More of the Same

Unfortunately, my eating habits haven't been great lately. I'm still in the 195-200 range, though. I'd probably be well over 200 if it wasn't for the many hours every weekend spent working on the deck that has been the interminable project. Still progressing well, though. Some more pictures below. Next step is putting the framework for the stairs.

Surgery Delay

So, over the past couple of months (wow, I can't believe its been that long), we've been building a deck. Well, actually, we've only been building the deck for a couple of weeks. The time before that was spent digging footings and pouring concrete. In any case, this whole thing has taken far longer than expected. I thought that we'd be close to done. However, we're probably about a month away. Since I didn't want leave the rest of the deck for Tina to finish, I rescheduled my shoulder surgery from next week (October 27th) until December 8th. So, another 6 weeks of dealing with this thing. Hopefully we'll finish the deck in time (here's a pictures for those who care):


As to the health kick, things have been pretty uneventful. I've been going through streaks of good and bad, so my weight has just been consistently in the 195-200 range. No bad, though I would really prefer to be more centered around 195. I was back to 196 today, and I hope that if I lean a little more to my streak of good, I'll be able to center around 195.

A Step Towards Success

Well,

Part of the reason I started this fitness trend wasn't just to lose weight, but it was also to get a hold of a potential health issue......that being my high cholesterol. Well, it seems that I'm finally getting somewhere. I had an updated blood test done, and my cholesterol levels are the lowest they've been since.....well pretty much since the first time I've had it measured which was college. Since my last analysis, my total cholesterol went down from 275 to 223. Although my HDL (good cholesterol) dropped slightly from 68 to 62, my LDL (bad cholesterol) dropped from 186 to 143. Plus, even my triglycerides fell from 105 to 89. So, this is definitely good news, though I now need to work to keep things at that level. My weight is down to about 196-197, and I've also been taking a decent collection of supplements, including multivitamins, Omega 3 fish oil, fiber, and oat bran (essentially everything that has been documented to lower cholesterol). I'm sort of now just cruising until my October surgery. My goal weight by then is 195, but really, I just want to make sure I'm in good shape since after surgery I won't be able to do any real weightlifting for a few months.

So, I'm still trying to hit 5 gyms sessions a week (3 for weights and 2 for running). If I do hit my 195 goal soon, I may even try to get down to 190 or so. We'll see. However, I now realize that this blog will do me a lot of good trying to recover from surgery, as it has kept me motivated through now. So, for all those keeping track. Since I started this blog, I've dropped 20 pounds, from 217 to 197 in just under 6 months. I'm am also down 26 pounds since last Thanksgiving. I'm most proud not of the weight loss, but of the fact that I did not use any fad or unsustainable diets to get there. No low carb, no South Beach, no raw diet. Just normal healthy eating and exercise. When I went on vacation or out on a weekend, I didn't need to worry about where we were going to eat because not only was I not limiting the type of food I ate, but I was also allowing myself a day or two a week to let loose.

Plugging Away

So I've been good the past few weeks. I've either run or gone lifting at least 4 times a week. Plus, Tina and I have started the early stages of building a deck which means that we've spent about 15-20 hours in our backyard digging holes. Frustrating, since we're still less than halfway done, but a great workout.

Another piece of sort of good news is I finally scheduled my shoulder surgery. I visited the shoulder specialist for the Baltimore Orioles. I was actually very impressed. You always want your surgeon to be confident. Preferably, to the point of slight arrogance....but definitely not too arrogant. The guy I saw has the perfect balance. Arrogant enough to just know that he'll fix the problem, but good enough to talk me through all the details. In any case, the surgery is scheduled for October 25th, so that is the point at which we need to finish building the deck.

The weird thing lately has been my weight. Its been all over the place. My last 5 weigh-ins have been.....198, 204, 201, 202, 196. So what's my real weight?

Tough Weekend

This past weekend was a bit tough on the diet. Bachelor party in Philly will do that to you. I weighed in at 202 today. Although my last post had me at 201, I actually weighed in at 199 last Thursday. Not too much of a concern, though, since I'm back at the gym regularly.

My shoulder is doing OK, but I have an appointment set up with an orthopedic surgeon up in Baltimore on July 27th. That should determine a lot. Let's see how this week goes. I'm hoping to get back under 200 for good soon.

7 Weeks, But I'm Back

So I'm out of shape and weak.

However, I'm also back at the gym and only weigh 201 pounds.

Not sure how I should feel about all this. In any case, after dislocating my shoulder, I continued to my running for about 2 weeks. After that, I went on a trip to Russia and all hell broke loose. I got back and got sick, which put me out of commission for two weeks. Then, I got this weird pain in my stomach for a few days. According to everything I had read, I was either going through my period or had appendicitis. I didn't want to take a chance, so I went to the ER. After 6 hours, they told me that they had no clue what it was, but that it wasn't appendicitis. It looked like an infection, likely the last part of the virus I thought I had recovered from. That all brings me to today, and my first workout in 4 weeks!

The nice thing about the fact that I only weigh 201 is that if I keep my diet up and just start my exercise, I should be able to regain my muscle mass and get in shape without really trying to lose any more wieght.

So, the goal is 3 sessions of weights and 2-3 session of aerobic workout a week. Shouldn't be too bad.

Its good to be back.

Does it count?

Well, I have one piece of good news followed by two pieces of bad news. The good news is that I hit 202 pounds last week, so I managed to hit my goal. After hitting 202, I essentially gave up my diet for a week. Which brings me to the first piece of bad news. That being that I weighed in at 204 today. So, does hitting my 203 goal still count? I'm thinking it does. In fact, I have already set a new goal of 195 pounds. Actually, my weight gain (according to the gym scale) was from 102.2 to 103.6. One and a half pounds isn't that horrible for a bad week and can just as quickly be reversed by a good week.

Now comes the second piece of bad news. While doing some back/shoulder strengthening exercises today, my left shoulder popper out of socket again. Most of you who bother reading this know my shoulder problems, and this is just the latest incident. Fortunately, it was easy to pop in, but will likey be sore for a while and effectively kill my weight lifting routine for a little while. Also, I'm planning to go white water rafting this weekend, which should now be even more exciting just based on what will happen to my shoulder. What this really has motivated me to do is go visit an orthopedic surgeon again. So, in addition to my continued weight loss, my goal is to schedule an appointment by the end of this week.