Born Again Gym Rat: Working Through the Discomfort

Wednesday, February 17, 2016

Working Through the Discomfort

It feels colder even though temps are in the moderate 30s. Just the humidity getting in everyone's bones. I get my son off to school and then head off to the gym. It's crowded, not just because the overcast skies seem threatening, but because HS kids are off this week.

Warming up, whacking, feeling okay in spite of the numbers. I must be getting better because walking the dog and doing other routine things don't really bother me. But putting my socks on in the morning is nearly excruciating, probably because the bed is too high for me to actually sit properly at the edge. I wear socks nearly all the time, but different pairs for different activities. I have super-soft and warm bed socks. And seamless toe, thin cotton &nylon gym socks. And every day wool socks. Which are not necessarily the socks I wear when I walk the dog and have to don heavy boots.

Avoiding lunging motions and stretches seem to be helping me recuperate. But it's awkward not being able to do certain hamstring stretches. Not that I need to stretch them. I've doubled up on the fish oil and completely cut out the calcium carbonate tablets. I haven't been able to find any credible information that taking calcium supplements actually prevents osteoporosis. My sleep is fractured in spite of taking ZMA nightly so I've started drinking some mild chamomile tea as well. My husband tells me that it has a bad cumulative affect and recounts how he would wake up groggy and prone to making bad decisions when he drank it nightly. No wonder we have a big box of largely untouched Sleepy Time tea in the cupboard.

Two steps forward, one step back but it's still progress. I pull my punches today because I don't want bruised knuckles. My finger tips are split and the cracked skin peeling off in small, painful sheets from the cold and dry winter air. I still swathe them in Bag Balm but it's hard to handle electronics or anything else if your hands are always sticky or greasy. The Step Mill is available but I know that's going to have a bad effect on my sciatica, so I do 15 minutes on the elliptical instead. I see a few regulars who have been MIA for the past year or two, like Ponytail Tattoo. His hair is longer than mine, but it's grey, like his beard. I see a few middle-age women who seem well on their way to becoming slender. I'm sure they're happy with their progress, but I'm more concerned with the lack of tone in their arms. I don't think "skinny fat" is in their vocabulary.

I'm really hungry by the time I leave the gym. The scale reads 110.6 lbs which is better than yesterday, but not where I want to be. After doing a few errands, I'm able to get home and make myself a protein shake. My personal favorite is the Optimum Nutrition 100% Whey Vanilla IceCream flavor. My husband favors the GNC Wheybolic Extreme stuff, but the last bag he bought is sitting here at home because he says it tastes terrible. It's suppose to be strawberry flavor and there's a faint scent of Strawberry Qwik.

I don't like brands that claim to give you 60 grams of protein without revealing that you have to use 3 scoops. So it's really only 20 gms per scoop. And there's a lot of stuff in this powder that I'm not sure about. I toss a scoop of it into my lactose-free, fat-free milk and chug it down with fish oil, vitamin D3, B-complex and chelated zinc. It has a nasty aftertaste, which I think is related one of the ingredients: 600mg Testofen® Fenugreek. Okay, 600 mg in 3 scoops. So that's 200 mg, and although I'm not exactly sure what it really does (in spite of what it claims to do), it reminds me of Chinese herbal medicine. Today, I take 1/2 a scoop and mix it with 1/2 scoop of my protein powder. It tastes slightly better.

Wednesday Workout