✏️Precerpt from Grandma's Ninja Training Diary: The Day I Confused a 40-Year-Old Man



I was hauling two garbage cans up my steep driveway — one in each hand, as I always do — when my son's caregiver's older brother spotted me. He’s around forty, healthy enough, and standing there with nothing in his hands.

He turned to his sister and scolded her.

“Why aren’t you helping that old lady?”

She didn’t miss a beat.

“You don’t understand.”

And she was right. He didn’t.

He didn’t understand that I wasn’t struggling. He didn’t understand that I wasn’t out of breath. He didn’t understand that this is simply how I move through the world.

He saw an older woman doing something he couldn’t do without struggling and assumed I must be suffering.

His mother, however, asked the real question:

“Why did you just watch and not help?”

That’s the moment that stuck with me.

People project their own limitations onto others. People assume age equals fragility. People assume strength looks like youth and gym clothes.

But sometimes strength looks like a grandmother hauling two garbage cans up a hill while the younger people stand there, bewildered.


Grandma’s Ninja Training Diary is the inspiring true story of a septuagenarian grandmother who dared to dream big—by training for American Ninja Warrior. Teaming up with her coach and trainer, she embarks on a three-year journey to build strength, resilience, flexibility, balance, and endurance—starting from scratch.

While COVID and two disabled adult children moving home permanently put a kibosh on those American Ninja Warrior plans, she continued to train -- a little more modestly but regularly -- and maintain the ninja strength and flexibility she had developed prior to these changes in life circumstances.

Told in a dynamic mix of diary entries, coaching insights, and behind-the-scenes reflections, this book chronicles the ups and downs of late-in-life athletic training. From gym workouts to rock climbing, yoga to injury recovery, sleep to mindset—every aspect of the transformation is explored with honesty and humor.

Grandma shares what she’s learning; her coach explains why she’s right—or wrong. Together, they offer a realistic, encouraging look at what it takes to pursue an extraordinary goal at any age.

Part training manual, part motivational memoir, Grandma’s Ninja Training Diary is packed with practical tips for readers over 50 who want to improve their fitness, health, and confidence. You’ll also get insights into strategies for balancing real life with ambitious goals and hard-won wisdom about success, failure, and the joy of simply showing up.




To read more precerpts from Grandma's Ninja Training Diary, click HERE.




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