Heatherrina’s BodyBlog

So I only worked out 2 days in France…  the gyms there suck and it cost us 26 euro for a day pass at the club med gym, which was pretty gross.  They did not even have free weights there!  The nicer gym was 45 euro- we checked it out but decided our 45 euro was better spent in Sephora than in L’usine (means factory because it is built in an old factory).

French culture, in regards to exercise and food is very interesting to me.  While I was there, I saw very few fat people.  However, in the locker room at the gym, I saw that these skinny women probably had bodyfat percentages of 30 or higher.   It was wall-to-wall cellulite and pancake butts.  I should not be so critical though.  The women in the locker room are some of the few Parisians that participate in an exercise regimen at all.  (Only in France for 10 days, I did not make it outside of Paris, but I hear that cycling is huge in the countryside.)  Most of the women didn’t use any of the weight machines, except for the seated adductor machine and a twisty ab machine that I am assuming works your obliques but I haven’t ever seen one in the U.S.  The men weren’t much better.
Parisians walk everywhere and don’t eat huge portions!  People in cities walk a lot more than people in the suburbs, but I think Parisians probably walk more than people in U.S. cities.  Furthermore, the French do eat a lot of cheese, butter, and bread.  BUT, by "a lot" I mean at almost every meal.  I don’t mean giant, super-sized portions of bread and cheese.  Anyway you cut it, Parisians, don’t eat very many calories, and burn off a lot of calories through daily physical activity.  There is no doubt that this accounts for the obesity rate being lower in France than in the U.S (even though both rates are on the rise).

If only diet and exercise were all there is to health!  A person can’t be healthy and be a smoker!  It’s just not possible.  I saw 13 year olds smoking outside of their schools on a break and with their parents!  It seems to be perfectly socially acceptable in Paris for teenagers to smoke.  This also might explain why so many of the middle-aged women were really really wrinkled.  Of course, smoking is on the rise again in the U.S., so we are not much better, although smoking is much less socially acceptable here.

While in France, I ate a ton of bread, walked a fair amount, and did resistance training only 2 times.  I didn’t smoke, and aside from my sister’s birthday dinner where I consumed a bottle of wine over several hours, I only had 1 glass of wine with lunch one day, and 2 cafe corettos during the trip.  I lost 4 lbs.  I went from 117 and 17% bodyfat to 113 and 17% bodyfat.  Do the math, and you see I lost muscle.   What did I learn?  I learned to adopt a more French attitude toward eating…  I have always believed that food is meant to be enjoyed, but the French REALLY believe this.  Also, it’s easy to NOT binge on cheese and bread when you know you are going to see it again in just a few more hours, and a little bread won’t make you fat or big.  Also, I learned just how important it is to be active in your daily life.  I already knew this but never imagined I would actually lose weight while in France just from walking.  How to apply this concept in southern California where we drive  everywhere might requires some thinking.  On the flip side, I learned I have to do resistance training, and do it regularly, if I want to achieve and maintain a lean and toned physique. And of course, no smoking…  I’ll get my wrinkles from the sun!

So I haven’t made a body blog in awhile…  I am about 117 and about 17% body fat.  Not bad considering the holidays just ended.  I basically did not put on any weight this holiday season!  I think I was a little more toned and lean before Thanksgiving, but I’ve basically been on the road since then and just doing the best I can to maintain my fitness level.
I leave for France in 3 days and I’ve been doing my best to get all toned up before I immerse myself in a world of cheese.  Luckily, I will be getting a gym pass for the 10 days I am there and I plan on working out briefly every morning.  I was really looking forward to the holidays ending so I could get back to my normal routine and not have to schedule workouts around family commitments, flights, and odd gym hours.  I will not even be home for a week before I leave again but I already feel better about myself after just 2 days of regular workouts.  I am boring as hell and I love a routine!  I can’t wait until I am back in school so I can really get back to it.  I am really looking forward to going to Paris, but I always get a lot of anxiety about travelling…  about what it will do to my body and what I will do to my body when I’m in an environment where it’s so easy to slip up really badly and slack off and eat like crap.

Even though I am stressing about the effect my France trip will have on my physique, I really should not worry that much.  I have been faced with the same distractions for the last six weeks and I have done pretty well.  Actually, I think I have practiced the perfect amount of health-awareness without being psycho about it and pissing off everyone close to me like I normally do on family trips.  Haha.  Let’s hope I keep it up a little longer!

Please forgive me, this blog is all over the place…

For how far I’ve come, I am giving myself a pat on the back.  I am doing something I rarely do.  I am giving myself a little congratulations!!!  Yes, I am saying to myself "Self, you are doing a great job!"  I have been really good about working out and eating right and it is beginning to pay off.  I am really proud of myself.  I know I will see more physical changes as long as I stick with it, but I am pausing a moment to recognize how far I’ve come.

This doesn’t mean I’m going to go eat a pizza and put my feet up.  I will never eat a pizza and put my feet up!  I am just letting myself recognize that I’ve come a long way from the person I used to be.  I am neither physically, nor mentally, the chubby little girl I once was.  I don’t look like that person, and I don’t think like that person, anymore, either.  I don’t think about cake like it’s a reward, I think about it like it’s poison.  I think about a protein drink like it’s fuel.  And I don’t think about exercise like it’s punishment, if anything exercise has become my reward.  I still have a long way to go, but for me there is no turning back now.

I know I will only become more fit and more regimented, as I age.  My body fat will be lower, my muscle mass will be greater, and my ability to say no to alcohol and drag my butt to the gym will grow stronger.  This is my life for as long as I live.

(Thanks Rat for NLP, self-hypnosis, and all the comm stuff you taught me.)

I am hanging on by a thread. My workouts are pretty much all that is keeping me together.  I’m feeling pretty self-destructive right now.  I would like to drink a handle by myself and destroy all the hard work I’ve been doing.  It would be a pretty stupid thing to do because quite honestly, my body is the only aspect of my life I am pretty much alright with right now.  But, regardless, I have the tendency to drink away my problems which really only makes them worse, and certainly doesn’t help my body any.  Anyway, I had two beers at the beach today, which I think is OK(I recorded them and everything!), but my drinking got a little out of hand a couple of nights last month and I feel like this seriously inhibited my progress.  I think it is excellent that I am not going out and drinking tonight, but I also feel like a friendless loser which only increases my desire to drink that handle by myself….

I uploaded a photo from my phone of my abs that I took today but I guess it won’t show up until I upload some more.  Sometime in the next few weeks I am getting a camera so I can take progress pictures regularly.  My knee is hurting really bad today (I think it is from roller-blading Sunday) so I am going to chill for the rest of the evening since I already walked 5 miles today and did a light yoga class.  Tomorrow I will get back to my routine, and hopefully my knee will be feeling better.

I entered my weight and body fat stats, going off of my scale.  The rest of the measurements I entered were taken by a trainer at my gym  on 3/12/08.  I am getting re-measured during the first week in April.  My eventual goal is to get to 108 lbs or less and 13-14% body fat with a waist measurement of less than 24 inches.
I have been doing a lot of yoga recently. I feel like it really rounds out my workout.  I also have a tendency to not stretch very much so it helps a lot, as well as with my core.  I am also doing a lot of walking in addition to cardio on the elliptical machine.  Walking, being low intensity, seems to be better at burning fat off than the high-intensity cardio I do.

I’ve been messing up with my diet…  skipping meals, eating out, a couple of glasses of wine..  it’s time to get back to my super clean diet regimen.  I did pretty well today.  Tomorrow I will be back to my regular eating….  every 3 hours, lots of veggies, lean protein, and whey protein drinks with unsweetened almond milk.

I want to make the next two weeks really count.   When I go in to get measured again, I WILL see a difference.  I am going to push it hard in the gym and keep my eating clean. 

I got to the gym one time this week.  I did a little exercise outside of the gym (sit-ups, free weights, walking), but nothing compared to my normal workouts.  I seem to have a problem staying consistent with my workout plan.  I also seem to always have a good excuse when I miss workouts.  This week my big excuses are work and school.  I think calling my reasons for not going to the gym "excuses" is actually a little off.  I think a better word would be "priorities."  Which is fine and great if I actually gave a shit about money or school.  You see, I have recently been working very hard to get myself out of some ridiculous debt, and I have also started taking a statistics class at a junior college to get it out of the way before I start going to school full time again in the fall.  Both paying off debt and working towards a college degree are positive things, but they are more important to everyone else than they are to me.  I have been letting the values and priorities of the people close to me influence my lifestyle instead of making my own priorities based on what I feel is most important.  I stressed myself out this week trying to figure out how I can squeeze in a workout while trying to work and go to school.  I have been in debt for a pretty long time, so what’s the big deal if I miss out on some work and stay in debt a little longer?  I have also been out of school for a couple years, so why am I, all of a sudden, rushing to get it all done?  What’s another year in school and a couple hundred extra dollars in interest compared to the degradation of my health due to neglect?  In 5 years, I will be out of college and out of debt but neither of those things will make me very happy if I am out of shape.  So, I am making my fitness my first priority.  Of course, if it were up to me I would just workout all day and never go to school or work, but within reason, I am going to put my workouts BEFORE taking another class or another day of work.  Who cares if I’m 30 when I get my bachelors?  I’m going to live 10 years longer than all the fat ****s who finished in 3.

So in my last blog I mentioned how I was just getting back into the gym.  Well, no sooner did I get back to my old stats of 113.5 lbs and 16% body fat, and I got sick again.  I have always been prone to illness, my whole life, but this is ridiculous!  Can’t I be healthy for four whole weeks in a row?!!!  I am getting frustrated with always trying to "get back" to where I was and never really improving.  Part of my problem is I am iron-deficient and I think that is why I keep getting sick.  I take a multivitamin with iron but my mom was anemic for a really long time and it’s probably just something I am going to have to deal with for as long as I am menstruating (sorry!  but the doc says that’s what causes it!)  Anyway, I have been supplementing with extra iron over the last few days and I already feel an improvement in my energy level and strength.  Today I’m going to work out and do some lifting, which I am always reluctant to do.  I’ll get back to my old shape, but I am crossing my fingers that I don’t get sick or injured again anytime soon!  This is going to be the year that I finally get to my goal of 13% body fat!

I’m finally back in the gym for the first time since before Thanksgiving when I pulled a muscle in my back.  In the last 3 weeks, my weight has gone from 114 lbs. to 116 lbs., and my body fat has gone from 16% to 20%!  Yes, I gawk at the 20%, too!  Anyway, I am highly motivated to work out right now, but my ability sucks.  I can’t do nearly as much cardio or lift as much weight as I could 3 weeks ago.  I feel pretty awful about how I look right now, and I was really disappointed to discover today that I had lost so much strength.  I guess the other side of that is I am pretty proud of myself for pushing through the weights portion of my workout even though today was really hard.  Similarly, one workout didn’t do much for my gut, but my mood is already 10x what it was a week ago when all I could do was sit around.  That is great, because it will help me stay motivated to go to the gym even though  I have to ride my bike there and it’s not as convenient as it used to be when I could drive.  As long as the uphill bike ride doesn’t serve as a deterrent from me getting to the gym, I figure it will help to whip me back into shape pretty damn fast.  OK, time to go make tomorrow’s workout plan!

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