231

In April, when my family and I initially moved, I was about 250 lbs. I was working out with Darebee workouts, but I wasn't sticking to a diet, whereas before, I was on the Atkins diet, and had gone from 293 to about 250 in a few months' time. Darebee workouts have a level-gauge, to tell you whether, and just how much, they may be suitable for beginners, ranging from level 1 to level 5; they also have 3-5 levels in the exercise itself, pertaining to how many sets you should do (usually, it's level 1 for beginners, level 2 for intermediate, and level 3 for advanced). At the time, I was pushing to do the maximum number of sets, with the minimum rest-time. I was able to do level 1-3 workouts that way, no problem; level 4-5 workouts, I could push through, but I had to cheat (the workouts usually say you can't stop, until the entire circuit of exercises for that set are done; I would occasionally stop to catch my breath, and wait for my heart-rate to settle down).

It's about half-way through the second week of July. My family and I have been homeless, for about the past three months. Originally, we had planned to settle in Columbus, but with our budget being the way it was, what was availble, and how well, or how poorly, the available locations could fit the needs of our family, we had to go from hotels, to campgrounds, and back to hotels, again. During this time, I would take long periods off from exercising, because the area wasn't really suitable for it, or I couldn't get a connection, to get the exercises; when I found a suitable location for exercise, I would take the opportunity to do so. As you can imagine, we've also been eating less, though none of us are starving, by any means.

A couple of days ago, I went to Wal-Mart, to pick up a few things. They have a machine that tests your weight, BMI, heart-rate, vision, etc., and based on those measures, and health-related information you provide, they come up with an assessment of your level of health. I was pleasantly surprised to find that I now weigh 231 lbs., and according to the machine, my level of fitness corresponds to that of the average 33-year-old (two years removed from my current age; I'll let you guess which direction).

On the downside, I was doing a level-5 exercise yesterday, and could barely get through the beginner-level sets, before I had to cheat on it again. I was still doing the exercises, but I had to pause to catch my breath between reps.

Long post, short: I still have a long way to go, but I'm getting there

Awesome work. Sorry to hear of your troubles; hopefully things will start picking up again following November 8th. 

Unrelated note, my heart-rate sped up at the title of this post. 231 was a good friend of mine in Utah; crazy coincidence haha. 

PS: No need to guess; your age is displayed on your Profile.  



--204

My weight's fluctuating between 230 and 240 now, but I figure it's more important to be healthy than to worry about my weight. It's just a nice goalpost to set

Might as well update, since it's been a while on this post...

Last time I weighed myself, I was at 248. It's the comfort food. I'm cutting it out.

Good news is, I'm making progress with my new exercises. I'm in a Defendu group, run by Clint Sporman, and one of the members posted FM 21-20, from 1946. Given my current living conditions, I'm only able to do certain types of exercises - the conditioning exercises, the rifle exercises (with a 10-pound weight, instead of a rifle), the guerrilla exercises, and some of the combatives and boxing drills, - and when I started, I was only able to do 8 reps of the exercises at a time. On the conditioning exercises, I've worked my way up to 13. Some, I have to do with slight pauses between reps, like the jump squats; the manual says to do half as many reps of those as other exercises, but I go for the same number, and it's hard on the knees. My goal is to get to 16, which is the manual's recommended limit, by sometime in January. Once I feel like I've gotten where I want to get with those, I should be in my own place, and I might even be able to get a gym membership, so I can go through the log exercises, running/marching/grass drills, maybe even try some of the "acrobatics".

So, after two and a half months of working at the hotel I'm staying at, I had to quit. It was getting to be too much for me. It's no fun to admit that I couldn't handle it, but when you have to go to the hospital, it's time to do something else. Fortunately, I have the car almost all the way paid off, and I've started a course in chaplaincy to further my skills.

This also gives me time to get back into better shape. I'm currently up to 250, since I had no time to work out. At first, I was working 7 days a week, 8 hours a day steady and then on call after about 4, except for two set times, when I had to do stuff like check vacancies and take out trash. They had moved it to 4 days on, and 3 days off. I was just too worn out, and had too little time, to do any exercise or training. Ironically, I was gaining weight. Now that I have more time, I'm going back to the gym, and have started a new training routine on darebee.com. I'm doing their 60-day "hero program", and when I miss days, I just lump together exercises from the days I miss with exercises from the days when I show up. The exercises are designed for general fitness, with an emphasis in losing weight, and I'm going back on a predominantly low-carb/high-protein diet. I'm working out, ideally, three days per week.

This is motivating, Anyman!

-Omen

Much appreciated, Omen. I don't know why I just found your comment, but it's a nice way to end the evening.

There's a lot to motivate me. I like to think there's a lot out there to motivate us all...

Many changes...

Currently at 273 again, partly due to medication, so the doctor has also prescribed Metformin for me. Working out at a gym, usually doing either weights and cardio machines or a program they call "BodyCombat", which is basically taking a combination of martial arts techniques and standard exercises and using them for cardio, which has always been a personal weakness.

Psychologically, the medicine has very much helped. I'm thinking far clearer than I was before, when everything was automatic and I was filtering my experience of reality through a kind of trance. Looking into the Human Givens approach, I find that their explanation best fits my experience, as their approach sees Schizophrenia and other psychotic disorders as consciously functioning through the REM state. No real HG approach here in America though, so I faced a major fear and started on an antipsychotic, which has helped very much. My mood has improved, my thinking is clearer, moments of clarity have become less unnerving and more frequent, and I'm finally able to become whomever I want to be.

As my academic future is in the toilet, so to speak, due in part to my own folly and in part to circumstances beyond my control, I have found a possible way forward with the path I've chosen. There's an organization called HMI, and at a pace of $98 monthly and one lesson a week for a minimum of 11 months, I can get a diploma in Hypnotherapy from them. I'm already trained in Hypnotherapy, and have since received training in CBT and Solution-Focused Therapy as well, but nothing I can use to get a license; I was never planning to make money with this anyway, but now I figure, why not? If I can get the diploma and use it to get licensing, I can help people both on and off the clock. The only things I don't like about it are that they have quite a bit of focus on NLP, which is considered a pseudoscience, Kappasinian theory (which I guess has been refuted in many points), and energy healing techniques, which I already know only work because they put a person into a trance in which they are receptive to suggestions made by the therapist and their work (basically, Mesmerism). On the plus side, they're an accredited school, and, at least in California, their degree is considered an alternative to a Psychology degree. I figure there are worse ways to spend my money.

Man I wished I weighed that much lol. I've just been wasting away in my bedroom. Down to 150 pounds from 180 pounds. Not in the good way; I'm 5'10" so 175-180 is what I should normally weigh. 

Pretty much just skin and bone now. 

Got a lot of work to do.

My goal is to eventually get down to, and stay at, 200

Nice; that's a good weight. I've tried getting what my family has always called "survivor fat" for years but to no avail; growing up in the arctic I was a bit jealous of my yupik native friends who were so obviously much better designed for an arctic climate. The vast majority of them are naturally "thick". Not really fat though; I'm not sure what the word to describe it is. "Survivor Fat" lol. If a yupik and I were in a survival situation where food was scarce, they'd survive a lot longer than I would because they have more mass for their bodies to cannibalize itself on; they'd probably make it over a week; I dare say perhaps even closer to two weeks. I'd be lucky to last four or five days lol. Something funky with my digestive system; just burns everything up too fast. Yupik metobolisms are naturally slower though from millions of years of evolution in subzero temperatures. My genetic makeup evolved in the plains of Oklahoma. =P

Thought about moving there; curious to see how my body would react to that particular environment. I'd wanna move to Nowhere, Oklahoma because I find the poetic irony hilarious lol. Better than Hell, Michigan. XD

Have you joined weight watchers? Mom's been doing that for months and months now and it's really worked wonders for her.....which kinda irked some of the other weight watchers....which confused me, because I thought that was like, kinda the whole friggin' point lol. But nope....apparently they frown upon losing weight too quickly, so if you do join up, don't do as good a job as you are capable of...I guess? *still scratching my head*

It's a good thought, but I can't afford it. Right now, I'm working on eating right and exercise, and taking Metformin to counteract the medicine's effect of gaining weight

Nice. I'm still malnourished lol. Just don't feel like eating a lot/forget to eat/forget to sleep etc. Kind of a wreck. Really need to get on some kind of a training program myself. =/

I would suggest starting small. Put together a schedule. I forget to do certain things all the time, and having one that reminds me of the seemingly small stuff helps me to better take care of myself. Once you get to where you're doing what you need to do without even thinking about it, a training program could be developed

Nice; thanks for the tip.

Anytime

It's been a while, so here's an update...

Currently hovering close to 300. Terrible weight, yes. Working out every other day, using the weight loss exercises on an app called BodBot. Almost all bodyweight, and burning between 90-500 calories per workout. Cutting down on food, too. Going to the local Y for weights. Someone suggested not doing the treadmill or elliptical, because it's not the same as walking or running, so during nice days, getting cardio by walking a mile with a different dog every third of a mile. It's also a good chance to keep an eye on the neighborhood, especially since drug dealers have moved in. No longer doing handouts for the homeless where they are under the bridge, since one of them stole a bunch of food being given out; instead, there's volunteer work at a local ministry that provides food and clothing for low income residents and homeless people. Having learned NLP, that's being used to help people in need. Looking to get permission to get on a new medication. Basically the same as this one, with an added medicine to lose weight. It might take a while

Glad you’re making progress!

Cool