Four days was the morning...my focus 2 years old

This four day weekend was interesting, I did not go crazy with my intake just because there was a giant bird in the house, no I don't mean Big Bird though I recall watching some of him Friday morning and I did not go over calories too much if at all on Thanksgiving. I have not worked out since Wednesday, meaning it has been four days since I have been to the gym and last night I started feeling it. Sitting in the living room I started feeling anxious and then bored and then I walked into the kitchen with full intentions of raiding the refrigerator but I stopped at the doorway and thought about how I wasn't really hungry and told Wify "I'm goin crazy" she smiled and it dawned on me that I had not worked out in so many days so out of the kitchen I went. I honestly believe that I NEED the exercise at this point or else I get all feeling confined and locked down, this afternoon will afford me the first chance to getto the gym since Wednesday of last week and I feel like its Christmas morning because I can't wait to get there this afternoon.

This Friday I have decided that I will post a weigh in because I feel that good, bad or ugly it helps me to have it out there and up on the blog so I have to get back to doing it. I am still up above my lowest weight but it is still creeping downward so that is all I can hope for, the plan is to hit it hard until I reach that line drawn in the sand which reads sub 300 lbs. I feel healthier than I have been since starting this whole ride and I know that I am, I can do things today that I was not capable of doing even 6 months ago and that is an amazing thing for me and it fuels my drive which is awesome because I want to do things like working out and I am finding that "what can I do to improve my work outs" is whats in my head much of the time.

Today I am planning on getting in my 15/15/15 cardio work out in and following that I will do my shoulders/biceps work out on the weights. What is the 15/15/15 cardio work out you ask? well I am glad you asked, let me splain Lucy, I start off with a 15 minute ride on a stationary bike set at a resistance level of 11 or 12 then its onto the Arc-trainer for 15 minutes set at 45 resistance and finally onto a treadmill for 17 minutes, which is a 2 minute warm up at 3.0 % incline to get my balance right and then 5 minutes at 15% incline, 5 minutes at 10% incline and finally 5 minutes at 5% incline all at 3.0 mph, not bad right? and I feel like I really get a good cardio work out in when I do it this way all while keeping it interesting by not spending too much time on one machine. I am starting fresh this week with the weights and what I mean is that I am not sore one bit and this is the first time since I started lifting more seriously that its the case, partially because of the 4 days off and partially because I am starting to get use to lifting again, or should I say that my muscles are getting use to it.

Another week and hopefully another pound or 4 disappears from the scale, I know that I will be more fit any way that its cut because with every trip to the gym, walk around the lake or bike ride I get stronger, faster and healthier so it is a win win my friends.

Thats all I got on this cloudy Monday so I am off to the gym, until next time remember that you are the one making the choices, not me, not that other fella, it is you, so make the right choices and the rest falls into place on its own.

As Ever
Me

Ask yourself....

Why am I fat?

Why can't I stop eating?

Am I going to die today?

When will I admit that I have a problem?

Who will take care of my children when I am gone?

What am I missing out on because of my weight problem?

Does this food taste good enough for me to allow it to control me?

How long will it be before I need assistance getting myself dressed?

How am I going to get up from this couch if I keep going in this direction?

How much longer can my body last at this weight before a serious injury occurs?

How many firemen will it take to carry me from my home after my heart attack?

Do I want to live the rest of my life wishing that I would do something about my health?

Do I want to put my loved ones through taking care of me because I won't do something about my bad eating and exercising habits?

When you are done answering those questions honestly, make a decision, Make the decision to do something about the weight that is holding you back and quite literally shortening your rime on the planet. I know it is not easy, I know that it takes time and I know these things from personal experience and though I do not like wishing simply because if you shit into one hand and wish into the other we all know which one fills up first but I really do wish that I had decided to do something about my health earlier on. It took me to get to the point where I thought about if I was going to have a heart attack on a daily basis before I did what needed to be done and finally decided that I had to do something before it was too late, if you are reading this and are in that place, or even if you are not quite there yet but do know that you are on the way, do not fool yourself into thinking that its not a life or death situation because it is and starting tomorrow will not cut it.

It is easy for me to see it so clear now that I am down more than 200 pounds but back when I was heavier there was nothing anyone could have said to me that would have made a difference in the way that I felt about it at the time, just ask my wife if you don't believe me because Lord knows that she tried to get me to see it. In the spirit of Thanksgiving I want to thank my wife publicly on my blog for being there through everything that we have been through in the past 8 years and though I know not all of it was because of my weight much of it was and for that I am thankful that I am married to the most wonderful woman that I have ever had the pleasure of meeting.

I hope everyone has an awesome Turkey day.

As Ever
Me

Billy-Ray Son of a Preacher curl..

Thanksgiving is just around the corner and for most of people that means a huge meal with lots of calories and a full belly at the end of the day, perhaps even some pie. It was decided by me that this year I am not going to keep myself from enjoying Thanksgiving dinner but that does not mean that I need to eat a 4000 calorie meal either, with some simple substitutions an awesome meal can be had by anyone. This year Wify and I decided that we would stay home and cook for just us and the kids on Thursday and Friday would be when we saw family and because of that I am planning on making a low calorie dinner, low calorie? Thanksgiving dinner? can that really be said in the same sentence? indeed it can.

My menu for Thursday will include Turkey obviously, and a 26 pound turkey at that! in place of mashed potatoes I will be making Parmesan mashed Cauliflower which is substantially lower in calories than traditional mashed potatoes and honestly in my opinion tastes just as good. I will also make mashed turnips which is mostly for my father when he comes by on Friday, along with some sweet potatoes grilled outside, I will also be making corn which will be from a can this year since its just the 4 of us cranberry sauce, dinner rolls and stuffing will be at the party as well. The only thing that I am not making low calorie is the stuffing and that's because my recipe calls for sausage and boiled eggs to be added and other than using turkey sausage I can't really figure out a way to make that taste awesome and drop the calories significantly enough to make the effort worth it. Dessert will be provided by the children, Wify decided that since its just us that we will let them choose something to make sort of like an after dinner activity for them and when we asked them what they wanted to make "ice cream" came up so we are thinking sundaes or something though I really do think that I will be picking up a pumpkin pie as well just for good measure and because Thanksgiving just isn't Thanksgiving without a pumpkin pie. Normally I do not include the Holidaze as days to count my calories but I don't want it to be a free for all either so if most of what I make is healthy and made as low calorie as possible I can do some damage control preemptively.

This week I have gotten off to a good start and seem to be in the right state of mind, I am watching what I eat, I am at the gym "doing my thang" and in spite of Thanksgiving being this week I am planning to see a loss on the scale come Friday. Still above my all time low which I reached just before my surgery I have to admit that I am slightly frustrated but it is on the way down and I have started lifting weights more seriously so a bit of retention is to be expected and I am not going to bother myself too much worrying about it.

I am off of my game a bit this week because my daughter has half days at school so I have to go to the gym earlier than usual and I did not expect it to be any different but the couple hours difference really is making me feel taxed when I am finished working out not to mention that I cannot stay as long. I received an email last week from someone saying that they enjoyed when I post exactly what I did for my work out so I am going to try and include that more often. Yesterday I started out with 20 minutes on a stationary bike and then I did 12 minutes on an arc-trainer, I wanted to get weight lifting in so the arc had to be shorter than normal because of my daughters short day. My bicep was feeling up to par so off I went and did a work out for my shoulders, biceps and back, all with lighter than normal weight consisting of a row machine for 2 sets of 12 at 130 pounds as a warm up and then 3 sets of 10 at 200 pounds, I followed that with some over the head shoulder presses 2 sets of 12 at 100 pounds as a warm up and then 3 sets of 10 at 130 pounds. Upright rows followed that and though it was the same 2 sets of 12 followed by 3 sets of 10 I do not recall the weight that I used, I do know that it was very light as I really just wanted to get the motion in, I finished up with preacher curls but what I did differently this time is that I used a very light weight and did more reps, I warmed up with 30 pounds for 2 sets of 18 and then 4 sets of 12 at 50 pounds, the last set did fall short because I started feeling it in my left bicep a little more than I wanted to so I did 10 for the last set and finished the day up with a 10 minute walk in the treadmill to cool down.

This morning I can feel that I lifted but I am not what I would call sore so that's a good thing, a little later this morning when I head out to the gym I will do the same cardio work out but I will do a leg work out on the weights this time around. My legs are...well..HUGE and no wonder after carrying all of that around for as long as I did, not to mention the fact that even before I blew up to over 500 pounds I was always a big guy doing mostly manual type jobs but I don't want that to be a reason to neglect them. The plan is to work on the leg press machine, the calf raise machine and maybe some lunges holding free weights, I prefer to do squats but with my back injury from 2000 I am still weary of getting hurt and side lining myself because I prefer one movement over another so the leg press machine it is until I feel like I am getting strong enough to do squats safely, an injury would not be good right now as I can feel myself getting into a stride, not that an injury is good at any point but surely you know what I mean.


Now that You have endured my lengthy Tuesday morning post You owe yourself a big ol glass of H2O so go grab that and I will get myself ready for the gym and my daughter for school. Thanks for following along and for more you will have to tune in tomorrow to see what Fatman and Blobin get themselves into, until then my friends..

As Ever
Me

Exercising, who me? yeah you! couldn't be. Then who?

Kickin around all weekend long I did not make the best choices where my intake was concerned but it wasn't terrible either, I stayed hydrated all weekend its just the extra calories that got me. A plus to the weekend is that I finally got to explore a trail not far from my house with Wify Saturday afternoon, we hiked 3 miles worth of this trail and decided that if we can get a sitter again next weekend and the weather cooperates that we will drive down to where we left off (we ended at a road crossing) and hike another 3 miles or so, it was really relaxing to get out on a nice day and go on a walk about with a beautiful woman.


My wife is noticing that about 30 minutes into or after I exercise that I get...hyper, yeah we will call it hyper for now. This phenomenon is something that I noticed as well but she seems to find it very humorous and likes to mess with me about it, about 30 mins into our walk she turns to me with this shit eating grin on her face and says "You just got VERY chatty" and I thought "hmmm I have haven't I" and within 3 minutes I was challenging wify to a skip race down the trail, and that thought turned into another thought "I wonder what the furthest distance anyone has ever skipped is?" to which Guinness popped into my head, I remembered when I was in my early 20's a friend of mine said that when I skip that I looked like a Deer prancing through the woods and that the distance from where I left the ground to where I landed between skips had to be 20 feet and before long I had come up with a plan to get into guiness by skipping the furthest.

I notice the same thing when I am at the gym, when I arrive I usually ride the stationary bike for 20 minutes no matter what I am going to do, it serves as a good warm up for me, and when I first get there I am sort of just there but after that ride I am ready to do anything. Friday for instance, My biceps were still killing me so I couldn't do the arc-trainer and I decided that I would do 30 minutes on the treadmill instead and I ended up doing 25 minutes on the bike and an hour and 10 minutes on the treadmill between a 3.0 and 7.0 incline and between 3.0 and 3.5 mph, I only stopped because I had to get back home in time to pick my daughter up from school. I have to say that I am rather enjoying this feeling that I get after and during exercise and can't help but to think that its my bodies way of making sure that I do it, making sure that it does not end up panting up stairs, or sweating from menial tasks perhaps even a way to stop the possibility of roots growing from my posterior into and through the couch again.

I over trained my biceps last week and learned my tough guy lesson and will use weight closer to what I should be instead of what I use to be able to do from here on out. I need to develop a more strict routine for my weight lifting because I am all over the place currently with it and making up a routine is not exactly something new to me as I use to lift a lot so upon returning from the gym today I am going to put some time into writing that up. My surgery is behind me now and I got my stupidity with preacher curls out of the way so I am refocusing and I can guarantee that results will be had in the coming weeks because its what I decided and that's all its going to take. I believe that adding a solid weight program into my exercise regimen will help me gain some of the lost mass back but I am unsure what will happen with the actual poundage loss/gain for a week or two because surly I will be retaining some fluids with the added weight training but since I am going to keep hitting the cardio as my main thing I think that I can keep the number going down while strengthening myself back up a bit, but now this post is getting rambly (is that even a word??!) so I shall end it here.

As always thanks for following along and the support and comments are ALWAYS appreciated so thank you all for that, make sure to stay hydrated and get some exercise into your days, if the once 534 pound fella can get to a point where he actually craves it then you can do it as well.

In 20 minutes think about how easy it would have been to exercise in that time and its out of the way, once you realize that it Really is that easy get up and do something about it, go ahead I dare ya!

As Ever
Me

Do your thang Honey!

This week I have been focusing on the gym and apparently when I am in the gym I am focusing on working out, this is a good thing yes? I got in a pretty good work out yesterday which consisted of 20 minutes on a stationary bike, 20 minutes on the arc-trainer 40 minutes of weight lifting and a 10 minute cool down walk on the treadmill, all in all it was a great thing but today I am really feeling the effects of the weight lifting and believe that I may have over done it slightly as my left bicep is very sore.

I stayed within my calories for the day coming in at 1900 on the dot which is 40 lower than my projected calories with the whey protein shake that I drink on days that I lift so I am happy with that number, I drank a gallon each of green tea and straight H2O so hydrated I was and obviously by my first paragraph I made it to the gym so a good day indeed. Tomorrow is Friday but I haven't decided if I am stepping onto the scale in the am just yet and I really don't have a reason why other than I feel like I am doing what I need to do, I am getting cardio into my days, eating within my calories and I have added lifting weights again (post surgery) and though my weight is what it is I feel like I am starting to focus on over all health a tad more. I still have a lot of weight to lose but I also have a lot of other health goals to hit and one of those goals is to gain some mass back that was lost during my weight loss process so I want to start looking at that as a secondary goal for myself.


I mentioned that I got a good work out in at the gym and I must have really been in a zone because about 10 minutes into my arc-trainer workout Christina Augilera "ain't no other man" came into my ear phones through my mp3 player, now I have that song on there because my daughter loves it and will dance like crazy as soon as she hears it..ok ok I have never lied on this blog and I won't start now, I really like that song! as soon as you stop laughing I will continue with my story..go ahead I will wait..
.
.
.
anyways, between verses there is a dubbed voice that says "do your thang honey!" and I guess that I was really going or into it because I said OUT LOUD "do your thang honey!" which was followed by a "oh shit" when I realized that I had said out loud, then me laughing, not like a little chuckle but a full on laugh almost triggered a case of unstoppable giggles but I did catch it and was able to get it into control. Now I am unsure if anyone heard me say either statement but there is a very good chance at least one person heard it, yes..heard the 330 pound big ol bearded guy that was going wild on the arc-trainer and now laughing almost uncontrollably say loud and proud "do your thang honey!" and later on my drive home I started laughing about the whole thing, in fact I am smiling hard as I type this, Have I mentioned that I enjoy going to the gym? I am unsure if I can go back now without ridicule but hey!

Over all I am doing pretty good this week and am hoping to continue that momentum and turn it into negative numbers again very soon, my surgery knocked me off track slightly because of not being able to work out and being limited with some other things but I am healing up nicely and almost back in full swing again. With that I do believe the end has come to another mind blowing episode of as the fat guy turns, we laugh, we cry and sometimes we have no idea whats going on but it is what it is and I thank you for following along.

Never EVER forget to do your thang honey!

As Ever
Me

Comfort, do you have it?

6:45 pm, its dark and cold outside walking up to the doors and opening them revealed a new place not as familiar as earlier hours, people scurrying around covered in sweat and filled with determination after a hard day put in at the office the work crowd is at the gym. Shoulder to shoulder standing on machines and benches, heart rates up and gazing around the room for the next available machine to open up so that the workout can continue. Angry face Mohawk man pedals madly on a recumbent bike and the movie Batman pops into my head as I think "Why so serious?" and onto my stationary bike I go. Plug in and press the quick start button, level 11 for 20 minutes and off to the races it is, I notice there are more people than I have ever seen in there at one time as I catch a woman on an arc-trainer looking into my direction as she begins her workout.

Scanning around I look for Wify but can't find her among the crowd and on I go pedaling, 20 minutes comes fast and off of the bike I step. Head over to the cleaning station to grab a paper towel to wipe down the bike but the mature woman in front of me grabbed the bottle to spray her machine down instead of spraying the towel and wiping so I follow her and ask "Can I get a squirt?" to which she replies "Where do ya want it hon?" a smile and a quick squirt later an empty arc-trainer is spotted and off I go again. Stepping around a small gathering of young girls loitering in the isle between the arc-trainers and the ellipticals I notice another lady eyeing my arc-trainer but I make it there in time to claim the machine, a short stretch, 20 minutes set into the quick start and within a few seconds I spot wify on some strength machines across the gym.

Giant arm tiny leg guy was there as was intense runner guy who puts the treadmill at an extreme incline and does sprints at a very high speed, though A.D.D. girl was not anywhere to be found a plethora of others were. A 10 minute cool down walk on the treadmill at 3.0 MPH on a 3.5% incline ended the night and my workout was complete for the evening, Wify completed her workout and we headed home.

Something interesting occured to me shortly after leaving, I was comfortable, not comfortable in the way a person gets because they have to pretend to be but comfortable because I was, I belonged there and the fact that it was wall to wall people most seemingly more fit than me didn't matter one bit and I did what I needed to do and did not think twice about anything. This is so opposite my initial gym expectations and in such a short time that I would reccomend that anyone who is hesitant about joining a gym because of atmosphere variables not be, no one cares about anyone else or what they are doing and if they do its kept to themselves because if a 330 pound guy can go wild on an arc-trainer and feel fully comfortable about it in a gym full of people anyone can.

I have to wonder if I am "goin wild on the arc trainer fat dude" to anyone?

This is my groove, I will not leave it.

As Ever
Me

A turning point, can you see around the bend?

Here I am, just me, doing what I need to do and its turning into something that I want to do, or let me say it differently, something that I crave. Not so long ago it was that random slim jim or 12 at the gas station that I wanted, or a slice of cake at a birthday party that would rival some entire cakes, or a Big D chili cheese burger (some of you New England people may recognize what that is) and now things are so different its like someone else is where I was or am. Today my little one is feeling under the weather and is home from school and I will miss my afternoon at the gym because of it, I am disappointed that I cannot go, I am looking for a sitter for this evening so that me and the boss lady may head out to get a work out in. I am amazed still at how I feel about working out again, I hear people say things like "Blah I have to go to the gym tonight" or "I don't feel like working out today but I know I have to so I will" and its not how I feel about it. I can't wait until its time to head out and get to the gym, getting there and seeing A.D.D. girl on the arc trainer every day with the tv on, an ipod in her ears and a book perched below the tv screen all while working harder than I have ever seen a person work out, or the 4 stooges, four old men that work harder than I have ever seen an old guy work out, hell harder than a lot of young people! they do work out in between making fun of one another but none the less every day they are there.

I had lost that part of me with the weight gain, He was in there but hiding, maybe just too depressed to come out and play or perhaps it was easier to eat and sulk, I am still unsure to this day but I tell you that the other guy, you know..the bigger fella, he will never be back because this is too much fun. I said in an older post once upon a time ago

"Once exercise is a habit you will no longer think of it as anything but what you WANT to do, It will not be sugary treats or greasy burgers that consume your thoughts, you will instead crave a rapid heart rate and beading sweat, the burn that comes with a good workout will be the "treat" that drives your every second of the day and before you know it healthy living will happen right before your eyes, astounded and impressed with yourself victory will be yours"

~Me~

and I have to say that statement has never been truer for me as it is this day. I have replaced a need/want for the sticky goodness of a Cinibon for a burn in my legs, this is what I crave.

I have accomplished something that I never thought possible, I lost more than 200 pounds and I did it on my own, which isn't actually fair to say because my family has been an immeasurably large resource for inspiration and support along the way. This blog Has been big in helping me keep on track until I could get to this point as well, logging my days on here along with some of my conclusions and ah ha moments helps also because there have been times where I have gone back into my own blogs and re-read them so that I could focus, there is so much that has helped me stay on track. One of the craziest things to me is that I have already lost more than 200 pounds and I still have a ways to go which can be disheartening at times because I do want to lose another 70 pounds and against the 200 that has already been lost it seems a small task but it is still 70 pounds! and the last 70 to boot so I anticipate it getting a bit harder the smaller I get. Can I presume that I will get there? I mean all the way down to below 265 pounds? I cannot presume anything because there are too many factors in life hence my situation in the first place but can I say that I will do everything that I can to get that last 70 pounds off? You already know the answer to that question if you have read any of my blog at all, I look forward to the day that I can say I have lost 50% of my total body weight.

Today I leave you with a Buddhist proverb.

"If we are facing in the right direction, all we have to do is keep on walking"...

Which direction are you facing?

As Ever
Me

Life is not easy...

At 534 pounds.

When you weigh as much as three full grown adults life is not a bowl of cherries, everything that you do is a struggle and when you are there that is not how you see it, mostly because it is the life that you are living and there is seemingly nothing that can be done about it. Basic tasks need to get done no matter what weight a person may be, I don't mean the laundry or the dishes or even spending time with the ones you love, I am speaking of a more basic set of things like walking, taking a shower or getting dressed, these things become huge challenges when you weigh more than a quarter of a ton and not a single one of us wants to admit weakness so we suck it up and do everything in pain and or discomfort so that we don't need to admit how weak we actually are. Bitterness becomes a defense, withdrawn attitudes are the flavor of the day and that's coming from me, the guy that laughs at everything, I am that guy making jokes no matter what even at my highest weight, ask anyone that knows me personally, it was the truth as its just my personality but it was more of a smoke screen to cover up all of the fucked up shit that I was dealing with at the time where my health was concerned.

Circa 1976

Sitting around with thoughts like "is today the day the firemen will have to cut a hole in the side of my house to get me out because I had a heart attack" floating around your gray matter is not all cotton candy and bunny rabbits, that kind of shit eats away at a person. Imagine that every day you wake up and 45 seconds after struggling out of bed as gracefully as your size allows so that no one knows how hard it is while walking towards the bathroom, chest pounding harder and harder with every step taken Bamn! that thought pops into your head, will today be the day that my family has to watch 12 firemen try to extract me from the hallway because it was the day my heart popped, every day after that thought materialized in my head my heart did pop and into that spiral downward we fall again. It is a feeling of unfathomable misery on a daily and every day gets a bit lower, every day that the idea of losing everything because of your size digs deeper into your bones and nothing can be done but to acknowledge silently that your days are in fact numbered if this path is the one to be followed, but still day in and day out down the stairs and a half of a box of cereal with full fat milk goes down with a coke and a smile.

August 2007, Largest size

I'll tell you, it sucks being that heavy and feeling like there is nothing that can be done, being trapped in your own skin is not a feeling that I wish upon anyone. Day in and day out food is there to comfort, and I don't mean comfort in any other way than it tasted good, it did not require any effort to slip it into the abyss and it tasted good, I think I mentioned that it tasted good right? and we grow. One day all of the fear starts getting the better of you and suddenly all you can think about is how you don't want to end up in the local news paper as the fella that was cut from the house while the scumbag media tries to interview your family on the porch with the hole in the wall as a back drop and still you can't stop yourself from lifting that fork to lips and eating bite after bite. The indentation on the couch is eerily taking the shape of your ass and it hurts to do anything, standing, walking, sitting down I mean everything and hiding all of the pain because of pride becomes second nature.

September 2009, most current photo of me

Then there is clothing, Let me tell you that buying a 6xl shirt or size 56 jeans is not exactly easy on the wallet, buying a tee shirt and a pair of jeans can set a person of that size back $70 to $95 dollars for a simple off brand tee shirt and the big and tall brand jeans. Now think about how these clothes are not really the most stylish things on the planet along with the fact that they are not made from the highest quality materials and need replacing often and it kind of sucks, though a superficial wound compared to the real issues of being hyper obese this one adds a lot to the low esteem part of the equation. So much that is not seen is going on in a fat persons head every second of every day...

"I wonder how long I can hold it because walking up to the bathroom is going to kill my back"...

"If I pretend to not be interested everyone will believe that I am choosing not to go to the movies rather than not going because I don't fit in the seats"...

"I have so much to live for why can't I just stop eating"...

"I don't remember sex hurting this much in the past"...

"If this goes much further we will have to install a Bidet in the bathroom"...

"I know its not a good idea with my chest beating like this but if I can just make it to the lawn to have my heart attack it will be less embarrassing for everyone because no hole in the house"...

"will I die today?"...

This entire post was inspired by about 4 seconds of thought yesterday after I ran across a parking lot and into my car, I jumped in put my seat belt on started the car and drove away, as I was driving away it dawned on me just how comfortable I was spinning around in my seat to check for traffic even though I had a seat belt on and had just ran across a parking lot, not out of breath and having had a surgery 8 days prior, oh dear how my life has changed. Life at just over 300 pounds is a completely different ball game and I have not had any of the above thoughts in quite some time, I do what I want to do when I want to do it. December 31st 2007 is one of the best days in my life and I can honestly remember it as clear as if it happened yesterday, it is the day that I chose to take my life back, its the day that I decided that there was a little girl that would have her Daddy for a very long time and I completely one eightied my plan, the road that was being traveled surely would have lead to bad things and perhaps a hole in my living room wall.

I am not special, I am no different than anyone else on this planet I simply had enough and decided to change the way things were going, It is not an easy thing to do so I won't lie and say that it is or has been but then I find most things in life that are worth doing are not easy.

Why are YOU waiting to live?

As Ever
Me

Is there a Doctor in the house?

This morning I have the pleasure of having Wify home because of Veterans day and we made a deal a while back that she would join the gym with me after I scheduled my Gallbladder surgery and since I held my part of the bargain up off we went this morning to sign her up. This also means that it was my first trip back to the gym since having my surgery and I ended up doing a light work out which consisted of 30 minutes on a treadmill at 3mph with a 3% incline and 15 minutes on a stationary bike set at level 11 resistance, I felt good afterward but tomorrow and later tonight will let me know if I did too much or if I am a go to get back in there every day again working slowly back up to my new bestest friend the arc-trainer.

Tuesday's menu could have been better and I know that I was over on calories but I have not a clue how much because I did not use my excel sheet, it was one of those bleh days where I felt like I needed more food and just went with it because I am still recovering a bit so Tuesday I gave myself a pass. My drinking is back to normal and I am back to my regular 1.5 to 2 gallons per day and my weight is coming down daily, have I mentioned that I am way up since the surgery? well I am and I believe it to partially be because of the surgery itself and all of the trauma but I did eat whatever would go down comfortably for the first couple days afterward and that may be a contributing factor as well but either way things are stabilizing where weight is concerned. I am a little bit disappointed at the timing of my surgery and my 25 by Nov 11th challenge that I have been doing because I did very well with that challenge and since the surgery ran into the last week and I really did not think it would make that big a difference I messed up any real numbers that would have been if I had not had the surgery this week, it is what it is I suppose.

The thing that triggered that challenge was because my doc said to me the last time that I saw him "you have done something that is not like you" oh yeah whats that? "you GAINED weight" and it bugged me because it was the first time that the recorded weight at the docs was a plus instead of a minus. Now it was one pound that I was up at the time so more than likely a fluctuation or I forgot to take my keys out of my pocket but even still and the challenge was born, I am just hoping that when I get to the docs office this afternoon that I am not above that number again. Either way it does not matter but since I challenged myself I would of course like to see me at least on the lower side of those numbers, it is pure insanity to me at just how much I am up since having the gallbladder removed but I know it is a temporary thing so in all honesty I am not too bothered by it.

Over all I am doing well post surgery (not that it was a big bad surgery or anything) but four holes punched through my abdomen still smarts! and getting back in the gym this morning felt good. From here on out I am going to be on auto pilot with the gym and my eating as well as my hydration so I have a feeling that it will be sooner than later that I hit my goal weight or at least chip my way to under 300 pounds because that is a bench mark that I am really looking forward to. I have a few subjects (more personal) that I want to write about on this blog but they take more time than I have right now as I need to get going to my appointment but look for them in the very near future, until then keep drinkin that H2O and keep in mind that YOU are the one making the decisions, so drop the brownie and get that arse moving.

As Ever
Me

Back to normal...ish..um..maybe not but I feel like I am!

I am back on track and counting again since my surgery, and this morning I woke up feeling great considering that yesterday was my first day without taking anything for pain and one of my four lovely incision spots still feels a little dodgy this morning but otherwise feeling like awesomeness in a bag. My intake for Monday was 1835 calories which is slightly higher than my normal 1700 but I did decide to up the calories a bit right before my surgery because of all of the extra exercise that I have been doing at the gym so I figure I will get back into it now and when I hit the gym again I will be in the swing of the new calorie scale.

I did go out for a short 15 minute walk yesterday and felt fine as far as any pain is concerned so hopefully that means that I can get back in the gym sooner than later. I won't push it because the gym will always be there and something that I have learned in the past almost 2 years of living healthier is that quick fixes usually never work, so hitting the gym before I am ready or should I say my body is ready will end up being a counterproductive endeavor if something were to happen and I injure myself. Being mentally ready to concur the world and physically limited by some tenderness because of a missing organ is slightly frustrating and again I am reminded how I was just about 2 years ago when sitting stationary was welcome and the norm, I am amazed still that I was in that situation not so long ago and here I am only a week so far where I am limited and going stir crazy because I am limited in the very same way.

I miss my stationary bike, I miss my arc-trainer, I want to take a ride around the lake on my mountain bike, in time this will be back in my days but for now I feel like Margot stuck in a closet while the other children play out in the sun, but sometimes Nature can be fickle and well...yeah I am missing an organ so. This feeling of wanting to go do something over sit on my arse though is a bit bleh because I can't do anything about it is sort of refreshing all at the same time because once upon a time I would have been more than happy to tout that I was not moving off of my robust posterior because I had just been in the Hospital dammit! I need my rest! it would have been the uber excuse that I needed to justify why I was stationary for the next few weeks. Quite the opposite is whats happening, Sunday I did some light yard work which was mostly slow raking and some sweeping but even though I was still somewhat in pain I just had to move around and felt better afterward.

Over all this week is off to a good start and hopefully in a few days I will start going back to the gym daily and get right back into my groove. I was on a roll with the pounds coming off and then post surgery I am WAY up in weight, its nothing that I am worried about between the eating not so great the couple days right after and not being able to drink as much as I would have liked to and the fact that I am sure I am retaining fluids because of the physical trauma to my body that the surgery caused, I am positive that it will right itself once I recover fully and get back to my routine.

That's all I have for you today, Thank you all for following along with my trials, successes and bumps while I get myself into top physical shape, Here's to better health and don't forget that H2O because as you all know I do believe it a very critical part of losing weight and staying healthy.

That is all..

You may now return to your work, play or coffee.

As Ever
Me

More random...

It's Monday so I figured it was time to try and write a post that was not written while drug induced, Let me start by saying that I have pretty much eaten what I wanted to eat since my surgery since I felt like crap and did not really feel up to being strict. I will do a play by play for those interested and for those not interested you can skim the post, After surgery I woke up groggy (obviously) and I was in the Hospital first thing in the am and out early afternoon. My doctor said to me "You will want to go out and eat a big dinner the night after your surgery" and though I would have to disagree with that statement I did eat before I left the Hospital, 2 very small blueberry muffins and 2 cups of apple juice which really seemed to help with the upset feeling that I had in my stomach. Me not wanting to mess with what works ended up eating blueberry muffins and apple juice for the next two days, that's not to say that I didn't eat a proper dinner the next day but the muffins seemed to settle the queezy feeling and the apple juice was preemptive planning for the constipation that I was warned would come with the pain meds that I was given.

By the time Friday came around I was starting to feel a bit better but still sore and starting to go a little crazy from being in the house and not being able to do too much in the way of..well anything without some pain for my efforts. Flash backs of late 2007 were coming into my head where being chained to a couch was the order of the day but for different reasons and I started thinking about how I was doing it back then for so long because a mere 3 days had me bouncing off of the walls, figuratively of course as I just told you I was chained to a couch..again figuratively but you get my point, I hope...of course you do. I was taking walks through my house and out into the driveway as well as around my house just to get moving because it did make things feel better to move a bit by Saturday but I was still very limited with what I could do. Sunday came and I had enough and joined Wify outside for some raking around the yard and I felt amazingly relaxed after we were done, I think just getting outside made a huge difference and I felt pretty good for the rest of the night.

This morning I woke up feeling decent enough that I didn't even take an Aleve for pain, thats not to say that I have none its just a pain level thats more of an uncomfort than anything else. I have also decided that today I will start counting my calories again and my ability to drink lots of fluid came back yesterday so I am going to resume that as well. I do have to admit that I really want to go to the gym because I miss the workouts but to go all the way there just to walk on a treadmill seems silly when I can just walk outside my house so I will hold off on the gym for a few more days at least.

I just haven't been feeling up to writing a post is why its been a while but I suppose its to be expected when finding a comfortable position is a challenge but I will try and get to posting regularly again starting with this post.

Thanks for reading along and thanks for the support, I lived through the surgery and and am getting back to normal again.

As Ever
Me

No bells No whistles, just an update post.

Halloween got me, and what I mean is that I ate my share of candy, cookies and I was just not watching what I ate this weekend and all of what I am saying happened Sunday and Monday so Halloween was gone and done with! but the chocolaty morsels were within range and I figured that I had been without a "treat" for long enough and I indulged in more than a few pieces of candy, I have not been a good boy. I believe, let me rephrase, I know that stress was getting the better of me because of the surgery this week and the fact that all day Saturday it felt as if a Klingon shivved me with his D'k Tahg and then hung off of it for more than six hours, so to say that my Halloween day/evening was spent in pain is stating it lightly and after holding off for an extra week I missed out on trick or treating anyways.

When I was setting up an appointment date for my gallbladder surgery with the surgeon I decided to do it after Halloween so that I could as the nurse put it "Be on Trick or treating duty" as the original date was going to be Oct 28th but I wanted to be able to go out with the kiddos and not having a way to know if after the surgery I would be able to go it was scheduled for this week instead. Around 3pm Saturday I felt a gallbladder attack starting but I was out so I had to deal with it the best I could, it lasted maybe 40 minutes and then faded away enough for me to grab a couple things at the grocery store before heading home and half way home is when the pain really kicked in and I literally spent the next four hours nauseous, vomiting and feeling like I was the victim of a knife attack laying in an alley puking. 9:45 pm after a hot shower and almost seven hours of discomfort ranging from a bad stomach ache level of pain up to how I would imagine Hari Kari feels the pain was gone and I went straight to bed as you could imagine I was very much ready for a rest at that point.

Sunday morning I woke up feeling like I had not eaten in days, I guess the fact that all I had eaten the day before was a bowl of cereal and a chicken wrap at lunch time could explain that not to mention all of the vomiting and lack of fluids. I started off slow with a small piece of baked sweet potato from the night before and it didn't start world war 3 in my gut so I ate a little more and when it was all clear I literally ate all day. No worries I thought, I had not eaten all day Saturday and I needed it so it was a pass, but then Monday I didn't count my calories at all and then skipped the gym (which was the plan because of the surgery, I was not going to go to the gym Monday or Tuesday) but there was no reason for the munching besides the fact that I wanted it, it is what it is and I can't take it back so I can't worry about it.

This morning I woke up feeling good ie: normal again and am on the counting calories again as well as put the candy off limits, I am torn on the gym because I did not want to go the 2 days before the big day but as I sit here writing this I want to go today, so I just might. After tomorrow I will no longer need to worry about random Klingon attacks and I will have about a week or two of recovery (at least that's what the doc said) before I will be able to get back to my normal exercise routine so I am not looking forward to that, He also said that a lot of people are able to get right back to regular things in only a few days so lets hope. I know that I won't be able to do my regular bike plus Arc trainer plus weights routine right away but the fact sheet that I got from the surgeon says that walking is one of the best ways to get moving and recover quickly after this so I may end up at the gym just to walk for an hour per day until I feel up to doing more, all to be found out I suppose but having a plan going in should help me focus when the time comes.

It appears that my Gallbladder was not going out without a fight and gave me the worse attack since this whole thing started as a going away present. I will not have time in the am to write a post for tomorrow but perhaps I will feel like writing when I get home from the prom but perhaps not, either way wish me luck because after tomorrow I will be less one organ and that random getting shanked feeling will not belong to me any more. Not really a weight loss related post but then that happens from time to time, Thanks for following along and all that.

As Ever
Me