Stress Shut Down

I had to go out of town at the end of last week for a meeting. I stayed at my dad's house, got some stuff done for him, and brought him back up with me to live for a few months. Because of this, I had a ton of things to do at work on Saturday.

While I was gone, a number of things happened at work so there was even more. In addition, I wanted to spend time with the kids to give my wife a break. Whenever I leave town, she has to load up all FIVE kids to do anything like shop or take one to piano lessons, etc...

I get home late Friday night with dad and of course, I can't get to sleep until about 2 hours later than normal. I get up a little bit late Saturday and one thing after another happened. I didn't get to work until noon. Ack!!! Instead of diving right into all that I dad to do, I could hardly do a thing.

I felt like I was trying to walk through tar. Everything I did was a great struggle. Despite this feeling, I forced myself to get a number of things done. Around 3:30 PM, I just shut down. I just sat there like a deer in headlights. I was frozen; unable to do anything else. I left many things undone. I went home and played with the kids.

I did end up having to go into work for about 30 minutes because of an emergency situation, but I went home as soon as I took care of it. I basically shut down and let everything go.

I am not sure what the repercussions will be this coming week. I am not sure that I care. It was just strange. Normally, I flourish when the pressure is on. For some odd reason, I shut down this time. What is the matter with me?

Anyhow, I should mention that my third and final interview was scheduled for this coming Tuesday, but I postponed it indefinitely. It's a job I think I could do well. Yet, I am not sure that I really want to do it. I am not sure if it is because I don't want to leave my current career or because I am afraid to leave my current career. I am not sure if these feelings are about the job I have been interviewing for or if I would have the same feelings for any other job.

Hehe, just a little aside. I have thought about becoming a personal trainer once I reach a healthy weight. I would like to specialize in helping the obese. I have done a little a research and it's scary. It looks like you can become a certified personal trainer with little to no hands on experience. I was looking for a college level program with lots of hands on experience. Anyhow, that is a long way off.

Living Fit Is My #1 Job!

Interviewed for Weight Loss Tips

I was interviewed for the Weight Loss Tips website.
http://wltips.com/Half-Man.html

Living Fit Is My #1 Job!

Biggest Loser-Gainers?

Last Tuesday, Biggest Loser aired a special which brought back some of the old contestants to see if they kept the weight off. It looked like almost all of them gained a good chunk of weight. The number that sticks out in my mind for the men was 240 lbs. It seemed that most if not all the men weighed around 240 lbs. Granted that is much less than most of them weighed to begin with, but for some, that is close to a 50 lb. gain since the end of the show.

I am sure that by the final weigh in, they went to great extremes to weigh as little as possible in order to win the dough. I am sure they probably purged themselves, downed exlax, and dehydrated their bodies for that weigh in. Heck, that is what I would do. Even considering that, it seems like they packed quite a few pounds back on.

I was surprised to see that and not quite sure how to take it. I wonder if it has to do with how they lost the weight. I believe they were on highly restrictive calorie diets. Perhaps their bodies became use to so few calories so that when that ate more reasonable diets, their bodies didn't quite adjust. Perhaps, this is a sign that losing so much weight so fast is not as effective as losing it more slowly.

I know I have been losing rather quickly, but I believe I am averaging in the recommended range of 2-3 lbs. a week. I hope that when I get under each 10 lb. mark, I will never rise above it again.

The best thing they showed was that they were all living fit lifestyles. Many of them were helping others live fit lifestyles as well. Of course, my goal is to live fit for the rest of my life. I am living fit right now. My body is becoming more fit every day.

Living Fit Is My #1 Job!

Week 31 Weigh-In

Bleh! I weighed 295.4 lbs. this morning. This is a gain of 2.6 lbs. That sucks! I was hoping to break 290. But, I am not deterred. I am determined. I will be heading down to dad's house later this week, so hopefully I will remember to grab my tape measure. Then I will be able to start getting my other measurements.

I could try to rationalize this gain, but there would be no point. I could have eaten healthier. I could have exercised more. However, I did eat healthy. I did exercise. Considering, how I have lost weight around 28 of the 31 weeks, I am not too worried.

Two weeks ago, I was on vacation. I exercised that week, but much less than usual. Healthy eating declined toward the end of the week. Last week, eating was fine. However, I did change up my exercise routine. I did this for two reasons: 1) I can no longer keep up the intensity of 2-3 hours of exercise a day and maintain all the other crap going on in my life. It's all starting to catch up. 2) It's time to take weight training to the next level (as far my weights will let me).

Previously, I trained my whole body twice a week: Mondays & Thursdays=Upper body; Tuesdays & Fridays=Legs & core; in addition I tried to do 2 hours of cardio Monday-Saturday. The weights consisted of one lift per muscle group.

My weights are a set of dumbbells up to 35 lbs.

My new lifting routine is:
Mondays: Push ups, Chest Press, inclined chest fly, military press, front lateral raises, side lateral raises.

Tuesdays: Standing bicep curls, hammer curls, concentration curls, straight crunches, left & right side crunches, reverse crunches, and pelvic tilt.

Thursdays: One-arm dumbbell row, dumbbell pullover, dumbbell shrug, squats, lunges, standing calf raises

Friday: Bench Dip, French press, tricep kick-back, kneeling butt blaster, side-lying leg lift, inner thigh lift, kneeling leg curl

Cardio will be 1 hour a day.

This reduces my time exercising, but increases the intensity. I am sure the trade off will be worth it in the long run. I do need heavier weights. I hope to be able to afford power blocks one day.

Oh, here is a before and now picture.

Living Fit Is My #1 Job!

Week 30 Weigh-In

I had a busy day yesterday because it was my first day back to work after taking a week off. It will be pretty busy all week. I did pretty well during the week last week, but by Friday, I gave in to some of the temptations of eating out so much. Anyhow, I weighed in yesterday at 292.8 lbs. (-0.2). I can't say what the rest are since I left my tape measure at my dad's house.

One nice problem this summer was that for most of the summer I only had one pair of shorts that fit. The rest were either too big or too small. However, I could not find any to buy at the right size either. While at my dad's, I was in Target and decided to look at their clothes. I wanted size 48 shorts. The largest they had were size 46, but they were on sale for $3. I decided to buy them hoping I would be able to wear them in about a month. Even if I only could wear them a few times before the weather got too cold, they were only $3. When I got home, I tried them on to see how tight they were. THEY FIT!!! My wife made me try an old pair of size 46 pants. They fit too.

Even with virtually no weight loss and not able to take my measurements, I can see that my body is reconfiguring. I just wish that my reconfiguring life was as exciting, lol. I discovered that the job I was hoping for in my current profession is likely a no go.

Living Fit Is My #1 Job!

Job Interview

I had my second interview for a new job in a new career. It went well and I am scheduled for my third and final interview in a few weeks.

Just a quick recap on my situation. My mother died last year from cancer. She had been my dad's primary care giver. He is suffering from the middle stages of Alzheimer's Disease. Basically, all of his responsibilities have landed on my shoulders. I have one brother in FL who can't take care of himself, yet alone anyone else. I have two brothers in MI. One will take dad for the day now and then, and lend a little help here and there for fixing up dad's house. BTW, he is single, no kids, and retired. The other brother has had very limited contact with dad, although he did take him up north for a week. Finally, I have one sister. She has taken dad for extended periods of time, but refuses to do much else. For example, she calls me up and tells me he is out of toothpaste!!! (Like I am supposed to make a three hour trip down there to buy him toothpaste!!!) Therefore, I have to make a three hour trip down 2-4 times a month in order to help put my dad's affairs in place, take him to doctor visits, and fix up the house. This has put a lot of stress on myself and my family. My current job requires 60+ hours a week. To say the least, my job is getting short circuited too.

The goal is to move my family into dad's house so that he can live out his remaining day's here (or until he needs to go into a nursing home). There very few openings in my current career near my dad's house. There is one possibility, but the process is slow and uncertain, so I am looking to change careers. I would prefer not to, but as the a great philosopher once wrote, "You can't always get what you want." I think I will get the job in the new career if I want it. It seems to be all a matter of timing right now. Grrr! I hate the waiting and uncertainty.

Living Fit Is My #1 Job!

Week 29 Weigh-In

This morning I weighed 293 lbs. This is down 1 lb. from last week giving me a total weight loss of 87 lbs. I have 30.9%(-0.7) body fat giving me 90.5(-2.4) lbs. of fat and 202.5(+1.4) lbs. of lean mass. My waist measured 53.5(-0.5) inches.

I am happy with this weigh in. It would have been nice to lose more than a pound, but it looks like my body is busy reconfiguring itself. Losing an inch in the waist in 2 weeks is pretty nice.

Actually, it turned out better than I thought. My body and mind rebelled a bit last week. I think I was over-exercising. I seemed more tired and sluggish than usual, I wasn't as determined to get my exercising in, I was cranky, and I didn't care as much about eating healthy. Don't get me wrong. I exercised a fair amount and kept up with my running program. I didn't make fettuccine alfredo and pecan pie. I was just off my game if you know what I mean. Anyhow, a few of the books I've read said that they are signs of overdoing it.

I haven't run or ridden my bike since Friday, so I hope it's out of my system. So guess what? It's raining!!! It's barely rained all summer where I live. But I take a week off and it begins with a steady downpour which has no signs of letting up. Grrr... There goes my morning run. No chance to scope out the bike riding paths around here either (I took the week off and brought my family down to my dad's house).

Oh well, I guess that leaves me plenty of time to work on dad's house, lol.

Living Fit Is My #1 Job!