kettle1531’s BodyBlog

Wow! It’s been a year since I started lifting. I can’t believe how great I feel. I’m proud of my self, how I look and my mental toughness through this experiance. Even on bad days, I can walk around with a smile on my face because I worked out, my pants are looser or I lifted more in a particular exercise than before (like yesterday’s 300lb leg press or today’s 165lb shrug). I’m looking forward to moving soon and will have the challenge of devising a schedule that includes lifting in the real world. I can’t wait to take this active energy and put it towards fun things at home - taking on new hikes, snowboarding, biking and getting up early in the morning to own the day and workout. Thanks Bodyspace members for inspiring me this past year. So excited to see what next year brings.

Other than working on not throwing up during Mikey’s HIIT, I have got my self a workout partner for the next few months. Although it is a lot easier to get out of bed and keep the deal we made, I have a lingering suscpicion that we are going to get really competitive with each other. We weighed and taped ourselves for a starting point yesterday - i was 139 (a goal of mine for a long time) and tried to hide a huge smile… i blame Mikey…

I can already tell. I owe Michael O big time for his sending me some rad HIIT-infused workouts. I already feel like I got twice the workout with half the time. Thanks Mikey!

Wow, what a crazy few weeks. Gotta love this line of work… regardless, I’m back and refocused on my goals. Never thought I’d be so happy to get back to the gym. I really missed it - is it weird to miss being perpertually sore? eh. Alright then pals, catch me if you can - I got some time to make up for!

Just a few weeks ago, I was scared of the leg press machine - envisioning a kettle1531 sandwich. Today, I almost effortlessly pressed 200lbs. Also, I remember when I first tried the seated calf press and got crushed - some poor guy had to lift it for me so I could pull my legs out - was 95lbs. Today, I pressed 105. I know  it’s not a lot of weight compared to most - but it’s my most. I’m feeling great and enjoy using pyramiding to set and achieve goals… even though tomorrow, I know I will be walking s-l-o-w.

I bet myself a beer last night that I have symmetrical abs. I’ve never seen them and feel that I must know. I wonder how many people of the world have never seen their abs… (and no, I won’t be drinking any beer - I have a feeling that once I can see them, I won’t want a beer and there’s none in this beautiful country anyway).

Experienced my first niacin flush yesterday. In hindsight, I probably should stick to a better schedule for taking vitamins… but, after looking it up, I’m glad did something good for my body and didn’t die of a heart attack. Maybe next time I won’t make myself sit out in the [ridiculously freezing] evening desert for an hour, drinking cold water.

That leg workout is enough to make me religious. I learned supersets today - I remember thinking, vaguely, ’superset, I’ve heard of this, how bad can it be?’ I put 160 on the leg press - already excited that it was 10 more pounds than last week and did wide, inverted, regular and calf press x 12 for 4 sets. I have never sweated, or cussed in amazement, like that from a workout ever. If that wasn’t enough, I completed my ‘regular leg workout’ with squats (and added 10 pounds there too), leg curls, seated calf presses and leg extentions (boy, was that a new level of pain). I really don’t know how I walked out of there - or how I’m going to get up from this chair… good thing it has wheels - and one day, I’ll have wheels too!

After problems with recent weight gain, I re-evaluated my portion sizes and found that my excuses for not being able to measure slid me into that American problem of eating too much. I watched "Super Size Me" the other night (yes, it was at work and I’m a bad person for that… but I haven’t had a day off in months and needed the mental break) and was astounded - it furthers my point about how americans think it’s ok to drink 64oz after 64oz of pure sugar and ingest a pound of french fries ‘because it’s only 40 cents more’. It was interesting to see how, historically, the large size of an item turned into the smallest available - even - the kids’ size. When I watch the people in the chow line ahead of me ask for extra meat, more gravy and an additional dinner roll, I get nervous. When the gentleman that serves the food scoops a half of a ladle of broccoli into my to-go plate, I thank him sincerely and we share a smile over the ‘extra’ guy that just left. I am dedicating myself to eating 6 meals a day - and I do not consider them as the phrase "6 small meals" suggests - they are appropriately sized meals that keep me content for 3 hours and I’m proud of that. I am paying more attention to the size of the food and not whether it fills up my to-go container. I remember that when I reached my teenaged years, my mother would give my father and I the larger portions of the meals - probably because we live in a ‘food is love’ culture that suggests the more we eat another’s cooking, the more loved we are. I’ve done it too! At home, when my friends were coming over for dinner or if I wanted to spoil my better half with a picnic - I’d empty out the fridge cooking and we’d eat until a diabetic coma took over! Maybe mom was just loving us and maybe it was part of the ‘bigger is better’ ideal… that has only led our society into being 2/3s obese. I feel better since having switched to 6 meals instead of 1-3 large ones. I feel more consistent, less fatigued and geez, I get to eat every 3 hours - awesome!

Ok,  feeling bad about the scale is such noise - I can’t believe I let myself get so upset. If this were easy, well - I would already look like a bada**. I will not allow the scale to measure my emotions, nor will I let any lame comments (from me or otherwise) wreck my mood and my discipline. Even if I have to make my motto "someone expects you to fail" - I will stay proud of myself regardless of my ignorant efforts to equate my selfworth with a unit of weight. I’m back in the game and smiling in the face of challenges.