You're Doing It Wrong...

I have lost over 130 pounds, at the moment, counting recent slight regain (hopefully some of it muscle, as I am now lifting 1.5 - 2x what I was a month ago, overall.) I have fought my way, tooth and nail down from morbid obesity to slightly overweight. I know that the vast majority of people who lose large amounts of weight regain it, and then some. So I am paying lots of attention to other successful people's blogs, other success stories on the web. I need to focus, to plant my feet firmly in the grass, and hope to learn from others what works for them, choosing what makes sense for me.

I am noticing a disturbing trend recently. Many of these successful individuals, on a regular basis, point to other people's blogs, to their attitudes, beliefs, struggles, or to the myriad ways to lose weight, maintain or become more fit and say "You're doing it wrong!" This is disheartening to me.

Why? Well, for one thing, I know for a fact that what works for one does not work for another. You can stomp your feet and scream to the sky that your personal experience and/or your chosen brand of science supports this idea. It does not matter how nastily or confidently you state this. My personal experience does not bear this out.

I tried switching out beans for meat protein, for example, eating LESS calories but matching protein amounts and found myself gaining massive fat around the middle, while many people claim that just the opposite happens for them. My friend lost weight doing this, I did not. I was scrupulously honest in my approach. I do not have time to mess around with denial. I wish to change my body composition for the better, and beans did not work. For me.

I lost my weight my own way, a particular method which many people say is wrong. But I'm still here, still ex-obese for the first time in my entire life. I'm still reaching for the body that I want, adapting my lifestyle, working hard. I've seen many people who lost it the "right" way who are struggling, who regained some or all of their weight, and some who did so and disappeared from the blogging world forever and ever. I do not blame them or their methods of losing or maintaining weight. We are all in this together. Sometimes tragedy overwhelms us, or life has a different lesson to teach us just then. I only miss them and wish them well, not feeling any bitterness towards people in those circumstances. I have lost and regained before. I have spun off the track before. I understand how it can go. Many of the greatest success stories have lost and regained before, like Sean from The Daily Diary of a Winning Loser. What matters is that you keep trying.

Another example of "You're doing it wrong" I see a lot is accusing others of a bad attitude. Man, your life is not my life is not his life is not her life. We all need to be supportive of others and understand that they have daily circumstances and life experiences that have shaped them in very different ways than your own. Yeah, there is such a thing as a bad attitude, but pointing to someone or even to people in general and mocking them for their attitude is not going to help, and seems to me the worst attitude of all. Modeling good attitudes, such as finding joy in everyday life, of finding the motivation and strength to live well, of caring for oneself, not tearing down others to make one's self feel better is probably a gazillion times more helpful. Yes, I see the irony here...I'm guilty of criticizing right here and now. But my criticism is of this mean-spirited crap I keep seeing, not the person's own daily struggles. Nobody is always happy/in the groove/motivated. NOBODY.

I accept that each and every one of us has a unique voice, our own way of doing things, methods and struggles and philosophies. What I do not think is constructive is the negativity, the smug know-it-all-ness that points to other people's blogs and says "FAIL." You can choose to blog that way, but I will probably never follow you or un-follow you in the near future. Maybe some people need to hear these negative messages to be motivated, but that's pretty much the opposite of what I've learned about human psychology. It only makes me sick to my stomach when I start to hear that condescension come out. Yet I do see people jumping in together to be nasty, to point to others and mock. It feels so...high school. It feels like a failure to evolve.

I am inspired by other people's inspiration. That's what I find infectious. When they eloquently state what got them going, what keeps them going now, despite all odds. When they celebrate their victories, their beautiful transformation. When they speak honestly about their own struggles, or even when they struggle with their own honesty but keep talking about it. Who amongst us doesn't deceive ourselves, from time to time? No matter what methods each of us choose about eating and exercising and living life, we all have things we can learn from one another. We can support one another. It doesn't mean that we endorse that other person's particular method, that our own is invalid. Your own success and joy and light will attract far more converts to your way than "You're Doing It Wrong" could ever hope to. I would hope.

Shoulders Pressed! Success!

Okay, today was upper body super fantastic lift heavy things day! (Otherwise known as Ocaam's Protocol Workout A from the 4 Hour Body book, by Tim Ferriss.) Previously, in last week's upper body super fantastic lift day, I failed to meet my minimum reps (one rep or less than 7) for the ever dreaded shoulder press, by half a freaking rep, at 40 pounds. It was the first time I didn't make the minimum. Though this sort of thing is not unexpected, especially at such a low starting weight, and there's a whole procedure to follow based on that.

Tonight I was filled with nervous anticipation as to whether or not I'd be able to hit minimum reps at the same weight. Would failing last week doom me to failing this week? Does lifting to failure always spur significant muscle gain?

So today I set it at 40 and tried again. I got there, but JUST...7.5 reps, to be exact! Hurray! This is TWICE the weight I first lifted to failure just over three weeks ago! Fantastic.

The fact that I got there this week really speaks to me about the incredible efficiency of this workout. ONE set of 7+ slow (5 count up/5 count down) lifts to absolute shaking groaning shuddering failure, with slow lowering of the weight even after that, plus adequate protein intake and rest, CAN spur a shocking amount of strength/muscle gain.Things only the weightlifters know, I guess!

Pounded the pull-down, 100 pounds x 11.5 reps today! I should be doing 120 by the end of the six weeks I set out for myself. I know these weights are still weenie in the weightlifting world, but for me, excellent real progress. I dicked around in the weight room for so long without every actually making any progress, so this is AWESOME.

It's hard to not to want to keep going, but I really want to switch to a more functional/fat burning fitness routine for a little while, that still uses weight training but involves MORE ACTUAL EXERCISE. Don't get me wrong, after we do our two lifts plus the abs, we are very tired and very hungry. It's hard work! But lifting a little bit twice a week, plus whatever walking we do is building muscle but not much functionality, nor are we losing fat. I chose this way to try and add a bunch of muscle very quickly. 

Just over halfway through, I can see a big difference.  My calves are getting definition. My biceps are insane. I can lift to failure much more than previously. It is totally, totally working.Theory is, this will help up my metabolism so that my body is burning more calories all the time, and so that I am stronger and more able to handle a higher level of exercise. Time will tell if this is effective in that regard, too. Mixing it up is supposed to be good for you, and I believe it. I think I'll cycle back to this kind of routine periodically, because it's easy and it's fun and I like getting stronger. Yes indeedy.

Tonight, I also added weights to my myotatic crunches. You do those on a Bosu (half) ball, supposedly more effective than a regular crunch. (I went to look for a video, and couldn't remember the name, put in "metastatic crunch." As in spreading tumors. That did NOT give me the results I was looking for!) I LOVED holding weights for those. I felt like they were getting too easy before. Just little two pound weights, but it kind of felt stabilizing or something. Next time, three pound weights!

As for the planks...weirdly, I could not meet my time from a few days ago! Should we be taking a week off between those, too? We're currently doing them every workout, twice a week. I could only hold my front and side planks for 30 seconds today, and last Wednesday I could do 45! I could only figure the struggle to get to my shoulder press minimum wore me out. Or that we really should rotate something different in instead, every other time. Ferriss suggests we do kettlebell swings every other time, but we're not trained for that. We will not have trainer money until we get back from L.A. and get paid again, three weeks down the road from now. And I don't want to pull my arms out of my sockets by accident so much.

But kettlebell IS next. I feel like a gym grown-up or something. Using the machines where you have to load your own weights on, instead of setting them with a pin, doing planks, using the bosu ball. Next will be swinging kettlebells and maybe even things like deadlifts and squats and pull-ups! Free weight and body weight exercises! Very exciting. Also, they offer a beginner's pilate's class once a week, want to hit that then too. It's a brave new exercise world.

Lastly, the belly roll has officially shrunk some, though the weight has only gone down a little. I feel like I can wear my tight Threadless day of the dead t-shirt again without being too self-conscious. I'm going to carry on with the no-alcohol (except tomorrow is the ONE day off from that, two glasses of wine and a few extra non-starchy carbs for metabolism boost, and all of that is under strict control), low-carb, no dairy, no messing around diet. Today, I decided I'm not losing fast enough and am cutting out nuts for the rest of the week too. L.A. clubbing is arriving too fast! Those skinny bitches will eat me alive! (I kid, it will all be fine.) But I seriously want to go feeling the best I can.

Beans, beans, the magical fruit?

Ok, so I really want to try and cut down on the burgeoning belly fat. Last night I went out, and my poor fancy shirt's buttons were shuddering under the strain of it al. This new gain is bumming me out. Gonna go whole hog on the Slow Carb, from Tim Ferriss' "4 Hour Body", instead of half-assing it. No more fruit/nuts/cheese except Saturday Cheat Day, as is prescribed. And now, checking to see if, as Ferriss claims, beans is the magic key to unlocking success with this new diet.

Added beans into my daily dietary mix this morning. A and I shared a can of black beans from Trader Joe's along with our sausage.

Considering how much gastrointestinal distress they have caused me in the past, I realized I had forgotten to procure any bean digestive aids along the way. Ferriss recommends rinsing the canned beans to get rid of the oligosaccharides that are soaked out in the liquid, but I like the liquid from black beans. I remembered reading somewhere that there were some food ingredients you could add to beans to help digest the oligosaccharides. A quick google search lead me to Wikipedia, of all places:

"Many edible beans, including broad beans and soybeans, contain oligosaccharides (particularly raffinose and stachyose), a type of sugar molecule also found in cabbage. An anti-oligosaccharide enzyme is necessary to properly digest these sugar molecules. As a normal human digestive tract does not contain any anti-oligosaccharide enzymes, consumed oligosaccharides are typically digested by bacteria in the large intestine. This digestion process produces flatulence-causing gases as a byproduct.^[12][13] This aspect of bean digestion is the basis for the children's rhyme "Beans, Beans, the Musical Fruit".

So THAT would explain my extreme stomach discomfort and gas with both beans and anything cruciferous. I had to stop eating broccoli for many years. Also, I always remembered that rhyme as "Beans, beans the MAGICAL fruit." Am I mistaken? Skipping down:

"In many cuisines beans are cooked along with natural carminatives such as anise seeds, coriander seeds and cumin. Other strategies include soaking beans in water for several hours before mixing them with other ingredients to remove the offending sugars. Sometimes vinegar is added, but only after the beans are cooked as vinegar interferes with the beans' softening."

Score! I rifled through the spice cabinet (yes, a whole cabinet devoted to spices, haha!) and found the cumin, tossing in generous amounts. Threw in a few capfuls of apple cider vinegar. Stirred and tested...Tasty! It's been about 3 1/2 hours, now...so far, so good! Stomach not rumbling, no gas pain. Knock on wood! And they taste really good. Like, too good to be good for me good. Let's hope not.

Beans are, by nature, starchy. Up til now, I've avoided them for many years, on that basis. I didn't eat them on the Specific Carbohydrate Diet that I followed to fix my gut, successfully, a decade ago. I mostly avoided them on "The Zone," and I lost 80 pounds at that time (before eventually regaining, and then some.) I was told not to eat them on many phases of the HCG diet that most recently dropped me out of obesity. But Ferriss recommends eating them on his Slow Carb Diet, with the theory that they are digested slowly because of all the fiber, thus avoiding spiking the insulin while adding valuable protein. I need protein from less caloric sources than the enormous piles of fatty meat I've been chowing down to meet the Occam's Protocol protein requirements. He also claims they stop hunger, which I think I agree with, so far. Was craving food a LOT before on my half-assed version of Slow Carb, especially fruit. Today, not at all.

I need to add more veggies to the mix, though. I should steam broccoli and cauliflower and things of that sort more often. It's hard for me to picture my salads without the cheese, fruit, nuts, minimal dressing (though I already use dressing with NO sweeteners and fairly low calorie counts, such as Trader Joe's Tuscany Italian). I want like crazy for goat cheese to be okay, buuuuut it's probably not. He says no dairy at all.

I've already cut out the milk I was using for my protein shakes, substituting Trader Joe's unsweetened almond milk instead. Amazingly, it tastes so much less sweet! Apparently I could TASTE the sweetness of the lactose in the whole milk. 13 carbs per cup! The almond milk has 2 grams of carbs, less than 1 of sugar. The downside of this switch, almond milk has 1 gram of protein, vs. 8 grams in whole milk. But 40 calories rather than a whopping 150 per cup in the milk. Sooooo...to comply with Slow Carb and give my waistline a chance, no milk, no cheese (sob!), no yogurt, no fun.

But I should give this a decent shot to see if my waistline comes back under control while I continue trying to gain muscle. Thanks for bearing with my current floundering. So hard to leave a method that worked and find a new way towards my goals. We'll see how this goes!

Saturday Cheat Day

Food porn warning! Read at your own peril!

So I'm supposed to cycle carbs in and up my calories one day a week, in order to trick my body into going "Hey! Look at that! We're eating a bunch of rich-ass food! I guess we don't have to hang on to every ounce of fat we're given after all." Why did I write that in plural? Perhaps I was imagining the teeming hordes of my fat cells speaking? Also, psychologically speaking, this seems a sound strategy. Keeps you from exploding into binge-y crazyland. So I sally forth, ready for piggy goodness to ensue. Though practically speaking, going for mostly low-carb-but-carbier-than-allowed-on-other-days options.

Supposed to kick off with protein, so I went straight to the Jarrow Brown Rice Protein Powder and organic whole milk. Trying to use up the last of that milk and switch to something a little less carb-y for future protein powder consumption. Then I made coffee and started cooking my newly discovered Fluffy Coconut Flour Pancakes. Ohhhhhh myyyyyyy! (Yes, you SHOULD imagine George Takei saying this.) They are OBSCENELY delicious. Dare I say, better than wheat flour pancakes? I dare! That is a picture above stolen from the recipe site's page, Nourishing Days. Thank you thank you thank you for this recipe! I got there via a post on Mark's Daily Apple, which is also an awesome site on Primal eating and fitness, which I would say most closely aligns with what want to eat and do for the rest of my life when I am done experimenting with 4 Hour Body stuff. In case you never heard of it.

In my version, I used up more of the whole milk, as I am fresh out of coconut milk, and a tablespoon of honey as the sweetener. Also, I subbed aluminum-free baking powder in for the baking soda by accident, but they were so fluffy and delicious, that is now part of MY recipe. I cut up strawberries and washed some blueberries and heated some honey in a jar in a pan of water to make it extra pourable, and stuck all that plus some grass fed butter on the hot cakes before eating. Also, we had some porkalicious uncured organic sausage. Excellent breakfast achieved.

This all will go pretty well with the heavy lifting scheduled for today, so that we don't bonk. Tonight, we do Workout B numero dos! I am guessing and hoping and begging the universe that without the added stresses of calibration, the leg press won't leave me with a bad case of the Peg Leg for the next few days, like last time. Though again, that got better shockingly fast, compared to the sheer amount of pain I was in (trust me, I'm no pain wimp, either. Kind of the opposite, actually. But I don't want to hurt myself, so I listen to my body!)

SOOOO excited to see what I can lift this week. I really really really hope my legs and chest press are gonna show massive strength gain like Workout A did this week. I haven't been this psyched to go to the gym, um, EVER. Love Occam's Protocol. I know I will need to switch to more functional fitness later, including way more conditioning, but in the meantime, this is really fun.

After the workout? Sushi!!!!! I love sushi, and I never get to have it because of the rice. (Sashimi, while awesome, is just NOT the same.) I love salmon nigiri, ono nigiri, amoebi (raw nigiri with the heads tempura fried separately!), ohitashi, spider rolls. Oh happy day. I am doing the snoopy dance thinking about this. Also, possibly beer. Which I am also crazy for and never get to have. So these are the actual very carby treats that I'm going for today.

Lastly, A and I and a dear friend/roommate have been talking over the issues with gaining muscle and fat gain. While we will try to be careful, maybe add in some more leaner meat meals, and stay off the fruits most days, we've decided we will not kill ourselves to try and lean out during this time period. We're going to try to minimize fat gain, but not freak the F out. I can see I've gained a LITTLE around the waist, too. But I'm not going to risk not putting on enough muscle due to protein deprivation, nor am I going to restrict myself to nothing but bland lean meats and steamed broccoli. I think that mostly staying off fruit, completely staying off sugar and grains and starch 6 days a week is deprivation enough. I am not a fitness model. I am a (semi-) normal human being with a normal weight, trying to gain some muscle for my sports of choice, hiking, scrambling, open water swimming, and continued weightlifting fun times. And to try and up my metabolism, after dieting it into the freaking ground.

After this 6 week period, I will start intense conditioning, lots of hiking and kettlebell swinging and try to cut fat down through diet for a little while. It will be spring. I'm guessing it will come pretty naturally, without having to stuff that much protein down my craw every day.

I know I'm see-sawing a bit here. Hard to overcome that panicky feeling of seeing minor gains after losing so very much weight. Just have to remember, I am WORLDS away from what I used to be, 2 1/2 years ago. For instance, I haul my ass into the gym on a regular basis. I take 4 - 6 mile walks without even thinking twice about it. We don't even have junk food in the house, a fact that lead our roommate to comment on how he's been naturally losing weight because that crap is never around. We cook all of our meals completely from scratch, and naturally reach for meat and veggie options only at restaurants. My ass occasionally fits into single digit clothing (though that is clearly size inflation.) Time to stop freaking out and live.

Peg-Leg Update

Okay, no longer peg-legging my way around town, so even though there is still soreness in my left thigh, it is well within manageable post-workout soreness levels, the third day after the overuse injury now. Will still probably bump back leg presses for a day or two to make certain that the muscle is fully recovered, but that's totally fine. Pleased with my speed of healing, based on how painful that was even just yesterday, to be sure!

Going to do Workout A (upper body only) for the second time in a few hours, and I'm really psyched, actually. It will be fun to see if I netted any strength gains since last week. By the monster growth I've seen in my arms, I'm guessing yes! This is the acid test...does this heavy lift to failure minimum rep thing really really work? Can't wait to find out!

Eating protein like a crazy carnivore. My hunger levels have been through the roof. I wonder if my healing overuse injury is begging for more protein than usual. Think I'll go drink another protein powder shake to see if I can quiet the beast for a minute. My weight is slightly up, but Tim Ferriss predicts a 2.5 pound muscle gain per week, minimum, no matter who you are, girl, boy, hard-gainer or not, by following Occam's Protocol, and this gain is just less than that. I am not gonna let the scale freak me out right now. It's not about that. My clothes seem to be fitting the same, except I can see massive muscular gains in my arms, which is crazytown! So time to keep chilling...will re-measure in a week, halfway through the protocol, to see what's happening all over, body composition wise. If the scale is edging up and it's all muscle, that's great. If not, we'll have to revisit diet - see below.

My mood is back up again. It's been mostly crazy up (as has been my libido!) since a few weeks after going back to eating normal amounts of food, taking the AGG/PAG/CQ stack (see previous posts for more info), taking vitamin D again and getting exercise. It's very hard to tease out exactly what is helping, but I'm glad something is.

I know this morning's rant about angry people seems...angry. I think I overloaded on the toxicity of so much of it at once. It made me kind of nauseous. And again, don't get me wrong, nothing wrong with being angry, even if someone is angry with me! Especially with me. I get angry, everyone does, it's important. It's all in how you deal with it. Do you stew in it, rage with it, take it out on other people? Or do you use it to see something is wrong, state your case, stand your ground calmly and try to negotiate a better life? At least my mood bobbed back up pretty quickly. I just needed to vent and move on. One more thing to remember about how your problems do not magically disappear when you reach a normal weight. In case you didn't know.

Tried on clothes for a second whilst running errands. Simultaneously awesome and depressing. Skinny-fat sucks. I am now so amazingly small, overall, but so...bulgy. I ended up buying nothing. Sometimes clothes look so freaking hot on me, but they really have to be the right ones. I know that now is the time to be patient, gain the muscle that is going to give me more definition and shift my metabolism more to fat-burning. Patience now is key. I may have to stay out of dressing rooms a little longer...

Lastly...I feel a little at sea about my diet right now. I know I need to be taking in 1.25 grams of protein/pound of lean body mass during this massive muscle gain phase. Do I need to be limiting my fats to keep from gaining? So much conflicting information. I'm supposed to be limiting my carbs to near nil except one day a week, and I am, though I am reluctant to completely give up fruit 6 days out the week as Ferriss recommends. I like an apple and almonds as a snack, but it's against my religion, apparently, right now. I am NOT limiting myself to lean protein at all. Eating roast chicken with skin, ribeye steaks, shrimp, salmon, butter, cream, occasional goat cheese. Some people seem to think that will work better for me, some think it's a recipe for disaster. This is kind of hard. Also, tired of severe restriction after many years on and off of that. Guess I just have to experiment and see what happens. Again, starting in April, cutting/functional fitness/more cardio-oriented phase may help tremendously.

Edit - one last thought for the day: I am not a religious-type person, so I was puzzled when I first saw this middle-aged lady crossing the street with what looked like some kind of junk smeared across her forehead. It was the second one that I saw in Target that produced my startling realization that it was in fact, Ash Wednesday, and these ladies were taking it quite seriously, which is cool by me, just not accustomed to it. Right after my revelation, I overheard this kid one aisle over: "She has ice cream on her head!" I totally busted up.

Happy Ice-Cream-Head Wednesday!

Heavy Lifting Heaven

Warning - I intend to spend this post effusively babbling about my first time discoveries of the joys and challenges of lifting heavy things to failure. If you find this boring because you couldn't be less interested in anything that banal OR stupidly cute but ultimately boring because you've been LIFTING HEAVY THINGS FOR YEARS, feel free to close this blog and move along to somebody much more amusing/informative/productive, like doing your taxes or playing Angry Birds or checking your Facebook. I will understand.

Okay, today was part deux (or rather, workout B) of our first week of Occam's Protocol, a workout routine from Tim Ferriss' "4 Hour Body" designed to produce massive lean muscle gain. I needz to cure my skinnyfat! (See last post for WTF that means.) Let me tell you, this workout KICKED MY ASS. If you had any doubt in the slightest that only two different lifts and a little ab work with NO cardio, not even any circuit work could leave you shaky and unable to make it down a set of stairs without clinging to a railing, you would be WRONG. So very wrong.

Holy crap. Where do I even start? The first session of both workouts A and B involve calibration, where you move up incrementally through what you think you could lift to what you can lift to failure, using a certain cadence/reps/rest time. And THEN you figure out a percentage of your last complete set, wait 3 minutes, and do your regular set to failure, as you will from now on. So I do think these first workouts kick your ass twice over. But WOW.

A and I got help from the gym manager dude that I love so much. He's young, super muscular, definitely a jock, yet he's got a kind face, a truly good heart and is so freaking sweet. I can't tell you how much I appreciate him. We were chatting with him tonight, and he said both of us shouldn't lose ANY MORE weight. He said now we can just take our time, enjoy the process of making slow and steady progress toning and eating and drinking and enjoying life. I wanted to smooch him, right then and there. Good guy.

The incline bench press is not one of the automatic machines that we are accustomed to. You have to set your own free weights on the posts, instead of positioning a pin. It actually had a ton of adjustments you could make.  I can't tell you why, but these things intimidated the hell out of both of us. Perhaps it's the nerdy fear of what I like to term "jockspace" that possesses us both (A is a big somewhat muscle-y dude naturally from his Viking heritage, but he's actually a big softy nerd like me.) Anyways, supersweet gym manager dude showed us all about how to use it, and was so encouraging.

I am ridiculously weak on these machines, despite my mildly impressive girly-biceps. It seems like all that time spent at the gym working out inefficiently plus dieting drastically (though under medical supervision and with urgent medical purpose) without being able to work out left me weak as a kitten. But I don't care. Everybody has to start somewhere. So, on the incline chest press, my post-calibration weight was only 20 pounds. Lord. But...you do it SLOWLY. Extremely slowly. By 5 reps, my arms were shaking. The set is supposed to be 7, but I failed at 8.5 reps. This is great! Perfect. If you calibrated correctly, you need to be only surpassing your minimum set by a couple reps at most.

Failure. It means true failure. Shaking, grunting, trying to force that weight up millimeter by millimeter, feeling sick with effort. Not giving up until you've held it there as long as you can, until you feel it giving way and dropping, then striving to slow the descent so that it takes at least a full five seconds until the weight stack clacks down. I love it. And that is the only rep that really counts, according to Ferriss and probably many many others. That is the rep that causes massive overload, and triggers muscle building. I never knew. Let me tell you one thing: damned hard work, but so much less hard work than fast rep after nearly useless rep of low-medium weights for years and year. That may have built me up some, given me some aerobic capacity. But this. This is doing years' worth of hard work, all at once. The efficiency is glorious!

We also did the incline leg press. We figured this one out on our own (Sweety-jock was on the elliptical, didn't want to bother him.)  It took a LONG time for figure out our calibration weights, and mine ended up being 100 pounds. But wow, 10 rep minimum, and I made it to 11.5. Perfect, awesome, and neither A nor I were able to walk after. He actually staggered when he got up, in a faux-drunken semi-circle. It was astounding how weak we were after that.

We did some ab work and discovered that the super efficient (read HARD) ab work Ferriss prescribed probably should only be done ONCE A WEEK like the other lifts on this protocol. Ferris did say to only do that with workout A, and that workout B had optional kettlebell work, but since neither of us feel ready to swing a kettlebell without professional help, we decided to try an ab repeat. I discovered I didn't have full muscle recovery from last time. I probably shouldn't have, but I pushed though anyway. I'll have to figure out something to do in the meantime.

Oh! But there ARE kettlebells at my gym, after all! Last time, I thought there weren't but we were shown where they are hidden. So I don't have to leave my happy gym after all! Hurrah!

We did eventually leave the gym for the night, and tried to walk down the outdoors stairs to the car. Our legs FAILED us. Literally failed us. We both had to cling to the railings to make it down safely. It was actually scary. And we were ravenous by the time we got in and out of Whole Foods with our roast chicken and assorted necessities. Note to self: ALWAYS have a Larabar in the car.

Lastly, I know this is going to sound insane, but...within a day or two of "Workout A", last Thursday, we could SEE a difference in our arms. Unbelievable. This smack really does work. Can't wait to see how quickly we gain some muscle. In April, we will hopefully be able to pay for some training and switch to a more functional fitness workout involving swinging balls and something called a Turkish Get Up (yes, I'm that adolescent that these things amuse me.) Which, apparently, besides whittling my waist and give me Michelle Obama arms is supposed to build up my now sadly flattened butt. Just in time for swimsuit season.

Now I must slather Arnica gel pre-emptively over the entirety of my body. This is based on the fact that I failed to after Workout A and was almost immobilized by happy-good-awesome-post workout soreness for two days after. Knowing is half the battle. But I couldn't be happier to be sore in my life. These workouts are working, and I feel focused and ready to keep pushing into a new phase of fitness and normal life.

Thanks for tuning in.

Edit: fixed typos!

Quickie, Quickie, No Longer Sickie

Feeling so much better today. The drama-free zone has worked wonders. Ignored another possible family drama-filled missive (until tomorrow - I think I can handle it then just fine.)  Just a chill weekend spent with friends and taking care of home and work.

Yesterday, I worked a little, then went to my friend's art show yesterday, ate cheese, drank wine, never touched cracker one! A triumph. Also went to nibbly dinner with a few friends after, again, they had NO carb-free options, but we made it work, just ate cheese and veggies and some roast beef and more wine. We are the champions!

Am still getting high off the compliments, as I am currently the skinniest that most of my friends have seen me. People calling me sexy and hot makes me squeal. Are you freaking kidding me? I hardly can even hear that. Someday that will end. Perhaps when I stop being a stranger and everyone gets used to (tired of) my ass being around all the time again. :)

That's the plan, too. I will never shut myself off from humanity, never severely limit my life in the name of weight loss again. I don't think I will have to. I am forever grateful to what I've obtained through the extreme self-control, sacrifice, and medical gift that I was given, but I can see a better way for me now that I've achieved this level of health and incredible lightness (for me.)

I had to work ALL DAY today to make up for being sick, but that's okay. I am giddy with excitement of the return of normalcy. Leaving behind the sadness/depression of the last week's family madness, and the resulting illness. Setting my new fitness/diet plans in motion. Especially lifting heavy things to build up arms and other body parts worthy of fighting off Terminators. (As you do.) Having a concrete plan for seeing friends EVERY week, at least TWICE a week. Low carbing during the week, one day a week carby refeed to upregulate the ol' metabolism. Tricksy science! I love it! Just getting as happy and healthy and kick-ass as possible.

My eating has been very very light today. I am glad about that, because I felt I was eating a lot before, although I've been steadily losing the weight I bounced up to after the Midwest fiasco-I-mean trip all week. (Some of it was probably water, but obviously not all, since the high water mark of my girth has been receding rather slowly.) Glad of it, anyways, I feel in control and just really, dare I say it...normal! Hurray!

Kick-Ass Mofo in 3...2...1..

Turning the corner on being sick. Finally some energy, and only a little sneezing.

Family drama continues. Email from a relative full-on defending the neglect of my little 3rd cousin. Phone argument with another relative about their "scorched earth policy"/abusive rage whenever they get angry or upset. Very hard conversations, indeed. I stood my ground while being as compassionate and diplomatic as possible. I don't want to contribute to drama, but I'm not putting up with abuse, either, which is defacto endorsement of continued drama.

But I am stepping back, letting go. The next two days, I have declared my house a drama-free zone. No email or phone calls will be honored, except an absolute emergency. Just dedicated to working/recovery from illness and stress.

Weigh-in this morning, am up 4 pounds from before the extremely stressful family trip to the Midwest. Hmmm. :/

Deciding not to freak out, though. Just up my physical activity. Continue to eat as Primal as possible. Take my supplements. See where this gets me over the next few weeks. Really looking forward to lifting again. It always gives me good results. My biceps are deflating, they used to blow my friends and family away. I had some serious Sarah Conner guns going on. This will not do!

This morning we decided to have some coconut flour pancakes, with eggs, coconut milk, strawberries, a little honey/xylitol to sweeten. They were really good, but I think I need to eat sausage along with, for more protein. And some veggies of some sort. I'll get it down. I'm doing so already.

Watched Kill Bill 1 again last night. Uma Thurman inspires me. I want to be able to kick some ass, too. Also in love with Lucy Liu, she made me wish I had freckles! And Vivica Fox, my god, what a body. I don't need to be uber-skinny, but I do want to be muscled and agile like them. Phase 1 - escape from obesity (to borrow a phrase from one of my favorite bloggers) is ovah! Phase 2 - become a kick-ass mofo, commencing!

Post-Traumatic Trip Disorder

Wow, that was quite a trip. Literally, and figuratively.

I got to see my Grandma again. For that I am eternally grateful. She is in MUCH better shape than my one sister reported, but is very frail and probably not long for this world. She made it abundantly clear that she's ready to go as we were leaving. That has been very rough to process. I've had to grieve many lost years of contact. I'm trying to forgive myself for my phobias, accept that I did what I had to in dealing with an extremely dysfunctional and abusive family, and move forward. It's very painful, but necessary work.

I did not have to deal with the sociopath family member that scares me so, but there was a LARGE chance that he might show up, especially toward the end. The aunt fell down and broke her shoulder. We took her to the hospital, but we had to leave to get my sister to her flight, and he was called. My  sister and I ended up having a panic attack about it, because we were delayed in leaving, and he might show at any moment. We escaped, but I literally had a pounding heart and a near total freak-out.

In other news, the child was not actively abused in front of us, but is sorely neglected and in dire need of people who can care for him the way he needs. My Grandma is too old, the aunt, also too old and grouchy. Still don't know what really happened, many conflicting stories, but I do believe he was abused by that woman. He shouldn't be there. His dad is a total waste of space who pees in buckets in the basement of my Grandma's house where he lives and doesn't help the two old ladies or look after the child at all, except to drop off McDonald's. I heard horrific stories about abuse and near starvation of the child in the past. A and I took him out a LOT, and he responded very well. We are determined to stay in contact and try to help him see that there is more to the world. Let him know that somebody gives a damn about him. A fixed up a dozen things in the house that could have easily been handled by the basement bum. We are pretty angry at him, though I know he had essentially the same story as the child - abused, abandoned, neglected, raised by my Grandma, who was already old then.

So many sad stories. So much pain and loss and cycles of neglect and abuse. My Grandma is so frail and tired and sick. There is more, but I don't want to talk about it here. Suffice to say, the stress level was extremely high. A and I got a chance to decompress by ourselves in Chicago for a day. Nice, but freezing cold. We saw a lone coyote lope along the beach in the middle of the city. We processed and cried and resolved to help however we could. We did see some of the town, and tried to enjoy ourselves a little. But it was a very tough trip. Mostly I am glad that I could bring any peace and joy to myself and my Grandma.

Came home Tuesday night, yesterday and now today, sick as a dog. Fever, head stuffed, nose running, headache, sore throat. No surprises there. Extreme stress, travel, eating sugar and other bad foods, freezing cold temperatures I should have avoided. A made me chicken soup yesterday, the sweetheart.

Food has been the least of my worries. I didn't totally go crazy, and I did NOT overeat, of which I am proud, but I certainly ate many little doses of carbs.  Some because that's what my aunt served us, which would have been rude and awful to turn down. These people have next to nothing. I happened to get my TOM while on the trip, so that made me very hungry, and I craved chocolate. I also ate to comfort myself while trying to process everything, in the airport, and on the way home on the airplane. I ate the crackers that came with the cheese for several meals, half the bread that came with a sandwich in the airport bar that had nothing else, a beer because it was what I wanted, a couple girl scout cookies that A bought, some ice cream at Bonnie Doon's.

I've done much worse in the past, but no excuses. I know what I chose to do. I realize that I have not been respecting Phase 3. But then, this last round was a farce as I am convinced the HCG never kicked in right because my doctor tried to reformulate the dose and it didn't ever seem to stop the hunger or make me feel like I did in the past. I am not worrying about it today. When I am over being sick, back to work. Primal diet, heavy weight workouts, walking every other day. I did take Tim Ferris' 4 Hour Body PAGG and CQ supplement stacks the whole time to try and minimize the damage. Will have to see how that worked, if at all, when I weigh myself. Gonna give it one more day for the water weight to come down, it usually takes at least 2 or 3 days for that to happen post-carbs for me.

Wish I could see my counselor, but that's not until Tuesday. I need to call my Grandma's, talk to the child to let him know we are not abandoning him, let her know we're all right. There are two other fairly stressful family things going on that I need to deal with. I don't think I can talk about them here because of the possibility of who is reading. It's hard, because I'm already so stressed and sick. I want to stop avoiding things, but I don't know what I have the strength to deal with right now. My whole family seems really messed up. I feel like the only one that is functioning even close to normally, except my brother. I am accepting this on a very fundamental level, but it's really fucking sad. I know I have things to grieve, and that stuffing my sad feelings would be bad. But I can't wait until I can feel happy about something again. Right now I feel as though I'm at the stringy end of a long hard winter. Desperate for the spring to bring some light and warmth my way.

Zombie Blog Comes Alive

So, I didn't mean to abandon my blog. Looking back at the posts, I can see why I did.

Overly verbose.

Obsessive.

I actually had to stop reading the blogs for a while, also, for a number of reasons. I have problems with internet addiction, to be sure. Addictive personality that latches on to anything to avoid pain and problems.

But I am losing weight again. I am learning to be more honest and succinct. I appreciate the other bloggers who are out there, laying it on the line day after day. I wanted to tell any of you that care that I haven't given up, and neither should you.

I feel I've come a long way in the last year and a half. The weight loss has been a slow process. I did have to take some time off, because I needed some time to just live and breathe and not worry about it. I regained some, but not a lot, in the grand scheme of things. Recently re-tackled it all, and now I'm down to a lifetime low, and am according to the silly BMI numbers, no longer in the "Overweight" category. This isn't the truth, however, I still have some excess body fat that clearly needs to go. Which is fine, I'm currently working on it.

I'm about to ditch my current method of weight loss for good. The rounds of HCG did get me from morbidly obese to "normal." I'm looking at a number of other models. 4 Hour Body, Lean Gains, or just plain Paleo eating, plus increased activity. I feel I need to take the activity and exercise to the next level, or it will be forever backsliding and trying to regain lost ground.

I'm dreaming of hiking to Camp Muir, the climbing camp on Mount Rainier at over 10,000 feet. We were going to take the Alpine Scrambling course offered by the Mountaineers to prepare for that, but could not afford it this year. Instead, we're planning on snowshoeing classes and training hikes starting mid-late February, as soon as I get off this round. This will not get us ready for Camp Muir, as I believe we need the navigation and safety training to safely cross the Muir Snowfield, but I do believe we will take some epic hikes this summer.

Lastly, it would seem that my paternal Grandma has probably not got long to live. Due to a complicated abusive family situation, we have been kept apart mostly for 20 years or more. I miss her and feel terrible about it. I am thinking about throwing caution to the wind, going out to see her despite the issues involved. I talked to her yesterday and cried for quite a while afterwards. I may have to abandon my current protocol to do so, as just for this particular protocol it's honestly too difficult to follow while traveling. Which is really tough, because my doctor will not allow me to go back on it for a year, and I don't plan to, ever. I am scared I won't be able to shed the 13 pounds or so I want to without it. But I am more scared that I will never get to see her again. Weight loss is not worth a lifetime of regret.

This has been a deeply emotionally trying time. The last few years I have worked really hard to learn to face my fears and stop avoiding painful things, and now I really must face up to this, too.

Another Great Lyn Post

Controversial

Lyn of Escape from Obesity has been a blogger that I am consistantly blown away by, and this post rocks.  She staunchly defends the right to find what works for you and stick to it.  I'm 100% behind her, even though how I lose weight is different.  Great job, Lyn.

The Journey So Far

Hello blogosphere.  I've blogged a little on this subject so far, but decided that a reboot was in order, keeping my weight loss and other aspects of my life in separate places.  So here I am, and I'd like to talk about the journey so far.

My highest recorded weight was 295, over 2 years ago now, though I may have been near that or even exceeded it several times during the last few decades as I've yo-yo'd up and down the scale.  I have been overweight or obese since I was a toddler.  In my case, I believe it has been a combination of lots of things.  I have a genetic condition called Congenital Adrenal Hyperplasia causing endocrine system imbalances leading to auto-immune problems, digestive problems, muscle and joint problems, and more, and I think that's the biggest issue.  I also grew up on southern cooking/heavily processed low nutrition foods and was punished for not cleaning my plate.  Additionally, I suffered severe childhood abuse of several varieties which lead to emotional eating and other bad food consumption practices, which was definitely a big factor.  Don't get me wrong, I take full responsibility for where I'm at now and know that it's up to me to make the necessary changes to lose weight.  It has taken decades of being on my own as an adult to puzzle all this out and find my way back to the highest levels of health that I can achieve, but the cool thing is, I'm doing it.

I've lost over 100 pounds so far!  It's been an amazing transformation of mind, body and spirit.  My whole life is changing for the better, and I couldn't be happier.  Like most change, this one started with crisis.  I think I've learned that crisis is the thing that spurs most of us into action.  Consequently, I have been learning to view problems in an entirely different light.  It may sound cliche, but over and over again, coping with crisis has forced me onto higher ground.

Over the years I've strived to find answers to my health problems and emotional issues.  Addiction of loved ones, my own addictions, relationship problems, severe depression, and health issues including severe pharmaceutical poisoning and early symptoms of MS all converged for me two years ago, and I hit bottom.  Just to survive I began getting counseling for my depression, social anxiety, self-esteem issues and free myself from codependancy.  Though not an alcoholic by any means, I still cut my drinking down significantly, began eating less and getting more exercise, started  a more intensive qigong practice and found a naturopath who really knew how to help me.  She put me on rounds of the HCG diet, and in combination supplements and my other healthy practices, the MS symptoms went away and have not returned for over a year now.  And I've lost enough weight to officially move out of being classified as "obese."

In fact, I went from "morbidly obese" to "obese" to "overweight" in less than a year.  According to the BMI chart, at 5'8", I should be 164 pounds or under to qualify as "normal".  I am currently 27 pounds above that weight, but I'm betting, based on how my body looks and feels, that I could really stand to lose at least another 40 pounds to feel and look right.  At the moment I'm maintaining my current weight and focusing on getting exercise and sunshine to boost my health and prevent any further development of the MS.  I've quit my job to get away from pollution and emotional toxicity, and am going to spend the summer hiking, open water swimming and weight lifting.

I will start a new round of the HCG diet, possibly late July but I may wait until fall, depending on how I feel in the next few weeks.  If you're familiar with the HCG diet, you know that it is restrictive and challenging, and after four rounds with the required maintenance periods in between, I'm finding that I kind of want a little more time off to enjoy going out with friends and family.  Since I'm maintaining my weight well, I'm not too worried about when I get back on the train again, so to speak, but on the other hand, I'm eager for normality too.

Why the HCG diet?  I know many in the weight loss blogosphere are against the concept of diet, and for lifestyle change instead, and I respect that.  It works for them.  Our bodies are all different.  Calorie counting and exercise alone does not seem to work very well for me.  I can restrict my daily calories to 1500 and lose no weight, even if I work out.  My current health issues seem to make it extremely difficult to up my metabolism and lose weight.  Low carb IS helpful for me, and I tend to lose and/or maintain if I keep the amount of carbs that I consume to a very small proportion of my daily intake.  The HCG protocol certainly adheres to low carb principles, but it's the mechanism of the hormone that actually causes me to be able to let go of excess fat and have it stay off.  It's been extremely successful for me so far, but I realize that time will tell.  And the HCG seems to be what finally stopped the tremors, twitches and restored my coordination (I had fallen 4 times in a month!).  (Mind you, I had only the beginning symptoms, not an official diagnosis with spinal tap and all, and it was caught EARLY.  I do not think that it will help people with advanced MS cases or people with lots of damage already done to their nervous systems.  Your mileage may vary!)  So I know that this protocol helps me with all of my health conditions and to lose weight, without causing me any other health issues.

My partner in crime for 19+, "A", has accompanied me on this journey.  He's also lost over 100 pounds using the HCG protocol, stuck with me through thick and thin, and I'm extremely proud of him.  Together we continue down this road towards health and freedom and a better life.