Week 6 Day 3

Posted on March 16, 2011 by admin

Today was another weird one.  Not to gross folks out but I did not have my normal morning Bowel movements.  I did not go by lunch and that is very off for me.  I should have been on number 3.   To get back to normal I took a serving of exlax.  Two hours later and still nothing.  Not even a stomach gurgle.   So I took another half dose and hoped for the best.   Stomach activity began but no real progress.  This situation also  caused my PM workout to not be great.    On the way home I picked up some apple cider and had a glass.  within 20 minutes I was back to being active.   Five times in 1 and a half hours!    I was not feeling stuffed and constipated but now things are flowing I feel less anxious and more myself.   Now that  I got that out of the way I can give a breakdown of my two workouts today.

My morning workout was 30 minutes on the Stair stepper machine followed by 30 minutes on the recumbent exercise bike.   I feel this bike does the least for me of all the equipment I can use there but it does give my leg muscles a good workout, and I really felt it after squats yesterday.

My afternoon workout was 10 minues walking at 10% incline at 3.0 mph.  I lost 5 minutes of this warmup time to a bathroom break.  From here We broke from the normal routine and went with Bench press (I did dumbbell BP yesturday) Triceps pull downs, Triceps curls behind the head, and standing curls with the EZ-Curl bar.    My stomach was going in full effect so I did not want to do more and my buddy’s back was sore so he was looking to skip the overhead presses and dead lifts today.   I think it worked out for both of us.    I can not wait to see the scale in the morning!

My eating for the day was all normal stuff.  My total consumed calories for the day was 2124 cal.   This is right where I should be, so life is good.

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Week 6 Day 2

Posted on March 15, 2011 by admin

Today was a back to normal day.  I hopped on the scale expecting to see a big dip since I have been barely eating but surprise I gained 5 pounds.   Yep 5 pounds.  I guess it makes sense I have not had much in the way of bowel movements since Saturday night and the meds I am on could cause constipation.  That might be why I was not feeling hungry at all.  Oh well with eating normal today I should be back to a regular schedule of bathroom breaks.    On to the workouts!   I worked out at the gym and did 20 minutes on the stair stepper machine.  I did not push to max effort but a comfortable sweating pace.  I moved to the treadmill and did 40 minutes.   My plan was to walk 20 min at incline then walk/job alternating minutes for the last 20 minutes but my back side by my leftkidney did not like the bouncing so I did jog 2 minutes but walked the rest at incline.   At this point in the day I still don’t know which direction my body is going to go to, feeling better or felling worse.  I finished out my workout and showered up and prepped my breakfast,   I had some steak over salad with some honey roasted peanuts.  Not the usual for me but I did not have time to shop or prep food this weekend so leftovers for breakfast.  Morning break was a banana, an orange and some macadamia nuts.  Lunch was a salad with chicken breast and a nature’s valley peanut butter bar.  My afternoon snack was just a yogurt and before I knew it I was heading for the gym.

I did take a pain pill and muscle relaxer first thing with breakfast since I had a good chance of working at my desk most of the day.  I did feel slightly sore from all the laying around the house I did, but not the intense kidney pain I felt that sent me to the ER.   I figured I would see pretty quickly if my back was bothering me once I started lifting.

Squats:

95lbs   5 reps

135-5

155-5

185-4

135-5

Dumbbell bench press

40lbs each  8reps

50-8

60-8

70-8

80-5

50-10

Assisted pull-ups using neutral grip

+240-5

+220-5

+200-5

+220-5

That felt like a decent amount of exercising and I felt good afterwards.  NO BACK PAIN!  That is both good and bad.  No muscle pain from exercising, YES!  but what does that leave as a problem?????   Hopefully when I follow up with a doctor I can get an answer.

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Week 6 Day 1

Posted on March 14, 2011 by admin

Today was a rest and recover day.  I did not go into work.  I took it easy and napped after taking my pain and muscle relaxer pills.   My appetite is off.  I did no physical activities.

Food for the day:

Breakfast 2 turkey sausages, a tangerine, and 2 pretzel rods.

Lunch was an egg roll, banana, and some sherbert

Dinner was steak with peppers and onions with a small lettuce salad with a couple of ounces of chicken on top.

I am curious to see what the scale will say tomorrow if I am well enough to go into work.  I have been really tired and somewhat light headed after taking the medicine.   I don’t know how I will do tomorrow exercising if I go into work.  I know I should not push it, I also do not know if I should skip lifting weights and just stick with cardio.  I will have to figure that out in the morning.

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Week 5 Day 7

Posted on March 13, 2011 by admin
I spent Saturday night in the ER with severe pain in my left kidney area.   They ran blood and urine tests and at this time do not think it is a kidney stone but a pulled muscle.   I am not sure on the diagnosis since I had exercised on Saturday morning for an hour split between treadmill and elliptical machine.   After breakfast I helped my wife move some books and junk for about an hour.  On the way home my back started bothering me so I took 3 advil.   We picked up some Boston Market for a late lunch and I was feeling much worse after that.   I puked up dinner and had a hard pain in the kidney area from that point on.   At 10:30 at night I could not take it anymore and went to the ER.   They kept me there for observation until 2am with an IV and pain medicine  and released me under the conclusion I hurt my lower back.  I got 2 prescriptions, on for pain one to relax the muscles.  When I take the medicine it puts me to sleep.   The doctor told me to take it easy for a couple days So I will not be in tomorrow.  I will see how I feel come Tuesday, but most likely will not be in that day either.     I will need to follow up with a doctor in a 1 to 2 weeks if this does not get better.
 
obviously  I did not exercise today.  I also did not eat right.  Breakfast was 2 turkey sausage, a banana and some sherbert,  lunch was 2 pretzel rods, and dinner was Quorn chicken nuggets with honey and musturd and some sherbert.   Total callories for the day were 928. 
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Week 5 Day 6

Posted on March 13, 2011 by admin

A day to remember.  I spent Saturday night in the ER with severe pain in my left kidney area.   They  ran blood and urine tests and at this time do not think it is a kidney stone but a pulled muscle.   I am not sure on the diagnosis since I had exercised on  Saturday morning for an hour split between treadmill and elliptical machine.   After breakfast I helped my wife move some books and junk for about an hour.  On the way home my back started bothering me so I took 3 advil.   We picked up some  Boston Market for a late lunch and I was feeling much worse after that.   I puked up dinner and had a hard pain in the kidney area from that point on.   At  10:30 at night I could not take it anymore and went to the ER.   They kept me
there for observation until 2am with an IV and pain medicine  and released me under the conclusion I hurt my lower back.  I got 2 prescriptions, on for pain  one to relax the muscles.  When I take the medicine it puts me to sleep.   The  doctor told me to take it easy for a couple days So I will not be in to work tomorrow.   No exercising either.   That makes me sad.

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Week 5 Day 5

Posted on March 11, 2011 by admin

What a great day it was.   I was feeling good all day from my extra weights workout yesterday.  Definately a little sore but not like I over did it.  I was a pound heavy this morning which I suspect is from the middle eastern food.  I get the veggie combo platter.  Chick peas, lentels, mixed veggies (sometimes has potatoes in it), white rice and afgan bread, all which are a bit carbs heavy.  I don’t eat it all in one sitting, and I put it over a big bed of lettuce, but it is what it is.    Today I had the second half of my dinner as a morning break meal and lunch meal.  Today I was also carb heavy and calorie heavy for the day.  My total carbs were 2742.  I will be hitting Bally’s tomorrow to start my day and I might add some additional cardio to offset my meals.  The middle eastern food is a guilty pleasure of mine.   In the past I looked at it as a healthy choice since it was loaded with veggies, but now as I plug in the food items into my nutrition tracker I see what the full story is.  I need to skip the bread (I only eat half)  and I need to skip half the rice.   because of the spicyness I drink more water too so some of the pound might be water weight too.

The day was mostly uneventful.  Since there is a chance I will not be getting my normal gym time in I have found a partial solution.  I scored some free Weights and bars on Craigslist.   I picked them up tonight.  There were the concrete in plastic type with the hollow bars but the price was right.  I already have a standard set with weights as well as a olympic set (that is at my neighbor’s house).   My goal is to set up the new free one with weight set for a few  exercises (overhead press/bent over rows/curls)  that use close weight and have my better standard bar for squats and deadlifts.    I did not relize how expensive the weight plates have become.  I guess the materials are in demand because of the wars,  but more than a dollar a pound?? WOW.  I will keep my eyes out on craigslist for some more deals.

My wife gave me a compliment today.  I took it as a compliment.  She commented on me evaluating what I wanted to eat for dinner based on my protein/carbs/fat ratio.  I don’t even remember the words she said, but it was something to the effect of  “it is amazing to hear you talk about your nutrition and what your body needs to eat…”   I guess that is what the habbits and rituals of making healthy choices will do for a person.   I use The Daily Plate  on livestrong.com to keep track of my nutrition and exercise for the day and have an app for my phone to allow me to keep track even when I am not near a computer.   I believe this is going to come in handy while I am working on the construction sites for the couple months that it is projected I will be there.

I hope to get back on the ball with documenting my meals better here, especially with more pictures.   I also hope someone will stumble across this blog and say to themselves, hey Joe is doing that , and you know what,  I can too!  Whether it is eating better, exercising some or more or just doing more active things rather than sitting in from of the

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Week 5 Day 4

Posted on March 10, 2011 by admin

I was still riding high on my scale weight from yesterday.   I had a good morning workout and ate well all day.  Inthe end my calories were on the high side at 2633  but I had a great afternoon workout lifting weights.  I pushed it some since yesterday afternoon it was an improvised garage workout. 

I did 60 minutes of cardio in the morning, 30 minutes walking at 3.3 mph at 5% incline and 30 minutes on the lower body elliptical machine.    It felt good  but I probably should have tried to jog some.  I did not because my legs were sore from squats the day before.  I squatted deeper than I usually do since the weights were lower than what I do at the gym.   Maybe tomorrow I will jog some.

Once the afternoon rolled around I was ready for the gym.   I started with Leg presses,

180-12,   270-12,  360-10,  450-8, 360-10

Then I moved to assisted pull-ups.

+220-8,  +200-3, switched to netraul grip  +200-5  +180-4

Leg extensions:

170-10, 190-10,  210-10,  170-10

Dead lifts

135-5,  185-5,5

Dip press machine

180-10,  210-10,  255-6,  210-10

Triceps cable  pull downs

150- 10,   130-12,15 

switched the height so Iwas pulling up over my head for tri’s

80-10,  70-10,  60-10

EZ-Bar curls +50lbs  10,10,10,10

Sit-ups  10,10,10,10,10

I was done after this!  A great day indeed.   Time for some rest!

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Week 5 Day 3

Posted on March 9, 2011 by admin

Not a bad day at all.   I went to the gym this morning to do my thing like I normally would.  I hopped on the scale to see where I was at and BAM!

I am now officially 20 pounds down and 1/5 my way to losing 100 pounds.  I feel good.  That put me in the right frame of mind to get on the elliptical machine and get sweating.    I did 25 minutes on the elliptical, 15 minutes walking on the treadmill at 5% incline at 3.3 mph  and then back on the elliptical for another 15 minutes.  That gave me 55 minutes of cardio and it was time to get out of there and get ready for work.

I did well eating all day.  I was off site today and had temptaions of Roy Rogers for lunch with the boss.  I took an apple in with me and enjoyed my Gala while he ate his order.  I waited until a little later to have my stir fry veggies with filet mingon.  I even enjoyed a yogurt after my main meal.

Being off site today gave me a window into my future.  Looks like I may be heading to the new location for an extended time and that will change my exercise routine drasticly.  My am cardio can get moved to Bally’s since the open at 5 am.  That should give me enough time to clean up and get to wirk and have a quick breakfast in my car before work.  Gone is the chance for hot oatmeal or heating frozen sausages.  That is a bummer for sure.   I can deal with eating cold meals.   My afternoon weight lifting is what may really suffer.  I have to pay for parking at Bally’s which is 2 dollars.  Not a big expense but it would be doubled if I do my lifting there after work.  I also have to conside my potential new location is further from my house and will cost more to drive to each day, and gas prices are skyrocketing!  The extra money  for the gym twice a day may be too rich for my liking.   I have the basics to do a good garage workout.  I have a straight bar with plates, a power tower (though I can’t do pull-ups or dips yet) an exercise bike that does upper body as well and a lat machine so I can do pull downs/LATS, triceps pull downs, and curls.  My bench is in my neighbors basement and I could get it back if I need it.  This afternoon I tested what I can do at home.  I did squats using the dip station as my starting point (kept weights light), ground to overhead presses, military presses, lateral rows, and  curls.  It was a fair to good workout.  I can still add deadlifts to the mix when needed.  I atleast know I have a good reference point for home lifting now.

squats

70lbs 5,5

120lbs 5,5,5

ground to over head press

70lbs-8,8,8,8,8

military presses

90lbs- 8,8,8

Lateral rows

70lbs-8,8,8

I am running late on the day,  I still need to shower, cook diner and get some rest!

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Week 5 day 2

Posted on March 8, 2011 by admin

This is going to be a short one.  Morning workout was a good one.  I walked/jogged for 30 minutes on the treadmill.  I worked up to 5.6 mph.  Walking speed was 3.3 mph.  Then 30 minutes on the lower body elliptical machine.  It was a good sweat.  My afternoon workout was charged up with a special work assignment to another location for tomorrow (later may become permanent) and I will miss the gym and my routine in the afternoon.   I have a plan b in place for the lifting but it will be not quite what it would have been.  Due to this assignment I had some adrenaline rushing through me and I needed to do some lifting before I did my afternoon cardio.  I bench pressed today.

Bench press

135-5

225-1

245-1,1

225-3,2

30 minutes walking on the treadmill at 3.2 mph  for 30 minutes at inclines from 5% to 8%.

Meals today were good except for a treat from the one neighbor.  She made us some egg rolls.  I ate 2 as I cooked dinner and that added about 500 calories to my dinner.   Total calories for the day 2834.    This was too much but I could not ignore her gift to us.  I would have been at 2334 otherwise.    Maybe tomorrow I do some bonus time on the cardio equipment,  maybe not and just take it in stride.

Let’s see what tomorrow brings.

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Week 5 Day 1

Posted on March 7, 2011 by admin

For weeks have come and gone.     More than 16 pounds have also gone.  I am on track to lose 100 pounds in 26 weeks.   Life is good.   I weighed myelf at the gym and was a pound heavier than this weekend.  I suspect there is a difference of a pound between the two scales.  This happened last week too.  No big deal since a pound fluxuation could be 2 glasses of water, or any other natural fluxuation in weight.

I had a good mornig workout after weighing in.  I did 30 minutes on the elliptial machine followed by 20 minutes on the Stair master.   My ankles were slightly sore so I did not want to stress them this morning.   I broke a good sweat and felt my heart pumping.

After showering it was breakfast time.  I enjoyed 3 hard boiled egg whites with hot sauce, 6 chicken and apple mini links (this finishes the package), a golden delicios apple and 1 heaping table spoon of peanut butter.  Total calories were 430.     I was hungry at 9am for my morning break and ate 1 can of tuna with 1 table spoon of light mayo, a special K bar, and 1/2 serving of honey roasted almonds.  This was 339 calories.   Lunch was next at 11:30 and it was another can of tuna with mayo, a light yogurt, and a salad with some cous cous in it.  Dressing was Balsamic vinegar.  Lunch was under 400 calories.  My afternoon snack was banana, tangerine, baby carrots, yogurt, and a special k crisp bar, 415 calories.  I hit the gym after work and enjoyed an apple on the ride home.   Dinner was salmon over a salad with asparagus, I also had 1 pretzel rod for some additional carbs  whick totaled 625 calories.  My total calories for the day were 2335.  Not bad.

My afternoon workout was 15 minuteswalking on the treadmill at 5-10 % incline at 3.3 mph.   Next was squats:

115lbs-5

135-5

155-5

185-5

135-6

Dumbbell bench press

45lbs-8

55-8

70-8

80-5

70-7

Bent over rows

+45-8

+60-8,8,8

+45-8

I was done.  My legs feel better than the first time I did this routine.  Let us see how I feel tomorrow.  All should be good.  

Ah, I almost forgot I need to add picture of me today.   I do not see any difference in my pictures without my shirt on, but when it is only a 4 pound difference each week I do not think the difference will be obvious.  From now on I am only going to do a front flex and rear flex shot each week and  save doing a profie and front non-flexing picture for every 4 weeks.   That should be easier on everyone’s eyes.

I almost think I can see the beginning of my abs showing an indentation center of my body and some definition on my biceps.  I think at the end of 4 more weeks I will do some side by side before and after progress pictures like I did with my orange shirt on.

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