I’m at the end of week 7 of p90x. Because the SO skipped some days we ended up on the same schedule this week. I said at the beginning of this that I wouldn’t work out with him because we are too competitive. But, it was fun. It is just for this week since I’m moving to the next recovery week in a few days.
I had to buy funeral clothes last week. I still haven’t lost any weight or any dress sizes but my body feels tighter. I saw a dress I liked but it was knit. Knit is clingy in all the wrong areas. I decided to try it on. It worked. There were no extraneous lumps. A miracle.
I decided to take some more pictures today. I continue to take the most unflattering pictures ever. It must be the angle of the camera. It makes my stomach look bigger than my chest which is Not True. I have the pictures in a slideshow from beginning tonow. They are totally interchangable. No visible difference in my body at all. That’s discouraging but I’ve decided that knit dresses don’t lie. The SO says my body is different too. Obviously am I just incompetent at self portraits.
I told my mother that I think that when I am at the end of three months of p90x that I will be in the shape they wanted me to be in before I was supposed to start p90x. I’ll have to do it again to see visible results. I’m definitely tougher though.
Riley likes to help me workout. He loves my super squooshy mat. He believes if I am reaching to the ground then I should be petting him. I have never fallen on him doing yoga but I did almost flatten him during a disastrous attempt at one arm pushups yesterday.
Today was the worst though. Bent over rows where going on. He came to rub up against me. Ten lb weight to kitty skull. Whoops. He seems undamaged so far. Poor abused kitty. Hopefully he got some sense knocked into him.
I’m in week 4 of p90x. That is the first recovery week. There is no weight lifting this week. You do yoga, kenpo, core work, and stretching workouts. It is still an hour of working out a day.
I can’t stand it. I love weight lifting. I miss it. You’d think I would like a chance to take it easy but it isn’t turning out that way. I feel like a slacker and it is hard to motivate myself to get through the workouts. I find myself really wanting to cheat for the first time.
I’ve gained the weight I lost back which I don’t totally understand since my food habits aren’t different than last week.
In two days I start week five which is the beginning of phase two. The weight workouts are new. I think in this phase I need to really get a handle on my diet.
In other self-improvement news I’ve finished my first set of 22 lectures for the acupuncture course. I’m going to start reviewing key ones now. It is frustrating because I have enough knowledge now to identify good patients for acupuncture and to be able to name a few major points to use in each patient. That is totally unhelpful when I don’t know where those points are or know how to put needles in a patient. I go for my first hands on training in March.
I finished up week three of p90x last night. The first three weeks are all the same. Now I have a recovery week. No weights this week but lots of yoga, cardio, and a new workout called Core Synergistics which is scary to contemplate.
There is a move in last night’s workout called the X. It happens during the “break” times which consists of running in place, faking jumping rope, and jumping jacks. I do not think they know what this word “break” means.
To do the X you jump up in the air and spread out your arms and legs to make your body into an X. I tried it on my first time through the workout and either I didn’t jump high enough or I was too slow but I didn’t have my feet back under me when I came down and that was ugly. I wisely refrained from doing this again. Last night I decided to try it. I did it! Then on every time I was able to do all ten reps! No wiping out.
The SO is still doing well. He’s starting week three. He bought a new pair of pants and they are too small and he is convinced that makes him a horrible human even though all his other pants are getting too big. He has to wear a belt with them now. Obviously the new pants are not the size they are supposed to be and therefore should be ignored.
Last week I mentioned that my pants were starting to fit a bit differently. Yesterday I put on the same pants straight out of the dryer and they were officially big. That of course means I spent most of the day showing people that I could pull my pants down too low. I’m a blast at parties.
So, this morning I decided to take some official pictures. I didn’t take before pictures because I knew they would be icky. But my pants are big! I can see muscles in my arms. At the end of week three I’m ready to wow the world with my new body. I put on a tank top and shorts and figured out the self timer on the camera.
Oh My God! I took the most unattractive portraits since Medusa’s high school graduation. My midsection has lumps and bulges like aliens are trying to escape. I looked at myself in the mirror and looked at the pictures trying to reconcile the two. I can’t.
I’ve decided to offer my services to makers of shady diet pills for their advertisements. I could make Kate Moss look like a 300 lb matron. It is a skill.
I took some pictures of me flexing my arms. If you ignore the whole rest of the picture you can see my bicep and shoulder definition. I’m holding on to that….
I started week three today. This is another repeat week. So far I haven’t missed any workouts, even if I probably should have. I’ve been sick off and on for most of the time I’ve been doing this (I still think the workout is trying to kill me).
One unexpected side effect is that I’m starting to like my body. I think what is happening is that I’m starting to see what is actually there instead of what I think is there.
I’ve always considered myself to be a hugely fat person. There are a couple of reasons for that.
1. I weigh a lot. By “a lot” I mean a freakishly large amount. If I tell people what I weigh it is always met with open mouthed stares and then accusations of lying. I have friends three to four dress sizes larger than me who weigh 50 lbs less than me. My mother is the same way. Her bones are off the chart on her bone density test. I think I have a black hole in the center of me. I have tough bones and a lot of muscle but if you just take my BMI, I come out as “obese.” Must be true then, right?
2. I wear clothes that say XL so I must be huge.
But for some reason lately I’ve been seeing things differently. It started with a picture from our vacation in Portugal. Usually I can’t stand photos of me since I see a huge blob. But in these I didn’t look big. Having that thought was wild for me. I’ve been told repeatedly that I have a warped picture of myself in my brain, but this was the first time that I was starting to think that that may be true.
Now I’m starting to notice when I’m at the gym working out surrounded by mirrors that I actually look pretty good. It surprises me everytime I have that thought. I’m not used to positive body image. I don’t quite know how to handle it. I can still go part by part and critique the flaws in my body but the overall package isn’t as bad as I always imagined it was.
And my arms? Seriously getting amazing. My biceps are hard. I find myself just touching them over and over because I can’t believe the difference in two weeks. I still have flabby underarms which I’m a bit scared might be genetic because I remember both my grandmothers with flappy arms even when they were thin. You still can’t quite see the muscle definition in a picture yet or believe me you’d all be forced to look at them. LOL.
My pants are starting to fit different. I’m not sure exactly what the difference is. It isn’t a good different like “I have to hold these up so they don’t fall down” but it isn’t a bad different like “These don’t button anymore” either. It is subtle like they are sitting at a new place on my waist. I think my lower abs area might be getting just the tiniest bit smaller. I really need to get some pictures so I can start comparing. I didn’t get before pictures so I should get some now pictures before any changes get really noticeable.
Remember back at the first week of p90x when I said that there were ab moves that I totally failed at doing? Well since then I’ve decided that when they do those moves that what they are saying to my own self is “Break Time”. I’ve been doing this three days a week for a total of 6 times so far.
Today I was doing this at the same time as the SO. The first impossible move came on and I said, “Can’t do this one. See?” And then I did it. I did five of them. I’m supposed to do 25 but I figured that was a big enough accomplishment. I took a break through the second (and most) impossible move but then I was able to do a few of the third impossible move. I could even do one of the harder variations of it.
I survived the first week of p90x and I actually even liked it! In fact, I think I’m obsessed. Because we are leaving right after I get off work today to go to my parents’, I got up early to do pylometrics. That is staggering. I don’t get up early for anything, especially to work out. But I was doing the jump training routine at 6:00 AM. Nuts.
The next two weeks are repeats of the first week. Yesterday I did the chest and back routine at the gym in order to use the pull up machine. It offsets your weight so you can lift just a fraction of your body weight. I was only lifting about 45 lbs but it was more work than using the resistance bands last week. I was wiped out by the end of the workout. I could feel my back muscles last night. Everyone one of them had something to say. But I don’t feel bad this morning. Last week after that workout I could hardly move. That’s either improvement or I need to work even harder.
Yesterday was Kenpo day. This is a cardio kickboxing/martial arts workout. I was really stiff through my hamstrings and calves after the leg day so I was a little worried about the kicks but it was fine. This workout was pretty fun but it is well known that I watch way too much Buffy so I like this sort of thing.
Some of the punch combos were confusing at first. I wouldn’t remember what punch to do when so I’d end up sort of flailing around and once I managed to smack myself in my own head. The SO came in when I was about half done and watched. That is slightly unsettling but I’ve been doing it to him so I guess it is only fair. By this time I was getting coordinated and he said that he thought I could beat people up. That’s so sweet!
He was on pylometrics. That’s the jump training one. I like watching him workout because his cussing at people on the DVD entertains me. He said that he was worried about me watching because he knows that I’m writing it down for the whole internet. I promised not to write anything embarrassing about him unless he happened to fall on me or something. He didn’t so he did just fine. (In case he’s checking on me.)
This morning I am even more stiff on the back of my body. Today is day 7 which can be a rest day or you can do an extra stretching routine. I think I better do the stretching. I have tight hamstrings anyway and they are in revolt.
Last night I had to adjust my blankets over my feet in bed and I sat up and did it. Yes, I did Ab Ripper X for the first time on Thursday morning and on Sunday night I was able to sit up unassisted again. I don’t think I’ve been as proud of that since the first time I did it as a baby.
Today the SO started. He has the hardest, largest upper body that I have ever personally laid hands on. It is part of the reason I’ve kept him so long! So he was scoffing at this workout. He asked in all seriousness if I thought that he should use p90x as a warm-up and then go to the gym and work out. After the first few moves he decided that he’d need to catch his breath before going to the gym. Where did he go after the whole workout? To the neighbors’ to watch football.
We did the ab workout together. That was nice because he did my cussing for me. He said something about not being able to sit up tomorrow. I reminded him of how excited I was when I sat up last night. He cussed again.
Then he left and I did Day 5 the legs and back routine. My legs are strong. I can lift a lot of weight on leg exercises. So of course most of the leg exercises don’t have weights. They rely on speed and repetition. Again I feel like a total bad ass now that I’m done. But I’m not sure who is going to help who out of bed tomorrow.
Bad things – There are timed wall squats. Riley is a cuddle kitty at night. He came running because his mommy made a lap. He jumped onto my lap. Have I mentioned that he is 19 lbs? Have I mentioned that he has claws that he can use to hold on when I was trying to push him off?
There are also timed lunged sequences. My dvd started to pause. Not skip which would have made the exercise shorter – pause which made it longer.
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Yesterday I was rubbing my arm because there was a muscle burning on each one that I didn’t even fully realize I had before the arm workout. I felt a dip on my arm. It is muscle definition. You can’t see it yet but I can feel the change. I’m also down 2 lbs but I was sick and not eating for a bit.
I woke up this morning feeling fine. (Oh crap, I wrote that without thinking. The last time I discussed that band I got nasty emails from the lead singer. Freaky.) Anyway, my arms only hurt a little which I attribute to my problem with the bands and not my intrinsically tough arm muscles.
Today was yoga day. I like yoga. I do yoga for fun. So, why was this the only workout so far that made me want to quit? It was 1.5 hours long. The first part was flow yoga. I’m not used to that so that was hard for me. That was followed by balances. I skipped the arm balances. I’m not strong enough for that. Then there were static stretches. Wore me right out. I think not knowing what was coming next was the mentally hard part. When I was in the flow part and the timer said there were 45 minutes left, I wanted to quit. But, it got better.
Oh, and my not-sore arms? In warrior two my biceps decided they really sort of did hurt.
By this morning the soreness in my chest and back was mostly gone but if I’m laying down I still can’t sit up without rolling over first. Today was shoulders, biceps, and triceps followed by AbRipperX again.
Again I was doing this with resistance bands since I was doing it at home. This was a problem. I’ll be fine when I take this routine to the gym and do it with free weights. But, my shoulders are my weakest spot so I had a very hard time finding a place on the band where I had tension through the whole exercise but not so much tension that I couldn’t complete the range of motion.
Overall the workout wasn’t bad except for the times when using the band would frustrate me. This is one that definitely will be better in the gym also.
I worked through the ab stuff sort of. Remember that I can’t sit up because of the soreness from the last time? How am I supposed to do sit ups? I did what I could. Let’s leave it at that.
Tomorrow is yoga X. I’m excited about that. I’m probably wrong to be excited about that. I have a feeling that they are going to make yoga hurt.
By 7:45 last night it hurt to breathe. Not hurt exactly. It was more like there was a band around my lower ribs that restricted my breathing.
I had a rough night. My subconcious went batty. I’ve been listening to a story about maids on audio book. I started reading a book about werewolves yesterday. I play too much rummikub on facebook. My brain put that all together and gave me a dream about werewolf maids that came in four colors and stood in lines and then there was a missing kid. My brain couldn’t make a coherent story out of it so I’d wake up and roll over and by then the pain had shown up. I’d fall back asleep and the dream would start again and then I’d wake up and say ow again. I’m really tired this morning.
The SO is off work today so I’ve brought the pylometrics DVD to work to do it when appointments are over. Between the tired and the pain I’m not sure how well this is going to work.
I tried it. I did about half of it before we had to leave. Then I came home and collapsed. I slept for four hours. I think I really am sick. I knew p90x would kill me after the first workout! Just kidding. I think it is the flu or something.
This video is mainly pushups and pullups. It shows you how to modify the pullups with either resistance bands or by using a chair to partly support your weight. Today I did the bands because I was at home. I didn’t have a good place to anchor them up high so I looped them over the treadmill. I was too powerful for that and pulled the treadmill around.
When this one comes up again I’ll go to the gym and use their pullup machine that lets you lift part of your body weight.
It wasn’t as impossible as I thought it would be. I’m not good at pushups but you do each move for a set number of reps that you pick depending on your fitness level. So you just do what you can do and try to get better each time.
The whole workout is about 45 minutes. Then you do AbRipperX. That’s a scary name. It is about 15 minutes of ouch. I was not even physically able to do some of the moves. You aren’t supposed to say that. You are supposed to say that a certain move is something that you are struggling with at this time. Well I struggled to the point of failure with the full situps. I haven’t done those since high school. Crunches only since then. Turns out that they don’t work the same.
I guess you could say that I did a very wimpy version of the workout but I still feel like a badass. My arms feel weak and tired.
I think it is a good idea to be a few days ahead of the SO. We have totally opposite strengths. He is all upper body strength. He’ll be all over those workouts. I’ll be better at the yoga and cardio portions. We are both competitive so we’ll have bad thoughts towards the other during the workouts that we aren’t good at. I’d hate to have to kill him over his own Christmas present.
The SO asked for a specific something for Christmas with the cavat that I couldn’t tell anyone what it was. Like that’s going to happen. I won’t tell anyone who knows him personal-like but telling the whole internet is obviously ok, right? Because it is relevant.
I ordered P90X which is a crazy workout system which all but gives you a written guarantee that if you do it you will be hot in three months. Or dead after the first workout. It’s a toss up.
I’m going to do it. That’s what makes it relevant. It seems customary to take mostly naked pictures of yourself prior to the workout so you can compare that with the amazing hotness that is you in three months. These are then posted on the internet. Yeah, not doing that and you are welcome. I’ll take a picture in shorts and a tshirt just in case I end up looking like an Amazon and then I will totally post it but I’m the type that is much more likely to die during the first workout.
I’ve been eagerly awaiting this since I ordered it on Nov 27. I might have been cheap and ordered it from another website that was cheaper than the official one. Those are probably pirated copies in China. Last week I started getting worried that it wasn’t coming. So I ordered it again from the real site. It came yesterday. It came in a box with P90X all over it. Haven’t they ever heard of plain brown wrappers for Christmas presents? Yeah, so now that’s he’s seen what he’s getting, I guess I’ll wrap that up for him.
Is it a bad sign that I had a hard time lifting the boxes up off the porch? I am so totally going to die when I try this.
