Wednesday, June 15, 2011

Day 3, P90X reboot

I only got through about half the workout yesterday before my life intruded so I decided to do it over today. I waited till everyone else was in bed so I could be uninterrupted. I think I'm going to get the most out of this only if I work and sweat and do it in one session. I'm not nearly as sore today as I was after pylometrics last time. Not to say that I'm not hurting but last time I could barely move. I want to make sure I'm getting my best out of these workouts. Tonight I ate light, Garlic Pasta Chicken so I could be on my best. The only thing about doing these workouts late is that I'm tired and dragging before I even hit the mat. On the other hand, I know I'm just going to put it off if I try to get up in the morning and do it.

I am feeling much more positive today and I like the Arms and Shoulders workout. Again I felt super good that I wasn't back on square one. Some of these I did a whole fifteen reps. I definitely need to get some heavier weights for next week. Other moves, I've got plenty of room for improvement. Some I did eight, others only five. I really like the moves that focus on the back of my arms. I want slender sexy arms for my super sexy wedding dress. But I feel that this a workout I'm holding my own in which is good for my self esteem which is kind of in the toilet right now.

The best part of Ab Ripper is that it is short. I'm improving here and feel pretty good about it. Weirdly enough the darn bicycling is the hardest one for me, crunchy frogs my favorite. Don't they use the same freak n muscles? I'm going to try a thicker mat because my darn back and hips really hurt during and after these exercises. I don't know that I can do anything at all about that, I've always had back troubles. I think a thicker mat is a higher priority even than heavier weights. I also like this because it's fast and feels more aerobic, like maybe it's burning fat and not just building muscle. I need to do something, but jumping around just hurts my giant boobs.

Has anyone ever tried a ECA stack? I've tried supplements before and I don't like feeling jittery and sick, but maybe I can add something to my diet to help me burn fat while I build muscle. Knowing myself though, if they make me feel lousy I won't take them.

Monday, June 13, 2011

Day 2, P 90X reboot

I spent all day putting out fires. Everything I touched today turned to ash. My business took a hit, I fought with my kids, my sister, my ex and my lover. Financially today was sucky. Everything that could go wrong did go wrong. But I did manage to get through Pylometrics with only five interruptions. I realize the workout probably is not as effective when done in more than one session but I figured it was better to finish it today, even in pieces, than to put it off till tomorrow. Since putting things off till tomorrow is my specialty, I don't want to fall into that trap again.

Maybe it's just me. I was pretty irritated so I found the workout irritating. I have a lot of things in my house that rattle. All that jumping around shakes my crappy floors. My balance is awful, being a big huge fat girl doesn't help me be graceful. I sweated and cursed and jumped for what seems to be half my damn day. And I'm glad. I'm glad I made it through my workout. This is the only way I'm going to get better. Next week when I do pylometrics maybe I won't about fall on my head every five minutes and have to go slower than everyone else because my equilibrium sucks. Maybe my thighs will be just a smidgen smaller so it won't be so impossible to get them into position. Maybe I won't be so inflexible that I can't get my legs up where they are supposed to be. I'm not expecting miracles, I'm just looking forward to it being better. I've got to make it through this week so next week I can see that it's better.

I'll probably be getting my roses tonight or in the morning so I should be a little less cranky and a little more bloated and sluggish. Tomorrow I won't skip breakfast and lunch and then binge on five chewy chocolate chip cookies and a huge glass of milk. So here is to getting through today's workout against all odds, and through doing well on tomorrows workout...cheers.

Sunday, June 12, 2011

I'm a lazy quitter.

So after a long week and  half of grueling push ups and sit ups and jumping around and soreness, not to mention the healthy eating I climbed on the scale. I hadn't lost so much as a quarter of a pound. Not to be discouraged I broke out my tape measure and was shocked to find that I hadn't lost so much as a squidge, even on my fat arms and I've never done so many push ups in my life. I said I was going to keep at it...tomorrow. Tomorrow turned into a month. Which turned into longer.

I went out to eat with my fiance and my son last night at a popular restaurant and they spent the entire time ogling the beautiful women. I used to be the beautiful women. Now my fiance tells me I'm beautiful and sexy, but I have a mirror and I know the truth. He definitely could not keep his eyes to himself with some of these ladies and it made me feel disgusting and ashamed. So this morning I got up and popped in my Chest and Back video for P90X. I'm feeling disgusted enough with myself to try again. I'm not going to get any smaller and sexier sitting around feeling sorry for myself. Not to mention I'm getting married in less than a year and  have no desire whatsoever to be photographed looking like this.

I was pleasantly surprised to learn that I was not back at square one. I must have really added to my muscle mass with that first week because I was able to do several push ups and I think I need to move up to a heavier band for my pull ups. Again I didn't keep up with Tony, I didn't expect to. But I was definitely not as pathetic as I was on day one. I did about half the push ups, on my knee's after the first one, for all of the reps with the exception of the last couple because I was so wiped out. I also managed to do the entire set of the pull up reps except for the last few. I think before next week I'm going to invest in a heavier band because I know I'm not even close to being able to do a pull up. I was even able to do a couple of the dive bombers and I think those are the hardest ones. Not on my toes, but still I wasn't even able to execute one last time I tried this.

I was also better than my first time on the Ab Ripper X, though not as good as I was doing when I quit. I managed to do as many as 15 on some of the exercises...some of them more like five. Still, I sweated through till the end, even though I did take more  breaks than I did with the chest and back. And drank lots of water.

As for eating I started my day out with a cupcake and a bowl of lucky charms, not the most well balanced meal. My kids are gone for the weekend and I went with what was easy. I will try harder with my diet. This afternoon I plan to have a salad and tonight a turkey sandwich. I even plan to leave off the mayo and slap on an extra mater so it's not dry. I am however trying to cut down on the hours that I sleep, when I'm depressed I sleep more, and I need to keep it at about 7 or 8 hours. More than that is not going to help me feel any better.

So anyhow, here is to round two, not quitting, and not getting discouraged. Cheers.

Wednesday, April 27, 2011

Kenpo X

Well I'm back at my 3:00 time slot which is good, since I'm not so tired and my motivation is higher. Had lucky charms for breakfast so I'm feeling good. Had Lucky Charms for lunch too, and sunflower seeds for a snack. Not exactly on the list of foods provided by Tony. My back aches today, which isn't exactly new territory, my back aches often because of my boobs. I feel like I do after I have a lot of walking or climbing stairs to do the day before. I tried and tried to get my back to pop this morning, but I wasn't able to. It feels all tight. Despite all of this I felt all fired up to try Kenpo X. And now that I'm done I kind of have mixed feelings.

This workout was the closest to cardio that I've done so far. Which is a good thing because I want to lose weight and need to do a little cardio. But I didn't feel particularly challenged by it. Basically it was a series of Karate exercises. I'm thinking I need a punching bag to really get the full effect of the workout. I feel weird throwing punches without connecting with anything. If I throw too hard I snap my joints, and if I don't throw my body weight behind it then I'm not getting much of a workout.

However, when I managed to keep pace with everyone else I stayed moving pretty much the whole time so that was good. I did sweat. And I liked the lunging and kicking. I guess I just feel that this isn't the most effective workout, but then again I don't think I'm doing it properly so I'll try again next week and try to make sure I'm putting plenty of ooommmppfff behind those punches.

Because I want to lose weight as well as build muscle I'm thinking about maybe doing some cardio in the mornings. Maybe going for a job. The hard cold truth of the matter is that my motivation in the morning is at an all time low. I love my pillows and do not want to leave the warm snug cocoon of my bed early to sweat and jump. I may have the best intentions in the afternoon after my workout but I know myself well enough that I will put it off if I try for a morning workout. Maybe I could try to take a run in the evenings after dinner.

Tuesday, April 26, 2011

Legs and Back, Ab Ripper X

I did pretty good with dinner. Turkey, with Gravy of course. but instead of potato's we had pasta and veggies. I made bread and stuffing as well but did not indulge, just fed it to everyone else. There were only a few dishes and I had the kids tackle them so I could get into my workout before I got too tired. Today was Legs and Back as well as Ab Ripper X.

Legs and Back was an hour long and was a pretty good workout. I have very strong legs and i guess to exercise my back there were a lot of thigh exercises like lunges. I was able to keep up pretty good on these. I went slower, because i want the form to be right and I don't want to cheat. So I didn't do as many reps. But I didn't need to stop as often to suck down water and breath heavily and dramatically during those exercises. I'm sure I pushed myself hard enough to feel it tomorrow. There were also some pull up exercises. These are very very hard for me. I'm using a resistance band because I probably couldn't do a real pull up if my life depended on it, but I feel very good about my progress here. I did these all the way down on the ground and with proper form for most of them. I managed to get a decent amount of reps in too. I might upgrade to the next resistance band next time we do pull ups. So even though I'm not keeping up, I definitely am improving.

I am really excited about he Ab Ripper X workout. It's only twenty minutes long which I think makes it easier for me. This is now the third time that I've done the workout and there was VAST improvement. Even with having been sick. I promised myself that I wasn't going to cheat. So I'm not rocking around, coming up on my side, or using my arms to help myself up. I'm doing everything with proper form. So for the first two workouts my situps were pretty sad. Tony likes you to keep your arms out in front so that you can't use them to cheat and I mostly just strained to get up and didn't really do that many reps. This time I was able to strain hard enough to get up properly several times. This is the first time since I've started that I've seen tangible improvement in my form so I'm really excited tonight. The exercises where you lift your legs from the lower abdomen are easier for me and I was able to do quite a few more reps tonight as well. At the end, Tony does this twist around exercise where you put your hands together and your feet up and then twist around to touch your hands to the ground on each side. I'm really slow at it because I'm trying to actually do the form properly. I was actually able to touch the ground on each side a couple times which again is an improvement.

Now my biggest problem is that I'm absolutely starving. I'm going to take a quick shower to de-stink and then I think I'm going to mack on those veggies and pasta to calm my craving. There is snack pack of pudding in the fridge for after school snacks for kids and I'm dying to smash on it. Maybe I'll also eat some of these hard boiled eggs minus the yolks. I only have four dozen to eat, lol.

Ok, Back Again

Well I got deathly ill for two days, then I had to work double shifts to make it up, then I had Easter to deal with. A laundry list of excuses I know. I actually tried to do my Yoga workout the other day but I was still feeling dizzy and weak. I don't usually get sick so I wonder if pushing myself so hard lowered my resistance. I'm sure it will be good for me in the long run. Also I made the mistake of climbing on the scale prematurely and was dissapointed by my lack of results. So my motivation flagged for a minute. But I'm not giving up so yesterday after work I dove back in with the Yoga workout. I worked an extra long shift and thought that Yoga would be a good way to ease back into the P90X.

I was so wrong. There was nothing easy about it. For starters it's really long. An hour and a half. By the end my limbs were shaking so bad I could barely get into position. For second I put my full body weight on muscles that I usually don't use. For third, my balance isn't that good so some of these positions are a real struggle to keep from pushing over.

On the good side, it was fun. All three of my kids got into it and enjoyed it. I started off by myself and one by one they were there with me doing the poses. It made the workout much easier to have company. Still I have to say that this is one of the harder workouts. I think it's because you hold the poses while your muscles shake and strain. Other exercises you are moving, but with Yoga you stay still alot and hold in positions that strain your balance and your muscles. However, I'm not really sore this morning. Just a little weak in the muscles, like taffy. My back feels like I need a good stretch. I did some of those stretches on my knees where you collapse your spine and stretch it out and it felt really good. I think that my back muscles were probably the main muscles affected by my Yoga. Which is good because my back hurts a lot from carrying around my top heavy boobs. I've been told that back exercises will help with that.

I know that my form was awful on a lot of these. I'm pretty chunky in the thighs and middle and I'm far from limber. I think this will be a good challenge for me and is something I'll see a really good improvement on over time so I can feel that I'm getting somewhere. I'm glad to be back on task with my workouts. And my diet too. I splurged on Easter. Having ham and potatoes and bread. Oh how I love bread. But for the most part I ate well. I was sick and didn't eat anything for two days and then could barely hold down soup and crackers so it wasn't like I was having cakes and pies. Today I was especially careful with my eating. Having an egg white spinach omelet for breakfast which actually turned out to be pretty good. I'll probably be going back to that one a lot since I don't like a lot of things on the menu. I brought an avocado with me for snack and then had a tuna sandwich for lunch.

I'm going to put dinner on the table and then do my workout for today. Then I'll log back on and let you know how it goes.

Tuesday, April 19, 2011

Day 3, 87 Days to go

My daughter is so sweet, she brought me breakfast in bed this morning. I ate every delicious fattening bite of my toaster struedel because I didn't have the heart to tell her it wasn't approved diet food. It did have blueberries which is why she made it for me, because blueberries are on my list of foods to eat. I had an avocado for a snack and am eating way less than I  usually do. I'm usually a eat till I'm full kind of girl and my portions really aren't satisfying me, especially with my upped calorie burn. I need to make sure that I'm getting healthy foods in me so that I don't crash.  So I had some nuts to hold me over till lunch and then had not only a baked chicken breast but also some cottage cheese and fruit. I can't eat the cottage cheese without the fruit. Still really hungry but sticking it out. I will not crash my kitchen and have cookies today. :)

I am pretty sore today, my legs and butt are really tender. But I'm taking that as a positive. I did some stretching first thing and took a walk before I went to work so I could keep my muscles loose. Today is Arms and Shoulders and I was looking forward to it. I know that you can't target a specific area of the body for weight loss but this is definitely a place that I want some definition. My flabby arms are the second most upsetting part of my body. I also have ab ripper. As much as I want to build that muscle, I'm hurting today pretty good. So I stood in front of my mirror starkers for a while before I put my workout clothes. I wanted to burn into my brain why I was doing this so I didn't half ass my workout. I think  it really helped. I needed the extra motivation because my kids pretty much abandoned me to play with friends today so it was pretty much me against the pain without any lighthearted joking and encouragement. I really missed that today and it made my workout a lot harder. I wish I had a bigger living room so I could have someone else do this with me, but it's pretty cramped with one mat.

So shoulders and arms was mostly working with weights. These workouts are targeted more towards men who want to get ripped so it focused a lot on shoulders. I don't necessarily want to build huge shoulders so I stuck with the 8 pound weights. I didn't make it to the 12 to 15 reps on any of the shoulder lifts so I have plenty of room to improve there. Other lifts I did make the 12 reps so I think I might need to invest in a heavier set of weights. I think I'm going to by some 10 pound weights before next weeks workout. I'm already stretched pretty thin financially with just the cost of the workouts so it's not really feasible for me to go out and buy a lot of new equipment. I really liked the exercises that focused on that triceps muscle, that's where my flab is and those were hard. I dropped down to 5 pounds on the reverse ones so that I could do some. I made it to the end of the workout and even did the bonus section.

I did better on ab ripper today. I thought the soreness of my tummy would be a deterrent but it really wasn't. I'm not as sore there as I was yesterday and it really only hurts when I sneeze, which I do all of the time because of my allergies. Still, on a lot of these I'm just straining and not doing the full move because I can't get all the way up off the mat. I don't want to cheat. But I definitely got higher today and tried with almost every count. I did much better on the reverse crunch type exercises where you lift your legs. These are easier for me in general and I was able to do a couple with proper form. Really this workout didn't put a strain on my super sore thighs so I was able to get through it.

Overall I feel that I am not halfassing the workouts and will get results. I need results to keep going though because I'm a instant gratification kind of girl. I'm not getting my cookie instant gratification and I've got to have something. I'm tempted to climb on the scale and have a look but I promised myself a week with no measurements so I'm not giving in. I'm working hard, I'm feeling the pain, so I feel good that I'm doing this.