6/28 & 6/29 - The Pact and the Beginning!

     My friend Brendan has asked me to make a pact with him, in order to better ourselves collectively.  He would be doing something super amazing, and well, I'll be performing what some may call a miracle.  I'm currently a paraplegic, paralyzed below my knees with no sense of feeling or movement 99.9% of the time in my ankles or feet.  I also have no balance at the hips, and am restrained to a wheelchair through most of the day.  I am able to get around in a walker due to the fact that I have use of my knees, but the wheelchair is the archenemy and I will defeat it. 
     So my part of the pact is this.  By the end of 2011 I will be able to move some form of my foot, whether it be my ankles or toes, and by the summer of 2012 I will burn my wheelchair in a blaze of glory and rely either only on the walker or not on anything but God's gift of self balance.  I'm currently overweight and since Brendan's part of the pact is so monumental, I tossed in that I'd also lose 100 lbs by the summer of 2012 as well. 
    Now that you are up to date on my part of the pact, it's time to discuss the beginning.  I was always an athlete growing up, and I am not afraid of the mantra "No Pain, No Gain"... that does not worry me, in the words of Papa Roach, "I'd rather feel pain than nothing at all".  Some of my current work out equipment includes a T-Core abdomen workout equipment, a Shake-Weight (Don't laugh, it'll kick your butt too!), and free weights.  While in the wheelchair, my upper body has become stout, but my lower body has done everything towards atrophy despite my best attempts to prevent that.  It has not hit the point of atrophy and I will die making sure it doesn't.  As long as there's a breath in me, I'll overcome this adversity. 
     That being said, I did 2 full routines with the T-core last night, 1 routine of the Shake Weight, and then some free weight curls, butterflies, "reach to the skies" (not sure of the actual name of that one), and then I marched in place in my walker for 10 minutes or so, and then did some squats.  Hopefully that is a start to me completing my portion of the pact.  Brendan, get your game on, cause I'm upholding my end of this!