My Superhero Body – Week 1

Welcome back, gryphans! I’ve finished Week One of the experiment I call “My Superhero Body,” and I’m ready to rap with you. Let’s take a look at the past week.

Miss last week? My Superhero Body – Week Zero

Want to catch up from the beginning? My Superhero Body – Getting Started

Post Mortem

Aches and Pains

So, exercise hurts!

Oh the pain! The pain of it all!
Oh the pain! The pain of it all!

There were pains I was expecting that came true, like a slight ache in my shins and calves.

There were pains I was expecting that never materialized, like chafed nipples, or terrible pain in my knees.

Then there were the unexpected pains, like the little ache (and occasional cramp) I get just above my knees. I can only guess that one of the muscles connecting my quads to my knee joint is getting a lot more work and strain than it’s used to. It hurts, but not even in a bad way. It’s a good ache that I find oddly satisfying.

At this stage, my pains and aches are surprisingly less than I anticipated. The only one that even has me worried thus far is a bit of an ache in the soles of my feet that has me worrying that I’m starting to get some plantar fasciitis again. I probably need some better running shoes, but with my weirdly-shaped feet, I’m lucky to find shoes that fit at all, let alone shoes that fit well. I’ll be monitoring this and seeing how this progresses, while saving up for what will probably be some stupidly expensive shoes.

The Wall

I’m pretty sure little kids have no wall. They can run full tilt until they fall down from exhaustion.

Even as a teenager and into my early 20s, I remember being able to push myself ridiculously hard. I could run so hard that I would throw up. I think my body would “nope” out, and I would fall over well before that point.

Now, in my early 30s, I start running, or at least jogging, and I feel the wall, a barrier to exertion. I have just a few small aches, feel like my breaths aren’t quite deep enough, and my body cries, “Stop! This is how you get hurt!”

This isn’t the marathon runner’s wall, where stores of glycogen in the body have been depleted and your brain screams, “Bro, we ran out of gas!” This is a learned wall of a brain used to the comfort of a sedentary life becoming alarmed at the slightest discomfort.

What to do about this wall?

Guten Tag.
Guten Tag.

We’ll have to knock down the wall!

I’ve been wogging (walking/jogging) at a park a few blocks from my house. It’s generally not very busy, has some small hilliness to it, and has a path that’s about a 5/8 mile (roughly 1 km) loop. (Shout out to Google Maps when it came to figuring out the length of the loop. They have a tool that allows you to draw a path on a map and see the distance.)

Each of my training sessions ended with a 10-minute free form run, 10 minutes to walk, run, or switch between the two.

On Monday, I pushed myself as hard as I could, and made it about 2/3 of the way around the path.

On Wednesday, I pushed myself as hard as I could, and made it 100 feet before I had a cramp in my left leg that had me pushing myself to my limits just to walk it off.

On Friday, I made a full loop of the park. I ran a full kilometer, which is the furthest I’ve run in a long time.

The difference on Friday was in part due to a little better job of stretching, but mostly achieved with some serious goal setting. I set out on my run with the goal of running a full lap around the park.

I had to start off telling myself that I’ve spent the last two weeks learning to run again, letting my body remember the movements, and building up my stamina. I planned which direction I would take the loop around the park, deciding to run up the longer, less steep side of the hill so I would be less likely to cramp up again. I set a starting point, letting myself walk to that point so I could really catch my breath. Most importantly, I told myself that I could do it.

Just do it!
Thanks for having my back, Shia. I’m sorry the internet memed you into an actual cannibal.

It didn’t matter how fast I went, as long as I kept my legs pumping and I kept moving forward.

About 2/3 of the way around, my body and brain were screaming for me to stop. I didn’t. I could see my goal. I pushed on, and suddenly the pressure was gone. The wall I’d come up against was inside of me, something I’d imposed on myself, and I’d pushed past it…

Well, actually, I’d just pushed it back.

I hit my starting point, denoting my full lap, and I was feeling pretty good. “Maybe I can keep going,” I thought.

I bet I’d made it all of 50 feet before my body shut it down. I had no run left in me, and no will to push it.

Next time, I’ll need to psych myself up for longer goals!

Dieting

When I am at home with Mrs. Gryphon, my will is fierce! I eat smaller portions. I add vegetables! I drink two large glasses of water before I even consider a snack!

Unsupervised, I still make poor decisions, but I’m making smaller poor decisions. Yes, I went though the Dairy Queen drive through and got a snack, but rather than get myself an entire meal, I ordered a small order of cheese curds and then savored them. So yes, I don’t make good choices, but I’m making better ones.

I also find that late at night my will erodes. When I was in my 20s, I instituted my 2AM Rule. The 2AM Rule is simple and sensible.

NOTHING GOOD HAPPENS AFTER 2AM.

Seriously, from 2AM to 5:30AM, I am to be sequestered and limit my human contact. I will eat things I shouldn’t. I will say things I shouldn’t. I will go places I shouldn’t.

It’s like my frontal lobe checks out and leaves me uncensored, uninhibited, and unaware of consequences. Alcohol, while often a contributing factor in the past, doesn’t even need to be present. I can be totally sober, but then the clock strikes 2AM and I turn into a walking Bacchanalia.

What has this got to do with anything?

Mrs. Gryphon and I have been taking shifts taking care of Baby Boy Gryphon at night, and while my shifts have me observing the 2AM rule and sleeping when I would otherwise be making poor decisions, I find that between 10PM and 1AM I hit this window of sleep deprivation where I make bad food choices.

Every night, I want, during that time, to eat. I want carbs. All of them.

All the things!
All the things!

I would guess that it’s because I’m tired, but I know I need to be alert enough to take care of the baby, so my body says, “Hey, carbs would wake you up! Simple carbs we can make into yummy, yummy glucose!”

I try to have a reasonable snack, but my body responds by saying, “Good start, buddy, but do we have a pizza in the freezer?”

Filling up on water during that time not only doesn’t silence the hunger, it also interrupts what little sleep I can get by making me have to get up to pee.

Even when I’ve been trying to make good decisions, they backfire in weird ways. Saturday night around 11, I thought, “Maybe if I have Jell-o as a snack, I’ll be sated but not have made a bad food choice.” So I boiled up 2 cups of water, mixed in 2 packets of sugar-free Jell-o, added 2 cups of cold water, and put it in the fridge. Around midnight I checked in on my Jell-o and saw no evidence of it setting up, so I panicked and drank the Jell-o.

That’s right, I panicked and I drank 32 ounces of not-yet-set-up Jell-o. Poor-decision-making-me felt the need to hide the evidence of my failure, even though it would have set up if I’d just waited until morning. So, 80 calories there. A lot of good stuff for my joints, hair, and nails, but… Dude, seriously.

I may have to set up fasting hours. Just a straight up, “Mr. Gryphon may not eat between 9PM and 7AM” with notes on (and in) the fridge and pantry to remind me. We’ll see…

Weekly Weigh-In

Tipping the Scales

On May 29, 2017:

  • I weigh 301.7 pounds
  • My body fat is 38.4%
  • That means 115.9 pounds of me is fat

In the last week:

  • I’ve lost 3.7 pounds
  • I’ve lost 2.3 pounds of fat

Progress!

Pictures

Not a huge difference, but in my profile my stomach does look a bit more trim. It’s a start!

Moving Forward

It’s small progress, but it’s progress. I didn’t become Jabba the Hutt in a week, so I won’t become… not Jabba… in a week either.

Bring me the Wookie cookie!q
Bring me the Wookie cookie!

Diet

I’m going to continue to try to make better food choices.

I am seriously considering putting stern looking pictures of Terry Crews around so he can sit in judgement of my food choices.

Do you need those chips? Really?
Do you need those chips? Really?

You think I’m joking, but I might just have to wear a locket with a picture of Terry Crews in it so that when I have doubts, I can gaze upon his stern face and make the right decision.

Exercise

Zombies Run 5k seems to be working for me, so I’m moving on to week 2 of the training.

Kind of a weird side note here, but the app is designed so you can select a music playlist to play behind the “game” while you run.

I don’t listen to music.

I am part of the vanishingly rare subset of the human race that doesn’t particularly enjoy music for the sake of listening to music. While I may appreciate its place in cinema as it helps set the tone for a scene, and even enjoy it as an element of storytelling in musicals, I almost never listen to music for the sake of listening to music.

Before you ask, no, I don’t just drive in silence. I listen to audiobooks.

Unfortunately, audiobooks don’t make the best listening while running, and I don’t care to run in silence.

Instead, I’ve been downloading Workout Music Mixes from Podrunner. DJ (and writer) Steve Boyett provides free workout mixes with fixed, or variable, BPM. They tend towards a variety of electronic music styles while providing a solid bass line.

I like these tracks to run with because they provide just enough stimuli to stave off boredom without being overpowering.

The major benefit, for me, is the bass beat. A solid beat helps me regulate my pace, keeping it pretty constant, and also helps me regulate my breathing. Right now, mixes around 160 BPM are great for me, lining up with my stride and breathing so I can move at a comfortable pace when walking or running.

If you’re like me and don’t listen to music, or if you need different music to workout to than you’d normally listen to (looking at you, fans of freeform jazz), give Podrunner a try.

 

That’s it for this week, gryphans!

Until next time,

Mr Gryphon

 

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MrGryphon

Jake (a.k.a. Mr. Gryphon) is the mystical Golden Gryphon an Alpha Geek who enjoys building and destroying things. He's also an author of supernatural fiction and a fan of the sci-fi and fantasy genres. Visit his author website here: http://jacobcox.us/

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