Hello friends! We meet again. Well I am back to discuss a continuation of my last blog. I just wanted to talk about what it is all about, incase there is some misunderstanding of the meaning. Have you ever felt in life you could do more? Have you ever started things you did not finish? Have you ever kept trying and trying something and you were not successful at it? This is the battle I have had with this weight loss.

You may ask what is the big deal? The big deal is I have tried and tried this a good 5 times in the last 5 years and I have not stuck with it. It is critical that I succeed at this. Going through this makes me take a look at my life as a whole. I have started a few things I could not finish. I have made bad choices, I ahve lacked the disciple to persevere.

I have said too many times, I can't, I won't, This sucks, This is hard. I have given up and thrown in the towel many times. What makes this time different is I have now realized and come to terms with this. I was in denial before. Now that I have really taken this seriously, and I have cleared my mind a lil, the scale is moving.

Having Dave's guidance has been monumental. I used Twitter to surround myself with ppl into fitness, and that has also helped greatly. When you surround yourself with ppl of the same interests you definitely take it more seriously. As of date I have lost 11lbs. I would have loved for it to have been 20, but I will take 11, and will have to work harder.

This is a mental challenge more than anything, and I for see this strengthening my mental health as well as physical health. I am done for now. Until later...........................................

Change. Boy We Have Problems

Hello my blogger friends!! This may be one of hardest blog posts I have had to write ever. I am not blogging just to show you guys all the good times and fun. Life isn't all good times and fun, there are some struggles. This blog is to share maybe? Is this a good vent? Will someone enlighten me with some great comments? Who knows...but here goes.....I suffer from major depression: In case you know nothing about it, Read below.

Overview

Major depression is when a person has five or more symptoms of depression for at least 2 weeks. These symptoms include feeling sad, hopeless, worthless, or pessimistic. In addition, people with major depression often have behavior changes, such as new eating and sleeping patterns.

Symptoms

• Agitation, restlessness, and irritability
• Dramatic change in appetite, often with weight gain or loss
• Extreme difficulty concentrating
• Fatigue and lack of energy
• Feelings of hopelessness and helplessness
• Feelings of worthlessness, self-hate, and inappropriate guilt
• Inactivity and withdrawal from usual activities, a loss of interest or pleasure in activities that were once enjoyed (such as sex)
• Thoughts of death or suicide
• Trouble sleeping or excessive sleeping

Depression can appear as anger and discouragement, rather than as feelings of hopelessness and helplessness. If depression is very severe, there may also be psychotic symptoms, such as hallucinations and delusions. These symptoms may focus on themes of guilt, inadequacy, or disease

Now you may be like shit! This guy has some issues. That may be truth, but read on....

i just wanna be,
i just wanna be,
successful.
i just wanna be,
i just wanna be,
successful.
i just wanna be,
i just wanna be,
successful.

Yeah,
i want things to go my way,
but as of late a lot of shit been goin sideways,
and my mother tried to runaway from home,
but i left somethin in the car so i caught her in the driveway,
and she cried to me so i cried too,
and my stomach was soakin wet,
she only 5′2,
and 48 hours all before i showed up,
and brought a thousand dollas worth of drinks and got poured up,
damn my reality just set in,
and even when the phantoms leased them hoes wanna get in,

i do a lot of things,
hopin i neva have to fit in,
so tryin to keep up with my programs is like a dead end,
my girl love me but fuck it my heart beat slow,
and right now the tour bus is lookin like a freak show,
and life change for us every single week,
so whats good,
but i know this aint the peak though
cause i want…

I want the money,
money and the cars,
cars and the clothes,
the hoes,
i suppose,
i just wanna be,
i just wanna be,
successful.
i just wanna be,
i just wanna be,
successful.
i just wanna be,
i just wanna be,
successful.

This song describes the current state of my mind right now. For some reason I can't wrap my arms around what it takes to get to where I want to go. Do I have noting? No. I have a car many ppl would like to have. I have a decent job. Many people would at least like to have a job. I have my girl. I want more. I am tired of working for the man. I want to work for myself. I want to do what makes me happy, instead I do what everyone else wants me to, or to please them.

So you are probably thinking what can you possibly be unhappy about? Plenty. I have a past that haunts me, sorry folks, you do not get those details. It seems people always have an opinion on what they think is going on, and they happen to be wrong. Everyone seems to know why I do or don't do things, or why I am the way that I am.

I have never just been able to focus on myself. I just want to be successful.

NEXT BLOG! What am I going to do about it??

Biggest Loser

Ahh a new day. So today happens to be the day at my office that a Biggest Loser Challenge begins. I was skeptical at first, because last year my co-workers and myself, and HR told us we couldn't. A few months later they took our idea and did it. So this year I am embracing it as something else that can help motivate me towards my goals.

So I just came back from the weigh-in. Their scale only goes to 280. :( That was embarassing. I would love to be able to hop on a regular scale. Last night I had the crappiest workout I will post the disappointing numbers:

Date	Exercise	Body Parts Worked	Time	Sets	Reps	Lbs		Max/Min
14-Sep	Machine- Seated Chest Press	Chest		1	15	105
		Chest		3	10	105
	Machine- Pec Dec	Chest		1	15	105		Max 35lbs up
		Chest		3	10	105
	Incline Press- Plate Loaded Machine	Chest		2	10	90		Max 30lbs up
				1	5	90
	Smith Machine Bench Press	Chest		3	10	70		Min 20lbs

I was so exhausted during this workout. I had 2 days in a row of about 5 hours of sleep and worked 10 hours a day. This just was not productive at all. I am still on the search of DISCIPLINE. This has really been a mental struggle.

I know I have it in other aspects of my life. It sucks waking up at 5 A to go to work for 10 hours a day, but I do. I found this statement at a website: To me, the root of the problem is not the diet program. The root of the problem lies within the individual on the diet program. So if you want to lose weight and keep it off we need to work on "YOU", because after all, you are the one who created your weight problem. This is a fact. You are the one who have been overeating. You are the one that just could not pass-up that last piece of pie. You are the one who has not practiced self-discipline. You are the one that did not listen to your doctor when he told you that you needed to lose 20 pounds. Now you are 50 pounds overweight. YYou are the one that hasallowed food to become your master instead of the over way around. Remember! The food did not fly out of your plate and into your mouth. You and only you made the decision to overeat.

How many people can really admit that? I know I can. Ya know the lbs are not flying off, I notice more muscle definition and clothes fitting loser, but I need to get the scale burning, and it isn't. I figure if I can do this I can do anything. This weekend I am suppose to do the Minneapolis Bike Tour. I have 6 days to get ready. I know I can do it because I finished the IRONMAN, but I trained for that longer than my training for this. I turned in my workout log to Dave, my trainer, and I am prepared for some criticism of the workout. A swift kick in the ass is what I need to make it happen. Should I really have to have someone else hold me accountable to this? I can't have my hand held forever. Damn this is tough.

O'rlly?

Really it has been almost a month. It has been a difficult time along this journey. I have had a difficult time getting fully committed to this. I read, I research, I ask questions, yet I seem to find a way to not stick to it religiously. I lost the initial 5lbs and I was so excited. Then I fell victim to shoddy planning which led to bad food choices and not going to workout EVERYDAY! I have started to see some changes in my quads and triceps from the resistance training. I need to pick up the pace on the cardio. This is where there is epic fail. I can ride a bike 20 miles easy, but I don't wanna walk on a treadmill for 15 minutes or more.

I guess the word of the day is DISCIPLINE. It is hard to maintain it in a scoiety of instant gratification. Not only have I learned that planning meals are important, but planning my life around working out is important. How do you tell ppl hey sorry I gotta miss something, because I have to go to the gym. Now this has become harder because I had the summer off from school. School is back in session. Now I really have to make the time to work out.


One good thing about it, is that I can take my textbook and knock out some chapters while on the treadmill. Talk about killing two birds with one stone. this battle is more mental than anything. I have to try to over come the mental part of this and become obcessed and religious about this is I am gonna make some things happen.

I use Gymtechnik to track my workouts, and they do not make it easy to copy. I will post workout stats when time allows. I promise you guys these will become more frequent.

Back/Biceps

Here is today's workout:

Wide Grip Front Lat Pull Down	Set 1 10 x 105.00Lbs Set 2 10 x 105.00Lbs Set 3 10 x 105.00Lbs Set 4 10 x 105.00Lbs
Cable - Seated Row	Set 1 10 x 90.00Lbs Set 2 10 x 90.00Lbs Set 3 10 x 90.00Lbs Set 4 10 x 90.00Lbs
Dumbbell - One Arm Row	Set 1 10 x 35.00Lbs Set 2 10 x 35.00Lbs Set 3 10 x 35.00Lbs
Barbell Curl	Set 1 10 x 35.00Lbs Set 2 10 x 35.00Lbs Set 3 10 x 35.00Lbs Set 4 10 x 35.00Lbs

Test

Refreshed

Today is the first day in 4 days that I actually feel rested and refreshed. I am not sure what was going on the last few days, but today is much better. I have not been as exhausted as I was in a good while. Yesterday afternoon it rained, so I did not get a ride in at all. Today I need to get in a solid workout.

Today I have been researching and researching and reading and reading. I really need to jumpstart my metabolism here. Things are not moving as fast as I would like. I am starting to think I may need to move my workouts to the AM. Sometimes I am so tired from a 10 hour day of work, I never make it there. I think evening workouts also may be contributing to me not getting a good amount of sleep, or quality sleep when I do. Maybe I take my supplements too late in the day? So today if it is not raining I am going to bike it and do some lifting today. I hope the recovery is not as long as it was last time. I gotta start putting up some results fast.

Running calculations

So today one of the Dr's at work told me that the calories burned calculations on livetstrong.com is wayyyy off. So I guess I will no longer will be logginf my activity in there. So today I took it upon myself to runs some calculations. I think I will use it just to log what I eat. I decided to use the Harris Benedict Equation to see how many calories I need per day just to survive. That number is 3039.85.

It is suggested that you have a 15%-20% deficit to lose weight. For most people the average is 500 calories per day for 1 pound. I want to lose 2 lbs per week. So I need a 7000 calorie deficit per week. So from what I am gathering I need to shave off 1000 calories per day to lose 2lbs per week. Until I purchase the bodybugg I will have to guestimate my calorie expernditure. This should be fun.

My muscle recovery is wayyyy slow. This is day 3 of soreness in my upper body. I wish my recovery time would get alittle faster. Today I need to go to the store and get some more fruits and veggies. I also need to find ways to sneak more protein into my diet. I think I am going to make some chili tonight. Should be a good way to get some in.

Got a nice cardio plan going today. I would like to knock in 12 miles. Wish me luck. Will check in later to let ya'll know what we get done.

It has been awhile

Damn it has been awhile since I have blogged. The month of July was definitely a hard month to go hard. My kids were visiting from NY. So including my fiancee's kids there were four kids in the house. So let's just say I did not get to do as much as I wanted to in July and the first week of August. Today I feel good and had a nice workout in the gym. I had this program on Blackberry that I never used, and today I decided to give it a try. http://www.gymtechnik.com/home.aspx

After meeting with Dave my trainer, and reviewed some of the exercises he wanted me to do. Over the course of the last couple weeks I have tried using free weights. I normally prefer machines. After trying free weights, I am really intimidated by these in the gym. My biggest fear is not doing some of the exercises properly. Today I will be tracking what I eat again. I track it @www.livestrong.com. It's late, check out a new blog tomorrow.

My rant

I do not usually rant, but I think today I really need too. I do not get kids today. Why are kids many kids today lazy and ungrateful? They think they have it sooooo hard. Today our kids just want to sit in front of the tv, the computer, or a video game.

My kids are here for the summer. They live with their mother full time. They are rarely active. I took them to the park to walk around it and they thought they were going to die. Yesterday I told them they had to play WII. I prefer they play boxing because it is way more active in the WII Sports than the other games. They whined, we do not have enough energy. Waaaa Waaaaaa!!! They already have genetic strikes against them for health problems.

I do not think we as Americans today put fitness as a top priority in our lifestyle. I am guilty of this too. Poor planning, eating out of convenience, not making time to go to the gym. I think we all have been guilty at some point. We really need to work to change this. Even some of the most healthy people fall dead to various conditions.

I gave the kids a lecture about being challenged in life. We can't improve and be better without a challenge.

Day 1 of the challenge

Great day! Ate good, rode 7 miles today. Got some good cadio in. No weights today. Rockin the weights tomorrow. Time for bed, last day of work for the week. The next 7 days gonna have some more hardcore workouts.

Body-For-Life Challenge

My co-worker and myself were talking about this Dr. Phil book about weight loss. She mentioned the website Body-For-Life. I went there and found the Body-For-Life Challenge. http://bodyforlife.com/challenge/2009/2009BFLEntryKit.pdf I am starting this tomorrow. I am pretty stoked about, while I am getting in shape I got the chance to win some major cash. You get to follow me on the 12-week journey. Wish me luck, I am gonna do the damn thing.

Sunday July 19, 2009

It's been a couple of days when since I blogged. It just has been hectic. Working out can be so difficult to fit in to a hectic schedule. My recovery times are lasting 4-5 days which really suck. I am trying to make the decision to wake up earlier than my 530 AM start to go to the gym before work. I go to bed early enough, or at least try to, so I can get decent sleep to be good for a 10 hour day. Can I get up any earlier ans still have a decent breakfast? School starts next semester, and I really have to fit the fitness in.

So the million dollar question is.........How do you fit working out into a crazy busy schedule?

Day 4 continued......

I had a bomb workout today. I had a cheat meal but I made up for it. Ran suicides today. I wanted to commit it when I was done. I rocked the eggwhites and oatmeal. Lunch I am not gonna talk about. Dinner I ate chicken breasts and steamed green beans and some water. I had a muscle milk, Dave said a huuge no, but I needed the protein fast and didn't protein with me. I won't make that mistake again.

Today was leg and calf day:

It was a decent start, but less than what I had been doing a few months ago.

Seated calf. 4 sets 45lbs/25reps, 55lbs/20reps, 65lbs/15reps, 75lbs/25reps

Hack Squats 4 sets, 180lbs/12, 180/10, 230/8, 200/12

Leg press 4 sets, 270/12, 270/10, 270/8, 270/12

Leg Extensions 4 sets, 105/12, 120/10, 135/8, 150/12

Let's see what we can do tomorrow.

A day...random, most likely Day 4

So yesterday out of guilt for my bad behavior, I am not giving details, I just know, I didn't blog about it. I am being good today. Got a tight workout planned after work. I do have to rant today though....Why do people ride in the left lane all slow and then when you go and pass them on the right they decide to get over??? That pisses me off so fucking bad damnit!

Anywho...eggwhites and oatmeal again this am. I left my protein shake at home this AM. Bummed about it, so will have to get that protein from somewhere else. I think I am gonna work the legs today. Arms still sore from 2 days ago so I think I will put some L-glutamine in my protein shake later. My coworker is eating sausage and eggs with yolks in front of me. What a MF!

Day 3

After getting my training write up from Dave, I had to start making some changes. Until I get to Cub I am working with what I have. this morning I started off with egg whites, a banana, and a cup of oatmeal. Suprisingly I was not starving like I usually am by now. We will see how I go through the day. Got a protein shake on tap next. So far, so good.

Day 2

Didn't get a workout today as I would have liked. So tomorrow I have to go hard. I got connected with what seems like will be an awesome trainer. I had a bad experience with the LA Fitness training program, but so far Dave seems like he is going to rock.

Today I am a little sore from yesterday's workout. I need to go shopping for the food for my new diet. Out of inspiration from someone helping me, I volunteered for Big Brothers/BigSisters this week. I look forward to being a mentor. Time for bed, but tomorrow's workout is gonna be intense.

Day 1 Workout

Well today was an ok start. I didn't do as much I wanted to do, but I did manage to get a 30 minutes workout session in. I work out @ LA Fitness. No cardio in today, but I did do some lifting. Here is what I did so far:

Seated row: 3 sets 10/8/10; 105/105/90lbs

One-armed row 3 sets 12/10/8; 90/90/105lbs

WG Lat Pulldown 3 sets 12/10/8; 105/105/105lbs

Back Extension 3 sets 12/10/8; 160/175/190lbs

WG Pull 3 sets 10/10/8; 270/270/270lbs

Not the greatest start; but something is better than nothing, and it has been a whole lot of nothing.

Until tomorrow........

Day 1

I never really understood why people blogged. After reading a few blogs I get it. Today is Day 1 of change for me. I have battled the challenges of achieving a healthy and fit lifestyle. I achieved one goal I made for myself this year, and then I stopped trying to achieve anything else since then. Now it is time to set my sites on another goal.

After finishing the The Minnesota Ironman Bikeride, which I rode 30 miles in the pouring rain, thunder and lightening and winds, I was real happy with myself. Sure now I know I can ride 30 miles in bad weather, what else can I do? I failed at getting down to my goal weight, and I have become determined to get there. It's feast of famine.

Last night I watched a tv show on TLC called the 650lb virgin. I found it to be very interesting. this guy lot 400lbs the old fashioned way. I am no where near that size or have that much weight to lose, so I know if he can do it I can.

That's me above. At my highest weight. Follow me as I go through the journey. After I am done with this log this morning, a new day begins.