that's where I live now, and then eventually I did enough marathons.

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I did everything I wanted to do and transitioned to half marathons, which by mile 10, you're like there's only three miles left.

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It was great, yeah.

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I get that there's only three miles left.

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It was great.

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Yeah, I get that.

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It was great.

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And then my girlfriends and I found a race in San Francisco called the Hot Chocolate Run, which was gorgeous.

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Starts in Golden Gate Park, goes along the ocean for four miles, ends up there.

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It's 9.3, which was like a nice distance, because less than 10, it doesn't take your whole day to train.

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It was great.

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So I transitioned to that before my life-changing accident happened.

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So I grew up very athletic.

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When I moved to California as an adult after college, my first roommate was a group exercise instructor, and she's Pam.

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You love to work out.

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Why don't you become certified?

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There was a 18-week course at the local junior college on how to be a group exercise instructor, so it literally fell into my lap.

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And then I thought I'm thinking some of the ladies who take my class might want to be trained.

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I should get my personal training certification as well.

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And I got that a couple months later.

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And then my career was born Wow.

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So it's so interesting, because most personal trainers don't last that long 24 years.

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It usually starts out as a something to do, to go somewhere else, to go into conditioning and strength at a college or something like that.

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They start there, but you have maintained this and you've grown by reading books and honing in on your audience, which is fantastic.

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So you mentioned the accident, and that's one of the real big things that I want to go over today.

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So why don't you tell me about the activities leading up to the accident and then we can start talking about how you were able to react?

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Sure, I transitioned as a trainer.

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It was interesting because when my kids were I have two kids, adult kids when they were little I had to do personal training in a gym.

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Once I went to school full time I'm like I had six hours I could actually go to women's houses.

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I started being a running coach because a lot of my friends want to run half marathons.

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I know how to do that.

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I was very good Not, I was very good for my age group, so I was able to do that.

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I helped a gal qualify for Boston.

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I'm like I know how to do this.

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And so my career changed and that turned into food coaching, because women, they want to lose weight and it is never about the exercise, ever.

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I was my heaviest as a marathon runner Heaviest because it was the 80s.

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We didn't know anything about food in college.

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You join 20 miles, you have some pizza.

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We didn't know, we didn't know, but I had said I had transitioned.

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My accident happened in December when I was training for that hot chocolate run, which was a lovely run to train for and, brad, you see I'm in workout clothes now.

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I'm a morning exerciser.

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That's what I like to do, but that day my husband and I went to the mall to finish our kids' Christmas shopping.

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We went out to lunch, we saw a movie and I live in California so I have nice weather most of the year.

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I headed out for a run, an easy, flat seven-mile run, which would actually kill me now, but at the time I was in really good shape.

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At 3 o'clock in the afternoon it was 50 degrees.

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It was no wind.

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In the afternoon it was 50 degrees, it was no wind.

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Checked my Garmin, I was at 815 at mile two.

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I'm like great If I can just hold this.

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It was a beautiful day until I was at a shopping mall and a pizza delivery guy looked left no cars were coming left and sped out of the parking lot.

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I was on his right and I put my hand out and I screamed.

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And because I screamed I, face planted into the windshield, left a tooth there.

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And then your brain takes really good care of you because I remember screaming.

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And then I woke up on the road rolling and luckily it was a Sunday, there was not a lot of cars out, so there was no car in that far lane, luckily for me.

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And then I saw the car drive away and he did pull back around.

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I'm sure he was very startled.

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And then really your preservation instinct just kicks in because I knew I had to get to safety, so I'd crawled back to the curb my kids have played soccer forever and there was so much concussion talk Like you probably shouldn to get to safety, so I'd crawled to the back to the curb my kids have played soccer forever and there was so much concussion talk like you probably shouldn't stand up, probably should just crawl, crawled back to the sidewalk, and that was so much blood because I lost a bunch of teeth and waited for help.

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I can't even imagine, but it's interesting that you mentioned the survival instinct and that you were able to use the knowledge that you had, because I don't know you think about it.

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No, it's intrinsic.

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Like your bodies, get to safety.

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It wasn't a conscious thought, it was start crawling.

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It wasn't even assessing.

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Once I got to the curb I was leaning over and bleeding.

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But it's primal.

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I believe all of us have a primal instinct to survive and that's really what took over.

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Yeah, I agree with that wholeheartedly.

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So tell me about when you got there.

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Now, what was?

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We already said what was going through your mind, but what was?

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What did you feel like when you were lying?

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What was hurting, what was going on?

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Really I was in shock.

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Obviously my mouth hurt, but nothing else hurt In fact when they put me in the ambulance.

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I remember doing this.

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I've had an ankle injury and I'm rolling my feet.

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I'm like I don't think I broke any bones.

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I know I'm in shock, but I felt pretty good.

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The ambulance gal who's in there with me, she looked at me.

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She goes oh my God, you're my worst nightmare, because she knew how long it would take to put teeth back in my head.

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But because she knew how long it would take to put teeth back in my head.

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But I was like I'm okay, then I go, I'm in the trauma and my nurse he has a big guy with a big belly he goes.

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You are the reason I don't run.

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It is unsafe, like dude, that's not a good reason not to run.

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But I didn't break any bones.

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I had a little brain bleed that night.

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That cleared up the next day and I was discharged the next day.

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Okay, that is amazing, because I was expecting a little bit more.

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I want that to happen to you.

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I definitely did, but I can imagine that the mouth pain is like some of the worst, right, because it's not something that you can, it's not something that is you forget.

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Push up to the side, so it's always there, right?

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Yeah, I had stitches in my lip and my discharge papers were get your stitches taken out in five days and I was like that's it, Sorry.

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And I did have a CT scan follow-up for two years every six months to make sure that there was nothing wrong with my brain, but I was like all right and it was my.

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Obviously my mouth was very tender, so I didn't eat solid food for three months, but I had started strength training two years before yeah, two years before the accident and I am convinced my strong muscles protected my bones and my Garmin got smashed to pieces.

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So I'm very thankful I had a big watch on, or else that probably would have been my wrist that hit the ground first.

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That's what I'm thinking.

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Yeah.

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But my injuries were very minor compared to what could have happened.

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Hallelujah, Wow, Somebody was looking down on you and that's a testament.

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But that's fantastic.

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Just I'm just curious now.

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So how far was it to finally get to see a dentist and you're able to get rid and take care of the rest of the injuries?

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Yeah, so on that would happen on a Saturday, I was released, got home Sunday, monday I was at the dentist's office and they were taking molds of my mouth, which was awful because my teeth were so tender, but they had to do cement molds to see what's going.

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On Monday, tuesday, I went to a periodontist because three of the four of my front teeth were gone.

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Actually, they were out by the root.

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The fireman found them in the street for me.

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I know it's so gross because people don't even like to get their teeth clean, but I'm like because in my mind they're like they might be able to put the teeth back in.

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They didn't, but one of my front teeth was pushed back a little bit.

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So I saw a periodontist on Tuesday and he pulled that out, which felt amazing because it was hitting my bottom teeth, and he's like okay, so we are not going to know what we can do with you for three months because you might have other teeth fall out.

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We're going to do a 360 x-ray, which is a school machine that goes all the way around your head, and after that happens we'll be able to make a game plan.

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So it was just hanging out and waiting.

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I did have one.

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I lost six teeth total.

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I had one lower tooth that ended up being loose and he had to pull that, but six teeth it was really.

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I look back and I'm like that accident happened for me, because my life is so much richer since that accident.

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But six teeth.

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And then I do have an amazing sports guy who I've been going to since I was running marathons in when I was 40.

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I walked into him on Wednesday to his office he's Pam and I told him he's okay.

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I want you in every two weeks to do spinal adjustments.

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And then, once we got the police report, I brought that to him.

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He's okay.

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Now I know the trajectory of how you hit.

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I'll be able to help you.

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I have zero pain.

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I have it's really incredible, yeah, so that's definitely a testament to strength training and and continuing to work with I'm imagining the sports guy is not is also a chiropractor chiropractor, somatic healer, physical therapist I have different degrees, so he was very obviously very gentle, but he knew that kind of and he said your strong body protected your bones.

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You are a testament to what it means to stay in shape.

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He was very clear.

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He's most people would not be in the situation that you are in which.

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Thank you, yeah.

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For lifelong fitness.

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Thank you for lifelong fitness Really.

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And that's absolutely a 100% true.

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I have been in a couple of bike accidents, nothing like what you were in and I think it was.

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I literally, I think I walked away literally because of the strength training, because of all of the biking, the swimming, the running that I've done myself and also and you tell me, but it seems like also the rate at which we heal because of the strength, because of the extra added fibers that protect the bones, the extra tendons and the fascia.

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It allows for a little bit of more rapid healing along with that protection.

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I was running.

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Six weeks later.

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I was Six weeks, yeah, and it turned me.

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Brad, you're going to laugh at this.

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I used to be a running snob.

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Once you're in a marathon, like why bother if it's less than three or four miles?

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Literally I was so happy to run a mile that I totally changed my tune.

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Like literally every minute you spend on yourself and your health is worth it.

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It could be one minute, could be five minutes, it could be 10 minutes.

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I was like I'm a terrible person because I used to think it's not worth it unless it's a 30 minutes or whatever.

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Holy crap, one mile is amazing.

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When you have literally not run for six weeks or whenever.

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Like even a half mile, it's a hundred percent worth it.

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I agree with that, and for certain, for general health, for general health.

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Yes, I agree I totally agree.

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You get to a point sometimes in your fitness where your previous, your previous opinion I agree with.

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For me, okay, so I'm in the military for Ironman and like I don't even warm up until the second month, I'm not even warming up until the second month, but that's the level of fitness I'm at.

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But for the psychology I think that you're 100% right.

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I hate doing this about me, but just to give people background, because I have not done an episode on myself, but I spent eight years and all I did was help people go from zero to 5K Eight weeks long.

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It was an eight-week course and it literally was started out with three minutes of running.

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Yep, that's it.

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And that's a lot for some people.

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A conversational pace and I'm constantly telling them if you can't talk, you are going too fast.

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So you're talking like 16, 17, 18 minute miles and I'm like I don't care, I don't care, I don't care.

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And these people and they came across the finish line of a 5k that first time, and sometimes it's 45 minutes, 50 minutes and they're so excited.

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Yeah, it's ridiculous.

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I'm sure you've got results like that as well and in some of the coaching that you've done.

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It's, it's been.

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It's so rewarding when you have helped somebody break through what they thought they could not do.

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I remember seeing a friend of mine on the treadmill and she's telling me she's running a half marathon, but she was walking, like, why are you walking?

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She goes oh, because I'm going to run the first two, walk the middle, and then right at the end I'm like no, absolutely not you.

00:16:04.327 --> 00:16:05.668
I'm like, no, absolutely not.

00:16:05.668 --> 00:16:07.552
You can run, walk, but you don't just walk that middle.

00:16:07.552 --> 00:16:09.212
And she was like what do you mean?

00:16:09.212 --> 00:16:12.236
And she literally blew my mind because I didn't know I was capable of doing that.

00:16:12.236 --> 00:16:19.889
I see what people can do and it blows their minds and when they do it they're like how did you know?

00:16:19.889 --> 00:16:22.254
If you're a mother, you've had a baby, you're very strong.

00:16:22.254 --> 00:16:23.256
Don't limit yourself.

00:16:24.645 --> 00:16:24.807
Stop it.

00:16:24.807 --> 00:16:28.552
That's one of the most, that's probably the most beneficial message that we can get that we can tell people.

00:16:28.552 --> 00:16:32.120
It's amazing what people they don't realize that they can do.

00:16:32.120 --> 00:16:37.846
Yeah, one of my biggest quotes is your mind will quit a hundred times before your body will, and that's it.

00:16:37.846 --> 00:16:40.474
People just feel like, oh, can't go any further.

00:16:40.514 --> 00:16:43.025
And I'm like, yes, you can keep going.

00:16:43.746 --> 00:17:12.317
So where, at what point, did you transition into more of diet and strength in your business than simply strength Personal training, I should say my daughter was still in high school and I would sit at the table with her and I actually I met with a woman.

00:17:12.336 --> 00:17:13.121
I'm like I think I have a lot to say.

00:17:13.121 --> 00:17:13.864
Would you help me create a website?

00:17:13.864 --> 00:17:15.147
I want to do a weekly newsletter.

00:17:15.147 --> 00:17:19.238
And she said, sure, when people sign up you should send them something.

00:17:19.238 --> 00:17:21.528
So I started writing, writing and I sent her.

00:17:21.528 --> 00:17:22.429
She's like this is a book.

00:17:22.429 --> 00:17:24.151
We can self-publish this on Amazon.

00:17:24.151 --> 00:17:25.352
I'm like what do you mean she goes?

00:17:25.352 --> 00:17:26.712
Pam, give me like 10 more pages.

00:17:26.712 --> 00:17:27.634
It's perfect balance.

00:17:27.634 --> 00:17:33.340
My first book really basic stuff sleep, good eating, exercise.

00:17:33.340 --> 00:17:34.507
Nothing I say is rocket science.

00:17:34.507 --> 00:17:37.973
Then I started training my daughter.

00:17:38.836 --> 00:17:39.837
I'm sorry to interrupt you.

00:17:39.837 --> 00:17:40.705
Which book was that?

00:17:40.705 --> 00:17:41.689
What was the first one?

00:17:42.049 --> 00:17:43.993
The Perfect Guide to Healthy Living.

00:17:44.916 --> 00:17:45.458
Oh, excellent.

00:17:46.586 --> 00:17:51.176
Then I started training my daughter's soccer team in high school and they ate absolute garbage.

00:17:51.176 --> 00:17:53.913
So I wrote Nutrition for Athletes for high school kids.

00:17:53.913 --> 00:17:56.713
They would tell me they're eating at Taco Bell.

00:17:56.713 --> 00:17:58.151
I'm like that's food you rent.

00:17:58.151 --> 00:18:00.093
It doesn't even do anything for your body.

00:18:00.093 --> 00:18:02.250
So I wrote very easy.

00:18:02.250 --> 00:18:04.692
And they were high level soccer players.

00:18:04.692 --> 00:18:07.073
You actually have to think about what you eat.

00:18:07.073 --> 00:18:14.390
So I wrote that for them.

00:18:14.330 --> 00:18:16.143
Women always want to lose weight, so guide to weight loss.

00:18:16.143 --> 00:18:16.608
And then one of my friends.

00:18:16.608 --> 00:18:17.237
She said she was worried about her daughter.

00:18:17.237 --> 00:18:20.933
Her daughter said she was worried about gaining weight in college and I'm like, oh, I gained 35 pounds my first year.

00:18:20.933 --> 00:18:24.530
I will write how to avoid the freshman 15 because I did everything wrong.

00:18:24.530 --> 00:18:31.965
So the books happened organically while I was out of work, while I was recovering and getting my teeth put back in my head because I literally had nothing else to do.

00:18:31.965 --> 00:18:35.115
I wasn't working for the first time in my life and I had all sorts of time.

00:18:35.115 --> 00:18:37.630
So it was very easy and fun to do.

00:18:37.630 --> 00:18:40.305
And Amazon's great because you can self-publish right on Amazon.

00:18:40.925 --> 00:18:42.686
Yeah, fda, amazon.

00:18:42.686 --> 00:18:44.968
So you didn't find that daunting at all.

00:18:44.968 --> 00:18:51.912
Like I'm putting out these books, like people find that very daunting, but when I write a book, I'm going to publish it.

00:18:52.873 --> 00:18:57.516
My website gal had published on Amazon before, so I sent all my work to her.

00:18:57.516 --> 00:19:01.998
She made a cover, she made it look pretty, she knew what to do, and it's great because you don't pay anything out of pocket.

00:19:01.998 --> 00:19:02.939
People can just buy it.

00:19:02.939 --> 00:19:06.941
And because I've been doing this my whole life, brad, really my whole life, I've been doing this.

00:19:06.941 --> 00:19:08.321
I was a coach before I knew I was a coach.

00:19:08.321 --> 00:19:09.942
It was very easy to write.

00:19:12.065 --> 00:19:14.550
I have content coming out of my ears really.

00:19:14.550 --> 00:19:16.817
No, I hear you, I hear you, but you know what?

00:19:16.817 --> 00:19:19.046
Even me?

00:19:19.046 --> 00:19:19.567
I've been doing this.

00:19:19.567 --> 00:19:20.954
I'm not doing it as long as you.

00:19:20.954 --> 00:19:34.132
I've been coaching for 13 years and I feel like I've got all that stuff, but I feel like it's daunting and I think you just inspired me because I've got the same thing.

00:19:34.132 --> 00:19:36.435
So where did your health is your wealth come from?

00:19:37.838 --> 00:19:43.713
So after the accident I had so many people say I can't believe you're so positive, I can't.

00:19:43.713 --> 00:19:47.086
And I'm like I didn't die, my whole tagline.

00:19:47.086 --> 00:19:52.289
I figured it is better than being dead, because if there was a car in that other lane they would have run me over literally.

00:19:52.289 --> 00:20:04.619
But when I got hit obviously before COVID and I wish there was no mask you couldn't wear a mask back then, so I had to walk around like this for a while when I was at Starbucks or something like your health actually is your greatest wealth.

00:20:04.619 --> 00:20:08.963
If I was not in great shape, my recovery would have been awful.

00:20:08.963 --> 00:20:10.244
It would have taken so much longer.

00:20:10.244 --> 00:20:12.528
It would have been a lot more than just my teeth.

00:20:13.211 --> 00:20:21.567
So it was at that point where I'm like people don't understand and we all know this when we get sick or we have an injury, especially as an athlete, you're like, oh, I can't wait to be healthy again.

00:20:21.567 --> 00:20:24.531
When we don't have our health, we don't have anything.

00:20:24.531 --> 00:20:33.888
Seeing your parents die, seeing older people get frail, you think I don't want to be like that.

00:20:33.888 --> 00:20:35.276
I want to live as long as I, as healthy as I can, for as long as I can.

00:20:35.276 --> 00:20:40.853
And then, of course, I got very passionate about strength training because my sports guy, who is amazing, is your strong body protected you.

00:20:40.853 --> 00:20:53.233
Okay, ladies, let's stop chasing skinny and let's start chasing strong, because when you're 80, you're going to want to be strong and not skinny, because we all see skinny older people in the grocery store and they're just frail.

00:20:53.233 --> 00:20:54.257
Their gait is terrible.

00:20:54.257 --> 00:20:57.115
We need to change our mindset about our health.

00:20:57.115 --> 00:20:58.852
So I get all worked up about that.

00:21:00.450 --> 00:21:02.565
Yeah, no, I agree, and it's by experience.

00:21:02.565 --> 00:21:10.286
If you didn't go through this traumatic experience, your mindset might've been different Somehow.

00:21:10.286 --> 00:21:12.133
I think you still would've figured it out.

00:21:12.133 --> 00:21:14.993
I think you still would've moved in that direction even without it.

00:21:14.993 --> 00:21:20.614
That's just my opinion from reading some of your, some of the blogs and your posts and everything else.

00:21:20.614 --> 00:21:24.144
But, yeah, but I think it was probably done a lot faster.

00:21:24.144 --> 00:21:27.035
But yeah, it's absolutely crucial.

00:21:27.744 --> 00:21:31.969
My message is always that don't chase weight loss or being fit.

00:21:31.969 --> 00:21:35.617
Find something else, find something bigger than yourself.

00:21:35.617 --> 00:21:37.589
I had a client.

00:21:37.589 --> 00:21:42.236
Her name was Kat, and she lost 150 pounds in 18 months.

00:21:42.236 --> 00:21:53.751
She was 5'1", she was weighing like 250 pounds and she had started doing 5Ks and she turned on the television once she saw Ironman.

00:21:53.751 --> 00:21:58.549
She saw Ironman World Championships and she's oh, that's interesting, that's a really cool idea.

00:21:59.766 --> 00:22:05.512
And then when she found Ironman Florida and she goes, I'm going to do Ironman Florida.

00:22:05.512 --> 00:22:07.836
So the idea here was that, instead of her going, okay, I'm going to do Ironman Florida.

00:22:07.836 --> 00:22:12.692
So the idea here was that, instead of her going, okay, I'm going to lose weight and get fit, she goes, I'm going to do Ironman Florida.

00:22:12.692 --> 00:22:23.849
And 18 months later, she was on the beach wearing a sized small wetsuit and going out and she did it in under 12 hours.

00:22:23.849 --> 00:22:26.356
That's amazing, amazing.

00:22:26.356 --> 00:22:36.719
So that's my message to people is go after that biggest thing when your message goes right on top of that, which is a go for the strengths, not about weight loss.

00:22:36.719 --> 00:22:41.496
You have a specific journey for weight loss as well in your reference box.

00:22:41.496 --> 00:22:42.258
It's called working.

00:22:42.845 --> 00:22:43.847
Oh, I've been overweight a couple.

00:22:43.847 --> 00:22:45.230
I've been overweight a couple times.

00:22:45.230 --> 00:22:48.286
I'm a woman like everyone else and it's I don't know about you, brad.

00:22:48.286 --> 00:22:50.451
As a coach, people think I eat perfectly.

00:22:50.451 --> 00:22:51.414
I've never struggled.

00:22:51.414 --> 00:22:52.767
I'm like, oh no.

00:22:52.767 --> 00:22:57.115
I was running with one of my friends at Ohio State and we stopped.

00:22:57.115 --> 00:22:57.917
I pull up my shirt.

00:22:57.917 --> 00:22:59.365
I'm like some girl has my back.

00:22:59.365 --> 00:23:01.268
Oh, is my back fat jiggling?

00:23:01.268 --> 00:23:04.471
It was the 80s.

00:23:04.471 --> 00:23:05.613
We wore baggy clothes.

00:23:05.613 --> 00:23:07.615
We didn't have mirrors in our dorm rooms.

00:23:07.615 --> 00:23:08.295
I didn't know.

00:23:08.295 --> 00:23:14.561
In 2014, my dad had moved out here and he was declining with Alzheimer's and eventually died.

00:23:14.561 --> 00:23:21.169
I was 20 pounds heavier.

00:23:21.169 --> 00:23:23.157
I'm a human, like everyone else, so I have grown out of my underwear and bras.

00:23:23.157 --> 00:23:24.625
I know what it's like to feel uncomfortable in your own skin.

00:23:24.625 --> 00:23:25.847
It's not about being perfect.

00:23:25.847 --> 00:23:29.727
It's about making progress and never, ever giving up on yourself or your health.

00:23:31.049 --> 00:23:32.772
Okay, let's move with that.

00:23:32.772 --> 00:23:38.588
So this happens in 2014 and you figure out that, okay, something's got to be done.

00:23:38.950 --> 00:23:39.130
Yes.

00:23:39.891 --> 00:23:43.678
So, first of all, what was the first clue?

00:23:43.678 --> 00:23:47.471
What gave you that realization that, okay, something's going to?

00:23:48.011 --> 00:23:48.913
I was absolutely miserable.

00:23:48.913 --> 00:23:49.394
In my own skin.

00:23:49.394 --> 00:23:50.596
I had a running injury.

00:23:50.596 --> 00:23:52.326
It was one of the first times that was.

00:23:52.326 --> 00:24:00.592
My sports guy said it was the deepest part between my hamstring and glute connector and looking back I was incredibly stressed.

00:24:00.592 --> 00:24:02.497
My brothers could not help me with my dad.

00:24:02.497 --> 00:24:03.605
It was awful.

00:24:03.605 --> 00:24:06.710
My kids were little, I was still carpooling and my husband traveled for it.

00:24:06.710 --> 00:24:07.692
It was a very busy time.

00:24:07.692 --> 00:24:14.079
I think my body just said yeah, you got to slow down, but running is my therapy.

00:24:14.079 --> 00:24:15.467
So I couldn't have therapy.

00:24:15.467 --> 00:24:17.330
I couldn't work out like I wanted to.

00:24:17.330 --> 00:24:20.137
I was just a mess and I don't drink.

00:24:20.137 --> 00:24:21.606
I didn't drink back.

00:24:21.606 --> 00:24:22.188
I don't drink now.

00:24:22.188 --> 00:24:23.108
I didn't drink a lot back then.

00:24:23.108 --> 00:24:28.819
I'm not a big sugar person because he had Alzheimer's and gosh, that's just a very yeah sugar's poison.

00:24:29.365 --> 00:24:29.906
Absolutely.

00:24:29.906 --> 00:24:37.810
But I remember I went back for his funeral and I saw some of my friends in Ohio and I came home and I was sitting in the Phoenix airport.

00:24:37.810 --> 00:24:41.166
I'm like all right, girl, you got to do something.

00:24:41.166 --> 00:24:44.194
I was always in the stretchy clothes.

00:24:44.194 --> 00:24:49.619
I felt miserable and I just thought I hope I'm under 160.

00:24:49.619 --> 00:24:52.789
The next day I got on the scale 159.8.

00:24:53.811 --> 00:25:00.417
Okay, it's time to be accountable, because I had spent the last three years really going down a bad road.

00:25:00.417 --> 00:25:05.192
Of anybody who's ever watched their parent decline or have Alzheimer's, it is awful.

00:25:05.192 --> 00:25:15.926
And not getting support from your family not my husband or kids, but my brothers doing it all alone is so stressful and it was like it's time for me to take care of me.

00:25:15.926 --> 00:25:18.494
And that's actually when I found strength training, because I couldn't run.

00:25:18.494 --> 00:25:22.634
So I started strength training on the regular and I was amazed.

00:25:22.634 --> 00:25:24.666
I had been a runner, brad, since I was 11.

00:25:24.666 --> 00:25:26.028
So there was a lot of change.

00:25:26.028 --> 00:25:32.759
My body not anymore, but when I was running the regular I am 745, 745, 745.

00:25:32.759 --> 00:25:35.671
Slow day 815, but really on the regular.

00:25:35.671 --> 00:25:36.332
But strength training.

00:25:36.332 --> 00:25:39.278
I was like, oh, your body really changes.

00:25:39.278 --> 00:25:41.372
It was great.

00:25:41.372 --> 00:25:48.925
Luckily for me, I had done that for two years before I got hit, because that really made all the difference in the world.

00:25:50.951 --> 00:25:52.394
So what was so?

00:25:52.394 --> 00:25:54.401
Let's talk about that real quick, all right.

00:25:54.401 --> 00:25:55.164
So you look in the mirror.

00:25:55.164 --> 00:25:56.489
You find like this is gonna be done.

00:25:56.489 --> 00:25:58.433
Get on the scale once again.

00:25:58.433 --> 00:26:00.018
What's your first step?

00:26:00.825 --> 00:26:04.441
Start logging on my fitness pal every single day and be in a calorie deficit.

00:26:04.441 --> 00:26:07.730
I did not know about the importance of protein back then like I do now.

00:26:07.730 --> 00:26:08.751
Again.

00:26:08.751 --> 00:26:11.999
This is pre-internet very little internet back then, right, we didn't know anything.

00:26:11.999 --> 00:26:15.393
So it was really daily logging and creating a deficit.

00:26:15.393 --> 00:26:22.214
And even if you go off track like you got it, you got to log it is being accountable to yourself.

00:26:23.136 --> 00:26:34.122
I did that, for I did a little like a 16 week challenge and at the end I was down to 143, which I fluctuate like everybody else 143, 145 and I'm five, seven.

00:26:34.122 --> 00:26:35.190
So that's a fine weight.

00:26:35.190 --> 00:26:40.616
But it was when you just and I tell women this all the time, we all want instant results.

00:26:40.616 --> 00:26:43.894

The Resilience of Spirit: Pam Sherman's Journey from Accident to Fitness Triumph

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