ultrablaze

Well I've been doing pretty well with about a year into this whole fitness thing, had a lot of setbacks and injuries but I've definitely been going in the right direction with diet and exercise, and feeling the change. Sometimes it is hard though, and I wonder if it is worth it. The realization of how big of a change there has been only hit me today when I stumbled across a picture from about 1 and a half years ago and I compared it with my latest "record" pictures I take every two weeks to track. I'm shocked at how out of shape I looked then, it wasn't really clear in my mind until this moment, but I'm so glad I took the steps to turn things around when I did. I'm not at where I want to be yet, but man have I gone in the right direction. At the point of this picture was more or less when I had finally been fed up with hating my body for my entire life, and decided to actually make proper changes. It took 6 months to really get going (when I moved abroad and got away from my usual circle of family / friends habits), and this last year has gone well. Pictures : - Summer of 2014 : http://postimg.org/image/d8tvmffcb/ http://postimg.org/image/qsw4a4ufr/ - Now : http://postimg.org/image/difo1zamx/ http://postimg.org/image/afnasxfcz/ Total difference from then to now between the 2 pictures, about 1 year and 6 months apart : - 85ish kgs to a steady 73kg the last few months, at 1m82 - Incapable of a single pull-up / chin-up to now currently doing 3x4 and 3x8 respectively on my bodyweight workouts and looking to keep increasing it. Anyway, this was a bit of a remotivator after a hard couple of weeks, so wanted to share it with this community and website which was a big part of getting me to make that initial push of habit changing and lifestyle improvement. Here's to having another great year for everyone!

Hi everyone! I thought I would give an update on my progress here over the last month in case anyone was curious and if it can be of use to somebody. I feel like things are going in the right direction! I have been following that daily plan, and I feel like it is helping build some range of motion and flexbility. The hip stretches are EXTREMELY effective at relieving my back pain, that appears to be a big part of where my problem stems from. I do them multiple times through the day now as I think of them as well as in the morning. All of this with a switch to a standing desk has led to a lot less back pain lately. I'll stick with it and hope things keep improving.

Hi everyone, thanks for the feedback. One thing is I'm terrified to try and do deadlifts and squats until my range of motion, flexibility and core strength is somewhat sorted because I feel like I'm going to do damage to myself if I try adding any weight to this process for now... Otherwise I agree with all of it really, but I have to make a decision because there seems to be a lot of different directions I could go. Luckily I have a gym at work with a free personal trainer available which can sometimes be nice for advice and form checks, I went over this list of issues with him the other day to get his opinion on all this. In his estimation my core is very weak and I have terrible mind-muscle connection with this part of my body. He had me doing some planks and it seems like I'm not even contracting my abs properly, I'm entirely holding myself up by tensing my back and other various muscles. With my abs tight I can barely hold 10 seconds, as opposed to not doing it and I go like 1min30 but my back starts to hurt... He also agreed my hamstrings are tight, my glutes are weak and my achiles tendons are VERY tight. He advised me a daily routine to try and help with this : - 3 planks for as long as I can with proper ab contraction until I feel it give out, build up on time - sit on the floor with knees bent, contract abs, start to lean back till I feel it pulling / hard in the abs. Again hold till I have to release my abs. Do this 3 times. - Pigeon pose type stretch where I lean forward - stretch out my achilles tendons. Start by going into a crouch, heels lift up due to tightness, lean forward on hands to keep balance. Reach back through my legs and grab my ankles from behind, try and pull my heels down and round my back forward to stretch it as well He also advised that I relax my bodyweight plan temporarily because he thinks I'm learning bad technique and not helping to solve these problems. I am now able to pull off my series of pull-ups but I'm tensing a lot of stuff I shouldn't to force myself over the bar it seems, core is not tight, etc. I'm thinking of trying to film myself for a form check from you guys and get your opinion, would that be useful? His suggestion was switch to doing pullups / chinups with a moderate elastic band for assistance and do bigger sets if needed, go really slow and focus on form and just keeping my abs tight and all that good stuff. Also add in deep bodyweight lunges to my usual rotation which I think is a good idea. This seem like a sound plan? It is so hard to know what action to take, I want to do everything I can to sort this because the back pain is a huge downer in day to day life... But I know my best bet is really picking something smart and doable that I will stick with on the needed timeline for the weeks / months / years it'll take.... So I really want to feel like I'm setting out on the right path, you know? The GMB fitness video also seemed like a good routine in any case. I'm also investigating ways to make my desk job less damaging if anyone has any links or advice. As in ways to sit, things I can do throughout the day, etc... I'm also looking into getting one of those alternating standing / sitting desks because my company can provide them, although I have heard mixed things. Cheers again!

Hi everyone, exactly 1 year ago I moved abroad, and it has been a crazy ride on many levels, including a progressive path onwards and upwards from being full sedentary and having 0 concern about my diet or health, largely started by this website and the lovely people. This may be a lot of info / problems / questions in one but it really all comes as a whole, couldn’t think how to separate them. I have come far in a lot of ways, as well as having many setbacks and injuries along the way but I know that is par for the course. However, I now want to work on fixing these blocking issues. I feel like my upper body is making great progress through bodyweight workouts, but my legs / lower back are in bad shape and getting left behind (no strength or development in legs / glutes / lower back / core). For starters, due to ankle mobility issues (both badly sprained over the past 2 years) + tight hamstrings I cannot really squat. If I attempt to go in to a “deep squat†I immediately fall backwards unless I can hold on to something to keep my balance. I’m kind of wondering where to start from here? I can try and make a video of my squat attempts. My lower back is also a recurring problem, I have not really been able to identify what is going wrong. It seems like I tense up in various situations : sitting badly, playing sports (basketball / table tennis) and use my back in a way that leads to it being sore and stiff... I feel like I need: - Exercises daily to work on tight hamstrings, and general flexibility and mobility in my ankles / legs. - Begin working out my legs, and in particular how to activate muscles in that part of my body (glutes especially). It has taken me basically a year to discover how to properly activate muscles needed for a pull up, I feel like it is the same in my lower body. Progression of exercises and techniques to really do this correctly perhaps. - Figure out how to properly use and engage the muscles in my lower back + core in order to make this part of me stronger and more functional. I still have no clue what “tight core†or anything like that means, I feel like I have no strength or control over this part of my body. For my overall current workout and shape : Monday/Friday I bodyweight workout : run 2 km, dynamic warm up, 3x8 assisted pull up (thin elastic band), 3x6 chin-up, 50ish roman table back hyperextensions (recommended by my doctor to strengthen lower back…) basically until failure, 3x12 push-ups and just begun adding 3x10 deep squats (assisted by holding onto a rack, not sure if this is helping or making things worse), thinking I need something for my core (plank, leg raises..?). Basketball on Wednesdays, Table tennis for 30 mins – 1 hour most week days. I’m 23, 1m72, 74ish kg. Currently eating at a deficit to try and lose my love handles for the first time ever (persistent bastards), would like to try and properly build muscle afterwards though, never attempted that before. I have been to osteopaths, physical trainers, doctors, acupuncturists and an alexander technique trainer for my ankle and back issues, all I have gotten is a pile of conflicting information none of which seems to really help much after a couple months of trying it… I know this is a lot, and I still feel like I’m missing large parts of the picture here. Anyway I would love to get some input / feedback / discussion going with anyone here, and am happy to provide anything I can that can help me get some answers. Perhaps avenues to investigate, other stories, anything really. Thanks so much everyone! May you find success in all your endeavours. Zack

Hey everyone, I very rarely post but I really appreciate the information I get from this community, and I've come to a (fairly positive) plateau in my fitness journey, and need to decide where to go from here. This may be long, because I usually over-inform, and also I feel context and information is really needed to be able to get a sense of things for this kind of question. So brief backstory, starting in March I went from out of shape never having cared about fitness to working on it. I have basically cut all processed foods, soda, sweets, fruit, sugar out of my day to day diet and eat basically paleo, and quite low-carb. I just kind of adopted this diet because I love vegetables (except potatoes) and meat but I'm open to changing it. I often suffer from information overload trying to figure out what is best so I just chose something I could live with that seemed good and stuck with it. I go to the gym for bodyweight workout Monday/Wednesday/Friday morning because so far I enjoy it more than weight lifting, going from 0 to 3x4 chin-ups feels great, I love the feeling of lifting myself up in various ways. I also play about 45 mins of ping-pong most weekdays to the point of breaking a good sweat. I was progressing through the start body weight site but have now stalled at my current routine of 3 sets of : 10 grok squats while holding something for balance, 8 decline diamond push ups, 4 chin ups, 8 low inverted rows (can't do that kind of pull-up more than 1 yet...), 8 dips. I have a full gym at my disposal as work but I don't really use any of it now except the bars to lift myself. I've had a few setbacks, I had a back injury this summer : http://rebellion.nerdfitness.com/index.php?/topic/68047-back-injury-building-strength-in-coreback/. I realized this is due to a weak core and bad posture, so I'm working on this in part with weekly pilates. I also sprained my ankle on my weekly basketball in September which is still an issue so can't play anymore or run for now. This combination of issues and previous injuries means I cannot achieve a squat of any kind (working on it for flexibility, etc) amongst other things. I'm 23 and 1m82, I have gone from 85ish kg to a plateau varrying between 70-73kg since July. Lately I kind of obsessed with losing the last flab around my stomach and love handles (can still grab some on the sides...) that I have had my whole life, and seeing my abs for the first time ever. As a result, I have been hardline with my diet and calories for a bit over month, and I've been honestly pretty miserable. I live in Ireland where going to the pub and having some drinks on the weekend is very much the culture, and I've been making myself not go out or eat anything unhealthy in the last month, and honestly I have not seen any progress here. I'm not sure this is a good goal to have at this point. Similarly, my weight-loss + strength gain beginner plan was working out, but I have been at my current reps for a couple weeks and cannot seem to improve anymore. So from all this, I have a few questions : - Is it realistic / smart to keep striving for weight loss here? I like the idea of finally seeing my abs by getting to a low enough body fat, but it feels impossible... I'm a young guy who likes to socialize, and I have just accepted that I want to go out on Friday / Saturday nights and not worry about drinking, and I'm much happier. So if my hardline approach to this last bit of fat loss didn't work, I feel it won't happen now... - Do I maybe have to switch to trying a "bulk" phase for the first time in my life to actually achieve further strength gains and progress? If so, I have 0 idea how to go about this... I feel like I'm reaching a point of "skinny-fat" as you might say, where I'm skinny all over, bit of flab in the middle, but lacking real muscle. I can post progress pictures and more diet details if needed. - Do I need to Improve / vary my workout routine or diet? I really want to be able to crank out 3x10 chin-ups and 3x10 pull-ups sometime in the future, I love that feeling but I cannot do enough. I am definitely a bit more defined, especially if I flex, but I feel like I look great with the "pump" after I leave the gym, but that is short lived. That is how I want to look in my day to day life, and I get the idea this is where I have to go from here. As a side note, I really hate tracking calories/nutrients...

I'll defiinitely try it at some point because I'm loving this butter and want to use it for everything, especially since it is so cheap. I jumped pretty heavily on the paleo train of thought to help with my switch to actually cooking food so all those oils were off the list, but I'm reconsidering that stance a bit so I may go for one of those options. Curious to try avocado oil at least once though.

Thanks for the feedback. I guess I'll try and keep the calorie counting thing up, it was hard, then amusing, but now quickly becoming a chore. To your points that I want to respond to This seems definitely possible, I guess I might try sticking with the calorie counting as I said and bumping it up to 2200-2300 or so see how I feel I am indeed male, and I have lost a fair amount of weight, looking quite a bit better, and not overweight anymore honestly. But around my gut (sides and front) I can still grab a handful of flab, and I'd like to get rid of it. I never went into this effort with the idea of maintaining washboard abs or anything, but I feel like I should be able to lose most of this if I stick with it, no? In terms of weight from the scale, I have no desire to get it lower, in fact it feels weird suddenly being 10kg lighter then I've been for years, but I'd like to lose that like I said and I know I can't target it so... I found vegetables hardest to estimate so far, since usually I was getting premixed combinations of vegetables (tomatos/red onion/cucumber/peper for example) from the bowls at work and have no idea what a "cup" of anything equates to. Similar when I'm cooking at home even though I try to weigh things. I would say generally except at breakfast vegetables feel like 80% of my meals, maybe my bookkeeping is off or I picked the wrong days. The fish was all that was left at lunch at work one day when I got back from basketball, just fish with a crust breading type thing, chose something that sounded close off the app. For the chicken wings and a couple other dubious sounding things they are from my recipes on the app, made them myself with just chicken oil and spices. The "maja eggs" was mostly vegetables with some eggs thrown in, etc. The name can be a bit misleading I admit, I think it takes the recipe titles. So there is still preference to be had for carbs that don't come from fruit right? As in avoiding sugar and whatnot? I have always been indifferent to potatoes but I could definitely add in a ton of yams/parsnip/squash/sweet potatoes into my diet and enjoy it. And I liked munching on free fruit throughout my day as well... Fair point about the alcohol The idea of paleo and making an all in hardline change made it a challenge which I enjoyed and helped me make a switch, I know myself and transitioning into it would have been much harder. I'm definitely open to bringing back in other things. I have no particular attachment to most of the paleo ban list though honestly, have never liked rice, or bread in general, or even cakes and whatnot. Pretty much the only reason I would add most of the non paleo things back in would be that I have always loved something sweet with afternoon tea, small cake/cookie/chocolate/whatever. Also pizza and savory pastries, but I figure I'm probably better off not making this a staple. Maybe occasionally good pasta can be nice but I honestly don't miss it except how easy it was with pasta + sauce from a jar. By just flat out saying I don't eat any of this non paleo stuff, there was no question of when my room mates were ordering take out, or getting a late night snack, on "is that unhealthy enough to warrant me going out of my way to cook something else?". It didn't fit the rules, so it was off, so I made something that was healthy instead. Don't know if that makes sense? But clearly the idea that eating wheat one time will put me into a ball of suffering and cause leaky gut or who knows what seems pretty extreme and unlikely for the average person. I will look into IIFYM for sure, but doesn't that require even more planning in that you need to plan ahead your meals to line up to meet fixed macro amounts for the day? Thanks for the responses in any case!

Hey everyone, So I've made a switch to a healthier diet but I feel like it has sapped my energy. Something is definitely wrong but I'm not sure what change to make first, it seems to be pretty much in the face of all common sense. This is a huge post but my situation baffles me and I figure I need to give all information that could be relevant. So a little backstory, start of March I went abroad for an internship and decided it was time to lose weight and get in shape, I'm 23 and started at 1m82 80 kgs. I have always had lots of energy to stay up late, go with little sleep, always had a bounce in my step, etc. Always easy to get up in the morning, could go to sleep at 2 I would wake at 7 for class without an alarm feeling fresh as a daisy. I just lacked physical fitness and strength, and was chubby, never really put any thought into diet or nutrition at all. As a student my diet was pretty bad, huuuge quantities mostly since I would skip breakfast and eat giant lunch and dinner, and was in the mindset of 0 concern for my health, "this is delicious eat till you can eat no more". Easy food was the norm (frozen pizzas, sandwiches and subway very often), and if not it was something my girlfriend cooked usually quiches/pies/cakes/cookies or pasta with lots of cream, cheese, etc. Drank quite a bit as well. Ever since I arrived I have been doing body weight every Monday and Friday, basketball on Wednesday and 1 to 1h30 of ping pong per day. Out visiting (walking) and stuff on weekends + out at night. I drink loads of water, and a pretty constant supply of 2-4 cups of green tea or herbal teas per day, sometimes black but never coffee. This has all been a constant, but my diet has gone through two phases. For about 3 months I was on a pretty unhealthy diet objectively, trying to live for as little as possible. Every week day I would eat a giant bowl of porridge at work (full fat milk, loads of honey and raisins), whatever meat/fish + mix of salads was offered at work for lunch, and bring home a tiny wrap from work for dinner often (bit of chicken + bunch of veg and relish in a tortilla). During the day I would eat as much fruit as I felt like (free at work), certainly a banana every morning, often add in apples/plums/kiwis during the day. I would often skip dinner in fact (or eat some fruit) especially if I was going out and drinking heavily, which I did often (2-5 nights). There was a mix in of late night burgers and frozen pizzas when I felt like it, and chips and stuff especially on the weekends. We have a deep fryer and often while having drinks ate super cheap frozen fries with loads of industrial sauce. Felt fantastic during this period, often on 4-5 hours sleep, tons of energy during the day, very happy, etc etc. to the point of running so fast on so little my room mates started calling me "bionic man".I lost about 4kgs in 2-3 months. I then decided since I love food so much (raised in France), I really should learn to cook, and this routine probably wasn't the healthiest. Especially I have goals to lose my love handles for the first time ever, so I wanted to make it happen.So about a month and a half ago, I switched over to a paleo type diet, started cooking my own proper meals for dinner, sleeping 8 hours almost every night. Buying everything from a local farmers market and great grass fed meat and butter from local butcher (I'm in Ireland). Out of curiosity, for my own knowledge and because it seemed like an interesting temporary challenge I have been tracking my calories the past few weeks and aiming for around 1800 for weight loss, and trying to keep carbs between 50 and 100g on non workout days, 100-150g on workout days. I now eat eggs for breakfast, with a tomato often, sometimes some bacon or a sausage. Still meat + salads/cooked veg at lunch. And dinner I cook some paleo type nice meal and eat it, or if low on time a bunch of scrambled eggs with veg + tomato salad. I haven't eaten pasta, pizza, bread or a processed food (including all industrial condiments) except one or two forkfuls to taste things my roommates cooked during this period. I go out a lot less, but still drink 1-3 nights a week when I do, trying to reduce the massive intake of cheap beer (6-7 pints in a night sometimes in previous mode), and drink some good beer + whiskey straight. I tend to factor the calories in to keep within the imposed limit. I will post a bunch of days of myfitnesspal as attachments from this month so you can maybe get a better sense, I tracked them as best I could. (sometimes I input "exercise" as well which changed the goals). Now during this time I have certainly lost weight, down to 71.3kg and have been stable there for the last week or two. This is by faaar the slimmest and best shape I've ever been in my life, have gone from barely being able to pull myself up on a bar to cranking out 3x6 chin-ups and a few pull ups, but the love handles remain with some flab and I'm determined to lose it. The giant caveat to this progress is the last month my energy levels have been honestly terrible, I'm tired during the day quite often, especially before lunch and in the mid afternoon. Especially the first few weeks but still now I literally feel some kind of brain fog coming on like I can't focus. Walking up the stairs when I get to work every morning my legs feel heavy, I lack the bounce in my step I'm used to having... Sometimes during a workout my body just feels like crap and I want to stop. When I go to play ping pong in the afternoon my energy feels low. In evenings when I want to go out, I feel like I have to drag myself out the door at 10-11 when all I want to do is sleep, this was unheard of before. Still waking up fine at 7-8 in the mornings without an alarm however. So here's my dilemma, what am I doing wrong? Clearly what I was doing before can't have been better. Basically I have gone from instinctive "do whatever" to having to make tons of plans and decisions. I'm tired of tracking calories so I'm going to stop, I at least have a sense of the amounts now and can check for new foods. It is not possible to maintain this kind of effort if my resulting energy levels are like this, so I need to make incremental changes until I figure out what is wrong, but I was hoping for some advice. I have a couple ideas : - Am I eating to little? Is my body just in need of more calories and I should increase the amount I'm eating? The more I think about it, the fact that I could lose weight with my previous lifestyle seems to indicate my body can burn through a fair amount more than I'm giving it these days. - My reading has given me a fear of carbs, especially fruit, as somehow going to stall my weight loss. Could this be wrong for me? I feel quite silly in the afternoon when I'm craving an apple stopping myself because it'll push me over the carbs/calories, or skipping a morning banana.- My body "seemed" to be just fine with wheat, grains the whole lot. I was loving the porridge for breakfast honestly. Obviously cutting out processed food in favor of real food is a good thing, but I'm beginning to wonder about adding some of these things back in, and maybe porridge once a week would actually be fine. Maybe occasional good quality pizza or hand made pasta is ok as well. But I feel this is a slippery slope back towards not bothering to cook anymore. - Go more "extreme" and attempt ketosis? I've read some people saying that perhaps the bit of carbs and alcohol I'm still consuming are keeping me from switching over, but honestly living with that strict a set of rules and diet seems like it would be hard for me. I'm definitely the kind of person who wants to be able to take a bite of something interesting or delicious without worrying about it, since I'm able to stop after just trying it. Thank you for your patience reading all this, I hope this was the right place to ask. I'm hoping someone has gone through something similar and found a solution, I'm open to all suggestions. My first change would be stop worrying about fruit again and get back to eating bananas and apples when I felt like it with no worry, but my research and sites like paleoleap and others have put a fear of fruit in my mind, and somehow grains are going to kill me... I mean before I started looking into all this nutrition stuff having an apple, a banana and a kiwi for breakfast I felt like I was making a super healthy choice, now all I can think is there goes my carb limit for the day, so I'll just have a hard boiled egg and some tea and wait till lunch.

Ok I'll look into making some ghee, but it seems like one extra process and thing to make/store in my tiny shared fridge, especially since I don't have a slower cooker. Atleast it would be pretty cheap. Avocado oil is definitely an interesting option it seems, but it looks pricey.

I have a tendency to under salt, but getting better through practice and tasting as I cook. Generous amounts of Maldon salt being tossed on everything, and I go through crazy amounts of garlic and onion. These kind of dishes are working fine, I am for example often roasting chicken legs with vegetables and fresh rosemary with lemon and olive oil, turning out great. Trying different combinations there. My issue is more with how to use other spices, namely things like curry powder,cardamom, cumin etc in ways that they really release their flavor and I actually end up with rich tasting curries and things like that. I find things I try in this style of cooking always turn out bland or just aggressively spicy with no real nice flavor. I will check out the book for sure. That is the kind of thing I need, like I found a page on just all the different methods of cooking things in the oven and how they are used to achieve different speeds / textures / effects, and found that really useful. A similar thing also for just common sauce bases in different cuisines, I found that very interesting and could be expanded upon. I don't know, maybe my question is to generic, but I'm looking for more general basic techniques that I can use to experiment with the flavors, because I have a decent sense of what should be added when tasting things and what goes with what, but just when and how do I add a given spice. Rub it on the meat, throw it in periodically, with the onions, with the oil when its hot, mix with butter before cooking... I have no clue, also for things I should avoid that will "damage" the spice or produce a bad taste. Maybe I'll attempt a few more recipes using these spices that seem detailed and see how they turn out. Does that make any sense?

Hey everyone, So I've gotten really into cooking lately, I have always loved food and I'm finding it to be a great experience trying out new things and experimenting. My main problem starting out was everything tasted kind of flat, one dimensional and dull. I've had some success with roasting using fresh herbs and some dried herbs, getting closer to the tastes of what I know as good home cooking, but I feel like I'm lacking basic information on how to properly get flavor out of them and add proper layered taste to a dish. Even harder to use are spices, I always find that things end up tasting flat and not getting the rich flavors of the spices I taste in other peoples food. I assume I'm missing out on something, on cooking techniques or methods to really infuse the food with the flavor. I have seen various suggestions of blooming spices in oil, and things of that nature, but I'm sure some of you who have gone from unable to cook to experts have found good ressources on this. Looking forward to spicing up my dishes.

Stiff and kind of tight feeling, sometimes get the sense that it is warmer then the rest of my back and almost itchy. Have the urge to kind of rub and massage it instinctively. Hurts a good deal at times but I think stabbing pain is a bit to far for sure. Hurts more when I force myself to sit up straight with proper posture in my chair I find.

The only issue is I'm an intern abroad, and each of these medical visits costs me a sizeable chunk of my already small monthly income... I guess I'll see the physio again and go from there. I tried with a hot water bottle, didn't seem to make much of a difference really in this instance.

Well I ended up going to the physiotherapist on Friday, she moved me all around to make sure there wasn't any more extensive damage then to my lower back. She said it spasmed a lot and was tight, and that I seemed to have injured the lower back muscles especially right side. She said my core was quite weak and that my squat form was bad, to avoid doing any more of that till I have it corrected. She said it should e cleared up in a few days if I take it easy, and told me to do some exercises to work on my form (body weight squats against a wall with a ball inbetween to keep straight) and for my core (bridges for now, then lots of planks, etc). So I came away relieved but so far if anything it is only getting worse, it hurts especially when I'm siting, even more if I try to sit up straight like I feel I should. I'm beginning to think there may be some other aspect to it.... Saturday I was running errands. it started hurting so much it was painful to walk. Yesterday it started hurting like crazy and I also felt nauseous and like my stomach was bloated (much bigger then lately and kind of tight and sensitive). I massaged it hard, and it relieved it as well as my back considerably for the time being. I also have noticed a lack of apetite recently, maybe a week; maybe more, I thought I was just finally adapting to the healthier food and reasonable portions. So I'm not sure if this is all from some other thing or a seperate issue honestly. Stomach still feels bloated, tight and sensitive (could be from my fuck up on Saturday? Check my respawn point topic). And I feel kind of sensitive just underneath where my hip bones are. I'm going to the gym this morning, will warm up with some safe biking, and do a bit of body weight but cut out the parts that put strain on my lower back for today just to be safe. Could see the physio again tommorow when she is back in the office or maybe I need a general doctor? Not really sure, but this is making every day pretty unpleasant.

Many good suggestions, can't go wrong with pesto. One thing that my grandmother used to make which is surprisingly fantastic : basil ice cream (or combinations like tomato/basil ice cream, balsamic strawberry basil, etc.) If you're feeling adventurous, give it a shot there are tons of recipes online and it is truly delicious.