The Journey Back - Day One
I read in a Face Book status message that all of the gyms are packed with people. The reason? It is because everybody has begun their New Year's Resolutions. I don't believe in New Year's Resolutions, so I don't make them. I did, though, decide to head back to the gym - not because it was a new year, but because my back is doing well enough for me to return to the land of the living. I would have been there on January 1st or even the 2nd but I caught a cold and, like most men, I turn into a big baby when I am sick. So I've been in bed, pouting and letting Pat take care of me. It made me sad, being sick; but not going to the gym made the sadness worse. So today I was determined to get there - and I was going to do it at my preferred time: 6am.
I set my alarm for 5am. I woke up at 4:30. I did some housework, some desk work and I soaked in epsom salt for awhile - not for soreness but to get warm (I don't handle the cold well) and to get these muscles, who haven't worked out in three months (except for one day, about a week ago, when I went to the gym to test my ability to train), ready to get back to training.
At 6am, I walked in the door of the New York Sports Club.
I used to keep a workout journal on Facebook. I programmed it so that the only people who could see it were me, Pat, Hunter, Lisa-Gabrielle and Kelly. These were facts and thoughts that I really didn't feel the general populace should be privvy to. Since I recently went public with a story about my eating disorder, I figure, why not stay public? After all, your story cannot help anyone if the only person who reads it is you.
So, what I admitted in my haphazard, stream of conscious, story about my battle with compulsive eating, manorexia, dysmorphia and obsessive training is that I kept a strict diet and exercise program for 7ish years and that for about 2 years I have eaten whatever I wanted and that for 3 months I have lifted not one weight. I am, essentially, starting from square one. I refuse to weigh myself, out of humiliation. I refuse to do a 'before' picture, out of vanity. The rest, though, is open season.
December 3rd:
45 minutes cardio; cross-trainer.
650 calories burned.
I sweated a lot and got extremely puffed; but the good news is that my back and all my joints got through without incident! The music that helped me push through: selections from the new GODSPELL cast album, Laura Benanti's recording of CHICAGO, Naya Rivera and Amber Riley's recording of RUMOR HAS IT/SOMEONE LIKE YOU, selections from Mary J. Blige's EACH TEAR, Mike Reim's remix of Katy Perry's THE ONE THAT GOT AWAY, The Wanted's ALL TIME LOW, the Rafael Lelis Club Mix of Whitney Houston's I DIDN'T KNOW MY OWN STRENGTH and Dave Aude's Radio Edit of Beyonce's HALO (which I could listen to on a loop all day).
Confession: I don't always stretch.
New Rule: I will stretch for at least 10 minutes after every workout. At least 10 minutes. I will also hang upside down for as long as I can, to help my spine re-align itself, daily.
Now. About food. In the past couple of days, I've begun to eat the way I used to. I am determined to get back to being Bulldozer. It's going to take baby steps, though. I can't eat like a regular person for 2 years and then go eggwhite, cold turkey.
Having read that a person should eat before working out, I usually have a bit of something to give me strength. Today I went for some yogurt; preferred brand: THE GREEK GODS TRADITIONAL GREEEK YOGURT. Preferred flavour: Honey. This food item is a real bugaboo for me. I can knock off a 24 oz. container in less than five minutes, flat, and follow it up with another 24 oz. container. I can also not start one of these containers without finishing it. It's a bizarre head fuck thing. I told Pat about it and he told me I was, truly, bizarre. I have to have a brand new, pristine, container - when the lid is taken off, the top of the yogurt has to be completely flat and smooth, like ice on a winter pond in Vermont. I have to break the skin on top - I cannot eat one of these yogurts if it is not smooth and flat or if someone else has broken the skin or if it has been stirred up. Once broken, the top must be eaten along the perimeter until there is no yogurt touching the plastic of the container. I continue to eat around the perimeter, in a circle until there is an expanse of emptiness from the plastic, inward, and there is a tower of yogurt in the middle of the tub. Then, I eat downward, where I have been eating already, until the tower threatens to fall; so I eat the tower. By then, there is nothing left but a shallow pool of yogurt from 3/4's of the way into the container, to the bottom - and this bit of yogurt always seems to be really, really cold; so it has to go. Not content to waste one drop, I get a butter knife and scrape the edges and get the bottom of the container with the spoon.
Did I mention that I have an eating disorder? And, ps, this is not the only food that has to be eaten a certain way. You should hear how I used to eat a box of Entenman's donuts.
Pat had some tummy trouble yesterday, so he went to the store for some yogurt. I could have told him to just buy for himself; but I didn't. I had him get me one, too.
That yogurt that I ate before the gym had:
960 calories
60 grams fat
150 mg cholesterol
390 mg sodium
90 grams carbohydrate
90 grams sugar
24 grams protein.
Now. Let's all put on our common sense cap, shall we? When I compulsively sucked back that yogurt, in all its' delicious glory and creamy goodness, was I doing myself a favour or a disservice?
I think it is time to put the kibosh on the yogurt. It's going to hurt and it's going to be hard. But there is a slogan that was used on the movie poster for COCO BEFORE CHANEL that is a philosophy in which I believe, firmly. I have to focus on those words, to get where I want to be.
It is 8:18 am. I wonder what the rest of the day will hold. I shall check back in tonight.
I set my alarm for 5am. I woke up at 4:30. I did some housework, some desk work and I soaked in epsom salt for awhile - not for soreness but to get warm (I don't handle the cold well) and to get these muscles, who haven't worked out in three months (except for one day, about a week ago, when I went to the gym to test my ability to train), ready to get back to training.
At 6am, I walked in the door of the New York Sports Club.
I used to keep a workout journal on Facebook. I programmed it so that the only people who could see it were me, Pat, Hunter, Lisa-Gabrielle and Kelly. These were facts and thoughts that I really didn't feel the general populace should be privvy to. Since I recently went public with a story about my eating disorder, I figure, why not stay public? After all, your story cannot help anyone if the only person who reads it is you.
So, what I admitted in my haphazard, stream of conscious, story about my battle with compulsive eating, manorexia, dysmorphia and obsessive training is that I kept a strict diet and exercise program for 7ish years and that for about 2 years I have eaten whatever I wanted and that for 3 months I have lifted not one weight. I am, essentially, starting from square one. I refuse to weigh myself, out of humiliation. I refuse to do a 'before' picture, out of vanity. The rest, though, is open season.
December 3rd:
45 minutes cardio; cross-trainer.
650 calories burned.
I sweated a lot and got extremely puffed; but the good news is that my back and all my joints got through without incident! The music that helped me push through: selections from the new GODSPELL cast album, Laura Benanti's recording of CHICAGO, Naya Rivera and Amber Riley's recording of RUMOR HAS IT/SOMEONE LIKE YOU, selections from Mary J. Blige's EACH TEAR, Mike Reim's remix of Katy Perry's THE ONE THAT GOT AWAY, The Wanted's ALL TIME LOW, the Rafael Lelis Club Mix of Whitney Houston's I DIDN'T KNOW MY OWN STRENGTH and Dave Aude's Radio Edit of Beyonce's HALO (which I could listen to on a loop all day).
Confession: I don't always stretch.
New Rule: I will stretch for at least 10 minutes after every workout. At least 10 minutes. I will also hang upside down for as long as I can, to help my spine re-align itself, daily.
Now. About food. In the past couple of days, I've begun to eat the way I used to. I am determined to get back to being Bulldozer. It's going to take baby steps, though. I can't eat like a regular person for 2 years and then go eggwhite, cold turkey.
Having read that a person should eat before working out, I usually have a bit of something to give me strength. Today I went for some yogurt; preferred brand: THE GREEK GODS TRADITIONAL GREEEK YOGURT. Preferred flavour: Honey. This food item is a real bugaboo for me. I can knock off a 24 oz. container in less than five minutes, flat, and follow it up with another 24 oz. container. I can also not start one of these containers without finishing it. It's a bizarre head fuck thing. I told Pat about it and he told me I was, truly, bizarre. I have to have a brand new, pristine, container - when the lid is taken off, the top of the yogurt has to be completely flat and smooth, like ice on a winter pond in Vermont. I have to break the skin on top - I cannot eat one of these yogurts if it is not smooth and flat or if someone else has broken the skin or if it has been stirred up. Once broken, the top must be eaten along the perimeter until there is no yogurt touching the plastic of the container. I continue to eat around the perimeter, in a circle until there is an expanse of emptiness from the plastic, inward, and there is a tower of yogurt in the middle of the tub. Then, I eat downward, where I have been eating already, until the tower threatens to fall; so I eat the tower. By then, there is nothing left but a shallow pool of yogurt from 3/4's of the way into the container, to the bottom - and this bit of yogurt always seems to be really, really cold; so it has to go. Not content to waste one drop, I get a butter knife and scrape the edges and get the bottom of the container with the spoon.
Did I mention that I have an eating disorder? And, ps, this is not the only food that has to be eaten a certain way. You should hear how I used to eat a box of Entenman's donuts.
Pat had some tummy trouble yesterday, so he went to the store for some yogurt. I could have told him to just buy for himself; but I didn't. I had him get me one, too.
That yogurt that I ate before the gym had:
960 calories
60 grams fat
150 mg cholesterol
390 mg sodium
90 grams carbohydrate
90 grams sugar
24 grams protein.
Now. Let's all put on our common sense cap, shall we? When I compulsively sucked back that yogurt, in all its' delicious glory and creamy goodness, was I doing myself a favour or a disservice?
I think it is time to put the kibosh on the yogurt. It's going to hurt and it's going to be hard. But there is a slogan that was used on the movie poster for COCO BEFORE CHANEL that is a philosophy in which I believe, firmly. I have to focus on those words, to get where I want to be.
It is 8:18 am. I wonder what the rest of the day will hold. I shall check back in tonight.
Thanks for stopping by.
posted by StephenMosher at 8:19 AM
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