Fat Man on a Diet

I knew I wasn’t going to be able to go straight back to the gym and follow some sort of strenuous exercise program, but I’d figured on being able to at least get some serious walking in during this first week – wrong! For me at least it’s just not been that easy. Even leaving aside the rain that’s dampened down my ambitions, my stomach has actually been hurting so I didn’t want to do anything that might make things worse.

What’s made it even more difficult is feeling so ‘flat’ and wondering if it’s because because I’m not eating an adequate diet? Hard to say.

For most of this week I might still forgo the walking (which is all the exercise that is advised at this stage) to make sure there are no after effects waiting to make themselves felt before I make a start. From then on, and for the next month or so, I think walking the dogs to the local park and back will be sufficient to make a start on fitness and then I’ll get advice from the surgeon when I see him.

If he gives me the go-ahead I’ll rejoin the old Focus gym and sort out some exercises that will both bring back my mobility and strengthen my core muscles to hopefully avoid and of the recurrent problems I have with my back!

First things first though… and walking will do for now.

Been two days… and I feel dire. The cold isn’t any better, the weight is *not* going down. I’ve *not* been to the gym, and the only good point is that I slept fairly well last night, perhaps aided by the three hours I had around lunchtime yesterday.

The weight this morning reads 127.5 kilos which isn’t good and reflects the junk I eat when my resistance is low. I can’t see me getting to the gym again today. There really isn’t much point in going when I feel like this… tho many (including myself usually) would argue the opposite.

The wife is off to to work, and once she’s gone I’ll go back to bed for an hour and see if it helps. If so… off I go. If not… well… not.

Results have come in from the first two weeks of the Comp. – I think the fact I’m coming in 11th clearly indicates how much I’ve lost focus and how much I need to pull myself back together. I lost 2.77% whilst the person leading has lost 4.04%. In real terms for *me* to have lost 4.04% I should have dropped 5.2 kilos already.

Of course the maddening thing about that is that I *had* lost that much last week but seem to have put some back on!

However, what I’ve not mentioned yet is that when I weighed (on Monday) I’d eaten breakfast, had a few glasses of water *and* was wearing my trainers which alone weight 0.5 kilos) so it wasn’t exactly ‘typical’. Nevertheless if I’m going to make any serious attempt to win this thing I need to focus. First I need to stop snacking on rubbish, and secondly… do more exercise so that even if I *do* find myself snacking I will at least burn it off again!

To be fair Sally is doing her bit. She got me in the pool for a half hour session of water based activity… swimming, walking, and ‘mobility’ exercise. Tomorrow after I see Stephen Parsons I’ll be going to the gym for an hour on the treadmill. After all, if I let this person (whoever it is) get too far ahead of me I’ll not catch up.

On the other hand… if s/he gets lulled into a false sense of security by this initial loss and I creep up from behind and overtake… it might just blow them out of the water! I know that when I thought someone had done that to me in the last comp. I all bar gave up!!

Whaddya mean ‘gamesmanship’? I just want to lose weight… winning would just be an extra… honest!!

Dire day today for anything but ‘family stuff’. Walked the dogs for an hour and settled down to do some work at home (on the computer trying to catch up) then I got a call that one of the kids was hurt so could I collect her from school. Since then it’s been all go… but nothing much in the way of hard exercise!

What’s worse was eating a McDonald’s ‘Caesar Salad Roll’ (if he knew, I’d bet Caesar Cardini would turn in his grave!) and a ‘flat white’ coffee from the Deli… well ok, but I was hungry, was taking the child to be x-rayed and hadn’t taken anything suitable to eat. No doubt something else I’ll regret come tomorrow!!

Focus… I need to focus!!!

Turned up at the gym this morning at 8:30 a.m. ready for a warm up before getting in the pool with Sal to stretch myself a little. I’d done 30 mins or so when I thought it might be a good idea to ask where she was. So the reception rang and left a message on her phone.

Ten minutes later they said… she’d be ten minutes.

So I carried on.

At 9:30 a.m. she staggered in looking as if she was about to pass out… very apologetic and very obviously spaced out. She needed to get home to bed.

We agreed to leave it for this week and start again *next* week. Suits me… I’d done my hour, I’m good.

I feel awful. Went to the gym… staggered around the estate for 30 mins with Sally… did some boxing… went to pick up a new computer… brought it home and assembled it… and fell into bed for two hours.

Got up feeling dreadful and I feel no better now 40 minutes later on. I will be *so* glad to get this competition over with.

I’ve no proof that I feel this way because of the diet… or that I’d feel better if I *wasn’t* on the diet… but I don’t recall feling this bad before I started. On the other hand I wasn’t getting up at 4:30 a.m. 5 days a week before either. Maybe I’m just ’sleep-deprived’.

So, today I’m cold, tired and hungry – I’ve had better days.

Managed to work my way through the second session with few problems… except a burning desire to not be doing it at all.

Did the first 30 mins at 5.0 kph and the second 30 mins at 5.5 kph. I might yet be getting back there.

Tomorrow of course is Saturday and I’m not yet sure whether I can go or not. There is a good case to be made for both ‘yes’ and ‘no’ so I’ll give it a bit of a think this evening when the wife gets home.

However, today I’m feeling pleased with myself… at least as far as the exercise is concerned!

Managed to walk the first hour without incident. I feel a bit ’shaky’ but I’m still mobile! Now I’m off to get a glass of water and then onwards to the gym! An hour there ought to finish me off nicely.

The youngest has a two hour practice session at the local ice rink this arvo so while I’m there I’ll do a few laps of the lake as well. It’s a pleasant walk in the sun and not too taxing.

For someone like me all this might sound a lot, but in the previous competition there were periods when I was doing three hours a day in the gym and I’m hoping I’ll get back to that level of fitness soon, but if I don’t actually make a start… I won’t make it, so away I go.

I’ve discovered why I’ve been shirking the gym for the past two days. Apart from the work I had to do, it appears I was coming down with something that currently appears to be a cold. In the past I’ve found myself ‘overeating’ on odd days without understanding why and then having the illness hit me. This seems to be another of those occasions.

The ‘upside’ is that now I know what’s wrong I can fight it, or at least try to. Despite the queasy feelings I’ll be out walking the dogs this morning for an hour to ‘loosen up’ and then I’ll get over to the gym to do an hour on the treadmill. It might be I’ll need to come home and sleep for an hour afterwards, but I have to get back into the routine of diet and exercise quickly or the whole point will be wasted.

I’ll ‘report’ back later to write up how it all went.

Other than that, well the weight isn’t lower… in fact it’s gone *up* to 127.5 kilos reflecting the amount I tucked away yesterday, plus the fact I ate breakfast before weighing this morning. Nevertheless it isn’t encouraging to see the scales moving the wrong way! Something needs to be done… so I have to get out there and do it.

It’s 11: 30 a.m. and I’ve not yet got to the gym. There’ve been a dozen things I needed to before I set off… and as I left I found a few more.

I rounded it off with a visit to the local shops to get food for dinner and a visit to the a swimming pool maintenance company to ask why our pool has been unusable for a month and when will they fix it.

I’m now sitting having a cup of liquorice tea and mulling over whether to give up the day’s exercise at the gym as a loss and get on with other things like housework that are still ‘exercise’ but not structured. Not decided yet.

Edit:
Didn’t go… just too busy. Tomorrow tho *everything* has to wait. I must go or I’ll just veg!