Spikings - The Journey Continues

[Spikings]

The Second Confluence: (+100 points to whoever gets the reference ;D)

 

Hi guys, this is my second challenge and it feels awesome to move on from the Recruit forum, woo! (see my first challenge here if you're curious) I'm hoping to tackle a few problems that came up in my last challenge revolving around food and some ineffective SMART goals.

I also want to continue my Corpse Bride t-shirt saga, and will post up progress photos every two weeks, donning this miraculously stretchy shirt of mine (see below).

 

Starting Measurements:

 

Bust: 40"

Waist: 34"

Hip: 40"

Thigh: 27"

Upper Arm: 12"

 

Starting Weight: 179 pounds

 

My Main Quest:

 

To quit food binging. This was a problem I wasn't aware of until halfway through my first challenge. I had "upped my game" after two weeks of success, overwhelmed myself and became on the verge of giving up altogether. While I fought through this, the rest of my challenge was littered with binge nights, usually twice a week. I want to beat this by catering my challenges towards this goal, and hopefully set myself on the right path to true nerdy awesomeness.

 

Day 1 photos (taken from Day 42 of the previous challenge):

 

 

 

Quest 1: Complete three exercise routines a week. I've recently discovered NR neilarey.com, and after a lot of consideration I've picked out these three workouts to complete - The Uncharted Workout, Lara Croft and Power 10. These should help strengthen a variety of muscles over the next six weeks and also ramp up the difficulty from the BBWW I completed previously, which became quite easy towards the end. I'm also hoping to complete at least five deep push-ups before the challenge is done too.

 

A = completed 18 workouts [+3 STR], B = completed 12 workouts [+2 STR], C = completed 6 workouts [+1 STR]

 

 

Quest 2: Eat less. Part of the binging problem was the portions of food I had. A common phrase I hear is that "All food is good for you - in moderation". While I think some foods are just inherently bad for you whichever way you look at it, I do agree with this statement and I want to keep a better eye on my food portions these next few weeks, specifically for dinners and snacks.

I will make the effort to correctly portion out both my snacks and meals every day with scales before eating them (or looking at the back of the packet to see how much a portion is), so I don't eat anymore than I need. By Day 42, I want this habit to be well ingrained into my head so I don't deviate from this again.

 

Measurement: A = 35-42 good portions [+3 CON], B = 28-34 good portions [+2 CON], C = 21-27 good portions [+1 CON]

 

 

Quest 3: Have two cups of tea or a pint of water every evening after dinner. This sounds easy to do and hopefully will be, but the secret plan here is to fill my stomach up with liquid rather than food and stop me from snacking as much during the evenings. Note that I'm not banning snacking completely as I hope this quest will work well in conjunction with quest 2 and limit the quantity of my snacking.

I also don't want to outright ban myself from eating certain foods, but instead develop a better and healthier relationship with eating over time.

 

Measurement: A = 35-42 hydration [+3 WIS], B = 28-34 hydration [+2 WIS], C = 21-27 hydration [+1 WIS]

 

 

Life Quest: Start and complete a Games Design Document for a game idea I want to develop. The idea in my head is extremely vague right now, but if I complete a decent GDD in the next six weeks, then I'll have a concept that can be developed further. I've done a few GDD's during uni, so I know the general structure of the document, what content needs to be included and to what depth. With any luck by my next challenge, I'll have a game to start creating!

 

Measurement: A = 100% GDD [+3 CHA], B = 75% complete GDD [+2 CHA], C = 50% complete GDD [+1 CHA]

 

 

Motivation:  I want to become the fitter and healthier me and set myself up this way for the rest of my life. Plus it never hurts to be stronger than the average person! I also want to be able to cosplay more often and I refuse to do this without better physique. If I'm gonna nerd out, I'm gonna do it properly. ;D

 

So now that's all typed out, do you know what time it is, Adventurers...?

 

 

Time to kick ass.

[Tkdgirl]

Sounds like you've learnt a lot from your first challenge! I think you're right that making small changes is better and hopefully in 6 week's time you'll be ready for some more.

I'll be following

[EVEArgent]

Great Goals! I'm so excited to see more progress from you!

 

GDD, woah. Now, that's a tough goal. You got this.

[Spikings]

Thanks guys, can't wait to see how the next six weeks go for both of you too! 2015 New Year Recruits are gonna kick ass! ;D

 

Day 1:

 

Measured my breakfast today, I usually have about 60g of branflakes in the morning, I'm now going for the average serving of 30g instead (then a breakfast bar afterwards). I didn't feel much of a difference really, still hungry by 10am like I have been for the last six weeks - but this already shows that eating more in the morning doesn't fill me up anymore than the right serving does, so really I was having extra food for no reason. That was my mini revelation of the day, lol!

 

Ate another breakfast bar mid-morning, had the same lunch as I always do at work (sandwich, a handful of nuts and an apple mid-afternoon), when I got back home I was really ready for dinner. A dominos flyer with vouchers came through my door, I threw that straight in the bin. Had about 25% less from my pasta bake than I had last week, and three hours on I'm still full, or at least satisfied.

 

Had one glass of water already and about to finish a bonus second.

 

GDD is not yet started, but I'm doing a bit of research this evening between chores and errands I have to run.

No exercise today, it fits in better with my week to start my workouts from tomorrow. Woo, so hyped for this!

[kuraiuncia]

Sounds like you've got great goals for this one Spikings! I'm cheering for you!

[Tkdgirl]

Impressive first day spikings! Portion size is a nightmare for me too so I completely understand. I spent a lot of my last challenge trying to convince myself that I wouldn't starve to death if I ate less. Like you, I have a habit of overeating at meals because I believe it'll then last longer. It's a hard one to change but you've made a great start

[Spikings]

Sounds like you've got great goals for this one Spikings! I'm cheering for you!

 

Thanks! Yeah I really want to do all I can to manage my food intake this time round - I'm not expecting myself to be perfect, but I really hope I can make enough of an improvement to continue the habit afterwards

 

 

Impressive first day spikings! Portion size is a nightmare for me too so I completely understand. I spent a lot of my last challenge trying to convince myself that I wouldn't starve to death if I ate less. Like you, I have a habit of overeating at meals because I believe it'll then last longer. It's a hard one to change but you've made a great start

 

Thanks tkdgirl! Lol, it's nice to know someone else understands the troubles of portions, it's not something I've seen around the forums as being a problem or part of a goal really, so I felt like I was being a bit specific at first.

 

 

Day 2:

 

Not done quite so well, but by no means catastrophic! I had some homemade tomato soup for breakfast today (it's been in my fridge for a while and I didn't want it to become inedible), but I forgot I added an extra 25% to the portion when I first made it. I didn't have time to do anything with the extra, so I ate it. Two biscuits mid-morning (forgot my breakfast bar), then same lunch as yesterday. My dinner also wasn't well portioned, I'd say about 50% more than would be recommended. But it was a homemade meal by my mum, a potato-brocolli-cheese bake, so only semi-healthy (but delicious).

I don't think I met my portion goal today, so I'll have to miss that.

 

Had a frustrating day at work, I wanted to get exercise done as soon as possible when I got back home, but I've been having trouble with my internet on my laptop recently, so I had to delay my workout until later, so extra frustration! Eventually got round to doing the Power 10 workout with a few alterations, I'll list it here for my own future reference.

 

With weights of 1.5kg (wish I had heavier):

• 10 supported tricep dips
• 20 bicep curls
• 30 punches (with weights)
• 20 arm raises (with weights)
• 20 raised arm circles (with weights)
• 20 seconds raised arm hold (with weights)

This felt like a good challenge for my arm muscles, will see how I fare tomorrow. If I feel ok tomorrow, I'll bump up the three sets to five.

 

Had my extra glass of water this evening also. Let's keep rockin'!

[Spikings]

Also for the mini challenge, I have followed quite a few peeps! Half being the amazing recruits I met last challenge that completed their goals and are starting their next challenge strong the other half being some Adventurers I've found around the forum that are pretty inspiring to read (and in some cases, have some great tastes in nerdery)! About six or seven people followed, so I shall add one shiny wisdom point to my stats!

[Tkdgirl]

Oh spikings, I think we are the same person. Last night I ate some leftover pasta - I wasn't particularly hungry but didn't want it to go bad!

 

Good job on the workout. How are your arms feeling this morning?

[Spikings]

Haha, I think we might be! Portioning my food is harder than I thought, particularly pasta, rice and such. And I hate wasting food too, tricky combination tbh!

My arms feel ok actually, my biceps and triceps feel normal which is surprising. My trapezoids/deltoids (somewhere round the back of my shoulders) are feeling sore though which is kinda nice, ha! I feel like I challenged those muscles pretty well, so that's something. Next week I think I'll go for five sets though, as it's not a knackering workout yet still pays off.

 

Day 3:

 

Portioned my breakfast cereal again today, woo! Also had an orange afterwards for good measure and didn't feel hungry for a while. Brekkie bar mid-morning, same lunch, then had a couple of biscuits mid-afternoon with my tea. Tonight was my D&D sesh with workmates, so food went a bit crazy from here. I bought a ready meal from waitrose which was mushroom linguine - really nice, but the salt/fat content was about 50%-60% of my daily recommendation. :/ While it's within my daily intake, I still don't like how ready meals are flavoured with excessive salt like this. Thankfully I only buy them during these sessions which is once a week or fortnight.

 

Anyways, I had a Monster energy drink along with that to wake up, then snacked quite a bit on random chocolate and crisps throughout the evening. I feel pretty full now, but it was by no means a binge at least. Feeling a bit put out by my decisions, when I got back home I did a bonus Power 10 workout while watching TV. Completed my three sets comfortably then drank a glass and a half of water, so I redeemed myself there a little bit. I'll put my portion count at half today as the main meals were managed well, but the snacking was not.

 

No GDD work this evening, I'm hoping to get a bit of time on that tomorrow, after that Sunday evening will be my next chance. Time's going fast!

[Tkdgirl]

I think the portion thing is always harder than it should be so you're making good progress. It's really tough at first to just see less food on the plate. One thing I did to help was to tell myself that if it didn't fill me up, I would eat something again later when I felt hungry. Unfortunately this did lead to junk food snacking but it did help me believe I wouldn't starve to death on smaller portions. Now I'm just about getting the portion size and snacks sorted

[Spikings]

Thank you, it's good to hear that I keep having doubts about my portions atm whenever I'm eating, it's not as easy to judge as I thought. I found this guideline a while back on tumblr though which I try to keep in my head when preparing food.

 

 

I don't tend to put in that much for bread and usually I have more for veggie (and definitely more for pasta and rice, oops!) but it's a good rough guideline all the same.

 

Day 4:

 

I have had the busiest day, feel completely knackered! xD Portioned my breakfast again plus an orange (this is getting to be a nice routine now)...in fact I'll just skip the text and say that I had pretty much the same food routine as I did the previous days. For dinner I had mince with a peanut butter sauce I made and a quarter cup of rice (instead of the half cup I used to do). I was really full by the end of this, but I'm putting that down to the peanut butter I used for the sauce, it was a good desertspoon and a half's worth. I'm guessing that was a bit too much, but the overall meal itself was smaller than my usual big bowl, so I'll mark today down as a pass.

 

Spent the evening writing a letter to a relative, then chatting to another on the phone for over an hour, suddenly it was half eight and I needed to exercise, argh! xD I only ended up doing 2 reps of the Lara Croft workout, partly because I was running out of time in the evening (I don't use that excuse lightly either), and also because I trying my first ever side bridges and it didn't take a genius to realise I had some bad form. I'll be youtubing how to do those later, and in a safer manner too.

Oh, and my arm muscles are now officially sore from the Power 10 workouts of before, rock on!

 

Had two glasses of water this evening after dinner, so win!

 

I want to do my GDD so bad, but it's now 10:15pm and I could literally just go to sleep right now. It's frustrating when my free time just disappears like that and there's nothing to be done about it. I'm just gonna have to try again Sunday evening and hope I get an hour or so in.

[Spikings]

Well the last three days have been completely exhausting, some in good ways and others in less than pleasant ways - I'll try to remember all I can.

Sorry in advance for the amount of text, I just ramble sometimes, ha.

 

Day 5:

 

Good portions again for breakfast and lunch, it was the usual until about 5pm. I then went out and attended a colleague's leaving do, which consisted of alcohol, a chinese restaurant and more alcohol afterwards. I kept to one glass of wine for the first three hours and had two glasses of water during dinner, so there's my hydration for the evening!

The chinese restaurant was a lovely place with quality meals. The starters often had huge portions so I went for the chicken satay on skewers to keep the quantity down (and the protein up! ;D). Afterwards I had thai green chicken curry which was perfect! It came with a small bowl of rice (smaller than what I usually cook), and a generous bowl of curry which had all sorts of vegetables in it, particularly cucumber and some mint, I could have that all day!

Afterwards we went back to the alcohol and I had a mixture of spirits and cocktail pitchers. Not exactly what I'd call healthy, and considering the amount of sugar in those drinks, I'll put my portion grade down to a half for this day. I got back by 2:30am and promptly fell asleep.

 

Day 6:

 

Got about six hours sleep and found it difficult to function most of the morning. Drank plenty of water and pineapple juice to curb the hangover, and also decided to have pesto, pasta and goat's cheese for a mid-morning brunch. Not the best choice, but the portion was decent.

I took a train to my boyfriend's at lunch and met up with some friends. A few of us went out for dinner to celebrate my friend's b-day (I have a busy life without realising it, I swear!) and went to the local pub for a meal. I chose one of their meals that was under 500 calories (spicy chicken chilli egg noodles w/ salad) and then had a tiny slice of salted caramel cheesecake after. Had water all the way through this. For these reasons I'm going to call this a good day for portions (the drinks later aren't helpful, but I didn't have as much as I did the previous night).

Later I had two thirds of a cider and some water before going out, then proceeded with two cocktails, three spirit mixers and a shot over the next five hours. And some more water! xD I got my hydration in on the water alone, but only just. Made my way back to my bf's around 3am and had a few slices of pizza with a friend.

After that, for many reasons, a lot of drama and bad situations exploded out of nowhere, so I stayed up until 5:30am consoling my bf and making sure he was ok. I got about an hour and a half's sleep.

 

Day 7: (first week milestone)

 

Got another two hours of sleep after a while, then went to check on everyone. The bad events of the previous night were still around, but not as awful as they were before. Had a couple of cold slices of pizza for breakfast and more water! xD Went out with my bf to the local teahouse and had a small portion of wild mushroom soup and some strawberry and cream tea, so soooo good.

Managed to sneak in another hour of napping in the afternoon before leaving to get home. However when changing trains in Manchester, suddenty ALL trains became delayed or cancelled...I was stuck there for two hours. :| I bought a greasy sausage roll from a nearby shop; I could have gone healthier but I wanted to keep in sight of my platform in case something happened. Got back to my town and got a taxi back home...except he could only take me as far as my £4.40 would go, then I ended up walking the rest. My portions sizes today were good, although what I ate and when I ate it wasn't very healthy (I didn't have a proper breakfast or dinner). I'll give myself a portion point, but I know full well that my food routine today wasn't good.

 

So yeah, I was planning to start my GDD tonight and also do my final workout of the week. Neither are happening tonight, neither my head or my body is in the right place for that, so I'll get some much required sleep and try again tomorrow.

I've been drinking my evening glass of water while typing this, so at least that's one goal met!

 

Summary:

 

Workouts: 2.5/3

Portioned meals: 5/7

Hydration: 7/7

GDD Completion: 0%

 

*sigh*... I feel like I have a lot to catch up on this next week.

[Tkdgirl]

Wow - what a weekend! Hope you can get back on track this week and get those goals sorted.

[Spikings]

Thanks tkd! Once I write this up I'll get around to checking out everyone else's progress, haven't had time to browse the forums for the last few days, I miss it!

 

Day 8:

 

Portions were good for breakfast and lunch, getting back to work always sets this right. For dinner I had some noodles, but added in two sausages and some broccoli too. The portion was larger than usual due to the broth, but since that's mostly just flavoured savoury water I'll keep this down as an a-ok.

 

I did my Uncharted workout that I was meant to do yesterday, it took forever. It did give my muscles some challenges, but I found myself having to stop regularly as my laminated floor throughout the flat really put an ache on my hands knees or elbows, depending on what exercise I was trying. I'm tempted to swap this out for something a little more cardio based, as it's also fairly similar to the Lara Croft workout I'm doing earlier in the week.

I tried to do my Power 10 workout straight after, but my hands and wrists felt a bit tender from the floor contact so I stopped after a slow set. I'll do my full three sets tomorrow though to keep up with my goal!

 

Not had my hydration yet, but give me ten minutes and it'll be done. Still haven't started my GDD yet, but I'm hoping to write down a rough outline in the next hour or so. I'll update this post once it's done so I don't change my mind in 20 minutes!

 

Edit: Did it! The document I quickly wrote up explains what content will be needed in my GDD so that there are no missing pieces of info in my game. I used my past GDD's for some reference on what to include, and also did a quick google search for GDD templates to see if there was anything I missed that would be relevant. I think the only thing I haven't included that is of importance would be the coding of the game. I have little to no experience with code, so I'll have to do some research and development on that.

For tonight, I'll give my GDD completion a boost up to 3%. It's a start, finally!

 

Oh by the way, I managed to do seven wide push-ups today in a row, proper ones too! Not terrifically deep, but not shallow either, very happy with myself!

[Tkdgirl]

Woo hoo for push ups - they're tough but SO rewarding when you see the progress.

[Spikings]

Day 9:

 

Meal portions were great today, had caluiflower rice for dinner which was tasty too. After the meal though I felt like my stomach was having problems digesting it. You know how your stomach feels right after a meal and it's like a fake hunger that won't go away? I had that for a good two hours, so I had my full glass of water, two biscuits, a small pack of crisps then a pack of chilli-fried peanuts - four servings worth. I'm putting down half a point for keeping on track with meals, but for snacks I failed miserably tonight.

 

In better news I complete my Power 10 workout. My arms have felt really sore today (probably from the pushups of yesterday), and not completely a 'good' sore. It felt much like a dull ache almost to the bones throughout the day, nothing distracting but there in the background. Thankfully it didn't have an effect on my arm exercises this evening, still can't do a full tricep dip but I'll get there eventually!

 

Might look at my GDD for half an hour before sleep, but I really need to dedicate more time to it this coming week. Tomorrow night is a no-go, Thursday I want to make an art competition deadline (there's money prize involved, hence the interest), so Friday night will be my next chance...I really wish I had more time in the day, y'know. :/

[Tkdgirl]

Oooh how was the cauliflower rice? We're having that today for lunch (assuming there are no culinary disasters!)

[Spikings]

The cauliflower rice was great! I usually have chicken with it too which fills me up a little more, but I didn't have any defrosted this time. How did you find it?

 

Day 10:

 

Breakfast and lunch were good and for dinner I got a small portion of noodles and a salmon salad from the reduced section at the Waitrose opposite my work - a pound cheaper than their usual ready meals that are filled with salt and saturated fat, so very happy with that! Onto the bad news, I had a LOT of junk snacks at D&D this week like marshmallows, doritos, red velvet cake and other crisps. It wasn't a binge but it wasn't healthy, so I'm not even gonna give myself a portion point here. :/

I had some water on the way back at least.

 

Day 11:

 

For lunch I had a gourmet burger at my pub for a last meal with a leaving workmate...ironically it was 200 calories less than the healthy pasta I had at that pub previously, which was interesting. This lasted me for seven hours or so, now having my original lunch (sandwich and sunbite crisps) this evening.

 

I tried to do my Lara Croft workout today and got through one set. I just....really don't enjoy doing these workouts I've picked out. I feel so unmotivated to complete them it's strange. It's like they don't flow properly and feel broken and segmented, so I can't go from one to another in a smooth way like I could for the BBWW. I might try going back onto the BBWW for now and maybe make my way to the advances version of that in time, because as it stands I'm out of breath on my current workouts, but not really getting any cardio in...or at least it doesn't feel like it, I don't know arghh!

 

Having my glass of water now and will not have time to do GGD tonight. It's like the past 6 days have really not gone my way, dunno how to tackle this.

[Tkdgirl]

I enjoyed cauliflower rice (although my son knew it wasn't real rice immediately!) but I had terrible belly ache for the afternoon afterwards. I'm hoping this was just a coincidence!

[Spikings]

Day 12:

 

Food portions were good on Friday. Breakfast and lunch were sound, had a couple of slices of cake through the afternoon, but they were very thin slices (there's 65 of us in the office, we don't like to be greedy! xD) then for dinner I had a small bowl of pesto pasta and goats cheese. Not necesserily the best food in the day, but I didn't binge or eat more than I needed, so I'll count this one down. Evening hydration from water = done, still no progress on GDD, and exercise was a no today.

 

Day 13:

 

Breakfast was as normal, I went out with some friends for the day around Manchester and had some noodles and fried squid for lunch. Thankfully my bowl was pretty small next to some of the other dishes on the menu, looks like the portions were a 'lucky dip', but thankfully I got lucky. Afterwards I had a HUGE fruity smoothie which was probably full of sugar, but natural sugar at least. This kept me full until I got back home at 10pm and I had a small portion of instant noodles. Another (+1 for portions)

Hydration was complete, had some water after my noodles and fruit juice, then some more in the evening.

I did a lot of passive exercise today, must have clocked between 4-5 miles of walking throughout the day and was knackered by the time my head hit the pillow. xD While not a part of my routine, it was a good day of moving around a lot.

No progress on GDD.

 

Day 14 will be posted later on this evening.

[Tkdgirl]

I freakin' love pesto pasta and haven't had it in ages...

 

Also - woo hoo for your positive day. Things sound like they're going really well at the moment - keep it up!

[Spikings]

Pesto and pasta really is the best! One of my favourite quick meals, I try to add spinach, tomato and garlic to it too for more flavour, it's gorgeous in the summer. And thanks yeah it seems like I've done ok these past few days which I'm happy about! Hopefully it only gets better from here.

 

Day 14 (two week milestone):

 

 

There's really little to no change in my progress shots in the last two weeks, which is both a good and bad thing. Good that I've not gone backwards or failed to adapt to my new challenges, but bad in that I think I've plateaued a bit. My BMI is currently 28, and ideally I need to be down to 25, so there's not much left to go in terms of losing weight. Whatever's left is probably going to be hard to get rid of, so I can only imagine I'll have to dig deep the next four weeks. I'm not exactly sure how I'm going to do that, but I'll do my best. I'm skeptical but I really want to level myself up, so badly.

On a plus note, I can tell between progress pics that my arms have toned a little thanks to the power 10 workout and ability to do pushups.

 

Today was a great day for portions. Previously whenever I've been at home on my own all day I've resorted to bingeing, not today! Had a slice of cheese and an orange for breakfast, tomato soup for lunch with a slice of bread, then for dinner my homemade version of corned beef hash, was so so good!! I had no snacks in between, save for one biscuit. I had a lot of water and tea over the day though which helped a lot and I definitely kept my hydration up with that, so yay! Now treating myself to a drink this evening, just one. I've really got a better grip on alcohol since my last challenge, so happy with that as well.

 

I also had time to make more progress on my GDD! I now have a basic game premise set out, although I think it might be a bit boring so I might change it up in time. The idea of the game is that you play the last dragon-slayer in your family line and your town is calling you to slay a nearby dragon that's wreaking havoc on their land. You have seven days to defeat the dragon and save the town, and don't die. Now go! xD

 

Summary:

 

Workouts: 5.5/6

Portioned meals: 10/14

Hydration: 14/14

GDD Completion: 12%

[kuraiuncia]

Whoa look at you go! You're doing great I see. Keep up the good work!

 

Man now that you've mentioned it I'm craving some corned beef hash myself. Mmmm, with cabbage, yes.

[Tkdgirl]

I can't remember whether you're counting calories or not?! If not, it might really help with losing the weight.

 

Someone on here recommended it to me because I found I was eating healthily but just not losing weight. As soon as I started counting calories, the weight dropped off. My bmi was only 22 so I was in a similar position to you and convinced myself it was just because I had so little to lose. I use myfitnesspal app on my phone and it made a huge difference to me. Might be worth a try?