Next stop …inner peace.
I know. I know. I need to invest some serious time catching up with my blog. Life has kept me busy and stressed, but things are beginning to calm down to the point I can breathe. I still have several things hanging over my head, but I am moving again in the right direction. I will update the stats page soon enough, but I did manage to lose 1.8 pounds last week merely from eating healthier.
I am getting around to it. Stay with me. Great things ahead.
1:12 AM. I can’t sleep.
OK, let me say one unrelated (actually, probably VERY related) thing. IT’S JUST CHEER. I mean %#@!*. And for an 8 year old, no less. Why should it be causing me such ridiculous stress? Accept that we aren’t going forward with our current gym, get through tryouts tomorrow, make new friends, and forget about it. Ugh.
So… I did not exercise tonight. Not that surprising, but I did eat great and according to plan again. I’m not going anywhere, just taking a (longer) break from intense, regimented workouts. I suspect I’ll hop on a treadmill here this week at an easy pace, and I still play softball on the weekends. I’d like to get back to lifting, but this month is just insanely busy. I know I have the time to fit it in somewhere, and I know very well it would likely help with stress and this sorta-depression thing I’m working through, but saying it does not make it so.
I’m slammed tomorrow night, so if I want to get anything accomplished, it will have to be earlier in the day. Not my favorite time to get out to the gym, but childcare, some loud music and a treadmill sound like a good mix.
Not a big fan of May so far. Thankfully there is a lot of the month left to recover. I’m working on it.
I want to be quick, because the last thing I want to be doing right now is sitting here.
I weighed in this morning at 299.8. It honestly was THAT close. And since I refuse to fall back over 300 (having narrowly escaped the fate I was trying to avoid), I hit it hard tonight. OK, I ate well. I did not exercise today, even though I wanted to. Life right now is ridiculously stressful. I have no time right now to do much more than I am doing. That being said, I will remain under 300 this week and the next and the week after that… and will continue downward.
It isn’t a lack of motivation. It is pure stress combined with a crazy schedule.
Our health insurance runs out this month. That hurts, considering my wife is a type I diabetic and dependant on her medicine to live. Her precondition also prevents us from getting any type of individual insurance policy. We are screwed. The best (and only) option I was able to find is a group policy through the ASBA for $1650+ a month. Woo-hoo! I also had to file an extension for my taxes, even though I owe to the tune of $10K. Interest and penalties are compounding right now even as I sit here. Ashley’s cheer team is causing me the biggest headaches as well. We spend so much of our free time doing cheer related activities (competitions, practices, classes, privates, parties, banquets, etc.) and to have things implode like they have this week is causing such incredible stress on all of us. She is scrambling to tryout at different gyms this week. So sad. Kara was just evaluated for a learning disorder somewhere in the auditory processing realm. We are waiting to hear back on her results (next week). And finally, I have $7.50 left to my name, with a week’s worth of gas and groceries to pay for before our next paycheck finally comes. I can’t pawn our wedding rings because they are already sitting there. Oh, and Candy is suing the cheer camp we were planning on going to in June because they told her this past week that she couldn’t be a counselor because she has diabetes. Awesome.
I will continue to eat well until things turn around enough that I can enjoy a good workout. I am NOT letting this get the best of me, even though it desperately wants to.
Its 1:30 am. I am WIDE AWAKE.
The past few days have been average at best. I have eaten well, and I managed some light cardio and a few kettlebell swings and such, but nothing as brutal or intense as last week’s leg workout. I actually fear getting to Vegas on Friday and not being able to walk, so I’ve toned it down a bit. Last week scared me. haha. I don’t need that kind of soreness with so much walking planned on our trip.
I expect a decent week, even if the weight loss doesn’t come. I will likely eat more than I intend to and probably drink too much also. I mean, it’s VEGAS. I want to enjoy myself. I am going to commit to some form of exercise throughout the trip, however. I know a great gym just off the strip where we went a few years ago while on vacation. The Green Valley Ranch also has some FANTASTIC facilities (although no squat rack, so…).
Anyway, just a warning that the posting will be lax this week and probably stop while I am in Las Vegas. I have my mother-in-law coming to Phoenix in two days, so we have some cleaning to do. Also, with Ashley’s national cheer competition this weekend, all we have are extra practices before we leave. Cheer, cheer, cheer, sleep. REPEAT.
Expect a serious push when I get back. None of this “20 minutes on the treadmill, and I am done” business. It will all be about metabolic training, serious resistance training, and increased activity. I so am looking forward to it.
The one great thing is this. I have lost over 30 pounds, and I don’t feel like I have even been trying lately. I am so much more confident that I can get there (wherever “there” is?) because I feel like I am starting fresh again at 290 and knowing I have a hard push left in me. It is so much better than sitting here wondering just how much longer I can keep it up. I am just drifting right now, so I am ready to WORK.
I’ll get in a good upper body workout tomorrow and a lower body workout on Thursday. Then I won’t think about it at all until after the cheer competition on Sunday. If I don’t post before then, have a great weekend. I am going to finally finish my blog and get it out there a bit more. I am getting great traffic, but I can easily triple that with almost no work.
Spread the word.
I move for no man…
Edit/updates coming tonight.
Just another painful week.
I KNEW I had done too much on Wednesday with my lower body workout. I rushed the exercises and reduced the rest period in between sets, but I did not reduce the load. I actually increased it. I also did not have my PWO shake afterwards because we were out and away from home. The result was pain on Thursday, followed by extreme pain on Friday, crazy soreness on Saturday, and lingering tightness into early Sunday. Fun week. I tried several times to walk it out, but it was just too much.
So the first third of the week was awesome. The second third was flat (no exercise, but I ate well). The last two days finally caught up with me. No exercise, no clean eating. I even capped the week with two bowls of ice cream last night. Had I skipped that snack and jumped on the treadmill, I’d likely have made up for my gains from the week before.
As it was, I only lost 4.2 pounds.
This tells me several things. Last week wasn’t as bad as I had thought. And this week isn’t as good as the numbers indicate. The positive I take from all this is that I am in a narrow range (low 290’s) instead of jumping immediately back over 300 after a rather long period of blah, blah, blah days scattered with a few intense workouts. There is hope yet. I don’t mind a breather to recoup, refeed, and rethink my approach.
The negative is that I leave for Las Vegas in a few days. A very large part of me has already checked out this week, knowing I will be eating poorly in a few days. These few days won’t make a difference, right? Let the party begin now… I am already planning the massive workouts that will start the day we get back.
Ahh, whatever. The fact is that I DO have a few days before we leave, so every bit will help me as I try to minimize the gains over the next week or so. I’d LOVE to come back at the point I left. And to that end, I will be bringing my scale, not only for a weigh-in on Monday morning, but to gauge how fast I begin to climb. If I approach 300 again, I will have no choice but to cut my vacation from sanity early and hit it hard while still in Vegas. I want to avoid that, but I also want to be able to enjoy a vacation as well. Fine line.
Bottom line, I will never be 300 again. And that thought is so much stronger than my desire to have fun.
I am 34.6% complete. -30.4 pounds
Four months in…
Here are my stats for April 7, 2010:
CHEST 49.0″ (-.5″)
WAIST 58.0″ (+.25″)
HIPS 45.5″ (-.25″)
I am not thrilled with these results, evidenced by the post below.
Nothing more to say other than I am more determined than ever to produce better results on May 7th. As always, the weight loss is fine, but I gauge my success on the 7th of every month. And using that yardstick, it wasn’t a very successful March.
If tomorrow comes and I can actually walk (after tonight’s horrendous leg workout), I plan to subject my body to a double cardio session. I will feel it one way or another tomorrow.
Time to put up or shut up.
So pissed off tonight. I REALLY thought, despite the past week, I would crush my monthly measurements tonight. I had a weak update last month and was SURE I was about to roll off crazy inches from my body. Yeah, that didn’t happen. I actually GAINED in one of the categories.
I had GREAT workouts 15 of the last 31 days. Not an incredible percentage, and I know last week hurt me, but come on? How do I gain even the slightest bit in my waist? Yes, a quarter inch is NOTHING – easily attributable to simple margin of error using a tape measurement. I guess I just expected killer numbers, and these were flat at best.
I don’t need any comments on it. I get it. I don’t need someone to tell me how logically, it is not worth getting upset about. I need to use this anger to fuel me. I am going to CRUSH next month. Period. Anything less is an EPIC FAIL.
Along those lines, this afternoon I had one of the hardest lower body workouts yet this year. So brutal. We had about 90 minutes to kill during Ashley’s cheer practice, so we decided that we would sneak in a workout close to the cheer gym. I spent the first 20 minutes complaining that a group of 3 high school guys were rotating on the squat rack. On leg day, I use the squat rack for about 90% of my exercises. I was just about to give up when they left. I spent the remaining time doing crazy sets with very little rest in order to catch up. I actually may have pushed a bit too much. Instead of that wonderfully exhausted feeling I love, I had that AND the unpleasant pain that comes every time I stand up. A bit more actual discomfort than I wanted. If it weren’t for that pain, I’d probably be on the treadmill again tonight, just to punish my body more for the lack of results.
I refuse to scale back the fun planned for Vegas since we never get a chance to get out, and it’s been almost a year since we were able to live it up in MY town. However …I will work out like crazy while there. I am now hoping for a “push” on vacation – which is asking a lot.
Ahhhhhhhhh. I’m pissed. It’s on.
Ugh. Happy Easter.
What really can I say?
For whatever reason, I was so incredibly hungry this week. I think I had been a bit low in my calories recently, and it just caught up to me. I knew that I needed a re-feed of sorts, but I went way beyond that. I started out just gorging on healthy food, but once the workouts stopped on Tuesday, I gave up the fight. It’s not like I ate a box of donuts in one sitting, but we did eat out three times, first at Paradise Bakery, then Jack in the Box, and finally Wendy’s. Not good choices.
By that time, the chocolate began showing up in the house. It was all over once I began raiding the baskets that hadn’t even been given out yet. I think I bought Ashley THREE bunnies this year. I ate the first two over the course of the week. And it wasn’t even good chocolate. Sigh.
To be honest, I know the scale shows a 6.6 pound gain (which is awful), but a TON of that is water weight and will come right back off. That doesn’t mean it isn’t painful, but it is a comfort to see 2 pounds drop off in the first day as I exercised and ate well today.
Two steps forward and one step back. The important thing is that this lasted only a week, and I am back working hard already. Even with this pace, I will get there eventually. My only regret is that I didn’t wait until our upcoming Vegas trip in two weeks. I may have to cut back now as I don’t want another huge gain so close to this one. If wishes were gumdrops… Vegas is what it is.
My monthly measurements are in two days – not good timing.
I am 32.7% complete. -26.2 pounds
Well, I might as well get reacquainted with the blog before everything goes to hell. I was awful last week, period. Let’s forget that for just a minute as I update what matters - TODAY.
Incredible day. I was up at the gym before 9AM. I think that is a first for me – maybe EVER. The upside is that I was able to go with my wife. It was awesome lifting with her like we used to. I was able to add to every lift, especially the bench and overhead press. Having a spot made every bit the difference. The sharing of this journey and her support means everything. I walked out of there finally feeling the same exhaustion in my upper body that my legs have been enjoying as of late. Shaky, jello-y, sapped. All the good stuff.
I spent the rest of the day wondering why I couldn’t push myself out of chairs or open ketchup bottles.
Ahhh, the women at the gym in the morning. Wow. Besides the obvious reasons to enjoy that, it was incredibly motivating to see these girls working so hard at the weights, doing kettlebells, plyos, and other crazy complex movements. I can say that because 1. My wife rarely reads my blog for some reason and 2. She was every bit as hot and inspiring at they were. I REALLY enjoyed working out with her again. It’s my new Monday thing.
After seeing the women (and men) at the gym, it is no use trying to convince me that long bouts of cardio is the way to get in shape. Compare the girls on the treadmills to those in the weight area …no contest.