My right arm; however, is quite a different story. I’m wondering if I aggravated the pulled muscle when I did my squats. All I know is it hurts like a bitch right now and I’ve got chest/arms to do tonight. Ugh.

Diet going very well today - went to Giordano’s to pick up pizza for lunch for my boss and resisted the temptation. I’ll be warming up my lean ground chuck burger for lunch. Had oatmeal for breakfast - I know I need to eat more, but I’ve been so busy that I keep forgetting to eat. On the other hand, I’m not having any hunger pangs, so it can’t be that bad.

Tomorrow is bench day, which I’m NOT looking forward to….well, I look forward to working my arms, but really hate chest work. I’ll be doing my bench with DB’s because my doc wants me to work each side equally, but that works fine for me - I won’t complain, since I dislike working chest regardless of how I’m doing it.

Diet’s been pretty decent today, I’ve done an excellent job of avoiding any sugar - including in my morning coffee. That sucks.

All in all, I’m feeling very positive now that I’m back in the gym again!

Cardio tonight…woohoo! I think I may go for a run.

Just got back from the gym….it was a decent workout. Not great, but my doc told me to go easy on the weights and only to do two sets of 12 on everything.

I only squatted 115 for 2 sets, did leg presses with 90 (I usually do twice that), curls and extensions at 30 - one leg at a time. Followed up with some ab work.

Started out with cardio warmup on the elliptical.

I’m not really sore, but feel a little fatigue in my legs……I’ll know on Saturday how well my body handles a full week of lifting and will know if I can get back to some heavier weights again.

Woohoo!!!!!!!!!!!!!1:clap:

I did it, I did it, I did it and I’d do it again

While there are a LOT of things I’d do all over again, the chocolate ice cream is something I could live without - my one major regret is how I let myself go and squandered my genetic gifts by abusing my body and not taking care of it properly.

Everything else I’d pretty much keep the same, since every moment and experience I’ve had up to this point has made me who I am right now - and for the most part, I really like me.

Surely, I’ve made some relationship choices that, in hindsight, were very poor ones both physically, emotionally and financially. I’ve learned something from them, though, so I can’t complain overmuch.  I’m SO glad that I didn’t marry any of my exes even though we essentially lived as though we were. That would be a MAJOR regret had I gone that route.

My 33rd year, so far, has been one of great introspection and self-discovery - such an interesting journey, too! We’ll see where I end up…..should be good.

….so, the damn Olympics are a pain in the butt. They’re way too addicting and I find that I become so involved in watching the games that I lose track of time and end up going to bed WAY TOO LATE!!!!!!

Why is this a problem? Aside from the obvious, it makes getting up in the morning for cardio before work almost impossible. But - I did it before and I’ll do it again. And again. And again. And again.

I’ve officially received the OK from my doc to get back to both my regular cardio and lifting routines - except he dropped my weights down a little bit, but that’s fine. Will go back on Saturday again to see how my body handles a full week or my normal lifting, hopefully all will go well.

Still working on tweaking my diet - doc says eat 2,500-3,000 calories a day - I think that’s way too high, but he says that since I’m eating different foods than before I should see a difference because of the way the body processes nutrients.

Supposed to avoid wheat, soy (which I avoid anyway with my thyroid issues), sugar, dairy and corn. Most of those are pretty easy to skip, except he did specify no whey protien - that kinda’ sucks. And except for the no dairy, the rest is pretty easy since I pretty much eat that way regularly.

Tonight should be interesting to say the least, but I’m very much looking forward to being back in the gym.

I curse myself for totally letting myself go in my mid 20’s - looked at the scale one day and it said 265. I wanted to put my head in the oven - except we had an electric stove and it wouldn’t have done any good.

I’ve had quite a few ups and downs since last Fall and haven’t gained weight, but I’ve lost muscle and my bodyfat % has definitely gone up after looking at the pics - and yes, those pictures are worth 1,000 words - and none of them are good.

Thankfully, my doc should give me the go-ahead to get back to lifting when I see him tomorrow and then it’s going to be a very focused and determined journey to dump the rest of the weight.

Diet has been a big sticking point for me - and there is such an overload of opinion on the right way to do it, so I’m going back to what worked for me and will see how I do - may tweak it along the way depending on how it goes. Low carb, high protein and around 1,300-1,400 calories a day. Going to add skim milk back into my diet, but only around 12 oz a day mixed in my protein shakes. Fortunately, I don’t have any junk food in my house so there is no temptation there - and it’s time to go grocery shopping for some veggies and more meat.

Will be forcing my lazy butt out of bed to get back into doing cardio twice a day again in addiiton to lifting on Monday/Wednesday/Friday.  Looking forward to running in the mornings again…..starts the day off on the right foot.

Yes, I’ve had some setbacks and some injuries since last Fall, but come the heck on…..I am so completely disgusted with what the camera just told me that I will NOT be posting any new progress pics until I can refrain from having the urge to take a hammer to the poor thing.

It is with renewed determination and an outright REFUSAL to accept failure that I step back into the gym on Friday after getting the all-clear on my back and shoulder from the doc.

I refuse to settle for having a mediocre ass.

In other news, I’m fairly sure I pulled something in my right shoulder when I took my lovely little spill yesterday morning. Ouch. No lifting for another two weeks according to the doc. Sucks.

So I’m rushing to my car and I lose a shoe, and then I completely wipe out catching air, landing on my right side and completely soaking my entire right side of my pants. I am NOT a happy camper and now I’m all crooked again. Looks like I’ll be back in to see the chiro sooner than I planned.

In other news, when I saw my regular physician on Friday, the same one who referred me to my chiroquacktor, I showed her the supplements he’d recommended and she questioned why he did. I asked her to politely ask him to NOT advise me to take any more freaky pills - I already take one that works just fine for my thyroid, I have no desire to replace it by taking 18 other pills throughout the day that cost an arm and a leg. Ugh.

Don’t get me wrong, I love my Chiroquacktor, but this seems just a bit far fetched.

I’m now taking three new supplements as recommended by the good man - one contains bovine hypothalmus Cytosol extract, the other has porcine thymus Cytosol extract and the third has some herb called bladderwrack. Seriously. What the hell is this stuff????

All I can say is that I better notice $63 worth of a difference pretty damn quick, LOL.

I told him flat out that if I didn’t know better I’d think he was a quack - but everything he does is right on target and works. I’ve never been cracked, poked and prodded so much as I have been since my first visit on Saturday - and oddly enough, my back pain is gone, my shoulder no longer cracks and I’m sleeping better.

What fascinates and baffles me is how he figures this crap out in the first place - he moved my arm around a bit and then asked if I’d been stressed or sad lately - which was right on the money - I HAVE been a bit sad missing my close friends and family lately, and have been very stressed with work. I asked him how he could tell that, and he said my body told him.

I should also mention that in addition to being a fully licensed chiropractor, he’s also a Certified Applied Kinesiologist, nutritionist and also practices acupuncture.

Talk about weird science.

The good news; however, is that I absolutely love her. It’s not often that you get a good one on the first try, so I count myself lucky. I asked her about switching from my current synthetic T4 to a combination T3/T4 for my thyroid to see if it makes any noticeable difference. She was very open to my questions and concerns…I have a feeling this is just the beginning of a beautiful relationship.

She also referred me to a chiropractor, who I’m seeing tomorrow - can’t WAIT! My back has been bugging me for a few months now, so relief will be nice. The other nice thing is that he also does acupuncture and nutritional counseling, as well as refers many patients to a beautiful spa in Chicago for massage therapy.

My workouts have sucked lately - been mainly just doing cardio. Switching my gym membership from a single club to multiple locations, so that should help to deal with the summertime activity interference.

Diet has been decent, but can always use some improvement.

Other than that, life is GREAT!!!!!