Fed up with the extra of me, time for change

[Storm]

Thanks for the input guys. Cameron's training plan takes care of the muscle grouping for workouts and has the cardio workouts scheduled. For those like me, workout knowledge challenged, it has the schedules all layed out, so for us it's just a matter of doing the exercise substitute for the cable exercises (which I've done with the help of a really detailed weight lifting book) and now it's off to the races.

I just got cleared by the doc to start the plan, and have finally shook the cold, and effects of the vacination shots that were part of this year's physical so it's tme to get down and get sweaty.

Diet wise, we are starting by using a balanced diet, and reducing non complex carbs, we'll work on eliminating these as we progress...baby steps.

We do not have a set time frame for reaching our goals (so there's no rush hence no need to do drastic diet changes), and we both have issues with migraine andhave food triggers, so sudden shifts in diet have to be avoided.

I have pretty well completed the big first step in the right direction....6 weeks no smoking, and the lungs have just about finished cleaning themselves out. I only have two weeks to go on my plan before I can fully claim to be a non smoker.

So things are lookng up and we're heading in the right direction.

Again thanks for the input, and a special thanks to Cameron for the great work he did on his book.

Cheers

Storm

 

[Storm]

Well I guess I was asking too much of the higher powers out there.

Before starting the new physical regime, and modified diet, I had followed the suggestion oin Carmen's book and had a complete physical, including blood work.

Well, I got the call from the doctor's office saying that something came back in the bloo work, and he wanted to see me, but it wasn't an emergency, so we set an appointment for today.

I walk into his office thinking that I was about to get the lecture on HDL vs LDL, and that I would have to change my diet. (Now this was in the pkan anyway, so I thought this was not going to be oine of THOSE doctor's consultation....WRONG.

He didn't like the LDL numbers, and another indicator test came back with some "heads up"numbers....end result.....he put me on Lipitor.

Now there's a blow. Just when I'm ramping up to whip the old me into a new me, I find out that the old me won't go away.

I've already done the research, and am not worried about diving while taking this medication, there appears to be no worries, or at leat none doccumented, but now I've got to re-work the whole diet thing.

Well, no matter how much you try, you can''t ide from your own genetic make up.

 

[coach_izzy]

Well, no matter how much you try, you can''t ide from your own genetic make up.

That does not mean that you have to be chained to it either. If your family tree shows history of lipids and other compounds in the blood, ask yourself how physically ACTIVE those people really were, and how well they managed their nutritional habits.

The genetic background is not a sentence, but rather, a reminder that you may have to have a sligthly different approach.

With regular, challenging exercise (not the rubbish that people engage at most gyms that is, watch tv or read a book while doing it) I do not see why those ugly numbers should drop. I've yet to see the exception. It all boils down on how well you keep those lifestyle changes.

What a shame that your doc put you on Lipitor (did he mention the monthly blood work needed to check for liver deterioration?) instead of trying a few months of good eating and physical activity first.

You go ahead and do your thing. This in no way changes what you're supposed to do. Do it well and you'll join the ranks of those who happily ditched their medications after making progress. Best of luck!

 

[ScubaGypsy]

Storm,

You've certainly received some excellant responses in this thread from a number of true experts. What I have to offer for consideration is that of one in a similar position as you about 2 years ago.

I started back to the "new me" about 2 years ago by using our gym at work. I found that I developed a routine and kept with it though now in retrospect, I really didn't know what I was doing. So last June I hired a personal trainer at a local gym as my thoughts were that once I went a few times then I'd return back to my "free-to-me" gym. I also bought Camerons book and showed it to her to develop a strength training regime for diving. Since then I have been going twice a week, 1 hour per session, and have slowly augmented this training to now include swimming 3-4x per week. I feel great! But what I learned was that I could never reach the potentials on my own without having a trainer. She has been able to vary my routines on every visit while continuing to support the overall exercises that Cameron has suggested. More recently, I have tried to go from 2x per week to 3x per week but have had difficulty in my recovery time. It is true that now at 46 I am not the same as at 36 when I played basketball 1-1/2 hours or more 5-6 days per week! So more recently I have been going 2x per week one week and then 3x per week the next.

I might also add that originally my swimming routine was just endurance to go 1 mile per session with 1-2 sessions per week (and I started by just doing 400 yds per session). More recently I have been changing my routine (again, thanx to Camerons response to my question in another thread) to where now I do endurance swims of 1 mile 2x per week with another 2x per week where I do interval training. In just this past month I am very surprised how much improvement that this new routine is resulting in with respect to my endurance swims.

Though I still mentally try and "push off" maintaining this schedule, I do force myself to go with the knowledge that I am very happy after the lifting and swimming sessions are completed.

This is just a suggestion but it has certainly changed the relaxed lifestyle that I was falling in such that I can keep up with my 3 teenage sons and dive, dive, dive when the opportunities present themselves!