Anybody who has ever watched Good Times knows what Florida is saying in this iconic scene. That was how I felt when trying to pull on a pair of pants last week.
Back at the Bottom
Yep. I'm back at the bottom. According to the scale, I am about 15 pounds heavier than when I started this, "trying to be a figure competitor" journey. I had to laugh. Here I had spent all this time and money because I thought if I got into better shape and did a competition, then that would raise my stock in some capacity. Fast forward to now not only did I NOT do a competition, I am 15 pounds heavier AND I've moved leaps and bounds in my career and otherwise.
Go Figure. My face look's like this little's boy when I think about that lesson learned.
How am I handling being back at the bottom? I think I'm okay with it. Based on all the research I have read about slowed metabolisms this is completely normal and frankly I would rather be like this with 15 extra pounds over having panic attacks about food or hating the gym. It is what is. Besides if you don't try, flop, and get back up then you're not taking enough risks and life is boring.
In clothing estimates, I believe I have about 5 pounds to go before the pants go back on.
At first I found myself angry and frustrated, because not only did I NOT accomplish my goal of getting on stage, I also gained more weight in the process! But after reflecting, I decided that was it was a great experience overall. I learned so much about programming, nutrition, solidified my message about body image/self worth, and even got a new muse out of it....so it wasn't a total loss.
Nutrition
I believe I had a nutrition breakthrough this week. One of the things I used to love to do cook healthy recipes that I got from bodybuilding.com or one of my fitness cookbooks. I liked to make protein bread to eat for breakfast. When I started training for the fitness competition, I stopped doing that and ate the same boring foods a lot of the time. It's taken me a while but this week I baked my first batch of protein bread in over a year and a half. It's red velvet and you can find the recipe on my health coach page.
For me it felt like a step in the right direction. I am getting out of restrictive mindsets that "oh you can't eat that" and food anxieties and back into holistic mindsets.
I do have to laugh that I thought I was such a mess before and now I'm 15 pounds heavier and I'm trying to get back to where I was. Sometimes the grass is NOT greener on the other side.
Another step forward was that last week I went to Ghiradelli's with one of my favorite people and her daughter who were visiting from out of town. There are no pictures of the sundae because we murdered them. I ate my Sea Salt Caramel Sundae with no guilt and the next day just went back to my regular food. I opted not to have dessert on my free day Sunday because those Sundaes did the trick. There was no obsessing or being anxious about it. When your friends are in town and come to visit and you go to Ghiradelli's square, you eat ice cream sundaes.
Training
Ahhhh Training is fun again! LOL! Right now I'm strength training 3 on/ 1 off with the 4th day being cardio because I was starting to feel winded while teaching indoor cycling. No bueno. Just to get back into the swing of things I did traditional body part training focusing more on super sets and tri sets.
This coming week, I'm switching to Total Body Training 5x per week, same 3 on/1 off schedule. Isn't this overtraining? Nope. I'm doing mostly Tri-sets (Three Exercises in a Row) and high repetitions. Why? Because I want to see some development and it's time to try something different.
I've been reading Coach Scott Abel's book about Hardgainers and he explains that people who want to see development (aka looks like they lift) are told to lift as heavy as they can but STILL don't really see development. It's a true statement. We tell people to lift heavy and many still don't have the development to show for it. They just have injuries and frustration...*raises hand*
Not to mention with this style of lifting, the idea is to focus on your muscles lifting the weights and not the weights lifting you. The idea is to engage the muscles not chase PR's. I've been applying these principles to my strength workouts: decreased poundages by about 20% and supersetting/tri-setting. I have to say that I feel the muscles that are engaged so I am looking forward to 4 weeks of this and then evaluation.
Can't be afraid of change and if you want something different, then you have to DO something different.
Goals/Progress
First, I don't want to get caught up on numbers. would like to be back to where I was originally but I don't know if that can happen. I can't force it. All I can do is be consistent with my eating and exercise. You can't force your body to do what it doesn't want to do. All that happens is it will rebel. If you try to force the body to lose weight when you've been restricting for so long it will simply ignore you and then do everything it can to hold on to every calorie.
I have a goal in mind to challenge myself to live out the message of body acceptance and body image. I look forward to sharing it.
No progress photos just yet. I would like to see some progress first before I share but I am confident that I will be able to show why you need to do something different and listen to your body.
Until the next time!!!
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