Day 16

Meals:

Breakfast – 2 Minneolas
Lunch – 3 Organic Bananas, 2 Small Bags of Chips
Snack – Chocolate-Covered Almonds (need to find a dairy-less chocolate)
Supper – Vegan Teriyaki Noodle Bowl (lots of veggies!), One Vegan Samosa
Post-Workout – Cappuccino Soy Milk, Remainder of Vegan Teriyaki Noodle Bowl

Workout:

Bench Press
Shoulder BB Press
Close-Grip Bench Press
Incline Bench Press
Cable Flyes
Rope Tricep Pushdowns
Drop-Set Lateral Raises

It was a much more intensive workout than I have been doing the past couple of weeks, but believe it or not, my energy held up! I’m not any weaker nor any less capable than when I was eating my miserable diet. I’m celebrating!

My Rib is Injured… Again!

Several summers ago, I got sick. The worst part of getting sick for me is always this nasty cough that I get. This particular summer, the cough was so bad that I heard a “snap” following a hard cough. I didn’t notice anything at first though I had a huge feeling that something was terribly wrong. It wasn’t until later that I figured it out.

I jumped in my father’s truck that he had let me borrow while working away. And as soon as I had jumped up into the seat, I felt it. It was a tight feeling at first, but then quickly developed into a bad pain. I could barely turn the steering wheel. In the short 5 minute drive to the trailer I was renting, I knew I had to call my mother to come drive me to the hospital. I had to wait a fair time for her as I was about 45 minutes away, but she quickly came and took me to the hospital.

The hospital was about another 30 minutes from where I was, and the wait at the hospital was about 2 hours. The problem was, by the time I was registered and sitting in the waiting room, I was having a hard time breathing. All I can remember is intense pain and focussing on low and shallow breaths.

We waited for awhile until my mother decided to check where we were on the list, only to find out that we had been bumped down rather than up and the wait from that point was longer than 2 hours. It hurts to breathe but I’m not a serious case? My mother was mad to say the least.

We hopped in the car, and headed to the next hospital an hour away. It was a shorter time than I would have had to wait at the first hospital, and this hospital took me in right away. The only problem was, I had popped a rib muscle, which the doctor promptly told me hurts as much as breaking a rib (crazy pain), and there was nothing they could do except give me Tylenol 3.

Now some people I knew would have gone crazy over Tylenol 3. My mother had a mini freak-out session about how I might become addicted to it, but after telling her everything would be fine, I got my prescription and was on my way.

It was a painful summer. The T3s didn’t touch the pain hardly at all. I always walked around with one hand putting pressure on that rib area. It was awful. Nothing but time was able to heal that wound.

Once again, I was sick a few weeks ago and the cough has mostly gone but not completely. I know my body has suffered a little more than normal (didn’t help when my chiropractor asked what happened except I had been doing nothing but sleeping and sitting on the couch, trying to get better), but my body still seemed in decent shape. I worked out this week and everything seemed good.

Last night was a chest workout, and even though I warmed up and stretched, in the very first exercise (bench press), my rib started to hurt. I can’t remember if it is the same side or not, but I’m pretty sure I popped a stupid rib muscle again. It hurts so bad and I have to put pressure on the area to even try to take a deep breath. My abs are also starting to hurt because of the way I have to modify my body when I need to cough. It’s miserable.

I had just gotten well enough to start back in the gym and this is what happens! Ah!

To be honest, I wasn’t going to complete my workout last night because of the pain. But as I sat in the locker room, looking at my open locker as I was going to change, I got mad, closed and locked my locker, and went out and did the incline dumbbell press. I’m pretty sure it was a very dumb idea. I’m pretty sure I made it worse. I had written down to do 4 sets of 12, but after 3 sets, I knew I was being ridiculous. I shouldn’t be mad, although it was hard to not at least be disappointed.

So here I am with heat packs and taking it easy. I would much rather be in the gym but I’ve done my damage and I should know better. Injuries are something to take serious and it’s very important to know when to quit. So learn from my mistake and save yourself some pain. I’m all about lifting heavy and “sucking-it-up” in most situations, but I felt the pain and knew I should have quit. Next time, I will.

The Famous “Bounceback”

I wrote a post a long time ago about being sick, and coming back to the gym. How my body surprised me, and the determination of not giving up. Well, today’s post is kind of on that track, but with a different twist. One that even shocked me.

I wrote yesterday of how I badly hurt my quad the night before. I took extra special care of it yesterday, trying not to overuse it, and just watching it closely. Once I finally got outside for morning recess with my students (after a VERY stressful morning), I simply sat on the ground in the shade and relaxed (don’t worry, I could see all the students from where I was sitting, teacher’s duty never ends…).

I got up and noticed it felt mostly better, though not quite all the way. So I decided to do a “sample” squat. It went ok, but I wasn’t sure what adding weight to it would do so I just continued to be careful throughout the day.

As I was on my way home, I began pondering what I should do to workout. I couldn’t really do chest or back or arms and shoulders because they were already done and I needed to do shoulders and arms again the next day. So the only option was not to go to the gym, or take a chance and do legs. Can you guess what I did? Took a chance. After all, it was one of my most stressful days at work. Almost everything had gone wrong.

When I got to the gym, I started thinking about what I was going to do. As is super important, I knew I had to warm-up that leg. NEVER take a chance on stressing muscle groups without some type of warm-up. It’s safer in the long run. For my warm-up, I got on the treadmill for 10 minutes. Normally I’d suggest a 5 minute warm-up, but because I was recovering from an injury, I did double to be sure. I kept it at a walking pace, and only added a small incline after the first 5 minutes. This seemed to go pretty well.

Next, I headed to the women’s workout room. I’m not afraid of working out in front of men, in fact that doesn’t bother me at all. What does bother me is that sometimes the gym is SO PACKED and the women’s room never seems to be that bad, and that was the case last night. Especially with my leg being the way it was, I wasn’t sure how “fast” I’d be according to the men’s standards. The women’s section is a calmer place.

Once I got in there, I decided to jump in a try the squats. I used a very lightweight, 40 lb barbell. I used sumo stance. These didn’t really hurt but instead gave me a feeling to know I needed to still be careful. I actually succeeded in my 3 sets of 20 which surprised me, but I knew I shouldn’t persist past that. No need to aggravate the injury. I then tried some sumo deadlifts with the same weight, but my leg wasn’t having any of that. So I headed for the leg press.

The leg press I used was the type that pushes your seat back. Normally, I would just do normal squats and deadlifts, but I figured the extra support might be a little better for a day like today. What happened next blew me away. The press had been left at a weight of 135. I decided not even to attempt that and dropped it to 55 lb. I did 30 reps. I raised the weight to 75 lbs. I did 30 reps. I raised the weight to 95 lbs (what I normally do on free weight squats), I did 30 reps. I raised the weight to 115 lbs. I did 30 reps. I raised the weight to 135 lbs. I did 30 reps. I raised the weight to 155 lbs. I did 30 reps. I raised the weight to 175 lbs. I did 30 reps. And it was at this point I stopped. Not from pain, not from exhaustion even. But from the simple fact I knew my leg may not feel it now, but it would later. I honestly couldn’t believe it: that I mentally was able to keep going, and that my leg not only held up, but went so heavy! I began thinking that maybe my legs have been under-recovered.

Next, I went for 2-30 second planks. These went by so easily.

After that, I went for the abductor and adductor machines. Adductor was so, so, so good. I haven’t done exercises for my adductors in so long, and it just felt so good. But again, I was doing 30 reps a set and continued increasing the weight until I was raw sore. Phenomenal. The abductor, well, significantly weaker than my adductors, but that’s ok. They still hurt me today, but I pushed them as hard as I could.

That pretty much concluded my workout, aside from the fact I forgot to mention that I did a set of 30-35 reps of calf raises in between each set of squats, but I’m just blown away and still am. That was such a GREAT workout, and only a day after injury? I never do that heavy of weight normally (except sumo squats was lower), and NEVER have gotten up to the amount of reps I used yesterday. I am in awe of what a body is capable of, of what a dedicated mind can do, of the punishment our bodies is able to handle and keep going. We ARE God’s greatest creation, and He must have put so much work into us. How much we doubt ourselves daily, how little our brains allow us to do, and yet here’s our body, just waiting for its orders so it can show us how much more it can conquer.

Love your body. Push your limits. See what amazing things you can do!