FeralGoth’s BodyBlog

Having discovered the joys of lump charcoal this past weekend, I had the idea of making grilled chicken "strips" ahead.  You know how they have bags of them in costco/sam’s club etc. the factory grilled and stamped with grill marks and infused with extra salt?  I thought - why not make my own - at least for a few day’s supply.   Chicken breast w/o skin/bones etc. was on sale so I picked up a 4 pack, rolled them all in a small bowl half full of Vietnamese Chili Garlic Sauce then tossed them on the grill, wow were they spicy!   I let them cool then put them in a ziplock bag in the fridge for this week… I also grilled some asparagus (lightly spray with Pam first and add a little salt/pepper) afterwards and did the same.

Over the past few days I have been slicing and reheating the spicy chicken and making impromtu quesadillas with fat free cheese etc.   Today I made the "mega taco"

Slice up 3.5 oz of the grilled chicken and reheat it in the microwave with 1 oz of grilled asparagus (in a bowl, covered for less than a minute, stir it up after 30 sec.)
1 Tumaro’s low fat, low carb multi grain tortilla goes into a skillet on medium.   Put 1 oz of fat free shredded cheddar on the tortilla and spread out evenly.   Dice up 1.5 oz of tomato and add it and the reheated chicken+asparagus to the tortilla, fold it over and lightly brown on both sides (copying Tijuana Flat’s "Grilled Tacos")  Get plenty of napkins and EAT IT!

Total Calories: 319.5
6g fat
17.5g carbohydrates
9g fiber
48.5g protein

So, there’s this small fiasco going on on the personal training forum, I posted a question asking how other trainers motivate their clients and nestled in with a bunch of good advice is someone telling me to "clean myself up" as if I am dirty or something?  (Dude, I gave up on that hippie deoderant YEARS ago… that stuff doesn’t work).  Some people continued to give some good client motivating ideas, while others chose to fixate on telling me things about how I look.   I know what I look like, and I know how people react to it… I’m 31 and this isn’t a freaking news flash.  The truth is, I’m not interested in the typical mainstream client, I may end up having a few, but the clients I’m most interested in helping are the ones who would never consider working with a barbie/ken looking trainer.  You know all those "fat girl" clients you don’t want?  Well, I don’t have a problem with them, and heck, I even want to help them improve their lifestyle.  They might not want to hire you because you’ll probably give them crap about what they wear to the gym… and since I won’t be constantly picking on them… they might do something crazy - like following my advice.
Which got me thinking… I was trying to remember why I hated P.E. back in school so much… it was because of the lame coaches always giving me a hard time about stuff NOT RELATED to my physical performance.  I would show up with a good attitude, never talking out of turn, never giving anyone even a slight bit of trouble.  For instance we had this one doofus who was supposed to be teaching us tennis, I had been taking private lessons on the weekends from a Dutch tennis pro and had developed a fairly wicked serve (he was not told about this), did he focus on teaching me other aspects of tennis?  NO, he gave me unending crap about the fact that I wore black socks to P.E.  This plus the blistering sun helped me to develop a rotten attitude about tennis.  Truth be known, I haven’t played since, which is a real shame, because I’m pretty ok at it and it may be a fun way to meet some new friends.   Socks aside, it seems like throughout my past, as long as there was some dang ex-football coach male teaching P.E. that same male was giving me a hard time about some aspect of my style (thanks for picking on my Chuck Taylors you jerk) which once again, had no bearing on safety or athletic performance.  I wasn’t even on a team for crying out loud, I was just fulfilling a graduation requirement.   At the same time, I sure *didn’t* have a rotten attitude about going to the YMCA and working out, or even participating in a step aerobics class (1993), no one gave me any bs at the YMCA…. and I got a better workout.
So…. what potential clients out there have had similar experiences?  As long as that client is wearing workout clothing that is safe, does not restrict their movement, and covers the legal areas then we’re good… I sure as hell will NEVER pick on anyone because of how they look when they’re my client, and if someone else does, I will support and defend my client so that they know I am on their side and want them to keep working out.  Would you continue going somewhere when you know that every time you went, someone would pick on you about something?   No wonder I keep meeting people who are afraid to ask others for help with fitness…

I was going through my bookshelf the other day and stashed inside the front cover of "Flex Appeal" by Rachel McLish were a collection of printout from May 5th 2003.  The first one was a body composition analysis done by a trusted trainer, and old school bodybuilder Raymond in DeLand who is still currently the only person on this planet who can call me "Little Lady" without offending me (it helps that he’s nearly grandpa age).  Anyway - that page has my body fat AND the mm measurements used to obtain the percentage.  I had been getting paranoid lately that maybe my calculations and measurements were way off since I’m approaching a (at least for me) low 16% while still eating the occasional cheeseburger.   Needless to say this should be accurate since I am willing to be seen at the pool in public on a weekend in a bathingsuit (the real test).   SO… here’s the comparison from then to now:

Then - 26 years old, 118.7lbs (clothed to workout) 19.7% body fat (and still not happy with the booty/cellulite issues)

Now - 31 years old, 123lbs (nekkid!) 16.5% body fat (significantly happier with rear end, thighs, upper body development, etc. etc. things are good)

Other fun things to realize is that at age 26 I had been a strict vegetarian for 3 years eating minimal cheese and having beans/tofu/grains as my main protein source.  Now I eat all sorts of things (steak burritos, eggs, turkey sausage, dark greens, broccoli like mad, brown rice, whey, yogurt, muesli etc.) - but not junk food unless its an "occasion" and that doesn’t happen too often. Yes, I will have the double cheeseburger and split the fries with you at 5 guys… but chances are its because I lifted heavy the day before… :)

The 2nd page is really interesting, it is a typed up mini report I did about my fitness goals at the time, and what I had been doing at the gym before going to see Raymond, and particulars of my diet.  I seriously need to find the old text file of this, because it is a complete 180 from what I do now.   I was doing loads of cardio, light weighted upper body exercises (12lb and 15lb dumbbells?!??! ! WHAT?????), yoga, belly dancing, aerobic kickboxing, tai chi (which I still do with some chi kung) not to mention loads and loads of crunches.

I can’t believe how far I’ve come when I look back at all of this.   Besides being so much happier with how I look now, I am so *significantly stronger* that its a little bit staggering.  This gives me great hope for my future personal training clients - I remember feeling so helpless back then about changing how I looked - like I would never get this sagging behind back where it needed to be.   Not everyone will respond to how I train now, but just knowing that there ARE ways to train that WILL make the changes you want to see is amazingly motivating.   I can’t wait to start helping folks on their way to fitness.   Ok, back to studying!!!

When I was a kid, I spent a lot of time in the backyard hanging from monkey bars, climbing trees, hanging on to trapese swings, climbing rope ladders, accidentally doing a lot of what essentially were wacky forms of chin ups.   Recently I’ve discovered that through some of my training I am getting close to what I as a tiny 60 lb kid used to be able to do.  Thats right, chinups.  Most adults can’t do them, especially women, which of course means that I am morally obligated to work on such things, because I’m wired that way.   About 6 months ago I could do 2, 3 on a good day, Monday I did 9.  Wednesday I managed to squeak out another one for an even 10.  After jumping up from the ground to grab the bar (been working on vertical jump as well - YAY PLYOMETRICS) - that was really funny because I wasn’t honestly expecting to be able to reach it, I jumped from a squat position and the next thing I knew the bar was in my hands and I was off the ground.  Crazy stuff!!!   Now I’m trying to remember what else I used to be able to do - I will say this though, when you’re a kid, skipping rope is waaaay easier than it is now - seriously, it seems like jumping rope will KILL YOU the first few times.