No Workout Again

This morning I was woken at 5:30 am to the sound of tornado sirens and had no power. So, I woke three sleeping teenagers and took them to the basement until the threat appeared to have subsided. I still had no power until about 9:30 am. By that time I had worn myself out feeding and watering the meat chickens.

Sunday Weigh-In

Thursday, I did the 05 Legs and Back P90X workout. Instead of doing only the first 4 lower body moves, I did the NEXT five moves (minus the back moves).

Friday, I woke early and, with a friend, spent 3 hours weeding the garden. (Getting closer to finishing the dense weeding)

I have lost 3 pounds since last week. I'm not surprised, though. It always seems that the first week I loose an amazing amount of weight and then it begins to lose more slowly.

Today's Weight: 1(?)3.0

I still have a lot distracting me from working out every day. Mainly, the garden!

03 Shoulders and Arms

I woke again this morning and worked out a second day in a row! Today I made it through FOUR sets of the P90X's Shoulders and Arm routine (I used 10 lbs weights for each of the first 3 moves, and 5 lbs for all the rest). I have to admit that I didn't do the chair dips - just really didn't feel like doing those this morning. Only had to stop 3 times to vacuum up those gross centipedes. Then, I worked for 2 hours in the garden pulling weeds using a short stool my daughter had been using (I snatched it away - she's young and doesn't need it! :)

I'm a bit sore today from yesterday. At least I can still walk.

I ate pretty well yesterday and the only "junk" I had was a bowl of popcorn that I finished off this morning. Tonight will be tough as I'll have to resist cake. We are having a cake decorating activity at church. Can I make it?

05 Legs and Back

Today I woke up and worked out with the P90X 05 Legs and Back. I did 4 exercises and they about killed me. To top it off, I spent about 10 extra minutes during the workout fighting centipedes. We have this very nicely finished, walk-out basement that seems to be calling centipedes from across the nation. I spent the first 20 minutes before the workout vacuuming them up and then continued to do so as they appeared throughout the workout. I don't know why we are fighting this battle, but it's very gross and irritating, for sure! It's raining this morning, so I've been blessed with not having to go out and weed the garden after wearing out my lower body. Good thing, too, as I can barely stand right now. This is why I was resisted the last couple of weeks to both workout and weed the garden. Tomorrow should be easier as I will be doing the arms and shoulders workout; but, I expect that my lower body will be very sore :)

Sunday Weight-In

Again, why do I even bother. This week was worse than the week before. On Monday I did the 03 Shoulders and Arms workout through three routines. Reducing the weight did help. Then, I went to work in the garden for an hour pulling huge weeds from the onions. I continued to do that every morning all week long. I still need to finish it this week and move on to the green beans. I just couldn't get enough energy to do both, workout and work in the garden. I'm not a physical labored type of person and I needed to choose the more important task of weeding the garden. Unfortunately, I also ate like a pig. I had a couple of ice-cream cones from DQ, helped eat a couple of bags of chips, and had a kit-kat or two. Uughh! So, I've determined that this week I will eat right despite not planning to workout.

Today's weight: 1(?)5.0

So, I'm almost back to where I started. I always seems to be starting over.

P90X

I decided to spend a little time this afternoon looking through a couple of the routines I'm trying to build the strength to actually finish. I didn't look through the first one because I can actually finish it. Don't be too impressed, though, because I'm doing girl push-ups and using a chair for my pull-ups, lol! It's the best I can do right now. This is what I learned by watching the full videos:

02 Plyometrics:
There are 6 groups. All of them repeat once. There is so much jumping in this routine that I should probably wear better shoes (I workout barefoot :)

So far I've regularly completed 2 complete groups and have been working on my 3rd. I believe this workout will take me a while to master before I even gain enough strength to go deeper and jump higher.

03 Shoulders and Arms:
There are 5 groups that repeat once. This one drives me crazy as there are so many bicep curls. I've regularly completed 2 complete groups and have tried to start and 3rd quite a few times. I'm just so tired of MORE bicep curls that I quit. So, I've determined to reduce my weight on the bicep curls in order to allow me to complete the workout. I've only been using 8 lbs! This has been enough weight to make me struggle toward the end of my sets. But, going again and again and again with these bicep moves is too much. For the sake of actually continuing with the workout, I will reduce my weight.

05 Legs and Back:
This one is a killer. By the time I have mastered this workout I should be looking really good. Then, to actually give it deeper squats, increased weight, etc, I should have buns of steel. This workout is crazy! Anyway, there are a total of 23 exercises. The pattern is to do two types of lower body moves and then give the legs a break by doing a type of pull-up. However, because I'm not following the P90X program as recommended, I choose to pass over the pull-ups because if I follow my own plan I would be doing them the next day in the next workout.

So, there are 8 types of pull-ups. This leaves 15 lower body exercises, of which I have only regularly completed 5! I've made it through two more a couple of times, for a total of 7. I have a long way to go. There isn't much I can do to alleviate the difficulty of this workout. Some of the moves call for weights and most of them call for my own body weight. All I can do is resist going too deep so that I may have the strength to complete the workout.

The Goal
Much of my goal is to finish these workouts for the endurance while building strength and muscle through the exercises. The question is raised whether the goal should be to finish the workout by reducing weights, not going so deep, or jumping so high and so on, or rather to give each move my absolute everything and stop the entire workout when I've reached my max. I'm not sure which solution is ideal. Until I have different information convincing me otherwise, I will make it a goal to finish the workout. Then, as I build strength I will increase my weights, go deeper, and jump higher as my strength allows.

Actually, I do have information that contradicts this plan in one of the articles I reference in this blog, No Pink Dumbells. They argue that in order to build muscle I must be using weights that allow me to barely finish the last two reps, and to do less reps vs more in order to afford me heaver weights to build the muscle necessary to burn the fat. At first I thought that wouldn't be a good idea as I don't want to become bulky; however, they pointed out that saying that I didn't want to lift weights because I don't want to become bulky is like saying I don't want to run around the block because I'm not interested in running a marathon. In order to become bulky I would have to follow this method for a lot longer than necessary to loose the weight. The reason I have decided that my first goal should be endurance is because I don't have any. I can do something for a short period of time, but I need to build up my lungs and.... my endurance. So, that has become a first goal. I feel that I will meet that goal by actually finishing each video. Then, after that goal has been met I will work on increasing the difficulty. What I've caught myself doing as I build strength, especially with the Plyomectrics, is going a little deeper and jumping a little higher. I allow myself a little latitude, but try to hold back a little bit because it will prevent me from being able to continue further into the workout.

Sunday Weight-In

Why do I even bother!? I feel I'm back to where I started a few weeks ago. Of course, I've not eaten really good all week and I only worked out twice. On Monday, I did P90X's Arms and Shoulder's and Tuesday, I did P90X's Lower Body Workout. Then, by Wednesday my poisen ivy on my arm was so bad I couldn't think of doing much, let alone something that would make me sweaty and likely scrap my breakout. Also, I was struggling with sleeping and wasn't getting up early enough to dedicate time to exercising. All week I found myself not eating all morning and not eating really well at night. Now I have to find the motivation to begin, AGAIN! :(

This week's weight-in: 1(?)3.6

Tomorrow morning I don't plan to workout because we will be working in the garden as a family. That will wear me out. I can't do both. :(

This Week...

This week I did....

Monday: P90X 01
Tuesday: P90X 02
Wednesday: P90x Shoulders and Triceps
Thursday: I didn't work out - I had a lot of cleaning to do and was worried about exhausting myself and not being able to finish it. It was a good thing, too, because the cleaning exhausted me.
Friday: I didn't work out using a video, but I did in what I tried to accomplish outside. I moved only 6 bricks. They are over a foot squared and about 2 inches thick. I could barely lift one and three of them over-taxed my wheelbarrow. Then, I dug up some huge plants and transplanted them to where the bricks had been. I had planned to complete a huge area, but only finished about 3 square feet. Uhhhggg! I worked harder than I had I done the Plyometrics and Shoulders and Triceps workout together! Hubby asked me what I wanted from DQ and I told him, "nothing". Although, later that night I wish I had said, "yes!"
Saturday: No workout. Have finished cleaning house and have a young teenage boy here who will hopefully help me finish the bricks! :)

Starting Again!

Well, It's been about a month since I started working out again. When my tops began to feel tight and my "fat" dresses that I've worn for the past 5 years during my weight gain are no longer fitting, I feel that I've reached the point of deciding in which direction I am heading. It's time to get serious. I'm going to post to the right of this blog my weight loss record, without disclosing the actual pounds (because I'm too embarrassed, yet). I really don't like to weight myself because if I'm not loosing, then I've always become discouraged and stopped and if I'm loosing sufficiently, then I over-reward myself with sabotaging snacks and slothfulness. Still, I've decided to weight myself on Sunday mornings to be able to track my progress and patterns.

I say I've started a month ago, but in reality I started a few months ago. I would lift a few weights here and there throughout the week, but nothing much more than more than doing nothing. (If that even makes sense). When the weather became warmer I would walk about 45 minutes. I had tried walking to my parents for my very first walk of the season and that turned out to be a big mistake. They live just over 3 miles away and it was too much for breaking me in for the season. I spent the next week treating a hurt ankle caused by walking on the side of a country road for over an hour. My dad had to drive me home, lol! He helped me measure the road that circles in my neighborhood and it turned out I would need to walk around it 5 times to equal the distance to their house. So, for the next two weeks I built up my strength to walk 5 times around the neighborhood. Then, the Sunday I determined enough was enough, my "fat" dresses were no longer fitting, I walked to my parents home AND back! I walked every day in the evening and did the P90X in the morning. I stayed away from ALL junk food and ate moderate and correct portions for each of my meals. I lost 4 pounds that week. It was exciting, but I didn't believe it, either. Really! I didn't believe it because I knew in the past I would loose some, gain some, loose some, gain some and so on. I really never lost anything because it would come back on again. Down 3, up 2, down 1, up 3, etc. I waited until the next week and found that I had put 2 more pounds on. No surprise. The next week I lost some more. That was 3 total weeks. Then, I lost control of my sleeping schedule, was stressed out about a deadline, and was given a huge box of cheese popcorn for Mother's Day that I took a week off. I put a little back on. Today, I started again.

That first week of walking AND P90X was the last week of walking. The gnats came out and I would have eaten a bunch in order to walk. My schedule has been like this:

Mondays: P90X, 01 Chest and Back. This is a tough workout for me because I cannot do a full pushup and cannot even do a pull-up. So, I do girl push ups and use a chair to allow me to do a pull-up. My goal was to make it through the entire video, which I've achieved. For most of the push-ups and pull-ups I'm doing 5 each, with the exception of regular ones which I did 8. Because I'm feeling stronger I increased my push-up count to 8 for each and 12 for the regular. I'm only feeling slightly stronger for the pull-ups. It's going to take time, for sure. I just don't have the strength. The only exersize in the video I do not do are the dive-bomber push-ups. Since I cannot even do a full push-up, then those are impossible for me at this time.

Tuesdays: P90X, 02 Plyometrics. My goal was to complete the video. I'm still working on it. I've made it through the third routine. Today, I was about to start the fourth and realized I'm just not ready. It's MORE jumping and I just finished a bunch of jumping and can barely keep myself going. I need a few more weeks of going through the 3 and then I'll add number 4.

Wednesdays: P90X, Shoulders and Biceps. I will have to make note of how far I go in this one. There are so many bicep moves that my elbow areas begin to hurt before I really feel I've maxed out my muscles.

Thursdays: P90X, Legs and Back. I skip the back in this because I return to first workout for Friday's. The legs I work on until the wall squats. Last time I was able to make it a few more moves before I was finished.

Fridays and Saturdays I return to the first two workouts. At least that's the plan. I don't like the other two workouts he has for those days and I need to build my strength for the first two, so I return to them. However, only one of the weeks did I even remotely do this. To be quite honest, it seems every single week I find a day, or two, that somehow I don't workout. So, I make sure I get through these four workouts once.

Well, that's a quick rundown of my month and plan. Wish me luck.... I need it!

Starting Again

Over the past year or so I've worked out here and there. Even been consistent for a month or so before I eventually gave up, again. I'm finally getting around to getting serious about this, one more time. I do need to do something, though. Today, while looking at a BMI chart at work - I do work at a hospital, I noticed that I either need to loose weight or grow 7 inches because I'm teetering into the obese column. It's more likely that I'll loose than grow up, uhhmmm, so I'd better get busy.

One of the challenges that I fight is that to have time to work out I need to get up at 5 am. That's tough. When I'm rolling out of bed, still too tired and in a dreamy state, the thought of using my tired and limp muscles to exhaustion is too much to ask. Also, I would get so tired during the workout that I would think about the entire day I still had to make it through. So, instead I would go back to bed. Over the summer I was having trouble sleeping so I would walk for an hour after work and it helped out a lot. What I realized is I can more easily get up and do my school work (I'm in college now) for 1-1/2 hours before work. When I return home I can workout as hard as I can knowing that no matter how tired I get I'm going to bed in a couple hours anyway. It's been a win-win situation.

Tonight, I decided to get started again. After having gained weight, don't know how much since I refuse to weigh myself, I went to my workout area and did P90X's plyometric's warm-up. Yep, that's it. I was tired, breathing hard and already met my max. Really, I should be doing his scaled down version, whatever it's called, but I'm all tapped out of workout video funds. Hubby has banned anymore spending on workout stuff. So, I'll have to make this do. It will take me about a week to get myself introduced to this new lifestyle and then I'll be able to add more to my plate. For now, I'm good at starting new habits of actually getting my butt into gear. :)