Archive for the ‘Fitness’ Category

Shout Out For A Great Article


30 Nov

Francine, over at talkaboutdiets.net penned a great one, The Healthy Diet Manifesto.  Check it out.

Starts of with a gem:

1. Everyone is on a diet. Healthy dieters choose a diet that will bring them closer to their life goals.

Diet is a not dirty word. You are on a diet every day, and making it a healthy diet is not as challenging as you may think. It is not about starvation. It is not about being deprived. It is about being able to breathe in your jeans. Even more than that, it is about living your best life. It is about having integrity in your actions.

And, my favorite:

8. Healthy dieters use the inside-out approach to dieting—using diet as a means for self-inquiry and as a catalyst for personal development and spiritual and emotional growth.

Life lessons are learned through difficulty. No one would choose to have a rocky marriage, credit card debt, or an illness, but savvy men and women learn valuable lessons from the curves life throws them, and that includes the need to diet. Healthy dieting is one of the easier curves through which you get an opportunity to learn life lessons—at least it is something you can control.

Heh.  I’m a sucker for self-inquiry.

Cheers!

Things To Not Do When On A Weight Loss Plan


30 Jul

Sorry for the cumbersome title. I originally wrote, “Things To Not Do When On A Diet”, but I remembered I hate the word diet as it is misused in the modern fitness world. In any event, I was inspired by an article over at Lifehack.org, Fitness is a Journey. Bring a Map., so here we go.

Straight from my experience, here’s a few things to avoid when on a diet weight loss plan:

  • Thirst: There’s a couple of old adages regarding proper hydration that I find very useful;
    1. If you are thirsty it’s too late, you are already dehydrated. You can avoid this state with a few simple steps. One, drink some water as soon as you get up. Two, always have something to hand to sip at whenever you are sitting, or reclining.
    2. Watch the color of your urine. If it’s clear you are doing well. If it’s not, drink some water.
    • Also, your body maintains a set hydration level. When you drink water it is absorbed immediately, and if that brings you above your set hydration level it is moved swiftly to your bladder for expulsion. The problem is that if you have had long standing levels of low hydration then your body has adapted to that state and accepted the low set hydration level. Your set level only moves up very slowly. To get past that you want to bypass that system. You can do that by getting your body to treat water as food, rather than water. Mix some unsweetened fruit juice into your water. A mix of 1 part juice to 3-4 parts water will do the trick nicely. This will cause the water to be absorbed a little more slowly, and can partially bypass the set hydration level check, which will get your set hydration level to rise more quickly.
  • Going Hungry: Don’t do it. Being overly hungry means you are tempting your body to go into a starvation response. That means your metabolism will lower, and your body’s mechanism for storing fat will ramp up. Those are bad. Being hungry is fine, but when the rumbles start, nibble something.
  • Sitting Still: Our culture has a lot of excuses for extended periods of time spent on our backsides. Fight the tide! Get up and stretch those legs frequently. Get the blood moving. I used to keep a large, 3/4 gallon, nalgene plastic bottle on my desk for my water. Mistake. That meant I only had to get up to go to the bathroom. Now I use a pint glass, while maintaining the same level of fluid intake. That means frequent trips to the office kitchen, which is thankfully on the other side of the building.
  • Feeling Stuffed: That painful bloated feeling you get when you stop ten bites to late. You know what I’m talking about. Avoid it. It expands your stomach and makes it harder to reach that point next time, allowing for an upwards spiral of consumable volumes. Note that it takes your body sometime to feel things after they enter your stomach. Eat slow. When you start to feel a little full, stop and take a break. See if you can be done. Your stomach will shrink to a more normal size, and the next time you will feel full sooner, which will help the downward spiral of weight loss.
  • Doubt:  I do not ascribe to the Law of Attraction.  But, I do believe in the Power of Intention, and the Might of Self Talk.  Our brains are amazing tools, infinitely capable of steering us on the course we say we desire.  If you say internally, “I’ll never get thin”, your brain will help you to fulfill that goal.  If you say, “I’m getting thinner!”, your mind will work to perpetually keep you in that state, which is to say always getting thinner but never being thin.  Acknowledge your successes as they come.  Consciously modify your internal dialog.  Switch, “I’m getting thinner,” to, “I am thinner,” and the results may amaze you.  At the very least you will stop beating yourself up.

That’s it folks, a few tips on things to avoid when working on weight loss.  Until next time, sip some sweet water, nibble if you need to, move a bit, don’t eat too much, and celebrate your successes.

Cheers!

Letting Mom Die


16 Apr

My Mother died this Monday, April 14th at 2pm. My brother, wife, and I were with here and witnessed her last moments. Her heart beat its last while I was holding her hand.

This comes at the end of eight years of congestive heart failure. Her first collapse was due to water retention, she had about two gallons of fluid in her chest cavity, which crushed her heart. She managed to recover from that episode and remained fairly active despite the death of 25% of her heart’s tissue. Although diagnosed with congestive heart failure she remained active, traveling frequently and independently.

Four years ago she suffered a massive heart attack. She managed to call me at 6am and asked for me to come over and be with her when the ambulance picked her up. Once we got her to the ER room of the Kaiser Permanente on Geary Street in San Francisco she slipped into a coma. She spent the next four days in room 3205 of the ICU unit at Kaiser Permanente. The doctors spoke to me with tears streaming down their faces that she was very likely not going to make it. They described the severity of the attack as “one step below just falling over dead.” I spent many hours of each day at her side supported by my amazing wife, Daisy. On the fourth day, as I walked quietly into the room her head popped up, her eyes snapped open, and she pointed a finger at me vigorously as if to say, “It’s you!” She was not able to speak that day, but by the next she was very animate and giving the patient nursing staff a serious run for their money. They say that doctors make the worst patients. After seeing my Mom’s behavior I think that whomever coined that phrase had never treated a career nurse. My mother was a psychiatric nurse for the Veteran’s Administration hospital here in San Francisco for 20 years, and she damn well knew the best way to do things, and she was not afraid to tell everyone.

My Mother was moved to an assisted living facility where she lived for 18 months. Her heart had suffered no further damage as a result of the attack, but the strength, and circulation, of her legs was very impacted. She slowly progressed from wheelchair to walker. We renovated her house and got her moved back in. Although she could not be as physically active, her mind was still sharp, as was her tongue. Many were the times that she closed the subject of me cajoling her about working to improve her health (and watch what she ate) with a wry smile and a hearty, “Fuck you, asshole!” I think that became her pet name for me for the last few years, which was something of an improvement over, “Travee-poo.”

A couple of weeks ago my Mom suffered an infection in her left leg which caused a large blister. The circulation in her legs had become worse, and her feet were often purple. We got her back into an assisted living facility (ironically, the same one that she first went to after her heart attack) where they treated the leg for a week and a half before sending her back home. The color of her legs was a great deal better. She now had an assigned living assistant that visited her four times a week. My Mother spoke highly of the woman, and Mom was glad to be home and in good spirits.

I had a phone conversation with my Mother on the evening of the 8th, and although she seemed a little tired, she reported nothing amiss.

Last Wednesday, the 9th, I got another morning call. This one was from the agency that had gotten my Mother her assistant. The assistant was outside of the house. My Mother had not been able to let her in, and had yelled something incoherent from up the stairs. I rushed over, went in, and found Mom. The TV was blaring, all the lights were on, and she had obviously been struggling, unable to rise from her bed all night long. Her fists were clenched as she fought for breath through cracked dry lips. All four feet, nine inches, and 240 pounds of my amazing Mother were shaking with the effort to breathe. She looked up at me, recognized me and a pleading came into her eyes.

I said, “Mom, it’s Travis.” I put my hand on her shoulder and she swallowed and nodded.

She said, “Finish it. Finish it.”

I said, “I’ll do what needs to be done, Mom, but we have to try. I’m going to call an ambulance and get you help. Okay?”

She nodded again and went back to breathing.

We got her to the ER of Kaiser Permanente where she quickly lost consciousness and was unable to speak any more words. They transferred her back up to ICU, room 3206. I stayed with her that day until 1am the next morning. The doctors asked me how much treatment I wanted to pursue. They explained that with the level of treatment that would be needed to support her she would never return to the level of quality of life she had previously had. I consented to them applying blood pressure medication, told them to attempt resuscitation if she had an arrest. Her breathing quickly weakened and I decided they should intubate her.

My Mother, and I, had an ongoing dialog over the last eight years about how she was to be treated during a life threatening situation. She had said that she did want attempts made to resuscitate her if that should become necessary, but under no circumstances did she want to be kept on prolonged support. She feared life in a vegetative state, or suffering a stroke. Mom spent the last ten years of my grandmother’s life caring for her, along with her sister, when grandma had a stroke. Mom, also watched the last days of my aunt’s life with a breathing tube, and did not want that either.

I decided to stay with the spirit of my Mom’s wishes more than the exact letter, and allowed her to be intubated. Without that she would have died on the evening of the 9th.

As the days went on my Mother’s condition showed only slight signs of improving amidst a general slow deterioration. At the end she was on two of the most powerful blood pressure elevators, or “pressers”, at very high dosages and still her blood pressure dwindled. The doctors explained that the risk of keeping her long term on pressers was that what they did was constrict her circulation to keep it focused in the central systems of her body, allowing her heart to beat strongly. That meant that her already poorly circulated limbs were getting even less blood flow which gave rise to the increasing possibility of amputation. The blood flow was also restricted to her brain, raising the possibility of brain damage, the extent of which would only become known if she ever recovered consciousness.

During the days I was at the ICU, I had conversations about my Mother’s wishes with over a dozen of the staff members. They all took pains to not give advice, to let me be clear with Mom, but at some point every one of them mentioned how they would not want to be kept alive forcibly. This was a profound experience for me. To me it points to a basic intuition that life is meant to be lived, and not merely preserved. This lesson never came home as much as it did for me over the last week, and I consider it a great gift that my Mother gave me.

My brother, Port, was with me for several of the days, as was my wife, Daisy. I also managed to get a hold of all of my extended family, which was a process of getting numbers from them and chasing after answering machines. All of my numbers are packed away SOMEWHERE due to the recent renovations my wife, and I have made to our apartment. My Mother had an address book by her side when I found her, but most of those numbers were out of date. Despite the handicap, everyone was reached, and both of the children of my aunt were able to visit.

My wife, and I, had been planning a housewarming party for weeks, for Saturday the 12th. We decided to go ahead with the event, but Daisy had to take on the brunt of preparations as I was rarely away from my Mom’s side. The party was one my Mom would have loved, lots of joy and good cheer. We raised a toast to her in the middle of the evening and the party went on into the wee hours. We finally shooed the last of the guests out at 3:15am and cleaned for over an hour before crawling into bed at 4:42am. At 4:46am the phone rang. It was the hospital. My Mother had had a heart attack and they were struggling to resuscitate her. We scrambled into the car and broke a few laws on the way over. When we arrived she was still alive, minimally. It had taken them 10 minutes to get her heart beat back, further raising the specter of sever brain damage. I remained at the hospital for the next 33 hours.

As Mom’s condition worsened, I had a conversation with my brother. We came to an agreement on the morning of the 14th that it was time to honor my Mother’s wishes. Her body was retaining water and she was no longer absorbing food through her stomach. Despite the presser medications now on massive dosages, her pressure was still critically low.

Since I was named as my Mother’s executor, and the recipient of her durable power of attorney, the final call fell to me. At 10am on the 14th I told the attending nurse to discontinue the pressers. Daisy, Port, and I sat with my Mother for the next four hours. We held her hand, and each other’s. I put my iPod headphones into my Mom’s ears and played the song that she wanted played at her funeral, “At My Funeral” by the Crash Test Dummies. (Yes, I know Mom, I will still play it then.) Daisy had also brought a copy of the Tibetan Book of the Dead. I had previously read it for my Grandmother, and my Aunt, after their passing, and Mom wanted it read for her. I did. As we waited I played more songs for my Mom, Pink Floyd and Creedence Clearwater Revival, both of which she loved in life. At 2pm, as I held her hand, and played the songs from the album my wife, and I, had listened to when we planned our wedding (another of Mom’s favorites), my Mom’s heart finally stopped. We asked for the breathing tubes to be removed and said our goodbyes.

My Mother’s passing was without pain, and thanks to the blessing of the clarity she provided me with our many conversations about the possibility of her death, I am completely confident that she left this world the way she would have wanted.

The official cause of my Mother’s death was an infection that festered in her leg from the infection she was treated for a few weeks ago. The advanced vascular disease in her legs caused the infection to worsen. The type of infection she got from that, according to the doctors, had a 50% mortality rate in a healthy adult. My Mother was far from healthy. That’s the official cause. The actual cause was obesity. Like me, my Mother had struggled with morbid obesity for many years. She watched as the disease got to me. Despite her efforts to help me with my weight issues I got to 396 pounds by my 21st year. After a moment of clarity I began to lose weight, and with Mom’s support lost 200 of those excess pounds. The disease of compulsive overeating continues to be an issue I face, but for the moment I am winning the battle against it. Through all my years of struggling with the disease my Mom was steadfast in her support of my efforts. But, she never quite came to terms with it herself. One of the foods I no longer eat is peanut butter. It was a frequent comfort food for me, and binge food during my many years of compulsive overeating. One of the forms of it I frequently used was Peanut Butter Wafer cookies. They come three sheets to a package, each sheet having 12 cookies you break off. I never broke them into individual cookies, I just ate them by the sheet. For the last year, while my Mom lived happily at home, I did her shopping. Every week she asked me to but those cookies, amongst her other not so healthy foods. For many weeks I tried to gently suggest that she should not be having cookies until she lost some weight. I always met a wall of resistance, and being my Mom, she won. Knowing Mom, she would have just found some way to order them behind my back, and the last thing I wanted was for her eating to become secretive. That is a painful shame that I am more than intimate with. So, I bought her the cookies. On the morning I found Mom, on her bed with the TV blaring as she struggled to breathe, a package of those cookies was by her side, and her front was strewn with their crumbs. In my day I often went to sleep the same way. Before April 14th I knew that compulsive overeating could kill. I have heard stories. But, now I have seen it. One of my Mother’s parting gifts to me is a greatly strengthened resolve not to succumb to the disease myself.

My Mother asked me to do six things for her around this situation. Two remain, her cremation and the splitting of her inheritance between my brother, and I. I am very proud to be fulfilling her last wishes with the amazing support of family and friends. I will do what you asked me to, Mom, no worries.

For the last four years, my Mother and I were engaged in a protracted argument. Since her retirement from the VA hospital was giving her about $2,000 a month, and the mortgage on her house was $1,400, I argued that she sell the place and we move her out of the city and to a cheaper apartment where she could live in more style. She resisted saying, “But, it’s your inheritance.” She won that argument, which just gives witness to how stubborn she could be. And, how loving.

A tremendous space is opening for me in the space were my Mother was while she was alive. I feel her presence more strongly than ever, and can only recall good times with her. Even the bad times are revealing themselves to be lessons she was struggling to teach me, or gifts from her heart. She continues to give to me so incredibly, and I can see no end to the generosity of her spirit.

I love you, Mom, always. You gave me the best of what you had. I promise to live out my days living up to the gifts you gave, and continue giving. Be well.

The Worst Thing About Negative Body Image


26 Mar

Due to my history of morbid obesity, and recovery from morbid obesity, I have a good deal of negative body image issues. I do not find it easy to see myself as attractive, or even “easy on the eyes.” In unguarded moments I tend to regard myself as rather ugly. It does not help that, having lost over 200 pounds, I have some excess flesh that hangs in of ways from my frame. Some days are better than others. Some days I can be more accepting of how I look, but my default state is that I am physically unattractive.

But, the above is not the worst of it. There is a deeper, darker aspect to negative body image that I did not understand until very recently.

A few days ago I was walking from my living room, into the bedroom. My wife’s vanity faces the doorway I was using. It’s a beautiful vintage piece with a 3/4 mirror in center, and two half mirrors on hinges to either side. On the night in question I was going into the room fresh from my nightly shower, and was naked. Most days I don’t give the image in the mirror much of a glance, but this night it caught my eye. The thought that flashed through my mind was, “How could anyone find that attractive?”

That is the worst part of negative body image. Not finding myself to be aesthetically unpleasing, but questioning the judgment of others. Something inside tells me that there is something wrong with another human being when they act as if, or say that they, find my body attractive. I think that something must be either wrong with them, or that they are lieing.

This is a terrible wedge that works its way into my relationships.  It makes it difficult, on a deep level, to authentically relate to others, especially in potentially romantic, or physical ways.

I do not know how to approach rectifying this situation, but having the presence of those doubts projected outwards on others is a step in the right direction.  Now I know, consciously, that this thought structure is in place.  The most obvious way to deal with it would be to remove my negative body image completely.  But, that is a hell of a lot more easily said than done, as long years of experience has shown me.  I think that instead, I need to work and accepting the words and deeds of others more.  I pray for the willingness to believe that the reactions of others are authentic.

One of the most long lasting scars from my youth about body image was an incident with a neighborhood girl.  I had long had a crush on her, and everyone knew it.  Especially her host of guy friends.  One day she came up to me and said, “I like you, Travis.  I think you’re cute, you know, like a hippo.”  I remember the moment with crystal clarity.  I remember the fall of her features as she saw hoe my expression melted from smile to numb and deep hurt.  I recall hearing the snickers from the gaggle of boys across the street.  Later I figured that they must have put her up to it.  In the moment she saw how hurt I was and tried to say something soothing, but I don’t recall what she said.  My world had gone numb.  Everything was a kind of dull roar.  I have nearly drowned several times in my life, and interestingly the roar in my ears that day had the same quality of the roar you hear when drowning.  I must have stopped breathing.  She wandered off and I went home in shock.

That moment has never left me.  I forgive her for what she said.  She was a child, and being pressured from her peers, and like all children afflicted with stupidity and cruelty.  I own my reaction and know that it is I who have carried it to today.  I know it was just a single moment in time, but it colors what I hear from others when they intimate, or outright say, that they find me attractive.  I am still waiting for the joke to be reveled, for the hammer to drop.

At least the snarling beast is out in the open.

Jack LaLane is Still the Man!


14 Feb

I love Jack for many reasons.  He’s my kind of crazy, and a hero and role-model for me.  One thing I have always loved about him is his bald faced honesty.

It’s a pain in the gluties. But you gotta do it. Dying is easy, living is tough. I hate working out. Hate it. But I like the results.

This from a piece in the Wall Street Journal in September of last year.

Take a look at that and consider the source.  This man basically invented the fitness industry in its modern form.  And there he is, telling it like it is.  There are many other fitness gurus whom I enjoy that are the opposite of Jack in this regard, sometimes to a fault, and I enjoy their enthusiasm.  But, when I am down in the dumps of no motivation land, a cheerleader sometimes will not do the trick.  At those times I need someone to hand me my gym shoes, give me a smile and say, “Yeah, I know, it sucks.  Let’s get to it.”

I am reminded of my other favorite inspirational tidbit.  Paul Anderson, arguably the strongest American ever, was a huge proponent of squats.  He believed there was no better way to develop strength, and that without them one could never reach their full potential in raw strength.   Part of his workout routine was doing nothing but squats on his families farm for a full day, every other day.  He would get up, go out to the yard and do heavy squats with farm equipment, go back in and eat, take a nap, and repeat for all day long.  I read an article about him where the interviewer said, “You must really love squats!”

Paul’s response was, “You know, I have probably done tens of thousands of squats of all types in my life, and I have hated every one.  I loathe squats.  But, I know there is no other way to get real strength.”

There is something very special about being dedicated enough to your goals to do what it takes, regardless of how you feel about it, always keeping your eye on the goal only.

So, the next time you are feeling less than enthusiastic about whatever practice you are undertaking why not fully accept that you don’t want to do it, and go ahead anyways.  The results are what you are looking for,

Travis Eneix

Dedicated to looking at the self.