jessejack’s BodyBlog

So here’s the deal. I don’t know what the hell is going on but apparently I never had a gym membership. After being a layabout for a couple weeks (or, as I like to call it, intense recovery!) I figured that I should let that stop me so I have devised a home workout plan to keep me going until I figure something better out.

First I bought one of those Iron Gym things that are basically a pull up bar that you can hang on a door without any hardware. So I have been doing pull-ups like crazy. I try to do a few sets in every position…chin up, pull up, and parallel grip. On the box it shows the dude doing a lot of other exercises which I think are basically worthless but you can modify them to where they’re pretty effective, I think. For example, the push-ups the dude is doing on the box or commercial seem to be pretty lame but if you do incline push-ups with the thing it seems to work really good because you can drop your chest down past your hands and get a deeper range of motion.  If you can wedge it against a door frame it will hold your feet to do crunches also. So really I think I’m getting a pretty good upper body workout with it.

Of course, what about legs? I was thinking about this while I walked around campus, and I was dreaming up some pulley contraption to rig up in my garage to simulate squats, when it hit me. My backpack is f’n heavy. So I went home and loaded it up with some physics books and did Indian squats and lunges, and it really seemed to work.

So there are a few ways in which I’m keeping myself going. I guess I stopped frequenting this site because I figured calisthenics isn’t "real" bodybuilding or something, but I can see the results in the mirror. Maybe if I was still throwing the iron around I would make gains faster but whatever. I’m pretty stoked.

Got some money. Got some food. Hitting the gym again.

So my fitness project has hit a little bump in the road due to my financial situation and my cupboards being bare. I have very little good food. Most of what I have is junk. Stuff my wife eats and crap I have left over from before I started eating right. That’s pretty much all we have left to eat, and even that is going fast. So why don’t I go to the store and get more? Well, I’m an unemployed full-time student. That means I get "paid" my financial aid twice a year. I won’t get that money for another couple weeks. I’m not sure exactly how we’re going to survive but we have no cash to buy food with. Hopefully we can beg, borrow, or steal to get by. But until we scrape up the dough I don’t have anything to eat but microwave popcorn and oreos.

I feel that if I can’t feed myself to grow it would actually be worse for me to go lift than it would to sit around like a couch potato. So, I’m taking a break from the gym until I can adequately stock the fridge. I’m still checking BodySpace every day so hopefully I will stay motivated to jump back in as soon as possible. I actually feel really guilty about it but oh well.
The other thing is that since I’ve been going to the YMCA it’s been totally screwed up. I think it was about 2 months ago I paid my membership dues and I still haven’t got a membership card. About a month ago I got a call saying that they never received the payment for my first month; I told them I paid it and produced my bank statement showing the payment to YMCA. OK, so we’re cool she said. Well, here I am still waiting. I even asked them last week when I was in the gym if I had to pay another month’s dues and they said I wasn’t even in the computer yet. Obviously the girl at the desk doesn’t know anything if I’m not in the computer, so she took a message to have the membership lady call me. Still waiting! Every time I go in there I have to explain my situation to the desk person to get in. They usually don’t hassle me so that’s not a big deal. I’m not letting that hold me up, it’s just an irritation I’m hoping will get solved over my time off.

So, yeah, besides that, drama with school, drama with life, and other crap, things are going pretty shitty! But nothing worth crying about.

So, I’m pretty stoked. I’m no Rip Studly (yet!) but I noticed today, after my workout when I was about to get into the shower, that if I flex my abdomen my chest sticks out further than my gut. That was one of my short-term goals and I’m really stoked. Now I can shoot for improving my measurements, and more definition in my chest and stomach.

On a side note, I think I’m going to consider moving to a two-day split instead of a full-body circuit. Reason being, I’ve read that you shouldn’t work out for more than 40 minutes at a time; accordingly, I break my workout into 5 min. light cardio warmup, 30 minutes lifting, and 5 min. light cardio cool down. It seems like I’m starting to run into this problem, especially now that I’m going more frequently, where there happens to be 300 people at the gym all milling around and I spend more time standing there waiting than lifting. If I could camp on a station until I’m done with it instead of moving around (because I’m currently doing so many different exercises) that would cut down on a lot of waiting time for me.

But anyway, mini celebration for me. Off to eat some chicken on whole wheat. Later!

So I am worried that I’m starting to get off track. The first couple of weeks I took it easy. I would be sore for like a week straight so I wasn’t exactly a constant presence at the gym. I figured that’s alright, my recovery will increase and I will hit the gym more often, and I’ll just play it by ear: when I feel recovered, I’ll go, and I’ll rest until then.

Sure enough my recovery time has gotten shorter. I am ready to go today and I feel like I should be in the gym right now. Unfortunately the wife is sick and someone has to watch the little one, and I don’t think the gym has drop-off childcare today. So I’m stuck at the house. I don’t blame her because it’s normal — she’s pregnant, by the way — so I should be supportive of her. But it frustrates me because I’m all amped up and I can’t get out of the house. And it’s a little troubling because if she’s sick today she’ll probably be sick the next day, the day after, etc. So I’m a little concerned about how I can be supportive yet not let it hold me back.

So every day after I work out I weigh myself on the scale in the locker room, and I’ve been dropping weight. I’m down to 153 and I’m starting to get a little bothered because my goal was actually to gain about 7 lbs (I’ve dropped about 5). I’m not getting too alarmed yet because I think I am gaining muscle; in just three weeks since I’ve started lifting I feel stronger and I’m already starting to see some improvements (I can actually flex my previously non-existent chest muscles). So my logic is that maybe I’m just shedding fat faster than I build muscle, and that once my bodyfat drops to a lower level I’ll stop losing and start gaining the weight back in muscle.

But, I’m thinking that if I hit the 150 mark I might consider easing up on my diet and just trying to eat everything in sight to get enough calories and protein in me, then go back to clean eating and cut later.

So, yeah, not quite sure where I’m going here.

So I got my membership to the Y today. Apparently all I have to do is go fill out the paperwork and I’m all good. The best part of all is that our membership for the whole family is $20 a month. That’s a steal considering all you get — weight room, pool, hot tub, day care for my daughter…all of which we will probably use.

Anyway, we’re going swimming tomorrow so I will probably fill out the paperwork then and start my training regimen this weekend. I’m stoked!

I took a good piece of advice and did some bodyweight workouts tonight to stay in the groove while I’m waiting for my gym membership to come through. I actually got a good pump just from that so I feel like I’m doing pretty good. I can’t wait to hit the gym though and start putting some real work into it.

I’m using my off-time to do some research into what kind of workout routine I’m going to do. I think for starters I will go simple: a machine-based full body workout 3 times a week instead of doing a "split". The main reason I’m leaning toward the machines is that I won’t have to worry about finding a spotter and I can focus on good form that way. The reason I’m thinking about the full-body workout instead of a split is that I just want to go simple and see how it goes. I will monitor the results and adjust my routine accordingly.

So, anyway, I’m super stoked about getting into the gym. Like I said, just waiting to see if I can ever get in touch with this lady to see if I can get a discounted rate or not. Also, I found my old friend Dan from back in Alaska. The last time I saw him we were both little scrawny punk rockers. I’m still pretty scrawny and I think we’re both into punk still but he is MASSIVE. I always ask him what it’s like to crush a skull with his bare hands because I bet he does it ALL THE TIME.

Alright. Going to bed. Gotta get some rest in. Thankfully the wife is letting me sleep in tomorrow. Then I have a big day of cleaning the garage =(

So I’ve come to my first major hurdle: running season is apparently over. I was about to go for my run the other night and, on the way to my car to fetch my iPod, I slipped on some ice and nearly ate it. It was at that point that I decided that there would be no more outdoor runs for me until spring.

I’m trying to turn this into a positive. It has accelerated my search for a gym which will allow me to start pumping the heavy iron. The problem in that arena is that I am broke as a joke and living off government cheese. Fortunately the YMCA gives subsidized membership to welfare people like me so I may be able to get in that way. I’ve put in an application but now I’m playing phone tag with the lady who will approve/deny it so until I actually get in touch with her my training is on hold.
The hardest part with these snags, in my experience, is staying motivated and re-starting once you’ve had a week off. So hopefully when everything comes through I can keep my eye on the prize! If anyone is reading this, don’t let me off the hook!