Thursday, September 25, 2008

Week 4 Day 1 (Yet again...)

Sets 21,25,21,21, Failed on Max at 25 :( Added another set of 7 to make my “minimum 32”.

Then did 50 consecutive knee pushups for full exhaustion. I had already done V-ups and leg lifts so I’m surprised my core held out that long. Looks I will be doing Week 4 Day 1 again on Saturday…

Monday, September 22, 2008

3 Months and Adjusting

It's been 3 months since my last post now. During this time I've been making a lot of changes and just trying to adapt in general. I still have moments of weakness and sometimes general anger over what has happened, but overall I'm doing really well.

At my last blood test my A1C was down to 5.9. For those that don't know, this is excellent! 5.9 means my blood sugar average level is within range of normal non diabetics. I have taken this very seriously, and my lower blood sugar is owed to a combination of things.

1) Religiously taking my medications.
2) Tight blood sugar control.
3) Significant diet changes.
4) Increased activity.

Tight blood sugar control basically means I check my blood sugar often especially when trying new foods and adjust my diet accordingly to maintain a normal blood sugar level.

I have decreased my carb intake significantly. I have also reduced my intake of saturated fats significantly and reduced my trans fats to trace levels. I have all but given up on salt, and have replaced refined grains with whole wheat whenever possible. I have also been replacing fatty meats with more lean meats (chicken, turkey, fish). Gradually I have been making the switch from skim milk to soy milk. It's been difficult to make the switch to soy milk due to the total change in flavor and texture, but I'm confident I will switch over 100% some time in the future.

I am going to the gym usually 3 or 4 times a week and am loosely following the Body For Life program (exercise portion only). Additionally I'm doing the hundred push-up challenge from hundredpushups.com. I'm currently in Week 4 of that program and am doing a little over 100 pushups every other day.

I've been using 43things a lot lately to track my progress on some of these things, and am going to start using the blog publishing feature there so that my progress will get published here to the blog as well. Currently these are focusing more on my exercise program, but it does cover some of my diet slip-ups or achievements as well.