Gotta Do Something New

Hello, everyone. I've been wanting to write about my training for Steelhead for a few weeks now, but I've been so busy with school and my new daughter that I haven't had much time for writing.

Unfortunately, there's not much to say on that front, as I quit training a few days ago and will not be resuming it anytime soon.

I've always had bad knees, even when I was a teenager. They're so bad that I had to lie to the Army about them in order to join them back when I was 21 years old. The combination of long bike rides and long runs needed to do a half triathlon is too much for my knees to handle.

I'm disappointed that I won't be able to do the race. But there are some upsides to quitting.

For starters, I had to exercise for up to three hours a day. I have two daughters now, and I don't like spending that much time away from my family. I felt selfish leaving my wife behind with the two kids because my workout required me to go bike riding for 30 miles.

I also have a constant fear of injury. Last year I kept making the mistake of trying to train though the pain. Because of that, I went through two major injuries. The last of which, my shoulder, has yet to heal up completely and might never be fully healed. I've had steroid shots, physical therapy, and with all of that I have been able to regain a full range of motion in my right arm. There's still a little bit of pain though, and if I over exert myself I could end up back at square one. I will probably have to look at surgical options somewhere down the line. This fear has kept me from working as hard as I need to do a half triathlon.

I also want to do more weight training. I lost a lot of strength while I was healing from my injuries. It's been nine months since I've had a good weight lifting session.

So I've been looking at new options for exercise. I decided that I needed a workout that would meet the following requirements:

1. It has to involve weight training. I need to increase my strength.

2. I have to be able to do most of it at home. I want my oldest daughter to watch me lift weights so she can learn how to do them herself. I know there are some things I might need a gym for, but I want to be able to use my workouts as a way to bond with my family.

3. The workouts need to burn a maximum amount of calories while minimizing risk of injury.

So after doing some research, I decided that High-Intensity Interval Training would be right up my alley. I found a workout plan that uses weightlifting for the HIIT routine, with a low amount of weight (so I won't mess up my shoulder) and an insane number of reps to ensure that I can increase both my endurance and strength. I found another website that has alternative exercises I can do when I need to do an exercise that requires a special machine.

The plan is only six weeks long, which is good because that's normally the time I start getting bored and look for a new workout plan.

I'm also going to combine that with some standard cardio. I learned to love running, and I don't want to stop. When my knees heal up (I should be good in a few days), I'll start hitting the road again. I'll still do some swimming too. I just signed a year-long family contract with my high school to use their gym and pool, so I'll be able to justify my spending on that.

I also want to get back into MMA. Since I'm not going to be doing any races this year, it seems like something I should do to help keep me motivated to exercise. I love doing martial arts and I'm anxious to get back in it. I'll have to let whomever I'm grappling with know about my shoulder so they don't destroy it in an arm lock. I'll wait on that though, as I want to see if I'll need surgery to recover. Most dojos lock you into a year-long contract, and I don't want to be paying for something I can't use.

Been a Good Couple of Days

It's been two months since I last wrote? Jesus Christ...

I've had a couple of really good days recently. For starters, my wife gave birth to our second child:

Don't stare too long, or you'll die from over exposure to cuteness!

We named her Laurel, after Dinah Laurel Lance, a.k.a., the Black Canary. Why not Dinah? Because I don't want to hear I've Been Working on the Railroad in my head every time I say her name!

I wanted to name her after a superhero so she always has a reminder to be strong. I was going to go with Jean after Jean Grey, but my wife said that was a no-go.

I've been euphorically happy ever since she's been born. That's strange for me, as I'm not a happy person in general. The lack of depression, anxiety, and other PTSD-induced moods is unusual for me. I'm going to enjoy it while it lasts.

But this is a blog about my fitness and weight-loss journey, so let me give you an update on that as well.

In my last entry, I mentioned my shoulder injury, and how that was preventing me from exercising. I got tired of waiting for it to heal on its own, so I went to the doctor and they prescribed physical therapy. The therapist looked at my x-rays and determined that my injury was due to a chunk of muscle getting caught between my collar bone and a bone in my shoulder (ouch!) Any time I exerted myself, the bones would grind against the muscle, causing pain.

After five weeks of physical therapy, my shoulder is about 99% healed up. There's no pain, but just enough of a feeling to remind me that the injury is still there. I'm not doing any exercise outside of physical therapy until it's at 100%, lest I aggravate it.

But I hope that it'll be healed up fully by next week (knock on wood). After that, I start training for my half-triathlon.

Unlike when I was prepping for the half-marathon, I won't be doing too much training outside of the sixteen-week plan so I don't over-exert myself like I did last time. I'm going to do weight-training just twice a week to gain more strength to help my speed for the race. I'm struggling to make the time limit for the swim (you get 70 minutes to swim 1.2 miles; right now it takes me 80), but I'm hoping that changes as I train. You get eight hours to finish the race overall. My goal for the race is to do the swim under one hour, and the bicycling in three. That will leave me with four hours to do the run, which means I could practically walk it if I wanted to (and I'll probably be able to do little more than a slow jog at that point, anyway).

So it's been a good couple of days. I have a new daughter, and I'll hopefully be back in the gym soon enough (once again, knocking on wood). Life is good.

If It's Not One Thing, It's Another...

Now that my abdominal muscles are all healed up and I'm just getting back in the swing of things, I start feeling an incredible pain in my right shoulder. Then my knees.

So now I'm not working out again.

I already know why my knees are hurting. If you do all your running on the treadmill, eventually my knees won't be able to deal with it.

But I have no idea what happened to my shoulder. It just hurts to lift anything.

This is pissing me off to no end. I got the gastric surgery so I could lose weight and do all of the athletic stuff that I used to do. But I keep getting hurt.

I love exercising. When I don't, I feel terrible. And I'm tired of feeling crappy because I can't do the only thing that seems to work for relieving stress.

I'll be seeing a doctor next week. But if it's anything like the doctors that dealt with my ab injury, they'll just tell me they can't do anything.

I Hate Eating Right Now

Now that I'm working out again I have to consume a lot of protein to make sure my body can recover from all the exercise I'm doing.

And I hate it.

I have to shove steak and scrambled eggs down my gullet every morning. I have to drink at least two disgusting protein shakes every day. And every time I do, I feel like I just finished Thanksgiving dinner.

Protein makes you feel full. Very full.

If I don't do it, I drag ass in the gym. I struggle to finish my runs, and I can barely lift any weights. I have to eat to get better.

Eating used to be fun, back when I was fat and ate whatever I was craving. Now, eating requires discipline.

It also involves constant counting. "Let's see, I had a protein shake with milk this morning, so that's 76 grams of protein. I ate ground beef for lunch, which has 50 grams. Had a piece of chicken with vegetables for dinner, which was 35 grams. All in all, I ate 161 grams. I need to eat 40-90 grams more or else fuck my workout. And it's 10 p.m. Fuuuuuuck."

When you're not working out, most people only need around 60 grams of protein a day. But when you exercise vigorously sports nutritionists tend to recommend at least one gram for every pound that you weigh, if not more. I'm not even consuming that much. I can't eat that much food.

Oh well. This is the price I'm paying to achieve athletic excellence. This is what it will take to do a half-triathlon next year. This is what it will take to become eligible for skydiving. This is what it will take to maintain a healthy body.

It also means that I have to exercise even when I'm not in the mood. When I'm too exhausted. Like today. I have a short, three mile run today. Nothing I can't handle, except I'm sleepy as shit right now. I need the motivation to hit the treadmill. I'll find it eventually. In the meantime, I need to make a protein shake.

Enjoy the video.

It's Been A Year!

I got my surgery one year ago yesterday. Since then I've lost 100 pounds and I feel damn good. I'm more athletic than I've ever been before (even when I was young and thin in the Army). I ran a half-marathon and I signed up for a half-triathlon next year. Women look at me (sorry ladies, still happily married), and I just love the way I look when I look in the mirror. In fact, I'm pretty sure my wife gets annoyed with all the time I spend checking myself out. :)

My life isn't perfect. Far from it. But at least now I'm not plagued with the problems that came with obesity and food addiction.

The other day a friend on Facebook hit me up with advice about getting bariatric surgery. If you're overweight and have failed to lose the weight for years after constant diet and exercise programs, then I absolutely recommend that you get it. Make sure that your insurance will cover it. Under the Affordable Care Act most insurance companies now have policies on the various exchanges that cover bariatric surgery under certain conditions. You usually have to have a BMI of 40+, or a BMI of at least 35 with a obesity-related condition to be eligible, and they'll expect you to spend six months on a diet regulated by the surgeon first. If you can't meet those conditions, you'll have to pay out of pocket. Some surgeons have financing options. As for what type of surgery to get, you'll have to ask the doc about that. I picked the gastric sleeve because I wanted something more permanent than the lap band, but I still wanted to be able to eat enough to meet the nutritional requirements for when I decided to start doing athletic things.

Anyway, I still have a lot of fitness goals to meet. Along with doing the half-tri next year, I still need to get below 240 so that I'll be eligible for skydiving. I'm looking forward to the day when I get to face my fear of heights and jump out of a perfectly good airplane. :)

I'm Writing This From Work...

After a week of keeping faithful to my workouts, here's what's going on inside my body:

Body: WORKOUT! NOW! 

Me: Body, I'm at work. I can't exercise now. I have no weights. 

Body: WORKOUT! NOW! WORK THE ARMS! 

Me: I just worked out the arms yesterday. Look, after work it's leg day. 

Body: YEAH LEG DAY! LET'S DO THAT! NOW! 

Me: Later! I'm working! 

Body: WORKOUT! WORKOUT! WORKOUT! WORKOUT! WORKOUT! WORKOUT! WORKOUT! WORKOUT! WORKOUT! WORKOUT! WORKOUT! WORKOUT! 

Just imagine Skylar screaming "WORKOUT!" instead of "SHUTUP!" and you'll get the idea.

So I'm back to feeling like a ball of untapped energy again. Which is good, as it means my body is back to burning fat for energy. It also means I'm motivated to work out again and don't have to force myself to do it (unlike the rest of this week).

And I'm quite happy to announce that my body is starting to show some muscle again. I'll be back to where I was pre-injury soon enough.

In the meantime, if any of my friends near Ferndale wants to help me out, perhaps you could show up at my work site with some dumbbells? A bicycle perhaps? I'm bouncing off the walls.

Ladies and Gentlemen: It Feels So Good to be (Sorta) Baaaack...

Good news, everyone!

I'm healed! For good this time!

And I was probably healed last week when I decided to do crunches on a decline board. My abs are healed up, but they haven't been worked in four months. They aren't as strong as they used to be.

Matter of fact, nothing in my body is as strong as it used to be. I'm back at square one, just after the surgery when I started hitting the gym and had lost so much muscle mass that I was lifting the same amount when I first took up weight lifting nearly 15 years ago.

My running has not been good, either. In the past when I had to take time off from running, I'd start running on the road again because it's easier to run on the road than it is the treadmill. But it was fifteen degrees out, so that just wasn't happening. I'm pretty sure I'll be using the treadmill until at least late March. The treadmill was not my finest hour. I ran at a very slow 5.5 mph pace and only made it for 2.5 miles before I was done. It'll take some time before I get back to where I was, let alone exceed it. But I've got all winter to get there.

On the weights, I'm using the wimpy machines instead of the free weights until I can get back some muscle. I'll probably switch back to free weights next week.

I'm also taking it easy on my abs. No more working them out four times a week!

But goddamn, it feels good to be working out again!