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Fitness Weekly Discussion
What have you been doing lately for your own fitness? Try out any new programs or exercises? Have any questions for others about your training? Want to vent about poor behavior in the gym? Started a new diet or have a new recipe you want to share? Anything else health and wellness related?
I’ve been playing Ringfit again, which has been fun. Realizing how out of shape my upper body is, whoops! Yoga class has been a great weekly thing, and I now have a weekly walk with a couple of friends who work at the nearby university.
Weight update
Weighed in this Monday at 239.2 lbs (~108.7 kg) which marks me hitting halfway to goal 2 of 230 lbs. As a sneak preview of next week, I did another way in just now and I'm at 238.4 lbs but I'm not entirely sure where I actually sit in weight as a whole. It's why I prefer doing weekly rather than daily, as daily is too obessive and can be marred by a too much or far too little calorie day. The weeks move slow but I always feel lighter. I also am starting to physically notice the difference around my torso, where my lower back seems noticably thinner, and when I vacuum flex my abdomen, it sits at a normal waistline, so that's positive.
Diet
Stewp, chicken or porkchop sandwiches, spaghett, and takeout lol I'll be getting some groceries soon, but I just have a lot of frozen stuff that I need to finish up with first. I also now have a Costco membership, courtesy of a friend of mine, so we'll see how I can utilize that fully.
Fitness
Car is fixed so I should be back to the gym tomorrow (Friday the 4th of Feb). Otherwise it's occasional DDP Yoga. I have already failed at continually doing my squats challenge lol but I'll try and get back on that horse for my non-gym days.
Re: daily weighing. If you have a smart scale, you can use TrendWeight to even out those highs and lows. I don’t weigh that often anymore, but I did when I lost 15lbs a couple of years ago. Here’s what the chart looks like (my data): https://trendweight.com/u/10b144a0641b49/
If you don’t have a smart scale, there’s this (older, original) version where you input your numbers manually: https://www.fourmilab.ch/hackdiet/online/hdo.html
Thanks autumn! My scale is not really a smart scale, though it does connect to my phone via Bluetooth but only because it's the Fitbit scale lol
My biggest concern is getting to obsessed with the scale, anyhow, so I'm doing my best to avoid it on a daily scale. I'll keep this in mind though if I get to the point of maybe needing a daily weigh in! :)
I feel ya there! If you do decide to go the TrendWeight route in the future, it connects to the FitBit scale, so you’d be all set.
Congrats on your loss so far! I know how mentally challenging it can be to lose weight. I’ve been in maintenance mode for over a year now, and it’s extremely boring compared to trying to lose weight, haha.
Yeah, I won't lie, I'm dreading when I get to the point where I'll have to maintain my weight, becuase I've never actually done that intentionally lol
As sad as it is, I'll probably be calorie counting the rest of my life because I cannot trust myself to "eat intuitively" that so many people say is the way to eat healthy. Me eating intuitively is eat until I'm not hungry anymore, and unfortunately my body is broken lol There is no "satisfied" feeling from eating. I always crave the food, even when I'm bloated lol
I still count calories. I've taken a few breaks here and there, but my weight trends upward whenever I do that, so I always end up going back to tracking. I'm a 5'6" 125lb office worker with the appetite of a 6'4" 250lb olympic powerlifter. :P
Not to be the "have you ever tried" guy, but for what its worth, increased levels of activity/fitness/sports will tend to reduce hunger.
I'm the same as you, I eat until I'm not hungry and that's usually too much. But when I get below 78kg I see a shift where I feel less hungry, eat smaller portions completely naturally, and even more so when I do a lot of activity on a particular day.
I do lift weights (though I've been on a hiatus the last couple of months due to car trouble), and I do find that my hunger is reduced for about a half hour post-workout, but that's it. My body is too battered for high intensity activity like sports, so that's out of the picture unfortunately, because I always did enjoy basketball. And I'd do more cardio but I absolutely abhor stationary cardio, and outdoor cardio is boring.
Even when I'm "not hungry", which for me is just a neutral feeling, I still feel a pull toward eating, likely due to bad habits and also I really, really enjoy eating food. Like, the mastication part of it, and gum doesn't get me those same feels, unfortunately.
I do hope that when I get down to ~200 lbs (~90kg), that I'll be less hungry. The only real change I've noticed at 240 lbs vs 285 lbs is that the initial meal of the day is challenging to be a large meal, whereas back then I could eat 2000kcal in a sitting shortly after waking up. My stomach was expanded so drastically all the time because I ate so much all the time.
I don't go to the gym until 5 pm (when I'm done work) so I don't get any real benefits of hunger reduction since I'm eating supper at around 7:30 and I go to bed at 10.
Yeah, i can totally understand, I have the exact same bad habits and reactions around food.
I can only hope I'm giving you a bit of light in the tunnel. I also thought I'd have to keep paying extreme attention all my life to not "gain back", but it's honestly not been the case too much. Although I'm often not losing as much as I'd like…
I recommend a smart scale (eg. the withings body scale) at the very least, it'll keep you honest.
Since last week I’ve been able to really improve my forward power pulls and even started doing them backwards.
https://youtu.be/XHqIGl3e0kQ
Yesterday I tried them again forwards and they were gorgeous!
Working on my posture has really upped my skating game. Biggest improvement I’ve seen in months. Super exciting.
This week it hit me how far I've let myself go and how indulgent and hedonistic I've been with my food and sweet intake. So, I'm overhauling it all. Keeping the changes gradual, but with some immediacy. Been having far too much sodium, calories, and sweets in general. Got a new pickup of groceries yesterday and kept my choices healthier. If it's a snack, it's a healthy snack. If it's sweet, it's fruit. If I don't want to cook- it's the better frozen options (frozen veggies, low sodium/healthier style frozen meals).
Trying not to make this a "diet" but a life-long change, by just properly substituting things. Basically setting myself up for success, rather than trying something hard to stick with and then relapsing (done that MANY times now). I won't keep most sweets around anymore. If I eat out, I know sodium will be high, so portions will be lower, or at least a minimum, the foods will be healthier (not fried, etc).
I think I can find a way to basically tackle all of my food intake issues, so even when I do have cravings or "stumble" I'm doing so in a healthy way- for instance if I still feel like I need an oversized portion- it's much healthier to overeat some low-cal frozen veggies than it is to have 2 burgers instead of 1 burger :)
Been down this road many times before, but I think I'm making better choices this time that I might be able to stick to long-term.
If anyone else reading this struggles with a hatred of exercise, what are some things you do to help overcome that?
I have been able to go periods of a few months at a time where I feel motivated enough to wake up early and work out (at home, usually alternating days between dumbell routines and treadmill cardio), but I can never shake the fact that I just really hate exercising. After a while I'll start skipping days and eventually throw my schedule off so much that I just give up and stop. My current "off" period has reached the 2-year mark now and I'm feeling the tug to get back into it, but I want to try to make it stick as more of a lifestyle change as opposed to something I do for a few months before going "back to normal" again. But I hate getting to the point where I dread every morning because I dislike working out so much, and don't know how to get over that.
My routine takes around 45-60 minutes a day (which is probably the upper limit of what I want to spend) and was arrived at over small iterations, consisting of 1 day chest/back, next day arms/shoulders, last day legs (which is my most dreaded by far), and I'd alternate those with days where I go for a jog either around the neighborhood or on the treadmill (which I enjoy more and can stick to a lot easier compared to the resistance training days).
My main thinking right now is to come up with a second (or more) resistance routine, maybe a less intense all-calisthenics one so I don't need to buy any new equipment, that I can alternate to when I get too sick of my dumbbells one. I don't know how realistic that idea is though--it took me a long time to come up with my current routine and don't know any good resources to help come up with different ones. I'm wondering if I'm missing something else that could help make exercise (muscle-building exercise in particular) less of a dreaded chore.
I'm not sure if this is helpful, but I think it may be a time thing. I used to love playing sports, but hating training (running, lifting, swimming...). That changed for me when I started doing it consistently with some friends. The external pressure got me through the initial hurdle and when I started getting the dopamine associated with those activities it drew me in further. I loved running. The post run high is something I couldn't replicate anywhere else and something I found myself needing after a stressful workday or commute. Then I got injured and had to take nearly a year away. When I was finally getting back to being able to train again I didn't feel any want to. Like you say, it felt like a chore. It took another few months to remember why I enjoyed it so much in the first place. I'm not sure if it is a fitness threshold that you need to cross to enjoy it again or what, but it took me until I was back up to a decent pace before I started getting my "second wind" and post run highs again. Sort of feels the same with weight training.
Big caveat, I have no idea how to translate those feelings into leg day. I have always hated it and always will.
I only do exercise I enjoy. I like cycling, RingFit Adventure, and yoga. I’ve tried lots of things, and I even had a good weight lifting setup, but it just wasn’t my thing and collected dust periodically. I finally sold it a few weeks ago, and now I have more room for yoga. RFA and yoga can be decent strength exercise if you curate them well enough.
When you do yoga at home do you follow a program of some kind? I did P90X for a while ages ago and found that I enjoyed the yoga days a lot more than I thought I would, but I wouldn't even know where to start creating some kind of routine. The idea of going to classes with other people doesn't appeal much to me.
There's lots of free yoga videos on YouTube. Yoga with Adriene is very popular. I really liked her 30 days of yoga series. 20-30 minute videos and you get a really good workout.
It's a bit weird doing yoga from a video, because you are trying to do the pose, while watching the video to make sure you're doing it right. But after a while you get pretty familiar with a lot of it and it's easier.
Over time I took some of the exercises I learned doing her videos and developed my own routine I do now.
One downside vs a class is you don't have someone to tell you if you are doing a move improperly. I recommend recording yourself doing the moves from time to time so you can see if your form is correct.
I don’t notice other people when I go to classes, but that took awhile. Down Dog is a great app for yoga. Lots of customization and that’s what I typically use when I’m not at class. Very small ($30?) yearly fee for all the features and there’s also a free version.
I don't really enjoy exercising, but there are certain exercises I find more tolerable. So basically I just do more of those types of exercises, especially when I am less motivated. That works for me because I'm just trying to lose weight and so it generally doesn't really matter what kind of exercises I'm doing as long as I'm burning calories. It sounds like you might have more specific goals so just trying to find different types of exercise might not work for you.
On days where I really don't want to exercise, I either don't exercise or somehow push myself through that feeling and do it anyways. Sometimes I can mentally work my way up to it. I'll pace around my house, tidy up my room, do some laundry, basically something slightly productive and active, all while thinking about how I don't really want to exercise but I should do it anyways. I think it is partly doing something productive that puts me in a more productive mindset and walking around starts warming me up and getting my blood pumping slightly more than just sitting on the couch. It's a weird thing to try and describe, but basically I am slowly trying to psych myself up to do some exercising. It can take anywhere from 10 minutes to an hour but usually I can push myself through and get a workout done.
Something else that works for me is committing to a smaller workout. I do weight training/calisthenics twice a week, usually for about 50 minutes. Yesterday was my day to do it and I really wasn't feeling it. So I decided I'll just do a 15-20 minutes instead, as that felt like something I could do no problem and is at least better than nothing. So I do the workout and by the time I was 15 minutes in I felt fine to do the full 50 minute workout. And even if I didn't, again I would feel less bad because at least I would have done something that day. So it's a win-win.
I know how my brain works, and so I've developed these kind of strategies to try and work through those feelings.
I think you have a good idea in developing a different routine to give you more options. You say that you enjoy the cardio more. Have you tried starting with with a bit of cardio to get you going and then moving to resistance training? Or maybe developing a workout where you're doing both types throughout, switching between the two? Just some ideas.
Yeah, I have a couple dogs that I enjoy walking, so I walk around 2 miles almost every day with them, which makes me feel somewhat OK about my baseline activity level even though I'm pretty sedentary the rest of the time. I do want to lose around 10-ish pounds to get to a more comfortable weight, but that's more of a diet issue for me. My bigger concern is to build and maintain enough stamina and muscle that I can stay relatively strong, healthy, and mobile into my old age (currently just north of 40).
I do like the idea of coming up with a wider variety of routines though.