Twas the night before weigh in and the nerves were affright

Tomorrow I will be weighing in and getting measured and I'm a little nervous. I've been working hard but I've slipped up quite a bit as well so I'm not sure how things will go.

However, tonight I hit a PR! (That's "personal record" for those who aren't hip to the weight lifting lingo). Last week I did circuit training so this week I'm hitting the heavy weight. Tonight I did chest and on decline bench I did 315lbs X 5 reps! I haven't put up 315 since probably 2010 so I'm pretty stoked about this achievement.

Whether or not I'll be happy with the numbers I get tomorrow, I'm not sure. But I'm happy right now with the progress I've made in building muscle and strength and honestly I'm just happy that I'm still at it. Part of me expected to give up by now so I'm proud to still be plugging away!

Tune in tomorrow afternoon for results!

The Things You Can Learn By Changing Your Intentions

Over the last two days I have been implementing my new goals: 2500 calories and alternating workouts. I have already learned some pretty exciting stuff. As it turns out I am stronger than I thought. This week I have changed from the 10-12 rep bodybuilding style lifting to a 4-8 rep strength focused routine. I haven't done this style of lifting in a long time so honing in on the right weight to use has taken some experimentation.

I am a huge RadioLab fan on NPR and they have this episode called "Limits." In it they talk about how the mental limits we set for ourselves sometimes keep us from doing things that we are actually capable of doing. Example, for years and years no one thought you could run a 4:00 minute mile. It was just believed to be outside of human capacity. Then in 1954 Roger Bannister ran a 3:59 and a mere two months later John Landy ran under 4:00 and since then it has become the standard for middle distance runners. Bannister broke a mental barrier and changed the parameters of the conversation.

I think I have broken a personal mental barrier this week. Instead of just adding a little bit of weight to each lift I do I decided to throw caution to the wind and just kept piling it on (of course I didn't throw safety to wind!). I have been hitting weights I didn't think I could even do a 1 rep max on, let alone do a set of 5. I am changing my parameters for how far I can push my body in the weight room and I think I am going to see some great results because of it.

Limiting myself to 2500 calories has also been a little different. I have actually been quite hungry a few times over the last couple days but sitting with that hunger has been a good experience. As an obese person I am used to eating a lot and eating all the time. I rarely felt hungry before because I was always snacking on something (and it showed). But now that I am limiting the amount of calories I eat, I have to be careful to spread them across the day which means sometimes I need to just wait to eat.

I have found this rather difficult but I am getting better at more effectively using my calories. If I cut out one of the eggs I eat in the morning that gives me about 100 calories I can use later for a small snack. I am also turning to more vegetables since they are low calorie but can be very filling. And finally portion control has become very important. We make some awesome homemade meals in my house (thank you wife for being a great cook and meal planner) but even homemade meals can get out of hand if I don't watch my portions.

I feel pretty good about the last couple days. I hope this change up gets me loosing weight again and helps me towards my path of living healthy.

And whenever I want to give up I just remember that this little girl wants to have her daddy around for a long, long time :)

The Inevitable Plateau

I wish this was the plateau I was talking about!

I'm calling it what it is: a plateau. I thought my weight loss was slowing because of my struggles to achieve my goals but even after getting back on track I am still not making any progress. I have been stuck at the same 365lbs for over a month and its time to change things up a bit.

Here's the plan:
              Calories: Drop from 3000/day to 2500
       Right now I am consuming around 3000 calories a day which should be dropping my weight by a couple pounds a week according to MyFittnessPal. Keeping to 3000 calories has actually been pretty easy so the challenge of dropping the bar to 2500 will hopefully reengage some passion for eating right. I think it should also be enough to get my body burning fat again but to make sure I am also going to change up the workout routine

             Gym Time: Switching from body building+HIIT to alternating schedule
       Its easy to become complacent in the gym so I am designing an alternating schedule to change things up and find new and exciting forms of gym torture. I am going to switch between heavy lifting and circuit training.
       Week "A" is going to look very similar to what I do now except I am going to increase the weight and decrease the reps. Right now I do between 10-12 reps on most my lifts. I am going to drop the rep count to 6-8. I will increase the weight to make sure that the last one or two reps are almost impossible to complete. This type of lifting is focused on building strength over definition and hopefully this change up will inspire some new muscle growth. I will also keep doing about 15 mins of HIIT after the lifting routine is done.
      Week "B" is going to be a whole new beast for me: circuit training. I have not actually designed this schedule yet and it is not my expertise so I will get back to you with the program after I have done enough research to put one together. However my basic idea is having an upper body routine and lower body routine instead of lifting only one or two muscles a day. I will do each routine twice a week: upper body, lower body, rest, upper body, lower body and if I can find the time I'll do carido on Saturday and rest Sunday.
      This will be my new routine and diet plan for the next month. If I am still not losing weight my next area to fiddle with is carb consumption. Not eliminate all carbs but I think my carb consumption is a bit high so I am going to do some more research and see if this area needs some work. Wish me luck and I'll let you know how everything is going. And of course thanks for reading. I really appreciate all of you who read my blog. It gives me encouragement to know that there is a group of people out there that care enough to keep up with what I am doing. Thank you. Also, I would love to get more people involved so please share this link and let's see how many like's we can get.

In addition to this blog I have been branching out my online presence. You can now find me in the following places:
          My website: wriggconsulting.weebly.com

          Find me on Fiverr!!!

          Or hire me through Elance

Time to Get Up Again

I read a quote the other day "We all fall down, but the best of us are measured by how often we get back up." Last week was a rough week for me. I definitely fell short of my goals and gave into some emotional eating. Stress is an insidious creature and when the daily levels of stress are compounded by something more extreme it can become overwhelming.

Like many people I have comfort foods that I turn to when I am feeling stressed or sad or angry. Unfortunately I was surrounded by some of my comforts (chocolate being suspect number one) when I was dealing with some stressful stuff and gave into temptation. Of course one failure can snowball and in the end I ate pretty crappy for about two days but the horse is getting impatient so I better get the hell back on. 

I have spent the last couple days getting back on track and decided that this week is going to be about reinforcing the goals I have set up so far. 

No Fast Food

Healthy Snacks

Keep a log

I have been surprised how much of a pain in the ass keeping a food diary is. I have also realized that I snack a lot. Its never a full "snack size" snack but its a little bit of everything which also adds up in the end. 

Well wish me luck on getting back to business. I have been fine tuning my lifting routine and have a couple current pics that will be coming soon, I swear. I know its been coming soon for a couple weeks but between the kids and Wrigg Consulting I have been pretty busy. BTW I started my own consulting business. I have a simple website set up at wriggconsulting.weebly.com. 

And finally, I always like to through at least one picture in but I wasnt sure what to put in this week so what you are getting is an awesome picture of me and Caiden when he was just a little baby. I found this when I was scrolling through some FB pics with the kids last weekend. One of my favorites!

Week Three: Time For Some Numbers

The goals from week one and two have been going pretty well. I would say the biggest struggle has been keeping my snacks healthy. Getting all my fruits and veggies has taken some practice but curbing the desire for all the unhealthy snacks I usually have has been a lot of work. Solid progress is being made though!!
I think the next step in my mission is to get a full account of how much and what kinds of food I am eating every day. I have a pretty good idea of what I'm eating but I need some hard data to look at and then I can find problem spots. To get this data I am going to keep a food diary for the next week. I like to us the My Fitness Pal app to track my intake. I could simply write down everything I eat but I find that to be a bit of a pain in the ass. Using the My fitness pal app is so much easier. Anything with a bar code I can simply use my smartphone to scan it and the app knows what it is and has all the nutritional information. The app also has a very extensive library of foods so entering in what I am eating is really simple. I have tried a lot of different calorie counting apps and honestly My Fitness Pal is the best I have used.

Here is my breakfast and lunch for today!

Tracking my intake through the app is going to give me a lot of data. Calories, fat, carbs, sodium, sugar, protein, vitamins, etc. Pretty much it compiles all the nutritional info on what I ate and gives me a report. I have my goal on the app set for loosing 2lbs a week. The app sets my goals based on activity level, age, gender and weight. According to MFP, if I stay under 3800 calories a day I will loose 2lbs a week. I think I can do better than that in calories but I am more concerned about carbs and sodium.

On a bit of a side note you might be thinking that 3800 calories a day is a TON of calories. It is. That might give you a little insight into the physical differences between someone that is 365 pounds and someone that is 180 pounds. The typical adult should eat around 2000 calories a day to maintain where they are. I can eat almost double that and loose weight. That essentially means that my body is working twice as hard just to do the regular daily activity of being alive. Thinking about how hard my body is working just to keep me alive it seems obvious that extreme obesity would lead to heart disease, organ failure, arthritis, diabetes, etc. Sometimes I worry that I am to late. I can already feel the affects of years of obesity in my back, knees and ankles. I went to the doctor the other day and had blood taken to test all the general things like cholesterol, triglycerides, blood sugar. The yearly physical kind of stuff. The last time I had my cholesterol checked I was 24 and it was borderline high. I never got it checked again for a number of reasons but partially because I just didn't want to deal with it. I am now waiting to get my numbers back to see what kind of damage I have done. The doctor reassured me that even if it is high I am on the right track and as long as I stay the course it will come down. Thinking about all of this makes it tempting to sit back in self-pity about "O, I am overweight cause of this and that" and let the depression take over but that will not get my children's father to a healthy life. Regardless of what irreparable damage I may have done, I can stop doing more damage and fix what can be fixed. So here's to trudging forward for these guys!!!

Plus 2 more that hadn't been born yet :)

Week Two:Goal Two

It has been a rough weekend. I haven't eaten any fast food but healthy is not how I would describe the last two days. It's funny how temptation just shows up on your door step sometimes. We always get wonderful care packages from my mother-in-law with all kinds of great stuff like cleaning supplies, clothing for the kids and bathroom supplies. We got one of these packages recently and in addition to all the great stuff it also contained my kryptonite: M&M's. I freaking love those things. I also find that when I am restricting one of my indulgences I am likely to give into a different one. So this weeks goal is inspired by my M&M binge.

All Snacks Will Be Healthy Snacks

Like many people, I tend to snack throughout the day. Since returning to be a stay-at-home dad this habit has gotten much worse. It is just so easy to grab a little thing here and a little more there and actually its not all that terrible of a thing to do depending on what I am snacking on. Having snacks or small meals throughout the day keeps your metabolism going at a more steady pace instead of the peeks and plummets of only eating three large meals a day. However, grabbing a handful of M&M's every time I walk by the kitchen is not the kind of snacking I need to do. Keeping my snacks healthy will reduce empty calories and increase the amount of vitamins and minerals I am getting each day. 

Eating healthy snacks is way to vague of a goal so I am setting some more parameters so I can determine if I achieved my goal. I figure a good way to inspire me to eat healthy snacks is to make a second goal of EATING MY FRUITS AND VEGETABLES

I used the calculator on the CDC website to set my goal: 2.5 cups of fruit and 4 cups of vegetables per day. I already had my wife hide the bowl of M&M's this morning so from here out it is fruits and vegies for this guy. 

Make sure to subscribe so you can receive every post via email and start gearing up for my losewithjames workout addition! Coming soon.

Goal Update and Life Update

The goal has been going very well so far. I have not eaten fast food this week and have been taking measures to plan ahead so it has actually not been that hard. The number one thing that has helped me avoid temptation has been crock pot meals. Seriously, I am pretty sure that crock pot meals are God's gift to over worked stressed out parents. During nap time I can toss all the stuff in, turn it on and walk away. Then hours later when its time for supper and we are running out the door to dance or to an appointment or just chasing this herd of toddlers around trying to keep them from killing each other and/or the dog I can just sit them down, plate the food and Wah-lah ten minutes of peace and quiet to scrape my sanity back together.

Last night we had Cilantro Chicken. Literally took less than 5 mins to prep and put in crock pot.

It has only been a few days without fast food so I don't feel much different physically but it does feel good knowing that I'm setting a better example for my children. Whenever I ate fast food, the kids ate fast food as well. None of my kids are obese but if we continued to eat fast food 2-3 times a week it would only be a matter of time. Me getting back to healthy is important but keeping them from getting unhealthy takes an even higher priority. 

I am pretty confident with the current goal so I am going to start preparing my goal for next week. You can expect a new goal to be set this weekend so be sure to subscribe to my blog to receive the next post via email. 

Now for some life changes. As some of you might know I have been driving truck for about 4 years minus a little break about a year ago. I have been at my current job about four months and have really missed being home with the kids. Therefore, we have decided that I am once again going to be a stay at home dad and Amanda is going to work full-time. I am excited to be at home with all my babies again and I am also excited for the different opportunities this will provide. While being a stay-at-home dad I am going to be pursuing some writing endeavors. I have a couple ideas I am developing for some E-books and I am writing speeches for people. Currently I am working on Fiverr (you can find my profile and gig here) to build up some experience and a portfolio. So if you know anyone who needs to make a presentation, sales pitch or really any kind of speech at all and they could use some help it would be really awesome if you sent them my way!!! 

There is one thing I am going to miss about my job: the exercise. I walked so much at work that I didn't really need to worry about exercise outside of work. But since I will not be getting my 3-5 miles of walking in per day I am going to need to incorporate some cardio into my week. Stay tuned to learn about my workout program. 

Ready to Go? Week One:Step One

My (hopefully our) journey is to being healthy which is more than just losing weight. I have decided that instead of throwing everything out there at once I am going to start slow and build a different lifestyle. I don't want to do a traditional "diet" because their progression is so typical. I start strong, fully resolved to eat in this certain way for X number of weeks. The first few days, maybe week, on occasion even couple weeks go well and then I find it simply unsustainable and once there is a crack in the flood gate the whole thing comes crashing down and I am back where I started.

Instead I am going to devote a week or possibly in some instances a couple weeks to adopting a new lifestyle habit. Each week or two I will add a new habit to the mix and within a few months I will have developed a new lifestyle. That is what I need: a different way to live. Some of these goals will be directly related to losing weight while others will be towards a more generally healthy lifestyle. There will be both positives and negatives as in there will be things that I will eliminate from my lifestyle and things that I will add.

Sustainability and accountability are the foundational principles that will enable this lifestyle to be built. Most traditional diets are simply unsustainable and often they are not meant to be sustained but only to "lose weight fast." The opposite ideology of "I'm simply going to eat better" lacks accountability both internally and externally. If "eating better" is not defined then there are no principles by which I can hold myself accountable. And if my vow of healthier eating is done in solitude then I have no community to celebrate my achievements or support me through my shortcomings. There will be shortcomings. I have spent 29 (all to soon to be 30, yikes) years developing my current lifestyle. I cannot expect to change 29 years of habit without making mistakes and falling short of the goal. That is why this will be a process. I have some notion of what the final product looks like but that is of no concern for me today. Today I start with step one.

NO FAST FOOD

I cringe even typing the words. There is probably nothing as quintessentially modern America as fast food. We are busy people and are constantly on the go. Fast food companies do everything possible to accommodate our busy lifestyles and make their product the easy choice. But this is why it must go:

Big Mac, Large Fry, Large Soda: 1,440 calories

Whopper w/cheese, Large Fry, Large Soda: 1,550 calories

My BK Favorite meal
Double Whopper w/cheese, Large Onion Ring, Large Soda: 1,760 calories

Even this picture makes me hungry. Satan get behind me!!!!

Beyond the egregious amount of calories that are in each of these meals there is also a pile of sodium, saturated fat and high fructose corn syrup (which btw is really not good for you.) Fast food is delicious but it is killing us...literally. The average sized adult is suppose to consume around 2000 calories a day. One sitting in a fast food joint is almost an entire days worth of calories.

The reason I am starting with this goal is that it is the low hanging fruit. If I can eliminate fast food that will cut at least a few thousand calories a week from my diet which will obviously help me loose weight. I am also choosing this goal because I have gone fast food free before and it felt amazing. When I lived in DC there were not any fast food joints near where I lived so I simply didn't eat it that often. I went probably 3-4 months without eating at any of the major fast food places. I felt great. My stomach felt better and overall I just felt healthier. 

To achieve this goal is going to take planning. The most common times that I eat fast food is when I dont bring a lunch to work and when I am in a hurry with the kids. Packing my lunch has to become part of my daily routine. Im not even going to worry that much about what goes into the lunch box at this point but only that it gets packed. Secondly, I am going to think ahead to identify the times in which the kids and I are going to be in a hurry and out and about during supper. Having simple to make or pre-maid meals on hand will be the key to not being tempted to just grab a quick bite.

Thank you for all your support and I will check in sometime this week to update how things are going. I hope that some of you join me on this goal and let me know if giving up fast food was easy or hard and if you feel any different. Also, if someone you know could use a plan to get on track to a healthy life please let them know about my blog. There is power in numbers and doing this as a group is better than going it alone.