Bob Harper knows a thing or two about having to change up your lifestyle. The longtime trainer suffered a heart attack in February 2017, and was forced to quickly make changes — and figure out what was happening with his body.
During a visit to the Biggest Loser set, Harper, 54, opened up exclusively with Us Weekly about doing “the silliest things” to feel good in his recovery.
“There’s this one pose I do in the very beginning of hot yoga, where my arms are over my head and I can see my heart pounding. I can see it, every time. I look at it, and I just kinda go, ‘There he is,'” the host said. “I make an acknowledgment, say, ‘Hey little buddy.’ I had a doctor once, right after my heart attack when I was going through so much emotional s–t, who wanted me to talk to my heart.”
Harper then noted that when the doctor asked him what he’d say to his heart, he started crying.
“I was like, ‘Why’d you give up on me?’ That’s what I said,” the former Celebrity Apprentice adviser told Us. “Imagine if you’ve ever been dumped and he broke the f–k out of your heart and you’re taking him back. You have to build a relationship with him, to trust him again. It’s the exact same thing. I had to start building a relationship, to trust it to go into a gym.”
Harper explained that he’d have panic attacks afterward, nervous to go back into the gym. That was part of the reason he wanted to host the new version of The Biggest Loser.
“I relate to the contestants so much more because, before my heart attack, I was doing crazy cross-fit workouts. I felt like I was in the best shape of my life. I was big, jacked and all that. After my heart attack, I couldn’t walk around a city block without being winded,” the trainer said. “My doctors just told me after two years of recovery, that I’m at 90 percent recovery. That feels really good. I just never take anything for granted anymore.”
The Biggest Loser premieres on USA Tuesday, January 28, at 9 p.m. ET.
