Last week we had a chance to speak with Michelle, a Two Bridges Fitness participant, who has been attending classes for almost a year. Each week participants come to class to get a good workout, but for some people, the classes mean a lot more than just exercise.
How did you hear about the fitness program and when did you start coming to class?
Two Bridges Neighborhood Council was having an outside event on Rutgers and were giving out flyers for the classes. I was interested at first in Yoga because I had been taking Yoga somewhere else. I learned about the other fitness classes and joined that too. This was in October 2017.
Why did you want to try the fitness program?
I’ve always been interested in fitness. I noticed a decline in my physical strength and my body changing as I aged. I was getting a little heavier. I wanted to get back on track and not fall into age and getting heavier and just being weaker. I have a daughter and she’s growing up. I need to keep up with her. I noticed that I was getting really healthy. I continued taking the classes along with eating healthy and lost a tremendous amount of weight in a very short amount of time. That kept me coming back. I met a lot of great people that are in the classes as well. People from the neighborhood, like-minded, same age range, also with children like me. I lost 40 lbs since I started. That got me really excited!
Was there any other particular health goal that you had prior to joining Two Bridges Fitness?
No. I was really all about the Yoga at first and I wanted to practice Yoga a lot more and become more flexible. I started taking the other fitness classes like cardio kick-boxing and HIIT as well. It worked out pretty well because the Yoga and the cardio combined, helped my body become physically flexible and fit.
Why is the fitness program important to you?
It’s important to me because it gives me something I can look forward to. Every week I look forward to seeing friends that I have that go to fitness class. I look forward to coming to get my workouts done at a great time in the evening when my daily routines are done. I have time for myself and it’s really close to home. That also helps!
What do you want to tell future donors? Why should they support this program?
I think it’s a really great program for the community. I think that the community should be involved and it’s something to bring our community and neighborhood together. It’s great for meeting people and getting information about other things going on besides fitness. It’s really important for the community to stick together as a neighborhood because there’s a lot of things going on with companies coming to the neighborhood and wanting to build and change the neighborhood. It’s not going to be the same anymore and it’s very important for the community to stick together to express how they feel about it and express what changes they don’t want made, what changes they do need made. Also these fitness classes empower you to make you feel better about yourself.
Anything else you want to share?
I love that we have these classes. I would like them to continue. I will continue to come to these classes in the future. It would be great to have other people join. It’s a really good influence and it makes people feel good about themselves. Even if they feel, “Oh I can’t do that. It’s too much for me”. Little by little you get the hang of it and it works out pretty great for your mind, your body, your spirit, everything…especially if you are a loner like me. I don’t really have any friends and I made friends just coming here.
To support our Two Bridges Fitness program donate today and click here. Each dollar that you donate through the ioby fundraising page will be matched (up to $1,000 per individual) until September 30th.