Personal Training – You may REALLY NEED it – find out if this is you….
Ok, the last couple of weeks have been kind of interesting as far as inquiries regarding personal training. I have had a couple of people who have really surprised me. And to be honest, I don’t mean this in a good way.
Example One — A person with a heart condition who has had open heart surgery. Since my father lived his whole life with a heart condition and eventually died from complications from it, heart disease is VERY CLOSE to my heart!! So it utterly SHOCKED and disappointed me to have someone who has survived heart disease to this point tell me that they were looking for “a couple of exercises” oh no, not personal training…….. too expensive. PLEASE GIVE ME A BREAK. I don’t mean to sound cruel but I find it shocking that someone would choose a few dollars over their health.
Example Two — A person called me to ask me for a free consultation. I really don’t do that so I told him I would be happy to discuss personal training. Oh no, so he went to another trainer for his freebie and then called to whine to me that it was not what he expected and that he still needs exercises and advice for his back. Sorry, but anyone with a medical condition should not be just jumping on equipment like an 18 year old kid with no health issues.
Both of these have really surprised me. I have great personal training clients who every day surprise me with their commitment to change their lives and I see their medical conditions improve greatly. Then I also have a great bunch of clients who do not train on a regular basis. They do a few sessions to learn a routine that works for them and their unique conditions and then they work out on their own.
Trust me, I understand that everyone wants to make the most bang for their buck. And I am happy to work with people to find a way. But that does not mean that I can do freebies. I like to spend several hours working on the routine for a new client and making sure I fully understand every need they have. And I just cannot apply that type of commitment to someone who will not commit to doing some training.
Really not trying to be tough here — just there are so many nuances to a condition. Say you just tell me on the phone that you have a bad back. Well that could mean a bunch of different things and the exercises would be different and unique for each. So I cannot just barf out some exercises on the phone. Another example is high blood pressure. While you may not even think of mentioning that over the phone, I will see it when I have you fill out your full medical form and it affects the tempo of how you lift weights as well as how you perform cardio. So really and sorry — I would rather you walk away from me with nothing than to walk away with half-baked advice or bad advice because we have not spent enough time to fully understand and to teach you to do your routine.
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