It's about time I started one of these.

started cutting 11/15/2003
Height: 6'.5"
Weight: ~265
BF: no idea, but probably over 30% :o

today, 5/11/2004:
Height: 6'.5"
Weight: ~214
BF: ~21%

I took the last week off. Tonight will be my first night back at the gym since last Monday. I had gone nearly 6 months in which I missed a total of two days at the gym (one due to illness, the other due to a movie shoot).

My current goal: 200lbs by July 15th, which leaves me just over two months. I haven't lost any weight in a few weeks. I could feel myself becoming burned out physically and mentally. Not only did I not go to the gym for the last week, I also didn't log my food. It was just time to take a break and see how I reacted to it. Well, I'm happy so far. I cheated a little at the beginning of the week, but the last six days, I've really eaten pretty well. I had dessert on Mother's Day. And tonight, I go back to the gym.

My less concrete goals:
1. transition from mostly machines to mostly free weights
2. find a way to lift in the morning
3. get into a better cardio habit
4. get below 15% BF by the end of the year, though this goal is brand new and will possibly change once I get a professional BF measurement

Tonight will be my big weigh-in. The lowest I've weighed at the gym (which is the only place I count because it has a high quality scale) is 213 and I hope to be no more than 215 when I go there tonight.

I was 214 at the gym last night, about what I thought. According to fitday I need to lose 1.5lbs a week to reach my goal. Because of my crazy weekend schedule (driving to NYC to see Ani Difranco at Carnegie Hall) I need to do legs AND cardio tonight. Should be fun!

I'm eating gum constantly since soon I won't be able to. I've needed braces for over a decade, so it's about damn time. What am I gonna do when I can't chew gum? It has been my savior on many occasions when I wanted to cheat. Guess I'll just have to "hike my skirt up" as my coworkers say and keep going forward.

I was such a slack punk last night I didn't do anything. So tonight I did legs, then back and biceps. I'm worn out! Since I don't leave for NYC until noon tomorrow, I might try to do cardio tomorrow morning and also Sunday. I really need to get my cardio under control.

I also binged last night. I have to stop buying cashews... I swear they taste like dessert. My binges these days aren't nearly as bad as a normal day of eating was just 6 months ago. So at least I can say that. In fact, I was 213 at the gym tonight, which ties my low weight (since I was 16 anyway).

We have one of those BF thingies that you hold out in front of you. It said 21.8% and I had already done my leg workout. The dude who works at my gym said it would have been lower if I had checked at the beginning of my workout. Not sure if that's a fact or not. I hope so! I'll check again next Tuesday.

Minds work in funny ways. I started doing cardio and lifting on different days, because it was easier to lift (less time). I justified it by saying to myself "people recommend doing them on separate days." That's all well and good, and I'm sure there are benefits. But the fact is, I can't do them on separate days without having a nice elliptical machine in my house, which I can't afford. So for the last month or so, my cardio has been sporatic at best. This is all my fault.

I just got back from my first gym workout of the week. I did chest, then 37 minutes of crosstraining (5 min forward, 2 min backward on level 8). And the fact is, this is the best I've felt post workout in months. I was burned out, but instead of separating cardio and lifting, I should have taken a week off from everything. It's crazy how $%#&ing easy it is to feel this good just by doing it all together. I don't need to sit at home and try to convince myself to run, since I've already done it. This is what works for me, and I need to stick with it. My recent lack of weightloss has been mental, not physical. I've been slipping in my cardio and my eating. I'm back, and it's on, and I WILL reach my 200 by 7/15 goal.

Well, it seems I've proven the obvious... getting back on track with my eating and starting regular cardio again has gotten rid of the pounds (probably mostly water weight). Last night at the gym I was 211 and it just feels good to be at or under what I weighed in college. 200 by 7/15 feels very possible, and I feel great. I know that losing fat is the real goal, and the scale shouldn't matter as much as it does, but frankly I've been ashamed of my weight (and scared for my health) for years and being able to say a number under 200 when people ask my weight is going to be amazing.

I wasn't really in a plateau, I was simply retaining water from not eating as well. That's my theory, anyway. I went from 214.5 lbs on Tuesday to 211 on Thursday. On saturday I was 208. So my weightloss was right on track. I was losing fat for the last month, it just wasn't showing up on the scale. I knew I was because I kept having to make my belt tighter (this is a belt that I couldn't even use a few months ago because it was too small... now I have to go 4 notches in, and I could go to the 5th and still be comfortable). I now need to lose just over a pound a week until July 15th to reach my goal.

After I had been working out for a few months I almost quit doing leg day. It sounded tempting, and the rationalization is "Hey, I do cardio, and my legs get worked out then." Of course I know now that leg day is extremely important, and I'm glad I never stopped it. When I look critically at my body, my legs are the farthest along. I can really see the muscle shaping in my legs when I flex them, and it feels good to see real progress. Most of the fat appears to be gone from them.

It was just a cheat meal, but it was good. Full ceasar salad, french fries for maybe the third time in 6 months, turkey pita with cheese, topped off with Ben & Jerry's cookie dough light. It turns out it may have been a good thing to do. The fries were bad, and the ice cream unimpressive. Frankly, I hope I'm losing a taste for these horrible foods. The salad was the best part, and it would have been fine if I had gotten a different dressing and dumped the cheese from the pita. Regardless, I feel fine and am looking forward to the gym tonight. I work with one of my good friends, and he wants to come check it out tonight and possibly join. That would be cool, especially since I'm quitting my job soon and would have someone to go to the gym with.

I've been thinking about... umm... cleansing. Frankly, I've eaten so horribly for the last decade + that I must have plenty to cleanse. I suffer from many of the typical symptoms... bloating, intestinal discomfort, etc. So I might try it soon.

For a long time I've been going to the gym on Saturdays. I track my weight on all three gym days, which used to be M-W-S and is now T-T-S. My weight always goes like this: lowest on Saturday, then up 2-4 lbs on Tuesday and Thursday. Last Saturday was my all time (well, since I was a kid) low of 208, and Tuesday I was 211 (again, this is normal for me). I was a little shocked last night, however, when I was down to 208.5. This means that tomorrow my Saturday weigh in SHOULD be right on pace of 2 lbs lost a week. I'm hoping to be 206, but who knows.

I haven't been able to lift or eat normally since last week because I had four teeth taken out. Getting braces is a pain, but I have to live with it. I can eat almost normally now, so I'll probably start tracking food again today. I'll at least do cardio starting this Tuesday, and I'll lift if I feel OK. No idea what I weigh.

I sprained my anke today one my last day of a four day vacation. Hopefully it will be ok. I think I will still be able to use an elliptical on Tuesday. All the crap they are doing to my mouth makes it hard to chew, and lifting hurts. I'm just trying to maintain for a few months and not push myself until the braces are on and secure. Three weeks until I'm unemployed!

My ankle (the left one) is huge this morning. I haven't sprained either one this badly in years. When I fell after rolling it, I also scraped my right knee on the outdoor b'ball court. That scrape has become a bump, so both of my legs are stiff as all get out. I have to get a ride to work this morning because the thought of driving a stick makes me cringe.

It's been almost three months. Since my last update I've quit my job, driven around the country, written an entire screenplay, gotten a new job, gotten into my old eating and (lack of) working out habits, etc. It's been interesting. I've managed to control it so I've maybe put five pounds back on (of the 60 some I lost). I'm back at the gym, and eating pretty well. I'm having real trouble getting back into the fitday habit. Logging everything seems hard. I suspect having a regular job helped. Now I work all different hours and don't have a computer in front of me.

Here's the thing. My life is basically on hold until the aforementioned screenplay is done. My friend and I are on the second draft. And I don't say this often, but I think this one could actually sell. Who knows. But the one thing I know, and I realized this on the way back from California on our road trip, is that I need to find out if I can make it in the film business. I have to try or I will never be able to live with myself. My previous job, which I had for over four years, figuratively beat me down until my creativity was absent and my dreams were clouded. I'm over that. I'm able to write again. And I have to try.

This is an attempt to get myself back to the level of commitment that I once had to fitness. Since I started in November, my mom has increased her gym activity, and my dad, brother, and sister-in-law have all joined for the first time. My other brother's fiance has also joined a gym. Guess I need to keep up.

Sugar cookies with frosting on top are good. That's all I can say. That coupled with some mac and cheese, and a caesar salad made this night a failure. Oh well. All I can do is start tomorrow. In order to circumvent the Fitday process, I'm attempting to make hard-copy lists of groups of food. That way I can do a bunch of work over the next few weeks as far as research and writing, and after that I will hardly have to do any. I see it working like this:

Meal one - banana and yogurt, or breakfast bar, or blank, etc
Meal two - protein shake and blah blah blah

I think if I can find a way to basically add up to ~2000 calories and somewhere close to 50-30-20 (C-P-F) while keeping sodium down, I will be in business, and back at the way I was eating before the road trip. It would just be easier for me to say "OK, tuna sandwich sounds like a good option" and know I'm getting enough good calories.

On an unrelated note, our screenplay is now 110 pages and draft two is nearly done. :)

The trend continues. Doing well all day and screwing up after work. Gotta figure out what I'm doing wrong. :(

Good leg workout today. Listened to the new Megadeth album, which is pretty good. Clutch is my new favorite band to listen to while lifting. Still struggling somewhat with clean eating, but I'm slowly getting better.

Maybe I need to get back to using Fitday. I'm really struggling with my eating at night, and it's becoming a hassle. My workout today was very good, however. I'm still hurting from my first real leg workout on Wednesday, but it feels good to be sore again.
I have a wedding to go to tomorrow. I'll be seeing a lot of my friends from high school who I haven't seen in awhile. I'll probably be the only one without a date, but whatever. It will be good to see the peeps again, even though one of our boys who would have been there is now doing 18 years.

18 years? What did he do?

When you write I feel you got 50/50 fitness/personal life. It's a joy to be reading!

Evenings are very hard! I wish I had some advice, but I seem to remember you replyed to my journal, saying something like it will hopefully get better for both of us... Struggling with the same problems...

Good luck with your screenplay and have fun at the wedding!

18 years? What did he do?

He shot two people while he was robbing a pawn shop. The dumbass was on his way to visit us and needed money to get here. Needless to say it was quite a shock for a while. Luckily no one was killed.
The wedding was a really good time. We managed to put in a good 8 hour shift of drinking.

Glad my journal has provided you with some entertainment. :) If you think of any way to make yourself accountable in the evenings, let me know. Maybe I need to come to these boards before I go get food. Or maybe I just need to shop better. We should start a support group for people who binge in the evenings. :D

I came really really close to buying doughnuts at the store tonight. I looked at them, got the rest of my stuff, came back, stared them down, said f*&% it and walked away. Hopefully this will be the beginning of a good thing.

It's been a crappy, stressful week already. We've written two complete drafts of our script, and we don't seem to agree on how good it is or where it should go from here. I'm over the initial excitement of finding out that I have legitimate Hollywood hookups and have progressed to full panic mode. How are we supposed to continue the script when we completely disagree about not only where it should go, but what it is now?

OK. Done bitching for the moment. In other news, I need to go to the gym both tomorrow and Friday since I was out of town today. :d_eek:

I've been doing miserably with my eating. I have no game plan, and it shows. I'm frustrated and dissapointed in myself, and physically I feel like crap.

I love it when I whine. Good times.
I turned 27 yesterday, and for weeks I've been talking about going back to eating clean and going back to the gym regularly (months even). So on my birthday, in the evening, I decided that "tomorrow" is an excuse so I went to the gym right then. I still went out drinking afterwards, but I had a really good workout. More importantly, I finally logged into Fitday today after probably four months off. I'm also determined to start walking to work. It's a short distance, so my laziness is quite breathtaking. Or isn't breathtaking enough I suppose. I grew up in a house where the pun ruled conversation.
I'm going to the store after work to get Kashi cereal and albacore, both staples of my successful first 6-8 months. I haven't set my new goal yet, but it will revolve around my brother's wedding in May. I'm thinking maybe 185 by May is a good goal, or maybe even 180.

Wow it's been a long time. I'm starting from scratch again.

2 and half weeks without soda/sweet tea/chocolate, etc which for me is really good. I've cut way down on fried foods. I'm lifting dumbbells in my room and walking. I may try to learn to really swim since I can get into the university gym for free. Hopefully the days of not caring until after I've eaten crap are over.

Holy crap. I went to 'spin' class last night and I can barely walk today. I will either lift tonight or tomorrow, as Wednesday is my second swimming lesson. I should go practice once more before then so my instructor doesn't have to kick my ass.

Did my second spin class Monday and third swim lesson tonight. No soreness as of now so my body seems to have adjusted quickly.

We're starting a new screenplay, which should be a good outlet. Being productive and healthier gives me more energy. Hopefully it will stay that way.

I'm going to attempt using FitDay once again. I'm sure my nutritional balance has been lacking. I have another swim lesson in an hour, and soon I should be able to swim three times a week for cardio. I'm trying to lift twice a week with just dumbbells.