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I haven't had a decent challenge this year it seems. Though I mostly have maintained, I really went full on self sabotage mode this last month. I tried to reflect a bit on what was happening. I have the anniversary of my Mother's death coming up on August 20th. That usually that hits me closer to the date though. I know that in the back of my mind, I have been fearful of what happened to me last time I lost this weight. We I first joined Nerdfitness in 2013, I had a great go to start off. Dropped down 257 lbs. Then seemed to bounce between 260-280 the next year. Then everything went sideways, and I gained everything back. I left the forums in shame, but finally found my way back. I had an amazing 2018 run. Losing 110 lbs for the year. Then this year I have been doing the bouncing between 250-270. All the while, that failure still lurks in my head. Today, I am sitting at 280. I seem to keep trying to make things work, but then giving in to whatever garbage at night. Thus erasing everything I am doing. My damn brain is really trying to make me do this crap all over again, isn't it? I am refusing to go back above 300. These last few weeks, I have been listening to some motivation type speeches. I linked one in my last challenge thread. So, I came up with an idea. This challenge, and really the challenges for the rest of the year. I need to Go Beyond, Plus Ultra! I am going to set impossible goals for me to reach this year. By my birthday (November 2nd), I am going to have these goals met. #1 - Be under 200 lbs #2 - Run a 30 minute or less 5k #3 - Do 1 pull up Easy, right? To meet this, I will have to lose over 80 lbs in 4 months. I will have to shave probably 8 minutes off my 5K time. I will also have to actually do a pull up, and the best I can do now is hang from the bar for a bit. Each one kind of fit together though. I lose weight, I will get faster. As I get stronger and lose weight, eventually I will hit that magic point that I can get the pull up done. So why the impossible goals. It seemed like a lot of these inspiration videos had common themes. Setting goals when everyone else said it was impossible. Having that time frame where it must get done. I never had my "big why" moment for why I want to lose weight and be healthy. I have the same "Be around for my kids" answer. Really though, I want to be the best version of myself. I want to be stronger, faster, and just a much healthier version of myself. What I think can drive me forward on these goals, is the idea of what if. What if, I can actually get this done? That will be one hell of a self esteem boost haha. Of course the flip side is what if I fail. That What if has always been there in my life. Kept me from many things. What if I fail? Well, I still succeed. If I truly give this my all, then I can be ok with not making goals. I will be just that much closer to reaching them. I look at it like a bowling game. If I do my very best and bowl a 250 game, but the person I am bowling against bowls 260 I lose the game. Still I gave it my all. I can be mad at the outcome, but not the performance I had. I felt like I wanted to have a little theme this challenge. My Hero Academia shall be that theme. From Crunchy Roll: In the show All Might choose Izuku to inherit his powers that he can pass on. Before he can do that though, Izuku has to improve his body. He has to push his limits so that he can be able to handle the All for one Quirk. Like him, I have to push my limits. Go beyond, Plus Ultra! Goal #1 - Get back to Keto, do Intermittent fasting, track all the things This challenge, I need to get back into the food eating 100%. I am going to use Chronometer to track food. I am going to use LIFE Fasting to track my fasting. I also have looked at my macros, and want to keep a certain calories remaining tracked. This should help a ton with weight loss. Since I have been off the full keto wagon for a bit, I can expect a pretty big drop in weight right away. I also need to check my glucose numbers. Type 2 never really goes away, and I bet my numbers have been spiking recently with my poor eating. 1 point - Calories never above 2100 per day. 1 point - Remaining calories 1000 or above each day. 1 point - Under 20g net carbs tracked each day. 1 point - 18 hour + fasting tracked each day 1 point - Blood Glucose tracked once per day 5 points per day, 35 points per week Goal #2 - Workouts, Running, and Walking I am going to restart the RunDouble 5k improver program. This time I will run every other day. I need to get hitting the weight as well. Monday, Wednesday, and Friday will be the workout days. Hopefully, I can expand this to maybe having 2 workouts during the days. I also want to do other workouts on Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturdays, but let's get consistent with 3 days first. My goal is to hit 10,000 steps each day as well. Nothing super fancy, just walking. It will help me mentally as well as physically. Saturday or Sunday will be my "rest" day. I still don't want to just turn into a pile of goo on that day though, so I can still go walk or do something fun. 3 points - Workout 3 times per week. 1 point per workout per day 3 points - Getting in all runs for the week. (4/3 runs per week) 1 point - 10,000 steps per day (5,000 on "rest" day) 7 points per week. 13 points per week Goal #3 - Rest Equally important to all other goals, is to make sure I get my rest. I know in one video Arnold Schwarzenegger said to sleep 6 hours. People say they need 8 hours just need to sleep faster haha. I don't think I quite subscribe to that idea. I have been staying up way to late, and getting up early too. My sleep has not been great. So really I need to get back into the grove. this challenge I am actually going to try a little less reading, in hopes of getting to bed a little sooner. With school coming up soon for my kid, I will have to be getting up earlier again. If I can get use to getting to bed sooner, then I might try getting up sooner as well and getting workouts or whatever polished off before school time. first steps first. 1 point - 10:30 PM off the computer and get reading. 1 point - 11:00 PM off to bed. I do have one exception. I have a later night game session with my friends in World of Warcraft. Usually only running a mythic dungeon or two. So I just need to get myself logged off as soon as we are done. Then ready a little to settle the brain, and then off to bed. 1 point - Saturday off PC when done with dungeons, ready for 20-20 mins, and head to bed. 2 points per day 14 points per week. Goal #4 - Plus Ultra Make time to check in daily. Fit in some meditation and/or positive affirmations from time to time. Kill this challenge, feel great, live up to the ambassador title again. 1 point - Checking in 7 points per week So there it all is. I wanted to use Week zero as my perfect start. Nothing is ever perfect though. So I am up late to make sure this gets posted. So while it isn't perfect, it is a start. tomorrow (Tuesday) I'll be tired, but it's time to engage. I will not let myself regain any more weight. Time for the fit me to win out again, over that other side that is trying to keep me down. Measurements: (Week 1 / End of Challenge) Neck - 17.08 in / Chest - 47.91 in / Waist - 51.37 in / Bicep (R) - 14.56 in / Bicep (L) - 14.48 in / Forearm (R) - 12.08 in / Forearm (L) - 12.08 in / Thigh (R) - 25.66 in / Thigh (L) - 25.31 in / Weight - 268.9 lbs / Points: Week 1 (08/05 - 08/11) - 0/69 Week 2 (08/12 - 08/18) - 0/69 Week 3 (08/19 - 08/25) - 0/69 Week 4 (08/26 - 09/02) - 0/69 Week 5 (09/03 - 09/08) - 0/69 Total: 0/345