2/20/19 10:47PM
I’ve had a very good week this week overall: I have made progress with my weights, I have visibly lost some more weight, and I’ve exceeded my expectations for my diet.
Before I go into my experiences this week, I’d like to just get this week’s reading out of the way. This week’s reading was about relationships, something I don’t have a lot of experience with. While I found the concept of self-nurturance helpful and applicable to my daily life, I found the relationship portions to be inapplicable as I’ve never been in a relationship.
Moving on to my fitness this week:
I worked out on 2/16, 2/18, and 2/20. Late night homework sessions and personal commitments limited my days this week. Hoping to get back to five or six days in the gym by week 5. I haven’t squatted in awhile, that’s something I hope to fix tomorrow. I hit a new personal record of 235 for my 5×5 routine on dead-lift, although I needed to use the belt today. I think I was just tired, and I hadn’t really eaten anything before I lifted. Still hit all my reps though. My overhead press gained five pounds, bringing it to 75. This is great, I just need to make sure my form is solid and I’m not cheating. I’ve started adding to my bench press, and did 140 pretty easy. Looking forward to seeing how high I can go in the coming days. Finally, I started doing the incline bench, and was able to immediately jump to 115. A primary goal of mine this semester is to build my chest, so I’m going to heavily incorporate this lift into my routine; I like it.
Unfortunately the circumstances that interrupted my lifting practically eliminated my fasted cardio routine for the past week, as I do that at 6 in the morning. Planning on getting back on track Friday morning.
Diet:
Absolutely phenomenal week for the diet. I’ve only had ice cream once this week, one cup of Gatorade to try and recover from a hangover, and have resisted numerous temptations in the forms of cookies, birthday cake, and cupcakes. I’ve found it’s much easier to resist eating bad foods when I rationalize how far they are going to set me back on my weight loss journey. I want to get in shape as quickly as possible. The easiest and most expedient way to achieve this is to have an ironclad diet.
I’ve eaten a lot more meat (read:protein) over the past week, consuming at least 2 chicken breasts at both lunch and dinner, along with broccoli, spinach, or green beans when available. I have cut down on my carbs and focused on eating primarily animal products, supplemented by vegetables. I’ve also been eating bigger meals than normal, as the MyDiet application has suggested that I eat upwards of 3,000 calories on my most active days. Ironically, by eating more, I’ve lost more weight and have started becoming stronger. I think I might have been chronically under-eating before I started regularly exercising, resulting in my body refusing to burn fat because it was in a starvation state.
SMART goal: keep the diet on track
Weight:
Like I said earlier, I can see myself getting slimmer every couple of days. It’s going to take a long time to achieve my fitness goals and dream physique, but nothing worth having is free. I’m embracing the process and just focusing on getting quality time in the gym as often as possible.
Mental Health:
As I stated at the beginning of this post, I didn’t really resonate with this week’s reading. I simply haven’t experienced a lot of the experiences outlined in the chapter. With that being said, I could work on incorporating self-nurturance into my wellness goals. I’ve always had a very low self-esteem, which bordered on self-hatred for years. I’ve been having some irrationally negative thoughts about myself this week, but I’m chalking it up to a seasonal depression or a lack of Vitamin D from the sun. I’m not outside much these days.
Looking forward to reporting on week 5, hopefully I’ve made even more progress!
Logan's Fitness HEAL102 