91. Day 90 wrap up

So I did the day 1 workout and man what a difference. I did the 5 sets of 50 jumps all in one go and didn't trip at all. My jumping is still pretty poor and I trip all the time so it was nice to finish everything out with one solid jumping session. The exercises were eye opening. I remember not necessarily thinking that the exercises were hard, but seeing that I was getting pretty close to all that I could do in the given reps, so it was really nice to be able to go back and do them again and breeze through them, although I did get sweatier than I expected.

Then I did 8ma and tried out the new ab exercise that I finally dug up. Circle crunches. Kindof like a combination of side crunches and regular ones. They're one of those movements that are just kindof hard for me to get my body to coordinate and I can't manage to get the circles to be symmetrical. I was doing them really slow and it's kindof cool to feel each set of ab muscles working.

Also, in the absence of a forum to stay in touch, I made a facebook group. It's a closed group so you have to get approved to join, but I you can just hit the request to join button and I'll approve it. Here's the link: http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=122595677792293 If you want to search by name instead it's called Peak Condition Alumni.

I'm still sorting through my thoughts to sum everything up. It's totally so hard, I've definitely had a wild ride over here. I am experiencing one thing really acutely in the hours since I've been done: now that all the rules are off, I'm totally having the urge to go try everything I used to like to see how it tastes now. I'm of two minds about this. 1) I want to keep on the diet and just stay strong 2) I want to just try everything all at once and just eat until I'm sick to really cure me of my stupid old food cravings. I'm trying to find a middle balance. I ate like I would have on a previous "normal" day at work today: blueberry muffin and cup of coffee for breakfast, grilled cheese and onion rings for lunch, oreo cake when I came home for lunch and I was so tired and hungry all day. I ate a nice dinner though, chicken pad thai with a bunch of spinach stir fried in and not too many noodles. It was so pungent/savory compared to pcp eating. Fish sauce and ketchup will do that though.

90. Not done yet

This won't be my last post; I'm still collecting my thoughts and still have to do today's workout. But I just had to stop in and say, my word yesterday's workout was hard, but I made it through. Hooray!

Looking forward to today's easy street wrap-up.

87. Body of lead

My body just feels heavy after the supersets. Like every limb weighs 800 pounds. It's a good feeling. But still I'm so tired, I just napped all day after working out. Good for the body, not so good for the to-do list. I'm not so sure that I like the supersets but they do change up the feeling of the workout. I posted this and then read everybody's blogs and seem to be in the minority about the supersets. Maybe it's just the fact that I'm thrown off by the change in routine and the fact that the v-sit plank set was particularly hateful. Not sure. But I can definitely tell that my body would only be able to take about a week of these.

I did manage to make borsht today, although my grandmother would laugh if I told her it was borsht because this recipe is totally not Eastern European grandmother approved, only pcp approved.

2 lb beets, washed, peeled if super dirty, and chopped into pieces.

1 lb russet potatoes.

thyme

5 c veggie stock, hopefully homemade,

2 shallots or a small onion

a little bit of red wine vinegar

Roast beets, potatoes, and shallots with the thyme in a pan that has just enough olive oil in it so they don't stick. Roast about a half an hour to 45 minutes at about 350.

After the veggies are roasted, put them in a stock pot with the stock and simmer for 15-20 minutes.

Then you can either leave it chunky or puree some or all of the veggies. Mix the vinegar in and serve hot or cold.

If you use chioggia beets (the ones with red and white stripes) the soup will end up an unappealing color but taste the same.

86. So strong

Guys we are so strong. I was doing the workout yesterday and I was struck by the fact that at the beginning, I would have never been able to do this. Like at first I really struggled with teh shoulder raises and could never get my arms up as high as Patrick's in the picture and now with a lot of struggling I can do 6 sets of them. That's crazy. The progression of the exercises is so slow/small that I didn't really realize it was happening; I mean intellectually I knew that today we were doing 17 instead of 15 or 6 sets instead of 5 but it never felt like there was a huge jump in hardness. Just a consistent hardness the whole time, although this past week has been really hard, but I might just be working harder in a burst of pre-finishing enthusiasm. But yeah we are so so so strong now!

I also did my homework. I'm starting school in January (I don't know if I told you guys that, but I got in to an accelerated bachelor's of nursing program and so will be doing that for a year and a half) and so I went over to check out the rec center under the guise that I wanted to see if I wanted to buy a membership for the three months before I start school. I was actually pretty impressed. It's brand new, spacious, bright and airy, which is a 180 from the gym I currently belong to (I got suckered into paying a flat rate for like 3 years, because you got a bunch of free personal training (turns out their trainers are jerks)) which is in the basement of a building downtown and feels cramped and stinky. There weren't a ton of people there, but there were some, just your general student types with a few older folks mixed in. There was the gaggle of skinny blondes yapping away while running on the ellipticals, there were some muscle-y looking dudes lifting weights, then a smattering of regular sized to overweight people using various cardio machines, but most of the people were playing basketball and there were two people playing squash or maybe raquetball. I forgot to ask about if I could jumprope there, but I'd assume I could because there was a ton of space. They offer classes too, not just like the normal cardio classes, but kung fu, boxing, ballet, belly dancing, and yoga. Being a member of gym also gets you access to the olympic sized pool and the smaller pool. What I noticed most was that I didn't feel the crippling insecurity that I felt at my gym that usually resulted in me fleeing halfway through my workout. Everyone seemed either very nice or like they could care less about you, which I don't mind at all. I probably won't join before school starts because I'm cheap and can workout at home just as well, but once school starts I might take a class and use the pool and maybe see if I can learn to play sqaush.

So yeah the gym wasn't totally filled with gym bunnies and muscleheads, and a lot of people could stand to get off the treadmill and with a jumprope, but it wasn't all bad and it was nice to see people playing.

85. OMGZ T - 5!!!!!

Guys I cried last night. Cried so much. Cried all through my jumps. I was/am so sad that this was my last pcp weekend. And then I looked at the website and the orange bar is touching some of our little blue guys, and I'm really not ready to be there/here yet.
That being said, we could probably add being able to cry through your jumps to the list of indications that you're doing them at the right speed. Crying and talking, they're both the same right?

Also, I made the mistake of looking at this week's workouts. I knew I shouldn't have, but I did and holy moly supersets.

82. Not feelin' it...

my body that is. PCP things are good. But I'm just feeling blah about my body. I know that Patrick told me not to look at it til the last day, but Jordan needed pants and I needed clothes so we ended up at the outlet mall to go to the Levis outlet. I was pretty excited about getting some new jeans, as my one pair have holes in the thighs (they had just started when pcp started, if only I had been with Team Sexxay, maybe my pants would still be in good shape). We walked in and I knew this wasn't going to go well as sometimes all the outlet has are juniors pants in any of the styles I would be interested in, such was the case this time. I figured I should still be able to find a pair that was ok, just to tide me over, but no, every single pair I tried on was wretched. I know that it was just the teenage girl cuts, but I looked awful in every single pair I tried on, if I could get them on in the first place. Some more strike outs at a few different stores and all that time in front of full length mirrors and I was feeling pretty bad. Then we went to a concert. The concert was at Oberlin College, which if you're not familiar with it seems like it recently has become the college for rich, little hipsters to go if their parents are willing to spend $50,000 a year for them to practice looking contemptuous at everyone except their friends and to learn four syllable words to tell people you think you're smarter/cooler than them . The show was filled with more 18 year old girls wearing spandex than gymnastics meet. They were all there being tiny and pretentious and I was there feeling like a whale, an old, boring whale.

I'm just sad. For as good as I feel, I still feel bad about my body. I feel like I saw a ton of changes during the first month or month and a half, but nothing much has happened since then. Everyone else has had these massive changes and while I definitely have had some change, I'm still fatter than what everyone else started out as. I was really afraid before this started that I would be the fat girl and everyone else would be so much better than me, and it's true I'm the fat girl, although I think I do as decently at the exercises as everyone else. I just feel like I have so much farther to come and that when I get released back into the wild, so to speak, next week that whatever I've got won't be enough to keep things from rolling backwards and then I'll be just as heavy as before. In better shape, but just as chubby. It's not like all this effort is for naught, it's just I would like to be able to buy some pants without it being a fucking emotional nightmare.

80. Eating too much

So after 80 days I still find myself overeating sometimes, the thing that's different now is that now I'm chowing down on a big plate of vegetables instead of pasta or ice cream. Sounds great right? It is except it seems I haven't yet learned one very important lesson: don't go too crazy with the stalk-y cruciferous veggies. I ate a ton of broccoli today and now I am totally, uncomfortably bloated and gassy. It was just so good that I didn't want to stop eating it. I stir-fried it with a spicy tomato garlic sauce that I invented to be my pcp-friendly sriracha stand in, and some shirmp and man was it a good meal, but the broccoli was hands-down the best.

Here's the "recipe" for the garlic chili sauce.
1 birds eye chili or other red asian chili (more if you like mega spicy)
6 cloves of garlic (or more or less)
2 plum tomatoes, seeded

Chop everything up and throw it in the blender. Blend until saucy. Put on everything.

79. Flying By

Man, I cannot believe it's day 79 already. We've been doing this for so long I can't really remember what life was like before we started, but at the same time I feel like I'm just getting started. I'm not ready to let go yet, not ready to go back to regular life. I know I've got 10 days to go, but I'm really getting sad to be done. I know that a lot of it can stay the same, I can keep exercising the same way and keep eating the same stuff, but I'm going to miss everybody and their blogs and whatnot.

Ok. enough emotional nonsense. Does anyone else feel like the new diet is so much food? I know I'll get used to it but boy do I feel like I'm eating way too much. Especially dinner, but that's probably because I'm still mourning the loss of the apple dinner a little bit.

And a question for Patrick -- why are chest dips the second best exercise we can do for wellness? Is it because they're really super hard and make all your muscles work?

I can't decide if I dislike them because I can't do them/they hurt my wrists and shoulders or if I can't do them because I dislike them and therefore don't work as hard on them as I do on things that I like, like pull-ups.
Have I told you how much I like pull-ups? I still can't do a full one by myself but think the Jordan-assisted ones are the best things ever. I know that I'm not doing all the work, but they make me feel so strong! And to think the very first day of inclines pull-ups I couldn't move myself at all.

Oh and I indulged. The other night after firefighting class I had no interest in cooking, so we went to our local super good Vietnamese restaurant. I got pho, which is my favorite, but is also supposed to generally cure what ails you, so I figured it might be good for my stomach. It probably wasn't as many calories as it was supposed to and wasn't actually that unhealthy. The broth didn't seem that oily and the beef in the soup is lean, so aside from being a little salty, it was pretty decent pcp wise, I think. I did doctor it up with a ton of bean spouts and lime and some chilis so I got a bunch of veggies in there too. It tasted good. Not really really good. But not gross. So I'm happy that I'll still be able to eat some of the things that I loved before without finding them weird tasting. Mostly it was just nice to be able to stop and sit and be waited on and know that there wasn't a mound of dishes waiting for me afterwards. I did get a glass of iced sweet chyrsanthemum tea and it was so sweet I could only a sip or two before I was done.

77. Things I don't/won't miss - pt. 2

5. Salad dressing - I was in search of something to jazz up my daily eggs and went to poke around in the salad dressing aisle. It never occured to me to look at the ingrediants in these things before, because when I make salad dressing it's olive oil (or fancy nut oil if I'm being fancy), vinegar or lemon juice, herbs and spices and maybe a tiny bit of sugar if I'm vinegar happy, but store bought salad dressing -- that stuff is foul!!! It's all soybean oil and high-fructose corn syrup and sugar and weirdo stuff like zanthan gum. Eeeww. I've always been squicky about ranch dressing and other creamy things becaue really, shelf stable dairy is totally gross, except for some reason I can deal with Parmalat but I don't encounter that on a daily basis, but like ranch dressing and alfredo sauce -- barf. But now regular salad dressing is out too.

6. Wearing the same pair of athletic shoes till they have holes in them (which given my previous state of activity was like 8 years) - I bought new running shoes the other day because I've been getting shinsplints after the running part of firefighter class. I went a local running store where they make you bring in your old shoes and roll up your pants and walk and run barefoot and then pick out shoes that will help with whatever foot issues you have and then hooked me up with some new shoes. When I laced them up the first time it was like a choir of angels were singing hallelujah behind me. My feet were so snug and comfy it's great. I even seem to be jumping better in them, but that's maybe all in my head. I might keep the old ones to compare, so that when I put them on and then my new ones and they feel similar I'll know it's time for new shoes.

7. Upset stomach after eating - Right before I started pcp, it seemed like almost every time after I ate, regardless of what it was, my stomach would be upset or at least slightly grumbly. While I realize the irony of writing this, while I'm still dealing with this stupid puking thing, this is totally different than what I had before. Now I just eat and then I'm done and my stomach feels fine. I did find a bread that was so dense and wheaty that after I ate a sandwich made with it I would feel almost uncomfortably full, but now that I've stopped making sandwiches with it, my stomach is a happy camper post-eating (that super wheaty bread does make awesome toast in the morning, it's so flavorful putting anything on it would be a travesty).

8. Drinking - This is HUGE for me. Before pcp started and honestly still, most of my socializing occurs in bars. That's just how it is. There isn't a lot going on in Cleveland except for playing trivia, doing karaoke, and watching shows at bars. So I spend more time in bars than your average bear. Before, it was only on very rare occasions that I would go to a bar and not drink, usually when my stomach was upset or I was super tired already. Now, I've gotten to the point where I'm totally comfortable being at a bar with everyone around me drinking and not feeling awkward about not drinking. I also drank alot of the time to relieve social anxiety. I'm still anxious, awkward, and shy, but even after drinking I still felt that way, so it obviously wasn't working that much.

9. Hot dog cart hot dogs - I don't actually feel anything towards these guys. I'm not grossed out by them anymore than I am any other restaurant food. It's just that if I didn't have time to pack lunch and was busy, I would run downstairs and grab two and a bag of chips for lunch. PCP has forced me to pack lunch almost every day and on the days that I didn't, it didn't take that much longer to go down the street to the cafe and get a salad. I can take the extra three minutes to go get healthy food. I'm worth it. And also the hotdog cart lunch never really filled me up, so I'd hit the vending machine in the middle of the afternoon for a snack, so really I didn't save any time at all, and probably spent an equal amount of money.

10. Vending machines - The vending machine at work (only the candy one, not the pop ones) always used to tempt me when I was getting my lunch from the office fridge (they're totally positioned right there by the fridge and microwave for "convenience" which actually means putting them in your way to tempt you). Now I walk right by without giving it a second glance. Earlier this year we asked for some healthy things in them (not all healthy things, lord knows the ladies at work would riot if they couldn't get their candy or chips) - the vending company put in barbeque flavored peanuts and baked chips, woo healthy! But yeah, there is nothing in there that remotely holds any interest for me anymore.

11. Being totally food focused - I'm a foodie. I love food. I love trying new food. I love eating fancy food at good restaurants that I could never ever make myself. I used to spend hours reading food blogs and looking at local restaurants' menus and thinking about what I would order when we went there. A lot of that has stopped. Lunch doesn't have to be special or super good. It just needs to fill me up. A sandwich with some chicken, lettuce, tomato, and peppers is just as good as a sandwich with chicken, some sort of fancy condiment, and some cheese. Had you given me the option to go out and eat my favorite meal or 1000 calories worth of my favorite foods for the first indulgence I would have been in heaven and had a hard time choosing which favorite food. Now I'm having a hard time mustering up the interest in anything. Partially it's that I'm afraid that something heavy and rich will really upset my stomach, but part of it is that I just don't really care anymore. I made some really awesome okra pickles the other week. I only ate one of them because they probably totally violated the salt rule, but they were awesome and that was really enough. I made some tomato jam and some dill pickles and I can't wait to taste them. When the cabbage comes in during the fall, I'll make some saurkraut. I can't wait to eat that. But as for things I used to eat - gourmet meals from fancy restaurants, rich pastry from good bakeries, and ice cream and cheese and cured meats, not so much. I'm sure they'll come back into my life sooner or later, but right now I'm content without them. I'm happy that they don't capture my interest like they used to.

12. Chest-dips - Just so you didn't think I'm totally pcp-ified, I still hate chest dips. I can honestly say that I will probably never do another one after this ends. I don't know what it is but I despise them. And I'm ok with that. My entire wellness won't be thrown off if I don't continue to do them once I'm on my own.

76. The outside aisles of the supermarket

So when I said that the only things I have been buying from the middle of the supermarket are cleaning stuff and cat litter, I was only talking about what I have been buying for myself. What I neglected to mention was that Jordan and his sister who also lives with us, both have raging pop habits. So almost every time I go to the supermarket, into the cart goes a 12-pack of Coke, at least one, like clockwork. I bring it home and put it on top of the fridge and in a few days the carton is empty.

Every time I unload the pop and my healthy stuff from the car, every time I go out and pick up fast food for Jordan when he's hungry and doesn't want to/won't cook and there's nothing in the fridge that will fill him up, I feel bad/guilty. Sort of. I feel some responsibility to keep my partner healthy and feed him good food, but on the other hand he's an adult and he is free to eat what he wants regardless of the nutritional value. I've tried packing him lunches and making breakfast for him to eat on the way to work, and making big batches of stuff he can warm up for dinner since we are rarely eating at the same time and not really eating the same things if we are eating together, but somewhere along the way I always fall behind and he's back on the fast food track. A part of it is the sheer volume of food he eats - he's 6'5", weighs 190lbs and works at least 50 hours a week at a pretty physical job, plus works out/does fire class a few times a week. Another part, probably the bigger part is that he eats so much restaurant food that what I make just doesn't usually taste as good. I don't know how to make a lunch that packs enough calories to keep him going that can be eaten quickly in the van on the way to the next job.

I don't really know where I'm going with this, but in trying to lay the foundations for keeping this healthy business up once pcp is done, I'm thinking about how feasible it is to do when one member of your family eats whatever you've made for dinner and then needs to supplement with three yogurts or a double cheeseburger.

75. Dude, stomach, what the hell is your problem?

Ok dudes, I thought I was finally feeling better, for about an hour this morning, and then I ended up contemplating pulling over on my drive in to work because I thought I was going to puke, and then actually puking at fire fighting class (not the smartest move to go, but I was so frickin restless that I thought maybe a big effort would be cathartic) but atleast I'm not incapacitating-ly tired anymore. Score! This stupid sickness thing does leave me with two questions:

1. Why when you're doing something really hard, do you get sick the minute things start to get easier. I was just starting to cruise along again, food was good, exercises were wicked hard, but my spirits were good, and then bam! super sick. Same thing always happened to me at the end of exams in school. I'd plow through studying, with tiny amounts of sleep and food and make it through to the end and then get so so sick on the way home and spend my entire break sleeping and being sick. I mean I guess it makes sense that when you push your body to the limit its going to break down, but I guess the main question for me is why doesn't the body break down during the hard parts, and instead waits until the stress abates to get sick?

2. What in the world made me sick? I feel like it lasted way to long to be food poisoning, besides which I'm only eating stuff I'm making with healthy foods? Did I not cook my eggs long enough? Did not wash something thorough enough?

I've been off the diet some in terms of grams and proportions, as one side effect of throwing up at least once a day is then later being totally starving. I've been keeping a lot to the brat diet (bananas, rice, applesauce, toast) with some egg and plain chicken and turkey and mushy veggies like tomatoes and avocado. So not so bad in the diet department for feeling mega gross, and really if I can eat healthily when I feel awful, I'd like to think I can keep it up when cooking doesn't feel like the hardest chore in the world.

I feel like my body has changed a lot, but I can't really be objective about it. The fact that I'm so used to seeing squishy Haley served me well at the beginning because I could see all the little changes, but now that I've gotten a little squishier, it's hard for me to notice what is less buff than it was a week ago, because I'm so used to squishy Haley that it's difficult to see the changes in reverse. I definitely feel weaker when I do the exercises, but still feel stronger than I was when I started. I can still see/feel the difference when I'm doing things like carrying groceries.

I would love to wake up tomorrow and have my stomach be fine, because I really feel like I'm wasting these precious few days of pcp. But I'm taking it as a good sign that Patrick's tip of the day was a total no-brainer for me. The only things that I can remember buying from the inner aisles of the store lately are cleaning supplies and cat litter. Hooray for doing something right.

72. Laid low but trying to get back up

So I'm sick, or was sick and am still trying to get back to normal or something. Starting shortly after my last post until Thursday-ish I was fevery, exhuasted, and super nauseated with some other GI issues, so I've been taking it easy lately. We had guests so I dragged myself out of bed more than I would have preferred, but took it super easy. I went for walks instead of juping most of the days, even though the most I could manage was much slower than a normal walk would be. Now my stomach is feeling better and I'm back to a normal temperature, but I'm still so exhausted; it's been a struggle to keep my eyes open all day at work. I jumped yesterday but didn't make it through all of the exercises. Failure came quickly with the Da Vinicis mostly because it was so tiring to lift my arms up, I couldn't do it for very long. Before I started my ab stuff I got down on the mat and just closed my eyes and dozed off. When I woke up I figured I should just go to bed.

I'm just so so tired and I've been sleeping so much. Maybe a weekend in bed will cure what ails me. I'm not used to being sluggish anymore.

66. Warning - PCP Philosophisizing Ahead

At the moment I'm in a very cocoon-y meditative introspective state. It started after reading Jenny's post about panarchy and that's when it really sunk in that this is bigger than getting fit for the firefighting test, this is about striving to reach a new place of normality, a quantifiably better normal. All of a sudden my mind just went silent (which is totally weird for me, because I'm pretty much the least mindful person around, my brain is always going off in 7000 different directions).

Today, I got up, went to class, came home, snuggled with the mister, did my pcp workout, baked some banana bread, worked on the house, cleaning and fixing, made dinner, and am now just finishing up with blogging and some cleaning before jumping into bed with my book. It was the kind of day that I think of when I think of life being good; relaxed and productive and really pleasant. This is my baseline for what life should be like.

Lately, things have been busy and so I haven't had as much time or mental energy for pcp. I've been great on the diet, but when working out, it hasn't been with as much care as it should be. I've done the exercises, gotten through, but haven't taken the time to really check my form and make sure I'm getting the most out of the exercises, and not going all the way to farthest amount of failure I can get to. I've been slacking. I kept telling myself that I'd get back up to par when life slowed down. But the thing is, life will never really slow down. Well will never slow down to the point at which I say, "ok, life is slow now; now is the time to do better with the workouts". It's a mistake to think that when life slows down there will be more space for well focused workouts. That's the wrong way of thinking about, because then you end up with life and working out and they're separate. They're not separate. They're one and the same. PCP/being healthy is life and life is PCP/being healthy. If try to separate them, you're only going find time for one: life or pcp. But when you realize that pcp is just another part of life and just get in there, that's when you've got it.

During the first month, I kept thinking, "oh in October when I don't have to workout ...". But no, that's not it at all. The 90 days don't matter. Well they do, I'm glad there's only 90 of them, I'm not sure I could pull off 120 or more, but they don't really matter. PCP doesn't end on day 90. By day 91, hopefully we've boosted ourselves up from our old normal to a new better normal so that when we don't have a workout prescribed or our daily grams measured out, we don't go back to our old ways, we start to find our way around daily life at our new, better level of normal.

End philosophisizing - Bicycles today were so hard. I don't know what it was but I was really struggling to get through the last two sets. Also, I did 6 sets of pull-ups with Jordan's help. He definitely had to help me way more at the end at the beginning. Patrick, is that the best way to approach them? Or should Jordan help me as little as possible so that I fail early on and then finish out the rest of the sets as inclined pull-ups?

63. Ch-ch-changes

Posted new pictures. Sorry for slacking about that, there's just something about the whole picture thing that feels weird and vain. But anyways, it's so powerful. Even though I haven't felt like any physical changes have been happening lately they totally have (I don't have a full-length mirror so I pretty much judge day to day progress based on my biceps). I am so much thinner in the hip/thigh/flank region as compared to my pictures up at the top. I'm so much less curvy, which is totally good. I never really minded/cared about being "curvy" but I always felt the my bottom half was out of proportion for my top half. Now things are shuffling out to be more proportional and I like it.

The inner changes are happening too. Yesterday I did 15 pull-ups with a lot of help from Jordan, but that was more than I've done before. I also did the max reps of everything else except the triceps dips. Firefighting class is getting easier too. The first class we did two reps of the run 1/4 mile, 5 floors of stairs, run 1/4 mile circuit, on Saturday we did 3 and on Monday and today we did 4. It's still hard, I still huff and puff and feel like a slow, out of shape, fatty but it's getting better and I recover a lot faster than many of the other folks, even if they're faster than me.

Yay progress. Go Team Badass!!