Cory's Quest for a Healthier Life

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-Cory- said:
Being able to pull myself back and make a different choice was hugely positive for me yesterday and I really wanted to take some time to articulate it today, even though I was way too tired to do it last night.
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Oh, well done Cory! It is excellent that you were able to pause & reflect & I too, appreciate you sharing that with us xo
 
Thanks everyone!
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Today was just kind of a neutral day. Nothing really good happened, but nothing really bad happened either. Went to work, went to the gym for zumba, came home and ate dinner. That's about it.

Breakfast - bacon and red pepper frittata - 293 calories
Lunch - salmon patty sandwich with carrot sticks and pickle chips - 564 calories
Dinner - pasta with sausage and eggplant sauce and mixed roasted veggies - 753 calories
Total - 1610 calories

Saved up some calories today so I could afford to have two servings of pasta. I find it really difficult just to have one serving. Skipped any fruit today so I could use it for dinner, which probably shouldn't be an everyday thing but I'm ok with every once in a while.
 
Great job fighting a powerful urge, Cory, everyone here knows that pull isn't some ordinary hunger pang.

Also, good planning on the pasta-fruit front. Maybe next time you can snack on some veggies instead?
 
@LJ: Filling in with veggies is exactly what I did/ Added some to lunch in place of the fruit for a fraction of the calories.
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Today was pretty good all around. Got a raise and a bonus, started learning how to do testing at work, and had a pretty good lifting session. The lifting session started out pretty iffy, but ended well and I learned something from it. This week was the heaviest week in my cycle. I was working up to do a military press at 80 lbs for 5 reps and deads at 155 lbs for 5 reps. I managed to hit 4 out of the 5 reps on military. This is the first time I actually failed a lift. That was really disappointing. But, I waited a couple minutes, made a second attempt, and was successful. I think I'm not letting myself rest long enough in between sets. Usually my rests are 30 seconds or less. My brother told me it should be closer to a minute or two. The rest of the session was good. No problem hitting my deads. Then I enjoyed the warmer weather and took a nice long walk.

Breakfast - overnight oats and blackberries - 468 calories
Lunch - french dip with curly fries - 900 calories
Dinner - falafel wrap with fettoush salad and hummus - 1331 calories
Total - 2619 calories

I decided to have my cheat day of the week today. This is actually the first time I've legitimately eaten above maintenance in a month or more. By the time you account for exercise, I think I'm about 250 calories above my energy expenditure for the day. I also was pretty generous in my estimation of calories for lunch and dinner, so it's possible I ate fewer calories than are listed here. Not sure if I want to eat this much on my next cheat day. Eating at maintenance, but not over seems to be a happy middle ground. I'm a little uncomfortable because of how much I ate today.
 
your brother is correct, your rest is too short. If your looking to add lean muscle then your rest will be between 1-3 minutes, if you are working on strength and the associated heavier weights then your rests will generally be between 3-5 minutes and up to 10 minutes if your working tripples, doubles or singles.
 
@Tru: Yeah, lesson learned there. Especially on a heavy day like that.
@LJ: I completely understand not wanting to fall. I'm just now reaching weights where I understand why I have abs/core programmed in every single day. You really need that stability.
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I've been struggling all day. I've just wanted to eat everything ever in the entire world. I've managed to contain myself for the most part, but I really wanted today to be good because I know this weekend has the high potential to be a train wreck. I also skipped jazz tonight. I'm just really tired today and wanted to get some stuff done before I visit home for the weekend.

Breakfast - grapefruit - 80 calories
Lunch - meatloaf, mixed vegetables, pineapple - 520
Dinner - chicken tacos, tortilla chips, salsa - 961 calories
Snacks - Reese's cups - 210 calories
Total - 1771

I'm making my mom a chocolate cake with peanut butter frosting and chopped up Reese's cups on top. It's her birthday this weekend, so I know Saturday is likely to be REALLY heavy on the food. I'm also assisting at a Strongman event that day and there's almost always food at those things too. I feel pretty sure that Saturday is going to be a really high calorie day. I kind of wish I had planned ahead better and used my cheat day this week for then. I'll either have to accept the calories and what it will do to my weight loss or just accept it as a bad day and move on. I don't think tomorrow will be bad. I know that there will be soup for dinner. One bowl without cheese or crackers is about 200 calories. I'm thinking I'll eat a big lunch (some kind of buffet or a large lunch platter of some kind) around 11 to tide me over through the drive. One large meal plus a 200 calorie one isn't bad. It's basically the same as when I do Indian buffet and then eat a piece of fruit at night and that pretty routinely has me at a deficit. I don't think Sunday will be bad either.


Ok......now that I look at it, the only day likely to be bad is Saturday. I can live with that.
 
Ok, the whole weekend was pretty much a 90 car pile up. I won't list everything, but a few of the highlights are Chinese food, jellybeans, cake, and a sandwich the size of a small child. But, I went into it kind of knowing it was going to be like that so I guess I can't complain too much. I did not drink any soda nor any alcohol, which most of my friends and family can't say. I guess that's a win. I'm not going to dwell on it. I've decided to give up my cheat day this week to try and compensate. Not sure where my weight is sitting. I'm kind of afraid to weigh myself after all the salt I had over the weekend. Back to the grind tomorrow!

EDIT: I also meant to add in some info about the strongman. I manned the door and took donations/entrance fees. The whole thing was to raise money for a local no-kill animal shelter. My brother manage 14 clean and presses and a 610 lbs tire deadlift (!!!!). He didn't do so well on the tire flip, but that's mostly because he's a short guy and the tire was too tall for him to be able to maneuver well. Farmer's Walk and the Hussafel stone went well. Atlas stones were ok, but not great. It was his first strongman though, so I think he'll do pretty well next time if he can take away some things from this competition. I'm so proud of him. :]
 
That must have been fun to watch, I didn't realize your brother competed. Back when I could do it (pre-children), I would nurse my New Years Day hangovers by watching legacy Strong Man marathons on ESPN8 ("The Ocho!"), with competitors like Magnus Magnusson (a fun name to say constantly for Americans), and Lou Ferrigno (aka. 80s iconic Incredible Hulk).
 
@Lama: It was a lot of fun and I'm so happy I got to watch my brother.
@LJ: This was actually his first strongman, although he's done highland games in the past. He and I used to watch World's Strongest Man all the time. It would come on during the summer when we were out of school, so I am familiar with those guys. Brian Shaw has been America's boy wonder for the last several years. He's a really big, really strong dude.
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Did pretty well today, although I will fully admit that my body felt like an old dumpster all day. This makes sense considering I basically spent all weekend treating it like one. Today is supposed to be zumba/hiphop night but it was canceled due to the impending weather. For those who down know, the East coast of the US is being hit with a pretty sizeable winter storm right now. I just decided to move my lifting day to today and then I can catch up on zumba on Wednesday when the snow will hopefully be cleared. It's a deload week, so my weights were pretty light.

Bench: 60 lbs 3x5
Squats: 85 lbs 3x5

I also did some various assistance work. Next week I'll add weight to my training max and a new cycle will start.

Breakfast - none
Lunch - turkey meatloaf, carrot sticks, and pineapple - 553 calories
Dinner - baked fish with roasted vegetables and blackberries - 590 calories
Snack - peanut butter - 300 calories
Total - 1443 calories

Couldn't resist the peanut butter today. Thankfully I had the calories left for it.
 
-Cory- said:
nd a sandwich the size of a small child.
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Ohhh, this made me smile. Well done on getting back to healthy foods, lovely Cory xx
 
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