Indeed, it sucked.

I did the juice. For a while.

As you may have guessed from the last entry, the green juice was indeed a problem. I just couldn't get past the taste and smell. The real nutrition is in the green juices; the kale, the chard, the spinach and so forth. I like these things. But, when you juice them, all you get is the concentrated chlorophyl and it smells and tastes like fresh mowed grass. I'm sure that smells delightful, to a cow, but I'm not much of a fan of grass to begin with, drinking the stuff was hard! Toward the end I was burying the chard and kale behind enough fruit that I could drink it, but I was worried about the sugar numbers and my diabetes.

The juices were filling, but not satisfying. I spent the whole week fixated on cheeseburgers. Weird, but it was where my head was at. With them being filling, with my fears of bumping my sugar with the fruit juices and with the gross-out factor on the green juices, I found myself often coming in at or below 1200 calories for the day. Not good. Starving myself was not an option.

I started to get some … cramps. Maybe not cramps, maybe spasms is a better word. The deal is that a muscle would contract and not release. It wasn't painful, it was sudden and alarming. Last Friday night, while in bed, my thigh flexed and wouldn't release. I kicked out my leg to try to get it to un-flex and the whole leg fired off: thigh, calf, foot and even my toes, all flexed and wouldn't relax. This lasted for over a minute while I lay there wondering what I was going to do? I don't know if it was lack of calories, lack of sodium, lack of potassium or what - but this freaked me out.

Nine days in and I was done with the 15 day juice fast.

That's the bad news. The good news came when I got on the scale Monday morning and saw that I had dropped 20 pounds. Well, I guess it's good news. Certainly seemed like a scary way to do it at the time.

In the process of all of this, I started a food diary out at MyFitnessPal. I've been keeping track of exactly what I'm eating - like I did out here years ago. It also keeps track of my exercise. It's not as good as Fitocracy for exercise tracking, but the food diary has really helped me see and control what I eat. I have even squeezed in some fast food - but I have found myself repeatedly playing with the fast food options before going to get the food. (The smaller fries, one burger instead of two ...) Yesterday I played with it until I decided to go home and eat something I already had that was better for me - saved myself 500 calories in the process.

In a few weeks I will get back on the scale. Sooner if I find myself waning. I've had some soymilk and I'm about to go make myself an omelet - all of which will get into the diary. I want the sacrifices I made on that juice fast to indeed be a reboot and to keep these good numbers going. I'm tired of being fat, sick and nearly dead.

I want to be healthy.

The Fast & the Furious

After some convincing, I sat down and watched the movie "Fat, Sick & Nearly Dead." It's a good flick, I recommend it - whatever your health level.

I have been thinking about a vegetarian diet or a juicing diet for a while. I'm a Midwestern meat eater to the core, but I am so struggling with getting the weight off, maybe it was time to change my attitude entirely.

As I sat watching the movie, I had a couple of things going through my mind. First, Joe Cross - the producer and focus of the movie, is a shill. Nothing wrong with that, but it's good to know when someone has something to sell. The difference: Joe lost a great deal of weight using his own method and we got to see that in the movie. Quite the product demonstration. Joe is pushing a lot of juicers for Breville!

But, Joe wasn't the most convincing part of the movie for me. The one that made me damn near cry was a guy named Phil. Phil was a trucker, so, like me, he has a sedentary job. Phil was an inch shorter than me and thirty pounds lighter. But, when he took off his shirt - that was my body! In the course of 10 months of a fruit & veggie juice fast, Phil lost 200 pounds. He checked with his doc every few weeks and was healthy all the way.

A few days later I bought a juicer.

This last week I have weaned myself off normal food. I filled my fridge with fruit and vege. I've added juice here and there to supplement my meals. Yesterday I was entirely vegetarian. Last night, I had my first "Green" juice; Kale, Cucumbers, Celery and Apples - it wasn't the best, I should have added some lemon and maybe some ginger. Today is the first day of juice only. I've had Carrot & Orange for breakfast, I have the rest of the green juice I made last night for lunch (I'll get through it somehow) and then I will buy more veggies and juice something good for dinner.

While researching this, I was shocked by how much protein these juices have. The whole thing about concentrating all those veggies and fruit down to just the juice, getting rid of the insoluble fiber, really makes a glass of nutrition. The pic above is my first juice creation: Carrot & Apple in a reusable cup. It was really good and very sweet! (Maybe too sweet. Gotta watch that.) The juicing is easy and even kinda fun, but it's messy. The machine gets coated! It's like cleaning out a lawn mower. And, on top of that, I have had several spills - my kitchen is VERY clean, if a little sticky, in a few spots!

I can't do this forever, it is indeed a "reboot" - right now I am shooting for 15 days. If I can get through to end of day on Friday April 6th, I will consider fasting further. I'd like to go as long as I can and lose as much as I can, but anything would be good. However, it won't be easy. Last night I left work late, I was very hungry and all I wanted to do was pull through a drive-thru. I counted them off as I went home: KFC, BK, Wendy's, McDonalds, Taco Bell, Jack in the Box, another Micky D's - but I bypassed them all and went home for my poorly made Kale juice. I'm a good boy. Today at work, my stomach is growling and the VPs are walking around passing out pastries. Where were the Veeps with pastries last Friday??

I will need to keep going to the gym, but with a different attitude. I'm likely going to lose some muscle in all of this. So, I want to make sure it comes off my legs and not my heart. Good, solid - but not insane, cardio. I'll keep my half hour on the treadmill in the morning. I want to add some light upper body. I want to start going swimming at night, if nothing else to keep me from sitting in front of the TV wishing I was munching on something, or worse - finding something to munch on. No munching! No chewing for 15 days!!

So, I am going for this. I am being careful. I'll see my doc eventually. If anything changes, you know from reading here I'll stop. If I need more food, I'll drink more - there's no possible way I can drink the calorie levels I currently eat. I want this to work.

The Veeps are standing outside my cube right now with huge boxes of pastries from Panera. Uuugh! This is gonna suck ...

Sometimes the Answer is "F*** You!"

I figured out why my gout was kicked off by the whey protein powder. The answer sucks.

The other day I heard a segment on NPR about yogurt. It reminded me that I used to eat a lot of yogurt. I like yogurt. I miss yogurt. I gave up yogurt when I realized I was lactose intolerant.

The NPR segment claimed yogurt was good for the lactose intolerant set. Really?

So, I set out on a scouting mission around the Internet to see if this was correct. Sure enough, several sites extolled the virtues of yogurt. The bacteria that makes yogurt breaks down the milk proteins, making them more edible for those with milk allergies and it breaks down the lactose into a substance that is great for maintaining colon health: lactic acid.

ACID. Whenever I see that word these days I stop in my tracks. Uric acid is the gout culprit. But, any kind of acid will make the kidneys work harder and can allow lactic acid to build up.

This got me thinking: What's the effect of lactic acid on gout? I was right to fret, it will interfere with the kidneys processing uric acid.

Then I thought: Lactic acid in whey protein powder? Yup! They use bacteria, much as they do in yogurt, to break down the proteins. This makes the protein more "bioactive" - easier to digest and thus easier to get the most bang for the buck. Which is great and all, except for the fact that those little bacteria make lactose into lactic acid. Razzlefarking-summaglitchin-grumblegrumblegrumble .... !

In conclusion: I still cannot drink milk. I still can't eat yogurt. I can't eat whey powder. And, likely, my colon is going to fall out.

That is all.

Screw everything, except consistency.

I have repeatedly failed to achieve success, so, it's time to change priorities. How's that for sounding like a politician?

I'm 40 years old. I weigh @475 (haven't gotten on a scale in forever) - the simple truth is that I may never be able to fix my body, repair the damage done. I could very easily have a heart attack tomorrow. My body is very messed up, as anyone who has read this blog is surely aware.

Constantly starting and ending diets and exercise programs, for whatever reason, is at best frustrating. It's likely doing more harm than good.

I need to find a simple, consistent routine. Routine gets a bad rap - but my routine, my bad habits, is what got me where I am. I think routine is the path out. A diet and exercise program that becomes routine isn't a diet and exercise program anymore - it's a life style change. Can you think of anyone more in need of a life style change than I?

This morning's Treadmill Revelations:

1. Food is not a form of entertainment.
2. Exercise is not a form of entertainment.
3. I get as many endorphins from a half hour on the treadmill as a half hour lifting weights and the treadmill is simpler - just walk.
4. Lifting weights is no more or less entertaining than the treadmill, see #2.
5. The goal, right now, is weight loss. The diabetes, the congestive heart failure, the sleep apnea - all of these are related to the 300 extra pounds I'm carrying.
6. When I weigh 200 pounds, I can care about finding entertaining exercise and general fitness. I'm a drowning man, worrying that my clothes are wet is a distraction.
7. I'd rather never lose weight than continue to stop and start diets and workouts because of sickness, injury, frustration, depression, blah, blah, blah. Eating a salad and thinking about my next workout is better than eating a candy bar and wishing I could lose some weight.
8. I'm sick and tired of the "I've just changed my diet and my body is revolting" aspect of dieting. Every time I start dieting or change my diet, my body decides it's time to camp on the couch, or camp in the bathroom! (As for the protein powder, well, it kicked off my gout. It shouldn't, but it did. There is some anecdotal evidence that I'm not the only one with this problem.)

Eat right, get on the treadmill - everyday. K.I.S.S.

First week @40

Sunday was my 40th birthday. Yeah, I'm old, whatever. I was "old" at 20 ... chronological age means nothing. You're as old as you feel, I feel like a dinosaur and always have.

It feels like I should mark this occasion. Celebrate my survival or something. But, in my case, my survival is simply staying out of the path of danger. I like to see risky situations from miles away. People that go to NASCAR make me cringe. Breathing noxious fumes may be worse than the possibility of a flaming race car tumbling into the stands - you can run from that, see it on-coming.

Beyond all of that, I've made some changes to my diet and lifestyle. I'm just hoping I can hold onto them. Today is the 9th. So far I have been to the gym everyday this month, save one, and even God rested on the Sabbath. My goal is to hit the gym every business day and most weekend/holidays. I went to the gym on my birthday!

I've also changed my gym habits. I'm doing more weight training. My boss, GmrGirl, is also my trainer and defacto nutritionist. (She can be your trainer, too.) We started getting me to do some lifting last week. She also ran my numbers when I began complaining that going to the gym and my 2000 calorie diet were showing poor results on the scale. Her point: I'm no longer sedentary. I need to eat. She wants me to do 3000 calories a day. Adding 1k of calories without adding carbs isn't easy!

My diet is now much larger. I've added an armload of fruit, less salads, more lean meat and I bought $150 of protein powder the other night. The easiest to find protein powder is Whey protein. Whey comes from milk. I'm lactose intolerant - so I figured this was a no-go. But, it turns out, the highest quality whey powder (and thus the most expensive) is also the lowest in lactose. That also makes it the lowest carb. So, I have two five pound jars of protein powder in my kitchen. Should last me a month or so the way I have been using it.

In short, lots of changes. I'm hoping, as always, to just keep the momentum. At this point, I might get on the scale toward the end of the month - maybe. My body is about to make some big changes if I can keep this up and not a lot of progress will show up on the scale. Two or three months from now, again, if I can keep this up, the scale will show drastic results ... or so I hope.

Disappointment & Anger

I know, long time since I've written out here.

And, I'm not looking for sympathy or advice, I just want to get this off my chest. Usually if I can write something out, I can figure it out. Or at least remove the drek so I can figure the rest of it out.

For those that don't know, I started a new job. Love the job for a lot of reasons. One of the cool perks about the job is that there is a gym right in the building. Good equipment and good showers - takes away a lot of excuses. Further, my boss, GmrGirl, is a professional personal trainer. Most of the team I work with is doing some form of fitness. It's a real pile of positive reinforcement.

So, yeah, I'm been dieting and working out for over a month. For my long time readers, you know that getting diet and gym together at the same time is pretty rare for me. I've been doing pretty good. Limited, minor cheats. I haven't seen a candy bar or a snack cake in well over a month. If I want sweet - I eat fruit. Low carb, lots of veggies. Two or so hours a week in the gym. I'm doing the treadmill for an hour at a time. Days between treadmill workouts, I've been doing more and more knee-push ups and ab crunches. I've tested my blood sugar every couple of days, haven't seen anything above 115. Really, I've been doing well.

I got on the scale a week or so after I started. 476 - no shock, that seems to be my "resting" weight. I decided to wait two weeks before I got back on the scale - I wanted a big number. I got 470. For a man that's used to drops of 10 pounds a week or more early in a diet, 6 pounds over two weeks seems pretty miniscule.

I decided to wait another two weeks. The gym thing is probably just balancing out the weight loss, right? Maybe I put on some muscle. (Felt like a lie, but it got me back to the gym, so, what the hell?)

This morning I got back on the scale. 469. Two weeks, one pound.

I'm angry. I'm disappointed. One pound. I had hope with how easy it's been to fall back into a diet and dive into the gym, that I would be able to hit 400 pounds by my birthday. If I'm only going to lose 2 pounds a month, I don't see that happening. I won't break 460 by my birthday.

Maybe I am putting on muscle, but MAN! - that's a lot of muscle, awfully quick. Seriously, even a normal dieter looking to lose 30 or 40 pounds can expect to lose one to two pounds a week. I need to lose 270+ pounds. I have huge fluid buildups my doc swears will depart as I exercise - I'm not seeing it. I'm on Januvia, which as we've seen before, results in large weight drops. Am I putting on five pounds of muscle a week? For a man with only 25% of the testosterone he should have, I find that unlikely.

And, OH! - The Dreadmill. The time passes more and more slowly every time I get on it. I spent four days on it this morning. I'm getting up at 5 AM, busting my hump, eating like a rabbit and I lost a pound in two weeks.

I'm tired, I'm angry, my feet hurt ... I just want to go crawl under my bed, even though I wouldn't fit.

Have no frets. I did the Dreadmill this morning. I am about to start the day with a big heaping Slim Fast bar. Lunch will be a salad - no meat - from BK. Dinner will be pretty much the same. Tomorrow will be similar. And the next day. I'm gonna keep going. I know it's the right thing to do even if the scale isn't showing it. I just prefer to see results for my efforts.

Disappointed

I stayed on the diet and put on six pounds. Terrific.

Friday, I had the shakes again even though I stopped for lunch while I was out delivering my papers.

I'm very confused. Are my portions too big? Too much salt? Not enough water? I certainly haven't gotten to the gym.

Disappointed … but not defeated.