Mickey18

You are literally one of my favorite people on this site right now. I love that I found someone who shares similar goals and similar experiences who I can ask questions without worrying about being a pest. I think, after reading the resources that you and IslandGirl_Beck shared, I'll give the Zone diet a try! Like you said, it'll be hard to go from counting calories to this, but hopefully it'll be more worth my while. I hope your six-week challenge keeps going well, and I will continue to follow your thread and keep up with your adventures to becoming a Super Saiyan!

This topic = my life. I recently decided I wanted to "go for the gains" because I consider myself pretty lean from my fitness journey thus far and really want to get some serious muscle definition. I've been an obsessive calorie counter for years, and though I want to start using MFP so bad, I'm also really worried about getting obsessive. For those of you who do food journals, do you just write down what you eat, or do you use a program like MFP that tracks your calories as well? (I know some of you have commented above that you use MFP, that question is more geared towards those of you who just said you use a food journal without much other specification.) For all of you, how do you figure out your maintenance intake? Thanks! Subbing for all the useful inspiration here already!

So if you don't count calories anymore, do you just eat whenever you feel hungry, as long as it's Paleo? I'm sorry if it sounds like I'm being scrutinizing or if I'm pestering you, because that's not what I'm trying to do. I'm just really curious-- this site has already taught me so much in such a short amount of time being on the forums, and it's caused me to re-evaluate everything from my workouts to keeping track of my nutritional needs. I have been an obsessive calorie-counter in the past as well (stemming from having an eating disorder, like you did), but I know it's causing all kinds of unneeded stress in my life and would love to find a way to break away from that while still meeting my gaining goals (which are also similar to yours). You are so lucky to have a personal trainer/fitness guide; I have to figure this out all on my own, and it's frustrating. Seriously, though, props on the progress you've made. It sounds like you're happy and that things are going well.

There is one week about every five weeks (in the weights class) where we do circuits of power clean, squats, bench press, and dumbbell exercises, but the other weeks (with the 3x10, 10-8-6-4-2, etc) we have more isolated workouts. For example, if my group starts out with squats on Monday/Thursday, we'll do power clean as well (making that "leg day") and then Tuesday/Friday we'll do bench press and dumbbell ("upper body" day). Then there's the Wednesday circuit, which seems like I explained it well enough that I didn't confuse you. Lol Genetically, I have naturally bigger/thicker bones and muscles. My initial goal when I began to get in shape was to get lean, and I feel like I'm pretty lean now and would like to get muscular. I've never been scrawny and am happy with the progress, so I would really like to bulk up without gaining fat. I mean, I've been warned that I may gain a little fat, but I would like to keep my bf% as low as possible. I understand most people only lift weights 3-4 times a week, as is recommended, but work out six days a week. What kind of exercises could I do on non-lifting days to craft a six-days-a-week schedule like this? Also, on "rest" days, is light activity recommended-- such as a leisurely walk or bike ride-- or should I just take a complete break from exercise? I really hope I'm making sense; I feel like I'm all over the place and am not clearly expressing what I'm trying to say. If you need elaboration, please feel free to ask.

This is what my previous post was in response to:

Fair warning, this is going to be long. Hope you're comfy. For my weightlifting class, we generally stick to four basic moves when in the weight room-- squat, power clean, bench press, and dumbbell exercises. We record every lift we do, and every week, we rotate how we do these moves. For example, the first week, we'll do 3x10 exercises, then 10-8-6-4-2 (the even numbers are the rep numbers; this amounts to five sets), then 4x6, then 5-4-3-2-1. The week after completing this, we'll do circuits of the four aforementioned moves. Mondays, Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Fridays are weight room days, matched up Monday-Tuesday and Thursday-Friday (two moves per day). For example, if Monday is squat/power clean day for my group of four girls, then Tuesday will be bench press/dumbbell lifts. We also do a heart-pumping warm up each day, which varies. Wednesdays are either circuits (deadlifts, light clean and jerks, and straight legs usually) or a fitness test (shuttle run, bench or squat or power max, jump test, etc) followed by a game like dodgeball or kickball. Me and another girl who don't do contact sports will jog stair laps while the game is being played. Now, what I usually do exercise-wise per day is as follows: after waking up, I'll do a 5-minute Pilates ab routine (supplemented with planks before and after) to wake me up. Then, I'll go to school and do the weights class workout. After I get home at about 3:30 to 4, I do a five-minute cardio session (I'm not sure how to describe this; it's a workout alternating between mountain climbers and good mornings, going down by even numbers-- 20 reps of each, then 18 reps of each, then 16, and so on until you've completed 2 of each move or the five minutes is up). Later in the evening after supper, I'll sometimes do the Nerd Fitness 20-minute hotel room workout with a short ab workout of my own creation. Whether or not I do the hotel workout, I'll always do the ab supplement. Also, I try to stand and move around for as much as possible during the day-- I get fidgety after sitting for too long! Like I said, I'm pretty sure it's too much exercise, but I'm not sure how to cut back or what to do. After doing a bit of research and deciding to begin bulking, I've been looking into what exercises I should be doing, but have so far found mostly vague answers ("it's only too much if you feel like it's too much"). I'm trying to let go of the fear and just experiment, but it's hard jumping into something and not knowing if my work will be fruitful or not. I try to drink lots of water. Today, for example, I drank two 24-oz. containers of regular water and that's not counting the water from the veggies and (black) coffee I've consumed. Aaaand that concludes my extremely winded post.

Good to hear the beginning of your challenge is going well! So, now that you're bulking and have to eat more calories, did you go straight to 2.5k? Or are you weaning into it? I read on a website about bulking that increasing calories should be eased into-- 200 cal a week for men and about 100 cal a week for women-- so I'm interested to hear what your trainer told you. I'm just as new to bulking as you are and am trying to figure this whole thing out. Also, you said your workouts underwent a serious change as well and that you used to do HIIT and interval training every day, twice a day. What do you do now? (I mean, I know it's strength stuff. Obviously. )

Progress Report, Day Two (Jan. 11, 2015) As stated above, I'm now gaining instead of cutting, which means I'm now shooting for around 2.5k calories per day instead of the 1.4-1.8 range I tried to keep myself in before. I ate mindfully at every meal today, except going to BWW with the fam for lunch proved to be a bit of a challenge in the mindful-eating department. We had to eat-and-run, so I had to eat a bit faster than I would have ideally liked. However, I didn't touch the appetizer of chips and cheese dip my family ordered-- a former weakness of mine-- so I count that as a win! However, this morning, I did something.... not good. I woke up at about 5 or 6 this morning because I really had to go to the bathroom, but after I got out of bed I discovered I was really hungry. So I may or may not have snuck into the kitchen and ate at least a serving size's worth of the breakfast coffee cake that had been sitting out from yesterday before coming to my senses (spoiler alert: the answer is "may"). Not good, but I didn't let it get to me. I had a similar afternoon problem, though I estimate that session to have done much less damage calorically (considering I ate a handful of mixed nuts and some baby carrots). The problem was that I wasn't really hungry-- at least, I don't think so. Not sure. But I found out from some research when I got home that my lunch was probably only about 350 calories tops, so that's probably why I ate mindlessly. According to my rough calorie estimates, I may actually have issues getting enough calories now, as the most calories I consumed today only rounded out to 1.8k tops. Up to this point in my life, I've had the opposite problem-- what a strangely freeing feeling! We'll have to see if I still have this problem on a night my mother actually cooks dinner, as I foresee those nights to be a bit of a challenge.

Don't sweat it. If you're truly eating healthfully, you'll feel better in no time. Trust me. Maybe you're suffering to something akin to "carb flu"-- unhealthy foods produce insulin spikes and quick energy fixes, and when you take those away after your body has become reliant on those, you're bound to feel a bit sluggish until your body adjust to better energy sources. Also, unhealthy foods are shown to have addictive properties, so withdrawal symptoms may be at play. It's sucky, but I'm sure you'll feel better in no time!

Typically, when I do a longer workout, I listen to something to keep things interesting. Since I've been really behind on "Welcome to Night Vale" podcasts, I've been listening to those. Unfortunately, I'm almost all caught up and need something else to listen to-- preferably podcasts, audiobooks, and the like. Any suggestions?

Hallelujah, someone who knows the parent-related struggle! I really appreciate the bodyweight workout resources. As I said, I'm in a weights class at school, but on days I don't have access to the gym-- such as snow days-- those will be perfect. Especially since they don't seem to generate a lot of noise. I do mountain climbers and it shakes the whole house!

After doing some research, I think I'm mostly going to listen to what my body and mind are telling me in terms of whether or not I'm working out too much and scale back workouts accordingly. I think I will wind up laying off a little, we'll just have to see. And I'm definitely going to create and implement a strategy about rest days. Thank you to everyone for all your help and support! You guys are awesome!

Yes, I have the mental-health seal-of-approval to be working out. It's just that old habits die hard, and that personal fear of slipping back into a "bad" lifestyle is what's really nagging me. On the same level, I'm also afraid to try a different workout/scaling back the amount of workouts/eating more so I can gain muscle because I don't want to lose all the progress I've made. However, after some soul-searching, I realized this was based in a fear of what others will think if I gain a couple pounds; I personally wouldn't be too torn up about accidentally putting on a couple bf percentages if I stumble upon something that doesn't work. So now it's all about letting go of how others will see me and just worrying about me. I really appreciate the concern, though-- I wouldn't want anyone with an ED to be doing this and not be in a good state of mind either.

Great first week, I would say! Don't sweat the whole "not going for a walk that one night" thing; reaching 5k steps is not more important than, y'know, not dying. I live in a small town in the Midwest U.S., and while we certainly don't have bobcats (and no coyotes unless you go farther out of town), we have a lot of people who let their dogs roam free. Big dogs. Haven't-been-trained-well-so-aren't-necessarily-friendly dogs. I enjoy riding my bike, but if I see a rottweiler roaming the streets and looking for trouble, I'm out of there. I personally believe measurements are way more accurate than daily weigh-ins, in which things like water weight or clothing can have a huge effect. Whichever method you use, however, it's important to remember that our bodies fluctuate from day to day. It's the overall pattern, and not the daily change, that hold the numbers you want to focus on.

I'm not big on calorie counting either, but I've recently (as in, yesterday) decided that I'm "lean" enough that I should stop cutting and start gaining so I can see the muscle mass I'm going for. I read that a female looking to gain should be eating at least 2,500 calories per day, but while I was cutting I was only eating somewhere from 1,400-1,800 per day (rough estimate). And I've been cutting for a loooong time-- a behavior learned from "mainstream" nutrition advice. Eating so much doesn't feel "natural" to me, hence why I'm trying to at least roughly estimate my daily caloric intake. Most nights, my mom will cook dinner, but some nights (like tonight) it's "fend for yourself," in which we eat leftovers or whatever else we want to prepare on our own. On these nights, I usually heat up some leftover meat/cook frozen precooked meats (like those Tyson grilled fajita strips), steam some frozen veggies/dish out some raw ones, and finish off with an apple or piece of fruit for dessert if I still feel hungry later. If I'm not that hungry on that night, I'll whip up a bowl of raw veggies, cut up some fruit, and dish out some peanut butter (not quite a serving size). I'm thinking of doing that tonight because I'm not that hungry, but I know if I don't add something in I'll be under where I need to be calorie-wise. And then, of course, we go out to eat sometimes. I have no problem making healthy choices at restaurants; actually, I consider myself a bit of a pro at this, if I do say so myself. Now that I think of it, I do have another question: not factoring hunger into the equation, should the caloric/macro amount of food I eat differ on days I work out heavily from days I don't (I work out every day in some capacity, probably too much TBH)?