Tag: exercise

My 600 Lb. Diet – Day 5

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

When I first started doing this, between days 2 and 3, I was often feeling hot, or just plain uncomfortable.  I couldn’t help but wonder if I was literally feeling the burn of calories that my body was doing, as there was no gargantuan excess of calories being consumed like my general living was like before Dr. Nowzaradan.  Granted, the season is in the midst of changing over right now, and temperatures have been swinging pretty hard, but still, I was wondering if the hot sensation I was feeling was like the start of ketosis or something.

I’ve had several friends do keto over the years, and I can’t say that it’s something that I’m particularly interested in trying myself.  However, given the fact that I’ve been minimal on carbs, and having cut sugar outright, I do feel kind of close to a keto diet, minus the fact that I’ve been pounding a large amount of spinach and broccoli throughout the week, since they’re so negligible in calories but high in nutrition.

Either way, five days in, and I have to say that the hardest parts of the day are in the morning, when I’m up at 6:30, and typically have to hold out until around 7:30 so that my daughter and I can eat our respective breakfasts together, and I’ve noticed a slog at around the 4:30-6:30 area, where I feel my energy level getting low regardless of how long I hold my afternoon snack off until.  It’s during these times in which I feel a little sluggish, and my heart tends to beat faster than I think it should when doing things like going up the stairs, or it could be the fact that my toddler is getting heavier or that I’m unfortunately getting weaker, because my already-diminishing muscles are probably eating themselves.

But it’s not that difficult.  The worst meal of the day is lunch, where I eat an entire can of chicken, where I simply get bored of eating just how much of it is packed into a can.  I’ve been leaning heavily on spices and mustard to help get me through them, and I’d never thought mustard could taste so good in my life until it was breaking up the monotony of plain chicken on spinach.

Breakfast – same as day 3
Snack – same as day 1
Lunch – same as day 1
Snack – same as day 1
Dinner – same as day 3

Exercise

  • 100 sit-ups (50, 50)
  • 110 push-ups (20, 30, 30, 30)
  • 2.98 miles (30:16, 399 calories burned)

Supplemental food on account of having run today

  • 1 slice Martin’s whole grain bread + 1/4 cup cottage cheese (155 cal, 12g pro, 48¢)
  • 1 slice Publix honey wheat bread + 1/4 cup cottage cheese (115 cal, 9.5g pro, 27¢)

Total
Meals/Snacks: 1,313 calories, 139.5 grams of protein. Cost: $9.92
Supplemental food: 270 calories, 21.5 grams of protein. Cost: 75¢
Running calories owed: -399 calories
Total sum of day: 1,184 calories, 161 grams of protein.
Cost: $10.67

My 600 Lb. Diet – Day 2

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment
A visual reminder isolated and put up at eye level where I cannot miss it.

Waking up this morning, I felt like I was hit by a ton of bricks.  I’m not sure if this exhaustion was the result of having gotten just five hours of sleep the night prior, or if this was a sign that my body was feeling weak from dropping down to just 1,198 calories the day prior.  Maybe a combination of both.  But I physically felt slower off the blocks this morning than on the first day, and I have to imagine that I was probably still being powered by the death row last meal the night prior to that, as opposed to this morning.

After one day, I do admittedly feel a little sluggish, but I’m hoping this is something that my body can adapt to, and not something that’s going to make me have to tap out way sooner than I had hoped, because as sure as I am that I could power through this, it might not be the best idea in the world to force, because on a daily basis, I am not responsible for taking care of just me, but a toddler as well as a pregnant wife.  And as much as wouldn’t like having to throw in the towel, the obligations to my family are far more important than an experiment for brog content that nobody will ever read.

But otherwise, it’s not so terrible.  There’s some comfort in knowing that I don’t have to think about what the next meal is going to be, because everything is basically planned out, so all I have to do is throw it into a bowl or onto a plate, and then eat, and then be on my merry way onto the next tasks that my day constantly demands. 

The only real restraints I’ve really felt are when I still feel hungry, and my first inclination is to go to the pantry and grab some Oreos or dive into a bag of chips.  I’ll make a first step but then verbally state that I can’t do that, and then instead usually go fill up my water bottle and slam another bottle of water, and end up peeing 50 more times throughout the day.

Also, I have to exhibit a little bit of restraint when prepping food for my kid, like licking a butter knife, after spreading almond butter onto a waffle, or not eating any remnant piece of whatever it is I’m chopping up for her.  It’s not so much staving off temptation as much as it is breaking habits.

Oh yeah, and getting used to my coffee, black.  It’s not that I can’t drink black coffee, but I typically like creamer in it.  The irony is that coffee is kind of an appetite stimulant, so it’s not really a great idea to be drinking it, but at the same time, I’m useless if I don’t drink it, so it’s like a double-edged sword that I need.

Breakfast: Same as Day 1
Snack: Same as Day 1
Lunch: Same as Day 1
Snack: Same as Day 1
Dinner: Same as Day 1

Total

1,198 calories, 122.5 grams of protein.
Total cost: $9.49

Exercise

  • 100 push-ups (70, 30)
  • 70 sit-ups (30, 40)

My 600 Lb. Diet – Day 1

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Despite the fact that the motivation behind this whole experiment is somewhat kind of a joke, I actually was a little excited to get started with it.  No time like the present to start putting my money where my mouth is, and not give myself any time to back out of it.  Especially when the only real result to actually sticking with this is weight loss, and who couldn’t use some weight loss these days?

It’s funny, while I was preparing for the start of this whole thing, the day before I started, I basically ate as if I were on death row.  Cereal that had some chocolate in it, Zaxby’s for lunch along with fried mozzarella bites and then Costco pizza later on for dinner.  A Tim Horton’s copycat iced capp recipe I’d been sitting on for like a year, I urgently went ahead and made it because the leftover heavy cream I had in the fridge would undoubtedly be spoiled if I were to make it 28 days.

But now that the experiment has begun, I am taking this shit seriously.  I hate failing to do the things that I say I will do, and I’m determined to go as long as I can with this, although there are a lot of loose parameters and tightening up of the rules that I need to do along the way.

I want to chronicle the things I’m eating, as well as try and put a price to them, because when watching My 600 Lb. Life, a lot of people try and make excuses of financial reasons why they can’t eat better, but they’re somehow ordering $45 worth of KFC to eat by themselves in a single sitting.  Naturally, I’ll try my best to attach relevant nutritional information, as well as notate if I’m doing any sort of exercise throughout the days.

So without further ado, here is the summary of day 1…

Continue reading “My 600 Lb. Diet – Day 1” →

I’ve done some stupid things in my life

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

But I’m about to do one of the more dumber things that I probably don’t really need to be doing.  Especially when I’m already starting every single day at like an eight out of ten on the stress level as it is.  But who knows, maybe this is something that can serve to be a distraction to how discontent I am with certain aspects of my life, and such would be tremendously welcome to help take my mind off how much my job makes me completely miserable.  But on the flipside, as a result of this little experiment, I might be hangry all the time, and serve to make not just my own life, but those of my wife and child miserable if I’m a torrent of anger all the time.

For the next month, or rather 28 days, I’m going to be embarking on the Dr. Nowzaradan diet plan, of 1,200 calories a day, high protein-low carb.  Or, for however long it takes for me to tap out and give in to the hunger, to which I really don’t want to fail because I don’t like failing in anything that I set out to accomplish.

Why the fuck am I going to be putting myself through this kind of hell?  I don’t weigh 600 lbs. I’m not trying to get weight loss surgery.  But after years of watching My 600 Lb. Life on TLC the greatest network in the history of humankind, I’ve been clowning on the people who appear on the show for ages now.  They’re fascinating specimens of human beings, and it’s not so much of the train wreck of watching another human being that has somehow managed to balloon up to 600+ lbs. as much as it’s always interesting to learn about their history and their mental conditions that led to such horrific downward spirals.

But the fact is that I have been clowning on the vast majority of the people, especially the ones who are quick to say yes, that they can cold turkey embark on the Dr. Now diet of 1,200 calories a day, but then fall so tremendously short of their initial weight loss goals, which has fluctuated between 50 in a month, 60 in two, or for those who really break the scales at first weigh-in, 100 in two.  So, as mythical wife and I were watching the latest episode (S9 E12), and Tammy bungled her way through her first period of time and naturally missed the mark completely, and I asked her, I wonder if I could do the Dr. Now diet?

And just like that, the ball began rolling, and here I am, on the cusp of putting my life into dietary hell, for literally no reason at all other than to see if I can do it.  I spent what little time I had today to do some cursory research on what kind of meals I could be eating, along with what foods I should be avoiding, and I’m more or less prepared to dive right in starting tomorrow, and only time will tell how miserable I’ll be, or how it’s not that hard after all, and perhaps I’ll lose some weight in the process.

Naturally, my goal isn’t just to do the diet, but also to brog about it each and every day, as if I didn’t already have enough things going on in my life to also take a slice of time to throw down some words about the experience.  But who knows, much like the beer testing in December, maybe it’ll encourage me to write more, and maybe I’ll actually spit up some quality words in the process.

So the parameters are quite simple:

  • 1,200 calories a day; most likely spread across three meals, and maybe some compliant snacks, but the end goal is as close to 1,200 calories at the end of the day as possible
  • I will continue doing my usual exercises, which has really been reduced to 100 push-ups a day, and running three miles, typically three times a week
  • I will try my best to document the food that I am eating for each meal, photos if I’m feeling ambitious
  • In the event that I tap out, it will be announced that I have tremendously failed and admit that I’m an asshole who doesn’t actually understand just how hard it is for the people on My 600 Lb. Life to do their thing

But if I do succeed, hopefully I’ll have lost some weight, and maybe have broken some bad habits in the process.  All the same, I’m already thinking of the things that I’ll probably go apeshit on once the diet is off, and the primary reason why I’ve chosen 28 days is that any longer collides with my birthday, and I think the chances are higher that I’d want to indulge in some capacity around then.  Who knows though, either indulging will wreck me, since I’d been eating clean for 28 days, or I’ll have gotten so used to eating clean that I won’t want to break the streak of cleanliness, even for my birthday.

Pour one out for my dead treadmill

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

My treadmill died this weekend.  I feel like I’ve lost a limb.

Ever since the start of the coronavirus pandemic really began, one of the first things to obviously go, was, the gym.  Something that I’d been consistently doing for literally ten straight years, and if I were factoring in the sporadic working out I did intermittently while I was freelance, butted up against the time before that when I was working and had a gym membership, then probably 15 straight years.

It was not an easy pill to swallow, but it was made easier by the fact that it also coincided with the birth of my daughter, so frankly I was too busy to even consider working out in the first place anyway.  But once things starting settling down (for the time being), I began to notice that my shirts were starting to feel a little loose in the arms, and tight in the stomach.  Obviously my body was beginning to revert back to a lesser state because I wasn’t exercising at all, and most definitely not aided by the sleep schedule of a new father.

Eventually, I reached a point where I couldn’t take it anymore, so I dusted off the treadmill that my mother-in-law bequeathed to us, and began running on it.  I remember the first time I really did a lengthy jog on it, I did probably about 40 minutes at a light pace, and I felt absolutely incredible afterward.  I was soaking in sweat but my body felt alive again, and I most definitely felt elation at the endorphins that were popping anew in my system for the first time in a long time.

Needless to say, running, and running on the treadmill has been the only real substantial exercise I’ve been doing since like, April of last year, and it’s been the only real saving grace to my rapidly shrinking and deteriorating physical state, since I haven’t lifted weights in quite literally, almost an entire year.

My angst and rage at the legions of ignorant fucks who couldn’t be bothered to wear masks and eradicate all this bullshit in just a month and that ‘Murica is still in this fucking predicament to where I still can’t work out, knows no end.

Anyway, I eventually settled into a pretty good every-other-day running routine, and I always feel pretty good after running, because as I’ve always stated as one of my personal exercise mantras, is that time is never wasted when exercising.

But a few days ago, I noticed that my treadmill was starting to make a really loud sound.  Typically I wear my AirPods and am often times watching shit on the WWE Network, so I can’t really hear the ambient noise of the treadmill, but when I was winding down, it was noticeably loud.  I chalked it up as an anomaly, and hoped it would be gone the next time I ran.

It wasn’t.  I popped open the mechanical panel, to see if there was anything obvious about why it was making such noise.  Nothing seemed amiss, and I ran it on a low setting, with the panel open to see if there was any loose parts.  If anything at all, it sounded like body noise that was causing things, which I guess with the aging, vibrating, and the fact that I probably run with an elephant’s stride, shit had jarred around throughout its age.

I closed up the panel and decided to just run anyway, and brace occasionally on the console, to see if I could settle the noise down.  It seemed to be okay at first; but then three minutes into my run, everything just kind of clunked to a stop, and I’m surprised I didn’t hurt myself in the process being brought down from 6.5 mph to 0.

I got off the treadmill and watched it abruptly reset and made a noise, reset and make a noise.  Obviously, something was wrong with it, so I pulled the plug.

As far as I can tell, the treadmill was dead.  I haven’t ran since.

Obviously, I’m at a crossroads where I definitely want a new treadmill to replace the dead one, but I’m not sure if I want a fairly inexpensive direct replacement of what just died, which would probably run me around 300-400, but mythical wife is really suggesting that we spring for something way nicer.  But at the same time, I want to believe that maybe 2021 will be a year in which with vaccinations, I might be able to return to a gym, to which in those instances, my running at home will definitely reduce dramatically as I would be working out at gyms again, to which why would I want to have an expensive treadmill collecting dust?

I don’t know, really.  For the time being, I’m going to have to resort to running outdoors again, but I’m at the mercy of the elements, and the fact that there are still occasionally fucks without masks out there, and I definitely don’t want to catch their coronaHIV while I’m just trying to exercise.

But I’m super sad that my treadmill died. 😢