A personal training & food journal. Read about our weight loss progress at Train With Ron in Chicago, our nutritional habits and the life changes we're making to get in shape and stay healthy!

DAY 78:

Hi all, it’s now 11 weeks into the game… and WOW have some serious changes taken place. First of all: last week, I had meetings for work, Monday through Thursday, early starts and late endings with lunches and dinners part of the deal. I showed up with my little Tupperware container of celery, carrots, nuts, raisins, a turkey wrap, yellow bell pepper, and an apple… people were giving me some serious quizzical looks as I passed on tri-tip, herb buttered chicken, garlic mashed potatoes (that one was tough) and gnawed my “rabbit food”. “What are you eating?” they asked… a little note of disdain in their voice, like you might hear in the school cafeteria from your school-lunch eating friends, when you brown-bagged some PB&Js. I explained the contents of my Tupper, and they replied, “Oh, so you’re dieting.” … “No,” I replied, “I’m changing my diet, completely.” When I told them about my results so far, the disdain turned to interest.

I explained how whole foods have stayed with me longer, taking longer to digest, not being hungry as often, how I all but eliminated processed flour and sugar from my diet. I went on to talk about the food industry, and how they have us fooled, feeding us cheap, empty fuel that we will burn through quickly, our bodies consistently requesting more and more to sate the hunger that cannot be quenched by empty calories. Everyone at the table listened intently… I was a little taken aback. I then talked about my training, the exercises I do with Ron, Matt, and DB… some of them were astonished and others said, “Oh, I can’t do THAT”, to which I replied, “Yes, that’s what I said… but I did do it, and you certainly can too.”

I have to admit, when Ron first told me about changing the way I eat, I balked. “NO WAY am I giving up (insert sweet food here) or (insert fast food item there).” Well, it was MUCH easier than I could have imagined. Watching the movie Food Inc. helped a ton – I realized that I was living inside the food “Matrix”, and today I choose not to allow the food industry to manipulate my body any longer, not without my personal say so.

Tonight I did single arm rows with 40 lb dumbells (most weight I’ve used for that yet) and blasted through my sets with flying colors… ran 4 flights of stairs after doing 25 leg presses, and really never lost my wind or energy. It was truly the first workout at Train with Ron that I felt like I truly handled… most of the time I have to stop, slow down, take extra breaks, or otherwise “slack off” – but tonight, I did everything one movement right after the other with little down time. I felt AWESOME!

Just as an afterthought… this week I put on 2 pairs of jeans I hadn’t worn in months. I also happened upon 2 nice pairs of dress slacks I had put aside for donation because they just didn’t fit anymore… but they do now, so instead of Goodwill, they’ll be going to the dry cleaners. I’ll donate ALL my clothes once I lose another 20 or 30 lbs and nothing fits anymore! My clothes look good on me and I feel amazing… yet I have such a long way to go… but the results have really been dramatic, I just can’t get over it.  I just started using RankYourWorkout.com through TWR and discovered that I gained 17 pounds of lean body mass… WHILE losing 25 pounds… amazing!

I also played a full game of hockey last week for the first time in 5 years… I didn’t play well, but I did play the whole game… and soon I’ll be playing out again in a cover band. My goals are being reached… it’s time to set even more goals for 2010, I’m achieving them faster than I can conceive them! What a FANTASTIC feeling… I’m hooked!