leloufish

I haven’t blogged in the last two days, but that doesn’t mean I’m slacking or anything. =D I’ve just been too busy with college-related stuff to blog about my exercise…but I finished my physics exam today, so that gives me some relief.

First of all, thank you all who’ve friended me while I haven’t logged in for a while XD I’ll try to be a good supportive buddy!

Next up…I’ve been sticking to my schedule religiously for the past week–Cardio everyday and weight training 3 times a week. So I’ve been beating myself up pretty good, and it feels awesome. I think I might be hooked on this exercise thing. Recently it takes more to get my heart up to target heart rate–meaning that my heart’s gotten stronger!

Food-wise I’ve been doing good, too! I try to aim for 1600 calories a day, and to fulfill this I’ve had a bigger breakfast with a nice cold glass of milk, along with my midday grazing (what counts for lunch) and dinner. Thanks for the suggestions!

Day after tomorrow is my weigh-in day, but I wouldn’t be surprised if I don’t lose much; I’m loving strength training, so I’m not going to worry too much about the pounds and focus more on the change in inches. But I will still take my weight ^^.

Tomorrow’s cardio and weights!

This is SUPPOSED to be my fourth time weight training since I started, but an unplanned cold got in the way and rendered me weak for 3 of those…So this was my 2nd time weight training.

I lowered the weights like Kerstin suggested before, and it made my performance a lot better–I was feeling the burn after 12 reps, not 3, and I usually made it to about 18 reps total. Thanks Kerstin!

I also did my usual 30 minutes of cardio. It’s amazing how fast people around me are cranking at the elliptical, where I’m chugging along at 50 rpm. I have the resistance set high, though–gives more push on my leg.

I walked down to CVS today as well, planning to get my protein shake…Turns out they didn’t have much in that direction (most of it was Slimfast!). I got one called “BOOST” that comes in a six-pack, and ordered the GNC one that Shannon recommended online. Thank you, too~!

I’ve never heard of Herbalife before now, either, and checked out some websites that contain their products. Very interesting! I might have to get something from there, too.

Strangely, I also had a hard time achieving at least 1500 calories today, too. It’s just that I’m not that hungry….but I ate a big thing of quinoa after my dinner in order to add about 400 extra calories to my low intake today. Is it crazy that I, who used to love food (and still do) can’t stomach enough of it anymore?

Anyways, I know it’s not healthy to be under 1200, so I try to add more each time. Perhaps more midday snacks would help me achieve that?

So I started off 7 am today with a quick ham/cheese sandwich (app. 200 calories) and a fiber bar (150) before I hit the gym for 30 minutes. Then, the exhaustion of staying up late hit, and I immediately took a nap around 11 am all the way to 5 pm. I finally decided to eat dinner at 7 pm, and it was just a repeat of what I had for breakfast (feeling too lazy to cook since my roommate’s not here).

So today, I’ve had a total of 700 calories, and it’s definitely not enough! It’ll slow down my metabolism….but I’m not hungry. It’s time like these that I wish I had one of those protein shake powders. I think I’ll invest in one when I hit the pharmacy tomorrow.

Anybody have any favorite brands of these? Favorite flavor? I’m looking at “Optimum 100% Whey Protein-Gold Standard.” Any suggestions would be helpful.

Thanks!

First of all, thank you all who celebrated with me on my first weigh in. Very pleasing results.

That being said…….Saturday. Today’s the day I’m allowed to eat anything I want, almost whenever I want, but not as much as I want.
It’s my reward at the end of the week, but that doesn’t mean I’m allowed to go ballistic.

I surprisingly had much more control than I thought I would’ve had today. The only one super-damaging thing I ate today….Cake. Yum, cake.

My roommate had gone home last weekend because it was her birthday, and she brought literally half a sheet back to the apartment. That cake had been sitting in the fridge, in plain sight (because there was no room in the back, where I would’ve preferred it) all week long. Every morning when I came down to grab my yogurt, the saliva glands would kick in staring at the sugary horribleness there. Yet, I’d hurry and grab the yogurt, eat a healthy breakfast and run to class.

Finally, though. Since my restrictions are lifted today, I allow myself to eat just one piece. Oh, and is it marvelous.

I bet that if I hadn’t waited this long and ate the cake anytime during the week, it would NOT have tasted this good. This deliciousness only comes from being deprived of it for that looong week.

But alas, my Saturday is soon coming to an end…which is why I chose to close it with this delicacy.

With it, though, I can plow through this coming week with renewed vigor to look forward to that one other piece of cake waiting next Saturday. Gym, I’m coming!

-2 pounds! Celebration time!

I’ll do the other measurements shortly.

Today was pretty uneventful. I went to classes, ate healthy, yada yada. I didn’t go to the gym today after asking my body how it feels with exterminating the rest of disease. It said that it was just a bit tired, and pointed out to me that even if I go to the gym, I can’t breath through my nose. So I agreed with it and decided to take the extra day. Tomorrow’s Saturday, my splurge day, so I won’t be going to the gym tomorrow, either.

Sunday, though…!

Anyways, when I was waiting for the bus to arrive after classes, a guy drenched with sweat, white earplugs embedded in each ear, and jogging with huge strides ran past. I was like ‘wow, this guy’s how I want to be like eventually’…but after staring at his back, I realized that there were words on it. They were hard to read because the shirt was stained dark from the sweat on his back, but it said

“The hottest fire makes the strongest steel.”

And I thought…it’s true! I gotta work myself hard these next few years to get myself a beautiful, toned body. Flames of the workout! Muscles of steel!

…Anyways, I thought it might be good for a little motivation.

Another odd thing about my immune system–it sucks at keeping the bacteria away, but it fights hard once I’ve been infected. I’m on way up from the cold now, but I’m not doing any exercise today. I’ll start back up tomorrow, pace myself according to my health. I wanna get healthy soooooooo badly! Why does my body do this to me when I’m all pumped up and motivated?

Anyways, to make up for my lack of exercise these past two days, I scoured some Japanese health communities (the gift of being bilingual!) and found a real popular concoction.

Now, mind you, it’s not a “magical potion” or anything. Just something to help lower blood sugar, increase immunity and keep your bowel system on the go. In other words, it’s a dieter’s good friend. The ingredients go:

200 mL of apple cider vinegar
2 tablespoons of honey
1 banana
1/2 tablespoon of cinnamon powder

You simply slice up the banana and toss it in the vinegar with the honey and cinnamon, and stick it in the microwave for 45 minutes. Leave it covered overnight, and it’s ready to be drank in the morning. Try to drink 2 to 3 spoonfuls a day.

The vinegar’s apparently supposed to draw out the potassium and other nutrients out of the bananas–so that you don’t have to sacrifice the amount of carbs you eat, and vinegar itself helps improve blood sugar, calcium absorption and other digestive goodies. Honey’s also good for digestion, naturally antiseptic….and so on. That, and it helps sweeten the concoction. Cinnamon’s also good for controlling blood sugar and cholesterol, I guess. Anyways, you guys can google the articles yourself.

And I’m not attesting to any of these facts, by the way. But I am trying the vinegar concoction starting tomorrow!

I caught a cold yesterday, but I still pushed myself to keep doing my 30 minutes cardio everyday. Well, I guess I paid for it today…I felt even worse this morning, that I couldn’t get out of bed. 10 hours later I finally can, but I missed all my classes and I couldn’t go do my weight training. Stupid disease. I know exactly where this came from, too–my physics lecture hall was filled with people sniffling and coughing, and knowing my useless immune system, I was bound to pick it up.

So I learned my lesson–can’t push myself too hard with a cold. I’ll try to recover before getting back into my schedule, but I’m not letting this be a reason to ooze away from my healthy lifestyle changes!

On a side note, my fat caliper came today! Made me happy. I’ll check this Saturday, which is my weigh in day.

So despite the little back up in my plan, I managed to go the gym today. I was supposed to strength train all my major muscles, but I had no clue how. Luckily, my gym seems to have a Nautical machine to work every muscle and more. So I simply went to each one, tried to figure out what they were doing on the diagram and followed along–6 to 12 reps, just as planned, and increase the weight if I’m not feeling the “burn” after 12.

Well my lower body and back can take 50 lbs easily, it seems. My abs can take 40. But when I got to my upper arm/shoulder workouts, HOLY SH!T was it heavy! I am so weak, I can barely do 6 reps at 30 lbs, my arms quivering from the first rep. Geez, it really lets me know what shape I’m in. Now I have a new short-term goal–increase upper body strength!

Anyways, after the weight training I got back on the elliptical and went for my daily 30 minutes of cardio. Tomorrow will only be cardio.

On a side note, I’ve been doing good with eating today. Breakfast at 6 am was a handful of almonds, yogurt and a Fiber-1 bar. Midmorning snack was a handful of almonds again.

I made an interesting little sandwich for lunch–lean turkey meat, baby spinach, provolone cheese (yes, so horrible), and a teaspoon of some spicy salsa on whole wheat bread. It was actually tasty, and the salsa spared me the need for mayonnaise or anything like that.

Dinner tonight will be sticky rice, a mini-salad and chicken breast pre-soaked in a solution of soy sauce, Japanese sweet vinegar, cooking wine, honey, garlic and grated onion.
Funny thing, I usually prefer dark meat over white meat because white meat gets so dry and hard, but I found out by experimenting that leaving the chicken soaking in grated onion for an hour keeps it soft and tender. You just have to be careful because it’s easier to burn because of the onion.

I’ll post up the recipe sometime!

Right, so I’m up at 5:00 am at the very moment, but it seems like one thing I forgot to take into consideration is finding out what time my gym opens. Oops.

Turns out that it opens at 7:00 am.

Well…Not too much of a problem for Monday Wednesday Friday, then. I can shift my schedule for those days.

As for Tuesday and Thursday, I’ll go do my cardio as soon as I get home from school and have a quick protein snack.

It’s okay, I’m not discouraged! I’ll just shift my plan accordingly. You can always make room for priorities, and exercise plans to be one of my top ones.