[braillediver]

Question?

Is anyone surprised by the commonality of our circumstances? Or is it understandable considering our common affliction to Head-Fi. We all have to be compulsive somethings.


Mitch

 

[LFF]

Hi. My name is LFF and I am a fat @ss.

I used to be real lean and skinny in high school. I was 6' 2" and came in at about 165lbs. I used to look good. In college I put on more weight due to me not participating in any sports and having only one girlfriend. I was 200lbs end of freshman year and graduated at 230lbs. Now, within 6 months with Law School and a full-time job to boot and excess stress I went up to 270lbs.

Lately I have tried to drink less pop and eat less junk food. I no longer eat after 7:00PM and that has seemed to help a bit. Regardless, I am still fat. I am tipping the scale at 245lbs now.

Currently, with me only working full-time and not having to deal with school, I have tried to be more active but I lack motivation. My current girlfriend who lives with me tells me I need to eat in portions and avoid fast food, but with a hectic schedule - it is rather difficult.

Any suggestions.

 

[Wmcmanus]

Quote:

Originally Posted by braillediver Congratulations!! I’m getting in shape too after way to long on the skids. In the last year I’ve gone from not fitting into 42-inch pants to a 36-inch waist. So when’s the First Annual Cayman Islands Headphone and Health Meet? I treasure hunt so set me up with a Spanish Galleon and we can collect gold doubloons. If it’s in 2-3 years I should have an Aristeaus by then so I could bring my HE90’s too? Mitch

We're actually long overdue for a Cayman meet. I've been "talking" about it for years now, and every time I get a thread started it kind of dies out after a while. It might not be the most practical meet to arrange considering the cost of travelling, the time away from work, etc. Plus, it would really have to be at least a mini vacation for it to make sense to people. I can't imagine folks coming here for a 2 day weekend and spending all of their time listening to headphones! So it really needs to be a full week, and that makes it quite difficult to get everyone's schedules to align. Maybe it can be a series of mini meets with whomever is up for the adventure, whenever. I do have a post in jpeg's "open couch" thread that invites pretty much anyone who is passing through Cayman to come hang out for a while.

Going from a 42 inch waist to a 36 inch waist represents a HUGE weight loss! That's sort of my goal, more or less. Congrats!

 

[Leporello]

Quote:

Originally Posted by PinkFloyd Quick way to lose weight..... worry a lot, smoke and don't eat.

Get your heart broken! Tried it once or twice, didn't like it, but my abs sure did look great!

Regards,

L.

 

[Wmcmanus]

Quote:

Originally Posted by EyeAmEye I'e violated every "rule" of diet, exercise and nutrition, and since October 2004, I've gone from 287 to 200. All I needed was an exercise bike. I do 1-2 hours a day, 6 days a week...

Dang! That's exactly what I'm trying to do. I think your time frame for losing that amount of weight is just about right. Much quicker, and it might be hard to keep off. Much slower, and you might start giving up on it in the middle.

Since you spend so much time on an exercise bike, I'd highly recommend the SportsArt recumbant bike that I linked to in my initial post on this thread. Not cheap, but well worth it in my opinion. But maybe you go to a gym and don't need your own bike at home? There are some serious health risks with upright bikes for men, especially for someone like yourself who spends so much time on it. The recumbant bikes take this stress off of your bits, and thus are no problem no matter how much time you spend working out on them.

 

[Wmcmanus]

Quote:

Originally Posted by 1911 when the man boobies start to sprout that is a serious hint to lose weight...how bout a before pic now..and then post a afer pic every six months?

You want me to post a before pic of my man boobies now? Man, you really are one sick puppy!

Nah, I know what you mean. I could probably do it at some point just by cutting and pasting pics that have been (and will be) taken of me at Head-Fi meets. There are a number of them floating around that show me weighing in at about the 280 to 290 mark, and then some pics form the National Meet when I was about 250. Since this thread started (what, just a day ago?), I've gone from 240 to 237.5 with my "water weight" loss. But still, it's the first time in years that I've been under 240, so that's kind of cool.

 

[star882]

Have any of you considered a homemade bicycle generator (or bicycle air compressor, or bicycle water pump, etc.) to do some useful work?
http://www.uwsp.edu/CNR/wcee/keep/re...cle/build.html
http://www.los-gatos.ca.us/davidbu/pedgen.html

 

[Wmcmanus]

Quote:

Originally Posted by LFF Hi. My name is LFF and I am a fat @ss. I used to be real lean and skinny in high school. I was 6' 2" and came in at about 165lbs. I used to look good. In college I put on more weight due to me not participating in any sports and having only one girlfriend. I was 200lbs end of freshman year and graduated at 230lbs. Now, within 6 months with Law School and a full-time job to boot and excess stress I went up to 270lbs. Lately I have tried to drink less pop and eat less junk food. I no longer eat after 7:00PM and that has seemed to help a bit. Regardless, I am still fat. I am tipping the scale at 245lbs now. Currently, with me only working full-time and not having to deal with school, I have tried to be more active but I lack motivation. My current girlfriend who lives with me tells me I need to eat in portions and avoid fast food, but with a hectic schedule - it is rather difficult. Any suggestions.

I think the phrase is FF. Seems so much nicer that way, doesn't it?

Now I hate to get all touchy feely with this, but it sounds like you've done some of the same things I've done over the years. In effect, you've found "reasons" not to exercise or to eat in a healthy manner, and it almost seems that during those times you don't "love yourself" enough to see it. This will happen at various points in your lifetime and you need to recognize it as soon as possible and figure out how to find time to fit in a modest exercise program, as well as "plan" your meals so you're not eating junk food on the run.

In my case, the year 2002 will always be my example. I actually kept track of the hours that I was working on a daily/weekly basis in an effort to try to manage my time better and to find ways of doing "more in less time". The result? The LEAST hours that I worked in any ONE week during that entire year was 81. Most weeks were around 95 or so, and some over 100. Mind you, there are only 168 hours in a week.

That entire year went by in a blur and of course I gained a bunch of weight. I was working a demending 40+ hour job in private banking, revising a textbook that I'm a co-author of, teaching a "one-man-show" CPA review course two nights per week and all day on Saturday, teaching a couple of classes at the local college two other nights per week, serving as a director for several local companies, serving as the dean of an online university with over 700 students, volunteering on various committees of professional organizations I belonged to, managing apartments, and more.

Now that I think about it, the "mistake" that I made was in thinking that I "needed" to be doing all of these things. Teaching has always been a passion to me and it's where I think I fit in best, occupationally speaking. So it took a while, but evenntually I decided to give up my full time job (this was not at all an easy thing to do in terms of the "comfort" of a regular, and quite nice, paycheck). But it had to be done. I was actually doing so many "other" things that I wasn't attending to my "real" job at the bank the way I really needed to. I was the head of the department, so nobody really noticed but me. Yet, I'd pull an "all nighter" at least once per week to work on the book. Not a good thing the next day no matter how much Diet Coke you drink!

It wasn't the "money" that was making me do all of these things, but the sense of being involved and making a difference. As it turned out, what I had the least amount of passion for was my "real" job, which of course paid the most. But I knew that would take care of itself, and it has.

Long story, but the point is that there may be certain points in your life when you let your passions get the best of you, to the point that it means you've allowed yourself to get run down. Now that I've "been there" (and 2002 is just my "worst case" example, there have been other years that were quite similar), I can honestly tell you that I'd never let it happen again. If you can avoid this kind of crazy over involved schedule, do so at all costs.

 

[braillediver]

"Plus, it would really have to be at least a mini vacation for it to make sense"

OK Twist my arm some more?


Mitch

 

[Wmcmanus]

Quote:

Originally Posted by elrod-tom Your story was...

So much like mine! Well, actually it was a mix of my story and that of one of my brothers. He's got kids and works long hours and had to choose between eating Twinkies while playing with the kids, or going down into the basement alone to work out. So of course is was the Twinkies and the kids! He's also had some sports related injuries that are quite similar to yours.

I think the elliptical machines are wonderful in terms of giving you an awesome, low (to almost no) impact workout. Recumbant bikes as well.

I also think you're wise to keep the pace of your treadmill sessions to a rather comfortable speed. At 3.2 mph, you will get a nice swaet going and will be able to keep at it for longer time intervals. I'm told that kicking it up from 30 minutes to 40 minutes at a moderate heart rate is much better than kicking it down from 30 minutes to 20 minutes at a much higher heart rate. At least for those of us who are not in "top athlete" type of form.

It's good to know that you're settling into a routine that works, and it's especially nice to know that your workplace is supportive of this!

(I'm starting to feel like Dr. Phil in this thread... and here I started it to get YOUR advice!!!)

 

[Wmcmanus]

Quote:

Originally Posted by elrod-tom I also bought a Total Gym (don’t laugh…this thing is great for doing exercises that strengthen load-bearing joints like knees and ankles) to use at home in the evening and on weekends.

I've got one of these as well but must confess that I've not made much use of it, but I do quite like the basic motion and the incredible variety of exercises you can do with it. Also, because you can quickly adjust the angle of the incline to 6 different positions (and thus 6 different resistance levels), it works quite for either strength training or cardio. Plus, it's perfect for a quick and easy pre-workout if you're doing "serious" body building. Essentially, you could do maybe 5-10 minutes on the Total Gym at a medium setting to quickly get your heart rate up and then hit the weights. Nice product for your every day guy (i.e., professed non-athletes, plus the "has beens" and "never was but thought they were" types).

 

[EyeAmEye]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Wmcmanus Dang! That's exactly what I'm trying to do. I think your time frame for losing that amount of weight is just about right. Much quicker, and it might be hard to keep off. Much slower, and you might start giving up on it in the middle. Since you spend so much time on an exercise bike, I'd highly recommend the SportsArt recumbant bike that I linked to in my initial post on this thread. Not cheap, but well worth it in my opinion. But maybe you go to a gym and don't need your own bike at home? There are some serious health risks with upright bikes for men, especially for someone like yourself who spends so much time on it. The recumbant bikes take this stress off of your bits, and thus are no problem no matter how much time you spend working out on them.

Have a recumbant at home, I do

I knew I'd never stick to any gym routine, needed something easy to do, and a home bike was the best option. The recumbant is great (I believe it's a Keys Magnetic, can't remember at the moment), and greatly reduces stress, particularly on my back. I haven't missed a day in my routine since I started. I think that's important, atleast for me, because missing one day makes it easier for me to blow off another, so and so on, until I'm back being the couch potato. I usually bike with my Karma, or watch tv. Heck, I even play Xbox with a wireless controller while I'm on it, and 1-2 hours goes by pretty quick. Started a few months on the lowest resistance level, and now I'm on the top level. By the time I'm done, I'm spent.

My weight loss has slowed to a trickle over the past few months, but I've noticed I started eating much more than previously, so I can still have whatever I wish, just need to curb the binging. The summer will help, I lose my appetite in the heat

 

[Wmcmanus]

Quote:

Originally Posted by EyeAmEye Heck, I even play Xbox with a wireless controller while I'm on it, and 1-2 hours goes by pretty quick.

Considering the amount of time your spend on that bike, you could probably read War and Peace in about a week! That, or watch a different movie every day!

 

[SAP7]

There's this thing called "diet" apparently....

Check it out.

 

[SAP7]

Oh.... you need to "exercise" as well. Typing doesn't count