Hardness23’s BodyBlog

Gone are the days of fake baking, the days of baby oil and tropicana and beautiful golden skin.  I went in to have some moles removed and the doctor decided to surgically remove them as they looked "suspicious."  I am stitched up in 2 places now and when my doctor told me many young women come in and get diagnosed with aggressive forms of skin cancer, I decided to take his advice about tanning seriously.  He told me he diagnosed a 13 year old with a deadly form of skin cancer not long ago.  I am waiting to hear back from the biopsy.  Meanwhile, I’ve decided this is my opportunity to save myself.  I work so hard every day to live a healthy lifestyle.  I don’t drink, smoke, eat  trans fat or even saturated fat.  So why would I do something so stupid like tan?  It’s probably one of the easiest ways you can give yourself cancer.  All you have to do is get it on your skin, and then it can spread to the rest of your body like wildfire.  I feel like getting skin cancer is like getting AIDS, hear me out.  IT’S PREVENTABLE!  Yet just as people still go out and have unprotected sex, people go out giving themselves skin cancer because they feel like it can’t happen to them.  And then they can’t do much when the doc tells them they have so long to live.  And like AIDS, you can be a young, healthy, otherwise normal person who is going to die of something they self-inflicted.

I’ve also realized that if I work hard to stay fit and lean, I don’t need to be tan to look good.  Fortunately I’m blessed in that way and I thank God for what he’s given me physically.  I used to tan to make my fat look more attractive.  Now I will work harder to rid the fat and have healthy youthful skin.  I’ll probably throw on a light coat of jantana if I go out and want to look extra hot and get some MAC tan concealer.  It’s such a hastle trying to keep a good tan too.  And then you get all stressed when you start to lose it, or your tanning membership runs out.  In todays economy I mean really I do not need to be spending money on something so stupid.  I remember coming home from the tanning booth and having new wrinkles around my eyes, gross!  Since I started drinking a lot more water, eating a lot more spinach with vitamin A and K, my skin is healthier from the inside and I intend on keeping it that way.

Also, my progress with my weight loss is coming along good and this I know because people are telling me all of a sudden my arms look really muscular.  LOL.  If they only knew the fat is just coming off of them.  It’s funny how nobody notices when I work so hard to put on muscle because I just look "bulky." And then all of these girls are like "OMG you look so TONED." What’s frustrating is the weight is coming off of my upper body, but not my lower body yet.  I just gotta keep on the stairmaster.  My doc told me not to exercise for 10 days until I go in to get my stitches out, I told him I have two pounds a week to lose!  He knew I probably was not going to take his advice.  I have taken three needed days of rest and slept about 12 hours a night with my painkillers, but I am ready to get my sweat on now that my pain is gone. 

I have to go in for a cholesterol test, in which I have to fast for twelve hours!  That’s right, no eating or drinking anything except water!  They said to just stop eating before I go to bed and come in in the morning.  That would be fine if I actually had a normal-people schedule!  I work from 11pm to 7am, so that means I have to go in after work in the morning since I normally go to bed at 1pm.  I will have to wake up at 9pm, eat breakfast, and then go a whole work shift and day without eating!  I am going to be so grumpy and it is going to throw my metabolism WAY off!  I was thinking about what I should eat before and after, and maybe take a.a. pills during the day.  AND I’m going to have to postpone my workouts.  Not excited.

I had no carbs today and a rough workout in the morning (10 pm actually) and should have been feeling crappy around the end of my shift around 5am.  Instead i had TONS of energy my whole workshift and even now when I’m about to go to bed!  All I’ve had today is about 300 grams of protein, 40 grams of fat and ONLY about 20 carbs.  With no carbs I am supposed to be out of energy!  What the heck!

Here’s my diet today:

1) 9 pm 1/2 cup Kefir, 2 scoops protein powder
2)  10pm 6 egg whites (1 yolk), 1/2 cup frozen spinach

WORKOUT- UPPER BODY- 60 Minutes, I took Purple Wrath sampler which I don’t normally take and got a massive pump.  I’ll probably buy some now.

3) 11pm protein shake, 1 scoop

4) 11:30pm protein shake, 1 scoop

5) 12 midnight6 egg whites, 1/2 cup frozen spinach

6) 2am Can of tuna with 1 tbsp of Olive Oil Hellmans Mayo, 1 scoop protein powder, spinach leaves
7)  4am same as meal 6

8) Salmon, 6 oz and 1/2 grilled onion, spinach leaves

My current diet involves 500g of protein a day, fats, and minimal carbs.  For all the people who think this is dangerous, wait and see my results, but in the meantime here is some evidence that this is perfectly fine and healthy.

Read this scientific article, and don’t listen to those nutritionists that don’t know what they’re talking about! Do your homework.
http://ndt.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/full/20/3/657"For individuals with normal renal function, the risks of high-protein weight loss diets are minimal and must be balanced against the real and established risk of continued obesity”

“Men in the famous Lewis and Clark expedition across America reportedly ate as much as nine pounds of buffalo meat each day with no ill effects [3]. That is well over 600 g of protein as a daily minimum."

I met with my new trainer today for the first time to practice posing.  She taught me all the quarter turns and mandatory poses.  They are a lot harder than they look!  I could not even do the lat spread at all.  She brought out another mirror so I could see my back and I realized my back looks a lot better then I thought when I flex it.  It’s really muscular and sexy I think because of how it curves in at my waist.  I’ve never seen myself like this because I’ve always had to try to hold a mirror up while looking at my back.  I’m going to practice a little every day with the quarter turns and the mandatory poses.  I think I look the best when I do the side chest pose because my body looks really shapely and I can point my toe to the ground which pops my calf out.  I thought I would feel really manly doing all these poses but I actually feel feminine and sexy when I do them.

While I was at the county fair today I somehow justified to myself that it would be o.k. to have a cheat meal.  It’s crazy because I am extremely disciplined, until I convince myself that it is o.k. to have a cheat meal.  That’s when all hell breaks lose and I am like an uncontrollable animal searching around for any unhealthy food I can get my hands on.  It was all because I realized that I haven’t had a cheat meal in about three weeks.  My diet is controlled, not entirely strict.  I eat fruits and cottage cheese and probably too much peanut butter most of the time.  So basically I’m not sure I was really WORTHY of a cheat meal tonight.  Anyways, I decided to get a burrito, with just chicken, beans, and rice.  Not too bad for a cheat meal.  Then I was still hungry.  I decided to get a huge waffle cone with oreo’s and butterfinger topping.  That’s probably a little too much.  I got home and was still not full, and I couldn’t stop thinking about food and how I wanted MORE.  So I made a bowl of cereal, Raisin Bran Crunch, which turned into half of the box.  Believe it or not I still am hungry.  I mean how is this possible?  I think it’s also because I know I’m about to start dieting and so I figure who cares if I get fatter before I start dieting?  It’ll make the before pictures better.  HA!  It’s funny how I can find a way to justify anything.  I’m going to the gym before I make myself sick.

I want everyone to look at my new progress pics and know that they are my BEFORE pics, and were difficult for me to post.  I also want you to check back in June of this year to see how I’m doing and again in July before my competition.  You’ll see what I am capable of and realize that although I’ve put on some weight this past winter, I assure you it is quality muscle under that fatsuit.  I will be designing my own diet plan and workouts.  I have the experience to do it on my own after two years of competing.  Be advised I am natural, and hope to be the inspiration of other natural bodybuilders.  I will become a muscular, lean, tight little package of muscle.  I am cleaning up my diet for now and start dieting in 3 weeks.

I love trying new foods, and now I might try Kefir.

Basically It’s like a yogurt, fermented milk.  You mix it with fruit or make a shake with it.  It sounds gross but fermented foods are really good for your digestive system.  They restore your balance of "good" gut bacteria.  This is important because all that healthy food and vitamins you spend money on make no difference if you can’t absorb them properly in your digestive system.  So I’ve decided to make it.  I read somewhere that asians (not sure on the descent)  used to drink the stuff by the gallon and not gain weight from it, and they were extrememly healthy. I’d like to find out more about that.

Other benefits of kefir:

1)  Low/no carbs.  The benefits of dairy without the carbs and milk-sugar (lactate).  This means low-carbers can eat it with no worries because the bacteria and yeast enzymes digest the milk fat and sugar.  This means you can use whole milk, and the bacteria break it down into little fatty acid chains that are easily used for energy, not stored.  This also means that you can’t accurately gauge the calorie content of it, the amount of carbs or fat in it because this is always changing as the fermentation process happens.  The longer it ferments, the longer the stuff gets broken down.
2)  The abundance of proteins in it are already partially broken down so it is easier for the body to take up the amino acids, and more efficient at it.

3) Rich in Vitamins B/K and calcium

4) The Kefir grains are produced more with every jar you make, and can be reused.  So basically you never run out of the stuff, and could even sell it.
I haven’t tried it yet, and it might be absolutely disgusting!  I guess I’ll find out.  Sometime I think I should just stick to the basics but I take joy in discovering new foods I like.  Maybe this is why I’m able to stick to my diets.  There are so many options.  I thought there weren’t any foods I haven’t heard of, but then I hear of this.
Also, on sardines.  Every time I eat them I feel better mentally and physically.  I did some research and the reason is the high amount of Omega 3’s, protein, and calcium.  They are also one of the cleanest fish with the least amount of mercury.   Since I’ve been eating a lot of Sardine salads with spinach leaves and lemon juice my skin has more color even though I haven’t been tanning, and is really soft and hydrated even when I forget to use lotion.  I can easily tell how a diet is effecting me by the way I feel and by my skin situation.  Spinach is also loaded with vitamin A and this also helps to prevent wrinkles and repair skin damage. It helps to keep it moisturized and prevent wrinkles.  I’m a believer that if you want to maintain your youthfulness, you can buy as many topical creams  as you want but if you eat bad, smoke, and are constantly dehydrated you will look old well before your time.

I was dieting since March 1st for a show at the end of April.  For the first time I failed at my goals.  I couldn’t lose the weight as planned.  I dieted for six weeks and lost only 5 lbs, when I had planned on losing 2 lbs per week.  It could be because of a few things, but diet was not one of them, as I used the same diet I’ve used before to drop fat.
1)  I was convinced to try a 3X a week full body workout plan.  Each day had 4 exercises, 1st day 5 sets/5 reps, 2nd day 3 sets/9 reps, third day 2 sets/20 reps.  I was convinced for a couple of reasons, one being that several prefessional figure competitors used this and succeeded before a competition.  Of course the plan was backed by logical reasoning and a guy with a legitiamate experience in the fitness industry.  The claim was that I would drop massive bodyfat and gain muscle (neither happened).  But sometimes I’ve realized Doctors don’t even know what they’re talking about.  This plan didn’t work for me.  I can say I at least gave the full body thing a try.  Now I know I’ll never do it again.

2)  My sleep patterns.  I got switched to night shift and was losing sleep.  I was only sleeping 2-3 hours at a time.  My hormones were all screwed up as I stayed up until 8am on the nights I had to work and switched back to normal on my days off.

Now that it won’t be feasible to compete when planned, I’ve picked a new date of August 15th.  This is a week before my birthday, and enough time to get things straight.  I need to focus mentally, switch up my training, and regulate my sleep.  Now every day, to include my days off, i am staying up until 8am in the morning.  It’s difficult convincing myself it’s morning when I get up, and that it’s night when the sun is coming up.  The last few days have been good, I’ve been able to sleep at least six hours straight.  The best part is, I’m about to go to the gym right now and it’s 11:15 pm.  I can grunt as loud as I want and not worry about people staring at me in amazement, wondering why is that girl grunting and lifting so much weight?  I swear, sometimes older men look at me like I am in violation of some moral rule that says women are not supposed to lift weights and that I am offending their manhood.  Deal with it!  In the meantime, find somebody else to stare at!  As a matter of fact, if you looked at yourself in the mirror maybe you’d realize how ridiculous you look when your flopping around those weights that are too heavy for you.  Anyways, back to the plan.

The new plan is to not start dieting until May, eat more and sleep more.  Because I’ll be eating a lot more (2,400 calories a day), I’ll need to train HARDER!  I will go back to doing a 4 day split.  These seem to always work best for me.  I used to do the traditional 1-2 bodyparts a day.  I will hybrid my previous plan with my old school stuff to come up with a genius plan that I know will work for me because it is not from a magazine or website, it is a compilation of the things I’ve tried and mistakes I’ve made.  I’ve tried almost everything now, from crazy supersetting high volume training, to powerlifting techniques, from reps from 6 to 30, sets from 6 to 30, and now I think I might nail it for the time being, and then when I need to switch some things up.  But I think I’ll keep the training frequency consistent.

Here goes, train days 1, 2.  Cardio only day 3.  Train days 4, 5.  Rest days 6,7 but add cardio if needed on one day.  Days 1 and 3, upper body.  Days 2 and 4, lower body.  I’ll do mostly compound movements and bodyweight movements, adding a couple of isolation stuff in the end.  I’ll start out with compound movements in the 15-20 rep range, and as I move on I’ll lower the reps to 8-10 and increase the weight.  I’ll switch up the workouts every single time and focus on different groups each time, but doing compound movements that will encompass all muscles in the upper/lower body as well.  I’ll keep all workouts less than an hour.  I’ll do cardio completely separate.

Diet- I got too fat over the winter, eating too many complex carbs.  I will keep the calories the same, but my carbs must be only fruits and vegetables.  I know oats are the staple food, but I just can’t handle them.  I added just more oats in my diet before and got too fat.  So now I have to rule them out completely, which is hard because I love them.  I’ll have to try to find carbs in fruits and veggies that will stick with me longer.  Grapefruit has a lower GI, and if I eat a lot of fiber I should get enough energy.  I think eating too many carbs as oats in the off season has screwed up my metabolism completely.  Before when my body was accustomed to a low carb diet and energy levels were high, I could drop weight so easily.  And when I would eat carbs they would just weight me down and make me tired, so I wouldn’t eat them.  When I "bulked up" for several months I forced them down and ate them the first three meals each day.  Now because of that I think I am having a harder time losing weight.  I need to "ween" myself off of the carbs again so my body starts burning fat for fuel.  I know for a fact that you DO NOT need carbs for functioning, yes even your brain.  Straihgt from by biochemistry professor.  People disagree because when you low carb diet at first you have a hard time thinking clearly and stuff.  If people would just stick to a diet like I did before through the hard times they would realize that with no carbs for a while your body will eventually adjust, and your body makes the necessary changes to fuel your brain and body with your fat reserves.  This is when you become ultimately lean, ripped, and vascular.  You can feel your body burning off all the fat you eat.  I had energy and did think clearly.  Everything was great and I looked my best.  I can’t believe I screwed it all up by trying to "bulk" again and start pigging out on carbs.  What’s funny is you always want what you don’t have.  When I was 120 lbs and 10% bodyfat, something I had wanted for years, I thought I didn’t have enough muscle.  I wanted more shape like those girls at my NPC show who had the boulder shoulders and quads the size of my waist.  So I thiought I needed to bulk up.  How stupid I was!! I’ll never screw this up again.  Once I get back on track I’m going to stay there, and before I could have.  I liked and adapted to my diet.  It wasn’t a diet anymore.  It was just my lifestyle.  I’ll get there again, and it’s going to start here with cutting out my oats, rice, cereals and sticking only to fruits and veggies for my carbs.  Then throughout my life when I feel the need to splurge, I may have a cheat meal once and a while.  But the funny thing was, when I was on my diet before, I adapted to it so well that I didn’t ever even want to cheat.

And the adventure begins………………………………..
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