The workout encouragement topic

Yeah, I have a weighing strategy that changes whether I’m trying to maintain (daily) or trying to lose (weekly) for just this reason. It’s too hard to get discouraged and body weight and weighing yourself is fickle thing. If I’m trying to lose, then the daily feedback quickly turns into noise and expectations. Weekly is enough to give me a data point to know if I need to change something. On the other hand, with maintaining weight, I just try not to give too much weight (heh) to any single reading. Pound or two more than I thought? Fuck it, maybe tomorrow will set it right. A lot of times it does.

Friends, this is to let everyone know I broke 200. Ah, I mean, I was over 200 pounds, but this morning I moved DOWN into sub-two-hundreds. I am (as of this morning) 199.8 pounds.

Wooooo.

I probably don’t weigh that now, because a PM on one of the teams brought in pork ribs, baked bean, corn bread and salmon today. It was crazy. They didn’t use the kitchen, but just set up a buffet in the task area. It was like a flash mob, but with pork ribs. Instead of singing and dancing, there was just contented chewing and the smell of smoked pork.

Fortunately I have another week to go before my next weigh in.

Great job. I’m down 14 pounds since trying the new diet. And haven’t had to go to the gym much to lose that though I do go when I can.

Congratulations! I know how good it feels to get below a big milestone, especially if it’s been a while since you’ve been there. I’m closing in on it again after gaining some back after my stay in France from June to January. Going to France doesn’t help weight loss when that person loves pastries!

I haven’t been exercising a ton. My ankle never healed right after over stretching it last spring. I’ve been walking on the treadmill 1-3 times a day at 4.5 mph. My weight had gotten back up to 214 and now I’m at 207. Some high blood pressure readings got me motivated again. Eating at Olive Garden last night wasn’t great for my salt intake. I had been keeping below 2000 mg of sodium a day, but after that meal (which I only ate half the entree) put me over 4000mg. The amount of salt they use is crazy. Salt seems to effect my bp fairly quickly.

My biggest issue with exercise at the moment is dealing with the lack of motivation and energy after I finish work. Torture can be many things, one of which is squeezing out that first kilometre or two running on the asphalt and I never manage to settle. And forget the gym. Days off, not a problem. The common sense solution is to do morning exercise but I struggle with that too, less attributed to energy and more from a messed up sleep cycle. Thanks shift work! It’s a bit of a catch-22. I need the exercise to lift my own motivation and help pull me from the depression that plagues my life. Sure, exercise won’t “fix” things, but apparently it helps. But that depression also pulls me down. So far it’s winning.

I’m saying that in part to segue into a comment @robc04 made:

Never forget that doing something is better than doing nothing. Keep up the great work man. That walking pace is solid. I thought I was a fast walker and at that pace, you’re definitely putting in the effort. Hopefully the ankle doesn’t complain!

After my father had some serious medical issues, I went from 84kg to 91kg. In three months.

I have moderated the diet to something that should slowly bring me down, but family weekends are hard because of the aforementioned issues and I can’t really do without alcohol (in moderation, but still enough to offset some of the diet for that week) twice a month.

So I started doing HIIT twice weekly a month ago (I used to run, but with a baby, that takes more time and mental prep than I can command right now). I’ve lost just 1kg, but tons of volume so far. Hopefully weight loss will start soon (this is how my body tends to go regarding exercise. First weeks no weight change and then a moderate weight loss).

Also, it’s interesting to exercise something that is not the legs. I’m not sore all the time now.

Is there anything you can do to make the barrier to star a bit less? Instead of going to the gym, do you have any dumbbells you can do some basics with - squats, presses, curls, etc? Do some body weight exercises like push ups? Save the gym for your days off for now and take the victories of doing some exercise at home.\

Thanks for the encouragement! I’m used to pushing myself with running, but you’re right - doing the walking is effort and burning extra calories and getting the heart elevated a bit.

It’s the long haul so its OK to come down slowly, and probably more likely to stick too. If you want to stick with the alcohol is there something else you can cut back a little on, like some chips or something? But if you’re making progress then don’t sweat it too much, you’re still doing well!

I’ll jump in here.

I experienced a life-changing event of the legal variety about a dozen years ago, and very seriously needed something to make me start liking myself again. Working out did that for me.

Luckily, I have a barn in my back yard, about 100 yards away from my house which was previously only used for storage and lawn equipment. But, I moved stuff out/around to make some space, and I’ve slowly accumulated a fairly decent collection of fitness equipment there.

At first, I only had a bench with a leg attachment and one of those glider ski-machines. After a year or two, the glider started hurting my knees, so I tried a nordi-track (bought for $20 at a yard sale) which I’ve found does not bother my knees, and I’ve been using that at least 2-3 times a week ever since.

Soon after that switch, I decided that I wanted to start doing more exercises with weights which my old bench didn’t allow. However, the prices of rack systems were far beyond my means at the time, so I drew up plans of my own and built one myself out of pressure-treated wood. The pride I had in finishing and using my own contraption exponentially increased my motivation, and I slowly kept buying more weights/bars/dumbells of various types to try/incorporate numerous new exercises into my workouts. I used to have a cable/pully attached to the ceiling for some exercises (lat pulldowns, tricep extensions, etc) until one day while doing lat pulldowns, the cable snapped and nearly 200 pounds of weight came down hard. Because of the height of the ceiling and the cable length, I had to sit on the floor to do these lat pulldowns, and this weight fell about 3-4 feet and landed between my spread legs, no more than 2 inches from each leg… and my testicles. I did not attempt to fix/replace the cable/pully system.

I’ve also added a row machine, a heavy and speed bag for boxing, and put down 3 layers (I know, overkill) of padding across most of the floor, creating a very small, but definitly usable track on which I now can do some light jogging in a circle around my equipment.

Basically, I’ve made it a habit, just something I do without thinking, like making coffee/breakfast when I first wake up. Every day, as soon as I get home from work, I change clothes and walk, run or (in snow) trudge to the barn. Since the beginning, I’ve always had a TV and DVD player in the barn with a considerable library of documentaries I like, most of which I’ve watched many times, but sometimes I’ll take a Netflix DVD (yes, I’m one of the very few that still subscribe to the DVD service) out there to watch while I work out. So, it is not in any way regarded as a chore. It is my “me” time, and I love it. As long as I do something every day, I’m content. Some days when I don’t feel good, I’ll just do 20 minutes of cardio. Some days, I’ll spend 2-4 hours out there. Most days it is about 45 minutes.

I’m really envious of this setup. I find having gym equipment in my house normally means I won’t use it.

Having a gym too far out of the regular commute is also a hard habit to make.

But a gym in the neighborhood of either home or work is easy to lock into a schedule. There’s something about being just far enough away from home that makes the habit easier to stick to.

Congratulations, Tim! Always a good feeling to get past one of those milestones.

Amen! I’ve had a rough time the last week or two, picked up a cold with all the congestion that entails, so it’s really rough to do my usual routine. But even just doing half or a quarter of my usual time on the elliptical or treadmill makes a big difference in how I feel.

That sounds like a great setup nogwart! Having some good equipment at home really helps. Driving to a gym was always something that was too much of a hurdle for me. Mostly because I hate sharing equipment. It sounds like you have a good assortment.

I used to have an bench and barbell with weights but I wasn’t using it regularly and it took up too much space. Now I’ve got a treadmill, recumbent bike and dumbbells from 2.5 to 65 pounds but I haven’t done strength training in a while. I’d love to build a structure in my yard with some windows for exercising, so I could see outside. This (or something like it) is one of my wishes for exercise equipment:

I wouldn’t mind a rowing machine too.

In the old weight loss thread I mentioned how I was getting some blood pressure readings around 150/90 since I got back from France. This got me to change some habits. I’ve been avoiding high sodium processed foods like deli meats, frozen stuffed chicken breasts, regular jarred pasta sauce, etc. I’ve mostly been staying in the 1400-2000 mg range.

I’ve also cut down on desserts. I allow myself 1 reasonably sized treat per day, like a dish of ice cream that is the actual serving size, <= 200 calories of candy, or one cupcake my son made.

I’ve also been making sure I drink more water than I usually do. I used to be lucky to get in 64 oz of water per day. Now I’m at about 100 oz.

My rapid weight loss phase seems to be over and I’ve been holding at 205/206. But more importantly I’ve been getting good blood pressure readings. I’ve even been getting some readings around 117/70 and haven’t even gotten into the 130+/80+ range as I was typically getting by bedtime.

I’m slowly trying to incorporate some jogging so I don’t aggravate my ankle or trigger my plantar fasciitis. When I do jog I’ve been doing intervals so I’m not running the entire time. Hopefully my ankle and feet will slowly get used to it.

I really want to get below 200 again and then slowly make progress to my long term goal of 180 lbs. It should be possible since I weighed in that range when I had a lot more muscle than I do now (which isn’t much).

I wonder about my sodium intake. I’ve been hitting the gym hard the last month or so (I’m going 5 times a week, taking Wed and Sun off) and I’ve been eating more high protein meals and low calorie stuff as well, trying to keep under my caloric intake allowance while not missing any protein. I’ve dropped 8 pounds since I started, which is great, and I feel more energetic as well, but my sodium is almost always way over whatever allotment this algorithm is telling me I should get to.

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It also doesn’t like my protein intake, but it’s only this bad on days I do heavy weight training.

Nice job on the 8 pounds Scott, that’s great!

2300 is the recommended limit for healthy people. I don’t know what the ramifications are for too much sodium if you don’t have a blood pressure issue with it. Maybe it makes the kidneys work too hard?

The recommended limit in France is something like 4000 mg so there isn’t universal agreement. I’d say if you haven’t gotten your bp checked lately to do so and if it is OK you probably don’t need to seat it that much but maybe a good question for your doc.

Oh yeah, I have my bp checked a few times a year at regular check ups (there seems to always be something that requires it) and I’m always in good shape there, so I don’t usually worry about it (until I read posts like yours, haha).

Congratulations you two. How do you get sodium numbers? Are you doing some sort of test at home, or is it just by tracking foods, etc?

Thanks! Just tracking with MyFitnessPal and entering things into the database manually when needed.

Still having luck managing my blood pressure with changing my diet and exercising. I pretty regularly stay in the 115-125 / 67-75 range. It will still go up to 125-129 / 75-79 range, but that is much better than the 130-150 / 80-92 range I was getting up to at times. For cardio I’m doing brisk walking, recumbent bike, and interval jogging.

When I used to do cardio every session was torture. I’d push myself and get my heart rate in the 160-175 range for an extended period of time pretty regularly. I’d have bursts where I would get 180+. These day my brisk walking gets me in the 115-125 range, bike in the 130-145 range, and jogging in the 130-150 range. I’m slowly ramping it up to try and prevent running injuries. I do like to get into the 150-160 range for a good workout, but it is nice to not constantly be running at full capacity.

My weight was 204 this morning, so 200 is getting back in reach. That is a momentous occasion for me. I did slow down my progress with a bad 10 day eating streak a couple of weeks ago.

I fully recommend anyone with high blood pressure to log their sodium intake. It is so easy to go well over the recommended amount of 2300mg. I typically stay in the 1200-2000mg range now. I am also paying attention to potassium with plays a role in bp regulation. Even paying attention it is difficult to get enough potassium and I eat a lot of whole grains and fruits.